Living in the Bubble

You know, it is weird how sometimes comedies and comedians tend to capture the real world with a blown out-of-proportion piece on what the real world is. Take for example the case and lifestyle philosophy presented in the show 30 Rock, where in one episode they start describing certain people as living "in the bubble". For those that have no seen the episode about living "in the bubble" or have never heard the idea, the bubble is a place where beautiful, handsome, and just abnormally over-respected people live their blessed life. They tend to be handed things their entire life, given opportunities that normally would not exist because they live in a superficial world where they already have good looks and so others tend to focus on them more. And the worst part about being in the bubble is that they cannot see that they are in the bubble, but instead wonder why others outside the bubble are treated differently without connecting the two. Like I said, a strange philosophy, but the bubble is actually a real world thing that happens all the time.

Maybe Watch This: Wild Cherry

Movie Poster for Wild Cherry

Tonight began much like any other night, I was bored and browsing through a long list of movies that did not seem very interesting when I came upon one that caught my eye. So I opened it and read the description about what this strangely titled movie I had never heard. Then, when all of the details satisfied my tastes in some manner or another, I decided to start watching it. 

What I learned from the description was this movie is about three female high schoolers that are apparently on some sort of list to have sex and they discover the list. So then these girls decide to seek revenge against the main character's boyfriend, because he should not be doing something so sinister as helping the main character get laid. Oh yeah, and Rob Schneider is in this movie as the dad. But what that description forgot to tell me was that the movie I was about to watch was one of those very awkward ones, a film that puts even the viewers into their own little place as they wonder what they are watching and why they cannot turn away. If that alone does not give any idea to what Wild Cherry is about, here is my full review!

Skip This: Due Date

Movie Poster for Due Date

So it was another night, another movie I was not sure I wanted to watch, and another couple of hours of my life I wish I could get back. I'll have to admit that when I first watched the theatrical trailer for this movie, I was pretty sure I would not like it, because I could already tell that Zach Galigianakis was going to play the exact same character role he did in the Hangover while Robert Downey Jr played the same character role he is known for. Add on top of that some jokes that just are not really that funny nor interesting, and I figured that was the movie. Still, I had nothing to do that night and I needed to pass the time, so I turned on Due Date with no care towards what might actually be seen and now I wish I could get my time back. If you are curious and want to know why I do not recommend this movie, then please continue reading my full review of Due Date.

Watch This: ParaNorman

Movie Poster for ParaNorman

Earlier, I received a call from my friend Jodi and she told me that she was in town nearby. So I of course left my Dad with the puppy, because my Mom was out doing her own thing, and told him that I was going to meet up with my friend! In honesty, it is not every day that a friend comes up from southern Colorado and wants to talk. I take every chance I get. Anyway, we meet up at a sandwich show and spend the next half-hour or so catching up and having a great time with her baby niece (9 months old for those that are curious). Then her sister-in-law comes and picks up her niece and we go about our day continuing to converse and have a great time.

After about an hour of hanging out in a coffee-shop / bookstore, I asked Jodi if she wanted to come home and see the puppy. She could not refuse such an offer (which I knew) and so we went back to my parent's home where we talked some more and played with the puppy. Then we came inside and decided to go and see a movie. Except nothing was really out that caught our eyes, so we decided to do a go to the theater and choose idea. What we ended up watching was ParaNorman, which was a surprising movie to say the least!

Do Not get Caught in the Political Sludge

A few days ago I received a call from one of the polling services that want to know my opinion about the current candidates for president, senate, and whatever else that they can ask me. Normally I try and dodge these calls, telling them I am not interested or I do not have time, but I was caught off guard this time because my parents handed me the phone and said it was for me. That is the last time I take a telephone from my parents without asking who I am talking to.

So this woman gets on and asks me if I want to do a short survey for the Colorado have-nots or what-nots (I honestly have no idea who she worked for, just that they were Colorado based). And right away I ask her if she can just put "I do not care" down the entire list. She tells me that she cannot do that, that I would be swaying the survey if I did do that, and that it she had "only a couple of questions that would only take a couple of minutes of my time." Ten minutes later, and a bunch of bullshit on my part being spewed out because I do not want them to know my opinion, I finally tell her I am done taking this survey. I then hung up, I mean it was not like she had be strapped down to a chair and I needed to finish the survey to escape for the day.

But the reason I bring up this incident in my life is because of the topic of the survey, which was what political crap can be said to try and sway the votes. Literally, after getting through the candidates and asking me if I was likely to vote for them (which I gave them all a solid three out of ten), this woman starts asking me if a statement would change my opinion. I am sorry, I do not wade through the political bullshit that they spew on television anymore and I never believe what I hear until I have looked up the facts for myself. So my question for her is simple, why would I want to give her answers that would support creating more of this political fudge that we all have to hear and has almost no truth concerning what the real issues are?

The Taste of Burnt

Throughout my life there have been times when I have burned my food in a toaster, on the stove, or a multitude of other ways. And although I watch the stuff I am cooking pretty closely to catch it before the food turns into a hard, blackened rock, it still happens. I do not think anyone can claim they have never burned something, so this should be quite understandable. But what I am learning is that while I burn food, I admit it and I still eat what I burned. Over the years of burning food for various reasons, I have actually come to appreciate the taste of burnt food, the taste of failure so to speak. What I am getting at is I have accepted my failure and taken it, even appreciated it. Admittedly, I will burn a bagel every now and then for that different flavor.

Yet in my lifetime, though short as the stay has been as of right now, I have started to realize that not everyone is like me when it comes to their mistakes. They burn the food and then throw it out and try again. I can understand throwing out something that you do not like, but to toss out your failure and not see the errors of your way is maddening. And maybe the whole idea of this comes from a part of me that knows there is no infinite amount of anything, that in truth everything has a quantity value to it. I cannot burn a million bagels and still feed the world, let alone my check book cannot buy a million bagels, so where do others get off thinking that they should be allowed to burn more food because they failed the first time.

I think this perspective of oh I failed I will try again without seeing if there was a mistake the first time is something we have come to just accept in America. "Oh I failed that test, I guess I'll just have to do better next time" or "Oh I burned my Poptart today, guess I'll just put another one in the toaster." It becomes a sort of pattern, an American experience per say, that you can fail in life and you do not need to live through the consequences of your failure. I think we should change that perspective. And the easiest way to go about teaching people that there is this moral dilemma between always thinking there will be more of whatever is to tell them they do not get a second chance. That you need to take your failure and see what went wrong, learn from it, enjoy the failure while it happens, and then become better from it. And instead we toss out this idea that failure is something that happened, but maybe a second time will fix it.

I would like to side note and just say I do not think this will fix all of the problems in the world, let alone all the problems in the United States. But this might be a great first-start proving ground for a lot of Americans to learn that they need to try their hardest the first time and they need to succeed. We live in a culture of people that just pitch things away the first time and do not learn from their mistakes, but we should live in a culture that examines what we have and what we want and then make the most out of what we can.

Maybe then we can all enjoy the taste of burnt. Thank you for my short political side-track today.

Maybe Watch This: The Kids are All Right

Movie Poster for The Kids are All Right

I am not going to lie and say that I love every drama out there, I do not and I do not think that is possible. Instead, I try and find the dramatic movies that make me feel like I have learned something by the end that I would not have known otherwise. And to say I have learned something by the end of the movie is not the same as saying that I felt like I knew exactly what I had learned, but there was some sort of educational evolution that happened in my head, a connecting of understandings that made me feel happy. In the past this has happened with such great films as Almost Famous (which I recently just re-watched) or Forest Gump (which was so good I went and read the book). I call these the good-feeling movies, as that is what they leave you with even if the ending is sad.

So taking a stab into the dark, I decided to watch a movie that was both recommended by a friend as good, a fact I learned after starting the film, and from the advice of an online review website. I think I have a lot more words to say about this movie then just that, as I do think this movie covers a lot of complicated topics and neither my friend nor the review I read really mentioned any of them. Here's my review of The Kids are All Right.

A Piece of Astronaut History Passes Away

Today is a major day in our planet's history, as the first man to walk on the moon has now passed away. At the age of 82, Neil Armstrong passed due to complications during a cardiovascular procedure.  I have used my blog to write a little bit of a commemoration to this American Hero, one that I hope is fitting of his character and life. I've created a small timeline below to commemorate his life and his work, which took a little bit of time to put together but I think gives great perspective. And of course, all of these facts are compliments of a multitude of medias.

First Moon Landing 1969

And of course this blog would not be right without the video taken from the Apollo 11 of the first lunar landing. If you would like to see more pictures of astronaut Neil Armstrong, the best place is to go and look on NASA's image gallery. This image gallery can be found at:

[http://www.nasa.gov/topics/people/galleries/armstrong.html]

No Thank You Comcast

I know that I am posting this article rather early in the morning, I know that this is about to be a rant on how bad Comcast is as a service, and I know I should probably just turn in for the morning and get some sleep. But I can't just let go of the issues I had last night, and instead it has festered in me over the last seven hours or more that I spent working on our new gateway to fix the internet. So let me start from the beginning.

Our internet has always sucked in one way or another. Before our new gateway, we had a wonderful problem where the internet worked great, the phones worked great, but they only worked great as long as one was not working. For instance, I would be on the internet writing a blog when we would get a phone call. Instantly our internet drops and everyone that is on gets kicked off line because some idiot decided that phones should trump the magical power that is the internet. It drove me nuts and I lost a lot of work from the phone-internet phenomena. And not just that, but if two people tried to get onto the internet at the same time, it kicked one of them off and the other one got a full pass. That drove my Dad nuts. So anyway, here is the tale of how I got the internet working again on all our devices in our home.

Asleep in her Toboggan

The following is just a quick thought, or maybe more of a poetic reaction to what is happening around me. So here it is, something I wrote quickly to go along with the cute puppy.

Sitting on the deck with a cup of coffee and a keyboard in front of me, writing about everything that is around me. The pitter patter of the rain is coming down again as summer ends and autumn begins. You can hear it hitting the roof lightly, the sound very relaxing as the smell overtakes. But that does not matter, because our puppy is asleep in her toboggan.

Some Apples to Other Apples

In the past few weeks my whole family has been putting efforts forward to train our new puppy, really working on it to stop several of the bad misbehaviors that she has. And what we have learned is that she is a very intelligent animal, where at the very small age of three months she has already started picking up on several things. For instance, she will let us brush her now without biting at the brush, she has become better with the leash and will walk longer distances before putting up some resistance and fighting, and she has completely stopped biting all of us. Again, this is still a really young canine, so it is surprising how quickly she is picking up all of these things!

But there is one habit we cannot seem to break her of no matter how many different ways we try and no matter what amount of effort we put into it. You see, little Indigo has a fond love of the taste of fruits and will stop at nothing to eat any fruit she can get her paws on. At first it was strawberries that were obviously bad and other assortments of fruits we would toss into the garden to mulch. We stopped throwing those in there to stop her from eating them (plus we read online that strawberries are one of the worst things for a dog to eat). Then she started picking up cherries off the ground from the remains of our old cherry tree, which there would be no way for us to pick up all of the cherries. Fortunately, the cherry season ended and the birds pretty much pick the cherries clean, leaving Indigo with just the pits to indulge in and that was not the part she likes. So that stopped.

And then she moved on to the apple tree, which is currently still in full bloom with tons of apples as they turn from green to red. For reference, we know that there are more than five-hundred apples on the tree, a fact we discovered after picking up over three-hundred off the ground in a couple of days and still seeing tons more on the tree. Well, our little puppy learned very quickly that she likes apples and would run over to the tree and start searching the ground for the fruits. Usually we would see her run back from the area after successfully picking out one of the smashed apples off the ground and then she would start to munch on it. At first all we did was take away the fruit and throw it out, but she became smarter than that and started playing keep-away (a game which we cannot encourage, so we stopped chasing her). So the next best thing we could do was pick up all the smashed, rotten, and disgusting apples off the ground. To put these into retrospect, these are not the apples you buy at the store that look ripe and delicious. Instead, these are the underdeveloped remains of apples that the squirrels have picked off, taken a bite or two, and then tossed to the ground. They are covered in dirt and grime, bugs roaming all over their outer coating as they turn the sweet fruits into food, and something that most other animals would sniff at before walking away. And like I said, we have picked up hundreds of these to stop her from eating them. Side note, her favorites were the ones that were already smashed open and usually the ugliest, unhealthiest ones of the lot.

As soon as she became aware of the task that we were doing, the tossing of her delicious apple snacks, she also became smart enough to know she could just grab a few while we were picking them up and go munch on them quickly. So we would see her come over, grab one while we were taking dozens of them away, and then go to the center of our yard to eat them. But her learning did not stop there. Instead, as she started to realize that there were less and less apples each day for her to eat, she started grabbing what she could and then hiding them around the yard. She was stock-piling the apples from us, keeping a secret stash for later. We never found that secret stash, but we did continue to pick them up and off the ground.

Well, being the clever dog that she is, she has moved onto the next level of apple eating. Now not caring about the ones on the ground, she instead ventures right over to the tree and will get up on her hind legs and pluck one right off of the branches. And she seems to have a very peculiar taste too, always heading for exactly one instead of heading for the easiest pick. Sometimes, that means she will even have to jump up and grab one off of the tree. In honesty, watching her is quite impressive as she takes them down. Still, the main point is that if we do not want her eating the apples now, we will have to pluck every apple off of every branch up to approximately four feet or more. That is not going to happen. On thing that my Mom noted as we watched her was that at least she is getting better apples now, instead of the ones that have been in the dirt and covered with God knows what.

What We Retain

I am sure that there are a lot of people with memories that challenge mine, those with photographic memories that only need to see something once before they can recall it. Still, I consider my memory to be one of the best when it comes to learning new things and recalling moments in time.

But just for the fun of it, I sometimes like to see exactly what I do recollect from the wide variety of subjects and situations that I have been in. That is to say, I will lay in my bed and stare at a ceiling, the lights off and the window covered to leave me staring at a fairly black scene. Take it or leave it, but this is a game about memory and objects are known to trigger thoughts. Anyway, as I lay there with my whole body as straight as an arrow I will think of a subject I have not done in a long time and just see how much of it I can recall and how much more I can recall as I start to think about it. Or maybe I'll look up and think of a time years ago when I was with friends and try to think of the little details in the rooms and what our conversations were about. In this way I can sort of gauge how my memory is doing. And from completing these recollections I have learned that there is an astounding amount more I can remember than I ever thought I could. 

Listen to This: A Dream Within A Dream

Album Artwork for Drink The Sea by the Glitch Mob

The following post if both a review as much as it is a story I want to tell, but only because something amazingly different happened to me today. So let me start at the beginning of my story and then show how perfectly it relates to a song. This morning my parents woke me up at what would be abnormally early for someone like me and told me I needed to watch the puppy while they go to the vet with one of our cats. If you are curious, the orange tabby needed some blood work to be done because we think he has a failing kidney. Anyway, I was extremely tired and almost unable to get out of bed, but I managed to get up and go downstairs.

After grabbing a cup of joe and taking the puppy outside, I sat and waited for my parents to return. When they finally did get back, and my coffee cup was completely empty, I did not feel like I had to sleep anymore. So I went upstairs and started writing another blog about learning French. I did not finish writing that blog (though I am working on it still). Instead, I ended up falling asleep about an hour later, completely passing out in the darkness of my room.

My dream felt real, like I had not gone to sleep and was just lying in bed not doing anything. So I got up and walked downstairs and talked to my Dad, to which I have no idea what our conversation was about and because it was a dream my mind just accepted that the thoughts were exchanged. Then I went back to my room and just lied in bed because I was so tired.

I fell into a second dream, a dream within a dream exactly as the movie Inception would say and exactly the title of the song. I was outside in the bright sun, the rays coming down and heating up my skin, and the new puppy was there. Then my Mom came into view, we were playing with the dog and having a good time. I felt that I was still not dreaming, but that the feeling of being tired had just passed away; yet at the same time I also felt like I was just barely asleep. It was surreal, it was weird, and it was different.

Suddenly my Dad was being real loud in the real world, his voice booming to my ears. It passed down through my dreams, through my thoughts, and reached me at the second level. I woke up from one dream and was in the darkness of my room. It was as if the vision of me being home was completely masked by the dream, I actually felt like I was there. I walked out of my room, which happened with surprising ease after just waking from a well-needed slumber, and walked down the stairs. No one was home, no one was there to have made that voice, but I was sure that I had heard my Father. Then he shouted again about something, maybe just overly excited about a politician, and the curtain that had been covering my eyes as to where I really was came free, waking me again.

I thought I would bring up this because it was crazy, a sort of insane state to suddenly have to wake-up twice from the same dream and the same slumber. And I am fully unsure how I was even able to reach the second level of the dream state. But the minute I woke up, I could also hear A Dream Within a Dream by The Glitch Mob playing in my head.

I think the first time I listened to this song I might have skipped over it, thinking little of the beginning beat as it sent shivers down my spine. However, I ended up returning about a week later when I fell in love with the entire album this song came on. If you have not heard all the songs on Drink the Sea, go out and buy a copy right now. To put it in perspective, this is the music I play when I want to have conscious and consistent thoughts, a background sound I used to study because it provoked me to keep learning. I cannot say exactly why, but I highly recommend this entire album. And if you are curious, my favorite song is still Fortune Days.

But this review is not about Fortune Days, it is about A Dream Within A Dream. When I finally did get back to listening to this, I realized how very close to home the name of the song actually hits. This is a very fast-paced song, the melody repeating at parts and bringing about a sense of the impending aurora at the end of the night. And the beginning, the part that had originally pushed me away from the song, is actually a very much needed and strong piece that shows the passing from a state of clear consciousness into the realm of the other world. It is the key, the reason that we pass from the first dream to the second one as our eyes close and we fall asleep. You can see the solar system in this first scene, the way the darkness in the sky passes above, the calming sensation, and then the breath as the dream begin.

Immediately after this introduction, the tune starts up as if you are somewhere you have never been, doing something you might never have imagined yourself doing. All the while it seems unreal, impossible in the feats that you accomplish, but they are still feats. And with the passing of time, it only seems to dive deeper into the dream-like state as you continue to be this magnificent heroine on some astounding, technological quest. And then you fall into the next level of dreams, spending the rest of the song trying to find your way out.

I think it is this imagination that really brought me to loving this song, the sense that I could see something that was not there even while only the music was playing. That is why I love this song. Add in a perfect back beat and some astounding repetition to drive home the thoughts and you get a golden song. And like I said, this is not even my favorite song on the album.

The Spotted Canvas uses the Glitch Mob music promotional media but is not endorsed or certified by The Gltich Mob. All of the The Glitch Mob logos and trademarks displayed on this website are the property of The Glitch Mob.

In the Dead, Boring Part of Night

I do not expect that anyone has seen what I made last night and added to my blog; mainly because for one I did not make a big post about it until now and for two I put it in a section that I am not forcing everyone to go over and look at all the time. Anyway, last night I was feeling rather bored and I wanted to take one of my photographs and transform it from a normal picture into something rather spectacular. I chose a photograph that I took within the last year while I was out walking, passing by a lake that was nearby my apartment. In the photograph there was a beautiful sun setting in the background, the colors a radiant red and orange across the lake. 

What I transformed the picture into was something much more than that, something with colors so uniquely different that it is hard to believe the original picture it came from. Out went the red, and with the swipe of a button everything was purple and blue. From there I focused on really adding in the space scene, adding astrological formations such as stars and the weird way colors seem to work as well with space pictures. And finally, I felt like topping the whole thing off with a planet to blend it all together. I just wish I could have added in a second planet in the upper left, one to balance out the first. The reason I did not add in that second planet was because I knew the only way it would look good was if it had a ring.

My Space and Mountains Photo Manipulation Picture

Now although the photograph looks spectacular, it is actually made up of fairly simple parts. With a bit of blending and a lot of previous knowledge of photoshop, I was able to quickly and efficiently take several different scenes from other photographs provided on google and morph them together. Sometimes I wish I would actually work to make my own backgrounds and work really hard to add in my own shooting stars, but it seems like a tedious task and the point of photoshop is to quickly take several pieces and blend them together or else make it all from scratch. Okay, I might have that idea wrong, but whatever. Anyway, staying up late has made yet another beautiful picture for my collection.

To Talk About A Puppy

Yesterday I was supposed to meet up with my friend for some coffee at our favorite place, Caribou Coffee. Unfortunately she did not wake up. And so no matter how many times I called or text messaged her, she was not going to be able to make it. Five hours after I first sent her a message she replied and then three hours after that she finally got back to me. The fact was we were not going to get our coffee no matter what.

Now I want to say before I continue that I know my friend can read this and a part of me sort of hopes that she does. Maybe then she'll understand why what she said upset me, bugged me so much that after a night of sleeping on it I still did not feel at ease about it. I know that I should try and let things roll off my shoulder, I know I should probably take words for the dime they are worth, and I have had some time to think this all over. Hopefully this will sort of bring up the issue a bit better or more clearly.

Maybe Play This: Black Ops

In case you are in the dark when it comes to Video Games, the sequel to 2010's major first person shooter hit is coming out this November. For those that care, Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 will premier in stores November 13th. But while there is still some time between the next game releasing and now, I thought I would finish up the single player campaign and finally give a review on the original Call of Duty: Black Ops. As of last night, I finally finished the campaign on the hardest difficulty.

Requested Blog: How I Am Driving My Father Insane

Today I did not know what I wanted to write about and I decided to take a request. So I went up to my Dad, who was sitting on his computer in our kitchen, and I just asked him what I should write a blog about. He said, "How about how you are driving you father nuts!" I thought about it for a minute, chuckling at the idea, and decided that it sounds like a great idea. I mean, sure, why not talk about how he is going crazy with me being home.

Skip This: Happy Feet 2

Movie Poster for Happy Feet Two

So I was bored tonight, trying to find something fun to do, and I was browsing through the movies I had at my finger tips. I saw that I could watch the sequel to Happy Feet, Happy Feet Two, and was undecided if I wanted to watch it or not. So I kept browsing, hoping that maybe something a little bit more luscious or intuitive would pop-up before I got to the list, never-the-less nothing did.

Now I will not lie when I say that I saw the first Happy Feet and loved the movie. The dancing and the music was exceptionally wonderful for a children's animation; as well as the ideas behind the movie where beautiful ones to teach kids. But I had my doubts about the second movie, feeling they would not be able to pull off the same unique, compelling story that was seen on the first go around. To say that I was not far from right would be only have the story. At any rate, here's my review of Happy Feet Two, and why I think you can skip this one.

Finally, My Car Evolves!

The Evolve Fish
[http://evolvefish.com]

For the past three years, my Mom has been promising me a special "evolve" fish emblem for my car. If you are curious to what an evolve fish is exactly, think of those Jesus Fish but something more for the scientific community.  It is a counter-symbol to say something versus the Jesus fish community, that I believe in evolution and science. Funny enough, after receiving the evolve fish today, I learned that there is a science fish as well, though it looks more like a rocket than a fish (the general shape and coloring is the same). See the link I've provided if you want to get your own! I would also like to just quickly state that while I love my new evolve fish symbol, I am not attacking those that believe in Jesus or the Jesus fish. He was my lord and savior too, I just also believe in evolution.

When they Arrived	The Magnet on the Back	The Sticker on the Dashboard

Well, today a small package arrived in the mail and my Dad handed it to me telling me he thought it was for me. I opened it up, and sure enough inside was not one, but two evolve fishies! One of the fishes was a magnet and one was a sticker. My Mom had order the two different types because we all felt that putting something like this on the back of my car was making a statement. That statement could be taken out of context by the christian community and they might either rip it off the back of my car or do something much worse. So the sticker portion of the fish will go on my dashboard where no one but my friends will see it and the magnet will be something I strap to the back of my car when my friends want to see what it looks like. After that, I will always take it off my car. After all, I do not want to lose my fishies!

A Note About Telephones

The following is a rant that I wrote about a telephone my parents have that kills the internet. Please only read if you want to hear ranting.

Watch This: Weeds

One of the Promotional Pictures for Weeds

For the past few years I have been sitting on the line of being entertained and being dragged along when it came to the television show Weeds. I got into the show back when it was first starting, loved the first three seasons right away, and I actually was out recommending it to friends. Then the series hit an all-time low for me where I was not satisfied with the series for the next three seasons. And it was not until season seven that I started to feel that this show was starting to rise-up and get better again. Now, in its final season I am once again telling people that if they have not watched this all the way through that they should. Here's my review of everything currently available for Weeds.

A Little Monster After Nine

Indigo Barking at the Potatoes

The longer we have our puppy, the more stuff it is that we seem to learn about her behavior and her personality. Like we know she is going to be an excellent family dog, because she gets upset when one of us leaves the room and super excited when that person returns again. She loves licking and kissing, she loves lying on our feet, and she loves being around us. So her being a loving family dog is not the issue.

Instead, we are learning interesting little personality traits about the puppy that we never expected. Like for such an adventurous dog, and I mean adventurous, she is afraid of a bag of potatoes that we left in the middle of the kitchen floor. Seriously, my Mom and I watched as the puppy would circle back and forth, watching the bag with a keen eye and as if at any moment it might get up and attack her. All of this from the same dog that is not scared of thunder, lightning, rain, the dark, cats, other dogs, or just about anything else that normal dogs are scared of.

Here's another strange one that she is scared of (in comparison), the broom. I was sweeping the backyard porch with the broom, getting all the dirt off of there that she had brought up, when suddenly I see she is standing at the very edge of the porch watching. She gets interested and steps up on the porch, but I don't stop sweeping because it was obvious which direction I was going. Well, she would jump about a foot in front of the broom and then ten feet back as I swept it across the wood. Indigo would bark a few times at the broom, then try to get close again. And sometimes she would even scurry off far away in fright that it was coming after her. Truly a funny sight to watch.

Nap Time Angel

But even beyond just the weird things that the dog is scared of, we are also learning how she starts acting when she gets energetic. Now, my Mom will say that she is getting cranky right before a nap, but I think it is just the dog's way of saying I am bursting with energy and ready to run around. Anyway, we were eating dinner and the dog was being a menace, grabbing things with her teeth and chewing things up. We ended up putting her outside since we all had to eat dinner and could not afford to keep pulling her off of things. Once outside, the pup started running around the yard and keeping herself busy. She drags a stick from one side to the other, munches on it a bit, and then is off again. And for all the love I have in the world for her, I do not have the type of energy she has.

Still, after prancing around the yard and tearing things off of trees and really running around untamed, she finally calms down. Getting up on the porch, she plops right down in her toboggan and goes to sleep. So by the time we got outside to watch here, finished with our own meals and quite satisfied, she is just laying dead in the toboggan. That's when my Mom picked her up and was able to hold her like a little angel in her lap.

And then she wakes up and has all the energy in the world again, which brings me to the main point of my post and the reason for it's inevitable title. At around nine at night (sometimes a little bit later), she starts getting rough again and nippy. This is where my Dad came in and started calling her the devil dog. I do not think that this is a devil dog, but more a puppy that has bursts of energy and just needs to use them. But it does feel like the devil has possessed her the way that this personality of being nippy and starts biting comes out every day around the same time.

After This: A Loving Dog at Eleven

Even right now as I am writing this blog, she is getting extremely violent with the milk jug again. From the sound of her growls and yips, you would think that she was in an epic struggle here to kill the piece of plastic. And it is strange that she gets this way with the plastic, but at least it is not human flesh. She does seem to identify the difference, which we know because she never attacks the milk jug or other pieces of plastic until we place them on the ground and let go.

Finally, after rough housing and (usually) being thrown back outside to go run around like a nut, she calms down and plops asleep again. At least we have a lot of pictures to remember her as a puppy like this!

Great Friends Last a Lifetime

I know that I do a lot of blog posts about my friends, but then again where would I be without them. They are like my family, they shape me into the person I am and they help guide me through the darkest of times. And the one thing I have always tried to do is hold my friendships throughout anything that life might through at us.

But this time, I would like to single out one friend that I have had for years now, one that I've had quarrels with and we've gotten through a lot of weird things that friends do not normally have to go to. This is my best friend (though not my only best friend) Jordan. Let me just give a brief history and then why I'm making this post.

Understanding the Elixir of Good Luck

So I actually ended up breaking this part off of my Elixir of Good Luck because I realized the post was getting a little bit long and I did not want to have this massive post with all the stories I had to tell. So here is a much more scientific view on the Elixir of Good Luck, which is optimistic thinking.

Optimistic Thinking
Current Studies
The following list is a bunch of different tests that were derived to see if people are optimists or pessimists based on their outlook of daily things in life. However, if you already know you are being tested for optimism, you'll find yourself ruining all of the tests because you are trying to think more positively. I'd like to just quickly note that here, and again in my conclusion of testing

• The Half Glass of Water Theorem: One of the most controversial and popular studies of how people think is dated back to looking at a glass of water that is half-full of water or half-empty with air. The basic concept is simple, if a person comes up and instantly says the glass if half-full, then they are an optimist because they see what remains. On the other side, a pessimist will see the glass is half-empty. However, recent studies that investigated this further found that there was a multitude of other answers to show how people perceived the glass. A realist tends to ignore how much water is even in the glass, stating that it is simply a glass filled with water, not taking into account the amount. Similarly, a deconstructionist tends to say that the amount of water is only bound by the size of the glass, so it's neither.
• The Rain Cloud - Sunshine Theorem: In theory, all people wake-up and perceive their day a different way, but optimists tend to have a brighter outlook on life while pessimist tend to think more darkly. This is where the rain cloud - sunshine theorem comes into effect. Basically, an optimist will see the day and, no matter the weather, always think that it is going to be a sunny afternoon. They don't need to turn on the news to hear it. Meanwhile, a pessimist will wake-up and describe the afternoon as rainy, turning on the news instantly to confirm what they perceive to be true. Of course, there are again a multitude of other answers that make it impossible to tell with this one test whether someone is purely an optimist or a pessimist, but in it's creation and study came another test.
• The Good News Theory: In a short study done on television news reports and the types of people that watch them, it was found that on general that the television news reports tend to give things a darker, pessimistic outlook. As such, the people that tended to be more attracted to watching television for their daily news were more pessimistic people in society. In contradiction to this, people with a more optimistic outlook on life tended to use internet sources for their news reports. The idea behind where you get your news finally came down to the following, a pessimist wants to hear about all the stories, where as an optimist would rather read the headlines and stick to the ones that make them happier or interested. Again, this is a flawed study because of the wide variety of audience and no to mention the overall variety in the data findings.
• The Situational Test: In a much less serious environment, people are handed a test that gives them several situations that they were to answer in a few sentences to a short paragraph. This test actually gives the best results as long as the people answering did not know it was testing for optimism, because each test could be monitored for different types of thinking. I've included a very short version of the situational test below, but since I've already said it is to see if you are optimistic or not it will be harder to get true answers. If you would still like to take it, see the section labeled The Situational Test: Are You Optimistic

The Situational Test
If you aren't sure how optimistic you are about life, then take the following test answering like you would on a daily basis. The problem with a test like this is that I've already told you what it is about, so all of your answers are going to try and sway towards the optimistic thinking side. In other words, you're going to try and give the best possible answer even if in real life you might not say that. Which is why I recommend calling someone who really knows you over and asking them to take this test for you instead! I've included the optimistic output at the bottom if you are curious what an optimist would say.

1. You are searching for a new car and you find a dealer that is willing to sell you one, but they are marking the price up quite a bit and it is not exactly what you want. It is close though and you aren't sure if you will get another chance to get a car as close as this. What do you do?
2. You and your friends were planning on doing something outdoors in the mountains, which are a 30 minute drive away and everyone is planning to meet at your house. Yet when everyone finally gets there, the rain clouds form in the sky and a few drops start to come down. Turning on the news, you are told to expect lightning and thunder as well. What do you do?
3. A natural disaster is on its way towards the house you have been living in most of your adult life and you have had less time than you expected to pack-up all your favorite belongings and get out. After you leave, there is no going back, so you grab the essentials and get out of there. Arriving at a safe-haven, how do you feel?

Optimist Answers:

1. You don't actually take the car at first, but rather sit on it and think about it. If worse comes to worse and the car sells before you can get back to buy it, you just think that there will be another chance coming soon and that wasn't the right car for you.
2. You discuss with your friends an alternative, but know that as long as you are with your friends it is going to be a good day. You keep a smile on and plan to maybe go to the movies, out for coffee, a library, or even just sit around the table to talk for a while. There's no way of bringing you down even when there's a raging storm.
3. It is alright to feel upset that your home, your memories are currently behind you in the destruction path, but an optimist looks at what he/she was able to save and is thankful for getting those out. You are happy to be with your family and friends, happy that no one is hurt, and more relieved that you had even a little bit of time to grab reminds of your precious memories. And even if something does happen to your house, you feel that in rebuilding you are showing you are stronger than the weather and still happy to live with the people you love.

Optimist Testing Conclusions

In truth there is only one way to figure out if you are an optimist or a pessimist without taking tests. Basically, go through a daily routine and just thinking about the decisions you make after you make them. Did you tell a co-worker that you did not think the deal would go through for some reason or did you think on the upside about it? Are you thinking about how much better you feel because you ate a salad or mourning not taking the donuts? If you really want to know what you are, just think about every instance out there 

The Elixir of Good Luck

On an earlier article I was talking about how I understood dubstep as being this type of electronic music where the musician takes a bunch of terrible sounds and puts them together as something that comes out amazing. And I started discussing that maybe that is the difference between some people, where there are those that take the worst things in their life and make the best of it. Well, in all honesty that is what this article is about, how there are those people out there that take the worst things and make the best out of it. In hindsight we sometimes call that good luck.

Take the following situation that almost everyone has been in, where they are out with their friend or friends and telling a story. Then they get to the end of their amazing tale of something incredible that has happened. Then one of their friends says that they have "Good Luck" with whatever happened. Well, there might just be some truth behind that statement, but there is also another really good explanation. See, in several recent scientific studies (one included in this link) it was found that people with "good luck" might also have a different outlook on life.

In the following article I've written, I've devised it into two different parts. In the first part, I just want to speak directly about optimism and how it affects good luck. In the second part, I wanted to briefly go over what they call optimistic thinking.

Listen to This: Bonfire

On a drive back from some stores that my Mom and I had gone to that day, I started playing some dubstep music for her. Right away, I could tell she loved the backbeat and was liking the song, but then again I was playing what I consider to be great dubstep for her. But in the middle of the song, I said something that got me thinking a bit. I said, "I can't understand how so many terrible sounds on their own can come together to make something as beautiful as this!"

Bonfire by Knife Party

The fact of the matter is that is how life works, where we as people can take the worst things that we are given and turn them into something beautiful. And I think that people that live by that philosophy, that live on the idea that they take whatever they are given and make the best of it, are the types of people that are always happy. But that is just my off-subject discussion that leads me into what I was really getting at, because I have a whole other article written for just that subject.

Thankful for Vinegar

I think I can explain this post in under twelve seconds by starting out with puppies are like atomic bombs, by which I mean that they are packed with copious amounts of destructive energy. In order to contain and control all of these energy you have to either play with them until they tucker out, give them toys to chew on and play with themselves, or figure out some other way. Scientifically speaking, we would classify all of these options as the dissipation of the energy to lead to a less violent force.

Well in our house we have three grown adults that have almost every day available to take care of our new puppy, and all three of us are exhausted now. Literally, this dog has more energy than we can handle and we all need about a week vacation from trying to raise her. Now do not take that the wrong way, we all love this puppy and we want her to be a part of our family, but it is just a level of work that would kill anyone if they tried it on their own.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel, something that we all have started to say we are thankful for that you would never expect, the empty vinegar bottle! Basically, what we have learned about our dog is that she hates plastic with a vengeance and will stop at nothing to attack and kill plastic items. So one day, my Dad placed a clearned-out and empty vinegar bottle on the floor to be taken out to the recycling bin later. Our little puppy-girl suddenly came out of no where and looked it over, sniffing it before jumping back and barking. I am not going to say our dog never barks, but she has to be upset with something to bark at it. So as he watched (and my Mom and I tried to sleep), she suddenly sprang up and attacked the vinegar bottle, trying desperately to kill it.

I say thank you, because this is a great way to keep her entertained that we never knew about before and start dissipating some of that energy I spoke of. And in all honesty, we all find it very entertaining that she attacks the bottle as such and we are not exactly sure why she hates empty plastic containers. Either way, it has been a great way to get rid of some of that puppy dog crazy and we have since continued to place the bottle down and watch her attack it at random.

The Puppy Takes on the Vinegar Bottle's Ally, the Milk Jug!

But that is not all she attacks. As shown in the video I took above, she will also attack empty plastic milk bottles in an effort to dominate them. Another item she has no problem attacking in the same manner are the tomato plastic holders that you get when you buy a tomato plant for your garden. Now I am sure that this is not teaching her things she should learn, but she does not attack anyone in the family like this, she does not bark at other dogs or at us, and she does not seem to be learning any bad habit from this exercise. So we have actually sort of been enforcing it since we would never put a vinegar bottle or a milk jug down that was still filled with their respective contents. I just hope she keeps staying as intently interested in it as she has been.

Basic Strategy for Plague Inc

Originally I was going to post this strategy overview in the review I did of Plague Inc, but after I wrote the first section I realize this needs a blog all to its own. Anyway, I've included a link back to the iTunes store if you would like to pick up your copy!

Plague Inc.

Basic Strategy for Plague Inc
Now at first I thought this game was extremely challenging, but the I started to get into it more and realized there are some really simple tactics that let you always win. However, I am going to give an up-front warning that by following the easiest strategy, you will also be sacrificing your end score! Your end score is best when you infect and kill at the same time and lowest when you infect and then kill the population. I will be giving the easiest of the strategies possible (though I have done other ones).

Play on Smartphone: Plague Inc

When I first started searching for games on my iPhone, I would only buy the ones that had a free trail version available. The why is simple, because I wanted to know if I liked the gameplay before I spent my money on an app that was going to cost me a whole dollar. I know, I'm a really thrift-er. Then I ran into this game, which was my first super-addictive game that I played on my iPhone. There was no trial, there was no guarantee that I would like it, but still I took the chance because of the rave reviews.

[http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/plague-inc./id525818839?mt=8]

And the reason I am saying that, the reason for giving doubt about buying this application, is that I want everyone to know that I took a chance and I thought it was worth it. So here is my review of Plague Inc.

Weird Email and Weird Messages

I know that I post a lot of blog entries, I know that I've recently started reviewing movies, and for whatever reason they have become popular on some websites across the net.  Yet what I got today in my email was actually the weirdest thing of all. It was a piece of spam that said the following (Please note that I've actually blackened out some stuff and removed all the links for your protection):

Hi, 

Considering that I work with <random_website>, I spend a lot of time on the Internet browsing blogs, and I must say that yours has caught my attention. Coincidentally, we recently published an article entitled (Article Name that is really long and stupid) that I believe would draw considerable interest from your readers. If you are interested in sharing with them, then feel free to do so. Here's the link for your convenience:  

(Article_Link_That_Was_Even_More_Stupid_Than_The_Article_Name_itself/) 

Thanks for your time!

K******* C****** 

So at first I was a little bit excited because I was getting an email about my blog and how it was drawing attention finally from google. I had a blog before this one and for all the efforts I put in to make it popular or interesting, I made nothing out of it. I'm not sure what I'm doing differently this time, maybe just because I do not care who reads this. At any rate, then I read the whole thing and instantly knew that what this really was is spam of the tenth degree. This person, Mrs K.C. as I'll call her, is most likely a computer bot that does a simple internet search to find articles similar to the one on their website and then send an email if possible. Or maybe it is a real person. Either way, I know how they found me and it actually has nothing to do with my blog. To say the least, I am still flattered that I am getting spam mail!

But this is not the only weird thing that is happening to me with spam messages. I also received a very convincing and interesting text message this morning (and coincidentally the exact same one from a slightly different number two days ago). What I need to make clear before I post that message is that the number was in the Colorado area code, but no one I knew. Anyway, the text message I got both times said the following:

If you could please let me know yes or no about the loan. If you can't then i need to come up with other options. I expect a call from missouri any 

Minute. I don't know how much longer mom can hang on. Thank you.

Now the clues I had that this message was fake are very small, except for the main detail that matters. First of all, my Mom was at home with me and so I was left confused. Second, I don't know anyone from Missouri. To say the least, I was left confused right after reading this. I just thought I would share it since this seems like some new scam.

Anyway, nothing else to really report at two in the morning.

Use This: Day One Journal

[Day One Journal]

So I was recently using the iPhone application My Wonderful Days as my journal application, and up until now it has been a stellar choice. My Wonderful Days was only a dollar in the iTunes store when I bought it, it offered some really nice features such as being able to set a reminder to write a journal, and most importantly it let me select my mood for the day. So at the time, I took the cheap way out on getting a journal and I still do not regret it.

Alas, a few days ago I started thinking maybe it was time for an upgrade. It turned out I really enjoyed writing a journal (when the journal reminds me I need to write in it) and that I really did like putting down my personal thoughts in a safe place that only I could get into. I started looking at some of the competition, and more specifically at the leading journal in the store. Now, for back-up the application I was looking at was called Day One Journal. It has been not only the leading journal application on iTunes, but it is the recommended application by Apple. In other words, I was really interested but still not willing to buy because I did not feel it was a great enough increase in quality for the extra money. All of that changed though within a week.

Day One - Journal

Day One - Journal

I logged into the Apple App Store and for a moment it flashed to the current featured applications. To my surprise there was Day One Journal sitting right there on the screen, but this was not the iPhone application. Instead, I was looking at the Macintosh computer application build of the same exact journal program. I was instantly interested, because if there is one thing I know about applications on apple products it is that they all tend to sync with one another wirelessly which was the one feature I was looking for. I was right, the iPhone application would sync with the computer application, so I was instantly hooked.

The reason I wanted an application that was both a journal on my phone as well as a journal on my computer was for typing in entries. Sometimes I have something to say while I'm on the move and so I want to use my phone to add it to my journal. Or maybe I have a photograph that I just took that I would like to remember when and where. Well, for all of those needs I would want something on my phone. But the phone part actually does more than that. I can also record the current temperature as well as the location the journal was taken at, which is really cool since sometimes I go places and while waiting for a friend I like to write in my journal.

On the flip side, I am also someone who likes to sit down at the end of the day and quickly type long entries into my journal. Before, this would mean getting out my phone and using the touchscreen keyboard to type in these long, excessive entries that describe the little things that happen during my day. To put it nicely, it was annoying and I am surprised I made as many entries as I had. But now with an application that can wirelessly send all of the data from my phone to my computer, I was in the perfect position to get the best of both worlds.

Now, the reason I am recommending this application goes beyond that nice and honestly very-needed feature. It also has a bunch of little features built in that I think are really cool, along with some other ones that are on the way. For instance, the Day One Journal also has most of the features that I had in my other application, such as the ability to star entries that I thought were very important and very meaningful to me or to set that daily reminder that I need to write in my journal for the day. Both of these are extremely important to someone like me, because I know that when I go back through my entries the number one thing I do is search for the meaningful ones and I cannot always remember to write in my journal. So since Day One has these features, it becomes more useful to someone like me.

Anyway, if you are looking for a journal application for your iPhone and maybe even one for your computer I recommend this one. Skip the hassle of getting a cheaper journal application that you will later have to hand-import into your better one and just start off with the best right away!

The Spotted Canvas uses the Day One^® application programming interface but is not endorsed or certified by Bloom Built, LLC. All of the Day One^® logos and trademarks displayed on this website are the property of Bloom Built, LLC.

Training Starts Yesterday

If the joke name "Bad Dog Gimme That" is not a clue to how stubborn our new australian shepherd/border collie mix puppy is, then the fact that we have decided to start training her should be a good hint. Up until now, we thought that this puppy was seven weeks old when we got her, which would make her eight weeks old now and another week away before we could start really training her to be a good dog. Except, then I counted the number of weeks since she was born that the breeder told us. Turns our that yesterday was her tenth-week-since-birth day. Upon learning this, a unanimous group decision was made that she starts training right away.

That was yesterday, and that is exactly what happened. Although we are still working on getting her a crate that we think she will enjoy, we are now tirelessly working on making sure she learns who is the boss. You see, up until now we have let her eat when she wants, play outside as long as she wants, tug on things, jump on things, bite us, and a mountain of other things that a dog should not do. All of that stopped. Here's how we've changed it:

• Eat When She Wants: She now has a food schedule, three times a day as recommended online and this will change to twice a day once she becomes a year or so old. We take the bowl away after half an hour of her feeding time and if she did not eat her fill, then she goes hungry for five hours or so.
• Play Outside: When she asks us to come inside, we do not always let her go in. We need her to know that the door opens when we say it opens, that she does not have a magical ability to command us to open the door, and that we will do it when we can. However, at the same time we are also trying to teach her to ask politely (as in whimper or bark) for the door to be open, which she has started doing. To clarify, this is not so much a large deal of letting her inside, but more of a who has control. And do not worry, we sit out there with her even on hot days, so we know when it is too hot.
• Tug on Things: We can't have our baby girl tearing up the house and to stop her we already bought some spray called Grannick's Bitter Apple. At first we were using some other stuff that said it stopped dogs, but after reading reviews we immediately turned it in because she actually attacked things more. This new spray stuff smells bad and after putting some down, she does not attack the object until it wears off (and it does wear off).
• Jump on Things: There are two reasons we do not want her jumping on things, because we do not want her up on furniture or other items and we do not want her jumping on guests that come over. A simple tug on the collar (it does not hurt her, but gives a physical reminder to stubborn dogs that they are not supposed to do it) and one of us saying, "No!" So far she has been learning quickly, not liking the tugs on the collar and learning to stop doing whatever she is doing wrong. There is still more training to go. 
• As an added note here, we are okay with her coming up and jumping on people that have given the signal that they do not mind being jumped on. This signal is that they get down to her level, on their knees or sitting on the ground, but if the person is standing she needs to know not to jump.
• Bite Us: This has been concerning for all of us, because sometimes when she gets playful she also starts nipping. Her teeth are sharp and painful if they dig in, and she has a habit of not liking to let go. So to say the least, we do not want her biting. Unfortunately, she is also still teething, so biting on stuff helps relieve some of the teething pain and so all she wants to do is bite. We have done two things to try and stop her from biting us.
• First we grab her muzzle lightly, shutting her jaw for a second, and we say, "No!" We do this about ten times, giving her plenty of opportunities to stop and we usually try and take her outside so she can be rough on sticks and toys and not us.
• If she keeps biting, no matter what, then she gets a 10 minute time out. I've never heard such cries and had I not have been strong, I think we all would have caved to letter her sit out for a few minutes.
• By doing this, she is learning much more quickly not to bite us.

And do not get me wrong, my family and I are being overly nice to the puppy too. If she has an accident inside, we just take her outside and let her finish her business. We never hit our dogs, we never smack or anything like that to our pets! These are family members and we know it does not teach her to stop doing the bad thing she is doing, but rather just makes the animal scared of us. Instead, we just clean it up and move on, hoping she does not do it again.

Anyway, I love that puppy dog, but she has to be properly trained! And these are just the things at the top of our list! We also want to train her to do normal dog tricks, such as sit, stay, lay down, roll over, and even the basic come here. And from there we also want her to learn how to heel, take car rides, and  never bark at other dogs. It is going to be a challenge, but I know that putting in this time and effort will lead to years of love and I mean both ways!

Listen to This: Turn Up the Music

If someone would have told me to listen to a song by Chris Brown, I probably would have asked why. That is not to say that I think he is a bad person, but more because up until now I just have not found anything that I like by him. No offense, I just did not care for any of his previous stuff and there is a lot of stuff in his modern music that I could not give a care for either. But still, that is not to say that a single does not pop out of the blue and catch me by surprise. So, feeling open to listening to this song, I found that I loved it. Granted, the first time I heard it I thought to myself that it was okay. About two weeks later, I had it stuck in my head even though I had not heard it once since then. Sometimes that is just how things work for me. And now I am in love with this song, dancing along to it like the most amateur dancer that I am (and I do not plan to take my excellent skills professional any time soon, though that might be saving the world from those problems).

Anyway, after that short period of time I just needed to hear this song again. So I loaded up the youtube page and started listening to it again, and again, and again. This did not satisfy my craving though, and as I was in my car driving to target or the liquor store or somewhere (I can't remember exactly, but it was in that general direction from my house), I loaded up the music video again on my smartphone and had another play. To say the least, within a day I had this downloaded and was playing it on repeat.

Music Video for Turn Up the Music by Chris Brown

Now what I like about this song is almost everything. I love the back beat, which is that rhythmic dance beat that just gets my hands and feet moving. And if the last music video I picked is to describe how much I love songs about the love of music, then that should tell you why I like the lyrics. But even beyond that, Chris Brown does a wonderful job of taking his song emotionally to the next level. Listen, by which I do not mean closely, and you will hear him screaming as he tries to convey how much turning up the music means to him. It is this emotional involvement, which we have not seen as in-depth in modern music, that I really like. Anyway, I say give it a listen!

The Spotted Canvas uses the Turn Up the Music music video but is not endorsed or certified by Sony Music Entertainment. All of the Turn Up the Music promotional material and trademarks displayed on this website are the property of Sony Music Entertainment.

Maybe Watch This: Total Recall (2012)

Total Recall (2012) Movie Poster

I will openly admit that this movie was not actually on my list of films I wanted to see, but that is because I consider the first film a classic story that should not be messed with. And being completely honest with myself, I know that if a director wants to remake a film, then they usually also want to change something in the plot. I do not think I have ever seen a film that was remade and simply just updated, new actors and maybe better actors, new technology to make the background, and perfection of an already outstanding script. Nope, they never want to do that because why did you make a whole new film then.

Still, my friends decided it was time to see a movie and they persuaded me to go and watch this film last night. I will say that I am happy I did go and see it with them (I love seeing movies with my friends), but with that in mind I will also say that the original movie is still better. And do not worry, I'll explain why I think the original is better in this as well, because that was the crux of my decision. Anyway, here is my review of the movie Total Recall (2012).

Total Recall [2012]

So for those that do not know, which seems to be a lot of folks in the younger generation, this is actually a remake of a movie by the same name, Total Recall (1990). That's right, a movie made just twenty-two years ago they have decided to remake with better graphics and a script that they think will hit home with the new generation. Except, to anyone that has seen the old movie this one is not even in the same playing field, let alone should carry the same name.

Maybe Watch This: 21 Jump Street

21 Jump Street Movie Poster

I cannot get to sleep tonight, which is maybe because I took a two hour nap earlier. At any rate, since my insomnia is keeping me up I decided to watch a movie. So I picked the one that has been bugging me for a while, 21 Jump Street. To explain how this movie has been bugging me, on Comcast they keep running an ad for the movie on their On Demand service, stay on the screen looking for a movie long enough and you'll see how annoying it gets. Anyway, I thought you should maybe watch it.

21 Jump Street [2012]

So this is just like any other typical movie you have seen about officers of the law going under-cover in a high school to find out who is selling drugs. Basically they both were strangely different in high school, the extremes of nerd and geek, and they in general did not get along. Then they get out of high school and become friends for one reason or another, so it should lead to a funny but very generalized comedy. And to that effect, that is exactly what this movie is, a funny but very generalized comedy.

A Very Weird Horoscope Today

I would like to start off by saying I am not very superstitious when it comes to luck and the alignment of planets and all of that. I just cannot see how the day I was born would have anything to do with or relate to the alignment of the planets, and even less understanding of how someone born two days different can have the same fate as I do. And do not get me wrong, I understand the philosophy behind horoscopes and Chinese proverbs of wisdom, but they just do not make sense to me.

Instead, I read my horoscope and my daily words of wisdom because it gives me something fun and interesting to do on my down time. I do not tend to take them for more than that, a bunch of very bland predictions of what I should feel like for the day that may or may not be right. So when I finally get one that not only hits home, but perfectly on to my current emotions, I am a bit surprised. Take for instance today.

Here's today's horoscope for Aquarius (Aug 6, 2012):

	Mood:	3/6 Stars
	A very demanding Monday due to the square formed between the moon and Pluto which could bring back old problems to life.
	Love:	2/6 Stars
	Unfortunately you will barely have any time to devote to your love life, you will be far too busy as it is.
	Career:	2/6 Stars
	You could well totally ignore important pieces of information you will be given today.
	Wellness:	2/6 Stars
	You can expect stress, mostly due to the issues present in your professional life today.

Play on Smartphone: Infinity Blade

Infinity Blade
Logo

I know this is a really late review end it, I know the sequel to this game is out and every possible gaming website on the planet has already beaten this game. But I lag behind because that is cost effective, especially for these single player games where it does not matter if I am up to date. And besides, none of my friends have this game on their smartphones so none of them will be able to battle me anyway. If you'd like to download it from the iTunes store, please follow the following link (or click the logo)

[http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/infinity-blade/id387428400?mt=8]

With all of that said, I finally got around to playing this app for my iPhone and it is amazing! Just for a quick clarification, yes I used the words "got around to playing," as in I've had this sitting on my phone for the past month or so and never even touched it. I bought it on sale during the July 4th holiday and just never touched it because I had too many other things to do. With that said, here's my review.

Still Updating

I have recently had a lot of energy to turn my blog from a simple cut-and-paste format that they provide into a more personal thing. I've been working countlessly on the backend of things, messing with the HTML as best I can, as I actually write the script myself to create a more efficient and nicer blog. To everyone that views the page, that means almost nothing. But to a programmer it means faster load times, easier code to browse through, and just overall better coding.

To Feel Inspired

I sat down and was watching some television when suddenly lightning struck me, an idea! I'm not sure exactly where it came from, but I just knew I had to use photoshop to make a specific picture. The challenge was that I knew it was going to take at least two other pictures plus some pieces I did not have. Still, when an idea rushes to me like that I try right away!