Thanksgiving Break

So as everyone knows, Thanksgiving is coming up. Hopefully, I will not have a traditional Thanksgiving with eating dinner at 3 or 4 o'clock with family and friends. I plan on having fun even if I am in boring ole South Carolina. Sorry for those who are fans but it does not do a thing for me but keep me extremely bored. But that was before I turned 18. Maybe I can see the night life in this city that I thought was completely lifeless. In order to get there, I will have to sit on a bus for about five hours but I guess it will be worth it if fun follows so let the journey begin. My first few days in South Carolina should be family free, except if my cousin decides to join me (She's cool people so that won't matter). One of my best friends is picking me up from the bus station around 7 and after that I hope it's a night of fantastic festivities. She goes to the University of South Carolina so she should know what's going on. She claims she is having fun, but I have to see it for myself. I plan on meeting new people and making new friends. That's always good right? I plan on staying with her until Sunday night because she isn't coming back to Georgia until Monday. Gosh, this should be great. I finished my bibliography and my essay. Now, there isn't much to worry about. Maybe after this weekend my opinion of South Carolina may change. It has a long way to go if it wants to be considered one of my favorite places, but I'll give it a chance.

Punk Music Part II

I thought the second half of the video was a little more interesting than the first half. It showed the problems that Punk bands had to face more than the earlier segment. I liked how the video focused on Punk's waves of progress. As years went on, Punk began to change itself. Its artists actually wanted to be musicians. In the early years of Punk, no one could really play well. That changed when bands actually started to want record deals. For a while, it seemed like Punk bands had fallen off the map. Their popularity and success came in waves. The time between these waves gave the genre time to change. Within this time, sub genres of Punk were created. Punk music became more hardcore. Punk still expressed the same "I do not care what you think of me" mentality but had a different ways of portraying that expression. I also thought that the black Punk band Bad Brains was interesting. Before this video, I had never heard of them. Another interesting part of the video was when the Sex Pistols had to face so much rage when they went on tour in the United States. I knew there were problems with the music but I did not think that people would be against them in the way they were when the Sex Pistols performed in San Antonio. By the end of the video, I had learned a lot. I never was really into the whole Punk music genre, but after watching this video I might give the music a chance. I do know a few songs here and there but not enough to go out and buy an entire album.

Punk Music

Even though my favorite genre of music does not have anything to do with Punk, I may know a few songs. Despite my brief understanding of the genre, the history behind the music is still interesting. I like the concept of which Punk music was started under. It was about not conforming to everyday society and breaking rules. Individuality is one of the most important things for a person to create. Punk artists expressed their individuality by playing music that was usually seen rowdy to people who did not believe in this form of expression. The genre was more liked by young people rather than the much more traditional older generation. A lot of early Punk musicians offered their political views in their music. Most of the time, the artists tended to be against whatever was going on in the world, such as the Vietnam War. These bands represented progress, like the Civil Rights Movement. The fact that this genre spread so quickly was surprising because it seemed that a majority of Americans, more adults than youth, were against this type of music. They thought it was just pointless noise. While American Punk was beginning to define itself, London Punk was just starting. The political and economic climate of London fueled Punk's influence. Young people were angry and rebellious. Their emotions were starting to be portrayed through their clothing. Once Punk began to grow, it split into other sub genres. Punk is still a very popular genre of music today.

Rupert Murdoch

According to the New York Times article at http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/11/rupert-murdoch-unalloyed-unbound/, it seems like Rupert Murdoch is blaming President Obama and Google for everything that is wrong in the business world. He believes that Obama has not done much to fix the global crisis and Google is destroying all relevant news sources. According to Murdoch, Obama is making the financial crisis worse by giving away money that the country does not have. He even goes to defend Glen Beck from Fox News when Beck stated that Obama was racist. All Murdoch had to say was that Obama did make a racist statement. The article did not give too many details on this argument. Though he criticizes Obama's job in the White House, the article mainly focuses on Murdoch's problems with search engines. He believes, search engines, like Google, are stealing content from his News Corporation. He even claims that he is going to prevent google from accessing any of News Corporation's content. He insults search engines as if he is familiar with them even though the article states that the first time he used Google was about a year ago. There is no way he could go up against Google. Google is the main search engine basically used by anyone with a computer and internet access. After bickering on about how Google and other search engines are destroying news, he also back talks the BBC calling it a, "scandal because it uses tax dollars to compete against private media." He seems like an interesting man to listen to but he does not give enough facts to back up his accusations.

The Box

After reading the review, The Box seems to be put in a negative light. John Swansburg does not seem to take the movie seriously based on the director's other failed attempts to create a decent movie. As Swansburg writes, he continuously throws in jokes trying to make the reader feel like the movie is pointless. The reasoning for Norma and Arthur pushing the button has no real meaning. Swansburg makes it seem that if they just gave up on life's luxuries, they wouldn't need to press the button. It almost seems like they don't really need the money if they stop trying to spoil themselves. According to Swansburg, the director Richard Kelly, creates another unsatisfying movie. If I was placed in a similar situation as Norma and Arthur, I don't think I would be able to push the button. I know one million dollars is a lot of money, but I don't think I could live knowing that I killed someone even if that someone was a complete stranger. Killing for money is a little unethical to me. I could be killing a single mother whose children have no other family or a child itself. The only way I could push the button was if I was guaranteed that the person I was killing was a criminal like a murder, rapist, or a child molester. Something serious. No petty crimes like taking a baseball bat to a mailbox. I might not know the person, but I wouldn't want someone's death on my conscience.

Time Machine

If someone invented a time machine, where would you go? If I was given the opportunity, I would go back to the 90s. I, along with a large majority of my peers, agree that the 90s was the best decade. Though there were problems, they didn't seem as big as the problems we face today. People seemed to appreciate living more instead of being caught up on problems. The mood of the decade can be seen in shows from that time period, such as Living Single, A Different World, and the Cosby Show. Television shows were the greatest in the 90s. Shows were more culturally diverse. Television programs today mainly have a majority black cast or a majority white cast with a few other minorities sprinkled in. The 90s were not afraid to push boundaries or bring up topics that most people might not want to talk about. People were not afraid to deal with race or other differences amongst the people that surrounded them, like interracial relationships were seen in more shows in the 90s than they are today. Another aspect that made the 90s great was the music. No matter what genre a song was under, everyone knew the words. Songs still had a point in the 90s. There were no Soulja Boys making a genre sound stupid. Fashion was also a plus. Like the decades before it, the 90s were all about expression through individualism. You didn't have to match in order to have a nice outfit. Another thing I liked about the 90s is that people seemed more determined to better themselves. They weren't caught up on being cool. They wanted to make something out of themselves later on in life. I have a similar mentality. Even though I was young in this decade, the 90s still speak to me. If I could get stuck anywhere in time, I would definitely pick to be my age now in the 90s. If I couldn't leave, I might not even have a problem with that.

Random but Good Questions

Have you ever had a question that no one really thinks about, or one nobody could really answer? Some of these questions actually end up being good ones. My friends and I put together a list of some of those questions that really make you think.

1. Why does toothpaste say you'll get better results if you squeeze from the bottom?
2. Why do we drive on the parkway and park in a driveway?
3. Why do people say, "I slept like a baby," when babies wake up every two hours?
4. Why do dogs get mad when you blow in their face but stick their heads out of a moving car's window?
5. When do you become important enough to be assassinated and not just murdered?
6. If you can't spell, something won't it be a little difficult to find it in a dictionary?
7. Why do doctors call what they do "practice"?
8. How do you draw a blank?
9. If you rush to buy something that is on sale, are you really saving money?
10. Why does putting batteries in the freezer supposedly make them last longer?
11. Why is the alphabet in the order that it's in?
12. What is the Hokey Pokey actually about?
13. How far East can you go before heading West?
14. Are eyebrows considered facial hair?
15. Why is vanilla ice cream white if vanilla extract is brown?
16. How did the funny bone get its name if when you hit it, it's not funny?
17. Do you yawn in your sleep?
18. Why do people say, "heads up," when you should duck?
19. If you blew a bubble in space would it pop?
20. Why are there holes in crackers?
21. Why are women and men shoe sizes different?
22. What is the color of a mirror?
23. If we say, "It's Greek to me," what do Greeks say?
24. Why is a round pizza in a square box?
25. Why is a boxing ring a square?
26. Do illiterate people get the full effect of alphabet soup?

Just some random questions. Can you answer any of them?