Greetings and welcome back to the Un-Zone, the only known site on the Internet devoted to all things related to Un. It's been a while since I last updated this blog, so I'm thinking that today will be a good day to post an update about what has been going on in my little part of the world called Lawrence, Kansas.
I'm surviving the final semester of law school. By May, this seemingly never-ending path of education will finally end. And then comes the real world and the final test called the Multistate Bar Exam. No matter which state you decide to take the Bar in, it will be an experience. There's nothing like at least two days of answering questions about the laws of the United States and the particular state that one would like to practice in
This lovely experience will cost a proverbial arm and a leg, maybe more if you've entered law school straight from four years of college. I'm beginning to think that anyone wanting to be a lawyer must have some sort of mental disorder; otherwise, such people would have never subjected themselves to this entire process. This might explain why the bar application asks such probling and personal questions about confirmed medical diagnoses of certain mental disorders like schitzophrenia, depression, and so forth.
My computer, for some reason, is acting up. Every so often, it fails to boot up Windows. Luckily, I save everything on a floppy disk or a flash drive, or so I assumed. Apparently, I failed to save Gray Hall II on a backup media like a flash drive or a floppy disk. To add insult to injury, the Gray Hall II saga was all the way up to Chapter Seven, with two additional chapters in the works. At worst, I'm going to have to redo Chapters Five to Seven, plus two additional chapters on finals and a Christmas party. At best, I just turn on my computer and it works. No messy rewriting needed. I'm hoping for the latter. Thankfully, I saved my Trade Law paper on a flash drive, so I won't have to rewrite that...
A random digression. Apparently, in the early years of Christianity, there were religious texts and gospels that were written by the Gnostics and other sects of Christianity. (This problem of doctirinal questions was not officially solved until 325 AD with the First Council at Nicaea, though by the 200's, many Christian bishops recognized the need for one doctrine set in stone (pun intended)). For those that did not get the pun, one must have an understanding of Latin and Greek, plus some New Testament. Petrus, Petros, the parable about the house build on a solid rock...forget it.
Well, there was the Epistle of Barnabas that claimed that the Bible should be interpreted not literally, but figuratively. The most unusual interpretation involved the prohibition on eating weasels (Chapter X). According to this document, it was not meant to be an admonition against eating weasels, per se, but an admonition against oral sex. They believed that weasels conceived through the mouth.
Or the Infancy Gospel of Thomas. If you read that one, boy, Jesus Christ has some anger management problems. Sure, he did miracles like raising the dead, healing the injured, and so forth, but he also killed two kids who did "bad" things to Jesus. Like throw a stone at Jesus and quite pitifully, splashing water out of a pool with a willow branch. And I thought that certain people has issues...
Of course, these are not "official" Church canon, but documents from the Gnostic tradition. Make of them what you will.
That's all for now.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Friday, February 16, 2007
The Dove Ad in Life Magazine
Greetings and welcome back to The Un-Zone, the only site on the Internet devoted to all things related to Un. It's time for an update. Consider this update a public service announcement that will prevent you from considerable and most likely, unrepairable damage to one's mind or eyes. You will thank me for this. Trust me.
I was working on the New York Times crossword and the Wall Street Journal crossword as well. In general, I prefer these crosswords as they require some level of crossword knowledge and a certain level of skill to successfully solve them. Pretty much, they aren't easy crossword puzzles. I solved them both in about an hour total, which was disappointing, as I expected a little more of a challenge.
Since I was done so early, I decided to read the Kansas City Star. I like to read the Star only for the sports section. They had a relatively interesting article about the Kansas City Royals, a baseball team that is hopeless in my opinion. The only entertainment one can get out of the Royals is predicting how awful they will be this year. It would be considered a good year if they get close to a .500 record, something that I doubt will happen in a while.
While browsing the Kansas City Star, I notice the Life Magazine supplement. If you don't get it, you might as well consider yourself lucky, as it's not much of an interesting read. The articles aren't interesting. Some of them are poorly written. Their Editor's Picks on what to see, read, watch, etc. are laughable at times, if not most of the times. They actually recommened people to see some of the crappiest TV shows and movies ever. And their picks for the hottest and best shows on TV are so awful. For some reason, they picked the shows that lasted for only one or two epidsodes and were cancelled. Which is quite telling on how good the editors of Life are at picking anything worth reading, watching, buying or listening to. They redeem themselves, sometimes, but not always. I digress.
So I manage to get through this week's Life supplement. I'll summarize the contents for you. An article about Jennifer Hudson (This is something already done by so many magazines and newspapers already and much better written. I might also add, Life is several weeks if not several months behind on their great article ideas. They might want to call their magazine Life, Several Weeks Ago), a blurb on the Chinese New Year (already done already), Oscar night stories (kind of entertaing, but as again, much better done), and some other forgettable stuff.
I get to the end of this waste of paper and then I see the back. Let's jsut say that it was quite an eyeful, but in a bad way.
I'd like to preface that my comments are not meant to be demeaning in any way, but meant to be only construed as my personal opinion. It's what I feel about this topic. I'm not saying that "beauty," "age," or anything of that nature is supposed to be strictly viewed the way that I see it. I'm not saying that certain activities aren't meant for certain people. In fact, I'm all for personal choice and if you want to do something and it's legal, then by all means, just do it. That's all I'm saying. What follows is just my personal opinion and if you have problems with it or if you don't necessarily agree with my views on the topic, that's fine with me. Express your thoughts, your disagreements. It's an open forum.
Dove has an ad campaign and it's all about redefining beauty. This time, it's about age and does beauty end when you reach a certain age. I'm of the opinion that their campaign is laudable. Their message is an excellent message.
I agree with what they say. Beauty has no age limit. Beauty comes in many shapes and sizes. All commendable.
Now, what does this have to do with the following? Quite a bit. I wasn't really aware of this campaign until I was surfing through the channels and happened to land on Oprah. I saw a short snippet and only heard some vague statements about Dove's new campaign. What I heard was the parts about their message is all about beauty has no age limits. That's all I heard and saw, as I had to leave for a class. All good.
Then I saw the back of Life magazine and I am beginning to rethink how good their campaign is. Not the substance of the campaign, but how they are delivering the message. The last campaign, one that focused on how beauty comes in many shapes and sizes, in my opinion was tastefully done. I couldn't find anything that I could object to. The delivery--how they sent the message--was done quite nicely.
The delivery on this campaign, however, wasn't as good. In fact, I think the delivery might be a bit of overkill.
Let's just say when it's oh, 8:30 in the morning, one does not want to see what I saw. It makes one wonder if one is fully awake in the morning. If one is not, then looking at what I saw might do the trick, though not necessisarily in a positive manner.
I will not post what I saw directly as it might not get past any filters (for those of you at work or in a public library or anywhere that has Internet filters installed on their computer), but I shall, instead, have a link to said ad pictures and the TV ads.
I might add in, if one is not fully prepared for what those links will show, what you may see, might be shocking. It certainly was shocking to me as that image is now burned into my eyeballs and my mind and it is slowing getting out. A good dose of mental bleach will get the rest out.
I also might add in that the magazine ad pictures on the website are just a fraction of what the full-page magazine ads show. Just to let you know. Those commenting on the ads, at least on the Dove forum, are, for the most part, in support of the ads and consider them good. There are some negative responses.
Maybe I'm not as open-minded as I thought I am, as I have a negative response to the ads. If I were as open-minded about beauty as I say I am, I would not be so...so...squeamish about said ads. Maybe my standards of beauty aren't as accepting as Dove's standards for beauty as I am a male and this talk about me being open-minded is just a sham for supposed political correctness. All of this is a possibility.
That's all for now.
I was working on the New York Times crossword and the Wall Street Journal crossword as well. In general, I prefer these crosswords as they require some level of crossword knowledge and a certain level of skill to successfully solve them. Pretty much, they aren't easy crossword puzzles. I solved them both in about an hour total, which was disappointing, as I expected a little more of a challenge.
Since I was done so early, I decided to read the Kansas City Star. I like to read the Star only for the sports section. They had a relatively interesting article about the Kansas City Royals, a baseball team that is hopeless in my opinion. The only entertainment one can get out of the Royals is predicting how awful they will be this year. It would be considered a good year if they get close to a .500 record, something that I doubt will happen in a while.
While browsing the Kansas City Star, I notice the Life Magazine supplement. If you don't get it, you might as well consider yourself lucky, as it's not much of an interesting read. The articles aren't interesting. Some of them are poorly written. Their Editor's Picks on what to see, read, watch, etc. are laughable at times, if not most of the times. They actually recommened people to see some of the crappiest TV shows and movies ever. And their picks for the hottest and best shows on TV are so awful. For some reason, they picked the shows that lasted for only one or two epidsodes and were cancelled. Which is quite telling on how good the editors of Life are at picking anything worth reading, watching, buying or listening to. They redeem themselves, sometimes, but not always. I digress.
So I manage to get through this week's Life supplement. I'll summarize the contents for you. An article about Jennifer Hudson (This is something already done by so many magazines and newspapers already and much better written. I might also add, Life is several weeks if not several months behind on their great article ideas. They might want to call their magazine Life, Several Weeks Ago), a blurb on the Chinese New Year (already done already), Oscar night stories (kind of entertaing, but as again, much better done), and some other forgettable stuff.
I get to the end of this waste of paper and then I see the back. Let's jsut say that it was quite an eyeful, but in a bad way.
I'd like to preface that my comments are not meant to be demeaning in any way, but meant to be only construed as my personal opinion. It's what I feel about this topic. I'm not saying that "beauty," "age," or anything of that nature is supposed to be strictly viewed the way that I see it. I'm not saying that certain activities aren't meant for certain people. In fact, I'm all for personal choice and if you want to do something and it's legal, then by all means, just do it. That's all I'm saying. What follows is just my personal opinion and if you have problems with it or if you don't necessarily agree with my views on the topic, that's fine with me. Express your thoughts, your disagreements. It's an open forum.
Dove has an ad campaign and it's all about redefining beauty. This time, it's about age and does beauty end when you reach a certain age. I'm of the opinion that their campaign is laudable. Their message is an excellent message.
I agree with what they say. Beauty has no age limit. Beauty comes in many shapes and sizes. All commendable.
Now, what does this have to do with the following? Quite a bit. I wasn't really aware of this campaign until I was surfing through the channels and happened to land on Oprah. I saw a short snippet and only heard some vague statements about Dove's new campaign. What I heard was the parts about their message is all about beauty has no age limits. That's all I heard and saw, as I had to leave for a class. All good.
Then I saw the back of Life magazine and I am beginning to rethink how good their campaign is. Not the substance of the campaign, but how they are delivering the message. The last campaign, one that focused on how beauty comes in many shapes and sizes, in my opinion was tastefully done. I couldn't find anything that I could object to. The delivery--how they sent the message--was done quite nicely.
The delivery on this campaign, however, wasn't as good. In fact, I think the delivery might be a bit of overkill.
Let's just say when it's oh, 8:30 in the morning, one does not want to see what I saw. It makes one wonder if one is fully awake in the morning. If one is not, then looking at what I saw might do the trick, though not necessisarily in a positive manner.
I will not post what I saw directly as it might not get past any filters (for those of you at work or in a public library or anywhere that has Internet filters installed on their computer), but I shall, instead, have a link to said ad pictures and the TV ads.
I might add in, if one is not fully prepared for what those links will show, what you may see, might be shocking. It certainly was shocking to me as that image is now burned into my eyeballs and my mind and it is slowing getting out. A good dose of mental bleach will get the rest out.
I also might add in that the magazine ad pictures on the website are just a fraction of what the full-page magazine ads show. Just to let you know. Those commenting on the ads, at least on the Dove forum, are, for the most part, in support of the ads and consider them good. There are some negative responses.
Maybe I'm not as open-minded as I thought I am, as I have a negative response to the ads. If I were as open-minded about beauty as I say I am, I would not be so...so...squeamish about said ads. Maybe my standards of beauty aren't as accepting as Dove's standards for beauty as I am a male and this talk about me being open-minded is just a sham for supposed political correctness. All of this is a possibility.
That's all for now.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Update to Gray Hall II
Greetings and welcome back to The Un-Zone, the only site on the Internet devoted to all things related to Un. It's time for a short update as there is nothing worth writing about today. Other than KU beat Colorado, it's still winter in Kansas, and that yesterday was Valentine's Day.
I haven't been regular with the Gray Hall II story, but I have an update posted up today. It's all about a day in International Trade Law. One must be warned as this chapter goes into detail about why International Trade Law is such a wonderfully complex class. And why if one is not into dense legal analysis or much into making logical conclusions based upon the vagaries of a country's history, religion, culture, etc., then this field is not for you. There is an added warning.
I've given a sample lecture from an International Trade Law class and it is long. And it crams a whole bunch of information into it. Please be aware that reading this painstakingly crafted lecture may cause drowsiness and if one is on medications, this might prove to be a dangerous combination.
That's all for now.
I haven't been regular with the Gray Hall II story, but I have an update posted up today. It's all about a day in International Trade Law. One must be warned as this chapter goes into detail about why International Trade Law is such a wonderfully complex class. And why if one is not into dense legal analysis or much into making logical conclusions based upon the vagaries of a country's history, religion, culture, etc., then this field is not for you. There is an added warning.
I've given a sample lecture from an International Trade Law class and it is long. And it crams a whole bunch of information into it. Please be aware that reading this painstakingly crafted lecture may cause drowsiness and if one is on medications, this might prove to be a dangerous combination.
That's all for now.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Happy Valentines Day...Assuming You Don't Read This
"Want to buy some illusions? Slightly used, just like new. Such romantic illusions, and they're all about you. I sell them all for a penny, they make pretty souvenirs. Take my lovely illusions, some for laughs, some for tears."
-Erica Von Schluetow, "A Foreign Affair"
"Love, love, you know what love is? Love is an illusion created by lawyer types like yourself to perpetuate another illusion called marriage to create the reality of divorce and then the illusionary need for divorce lawyers."
-Kevin, "St. Elmo's Fire"
"True love is like ghosts, which everybody talks about and few have seen."
-François Duc de La Rochefoucauld
Greetings and welcome back to the Un-Zone, the only site on the Internet devoted to all things related to Un. This site, pretty much, is all about me and what I find interesting. If you don't like this, well, there's always another website to go to. Kindly hit the Back Icon or find a link you might enjoy on the sidebar. I hear that Google is a great site...unless you're in Myanmar. They don't have the Internet.
If you haven't realized by now, today is Valentine's Day. If you are male, currently in a relationship and you don't realize this fact, despite you significant other breathing down your neck and asking what you are going to do today...I pity you. If you are living where it is snowing or previously snowed, bundle up. If you thought it's cold outside, it will get extremely warm soon. And not in a pleasant way.
I don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day. There are several reasons, but the most important reason is that I am single, so celebrating Valentine’s Day is a pointless exercise in futility. I could go on with the many reasons I am single and it will all come in due time, but not now. The second reason is just as logical. If I am in a relationship, it will fail, no matter what I do.
Any relationship that I have in the future will inevitably fail. It will crash and burn at some unknown point in time. Even if it is the one that I think will “last forever,” it will fail. It’s bound to happen. What is the reason for this failure? No woman will make me happy. Before you think that I have unrealistic standards, I have to add in the following. I will never make any woman happy.
Maybe I should rephrase this in a different way. Any relationship I am in will never be a realistic relationship. It will be some version of a Hollywood-movie cliché that we can never achieve. In some way, we'll be wondering if our relationship is fitting some theoretical model based upon a chick-flick, some romance novel, or some perfect relationship we see on television. We’ll both be thinking that romance will hit me suddenly and it will happen in due time. It will happen as long as I wait and keep on believing…just like any one of those sappy love songs you hear on the radio.
That’s the problem. Success or failure will be measured on some unrealistic standard, what you call fake love, love that never happens. Song lyrics give you some vague version of love that makes sense. It’s how love is supposed to feel. Girls are supposed to fall in love with the boy, no matter what people say, because it's the right thing to do. Love is a many splendored thing (and last forever) when it doesn't we're supposed to ask why we're falling in love and we're supposed to get bitter about it. But when it's good, it's good.
In order to show your love, what do you do? You buy them roses and chocolates on Valentine's Day. And to really show your love, you do the jewelry route. Not just any kind of sparkly rock, but a diamond. After all, as the commercials say, "A Diamond Lasts Forever." Love doesn't. People want to believe it and that by believing it, you’re going to have everything end perfectly (just like Bridget Jones's Diary or When Harry Met Sally or…you get the point of this). The concept of fake love created by movies and popular culture is powerful. And hell, I'm probably thinking like this right now.
I’ll never know if my relationship is going well, as there is no standard. We’re all trying to live like a perky sitcom couple who seems perfect. If I show my affection in a sane manner, she probably won’t like me. If I do what pop culture says what is right, despite what I think about pop culture or what society thinks is right, then I won’t be happy in some way. I might as well have an unconventional and impractical relationship, but now, the unconventional and unacceptable relationship is now acceptable and cool. I lose in either case.
Maybe people aren’t falling for pop culture. I’m not the most handsome person. I’m what you might consider to be funny, kind of emotionally detached, nerd and academic, an inherently one of those quiet “nice guys.” In Hollywood terms, I have the Woody Allen/Billy Crystal double-play. Woody Allen gave smart and funny guys who may not be handsome the hope that a beautiful girl might date you (in a million years or so). I'm sorry, that bit rarely works. Despite what everyone might say, people are looking for good-looking people. It sounds vain and superficial, but it's the truth.
Billy Crystal played Harry in When Harry Met Sally; this movie was based on the “best friends becoming soul mates” premise. Again, it’s not going to happen in reality. It never works because one person is completely oblivious about the other person’s affections or knows about them and will never date the other person in a million years. I’m going for the latter possibility. To be perfectly honest, there have been many times, more than I can remember, where I've wanted to ask certain people out, but never did. This might be seen as a sign or cowardice, but I consider it a sign of practicality and acceptance of reality. As much as I might like to believe something might result from it (positive results), it's not going to happen. I might be friends with them, but I'm not going to expect anything more from it. Especially when the other person is not reacting in a manner that might indicate wanting more for the relationship other than friendship. On the other hand, any single, attractive females are welcome to prove me wrong.
Fake love might be worth it. At least when I wake up on February 15 and as I eat a bowl of cereal, someone will be at the other end of the table, looking at me. Most likely, they’ll intensely look at me with dagger-like eyes, resenting the silence. Because the silence means silence, and not some profound statement that has some deeper symbolic meaning. It means that it is all over. It will be the first real thing about the relationship. There will be no more empty and meaningless phrases that sounded so wittily intelligent. I’ll sit there wanting to disappear, to melt into the background, to get far away from there. Only because I tried to be an Icarus in relationships. Reaching for the Sun when staying close to the ground might have been better.
Depressing? No, that’s what happens in real life. Sad but true. You know, I think I'm going to eat my cereal alone. For a long while. And be happy about it.
Oh, for all of you people in relationships right now...Happy Valentine's Day.
-Erica Von Schluetow, "A Foreign Affair"
"Love, love, you know what love is? Love is an illusion created by lawyer types like yourself to perpetuate another illusion called marriage to create the reality of divorce and then the illusionary need for divorce lawyers."
-Kevin, "St. Elmo's Fire"
"True love is like ghosts, which everybody talks about and few have seen."
-François Duc de La Rochefoucauld
Greetings and welcome back to the Un-Zone, the only site on the Internet devoted to all things related to Un. This site, pretty much, is all about me and what I find interesting. If you don't like this, well, there's always another website to go to. Kindly hit the Back Icon or find a link you might enjoy on the sidebar. I hear that Google is a great site...unless you're in Myanmar. They don't have the Internet.
If you haven't realized by now, today is Valentine's Day. If you are male, currently in a relationship and you don't realize this fact, despite you significant other breathing down your neck and asking what you are going to do today...I pity you. If you are living where it is snowing or previously snowed, bundle up. If you thought it's cold outside, it will get extremely warm soon. And not in a pleasant way.
I don’t celebrate Valentine’s Day. There are several reasons, but the most important reason is that I am single, so celebrating Valentine’s Day is a pointless exercise in futility. I could go on with the many reasons I am single and it will all come in due time, but not now. The second reason is just as logical. If I am in a relationship, it will fail, no matter what I do.
Any relationship that I have in the future will inevitably fail. It will crash and burn at some unknown point in time. Even if it is the one that I think will “last forever,” it will fail. It’s bound to happen. What is the reason for this failure? No woman will make me happy. Before you think that I have unrealistic standards, I have to add in the following. I will never make any woman happy.
Maybe I should rephrase this in a different way. Any relationship I am in will never be a realistic relationship. It will be some version of a Hollywood-movie cliché that we can never achieve. In some way, we'll be wondering if our relationship is fitting some theoretical model based upon a chick-flick, some romance novel, or some perfect relationship we see on television. We’ll both be thinking that romance will hit me suddenly and it will happen in due time. It will happen as long as I wait and keep on believing…just like any one of those sappy love songs you hear on the radio.
That’s the problem. Success or failure will be measured on some unrealistic standard, what you call fake love, love that never happens. Song lyrics give you some vague version of love that makes sense. It’s how love is supposed to feel. Girls are supposed to fall in love with the boy, no matter what people say, because it's the right thing to do. Love is a many splendored thing (and last forever) when it doesn't we're supposed to ask why we're falling in love and we're supposed to get bitter about it. But when it's good, it's good.
In order to show your love, what do you do? You buy them roses and chocolates on Valentine's Day. And to really show your love, you do the jewelry route. Not just any kind of sparkly rock, but a diamond. After all, as the commercials say, "A Diamond Lasts Forever." Love doesn't. People want to believe it and that by believing it, you’re going to have everything end perfectly (just like Bridget Jones's Diary or When Harry Met Sally or…you get the point of this). The concept of fake love created by movies and popular culture is powerful. And hell, I'm probably thinking like this right now.
I’ll never know if my relationship is going well, as there is no standard. We’re all trying to live like a perky sitcom couple who seems perfect. If I show my affection in a sane manner, she probably won’t like me. If I do what pop culture says what is right, despite what I think about pop culture or what society thinks is right, then I won’t be happy in some way. I might as well have an unconventional and impractical relationship, but now, the unconventional and unacceptable relationship is now acceptable and cool. I lose in either case.
Maybe people aren’t falling for pop culture. I’m not the most handsome person. I’m what you might consider to be funny, kind of emotionally detached, nerd and academic, an inherently one of those quiet “nice guys.” In Hollywood terms, I have the Woody Allen/Billy Crystal double-play. Woody Allen gave smart and funny guys who may not be handsome the hope that a beautiful girl might date you (in a million years or so). I'm sorry, that bit rarely works. Despite what everyone might say, people are looking for good-looking people. It sounds vain and superficial, but it's the truth.
Billy Crystal played Harry in When Harry Met Sally; this movie was based on the “best friends becoming soul mates” premise. Again, it’s not going to happen in reality. It never works because one person is completely oblivious about the other person’s affections or knows about them and will never date the other person in a million years. I’m going for the latter possibility. To be perfectly honest, there have been many times, more than I can remember, where I've wanted to ask certain people out, but never did. This might be seen as a sign or cowardice, but I consider it a sign of practicality and acceptance of reality. As much as I might like to believe something might result from it (positive results), it's not going to happen. I might be friends with them, but I'm not going to expect anything more from it. Especially when the other person is not reacting in a manner that might indicate wanting more for the relationship other than friendship. On the other hand, any single, attractive females are welcome to prove me wrong.
Fake love might be worth it. At least when I wake up on February 15 and as I eat a bowl of cereal, someone will be at the other end of the table, looking at me. Most likely, they’ll intensely look at me with dagger-like eyes, resenting the silence. Because the silence means silence, and not some profound statement that has some deeper symbolic meaning. It means that it is all over. It will be the first real thing about the relationship. There will be no more empty and meaningless phrases that sounded so wittily intelligent. I’ll sit there wanting to disappear, to melt into the background, to get far away from there. Only because I tried to be an Icarus in relationships. Reaching for the Sun when staying close to the ground might have been better.
Depressing? No, that’s what happens in real life. Sad but true. You know, I think I'm going to eat my cereal alone. For a long while. And be happy about it.
Oh, for all of you people in relationships right now...Happy Valentine's Day.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
Some Actual News...
Greetings and welcome back to The Un-Zone, the only site on the Internet devoted to all things related to Un. It's all about the little and random things floating around in my head that I happen to find interesting. Just so you know.
Since everyone in the news media is talking about Anna Nicole Smith for some reason, you've probably missed out on what is happening in the world today. I know that current events may be hard to understand, but really, is some dead ex-stripper who married a really rich man all that important? For me, if this fluff story trumps what's happening in Iraq or let alone next door...man...I dread to see what the US will be like in the future. Well, I just hope the generation that John Mayer sings about lives up to what he sings. If not, we are all screwed.
So, knowing that you all have busy schedules and might not have seen actual news of importance, I've decided to inform you about what you might have missed this weekend.
Not as news-worthy and important as what's going on in Congress. Because these events really don't influence what's going on in our day-to-day lives.
Iraq? Not important. Iran? Not important. North Korea? Not important. Anna Nicole Smith died due to unknown reasons? Stop the presses! Front page news! Forget Iraq! We all know it's FUBAR and going like hell in a handbasket. Who cares if over 3,000 people died! It's ANNA NICOLE SMITH!
That's a shame. It's disgusting. We have instant access to news, 24 hours a day. We can go online and in less than a second, know what is happening across the world. We've got newspapers, TV, and the Internet providing information that took weeks, if not months to get to people. And what do we do with this great medium of knowledge? We use it to pump out swill like non-stop coverage of snow, of Anna Nicole Smith, of sensationalized, steaming piles of swill. People hundreds of years ago would die to get information like this. And we've degraded it down to this.
That's all for now.
Since everyone in the news media is talking about Anna Nicole Smith for some reason, you've probably missed out on what is happening in the world today. I know that current events may be hard to understand, but really, is some dead ex-stripper who married a really rich man all that important? For me, if this fluff story trumps what's happening in Iraq or let alone next door...man...I dread to see what the US will be like in the future. Well, I just hope the generation that John Mayer sings about lives up to what he sings. If not, we are all screwed.
So, knowing that you all have busy schedules and might not have seen actual news of importance, I've decided to inform you about what you might have missed this weekend.
- The United States puts the pressure on Iran to change its evil ways. An aide to Vice President Cheney says that war may be a possibility and that 2007 is the "year of Iran." Not that G.W. Bush or Congress would declare an armed conflict with Iran or anything...
- North Korea has agreed to shut down a nuclear reactor and dismantle nuclear weapons...in exchange for some much-needed aid. Kim Il Jung will be able to get some fuel oil for his tanks. And in the process, ignore the agreement North Korea made, rebuild some weapons in secret, and go through this again.
- We're actually fighting four different wars in Iraq and in order to win, it may be necessary to lose one of them. This is not what G.W. Bush wanted when he said that victory is the goal. But I'm not even sure that he's sure what he means by that.
- According to the Department of Defense, as of February 13, 2007, 10AM E.S.T. the number of dead American GIs is 3122. The number of wounded is over 23,000.
- On Monday: 136 Iraqi civilians died; 3 American GIs died.
- On Sunday: 114 Iraqis, 2 GIs Killed
- On Saturday: 3 GIs, 87 Iraqis Killed
Not as news-worthy and important as what's going on in Congress. Because these events really don't influence what's going on in our day-to-day lives.
Iraq? Not important. Iran? Not important. North Korea? Not important. Anna Nicole Smith died due to unknown reasons? Stop the presses! Front page news! Forget Iraq! We all know it's FUBAR and going like hell in a handbasket. Who cares if over 3,000 people died! It's ANNA NICOLE SMITH!
That's a shame. It's disgusting. We have instant access to news, 24 hours a day. We can go online and in less than a second, know what is happening across the world. We've got newspapers, TV, and the Internet providing information that took weeks, if not months to get to people. And what do we do with this great medium of knowledge? We use it to pump out swill like non-stop coverage of snow, of Anna Nicole Smith, of sensationalized, steaming piles of swill. People hundreds of years ago would die to get information like this. And we've degraded it down to this.
That's all for now.
Monday, February 12, 2007
Here Comes the Rain Again...Turning Into Snow
Greetings and welcome back to The Un-Zone, the only site on the Internet devoted to all things related to Un. It's time for an update to this website, something that has been lacking in the past few days. Then again, it may be due to other reasons, other than a lack of random thoughts floating around in my head. Well, here comes an update...
It's now raining in Lawrence right now. And it will turn into freezing rain and quite possibly, snow. Ah, nothing like winter weather in Kansas. I'm not going to complain, as I could be in New York right now and have over ten feet of snow on top of me right now. That would be something to talk about. The pictures put everything into a proper perspective. For some reason, people want snow and when it comes, they start complaining and start wishing that it would end. Go figure.
I'm still working on a research paper for Advanced International Trade Law (AITL). It's getting better...I think. At this moment, I'm not sure what to make of it. I'm now going over a lovely (note the sarcasm) 160 page report on the Internet and China written by the Human Rights Watch organization. That's in additon to the OpenNet Initiative summary of the situation. All in all, it's not as bad as I thought it would be, which isn't saying that much, as I had very low standards for such academic work. I still wonder how my AITL professor maintains his sanity while reading WTO Panel Reports, as those can be well over 300 pages long.
In other law school related business, the Advanced Litigation case is going quite swimmingly. It's about a nasty child custody dispute with wacky facts like the mother supposedly belonging to a cult (rules include no bathing, lighting incense, and listening to sitar music all day); a father who allegedly drinks, gambles, and cheats with his secretary; and a child psychologist named Dr. Kildare. It's almost too good to be true, which I suspect this case is. That is, a true child custody case but modified. I just can't wait to become a lawyer (more sarcasm here) and deal with cases like this...
You my have also noticed that Gray Hall Two is on hiatus at this moment. Don't fret. I should have a new chapter up very soon. I've got all this other stuff to worry about and the story had to wait.
That's all for now.
It's now raining in Lawrence right now. And it will turn into freezing rain and quite possibly, snow. Ah, nothing like winter weather in Kansas. I'm not going to complain, as I could be in New York right now and have over ten feet of snow on top of me right now. That would be something to talk about. The pictures put everything into a proper perspective. For some reason, people want snow and when it comes, they start complaining and start wishing that it would end. Go figure.
I'm still working on a research paper for Advanced International Trade Law (AITL). It's getting better...I think. At this moment, I'm not sure what to make of it. I'm now going over a lovely (note the sarcasm) 160 page report on the Internet and China written by the Human Rights Watch organization. That's in additon to the OpenNet Initiative summary of the situation. All in all, it's not as bad as I thought it would be, which isn't saying that much, as I had very low standards for such academic work. I still wonder how my AITL professor maintains his sanity while reading WTO Panel Reports, as those can be well over 300 pages long.
In other law school related business, the Advanced Litigation case is going quite swimmingly. It's about a nasty child custody dispute with wacky facts like the mother supposedly belonging to a cult (rules include no bathing, lighting incense, and listening to sitar music all day); a father who allegedly drinks, gambles, and cheats with his secretary; and a child psychologist named Dr. Kildare. It's almost too good to be true, which I suspect this case is. That is, a true child custody case but modified. I just can't wait to become a lawyer (more sarcasm here) and deal with cases like this...
You my have also noticed that Gray Hall Two is on hiatus at this moment. Don't fret. I should have a new chapter up very soon. I've got all this other stuff to worry about and the story had to wait.
That's all for now.
Thursday, February 08, 2007
Thoughts For Today
Greetings and welcome back to the Un-Zone, the only site on the Internet devoted to all things related to Un. If you don't know by now, this blog is all about the random stuff floating in my head that I find to be of interest. Hey, you came here so deal with it. There's a link to Google on the sidebar and there's always the Back icon on your browser. Don't make me call the wahmbulance because you don't like this site.
Speaking of calling the wahmbulance, I saw the Sunflower Shootout, formerly called the Sunflower Showdown, but changed due to the political correctness that seems to be pervading society these days. Maybe it's back to the Sunflower Showdown. At least Oklahoma-Oklahoma State is still the Bedlam Series and Texas-Oklahoma in football is called the Red River Shootout. God forbid what sort of politically correct names they might change them to. Something like the Red River Disagreement or the "We're Kind of Mad At You Series." It's sort of like the Border War between Missouri and Kansas being changed to the Border Showdown. This is an apt name as Missouri Ruffians and Free-Staters from what was Kansas Territory were killing each other and burning cities down. All over whether Kansas should be a free-state or a slave-state. And this started in 1854, long before the US Civil War. John Brown, William Quantrill, the Raid on Lawrence...great stuff. I still call it the Border War as it is an intense rivalry. My background in hsitory in college wells up...so excuse me.
KU laid the proverbial smackdown and opened up the can o' whoop on K-State in this basketball game. It did get close in the first half due to the inspired play of Maybank, the only person on the K-State basketball team who was animated. Well, you might include in Coach Huggins (and his days at the University of Cincinnati), where guys played basketball and failed to graduate. They did, however, get lots of free time to do stuff like domestic violence. One had so much free time, he taped someone to a lawn chair, clubbed him with a whiskey bottle, and threw weights at his head. But they won games and made it to the tournament, so that was much more important. Let's hope that K-State is happy with their decision. If you've got to put in a clause that makes payment of salary dependent on "reputation of the University," you've got a problem.
Not that I'm bashing college sports or Coach Huggins, but this is what "student-athlete" has become. A giant joke. They're focusing more on the sports part and less on the student part. The student part requires stuff like going to class and getting a grade, other than a D or an F, let alone an incomplete. It requires graduation, no matter how long that takes. College sports have become a money making business and not what college is supposed to be about like an education. But I digress.
Jason Bennett needs to take a chill pill. Seriously. Extra strength if they've got it. Yelling and screaming at the referee because you think there was a phantom foul called on you every single time is not going to go over very well. Punching chairs is not a good thing. Ranting and raving is unproductive. If Coach Huggins has to restrain you and he is acting calmly and rational, that is definitely a bad thing. If he's an example of correct behavior, that's a sign you should shut up and sit down. Or play better basketball and pay more attention in practice. You might learn something there. Like how to play basketball without fouling out. Sure you might think the call stinks and you're not getting your way, that's how things work out sometimes, in basketball and in life. Put simply, shut up, quit your whining, and deal with it.
He can get a chill pill when the wahmbulance comes on by after the game. I can't wait until the game in Manhattan Kansas. Maybe Bennett will have grown up emotionally from the level of a whiny jerk to a more emotionally stable toddler. At least the toddler knows when to cry cause they actually have a reason to cry and scream about. Heck, he might have made a big advancement in his level of maturity and become, I don't know, a seven year old. He may be 7+ feet tall, but he whines like he is 6 months.
So that is a summary of the the first Huggins-era Sunflower Showdown. Not much of a showdown as Jason Bennett got "Kaun"ed out of a head-to-head match with Sasha Kaun. I'm just hoping that Sasha Kaun learns how to hit free throws more consistently. 50% for a big guy who is going to get a lot of free throw shooting opportunities is not good. At least Kaun doesn't whine about his bad games.
That's all for now.
Speaking of calling the wahmbulance, I saw the Sunflower Shootout, formerly called the Sunflower Showdown, but changed due to the political correctness that seems to be pervading society these days. Maybe it's back to the Sunflower Showdown. At least Oklahoma-Oklahoma State is still the Bedlam Series and Texas-Oklahoma in football is called the Red River Shootout. God forbid what sort of politically correct names they might change them to. Something like the Red River Disagreement or the "We're Kind of Mad At You Series." It's sort of like the Border War between Missouri and Kansas being changed to the Border Showdown. This is an apt name as Missouri Ruffians and Free-Staters from what was Kansas Territory were killing each other and burning cities down. All over whether Kansas should be a free-state or a slave-state. And this started in 1854, long before the US Civil War. John Brown, William Quantrill, the Raid on Lawrence...great stuff. I still call it the Border War as it is an intense rivalry. My background in hsitory in college wells up...so excuse me.
KU laid the proverbial smackdown and opened up the can o' whoop on K-State in this basketball game. It did get close in the first half due to the inspired play of Maybank, the only person on the K-State basketball team who was animated. Well, you might include in Coach Huggins (and his days at the University of Cincinnati), where guys played basketball and failed to graduate. They did, however, get lots of free time to do stuff like domestic violence. One had so much free time, he taped someone to a lawn chair, clubbed him with a whiskey bottle, and threw weights at his head. But they won games and made it to the tournament, so that was much more important. Let's hope that K-State is happy with their decision. If you've got to put in a clause that makes payment of salary dependent on "reputation of the University," you've got a problem.
Not that I'm bashing college sports or Coach Huggins, but this is what "student-athlete" has become. A giant joke. They're focusing more on the sports part and less on the student part. The student part requires stuff like going to class and getting a grade, other than a D or an F, let alone an incomplete. It requires graduation, no matter how long that takes. College sports have become a money making business and not what college is supposed to be about like an education. But I digress.
Jason Bennett needs to take a chill pill. Seriously. Extra strength if they've got it. Yelling and screaming at the referee because you think there was a phantom foul called on you every single time is not going to go over very well. Punching chairs is not a good thing. Ranting and raving is unproductive. If Coach Huggins has to restrain you and he is acting calmly and rational, that is definitely a bad thing. If he's an example of correct behavior, that's a sign you should shut up and sit down. Or play better basketball and pay more attention in practice. You might learn something there. Like how to play basketball without fouling out. Sure you might think the call stinks and you're not getting your way, that's how things work out sometimes, in basketball and in life. Put simply, shut up, quit your whining, and deal with it.
He can get a chill pill when the wahmbulance comes on by after the game. I can't wait until the game in Manhattan Kansas. Maybe Bennett will have grown up emotionally from the level of a whiny jerk to a more emotionally stable toddler. At least the toddler knows when to cry cause they actually have a reason to cry and scream about. Heck, he might have made a big advancement in his level of maturity and become, I don't know, a seven year old. He may be 7+ feet tall, but he whines like he is 6 months.
So that is a summary of the the first Huggins-era Sunflower Showdown. Not much of a showdown as Jason Bennett got "Kaun"ed out of a head-to-head match with Sasha Kaun. I'm just hoping that Sasha Kaun learns how to hit free throws more consistently. 50% for a big guy who is going to get a lot of free throw shooting opportunities is not good. At least Kaun doesn't whine about his bad games.
That's all for now.
Monday, February 05, 2007
The Day After the Super Bowl Update...
Greetings and welcome back to The Un-Zone, the only site on the Internet devoted to all things related to Un. It's time to do one of those semi-regular updates to this website so you know that I'm still alive in some manner or another.
The Colts won, 29-17. Peyton Manning continued his streak of relatively poor (at least when compared to regular season games) performance in playoff games. Well, unlike many of his previous playoff games, the Colts managed to win...at least this year.
Rex Grossman...man, they should have played somebody else as QB. He was an excellent quarterback in college, but in the NFL, that's a different story. He's like a Jekyll/Hyde and you don't know which one will show up at game time. The Good Rex (if you can call it that) is relatively efficient and mistake free. Sure, his completions and other states aren't as gaudy as Peyton Manning, but he gets the job done. The Bad Rex is the fumble/interception machine that makes Trent "The Tr-interception" Green look like Joe Montana or any all-time great QBs. OK, not that great, but when Grossman is bad, it gets really ugly. And it makes you think that Trent Green isn't all that bad (at least for a hardcore KC Chiefs fan). And last night, instead of being a T-Rex eating the competition, he was a massive train wreck. Not that pretty. The only thing consistent about his game yesterday was the inevitable sacks, hurries, and interceptions that people associate with his er...style of play on a bad day. It kind of makes the Arizona debacle (the Bears won due to Arizona's incompetence and the Chicago defense despite the SIX QB mistakes) look good in comparison.
Who decided that Peyton Manning should have been the MVP of Super Bowl XLI? His game wasn't that great despite the numbers. Addai, the running back should have gotten that honor. His running game was great and his receiving was pretty good. He got the Colts first downs when they needed them.
I like the commercials during the Super Bowl. In some cases, they're more interesting than the game itself. But this year, they weren't that super. Some of the commercials made me wonder who was the moron who thought their ad was worth $2.6 million. In previous years, a number of them were laugh-out-loud funny. This year, they were lacking something...like humor or production skills or any semblance of being interesting.
There were too many car commercials and all of them made me want to change the channel. They are boring and there are too many of them already on television. Plain and simple. Please, car companies, don't bother with car commercials during the Super Bowl. I and many others have had enough of them already. The Doritos commercials were lame or annoying. The online contest video was lame. The excited cashier one wanted to make me slap the cashier and the ad agency people who came up with that lousy ad. I still remember the Doritos commercial featuring Ali Landry and the laundromat. That was a good ad. What was up last night, not that good. The Sierra Mist commercials sucked. The fat guy is getting annoying. Stop it. Stop it. Now. Who the hell thought up the Revlon commercial? That was bad.
There were some good commercials. The Bud Light/Budweiser commercials, as usual, were funny. They managed to be funny and interesting. One of them, the foreigners learning English, was definitely politically incorrect, but it had humor. Companies wanting to sell their products in Super Bowl ads should use the ad marketing firms that Budweiser/Bud Light use. Or they should follow their formula for what a funny Super Bowl ad should be (no farting horses, please). The CareerBuilder commercials had humor. The jungle metaphor was good, but at times, got a little too tedious.
To sum up, the Colts won. Grossman outdid himself and pulled another Grossman. The Super Bowl ads, for the most part, were like a $2 blowjob from a whore in Bangkok. Basically, the ads sucked badly and weren't worth the money or the experience. I think they should have a blacklist of companies that should not be allowed Super Bowl ad time, no matter how much they pay. It should make the entire Super Bowl experience a whole lot better.
That's all for now.
The Colts won, 29-17. Peyton Manning continued his streak of relatively poor (at least when compared to regular season games) performance in playoff games. Well, unlike many of his previous playoff games, the Colts managed to win...at least this year.
Rex Grossman...man, they should have played somebody else as QB. He was an excellent quarterback in college, but in the NFL, that's a different story. He's like a Jekyll/Hyde and you don't know which one will show up at game time. The Good Rex (if you can call it that) is relatively efficient and mistake free. Sure, his completions and other states aren't as gaudy as Peyton Manning, but he gets the job done. The Bad Rex is the fumble/interception machine that makes Trent "The Tr-interception" Green look like Joe Montana or any all-time great QBs. OK, not that great, but when Grossman is bad, it gets really ugly. And it makes you think that Trent Green isn't all that bad (at least for a hardcore KC Chiefs fan). And last night, instead of being a T-Rex eating the competition, he was a massive train wreck. Not that pretty. The only thing consistent about his game yesterday was the inevitable sacks, hurries, and interceptions that people associate with his er...style of play on a bad day. It kind of makes the Arizona debacle (the Bears won due to Arizona's incompetence and the Chicago defense despite the SIX QB mistakes) look good in comparison.
Who decided that Peyton Manning should have been the MVP of Super Bowl XLI? His game wasn't that great despite the numbers. Addai, the running back should have gotten that honor. His running game was great and his receiving was pretty good. He got the Colts first downs when they needed them.
I like the commercials during the Super Bowl. In some cases, they're more interesting than the game itself. But this year, they weren't that super. Some of the commercials made me wonder who was the moron who thought their ad was worth $2.6 million. In previous years, a number of them were laugh-out-loud funny. This year, they were lacking something...like humor or production skills or any semblance of being interesting.
There were too many car commercials and all of them made me want to change the channel. They are boring and there are too many of them already on television. Plain and simple. Please, car companies, don't bother with car commercials during the Super Bowl. I and many others have had enough of them already. The Doritos commercials were lame or annoying. The online contest video was lame. The excited cashier one wanted to make me slap the cashier and the ad agency people who came up with that lousy ad. I still remember the Doritos commercial featuring Ali Landry and the laundromat. That was a good ad. What was up last night, not that good. The Sierra Mist commercials sucked. The fat guy is getting annoying. Stop it. Stop it. Now. Who the hell thought up the Revlon commercial? That was bad.
There were some good commercials. The Bud Light/Budweiser commercials, as usual, were funny. They managed to be funny and interesting. One of them, the foreigners learning English, was definitely politically incorrect, but it had humor. Companies wanting to sell their products in Super Bowl ads should use the ad marketing firms that Budweiser/Bud Light use. Or they should follow their formula for what a funny Super Bowl ad should be (no farting horses, please). The CareerBuilder commercials had humor. The jungle metaphor was good, but at times, got a little too tedious.
To sum up, the Colts won. Grossman outdid himself and pulled another Grossman. The Super Bowl ads, for the most part, were like a $2 blowjob from a whore in Bangkok. Basically, the ads sucked badly and weren't worth the money or the experience. I think they should have a blacklist of companies that should not be allowed Super Bowl ad time, no matter how much they pay. It should make the entire Super Bowl experience a whole lot better.
That's all for now.
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