I Give Up On Trying To Get It...

I will never understand why people who seem to be as smart as Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Neal Boortz can be so mind-bogglingly blind to the things going on around them. Especially when they lay heavy claims to intellectual integrity and honesty (something Mr. Hannity talks about ad nauseum on his radio show) cannot do, or rather will not do and admit that even a most minor and casual level of research can debunk the majority of their shallow views.

Love the government. They're only doing it to protect you. They can do no wrong...blah, blah, blah.

Okay, maybe they're not that shallow. I mean, after all, they do have some differences with the president and the party line. They're potato-chip kind-of-guys, and the president is a pretzel man. (*Snicker* Sorry, couldn't resist that one.) And I can almost understand why Sean and Rush are like that. I'm sure Rush stays so doped up he has trouble remembering what order the initials in "EIB" go in and Hannity is so blinded by the reflection from his enormous forehead and chin he can't see what's in front of him, but... Neal Boortz honestly surprises me.

You can listen to Neal and tell that he really is that smart. He sounds smarter and more experienced than Sean and Rush. But he can turn around and say some of the most mentally-defecient things that you will ever hear, and when you hear him say it you have more of a "What the heck?!?!?" moment than you would if Limbaugh or Hannity said it. I just don't get it. Sooooo many people as smart as these guys ... hell, even people relatively dumb as a sack of hammers can do the research to see the truth, to see why the Bush needs to be trimmed.

I just don't get it. Maybe its time to move on and get another rant.

Hitting That Funky Depression Vibe Again

You may or my not have noticed, but... no post yesterday. Yep. But... I'm sliding into depression. Nothing major, but just a minor funk. I realize that I'm letting too many things that I really have no control over. An old friend (or rather, an old high-school crush) having trouble with the douche-bag known as her child's father who she is getting a divorce from (or may have already gotten a divorce from, I forget) and is seeing other guys, my mom who may or may not lose her job due to the plant she works at closing some time between the next one-to-three years.

I was hoping to actually hoping to get to go out of town with some friends to a Haloween party and get really drunk at least forget for a little while, but they all went out of town at 6 o'clock and I didn't get off from work till 8. And not trusting my pickup to make it anywhere out of the county under its own steam, there went the jaegar-induced temporary amnesia.

And that's almost something else on its own to get down about. The fact that now I'm almost hurt that I missed an opportunity to become chemically-dependant, knowing full well that I've got family history of it on both sides. And yes, I do in fact think that people can be genetically predisposed to chemical dependancies. S'a fact. Go look it up.

O, and let's couple with all this the fact that I just heard that while my brother (who is in the school band) had his car broken into while they were playing at a football game. I don't know why. Apparently nothing was stolen, so I'm thinking random acts of vandalism from fans of the loser team. To be completely crass for a moment, but what the god-damn hell is the fucking world coming to that it makes sense to somebody to go randomly break into a bunch of cars because their football team is a bunch of damn losers!!!! AAARRGGHHH!!!

Forgive me, for taking the lord's name in vain and for being so vulgar for a moment. its just been that kind of week / month / life. Well, I'm going to try to enjoy the rest of my night and chill out as much as I can the rest of the weekend. It looks like it'll be my last chance to do so for quite some time.

Later all. And thanks for listening to my whining.

Differing Opinions On The State Of The War

Look at the heading of my blog. It says that I don't think I know everything, but am pretty sure that everyone else doesn't know nearly as much as they think they do. And its true for the most part. But I am only human, and I do occassionally succumb to the beast of arrogance, and I think I might have just done that.

A few minutes ago I just posted a response to a fellow blogger's post about the war. He had a point that we really need to get away from the labeling and balming side of things and just focus on affecting the beneficial changes that our country needs. But I did not agree with his insinuations that there is no concrete proof about dileberate misleadings concerning the WMDs. There is proof cited everywhere that is not the conservative / liberal controlled mainstream media.

I'll tell you right now that I don't know if the mainstream is controlled by liberals or neo-cons. They both throw too much crap around for my tastes.

You Know, The Funniest Thing Happened Today...

And it really is kinda funny too. I know you hear that a lot, but bear with me a sec. You'll love this. Its sooooo good its got to be fattening!

Now keep in mind that this is a rather cramped hallway that intersects 3 classrooms and 3 instructor rooms. Only one instructor was around at the moment.

Okay, I show up 15 minutes early for class, sit my books down and walk around for a second. I step back over to the classroom door and try to open it. Crap, it's locked. I fume for a second and decided to chew a piece of gum while I wait. I reach into my pocket, pull out the pack and ***bweew*** everything goes black.

CRAP!!!

Apparently not paying attention my elbow had bumped the master shutoff switch for power in our part of the building. The one instructor in his room at the moment comes out... kind of laughing.

"You hit it, didn't you?"

"..."

"Thought so. C'mon, let's find comeone with a key."

Now, neither of us knows why they have the breakers for that switch in a completely different part of the building or why the thing is still even up to begin with. So we go ask around and finally find someone with a key to the room where the box is (the gentleman who just so happens to be the instructor for the 5 o'clock class I was waiting to start), but he didn't have a key to the fence around it. We found an instructor in the automotive department with a key to fence to let us in.

The room is a scary sight and hums like you wouldn't believe. We find a big honkin' fuse box with breakers and whatnot the size of my fist and look around. We find one breaker that looks like it may have been tripped, so we try to raise another faculty member familiat with the electrics to confirm we're looking at the right breaker, and not something left off to prevent the building from catching fire or something. While the instructor who found me in the hall when the lights went out makes a call, I stepped outside with my teacher and he started smoking while talking about this being another thing in the already bad day he was having.

Keep in mind two things. My teacher had just lit one up. Its also about 15 minutes after class was supposed to start.

The instructor on the phone comes out and reminds us of this. My teacher rubs his cigarette out on the ground and runs off to make sure nobody leaves and to remind everyone that class is, in fact, still on. The other instructor gets confirmation that we're looking at the right breaker, resets it, and I run on ahead and made sure that everything was working. Yep, as I stepped back into the building and the computer labs were rebooting themselves.

So for those of you who were having a bad day, I hope this at least made it a little better.

After all, if we can't laugh at ourselves, who can we laugh at?
(I'm tired of laughing at Bush!)

Cleaning Up The Ol' Drawing Table: Back to Working On My Personal Projects

I've always got a plethora of personal projects going on at one time. Most of the times they get started and never really see the light of day and get past that initial conception stage. Drawings, roleplaying game stuff... and a whole lot more than I can even remember.

So over the last few days I've been going back over everything on my plate so to speak and clearing it off... just throwing away everything that I know I will never get around to or have lost complete and utter intrest in.

So now I am down to my three big projects: new comic pages for my portfolio, a flash cartoon my brother and I are working on for a contest, and my own campaign setting for Dungeons and Dragons. The cartoon is a new thing, the other two are me trying to get back on track with old projects.

My biggest step towards one of these projects was yesterday when I completed a prestige class for my campaign setting: the Planar Sentry. Basically its combat-oriented class meant to take on outsiders and extrplanar entities. Right now its a 5-level class, with a Smite Outsider at each level and another ability at almost every level. Honestly, it seems a little broken to me. I'm likely to revise the number of smites per day and how one of their other abilities works. Shhhhhh... its a secret. Suffice it to say, there's another thing or two I'd like to add in there, so I might actually expand the class to a 10-level class.

Minor Change in Posting Policy

Okay, one minor change in posting policies. As my weekend is usually filled with the bulk of my study time and the little bit of time I get for personal projects and / or a social life, I will not be doing daily posts on Saturday and Sunday.

I will continue to do daily posts on Monday thru Friday, and additional posts as news comes up that I see fit to point out to others, like what I did a few weeks ago with the rave in Utah and all that.

Later all.

Looking Forward To A New Drawing Experience

Great news, all. After talking to the drafting instructor at the tech college I'm attending, she managed to hook me up with a catalog for drafting supplies that she uses in her class, and thanks to that, I've been introduced to something I've been looking for for a very long time: a steady supply of non-repro blue lead!

KA-WOOT!!!

For those of you who do not know, comic book pencilers usually do their layouts and initial sketches in a non-repro blue lead. Usually they are easier to erase and are not reproduced by most scanners and copiers, hence the "non-repro" part of the name.

There's only one catch tho; they're professional drafting leads. I've had no experience with sharpening the darn things once they begin to lose their points and whatnot. It's going to be a new experience. I'll let you know how it all goes.

P.S. I'm going to start compiling a list of links to the stupidest people on the internet and in the media. I'll give you a hint on a few of the names. One starts with "S" and ends in "ean Hannity." Another starts with "R" and ends in "ush Limbaugh." You see where I'm going with this, right? Well, perhaps "stupid" might be an inappropriate label. After all, most of them are "relatively" smart and over-tout the merits of their own "intellectual honesty" (Mr. Hannity, I'm looking at you...), but they are blindly biased and moreover are trying to inflict that bias on others. Not only is that stupid, but its a tad hurtful to us as a society, no?

Make-Up Post 5: Tuesday: Thinking About My Comic Book Concept More

Remember waaaaay back when I talked about my pseudo-Christian comic book idea basically about a robot and an amazon-esque primal woman called "A.D.A.M and Eve" and promised to post some of my prototype pix up, and never did.

Well, there's a reason for that.

I'm growing a little reluctant about the concept alltogether. Don't get me wrong. I'd like to do the android / woman love story right, and I think I could. Its just that some of the storyline ideas I had for the book seemed like they might be a little dark. Dark to the point that many more fundamental Christians might find it to be a little too offensive. I'm not scared of fighting the Southern Baptists or anything. I've been getting on their nerves and them on mine for quite some time now. Its just that I'm biding my time 'till I get things so concretely put together that I can hopefully present some of it in a non-blasphemous light.

Make-Up Post 4: Sunday: Moment of Self-Realization

I woke up this morning and realized that... I really am declining from the person I want to be.

The last few weeks, I've been staying up late all the time and waking up late in the morning, my schedual usually putting me going to sleep around 1:00 a.m. or so and getting up at about 11:00 a.m. a scant 3 hours before my first class of the day. It really gets on my nerves because I've missed a good bit of gym time the last week and I'm kicking myself because of it.

And that's when I realized one of the big things that's changed about me is that I am not nearly as self-disciplined as I used to be. Its a big thing that I need to work on. So tonight, screw the world. After I get off from work at 8:30, I'm going home, getting a wee bit of study time and play time in, then I'm hitting the hay at 10:30. I'll let you know how that all works out.

Make-Up Post 3: Saturday: Teaching Seems To Be The Best Way To Learn

Yesterday I was treated to an unique experience. A classmate of mine offered to help explain a problem we both were having trouble with to me. I was so taken aback that I sat there and let him run with it. And I have to admit I was impressed.

We were looking at issues with supernetting and route summarization and as he sat there explaining the problem from one of our tests to me. He would stop for a few moments, like he'd get stuck because he was really doubting his grasp of it. But he'd eventually get focused again and get back to the point. Overall, he really did help shed some light on things from me, and I was glad he did.

He really is smart, but he doubts himself too much. And when he's speaking, you can really see it. When he has a firm grasp on things, he just kind of blurts it out and it usually is the right answer.

And I could tell that when he was trying to teach the process to me, he was helping himself really to further understand it. So I really hope that he can learn to get over those moments of self-doubt.

More Make-up Posts and A self-Realization of Sorts

Hi. I'm sure you noticed no posts yesterday. Not even make-up posts for the remainder of the prior missed posts last week.

PC problems.

Hand to God.

But I'm back. All taken care of. I'll have a make-up post for yesterday, and another post or two for the prior missed days.

Again. I'm sorry. T'wat out of my hands.

Make-Up Posts 2: Friday: Quick-Growing Collagen: Just Remove Water!

According to a BBC News report today, a team at the University College London has discovered a way to accellerate tissue generation via the removal of water from the starting material. Typically the process of creating specimens for skin grafts and whatnot runs between one and twelve weeks. There is speculation that this could accellerate the process greatly.

This technique, called plastic compression allowed for the creation of collagen in under a half an hour. This is great news for surgeons and patients everywhere, allowing for speed and effeciency unheard of and the creation of tissue at the bedside or in the operating theater.

This is definitely something for everyone to keep their ears to the ground for further news on.

Make-Up Posts 1: Thursday: Holy Immense IP Iterations, Batman!

This might seem a little strange for someone who plans to be immersed in the world of high-tech, but maybe, just maybe we don't need to be growing as big or as fast as we are doing now. Surprisingly enough, the thing that really has got me thinking about this is the concept of subnetting.

I just heard the brains of everyone not into networking shut down for a second. Don't worry, you don't need to know much about it, but here's a quick synopsis.

In orders for computers to talk to each other on a network, they need to have an IP address. But you might only want one set of computers to be able to talk to another set of computers, so you might put them on a different subnet(work) from the other computers they shouldn't talk to. Now IP addresses are ultimately the mailing system of the internet with the IP address saying that this bit of information needs to go here, and vice-versa. This means that each seperate network has to have its own IP address.... and so on. You get the general idea, right?

Now we're on IPv4. The IP address is 4 decimal octets whose values can range from 0 to 255. There are 4,294,967,296 unique addresses and we're running out fast. Thanks to subnetting, supernetting and other networking technologies, we are able to conserve addresses and essentially allow duplicate addresses on private networks that might match other unattached networks' addresses. Anyway... sounds like a lot doesn't it?

IPv6, however, will be a brand new beast. It will be a 128-bit addressing scheme composed of 32 hexadecimal characters (that's right, base-16!!!). The result: 430 quintillion (4.3 × 10²⁰) unique addresses per square inch, or 670 quadrillion (6.7 × 10¹⁷) per square millimeter, of the Earth's surface. To get a grasp of these numbers, please follow the links to Wikipedia, which has a great explanation on these large numbers. Also, for a more comprehensive explanation on IPv6 itself, please check out the Wikipedia link here.

What could we possibly need this many addresses for? I'm not sure, honestly. Even if you were to slap a computer and cell-phone in the hands of every living person on the face of the planet, one office computer per government official, one per computer per corporate officer, and toss in an additional one per every person on the planet, we're still only really hitting the 20 billion or so mark.

If you listen to the alternative media which I encourage you to do (and occassionally the mainstream media), you will hear talk about implanting RFID chips into people for tracking purposes. Yes, I do believe its coming. Yes, I do believe it will likely be against our will. But think about it... that many unique IP addresses, that many RFID chips.... it'll make things pretty easy to route and / or track all that movement and data.

I'm not trying to scare people, but it's something to think about.

It Was A Busy Weekend...

But I'm gonna make up for the missing posts. Today. I promise.

I'd rather not say exactly why I was so busy this weekend, just suffice it to say that most reasons were family-related and the others... well, that's just between me and the concerned parties at the moment.

I was actually working on a large post since Thursday night, but didn't get to post it because of class. That, however, will be taken care of today.

Anyway, have fun with today's Make-Up Posts!

I've Been Thinking Again... No Wonder My Head Hurts!

But seriously...

The state of American politics really has me troubled. I can't help but to be shocked and dismayed by the complete and utter disregard that our politicians have for the laws and protocols they would have us follow. The corruption has hit the point to where it is almost absolute (surely you remember that old adage about power corrupting...). And the saddest part about it is that we let them get away with it!!! Especially the Bush crony-ism!!! What is it with this man appointing grossly underqualified to positions of power within his administration???

The man can't have lost his mind... because I'm not entirely sure he was in full possession of his mental faculties to begin with.

But surely we as a country have taken leave of our most basic senses.

Instead of merely crying out in outrage and listening to the media reminding us of how outraged we tell each other we are, its time to get out to the ballot-boxes and remind the politicians who really is in charge and who, at the end of the day, really signs the checks!

Now that I'm thinking about it, maybe in the future we'll explore the illegalities of the current income tax system.

Young Avengers Have Renewed My Faith In Marvel Comics: And A Partial Apology To Mr. Howard Chaykin

Last night I re-read the latest issue of Young Avengers (issue #7 to be specific), and something occurred to me: Howard Chaykin (famed comic book writer / artist I got a chance to meet at this past DragonCon) was right about something: Marvel Comics may still very well be the "House of Ideas" (a label it has hoarded away to itself for many years now).

So to Mr. Howard Chaykin. You can count yourself among the honored number of 26 people I have ever admited this to. If I ever run into you again, the drinks are on me!

You were right.

I was wrong.

Kind of.

Specifically, Marvel Comics still does occassionally let new and great ideas burst through the slew of X-Books we have to wade through month after month.

The Young Avengers (as well as their New Avengers counterpart) is a very fresh and interesting title that I've got to encourage everyone to read. In the current 7 issues to date, they have picked up the tatters left from the Avengers Dissassembled storyline of last year and strove to help pick up the slack of the heroes they thought lost to the world. Gathered by Iron Lad (who was revealed to be a young version of Kang the Conqueror), the first few members known as Patriot, Asgardian, and Hulkling were all supposed to have some sort of ties to the Avengers of old (just not in the obvious ways as some would think). Patriot was revealed to be the Grandson of the ORIGINAL BLACK Captain America who recieved an infusion of blood from his grandfather and apparently some of the super-soldier serum along with it. No connection has really been revealed about Hulkling and Asgardian other than the fact that Asgardian has absolutely nothing to do with Thor or the gods of Asgard. His powers are magic of some sort.

Their first mission led them to break up a hostage situation at a church where they ran into the girl who would end up becoming their next member, "Hawkingbird." Now the adult Avengers track down the teens and try and dissuade them from persuing their course of action and Scott Lang's daughter shows up to reclain some of her father's possessions, and it is revealed that she has developed growing / shrinking powers from the Pym Particles she had been "borrowing" from her father (without his knowledge) over the course of his career. Kang shows up, intent on reclaiming his younger self and his armor, neither of which the Young Avengers seem intent on giving up. Engaging in a battle during which the older Avengers become incapacitated, its up to the young new heroes to stop Kang and set things right. The do succeed in ultimately killing the older Kang, but they do have to send their friend Iron Lad back to his home in the future to become the man he despised and sought to flee from. The armor, however remains in our time inhabited by essentially a teen-version of the Vision, since the young Kang used his OS to help run his armor and information to gather up the Young Avengers to begin with.

Still, once the old Avengers revive, they continue to threaten the teens to abandon their costumes and gear and return home or they were going to out the children to their relatives. They leave the outfits, but thanks to the resources of "Hawkingbird's" father's fortune, they soon have an abandoned warehouse HQ of their own as well as new gear. Once they re-emerge, they decide to try and "come out to their parents," in hopes of beating Captain America to the punch. This ends in Giant-Girl leaving her house to meet her friends in a fit of rage after hearing her step-father speak very poorly of her, and Hulkling and Warlock (formerly Asgardian) come out to Warlock's parents and are officially accepted... as a gay couple. Not a bad thing, but not what they were going for. There is also the tragic and yet very emotional moment between Patriot and his grandfather. No words said, just a tear of joy and a smile on his face as he thinks his grandson might be following in a set of steps to help make the world a better place for mankind.

With Patriot running very late for his meeting with the others, Warlock uses a spell to locate him where he has apparently tracked down a group of drug dealers led by Mr. Hyde. This goes back earlier to an encounter Patriot had with several sellers of MGH (Mutant Growth Hormone), a drug that temporarily induces super-powers in normal humans. Everyone engages in battle with Mr. Hyde while Warlock tends to Patriot, noticing his wounds are not closing and wondering what happend to his powers. In a fit of rage, Patriot runs off with Warlock in persuit. When he finds his friend, however, he's shooting up like a junkie. (Shades of 70's Speedy, no?)

End issue 7.

In 7 issues, they have managed to have a better witten, better managed, and less confusing storyline than most other mainstream superhero comics over the last 5 or 6 years, while still referencing a great amount of untapped background story not really used before. Don't get me wrong. Marvel still has more X-Titles than there probably should be in circulation, and Iron Man has been outed and gone back into the closet (in an open-secret identity sense) over the last few years than I would care to remember, and let's not even talk about Spider-Man. Its kind of like what caused the formation of Image Comics years ago. No matter how great writers and artist may be, there is only so much they can do with characters with far too much back-story and continuity issues. But if this shows nothing else, it shows that maybe if Marvel can step away from the same old stale characters and stories being repeated ad infinitum over the last 20+ years, they really can become the "House of Ideas" once again.

Excelsior, true believer!

Week-Long Hiatus: O How You Must Hate Us!

I know that I said once a few weeks ago that I would do a daily post, even if no more than a "Hi, I'm not quite dead yet" kind of thing. And yet, I did not for the entire duration of the last week. I guess it just shows absolutely nobody is truly reliable when it really comes down to it.

Especially bloggers. As much as I hate to say it, bloggers are almost as unreliable as *gasp* the mainstream media! Yes, as hard as it might be to believe we're almost as unreliable as say.... Neal Boortz, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Bill O'Reilly. You need to keep a few things in mind, however.

Unlike the mainstream media, we bloggers admit that, while many of us do in fact consider ourselves to be reporters of a sort, we are still giving you our opinion with the news in question. Many of the other morons in the mainstream media however do not. They think that just because they are so damn smart and special that what they think must be fact and not opinion since they are the ones thinking it.

And I'm sure that if these statements were to come to their attention, they would be dismissed as the casual ramblings of another arrogant youth. At that I would remind them to read the header of my blog. I believe that statement sums it up rather accurately. One thing I got used to a long time ago is that I do not know everything. I am not as smart as others believe me to be. I am smart enough to realize that I will never know everything I should or everything I would like to.

I do, however, know one immutable truth. When it really comes down to it, age does not equate to knowledge or wisdom, nor does youth imply a lack of either. Stupidity is without bounds.

Today I renew my promise. Daily posts...not quite dead yet... blah, blah, blah.

We'll see how long it lasts this time.

Not Everyone Will Like Everything... So Quit Forcing The Subject!

One of the many things I am tired of is people trying to convince me that something I should enjoy something I don't like. Don't get me wrong. I can admit that things I don't like may in fact still be good. Here are a few examples.

I do not personally like Firefly. Its just not my Whedon-ized cup of tea. But I can admit that it is a good, quality show and I see why people like it. Its just not for me.

Another example: Curb Your Entheusiasm. To me, its just not funny. Its not that I don't get it. I'm not anti-semitic. Heck, I really like Seinfeld, another show Larry David worked on. Seinfeld I liked. Curb Your Entheusiasm... not so much. I hate to say it... and I'm sure I'll catch heck at some time in the future for it, but its not funny. This one I do not understand what my brother sees in it.

This is why I don't expect people to like what I like for the most part. See, to me, Transformers the Movie is the greatest cinematic masterpiece ever concieved. I can explain to others why I like it, but all the same, I do not expect everyone else to "get it."

Its the same way with people's personal views as well. You can express them all you want, as I do. In fact, I encourage everyone to do so. Variety and differences are the spices of life. Just don't expect everyone else to "get it," and certainly don't try and force others to do so.