In an effort to provide you with the best content a blogger can find, the Chris Hill Festival has obtained an anonymous hotmail account. To start off the shenanigans, I replied to Mr. Zuma, who had the kindness to send me the traditional Nigeria Scam letter yesterday. I accidentally deleted the letter I sent, in which I explained how excited I was to participate and asked for more information, but here is the response that Benni sent this morning:


Dear [xxxxx xxxxxx],

We acknowledge the receipt of your mail in response to our proposal in which you indicated your interest towards knowing about the details of this transaction. I hereby, convey the acceptance of my colleagues that I continue discussions with you untill the completion of this mutual beneficial project. As requested by you, here is a detailed mail explaining the nature of this
transaction to you.

What the? "Those words, I do not think you know what they mean".


We are three-man members with the South Africa Department of Mining & Natural Resources (SADMNR) of the Ministry of ministry of minerals and Energy vested with the authority to appraise and approve contracts according to the priority of the Government of South Africa.

That's interesting, a quick Google search finds no reference anwhere to "SADMNR". How odd.


By virtue of our official positions in the (SADMNR), we have been able to over time, through hindsight of mining contracts documents which we have secured for ourselves a contract sum of US$24M(Twenty-Four Million,United States Dollars) only, lying fallow in our Apex Bank (RBSA) which was originally awarded and completed by an Americn company and now we need your assistance to transfer the funds into a safe offshore account.

$24million US Dollars only? Through hindsight? You would think these scam artists would at least some sort of reasonable effort to write a believable letter. Do people actually fall for this? In hindsight do they not realize they are complete morons to read this and believe that it's true?

[snip banking mumbo-jumbo using big words like "escrow" in an effort to sound official]


we will procure the appropriate documents by ncorporating any name you will give as an existing company over here in which
you will fill and append your signature indicating you/your company name as the new beneficiary for prompt remittance of
the funds into your nominated account. With the machineries in place the ownership of the contract sum will be transferred to you after the validation and authentication of the documents at the Department of Justice here in Johannesburg .


Any name I choose can be my company name? So I could incorporate the name, say, "Coca-Cola" and I will be incorporated in South Africa? Interesting. But what's this about the Department of Justice? If this is so hush-hush, should we really be going before the Department of Justice? Maybe I should mention this in my response, I wouldn't want anyone to find out about the plan.


We intend arriving at your place with the relevant original papers/documents within 72 hours...

Oh no you shant!


as soon as you receive notification of transfer from the Debt Reconciliation Committee (DRC) before the funds are finally transferred into your nominated bank account by Key Tested Telegraphic Transfer (K.T.T).

What is up with all the acronyms? Surprise surprise, "K.T.T." actually seems to be a real technology, and if you do a Google search for it you'll see that this technology is the main means for African lowlifes to scam money from stupid Americans.


In this regard, we would need your tel. and fax number, so that we counld fax down an indemnity application form which you would be required to fill and fax back to me immediately in order to facilitate quick approval of the subsequent power of attorney that will bestow all rights and privileges to you,

HAHAHAHAHAHA, yeaaaaaaaah, right.


remember this business is 100% risk-free as long as maximum confidentiality is maintained by you.

I don't know which of these two clauses "100% risk free" or "maximum confidentiality" are more ridiculous. You choose.


My colleagues and I would require your personal guarantee concerning the safety/availability of our share on demand when the funds is credited to your nominated account and advised us accordingly on high yielding investment portfolios in your country.

Suuuure, you can have it wheneeeever you want....yoink.

[snip more mumbo-jumbo, including a 20% offer to me]


Expecting your quick response . God bless you and your family.


--
_______________________________________________
Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Mail.com


It's good to know that the money hasn't gone to Benni's head and that even rich South African diplomats use FREE Personalized E-mail!

Anyway, I've fired off another reply. I'll post it later when I hear back from Benni. Keep a lookout for more anonymous e-mail fun.

I have great news to share with you! Check out this fabulous email opportunity I received today, along with my running commentary:

Compliments of the season. It is indeed my pleasure to write to you this letter , which I believe will be a suprise, as we are
both complete strangers.

I don't know about you, but I'm not a complete stranger. You're a complete stranger. So yes, I am certainly surprised to be reading this letter.

I work for the ministry of minerals and Energy in south Africa, and by this letter I am representing and also acting on
behalf of two of my senior colleages( The Director-General and The Group Manager) whose mandate I have gotten, to contact a trusted and reliable foreign based businessmen, concerning the business matter of mutual benefit to all.

So you work for two unnamed colleagues from a country I have never visited, you don't know who I am, and you are looking for a trusted and reliable businessman, and therefore you contacted me? What a strange coincidence, since I am not a businessman at all.

By this mandate given to me, we are in dire need of a foreign partner to assist us in the transfer/investment of USD24,000,000,00. ( Twenty-four million United States Dollars).

You're killing me buddy, this sentence doesn't even make any sense!

The key issues are the transfer and the subseqent investment of the said sum. We are ready to go into an
agreement with you and also offer you a negotiable fee for putting together an investment potfolio.

Wow, I knew Personal Finance would come in handy some day. This guy is ready to go into an agreement with me despite the fact that we are "complete strangers". How trusting!

It does not matter whether or not you own a company or you have invested funds before. We shall guide you on what to do.

Well that's good to know, because I certainly do not own a company and am just as likely to invest all of your money into my own bank account as I am to put together a solid growth portfolio.

The basis will be that a major company won a contract and subcontracted it to you . More often, big trading companies and firms of unrelated field win contracts and subcontract to more specialised firms for execution.

See, the problem with this analogy is that a) I hadn't competed for any contract, never mind won one, and b) I am not a more "specialised" firm. Whoops.

We shall follow strictly all legal procedure entailed in our laws and international laws in transfering the funds to you. The source of this funds is legitimate and authouritative.

Really? What is that source then? If it's legitimate, then please tell me exactly where the money is coming from, because it sure sounds fishy to me.

Please be informed that under the South African Government monetary policy, strategic positioned government officials are not allowed to operate or own bank account overseas, hence our need for a foreign partner to front for us.

But you are allowed to send money to "complete strangers" to the tune of 24 million USDollars? What strange laws you have.

We pray that you take the essence of this letter in stict confidence, as the two officals involved would not like to be exposed on this.

Don't worry, I won't do anything stupid like post it to the web or anything.

Kindly notify me by e-mail for futher details, upon your acceptance to assist us.Details will be made available to you as soon as you reply. Thank you and God bless you, as we wait for your urgent response.

Don't worry, you'll get a response :-)


Best regards,

Benni Zuma
zuma@diplomats.com


In case you were wondering, diplomats.com is unreachable via www and was registered in March 11, 2002. Mr. Zuma has piqued my curiosity, so I am going to reply (under a fake email address of course, as amusing as these letters are I'd rather not receive them every day) and see what other details there are.

In case you'd like to read more about these sort of scams, go to the Urban Legends Website or read this funny description at Salon.com. I'll keep everyone posted if my reply gets further response.

Last night I had the following dream, feel free to psychoanalyze me in any way:

I'm in a grocery store, specifically the produce section, and I see two guys looking at watermelon. They appear to be gay, and when they see me looking at them they go beserk. They chase me for awhile, then start throwing various-sized blades at me. Some are small, like razor blades, others are large, like rotary saw blades with big spikes coming out of them. Luckily I have a sawed-off broom handle (much like the one I played duct-tape baseball with yesterday, hmm...) with which to defend myself. I manage to block away all of the blades and dash into the parking lot, only to be confronted by a bearded western-looking man with a small gun. By some stroke of fortune, I happen to have an identical gun in my pocket but instead of shooting him I grab his gun and take it apart, rendering it unusable. He is still chasing me, however, but by another stroke of luck a school bus pulls into the parking lot and a jump aboard. I have no idea where it is going, but there is a girl on the bus who looks familiar (from where I don't know) so I get off at her stop and go into her house. At this point I realize that a) it is some sort of holiday and her family is cooking a large dinner and b) my family lives next door. So of course, the logical thing happens. Her dad brings me a bunch of ceramic tiles and a tub of paste and tells me to caulk the tiles in the bathroom upstairs. At this point I wake up, very confused, because my alarm goes off telling me it is time to get ready for work. If only I did not have work this morning, who knows what sorts of crazy adventures I could've had remodeling the bathroom or riding strange buses around a fictitious suburb.

Last night, michael and I saw the funniest music video I've seen in a long time. For every 25 rap videos featuring singers wearing jerseys and dripping in gold, there is one really really funny one, and this was it. The song is by Ali and Murphy from the St. Lunatics (Nelly's friends, basically), and it's called Boughetto, which appears to be a cross between the words "Bourgeois" (a word pronounced "Boo-jee" in the video) and "Ghetto", the definition of which can only be described in couplets such as "If you got an expensive weave, that's boughetto. Spend 600 on weed, that's boughetto." Suffice to say I am *not* boughetto.

The video features entries from the "Encyclopedia Ghettonica" and scenes from a high school science class. In class, there is fire shooting up from the gas jets found on the chemistry benches, a periodic table featuring the element Hair Weavium, and a skeleton wearing a hat which is inexplicably dancing with a number of females in the class (which is, of course, all African-American). The highlight of the encyclopedia is a picture of Albert "Ice" Stein discovering "Bling" in 1903. If you have Kazaa or one of those file download programs, download this video. You will not be disappointed.

Unfortunately, this song was not released without controversy. It seems there is already a patent on the strikingly similar word "bourghetto" by an outfit planning on starting an eZine about bourgeois culture with a hip-hop twist. Since the song was eventually released, we can safely assume the lawsuit was cleared up, luckily for those of us who enjoy the occasional dancing skeleton and augmented periodic table.

I just saw that awful, awful McDonalds commercial featuring that annoying guy that says everything twice. They call him "Eddie the Echo", and he looks like he should be fronting Weezer or coming in from the bullpen for the Indians in "Major League 4: The Guy Who Plays Willie Mays Hays Actually Gets Another Acting Job". They show this commercial about once every 5 other commercials, and every time I see it I get this uncontrollable urge to go to McDonalds and squirt the ketchup out of that little pump-action thingy all over the counter and then leave. And do people yet realize that none of the people in fast food commercials who work behind the counter actually look like real fast food employees?

Person Behind Subway Counter in "Jared" Commercials: Attractive female who looks like she's taking a big pay cut to work at Subway, often flirts openly with the customers. Always serves a sandwich that looks perfect in every way with no condiments spilling out. Every piece of lettuce is in its place, and service is always with a smile. Fresh bread is always coming out of the oven.

Person Behind Subway Counter at Mallinckrodt Center: One or more teeth made of substances other than enamel. Often talking unintelligbly on the phone rather than serving customers. When not on the phone, employee is usually flirting with one or more other employees who are behind the back wall and/or cussing them out. Oftentimes your request for "just lettuce" results in a sandwich with tomatoes and/or peppers. Bread is always coming out of the oven, but never the variety you actually want.

Our apartment has been vacant for 6 months before we arrived, yet the people who lived here before us (a couple of Asians from the sounds of their names) continue to receive mail here. Yesterday I got a bank statement for one of them. Today I got their last free issue of their subscription to Conformity magazine.

I wonder if there's also a Doing Weird Things Just for the Sake of Being Different magazine. If so, Robe Boy is definitely cover story material. In addition to his normal antics, the night before graduation he apparently shaved his head and eyebrows and was wearing nothing that anyone could see beneath his cap and gown. Then a plane flew overhead dragging behind it a sign that said "Congratulations Robe Boy and Class of 2002". If this guy isn't either living in a cardboard box or the wacky CEO of a new age company in 10 years, then America isn't the country I think it is.

Chris Tunes in: A Diary of the Latest Offerings on 101.1 The River from 4-4:30 PM

4:01 PM -- With Arms Wide Open, Creed

Why hasn't Creed gone away yet? And worse, why have they brought all of their friends? You just can't turn on the radio anymore without hearing one of a dozen cookie-cutter "feaux-religious" bands like Creed, Lifehouse, or The Calling. Their style is rock, but their lyrics and name just taunt you: "nah nah nah nah nah, we're sneaking Christian messages into mainstream radio, and there's nothing you can do about it". I consider myself Christian, but that doesn't mean that I need to convert everyone around me through songs, action figures, or those funny shows on TV where the man with a big microphone massages the head of "deaf and dumb" heathens in some foreign county and knocks them to the ground, only to proclaim them "healed" because he can mimic their speech and pretend that they can hear him. And then there is Veggie Tales, teaching children to choose their religious beliefs based on talking vegetables that they see on television. [shudder]

4:06 PM -- The Middle, Jimmy Eat World

This song was just referred to as "the new one from Jimmy Eat World", despite the fact that the album it comes from came out last summer. It is a great song, it's just unfortunate that because it's on the radio all the indier-than-though folks decry Jimmy Eat World as sellouts. They wrote a catchy song that people like, there are a lot worse things on the radio nowadays, so quit your bitchin'.

4:09 PM -- Hook, Blues Traveler

I liked this song back when I was a sophomore in high school, despite the fact that John Popper now comprises of his own zip code and that harmonica just gets really annoying after awhile.

4:15 PM -- Something by Michelle Branch

There's not much to say about Michelle Branch, she kind of sounds like every other female artist on the radio who plays the exact same style of music.

4:18 PM -- Be Like That, 3 Doors Down

This song falls under the category of "songs by that band that sounds like every other band". Also in this group are Wish You Were Here by Incubus and anything by Nickelback. Here is what the typical fan of 3 Doors Down has to say about the album this song comes from: "When I heard Kryptonite on the radio for the first time, I cranked the volume way up on my stereo and just thought about what an awesome song it was. After I listened parts of the other songs on the CD, I sort of rejected those tracks and only listened to track #1, Kryptonite." (taken from an actual website)

4:21 PM -- Smooth, Slimmed-Down Matchbox 20 Guy and Temporarily-Resurrected Carlos Santana

This song was wildly popular because it feature not one but two comebacks! Nobody who was born after 1970 even knew who Carlos Santana was, and after their hit album of songs that all sounded the same, the Matchbox 20 singer was in a Fat Farm somewhere trying to get down to a size where he could fit his arms around his guitar again. Since this song came out, Matchbox 20 came out with yet another album of songs that sound the same and Carlos Santana has returned to wherever he was circa mid-70's through 1999, biding his time until this generation of radio listeners forget about him and he can come out with another comeback album.

4:25 PM -- Eternal Commercial Break

During which I give thanks that I did not hear any of the following: Uncle Kracker's one and only hit song (Follow Me), Drops of Jupiter by Train, The baby-talk song from Moulin Rouge, or anything by any of these bands: Nickelback, System of a Down, Hatebreed.

UPDATE!

The song which played immediately after the break was, of course, How You Remind me by none other than Nickelback. Now I remember why I don't listen to the radio.

I have come to an unfortunate realization: I do not feel safe walking around any part of St. Louis or its surrounding areas at night. Last night I went to Schnucks to pick up some groceries at about 11 PM, and the parking lot was filled with unsavory characters just standing around seemingly ready to plot whose apartment they were going to toss later that night. The other night my girlfriend and I were pursued for a few feet by someone looking for a handout after we came out of Blockbuster Video.

It even happens during the day. We made the unfortunate decision to visit the Schnucks on Delmar last weekend and were actually panhandled while we were shopping. A disheveled woman claimed she needed $15 to pay for her prescriptions, yet later on we walked past the prescription counter and it was closed (it being a Sunday and all). Today I walked over to the Loop during my lunch break to return the game we rented from Blockbuster, and I had to avoid an unshaved old man who was walking around aimlessly and rambling incoherently to no one in particular. Rachel claims she is a target for random weirdos, but I think I've stolen that crown from her this week.

I guess this is the price I pay for going to school someplace that actually has things to do rather than be at home in Stuart, FL, where it is usually pretty tame at night but that is because all of the residents went to bed after Matlock about 5 hours earlier.

Here are the promised pictures of Admiral Rufus Fish VIII in all of his glory. He has this nasty habit of almost jumping out of his bowl if I put my fingers too close to the water when feeding him, but I guess the skittishness comes from years of naval campaigns to protect the colonies under Her Majesty's Royal Navy.

The Admiral bathed in light.

A little darker so you can see his name placard.

Sorry I've been terribly bad about posting. The only real news around here is that I have a new apartment-mate. His name is Admiral R. Fish VIII, and he is of course a fish (The "R." stands for "Rufus"). I took some pictures of him, and I'll post them up here soon. In the meantime I've been hard at work working on an NP-completeness proof. I'd go into NP-completeness and what it means, but it would be a whole bunch of technobabble and you're probably more interested in pictures of the Admiral. Or at least you'd better be, because he outranks you.

Review: Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones

Sorry for the lack of updates, but it's time to finish off Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones week with my review of the movie. I went last night to the AMC16 Multiplex on Olive hoping to see a long line of fans dressed in crazy costumes. The line was there, but unfortunately the costumes were not. Instead of a gaggle of Chewbaccas and Boba Fetts, I saw only 2 people wearing the robes of the Jedi Knights and carrying plastic light sabers.

Disappointing fans aside, I thought the movie was an excellent continuation of trilogy number two. My biggest complaints about Episode 1 were that everything in Phantom Menace looked too fake and that the plot was not a good Star Wars-esque plot. Both of these problems were rectified this time around. I'll try not to include any spoilers, but the plot returned to a good-old whiz-bang adventure story like the originals. Sure there was that whole love story aspect, but there was also the mysterious clone army and the chase of Jango Fett across the galaxy.

The fakeness was also somewhat removed, although it seemed to be different in different parts of the movie. The chrome spacecraft looked cool but looked more "futuristic" than the crafts from the original movie which were supposed to have taken place at a later date. After the shootout with Jango Fett, though, Obi Wan's ship was charred and damaged, and C3PO and R2D2 looked sufficiently worn out. Some of the scenery still looked like it was just painted on a computer screen, but for the most part the foregrounds were realistic without being "too good looking".

My only real quibble with the movie was Hayden Christensen's portrayal of Anakin Skywalker. There seemed to be no motivation for a lot of his moodiness, and his lines weren't really delivered very well. Then again, he had some classicly bad lines, especially the one about how he didn't like sand but Padme was beautiful. I don't know who wrote the dialogue, but it made me wish the wisecracking Han Solo was there to smack Anakin around when he said something stupid to her.

All in all the movie was very enjoyable and a fitting continuation to the series. Now the question remains: what happens after Episode 3? If Lucas doesn't make movies 7, 8, and 9, then someone will. May not now, but someday, in a galaxy far, far away...

Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones week continues here on the Chris Hill Festival. Special thanks to Amy for finding the link to the R2-D2 porn that I was looking for. There is also a little article about it on Slashdot. Funny stuff.

Oh well, it seems like someone is on to my selling-out tactics. Dev sent me this link about Google Bombing, which is the name that people have given it when you try and boost your rating on Google using artificial means. Guess I'll have to find some other way to continue my grand quest to garner the #1 ranking for all things Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones.

2 new weblogs to read!

That's right, check out Amy Sia's livejournal Pandaposse and Amy Hawkins' "spooky" blog Lightistoobright.

Only time will tell if one or both of these will crack the top link bar, especially if James and michael continue their silent ways.

The school year is over and a lot of my readers no longer have fast internet access, so as a result readership is down. In order to boost flagging visits, I'm selling out and making a post about Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones. When Google crawls my page tonight it will find much Star Wars Episode 2-related content and boost my rating in that department. Because the movie, Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones, is coming out next week, I will get a lot of visitors looking for movie tidbits or copies of the illegal bootleg.

Unfortunately, I haven't actually seen the movie like David has, although I have read a lot of the reviews. The consensus among fans of the trilogy seems to be that it is much better than Episode 1, which begs the all-important question: Why is there no name for rabid Star Wars fans? When someone says the word "Trekkie", you can instantly conjure up an image of someone who can speak Klingon and has endless online debates about whether or not Captain Kirk slept with Mr. Spock. However, the phrase "die-hard Star Wars fan" just does not do justice to someone who waits in line for four months to see the movie and has a bumper sticker that says "My other car is the Millennium Falcon".

There is an amusing article on CNN.com about Star Wars fans and the crazy things they do with the following hilarious snippets:

-"Before heading to class, University of Washington history student Jacob Kenagy sets his VCR to record commercials -- yes, commercials -- in hopes of finding a new ad for 'Star Wars.'" Sounds like someone who is firmly grounded in reality.
-"Fans also got early conceptual drawings and photos from spies on the set and at manufacturers of 'Star Wars' merchandise, said Gary Demirdjian, 32, an aspiring filmmaker who frequently posts as 'Lord Mauly Mall' at TheForce.net." Wow.
-"Lucasfilm sometimes objects when sites reveal copyrighted footage, try to make money or mix R2-D2 with pornography." Regretfully I could find no examples of said pornography in a quick search of the 'net.

Speaking of the crazy fans who have been waiting in line since January, I bet they were pretty pissed when, after four months of skipping work and wasting time, a bunch of 'net geeks saw the movie before they did. That's a shame.

Another constant to every Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones review as well as any Star.bobafettfanclub.com/index.shtml" target="_blank">fan club. The biggest news about the new movie is that there is another Fett, Boba's father Jango, which is apparently a very exciting development. So exciting, in fact, that 30% of responders to a poll on the Boba fan site said they would be attending the movie dressed as one of the Fetts. When you're at the movie, keep a lookout for these fun-loving folks and take some pictures. The best picture of a fan dressed in a homemade Star Wars costume will garner much praise from me and be posted to the site. Mail them to me here.

So hopefully I am now ranked #1 on Google for all things Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones. I'll be seeing the movie after work next week so I'll most a real review of it then. Until then, keep your Boba Fett costume on and get back in line.

Sometimes mid-afternoon television can be vastly entertaining. Take today's infomercial for Kennelwood Village, which contains, in their own words, "five park-like acres of lush landscaping, abundant trees, and a natural spring flowing through the property. Sounds nice doesn't it? I look out the window of my apartment and see a dumpster and a fountain with water which has been dyed blue, but the residents of Kennelwood get a natural spring.

Check-in time is at noon, rooms are only $38/night double occupancy, and you can get a suite or cabana for $45/night. Here I'm paying $754 per month plus utilities for 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, a living room and a kitchen.

Airport pickup service is provided, as well as door-to-door service if you're in the process of moving. There is even a travel agent on duty. Personal training is provided for a small fee as well as a styling salon, and there is a schedule of events that happen daily.

Sounds too good to be true doesn't it? Well it's certainly true, but unfortunately you can't take advantage of all Kennelwood has to offer, because it's only for pets. There are apparently some people out there who are fabulously rich and have pets they don't want to take care of. These pets, also being rich, need round-the-clock care, obedience training (the "personal trainer" as it is called on the commercial), and events such as "PlaySchool" (consisting of brushing, attention, walks, and tetherball) and "Yappy Hour" (ice cream and cookies).

As I was watching the infomercial (which was, of course, narrated by a dog telling me how much he wanted to be taken to Kennelwood and live in a four-level suite, the most expensive of all lodging arrangements), I had one important question: how can I get a job? Apparently there are people there whose only job is to walk, pet, and play tetherball with dogs all day. Forget all this hard core Computer Science research, I want to get paid for "taking pets to grass to urinate or defecate" (which is a $2 charge per trip).

Some of the more interesting Kennelwood programs:

-"Unlimited Feeding", making your dog as fat as possible to counteract the exercise from frolicking in the stream.
-A "Pre-entry exam" to check for fleas, kind of like the SATs I guess.
-A "Pet travel agent" to help your pet relocate to a new city.

Wow. Some people have much, much more money than they really need.

Most of my stuff is in the apartment and it is finally starting to look suitable for habitation by humans. Curtains are on the windows, there are placemats on the dining room table (by "dining room" I mean "half of the living room where we will eat"), and the phone service is actually working. Pretty soon it will have DSL access, and then it will finally be suitable for habitation by me.

Tonight was the Senior Gala, the final event of senior week, and it would have been fun if I were into the dress up, open-bar, spend all night talking to random people you don't really hang out with type of scene. Alas, I am not, so I didn't enjoy it as much as say the guy wearing the shirt that said "I'm Drunk". In fact, I would have to say that I had much more fun at the concert on Monday night. Here is a comparison of the two events:

Punk Concert: Lots of great music by bands that I like.
Senior Gala: The Moulin Rouge baby-talk song, "Pop" by NSync, and the sound of people smoking in the Nelly Song ("Ride Wit' Me").

Punk Concert: 8 of my good friends.
Senior Gala: About 10 of my friends plus a few hundred people that I've either never seen in my life, all getting wasted.

Punk Concert: Jeans and a t-shirt.
Senior Gala: Suit and tie, making beer spillage that much more traumatic.

Punk Concert: No one is old enough to purchase alcohol legally, so only about 1% of the crowd is intoxicated.
Senior Gala: Open bar, so only about 1% of the crowd can remember their own names.

Screw "growing up" and "being sophisticated".

It is storming out, so I will make this quick.

Last night I had the privilege of attending a concert performance featuring the fine musicians in Jimmy Eat World and Green Day, and the sophomoric hijinks and occasional guitar playing of Blink 182. It was quite a lineup, and Jimmy Eat World opened with a run-through of most of their newest album (originally called "Bleed American", renamed after 9/11 by some random idiots "Jimmy Eat World") which was reasonably well received by the crowd, consisting mostly of high schoolers.

Green Day followed, which was a considerable surprise since they are by far the oldest and most established of the three bands. I can't say enough about their set, which blew me away. Green Day was the first "punk" that I ever listened to, back when I was a misguided 8th grader listening to Bon Jovi and Tom "Life is a Highway" Cochrane because I didn't know any better. They've had their shares of ups and downs since their breakout album Dookie, but this show was a blistering set of their hits that seemed to make everybody happy.

Closing out the night was Blink 182, who most of the crowd seemed to be there to see. I say this because there were an inordinate number of teenage girls with "Blink 182" written on their bodies in magic marker and undersexed boys hitting on said girls. During a particularly slow moment of Jimmy Eat World, two of these guys who were standing behind us starting screaming "hey hot girl" to a girl standing next to me. When she did not respond (presumably because her name is not actually "hot girl"), the guys took matters into their own hands and came down to harass her more closely. They introduced themselves, and she seemed rather underwhelmed at meeting these two smooth-talkers. I say this because she turned around and basically ignored them for the rest of the show. But back to Blink, who don't really deserve much more coverage than this. Their antics got old very quickly, and it seemed like they played much more of their stupid half-minute profanity-laden jingles than their real songs. The crowd didn't seem to mind, though, as they were moshing throughout the whole thing, even during Adam's Song which is a slower number about the teen suicide problem. If that isn't a mosh-worthy topic I don't know what is.

Despite this, a good time was had by all. My friends are starting to disperse for the summer so it's getting less and less populous on campus. My parents are also in town to help me move, so it's been a hectic and chaotic couple of days. The apartment is starting to shape up nicely though.

Review: Spiderman

On Friday night I, along with David, Bryan, Pete, Berney, Liz, Bob, Loren, Brian Lewis, his girlfriend, and about half of the WashU senior class hit the Esquire to see the latest adaptation of the Spiderman story.

I am usually a big fan of superhero movies, and this one was no exception. There were a few cheesy lines, the CGI effects were not quite seamless, and there were a few curious plot holes, but all in all it was a fun summer movie to start out the blockbuster season.

I've never read the Spiderman comics, but from what I understand they made a few changes from the original story. One was to have the spider that bites Peter Parker be genetically enhanced rather than radioactive. Neither scenario is the least bit plausible, but since genetics research is always in the news nowadays this seems to be about updating it to reflect the present environment. The other major change was to make the webslinging aspect of his power be biologically built-in. In the comic books, Peter Parker invents a superstrong adhesive and small handheld cartridges to shoot it out. This was also a positive change, in my opinion, because as smart of a science student as he may be he would not have time to do this sort of research while still being a high school kid doing chores and fantasizing about Kirsten Dunst.

There was more major inconsistency, however, and that was the strength of his powers. Much like the Superman movies, where in one movie Superman could fly around the world faster than the speed of light to make time stop but other times he could barely catch a falling person before they hit the ground, Spiderman's powers seemed to fit the scene. If they needed him to seem weaker, he was weaker, if they plot called for superhuman strength, he all of a sudden had it. People would look away and look back and in a split second he would have sped out the window, but most of the time he moved much slower than this. I have not seen a superhero movie yet where there was some sort of constant restraint on the hero's powers, I wonder if the comics are also like this.

All in all it was an entertaining evening for my $5, though, and the opening left it wide open for a sequel. We'll see if Spiderman becomes a long running franchise like Superman and Batman, but even if not there will be plenty more comic adaptations in theaters soon. Daredevil, The Incredible Hulk, X-Men II, rumors of a new Superman...

And now it starts to get hectic.

Tomorrow my parents come into town to help me move to my apartment, and on Wednesday my grandparents arrive so they can watch me graduate on Thursday and Friday. All madness will surely ensure when everyone gets here, as I will be half in the apartment and half still in my dorm room. This also means I will be able to get absolutely nothing accomplished, which is not good because I still need to finish up some WUGrade stuff. That will be today's project I guess.

We will not have DSL in the apartment until, at the soonest, the 17th. Therefore my posts may become infrequent (or they may not be, we'll see). Use this free time to enjoy some of the other weblogs in the community.

[drum roll please]

And the winner is...

Erv: 10
Ab9: 9

and in other tallies:

michael: 1

Is it time to remove -273 from the link bar and add both Erv and Ab9? Not as long as David and michael are providing me with free hosting.

I am terribly sorry that I have not posted much recently. On Wednesday I started working in the DOC Group where I will be doing research this summer. Today I set the group up with Blogger accounts so that they can track their progress quickly and efficiently.

The other day while the group was filling out paperwork, we noticed a disturbing trend. On our demographic information form for payroll, there was a section for "race/ethnicity". The choices were: African-American, Asian/Pacific Islander, Hispanic, American Indian, and "Other". If you're like me, you've noticed that "White/Caucasian" has now been lumped under "Other". I'm not exactly sure what to make of this, but is the world getting so PC that I am not allowed to have a race anymore? Next thing you know instead of "Gender: male or female" it will say "Gender: female or other". Scary.

Today someone found my site by searching for, I am not kidding, "Sorority naked initiation stories". Wow.

While walking back from work today, I had an experience odder than any I ever had with my archnemesis (the National Forests guy). A guy holding a video camcorder and a girl holding one of those long, skinny microphones like they used on game shows in the 70's were standing in Mallinckrodt. Curious (and because no one else was around), I walked by and was flagged down by them to participate in a "survey".

So the guy turns on the camcorder and the girl (who apparently did not know how to operate the microphone because she waved it around like a flag even when one of us was talking) looked at the camera, then looked at me and asked that immortal question that man has trying to been answer since the dawn of time..."Have you ever let your girlfriend touch your isthmus?"

No, that's not a typo.

If you're like me, you would have given the girl a crazy look and informed her that an isthmus is a geographical formation, not a part of the body. She, however, informed me that the isthmus is in fact a part of the neck right smack in the middle between your two lymph nodes.

That was the end of my candid interview, so I walked away and immediately kicked myself for not asking what exactly the purpose of their little survey was. At first I thought it was one of those Letterman-style street surveys where they go up to a group of what must be the dumbest people in America and ask them how many states we have in America and one person answers something like 23 while the others nod in silent agreement. However, a quick scan of Google reveals that the isthmus is, in fact, the part of the neck in the middle that connects the two lobes of the thyroid.

So my strange occurrence remains as mysterious as ever. Please e-mail me if you have any idea what it meant.