It is widely known that Google is a fairly good indicator of public sentiment. Actually, I made that up. The truth is that google trends offers only a hint of what the public’s feelings are about any particular issue. If anything, the best we can get from these charts is time-based popularity metrics.

Nonetheless, it came as a surprise to this blogger that Mr Ron Paul has surpassed hentai in popularity at the current time. Of course, this is only in the US. Overall, hentai is still dominant many times over when all metrics for the world are compiled, which you may test for yourself.

Also of note is the incredible dominance that Ron Paul has over hentai in the news (bottom section of plot).

Revolution…indeed.

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This post does not constitute an endorsement of Ron Paul or any other political figure, country, person, thing, idea, color, hue, luminosity, or Hillary Clinton.

I refuse!!!

I refuse to do an obligatory “Merry Christmas” posting.

NOOOooooooooooo!!!

Ain’t gonna’ do-it. No way. No How.

You can’t make me.

I have free will. I think, therefore I am.

. . .and I am not going to do it.

Everybody thinks that just because they have a blog they are required to do a Merry Christmas post. Why? I, being the rebel that I am, will not be doing a Christmas post this year. Heck, I may not even do one next year either.

How do you like that? Yeah, feel that freedom. We’re breaking the chains of conformity.

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As long as I’m posting today I suppose I should say Merry Christmas to you guys that read my blog.

Merry Christmas, people who read my blog.

People look to the past to find themselves. They search their memories for hints of hope but often find despair. The mind wonders through a singly linked list of thoughts. One event building upon another until the present is reached. We ask, what if I had done it differently? We think, what if I had changed this? More often than not the truth is that we simply couldn’t do anything to change the happenstance of our past.

They say we must learn history or else, surely, we are doomed to repeat it. I’m sure most of us can relate to that mantra. How often I have wondered the truth of that mantra. How much control is there? How much leverage do we hold over our own destiny, our lives?

If I be more poetic, this one may believe in fate. To love one thing less myself, that would be great. I feel that a long year, nay, many long years have chilled mine heart. The now cold weather has engendered a start. That is a start to reflect on the past.

Can it be that there are actually key moments in any of our recent memories having to do with anime? Did one moment, one second, leave such an indelible mark on our thoughts as to define that simple instant as a key part of our life? Was it that important? Is it not simply an escape from those moments that would or do? Having simply some fun? Wasting some time? Running away?

If I be a more cynical person, this may seem a bit of a downer. I don’t believe that we are as simple as that. I don’t think that we are tools of fate. It may be so that we are defined by our past, but we don’t live there. Even though some may exist there, it would seem. Don’t play those memories repeatedly in your mind else they become your world.

I think what I’m trying to say is that one should live in the moment. I think that makes me a hypocrite. At any rate, School Rumble is a pretty good cure for the winter blues.

Let me get the basic introduction out of the way first. Oldboy is a South Korean film based on a Japanese manga, un-coincidentally titled Old Boy. It’s a 2003 film that, according to wiki, was well received when it was show at the 2004 Cannes film festival.

The wiki article has a fairly good plot synopsis. I’m sure that there are also detailed analysis of this movie on the net. Needless to say, in internet years this film is ancient. I’ll avoid simply giving a summary of events in favor of talking about a few scenes that I will probably remember from this viewing.

I found myself eagerly awaiting some free time that would allow me to sit and watch this film uninterrupted. It is interesting that a film with a major plot element being a fifteen year imprisonment doesn’t really stress the lost years angle. Dae-su is taken away from everything he knows and in the blink of an eye the audience is transported to the future. The drunk weak man we saw at the start of the film is now a hardened monster.

We do experience his captivity to the extent that we know it happened. The viewers are given the chance to see the progression into the form that will be the Dae-su for the majority of the plot. They do not get the chance to empathize with the human aspect of his imprisonment. In some ways it is almost comical how his capture is expressed. If this were a movie about the depths and variations of the individual then it wouldn’t make much sense. However, this isn’t a film setting out to examine the human condition. It is a film about vengeance and pain. Aside from the occasional bit of humor the film doesn’t deviate too much from this theme.

There are a few scenes that were memorable mostly due to sock value. That is not to imply that the movie doesn’t keep the viewer entertained. It does a very good job of not getting boring.

Give me something alive:

Dae-su walks into a restaurant and orders “something alive.” This particular scene isn’t notable simply because he is eating a squid (I think) that is still moving around. As far as I know that isn’t too unusual. It is the vigor with which he begins to digest the small creature. A single bite and the head is removed. He pauses as if to recover from taking too much out of the slimy thing. Its tentacles flail about his mouth and hand as they instinctively/unconsciously attempt to aid in an escape. It is too late. It is dead; it just doesn’t know it yet.

(more…)

This show is trying to pick a fight with me!

It started with the “monkey butts” in episode four. The alien-astal projection was one thing, but a monkey butt combo was a total knockout. I wasn’t sure I could recover from it. I decided to watch episode five to see if there were any latent side effects.

It was going fairly smoothly until this abomination of animation. Are they talking at the urinal? Yes, they are! What the hell! There’s a rule people, “No talking at the urinal.”

I know what some of you are thinking, “But I talk to people when I’m at the urinal all the time.” Guess what? They’re ignoring you. It’s a rule that you can’t even listen to people talking at the urinal. You have to go, “bla bala lalalal” in your head until they shut up.

Got it? Eyes front, do your business, and get out. That’s how it supposed to be done. Also, for the love of whatever deity you believe in, wash you freak’in hands.

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Obviously, this message is directed at our male readers.