Generation WTF

Ok, so I love love love this show Generation Kill and well, I was a huge fan of the Wire so I knew this show would be well written, well acted but I'm confused about something. Are real military leaders this retarded? Actually, I’m insulting all Down syndrome and autistic people by comparing them to the military leaders on this show. I know the show is based on the real life experience of a reporter who was embedded with a recon Marine Battalion but I'm not sure if they are embellishing the stupidity of the military leaders for entertainment value or whether this is how it is in the real world as well. Since I'm Canadian, my experience with military life consists of choosing the right perk in COD4 so when I see some crazy decisions made by company commanders like dropping a bomb 200 yards from Marines or leaving a fully stocked military vehicle behind, I scratch my head. I'm amazed the marines haven’t turned the gun on their superiors yet. So far, they’ve been made to run a gauntlet through a small town without air cover or artillery, they’ve been told to eat 1 ration a day, leave behind a supply truck only to see it blown up, and on top of all that, they have maybe the most retarded leader I've ever seen in TV or movies in Encino Man. That dude might be mildly comatose. The show is excellent but all I keep thinking is, when are they gonna mutiny? Anyways, it’s on HBO on sunday nights so watch the show if you can. You won't be sorry. So ex military guys and gals, is this how it actually is?

 

Posted by th3midnighter @ 11:39 am EDT | Permalink | 4 Comments

To Ferberize or not to?

So our son just turned 7 months a few days ago and me and the wife have decided that its time for him to sleep on his own. He's been sleeping with us for the last 7 months in our bed with a co-sleeper but we'd like to be able to sleep through the night and you know, actually get to sleep together so we are moving him to his spacious crib in his spacious room. So we thought about all the different methods and are going with the Ferber Method. Its named after some Doctor in Boston who after doing years of research and studies found that babies after 4/5 months who have trouble sleeping through the night can be taught to sleep by a system of soothing, quiet bed time and letting them cry it out. We are on night number 2 and let me tell you, hes got a set of lungs. He lasted 34 mins the first night and last night he lasted 49 mins cause I made the mistake of picking him up. We are going to stick to it for a few weeks to see how he responds but once he was able to fall asleep, he stayed asleep for most of the night. My question is this. How many have tried the cry it out method and when did you see a dramatic difference. Also, if you had a baby who wasnt able to sleep through the night and woke up every few hours, what other methods did you use? Who knew parenting was so complicated. I have more respect for my parents with each passing day.

Posted by th3midnighter @ 12:18 pm EDT | Permalink | 11 Comments

Oil, what is it good for?

 

Am I the only one that thinks that the price of Oil going up is a good thing? 

I realize short term, it creates some stress for the middle to lower class because its more expensive to go to the cottage, to do that vacation, to drive to work but I think the long term effects of this phenomenon is being missed or at least ignored by the vast majority of people.  Oil is by far the most resourceful commodity we have right now.  Oil is a key ingredient in plastics, rubber, pharmaceuticals, cement, electronics, clothing, and on and on.  So we have this product that can be molded, melted, sculpted to create many of our every day products and yet we use like 90% of oil to burn as fuel.  That just seems incredibly wasteful and short sighted.

 We waste oil so freely and have been doing it for over a hundred years and finally the price of Oil is at a point where we are starting to question our daily habits and rituals.  In a single year, the price of Oil has done what countless Gov’t policies, commercials, documentaries, books, and environmentalists couldn’t do.  Make the consumer rethink and re-evaluate how they travel, work and live.  For the first time, I heard my dad say “I think I’m going to bike to the corner store.”  The man hasn’t ridden a bike in over 20 years.  For the first time since the early 90s, a pick up truck isn’t the best selling vehicle in the states.  The incredibly fuel efficient Honda Civic was the best selling car in May.  GM just announced that they are closing one of their bigger plants near Toronto that used to make pick up trucks because people are moving towards smaller sedans.  Toyota and Honda both have announced fully electric cars to be released in Japan by 09, and most likely in the North American market a year or two after that. 

 All of these changes in the market have nothing to do with a shift by the consumer to be more environmentally conscious cause lets be honest, most of us don’t give a shit about the environment.  We care about our comforts and maintaining our lifestyle.  The minute our lifestyle becomes too expensive for our budget, that’s when we force the market to change.  This shift is going to force governments to invest in more public transit, its going to force Auto companies to make their cars as oil free as they can and it’s going to force the consumer to use less gas, whether it be for our car or for our home.  So from my point of view, I hope the price of Oil keeps going up, up, up.  Over $200 a barrel would be perfect.  It’s been too cheap for far too long and we really need to wean ourselves off it and God knows, we aren’t going to do it for the drowning Polar Bears.

Posted by th3midnighter @ 11:35 am EDT | Permalink | 11 Comments

Movies...

One of my earliest memories growing up are my dad taking me to movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark and Superman so I grew up being a huge movie buff. Lately, there have been some terrible movies that have been released (Indy and the Skull of Shittyness and Hulk) so I started thinking about movies that I get excited to watch even if I’ve seen it 10 times. These are movies either I own or watch anytime I catch on TV. I thought I’d limit it to movies that have been made in the last 10 years so at least if you are at Blockbuster, you might find it there if your first and second choice is out. I left out Oscar winners like BrokebackMountain and Saving Private Ryan because I assumed most people have seen them already.

So here goes:

Fight Club: Probably my favorite movie of the last 10 years. Brad Pitt in his best role as a “fuck you” Soap salesman and Ed Norton, a insurance claims specialist who create a club for guys who need to well fight to get through the mundaness (made up word) of everyday life. I loved the book so to see it translate so well onto the big screen was a bonus for me. Fincher and Pitt at their finest, even better than Se7en imo.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: I always fuck up the title but the movie is brilliant. Charlie Kaufman has written a bunch of great scripts like Being John Malkowich and Confessions of a Dangerous Mind but this is by far his best “feel good” script and more than that, it’s a beautiful love story set within a non traditional storyline. I’m not a huge fan of Jim Carrey but as a broken down man who wants to literally forget the love of his life he does a great job, and it’s a great script and directed with a lot of soul by one Michel Gondry.

Office Space: Before Steve Carrel made middle management a one liner, this movie made me realize I wasn’t the only one out there with a moron for a boss. So many good one liners in this movie and easily one of the funniest movies of the last 10 years. “I'm thinking I might take that new chick from Logistics. If things go well I might be showing her my O-face. "Oh... Oh... Oh!" You know what I'm talkin' about. "Oh!"”

Memento: Before he blew up big with Batman Begins and now Dark Knight, Christopher Nolan made a name for himself with this murder mystery that really should’ve been nominated for an Oscar. I’m not even doing the movie justice in my description and I’d love to say more but I don’t want to ruin it. Just go rent it if you can’t find what you’re looking for in Blockbuster. You won’t be sorry.

In The Company of Men: Ok, this movie breaks the 10 year rule since it was from 97, but I have this on DVD and couldn’t ignore it. Two execs who are friends make a bet and go out of their way to ruin a woman’s life. Sounds cruel I know but I was amazed how honest the movie was. I actually think it paints men in a true light…for the most part.

Magnolia: People tend to either love P.T. Anderson movies or hate em and I love love loved this one. Huge cast, big story involving multiple characters that gets revealed at the end. You have to go into this movie with an open mind because it does tend to wander into the surreal for a bit but it’s worth the ride. Oh, Tom Cruise actually does a good job in this movie which you can’t say too often.

Requiem for a Dream: I don’t know which I love more, the score by Clint Mansell or the movie by Aronofsky. Story is about 4 characters that get into drugs in very different ways and how their lives are incredibly and completely ruined by it. If you want kids to stop using drugs, make em watch this movie. Brilliant and scary.

Oldboy: Korean movie about a man who is kidnapped and imprisoned for 15 years then released and he has 5 days to discover his kidnappers. Now this sounds like any normal Hollywood movie until you watch the style and the way its shot. The pain that the character endures throughout the movie, not just the physical kind is overwhelming.

28 Days Later: I realize the Boyle will forever be known for Trainspotting but this movie imo is the best Zombie movie made in the last 25 years. Easily. Scary, fun, hopeful, and well directed. A zombie movie that makes you think. MMMM Brainz.

Well that’s it for now; hope everyone has a great weekend.

Posted by th3midnighter @ 3:11 pm EDT | Permalink | 6 Comments

It's hard out here for a Pirate...

Last week, the Canadian Federal Gov't proposed Bill C-61, a comprehensive restrictive bill that would limit how a Canadian citizen could attain, use and share almost any form of digital media.  In layman terms, it pretty much makes it illegal to share songs that you bought from iTunes, rip music, download almost anything and even upload a video onto YouTube.  If you want more information of what exactly the Bill covers, I've included a link below.  Aside from the fact that its pretty obvious that our Federal Conservative government is taking its cues on this bill from individuals such as David Wilkins (US Ambassador to Canada) who has been extremely vocal in his support for more stringent laws on digital media in Canada as well as other American politicians like the Governator, I think the bigger picture here is that the government is totally missing the boat on this issue.  Digital Media in the last 5 to 10 years has changed the way we communicate, watch movies & TV, and listen to music and even how we get our news.  The Canadian and well as the American Gov't have gone out of their way to make it impossible to share all this data freely and has pushed the file sharing community underground. 

Ever since Napster broke out onto the scene many, many years ago, the internet has been the main conduit for many consumers to get their music, movies, TV shows all for free of charge.  Now while I may or may not partake in such activity, it’s very obvious why torrents and newsgroups are so popular and take up such a huge % of the net bandwidth.  The home PC combined with high speed internet accounts combined with 19 to 32" LCD screens at very reasonable prices have created an environment whereby the consumer can get his fav HD TV show downloaded on his pc within an hour without commercials and be able to watch it at his own time.  What I don’t understand is why the Cable companies, the Federal Gov’t, the advertisers, the Music studios haven’t seen this as the perfect storm to take file sharing to the next level.  5, maybe even 10 years ago, you had a very small % of the population that understood how to search and find what they were looking for online and get it in a timely manner.  With the advent of Torrents and sites like mininova, piratebay, my mom can hop online and find her favorite Desperate Housewives episode in less time than it takes me to write this blog.  So with a savvy consumer base, and the technology available to support that consumer base, why haven't these governments seized the opportunity to change and amend laws to make it not only easier for the consumer but more importantly, more profitable.  I get that advertisers lose all of their investment if you aren't watching Lost on Thursday night on ABC but really, doesn’t the PVR already negate advertisers?

To me, there are some really simple solutions that the Cable companies and Music Studios could implement that would bring in millions into their coffers and satisfy the thirst of the net pirates.  For TV shows, simply release the episodes an hour after it airs as .wmv files or .mkv files to download either directly of the studios site or through your PVR.  Don’t force me to watch the show on my PVR or on the website itself.  Give me the ability to download the file (with commercials built in) so I can watch it on any medium I choose whether it be my Iphone, PSP or my sexy HD TV.  Once the TV show is aired, it’s not like you are losing any more money on it.  As for music, don’t force me to go iTunes to use their proprietary software in order to buy one song.  I know there are similar services to iTunes but they don’t have nearly the selection that iTunes has.  The artists really need to get more involved in this process similar to what Radiohead has been doing lately.  Let the artist control how their art gets shared to the world.  Give the artists more input on how their music should be shared instead of forcing the consumer and the artist to follow archaic laws that don’t apply in the Digital age.  Movies are a bit tougher to open since it would take away from direct profits in the theatre but I heard last year that Stephen Soderbergh (director of the Oceans 11 series) was going to release a movie straight to DVD as well as Download as well as theatre to see if it would increase total sales.  The options available for a Movie Studio might be limited in comparison to Cable companies but I think they can still release movies over the web for Download and charge consumers a price without making the consumer feel like he got ripped off.  If I could DL Iron Man a month after it’s been in the theatres for $10 bucks and it expires a month after I download it, then I’d defin take advantage of that.

 

With more and more people having home entertainment centers with big ass HD projectors, give them the opportunity to watch new movies at home while still charging them a fair price.  I know I'm not the first to come up with any of these ideas but it amazes me that Gov’t officials and cable companies and studios are looking at new ways to stifle the use of technology instead of using it to entice more consumers to buy their products.  People are not going to stop downloading simply because it’s just too convenient, quick and yes, free.  Instead of punishing and limiting the options of the consumer, they should be looking at ways to take advantage of a brand new marketplace, one where you get everything with just one little click.

www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20080613.COPYRIGHT13//TPStory/Front

Posted by th3midnighter @ 3:41 pm EDT | Permalink | 0 Comments