He Came to Rock...and Rocked Like No Other!

    "A Cowboy From Hell, that was Far Beyond Driven, you were G*****n Electric, the Medicine Man, who wrote his Message In Blood, using The Art Of Shredding, you died in a Vulgar Display Of Power, Walk to the Cemetery Gates, Rise above the Floods, you are forever Stronger Than All, and we are forever Hollow. R.I.P "Dimebag" Darrell"
               (December 8th, 2004)

   I think the above aptly describes just who he was as a man, as an inspiration, as a legend! Darell "Dimebag" Lance Abott. I still remember watching the news when the reports came in about what happened on that stage...all because of one nutcase and a gun. It's in the five years to the day since that we remember and celebrate the lasting impact that he had on a musical genre that I have such a close personal connection with. He inspired a generation, and will continue to through his music...the legend lives on! I only regret that I couldn't truly experience Dime for the man that he was; a kind-hearted and genuine soul who didn't bow to anyone except his instincts and his passion for music and sharing that with everyone he met! All I can say now, as I raise my Blacktooth Grin, is Rest In Peace Brother...Getcha Pull!

Don't Stop Believin

So it has been just over a week since Spirit Day and all I can still say is one all encapsulating word, Amazing! For those who may not know, Spirit Day is an event put on by the Archdiocese of Vancouver, as a large youth rally for grade 7s from all over the lower mainland. Since the first one in 2005 it has been characterized and defined by a day of fun, food, fellowship (hurray for alliteration), praise, and music! Thankfully I have been blessed to be a part of it and contribute my bit since the second one, "Great Power, Great Responsibility", in 2006. Now this year, passing the 6th annual celebration (there were two of them in 06) I always take something new from each one, this year was no different.
Previous years saw a humble beginning to the largest youth event put on, eventually we had to move to a larger venue, a huge auditorium at Pacific Academy in Surrey. Unbelievably this year had to be split into 2 days, to accommodate for over 1800 grade sevens and chaperons!!! Running the same event twice between pacific academy and Archbishop Carney Secondary school in Port Coquitlam, the birthplace of Spirit day! Once again graced by the presence of the outstanding Matt Maher and Ike Ndolo and band for the first time, and Brad and Gene from Apex ministries...you can definitely tell that something special was going to go down during this weekend.
In years past I had the chance to display my crazy antics on stage in front of hundreds and hundreds of people, whether as a superhero, normal teenager, janitor, high school musical backup dancer, creeper boyfriend, or an insanely nerdy scientist with a intellectual dominance complex. This time I was asked to help out with the Spirit team, which entailed interacting with the kids one on one, leading games, shuffling them to and fro, and helping to lead praise and worship. No matter what context or role I was placed into I always take something new from each year. First and foremost it was a genuinely reaffirming experience, renewing in a sense, after witnessing over 1800 people celebrating our faith as one body in Christ. For many it was their first introduction to this body, and the power it holds, resulting in their surrender to it subsequently.
I remember the first night at Pacific in the closing session after mass with the Archbishop. Brad and Gene, apart from their crazy juggling antics, plate spinning, whipping, straight jacket escaping, and utterly hilarious storytelling, took their time too to share through powerful teachings and testimonies just how we are all one body. Matt Maher was leading the final song set where pretty much the whole crowd went nuts, the spirit team lined the bottom of the stage leading in actions and clapping. It was the last song that I found quite thematic of the day, I tried thinking about a summation of some kind but I always kept coming back to this song, "Alive Again" by Matt Maher. Watch the video below, it was taken at Carney the next day...now imagine this energy but with twice as many people!

The Energy of the day was truly inspiring, and was a very poignant reminder as to why I'm in Youth ministry and why I pursue my call to serve. I remember jumping up and down, playing air guitar with a crowd of grade 7s, clapping til my hands got sore...but it was amidst all that that I truly saw what spirit day was about and what it was designed to provide. It was all about sharing our faith, sharing my opportunities and experiences with them so that they may "Believe".

Believe

"I'm Alive"
Lyrics by Matt Maher

I woke up in darkness surrounded by silence
Oh where, where have I gone?
I woke to reality losing its grip on me
Oh where, where have I gone?
'Cause I can see the light
Before I see the sun rise

You called and you shouted
Broke through my deafness
Now I'm breathing in and breathing out
I'm alive again
You shattered my darkness
Washed away my blindness
Now I'm breathing in and breathing out
I'm alive again

Late have I loved you
You waited for me, I searched for you
What took me so long?
I was looking outside
As if love would ever want to hide
Finding I was wrong
'Cause I can feel the wind
Before it hits my skin

You called and you shouted
Broke through my deafness
Now I'm breathing in and breathing out
I'm alive again
You shattered my darkness
Washed away my blindness
Now I'm breathing in and breathing out
I'm alive again, I'm alive again

'Cause I want you
Yes, I want you
I need you
And I'll do whatever I have to
Just to get through
'Cause I love you
I love you

You called and you shouted
Broke through my deafness
Now I'm breathing in and breathing out
I'm alive again
You shattered my darkness
Washed away my blindness
Now I'm breathing in and breathing out
I'm alive again

Go Forth...

A pretty morbid summation of how I feel about school now!

Madness descends upon a wave of thunder!

To follow up on the last post I present to you another project of grandiosity that when complete it shall open rifts from the depths of hell, rend empires asunder, make everyone under its reach weep instantly, make your ears bleed from awesome, yet it shall move you at the same time...well you get the picture! I'm going to build a guitar. I figured I'd save quite a bit doing the work on my own rather than forking over more than a thousand dollars on a new one. There is a website, www.warmoth.com, that specializes in producing custom guitars. I figured I would just buy a separate neck and body and do the finishing and configuration on my own, think of the bass as a pilot project.

So I want to go with a shape that still screams rock/ metal, yet at the same time is suitable for other environments. I fell up the "Z" body shape and I absolutely love it. I was thinking of a veneered top (flame or quilted maple) over a thick wood like mahogany (great sustain and warmer, fuller tones). The reason for the veneered top is that I want to stain it, keeping the amazing figures of the veneer underneath. Staining it black first to define the deeper grains, then sand off the top and cover it with another colour, it will end up giving it a rich depth, plus it also looks dead sexy! Not sure on what colour yet, so if anyone has any input please let me know!

For the neck I originally found a neck from another custom shop (www.lvguitars.com), there was a really sweet neck that has a dragon inlay up the fingerboard. For the first one though I though it might complicate things because of the neck pocket depth and the scale, because I want to also mount a Floyd Rose Tremolo system to make this beast dive bomb worthy! So I found another item on warmoth, based off of the signature headstocks of the amazing luthier Ken Lawrence, most famously recognized on one of James Hetfield's explorer style guitars from ken! So comments and insight are greatly appreciated!

It's ALIVE!!!....Or it will be!! (insert anticipatory muahahahaha/ evil cackle)

Rather than divulge about the regular psychosis stemming from the relentless barrage of papers, books, and the subsequent reading, followed by the ever so often "bang head here" stress reducer I figured I'd bring some light as to the current status of my latest project.

A couple years ago I lent my first bass, a budget ESP-LTD B-50, to one of my friends. Less than an hour later I get a call saying he plugged it in and heard nothing but noise...and not the good kind! Turns out that was the definitive death knell to the thing. Taking a look at the back it turned out that the wiring was completely torn up! Fantastic. After contemplating reenacting Hendrix's iconic "set the bloody thing on fire" moment I thought I'd churn out a more productive creative response: HOT ROD IT! So, starting last year, I sanded the living tar out of it, I'm not kidding when I quote about 5 hours just on sanding alone.

So far the body is sanded down to a perfectly smooth level, working from a 50 to 250 grit sandpaper, pictures shall follow...eventually. Seeing that it was dropped several times the wood was dented and some hairline cracks and exposed grain resulted, so i found this small pot of grain filler. This stuff is so easy to apply and it has cured a lot of headache, works like a charm, just spread over and sand smooth.

Next step, finally, is to prime it, then sand it again, then prime again...you can see where this cycle is going to end up eh? MORE SANDING! After I should start laying down the base coats of paint, I was planning on a classical yellow to red sunburst. But it shant' end there, no, not at all! I went through about 12 different sketches of what I want but I have come to a conclusion...I hope. What I was planning on doing is lay down the sunburst as a foundation and then cover it in auto, or masking tape. After that, sketch in the design and cut it away with a knife. Next step will be to spray the whole thing black, where I will then pull away the tape when dry, exposing the design underneath in sunburst!

If you have no idea what I'm talking about refer to this video, all credit for inspiration goes to this guy!



And that should encompass the awesomeness of this project, I was also planning on doing a Skull like design on the back. I designed this screaming skull design a few years ago, so I'm gonna work that in somewhere! To add to the madness I also found some wicked new pickups, in the exact configuration (EMG Passive PJ format, already have actives on Isis, and batteries are freaking annoying sometimes!), so I can finally do away with the crap sounding buzz that drove me insane for the duration of its life!

Alive and.....

Wow, so I have not touched this blog for quite some time it appears. Fret not whoever actually reads this dusty, neglected excuse for a blog.

School is pretty much killing me, and what else is new? I'm starting to think about starting a procrastination club on campus, if they actually have one...probably won't get anything done, but i'll get on that later...case in point! Speaking of which, I have a midterm in 11.5 hrs and I need to study!

ONCE MORE INTO THE FRAY!!!

Like pulling teeth!

So I guess I can sum up the past few weeks to something around this title. I haven't really been to the dentist in a while, 2/3 times were for cleaning, the other was for cavities...fun. That means the finger-waving dentist comes in to exert her cruel perception of power and authority to the novacained 20 year old in front of her. That's why i can endure the normal routine, because she doesn't do it.
It began with the usual, pumping me full of freezing to the point where I looked like I had a stroke ( i couldn't feel my right nostril and I couldn't move my eyebrow, which has never happened before!), and then stretches this blue surgeon's tarp thingy over my mouth, almost gagged me too...fantistic start there! So after being rendered unable to voice my displeasure I can do nothing but grip the seat and stare off into the corner while I try to block out the chit-chat with her assistant. Between discerning which sound would result in "if you're going crazy bang your head against wall thusly," the drilling or the socializing I caught on that apparently they didn't know that I could clearly hear everything they were saying.
Then it got fun, she started talking about how wonderfully skilled as a musician her daughter is yada yada yada. Then she started talking about how she loves to sing church hymns and how Jesus is present in the music and motivates her to be closer. I'm all for that but immediately I evauluated, "right-wing, conservative evangelical." There's nothing wrong with that, sure they're a little passionate for lack of a better term but I thought how she'll react to the band shirt I was wearing under the apron, all I could do was laugh and try to smile gleefully in eager anticipation. My bro told me that she spazzed at him for wearing his Metallica shirt when he was in, if they think Metallica is the poster child of the devil's music then Lamb of God was the spokesperson, or in terms relevant to her, "the door-to-door evangelist." I was wearing the shirt from the kick ass concert I blogged about in a previous post, it featured the band name on the top and a screaming winged skeleton wrapped around their logo. So after she finishes up I stand up only to see the acusatory, wide open eyes as she scanned my shirt. Immediatley she asked, "is that a sacriligious shirt?" I laughed as I said no and told her it was a band shirt from a thrash metal band from the states, she didn't buy it seeing that metal=evil=satan, clearly... her logic is astounding. My how the ignorant preach! This is the precise reason why I love metal, enforcing the whole mentality of if you don't like it that's fine, but if you challenge it then screw off! I said I explained the band to a priest and all that, skulls do not equal satan, Lamb of God is a name not a statement! "Well I'm sure he didn't want you to be wearing a shirt like that!" I didn't actually wear the shirt in front of a priest, I just wanted to play along and see her reaction, what a glorious reaction it was when she hastily said goodbye and disappeared into another room. I love playing these games, especially when you win!

The Bass to my Diatribe

Okay hopefully you tuned into the little play on words in the title. Gonna be a little rantish but I need to spew this out somehow.
Most of you who know me know that I have very different tastes in music compared to the "here today, gone later today" 15 minutes of fame mainstream music. There, you can already gauge my opinion from that! While I am in no way some kind of heavy metal crusader hellbent on converting the ignorant, I can respect other peoples musical choices as well, it what makes everybody unique. That's the thing though, society is plagued by the media, "musicians" and artists are created, beat out, and molded into some icon of these big record companies to boost sales or appeal to a certain demographic.
That's a completely different argument though, i can go on for that for hours. In those lines though there is something that I just don't get, is how bad some people can be and have the gall to call themselves artists. Recently I've been finding myself barraged more and more with the whole hipster, hippie revival, indie rock stuff. Now i'm not gonna bash whoever listens to this, some of my best friends love this stuff. But the thing that I cannot stand is the very prominent arrogance that permeates several of these "artists." They prance around in some acid/ other drug induced delusion spewing utter crap, yet when called out on their style they all claim they're unique, and unlike anything that society conforms too, yada yada yada! Their ego is filled with as much crap as their "art."
Whether it's computer synthesized beats, or your boring ass 3 chord progressions, a degree of musical competency is a must. The utter tragedy that I cringe at all the time is how many absolutely slaughter any degree of respect demanded by the instruments they play. As mainly a bass and guitar player the music I play, as well as many other genres, requires a very intimate knowledge with your instrument. Theory, scales, chords, keys...all these fall into a desire to learn, to expand one's knowledge and escape a restricted dogma of "this is how it's played." What kills me everytime is I look some of this junk up and the bass player is there plucking away at root notes...with a frickin pick. Once again, there are many great pick bassists but honestly these images remind me of myself when I first picked up a guitar, constantly scanning the fretboard, counting which fret to use, and playing out of beat (this was probably in grade 5).If they do use finger-plucking style they use their thumb or their hand is positioned retardedly like they don't know they have a strap attached to the guitar/bass and they have to anchor it to their body. There is more than one string. I'll be damned if I see any of these artists play an arpegio, let alone be able to find where the frickin octave is (cf the greats: Cliff burton, Victor Wooten, Stu Hamm, Steve harris, John Myung, john Entwhistle, Les Claypool, Geddy Lee, Flea, Jaco Pastorius...these guys learned, they trained, they practiced, they didn't bash their hands against the thing and recorded whatever came out and call it music).
I had to do that, I apologize for the length, I do not apologize though for the content. Just another breath of madness!

Twitter This (reloaded)

Remember my anti-twitter rant a while back? Well I just stumbled onto this video from the Collegehumour guys, funny stuff. Once again emphasizing the point that 10-1 nobody freaking cares about what you're thinking or doing at that exact moment, just do it and get it over with!

Goodness a plenty

After days of trying to get it to work I finally did it. One of my friends just recently delivered unto me the 8gb download equivalent of pure gold, the complete adobe masterworks (aftereffects, premier, photoshop, encore, etc) shame that Daemontools was being a pain in the but, I spent today remapping the adobe registry on my comp. Total pain, nearly wanted to gouge my eyes out from all the thousands of damn .dll and other files, turns out there was a fragment from a previous adobe download that didn't properly uninstall, thus rendering my first attempts to banging my head into my desk. Aside from the nerdy comp talk, it finally worked.
I am now currently basking in the goodness that is aftereffects, I can feel the creativity flowing. So in essence this was merely an update saying that I am excited as hell to get cracking at several film projects this summer. Expect a new machinima, some music videos, promo stuff, the whol shabangabang!

So I'm currently stuck trying to make the next few days go by as fast as possible. In my efforts to calm myself down I've been listening to Bruce Dickinson's solo work, if you don't know who he is, he's the lead singer of one of the most epic and legendary bands ever to grace God's good earth: Iron Maiden. I just recently rediscovered this old gem on youtube, when I first heard this song I was obsessed with it. One of the first songs I learned on guitar all the way through, gave me chills everytime, just thought I'd share it with you!

Monday wails its Siren song

Ok so by now most people in university are done exams, for the world being the way it is...I am not. I'm stuck writing my last two exams both on monday and I'm currently taking up residence in the library.

You know how in cartoons or television in general how students are often depicted with skyscrapers consisting of books and notes around them? Well that's what my little hole in the wall in the silent room looks like. I'm stuck writing my last paper to hand in monday morning and I'm usually content with 8 sources or so on top of my primary sources, it's only 2000 words...big deal. I have around double that amount! I know I shouldn't be complaining, but I've been doing this for the past month, so you can see why I might be just a tad on the insane side...fan-bloody-tastic!

Respect!

Walk:

Lyrics by Pantera

Can't you see I'm easily bothered by persistence
One step from lashing out at you...
You want in to get under my skin
And call yourself a friend
I've got more friends like you
What do I do?

[Pre]
Is there no standard anymore?
What it takes, who I am, where I've been
Belong
You can't be something you're not
Be yourself, by yourself
Stay away from me
A lesson learned in life
Known from the dawn of time

Respect, walk

Run your mouth when I'm not around
It's easy to achieve
You cry to weak friends that sympathize
Can you hear the violins playing you song?
Those same friends tell me your every word

Are you talking to me?
No way punk

On the Wednesday the Lord said, "Let there be metal!" And there was METAL!!

Today is my brief respite from constant paper writing and studying...welcome to my nightmare.

What I inscribe into the hallowed tracts of this blog is a summation of probably the best way to finish off classes for the year! 

Wednesday marked my last day of classes, and to mark that celebration all I had to do after my last class was take a little walk down to the other side of campus to the new arena where the hordes of metalheads were held at bay before the ensuing chaos. I found it quite amusing as I walked through campus. The ams blockparty was off in full swing, with some crap band that I've never bothered to pay any attention to, the roots or something like that...meh. The field was frickin packed with students, probably most of em drunk out of their minds (I was driving so I didn't bother). As I walked further on I finally found em: metalshirts, spikes, tattoos, raucious screaming, metal horns....what a night it will be. The really funny thing was that as we all took over the corners and streets along the new thunderbird arena, all the frats were heading down to the block party...loved seeing all the stares as they tried in their drunken entirety to avoid us. 

Ended up meeting with Chris and Elaine, seeing that this was their first metal concert experience, it looked like they had quite the first impression. Met up with my bro and proceeded to get in line, running into an old buddy from my last job as well. Once we got in we didn't really bother with the first band who was already playing at the time, Municipal waste. Spent the time instead grabbing some sick merch. God forbid went on next, pretty solid band. I wonder how much "greenery" the vocalist scored, he only asked 5 times when he said they'll be at the merch section in between sets. As they set up for the next set I get a text from my friend Kurt, who called me when he was at the block party when he heard there was a metal show goin on at the same time, kinda funny how i asked him a few months ago if he wanted to go and he said he'll be too busy. Sure enough the text says he's in the arena, perfect freakin timing bud haha, and he was sitting right in front of us a few rows down, so he joins up with us for As I lay Dying. Awesome band, I've listened to them before, not as much but they played a very solid set, gotta listen to em more.

Finally the next band to go on was Children of Bodom, what else can I say? Saw em last year at gigantour, and just like last time they absolutely tore it up, except this time we were a lot closer to the band, and I saw Chris' eyes light up like a kid's at christmas, I could tell she was happy! This was when I started thrashing around, headbangin to the max. Songs like Silent Night Bodom night, Angels Don't Kill, In your Face, Hate Me, Bloodrunk, Hellhounds on my trail. To finish it off, Randy from Log came out to commemorate a special date, that night was Alexi Laiho's bday! This promptly brought about a concerted happy 30th birthday greeting from everyone, don't get any more historic than that! To end it off they went right into Downfall, the same song I almost got whiplash from last year! Awesome show as usual.

Security was pretty crappy though in the set, funniest example was when a fight broke out among two guys who were badmouthing each other, few punches into the head and a tackle, it took like 30 seconds for security to jump in. All of the arena starts to chant and cheer as they're dragged off, just to enhance the comic aspect some random guy walks out past em with pop and popcorn and waves his hands around (cf. Rocky victory pose) resulting in the whole crowd laughing and cheering at him.

Finally Lamb of God started their set, fully took advantage of the stage (had a platform set up around Chris Adler, and a red carpet rolling out in front, dominated by their awesome logo behind the drums, so cool when Mark Morton, John Campbell, and Willie Adler all surrounded the drums). They started playing the acoustic intro from their new album Wrath (Can't stop listening to it, so damn good), and went right into "In your hands". Right away the crowd went nuts, circle pits opening up everywhere, crowd surfing, the whole package. In Randy's ever present opinion we were told once again how Vancouver is the band's favourite canadian city and how we always support them, the reason why they always come back to us first. I always love how the band has such a connection with the fans, especially in one of their fav cities. I was pretty much screaming and headbanging to everything, my neck is still healing from all that. Halfway through the set randy announces to the crowd that Britney Spears (who was playing at GM place at the same time) walked off on her gig 20 minutes into the set due to too much pot smoke, way to go for being the anti-drug activist you freakin hypocrite. So after tearing into her and the general laughing we are reassured that that will never happen at a Lamb of God show. Funny thing was after that, some chick jumps onto the stage and starts dancing around. "look everybody it's Britney Spears' body double courtesy of crystal meth!" before security dragged her off stage. Finally "even though Canada is such an awesome place, you guys can still act like a buncha rednecks!" and then the riff goes into "redneck," crowd went freakin nuts as they used that song to finish off their set and go into "Black Label". Then I saw something that hasn't happened in years, without the band's direction, the crowd separates and form the much dreaded WALL OF DEATH, youtube it if you don't know about it, pretty much picture a lord of the rings fight scene where two sides smash into each other. Left with the humbling image of Randy standing on the stage bowing and kneeling as we chanted "LAMB OF GOD" long past the house lights going up, you can definitely tell that there is a lot of truth towards what he said earlier about how freaking awesome Vancouver is. Definitely one of the best ways to finish off the school year!

Just a case of the mondays

Ok so this morning, I had another unfortunate run in with a transit gongshow. Last week on friday, a body was found at the foot of the ubc highway, turns out it was a murder in broad daylight, the victim was the sister of a vancouver mayoral candidate last year, so it's been pretty high profile. Unfortunate as it is, the cops and investigators have decided to block off the whole area, until friday at least. So this morning as I woke from my nap on the bustrip to class, I found out that we had to get rerouted, unfortunately that route took us down Dunbar, in the morning rush...fantastic. The result? Well it did add an extra 40 min or so to get down to campus, where going along the highway where we originally were supposed to go, would have taken 5 min. I ended up missing my first class, and was late for my next one, awesome! 

Upside to today though, I think God finally decided to flip a switch or something...Spring is officially here and the weather today was AWESOME! Didn't have to wear a jacket, got to enjoy walking to class, spent some quality best friend/ 2nd family time on the knoll, and I did enjoy my smoothie that for some bizzare reason exploded in the Bread Garden when they were making it. It was an actual explosion, smoothie flew like 8 feet from the girl, felt so bad when she was covered in the stuff and she was freaking out asking if i was ok! that is service right there!

Hooked on greatness

So I'm currently going out of my mind with finishing my term papers. Classes finish next week, and the celebrate I just have to take a brisk stroll down campus to the new arena. Lamb of God and Children of Bodom...need i say more? Can't freaking wait, LOG totally killed it when opening for metallica back in december and I'm totally digging their new album, Wrath (it is a welcome return to their roots). When I saw Bodom at Gigantour last year, first time seein em...loved it when they did their old stuff, not to mention their cover of Don't stop Believin! Quite excited for next week.

In other music related stuff, I stayed up late last night when I saw that Les Claypool (the bass genius behind Primus) was performing on kimmel. Holy crap it was pretty damn cool. I'm not usually a fan of abstract weirdo freak music, but Les has always been an amazing musician nonetheless, these new tracks though have surely grabbed a hold of my attention. Check out the vid below of him performing his new single, "Red state Girl."

Twitter this!

Just a general notification and inquiry...What the hell is so damn special about twitter?

What's the point in wasting your time telling people what you're are doing (or pretending to do) every waking minute where you can spend that time actually doing something without a care of who in Japan or wherever else might just give two cents to pay a modicum of passing apathetic attention. That's right, 10 to 1...nobody freaking cares. No I don't care about how intuitive your cat is, what's going on in Oprah, where you're going, what you should put on your playlist, or how much the world should pity you... etc, etc, etc. It's in no way whatsoever conducive to a healthy social life, that's a subtle way of saying go outside and make some friends as nobody online would certainly care, just as much as I sure as hell don't!

If that sounds a bit harsh, I'm not sorry. Term papers are turning me into one hell of a critic on the epidemic proportions of vapidity and vain emptiness that is permeating this thing we call society!

In review

Ok, so i'll try to make this quick as I have a million other words to write for my three term papers, and I have to head off to take photos for an event tonight...busy busy busy. 

I promised I'll do this eventually, but last saturday I finally caved and did the one thing I've been putting off forever, with due reason. I went clubbing. Yes, the metalhead that many have you have come to know walked into one of the most out of place situations in his life. I promised to attend my dear "sister's" bday, Chris I know if you're reading this you'll tell me to take off the quotations, so I went clubbing for my sister's bday. 

After one of my friends bails last minute it becomes even more awkward as I'm suddenly one of the only guys going. That made me a prime target to drag onto the dance floor...thanks to Maya. So after sorting out rides we find ourselves outside Aubar, before the places becomes packed. We had two tables where I promptly volunteered to be the "stuff guardian," deteremined to put off the inevitable. While sitting around I proceeded to text several people about said predicament, some couldn't believe me, others laughed (there will be pictures!), others told me to drink it all away (i was driving...no thanks), and certain people laughing that they were just there the night before!

I swear it's like the full moon comes out at that time, just inside the building...not outside. Looked like a vile concoction of misplaced morality, shame, alcohol, bad dancing, equally bad music and DJ, and raging hormones. It was fun in itself watching all these sleezy guys tryin to take a chomp out of any passing, intoxicated female...where they either get rejected or the ensuing chaos becomes only for eyes above the age of 18. Awkward, not to mention the person grabbing my butt when I finally got pulled onto the dancefloor with the concerted efforts of Chris and Maya...you got three songs out of me, happy? I did take solice in the fact that I was told I dance better than some of the people in the crowd (cf. Edi clone...whoops sorry dude) we watched, much in conflict with my previous evidence at their grad dance back in gr 12 ( all the girls were from the same school...so they saw my terrible dancing first hand), and apparently that didn't count?

So there we go, from what I can remember that was my saturday in summary. Amidst the chaos, awkwardness, confusion and madness...it turned out to be a pretty fun night, interesting times with good friends. Maybe I shouldn't use interesting times, as I just found out that in some places it is a casually placed euphemism for a curse or taboo, named the Chinese curse...wiki it if you don't believe me. Don't get me wrong, even though I did enjoy the night...I learned firsthand that clubbing ain't my scene. Looks like I won't be doing that again for quite a while, once in a blue moon...last time i checked, I haven't seen a blue moon in a LONG time!

Transit Gongshow

So this week has clearly attested to the snowball theory of everything starting small and then spinning rapidly out of control...almost literally.

Over the weekend, the weather has decided to go beyond sub-zero temperatures. On Sunday my car was encased in ice before going to work, and at night we had three people in the parking lot defrosting and scrapping our respective vehicles. So what do you expect the next day? Well in the very articulate words of my dear friend Sarah, "one snowflake falls and the city shuts down!" That's exactly what happened. Monday morning I'm roused out of bed to the sound of my dad yelling, "it snowed but it's not sticking, you'll be fine out there!" If it wasn't sticking, then how come the only colour I saw out there was white!? So the initial gongshow was at 7:40 am when I left my house to go to campus, in the back of my mind I kept thinking I shouldn't even bother...should have listened. First bus doesn't come, next one comes 20 min later at a snail's pace because there was solid ice below the snow... a 10 min drive to my 480 stop turns into 20 min. So I end up waiting for the 480, finally it comes and everyone crams in. The driver then tries to get everyone waiting for the next one to hop on, when asked he says, "cuz the next one won't be here for another hour!" Seriously!?

So I find it was high time to take a nice nap, when I wake up I find that I'm only just past granville and 70th ave. I look at my cell and the time says 9:59....cmon, i've already missed my first class and now I'm late for my second.... I don't get to Ubc until 10:20am. 2 hours and 40 minutes for a trip that usually takes less than an hour!

Magically the snow melts from the streets in the afternoon, sparing me from another suicidal home trek. I just remember dreading that night after classes with Kathryn, saying that I'll try not to die...but just in case, she'll be the first one I'd tell (Sorry Sarah I know it's usually you, apparently from what Kat told me!). But I did make it home safely, guess either outcome Kat was on a first to know basis! Haha!

Ok, onward to this morning. I get dropped off at my stop and much to my luck a bus pulls in just in time. I get my favourite spot, and since I don't have any readings to finish I decide to take a nap...again (I have the most comfortable naps on the bus...I'm weird that way!). So as I'm enjoying the bliss of unconsiousness I sense that the bus isn't moving anymore. Much to my hunch it turns out the bus isn't, once again stopped just pass granville and 70th Ave. The bus driver is in the back of the bus asking for a witness. "What the heck is goin on?" I ask. So for 20 min we're all left in the dark as to what's going on, as the bus emptys and fills up again much to the overbearing impatience of certain transit goers, just sit still and hope for the best. So after a healthy amount of time of nothing happening, someone comes into the bus asking for someone who can speak cantonese and translate for this guy who apparently rammed right into our bus!!!!  "umm this is a bus coming out of RICH- (rice)- MOND...take your pick!"

Sure enough, this moron thought he could overtake a bus between lanes and smacks right into the bus...and it took 20 min to squeeze out the guy's license and registration info (that is if he a. doesn't have one or b. isn't a legit registration...it happens). Rough times eh? To add to that, the bus driver keeps asking for a witness who can describe what happened even though nobody exactly knew what happened! Genius.

Bang the gong...this is the world I live in!

Verbal Regurgitation

Ok My last post I think made it loud and clear that I hate it when people take advantage of priveleges that they do not deserve (cf. the cavernous ever echoing skullcaves of high school students who somehow found themselves in university). 

My next rant follows certain people in my classical studies class (anyone who wants to hunt me down it's clst 331 002, 9:00am to 10:00 am). I take it that by third year people have worked out the first year noobishness and for the most part realize that school is serious business now and you have to work for it. What I don't get is how people will sit down in class, lecture is going on (johnson is probably one of the best profs I ever had, just love the no-crap attitude), and people will just sit down take out their crap macs ( i have a bias that macs are for either used for the power of multimedia, and the remaining majority are for people who don't know how to use a computer...statistically it's also true so stuff it you naysayers) and just surf the whole damn class, never looking up at the front at all. Subconciously I always sit dead center in the back row, it's a relatively small class so the prof is able to see everyone. Always I'm plagued by having two of the shining exemplars of apathy sitting in front of me. e-diets, celeb gossip, fashion and effing facecrack is all I see flying across their screens...hardly any notes whatsoever. First of all it's bloody distracting, peripheral vision has its drawbacks. Also with facebook, where one said individual would spend the whole class pretty much creeping other peoples' profiles...trying to dig up some dirt or whatever shallow people do, rather ironic that they go that deep into invading somebody's privacy (often those who they do not know at all) only to yield nothing. 

K, so onto the basis of my irritation, if you're gonna come to class please actually act like you care. If you're paying your own tuition at least make the effort, if mommy and daddy are paying your way like the spoiled little bitches you appear as...stop wasting their money and gtfo of class...i'm trying to learn!

My angry rant

Ok, so I haven't been back for a while and I regret starting this off on a sour note but I just have to rant for a bit. 

This tract is in reference to the painful, disparaging, maddening observation that while there are many people out there that do so much good and contribute constructively and positively, stupidity still runs unfettered through the fields of abundance.

I speak of course in relation to what I encountered in my 4:30 film class yesterday. With it being a second year and above course, I am now firm on the opinion that it should only be available to those with the competency level of people in those respective years. So I walk in, and to the recurring observation that it is reminiscent of your classic film (ironic no?) representation of a highschool class: screaming, laughing, objects being thrown, and very liberal profanity. So I turn to my friend mik and I can see it in his eyes, where I verbally confirm, "welcome back to highschool!"

Bruce Marchfelder, the instructor, comes in eventually and the crowd slowly calms down. As class progresses somehow the highschoolers' lack of interest is represented in proportion to the rising sound level. Seriously, right off the bat, who the hell talks in class? That's not all, who the hell talks in class after the instructor has told, numerous times, to shut the hell up? The same instructor who tells said individuals to shut the hell up after adding that he doesn't want them to fail the class (big frickin hint no?), and also on the common concept of respect. 

So class continues and suddenly the noise erupts, all around me, especially the people behind me (well i sit in front, so it's everbody behind me) begin chatting away like it's nobody's business. Rightly so, Bruce goes ahead to tell them to shut the hell up, I think he cracked this time when he yelled and everyones' head whipped around wide eyed, coulda given themselves whiplash. For crying outloud! He is a professional in the film industry, he can read body language like no tomorrow! He is totally and constantly aware of what goes on, yet the class treats him like he's a robot, unaware of the 35 odd people in front of him, uncaring.

Another talk on how what they do now affects their future ensues, as it is competitive and other people will always look at what these morons do in the future. I don't think they linked the phrases on "future", "now", "motivation", "maturity", and "I can seriously f*** up your transcript (well he didn't say that but it was damn well implied) together, do we have to go back to elementary school for these people and teach em grammar all over again? 

Class then tries to resume as normally as possible as I gaze at the works of D.W Griffith on the screen and then as abruptly as it started...it ended. With a throw of the remote and an exasperated sigh, the arms throw up and that was it. "Can't do this, forget it...forget about class, can't handle this right now! Just go!" And that was it, class was over. 

I seriously do not bloody understand. How many times does it take someone to have those messages drilled into the thick empty caverns of their skull? This is not highschool anymore people, from day one you're part of the race. That's exactly what it is, a race, you have to work and train for it. Not just sit back and act like you own the world and that everythin is going to work out in your favour! In the end it's not what mommy and daddy want for you, you're going to realize very soon that it's what you want for yourself. So please drop your egos at the door where I don't care, sit down,  and shut the hell up...because I'm trying to learn! Otherwise...go back to highschool where you evidently belong, and give your seat to someone who deserves it!