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Things that I like.
2005-08-11 02:09:40
You know, I've been reading a few of the journals on the .org. Some of them make no sense whatsoever, some are cute in their own incomprehensible way (hinatasan for example), others though...
So many of the journals on the .org are filled with angst and hate. Some of it is obviously done in fun, such as Godix and (I think) Sammy. Most of it seems pretty genuine though. Heck, when I read back to my own journals I can see a pretty fair amount of ranting there.
So today I've decided to list things that I like. Hopefully, it's not too short of a list.
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I like waking up early, before the sun comes up and lifting weights. It makes me feel alive and ready to take on the world.
I like seeing my wife smile when I check on her after she's gone to bed.
I like my new TV. It's a 60" widescreen HDTV, and it rocks.
I like watching my students learn something new for the first time. That AHA! Moment is great when they learn to break the boundaries of their lessons. I plan lessons hoping for that on purpose.
I like that sneaky little smile that beautiful women get when they think they've snowed you. And the real smile when you point it out.
I like the way my dog jumps up on the couch and does that wiggly happy dance in the window as I pull in the driveway from work.
I like hot chocolate on a cold day.
I like laughing so hard that my chest gets tight and it's hard to inhale.
I like when I go to the shooting range and practice with my rifle. That moment of calm precision just before the violent smash of the rifle into my shoulder.
I like buying extravagant gifts for people, and the look of surprise when they get a 600 dollar pearl instead of a book on dieting.
I like to get girly things for my wife.
I like swordfighting. during a perfect sparring session when the shenai are whistling through the air and my body moves with precision and clarity.
I like riding my motorcycle. I l ike to crank on the gas when I'm going around a corner and doing power slides. I like being able to dust corvettes on the onramp at the freeway.
I like reading a really good book in my hammock out in the backyard by the Koi pond.
I like romantic comedy for anime. I don't care if it's not macho, shows like Love Hina and Ai Yori Aoshi are comfortable and watchable.
I like horseback riding in the Hollywood mountains as the sun sets, and riding back to the stables under a full moon.
I like knowing that I've been in a knife fight and didn't back down.
I like that my eyes naturally change color.
I like protecting people, and knowing that they feel safe when I'm around.
I like to scratch my back on doorjambs like a bear.
I like spoiling my wife with gifts and love.
I like being lazy on the weekend.
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if you do your own list, (or strangely find that you like the same stuff) let me know via pm, I'll check it out! -
Schools closing - a work rant - a site rant.
2005-08-04 01:37:02
Summer is rapidly drawing to a close.
So far I've given my students lessons on :
Poser (character design and animation program)
Photoshop
Terragen
and
Adobe Premiere.
Today was the first day of doing videos with premiere.
Originally, I had wanted to do an all AMV class for summer but not enough people signed up for it. Instead I got 12 people in a class that has 8 computers. So anyway today I started on premiere. The assignment was pretty simple: take some poser animations and put them into premiere. Use the sound effects CD (provided by me thank you) and add sound effects. Whooshes, bone crunches, or whatever to the set of clips. Pretty simple overall. They sucked big time. Of course I've got students that have been making AMV's for a while, so they thought they were all leet and shit. Too bad they weren't listening when I described the poser assignment a couple weeks ago.
I've created an AMV editing disk for them to all take home, it has about 45 min of various anime on it (cowboy bebop, Lain, Sailor Moon, and Wolf's Rain) as well as six selected songs, and a demo for Adobe Premiere as well as the AMVapp. It was a real bitch getting the footage compressed and still looking good enough to edit, yet still fit onto a standard CD. I'll be putting their videos onto DVD at the end of summer.
You know, grading rank beginners can be sort of tough after seeing all the awesome videos on the .org. To me, I see videos that smack of quality and care (Like most of say.... Bakadeshi's work) and then I see students that do random cuts, random every thing, and think it's glorious. That's an important time, when they are still taken with the awesomeness of making their own videos. I can't just point out all the problems with it, or they'll stop right then. Think about the first time you EVER used an editing program. It was probably complicated, and compared to later work absolutely atrocious, but it was still great to you at that moment. I have to fan that little flicker of flame until a persons talent grows enough to learn on their own. It means I wind up watching videos that suck beyond all logic a lot, and have to find the good things in them. I guess that's why I tend to be slightly generous with my op scores on the .org.
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Random work shit
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You know that feeling when you go into work, and someone tells you that they are going to be out the very next day for some shit like a doctors appointment? You just want to smack the shit out of them, I mean they always go "oh, it was the only appointment". Bullcrap. Lets face it, you can scedule shit for when you are not at work. Especially when your day during summer session ends at 1:00. Goddam fucking fuck. That means that I have to do their work for them. I have to do, not only my work, and all the other extra crap that I'm doing, and covering their lazy fucking asses as well. How fucking hard is it to say: "Oh, I work in a school, can you scedule for 2:30?" Apparently pretty goddam tough.
I do logistics and transportation for 80 people on a daily basis, in addition to teaching, doing tech support, network administration and running behavioral intervention on wayward students. On top of that, I leave later than almost anyone else at my school. When I ask for a raise I get bullshit answers and "oh, now isn't a good time". Meanwhile the people that saying this are driving a 2005 mercedes and mustangs. Fucking assholes. I swear to god, that if they don't recognize I'm going to do a 'doin my job' strike and not do any of that extra shit that I've been doing for so long. They can hire a fucking consultant to come fix things.
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extremely random rant
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What is it about people bitching at other members in their journals?
It's like watching a bunch of monkeys fling feces at each other. Admitedly, everyone has a bad day, heck I've even been known to be a bit on the rude side to a few other members, but lets face it: it's just a forum for people that like anime, and in particular people that like anime put to music of their choice. Like I mentioned earlier, everyone has a first video. It's probably to a show that they like, with scenes that they remember. Scenes like that spot in Evangelion with those guys on the twister thing. So what? To them, that made perfect sense at the time. Don't judge videos based on OTHER videos that you've seen. Judge them based on what you see right in that very same video. I still see DBZ videos that I like. I still see the same scenes from Naruto, and the videos are still good. Lets face it, no one is forcing you do download videos that you don't think you're going to like.
Lately the site seems to have lost a lot of it's feeling of being a community. New threads are shot down quickly, the old ones are full of crap. Members constantly railing at each other. Hell, Arigatomyna did a video recently and all people could find to comment on was how 'gay' it was. Dur, don't you think maybe that she knew that? Here we have someone who has taken the time to help countless other members (including myself), and has always made an effort to answer any real questions that I've had about a myriad of topics. And she gets a thread full of "it's gay" responses to a video. I'm sure I could find other stuff, but lets face it; I just haven't been as interested in the forum recently. I used to look forward to opening my email in the morning and seeing all the topic replies on stuff that I was following, or participating it. Lately, meh. It's not holding water for me. -
oops
2005-07-22 01:48:51
At school, right at the beginning of summer session I programmed the bells to ring at the appropriate times given that the classes are different.
The problem is that a few of the bells didn't ring on time, it was three bells I believe, but they were right about at dismissal time, like 11:10 and 11:50 and 12:00 so it wasn't a big deal. I figured I'd get to it when I had a chance. That chance finally came about 2 1/2 weeks into the summer, and we figured out what the problem was.
I had reversed the AM/PM settings for those times, so that they were ringing, just not in the morning like they were supposed to.
Oops.
I'll bet the people in the apartment complexes around the school really loved me for that one.
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Terrorism; why it's easier than you think.
2005-07-11 01:35:13
I used to work as a security supervisor. I did concerts and large sporting events (like the Rose Bowl). Eventually I quit since they kept promoting me to more responsibility. Not that couldn't handle it, I could. That was the problem. I just wanted to have some fun on the weekends and check out a few free concerts as part of the package. I usually spent more on T-shirts and stuff for my wife than the meager wage they gave me.
Where am I going with this? Well I heard, as did most of the rest of the world about the London bombings. I started to think back on when the World Trade Center was planed. I was doing security at the time. I remember how every one got all up in arms about 'terrorist this' and 'terrorist that'. Everybody wanted to be the guy that cought one. The thing is.... it's kinda of hard to spot them. Remember, terrorists come in all shapes and sizes. Back during the hight of the cold was both US and USSR had moles that lived for years in the target country. Just regular guys that had 9-5 jobs, kids and minivans. They looked like, they WERE your neighbors. The only difference was that they had a secret mission that was activated by either a code, or a news event. It works like this: the cell leader puts in an ad in the personals, about how blah blah blah misses blah blah blah, and mentions specific names and dates. No actual contact between the agents and the cell leader. Even if you catch one, very little changes since there can be any number of cells, and none of them have contact. News events work the same way. One group blows something up, and either gets cought, or goes into hiding. Either way, you'll probably never see them again. The other group sees that event on the news and uses that as their own trigger. Again, no actual contact.
So where am I going with this again?
Skip forward to the modern day. Half trained crews, frequently students doing volunteer time, or marines out from 29 palms usually did the searches. Most of them 'wanted' to catch someone smuggling something in. The likelyhood of that was pretty low though. Lets face it, all the guns that we found were on off duty cops. Knives and whatnot were usually of the work variety and to my eye looked like they were left on by accident.
I kept trying to point out that the terrorist, if they wanted to sneak something into the event wasn't going to be dressed in robes wearing a tuban on their heads. If you DID see one, then you needed to start looking in the other direction since it was sure to be a distraction. No. A terrorist sneaking a bomb, or bio agent into the event would either be in a wheelchair, or a lady with a baby. For one of two reasons:
one - searchers are reticent to search those groups. Make the cripple move to check his cushion? Damm right. Dig all the way to the bottom of the baby bag, make sure the bottles actually have milk in them? Damm right. That's only the obvious way. Most concerts and sporting events have literally miles of fenceline. much of it is either near a parking lot, or accessible. More likely they would just toss a small bag over and let someone pick it up. Hell for that matter, remember when I mentioned how lots of the people that do peripheral security are volunteers? Voila, instand entry.
Those are just the easy ways that come to mind. I could probably come up with an easy dozen without trying.
Ok, so this has been a long ass entry... what's the point you're wondering (if you've gotten this far)?
The point is that only through diligence and dedication can we find people like this. The average guy has to be willing to do something when they see it. If we start to give up our basic freedoms in the name of security, well I'm thinking that we don't deserve either then.
Sorry for the ramble. I'll put up something cheery or fun next time. -
Nobody thinks of MY pain.
2005-07-05 02:49:45
Seriously, I like to leave OPs on lots and lots of videos... I'm somewhere aroung 150, I think. Most of my reviews tend to be about 1100 or so words long, and generally feature what I like to think of as useful information on what I thought about the video. That's what an OP is right?
Have you ever watched a video that was so godawful sucky that you just couldn't think of a single thing to write about, or a place to start?
I hate that. It fucks up my whole flow if I'm doing a whole bunch of videos, say.. 10 over a weekend. I'll get to one sucky one and not want to even look at an AMV for a while.
I got a review from Arigatomina recently.. it's massive. How is it that she manages to write a small novella, and not really have any filler material in it? It's a skill I tell you.
Actually, I've gotten a bunch of reviews recently.... which brings me back to the whole pain thing.
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