LINE OF THE DAY, part XXXIII

From commenter Heras-clitus on the article 5 Reasons to Be Terrified That Computers Can Now Read Faces on Cracked.com (forgoing the usual centering and italicizing since it would interrupt the flow of the comment):

So, so you think you can tell
Heaven from Hell ......check
Blue skies from pain ......check
Can you tell a green field
From a cold steel rail? .....check
A smile from a veil? .....check
Do you think you can tell? check and confirmed

Did they get you to trade
Your heroes for ghosts? ......Transaction complete
Hot ashes for trees? ......Confirmed
Hot air for a cool breeze? .....Action in progress
Cold comfort for change? .......Processing
And did you exchange
A walk on part in a war
For a lead role in a cage? .....virtual monitoring successfully uploaded, consciousness
currently updating

How I wish, how I wish you were here .....localization routine complete
We're just two lost souls
Swimming in a fish bowl .....containment verified
Year after year .....time stamp comfirmed
Running over the same old ground ......optimizing course corrections
What have we found? ......updating data categories
The same old fears ......boasting Gherlin and Serotonin intakes
Wish you were here ......creating live uplink, holograms and neural real time
connections. YOU ARE NOW HERE.

Bra-vo...


"Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd

COINCIDENCE?

     Just a quick thought, but do you think the internet's ability to preserve much of what gets posted on it (and the ease with which such stuff can be copied and stored on other media for reposting anytime later) and the rise in anti-bullying groups is more than just a coincidence?

     Being bullied is never fun, regardless of its form or severity, even though it does teach you things about yourself, your attackers, humanity itself, the unfairness of life, futility, etc. But whether you were physically assaulted, openly ostracized, a convenient scapegoat, shunned, had your joys mocked, or merely ignored, it was safe to say that upon graduation from high school, you were given a new chance to start over. Hell, in college you just might meet several people who were bullied for the same reasons you were. Instant understanding friends! No guarantees of success of course: your brain chemistry now likely reflects some sort of trauma taking the form (and probably combination) of fear, vengeful envy, heartbroken silence, social awkwardness, comforting pride, simple hatred, worthlessness, or purposelessness, etc.

    The internet, however, is like permanent high school now and even though you've long since matured from previous naïvetés, the internet remembers.
     Photographs had to be taken with somewhat bulky cameras using actual film which then had to be developed. Not only that, but cameras weren't exactly something you could just carry around and plus the number of picture you could take were limited and instant sharing was not possible without a Polaroid camera. If you wanted to show someone an embarrassing photo of someone, you had to physically hand it to them and that person would have to hand it to someone else and so on and so forth. Sure, copying was possible, but that took time and money. Making fun of a person via a picture you've taken of them was difficult from both a logistical and economic perspective. Now we have digital photography and cellphones to not only take a picture that instant but can be shared hundreds of times essentially both instantly and at virtually no cost making any embarrassing outfit or antic effectively immortal.
     Your old poems? Notes given to girls/boys you liked? Fan-fiction writer were you? Evidence of prior phases you had gone through? You could throw them away, tear them to pieces...hell, even burn them and they'd be gone, existing only in your head and those heads whom you had shared them with. But these days, did you post it online? Are your uneducated opinions still available on some internet forum? Did you use the same e-mail for everything for a while so a simple Google search can lead a dedicated searcher to all sorts of goodies? How many websites have you signed up for that you've completely forgotten about? How many passwords have you forgotten? It's inescapable... I'm also sure you've never ever once forgotten to sign out of an account either.

     It makes me wonder...

WE ALL HAVE OUR JOHN CONNORS...

     If you remember the Terminator franchise (and seriously, if you don't, go the fuck away...like, now), the singular obsession of Skynet was the elimination of the human resistance leader John Connor. In the first film, it went after his mother to eliminate him before he had ever been born. In the second film, it went after him as a child, going after him when he would be vulnerable.
     As far as I am concerned, it ends there but since Terminator 3 exists as does Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, I'll point out that Skynet's mission in part 3 was to eliminate John Connor's lieutenants under the assumption that if you cannot get the main man, eliminate those who have helped him before they become important. In the Sarah Connor Chronicles, its missions become more varied like making sure equipment is in place and eliminating miscellaneous threats to its nascence.

     However, it was in this latter film and television show that a new concept was revealed in terminator programming: When the T-X accidentally encountered John Connor (who had been living "off the grid" for years in the timeline of this film) in a veterinarian's office, the T-X found its mission parameters immediately and irrevocably altered to terminating John Connor.
     This also happens (at least once in the aborted television) series when a terminator on a mission to eliminate someone else is distracted by John who (correctly) assumed that the machine would deviate from its mission to go after him. You see from the machine's point of view, its mission parameter changing to terminating John Connor.

Faced with Bedell's impending termination, John did the only thing he could: he diverted the machine's attention. "Hey! Look over here! It's me, Connor! John Connor!" With a Mission Priority Override, the Terminator abandoned Martin and raced after John.

      Basically, the termination of John Connor is every terminator's primary mission no matter what else they were assigned to do. In the film's universe, since Skynet did not anticipate being destroyed by a human resistance, it did not make any attempts to preserve records when it launched the United States's nuclear armaments against the U.S.S.R. (who in turn launched all of theirs through the concept of Mutually Assured Destruction). Skynet did not know much of John Connor's youth which is why its targeting is as imprecise as it is.
     In the first film, it only knew his mother's name and knew she lived in Los Angeles. This did not bode well for the two other Sarah Connors in the area. I'm not sure under which knowledge it operated for why it sent the T-1000 where (and when) it did in the second film. The third film only became about John Connor for the T-X once she accidentally encountered him otherwise it could have been a completely different film.

     Anyways, what's my point you ask?

     I think we all have our respective John Connors in our lives and I don't mean for termination, I mean that girl (or boy...whichever is appropriate for you) who is no longer in your life but if she were ever to (somehow) come back, you would drop everything to be with her no matter what or either that, the amount of resistance you would need to put up to avoid uprooting your life would be nothing short of Herculean.
     She's your one. She's The One.

     My The One is The First One: my crush from high school. She's not my first crush, but she was my most powerful one in high school and whose influence remained despite the passage of years. Only would Digby challenge her for dominance and she ultimately loses and I'll tell you why.

     The First One and Digby are opposites. The First One is that of light and Digby is that of darkness.

     Simply put, The First One inspired me. I created a coded alphabet to write about her. I created a language in order to have a new way to think about her. I named a made-up planet after her. I've used known information about her to make cheat codes and Easter Eggs in BASIC programs I've written. She inspired poetry from me. She remains the standard candle by which I judge beauty. She is the perfect fantasy...

I heavily manipulated my original 20 year old drawing in an attempt to make it look cooler

     Digby did not ultimately inspire me. She brought out the worst in me. She has no legacy. No poems; no BASIC cheat codes; no planets or moons named after her; she did not revive work on my language...nothing. She inspired only darkness like envy, pride, and wrath.

     I cannot imagine it ever happening, but if somehow someway The First One reappeared in my living life (as opposed to online via Facebook) and offered up a chance to date her, I seriously cannot calculate just how into someone else I would have to be to not immediately dump whom I'm with just for that chance. And I barely know anything about her. She is that powerful a fantasy. She is the one who started it all...my goal of goals.

     Don't tell me you don't have one yourself...

STEAL THIS IDEA, part XII

     Whenever asked what my superpower would be, I would answer (semi)jokingly in one of two ways: it would either be to know when I'm "half-tired" (so I'd know when to turn around and go home) or to be able to declare Mulligans on life.

     A Mulligan is a golf term for a do-over. Therefore, today's idea to be stolen is that of a superhero whose power is to undo the last few seconds to last few minutes of his life.

     I favor the teenager bestowed with this power to be able to manipulate it by either seconds or minutes, but no more. Let's say five minutes for the maximum (or some quirky, but relatable number to a temporal equation, if such a number exists). Basically I want it to be manipulatable for one reason: I have this vision of him during a montage asking out every girl in school to see who likes him and who doesn't.

      I'm sure this gimmick has been done before to some extent. It feels familiar like that Adam Sandler movie Click. I just want to see it in the superhero genre. It sounds like it has possibilities.

      You would have to figure out exactly what his power does like, is it universally applied? Does all of existence get undone except in his memory of his mulligan period? Is it simple time travel (simple, he says...)? Is it more a ranged thing like, let's say the Men in Black memory erasers (meaning anyone within sight of him is affected)? Are there people (arch-villain I suppose?) who are immune to the effect? And why? Does he continue to age despite the mulligans (meaning that if he overdoes it that he will eventually be noticeably older than he should be - a few seconds here and there add up over time)? Stuff to think about...

     One thing he definitely cannot do is repeatedly use the power to travel further back in time. I guess some limitations could be if he goes back thirty seconds, he cannot use his power again for thirty seconds (that is, until he's "caught up"). He also cannot go back to a period he mulliganed.
     Using the previous thirty second example:
     He's caught up to himself and ten seconds more have passed. He could mulligan back ten seconds, but he could not mulligan back even eleven because that would place him back in a period he had already mulliganed. Make sense? Perhaps it could be rationalized both as a limitation and a means for avoiding time paradoxes. These rules are reminding me vaguely of Time Cop now :-)
     Basically he has one chance to re-get it right. Sure he could stall and mulligan again later but those moments where he can't use his power could prove deadly.
     I can envision him getting into difficulties despite this ability like, let's say he's been within a sniper's scope for a minute and he mulligans back forty seconds for another reason. He'll still be in mortal danger so it's not like this power lends him effective immortality. He would have to use it smartly to wield it effectively. Something a teenager may not be prone to doing.
     If he has to have a sidekick, perhaps a complementarily powered hero who can see up to a few minutes into the future? Perhaps they meet because this person noticed the future didn't turn out the way he saw it (which shouldn't happen so long as he does not tell anyone what will happen) - it leads him to figure out (please don't call him this) Mulliganman's identity or something-or-other. Of course, such a person could also be a villain. I dunno.
     I would be open to him being able to go back further, like an hour or even a whole day. Given his inability to use his power for that entire period, it could lead to some interesting stories. Relive an entire day, but having to do it like a normal person and unable to reaffect anything that happens that day. Is he ultimately a coward without his power?

     Have I said enough to get the ball rolling?

DISCLAIMER: To anyone reading this, you are welcome to not only use, but claim this idea as your own without giving credit to me. I sometimes have ideas, but I do not have the skills needed to express them. It is more important to me to see these ideas done than to receive recognition for them. That being said, giving me a mention anyway would make me giddy. If this idea has in fact already been done, then I strongly suggest you not actually steal it (at least not without major revisions) :-)  

LINE OF THE DAY, part XXXII

From this article on Cracked "5 Inspiring True Stories for Anyone Feeling Cynical Today", there appeared this, by commenter Thunderous, in the comments section:

#5 is just perfect. Mister Rogers was perhaps the greatest person to walk this planet for hundreds of years- he was kind, gentle, humble and he loved everybody. And because I can't see his name without thinking of this story, I'd like to share what happened when he was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Emmy:

Mister Rogers went onstage to accept the award — and there, in front of all the soap opera stars and talk show sinceratrons, in front of all the jutting man-tanned jaws and jutting saltwater bosoms, he made his small bow and said into the microphone, "All of us have special ones who have loved us into being. Would you just take, along with me, ten seconds to think of the people who have helped you become who you are. Ten seconds of silence."
And then he lifted his wrist, looked at the audience, looked at his watch, and said, "I'll watch the time." There was, at first, a small whoop from the crowd, a giddy, strangled hiccup of laughter, as people realized that he wasn't kidding, that Mister Rogers was not some convenient eunuch, but rather a man, an authority figure who actually expected them to do what he asked. And so they did. One second, two seconds, three seconds — and now the jaws clenched, and the bosoms heaved, and the mascara ran, and the tears fell upon the beglittered gathering like rain leaking down a crystal chandelier. And Mister Rogers finally looked up from his watch and said softly "May God be with you," to all his vanquished children

There was a follow-up comment (on a different comment) by commenter Cobra-D that I also liked about Mr. Rogers: "No, no [Mr. Roger]'s not [an ex-marine]. Just a saint among us heathens"


Mr. Roger's Neighborhood opening theme

LINE OF THE DAY, part XXXI

Courtesy of commenter Onslaught from this video on Cracked:

Yes but there are differences between women and men. That's just reality. There's differences between black culture and white culture. That's just reality. Yes you see black characters that have traits of black culture (traits? What do I mean by that? Think Obama replying with "nah we straight" when offered change by a shopkeeper) and it doesn't mean anything. It's not racist it's just reality. Why do we have to portray women as men and black people as white in order to not be sexist/racist? Do you not see the sexism/racism in that? Ah, whatever.

And in case it wasn't clear, that Obama example actually happened.

to which later s/he responded:

The stereotypes of males and females account for the majority of males and females. That's just being real. It's not like a small criminal element of the black community making all black people get labelled the same, these are actually pretty damn accurate. Can it even be called a stereotype when it fits the majority, if not all, of the group (the group in question being heterosexual males/females only)? Is it a stereotype to say the sky is blue? Is it a stereotype to say water is a liquid?

Sure, some straight women might fight these 'stereotypes' because they've been trained from birth to see femininity as weakness instead of having its own unique power but that's an active choice on their part and not indicative of how they really feel. Women ARE more emotional than men, for example. It's not a stereotype, it's not sexism, it's just fact.

I see this comment not so much as, "I agree with this wholeheartedly. End of conversation." but rather, as a jumping off point into a conversation/civil argument. One of the many topics which falls into the things we're "not supposed to talk about."

STEAL THIS IDEA, part XI

     I've played several fighting games before and one thing they all have in common is a timer. Each round/match has a time limit. If you don't knock out/kill your opponent before the timer runs out, then the winner goes to the one with the most energy/life remaining. That's fine and all, but what bugs me is that this rule also applies to the final fight.

Timed out? I guess my dreams of conquest are over...

     That guy, Zankuro, a demon samurai warrior, will permit you to defeat him simply because sixty seconds have elapsed. How honorable...but also, how stupid. He's the BAD guy, right? M. Bison, who is trying to take over the world and Shao Kahn, who is trying to rule two dimensions, also possess this bizarre honor code. I could see maybe the non-decisive rounds being able to end by time out. After all, that's how the game's been played up until this point. It would make sense. Even the sub-bosses leading up to the final fight would be fine. After all, we can assume that they were "dealt with" by their leader for their failure.

Is M. Bison making a jerking off gesture?

     But what if, in a decisive round, when the timer elapses...the game continues?

     Believe me, when you get to these rounds, they're tense. Victory against these brutes can only come from both a patient offense and an especially patient defense, but sometimes it's not enough and the timer is your only ally. Your stress builds up; you're ultra-tense watching in your peripheral vision the timer. Five... Four... Three... Two... One... and because  you're ahead, you breathe a sigh of relief. It feels like a cheap victory, but it was a victory nonetheless. At that moment, you relax the controls and loosen up.

     Now imagine the game continuing. Maybe the boss taunts you if he speaks or simply laughs as the game continues and he (almost certainly) beats your ass into next week perhaps even with a super-duper special move he was saving for just such an emergency.

Is that your best?

     It would be awesome, and (for the first time at least) you'd never see it coming.

DISCLAIMER: To anyone reading this, you are welcome to not only use, but claim this idea as your own without giving credit to me. I sometimes have ideas, but I do not have the skills needed to express them. It is more important to me to see these ideas done than to receive recognition for them. That being said, giving me a mention anyway would make me giddy. If this idea has in fact already been done, then I strongly suggest you not actually steal it (at least not without major revisions) :-) 

PERMAPUPPIES AND EVERKITTENS

     I wonder if scientists ever will one day engineer dogs and cats which never grow out of their juvenile forms?

     My guess is that they would be lab creations which would be implanted into normal dogs and cats. They would be birthed and just live out their lives in their adorable awkward forms.
     I'm certain there would be moral/ethical objections, but I really can't see there not being a market for such creatures. Perhaps more so with dogs since certain breeds grow a lot more than cats ever do. I think of the difference between my Uncle's golden retriever as a little puppy and this giant hunk of muscle it has since become as a good example.

     This concept could also extend to chickens and ducks which have such adorable juvenile forms but grow up all too fast.

     I guess this could also count as a STEAL THIS IDEA to be used in a movie taking place in the future. Why not?

Try not to love them. Go ahead. I'll wait...

A LITTLE ADVICE...

     It really bugs me when people keep only $100 bills hidden somewhere for use as emergency cash. The truly paranoid do something similar by buying up one ounce silver and gold bullion coins. But here's the thing that gets me, say the economic disaster you swear's gonna happen actually happens. How do you go about buying things?

     Unless you're buying shit $100 at a time, you could find yourself in a spot where you need something desperately but the seller cannot make change. It's either accept it for a hundred bucks or not at all. You may be stuck overpaying.
     The same applies to the silver and gold holders too. One ounce of silver is currently around $30 per troy ounce (31.1035 grams) and an ounce of gold is hovering around $1700 per troy ounce. The silver might not be too big a deal, but the gold? When was the last time you spent at least $1700 on anything that wasn't a car or house?
     Gold's not really helpful unless you're buying big stuff. So what of all your minor purchases? Day-to-day stuff that will surely come up in the new apocalyptic order. Fees, taxes...protection money, etc.

     How about this? You actually keep an assortment of bills on hand so when a natural disaster strikes, you're not being that asshole using a one hundred dollar bill to pay for fifteen bucks worth of stuff. Know what, and more importantly, HOW, you buy.

     I don't carry bills over $20 in my wallet and I find even $20s can be a bit much. You know why? Because I rarely make purchases large enough at one time to require the use of a $50 or $100 bill but yes, when planning such a purchase, I will keep a fifty or hundred on hand. Otherwise I don't like being the dick making small purchases with large bills.
     And don't give the "It's legal tender!" bullshit argument. All that means is that the piece of paper you're holding is that denomination in dollars, nothing more. The only requirement is that a fifty dollar bill has to be accepted as fifty dollars (the same is true for the old silver money - a silver dime and a clad dime are both ten cents in terms of legal tender laws, but because the silver is worth more than ten cents, no one in their right mind spends them like clad dimes). There is no requirement that I (nor anyone) must accept your form of payment. Stores only put up with your shit generally because they don't want to create antagonistic relationships with their customers but speaking as a cashier, I fucking hate you when you tender sixty one dollar bills in your payment or use a $100 bill to buy less than five dollars worth of stuff. "Sorry, it's all I've got..."

     Go fuck yourself...

     And as for you silver and gold freaks, buy smaller coins for your apocalypse. I don't anticipate one happening ever, but should it, I have a handful of silver dimes, quarters, and half dollars which will take me a lot further than your oversized silver and gold "eagles".
     And if you want proof that having only big stuff can cause you a problem, I point you to Indonesia.

Due to the limited printing capacity of the government, it focused printing on 100 rupiah notes. Limited supply of smaller notes meant that the 100 rupiah notes were worth less than a combination of smaller notes.

     Supply and demand. Supply and demand. If you focus too much on the big stuff, the guys with the little stuff will ultimately benefit while you overpay.

STEAL THIS IDEA, part X

     This is kind of like a twist on It's a Wonderful Life. I was thinking of a film where the protagonist is suicidal. Since it would be dramatic, he is saved moments before he would die from a self-inflicted wound by a mysterious person who takes it upon him/herself to convince the protagonist that life is worth living. The course of the movie could have the protagonist introduced to people this person associates with.

     I don't want the reason for this guy's desire to suicide to be known: it's not important at first. It's just a jumping off point. He just believes he needs to die because he is sinful and a bad man. The advertising goal of the film should be to make it like a redemption drama; a feel-good film if you will. The kind of film which would restore your faith in humanity.

     However, I want a sense of uneasiness about the protagonist...that something isn't quite right about him. It could be played off as parts of his past that we the audience would forgive because the protagonist is a better person now (let's say) or genuinely sorry. I want there to be an uneasiness about why these people are helping him. Nothing obvious. No creepy organizations or outfits. They should be like regular psychiatrists doing their jobs and doing their jobs properly and competently, although perhaps they emphasize the spiritual a bit more often than a professional psychiatrist ever would.

     As for the twist, I want the person whose life is saved to actually be a very bad person, or rather, someone who will become a very bad person. Say it's a time-travel adventure in disguise. We learn the protagonist is being driven to suicide during the film by people coming back to make sure this person never lives long enough to do harm (make it like it has to be suicide or else someone will take the protagonist's place - maybe s/he has followers/believers already?) and that the people who save him/her and perhaps also fight the ones who had driven him/her to suicide (action flick?) be people on the protagonist's side.

     I just want the audience being tricked into rooting for the wrong people. Subtle clues throughout (the kind you would miss or overlook on a first viewing) can give away that this is a person not worth saving.

DISCLAIMER: To anyone reading this, you are welcome to not only use, but claim this idea as your own without giving credit to me. I sometimes have ideas, but I do not have the skills needed to express them. It is more important to me to see these ideas done than to receive recognition for them. That being said, giving me a mention anyway would make me giddy. If this idea has in fact already been done, then I strongly suggest you not actually steal it (at least not without major revisions) :-) 

OVERTHINKING THINGS THEATER PRESENTS...

     I hope this is the first of many such entries. I can see the potential here :-)

     There's this new show out called Monsters High. I don't watch it but I've become aware of it because my store sells the dolls associated with the show. I'm guessing it's the typical tween drama stuff set in high school but they're monsters because that's popular right now. Just some creepy things I've noticed because I'm easily bored and rarely accept what I'm told at face value.

     I've wondered about their origins. They're all daughters of various famous movie monsters (like Dracula, the Werewolf, the Mummy, etc.), often with punny names like Draculaura and Frankie Stein (let your horrid curiosity get the best of you and read the rest of the names here --- also just noticed there are some boys in this school thanks to this link but my next point still applies) but the thing is, they all look the same age so it had me wondering just what the fuck (probably not a pun) happened in the lives (unlives?) of their fathers?

[TRIGGER WARNING - after the jump is a quick reference to sexual assault, albeit done with absurdity in mind; your call]