Two random movie related videos…

So, I’ve been sitting on these two videos for a little while, but I thought that I would share them.  This Oscar stuff just makes me laugh, and Jack Black, Will Ferrell, and John C. Reilly certainly help.  Nothing quite like poking fun at the movie industry, and I love the thought of lyrics to the cutoff music.  I hope that you enjoy them as much as I did.

By the way, the embedding has been turned off, so just click on the video twice and it should open it.  I promise that they’re worth the hassle.

The most versatile word in the English language…

(For those of you who read the American Association of Thirty Somethings blog, let me go ahead and apologize for double  posting.  I know, I just got lazy tonight.)

Thus far, I have discussed a number of random topics, and today I would like to tackle one that is near and dear to my heart. “What could that be,” you ask, dear reader. The English language. It’s one topic that we all love and hate. It’s great when used correctly, but there are lots of times that it’s butchered by native speakers. However, I’m not here to debate and bemoan the ins and outs of English, but instead to celebrate it.

More specifically, I want to celebrate the most versatile word in the English language:  dude.

Growing up as a child of the 1980s, it felt like that word was everywhere.  However, a little  research shows that it came around in the 1880s.  It can be used in any number of circumstances.  Dude! (translation: hello), Dude! (translation:  sorry to hear about your family.), Dude! (translation:  why did you eat my frozen burrito?), and Dude! (translation: not cool my friend).  Or the following is submitted for thought:

That’s right, it is truly the most versatile word in English.  And, dude, if you disagree with me than check this out.  As a parent, I am apt to say to my son, “dude, don’t do that.”  That’s right, it has even worked it’s way into my parenting.  Perhaps it’s my way of not sounding like my parents (even thought the content often does).  It is a word that has transcended cultural and social boundaries.  What proof?  Just look at hip-hop.

So, dear reader, go out there and celebrate dude!

A few thoughts on hotels…

So, I’ve been off the grid for a couple of days, and had to make an unexpected trip.  Now, I don’t often talk about travel and the such, but I just had to comment on an observation.  Over the course of that trip, I had the opportunity to interact with two different hotels, and has a drastically different experience with both when it came to guest amenities.

These two different hotels, the La Quinta Inn, in Anderson, South Carolina, and Embassy Suites, in Birmingham, Alabama.  As you can probably guess, they have two different establishments and cater to different people.  Now, with all of that being said, I need one question answered for me:

Why can’t high end hotels offer free wifi access?

The La Quinta Inn offered it free of charge, but not the Embassy Suites.  Nope, they offered it at the “cheap” price of $9.99 for 24-hours.  This makes no sense to me.  You would imagine that the higher-end hotel would offer it free of charge.  Lots of business travelers, plenty of tech savvy people coming through, but no, they don’t offer it.

Now, this is not an isolated incident.  I’ve stayed at other high-end hotels (i.e. the Camelback Inn in Scottsdale, Arizona), and had the exact same experience.  However, if I stay at the Holiday Inn Express, it’s free.  Seriously, I just need someone to answer this for me.  Why does this happen?

They call me the seeker…

Okay, for those of you familiar with WordPress and it’s settings, you know that it will tell you specifics input about your blog.  It can tell you how many views for blog has, what the most popular posts are, who referred into the page, etc.  Still, there is one thing that fascinates me: the search terms result.

Now, search terms listing are exactly how they sound.  It’s what term did someone who search use when they ran across your blog.  That in and of itself is pretty vanilla, but you can them listed by all time tops.  This, of course, it what has gotten me talking about all of this.

So, I’m sure your hanging wiht bated breath for the results.  Well, here are the top ten:

1. writers block (31 views)
2. writer’s block (17 views)
3. \”25 random things\” facebook (3 views)
4. actinidin tooth (3 views)
5. “big wig ball” photo (2 views)
6. writiers’ block (2 views)
7. writer’s block photos (2 views)
8. writers(2 views)
9. 25 random things facebook (1 view)
10. 25 random ticklish (1 view)

Needless to say, that’s kind of a crazy list.  The basic “25 things facebook” deal was from a couple of months back when you couldn’t get away from it.  Silly me, I put up a post of 25 random things, but just random in general, not necessarily about me. 

What was/is really interesting is that I kept seeing one term that was pretty commonly popping up on my search terms list:  writer’s  block.  It’s a little  insane that writer’s block has become my most common search term.  If you look at the complete list, it shows up around 60 times as being searched.  Facebook 25 things is the next closest at around 20.  So, someone out there has either found this blog through searching for “writers block” or there are a ton of people out there with it.  Oh, and if you’re reading this, and you are one of the people searching writer’s block, drop a comment and say hi.  We’d love to hear from you (and yes, that was the royal we).

Also, number 3 just goes to prove that people will search for anything.  By the way, did you check out number 10.  I don’t even know where to start on explaining that one…

Now that I’ve talked about the last two topics, I promise I’ll get back to some music, movies, pop culturey stuff.

Cool nicknames…

, I have some what of a weird topic  that I was thinking about the other day:  nicknames.  There are several different reasons for this.  Being named Thomas, I have a mother, wife, and more recently staff members who get offended when I’m called anything other than Thomas.  This includes Tom and Tommy.  So, even as a little boy, there was no nicknames  (of the none picked on variety) for me.  Strangely, now that I’m a working professional, I’m called Tom (a nickname) most times when I meet a new person.

Now, the world of monikers is far bigger than just Thomas and Tom.  There have been some rather famous ones:  The Edge, McG, and D-Bag to name a few. (I’ll let you figure out who the last one is.)  Interestingly, McG, of Terminator Salvation and Charlie’s Angels:  Full Throttle (directing) fame, is so nicknamed for his mother’s maiden name McGinley.  The Edge, guitar player for U2,  got his because of his angular facial features.  I would also imagine that there a lot of other “famous” handles that we, the general public, have  not idea about.

Now as great as it would be for every single nickname to be cool, but that’s just not the case.  Now, we’ve all heard of terrible ones, like The Lady Slayer.  Okay, maybe you haven’t heard of that one, but you know what I’m talking about.  No, no, I’m talking about names in their diminutive form, which is just a fancy term for nickname.  There area couple that just seem to far of a stretch for me.  These are things like Sally for Sarah, Paco for Francisco, and the worst offender of all Hank for Henry.  It’s just too far.  Let me go ahead an apologize because this view has bitten me before.  Sorry, Sally…

In my quest for cool non de plumes, I went out and checked out the interweb for a couple of nicknames for Thomas and here’s what I found:  Big T, Tom,  Tom the Train, Tommy Too Tone, Tumor, T-Money, Taka, Thumbs, the Tominator, Craz Teebo, Thominho, T-Rock, Tomtom, and  my personal favorite Better Than You.  Truthfully, I think my true nickname would be D-Bag if I tried to use any of the above, but it was fun running across them.  It’s almost like having an alter ego.

So, what was/is your nickname?  What is it that people call you that’s not on your birth certificate?  On a side note, I would never give myself a nickname.  Because let’s face it, that’s just not cool…

Viva la Rock Opera…

I am going to continue on with a thought I started last night.  Specifically, my love of Rock Operas.  Now I can hear you say, “what’s a rock opera?”  Well, it is a rock musical presentation that tells a linear story in multiple parts.  It is a combination of theater and arena rock.

Of course, last night I talked about The Who’s Tommy.  Which is a great example of what a rock opera should look like.  It was a interesting story that takes on a musical ride.  (In review, that last sentence sounded a little stupid.)  It is the best ice breaker for the this sub-genre.

Other Rock Opera of note include Weber’s Jesus Christ Superstar, Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, Pink Floyd’s The Wall, Weezer’s Pinkerton, and My Chemical Romance’s The Black Parade.  These are wonderful examples of rock as a form of story telling.  Not just story telling in a small three minute piece, but instead in a larger arc.  It delves into deeper messages, meanings, etc.

So, it goes without saying that I’m a music fan that listen’s to the words.  I listen and dissect the meaning of the artist, and what message it is that they’re trying to convey to the listener.  My love for Rock Operas comes in the aspect that they are diving in and exploring complex themes.  It leaves lots of things for the listener to decide for themselves.

Now, I want to see more rock operas be produced.  It’s time to have a more intelligent set of stories.  I mean, there are only so many “baby, I love you” songs that I can listen to.  How many times do we have to listen to the “I got dumped” song.  We need more thought.  Let’s start the movement here in now for the more intelligent rock.  Who’s with me?

A Gen-Xer’s Confession of Loving Emo Music (Part 3)

Bet you thought I forgot about this!  Well, I didn’t, and it’s now time for part 3 of my multipart series on loving Emo music.  If you want to catch up on all of this, check out Part 1 and Part 2.  Following linear steps, that brings us to part 3, in which we’ll discuss (translation:  you’ll read) who it is that I like in this crazy genre.

As a quick reminder, let me say that I’m really talking about the more modern alt-rock sound versus the late 80s and early 90s pop-punk piece.  Just a good piece of information for those of us joining in.

For me, my tastes have rotated some over time.  There are a couple of major bands that I love.  Probably my biggest is My Chemical Romance.  Now, this is getting into the actual confession portion.  This is an interesting band that has done a great job on bringing back the concept album.  For those of you not familiar with it, a concept album is an entire album written around some idea (either grand or simple). 

One of my personal favorites was The Who’s Tommy.  The album was written around the idea of a young boy witnesses his father, who was thought dead in the war, come home and kill the man his mother was living with at the time.  It looks at the impact that this traumatic experience and family reaction has, and ultimate comes into the celebration of being special versus being normal.  If you’ve ever seen the movie and thought it weird, check out the album.  It’s much better.  It’s the whole idea of book to movie.

Now, My Chemical Romance’s last album was The Black Parade.  This emo album was a triumph on multiple levels.  The first is that it was a throw back to arena rock.  Big guitar, singable melodies, and overall massive sound.  Second, the album was a concept album.  For those of you playing at home, I love a good concept album.  The album follows the story of a young man diagnosised with terminal cancer and is built on the thought that “death be not proud.”  It’s not a strict concept album, with a few tracks of of the concept, but it plays great from start to finish.

Here it is, this emotional sound, focusing on death.  Strangely, it’s not the “my heart is filled with darkness because Hot Topic didn’t have the jewelry I wanted” kind, but more of a coming to grips with mortality.  Arguably, you could call both Tommy and  the Black  Parade rock operas, but let’s not split hairs.  So, here’s your chance.  Take a risk, if you haven’t checked out My Chemical Romance, give them a shot.  Also, if you’re interested in getting into the mainstream sounds of Emo, look into bands like Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco, and Modest Mouse.

The modern death music (ironically by pop culture)…

So, I was cruising the interweb thing for a few videos to link to for another blog post, and it hit me that the music industry has been suffering a long, slow and painful death.  Okay, so it didn’t just come right out and hit, but I’ve been tossing around the idea for a while.  Now, I’m not talking about a particular genre, but instead mean all music.  What is this horrible force that could slowly be bring music to its knees?  Music videos…

Now, don’t get me wrong, there are some great artistic music videos out there, but it’s all come at a price (and I’m not talking about the Spice Girls).  Music videos have changed the face of music, and it doesn’t look like it’s changing back any time soon.  Videos became the time that you actually saw the musician.  So, instead of just being a great singer, song writer, etc., you now had to have “the look.”  Don’t believe me?  Just ask Christopher Cross.

Haven’t heard of him?  Sure you have, but you have to think back to a not-so-magical time of the late 70s/early 80s.  Christopher Cross was a pretty successful singer/song writer.  He  put out three major albums early in his career, in 1979, 1983, and 1985.  By 1981, his first album had caught on and was nominated and won the “Big Four” Grammy awards, Best Record, Song, Album, and New Artist.  By the way, that has never been done again.    However, something else  major happened in 1981 as well.  That was the year that MTV was launched.

Ironically, the first video played on MTV was the prophetic Video Killed the Radio Starby the Buggles.  These catchy pictures and music would prove to hold more truth than any other video played on MTV.  By the time 1983  rolled around, there were sentinel videos like a-Ha’s Take On Me.  These type of videos, and others, impacted the need for musicians to have “the look.”

Let’s go back to Christopher Cross.  His second album, in 1983, also had a couple of  big hits.  He did alright for himself, he had a couple of hits like Think of Laura and All Right.  Now, I would imagine after a couple of Grammy nods in 1981, he bought himself some good will.  You typically think of a sophomore slump for a second album, but instead three hits.  Still this is 1983, and things are different.  Why you ask?  Because of videos like Thriller.

Regardless of what you think of Michael Jackson, he helped to prove that not only having the look (and in 1983 he had it), you could treat music videos like a movie.  I mean, John Landis directed it and Vincent Price did voice overs.  The world of music had already begun to change.  Audiences weren’t just seeing their artist in person when they went to a concert, but on television, with a channel that (at the time) showed music videos around the clock.  Unfortunately for Cross, he just didn’t have “the look”, and it would come back to haunt him.

So, if we visit Christopher Cross in 1985, we find that his album was a flop.  Now, we hear about him because some random music guy writes a blog on him.  Still Cross is only one example.  One of the more “modern” (and I use the term loosely) comes from Blues Traveler’s first major video for Run Around.  Watch the video, and find the ironic twist of it.  On having a look, John Popper, Blues Traveler’s singer, made reference to the fact that his was not a body that would make teenage girls scream.  I know what you’re  saying, “surely this can’t be completely true.”  All I have to do is point to the pop culture touch stone of American Idol and ask, “when was the last time an ugly contestant made it to Hollywood?”

The price of this you ask?  Simply this, there are some great musicians/songs/albums/etc. that aren’t getting mad because whatever band doesn’t have “the look.”  We’re losing out on tons of great stuff that we’ll never hear.  How many local bands, that put out lights-out music, but never make it past the local scene are there?  All of this because of music videos. 

In an ironic twist, about the only time that you can find music videos on MTV (Music Television, if you’ve forgotten) is in the middle of the night.  I rest my case…

If only we could do this in movies…

I need to start by saying in no means is this a political blog. I don’t think I could pull everything together enough to get a solid coherent thought about it. Still, I have to say that I have never loved a White House Press Secretary more than I have in Robert Gibbs. Your political leanings don’t matter, because this dude is just awesome! What makes him so great? I’m glad you asked. I present the following for your consideration:

How many places have you ever been that you would love to do the exact same thing? I would love to just be able to take people’s cell phones and give them back to them after the event. Every movie, graduation, religious service, whatever, seems like it disturbed because someone can’t remember to turn their phone on vibrate. Just some simple forethought, and most of those disruptions would have been avoided. Forgive me as I rant a little.

And along comes Robert Gibbs, and takes up not one, but two cell phones from reporters. That has got to be the greatest thing ever! A White House press conference and you forget to put your phone on vibrate? Are cell phones new technology? If this were even five years ago, I might have been a little more forgiving? I have a hard enough time getting through a single meeting with out someone’s something ringing. This guy is being asked incredibly tough questions and talking about information of the highest level. I can only imagine how distracting that must be.

So, kudos to you, Robert Gibbs, for being the coolest White House Press Secretary ever! Way to bring some common sense swagger to the role of the Press Secretary.

Sweeps Week…

There is nothing quite like television in early May. (That is a statement that is both filled with truth and sarcasm.) What makes that exciting is the fact that it’s sweeps season. Sweeps, as I’m sure that everyone already knows, is when they use the number of viewers watching television to help set the ad rates for different networks. This is a time when they pull out all of the stops.  Specifically, it happens around four times a year.  (Okay, so I didn’t realize that until I started researching this.)

Pulling out the stops is different for different shows. Is it a new character? Could someone die?  Maybe a guest star?  I mean, who wouldn’t want to tune into their favorite show with Paris Hilton.  (For the record, this blog doesn’t endorse any one who is famous for simply being famous.)  The one great thing was that there were always new episodes.  None of that rerun stuff, just new awesome television.

This year I remember some people killed, one changing bodies,  some mind reading, time travel, world saving, and a character leaving the show.  By the way, those are all on Heroes, Medium, Scrubs, Lost, and the Mentalist.  I let you, dear reader, figure out which one goes with which.  Now, in black and white, those don’t seem that odd, but it’s it’s some crazy plot twists.  It’s amazing what writers will do when the networks come calling.

I may be wrong on this, but I believe that the ever infamous Jumped the Shark episode was a sweep show. However, I might be wrong, maybe it was just a “very special” episode of Happy Days. Although, it was a three (that’s right, count ‘em one, two, three) part episode that ended with a moral lesson. If that’s not in the sweeps week frame of mind, I don’t know what is.

So, enjoy the excellently weird television, at least until the end of next week…