In this week's episode of South Park, three of the boys play Rock Band. This in itself is kinda cool but then add the fact it's Cartman singing to Lady Gaga's Poker Face, well that's just plain awesome.
During one of the times that the repair company was over to assess the damage to my ceiling, they sent someone new that I hadn't dealt with before. When he arrived at my apartment, I casually mentioned, "The scene of the crime is right over here." When I said that, I was really referring to the bathroom. Of course, I meant it metaphorically since there had been no actual crime committed when my ceiling got all wet.
After the guy left, I then remembered that the dude worked for a company that actually cleans up crime scenes. So while I was just joking, I'm almost positive that dude has done assessments of real crime scenes to estimate the amount of work to clean it all up. So it's no wonder he seemed to find my situation a very minor repair job. I wonder what type of stuff he's seen.
As a male who is in touch with his emotions and his sensitive side, I don't feel any shame in admitting I have shed a tear, perhaps even two, while watching a motion picture. For many dudes of my age range, I don't think this is very uncommon. For my generation, lots of males first cried at a movie when Optimus Prime died in Transformers: The Movie. I hope I didn't spoil that for anyone. Though I actually didn't cry when I saw Optimus give up the Matrix of Leadership, there were certainly a few movies I saw that tugged at the heartstrings of my blackened heart. Coincidentally, there are a few Internet movies that have also made my penis cry but let's not talk about that right now.
So stay with me as I tell you this anecdote that involved a friend of mine. My friend Lafawnduh went to see one of the Harry Potter movies in 2004. I think it was the one where he gets his driver's license or something. Anyways, when the movie let out, she went to loo. While at the sink, she saw a whole gaggle of ladies enter the washroom with tear-stained faces. Since the wizard movie she saw wasn't that sad, she surmised these women had seen some other film, perhaps Alien vs. Predator. It turns out that in between sobs, a girl informed Lafawnduh that it was actually The Notebook which had caused all these ladies to weep uncontrollably at the end.
When Lafawnduh told me that story, I was intrigued. Could I resist the emotional story told in The Notebook? It got even more interesting as the years passed as the film garnered a reputation for being a tear-jerker.
It wasn't until tonight that I finally watched The Notebook. The last scene came and went, and I found myself on my couch... wondering if I should eat that grapefruit in the fridge today or tomorrow. I didn't feel like a shedding a tear one bit. Tear-jerker? Not for me at least and I'm a sucker for all the cliche stuff. If you haven't seen the movie, you might wanna stop reading here because I'm about to lay down some serious spoilers.
Yes, I thought the movie was quite good. I can see why those two crazy Canadian kids became a real life couple for a few years. It was touching in a few parts but not to the point where I thought I was gonna weep. Don't get me started on the end though. I'm supposed to believe they just died in their sleep while holding each other? Come on! That was so cliched that it wasn't sad, it was just cliched. I wouldn't have been surprised if some guy came on and said, "Damn, and he was just two weeks from retirement!"
In summary, a good movie but it didn't even come close to making me reach for a tissue. Please, if you just thought of a joke to make, write it in the comments.
In a post I wrote a few weeks ago I outlined my endeavour to go as long as possible without wearing my winter coat. It really makes no sense to do so as any logical person would wear as much clothing as required to keep comfortably warm. As I am prone to fits of illogical behaviour, that means I'm still wearing hoodies and such outside.
I've decided to expand upon my personal stunts, though still heat related. I'd like to see how long I can go without turning on the heat in my apartment. Now, here's the interesting part. I've never turned the heat on in my apartment. I moved into my place when spring was in full bloom so heat was not required back then. Do you think it's possible for me to go the entire winter without turning on the heat? Last year, I made it as far as the end of October before I had to relent but that was in my previous abode.
The coat thing is kinda stupid but this apartment heat thing is a tad more beneficial. The less the heat is on, the less my electrical bill is. As with anything, larger goals are best achieved by breaking it down to smaller ones. I should concentrate on getting to the end of October without turning the heat. Then it might be the month of November... and so on!
By the time you read this, the web hosting service known as GeoCities will have ceased operations. If you have been using the Internet for a decade or more, you will understand what GeoCities meant to the beginnings of mainstream Internet use.
In mid to late 1990s, it wasn't all that easy to get web hosting. If you were a university student and a bit lucky, your school might have set aside some server space for personal student web pages. If you weren't a university student, things were a bit more difficult. Then GeoCities came along.
GeoCities was one of the first and most memorable web service to offer people, anyone, the ability to host pages on the Internet. If you were a fan of kittens and wanted to post your pictures of your kitties on the Internet, then GeoCities would allow you to do that, all for the price of free. Pretty soon, there thousands upon thousands of personal web pages on GeoCities, allowing normal, average people to express their thoughts and ideas to millions of others on the Internet.
The offering of free web hosting really showed people they could add to the Internet and not just consume what was already out there. In that sense, GeoCities will always have a place in Internet history.
The other thing that GeoCities was known for isn't as impressive. If you were on the web in the late 90s then you already know what I'm talking about. I'd guess that 90% of the pages hosted by GeoCities looked like crap. It was great that everyone now could be on the web but it soon became clear that almost everyone knew nothing about web page design or what looked good.
Over the years, there were several GeoCities web page cliches that developed. First, there was the gaudy background image that seared itself into your brain. The image usually was so loud, it prevented you from reading the text on the page. Then there was the overuse of the "blink" tag. Some people made almost every other word on their page as blinking. Let's not forget the random images that people would place all over their pages. Stuff like badges indicating it was Yahoo's site of the day for December 14, 1998. Who could also forget the pile of broken image icons all over a page? This is where people either didn't know or didn't realize their img tags pointed to non-existent image files. Let us then remember blue text links. Back in the day, almost every single link that was text was coloured blue because that was the default and no one really bothered to change it. I could go on about "under construction" images and animated gifs but I'll just stop right here.
Despite how bad GeoCities web pages were, it got people to contribute to the Internet. It allowed people to share their views to the rest of the world. In an age where Facebook, Twitter, and blogs are now refined forms of Internet expression, GeoCities was the raw beginning.
Yahoo!, who bought GeoCities a few years ago, is shutting it down today. There will be no official archiving of GeoCities pages but there are small groups out there who have been working for months to save as many pages as they can. Good for them for trying to save a bit of history.
Last but not least, web comic xkdc is commemorating the closing of GeoCities with this comic. It's amazing how far we've come.
