I love Dilbert so I wanted to start off with today's comic. I'll translate my title for those of you who aren't 1337: I'm now a junior officer of the UT chapter of the Association of Computing Machinery, which is probably the biggest and most prominent Computer Science organization in the world. That means that I'm in training to become an actual officer for the club. The biggest difference from NSC is that joining wasn't as exciting because there's not as much of a welcoming experience. We had a really fun retreat for NSC (as opposed to a much more scaled down JO intro event) and all the upperclassmen were really cool to the new members and actively helped get them more involved. If I like being in ACM maybe I'll try to implement something similar; they are still pretty cool people overall.
I've got movie information coming out of my ears today so brace yourself. Things are not looking good for Terminator 4 with none of the old actors slated to come back, including the governor of California. Why are they still doing a sequel? It's better not to think about it; just smile and nod along. Those of you salivating for Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy will be pleased to know that JoBlo put up a new installment in their series of Q & As, and it has some interesting information about the transfer to the big screen. The lucky bastards at FilmForce got some time on the Batman Begins set with the Batsuit and the illustrious Batmobile.
Apparantly the vehicle was built by the people who work on the Bond cars and it has 340 horses under that big, black hood. They also praise the Batsuit for its stealthy look and for finally getting rid of having the nipples on the breastplate. I also have more Superman buzz today: Michael Gambon, aka Dumbledore, is supposedly slated to be Jor-El in the upcoming movie. He's a pretty talented actor so that would be cool. In totally unrelated news, Keanu Reeves finally got his star on Hollywood Boulevard so you can all stop holding your breath. I don't know that he deserves it because he needs to act more, not shoot more people or bring more brunettes back to life.
My other movie stuff is pretty meh. The Ring Two will be at the South by Southwest Film Festival so all you Austinites should look into that because it should be a good movie. Pierce Bronson seems to have another great movie under his belt called The Matador and even Moriarty approves.
I guess I'll go into some tech stuff. News Forge put up a mindblowing interview with a sociologist regarding her study of the KDE open source project. I would consider it a must read for Linux lovers. Linux fans will also appreciate this roundup of Linux Live CDs. All you MSN h8ters will get a kick out of this analysis of the new MSN.com. It's not humorous, it's just very true and points out that they didn't pay attention to the look in IE and overall it looks like someone threw up on FrontPage or whatever whacked out editor they used. And I saved the best for last: DARPA (which actually exists outside of MGS) hired two Polytechnic professors to construct AI robots that can learn by reading. It's kind of cool and scary at the same time because what if they could be made smarter than us? Theoretically they would read and comprehend information faster than us if this project is successful, but I guess we shouldn't jump the gun here.
I had to fit in some quick game news. The Incredibles will be making a return to all consoles in the near future with a sequel, which will hopefully not be as directed towards kids as the first was. Winning Eleven 8 has seemed to sway the pens of writers almost across the board, but I still think FIFA is cooler.
Just three more bits of randomness to plow through. As I magically predicted a couple of days ago, the Fed did, in fact, raise the federal funds rate. They will start facing a situation in a few months if output continues to only increase steadily without more pronounced job growth. Meanwhile, there's drama near my motherland with Bangladesh chastising India for withdrawing from the SAARC. Was their reasoning valid? You can't tell half the time if that government is sane. I missed the State of the Union address tonight, but it appears that he just kept denouncing terror, praising Iraqi elections, and presenting a half-baked Social Security plan. The Democrats really pinned the tail on the donkey with their rebuke of our haphazard stance in Iraq, Bush's scare tactics, and holes in our security. Tell me again how this guy got reelected?
At last, you have reached the Thursday Bookworm:
1. What is your opinion of poetry? Do you love it, hate it, can't live without it, or wish all poets would be stranded on a desert isle?
I hate it when it's really pretentious and aims to use big words to try and intimidate you. I prefer poems that can present their meaning in a way anyone can understand, and I read some great ones a couple of years ago but it's so late that I couldn't remember names if I tried (except for some Latin ones).
2. What is your favorite poem? Copy and paste it here in your answer (and yes, if your favorite poem happens to be a dirty limerick, so be it- share away).
Fuzzy Wuzzy was a bear
Fuzzy Wuzzy had no hair
So Fuzzy Wuzzy wasn't fuzzy was he?
Gotta love Eek the Cat.
3. Do you have a favorite poet or a favorite collection of poetry? Along the same vein, is there a particular poet that you don't really care for? Why?
Leaves of Grass comes to mind as the poems were nice and simple and painted pretty pictures. My favorite poet would have to be Dante Alighieri because he had to be one cool badass to write Inferno. Maybe I'll get into Virgil next year who knows. The only poet I don't like that I can think of is proabably Martial.
4. Do you consider songs to be a form of poetry? Why or why not?
It depends. I consider hip hop stuff to be poetry (not rap) because you can hear a coherent message in the true hip hop stuff.
5. Do you write poetry? If so: 1) would you consider posting one of your poems with your answer so we may all read it; and 2) what inspires you to write your poetry?
I have written some, but I'm not putting any online because it's too embarassing! If you really want to see it, e-mail me and I'll take your request under consideration. I write when I'm either deeply saddened by something I have to express before exploding, or, more rarely, something beautiful strikes me. Not that I don't see cool stuff because I consider my walks around campus on most days to be rather scenic, but it's hard for me to get inspired enough to write a poem. I'm more of a prose guy.
On a final note, this week's 24 was beyond awesome and my favorite episode of the season. I'm still stoked that Tony is back...God I'm a nerd!
2 comments:
Pfft, looks like /somebody/ threw some cash at an art major who could weld sloppily, and wanted to make fun of Hummers, at a crowd who mostly wouldn't get it. I like my batmobiles like the Keaton car: shiny, smooth, and with only the sides of the wheels visible. This one isn't nearly cool enough to change my mind.
"It's not really a killing machine, but the gunfire is more used to get out of tricky situations like blowing a wall or obstacle out of the way." Hah... if you can use it for that, you could even more easily use it for killing, except that Batman's always been such an angsty good guy. He's like Spiderman's big brother. Really cool new suit though.
The JO induction is a much bigger deal with the bigger group in the fall. You four just got in during the quiet semester. :) That said, feel free to go to work for HR and try making joining more like NSC. And congratulations, and welcome, and all that!
-Will Warner, from the ACM forums.
:D Helloo.
I've thought about getting the Bassett hound a while back. It doesn't sit right with me. :( They always look so darn sleepy. I was hoping for a terrier of some sort. How are things going in the apartment?
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