Creative Title

Can't believe I keep doing this. I completely intended to work today on a nice, long post. However, an issue came up at dinner last night that has me all emotionally screwed up at the moment. It's just been somewhat resolved, but I still can't transcribe any of my ridiculously long thought trains quite yet. I'll do my best to have it up Wednesday or so.

Sorry, but get over it. In other news, whilst looking through my parents' records the other night due to my discovery of Blue Oyster Cult, I found out the most surprising thing since learning that the world spins: Styx did Mr. Roboto (which was particularly shocking due to the fact that I'd just found out that Come Sail Away (Yeah, I meant to use that link) was also by them). But that's not the primary song for today, since it's more strange than actually good. No, I'll give you the song that began that night's search. What had happened was that I wanted to make sure that Taarna (from Heavy Metal) is spelled with two--technically three--A's. It was, and I somehow got to the the IMDB page for the soundtrack. I don't know why, but the Blue Oyster Cult one caught my eye, and I YouTube'd it. Therefore, that's what you get. Enjoy Veteran of the Psychic Wars (Static picture!):



I've just been in a music-discovering mood lately. It's nice to actually be getting a grasp on some of this stuff.

This weekend, I'll be going to the mountains to shoot my nice, pretty gun in further celebration of today's Heller ruling. I'll be leaving early in the morning--a few hours more than the time at which I've gotten used to waking up--so nothing here until Sunday at the earliest... and even then isn't too likely.

You know me, though, I can't leave you guys to your own devices without some entertainment. Well, I've been starting to have interesting dreams again since the end of the semester (the most memorable one I'd had during it was about the mini post-it notes on my desk). Last night had my car breaking down and me having to walk to Tang Soo Do, which is a good 20 minutes at 50 mph. The night before involved zombies, which is always a really cool thing to dream about (about which to dream... gah!). Granted, I also dream about more mundane things--like continuing to find ticks all over the house, since I've really been finding ticks all over the house lately thanks to those 100+ days we had a while back. Nothing as boring as post-it notes, though.

What does all that matter, though? I know I was talking about today's musical selection when I went off on some rant about dreams, but there's a reason. Today on the way home from Tang Soo Do, a certain song came on the radio that I figured would fit in well with this discussion. Thanks, Aerosmith!



I'd say sorry for going to the dark land of no internet for three whole days, but I feel that Nerf Herder does it in a much better way than I ever could.

As everyone probably knows by now, as there seems to be an internet party starting that can even be heard, the SCOTUS voted for an individual right to bear arms today, just a few minutes ago. The result was 5-4, and I could just hear my mom talking on the phone about how the world got to where it was, where almost half of the Supreme Court votes against her right to defend herself. But hey, I agree.

Here is the 157-page opinion, which I am not reading right now. I'm incredibly hungry, so there is a need for breakfast and a big bowl of celebratory ice cream. Perhaps I'll get some no-bake cherry cheesecake at the grocery store today...

On THR, someone posted the following picture for the Brady campaign, which I found all too fitting:




Celebrate accordingly, everyone! Umm... most will probably just read the opinion, actually.

UPDATE: So I've been hearing some complaining about the decision on basically allowing "reasonable restrictions" on frirearms, many on THR, but many elsewhere as well. Truth be told, I'll care about that tomorrow, and celebrate the win today. First, this wasn't exactly surprising. Most of those who voted for the individual right probably wouldn't have done so had ownership been decidedly unrestricted. I do hate that every bill or ruling that makes a small good change has stupid baggage attached to it, but that's the way the world works now, apparently. I'll celebrate the small victories when we have them, bittersweet as they may be, and worry about the fact that every small step forward is accompanied by two steps back every other day of my life. Cheers!

Via the B.I.L.T.B. (who is in permanent denial that his blog is a blog), the SCOTUS decision on Heller is likely to be Thursday. You can expect me to have a post then, which will either be celebratory or "the world is doomed"-depressed. Word on the street (read: at the range) is, however, that things have been looking fairly good for us pro-gun people, if one is to judge by the arguments at the hearing.

I began a thinking post today, but can't really finish it tonight, so you can expect that in a few days. Probably after the Heller decision post.

Until then, I'm not sure whether I've posted this on here yet, but I give you Carry on my Wayward Son by Kansas. The video is just the lyrics, as I have some sort of grudge against recorded live performances and refuse to post them. I'll bet it's the audience.


Apparently, this was one of those annoyingly overplayed songs back in the 70's. Sort of like anything by Nickelback is now.

I was planning on making some thoughtful post today, but it turned out to be really, really busy. And not just fake-busy like days like this usually are, I mean actually busy-busy.

See, I first woke up to my mom offering to pay me for washing her car. I quickly accepted after a brief lesson from her in negotiating ("now, you say, 'I think $20 would be better.' I then say, 'how about 15?' and we agree"). I washed the car, which is significantly larger than mine, and needed more effort on the bottom edges due to them being made white like the rest of the thing, and went to my office-cleaning job at 3:00.

I drove there, cleaned a bunch, took out the trash, and the door closed behind me. Now, this doesn't seem like a big deal until you find out that it's one of those doors that locks when closed. What you might also like to know is that the front door isn't one of these, but I always lock it for security.

Yeah.

After sufficient cussing and fruitlessly pulling at the door handle (The day's "Padme-Is-Dead-NOOOOOOOO" was already used up when the old lady in front of me turned the same way as me for the third time), I decided to calm down and look over my options. Before I could do anything, though, I needed to get out of the area encased completely by a fence with barbed wire on top. I stood at the bottom of the gate where trucks come in for whatever they need to do, trying to figure out a way to move two steps forward to the other side. I considered trying to squeeze through the two gates, but realized I'm not as small as I was a decade ago (at age 8). I then tried simply going over the barbed wire, but ended up just not trusting my jeans to be very good armor. So, those two were out. That was when I found my savior: the hinge. There was a space large enough for my calf, and the hinge itself was nice and big and strong to keep people from knocking it off. What the engineers failed to realize, however, is that that also meant it could easily hold my mere 115 lbs. Ah-ha! I climbed onto it, briefly putting my weight on my sprained ankle, and got over rather easily. The lesson is, barbed wire will provide great protection from trespassers.

Now came the hard part. I was out of my prison, but what to do now? My original intent was to drive back home and borrow my dad's key to let myself back in, but when I got to my car, I realized that the key to that was in the same place as the key to the office: inside the office. So, I began looking around. The place was practically deserted, since no one in their right mind would work on Saturday. I walked by the nearest offices and saw them to be empty. The next tier had a car parked in the lot. I was saved! I began walking over, just as the car pulled out of its space. Anxious, I ran a couple steps forward, hoping to catch whoever (whomever?) it was before they left, but they were turning the wrong way. My heart sank as I realized that there was another entrance to that lot on the other side, perhaps 100 feet away or so. The person left, completely oblivious to my horrid suffering, and I ran up to see if anyone was present in the other offices in that section. There weren't, of course.

I looked around for somewhere that might have people, and found a little catering place a little ways off. Lord be praised! People were there! They let me use their phone to call my parents and beg for someone to come let me in. She agreed, since the only other option was to make me walk home in the rain. Now, I'm not sure of how many miles it is, but the car drive is at least 20-30 minutes long. I then sat at the door awaiting my parents' arrival. I noticed that it was thundering and the clouds were growing more ominous by the minute. I waited and waited for it to rain, just so that I could have something else to add here to make my day seem even less fortunate, but apparently a certain omnipotent being doesn't like me quite that much.

My parents arrived in my dad's fun new convertible, and unlocked the door. My dad, of course, detailed exactly what had happened, and then showed me the people-gate on the other side of the barbed wire fence that's apparently always unlocked (honestly, what's the point of having that fence in the first place?).

So, that's what's keeping me from a thought-post for the moment. Also, I could not have postponed it until tomorrow due to bridesmaid dress shopping. So, ha! You have Scrubs to thank for today's make-up music selection. Just so you know, this reinforces my opinion that nothing in the 80's made sense. Enjoy, Safety Dance:

Well, I wrote a good, long post today, and worked on it literally for hours whilst trying not to be distracted by my NJ WoW friend. Then, just about right now, I decided that I didn't like the subject matter and deleted it. So, I know it sucks for you, but it sucks more for me (trust me).

So today's make-up entertainment consists of two parts: the old and the new. First, I apparently love Boston but didn't know that they were the ones behind many songs I knew I enjoyed (thanks, NJ friend!). That seems to happen a lot.

So, this has been played on the radio a lot lately, and I'd actually guessed that this particular one was by them, but it's good to have confirmation:



The second song is by Paramore, whose most popular piece is Misery Business. Really, the themes of many of their songs seem to be the whole "high school is so dramatic, poor teenagers" (granted, they are about my age now, which is the usual time for such feelings) thing (along with one that I know of about family abuse. While that's a terrible thing to happen, I can't relate, and we live in a really messed-up society if most people can), which does tend to bother me a bit, but I don't mind so much if the instrumental part at least is pretty good.

So, I've been listening to Born For This today, and it was either that, or The Real Slim Shady (Any of the actual music video were censored), which I was listening to yesterday. Perhaps I'll post that one later on. Here's Born For This, though (static picture):



This is Boston, too? Man, I am real behind on this stuff.

Since we're having a special yummy dinner for my dad tonight, I can't be too interesting, but I still feel as if I should post something sooner rather than later.

So, I've noticed that many of the music videos I've put up lately have been for rather soft songs, or at least songs with a soft-ish part. Perhaps I've been in a mood, or perhaps it's the girl in me trying to claw her way out through all the car and gun thoughts (and those mental fingernails are sharp!). Either way, I've been meaning to take a break from it and post more active songs, so I started keeping an ear out for them.

The first one that I came across was White Wedding, which proves to me without a doubt that absolutely nothing from the 80's makes sense. Yeah, and you wonder why I don't always watch the videos I post (at least, I assume that that's the general thought). So, I determined that I didn't really want that exact video on my blog.

On the way to my office-cleaning job, I heard a really great song, but I can't remember exactly what it was. Instead, and until I recall it, today's second link will just be what I've been listening to on YouTube the past day or so: Can't Stop by the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

The reason I couldn't remember what that first song was is because Pink Floyd came on just after it and distracted me from repeating it in my shot-term memory enough to send it into the long-term area (I love psychology). So, that's the video I settled on actually posting. Enjoy your Money:



Apparently, before my parents were married, my dad's mom asked my mom what her favorite pieces of music were. Allegedly, she named a couple classical ones such as Beethoven's 5th, etc., before adding the album Dark Side of the Moon. Needless to say, my grandma wasn't too happy.

Well, I was going to reload bunches of ammo today for the IDPA match tomorrow, but there's a primer stuck in the machine, thereby keeping any primers from being loaded, rendering quite a few cartidges I've just made completely useless (as the primer is a fairly necessary component). So instead, I'll write a post and perhaps clean my gun later, though the gun itself is useless for a match without bullets.

So, Gangs of New York came on TV yesterday. I missed the very beginning and bits and pieces in the middle due to my current unwillingness to watch commercials, but I believe I got a general grasp of the overall plot.

Overall impression: Pretty good, actually. I didn't quite get what was going on in the ending, but my knowledge of what was happening in NY during the Civil War is rather rusty.

From what I understand, Leonardo DiCaprio's father was killed by the big crime boss guy who pretty much runs the city ("The Butcher"). He grows up, and plans to take him down by infiltrating his organization. He quickly gains The Butcher's trust, and becomes something like a right-hand man/son to him.

That's most of the movie. Naturally, there are many other things going on, including an affair of sorts with Cameron Diaz (Oddly enough, during one commercial, I turned to Vh1 where they were talking about her trip to Peru with the commie bag), but I'll not yammer on about every little detail. What follows is probably spoilers.

Eventually, Leonardo's character, Amsterdam (thank you, IMDB!), is betrayed to The Butcher by his friend, Johnny, the only character whose name I can really remember. A big, awesome, dramatic scene follows, and the whole battle between the two grows and comes out in the open. I'll not give away what exactly happens in the end--made easier by the fact that I'm not entirely sure about it (though I did completely understand the resolution of the primary conflict), but it was nice--dramatic.

So, here's the song that came on during the credits. I'm no fan of U2, but I'll not deny that I enjoy quite a few of their songs. So, here are the credits. The Hands that Built America begins at 26 sec. after the Spanish dub stops talking, followed by what seems very much like nothing. Oh well:



I recommend the movie, though I really need to see it all the way through real soon. Perhaps I can convince my mom to rent it, since she wanted to see it as well...

America's Next Top Zombie Idol. Seriously.

Now, I'm not one for reality TV shows, but I just can't turn away from anything with zombies. I mean, come on! So, yeah, I may very well check it out.

That's about all I have to say about that. I'll most likely post again in a couple days, but I may choose to do so today out of guilt (it's not incredibly likely right now, since I had to type this post twice now because I chose to preview it first. That'll teach me to look over my work). So, until whenever, I must now leave to clean my gun and/or reload some ammo for the IDPA match on Saturday, but I'll leave you with a random Robot Chicken clip I can now embed from their website (since they got all idiotic about "copyright violation" on YouTube). Would have been Zombie Idol, but they didn't have the whole thing. Later!

I just can't quit you! I'm trying to break the habit of posting every day, but it's a little difficult at times.

Well, something very interesting happened today, so I have a very good excuse for lack of lack of posts. Today, my mom and I were going to the range (I'll not go into a long post about that. I just shot 100 rounds into a terrorists face,while my mom used her shotgun to demolish a lower--yet even more sensitive--part on the target). Before that, however, my mom claimed that she needed to "run an errand" for my dad, "for his work," or something of the sort.

It wasn't. Not even close.

We pulled into the gravel parking lot of a used car dealer in a somewhat shady-looking area, which I actually knew fairly well from driving home that way back when I was in public high school. We parked in a space, and walked inside the small facility. On the way to the door, however, I began to suspect something was up, as we passed right by a white convertible that looked very similar to the glimpse of some pictures I'd caught in a mirror the night before when my dad showed my mom something on his laptop, telling her, "don't let [Hazel] know."

Well... no, it's not for me, but my parents had, apparently, bought a car. It's a 1993 Mazda Miata, and here's a nice picture in that wonderful camera phone quality (how much do digital cameras cost now? I really oughta get one...):




I believe my dad actually wants a Cobra, but those are really expensive, whereas they bought this for around the same amount as the one I drive. He does plan on getting a Cobra in a few years when he's retired, provided that he's not taxed to death. So yes, my parents will be those old people in a really awesome car that make everyone else on the road feel incredibly awkward.

All this made me wonder what neat car I'll want to get when I retire and a) have money, and b) don't care about living too much longer (as in, I won't care as much about it being crashworthy. Currently, I drive that tank and don't tend to want to trust much else). I've settled on a black, late '60's-era Impala, mostly because it's the Metallicar (yeah yeah, I know), but it also just plain looks cool.

So, this got me wanting to listen to some classic rock. I flipped the radio to the station that most consistently plays that particular genre, and got this. I love that song, but it won't let me embed, so I'll just go on continuing the train of thought I had. I usually hear some fun songs when I go to my office-cleaning job, as it's a good way to drive, and this past weekend was no exception. After a particularly fun singing of Bohemian Rhapsody (Yes, I do the Wayne's World headbang), Renegade came on. Of course, I knew neither the artist nor the title at the time, but found out easily enough. Therefore, here you go, and enjoy Renegade by Styx (the video is just album covers. It was either that or a Supernatural video, and I don't want to seem too obsessed):



P.S. Sorry about all the parentheses. They're just so useful when I have a bunch of branches relating to one thought that don't really go anywhere.