Adult Content

Maybe you know, maybe you don't, but I just started a new job. My first grown-up job, actually, working at a marketing firm. It's only my second week and already I wonder if waking up early and sitting in an office all day suits me. I can't blog for a living, though (yet!), so up I get and in I go, every day.

When I was little, I never dreamed of working in marketing for a living. No, I didn't imagine I'd be writing press releases and SEO tags all day, but I wasn't one of those kids who wanted to grow up to be the president or an astronaut or a cartoon character or something ridiculous, either. I had a few other ideas in mind:

• Pro Figure Skater

Truthfully, I wanted to be Nancy Kerrigan (minus that nasty knee injury). But since the position was already filled, I would have settled for becoming an Olympic champ in my own right. Problem is, I had never ice skated before. Other problem is, Olympic-caliber athletes have generally been training since birth. Other other problem is, they get up really early in the morning, and I like to sleep in. It just wasn’t in the cards. Which is probably for the best, because while I’m pretty stellar at Rollerblading (and look pretty awesome doing it, of course), I still fall down an awful lot on ice. My cutting edge dreams just weren’t meant to be except briefly, at a Career Fair theme party in college.

• Professional Singer

This followed along the lines of my figure skating aspirations, in that I wanted to do something for a living that I can’t even do for free. Anyone who has accompanied me to karaoke knows that while I’m not the worst singer in the bar, I’m not likely to get a standing ovation. Only the occasional notes are hit. I love karaoke, and I think I make up for my lack of killer pipes with my enthusiasm, but there’s no record deal in my future. I’m not getting discovered singing Tom Petty at the Clermont Lounge. As a kid, though, I don’t think I fully realized that I’m not a singer. I was in chorus. I tried out for solos in the school musicals and never understood why I always got the speaking parts instead (the biggest speaking parts—oh yeah, I was quite the thespian in the 5th grade). Now I know why.

• Reporter

At some point or another, I began to want to be a journalist. I don’t remember when the dream developed from generic reporter to magazine journalist, but the general idea stuck with me at least through most of college, ever since which my degree in Magazine Journalism has primarily been used as a placemat. I doubt I’d be the blogger I am today, though, if it weren’t for those long-form feature writing classes. Regardless, the journalism I participate in these days is primarily of the citizen variety.

• Lawyer

Reading too many John Grisham novels and watching way too much Ally McBeal in the 8th grade contributed to this pipe dream. I was even pre-law when I started college, and you know, it wasn't so out of the realm of possibility that I would have gone to law school. I just didn't really feel like it. When you're pre-law your freshman year, they devote an inordinate amount of time to talking you out of it. "It's nothing like it looks on TV!" they say over and over. "You're hardly ever in the courtroom! It's all research!" You mean it's not going to be like Legally Blonde all the time? Well then never mind. I'm out.

So I'm none of those things right now. Not by a long shot. And I'm not sure I know what I really want to be when I grow up-- maybe the president. Maybe an astronaut. Maybe a cartoon character. Or maybe I won't give up on my dreams after all. Maybe I'm destined to earn a gold medal or a gold record. For now, I'm just going to keep paying the bills, and maybe one day my childhood dreams will be realized.

You know what I don't get? Cats and boxes

Why cats love boxes. They just really love the hell out of boxes. Have you ever noticed this? I'm certainly not complaining. I adore cats, especially cats in boxes. I don't, however, understand their ardent appreciation of cardboard.

My hypothesis is that it helps them feel safe. It gives them a place to hide, a place to be warm... It's all about security, I think. And I guess it gives them a space demarcated as their own. (Those claw markings clearly indicate the owner of the box.)

More than that: it's also a look-out. From their box-vantage, they can see and hear all that occurs within their purveyance while staying "enclosed" or "hidden" in their cardboard shelter. I use quotations because often times the box is not closed. In fact, my cat Gwenevere has lately found sanctuary within a box that is actually completely open (see pictures).

And that's part of what I find so interesting. Clearly, an open box is not any safer than just being out in the open, but there's something happening in their cute kitten (all cats are kittens, shut up) brains that makes them think otherwise. Or perhaps they're merely looking to claim land for themselves? Cat psychology 101. I'm not a cat whisperer, so I don't know.

I also don't get why cats love sitting on paper.... Any of you ever thought about these things? These are important questions! The questions of our time!




I will leave you with some video of an awesome cat named Maru. The first one demonstrates his love of boxes; the second one gives you an introduction to his whole world (it's a little longer).

Eat Pray Love

Maybe one day I will learn to read, but my school hasn't caught on yet that I can't. (Please don't tell them. Thanks, Internet, you're a pal.) So how am I typing this? HahahaGET OUT OF MY TUBES. No, just kidding; GOOD QUESTION. I'm dictating to my creature/fiance. she kan reed gud

Mikey and I discuss the things that keep us going. HINT: not batteries (Well, I can't speak for Mikey.)

Find us on iTunes or download here.

WTF Happened Weezer

You may not know this, but music is important in my life. Really, I'm a big fan of music.

In particular, I'm a big fan of Weezer.

Hearing the blue album for the first time was a pretty revelatory thing for me. I was in middle school, and discovering a lot of new music on my own. This was during the dot com explosion, but my family was rocking a 14.4 modem, so the internet was basically molasses. A lot of my music came from the radio, coupled with time spent in used CD stores. I had heard Buddy Holly many times over, and always enjoyed it when I heard, but didn't know who it was. I was browsing a local CD Warehouse when I saw an album with a blue cover prominently featuring four goofy-looking dudes and the word "Weezer." Finding the band name funny, I checked the back and realized this was "that Buddy Holly band." I had some allowance saved up, so I figured... why not?

Honestly, it didn't seem like a big purchase at the time; I had no idea what to expect, so I didn't make much of it. My sister wouldn't let me change the music in her car, and that was fine.

A year or two prior, I had received a nice CD player. Three CD changer, two medium-size speakers, remote control, a variety of different pre-set equalizations along with a customization option, the works. Suffice it to say I was impressed with the quality of the product, though it may be paltry by today's standards. Anyway, I got home and innocently popped that blue CD into my CD player, completely unaware that my life was about to change, truly.

Finding the correct words to describe my feelings while listening to that album is difficult. From the celebratory surf-rock of Surf Wax America to the brooding emotionalism of Say It Ain't So to the epic build and release of Only in Dreams, Weezer's blue album perfectly encapsulated my feelings as a child on the brink of defining himself in his own terms. Perhaps you think I'm being high-falutin, and perhaps you're right, but regardless you can hardly overstate the sheer awesomeness of the blue album. Every song is catchy, every song is accessible, the whole album is just fluid and perfect.

Then I went to high school. Middle school is a hard time for most everyone, and the transition to high school is not necessarily any easier. Granted, I had a good high school experience overall, but I spent most of my freshman year trying to determine who I was. (This was predominantly subconscious, but clearly the kid walking around in blue and white striped knee socks or white pants with rainbow pinstripes has manifested this process externally.) During my freshman year I found out that Weezer had some 4 years previous released a follow-up to the blue album, Pinkerton. I bought the album by the end of the week.

Pinkerton held its own revelations for me, but not quite on the scale of the blue album. Pinkerton was different. It was strange. It was funny. It was abrasive and sexually frustrated. The solos were spazzy, the guitar lines angular. The whole album had a raw emotional feel, but it was touching and intensely personal. A great record for teenage boys, truly (and girls, too, but I always like to identify with lead singers). This album didn't leave my CD player for a solid 4 months, without exaggeration. I listened to it almost daily; even now it frustrates me how short the album is.

Weezer had pulled me in completely. They were my default favorite band for years following.

But some things had happened between Pinkerton's release and my purchase of the album. Matt Sharp, the bassist, left the band. Sales for Pinkerton were lackluster. Rivers Cuomo, the lead singer and primary songwriter, retreated to Harvard for a while. These were things I did not know.

Weezer's next album, the green album, was due out in May of 2001. Pinkerton had only been in my possession for a few months when I found out about the new album. I bought the green album the day it was released; I still remember walking the half-mile or so to the CD Warehouse near my high school.

Unabashed, super-polished pop rock. To me, that sums up the green album. Suffice it to say I was taken aback by Weezer's apparent face lift. Their personality as a band had changed. My theory has always been that Rivers took the poor sales of Pinkerton quite personally given the.... personal nature of that album. So he wrote songs that were less personal, more vague, and somehow less meaningful. Don't get me wrong, I still like the green album, but it obviously lacks the same quirkiness and charm of their first two records. And sure, I defended the album and the band vociferously, a trend that continued for the next couple of records in fact (perhaps against my better judgment), but the green album definitely left me feeling short-changed. It was a short album, but that wasn't the real problem. I just didn't understand how a band I loved so much could release such a seemingly flat album. My feelings on the album were mixed, at times hearing it as vapid, at other times lively but prosaic. Where was the dynamism? Where was the emotion? Where were the theatrics? (Pinkerton was based on Madame Butterfly, after all.)

Again, I like the green album. And in fact, my opinion on the album has changed dramatically over time, and especially in comparison to their more recent releases.

Next was Maladroit, which I liked a lot then and still like now. I think perhaps I knew that Weezer would never be what they once were, and I accepted it. Of course, they had also shifted stylistically again. This time they traded polish for distortion. Maladroit was more distorted, but also stilted and oblique, at least musically. Solos were everywhere. Huge bass lines. Crunchy guitars. (Well, except for Death and Destruction, a much lighter number in roughly the middle of the album.) They were reverting back to the abrasive sound of Pinkerton, but of course didn't get there, and they never would have.

Then I went to college, and then came Make Believe. But I'm not going to go into detail here. Or for the subsequent albums: red album (their third self-titled album a la blue and green album), Raditude, and the most recent, Hurley.

It's hard to say exactly what occurred between Maladroit and Make Believe, but it wasn't very good. Ultimately, Make Believe was forgettable. Actually, everything after Maladroit is forgettable to me. What happened? Did I grow up? Likely. Did Weezer not grow up? Also likely. But who changed more, me or them? Granted, Make Believe and its successors had a few good tracks, but also some really horrible ones. We Are All on Drugs. Really? If the title is any indication, and it is, this will be no good. The quality of songwriting has been, to me, relatively dreadful except in a handful of places. The music has been good albeit unremarkable.



Of course, I own all their albums. And I've listened to even their more recent albums many times over -- save for Hurley, which I've only listened to a couple times. I wouldn't listen to them if I didn't feel something for them. But am I just fooling myself? Can't I just let go and have fun and enjoy the music for what it is? I like to think I can. Or am I just cynical and jaded?

Measuring their impact on my life would be difficult. Those first two albums, in particular, represent and sum up a lot of my high school experience and, ultimately, myself. And while I know I'm a sucker for nostalgia, Weezer is quite clearly a different beast these days. So what the hell happened? Who changed more, Weezer, you or me?

Update: Weezer recently announced some tour dates for their "Blinkerton" tour.

Why We Watch... Anime

What is so bad about anime?

Mikey: I am going to come out and say it, though maybe I will mumble it a bit: I like anime. Not all anime, but a wide variety of it. There is a lot of stuff out there and no one likes everything of a certain genre. Even bacon products. Baconnaise is gross.

If someone heard me say, "I like anime," without knowing what I look like, they would probably assume I'm a chubby guy that wears Sailor Moon shirts that are way too small for him. Trust me, this is not the case; all my Sailor Moon shirts fit just fine. I am a normal looking guy that can fit into a variety of crowds. Yeah, I am dorky/geeky/nerdy at times, but eh, who isn't?

Not only are the fans of anime stereotyped, but so is the anime itself. The word anime triggers thoughts of Pokemon, Dragon Ball Z and Sailor Moon. These shows have their place, but not all shows or movies are like this. When I was much younger, I watched a few of them, but there is way more to the genre than that. Of course, this is a cartoon, and things are going to be a little bit more fantastic, but how is that so different from the CGI used in movies like Avatar? The good and the bad thing about anime is that there is so much of it. There is probably something out there that you will enjoy. Then again, there is a lot of crap to filter through that you may not enjoy.

So how do I get you to watch? Well, maybe you need to get past the fact that this is a cartoon, or that themes in the stories are a little weird. Some of the best anime, in my opinion, is only a couple of steps away from the Disney animated features of old. A hidden castle in the sky isn't a big leap from a prince beast that talks to a clock, a teapot and a candlestick. If you have never watched anything anime, I would tell you to check out anything by Hayao Miyazaki, and if that is too broad for you, check out Howl's Moving Castle or Spirited Away.

If you have dabbled into anime it really depends on your own tastes. I like action so I am all over the show Cowboy Bebop (there is also a sick musical track through out the show and movie). I really encourage you to give anime a chance and if you want a more specific recommendation ask someone or even myself. If I haven't seen something I will just netflix it.

Mattie: Anime culture has definitely been stigmatized here in the US. I feel as if there was a big surge of Japanophilia within specific circles of people in the 90's, and the stereotypes and stigmas of that subculture have, for whatever reason, carried over until now. A lot of people probably don't make the distinction between casual anime fans, hardcore anime fans, and complete Japanophiles. Somehow, if you like a little anime, you're that guy (or girl...).

At the same time, the internet has become an expansive and ubiquitous monolith. The internet's tendrilous grip extends far and wide; as it has become more entwined with our everyday lives, more people seem to be finding many once-strange things culturally acceptable, anime included. Miyazaki's films have even found moderate success in the States...

Attention: Ladies

Virginia, my fiance, recently started an etsy store called ApricotBasket. She makes jewelry and stationary, but can certainly do custom items.

Here's the link: ApricotBasket. Give her some love

WHY I LOVE CATS

Reason 2:




Video is thanks to our friend Jack over at Late Night JengaJam