Goddam phonies...

I'm in a good mood as I managed to clean my room good and proper and as a result I feel pretty organised. That doesn't mean that I'm making any progress on the plentiful amount of homework I have to do though. Instead, I've cleaned my iTunes and iPod up and organised my school folders as opposed to working off whatever I had left in my bag from the day before...

Having been recommended to by my girlfriend's sister, I read J.D. Salinger's 'The Catcher in the Rye' this week (I say read this week, I mean finished this week after reading the first quarter on and off for the past four months or so). But it was very, very good and very enjoyable. I've never been that into first person narrative but there was something about this book that was immensely captivating in that it really offered insight into the way we think. Maybe 'we' is the wrong word - 16 year-old boys is maybe a better choice. Anyway, for those of you who haven't read it, I must urge you to...

One of my favourite bands, American Football have a song entitled 'Letters and Packages' off their first EP back in good old 1998. I realised this week that the song actually references / pays tribute to one of Salinger's more famous short stories entitled: 'For Esme, with Love and Squalor'. The story is about Esme, a young girl that the main character, an American soldier, met in a tearoom after seeing her perform in a choir. They talk over tea and she tells him about her fathers death. When she leaves she gets his contact information and at the end of the story he is looking through an assortment of unopened 'letters and packages' and finds something that she had sent him...

I think it's awesome how some of my favourite music can be so closely related to my favourite books...

Jonty x

Although

I don't read anywhere near as much as I'd like to, I managed to finish Stephen King's Carrie this week and yeah, it was pretty cool. I've never seen the movie adaptation but for being written by a relatively young Mr. King, I thought it was a good read. I feel I also kind of stick with what I like and know I will enjoy which is why starting It-the next book on my to-read pile-will make it the fourth King book I've read in a row. Almost.

I'm taking my girlfriend to London tomorrow which should be fun. Hopefully we'll get to visit the National Gallery and perhaps the British Museum with a trip to Denmark St. on the way. Plus, thanks to a well timed visit to my university fresher's fair, we will be able to travel in style for only £1 return... And my grandad's taking us out for dinner. Sweet.

I think I'm going to read Catcher in Rye next as it's one of those must reads. Oh well, school starts on Monday so we'll have to see how much time I have to do things other than research and study...

Jonty x

Catering for everyone...

I don't know what Microsoft were thinking of here. In an attempt to position themselves at the Polish market, they swapped what was originally a black business man with his white equivalent whilst forgetting to Photoshop a white hand in. Plus I think said black/white man is using a Macbook too...

Rather than seeing this as overtly racist, I'd like to think Microsoft are catering for everyone by giving someone both black and white features, but I'm not going to think this because I don't really like Microsoft. So yeah, Microsoft are racist.

Jonty x

It's

only a matter of days now (17 to be exact) until my girlfriend arrives in the UK, and I’m so excited. Despite the fact that she has lived here before, I feel there are still many aspects of British culture that she is yet to experience. For instance, she has never indulged in any decent Indian cuisine (no irony intended) or taken in any of the quality programming British television can offer its viewers.

I’ve been working on pronouncing my ‘th’ sounds recently after noticing that I replace said ‘th’ sounds with the lazier alternative, ‘f’ – e.g. ‘Jonafan’ instead of ‘Jonathan’. It’s becoming fairly a contrived effort though, with me now saying ‘thinger’ instead of ‘finger’. I think it just needs work, or speech therapy…

I watched around 4 hours of LOST season 5 last night and have decided that hands down, it is the best TV series ever. I said this about Prison Break, but everything about LOST is good, all five seasons of it. It’s like six or so awesome TV shows in one as each character brings so much to the table both on and off the island. I can’t wait to see what they’re going to do in the final season and I’ve saved the one and half hour finale of season five for viewing once I’ve written this.

I got some new ink this week. I now have the word ‘BOIZ’ scrawled with my friend’s sister’s tattoo gun across the bottom of my big toe. I figured it would wear off in a few weeks so what’s the harm? Perhaps what’s worse, is the fact that my other friend and I now want a tattoo gun of our own to brand each other with whenever we feel like it!

There’s no real theme to this evening’s post, merely a collection of things I’ve either experienced or thought about over the past week or so. I have decided that I hate motor vehicles however. I have a 3.5 ton van that belongs to me sitting in a field with no MOT and a tax disc that runs out next week. Had I thought about it, I could have sold it back in December when it had both of these things for a cool thousand easily. Right now, it’s just sitting there pretty much worthless. Damn.

Jonty x

Mii

I've been going to bed at progressively later times this week, setting a new record of 3:45am yesterday. In a feeble attempt to combat this and break the initial stages of what was becoming a nocturnal sleeping pattern, I decided to get tucked up early tonight. Instead, after an hour of listening to music and trying various sleeping positions, I decided this page could do with some attention.

It's been an interesting day. I bought a car, got a great deal on some pizza at lunch, finished the final mixes of a band I've been recording, wrote a new song, and managed to reach level 1500 on wii sports Kendo. I can't actually beat the final boss but I'm getting there. I feel it's all about technique and on watching YouTube videos regarding the matter, feel my own should be augmented in some way. Training will begin tomorrow.

I feel like I got a pretty sweet deal on my new car though. My next door neighbour's boyfriend wanted rid of his Peugeot 306 and on telling me he was scrapping it at the end of the week, I offered him what I felt was a fair £50 and he was happy to let it go. All that I have to do now is make it actually work.

I'm a little worried about my final year university program. I still need to decide on a dissertation topic and go over to the campus library to read some previous students' work. As well as this, I have a bunch of clashes and can't find decent classes or even work out if I have enough classes? It doesn't help that my field chair's on holiday for the rest of the summer either. Pfff... whatever, it's too late to sort it out now so I'm allowed to procrastinate.

I'm venting (in a non angry way) a lot creatively at the moment--it's great. I got to spend a day at the new studio yesterday messing around with, amongst other things: a lovely ProTools HD setup, pianos, a concert vibraphone, and a pair of AKG c414s. I'm working on some really awesome poster designs and have countless ideas in my head for upcoming work and, as it would seem, am actually writing something of both substance and value on here (despite it being 2:38am).

It's not all bad I guess - at least it's going to be sunny tomorrow :)

Jonty x

My all time, top five favourite...

foods would most likely be (in no particular order):

- Cheeseburgers (both the pretentious and the not so pretentious varieties)

- Chicken Enchiladas (both Mexican and New Mexican styles)

- Sausage Sandwiches
- Pecan Pie

- and Pesto Pasta

I am currently sat at work having had only two customers in the past hour, only one of whom actually spent any money.

It's raining (again) and I hate it.

Other than this, it has been a long time since I've written anything of substance on here, and I fear the few people that did read this thing have probably given up on the idea due to my sheer laziness--that and me having very little to write about. All that is about to change though. I am going to write an awesome entry on something really interesting that will bring all those deserted followers back.

As soon as I can think of something that is...

Jonty x

A new design by me...

Do we have to know this for the test?

As my time here within US higher education is coming to an end, I feel it’s only fitting to talk about my perceptions of it as a system and ultimately what I’ve taken away from the experience. I know that before I came out here, my brother had always said he wished he’d come to school here and in remembering this, I’d have to kind of agree and disagree.

What I’ve really enjoyed here is the non-specialised nature of learning. That’s not to say that’s how I think every school or university should teach, but it definitely offers a fresh approach for students. For instance, here in the US, first and second year students take general education classes on pretty much anything the university offers. After two years of a wide-ranging choice of subjects, these students then decide their major or the subject their degree will be classified through. I don’t know about you, but when I was 17, I didn’t know what I wanted to study for the next three years. I feel that pushing this age up and specialising later is much more accommodating solution.

That’s not to say I agree with it entirely however. One thing I’ve noticed in my time here is the extent to which students are really involved in their learning. Many of my classes for instance, are merely assessed through multiple-choice tests, which is definitely something I have never agreed with as a means of recognising achievement. To me, you shouldn’t be in any university of college environment if you ask the question ‘is this going to be on the test?’ or worse, ‘do we have to know this for the test?’

I got even more frustrated when for an essay, we were told to base our research on a select few academic journals. Now, I don’t know if this says as much about the professor or his/her trust in his/her students. On so many occasions I have felt spoon fed; the concept of a study guide to me, completely defeats the whole point of learning. Does it not just become regurgitation of facts?
Regardless of this, whatever environment I learn in, I’m always going to have quibbles with. I just think at 21, people should know how to write a paper and actually do some independent research, or they shouldn’t be in school…

Other than that, I watched Evil Dead II for the umpteenth time last night and again realised how good a movie it is in every single way. As for my travelling plans, I have decided to head up to Seattle and Portland next week and just see where the wind takes me… Las Vegas after that should be interesting too.

Jonty x

You walked? What's that?

I only have to look around my campus here in Sacramento to see actually how many cars are on the road. What’s worse, is that—seemingly—about 95% of said cars have one passenger; the driver. On top of this, your average tank of petrol or ‘gas’ will set you back a mere $2.30 a gallon. That’s right, a gallon (that's about 26p a litre). Perhaps I have a chip on my shoulder about the—as I see it—socially optimum price of petrol in the UK, but I really think it’s more than that. The diagram below sums it all up pretty well…

And put it this way, I haven’t seen the price of petrol in the UK at 88p a litre since 2006. In fact, I remember last summer petrol being £1.29 ($1.96) a litre. That’s, what, $7.84 a gallon here in the US! So why are UK residents willing to pay such a high price in order to run their cars? Is there less need for a car in the UK? From my experience the answer is yes but what about public transport? Look at this GM ad for instance:

I wonder sometimes, if the infrastructure and availability of public transport in places like Sacramento was improved whether the number of people using it would even change at all? I don’t know if people are just too comfortable in their cars or just too lazy? Perhaps I am too cynical, but there’s no way I could afford to run my car in the UK the way some people do here… I really think people have the wrong attitude when they view buses by the ‘creeps and weirdos’ who supposedly use them. How about this, my solution to getting the US out of its massive debt is to raise fuel tax and use some of that revenue. Haha...

Jonty x

I Want to Believe...

As I am such a hard working and thoughtful scholar, I was discussing with my colleagues the other day the differences between economics and politics. In respect of the 21st century, my father maintains four of his own blogs which, unlike me, he updates daily. He had this to say on the matter: Hard-nosed positive economics focuses on “the how” leaving many of the “why” and “ought” questions unanswered. Oh, now I get it...

For those of you who are utterly fascinated by such a topic, I advise you to read Will Hutton’s article Life may not be fair, but that’s still no excuse for an unjust society.

I have become apathetic in my ability to maintain this blog but that's not to say I'm going to stop altogether--maybe in a couple months. I decided about an hour ago that I'm going to watch the nine season, televised entirety of the X-Files as I feel I never really appreciated how good it is. Whilst doing that, I am looking forward to writing about either Sam Raimi's Evil Dead 2 or Tarantino's Death Proof for my film class; recognising them for their hidden ideology and I might even critique them from a feminist film theory perspective--not that I am such a thing.

This week I also have to decide if I'm going to visit the Grand Canyon or Oregon...

Jonty x

So I found out this week that Safeway buy 300 boxes of Rice Krispies for $16! What a markup! I wish I could buy that much cereal for that amount of money--although I think a good majority of it would go off buy the time I got round to eating it. I don't think there's going to be much of an underlying theme to this entry and it will more than likely end up as a random collection of things I've either been told or have thought about at some time during the past week.

So, I finished reading Watchmen and also went to see Zach Synder's slow-motion filled cinematic adaptation which really does have a lot of slow-motion. I also, on top of the ever-increasing pile of homework I have, managed to read in the past couple of weeks both Daniel Clowes Ghost World and Charles Burns' Black Hole both of which are fantastic and if you are in anyway into the medium of the graphic novel, have to read.

I got the chance in my documentary class to see for ashamedly the first time, This is Spinal Tap. I don't think I've ever laughed that much in a classroom before but it was educational laughter so it's okay. I went to a Wellness Fair today (whatever wellness actually means) and got a good selection of freebies. Everything from the local fire brigade's self-promotional sticker to a highlighter that has a de-highlighter on the other end--as you never know when you might accidentally highlight the wrong thing. Huh?

I think I've also decided that Prison Break season 3 is no where near as good as its predecessors and that recognising this perhaps says a lot about the fact that I'm only 2 episodes into the 12 episode season over 3 weeks of viewing.

So for anyone who is reading. Sometime this week I urge you to either read: Ghost World or Black Hole, watch Prison Break season(s) 1 and / or 2 and listen to anything by Rogue Wave.

Jonty x

Audiophiles of the Y Generation...

You know how most people are perfectly happy with Apple standard-issue earbuds, white plastic molded around a crappy audio experience? A Stanford professor's informal annual study shows that younguns also, for some reason, actually like the "sizzle sounds" of MP3s.

Each year, Stanford Professor of Music Jonathan Berger does an informal test of his students by playing a bunch of different music in a bunch of different formats. Here's how he performs the informal study:

Students were asked to judge the quality of a variety of compression methods randomly mixed with uncompressed 44.1 KHz audio. The music examples included both orchestral, jazz and rock music. When I first did this I was expecting to hear preferences for uncompressed audio and expecting to see MP3 (at 128, 160 and 192 bit rates) well below other methods (including a proprietary wavelet-based approach and AAC). To my surprise, in the rock examples the MP3 at 128 was preferred. I repeated the experiment over 6 years and found the preference for MP3 - particularly in music with high energy (cymbal crashes, brass hits, etc) rising over time.

In other words, younger people haven't just grown more tolerant of thin, soulless MP3 renditions of their favorite music, they actually like them. Professor Berger has been quoted as saying that it's the "sizzle sounds" that people are loving because it's what they're comfortable with. People aren't just ignorant of high quality audio, they actually hate it. Gee, thanks for contributing to the downfall of civilization, mp3 players. What's interesting about this I think, is what it says about the ears of my generation. Hmm.

Personally, I don't really have too big of a problem with mp3s or mp3 players for that matter. I own an iPod. I love having an organised iTunes library and whilst I still relish in my CD and vinyl collection, I probably listen to my mp3s most of the time (always at 320kbs though, oh yes). What annoys me, are those pseudo audiophiles who spend £100+ on RCA to phono cables to 'enjoy' their mp3 player through their hi-fi separates. Why you would try and improve the sound of a medium which has already compressed and thus lost the quality of the original recording is beyond me.

So, the answer? mp3s are small and fun but if you're all about quality, stick with Cd's I say.

Jonty x

Lamps don't have feelings do they?

I had the pleasure of seeing for the first time this week, this ad:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I07xDdFMdgw

It turns out that it was directed by Spike Jones and I really don't know why but I did actually feel sorry for the lamp. Whilst the Swedish gentleman at the end of the ad tells us that lamps actually don't have feelings and yes, the new one is probably better I can't help but see the lamp wishing it could go back indoors where it's nice and warm. I guess the music doesn't help, neither does all the rain and whole street corner scenario. I also think Pixar have managed to subconsciously condition me into personifying things like lamps and cowboy dolls too.

Anyway, in the past two weeks I've managed to re-watch the whole first season of Prison Break and am currently half way through season two and I can't even begin to describe how good it is. I actually think it's impossible to be bored watching it? I also enjoyed reading the show's actor's individual backgrounds earlier this evening and was interested to see that one them had been involved in DUI and consequentially served actual real-life prison time. Kinda ironic really. Maybe being involved in such a show meant that he could easily fashion his own Allen key and break out of wherever he was through the toilet in his cell. Oops.

Jonty x

What a lovely color!

Why is it that I can get on a plane, travel to the US and find myself experiencing the same language barriers I would having landed in Spain or ... I don't know ... Namibia? Maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration but seriously, even being asked the most simple of questions like 'what time is it?' causes the person who asked it to stop in their tracks when I reply, 'half seven'.

Me being me, I set off to research why people over here say, or more importantly spell things the way they do. What caused such translations to take place in the first place? And thinking about it, although it's completely off subject, if I'm lacking organisation, am I unorganised or disorganised?

In fact, as I've since found out, it depends! Take for instance the notion of a woman whose desk is in a real state. Not organised if you will. If we were to say her desk and papers seem unorganized, things would be a bit of a mess but she could find anything she needed in a moment. If however, her desk and papers were disorganized, things would most definitely be in a mess and more importantly she could probably never lay her hands on whatever it is she needs.

So there's a fun lesson in the correct use of a word I like to use a lot but why do Americans say and spell things differently? American English and British English actually differ at the levels of phonology, phonetics, vocabulary, and, to a lesser extent, grammar and orthography.

The differences in grammar (as we know) are relatively minor, and normally do not affect mutual intelligibility. For instance these include, but are not limited to: different use of some verbal auxiliaries, formal (rather than notional) agreement with collective nouns, different preferences for the past forms of a few verbs (e.g. AmE/BrE: learned/learnt, burned/burnt, and in sneak, dive, get); different prepositions and adverbs in certain contexts (e.g. AmE in school, BrE at school); and whether or not a definite article is used, in very few cases (AmE to the hospital, BrE to hospital). Often, these differences are a matter of relative preferences rather than being absolute rules; and most are not stable, since the two varieties are constantly influencing each other.

But whatever, I think it's interesting...

Jonty x

Mmm... Tasty...

Redline or Redline RTD is the name of a thermogenic energy drink manufactured by VPX (Vital Pharmaceuticals, Inc.).

Marketed towards the fitness industry, it is sold as an energy drink in gyms or health food stores. The beverage includes anhydrous caffeine, evodiamine, tyrosine, yerba mate extract, green tea extract, 5-HTP, vinpocetine, and Yohimbine.

Redline, unlike most energy drinks, has no calories or sugar. Redline is sweetened with Sucralose and is sold in five flavors (grape, green apple, berry, peach mango, and mandarin orange). Sounds good eh? Maybe not...

Redline is not for the consumption of persons under 18. In fact, a fellow student in one of my classes was actually IDed for the drink in a gas station this week! I don't know about you, but that's definitely the first time I've heard of someone being asked for identification over a drink...

There are however, several warnings on the container, including "Do not drink while pregnant," "Keep out of reach of children," and "Do not drink on an empty stomach", amongst other things. Some users have reported that they have experienced trembling, increased body temperature, sweating, headaches, and nausea when consumed on an empty stomach. The product also carries labels warning consumers not to use it if they are under the age of 18, and the item tends to be age-restricted in many retail outlets, including Wal-Mart.

The Navy Exchange has imposed a limit of one Redline per customer due to concerns of sailors potentially overdosing! Due to its higher caffeine content, it is not recommended for those who are very sensitive to caffeine. Redline recommends that first time consumers drink just half the bottle. Just half? But I'm tired and thirsty!

Anyway, I'm gonna try drink two of these before class one time and see if my contributions toward the discussion are nothing short of genius...

Jonty x

Cosmicomics

On Monday night I sat for two hours in what turned out to be one of the more interesting lectures I've ever attended. What are the ideological implications of the ways in which particular social classes are staged and narrated cinematically? I've got a sneaky suspicion that this will be the question on my mid-term in a couple of weeks in which case I should probably look up what a social class is. Lolz.

Regardless of what the class is actually about we actually got onto talking about some quite interesting subjects. For instance, why is it that I love mainstream cinema? I go to the cinema every week and am never disappointed by films with a good narrative and explosions and cool stuff like that. I guess I know what to expect and don't ever ask questions...

But here's what my professor thinks. We think we can go into a film completely oblivious to what we're going to be shown. We as spectators are completely subjective to film and it is us who ultimately structure them... Right? Wrong. We're never made to feel uncomfortable in films - in fact, we as spectators watch from a visual ideological calm. We're never made to question anything. But what is there to question?

What even is ideology? You might say it is an unwritten law that we have no control over whatsoever. How do we question the invisible? Is this narrative I love in films not just ideology? Think of it this way ... It's Valentine's Day. Why are we conditioned into buying flowers etc for our significant others by a holiday that was effectively coined by a greetings card company? All those choices and the need to buy something - this is the Valentine's Day narrative. How do we look beyond this?

I'll prob fail the mid-term. All this stuff is so subjective and I find it hard to actually agree with any of it, hence all the questions.

Anyway, Cosmicomics is a collection of short stories by an Italian writer named Italo Calvino with each story taking a scientific "fact" (though sometimes a falsehood by today's understanding), and builds an imaginative story around it. An always extant being called Qfwfq narrates all of the stories save two, each of which is a memory of an event in the history of the universe. The first story, The Distance of the Moon, takes the fact that the moon used to be much closer to the earth, and builds it into a romantic story about two men and one woman in a tribe of people who used to jump up onto the moon when it passed overhead.

Awesome.

Jonty x

I wish

I could play guitar as well as this guy. In fact I wish I could play every instrument as well as this guy. His name is Mike Kinsella although he is probably more recognisable through musical vehicles such as Owen, American Football and Cap'n Jazz. I'm weird with music though. I'd like to think that I have pretty eclectic taste in that I will happily listen to everything from Steely Dan to math metal... it's the stuff in between these polar opposites I'm not too sure about...

I urge you, in fact, I insist that you check out some of this guy's musical endeavours. The fact that he writes, plays and records everything is only cooler and I think I'm going to maybe get him tattooed on me now. That's another thing I seem to have a habit of doing; becoming obsessed with things. Star Wars, Pokemon, 18th Century art whatever this week's trend is I guess. But seriously, expect a blog entry on any one of those items listed above in the next few days.

For now CLICK HERE and listen to Owen. You won't regret it.

Jonty x

An experiment with what in what??

Sometime last year I told myself that before I died, I had to see in it's flesh, this painting. I guess I'm lucky living where I do that the painting itself is actually only hung about an hour or so from my house at the National Gallery in London. So, I knew before embarking on the ten hour plane journey to San Fransico that the plane was going to crash and I would never see this painting and thus took the liberty the week before setting off to pay it a visit.

Strangely enough, I actually have no inherent interest in art. It's fun to look at and as with any artistic medium, I can always appreciate the effort that goes into it, I just, don't know, find it exasperatingly frustrating when people look into things like poems and artwork in order to see whatever farfetched meaning they can possibly deduce.

So why this painting? I actually got in super, super late one evening a while back and for whatever reason, the BBC were airing a documentary that looked at both the painting, its artist, and the historical and cultural background surrounding it. Awesome. Well, not really but there is something intrinsically alluring about the painting. I don't think I've ever seen something created by hand that so closely resembles reality... It's funny to think that when I did eventually get to see the painting in it's flesh and blood, that I could get close enough to see each brush stroke that was made eight years before the country I am sat writing this in, even existed.

I suggest that if you ever want to feel culturally enriched, pay the National Gallery a visit...

Jonty x

Breathtaking!

So, in class today we yet again began discussing Pepsi's latest advertising campaign and their subsequent 'new logo' to go along with it . Following on from this, my professor loaded onto the display, the Arnell Group's 'Breathtaking' pdf file of all thing wonderful and weird.

'Breathtaking' theorises consumers will feel a gravitational pull elicited by the new logo, one that will lead such individuals to fill its shopping carts with Pepsi. At its most extreme, the document compares the reimagined Pepsi globe logo to the Earth's magnetic fields and the sun's radiation. "Emotive forces shape the gestalt of the brand identity," are just some examples of the language choices in this document...

Whether this whole thing is a hoax or not is another question. Personally, I had a lot of fun reading this thing and find it quite hard to believe that an account worth $1.2bn would conjure up something like this but then again, what has Burger King got its ad agency doing here?!

At the end of the day, whether it's a hoax or not, I actually quite like the new Pepsi logo. I even thought their Superbowl ads this year were pretty sweet but I seem to be alone on that one...


Anyway, you check the actual pdf document out for yourself here.

Jonty x

Really?

So for the past few months I've woken up everyday and after either a, thinking 7:30am is way too early for class or b, weighing up my options over what to eat for breakfast, I ask myself the same question: do I still want that comic book guy from The Simpsons tattoo?

It's either that or Bruce Campbell. At the same time I think to myself, 'yeah that will be really sweet, no one has anything like that' and I'll probably get it on the back of my thigh as who ever looks there? In fact, I don't even think I can twist my neck that far to see round there.

I guess every one's tattoos mean something to them; they have some sort of sentimental or inherent value and that's fair enough. But seriously, who would get a tertiary character from a steadily declining cartoon show inscribed to their body for the remainder of their life? Me.

I guess said character embodies most of the principles and standards I follow in my own life. Living here in California for the next few months is also reason enough for me to invest in something I see as a somewhat glorified souvenir...

For now, until I think of something even cooler than an overweight cartoon character I guess I'm all set...

Jonty x