California's Dark

I am now sitting in the kitchen of my parents house, a mere 43 hours since I was here last. Since I left I have turned in one take home final and designed a front page of a newspaper for another final. I am truly happy to be done with school, I finished today, but there is something strange about having free time. I just got home and I am already bored. I wish I brought home my room mates Playstation two so I could play guitar hero or something. Hell, I would even play the original Tony Hawk game if it were the only thing available.

I keep forgetting to explain the titles of my posts. So I will go back ans explain the last couple ones in case people were confused or think I was making up my own. Back when I wrote, "Happiness is a well organized iTunes," I was listening to The Beatles' White Album which was created in 1968, which has the song on it "Happiness is a warm gun." I was just busy making my itunes all nice and organized for the possible arrival of my iphone.

The post above that is titles, "Punch the keys for god's sake." This post was the first post that I had done in a while because of the hectic schedule the magazine forced myself and others to be ruled by. The title comes from the infamous website, Your the man now dog, (www.ytmnd.com) where Sean Connerey's quotes have been immortalized. This post was sparked by a discussion my friends and I had about using the Ctrl+Z command in InDesign (undo) in real life. It's a laugher to us anyway.

The next post up titled "Sing till your lungs give out" was really made by me and just came out of my reaction to the vocals of the lead singer in Paramore. She just hits all the notes and impressed me. Read the review if you want to know more.

And the post before this one's title called "When you were young" comes from The Killers' 2006 album Sam's Town. It's also on Guitar hero 3, but I kept hearing it at the wedding and it sparked my disgruntled comments about my relatives.

I understand that is post is a bunch of referrals to old posts, but maybe if people commented there would be more to discuss. I am looking forward to this winter break and I think I am going to start it now with a nice coma. Oh, before I forget, I am a huge fan of Rage Against the Machine, so I was happy to see that Tom Morello made a new album with his band the Nightwatchman. If you like Tom's stuff I would suggest picking up a copy of the album called, "One man revolution." The title of this blog is from the first track on that album and I am listening to it right now. So far I like all the songs I have heard.

When You Were Young

This last weekend was hectic to say the least. I had my first two final exams on Wednesday and Thursday and I came home after my evening final on Thursday to hang out with my girlfriend. Friday night was the rehearsal for my sister's wedding and dinner with our two huge families. On Friday I also helped my parents set up their house for the after-wedding brunch on Sunday as well as picked my brother up from the airport. Oh yeah and I was supposed to be studying and preparing for my finals today and tomorrow. Let me count the minutes I wasn't busy... 7... maybe.

Even though the weekend was hectic, it was still pretty amazing. My sister truly got her 'fairytale' wedding and is now happily sitting on the beach in Hawaii on her honeymoon. Her dress was really beautiful and the whole ceremony was quite enjoyable. I was getting kind of tired of the, "I remember when you were this tall" comments that everyone seems to say even if they don't remember you. I also felt old when they used the, "when you were young," comments. The entire affair was truly amazing. I was kinda choked up, more than I thought I was going to be, because I hadn't prepared myself to see my sister get married. It didn't hit me until the next day. The increase in family size at the brunch was also daunting.

After the wedding I helped my parents transport all the floral arrangements back to their house. Then before I was able to scoot of to bed, I was summoned to help move in tables and chairs for the brunch the following morning. Little did I know that it would mean I would be doing all of the work with my brother. So we were up till about 1 a.m setting up for the brunch and because I couldn't sleep I decided to re-visit my New Super Mario Bros. save file on my Nintendo DS.

I got to sleep around 2 a.m. and woke up around 9 a.m. that morning to get ready for the brunch. If you are wondering when I studied for my finals, I have not yet and will get to that soon. At the brunch we have about half of the entire wedding guests, about 100 people or so, show up to my parents house. I should have taken pictures, but my parent's living room was packed wall to wall with people and somehow we fit all those people in with tables and chairs. All the furniture was moved into the garage, and then replaced by my twin and I after the party.

In an attempt to be polite to the guests and help out my mom and the caterer I stayed away from my laptop and any school books for a while. When I opened them to begin studying, it was time to go pick my uncle and family up from the hotel and head out to dinner. So after dinner I gathered up my things from my parents house and drove the rainy 45 minutes back to San Jose where I began studying for my 8:30 a.m. final, at 11:00 p.m.

I got my take home final done, but it was a very long night. I took a nap around 2:30 a.m. in order to rest my eyes for a little while, sleeping through my cell phone alarm, waking up abruptly at 4 a.m. and continuing the work. The only other trouble with this weekend other than the fact that I didn't get to spend that much time with my girlfriend is that my hand is swollen from all the hand shaking. Everyone in my family and new extended family shakes with a Texas-death grip. I have black a blues in between my thumb and pointer finger as well as the area on the palm under the pinky finger. The girlfriend is in Mexico so I am trying to find things to keep me busy and off my mind being jealous of her trip.


Black and blues, family, finals, sleeping, wedding, wedding cake

Sing Till Your Lungs Give Out

I am going to admit an embarrassing fact. In 2002 I was impressed by Avril Lavigne's album Complicated. I was in my punk swing and I thought the song "Sk8er Boi" was catchy and had some good guitar in it. Much like my opinion of "Bring me to life" by Evanescence. Avril soon found her way to MTV and my following of the band soon faded away, along with her talent. I truly struggled seeing a female vocalist make her way through the punk-pop/rock scene like Avril did, but I have found proof that I am wrong. Let's just hope this group doesn't kick the bucket after one album.

The band that impressed me is called Paramore. The lead vocalist's name is Hayley Williams and this band already has hope because they didn't name the band after her. So their album Riot! has me impressed. Their hit songs "Misery business" and "Cruchcrushcrush" are impressive to me. Take a look and listen.



The lead singer's vocal range is impressive and although I have not read her wikipedia page, I hear on live105's morning show that she is 19-years old. They preformed at Not So Silent Night and impressed most of the audience members who called in to discuss the highlights of the show. I can't say if the band will last, because these days it seems like no one hangs around for all that long. But if Paramore keeps making music like the tracks on Riot! then I feel that Paramore fans will be happy for quite a while, while most people will forget about Avril Lavigne and her Canadian ass.

Avril Lavigne, Live 105, music, Not So Silent Night, Riot!, Woody Tony Ravey,

Punch the Keys for God's Sake

Another awesome title courtesy of Sean Connery and YTMND.
My friends and I who have been working on the magazine reached a new level of procrastination. You know you have been working on something too long when you start to make jokes about the program applications that you are working with being part of real life.

In a discussion that we were having, we joked about how InDesign's Ctrl+Z command is one of the most glorious inventions. Not only that, but how it would be awesome if you could Ctrl+Z something in a real life situation. The immediate quick fix I thought of was for when that pick-up line fail miserably. Ctrl+Z that baby and poof, your back to where you were before you mentioned the line to try another one in your repituare. But it would have other applications as well.

Another example that comes to mind is like in the movie "Click" where is boss is being a jerk and he just pauses time, hits him across the face and then rewinds. Well I think of it like that, but you could hit him in the face and then see the reaction THEN Ctrl+Z and laugh about it later. But yes, the possibilities are endless with what you could Ctrl-Z. As a designer it makes me laugh at the possible applications of programs in real life.

Cut and paste? Duplicate? Transform? Rotate? The whole effects drop menu? I mean, I know that only Adobe users know what I am talking about, but at least we thought it was funny.