mercredi 28 mai 2008

lanair

"j": lanair is christian
"j": lol
"j": and apparently hates abortion
"j": because only god has the right to choose who lives/dies
"j": just like god chose in the crusades

haha, not that I'm against christians or people who are against abortion...I just think that this is a point well-put. Also, I dislike this kid named lanair. I don't think he knows that it's hard to make the NCSSM community dislike you or have bad preconceived notions about you before they meet you. Congratulations, lanair....you have accomplished the improbable.

I want you guys to look at this website as well, which I got from reading the wikipedia article on enloe high school and its evangelist controversy. I find the Kamil International website hilarious...so I wanted to share with you.

dimanche 25 mai 2008

silence! I kill you!

Achmed, the Dead Terrorist

I have a hilarious sex slave

---: so one of my ex-best friends are like....hanging out with this person
---: and the person looks like....
---: a lesbian
"j": oh
"j" (6:00:45 PM): i thought you were going to say "christian"
---: hahahahahaha
---: same thing
"j": hahaha
"j": ... only lesbians would be stoned (and not the good kind)
---------------------------------
---: it's like my aunt came home yesterday and I was on the phone with tracy
---: and I was like, "why do we have kosher hot dogs?
---: and tracy was like, "was it on sale?"
---: so I asked my aunt later and she's like...."yeah....it was cheap, so I got it"
"j": hahahhaa
"j": "we're secretly jewish"
"j": jewish asians!
"j": oh noes
--------------------------------
---: mojo said something like "white isn't a race"
---: or something like that
---: so they started talking about what defines race
---: and mojo actually was getting somewhere decent with his argument
---: and volina's like "no....race is defined by skin color"
---: and it took so much out of me to not laugh at her
---: from the other table
"j": lol
"j": i want to be an alien
"j": do i get to color myself blue?
"j": yay, i win
"j": startreeeek

vendredi 23 mai 2008

cornea

So....my eye? I have a damaged cornea. My corneas are both a little roughed up, but my left eye is a lot worse. So what happens is the spots I've been seeing are from the damaged spots. Heh....apparently I also found out that according to their records, I have 2/20 vision tainted by astigmatism. I was told by some doctor a year ago that i'm a little nearsighted...but I guess not enough to change my prescription. Hmm....If I never had astigmatism, I'd be ok.

dimanche 18 mai 2008

Charlie the Unicorn 2

"If it doesn’t make you giggle like a 20-year-old stoner, you’re probably defective."(iwilldare.com)

Yes, yes...There IS a second installment of the crack-filled adventure. They're back for Charlie....this is exciting news and I couldn't really put it into the same post as Jay Chou since that would've been blasphemy.

Jay Chou World Tour Concert DVD

The quality, I think leaves something to be desired, but if you just want the background music, then it's nice....It's a live full DVD, and there are 22 parts

start here

Here is a guy that I forgot to mention last time, and I only know him as "betaunknown" a Singaporean pianist, apparently, and well....you can read about everything else from his profile. Have fun! Oh yes, I failed to mention...I think all of his videos are reproductions of Jay Chou compositions, most of which I think are songs from the Secret Movie Soundtrack.

samedi 17 mai 2008

jay chou

he's one of those people that I'm rather amazed by. The range of musical style used in his songs his huge, and I thought (since I've been obsessed with his music lately) that I would go check him out on wikipedia. Personally, I liked jay chou, but I actually fell in love with his music in secret. Granted, it's not the most complex score you'll see in your life, but for a musician of his age he's pretty amazing. I don't think I'm good enough to describe to you hos his music is like, so I'll just name a few examples:

Herbalist's Manual--makes use of techno/electronica

Red Imitation--uses Spanish style music (especially guitar at the beginning)

Reverse Scale--listen for the strings in the background, adding a bit of classical music

Rosemary--a Brazilian style of music called Bossa nova, I think. It's completely different from the kind of music that he usually does

Perfection and Sorry--(two of my favorite songs from a mix cd that I did after my dad accidentally downloaded a few of his songs) use counterpoint (background--although it's more apparent in the piano in perfection)

Wounds of War and Twilight's Chapter 7--use uhh....polyphony. I'm not sure how to describe it to you, really...it's like...these two opposing melodies in a song....but not exactly opposing because they...sort of harmonize? in a welrd sort of way. One's usually more dominant than the other. I think it's more evident in Twilight's Chapter 7 than it was in Wounds of War.

the last two are styles that are hmm...not common in music that you hear in everyday life. according to wikipedia, it's common in renaissance and baroque music styles? I'm not sure since I don't have a classical music training (<--fail!)

As a director, he produced a moie (his only one) that surpasses a lot of movies I've seen here, and I find him amazing (though not as amazing as Darren Aronofsky). You should watch Secret because it's a really good movie. If I haven't mentioned it above, this is the movie that caught my attention to his music (though some songs in my mix cd did that, too--I spent most of my time listening to those and fantasizing about what I can transpose for sax rather than really listening to his music) and made me really, really fall in love with the style. I'm a firm believer (I argued in class about this once on film adaptations of books) that without music and sound effects in film, it would be nothing not words. I believe that films that are emphasized with music catches the audiences' attention an lot more, involved their brains a lot more int eh experience and makes the viewing process complete. I gave the example that the illusionist was a movie with a bad plot because instead of having what's on screen working in harmony with music, the music caught more of my attention.

Anyway, one of the videos that has caught my attention for the moment in terms of how it's been directed is Far Away. The song itself also included...uhh...I'm not sure what that style of singing is called. Chinese opera, perhaps...idk? In case you watched the video and thought that the guy put in there was fake or whatever (yes, yes I did think that because I didn't know who he was) then here is a video of the song at the World Tour. I think it's great how he mixes different styles into his songs.

Also in the world tour version of Fa Ru Xue an instrument that I like a lot was used. I'm not sure what it's called....but you'll be able to recognize its sounds especially if you're asian. My grandmother knows how to play that and used to when she was younger. I want to learn someday.

If you haven't recognized the trend by now, I'm on a "world tour craze" because this next video for Nocturne is just to emphasize that it's nice that he doesn't sound bad live. I want to go to one of his concerts soon (before he stops being able to do this on a large scale and before he--or I--gets old). Yes, yes...those girls are hanging off of him one by one. I think at this point I feel inspired to go to the concert tonight.

On to World Tour--Secret. And what is it with asians and glow sticks!??!?!

Dandelion's Promise--also from the movie Secret, only as an instrumental. I suggest you go watch that movie :D Here he is, playing and singing. He composed all of the music for his songs, though he might not have written the lyrics.

And I'll end my string of videos with this lovely note. Jay Chou/Yu Hao duet--and what Gabe Whaley (NCSSM class president 2008) and Justin Huang did at Asia Fest called Dragon's Heel which I'm guessing is the song's name. Strings were Yify Zhang, Sophia Han (NCSSM concert master), Reid Huffman (sp?) on viola, Sunny Huang and Adam Collins (cello) Lucy Owen (timpani) and Apurva Oza (drum set)

What I'll also be attending tonight is the Jazz Concert with Joey Calderazzo as the guest pianist at our 3rd Annual Fine Arts Weekend at NCSSM. Here's where you can listen to some of his music, on his myspace, I think....I wouldn't know if there is any since I can't access myspace. But I'll take a chance anyway and say that he has samples for you to listen to. I'll have photographs on my flickr account which I think was linked right....idk because I can't check on here since flickr is ALSO blocked at NCSSM. Meanwhile...that is my shameless plug for my photos.

mardi 13 mai 2008

hmm

so I'm having one of those really pessimistic days. Maybe it's just that frances and I don't talk much anymore and I'm just now thinking of that. Maybe it's also the fact that I really don't find that she enjoys my company anymore. Perhaps this is karma? Sure I've done that to a lot of people, but then if you hung out exclusively with one person for a year and a half, you'd like to think that it would not take them a matter of 2 months to cease that relationship. Maybe I'm angry--maybe because I didn't expect it and it came to me or maybe it's because I *did* expect it and I'm angry that I didn't do anything to stop it. What can I do anyway? It's not like I didn't try. Sometimes I ask myself if telling her what I'm thinking would make a difference, but then I realize it probably wouldn't. Why? If you care enough about someone, you should be able to know on your own if something is wrong.

To let someone affect you is to say they mean something to you. To let someone affect you negatively is to say the inverse is not necessarily true.

jeudi 1 mai 2008

all I hope for this week

is that you'll be here this sunday :)