Firearms & Frozen Treats

I have been sick the past several days with a sore throat. I really wanted popsicles, but we didn't have any, so I had to make some Jell-O popsicles. That entry is from a little over a year ago. Anyway, I made strawberry banana ones with chunks of banana.

On the 12th my dad and I went to a shooting range with Patrick and his parents (my aunt and uncle). I've shot guns only a few times in my life. Although I very much hate the idea of hunting in this day and age, and am generally kind of weirded out by gun nuts, I am really quite interested in guns. Maybe it's the survivalist in me, but I think it's probably a good idea to know how to use a gun, just in case you ever need to use one. You never know when there's going to be a zombie outbreak, or when Skynet is going to attack, or when a group of cowboys or a biker gang is going to ride into town and start causing trouble.


I started with a .22 caliber rifle, which is the only gun I've ever shot in the past. I spent most of the time shooting .22 caliber and .357 caliber revolvers. I loved those. They made me feel like Doc Holliday or something. My dad kept saying I looked like Clint Eastwood. I was hesitant to shoot any of the semi-automatics, but I ended up shooting a 9mm Hi-Point, an AR-15, and an AK-47. I didn't really enjoy shooting the AR-15 or the AK-47 because of the recoil, but I actually liked the 9mm Hi-Point quite a bit. I wasn't a bad shot either. I was no Deadshot or Martin Riggs or anything, but I wasn't bad.

My aunt took some photos of us, but I haven't seen them yet. If and when I do, and if I like them, I'll post some here.

Halloween is coming up. So this is my...

Spooky, isn't it?

This year's X-Entertainment Halloween Countdown started yesterday. Sometimes I go for long periods of time where I seem to completely forget that X-Entertainment exists, but I've been a fan of the site for probably a decade. It's not necessarily hard to believe, but it's a little bit crazy that it's been over a decade since Matt ate Nad's hair removal gel. That remains, in my mind, one of the highlights of internet culture.

Even before Matt started doing Halloween Countdowns, the holiday was celebrated extravagantly on the site. Sometimes he wouldn't even wait until the month of October to start the extravagance, so it seemed like the countdowns were created as a way to rationalize starting to celebrate early every year. I used to love Madd Matt.

He is not afraid of the dark. He is the dark.

The Halloween Countdown has just started, but it already seems more exciting than the past several years' countdowns did. It seems like Matt's putting more enthusiasm into it than he previously did. Witnessing it is probably not unlike a new parent witnessing their young children experiencing their first few Halloweens and Christmas's. It makes visiting the X-Entertainment site feel like it felt years ago. It's fun. It's making me in the mood for Halloween.

The past few years I had plans for Halloween, but I was let down at the last minute each time, and ended up sitting in my room, watching John Carpenter's Halloween (I'm forced to make that distinction now since Rob Zombie decided to make a terrible remake a few years ago) or Ghostbusters.

I have no plans this year, so I can't be let down. Suddenly the idea of sitting around that night and watching movies by myself sounds fun, when it's not in the context of broken plans. I'm going to go buy some exquisitely delicious Halloween candy, and watch movies, and have a wonderful time. And I'll be counting down the days until that night with X-Entertainment.

Reformatting the planet, and going overboard with links.

The first season of Penny Arcade: The Series is over, and they haven't started the new season yet, so they've been putting up other programs on PATV.

2 Player Productions (actually comprised of four people. Weird, I know.), the production company that produced the first season of Penny Arcade, produced a documentary about chip music called Reformat The Planet. I originally saw it on Pitchfork TV a while back, but now it's on PATV.

I talked about Tristan Perich in my last entry. He has a few scenes in Reformat The Planet.

Jesse Novak is also in Reformat The Planet. I know of him from the comedy group Olde English. His brother is BJ Novak, the writer of, producer of, and actor that plays Ryan Howard on the U.S. version of The Office. I believe Jesse has written music for The Office at least once. One of the Dunder Mifflin jingles in that episode where the office makes a commercial for the company.

I love the concept of chip music, but I rarely hear any I like. Reformat The Planet is an interesting movie, but I didn't really hear any music that interested me in it. There's a very gimmicky aspect to chip music where regardless of how well composed a piece of music is, as long as someone uses that medium to make music, it's automatically considered as valid as any other chip music. I rarely hear what I consider to be interesting compositions and textures in the medium of chip music. I'm not saying any music is invalid, but I wish people would be more daring. I think that the reason old video game music is so memorable and moving has more to do with the interesting compositions rather than the 8-bit sound.

Tristan Perich's 1-Bit Symphony

I've thought a lot about ways of presenting music, but usually my ideas are based on new or interesting ways of presenting widely-used, existing formats, such as CD, vinyl, or MP3's.

One of the most interesting ideas I've come across (Tyler from my previous entry linked to it from his facebook page) is this:



"A complete electronic circuit - programmed by the artist and assembled by hand - plays the music through a headphone jack mounted into the case itself."

It's not a recording in the traditional sense of the word. I think it's probably more accurate to think of it as an electronic music box, and I'm fascinated by music boxes.

Another interesting way of looking at it is that it is not a stretch to see the mounted circuit itself as minimalist album art when it's in the context of a CD jewel case like that. I love the idea of physical objects being used in album art rather than just images. This is not only a physical object, but it's what plays the music. The album art plays the album.

Of course, I think one downside to a presentation like this is that it's such an interesting idea that it is in danger of becoming a gimmick and overshadowing the music itself. Although that doesn't decrease the validity or quality of the music, people like me are only talking about the album because of the presentation and not because of the music. Maybe that's alright though, because maybe the music isn't the only part of the art as a whole. Maybe the circuit idea isn't there to compliment the music, but the other way around, and the music is there to compliment the idea of the circuit. That doesn't mean that the music is any less important. It's more like a film score complimenting a film. The music is very important and enhances the film, but the film itself, as a whole, is the most important thing.

You can download a free recording (provided by The Rambler) of the first movement in the 1-Bit Symphony by clicking here.

Free music you could check out, if you were so inclined.

A band I really love called Endless Hallway released a new song yesterday. They recorded it a few months ago. It's called "Magneton"

The link to download it is here.

I've been into them since there were only two guys in the band and they had only a 30-second teaser of a song on their myspace site. Since then they've released several demos and a great album.

I went with Patrick and his friend Aaron to see Endless Hallway live last year when they were on tour, opening for Gavin Rossdale. They were amazing. It was the best show I've ever been to, and I've been to a lot of shows.
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My friend Tyler is a musician. His music project is called Clamour. I met him on the internet a while back, and since then I have released nothing, and he has released several EP's, making me feel like I'm lazy. He just released his latest EP, which was planned to be a full album. The EP is called "Tower"

The link to download it is here.

To be honest, his music isn't something I'd regularly listen to, but it's interesting. I get the impression he does it for himself anyway rather than for an audience, much like how I approach my own music, even if our respective approaches also differ in many ways.

A document within the download explains that it is his final Clamour release, and that Clamour is now "asleep". He just has a different path in life to go down.

I don't know Tyler very well, but I'm glad to know him at all, and I hope we continue to talk at least once in a while, and that we'll maybe work together on something in the future.

"That guy will do anything for attention."

I watched one of the new Shark Week shows, and this man let a Remora attach itself to his stomach. I've definitely never seen anything like that before. I thought he should have swam around in the water, to impress all his friends.

"Hey guys, look at me! I'm a shark!"

Everyone's known at least one person who would do just about anything for attention. The least they could do is be creative enough to attach Remoras to their stomach.

Superstition and Astronomy.

I'm not superstitious, but I'm a little stitious.

Early in the morning on Friday, the 13th, a black cat walked in front of our van. I'm just glad it wasn't Jason Vorhees.

After that, we watched the Perseid meteor shower. It was beautiful. I've always been interested in astronomy, but my terrible vision and refusal to get glasses or contact lenses makes it difficult to take on as a hobby. My fellow meteor-gazers and I witnessed some strange things. At one point we saw a flash in the sky that lasted a couple of seconds. We believe it was a meteor heading straight in our direction, but obviously burning up in the atmosphere before it got to us. At another point we saw a very bright flash of light below the treeline. I have no idea what that could have been, and I have no idea if it was related to the meteor shower. It couldn't have been a meteor hitting the Earth, right? At another point I saw what I believe was a satellite moving slowly across the sky. It was a very faint light.

I'm not actually superstitious.