Guitar Hero 5

Why do we still care whether or not Kurt Cobain is featured in a video game? I really do not understand this at all. The former members of Nirvana released a statement saying: "While we were aware of Kurt's image being used with two Nirvana songs, we didn't know players have the ability to unlock the character. This feature allows the character to be used with any kind of song the player wants. We urge Activision to do the right thing in 're-locking' Kurt's character so that this won't continue in the future."

Is Kurt Cobain really that important? Did he add more to music than Johnny Cash, Santana or Van Halen (also in the game)? I mean in all honesty the guy made some decent tunes, but Nirvana was not that great...(Am I going to be smited by the rock gods now?). Everything that Dave Grohl has done since Nirvana is 10x's better than anything he did while he was in it.

It just boggles my mind why some people get so obsessed with one Band (The Beatles, Nirvana, Led Zeppelin, The Grateful Dead) and make them out to be far more important than they are! its confusing and frustrating to think that Courtney Love and the members of Nirvana feel that Kurt Cobain's flash in the pan career gives him exemption from a stupid video game...wise up and understand that He was no better and no worse than any other rock legend and...cliche en route...Let it Be...

I Pitty the Fool that doesn't take Communion

Bolivian Crossing...

I've traveled pretty extensively in South America and by far one of the most shocking experiences happened in the three hour span of leaving Argentina and crossing into Bolivia. Just for some context, when traveling in Argentina in one's youth the most common mode of transportation is Bus. These buses however are not like their hillbilly cousins in the United States, the greyhound, instead they are plush with some full reclining seats (cama, media cama), stewardesses and booze. It is more like flying on an airplane without the whole flying and getting to your destination quicker mess. Moreover these buses don't have the normal stops on every corner, they only stop at stations more like trains in Europe and you have a chance to stretch your legs and maybe buy some candies or a sandwich. Comfort, convenience and price these buses in Argentina seemed to have it all.



The one thing these buses did not have however, was the ability to cross the Argentine Bolivian border. As if the bus would somehow explode or turn into a pumpkin these titans of comfort dared not even creep towards the border. While traveling from Salta, Argentina to La Paz Bolivia I came to a border town in which I thought I would catch another plush bus for the rest of the trip. In Salta the travel company let me know that there was no direct bus to La Paz, but that it would be easy to find another bus once I was in Bolivia. Knowing nothing about Bolivia this seemed pretty much on par with the rest of my trip having crossed the Argentine border a few other times in Uruguay, Brazil and Paraguay. So I got to the station in La Quiaca, Argentina strapped on my backpack and made my way to the border to cross. In hindsight, my first indication that something was amiss was when the bus would not take us over the border and when the taxi would only take me within about 100 yards of the actual line that I would later learn was important to keep the Bolivians out.



I made my way to the border and noticed that the closer I got the more desolate the Argentine side became and the more robust and full of people the Bolivian side was. It was like there was an invisible line just over the Argentine side that the Bolivians wanted to cross and the Argentines dared not to approach. It was confusing, I thought I just had to show my passport then jump over the border and hope on another plush bus for the next 10 hours to La Paz. Oh how wrong I would soon find out I was.



The border crossing was not an issue, in and out with a decorative Bolivian stamp in my passport and I was on my way to the crowded bus station. "Manzana Manzana Manzana!" a little old lady with very few teeth selling apples in front of the station shouted. Her voice was louder than anything else around, even the backfiring cars and stray dogs that seemed to be walking around everywhere. She was squaty, and dressed in full Incan regalia, multi-colored blanket on top of multi-colored blanket and topped off with a fedora. The most unappealing thing about her however had nothing to do with her leather exterior, rather it was her smell. Even at 10 paces, I could smell her and it was not a smell I can even begin to describe. Her stink made me want to spray cologne up my nose then roll around in a bed of roses. Don't mistake this, the smell was horrible and I later came to realize that it was pervasive amongst all the impoverished Bolivians, the smell of ancient, mixed with sweat and just a dash of never washed clothing.



I realized quickly I needed to get out of here and into some civilization so I bought a ticket for what I thought was the next bus (turned out to be two hours late) and waited. Expectations high, as the time for my trip neared I saw a clunker of a bus that looked just a little better than a yellow school bus but not quite as clean slowly drive up. "Dear god no" I though to myself as I came to the realization that this would be the way I would be getting to La Paz...in a shitbox. Having my "Premiere Ticket" which meant little else than I got to go on first and didn't have to sit in the isle, not the isle seat...the actual isle. Little did I know that in coming to Bolivia I was crossing from a progressive and rich country, to one of the poorest in the world. This bus as I sat would begin to fill, not just the seats, but every space available was either stuffed with a person, a dog or some kind of good in a large multicolored bag. The smell was incredible, I had to take some of the flavored chap stick I bought a few weeks earlier and smear it under my nose to keep from throwing up. But, I was sitting with close to 100 of my new friends and we were about to be on our way.

Of course this was the error in my way, I thought once we got going things would be better, oh how wrong could I possibly be. After about an hour the bus finally hit some town I didn't know the name of. It was night and pitch black accept for some shops on the mostly paved road and the bus driver announced that if we wanted we could get off, us the bathroom or buy something. Already squeezed into my seat I decided I better not as I watched a few people exit the bus before it stopped moving. This was where the confusing part happened, the bus kept moving leaving the passengers behind and picking up a few new ones. Their things were still on the bus, but they were going to stay where ever in the hell we were. It was at this point I said to myself "I will not for any reason be leaving this bus until I am where I want to be", and very soon after I came to regret that decision.

The road, or rather the dirt, became rocky and bumpy after about two hours of driving and our pace slowed to a crawl, I could literally have gotten out and walked faster than this damn bus was moving and the smell was intensified because the insane amount of dust made it impossible to open the windows. The vibrating and bumps were so severe that every time I leaned my seat the two inches it went back, the bus would shake so hard that it would vibrate me forward. It was as if someone somewhere was playing a sick and cruel joke on me, and I blamed god.

Sleep was not an option, reading was not an option instead I sat awake in the pitch black slowly and unsurely making my way to the heart of Bolivia wishing with every bit of my being that I never got off that bus in Argentina.

Thoughts on Clothes...

Known or unknown to the wearer, these are the things that your clothes are saying about you...be warned!


The Bow tie: The Bow tie is the pierced eyebrow of the Republican Party. Nothing says I'm here to party but will slit your throat if you adversely affect my political career like a bow tie.

The Tommy Bahama Shirt says two things: 1. I make over 100k a year, take your long sleeved shirt/tie and kiss my expanding ass! 2. I'm impotent but comfortable.

Ed Hardy Shirt/Pants/Hat/Anything: I just pounded 4 red bull vodkas, watched some UFC and now I wanna hit the club and rub my cock against some girl with fake boobs...also I live with my parents until my club promotion gig takes off.

Push-up Bra: Yeah I like to show off my boobs, but I'll kick your ass if you look at them!...Unless you buy me a drink...

Speedo: I could wear another bathing suit, but I side more with the Europeans both in politics and dress so enjoy my package.

Sweatshirt tied around the waist: Ha! My ass is fat but you can't tell because of the sweatshirt that is blocking it! My deception has won and now I will find the man of my dreams!

Under Armor in a non-athletic setting: I workout, look I'm wearing Under Armor so it has to be true.

Under Armor in a Non-Professional Athletic Setting: I'm better at this than you. I have the gear and as soon as I step to the plate for our co-ed interoffice softball game, I'm bringing the thunder, learn it, know it.

I read this off a blog that I frequent...I'm going to post it than give my own opinion:

IS MEGAN FOX BAD FOR WOMEN?


If you ask a guy what he thinks of Megan Fox, 9 times out of 10 he’ll start drooling all over himself as he tries to explain how her hotness defies the laws of the universe (and that one other time, he’s probably gay). It’s easy to see what her appeal is to members of the male species: she’s beautiful like a young Angelina Jolie and plays up her sex appeal in her movie roles.
But then you watch her on a late-night talk show or read an interview with her in a magazine, and you wonder how any guy can find her sexy. Not only is it unbecoming for a young woman to say the things she says, but her comments are also unprofessional for any actor to say while promoting a film. No self-respecting professional in their right mind would mention their poor hygiene habits on national television!
And yet, men everywhere are enamored with her. Either they are able to look past her idiotic remarks, or they embrace them. If the latter is the case with Megan Fox, then we women have a problem.
That this type of woman – who comes across as a crude simpleton and takes on movie roles nearly pornographically portraying her body – is the ultimate male ideal, should trouble all women. Intentionally or not, the global obsession with her sends a message to women that perfection means impossible beauty and a serious lack of social graces, if not a lack of intelligence.
It’s true that women often objectify male celebrities in a similar way, but we seldom see such pandemonium over one actor/actress, especially one who has only had two major movie roles in her career thus far. And this commotion has to mean something, since all the tabloids and blogs can’t seem to stop writing about Fox.
What it means for women is that we have another damaging prototype to contend with. She may not be setting us back sixty years quite yet, but she certainly isn’t helping women achieve the level of respect in the media and in society that they deserve. Men can claim she’s just a harmless fantasy, but even fantasies can be very telling of what people truly think.
What do you think? Is Megan Fox trouble for women, or just a male fantasy?



Marissa - Wesleyan University (http://collegecandy.com/2009/07/07/is-megan-fox-bad-for-women/)

My thoughts: First an foremost, to say that a woman is bad for women because of her beauty is simply preposterous. Since the dawn of time men and women are forced to contend with the fact that some people look a hell of alot better than them. This is why people go to gyms, diet and buy expensive clothes, they want to look like the people that the idolize. Just because some people take it to far (anorexics ect.) does not mean that idealizing a celebrity is a bad thing. I think that bettering oneself physically is just not a bad thing. Just get over yourself and the fact that you are not Megan Fox, and...never will be. Just because she is comfortable in her own skin that should not make you uncomfortable in yours. Megan Fox is hot, she knows it and she is using it, like anyone else would in her position. This is the very reason why you don't see many women of her hotness in the chemistry lab, but rather on the pole.

Secondly because she is in the public eye does that some how inherently force her to be a "lady"? I thought that each person, mind that each woman, in this post feminism ear is allowed their own way, their own idea of the good? Should Megan Fox be focused on starting a family, getting pregnant and getting in the kitchen? Doesn't her boldness to discuss her bodily functions and the like scream her feminism, or am I missing the mark? Does Feminism only mean your definition of what it means to be a woman, does feminism mean getting in the workforce and living up to someone Else's potential?

These are all questions that further explain...Megan Fox is hot.

Thoughts on MJ

There is no reason not to join the crowd and put my two sense in on the recent death of the King of Pop, Michael Jackson...



Sitting in downtown LA this morning there is no avoiding the memorial and the ideas of the memorial that was put on in tribute to MJ. There wasn't the 750,000 people that the media expected. There wasn't the fanfare and circus that everyone was prepared for. The streets weren't packed, the riots never started, instead the somber occasion was...just that, somber. Today more than ever people resinstilled in my mind the fact that people can be respectful and can understand and truly exemplify empathy. It just further goes to show that the media of the US was ready to write everyone off and had the report in the chamber, wherein people rushed the Staples Center and who knows what. But that didn't happen, and that isn't the point of this.



What I want to say is that it is very rare that I have a 180 on what I think of a person. It is often very hard for me to change who I think a person is once I make a decision about them. Today, listening to the memorial service on the radio, I did. Michael Jackson was accused of some pretty heinous things, not only once but twice. With that I knew it had to be true, and that He just paid off who he needed to in order to not tarnish his name. But the more you hear about the man, the humanitarian and the father, the more the idea of this crime becomes more and more preposterous. It just seems like this once, the kid was lying (or the parents were) and someone wrongfully accused suffered the consequences.



The thing however that unites all people from all over the world and ties them to Michael is his music. It has been impossible to escape lately, but when you think about it, it is always hard to escape. In listening to the barrage of Michael Jackson's music these past 11 days the more I have realized that it is always that way. There isn't a club I've been to, a day I've gone through or anything like that where I haven't heard a song by or a version of one of Michael's songs. And the crazy thing is, I like it. The more I hear a song usually the more I hate it, but that doesn't happen with Michael Jackson, you can hear one of his songs once, twice of 70 times and it is just as good, just a fresh as the first time. I can't even imagine being around for the absolute mind melt that "Thriller" must have caused when people heard the first notes of that Album. His music is pure, its catchy and its amazing. The music is what makes people drawn to him and drawn to his ability to say what they want to say, but have never had the words to. Ballads, Dance hits whatever its all great stuff and it is all worth its weight in gold. Not even to touch the impact the man has had on dance. I mean the moonwalk is probably attempted 100 times more than the waltz.

Michael Jackson was not a role model. Michael Jackson was not perfect. Michael Jackson was a flawed as anyone one of us. Maybe that is his legacy, that despite our flaws...despite our short-comings greatness and vision can be achieved by all...

The Boomers are at it Again...

Here is an interesting article that I found from PC World regarding the influx of Baby Boomers into the Facebook and Twitter network. Watch out because your Mom might end up poking you...gross

Are Baby Boomers Killing Facebook and Twitter?

It may seem like Facebook and Twitter widen the gaps between boomers, Gen X-ers and members of Generation Y, but online social networks may bring us all closer.
The story is as old as the Web: A social network born among 20-something college kids and young wired professionals sprouts up, apparently out of nowhere, and grows into a cultural phenomenon. Eventually, it reaches critical mass and explodes, its mushroom cloud drawing the attention of millions of baby boomers, leading to a huge influx of new users, which in turn triggers complaints from the youngsters who started it all. The invasion of the boomers spurs some members of younger generations to flee the carnage (and the fallout) in search of fresher territory.
We've seen this scenario play out on MySpace and Facebook, and now it is starting to happen on Twitter. When the Baby Boomers -- traditionally defined as anyone born in the United States between 1946 and 1964 -- arrive, they tend to do so en masse. And when they set up camp, they invariably change the dynamic of the social network itself. Whether due to their distinctive social habits or the sheer vastness of their demographic, a mass migration of 50-and-over folk brings in its train everything from increased political activity to a proliferation of spam.
That boomers dramatically alter the social networks they adopt should come as no surprise, according to Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Internet & American Life Project, a think tank that studies Americans' online habits. "Boomers are the mainstream of the country now," Rainie says. "When you attract a mainstream audience, you're going to attract a lot more commercial interests. Boomers validate that this is a big market, and that this is a place where commercial interests can make money."

End of innocence

The twin processes of mainstreaming and commercialization mark an end of innocence on a social network, as younger users lose what was once their private playground or -- even worse -- have to share it with their parents.
"Younger folks don't want their parents there," Rainie says. "But does that mean they'll all flock to different places?"
Not yet, according to data collected by Rainie and his colleagues at the Pew Research Center. Though a few early adopters may jump ship as a social network that was once on the electronic frontier gets swallowed up by digital suburbs, most stick around -- at least until a major new network arrives to supplant the old one, as Facebook has done with MySpace.
Still, there's no shortage of anecdotal evidence that sharing the online world can be a source of intergenerational strife. Take Will Smith (no, not the actor), for example. When this 33-year-old tech professional received a Facebook friend request from his father in March, he was floored. Not because he didn't want to connect with his dad, but because doing so on the same network that he shared with so many peers and colleagues raised a host of complex concerns.
"My father, who I dearly love, has a tendency to forward e-mails that are pretty off-color," Smith says. "It's probably nothing that would get me fired, but stuff that could earn me a trip to HR, if I ever opened them [at work]. My concern was that he would post that type of message on my wall or in another public venue on Facebook without realizing it was a public venue. Since everyone from my immediate supervisor to the president of my company is in my friend list, there's potential for bad things to happen. I don't think anything actually would, but there was strong potential for embarrassment."
To reduce the likelihood of a career-damaging dust-up, Smith sent his dad an e-mail in which he laid out what he considered reasonable limits for their online father-son bonding. Off-limits: "Politics, sex, jokes, things you find funny but offend me, comments about family members, any combination of the aforementioned items and pretty much every e-mail you've ever sent me."
Ultimately, Smith's worst-case scenario never came to pass and -- perhaps because of that e-mail -- his father never logged back into Facebook. But according to data from the Pew Internet & American Life Project, people of the same age as Smith's father are logging onto Facebook in droves, and baby boomers are now the fastest growing population on the social network.

Share and share alike?

To get a more personal take on the way family politics play out on Facebook, I called up a baby boomer I know pretty well: my Aunt Linda. She is on my Facebook friend list, as are her three children, ages 20, 23 and 25. In contrast to the Smiths, for whom an online connection proved troubling, my aunt came to Facebook in the first place because her college-age daughter invited her. For Aunt Linda, it's mainly a fun way to keep up with her kids while they're away from home.
"I try not to meddle," she says. "I typically go on there, look at their latest pictures and log off."
But like many of her generation, she is deeply concerned about the amount of personal information that her kids -- particularly her 20-year-old daughter, who is still in school -- share online.
"It really worries me. Not just possibility of stalkers, but also because of the way it represents her online. I know that [her older brother] had employers checking out his MySpace page when he was interviewing for jobs right out of school."
Pew's Rainie confirms that my aunt's concerns are hardly unusual for a member of her generation. "Older Americans are worried about the way younger users behave -- how much they disclose, how they present themselves. They wonder, 'Aren't they concerned about the future?' They're aware that [kids] are creating a permanent record on the Internet."
It's the Smith family dynamic in reverse: The voice of age and experience seeks to caution the young against potentially harmful exuberance in the online world.
Different strokes
In addition to basic differences in attitude that seem to arise with differences in age, each generation tends to use social technologies in different ways. To get a broader sense of these differences, I asked 1,200 of my closest friends on Facebook and Twitter what they thought of the online generation gap. Surprisingly, the answers I got -- from people as young as 19 and as old as 60+ -- were fairly consistent.
The gap is most evident in the way people use the networks, not in whom they connect with. The networks of nearly everyone who responded to my questions span multiple generations of users. But the observations my correspondents made about the kinds of posts that other participants submit were telling.
One representative response came from a Twitter user who had this to say: "Gen Dvide=Usage Dvide <25>25 tend 2 use 4 customized networking/info/culture/research"
Translation: It's all in how they use it. Common gripes about the inanity of Twitter updates -- stereotypically oversharing every moment of daily life from breakfast to dinner, including all rest stops -- may be largely due to the tendency of 20-somethings to broadcast their personal lives in their status updates. (The Twitter criticisms can be rebutted, of course.) Nearly every respondent acknowledged that members of Generation Y--often defined as those born in the 1980s and 1990s -- seem bent on publicizing every detail of their daily life over the Internet.
By contrast, members of Generation X -- tagged as those born between 1964 and 1984, who now make up much of the mainstream workforce -- tend to post more information about their professional lives, conferences they're attending and projects they're working on. To some older observers, it looks like self-absorbed bragging, though many 30-somethings claim to have reaped career-boosting benefits from this type of crowdsourcing. (There is much argument over when the different generations start and stop: Sometimes the Cultural Generation definition is more important than the actual birth year.)
Toward the upper end of the age spectrum, baby boomers tend to use social networks for connecting with old friends, sharing political news, discussing religion and exploring hobbies. Due to the rocky economy, they're fast getting used to networking for jobs via the Internet, as well.
A Facebook contact wrote: "All the 20-somethings I know have hundreds of friends; it seems like they connect with everyone they've ever met. I think 40-somethings like me are more selective -- I don't accept requests from people I don't know, and tend to think of Facebook more in terms of networking and connecting with old friends."
Another Twitter denizen had this perspective: "There is a divide. As services become more organized, they attract older users. Once it becomes more organized, the kids leave."
Rainie agrees. "There's probably some generational divide," he says. "Because people hang out with their friends, there's bound to be some clustering." But he sees no evidence of a serious online generation gap and says that his own friend list spans multiple generations.
Though the cross-chatter between members of the various age groups can get a little noisy, none of the people I talked to saw it as a bad thing. Instead, most seemed glad for the diversity of their friend lists.
In the future, Rainie envisions a day when social networks will more closely reflect the way real-world social networks function, allowing users to discriminate better between close ties and loose ties. When that happens, much of the cross-chatter may be lost. But when that happens, we may also lose a great opportunity to share ideas across the generations.

Robert Strohmeyer