manilajones's Xanga

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Wed, 10 Mar 2010 21:40:33 GMT

All in all

is all we

are.

The Reconstruction of February

Sat, 06 Feb 2010 00:04:32 GMT

There are several reasons why February is the worst month of the year. Firstly, it’s one of the coldest months, which automatically makes it dreary and depressing (or seemingly so). But, unlike the other cold months like December and January, February doesn’t have any happy holidays that put people in good spirits. The only “holidays” of any “significance” are Presidents’ Day, which no one (except United States Presidents, or possibly the Presidents of the United States of America, I suppose) cares for, and something called “Valentine’s Day,” which (theoretically) only people “in love” care for. While both of these holidays are wholly superfluous, “Valentine’s Day” is the one that is more unnecessary, but only by a little bit. At the very least, Presidents’ Day is a federal holiday that gives us the day off from work. We can stay at home and destroy our brains by watching MTV all day and not feel guilty about it. On the other hand, “Valentine’s Day” isn’t a real holiday. In addition to going to work as usual, people are expected to go out of their ways to celebrate (or justify) their relationships. I can certainly understand being in love, but I can’t understand being obligated by society to express it. This seems to be more work than is necessary, especially for a non-holiday. In the end, “Valentine’s Day” just pisses everyone off and ruins February.

In recent years the National Football League moved the Super Bowl from the last week of January to the first week of February, which effectively gave February at least one redeeming quality. Super Bowl Sunday is a day when many people arbitrarily drink copious amounts of alcohol and gorge themselves with unhealthy food. Sometimes people will also watch a football game on television, but not all the time. This is a joyous occasion for everyone, but the downside to this is that it occurs on a Sunday, and this presents a national dilemma. Going back to work immediately after a day of gluttony and decadence is generally difficult and dreadful, and this forces many people to ditch work. I suppose one solution to this would be to move the Super Bowl to Saturday, but that would be utterly blasphemous. The best solution to this quandary is to move Presidents’ Day to the day after the Super Bowl. This way no one would have to skip work because they were bloated or hung over. Furthermore, it would add some meaning to an otherwise meaningless holiday. In the end, it would be good for the economy and boost national morale. Presidents’ Day occurs on a random Monday in February, anyway, so there is absolutely no reason NOT to move it to after Super Bowl Sunday.

And then we should move “Valentine’s Day” to February 30.

Nine Months Until Death

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 18:43:41 GMT

The leading causes of death among women in the United States are heart disease, cancer, stroke, and respiratory disease. However, a recent study found that the single leading cause of death among pregnant women was murder. MURDER. Furthermore, the murderer was usually an angry spouse or boyfriend. After reading this, I asked some women if they would reconsider having a baby in light of this information. Most of them immediately said something along the lines of, “Um, no.”

I found this highly surprising. If I learned that the leading cause of death for anything I did was murder, I would, at the very least, think about it for two minutes to reconsider my options. If the leading cause of death for, say, optometry students was murder, I might have gone to broadcasting school. If the leading cause of death for, say, grocery shoppers who shop at Ralphs was murder, I would probably shop at Safeway. But the women I talked to didn’t seem fazed by the chance of getting knocked off after getting knocked up. Perhaps the desire to have children changes all the rules. How the hell should I know? I don’t love myself enough to procreate.

This study revealed a very grim fact. But what can I do to change it? As a man, the most I could do is not blast my next baby’s mama head with a pistol, but I doubt that would make any significant change in the statistics. But what about women? I suppose the most that a pregnant woman can do is not use her pregnancy to trap her boyfriend into marrying her, otherwise the boyfriend might go postal and kill her. I'm sure this is a rare occurence, but this shouldn't happen at all.

We can also hope that women would stop sleeping with jerks, but we all know that's not going to happen.

The Deconstruction of The Tonight Show

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 23:55:20 GMT

Last week Conan O’Brien hosted his final Tonight Show, thereby ending perhaps the most bizarre melodrama to ever be played out in the history of the late-night talk show genre. After only seven months, Conan O’Brien agreed to accept a buy-out of his contract from NBC, choosing to leave the network rather than move The Tonight Show from its traditional start time at 11:35pm to 12:05am. Like most people watching his final show, I couldn’t help but feel awfully sad that he was leaving. I grew up watching this guy.He kept me up on those nights when I had to stay up late to study in high school, college, and professional school. His final show effectively marked the end of an era for me. While I was sad for myself, I was not sad for Conan. I did not feel sorry for him that he was leaving his dream job because I firmly felt that he got exactly what he deserved.

Now for the record, I like Conan O’Brien. He cracks me up. I think he is a comedic genius. If you were to ask me who, between Conan O’Brien and Jay Leno, makes me laugh out loud more, I would say Conan. He’s fucking hilarious!I think he is one of the funniest, if not the funniest, people on television. And I know I’m not the only person who feels this way. In fact, I don’t know a single person who does not like Conan O’Brien, and everyone I know considers Conan O’Brien to be astronomically funnier than Jay Leno. I love Conan O’Brien. They love Conan O’Brien. WE ALL LOVE COCO.

Having said that, it’s understandable that a lot of people are disappointed about the current situation. Conan fans have been very vocal about their displeasure. There have been rallies across the nation, trending topics on Twitter, and Facebook groups in support of Conan .Fans have lionized Conan’s image on posters as if they were counterculturists awaiting the second coming of Che Guevara. However, there has also been a sense of negativity surrounding all this support, and this sense of negativity has been directed at NBC and, particularly, Jay Leno. While waiting outside Universal Studios to get into the taping of Conan’s last show, Conan-enthusiast Juliet De Franco told an Associated Press reporter that Jay Leno “just seems like such a jerk for not retiring.” On the internet, Conan-fundamentalists have been hijacking Jay Leno fan sites and terrorizing his fans with anti-Jay sentiment. These are actions and attitudes I don’t quite understand.

Jay Leno has about as much to do with Conan O’Brien leaving The Tonight Show as Lady Gaga has to do with being attractive. The two are mutually exclusive. It’s probably easy to point the finger at Leno because NBC obviously favors him to be on at 11:35, and, if Leno did retire, NBC would probably have no choice but to keep Conan. However, like everyone else in this country, Leno does have the right to pursue work and it’s not inappropriate of him to accept a job that’s offered to him. The reason why NBC chose Leno over Conan is simple logic and mathematics.

If you look at the numbers, Conan’s show sucked in the ratings.The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien averaged 2.5 million viewers per night, which relinquished NBC’s 15-year-long hold of the late-night crown to David Letterman, who is averaging 4.5 million viewers per night. On the other hand, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno averaged 5.2 million viewers per night and beat Late Show with David Letterman for nearly 15 years straight up until Leno left Tonight in May of 2009.

Who is to blame for this? People have argued that Conan’s poor ratings were the result of shitty primetime programming by NBC, more specifically the flop that was The Jay Leno Show at 10:00pm. They say that Leno’s paltry viewership at 10pm brought down the ratings for the late local newscasts and, consequently, Conan’s Tonight Show. (As an aside, The Jay Leno Show averaged 6.2 million viewers a night, which is very good for a late night talk show but very bad for a primetime show.) However, it seems that the people who say this don’t want to acknowledge that Conan’s ratings sucked before The Jay Leno Show even started. The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien debuted in June of 2009 and suffered throughout the summer before The Jay Leno Show debuted in September. You can’t blame Jay on that.

But how important is the lead-in primetime programming anyways? People like to say that The Tonight Show with Jay Leno benefited from NBC’s industry leading primetime “Must See TV” lineup throughout the 1990s and early 2000s and that this gave him a boost over David Letterman. But NBC’s primetime dominance died in 2004 with the series finale of Friends and the resurgence of ABC (due to the debuts of Lost, Desperate Housewives, and Grey’s Anatomy). CBS became the primetime ratings champion but Jay Leno was still beating David Letterman (who is on CBS) on a nightly basis until he left last year. Primetime programming might affect local newscasts, but people are going to watch who they want to watch at 11:35pm.

It’s not unreasonable to say that NBC didn’t give Conan O’Brien enough time to establish himself at 11:35. Now that he is gone, we will never know if his ratings would have improved if he was given longer than seven months. This is where NBC took a gamble.In this faltering economy where businesses need to make good economic decisions, all NBC knew was that 1) Conan O’Brien had a small niche audience while at 12:35am with Late Night with Conan O’Brien, 2) Conan was losing to the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (who is on CBS) during his final years at 12:35pm, 3) Conan was losing to Last Show with David Letterman at 11:35pm, and 4) Jay Leno attracts viewers at whatever time you put him in. While Conan might be funnier, the bottom line is that Jay is a better talk show host.

So, why do I not feel sorry for Conan O’Brien? One reason is that he wasn’t fired. He chose to walk away from Tonight and I can’t feel sorry for someone who controls his own destiny. The other reason is karma. Conan has made no secret that hosting The Tonight Show has been a lifelong dream of his. Generally, people are sympathetic towards stuff like that. It’s easy for us to think of NBC as the bad guy who is pushing Conan’s hand and squeezing him out of Tonight. Conan O’Brien is easily perceived as the innocent victim in this entire mess who was forced to leave his dream job on a matter of principle, and Jay Leno is equally perceived as the crotchety old man who won’t go away. It’s certainly honorable that Conan is sticking to his guns, but what everyone is seemingly forgetting are the circumstances by which Conan was offered the Tonight job in the first place…

In 2004, NBC didn’t offer Conan the Tonight Show with open arms. At that time, Conan was getting offers from Fox and ABC to jump to their networks. Knowing that NBC didn’t want to lose him to a competitor, Conan used this as leverage to negotiate a new deal. In effect, Conan strong-armed his way into the Tonight Show desk and Jay Leno, who was leading in the ratings, accepted these terms and agreed to give up his dream job in 2009. Who’s the victim now? The kind thing for Conan would have been to tell NBC that he would take over Tonight whenever Jay chose to retire. Instead, he chose to bully NBC around.

What goes around, comes around.

No one will miss Conan O’Brien more than me, and I found his final monologue to be one of the most heartfelt moments in TV history. In his final monologue before signing off, Conan pleaded with his fans not to be cynical. I suspect that this is because he knows something that his fans don’t know. His fans will always blame the fall guy, but he knows that there is really no one to blame at all.

Good things will happen as long as you are kind.

Zero Feet Deep

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 23:42:33 GMT

Someone once said that “still waters run deep.” I don’t know who this person was or what this person did for a living. The person who made this statement may have been simply stating the obvious fact that deep rivers don’t make as much noise as shallow currents. Or, as philosophy majors like to pretend, this person may have been making the existential observation that unassuming people are more interesting than they appear. I don’t know what the person’s intent was by making this statement. All I know is that this person was either a river enthusiast or critical thinker, and this person definitely was not Malcolm Gladwell.

Do still waters run deep? Now, I’m not a “deep” person, but I am certainly quiet. Interestingly, being quiet and keeping my mouth shut has inadvertently stirred the waters on Xanga. Whenver I come across a revolting or unintelligent blog post, rather than commenting with an onslaught of insults and expletives, I usually opt to not comment and simply leave zero eProps. This action appears to drive the authors of these posts batshit insane, instigating these dorks to spew more of the nonsense that warranted them zero eProps in the first place.

In a community where comments are perceived to be more valuable than eProps, it’s interesting that zero ePropping someone raises their ire moreso than calling them an outright buffoon.

I don’t know if still waters run deep, but babbling brooks sure are shallow.

Resolve and Resolutions

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 23:20:06 GMT

Whenever I tell someone that I have a girlfriend they almost always resolutely respond with, “How in the name of Hollywood Undead is this possible?” I can understand where this sentiment comes from. The people who know me always perceive me as a single, despondent loner with the social skills of a doorknob, and I suppose I am partially (or wholly, I guess) responsible for that. A significant part of my life over the past three years has been this farce of a blog, and during this time I’ve actively construed myself to be a single, despondent loner with the social skills of a doorknob. And while this is entirely correct, it’s not wholly accurate. I’m not depressed every single minute I’m awake, and when I’m in social situations I don’t always make the people around me want to kill themselves. I have no redeeming qualities, but sometimes I like to pretend that I do. I mean, I’m certain that I’m not the worst human being alive right now. I know I’m a little more respectable than, say, Katy Perry because even though I’m a talentless loser, I’m not afraid to admit it. While my brutal honesty with myself might be the single glaring obstacle that’s preventing me from becoming an international pop star, it’s my willingness to constantly downplay my significance that makes people view me in that very singular perspective. I’m a one-dimensional guy, but generally speaking, being one-dimensional isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Adam Sandler, for example, has made a successful career out of playing the same dope in all 300 of his movies. But, the light that I am one-dimensional in is not something I like to brag about. No matter how content I sometimes am and no matter how many people I have around me, people seem to be resolved to the notion that I am chronically lonely and unhappy. The singularity of my existence is ubiquitous among the people who know me, and they all unanimously agree that my recent change in relationship status is a good way for me to “start off the new year.”

Now, for the record, I hate New Year’s Day, and this has nothing to do with that stupid Rose Parade. I hate New Year’s Day because it’s completely nonsensical. The fact that this holiday even exists is counterproductive to the very sentiments that it’s supposed to represent. New Year’s Day supposedly emblemizes new beginnings and fresh starts, which make it trendy and socially acceptable for people to formulate “New Year’s resolutions.” These are certainly honorable notions and feelings, no doubt, except for the fact that everyone takes the damn day off on January 1. Every first day of the every year, no one is losing weight, sending out resumes, being more generous, or saving more money. Everyone is lying in bed and riding out their hangovers. People aren’t actively fulfilling their New Year’s resolutions, they’re only thinking (read: fantasizing) about how they can make their lives better while sitting on their couch and watching college football. No one does shit on New Year’s Day! There is nothing more unambitious (or American, I suppose) than starting off a new year by making the first day a holiday. It seems to me that it would make more sense to take the last day of the year off and make December 31 a holiday, and start the new year off by working and getting stuff done. New Year’s Day, as a holiday, is just a celebration of procrastination and laziness.

I don’t understand forced new beginnings, and that’s probably at the core of why I don’t like New Year’s Day. It unnecessarily makes us view our lives in a temporal perspective. Life isn’t measured by hours, days, or months as much as it is by the sequence of our experiences. Have you ever reflected on your life? I suspect that you have, and I also suspect that you don’t chronicle the events in your life by years, but rather you remember them by the context in which you were alive. We remember our lives by what grade we were in, where we were working, and who we were sleeping with. If you’re in (1) school, (2) have a good job, or (3) are in a fantastic relationship, you can certainly agree that time moves at a lightning fast pace when you’re existence feels validated. Conversely by that same token, this is why the lives of (1) married people, (2) Scott Baio, and (3) people who aren’t having sex (see 1) seem to be trapped in a time vacuum. New Year’s Day tells us to view our lives in an uncreative way, whether we have lives or not. It’s a way for dumb people to feel better about their wretched lives when they probably shouldn’t.

Here’s a solution. If you want to get tossed on New Year’s Eve and party like it’s 1999 then go ahead and do it. New Year’s Eve is the only time of the year when you can kiss a complete stranger on the lips and not be punched in the face or arrested for doing so. Everyone should take advantage of this snafu in social dynamics. But, if you want to turn your life around in 2010, don’t use the New Year as an excuse to do so. Resolutions are like marriage licenses; they’re bound to get broken. Life is a continuum, and you can change your life whenever you want to all year round. Your resolution won’t improve your life, but your resolve will.

I don’t know what’s going to happen to me in 2010, and I’m pretty sure that I don’t care. I don’t like to fantasize about how I want things to be. I just know that my life is moving faster than seconds and minutes. People say that my year is off to a great start, despite the fact that they’ll always view me through a lens with one-dimensional resolution.

Ain't No Rest for the Broken

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 19:54:27 GMT

It is a commonly thought by many people that I know a lot about popular music. This may or may not be true. I suppose there are things that may indicate that I am a pop music guru. It is true that I have an enormous CD collection, an iPod filled with over 10,000 songs (more or less), and a subscription to Rolling Stone. Sometimes, I even read Blender! However, it is also true that I do not know the difference between the Beatles and the Monkees. I don’t know if they are two distinct bands or one band with two names. I do know that at one point one of them had a television show and one of them is slightly overrated, but I cannot tell you who the hell “Ringo Jones” is, or if he even exists.

Whether I know a lot about pop music or not is not as important as the perception that I know a lot about it. This is true for a lot of aspects of life, but especially in the pretentious world of music. Being that modern music is the soundtrack to our lives, it is thought that anyone with vast knowledge of this must have some sort of revolutionary insight into the meaning of existence.

Also, it makes you seem cool in front of your friends when you can say you’ve heard of Cage the Elephant.

Whenever you’re given a chance to sound smart, you should always take it. Whenever someone asks you about an artist or band that you’ve never heard of, always reply with, “I like anything except their new stuff.” This statement will get you respect 90% of the time because it implies that 1) you’ve heard of them, 2) you’ve heard some of their stuff that few people have heard, and 3) you have eclectic taste. You might be as clueless as a broken clock, but even a broken clock is right twice a day.

I don’t really know that much about music, I swear.

Super. Ficial.

Fri, 15 Jan 2010 19:57:05 GMT

There is a popular television show on Fox called 24. It chronicles the adventures of a federal agent turned rogue vigilante named Jack Bauer (played by Kiefer Sutherland) as he fights terrorists and thwarts their attempts to destroy America. The unique thing about this show is that it occurs in real time; a one hour episode depicts exactly one hour of that day. And, because each season consists of twenty-four episodes, each season takes place in exactly one day. If you’ve ever seen the show, you would know that Jack Bauer has a rough job. He’s been tortured by terrorists (on numerous occasions), sabotaged by friends (on numerous occasions), witnessed the death of his wife (once), and betrayed by his own country (on numerous occasions). He’s even seen his daughter attacked by a mountain lion, although this wasn’t as dramatic as it seemed. This has been going on for six seasons, and fans of the show will tell you that Jack Bauer has the unhappiest life of any human being in existence. This is highly intriguing considering that we really don’t know Jack Bauer at all. Realistically, we have only seen six days out of this man’s life, yet we perceive him as a wholly miserable man. This may or may not be true. For all we know, he might be as happy as Santa Claus on Prozac at Disneyland in all the other days of his life. But, from the six days that we’ve known him, we have a pretty good idea of what his life is like. Essentially, our perception of Jack Bauer has no depth, but our perception is really all that matters. Being superficial isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

People like to say that being superficial is wrong and immoral. For example, it’s commonly said that you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. I find this advice to be highly overrated. I always judge a book by its cover. Whenever I need a book to read, I never ask for recommendations from people I know. I find that taking recommendations from others is unambitious and full of self-loathe. I mean, why should someone else’s self-fancied “good taste” have any impact on my own life? As far as I’m concerned, all the books that I haven’t read are all the same. They are not good or bad, intelligent or idiotic, insightful or meaningless. I have no preference for particular authors, even if I have read their other books before. I’m indifferent to every book I’ve never read. So whenever I walk into Barnes & Noble, I select the book with the most interesting cover. With all things being equal, the book with the best cover wins. I figure that if the publisher and author are willing to invest time and creativity in designing a good package for their book, then they should earn my patronage. This is absolutely superficial, but it’s also logical and pragmatic. Hard work should always be rewarded in all aspects of life. And if the book I choose turns out to be lame, at the very least I would have a good-looking book to put up with all the rest of the good-looking books on my bookshelf. There is no downside to being superficial. This is a good way to live life, and this is why I don’t begrudge people who don’t talk to me.

From my blog, you have a pretty good idea of what I am like.

The Complete History of Social Networking Websites

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 18:53:10 GMT

Socially, there are essentially two groups of people in America, with each group having its own distinct members and characteristics. For now, we’ll call these groups Group A and Group B.

In the beginning (2003), there was Friendster.com. Yuppies, educated people, Asians, and other socially conscious and internet-adept folks (all members of Group A) joined this website. This group immediately saw the potential with Friendster as a place to reunite with old friends and find people with similar interests. These people from Group A instantly found themselves reconnecting with people they hadn’t seen since elementary school and people from their old church they hoped to never see again. The internet being used for this purpose was never seen on such a large scale before (the site’s massive popularity occasionally destroyed its servers).

Meanwhile, children, porn stars, artists, and other derelicts (all members of Group B) wanted to get in on the social networking craze, but didn’t join Friendster. They joined MySpace.com, mostly because they were guaranteed of having at least one friend (MySpace founder Tom) upon signing up. MySpace was kind of like Friendster, except without any rules. People were allowed to customize their page with layouts, music, and endless amounts of naked pictures. For these reasons, MySpace was inundated with people from Group B in the summer of 2004, dwarfing Friendster’s membership. Not to be left out, Group A members of Friendster joined MySpace as well, but were outnumbered by the deluge of people from Group B. Because of the Group B invasion, MySpace became a cesspool of overexposed pictures, broken English, music, and venereal diseases.

MySpace dominated for years, but lurking in the background was a group of young Group A people (college students) on an upstart social networking site called Facebook.com. People from Friendster, Group A people on MySpace, and Group A people who were new to the social networking phenomenon flocked to Facebook, which was seen as a place that restored order and respectability to social networking. Facebook took a while to catch on, but eventually 99% of all Group A people in the United States joined the site by 2009.

Meanwhile, Group B MySpacers, confused by Facebook’s applications and turned off by its privacy controls, refused to join Facebook. They stayed with MySpace but still wanted their imbecilic thoughts to seem relevant, so they joined Twitter.com. Twitter also attracted Group B vagrants (mostly celebrities who didn’t finish high school) who couldn’t comprehend MySpace, and Twitter continues the grand tradition of mindless internet that began with MySpace. By 2009, 99% of Group B people nationwide were on Twitter.

And THAT is the complete history of social networking sites.

Theoretical Morality

Tue, 01 Dec 2009 21:07:14 GMT

In regards to existential philosophy, there are two types of people in the world. There are those who believe in Divine Creationism and there are those who Don’t. With the exception of possibly Brandon Flowers, everyone fits into one of these two categories. Both of these schools of thought are based on theories that have yet to be proven. Those who Don’t generally subscribe to the theory of evolution, which is a theory based on the strong biological model of natural selection. Religious people believe in Creationism, a theory which is based on a simple, yet hard-line, mathematical equation: 1 Cross + 3 Nails = 4given. Both of these theories seem valid (one more than the other, though), but no one in the history of the world has yet to prove that one is the absolute truth.

The truth is that no one knows why we exist, but the larger truth is that our morality has nothing to do with the basis of our existence. If pious people were to somehow prove that God exists, we still would not be able to prove what her morality would be. Religions only assume to know what the morality of their deity is. Have you ever had someone assume something about you without really knowing who you are? Perhaps they assumed something obnoxious like you were a thug because you have numerous tattoos, or that you liked Nickelback because you were Canadian. I suspect that things like these may have happened to you, and I also suspect that you felt that these occurrences were rude. If God exists, who are we to know what she wants or what her intentions are? She might be Slipknot’s number one fan or think Relient K is full of shit. It’s disrespectful and arrogant to assume that we know what she likes or what her morality is. By that same token, if scientists were to somehow prove that evolution was as infallible a truth as Kevin James being unfunny, that wouldn’t automatically default the human species to be an amoral race. No one has ever been able to prove our existence, but nevertheless, societies have been governed by morality ever since the beginning of civilization.

The only thing that is proven is that morality has always been defined by modern society and the contexts of being alive. This is why we consider homicide for personal reasons to be despicable and warfare for national security to be patriotic. This is why slavery was a moral economic institution in the seventeenth century and this is why dorks like Oprah Winfrey are considered heroes in 2009. Smart people and philosophy majors like to ask irrelevant questions like: Are we products of evolution or Creation? Is Jesus Christ the Son of God or was he just another black civil rights leader who died from capital punishment? Are we Human or are we Dancer? These are all questions that are unimportant to everyday living. They have no bearing on what morality is.

But I can’t prove that.