This has always been one of those truths that I've lived my life by.
There are times when it rings louder than others, and this is one of those times. I was going to say it rang louder now than ever before, but that isn't true, although it's true that it rings louder now than it has for a while. I spend a lot of time on here talking about people, and how grateful I am to have them in my life, but it really is true.
As of this moment, I am super duper at home. Here's the layout of the current room in counterclockwise order. To my right you've got Ann, working on homework, or just browsing the interwebs. Ricky is laying in the bed next to her in a constant state of half sleep. Cathy is full blown passed out on the other bed. Eric is sitting at the other end of that bed. To my left is Corey finishing up his program and running the music. Gerardo just walked in, throwing all of this off, not that I mind in the least.
On occasion, after a long day, I might start to feel like I want some time alone, but when it all comes down to it I can't imagine spending time away from these guys. They're my life, and everyday they mean more and more.
We're headed to eat now, and I won't be back for a long period of time. Love ya guys!
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Tuesday, September 20, 2011
Hispanic Pony Newspaper
Weirdest stand alone title ever, haha.
So, my friends and I do some pretty crazy things. We've recently taken to doing this thing where if we miss something we say, "Rewind." and everyone pretends to go back and repeat whatever just happened. It was first used to see who said something first, which turned us all into mind readers because we started answering questions before they were answered.
We've also started watching My Little Pony a lot. When I say "a lot" I really mean we've watched the first two episodes and fallen in love with the show. It's definitely my type of show, and we're all awesome enough to obsess over it, in a good way. After watching the first two episodes we started claiming which ponies were us. It came out to:
Cathy - Twilight Sparkle
Eric - Applejack
William - Pinkie Pie
Corey - Rarity
Ricky - Rainbow Dash
Ann - Fluttershy
Gerardo - Spike
Later, Ricky was applying for a position at the newspaper. We decided that if he didn't get it we would start our own newspaper. Everyone has their own section as follows:
Gerardo is in charge of Soccer, and it will only be written in Spanish.
Sara is in charge of Music and Arts, basically all things Indie.
Eric is in charge of Nintendo.
Ricky runs the Opinion section.
Eric W. writes about whatever sports news tickles his fancy, minus the soccer bits.
Daniel does an Ask Daniel column.
Corey is in charge of the Social Matters.
Cathy does Literature.
William is writing the Foreign news part.
Jacob has a Minecraft/Technology section.
Ann does the crafts section.
Lynn draws the comics.
I write about video games, mainly RPGs.
And finally, we've sort of recieved/given Hispanic names to everyone.
I'm Eduardo.
Gerardo is Antonio.
Ricky is Enrique.
Corey is Maria.
Jacob is Alejandro.
Enrique is Jose.
Pedro is Pablo.
Cathy is Catalina, I think.
Eric is Roberto.
Ann is Guadalupe.
There's really no point to any of this, I've just been trying to find the time to post it for a while now. Boo college being super duper busy!
Really though, it's pretty great, college that is. My classes are interesting, with the most interesting definitely being Python. I'm also getting to spend a lot more time with people this year than I did in previous semesters, which is making all of this a lot nicer.
I have found though, again, that I find myself attached to people super easily. This is a problem when I feel my super attachedness might be a bit overbearing for some people, that or they might get tired of it after a while.
I dunno, I would talk more, but I really want to sleep since I can, and post this thing, finally.
Till next time,
=D
Ricky runs the Opinion section.
Eric W. writes about whatever sports news tickles his fancy, minus the soccer bits.
Daniel does an Ask Daniel column.
Corey is in charge of the Social Matters.
Cathy does Literature.
William is writing the Foreign news part.
Jacob has a Minecraft/Technology section.
Ann does the crafts section.
Lynn draws the comics.
I write about video games, mainly RPGs.
And finally, we've sort of recieved/given Hispanic names to everyone.
I'm Eduardo.
Gerardo is Antonio.
Ricky is Enrique.
Corey is Maria.
Jacob is Alejandro.
Enrique is Jose.
Pedro is Pablo.
Cathy is Catalina, I think.
Eric is Roberto.
Ann is Guadalupe.
There's really no point to any of this, I've just been trying to find the time to post it for a while now. Boo college being super duper busy!
Really though, it's pretty great, college that is. My classes are interesting, with the most interesting definitely being Python. I'm also getting to spend a lot more time with people this year than I did in previous semesters, which is making all of this a lot nicer.
I have found though, again, that I find myself attached to people super easily. This is a problem when I feel my super attachedness might be a bit overbearing for some people, that or they might get tired of it after a while.
I dunno, I would talk more, but I really want to sleep since I can, and post this thing, finally.
Till next time,
=D
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
The Difference
So, I always mention my friends, and always try to specify which friends I'm talking about. I've always wondered why I felt it so important to specify which friends I'm talking about, and I've recently discovered it's more for myself.
Each set of friends is different, but each set of friends has been made at a separate point in my life. Since I've formed the bases for each relationship at different points, I don't feel the same about any two groups.
You've got the group I've known the shortest. The UT crowd. I met them after a semester of college, and have only known them for 9 months or so. I honestly don't feel like I've got that super close friendship, where I can talk whenever I need to, but it's growing. It took very little time to get comfortable around them, enough so that I was willing to drive 5 ish hours to Dallas to meet up with them for a midnight release of Harry Potter. I drove back the next day. Totally worth it, and it wasn't awkward sleeping in the living room with Eric and Cathy, which if you know me make since because I've always found it awkward to even think about sleeping in the same room as someone with the opposite gender, but I'm weird like that. I've grown a lot with these people, and in such a super short period of time I've gotten to know them quite well and couldn't ask for better. I basically met them after a semester of needing someone to hang out with, that social interaction, and their arrival in my life was more than I though possible.
Then there's the Google group, err groups. There's the whole group I met in California, and then all the people I met in New York who get added to the category. Mainly, for this post though I want to talk about the people I met in California, because those are the ones I got closest to. I'm so lucky I got to go California with Google in the first place, and after meeting everyone there I realized just how lucky I really was. Meeting these people was a whole new experience for me since I usually meet people through people. Here it was a blank start, a clean slate where no one had anything to go on except a picture that we submitted and the knowledge that this was a Google CS camp thing. Since there was the added magic of Google I was way more lenient on judging people than I usually am (My judging is more so a pre-screening of people and knowng fast whether they're the type of person I would hang out with). I don't always feel comfortable with them, but when I do it's the type of comfortable where I could literally just fall asleep lying on their shoulder and there would be absolutely nothing wrong with that. The type of comfortable where staying the night in a hotel room with 2 guys and 3 girls wasn't weird at all, it just felt like another normal thing. It may be the extraordinary circumstances surrounding our meeting, but I feel like I met them with a more open mind than I met most my friends, and because of that there's that whole new layer of emotions that I feel around them.
Then there's the last group. The Amarillo group. I met these guys when I was most sheltered, most awkward, least sure of who I was. They've been there through every one of my stupidest moments, and for some reason found something worth waiting for. These are the guys I know I can talk to things about, and yet the ones I have an irrational fear of pushing away somehow. There's years worth of eggshells lying around, and I'm scared one of these days I'll stumble onto the right one that pulls everything apart somehow. It doesn't make any sense when I talk about it, but it's how I feel. There's so much that gets left unsaid on my part because it sounds too whiny, or mushy, which shouldn't bother me after all this time, yet I feel it gets bothersome after a while. I've gotten more comfortable around them over the years though, and now sleeping in a mixed gender room doesn't bother me, but it never would have happened more than a year ago. Since I've known these guys the longest they've also gotten accustomed to me. This includes them telling me when I shouldn't listen in a song, or knowing that their cursing doesn't bother me like it did. I'm now privy to less, and at the same time more, than I would have liked, but I've grown to accept it. This group is responsible for my applying to UT and the Google program. This is the group that breaks my heart every single time I have to drive away, knowing I won't see them for a while. They're responsible for my turning out the way I did, with pushes here and there in a better direction. They're my life, and even though sometimes I feel like I don't belong or that I'd rather be somewhere else, I wouldn't trade a single one for anything on this planet. They're all greater than I could ever explain if given all the time in the world, and they will never be anything less to me.
This blog started three or four days ago, and as such has gone through several different sittings. I feel like I continued with how I had planned on doing this, but overall I feel like that should give you a good picture of what I mean when I specify my different friends. None of them is worse, or better. They all mean something to me, and I wouldn't be the same without them. They're just different.
Each set of friends is different, but each set of friends has been made at a separate point in my life. Since I've formed the bases for each relationship at different points, I don't feel the same about any two groups.
You've got the group I've known the shortest. The UT crowd. I met them after a semester of college, and have only known them for 9 months or so. I honestly don't feel like I've got that super close friendship, where I can talk whenever I need to, but it's growing. It took very little time to get comfortable around them, enough so that I was willing to drive 5 ish hours to Dallas to meet up with them for a midnight release of Harry Potter. I drove back the next day. Totally worth it, and it wasn't awkward sleeping in the living room with Eric and Cathy, which if you know me make since because I've always found it awkward to even think about sleeping in the same room as someone with the opposite gender, but I'm weird like that. I've grown a lot with these people, and in such a super short period of time I've gotten to know them quite well and couldn't ask for better. I basically met them after a semester of needing someone to hang out with, that social interaction, and their arrival in my life was more than I though possible.
Then there's the Google group, err groups. There's the whole group I met in California, and then all the people I met in New York who get added to the category. Mainly, for this post though I want to talk about the people I met in California, because those are the ones I got closest to. I'm so lucky I got to go California with Google in the first place, and after meeting everyone there I realized just how lucky I really was. Meeting these people was a whole new experience for me since I usually meet people through people. Here it was a blank start, a clean slate where no one had anything to go on except a picture that we submitted and the knowledge that this was a Google CS camp thing. Since there was the added magic of Google I was way more lenient on judging people than I usually am (My judging is more so a pre-screening of people and knowng fast whether they're the type of person I would hang out with). I don't always feel comfortable with them, but when I do it's the type of comfortable where I could literally just fall asleep lying on their shoulder and there would be absolutely nothing wrong with that. The type of comfortable where staying the night in a hotel room with 2 guys and 3 girls wasn't weird at all, it just felt like another normal thing. It may be the extraordinary circumstances surrounding our meeting, but I feel like I met them with a more open mind than I met most my friends, and because of that there's that whole new layer of emotions that I feel around them.
Then there's the last group. The Amarillo group. I met these guys when I was most sheltered, most awkward, least sure of who I was. They've been there through every one of my stupidest moments, and for some reason found something worth waiting for. These are the guys I know I can talk to things about, and yet the ones I have an irrational fear of pushing away somehow. There's years worth of eggshells lying around, and I'm scared one of these days I'll stumble onto the right one that pulls everything apart somehow. It doesn't make any sense when I talk about it, but it's how I feel. There's so much that gets left unsaid on my part because it sounds too whiny, or mushy, which shouldn't bother me after all this time, yet I feel it gets bothersome after a while. I've gotten more comfortable around them over the years though, and now sleeping in a mixed gender room doesn't bother me, but it never would have happened more than a year ago. Since I've known these guys the longest they've also gotten accustomed to me. This includes them telling me when I shouldn't listen in a song, or knowing that their cursing doesn't bother me like it did. I'm now privy to less, and at the same time more, than I would have liked, but I've grown to accept it. This group is responsible for my applying to UT and the Google program. This is the group that breaks my heart every single time I have to drive away, knowing I won't see them for a while. They're responsible for my turning out the way I did, with pushes here and there in a better direction. They're my life, and even though sometimes I feel like I don't belong or that I'd rather be somewhere else, I wouldn't trade a single one for anything on this planet. They're all greater than I could ever explain if given all the time in the world, and they will never be anything less to me.
This blog started three or four days ago, and as such has gone through several different sittings. I feel like I continued with how I had planned on doing this, but overall I feel like that should give you a good picture of what I mean when I specify my different friends. None of them is worse, or better. They all mean something to me, and I wouldn't be the same without them. They're just different.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Flashback to Charles
Ok, so this isn't going to be a super long post, I just want to get a few things in real quick before I hit the hay.
As far as what I ended the last post on, it's still up in the air. I'm super fickle sometimes.
Anyway, classes started today, yesterday. They're going to be fun. Linear Algebra should be somewhat easy, Physics will get hard, and Python will be time consuming.
I'm irked that in Physics we have to pay money to be able to do the homework. That's super silly.
Python is going to be a blast though. The professor, Julian, seems super awesome, and if you were at CSSI, or know Charles he reminded Sara and I of him. It's going to be worth the effort.
Tuesday Eric started playing Kingdom Hearts for the first time. I'm loving seeing it all again. Absolute favorite game of all time ever right there.
I have more to say, but Jacob is sleeping, and I feel super bad for still being awake blogging.
I'll post more later! =D
Oh and be jealous, because I got to Hangout with Emily today! Boo-yah world! =D
Love you guys, and night.
As far as what I ended the last post on, it's still up in the air. I'm super fickle sometimes.
Anyway, classes started today, yesterday. They're going to be fun. Linear Algebra should be somewhat easy, Physics will get hard, and Python will be time consuming.
I'm irked that in Physics we have to pay money to be able to do the homework. That's super silly.
Python is going to be a blast though. The professor, Julian, seems super awesome, and if you were at CSSI, or know Charles he reminded Sara and I of him. It's going to be worth the effort.
Tuesday Eric started playing Kingdom Hearts for the first time. I'm loving seeing it all again. Absolute favorite game of all time ever right there.
I have more to say, but Jacob is sleeping, and I feel super bad for still being awake blogging.
I'll post more later! =D
Oh and be jealous, because I got to Hangout with Emily today! Boo-yah world! =D
Love you guys, and night.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Telepictionary
So I'm back, in Austin, at UT, living in Jester, same room. I don't know if you felt the excitement that was pouring out of me as I typed that, but believe me there was a lot of it.
I've been telling myself to blog for about... Two (?) days now. I'm not too sure exactly on the time, I've had so much happen in the past few days that it's been a whirlwind of awesomeness.
I got help from Ann, Cathy, Lynn and Emily moving in on Thursday. I'm super grateful they were willing to help, it made the whole process go so much smoother. We went and ate at Pluckers, and then returned to hang out and just talk in my room while I put a few more of my things up. I then drove them home, and made the awesome (dreadful) walk from my parking spot to my dorm.
Friday I woke up to help Gerardo move in, but he assured me he didn't need help, and sent me back to bed. I then got up to meet Lynn and Ann, before heading to move Cathy in. Her parents are super nice, and it was cool getting to meet them. We helped Cathy organize her room, and I alphabetized her books on her bookshelf. Side note: She had 3 boxes of books, and she lives on the two and a half floor and there are no elevators. Those things are heavy! Haha.
After we got Cathy all moved in we decided to go eat, and Cathy, being super awful, paid for our food since we helped her move in. =P Gerardo crept up on us, on accident, which was super funny. We then went back to my room to play some Little Big Planet. Cathy got super addicted and was beating the rest of us. Whilst we were playing, Jacob arrived, so we felt bad playing and tried to help him move in, but there wasn't much he needed help with.
Following that, Jacob and his family invited me to dinner, which took place at Curras. It was a pretty great Enchilada, and I ate more of it than I thought I could.We returned, and went to Cathy's room, where we played Telepictionary a few times. We got some pretty great sequences out of that. We then returned to my room where we played more Little Big Planet. It was as enjoyable as it was before, and Cathy was continuing to be one of the better players consistently, which is super duper awesome. When we finished up our gaming, we walked Katherine to her dorm, then I walked Cathy to her dorm, because I didn't want her to get attacked in the middle of the night by some strange night attacker person.
Saturday, the Erics moved in, and I got to help the second Eric move in when he got here. We were able to get everything up in 2 trips, and then the move in help left so he could unpack and we wouldn't be in the way. We ended up playing more Little Big Planet, with Eric joining us once he was free.
I just got super distracted, and lost all trains of thought, and it's 2:30...
We saw One Day yesterday, and it was one of the greatest movies ever. I recommend it to all of you. I spent the whole movie going back and forth between thinking, "I want to be that guy!" and, "Well, I don't want to act that way." Honestly though, he had some super awesome redeeming qualities, even though he was a jerk and I thought he didn't deserve her.
Realistically though, I feel like I'm a lot like that. I'm stupid at times, and I hate myself for the way I act, or treat people. I'll say something that completely destroys someone, not with the intention of destroying them, just because it sounds right in my head. In a moment I can send a conversation in the opposite direction and not even know I did. I like to think though, that at the end of the day I've done more good things than jerkish things.
I know I can't erase my jerk moments by being doubly good. I wish it worked that way, but it doesn't and never will. When I watch romantic shows I'm reminded more and more that I'm not as good as I can be. We have these shows where the guy is always the jerk, and the girl is way more deserving than he or she realizes, and in the end he changes and they're happy with each other. I feel like that is so me, granted I'm sure it's a ton of people.
I'm the best friend, who doesn't always realize the blessings he's being given, and when he does he's too... Slow to act on it. If I were to be super honest right now, I'd tell you that I've given thought to the whole liking someone situation. Lots, and on several occasions felt as though I may have found someone who makes me happier than anyone else. I can't be sure, because I have to spend way too much time over thinking things, because I'm retarded.
Wow, umm... I think I'm off for the night, because I may have just talked myself into something I've been trying to do for a while now. I'll keep you posted.
Goodnight, and I hope everyone is enjoying the start of a new school year. =D
I've been telling myself to blog for about... Two (?) days now. I'm not too sure exactly on the time, I've had so much happen in the past few days that it's been a whirlwind of awesomeness.
I got help from Ann, Cathy, Lynn and Emily moving in on Thursday. I'm super grateful they were willing to help, it made the whole process go so much smoother. We went and ate at Pluckers, and then returned to hang out and just talk in my room while I put a few more of my things up. I then drove them home, and made the awesome (dreadful) walk from my parking spot to my dorm.
Friday I woke up to help Gerardo move in, but he assured me he didn't need help, and sent me back to bed. I then got up to meet Lynn and Ann, before heading to move Cathy in. Her parents are super nice, and it was cool getting to meet them. We helped Cathy organize her room, and I alphabetized her books on her bookshelf. Side note: She had 3 boxes of books, and she lives on the two and a half floor and there are no elevators. Those things are heavy! Haha.
After we got Cathy all moved in we decided to go eat, and Cathy, being super awful, paid for our food since we helped her move in. =P Gerardo crept up on us, on accident, which was super funny. We then went back to my room to play some Little Big Planet. Cathy got super addicted and was beating the rest of us. Whilst we were playing, Jacob arrived, so we felt bad playing and tried to help him move in, but there wasn't much he needed help with.
Following that, Jacob and his family invited me to dinner, which took place at Curras. It was a pretty great Enchilada, and I ate more of it than I thought I could.We returned, and went to Cathy's room, where we played Telepictionary a few times. We got some pretty great sequences out of that. We then returned to my room where we played more Little Big Planet. It was as enjoyable as it was before, and Cathy was continuing to be one of the better players consistently, which is super duper awesome. When we finished up our gaming, we walked Katherine to her dorm, then I walked Cathy to her dorm, because I didn't want her to get attacked in the middle of the night by some strange night attacker person.
Saturday, the Erics moved in, and I got to help the second Eric move in when he got here. We were able to get everything up in 2 trips, and then the move in help left so he could unpack and we wouldn't be in the way. We ended up playing more Little Big Planet, with Eric joining us once he was free.
I just got super distracted, and lost all trains of thought, and it's 2:30...
We saw One Day yesterday, and it was one of the greatest movies ever. I recommend it to all of you. I spent the whole movie going back and forth between thinking, "I want to be that guy!" and, "Well, I don't want to act that way." Honestly though, he had some super awesome redeeming qualities, even though he was a jerk and I thought he didn't deserve her.
Realistically though, I feel like I'm a lot like that. I'm stupid at times, and I hate myself for the way I act, or treat people. I'll say something that completely destroys someone, not with the intention of destroying them, just because it sounds right in my head. In a moment I can send a conversation in the opposite direction and not even know I did. I like to think though, that at the end of the day I've done more good things than jerkish things.
I know I can't erase my jerk moments by being doubly good. I wish it worked that way, but it doesn't and never will. When I watch romantic shows I'm reminded more and more that I'm not as good as I can be. We have these shows where the guy is always the jerk, and the girl is way more deserving than he or she realizes, and in the end he changes and they're happy with each other. I feel like that is so me, granted I'm sure it's a ton of people.
I'm the best friend, who doesn't always realize the blessings he's being given, and when he does he's too... Slow to act on it. If I were to be super honest right now, I'd tell you that I've given thought to the whole liking someone situation. Lots, and on several occasions felt as though I may have found someone who makes me happier than anyone else. I can't be sure, because I have to spend way too much time over thinking things, because I'm retarded.
Wow, umm... I think I'm off for the night, because I may have just talked myself into something I've been trying to do for a while now. I'll keep you posted.
Goodnight, and I hope everyone is enjoying the start of a new school year. =D
Friday, August 12, 2011
No Such Thing as Monsters
I get super caught up in Google, and College, and life sometimes that I forget to stop and look at where it all started.
My whole Tuesday was devoted to my friend Brian's movie premiere. It was awesome, and I wish I could have more days like that one!
I'm going to take us back a bit, to when we were still in high school. I don't remember how it all began, but somewhere along the way Brian and I became super awesome friends. Not even lying, I would pretty much do anything for him. We've done several projects together over the years, starting with our cake project freshman year. I don't think we did a project Sophomore year, which kind of breaks the pattern I was going for. Haha. Junior year is where the magic happened.
Our English teacher assigned us a video project. We had to make a parody video about two of the books we had read. Brian and I had no trouble deciding to work together. Chris, Ryan, Nate and Cong were also in our group and Stickley and Autry came from a different English class to help us with some of the scenes. (Julie also showed up to help, however she is Chris's super awesome mom and not a student.)
It was the most genius video I'd ever made, which doesn't say much because it was the first, but it was awesome. Brian planned everything out, and we pretty much hit the ground running. We decided pretty unanimously on Moby Dick and The Great Gatsby. Nate took the role of Ahab and the Owl Eyed Guy (Sorta), Cong was Queequeg, Chris took the roles of Gatsby and Detective Grissom, Ryan was a reporter, I was Moby and Ishmael, Brian was George, and everyone else were the extras that were at Gatsbys/part of Ahab's crew.
We started off with a Cribs-like intro, which was all about Gatsby, and eventually he got shot. This lead to the reporter and Detective Grissom, who segwayed the video into an awesome chase scene with Ahab and his crew chasing Moby, me. Brian, Chris and I spent several hours editing it, using Windows Movie Maker. We stayed up until 1 or 2 in the morning, the night before we were going to turn it in. The rest was history. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILXgwKasH2g
Shameless plug for a high school video. Yeah, haha. I went that far.
When Brian was looking into college he decided to make a video to send to USC. The video was How To Ride A Bike- Learning to Fall Down. It was a more inspirational type video than Brian had made. Here's that one. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jf30CumJTI8
Senior year, in our Government class we had to do a John Locke project. Brian, Brison and I teamed up and decided we were going to make a video. Somehow we ended up on the idea to take songs and rewrite them. We decided on two songs, Tik Tok and Birthday Sex. I have no idea how those two made the cut, but they did, and it doesn't make much sense.
I didn't appear in the video, and Brison did Tik Tok while Brian did Birthday Sex. It was an interesting video, and we meant it to be super funny with very little of the video that was scripted, with most of it being thought up on the spot. The hardest part was getting all the video and everything on my computer which wasn't able to connect to the camera anymore because we got a new computer. We actually didn't get the video working in time for us to present, so we made a backup slideshow that was thrown together in a few minutes.
I remember it was snowing a lot, because we had to drive over to Camron's to get the video on a flash drive, and then back to my house, and then to take everyone home and there was snow and ice and what not all around. We got the video together, with music and vocals which took some work, and then presented it the next day even though we had already done our slideshow.
Our class thought it was funny, and so here is that project. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=989s7rkTDhs
Also our senior year, Brian had a few projects of his own for us to work on. One of them was a fun one called Wanted: New Roommate. This was all in our free time, over Spring Break senior year, and we had a ton of fun making it. It was serious, and funny all at the same time which made it rather good. This is the first of the films that I actually appeared in, if you don't count me carrying a whale/showing up in the credits for Death in The Water.
It was a lot of fun to shoot, and was the last video of Brian's design I edited. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgjPS7Si4uM
We did one more video where I edited, but it was more my set up, with Brian helping out with the filming and lining things up. It was a video for our choir banquet, that was supposed to be fun and cool for everyone to watch. I wanted it to be something we could watch and think, "Yeah, that was our choir!"
We interviewed a few people and put what they said in the video, along with some epic music and one of our concerts. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JN-NcLshnc&feature=grec_index
The next thing Brian went on to tackle was a video he titled Cured. This video took place earlier this year, I think around Spring Break time. It's about a society that has figured up a way to keep people from aging and thus dying of old age. Basically, since there's more people you have to have permission to have kids basically. It's a strange society, and makes you question what you would do in order to protect the family you have.
Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iadQuTBmQp4
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dh9oit0Cz_0
Finally, Brian has recently made No Such Thing As Monsters. I've seen it twice, and the only reason I haven't watched it more, is because I've been busy since he put it up online. It is an amazing story, and watching it the second time it was a whole lot more powerful. The movie isn't perfect, but the budget was literally nothing for it, and so he made due with what he had and created an amazing show.
My favorite part of it is the characterization, and how real the actors make it feel. Keep in mind that everyone who appears in it did it because they wanted to, they had no obligation, no payment, just a love for acting. The same goes for the whole crew. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8YjR3uE7iA
That's the movie we had the premiere for, and it's crazy thinking about how far we've come, how far Brian specifically has come.
There you have it, a whole novel post about Brian, and his films. I love that guy, and anything you could say that would make things better would be appreciated.
http://www.blackelephantfilms.com/
There's his website, and ways to contact him, cast or crew.
Alrighty, adios guys! Love ya!
My whole Tuesday was devoted to my friend Brian's movie premiere. It was awesome, and I wish I could have more days like that one!
I'm going to take us back a bit, to when we were still in high school. I don't remember how it all began, but somewhere along the way Brian and I became super awesome friends. Not even lying, I would pretty much do anything for him. We've done several projects together over the years, starting with our cake project freshman year. I don't think we did a project Sophomore year, which kind of breaks the pattern I was going for. Haha. Junior year is where the magic happened.
Our English teacher assigned us a video project. We had to make a parody video about two of the books we had read. Brian and I had no trouble deciding to work together. Chris, Ryan, Nate and Cong were also in our group and Stickley and Autry came from a different English class to help us with some of the scenes. (Julie also showed up to help, however she is Chris's super awesome mom and not a student.)
It was the most genius video I'd ever made, which doesn't say much because it was the first, but it was awesome. Brian planned everything out, and we pretty much hit the ground running. We decided pretty unanimously on Moby Dick and The Great Gatsby. Nate took the role of Ahab and the Owl Eyed Guy (Sorta), Cong was Queequeg, Chris took the roles of Gatsby and Detective Grissom, Ryan was a reporter, I was Moby and Ishmael, Brian was George, and everyone else were the extras that were at Gatsbys/part of Ahab's crew.
We started off with a Cribs-like intro, which was all about Gatsby, and eventually he got shot. This lead to the reporter and Detective Grissom, who segwayed the video into an awesome chase scene with Ahab and his crew chasing Moby, me. Brian, Chris and I spent several hours editing it, using Windows Movie Maker. We stayed up until 1 or 2 in the morning, the night before we were going to turn it in. The rest was history. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILXgwKasH2g
Shameless plug for a high school video. Yeah, haha. I went that far.
When Brian was looking into college he decided to make a video to send to USC. The video was How To Ride A Bike- Learning to Fall Down. It was a more inspirational type video than Brian had made. Here's that one. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jf30CumJTI8
Senior year, in our Government class we had to do a John Locke project. Brian, Brison and I teamed up and decided we were going to make a video. Somehow we ended up on the idea to take songs and rewrite them. We decided on two songs, Tik Tok and Birthday Sex. I have no idea how those two made the cut, but they did, and it doesn't make much sense.
I didn't appear in the video, and Brison did Tik Tok while Brian did Birthday Sex. It was an interesting video, and we meant it to be super funny with very little of the video that was scripted, with most of it being thought up on the spot. The hardest part was getting all the video and everything on my computer which wasn't able to connect to the camera anymore because we got a new computer. We actually didn't get the video working in time for us to present, so we made a backup slideshow that was thrown together in a few minutes.
I remember it was snowing a lot, because we had to drive over to Camron's to get the video on a flash drive, and then back to my house, and then to take everyone home and there was snow and ice and what not all around. We got the video together, with music and vocals which took some work, and then presented it the next day even though we had already done our slideshow.
Our class thought it was funny, and so here is that project. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=989s7rkTDhs
Also our senior year, Brian had a few projects of his own for us to work on. One of them was a fun one called Wanted: New Roommate. This was all in our free time, over Spring Break senior year, and we had a ton of fun making it. It was serious, and funny all at the same time which made it rather good. This is the first of the films that I actually appeared in, if you don't count me carrying a whale/showing up in the credits for Death in The Water.
It was a lot of fun to shoot, and was the last video of Brian's design I edited. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgjPS7Si4uM
We did one more video where I edited, but it was more my set up, with Brian helping out with the filming and lining things up. It was a video for our choir banquet, that was supposed to be fun and cool for everyone to watch. I wanted it to be something we could watch and think, "Yeah, that was our choir!"
We interviewed a few people and put what they said in the video, along with some epic music and one of our concerts. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JN-NcLshnc&feature=grec_index
The next thing Brian went on to tackle was a video he titled Cured. This video took place earlier this year, I think around Spring Break time. It's about a society that has figured up a way to keep people from aging and thus dying of old age. Basically, since there's more people you have to have permission to have kids basically. It's a strange society, and makes you question what you would do in order to protect the family you have.
Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iadQuTBmQp4
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dh9oit0Cz_0
Finally, Brian has recently made No Such Thing As Monsters. I've seen it twice, and the only reason I haven't watched it more, is because I've been busy since he put it up online. It is an amazing story, and watching it the second time it was a whole lot more powerful. The movie isn't perfect, but the budget was literally nothing for it, and so he made due with what he had and created an amazing show.
My favorite part of it is the characterization, and how real the actors make it feel. Keep in mind that everyone who appears in it did it because they wanted to, they had no obligation, no payment, just a love for acting. The same goes for the whole crew. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8YjR3uE7iA
That's the movie we had the premiere for, and it's crazy thinking about how far we've come, how far Brian specifically has come.
There you have it, a whole novel post about Brian, and his films. I love that guy, and anything you could say that would make things better would be appreciated.
http://www.blackelephantfilms.com/
There's his website, and ways to contact him, cast or crew.
Alrighty, adios guys! Love ya!
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Toss Toss!
The trek back to the hotel was probably the hardest of any of the treks we'd made because it was in the middle of the day and super hot. We managed to make it, although I didn't think I would make it.
We got to the hotel, and they didn't have Emily's room or Izzy's and my room wasn't ready. Izzy looked into getting a room at a different hotel, and Kofi, Lynn, Emily, Elissa, Sam, Mario, Sara and myself sat in the lobby waiting for my room to open up. It did finally, and around that time Elissa left, so we all said our goodbyes, and Izzy went to a hotel a block away.
When we got upstairs and in our room, we started the shower rotations and I passed out super quick. I woke up to Kofi hovering over me, he was leaving and Emily made sure he said goodbye. It was in no way easy, but it wasn't as sad as last year. After meeting up once, I wasn't scared I'd never see him again.
I don't remember if I passed out again, or stayed awake after that. I do remember talking to Sam and realizing that he's probably one of the coolest people I've had the pleasure of knowing. He did a few impersonations, and I think one of them was me, which was ridiculously accurate.
Eventually we all finished getting showered, and we were in the last stages of getting ready, so we started to work on where we were going to go eat. Sam wasn't dressed up, because he was just crashing in the room until his friend got off of work, so he didn't want to go somewhere nice and look out of place. We thought about a few places, but decided on Shake Shack eventually. I was wearing my black dress shoes, black dress pants, a black T-shirt, navy blue button up, a silver tie, and a black velvet vest. I got told the heat would kill me, and it tried to. I had to take my vest off after we got to Shake Shack in order to live.
If you get a chance go there. They had the best orange cream slush thing ever! The burgers are pretty great too. After eating, we walked with Sam over to the subway entrance and all said our last goodbyes with him. Sam, if you read this I miss you, and wish I had spent more time with you than I ever did. We got on the subway, and down to our stop easily, and weren't sure if we should go to the theatre or wait and shop some. We decided to go in, and looked at some merchandise, and bought some, and then went upstairs to where our seats would be. We couldn't get in the theatre yet, but we sat outside the doors and it was a bit overwhelming. The whole building is Wicked themed... Did I ever mention we had planned to go see Wicked? Hrmmm...
It's legit though, the building that is. We got drinks because they came with a souvenir mug, and then just talked as we waited to go in. The stage... Ahhh. The work that goes into that shines forth when you just look at it. Ahhh!
Had I finished this the other night when I started it, I would have skipped out on describing the Wicked experience to you as well as I could. Emily had said something about it being almost inevitable that we would cry at the end, and she was right. I need to explain something before I go on, we had all been up since 7ish the previous day, and had got, at most, a few hours worth of naps in. Sitting in the theatre was super hard, because it was cool and comfortable which didn't help the whole tired thing. Izzy took a nap before the show, and I think Sara might have tried.
I'm not going to devote a lot of time to explaining the show, because if you know it you know what happens, and if not you need to, but it's a lot for this blog, haha. I think Izzy was the loudest person in the theatre when he laughed at Galinda, and at the end when Glinda imprisons Madame Morrible. There were several parts in the show where I couldn't help but cry, it was a mixture of the amazingness that was the show, and the overwhelming feeling that I was actually sitting there watching a Broadway show in New York. I'm silly like that. =D
I do think I dozed off for a short second, Emily quickly woke me up, haha. During this whole thing Mario was sitting twelve seats from the stage, while Lynn, Emily, Izzy, Sara and I were a row or two from the very back of the balcony. The view was amazing though, haha.
After the show, I talked myself into buying a Wicked sweet track jacket. It took me the whole show, but in the end, I couldn't help but buy it. We took several fun pictures right outside, and then made our way to the heart of Times Square, and did our last bit of shopping. Hershey store, M&M store, a little shop for "I heart New York" shirts. The good stuff, minus Disney, haha. We eventually decided we were super tired, and all made our way back to the hotel.
We talked about the show, and all of our favorite parts, but still crashed pretty quick once we were back. We ended up waking up later than we expected to, which was bad because we didn't have much time before Lynn and Mario left for the airport. We managed to run to this nearby food place and grab some breakfast/lunch to go and eat it outside the hotel before the shuttle for Lynn and Mario showed up. I think Lori arrived before they left, and we all said hello to her and goodbye to Lynn and Mario. Izzy went to his hotel with Lori to get his luggage so he could keep it with mine and Sara's at our hotel while we ran around before we left. While he was gone the shuttle for Emily popped up, and he didn't get to say goodbye which was super sad.
After Sara and I saw Emily off, we checked out and gave them our luggage, along with Izzy's to hold till our shuttle arrived. We made our way over to Central Park, and found ourselves walking around this big lake thing, which wasn't too exciting, so we left the park and went to a nearby Starbucks. We then walked as we looked for a place to eat. My phone battery was on it's last legs, for some reasons, which was bad because I had given the shuttle company my number.
We eventually decided to eat at the Shake Shack, so we caught some shuttles over there and stood in the line, which was long. It was nearing time for the shuttle to arrive, and I was worried, because my phone had died. We got our food to go, and basically ran back to the hotel. The guy had waited for us, and he wasn't too happy about that, but we were thankful. The hotel then took a long time finding Sara's luggage, which made the guy a bit angrier I think. We said our goodbyes to Lori and Izzy, and sat in the shuttle, eating quietly to ourselves.
We made it there, before 4:30, which was an hour after we had signed up for the shuttle at, which meant we didn't get charged extra but the guy asked for a waiting fee, or whatever so we paid it so we could just go inside. We got inside, got checked in to our flights went through security, and waited at the gate. They informed us that we might miss our connecting flights because they had to stop in Tennessee to fill up, because it was too hot in New York. We called our families to tell them, but ended up landing in Dallas only a few minutes late.
Sara and I walked to my gate, which was overbooked so they were taking off a bit later. I charged my phone, and we talked about how we'd see each other in a month so it wasn't sad. Then, I boarded the plane, waved goodbye, and that was pretty much it...
I got home, and was super happy to see my sister and parents. I couldn't stop thinking about the trip, but I was ready for that Sunday afternoon, because I was having my birthday party then.
Ummm... That was my New York trip, since then I've had a birthday party, played in a Brawl tournament, watched Brian's movie with the cast and crew and am currently waiting for the premiere on Tuesday. It's a legit premiere with people paying to watch, and catering, and we rented out a room at the Civic Center. Crazy stuffs.
I'll tell you guys how that goes. Love ya! =D
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