Because me, myself, I come and go

Excuse the bubbliness of this post, it's actually something I wrote some time ago, which doesn't really explain anything, since as bubbliness goes, it comes and goes, it comes and goes... karma...karma..karma..karma chameleon...

Anywho...

Welcome to the wonderful world of Rand! It's been a while since I've started out with a greeting so I thought I'd spit one out. Anyways when I'm depressed, apathetic, feeling empty or any combination of the three (there are differences between the three but the differences do not constitute a barrier, they are more like shades of being really screwed up) I can only watch certain TV shows. Simpsons always, and Scrubs usually. Other shows I tend to get tired of very quickly even if they are shows I love and I can see that they are high quality and that on normal occassions I would love to watch them.
I think why the Simpsons is so easy to watch is because it never gets too serious and because it is just completely hilarious. Also there's nostalgic value. Even that said, there are certain episodes I can't watch. Lisa's Rival for example I can't watch, probably because I don't like seeing Lisa suffering, even if the episode is pretty good (the most awesome gag is Bart getting Milhouse on the FBI's Most Wanted List and then tipping the FBI off and finally the Fugitive scene). But most of the episodes of the Simpsons have such non-stop crazy off the wall humor that it's very easy to watch, and very easy on the nerves.
Scrubs also has a lot of that crazy off the wall humor and maybe that's why it's easy to watch. But what's strange is that it is also a semi-dramatic show, and in most cases dramas are the first to go when my depression interferes with my tv watching. Scrubs involves death, character growth, etc., so it's strange that when my mind is in a state that usually wants to avoid anything actually pulling at the emotions it should choose Scrubs. But maybe its the fact when Scrubs pulls at you, it pulls at you in situations that it depicts as ordinary. Thus you don't have to dig into your heart for emotions you weren't prepared for and for extraordinary variants of those emotions, the ordinary sort of sadness is appropriate, the ordinary sort of self-reflection is alright. That said, there are still certain Scrubs episodes I can't watch, I haven't been able to get myself to watch My Own Personal Jesus even though it's an episode I'd really like to watch. (On the other hand this theory might be completely off or it might be a combination of this plus most of the sadness is not critical of the characters which allows me to feel that emotion without feeling the pull of sympathetic guilt, which may be what I'm really trying to avoid, maybe, I'm not sure, one can never truly stare into their head and completely understand it, Godel actually proved that.)
I write this for a couple reasons, first of all, this is what's in my head right now, secondly, this is one of those odd little things about how my mind works that I and hopefully some of you find fascinating, thirdly, I take my tv watching pretty seriously. Well, maybe not that seriously, I can enjoy it without analyzing it. But tv provokes me, it touches me, it keeps my mind active by pulling out emotions that were inactive, forcing me to think out jokes and dramatic situations, and sparking my imagination. To rebuke those who say tv kills imagination, I'd say my imagination is build up by tv. I'm able to access the ideas, words, and images of tv to build up my ideas, to use as inspiration. Many of jokes were inspired (although not necessarily copied) from the Simpsons. I only really thought of robotic life after watching transformers. My first ideas about mecha only came after watching Gundam Wing. My ideas about the fantasy epic really took off only after watching Record of Lodoss War. But my ideas did not stay derivitive copies of these tv shows, rather they evolved into other directions, sometimes making them untracable to their origin. On the shoulders of these giants my ideas stand. Some may argue books can play the same role, and they can, but tv provides images, which helps my imagination imagine images built on those of tv, that is not to say that books are worse, books force my mind to imagine my own images, on the other hand tv helps my mind imagine more complex images, and anyways, the worth of a story depends most importantly on the story not the medium.
Some would argue that it is best for the mind to be untainted by tv so it can imagine ideas completely original. I remember a story by Orson Scott Card called "Unaccompanied Sonata," it is an amazing story and everyone should read it. Among the many concepts it contained (although this was not the theme, but rather a background concept, and it didn't really recommend this so much as say this was how the world of this story worked) was the idea that a musician to be truely original had to be completely cut off from any music. When the musician of the story did hear music suddenly he started altering his music based on what he heard, making it in some way just a little derivative. Because of this he was cast out of music. The idea is intriguing, but I like the idea that just like science art can build upon itself. Yes, it is interesting to see fresh perspectives from those who haven't studied the art (and I use art in a broad way including tv, books, etc.), but those who have studied art can build on the past, learning from the flaws and successes to perfect the art. Yes, things will be a little derivative in some ways, but honestly, I'm not afraid of things being a little derivative, as long as it's done well. TV is just like any other art in the fact that it can offer ideas, words and images which can be used to build more stories and art. So I do watch tv with pride and appreciation, at its best it is art, and it is wonderful.
And on a more personal note, when I'm really depressed sometimes TV with the ideas it gives me helps push me out of my depression just like a book might or a painting might. On the other hand, tv does provide a distraction, which has cost me much time, but no blessing in this world is without its drawbacks. Yet I think tv is most definitely worth its drawbacks.
That's about all I want to say about that, so take it to your head, take it to your heart, and remember Rand rocks. Goodnight Folks!

And God Bless.

Sooner or later everyone fails

Not a bright sentiment to start with. I can't say though that I'm feeling bright. But not too bad. Overall, just a little low, and a little disappointed on myself and things...

For example, my re-emergence into the world of blogging which fizzled quite immensely last month. Generally, lately, it seems that whenever I have a good spell, some crap storm breaks loose, I patch that up, and then I look back and see the rest of my life has been abandoned. And lately, it just seems like a matter of sooner or later...

(By the way, quoting above line from Scrubs, Episode: His Story, Wooo! Scrubs)

In the end, screw that!

Screw those depressing, self-pitying, waah-waah-waah feelings! Now I'm going to deny those feelings exist, nor am I going to penalize myself for them, but rather I say bah-humbug to depression and move on, or at least aspire to, for that dear friends, is false bravado.

But it is still distressing how often, especially within this last year or so, and most especially within the last few weeks or so, I have made determinations to change my life but then had those determinations fall apart. There is the temptation to declare hopelessness, but then again, if parts of my plans and strategies have fallen apart, parts have succeeded, and in some ways I am better off that I was say a year ago...

But all weighed, I dunno...

In the end it doesn't matter. One of the constants of life, is that things fail, always there are plans that happen to be a bit too grand. Yet there is some satisfaction in being the man who tries. After all, accomplishments crumble to dust, memories are forgotten, and we are all but dust in the wind, but if there is something beautiful to make of our lives, then the core of that beauty is the life itself, well lived, devoted to love, or if you will indulge a Christian, in the seeking, the finding, and the being found in Christ Jesus.

Dance! Dance! Now where's my revolution buddy?

I've been talking about plans and the future and stuff a lot lately, however, unlike my previous bouts of future-philia there is a reason for that.

I am planning to make big changes to things. And hopefully, if I actually get off my ass and do them, they should come to pass.

Big plans:
Multiple webposts:

History man (I might change the name, the current name I have for it is Years Like Grains of Dust or something of the like): A history-focused webpost. I've done occasional history-centered webposts from time to time, but I've never expected the audience here to be focused on that. Moreover, I've never used the prompt of necessity to make myself write more about history. I'm a little bit scared of unleashing that potent prompt, but no pain no gain. Check out the first introductory post here.

Mathimoto's complaint (or something of the like): A math-focused webpost. There's a dearth of good math-centric webposts on the web as a whole. I'm aiming to fill that void with a vengeance. I'm talking interesting math facts, quick math lessons, math news, math history, the works. I might also be able to get some other math folk to help out with this.

Rand Reviews: Basically a focus on my reviews, with also my AMV reviews and maybe some webpost pointers. Mainly just getting away from my personal stuff and philosophy stuff for people who aren't as interested in that. Also, it's a way to force me to do more reviews and such.

The Rand Show: I'm hoping to keep this going strong, but with more emphasis on my personal philosophy, my religion, and my take on the world as it turns. Although I might have to clip some parts of what I have now. The work world isn't the best place for dealing with certain things, and since more job places are getting more intense in searching the web for who you are, I might have to take a censorship axe to some of my older stuff.

Also, a possibility: The Rutgarian. My thoughts on Rutgers and such. The limitation with that though would be, I'm graduating in a semester. I think part of the reason I'm feeling so much Rutgers pride is that I've gotten used to this place and am a little afraid of leaving, but there's a whole world out there, and it's not going to conquer itself (or will it? Dunn Dunn Dunn!!!).

Also, a Rand art webpost. I'm planning to make a big push with the comic soon, and I've also been drawing a lot otherwise. My camera's now working and I'm trying to learn some video editing skills. So I'm hoping all that stuff will end up on the site, but the problem with that is: Some people are more readers than lookers, and some people (like me when I have to deal with the highly interesting but image and clip-saturated webpost The House Next Door) get tired by slow, slow upload times due to massive files located on a swebsite. Answer: Secondary website where those giagantic files can roam free.

Other plans:

GET A JOB!!! (Yeah, I'm going to need to do that, and so some of these high-flying plans might need some trimmin').

Sellin' some T-shirts!!! Woo!!!:
I've never been opposed to selling out, well, as long as I can still do stuff at my quality level or reasonably close. But so far, busy and lazy have kept me from doing so. And yet here's something which I can do with relatively little effort, so perhaps you'll see some of that sometime pretty soon.

Getting more webbish: it's time I got more into the 21st century, especially since some parts of me are more 19th century. So I'm learning so web apps and such and I'm trying to borrow my way into the general web community. Look out web, you're about to get Randerzized.

So those are my plans. As I've said I've been talking a lot about them lately and so I'm going to try less about them from now on unless I actually have something significant to say about them. But stay tuned, because I AM RAND!!!! And that makes me just plain awesome.

And because of my great and glorious awesomeness I've deigned to give you a treat:

Here's TURK (of Scrubs fame) DANCING!!!!

So take it to your head, take it to your heart and remember Rand rocks. Goodnight Folks!

My Words of Wisdom

So this is a little something I picked up from last weeks Scrubs episode My Words of Wisdom, maybe it's true, maybe it's not, maybe I'll boost it to a full blog, maybe I won't but anyhow, anywho, etc. Dr. Kelso told Dr. Cox you don't keep doing things again and again unless you get something out of it. And I'm wondering about my breakdowns, it's happen every year, do I get something out of it? Perhaps I do, perhaps I don't. A breakdown does give me a break from my normal stuff, and then it gives me an opportunity to some intense work with an adreneline inducing challenge of fixing my problems. Maybe that's what lures me to my problems. But then again, maybe it's just my beakdown is aimed at destroying me completely. Or mabye it's a little bit of both. But anyways. Since this is probably the only post I'm going to do this day, I might as well give a good ending (since I'm both tired and busy). So take it to your head, take it to your heart, and remember Rand rocks. Goodnight Folks!

Somewhere over the rainbow

I just saw an episode of Scrubs (awesome, awesome show) which involved Wizard of Oz metaphors (they tend to carry these metaphors a little too far sometimes, but it's still an awesome show) and JD, the main character, was just trying to get home. Of course they ended with the classic "Somewhere over the rainbow/There's a place called home" or something like that. It reminds me of my conflicted attitudes about my home. This is definitely one of those sessions which I never, ever, ever what my parents to read, but a lot of times, even among my family, even among my close family, I still feel like an outsider, like I don't belong, like I'm not home. I mean, I take this as my shelter, my place to stay, and my little realm, but it's not where I want to come back to after all the storms of my life. Where do I want to go back to? I have no idea.

I feel restless nowadays, I want to go somewhere get out of New Jersey, travel around the world. I'd like to think if I travelled long enough I could find a place called home, and maybe I could. But maybe what I'd really need is a job I could really enjoy, or a woman I could really love, or a life that I could be satisfied with keeping steady and without feeling a need to radically change it, and then wherever that was, that could be home. But I don't have that now, at least not really. There are moments when I feel at home, but overall, no. It is still somewhere over the rainbow, I'd like to think it's out there, somewhere on this green Earth. But if not, at least I can trust that I have my true home up in heaven, and if nothing else can be found, that will still be enough.