This One Goes Out to the Little Guy...

In this post-season college football week of BCS madness, I watched only two of the BCS games that have been on so far. (My Irish didn't do so hot in their post-season, but let's not talk about that.) Unfortunately, out of those two - neither happened to be the Boise State vs. Oklahoma game, which from what I've heard (and seen on the highlight reel, happens to be one of the greatest and most symbolic bowl games in college football history. Here we have Boise Stat, some pissant college team from Idaho of all places, winning a national bowl game and going undefeated throughout their entire season. It's quite the Cinderella story and you can definitely take something from that win - fight for what you want, it might not come easy, but if you fight, you will succeed. That's exactly what the Broncos did, congrats.




Here's the highlight reel from Sportscenter. Wish I would have seen it. If anyone has seen a youtube clip of the entire game or a torrent that I can download the footage on, let me know.

2006: "Between Love & Hate"

2006 was a year of many achievements, failures, and plenty noteworthy events. I could write for pages about how it's remarkable that the UN actually has accomplished (positive) things this year, though in the proverbial eleventh hour. I could explicate on how Sudan allowing UN peacekeepers into Darfur is amazing, or how the sanctions on Iran are entirely uncharacteristic for an organization so wound up in bureaucracy and national sovereignty hoopla, but that would be uninteresting and would probably end up sounding contrived, like every other "year in a review" piece. If you're that curious, I would suggest watching the latest JibJab video.

I'm hear to talk about my year. The latter half of my Junior year, summer, and Fall of my Senior year in high school. The excitements, the upsets, the whole shebang. Curiously enough, the title of this post, a Strokes song, is somewhat apropos in describing the year.

My New Year's Resolution: To meet and discover new people, and be open to change in relationships with friends. Be more positive and take more chances in terms of meeting girls and new people to be friends with. Try to reestablish the friendships that broke off in late-2005 and if they don't work out then drop them, hard. Don't need to bring any excess baggage into this hard year (think about it - 1st semester finals, 2nd semester/finals2, summer before senior year, first semester senior year, ACT/SAT, college apps.)

That was my proverbial "New Year's Resolution" for 2006. This particular ideology came out of being completely blown off by the people who I called "my friends" last year on New Year's Eve. No one was home in my house, I basically sat around (alone) and, for lack of anything better to do, watched the Twilight Zone marathon on SciFi. Not exactly my idea of a good time.

I returned to school, hellbent on dealing with the situation and I did -- the people involved, I refused to really hang out with them at all before an apology was reached and it was not for the time being, so such is life. Taking a break from that line of craziness, I spent second semester last year really making sure I got all of my ACTs dealt with, my grades decently set up, and whatever else.

My 'extracurriculars' definitely changed as I did over this semester; Model UN was a crazy time this semester as well, with exec board members quitting, strife on the board, and general mayhem, it was at times hectic. The MUNI conference ended up being a great deal of fun, surprisingly enough, and it was definitely a conference to remember. Drops of Ink came into its own with me, as Brendon joined the group, and I became better friends with some of the seniors on staff. And of course, Debate, with my 0 debates and despite my placing 44th/46 at state, it was a fantastic time.

For a certain change of pace, that semester, I visited my friend at BU during my spring break. I have already gone into it, but that really opened me up to new opinions about things and triggered a lasting love for that particular school and enough goodness to get me through the end of the year.

I found a new passion that semester, which manifested itself in Mock Trial, which virtually dominated every waking hour of my life (outside of homework) from late January to March when we went to state. Through this team, and I'm "serious as a heart attack" when I say this; I met some great people - Dan Porter, Sean Clement, etc - and had an amazing time portraying witnesses for both the defense and prosecution. A guy that would never "throw you under a bus," Mr. Duffy was also a solid addition the repertoire of people in my life. This even went so far as to convincing me in going to a camp over the summer called "Mock Trial Academy" in which I was able to meet several people from across the country that I hope to see again in the future, giving me great hope for college, as this was somewhat of a college-esque atmosphere.

And lest I forget, prior to the Mock Trial camp, I received a fateful phone call from one of my former friends, Blake, apologizing for the "New Year's Eve fuck up" and pleading for forgiveness so that our group of friends can reunite once again for a final hoo-rah senior year. Of course, I believed this line of bullshit, and against my better judgment, decided "hey, I'll give it one last shot."

The summer was filled with interesting times, to be brief; the words "Innocence Faded" just about sums up my summer, both figuratively and literally, between the actual filming of the movie to the behind the scenes drama. The failed camping trip, the drinking tickets (not mine, sorry, I'm not retarded enough to get trashed at concerts), the late night Taco-Hut runs -- quite the experience.

Interjecting in the production of Innocence Faded though, was my cross-country trip to Pitt, BC, Tufts, and BU. I enjoyed the luxuries of wireless Internet through the generosity (ha!) of Paslode and was able to see the schools that I needed to. Once I was able to establish that Tufts was way too damn small, and BC was way too filled with preppy rich kids (okay, yeah, but the people at BU at least aren't blatant tools), I moved on to spending time with my lifelong friend Andrew, his roommates, and his girlfriend. The days that I spent with them at BU in the twilight of my summer are days that I won't soon forget, between the beach party with the Komaromi family, to chilling in the launch boat, to SoaP, and of course, the ragers.

After this trip, I returned home to find my re-established friendships in shambles, and once again looked back to my New Year's resolution for guidance. I realized the mistake I had made in trusting that any of it would work out after hearing the "enlightened" words of Ryan Wallace "[blake] just doesn't [like you] nemore really no reason... i guess its been kind of accumulating throughout the summer... ppl are just loosing there fondness of you" [sic].

With that in hand, and the awkwardness of having one of those individuals in probably half of my classes, I went about my life, senior year. What was senior year supposed to be about anyways? Raging drunk parties? Tailgating? Sex? Not so much, apparently, because between that shenanigans and the AP classes I was taking, life was less than satisfactory in the fun department.

Struggling with the grips of where I wanted my life to go (and college apps) for the first couple months, I had much time to think about these things, but I chose not to. I chose not to think about the people I spent my entire summer with, who - to paraphrase Duffy - threw me under a proverbial bus.

Able to once again separate myself from the bullshit, I picked up the pieces and dealt with things as they came - the DISEC fiasco, Mock Trial leadership issues, and questionable grades, to name a few. A trip to University of Georgia (Go Dawgs!) occupied one of the latter weekends in October, and I must say, it was a good time. Similar to my BU trip junior year, I met many people there (mostly members of the AXO sorority) that were extremely nice and it was a welcome break from harsh reality of high school.

Fast forwarding a bit, "Holiday" Break 2006-07; in the last 72 hours, I've spent 24 of it chilling with people, better people than the ones I was friends with before. Between the hours of Guitar Hero at Tomayo's house and listening to Dark Side of the Moon at 5:15 AM at Ali's, it has been a great time. I would even go out on a limb and say the New Year's Eve celebrations that I just had were the best that I experienced in my life.

I think about my New Year's resolution from last year, and I realize now that it has truly come full circle. I definitely was open to change this year, and change I did. Not thinking about the events that happened at the beginning of the year was the right choice. I have moved on to bigger and (certainly) better things and with this, I can go on to pick a college, and keep heading in the right direction as a person.

I look to 2007 with hope, rather than pessimism. Life has its ups and downs, people change, innocence fades. Which of these mantras is the truest is irrelevant, life is a journey. This year will be an integral part of that journey and a year to remember. Senior year part deux, college, a serious change in venue whether it be back to the Northeast, to the South, or to another Midwestern state. Rock on.

I'm Not At Home, Where I Live

This is an old post that I wrote on June 29th, 2006. Obviously in 6 months time much has happened, and this is slightly out of date, so I'll try to make a few corrections and edits in italics.

This has been a very eventful year for me, in terms of all of the aspects of my life. Since the literal new year, I have given my group of friends a proverbial F*** you and didn't hang out with them at all, joined a new team - that being Mock Trial, attempted valiantly to run Model UN in my term as a member of the exec board despite inner-club problems, gone to visit Boston University, taken my first AP test, gone to Prom, regained my group of friends for whatever reason, lost that group of friends over after my second BU trip, over completely asinine excuses for reasons -- the laundry list goes on. Through all of this, I think I've remained grounded in my beliefs and values, at least to some extent.

The longer I am in high school, the more I grow to resent it. I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be the other way around, leaving senior year missing the school and the people, and then wanting to visit. That's the polar opposite of what I'm feeling. Through all of the craziness of last year, and all of the fun and no so fun experiences, one thing has remained constant; the rocky relationship I have with people around here.

I don't think I'm a social recluse, and I certainly don't confine myself inside to study all of the time, but many of the people in my life are almost not worth it. I'm not saying that I hate everyone and want to go die or something, but I've come to realize that bit after being in a totally different environment, multiple times now this year. And at the moment, it's not like I deal with the people that I "resent," but rather, I just don't hang out with people. For whatever reason, it's school, clubs, and nothing else this year. Even over break, I've been home since Tuesday and haven't seen anyone yet.

The first of those environments is my visit to Boston University. Not only did I get to see once again a long time friend, but I got to see a different kind of people. There was drama, but it wasn't as ridiculously stupid as things are in Libertyville. I met many really cool people there, and just loved the place. Or did I really love Boston University as much as I loved the experience of being away from Libertyville in the college setting?

The second of these is MUNI. I was always grounded to people that I knew and may or may not have liked from high school, but my committee consisted of mostly people that were not people I knew, and the one I did know, I didn't talk to hardly at all. Through this, I met three really cool people that I kept in contact with long after the conference. And I was only with them for around 3 days of committee.

The third of these environments is Mock Trial Academy. In this experience, it was a 11 full days away from the angst and stupidity of Libertyville. Granted, I talked to people in Libertyville, but briefly. I met an insane amount of people that I wish I could see on a weekly, if not daily basis, from all around the country in this semi-college-esque setting. I also became almost a different person on some levels. I played Ultimate Frisbee, almost daily, which is something that I would never dream of doing at home, had I not done this at camp. Prior to camp, Ultimate was just a good way to get out of running in gym. Now, it's probably something I consider to be one of the most entertaining physical activities out there. Not only that, I found girls much easier to talk to and to connect with on some level. Back "home" this is a near impossibility. Everyone has their impressions of people and stereotypes and it's very rare for me to be able to break those and develop a good friendship or a relationship beyond that.

I came back home under the impression that, yes, I would miss camp and the people I met there, but I would have plenty to do with my friends, since they were ranting and raving about "doing stuff when I get back" when they called me at camp.

Now, I just feel like everything is way too difficult to deal with around here. Friends are impossible to motivate to do anything, and there aren't enough options of people to hang out with, because they're all uniform in their apathy and laziness. I don't connect on the same level with them that I do with my friends from Mock Trial, Model UN, and other past friendships I have. I can't rely on them for advice about things, I don't sit up talking to them until 4:15 in the morning. And in fact, the bullshit escalated to the point where they basically told me to go "fuck off" RIGHT before school started -- haven't hung out with or talked to (outside of a strictly professional basis) any of the bastards since then.

Instead of being home, I couldn't feel farther from home right now. All I can think about is how pointless it is to actually even bother calling people, because they are too busy with the shit that they do - combine that with their apathy - to hang out. Next year is going to be a rough year, with 3-4 time consuming clubs, being a school newspaper editor again, and just having to get through 4 AP classes and probably 6 AP tests, I don't think that I'll be doing much hanging out in the little time away from school and clubs that I'l have... Quite depressing to think about. Oh well, college is only a year off. . . (8 months actually, only 5 of which are school).

Wildcat Football; An L-Ville Institution

For lack of something better to post; I wrote this 1.5 years ago as an interview peice for DOI. It was just a mock-up article to practice writing, but it's pretty funny.. I interviewed an imaginary football player who was acted out by Perry.

Every Friday, walking through the halls of Libertyville High School, one sees the recognizable cheerleaders and football players, both clad in their orange and black uniforms. The familiar battle cry of “Wildcat Football, YEAH!” can be heard, prior to each game night. Glancing at the stands during the games, one can see the body-painted, masses of orange. They are die-hard supporters. These people bleed black and orange.
Wildcat Football, an institution in Libertyville. The players know it. The coaches know it. The community knows it. The 2004 class 7A champs are back for more this year with their current record of 5-0.
Recently, the Wildcats were given a new field to play on, and star quarterback, Don Billingsly comments, “There’s not much you can do to make us better but it [the new field] makes us look even better!” This is Billingsly’s fourth year on the team, and he has received a full-ride football scholarship to Notre Dame next fall.
The community support for the football program is quite extent. Going to the games is not just an activity popular with the student body. Local shops close their doors early so they can make the 7:30 football games; it’s almost like Texas high school football. Some students even sacrifice their time in class to practice football. When Billingsly was questioned about his opinions on school, he replied, “There is only one school subject, and that’s Wildcat Football. Who needs education when you have football. I don’t go to class…”
Of course, there’s always a down side to every good thing, and that’s the alleged rampant steroid usage in the football program. In reply to questions of steroid use, Billingsly does not confirm or deny by his response, “Anything to get the edge.” He also comments about the safety of these banned substances, “If it doesn’t turn your piss blue, it’s okay.”
The Wildcats next game is against the great rival, the Stevenson Patriots, at 7:30 on Friday the 2nd of October.

Apple: the Ultimate Hype Machine

What can one say about Apple Computer? Successful company? Sure. Best mp3 player, that has gone unchallenged by a legitimate competitor since its creation? Of course. Better than Microsoft? Well... for sure not in sales or market share, but in quality of products? Here's where it gets a little sketchy for Apple.

Apple has always been a part of my life in some way, that's not to say I'm an Apple advocate or fan, but naturally, since I'm curious about technology, this has been the case. In elementary school, the Mac OS's since practically the original one were thrust upon me, the reason given being that "it's easier to manage them since all of the parts, software, and operating system come from one company." I always thought that was a cop-out, personally, but that's another story for another time.

Naturally, as I used these OS's, I saw the so-called "progression" of them from one to another, and also curiously noted that they all have looked the same. The defunct GUI of Macs (up to OSX) is unbelievably bad. I can't understand why people would tolerate this Windows 3.1-esque crapola. "Because they're stable, reliable computers." Uh, yeah, bullshit. (Watch this; http://www.drjack.com/macs_suck/)

That brings me to the first component of the Apple Hype Machine; the users. I have never met a more fanboyist group of people (other than maybe Nintendo fans) in my life compared to Mac users. These people will stand until the death debating why Macs are better than PCs, which is really admirable, until you actually use a Mac and realize that this "geat user interface" only serves to limit one's ability to operate on it beyond basic functions. The Mac operating system is very, very limited in what you can do to edit the settings of the computer and when you do succeed in finding the setting you need to edit (they hide them to idiot proof the machine), it doesn't work most of the time.

I see it this way; yes, Windows sucks. Windows whatever is probably a security risk because people actually use it, but at least the level of compatibility is high. (Take for example, the following situation. I was given a task at work to make a networked printer work with a series of PCs. My boss had already set up the stuff properly with the Windows PCs on the network, because it was a simple question of plugging the printer into the place where the previous printer sat, and installing the drivers. The Linux printer was kind of tricky, but nothing terrible. I went to the printer website, downloaded the Linux drivers, and installed it with the CUPS printer function in Linux within 5 minutes of tinkering. The iBook laptop that I needed to install it on was another story. First of all, it took me about 3 minutes just to find the printer setup location, because it's not really put in an intuitive place, then it took me quite a while to figure out how to install the driver, because it kept giving me a cryptic error message that made little sense to me. Long story short, it took about 2+ hours to install the printer on that laptop.)

The next part of the hype machine is the whole "Windows is bad" aspect of things. Apple themselves have been using this in recent marketing techniques, and I pretty much covered it four months ago in my post "iSuck: Debunking the Latest Mac Craze."

An additional segment of the Apple Hype Machine is the whole naming scheme that they use. "iThis", "iThat," what does it all mean? No one really knows. Except that now they have the consumers thinking... "O0o0oh! It has the 'i' prefix. It must be good," because consumers can't think for themselves and are driven by ridiculous marketing techniques.

Which brings me to the final component of the Apple Hype Machine, that being Apple's marketing techniques. Unlike a normal company, Apple does not announce new products prior to their final conception and release. You can buy a 4th generation iPod the day it is announced, unlike say, Windows Vista... which, still is not out, but was announced years ago. Not only is this a bit sketch on Apple's part, it creates this gigantic hype and speculation machine in the (prepare for word to be used that's featured in Maddox article; "If These Words Were People, I Would Embrace Their Genocide") blogosphere and world of Internet forums. People wonder "OMG, like, is this going to be the iPod that can transport me to the moon?! Dude, totally. It has to be, because the press conference invitation mentioned something about free refreshments. And cheese is a refreshment. And the moon is like, totally made of cheese. Yeah, so it has to be right." People draw these completely asinine conclusions and then when the actual press conference happens, it's like, "oh, fakeout, actually, it's about a new MacBook release. Because the first one had major problems. Like the exploding batteries and, oh yeah, the whole 120+ degrees thing under the processor. (I smell a few law suits coming, and their smell is reminiscent of burning flesh.)

This is not to discount the quality products that Apple makes, because like I said, the iPod is unchallenged. I own an iPod, it works great, except for the shitty battery. I think that it is unfair for Apple to put their Hype Machine in full swing for stupid things like having overpriced movies and games on iTunes. I dunno about you, but I definitely want to spend $12.99 on movies that I can only watch on my iPod and computer that are filled with DRM crap, as well as $4.99 games that I can only play on my iPod, with a clickwheel, no less, especially when I can buy a movie legitimately from Best Buy for the same price, copy it to my computer and iPod, and still have a hard copy in case my computer crashes.

Fuck Apple and their hype. Tell me when they develop something that's actually innovative, but does not require 3 re-releases and recalls in order for it not to injure me/kill me/fall apart on me. (Oh, and just as another jab, maybe Windows requires a lot of patches to fix problems, but at least the hardware that I use doesn't require me to buy new versions for it to work without damaging itself.)

Do me a favor, no, do yourself a favor; don't buy this re-release of the iPod, wait until their new shit comes out, because they will no doubt release an updated iPod within the next 3-4 months. And also, boycott those damn movies on iTunes, $12.99 is too much for something made for a 2.5" screen that you don't have full access to.