Yup, I'm going to try out LiveJournal for a while too. So, here's the link.

Here, I mean.

There's one on the side too, so stop on by. Of course, if it sucks, I'll be back here.

A couple of days ago, (3?) I found myself watching the Batman movie; the old one starring Adam West. Suddenly, I found that I understood virtually everything about it. I know what the creators were thinking when they made/ designed the show. I knew what each actor had been selected for. The show suddenly made sense! So, here it is.

The creators: The creators of this series HATED the Batman comics. They would read the comics and call Batman constantly. "Oh man, so he's got his own plane? I bet he's got his own space shuttle too.", one would say. "No man," the other would rejoin, "he's got his own space program. Man, Batman is such a dick. I bet he'd call it BatNASA and sue the government for copyright infringement." Now, somehow, these guys actually were able to make good and turn their ideas into a real television show.
The show is generally viewed one of two ways. Firstly, the incorrect way, it is viewed as a crappy, campy show. Hopelessly out of date, they believe it to be nothing more than another installment of 60s pop-cultural trash. The second way it is commonly viewed is as a comedic take on Batman. They think someone said "Let's make a funny version of Batman." These are the people who "got" the show when it came out. They realized it was not to be taken seriously. They did not, however, understand, the true motivation behind its creation. The guys were just harsh haters and they made it into a show at the perfect time in television history. I mean, at the time, what else was on? I Love Lucy reruns, Gilligan's Island or The Love Boat? I don't really know, but the point is, at the time it was a show on TV. They didn't have, like, Kung Faux or what-have-you. It was a television show. They really pulled it off well.
The creators had some really awesome ideas. For example, they really seem to play it that Batman and Robin are just doing their job. Literally. This is their job. They are policemen, but total all-stars, so they can basically just get the police to do whatever they say, and they can bring in their own personal bat-items to aid them. It's really funny, for example, that they are just flying their helicopter in the middle of the day. The creators couldn't have really pulled it together, though, without their cast. The cast members were selected for the following reasons.

Adam West: West understood that it was a comedy. In addition to speaking and acting weird anyways, he got that he wasn't supposed to be taking it seriously and played it deadpan for laughs.

Burt Ward: Ward totally understood where the creators were coming from. He got that it was harsh bat-callouts and he played it to the hilt. Robin is just hilarious with his riddle-solving, indignant determination and Cleaver-era moralizing.

All the big villains: These guys were actually pretty famous! Caesar Romero? Burgess Meredith? What were relatively big stars doing on this show? They were there, more or less, as "special guests". They didn't HAVE to be doing this. They could be doing serious work, but, this might be fun and their public would like it. So they came on and they played it jokingly, like they were just having fun and really playing up the role and no one was expecting much from them. They just had to be on the show. It didn't matter how their acting was or anything. That's the attitude and feel the creators wanted. Oh, Alfred was famous too.

The moral here is that the old Batman show is simply the harshest hate against the concept of Batman that actually got over on television as a legit show. It's pretty funny. Now you know and knowing is half the battle.

Well, I'm thinking about trying out LiveJournal. Apparently, against its Friends system none can excel and it might be better in general. Who knows? I'll try it out anyways.

Let me tell you something about French cartoons, by which I mean original animation not adapted from another medium. (Tintin, Asterix, you're off the hook in both senses of the phrase)

It sucks.

I'm nearly certain you've encountered this trash in the past. Classical atrocities such as "Albert the 5th Musketeer", "Robinson Sucroe" and modern travesties like "Kid Paddle" and "The Tofus" ring a bell? For your sake, I pray not, but for the sake of this entry, of course they do. I remember Jon breaking down how Matthew Cheung looked like a French-Canadian cartoon character. Classic, and really strangely accurate, though I can't say why. (No disrespect intended. The guy can seriously mirk a Neil Young impression.) French cartoons can be quickly identified within seconds with this convenient check-list:

1) Do the characters talk with unusual rhythm or breathtaking rapidity? ***NOTE: THIS POINT ALSO APPLIES TO SPEED RACER THOUGH IT IS NOT FRENCH***
2) Are the words actually synched quite well to the movement of the mouths?
3) Is there at least one very short character/ very tall character?
4) Do the jokes make very little sense or does the humour rely heavily on farce or puns?
5) Do the scenes have painful wipes between them, like Home Improvement?
6) Does it suck?

It's probably a French cartoon. They are pretty much unmistakable and certainly overabundant. Of course, english North American animation has more than it's fair share of proverbial venomous water snakes in its rice paddy. I would be glad to break them down with you some day.

There is only one funny thing I have seen in a French cartoon that I have seen, and that was an episode of "The Tofus" I ran past where I just happened to hear a character yell "I hate you, cracker!" Killer. Unintentional though, I think, so it doesn't count or matter.

Oh! Reboot is on, from the bit where Megabyte does the intro 'cause it's Megaframe and Bob is lost in the Web. No, Enzo isn't what's-his-face yet. What a sweet show.

And cripes, for that matter. My blog has probably never gone this long without an update. Well, VSmack's got a new blog over at LiveJournal, though I'm not sure if that's the definitive article yet, so the link remains unaltered.

Work is pretty sweet, as far as work goes. I'm a reg'lar cashier, but I also tell the other cashiers what to do, so that's decent. It's definitely not a career I'd pursue (no way, eh?) but for summer work, it's the best I've had so far.

Hmm, what else? Despite the long break, it's been mostly the same stuff. Work, music, friends, etc. Though, of course, there is nothing wrong with that. Anyways, check it.

Matt's B-day was pretty interesting. We headed down to the beach as the sun went down, but, for reasons that are unclear to me, we walked (read: climbed/trekked/mountaineered) along the rocky and ungroomed shoreline of Lake Ontario instead of following the road. Loaded down with a pizza, a backpack full of bottles and handicapped by insufficient light, it was pretty harrowing, but, man, it was fun. Worked up a good sweat. Then, on the beach, we proved our worth by quickly summoning a mighty conflagration of flame upon which we burnt offerings of marshmallows and some of my hair accidentally to our Pagan gods. The bottles were emptied and a good time was had by all. Mark gave the remains of a found watermelon to an interloping simian, much to my delight. (Upon further review, I love that sentence.) Jerm and I unwisely fashioned a crude sandwichlike object out of bread, ham, French dressing a Krapt Single and mayonaisse. Matt's basement was, as always, cold and wet for somereason. It was a good night.

Oh, and my B-day, you ask? Friday. The plan is still pretty sketchy, but going to see Willy Wonka is definitely on there. Catch a date, so to speak. That's my childhood movie, and you'd be wise to bet that my hypothetical children will watch it. I'm not going to speculate about it now, but I have high hopes, and Ash and I have had a date for it for a while, so it's locked down.

More later, here are my parting shots.

-The salvia is growing really quite well.
-Coach McGurk always has his whistle. Nice touch.
-The Shakespearian insult "rumpfed" is nice.
-I want a good rock opera. A good, hard rock opera. It was such a sweet format and it just got ruined by trash.

Well, to start, I've chosen my courses for next year. Here they are.

Statistics for Psychology II
Psychology Research Laboratory I
Introduction to Developmental Psychology
Introduction to Abnormal Psychology
The Human Brain
Memory and Cognition
Clinical Neuropsychology Laboratory
Scientific Communication in Psychology
Environmental Hazards
Mammalian Physiology.

80% of my courses are psych; pretty astonishing, but then, I'm pretty good at it.

Also, I got my Salvia clone yesterday. According to the interesting Polish fellow that sold it to me, the plants don't heal from injuries. They just cut their losses and regenerate. So from that perspective, the couple of clearly dead leaves are a good thing. Immediate harvest and healthy leaves on the way. But, who know how long it'll be until it's ready. It's a little complicated to care for it, so I hope I don't kill it.

Strange that VSmack would refer to Mongolian idiocy in a recent comment. The inventor of the marshmallow (the confection, not the flower or whatever) was named Archibald Query (pronounced "kwairy") and that struck me as an immensely appropriate name for the good Doctor of Phrenology and Diagnostic Miscellanea.

Anything else to declare?

I keep forgetting the words "noisome" and "perfidy".
Curly from The Three Stooges really is pretty funny.
Bad News Bears does not need a remake.

Training is done at work. I think you already know, but I'm on cash rather than produce now, still shift manager, so that's actually better for me, since I don't need to get my hands wet and cold and hear that horrific squeaking noise all the time. Man, CBC Radio One is practically all I listen to, but they have some really whack shit on there, very frequently. Right now, there's this person singing who, honestly, sounds like an eight year old with their mouth full singing some trash about fairies or something accompanied only by an autoharp and an incompetent percussionist on, I think, a toy drum. This flat out sucks and is not unusual fare on this station. Damn Canadian content quota. We need less performers and more good ones. Canadian music is pretty sad, really. Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Gordon Lightfoot et al., you are excepted from that statement and I love you for it. Oh, now they're interviewing carnies on the radio. This is a good time to break this off.

Man, that was an incredible concert. It turned out mein vader wanted to see the concert too, so we drove up.

We got around to the HVM signing and after waiting in line for a while, I got up to the table to meet the guys. (Of course, only Trewavas, Rothery and Hogarth were there, but that's more than good enough.) I'm sure I didn't say anything too interesting to them; I was mildly befuddled and am not the sort to rehearse an address. I do remember that I said that I was "very glad to meet you all" which I thought was very sincere and kind of sweet. H really struck me with his interest and sincerity. What a great guy. So, I got my preorder Marbles album signed by the three of them making it probably the coolest thing I own.

Also, I was interviewed on the way out by MusicPlus (the French MuchMusic) and was disappointed with the content of the interview. But I got to say some glowing things about Marillion and I was certainly able to elevate the level of discourse on that Don Karnage- playing- fill- in- the- rest- of-this.

But that concert was just fantastic. The performances were incredible; Rothery was totally shredding and it was practically mystifying to see him make Ocean Cloud come out of his guitar. Hogarth too was beyond belief. He did a better-than-album version of "Cover my Eyes (Pain and Heaven)", and a song that I hadn't heard before called "Answering Machine" that also really stood out for me. All in all, it was the best concert I have ever been to. Damn, I wish I had a recording of it, the music was so good.

Now, for the social bits. When I got there I almost immediately found Conor's dad up by the bar who told me that Van Smack himself made it afterall. So those guys had grabbed some great seats on some sort of oddly arranged steps, and while I had to stand it provided a great spot for chilling and rapping, which we did. But! At the encore, these cretins were yelling for "Beautiful" but the sheer might of the Bulldogz won out and they played "Made Again". Wow. Two encores and one stage redress later, I was astounded to find that the crowd had picked up on The Salute. It's almost like hearing a crowd shout your name. I was blown away.

Looks like i'm going to be going to the Montreal Marillion show afterall! I'm going with my Dad for a Father's Day thing. He's not really down, per se, with Marillion, but he likes the music so it will not be unenjoyable or lost on him. I think we're going to do it with no sleeps. Once again, I'm glad to be going. I hope to meet Mr. H and the crew and maybe get my pre-order Marbles signed.

Also, I got my PSP today, with Lumines. That game and moreover that system is fantastic. I really hope they play this system to it's full potential. GPS, internet access, wireless file sharing. Man. Let's do it Sony and online community! 

On that Chappelle where they play the guitar for white people:

The "chic Manhattan restaurant" is such a dive. It's spacious, yet with normal sized furniture. I know it wasn't a real restaurant, but, man, it was really lame, for serious.

The bit where Chappele yells through the microphone is very very funny, and also convincing. It could be a real song! Also, the "eyes-rolled-back-semi-robot-guy is awesome".

I am absolutely shocked that the last entry garnered zero comments. I think it's the most shocking thing ever seen on this or any other blog. Maybe, though, it's that everyone was at a loss for words. I certainly was. I really, even now, barely know what to say about it.

So, it's on, biatch! The trip to Montreal, that is. I have my ticket, which must be picked up at the box office and my train ticket has been reserved. This will be great. I'm glad I'll finally have seen Marillion, and maybe met them at HMV?