pop (15sec) + rap (30 sec) + pop (15 sec) + rap (until 15sec before the end) + pop (15 sec)

For example:

What’s so pleasing about a man yelling out the lines to a badly composed poem? What happened to melodies, to an actual tune, to the background instruments? Sure, the beat from the big bass drum is nice, and quite catchy, yes. Is it worth three minutes of wasted time? As far as I can tell, the only music that’s really music these days comes from movie soundtracks, because you just can’t have the dramatic effects without an accompanying orchestral arrangement.

Come on… just think about Inception’s soundtrack

It’s not fancy, it’s not complex. But without it, would Inception be nearly as good?

Today’s music is a combination of a drum set and autotune. There’s very little redeeming about it, and yet it still is a huge industry in this country… What’s wrong with the world?

Also, somebody want to tell me what the point of all the DRM stuff is about? It’s not like they’re ever going to get rid of the analog hole… It’s not really possible to, either. So long as there’s a mic input and a speaker output, a crossover cable will easily get you a full recording. If thats the case, why bother? People who like the artist will buy the songs, all others will use YouTube or torrent it.

It’s more than a little bit intriguing, no? It’s all about perspective.

Sample video:

Yes, my sister’s piano skills could use a little bit of improvement, but that’s not the point of the video. The video is slightly lower quality than the original, due to the flash reencoding. It’s good enough, anyways.

One strange thing about this camera is that it records 720x480px files, but the sensor itself is 640×480. Thus all files must be converted to 640×480.

8-9-10

To compound that, this post is published at 11:12 AM, so the full date and time would be…

8-9-10 11:12AM

8, 9, 10, 11, 12 =)

Happy sequential date day!

Of course, when I get really really bored (rarely ever happens), I pull out a … video game (xD). Lately I’ve been playing TF2 again, as people came back to the servers.

I was also bored enough to learn how to play “River Flows In You”. The below mp3 is the second time I’ve played it.

Download

Philmont’s coming up soon as well, I’m leaving at 3:45AM Friday (annoyingly early). It should be a fun 14 days, lots of hiking and other activities (black powder?). Unfortunately, it cuts in the middle of my internship time, which is a pretty major annoyance. Hopefully I’ll be able to make up the work later.

Unlike most normal pens (rollerballs and ballpoints), fountain pens utilize capillary action to move the ink to the paper. This is facilitated by an interesting looking nib, but it creates a nice, smooth line. The characteristic ink marks of a fountain pen are recognized by many as “calligraphy”, as in the time modern “calligraphy” was the norm, dip pens and fountain pens were the most common.

These are the parts of a normal fountain pen:

As you can see, its not quite what you’re probably used to.

A pen-to-pen comparison:

It’ll be what I’m writing my APUSH notes and such with, and hopefully will last some time (until I get a better one!)

I’m not too sure if we’ll actually try using these during the Philmont trek, but they should be a good backup, just in case something happens to the primary white gas stoves. I tested one out today, it works reasonably well:

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Boil time for 1L of water was approximate 5 minutes and 30 seconds; for one can of Progesso soup, 3 minutes and 15 seconds. The fuel reservoir held about 25 minutes’ worth of fuel, about 2 fl. oz.

Conclusion of this experiment seems to be a success, with no major mishaps.

That’s the finished product. Usage is as such:

1. Hold the corner shown in the image
2. Swing the side with open loops (left, in this case) quickly through the air, making sure the loops catch and have resistance

Instructions:

1. Start with a normal, preferably 8.5″ x 11″

   

2. Make one crease as shown, left to right

   

3. Make another crease on the other axis

   

4. Unfold and lay flat

   

5. Make a fold from the side (left or right) to the center

   

6. Fold the center fold in.

   

7. Fold it in half

   

8. Unfold and refold so that the flap is on the outside

   

9. Pull the flap diagonally so that just a corner sticks out, then hold the noisemaker as shown

   

It’s pretty interesting, and very, very simple.

An attempt at a poem, inspired by some events in my life and others.