Trying to live

Life has been rather unique these past view weeks. For my loyal audience of three, you know that I've graduated and am hoping to move beyond the borders of the land of coffee and broken dreams. To coincide these unique events, I'm churchless and one of my closest friends Casey has moved back to Arizona for a little while. Needless, to say life is going to be different. To compensate for the lack of educational motivation I've been tracking down websites that will publish me (expect a few more film reviews on some other sites in the next view days and weeks). I have a new motivation and sense of urgency in my desire to write (today I even began mapping my eventual book The Gospel According to Horror Movies). I'm rediscovering my love for music (I saw As Cities Burn play the other night, and their new album continues to move me). I've even begun to branch out of my usual daily gang to meet some new faces, though I'm still not ready to return to church yet. Crossroads are weird thing. I hate them yet can't avoid them. I know we're supposed to like change, but I can't remember the last change that I've actually been okay with. Everything's always forced. For the love it would be nice to have some stability. Either way, life is good...so's TV.

A Good Day

Today was a pretty damn good day. I did, however, have to go to work, but I won't let that spoil anything. I got my summer grades today, and the final scores for my grad career are A, A, A, and A-, brining my GPA to 3.63. I also have had some articles published online at the websites Getyourtournament.com and rednow.com. Me and Casey are over half-way through season six of 24 and just finished book two of Avatar: The Last Airbender. Life is pretty good. All I need is a real job and a real girlfriend. Until then, Buffy the Vampire Slayer here I come.

Either than that stuff, life is interesting. I've been trying to read Culture Jam but it's just no an interesting book. The concepts are fine but the practical application isn't there and the pessimism is a major hindrance to motivation. On top of that, I can't find the book. I'm hoping to start reading Dallas Willard's The Divine Conspiracy and finish reading Teaching to Transgress. I've begun mapping out my musical (my emo love story musial). I'm writing some other articles for rednow.com and trying to get some others published on other websites. The diet is gonna start any day now, and hopefully subbing will go through soon so I can quit Starbucks (and hopefully find my soul again). Life is good.

The ultimate Shoot 'em Up film

I caught an afternoon film. Guy films have always been their own breed of gore, sex, and "guy" stuff. Shoot 'em Up takes everything cliche about shoot 'em up films and makes us laugh at the entire genre. I'm a slave to Clive Owen's films. Paul Giamatti is always great. And the amazing Monica Bellucci is incredibly hot (plus she was born in Perugia, Italy, the city I studied in for five weeks). This is truly the ultimate shoot 'em up film. Everything about the was too cliche and predictable to be unintentional. Owens plays Mr. Smith, the unlikely and resourceful hero who often states what he "hates" about America. Giamatti is the hitman we never thought he could be. And Bellucci is the caring prostitute. You know you're in for a histerical movie when the first gun fight features several hitman trying to shoot at Mr. Smith while he tries to deliver a baby. A major climax in the film occurs during Owens and Bellucci's sexual climax with another gun battle-but they don't stop having sex but, as one of Owens' oneliners states, redefine blowing your load.

Resourcefulness has always been a major element of shoot 'em up films. In a scene in a gun factory, Mr. Smith sets up the ultimate booby trapped guns that just require the pull of a rope to take out 10 guys with one tug. Another great scene occurs when Owen holds four bullets in his knuckles and sticks his hand into a fire, shooting the bullets into the man that should have killed him rather than taunted him.

The movie is half gun battles, half oneliners. Everything is intentionally rediculous. People either saw it as cliche or brilliant. Film critic Richard Roeper hated the film, but that's to be expected from a critic that has no taste. When the intro is simply Clive Owen sitting on a bench eating a carrot and then muttering "fuck" before getting into a gun battle, ya know that this is not a film that needs character development, plot, or abstract symbolism. The medium is the message. A british dude bitchin' about society while killing everyone around him is the perfect way to critique violent American culture.

Shoot 'em Up is quite the awesome movie. It felt like Crank and Planet Terror with the tribute feel of Kill Bill. Thanks to Army of Darkness, farce films became a more confusing phenomana. Farce could still be enteraining. Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead are histerical, but they functions as films even you don't get the joke. The canon of Sam Raimi has reached its climax through Shoot 'em Up. It's still a good action film, though if you don't get the joke it's more insulting than The Transporter 2 and Bad Boys 2.

Grad school is at an end

September 14, 2007. This is the day all of my work is due for the summer quarter. And this is it. Next Friday marks the conclusion of my Masters program at Fuller Theological Seminary. I decided to take four classes this summer (you're only recomended to take three), and I have the work for two of them left to do. Next week I'll be turning in small papers on the films The Fountain, Pan's Labyrinth, Transformers, and The Hills Have Eyes, along with two book reviews and a 50-page magazine about Obey art that will consist of roughly 20 regular-sized pages of writing. Hopefully the film articles will end up online, as I am trying to get them published on websites. I am done with everything but the Pan's Labyrinth article and a little of the writing of the magazine. It's weird to know that after next Friday I can read whatever the hell I want. I can write to write. I do plan on finding conferences to present at and will continue to write, but I will have to motivate myself. I'm gonna be done with school for at least two years. That's fucking strange. I think I may go insane.

Gears of War is my unofficial life

So I've been playing a shitload of Gears of War lately. I can't focus on my homework and the only way to unwind is to play a video game with more blood than Evil Dead 2. There are two xbox 360s in the house, thus we've been doing a lot of online gaming. I don't care how nerdy it is. I don't care how much people think I'm wasting my time. Some people shop, jog, and pray. I play video games. I'm okay with it.

Summer Reading List

I just checked out Sojourners' website and looked at Jim Wallis' summer reading list-it inspired me to create a similar suggested list:

Culture Jam: How to Reverse American's Suicidal Consumer Binge-and Why we Must by Kalle Lasn (I'm reading this now, pretty interesting)
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
Performing the Faith: Bonheoffer and the Practice of Nonviolence by Stanley Hauerwas
A Black Theology of Liberation by James Cone
Why White Kids Love Hip-Hip: Wangstas, Wiggers, Wannabes, and the New Reality of Race in America by Bakari Kitwana
Body, Soul, or Spirited Bodies? by Nancy Murphy
The Gospel According to America: A Meditation on a God-Bless, Christ-Haunted Idea by David Dark
Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom by bell hooks
Revolution by George Barna
Choke by Chuck Palahniuk

I can sub!

I got my CBET results back, I can now become a substitute teacher. I am one step closer to quitting Starbucks, thus making life a happier one. I've been excited about this idea for a while now for several reasons. I'll be able to make enough money for rent, food, health insurance, and whatever else. I can make own schedule-work just enough to pay bills or work more. Subbing will allow me the time off I need to visit people for weekends or whatever. Plus, I won't have to work on weekends. Lastly, subbing will give me a little bit of teaching experience, helping me prepare to do adjunct teaching in the spring. Things are happening...