Long time no blog…

Well, hello again, WordPress blog. I had to take a hiatus due to some personal issues. I’ve been considering the fate of this blog for a while now, and I’ve decided to keep it. Yes, like a pregnant teenager who is scared, no longer with the person who got her into this situation (or website, as the case were), and deciding how to continue, I’ve decided to keep my little bastard of a blog. On the plus side, if I ignore this blog CPS won’t be at my door (can you tell I don’t want kids? Sorry mom!)

Anyway, I hope to be updating more often with multiple links in a single post and not much to say on each one, as opposed to giant posts less often.

I may also be deleting some other posts. Let’s face it: some of them are beyond unnecessary.

Rockin’ Finches

This is an installation at The Barbican in London, England. A bit bizarre, but these finches rock!

Reverse Discrimination

Recently there was a story published about how a 36 year old single mother who had sex with a 12 year old boy 191 times being sentenced nine years in jail. Reading this story has brought up an interesting issue in my mind: reverse discrimination, specifically reverse sexism.

The first thing I have to say is that this woman clearly has something wrong with her if she’s actively pursuing 12 year old boys. The article gives the message that this boy most likely wasn’t very consenting to this, with sentences such as “Mr Bennett added: ‘The defendant groomed him by buying him gifts to keep him happy’” sticking out at me. However, when I first saw this article my first thoughts were of the 12 year old boys I knew in middle school and what they were interested in. Overall, though, it seems that in this case the woman took advantage of this boy and had to buy him gifts to bribe him into being happy. So we’re going to assume that this was, in fact, a case of sex with an unwilling victim–more commonly called rape.

And yet the word “rape” is not used once in this article. And then I think of what would happen if a similar case came around where a 36 year old single father had sex 191 times with a 12 year old girl, and the absolute media shit storm that would ensue. In Texas, repeat sexual offenders are classified as capital offenders, meaning they are eligible for the death penalty, and have an absolute minimum sentence of 25 years in prison (source). If this case had happened in Texas, there is a very good chance this man would be put on death row for his crimes.

I realize that this crime happened in England, but regardless, child molestation cases are taken extremely seriously virtually everywhere. However, I believe that, even though I’m not very familiar with England’s court system, a man would have gotten a longer sentence. This woman is 36 years old now–in nine years she’ll be 45: just old enough to qualify as a cougar. Gee, I can’t WAIT until she gets released again!

I think this case is interesting in that it really shows a gender divide as far as sentencing for crimes goes. While I can’t think of any off the top of my head and my Google-fu is broken for the night, I’m sure I’ve heard of cases where a man had sex with a preteen four or five times and got more than ten years in prison for it. This woman had sex with this boy 191 times, and her sentence is nine years.

I believe this case shows that gender discrimination can go both ways, especially with how women tend to get off easier for some crimes. What this woman did was disgusting, and she deserves to spend a much longer period of time behind bars as far as I’m concerned. Unfortunately, women are often portrayed as victims, and sometimes the fact that they can also be perpetrators is missed by some people. So yes, while we should strive for equality between men and women, this also means not constantly treating women like victims in legal settings.

Species Avoids Extinction by Abstaining from Sex for 30 Million Years

Why yes, you did read that title correctly. A certain species of tiny invertebrates called Bdelloid rotifers managed to survive possible extinction from parasites by drying up and blowing away in the wind.

From the article:

“These animals are essentially playing an evolutionary game of hide and seek,” said Sherman. “They can drift on the wind to colonize parasite-free habitat patches where they reproduce rapidly and depart again before their enemies catch up. This effectively enables them to evade biotic enemies without sex, using mechanisms that no other known animals can duplicate.”

You can read the article here. Simply fascinating stuff.

The Horrors of Evolution

While the page titled “Evolution Fucked Your Shit Up” isn’t something I’m proud to be linking to, this is some pretty interesting stuff.

Evolution Fucked Your Shit Up: The World’s 50 Freakiest Animals

Fun fact: on the head of the Human Faced Carp, it looks like a distorted face is screaming (and no, that’s NOT what the “Human Faced” part is referring to).

Book Reviews

The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein
This book is told through the eyes of Enzo, a man’s dog. He tells the story of the troubles his master faces. I really can’t say much more about the book, other than that I absolutely loved this. I cried like a baby at the end. It was beautiful, and it really makes me miss the best dog I’ve ever known–my grandparents’ dachshund, Heidi. I found this book absolutely wonderful and I intend to read it again. It does mention racing (the Formula One kind, not that NASCAR shit), so if you’re not into racing some parts may be confusing. But I highly recommend this book, and immediately passed it on to my mom. Read this book. 9/10

The Gates by John Connolly
This book was entertaining, but overall I’d give it a “meh.” It was humorous and I smiled/laughed at a few parts, but it wasn’t life changing. The plot was a bit confusing at points. However, if you’re looking for an easy read that’s funny, go for it. 5.5/10

I Love You Phillip Morris: A True Story of Life, Love, & Prison Breaks by Steve McVicker
This book tells the story of Steven Russell, a con man who managed to escape from Texas prisons four times to be with his love, Phillip Morris, whom he had met in jail. While it wasn’t exactly what I was hoping for, it gave an eye opening look into the mind of a con man, and how he operates. Steven Russell is, in my mind, an absolute genius. He cooked up schemes that fooled several large companies, and he managed to escape from prison four times by using his own wit and charm. The way he managed to outsmart the prison system is amazing. While it didn’t go as into his relationship with Phillip Morris as I’d have liked (I felt it skipped some major parts that confused me a bit), this book was really interesting. Steven Russell, I tip my hat off to you. Maybe it’s because I’ve been watching Arrested Development lately and watching George Sr. talk about being in jail, but the prison parts really interested me. I recommend this book, definitely. 7.8/10

Brief Movie Reviews

I’ve been watching a lot of movies lately, mainly due to the fact that we upgraded our TV at home from a crappy outdated thing to a 40″ flat screen. I figured I’d go ahead and write brief reviews/my thoughts on them.

Wall-E
I had heard rave reviews about this movie, and was a bit disappointed. It was enjoyable and cute and I would watch it again at a later point, but I felt like it was lacking plot wise. Part of this could be that I’m jaded by Pixar since my “UP” review, but I think that overall the plot seemed kind of transparent and not very strong. Overall, I’d probably give it a 6/10.

Funny People
This movie was also a disappointment to me. I generally like Apatow’s work–LOVED Freaks & Geeks, Undeclared, 40 Year Old Virgin, and Knocked Up. I rented this thinking it would be a comedy and was sorely disappointed. Maybe this has to do with the fact that I’m one of the only people who doesn’t seem to think Adam Sandler is a gift to mankind. I’d say this was more of a drama that had funny aspects. At the end of the movie, I felt like I’d wasted two and a half hours of my life. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t really that enjoyable. I’d liken it to watching Spanish soap operas on TV because nothing else is on–sure, they’re entertaining for the moment, but you’re only watching it because you have nothing better to do. Honestly, probably the most excited I got during this movie was when I saw Bo Burnham in the background and yelled out HEY MOM IT’S BO BURNHAM!! I give this movie a 3.5/10–really, don’t bother seeing this movie unless you want to gargle Adam Sandler’s balls in your mouth… in which case you’ve probably already seen this movie and are preparing to write me a strongly worded comment on how wrong I am.

Relative Strangers
I picked up this movie two or three years ago based on the fact that I basically want to be Kathy Bates when I grow up, and the story behind it. Since this one isn’t one that I’d heard of previous to picking up the box, here’s its IMDB page, and here is a trailer for the movie:

My mom and I really enjoyed this and laughed a lot. We enjoyed it so much we watched it again the next night. It’s essentially every adopted child’s worst fear, played to an extreme. Danny DeVito and Kathy Bates are fantastic. I’d give this movie a 7.5/10.

James Cameron’s Avatar
Why yes, I’m aware that I’m basically one of the last people to see Avatar, thank you for informing me. Anyways, I saw Avatar last week in 3D and was really impressed… but not with the 3D. The movie was two and a half hours long–maybe ten minutes of that were cool in 3D. Aside from that, the plot was solid, and the visuals were outstanding. As a former film nerd, I can say that I was awe struck at the amount of work that went into making this movie. I did spend a lot of the movie thinking “Wow, this is just like Fern Gully!” Essentially, if you’re one of the few people who hasn’t seen it yet, it’s worth sitting through two and a half hours. I also wish I was ten feet tall and blue now. 8/10.

Movie review: Disney/Pixar’s “UP”

Tonight my mother and I were bored and decided to look through our TV’s On Demand menu. I had continually heard good things about Disney/Pixar’s “UP,” and we decided to watch it.

Let me tell you, readers: this was an absolutely fantastic movie. It was funny, sad, and touching. Here’s a summary without giving too much away:

Carl Frederickson met his true love, Ellie, when he was a young boy who wanted adventure. They were married for many years. Now Carl is old and Ellie has passed away, and he decides to go on an adventure by inflating a bunch of balloons and using his house to go to South America like he and Ellie always wanted. Unfortunately, he accidentally brought along a young Wilderness Explorer who isn’t exactly the perfect scout. They make it to South America, where they meet Carl and Ellie’s childhood idol, who is in search of a rare bird. A talking dog named Dug is involved. Awesomeness ensues.

An aside: I really am a nerd and have several children’s movies in my DVD collection. Some of my favorites (that I will admit are also some of my favorite movies ever) include Babe, The Adventures of Milo and Otis, Matilda, The Great Mouse Detective, My Neighbor Totoro, and literally everything Wallace and Gromit. As you can tell, I do have a thing for GOOD kids’ movies, so watching this wasn’t too far outside what I would consider watching. At the same time, you can probably see that most of these movies are older–I haven’t been too much of a fan of most of the more recent kids’ movies.

Even though this is a newer kids’ movie, I greatly enjoyed it. I highly recommend it to anyone, but I do warn: I was crying in the first ten minutes, and apparently this is not an uncommon reaction to the first part of the movie. It’s absolutely fantastic, though. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a movie that great. Overall, I’d give it a 9.2/10.

Sheep Gives Birth to Human-Faced Lamb

There really isn’t anything witty I can say in response to this.

Well, I’ll quote the article at any rate:

The governor of the province where the ugly goat was born said that the little goat was the fruit of unnatural relationship between the female goat and a man.

“This incident is very shocking. It is my first time to see such an evil thing. It is really embarrassing,” he reportedly said. “The head belongs to a man while the body is that of a goat. This is evident that an adult human being was responsible. Evil powers caused this person to lose self control. We often hear cases of human beings who commit bestiality but this is the first time for such an act to produce a product with human features,” he added.

The mutant creature was hairless. Local residents said that even dogs were afraid to approach the bizarre animal.

The locals burnt the body of the little goat, and biologists had no chance to study the rare mutation.

Okay, granted, that thing is creepy as hell… but burning it? So sad scientists couldn’t study it. Hopefully next time one of these is born, it will be in a more developed nation where locals don’t kill the animal, claiming it is evil and sent by the devil. Unfortunately, this excludes many parts of rural America as well.

Doctor Who: The Demise of Ten

So. Doctor Who. I’ve only watched the new series, but my favorite Doctor is clearly Nine/Eccleston. I’ve never been totally nuts about David Tennant’s portrayal–I just didn’t find him as fantastic (shoot me) as Christopher Eccleston. Towards the end though, I will say I’ve warmed up to David Tennant.

So here are my thoughts on Doctor Who’s “The End of Time: Parts 1 & 2″