Dancing with the Stars

I clearly haven't been keeping up with this blog, and there isn't much that would light enough of a fire under my ass to take it back up again, at least not until the semester's over...and then I saw this.


Needless to say, my face liquified like that Nazi who beheld the Ark of the Covenant in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Not in a good way, either, like a killer guitar solo melts face. No, this is like actual face melting: an unmistakable sign of divine, seriously Old Testament displeasure with man's folly.

I'm really at a loss here, so I'll have to go collect myself later and decide whether I have it in me to edit the post and write some more. For now, though, here are a few thoughts:

1) George Lucas sends cease and desist orders to random bars that have marathon Star Wars movie nights, but endorses this? What kind of drugs is he on (apart from the ones he must take daily to prevent his neck-sack from continuing to inflate and engulf his head)?

2) No fucking way Han Solo would be in a mood to dance right before being encased in Carbonite.

3) Where's Vader in all this? He was a humorless dick when he was still Anakin Skywalker (spoiler!); I can't imagine he's down with the hippity hop.

4) If there is one person in the Star Wars universe who should be hosting a dance party, I readily grant that Empire Lando Calrissian, complete with the blue cape of a space pimp, is the only man for the job. That is the one element of this game with which I have no qualms.

5) Han Shot first.

6) Who puts a DJ station in a mineral refinery? Empire makes abundantly clear that Bespin's operations are run by droids and small, likely enslaved alien species, neither of which would merit the courtesy of background music in the workplace. And wouldn't that be distracting? Industrial operations have significant safety concerns to begin with. Start playing some Rhianna, your maiming statistics spike, and next thing you know, the Galactic Empire revokes your permits. Stupid.

7) I like to think that Han Solo would be a better dancer than this.

8) This likely cancelled Chewbacca's life-debt to Han, as Han is clearly already dead inside.

Any points I miss? Feel free to share your insights and condolences for the Star Wars universe in the comments section.

Lionel Richie is the Soundtrack to my Heart

Shockingly, I immediately fell off the 'one blog post a week' wagon as soon as the semester started. I'll make sure to post something more characteristic of my usual long-winded gibberish this weekend, but in the meantime, I thought you might appreciate this video. Not only does it feature spliced together movie dialogue to reproduce the first verse and chorus of "Hello" by Lionel Richie, but it's also a gentle reminder that even at my most manically productive, I will never put my time to such good work as the saint who made this video.

Enjoy.


Hello from ant1mat3rie on Vimeo.

New Years Resolutions, or A List of Things I'll Fail at this Year, as "Life" is Simply Too Broad

Like so many others, I enjoy creating a short list of resolutions at the cusp of the new year, just as the throbbing pain of 2011's parting nut-shot still radiates upward through one's torso and the piercing shriek of the infant 2012 ruptures your ear drum. It's a magical intersection of hope and the can-do spirit of self-improvement, long before reality (re)asserts itself and forcibly reminds us that our fundamental character is etched into our very soul and that we stand doomed to repeat the same sins, foibles, and lapses until the slow rotation of the Earth grinds the planet to dust.

Or, you know, not. Um...How's the new jogging regimen going?

Despite the rather grim turn of my introduction, I do think these resolutions have genuine merit, if only as a moment of self-reflection that considers the topography of our character and responds with a well-meaning mission statement for bettering ourselves that calendar year. And so, in that spirit, I humbly offer my resolutions--in no particular order--for a new year that, my Mayan friends tell me, will see the catastrophic termination of life as we know it.

Play More Golf. I include this not only because I enjoy it, but because it is becoming increasingly apparent with each passing year that my income and standard of living are not sufficiently projecting the aura of white privilege that is quite literally my genetic birthright. I don't know enough about economics to commit white collar crime, so it's this or tennis, and the latter has way too much staccato movement for my taste. Also, it's harder to get blind drunk playing tennis than golf.

Punch Clean through a Man's Chest. This is a standing resolution every year, and obviously needs no further explanation.

Outsource My Paper Grading to a Third World Country. The university is effectively a corporation in many respects (which has become particularly apparent now that I work at a private one), so I think I'll take a cue from many other American corporations and get the dirty manual labor of my profession taken care of by someone else. Bonus points if, like the manufacturers producing Apple's products overseas, this paper grading somehow manages to pollute China's water and air. They aren't going to let us remain the largest economy on the planet by asking nicely, people--most of them can't even understand English.

Accumulate More Obscure Knowledge about Punctuation and Typeface. Just this week I've learned the difference between the en dash and em dash (em dash is longer and is the standard punctuation mark), not to mention why they have those names (they are the length of the letters n and m respectively), as well as the distinction between a hair space and thin space. Because my priorities are irreparably warped, I found this genuinely interesting, and have vowed to learn even more arcane minutia of the printed word. Then I can become a copy editor and finally have a legitimate reason to kill myself. To my readers who are copy editors, I apologize. Yours is an exciting and life-affirming profession. Now get back to combing over the punctuation in the latest Harlequin romance novel. Who else will tell us whether "purple-headed warrior" really needs that hyphen or not?

High-Five More. Those are still cool, right?

Maintain my Luxurious Hairline. This is by no means a shot across the b(r)ow of anyone in particular; I just want to be mistaken for a seventeen year old boy for a few more years, okay?

Embrace my Terrible Taste in Music. I am currently listening to an acoustic cover of "The Freshmen," originally by The Verve Pipe (that's what you smoke meth in, right?), and I genuinely enjoy this rendition of "The Dragonborn Comes," which is itself from the video game Skyrim. I think those pretty well make my point for me.

I think that's enough for now. I'll keep you posted (get it? It's a blog, so...I post...blogs) as each one falls by the wayside. Feel free to add your own in the comment section. I reserve the right to shamelessly steal any that seem even potentially doable, particularly if I don't have to upset my daily routine in accomplishing them. Aim low, right? Ooh...that's another good resolution.