For lunch today I went to Mcdonalds because I like their sweet tea. When I got there I found out that they were out of sweet tea and it was going to be 20 minutes before they had more. So I just had to go with Hi-C orange. It was pretty good too. MLIA

and

Today on my way to work I noticed the “low fuel” warning on the dashboard. I pulled over and got some gas. MLIA

These, to me, were funny! I could relate to them, and they gave me some hope that not everyone’s life sucked. There was a problem, though. I got bored. Quickly. These posts were amusing at first, but after time, they’d pretty much described every aspect of my day. So, MLIA evolved. The newer entries are as such:

Today, while ringing up a customer for his take-out, I noticed that the name on his card was “Bruce Wayne”. I froze for a moment before whispering, “What are you?” Without missing a beat, he responded, “I’m Batman.” MLIA

and

Today, at the theme park where I work, I loaded a family on the paddle boat ride. A few minutes later, chilling on the dock, I hear the five-year-old son burst out into “I’m on a Boat”. The rest of the family, and eventually most of the other riders, myself and my coworker, joined in. We did the whole song. MLIA.

These newer MLIAs are a lot funnier, certainly, but the fact remains: these lives are not average. People are starting to exaggerate how “average” their life is, and it effectively becomes not-average. The new stories are spectacular, and I really wish they would happen to me. Things of this sort are not average.

The MLIA community found itself faced with a problem, it could remain average, and become boring, or it could evolve, as it has, and become no-longer average. I’m not exactly pleased with their decision, and to be honest, I think they should’ve foreseen this when they bought their domain name. It Made My Day is one of the newest single serving sites, which almost perfectly copies MLIA, but the name is much more descriptive of what the stories truly entail.

Love you all. I’ll have a post tomorrow.

This review was published today in my school’s magazine, Nexus.

The Lonely Island's new album, Incredibad

Have you ever been in the age-old situation, in which a reason for celebration is coming up, be it a birthday, anniversary, or perhaps Valentine’s Day, and realized that you don’t have a gift for your significant other? Justin Timberlake (who single-handedly brought sexy back, so you know he’s to be trusted) has a suggestion. First, he says, “Cut a hole in a box.” Next, Timberlake suggests you “put your junk in the box” before finally prompting her to “open the box.” It’s a dick in a box! This Saturday Night Live classic, Dick In A Box, along with many others, can be found on the new album, Incredibad, by The Lonely Island.

The first thing that struck me about this album is the extensive list of guest artists, from T-Pain to Jack Black to Norah Jones, and more. At its heart, this album is a comedy album, but it’s a really good comedy album. The songs are predominantly rap parodies, and never fail to elicit laughs. I’d go as far as to say it blows comedy artist Weird Al out of the water. If you’re a fan of the Flight of the Conchords, you’re sure to like what The Lonely Island’s come up with.

In “I’m on a Boat,” Samberg, T-Pain, and Schaffer rap about…well, being on a boat. It sounds silly, I know, but it’s meant to poke fun at what other rappers sing about today. Soulja Boi sings about dancing, and Chamillionaire sings about driving, but somehow it’s not so funny when they do it. Samberg sings, “I’m on a boat / I’m on a boat / Everybody look at me ’cause I’m sailing on a boat.” This is one of a couple songs off the album that, I feel, is best paired with the video.” Once seen, it’s hilarious. I feel like if I were to only listen to the song, my response would’ve been more of an “okay, great” versus the fit of girlish giggles I was sent into. The first time I watched the video, I laughed myself to tears. I couldn’t help feeling that the low point of the album was We Like Sportz. Other than that song, the album is very nicely produced, but Sportz felt “You-Tubey;” amateur, and low-budget.

The album, unfortunately, isn’t all new material. As I mentioned before, The Lonely Island has actually been around for a little while, and are responsible for such classics as Dick in a Box and the 2005 Internet phenomenon, Lazy Sunday (“we love that chronic-what?-cles of Narnia!”). These songs, however, contribute to a sense of familiarity, as well as providing a pretty good idea of what to expect (if you’ve heard them before).

Overall, I’d give the album a 9 out of 10. The lyrics are brilliant, the guest-singers are sure to appeal to any taste in music, but it takes a certain sense of humor to “get it,” and it’s hard to imagine what I’d think of the songs had I not seen the accompanying videos. I strongly urge you, if nothing else, to check out The Loney Island on YouTube. They’ve gone as far as to make videos for five songs, and Lazy Sunday can be found by searching Hulu-copyright restrictions prevent this one from making YouTube.

It doesn’t make a great deal of sense, the way they’ve implemented it. My family shows up under my basic information, which I don’t see as being that important, honestly. My brother is not as vital to who I am as my girlfriend. Sorry, Ben, that’s just how it is. Now the relationship status makes good sense. It could, concievably, change fairly often, and it makes for good gossip. In 10 years or so, after I’ve left highschool, and my friends start to get married for real (we’ll come back to this), it’ll be nice to see if any of the highschool couples actually end up getting hitched. But Ben’s always going to be my brother. Randy Malamud is always going to be my father, as Wendy Simonds will alwaye be my mother. There’s no reason for that to be with the rest of my chronically changing information. Consistency-wise, it doesn’t make sense.

Personally, what I’d like to see is a new Family section, possibly with a nice, visualized tree. (Now ain’t that original!) At least, if they’re going to go down this family path for serious. They could also go about adding cousins, uncles, aunts, there’s a lot more to my family than parents and siblings.

One last concern of mine, that I told you I’d bring back up, is what’s happened with marriages. Those darned kids, mockin’ the holy institution of marriage! That’s, right, blog-readers, people are listing themselves as “married” on Facebook without actually being in a serious relationship! What blasphemy! To be honest, I couldn’t care less, but my stepmom’s quite disappointed to have found out that her and my father’s facebook marriage might not be taken seriously. I can’t wait for friends to start claiming other friends as brothers and, in time, children.

I’ve still yet to see if Facebook would let me list my girlfriend as a sister. If not, I’m sure there are a great deal of families out there ready to raise a shit-storm.

family

]]> http://jakeforthewin.com/wp/?feed=rss2&p=98 0 http://jakeforthewin.com/wp/?p=92 http://jakeforthewin.com/wp/?p=92#comments Fri, 24 Apr 2009 18:58:52 +0000 admin http://jakeforthewin.com/wp/?p=92 I’ve been doing quite a bit of work for my school’s fashion program, UrbanCouture, recently. I thought I’d put up two flyers for shows I’ve made, just to show off. I also put together an amazing program for the upcoming yearly show (which if this post garters any hits, I’d suggest you get tickets to!), but that’s a bit under-wraps at the moment. But yeah, here’s some work to show off, since I haven’t put any up recently. Enjoy!

P.S. I’ll put up photos of the program, once it gets back from the printer.

By the way, I swear a lot in here. If that’s not up your alley, I advise you to stop here. Ok, I tried.

I’m not a vegetarian. In case you hadn’t figured that out through my previous posts about corned beef and roast chicken, let it be known. I love meat. There, I said it. And don’t get me wrong. I’m fine with vegetarians. My girlfriend’s a vegetarian (for health reasons, though), and I’ve got to hand it to them, they’re one hard-willed crowd. I think that if I could eat Indian vegetarian all the time, I could do it. But as it is, I can’t. And Indian vegetarian food is hella greasy. So health-wise, it wouldn’t pay off. I’d only be doing it for moral reasons, and like I said, I don’t give a shit about eating meat.

My dad’s got a couple of friends. They’re vegan. Yeah, I know. That’s just fucking insane, right? NO animal products, WHAT SO EVER. No honey. No milk. Insane. They kinda make exceptions when they go out, but we’ve been trying to keep it pretty strictly vegan. So, we hit up Soul Veg. I thought it could be good, these are people who live, breathe, and fuck vegan, they’ve probably got their shit down by now. Sorry, to all you good folks in the Midwest, for saying fuck so much. Onwards! We get to the restaurant, it’s HELLA hot. Maybe their AC is out, I dunno. But it was about 400 something degrees in there, like the devil’s fucking cunt. And their water doesn’t have ice. Vegans eat ice, no? Service was shit, too. I got the same experience at the Sunflower Cafe, which I didn’t love at the time, but looks much nicer now compared to Soul Vegetarian. It took about half an hour for them to acknowledge our party of 9. Maybe that was part of the problem, maybe not. 15 minutes after ordering, we got salads. Complimentary, at least. But only half-decent. The dressing tasted funny, I’m nearly positive their garlic was fucked up. A simple oil-vinegar would’ve been fine AND VEGAN, but no. They had to take it that extra step. Not to mention, the salad wasn’t really anything special. The lettuce wasn’t great, the carrots and tomatoes seemed like an afterthought, and it didn’t seem well prepared. More of a, “let’s give them something to keep them quiet.”

Next came my soup, which wasn’t bad, actually, probably the best thing I got that night. Still, it tasted highly of garlic, and a bit funky, further proving my hypothesis about their garlic. It was split-pea soup, by the way, something I haven’t had in a while. It was fine. Decent, but I’m sure my mother could do way better, and for less, too. My main course was a veggie burger. Not their famed Garvey burger, but a lentil patty. It could’ve actually been really good, except for one thing. They used ketchup. If there’s one thing you can do to loose ALL of my culinary respect, it’s to slather your burger with ketchup. The stuff tastes shit, it’s too damn sweet and doesn’t taste anything like tomatoes, and it says to me, “I’m not confident in my food, so I’m gonna go ahead and cover up whatever taste it may’ve had with some fucking sugar shit, eh?” Rediculous. Giving ketchup on the side is one thing, for those who like it. But putting it right fucking on there, without any prior warning, really? The burger effectively tasted like shit, a flavorless lump of something.

I had to duck out of the restaurant, and wasn’t really in the mood for any of their Ice-Kream for dessert. I had a spoonful of my stepmom’s, and thought it was alright. It was the coldest thing I’d had all night, a relief in the middle of fucking April, but didn’t blow my mind. My mind was far from being blown at that point. I tasted around, during dinner. The aforementioned stepmother ordered some country-fried “steak,” which again was mediocre, but didn’t taste anything like steak. The cornbread was alright, but I could make vegan cornbread easily.

I was left feeling overall unimpressed, disappointed, and frustrated that I’d spent the evening at a simply mediocre restaurant versus, perhaps, eating ramen at home, watching food network, and touching myself. I think that would’ve been a much more productive and enjoyable use of a night than eating at Soul Vegetarian. With all due credit, my brother insists I order “like a meat-eater,” well surprise! I am. Maybe if you’re a vegetarian, or rather, a vegan, deprived of any animal product for years on end, you might enjoy Soul Vegetarian. But if, in fact, you’re only a vegetarian, with the moral capacity to consume dairy and other various animal products, stay the fuck away. I could see them becoming a successful business, operating as a vegan ice Kream parlor, but anything short of that is a waste of time, money, and real estate in my opinion.

Conclusion: don’t go there, unless you really need to impress some vegans. And even if so, be cautious, if their taste buds are still intact.

As I mentioned, I’m not all that into the clothing scene. I don’t really get it. I shop at target, which is really good enough for me. Sure, it’s slightly unsettling sitting in algebra, the two students on eather side of me rocking the same shirt I am, but at the end of the day, a shirt is a shirt. About a year ago, I made good friends with Vincent Martinez. He directs our school’s fashion program. I’m a graphic designer, so I’m supposed to be incredibly artsy, but I just like sitting infront of my laptop all day. And I make pretty things. I’ve done lots of work for Martinez in the past couple of months, and he invited me to attend a show of his, Remixed. Which was where I spent my evening.

The show was in Atlanta’s posh, artsy west end. On Marietta Street, if anyone knows where that is. I went alone, and I realized why people take dates to these things. I didn’t really know anyone there, and felt just a tad outside my social realm. I’m sure it’s the kind of thing where I’ll end up in a couple years, but the people were interesting enough. I stood in the corner, attatched to my phone, swallowing shrimp coctail after shrimp coctail. Eventually, my friend Sam showed up. I somehow convinced her to come, or so I’d like to think. I never actually spoke to her directly about it until this afternoon, but the idea had been planted in my head around the beginning of the week. So we browsed this fancy, posh shop, full of women’s clothes and little impulsively bought books, candles, and other whimsical items. The fashion show, though, was like nothing I’ve ever experienced before.

My brother watches project runway, or he did for a short period. So I’ve got an idea of what goes on at these sorts of things. Women walk about in skimpy dresses, slut it up a bit for the cameras, and their dresses sell for thousands at posh boutiques not unlike the one at which I spent my evening. I knew not what to expect, since this is my highschool’s fashion program. These models can’t legally drink. I watched them parade down the runway, an artistic representation of Atlanta’s Old Fourth Ward. One at a time, they’d show off their dresses, the one male involved in the show flaunted his skin-tight, silk pants and man bag, and they would all do this blank stare into the distance. Sam and I were positioned at the very foot of the runway, so perhaps it’s for the best that these girls, dressed in less material than would be used for my various pillowcases, didn’t look me straight in the eye, but I couldn’t help but feel that these poor designers felt, perhaps, a bit dejected. They stared off into deserted Marietta street, an expressionless look on their face, as if to say, “Oh yes. I wear something this lavish every day.  Now, please, let me get on with my business.”

The harsh realization that I came to was that, despite having put almost a month of work into the email flyer sent out, that these clothing designers in the making really, truly put so much effort into these clothes. They’ve spent three, maybe four months on a dress to be shown off at one show, since you can’t wear it anywhere else. But if this dress were at Target, I’d give it a glance, and head for the screened t-shirts.

Music to get stuff done to

Apparently, I’m too awesome for the Nexus, A.K.A. my school’s magazine, so I can only publish one of two reviews I wrote. This is the one that won’t be published. It’s a sad thing.

I’ve got a bad habit of procrastinating. I’ve been putting off so much stuff for the longest time; I’ve got a speech to write for Mr. Herrera, another for my Sunday school class (yeah, Jews have Sunday school), a project for Mr. Darden to complete, and an intro to revise for my other Nexus article, on The Lonely Island’s new album. I missed a couple of deadlines, and I’ve got a driver’s test to take this Friday, so I’m in a bit of a crunch. On top of all that, I had this review to write, and I’ve been freaking out about all of it.

Lucky for me, Tonight, by Franz Ferdinand makes for tons of productivity, since it’s really not that interesting to listen to. The other two albums I’ve reviewed for Nexus have key lyrics that needed to, interesting beats, and are arranged in a way that also draws attention. The songs on Tonight all sound exactly the same, so none require any individual attention, the lyrics are generic and really don’t seem to be about anything (often a specific phrase catches my attention, only because it’s repeated around 10-15 times as a sort of chorus), and have a tone which doesn’t really qualify as happy nor sad, so whether I’m freaked about inevitably failing the driving laws test again, depressed about my burden of work, or happy about my newly purchased video game (Guitar Hero: World Tour—it’s AMAZING—but that’s another review…), Tonight suits the mood, and doesn’t distract.

If music was meant as pretty noise to be played in the background while mundane activities were carried out, this album would be a total win, a definite 20 out of 10 in my book. Unfortunately, being something of a musician myself, I can’t help but remind the masses that this isn’t music’s purpose in life. Music should make me happy when I’m sad, and once it’s accomplished that, keep me happy as long as necessary, and on that, Tonight fails on every count.

Some people keep ESPN or CNN on all day, to fill the often-distracting silence. I suggest that Franz Ferdinand’s Tonight be used in the same way. But for music to entertain you, or to inspire you…look elsewhere.