Zwan vs. Smashing Pumpkins

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Most of you are no doubt familiar with the Smashing Pumpkins. I remember the Smashing Pumpkins for many of their hit songs including “1979,” “Tonight Tonight” and “Today.” Yet much of their music could be described as dark. For example “Bullet with Butterfly Wings’” chorus ends with:

Despite all my rage I’m still just a rat in a cage
And I still believe that I cannot be saved
And I still believe that I cannot be saved

Some say the song is about Kurt Cobain’s suicide. Mostly its just about a feeling of helplessness. The Pumpkins’ lead singer, Billy Corgan makes Biblical references with “I suppose I’ll show all my cool and cold-like old Job.”
An even more disturbing lyric comes from “Zero“:

Emptiness is loneliness, and loneliness is cleanliness
And cleanliness is godliness, and god is empty just like me

I don’t play that song all that often due to that lyric. Yet those Zero shirts still sell well on Ebay, for all those emotionally distressed teens who need something to express their self doubt.
The Smashing Pumpkins broke up in 2000. Consequently Billy Corgan formed a new band called “Zwan,” which seemed much more positive in overtones than some of the previous Pumpkins songs. Evidence in this is Zwan’s only album title – “Mary Star of the Sea” – named after a Catholic church in Key West. Compare that to “Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness,” from which Bullet and Zero come from
Zwan’s big hit, “Honestly” borders on contemporary Christian music depending on how you read it. I managed to snag it on my favorite p2p site. Some good lyrics:

cause there’s no place that I could be without you
it’s too far to discard the life I once knew
honestly, all the weather storms are bringing
are just a picture of my dreams
’cause when I think of you as mine
and allow myself with time
to lead into the life we want
I feel loved, honestly
I feel loved, this honestly

So this begs the question. How does such a positive set of lyrics come from the same mind as lyrics that would say that “God is empty?”
Corgan himself has suffered from clinical depression in the past. I see Corgan’s complex feelings…one song showing rage and anguish…then another song showing kindness and love…as being a parallel to mine…and pretty much everyone’s thought processes.

AOL Owns You

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This is kinda scary.
(In regards to AOL Instant Messenger)

Although you or the owner of the Content retain ownership of all right, title and interest in Content that you post to any AIM Product, AOL owns all right, title and interest in any compilation, collective work or other derivative work created by AOL using or incorporating this Content. In addition, by posting Content on an AIM Product, you grant AOL, its parent, affiliates, subsidiaries, assigns, agents and licensees the irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide right to reproduce, display, perform, distribute, adapt and promote this Content in any medium. You waive any right to privacy. You waive any right to inspect or approve uses of the Content or to be compensated for any such uses.

Big brother is watching, folks.

Parasitic Twins

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You might have seen the story about the Egyptian girl having a second head removed. The head was part of a parasitic twin which never fully developed and is dependent on the host twin.
You really don’t hear too much about parasitic twins or even conjoined twins much. Mostly these come from 3rd world countries. I suppose in the U.S. and other developed nations, these type of twins would be classified as severly deformed and be terminated through abortion.
Here’s a webpage which has a large number of pictures of parasitic twins.

Supersize Me

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I watched the movie Supersize Me, a documentary which a man decides to eat McDonald’s food exclusively for 30 days. The movie brings up some good points in America.
One issue the movie brought up was how schools are catering to the junk food tendencies of kids. A balanced diet is just not happening in the school cafeteria anymore. Cafeterias are giving students what they want and not necessarily what they need. I’d suggest getting rid of the coke machines all together. Kids get enough cokes at home. And, as the movie pointed out, reducing caffine consumption tends to make for a better learning environment.
By the end of the movie, Morgan experiences bad health and his doctors are begging him to stop doing his experiement. You’d tend to expect this for someone who eats McDonald’s food exclusively. Why is this any surprise to anyone?
I get the feeling that Morgan comes from an environment which detests fast food. His girlfriend in the documentary is a vegan, which in itself is an extreme.
Before seeing the movie, I didn’t eat McDonald’s much at all. After seeing the movie, I choose not to eat McDonald’s unless I’m in a situation where I HAVE to eat it. In that case I’ve eaten there twice since seeing the movie. One was when I was with a church group going skiing. The other time was somewhat as a joke when seeing renting this movie.
I do eat fast food alot. Probably too much. The fast food places which I frequent are Wendy’s and most all the pizza places. Lately I’ve been trying to find a good deli sandwich. And you’d be surprised how many deli shops there are around town. I probably am paying for my fast food passion. I’ve gained an inch on my waist.
We as an American society aren’t going to change our fast food ways too quickly. We’ll constantly be on diets and constantly complaining about our weight.

The Hotmail Switch

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Being Webmaster of my church provides for some different tasks. Among them is acting as a postmaster for any mail sent to the general email address. I had automatically been forwarding all email sent to this general email address to a Hotmail account. Many many times I’ve found that Hotmail is slow and cumbersome. That’s usually what happens with Microsoft. They usually buy some new product and make it bloatware. I have no patience when I’m trying to send an email and I keep getting “server busy” errors. You get what you pay for I guess.
So I made the switch to a Yahoo mail account. We’ll see how this one does. I would have switched to Gmail (I have an account with 6 available invites) but I wasn’t sure if there was any virus checking with Gmail. Being the receipent of viruses is a risk of being a webmaster for the church. I wouldn’t dare download the church’s email using Outlook. There are just too many well-meaning people out there who send out viruses without knowing it. I’ve never had a problem with Hotmail’s virus checker and I probably won’t have a problem with Yahoo’s virus checker either.
Postscript (3/1/05)
After one day from the switchover, I’ve found Yahoo is much faster than Hotmail. However there were some bugs in the system. I had to put some spam filters in place so that I wouldn’t get overloaded with Viagra spam and other such nonsense. It is truly amazing how many people will scrape whois entries looking for email addresses so they can sell you some snake oil.

Mashups

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Mashups are 2 or more songs mixed together to sound like one song. Usually done by DJ’s with 2 unrelated songs. This article explains it in more detail.
I wouldn’t classify a remix of an old song, such as P. Diddy’s “I’ll Be Missing You” or Trick Daddy’s “Let’s Go,” neither of which could be classified as anything substantial. Mostly they just ruined good songs.
Some of the more memorable mashups:

  • “Boulevard of Broken Songs” (Green Day and Oasis) – They’re playing this on 102.9 The Buzz here in Nashville. Since I like both songs, I think it sounds great together. The dark Green Day lyrics are complimented by the upbeat Wonderwall lyrics. Excellent song. Hear it here.
  • The Beastles (The Beastie Boys and The Beatles) – The Beastie Boys are a bit grating at times. However there are some good points on this album. “What You Want, Lady?” (Mix of “What You Want” and Lady Madonna”) is one of the better songs on the album.

Guestbook Spam

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Lately I’ve been battling a new type of battle. Guestbook spam. 3 times last night I had some spammer sign my church’s guestbook promoting their Human Growth Hormone treatment and their loan service. I can’t tell if this is being done manually or by some type of bot. Each time someone signs the guestbook I get an email alerting me of the entry. Each time I have been sitting at the computer when I received notification of the entry, and corrected within minutes.
This happened with a couple of webpages I helped set up: Todd’s webpage and with Josh’s webpage. The only difference is right now both guestbooks are disabled inadvertently.
Guestbooks are SO late 90s. No one (except for spammers) uses them anymore. Instead you’ll see comments on blog entries. And now even blogs are being inundated with spam.
I use the guestbook contained on Matt’s Script Archive. I’ve been looking for a solution for this, either trying to block spam according to content (key words) or IP addresses even. However Matt’s Guestbook Script is not sophisicated enough to allow for this. (One reason I use it is because it is so easy to set up).
The internet used to be fun. It was fun when you didn’t have to repair guestbooks daily when someone tries to sell their snakeoil.
If anyone has any good solutions for guestbook spam, apart from removing the guestbook altogether, I’d love to hear it.

YCDTOTV: Divorce

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Here’s another comedy skit from YCDTOTV. Keep in mind this is one of those opposite sketches, where the opposite of true life really happens.

From Divorce (1984)
Dad: Justin, I’ve got something I gotta tell you. Your mother and I have been talking things over and we’ve decided that we’re going to get married.
Justin: Oh no, you can’t do this to me. I’ll be the only kid in school who’s parents are married. I’ll be the laughing stock of the whole school.
[Justin runs out of the room]
Dad: No, you don’t understand Justin. We’re not marrying each other.

The sad thing is it’d be funny if it wasn’t so true today. Think about it.
Another sad thing is today’s society is putting so much pressure on people to get married in order to live happy lives. Couples are marrying much too early, just for the sake of getting married. Then they realize that they aren’t happy. They end up getting a divorce or living very unhappy lives.

Dippin’ Strips

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Wednesday night I got Pizza Hut’s Dippin’ Strips, along with a large sausage pizza. In leiu of getting a topping on the Dippin’ Strips, I decided on extra cheese, making it more of a deluxe cheese bread.
The ‘Strips come with 3 dippin’ sauces: Ranch, Marinara, and [faux Papa John’s] Garlic. I passed on the Ranch and Garlic and opted for the Marinara.
The pizza itself is considered a “large” although it isn’t big enough to feed a family of 4. I could have eaten it all myself, and I don’t even consider myself as having much of an appetite.
I’m imagining Pizza Hut’s experimental kitchen. Chefs trying to find new ways to market their product. We saw the stuffed crust. We ate the 4 small miniature pizzas in one. These Strips are just a new way to market their product. A gimmic if you will. If it wasn’t so expensive it might be good. As a matter of fact I make it a point NEVER to buy from Pizza Hut unless I have a coupon.