Marty lost. 

I haven’t watched RockStar: INXS since the beginning, but the last six weeks or so have made me happy inside.  Marty’s original song “Trees” has been stuck in my head and my CD player ever since he first premiered it.  And he lost…

When I heard the decision, I jumped up and swore at my television set very vigorously.  The words were vulgar.  The passion was immense.  I was mad.

J.D. does have the performance and even writing style that more closely matches who and what INXS has been historically, so I kinda understand the decision.  But I’m still saddened.

I hope Marty gets a chance to do a solo album right.  I’d love to hear a studio version of “Trees.”  I’ve no doubt the whole endeavor will rock greatly.  I’ll never be able to watch American Idol again.

To drink or not to drink, to get high or to remain sober, and to engage in fornication or not to. I have these decisions looming over me at this point. I want to do all three. I want to have each of those as part of my life experience, but I am scared that I am violating myself. I mean, I don’t know what is even going on with girls. I am so lost and just want someone to talk to honestly with, and have them give the reaction that I want. I don’t know if that will happen, but if it does, I will be happy, at least for a time. I doubt that I will have sex, because that is more a decision of timing than anything else. It will happen and I feel that saving that for someone special (my wife) and that there is nothing that I should do to jeopardize that. The drinking and the drugs are different. There is a point at when I have to stop doing stupid stuff. When I have to be responsible for others lives and my own (on more of a level than I am now). I want to try new things, and at this point I think that I have tried most of what I feel is exciting. I mean that I want to know certain things feel like, and the sensation of getting high, tripping, whatever you want to call it, I want to know what it feels like. I want to have that sensation pulsate through my body, and ponder on it. The drinking is another thing all together. I don’t know whether I will ever start to drink in my lifetime, but if I am going to, I should start now. I mean why waste time. Those are my reasons for. The reasons against are that I feel like getting high is wrong, not to mention illegal and dangerous. I could become an addict or I could get busted and kicked out of college and never able to get a job again. Now these are unlikely scenarios, I mean to say that those aren’t my reasons for doing it. Right now the main reason is that it is a sin and that I have never done it before. I think that it says a lot about the testimony if they haven’t just quit something, but moreover that they had the fortitude not to ever do it. I am afraid that it will, in some way, hurt my Christianity. I don’t ever want to hurt my walk with God; even now when I don’t feel him in my life. I don’t want to make a decision that will last a lifetime, when it is a momentary mood where I feel like I am no longer attached to my God. Oh well I think that I have about a week to make this decision, at least about the pot. I have someone coming over that will make me a very tempting offer, and whether I do or not will be a lifelong decision. But I think that’s life, “Huge decisions in the crunch that define who you are forever.”...

I am feeling better about my friends situation. Like I do have friends who love me and things to do on the weekend. Seth and I (a group that we are) are finding a nitch in which to run in. I think that I’m gonna be okay. I just need to keep a sunny outlook. Though it helps that Joseph is in town. He is always the voice of reason in my life, and God knows that I need that now more than ever…

I think that this is enough reality for a Saturday night, I am too young to be dealing with all of this crap…

Your Pal,

I just got done watching “Night of the Living Dead.”  Again.  I can’t get enough of the whole Romero series (Night, Dawn [78], Day, Land) and the more I watch them, the deeper the messages seem to get, or at least more personal.  At the very least, they make me THINK.

Today in Feature Film Writing we had to speak for a little bit about a character in literature, cinema, whatever that we tend to associate with.  Although my choice of Riley from Land of the Dead wasn’t that profound (or maybe obvious) compared to other choices (Jean val Jean from Les Mislerables, etc.), the more I think about his situation, the more I find myself thinking about my situation.

The moment in Land of the Dead that sticks out the most is when Riley, Charlie and Slack are in prison and Slack asks Riley what his story is.  His response is “I don’t have a story.  Nothing bad ever happened to me.”  The guy is in prison, and he is still able to say nothing bad ever happened to him.  He is in a world overrun with walking dead, and he is still able to say nothing bad ever happened to him.

This speaks to me on so many levels, believe it or not.  On one level, I see awful things happen around me all the time.  This world isn’t in the greatest state.  People die of cancer, people watch their neighborhoods wash away in a matter of minutes, etc.  But nothing bad has ever happened to me, and while I may not necessarily think about it regularly in those terms, I do tend to look at the glass being half full.  At least, I try to.

Going deeper, I see the whole scenario as even a possible representation of spirituality.  The dead are those who’ve yet to find Christ and those alive in Christ must fend off the onslaught.  If this is the case, then, how do I reconcile that with the fact that in the Dead series, the humans tend to be enemies.  All this crap about zombies happen, but in every movie, humans turn on each other, and in the end, humans are the end of other humans.  I can’t remember the exact line, but in Dawn ‘78, a priest says something along the lines of “In a world where the dead are coming to life, we must stop killing or lose the war.”

Are we as Christians cannibalizing our own?  It’s not a thought one likes to think about.  I certainly don’t.  But what comes to mind at this point is the Brennan Manning statement (used by dc Talk on the Jesus Freak album) that “the number one cause for athiesm in the world is Christians…”  Good intentions can only go so far, but if we’re not acting in love for one another, and I mean true RESPECTFUL love, we’re going to lose the war.  Love and respect seems to have been lost, and outrageous fundamentalist efforts, while well intentioned, seem to have the opposite effect from what is desired.

I’m almost certain that’s not the statement Romero was going for, even in the slightest.  It really isn’t even a direct thought stemming from the movie, just the result of long, drawn-out, and partially scattered thinking on the nature of human vs. human activity in a world full of zombies.

Wow.  “From Justin To Kelly” is on ABC Family right now.  It’s almost over and I’ve watched nearly the entire thing with a really morbid fascination.  This movie is so awful, I can’t think of how to describe it without using some REALLY vulgar terms.  There simply aren’t words (within the bounds of civility) that can describe how bad this movie is.

So I’ll stop.