It’s not a typical alien movie. It has some interesting plot twists and an interesting approach overall making it more accessible and interesting, no matter what types of movies you normally like.

Most of the complaints I’ve heard have been with slight plot holes that are pretty normal for all movies, I haven’t really heard any bad things overall about the movie. I don’t have any real complaints, it was the best $6 I’ve spent in a long time.

District 9 has lots of action, cool aliens, and great special effects. Peter Jackson delivers.

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Looking through the site a bit, it’s got some great tips and great links to some quality art. Trying to make your dorm look a bit unique can actually be tough (believe it or not, the famous “College” poster and a Pulp Fiction poster are not really unique), but if you look around you can definitely find cool posters and paintings you might like.

I was sold the second I saw this gem.

There’s also a cool blog with tips and links to other artists. If you’re looking for some quick posters, go over and give it a shot!

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I’ve found it’s a similar feeling when I try to estimate how much money I’ll make at my job. If I over-guess how much I made, I end up disappointed. If I guess it exactly right, I’m pretty neutral because it’s what I expected. But if I underestimate my money, I’m always pleasantly surprised.

I plan my life around what I expect to make, so when I actually make more, it’s a lot easier to keep it in my savings account rather than spending it.

Here’s how I underestimate what I make:

Underguess my real wages

When I first started working at my job, I made $6.75/hour, the minimum wage in California at the time. After taxes and Social Security were taken from my paycheck, my real wage was about $6/hour.

A couple years later, minimum wage has increased and I’ve earned a raise, bringing me to $8.50/hour. However, in my head I still assume that I make only $6/hour. I’ve never recalculated my real wage — and I try not to — but I do know it’s a good bit above $6.

Round down my hours

My job has pretty sporadic hours. Instead of working set shifts, I have a list of tasks that need to be done before I can go home. My hours can range from 3 in a day to 8, and more often than not I’ll end up not clocking out on a full hour.

So I round down how much I remember.

If I work three hours and fifteen minutes, I’ll remember that I worked three hours. If I worked four hours and forty-five minutes, I only remember four. This adds up pretty quickly, and by the end of each pay period I’ll have five to ten hours that I haven’t counted.

The end result:

Last paycheck, I counted that I had worked for 16 hours. 16 hours at $6/hour comes out to $96. Not a whole lot, but I’ll take what I can get now.

In reality, I worked 20 hours. At whatever my real wage is, I made $155. That’s $60 I didn’t think I would make.

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A lot of high school and college students will hold a lot of contempt for admissions officers and the admissions process as a whole, claiming it’s unfair, biased, vague, and confusing. Because students never fully know what to expect from admissions, it’s very easy to take it out on the anonymous people who decide our futures.

However, this post was interesting because it showed an insight into an admission officer’s job at a highly-selective school like MIT, where only one in eight students are admitted, and how personal the review process can actually become. I found this quote especially deep:

To the 87% of you who have shared your lives with us and trusted us with your stories over the last four months, please know that they meant something to me, and I won’t forget you. When I say that I share the pain of these decisions with you, I’m not lying. I’m really not lying.

As a student, it’s incredibly easy to get caught up in hating on the admissions process, but in the process we forget that there are people who have to determine who gets accepted and who gets denied, and the job isn’t always easy for them either.

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Cursive handwriting books

I went to a private school through sixth grade, and cursive was definitely forced on us there. Once we learned how to write in cursive, we were expected to always use cursive in any writing we turned in. Teachers wouldn’t accept our work if it wasn’t in cursive. They claimed that only cursive was used in the “real world”, and that printing was inferior and for little kids.

In seventh grade, I finally began to attend public school, where it was perfectly fine to print. Out of habit, I used cursive for the first couple of weeks until I decided to give printing a try again. I quickly found out why most people never bother with cursive.

My print was far faster and far more legible than my cursive ever was. Occasionally, I would write something in cursive and come back unable to read it, but once I started printing, I had no troubles at all. And, finally, I could keep up in taking notes with what the teacher said.

Seven years later, and I still haven’t used cursive for anything except my signature. And now I’m wondering, why was cursive so important for us to learn? My friends who attended public school had cursive shoved on them at first, and they too find no use for it.

What do you think? Do you use cursive writing?

Technorati Tags: education

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I’m talking about OGame. OGame is a space game set in the future where you try to build up your space empire to be as powerful as you can. You farm resources, research new technologies, colonize planets, build massive fleets, and raid enemy planets. It’s surprisingly addictive once you get the basics down.

Sample screen in OGame.

What’s interesting about OGame is that it’s played within your browser window — right now I have a tab open to OGame. The game doesn’t have much in the way of “gameplay”. Basically, you click links to carry out actions rather than watching it. It’s not something you really play actively, but rather check on every twenty minutes or so.

Of course, reading the title, you might ask why I’m wondering why I returned. I go through a little tradition, where once a year or so, I create another OGame account and try to reestablish myself. While it’s always a lot of fun, OGame can be pretty stressful. Whenever I leave my computer, I have to make sure my little empire will be alright until I get back (“fleetsaving”, for anyone who’s played before). And, inevitably, one time I’m not going to have time to protect everything, and I’ll come back to find I’ve lost everything. I’ll get bored and quit, only to start a year later.

However, in the meantime, the game is still lots of fun, and best of all, it’s free. I’m in Universe 24, if anyone wants to join!

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My game of choice: Prototype.

To sum up this game quickly, think Grand Theft Auto, but with super powers. You can roam around the city freely, running up buildings, jumping around, gliding through the air, and causing general mayhem, and on the way you can do missions to work through the storyline.

I’m just starting out in the game, but already I’m liking a lot. Prototype is centered in New York City, meaning there are tons of large buildings to climb up and a huge town to roam around.

The fun in Prototype definitely comes from your super powers. You can spawn large claws or huge fists. You can pick up cars. You can hijack tanks. You can absorb people and become them. As you play, you unlock more powers.

Admittedly, I’m not too keen on the graphics. Although my computer’s not the best, I feel like the graphics could be far more sharp and interesting.

Here’s a gameplay video, if you’re curious:

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The other day, I was looking on the Opeth forum and saw a topic about Mikael’s stage shenanigans and I found a lot of them pretty funny:

“We have a new album out called watershed who likes it?”

*crowd cheers*

“I said do you like it?!”

*crowd cheers louder*

“Does anyone here not like the new album?”

*a few people cheer*

“Guards, kill them.”

Admittedly, I’m more than a little bit of a fanboy, but nevertheless this topic is full of hilarious live quotes. A bit of offensive language though — you’ve been warned!

I also particularly liked this video, where Åkerfeldt plans to overthrow Dio with his new sign — “The Hook”:

Technorati Tags: music, metal, opeth

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I don’t know how many of my readers are mothers, but if you are, congratulations and thank you for all you do!

If you’re away at college, take some time to give your mom a call and thank her for what she’s done. It’ll definitely make her day!

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