Numbers

I know this post will be all over the place, so I'll just number it off.

1. "I wonder, I wonder, what you would do if you had the power to dream at night any dream you wanted to dream? And you would of course be able to alter your time sense, and slip seventy-five years of subjective time into eight hours of sleep. You would I suppose start out by fulfilling all your wishes. You could design for yourself what would be the most ecstatic life: love affairs, banquets, dancing girls, wonderful journeys, gardens, and music beyond belief. And then after a couple of months of this sort of thing at seventy-five years a night, you’d be getting a little taste for something different, and you’d move over to an adventurous dimension, where there were certain dangers involved, and the thrill of dealing with dangers. And you could rescue princesses from dragons, and go on dangerous journeys, and eventually get into contests with enemies. And after you had done that for awhile, you’d think up a new wrinkle, to forget that you were dreaming, and think that is was all for real." - Alan Watts

2. "I am obsessed with the "now". It's true, and I can't deny it any longer. Every morning I get up and slave over the news of the day, and I think about what's on my plate. Always trying not to acknowledge the past, because that's what it is: the past. How could it affect my moment-to-moment existence? But now I am told I should focus not on the "now" but the "eternal", and sadly, that is not easy. I look at these old stories and they bore me endlessly. The only reason why we learn about them, or even know them, is because they are old. If somebody wrote Gilgamesh today, they would tell that person to learn how to write, dammit!"

The Alan Watts quote would seem to sugest that I'm going about life the wrong way. That I should really be focusing on the eternal, and not on the now. "The past does possess the present", right?

3. '... it is best never to have been born at all, next best to die young, and old age is the worst that can befall man." These lines are taken from Oedipus at Colonus. Interestingly, Steiner points out that in Greek tragedies death is interested in the young and has grown tired of the old. I gotta admit, I kinda agree. I don't ever want to get old; rather, I would like to die young. "Only the good die young" as they say. Interesting enough, today in the cafeteria I noticed an older guy sitting in a booth by himself. I immediately wondered why he was there in a somewhat angry manner in my head. Why was there a sudden burst of emotion? Is there really a conflict between myself and the older students? Next time...

4. Last thing, I really don't like Family Guy. It's senseless, stupid shout-outs. Honestly, the only humor you can get out of it is (well, at least ever since it came back from being cancelled) is nostalgia. One particular line that really pissed me off was from an episode where Stewie and Brian travelled to WWII. Brian kids that America didn't invade Germany because it was developing nuclear weapons in the 1930s. Think about how stupid that is. Is McFarlane suggesting that it was stupid to invade Germany because they were developing those weapons? If you want to laugh at that's clever (and you don't feel ashamed of yourself afterward) there is so many better shows out there: Arrested Development, South Park, Futurama, The Simpsons, Penn and Teller Bullshit, 30Rock, Always Sunny, The Office. ANYTHING, even American Dad for God's sake. Actually wait, I take that back. Dane Cook is worse than Family Guy. Somebody once asked me if I could beat up any person in the world with no reprucussions. No, not William Shatner, not George Bush, not Hillary Clinton, Dane frickin Cook. I hate that guy so much.