creeva

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

I’m sure some of you have figured with everything going I’ve been lax at getting more stuff up.   Well a new year is coming soon and I’m hoping ot be back on track of at least getting three worth while posts out a day.   I’m also hoping to get a couple of new blogs off the ground (aren’t I always saying that?).    I also have at least two podcasts that I put off because of time that I need to go chase down the interested and plan things out.   This next year is exciting and I have alot of goals.  There is some clean up I need to finish before this year is out.

1.  I need to get the rest of the photos from my father to get scanned.   The one above is one from the start of that set.  Since I didn’t know how to find a topic photo for this random post, I thought that would do.   Yes that is me.   You might think that is make up but I really had black smudges like that on my face for most my life (j/k).

2.  I have a few comments that I need to address.   Two deal with my month of mother that I never finished.   It would almost seem that one of the comments stopped me from going on, that isn’t the case.    I had caught up on my   writing to that day ( I wrote most of it weeks in advance) - I didn’t have the steam to get going anymore - I do have one or two left in me - so maybe tonight I’ll rock those out.

3.  A schedule and a focus for my future writing - I want to get focused and get things going in a well rounded and regulary scheduled fashion.

Look forward to more coming very soon

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

Picture from here

It seems through some of my affiliation that I am attached to that people feel the need to forward me chain letters.   Even if it was something I believed in, I wouldn’t want a chain letter.  I would prefer to read your own thoughts.  It seems someone sends me mails with a religious bent to them.   Some of them rail against the separation of church and state, something that even as a christian I hold very dear (for some reason most Christians don’t want it separated since they naively believe for all eternity they will be the dominant religion).   I’m more pragmatic.  I don’t think the dogmatic moral laws of each different little christian sect should be represented.   I’ve had my immediate say.  Let’s look at the first chain letter in this new series.

Picture from here

A 15 yr. Old SCHOOL KID IN ARIZONA:

New Pledge of Allegiance (TOTALLY AWESOME) !

Since the Pledge of Allegiance
And
The Lord’s Prayer
Are not allowed in most
Public schools anymore
Because the word ‘God’ is mentioned….
A kid in Arizona
Wrote the attached

NEW School prayer :

Now I sit me down in school
Where praying is against the rule
For this great nation under God
Finds mention of Him very odd.

If Scripture now the class recites,
It violates the Bill of Rights.
And anytime my head I bow
Becomes a Federal matter now.

Our hair can be purple, orange or green,
That’s no offense; it’s a freedom scene.
The law is specific, the law is precise.
Prayers spoken aloud are a serious vice.

For praying in a public hall
Might offend someone with no faith at all.
In silence alone we must meditate,
God’s name is prohibited by the state.

We’re allowed to cuss and dress like freaks,
And pierce our noses, tongues and cheeks..
They’ve outlawed guns, but FIRST the Bible.
To quote the Good Book makes me liable.

We can elect a pregnant Senior Queen,
And the ‘unwed daddy,’ our Senior King.
It’s ‘inappropriate’ to teach right from wrong,
We’re taught that such ‘judgments’ do not belong.

We can get our condoms and birth controls,
Study witchcraft, vampires and totem poles.
But the Ten Commandments are not allowed,
No word of God must reach this crowd.

It’s scary here I must confess,
When chaos reigns the school’s a mess..
So, Lord, this silent plea I make:
Should I be shot; My soul please take!

Amen

If you aren’t ashamed to do this,
Please pass this on.
Jesus said,
‘If you are ashamed of me,
I will be ashamed of you before my Father.’

Not ashamed. Pass this on..

Let’s go through this section by section:

Now I sit me down in school
Where praying is against the rule
For this great nation under God
Finds mention of Him very odd.

Well ironically we still have in god we trust on our money, what people don’t realize is that “God” on your money has been found legally to be an abstraction and doesn’t necessarily refer to a Christian Diety.   Religious freedom was one of hte purposes of this country.  Once you start choosing an officially sanctioned govenerment religion, or teach the tenets of said religion you undermine the purpose that we were taught in school on why the first settlers came here.  (Yes I know that story is not quite as simplistic or accurate as we were taught).

If Scripture now the class recites,
It violates the Bill of Rights.
And anytime my head I bow
Becomes a Federal matter now.

Ironically I don’t think we have thought police anywhere - like everything else it’s a don’t ask don’t tell world anymore.  If your flaunting anything that’s against school rules however you will be punished.   There have been exteremly few federal cases over this so I’m not quite sure it would really be a federal matter.

Our hair can be purple, orange or green,
That’s no offense; it’s a freedom scene.
The law is specific, the law is precise.
Prayers spoken aloud are a serious vice.

What’s wrong with different colored hairs at all?  Mine has been natural.  Mine has been jet black.  Mine has been purple.  Mine has been blue.  There is nothing wrong with this.  My sister however almost got expelled from school because she dyed her hair bright red (not natural red).   I almost went and fought this at the school board, but she backed down (I’m sure with my mother’s coaching of not wanting to look bad to the neighbors).   We’ve lost the freedom of personal expression in schools and it’s not just prayers.  Besides if you really need to pray out loud I find you creepy.  Your like the guy at the video game store who picks up every title and reads the description out loud since they seem to lack any inner monologue.

For praying in a public hall
Might offend someone with no faith at all.
In silence alone we must meditate,
God’s name is prohibited by the state.

Um, yes please be silent.  I pray, but I find you audible prayers creepy.  “Dear God please make my genital warts go away” - come on that would just be extremely creepy.   That’s the kind of thing I know some people pray for.  We want to pretend that they are all praying that the sick get better or the orphanage finds a savior donor so it can stay open.  It isn’t.

We’re allowed to cuss and dress like freaks,
And pierce our noses, tongues and cheeks..
They’ve outlawed guns, but FIRST the Bible.
To quote the Good Book makes me liable.

I’m fairly sure that guns were outlawed in most schools before the bible.  Granted I know some rural schools were teh kids could check in their gun when they arrive because they were hunting before school.   Do we really have to point out on how many levels that is wrong.   We’ll stick with just the hygiene issues.

We can elect a pregnant Senior Queen,
And the ‘unwed daddy,’ our Senior King.
It’s ‘inappropriate’ to teach right from wrong,
We’re taught that such ‘judgments’ do not belong.

I don’t see anything wrong with this - I have great grandparents that were probably married younger then someone who is the prom king or queen.   You can always judge someone, but when you have a holier then thou attitude it just doesn’t fly.

We can get our condoms and birth controls,
Study witchcraft, vampires and totem poles.
But the Ten Commandments are not allowed,
No word of God must reach this crowd.

Hmmmm, you complain about pregnant senior queens and unwed fathers, but rail against birth control - I won’t point out the irony.

It’s scary here I must confess,
When chaos reigns the school’s a mess..
So, Lord, this silent plea I make:
Should I be shot; My soul please take!

I’ve gone to a private school and I’ve gone to a public school - let me tell you the Christian schools still have the same issues with the ten commandments as part of the curriculum as public schools have without.

I’m not alone - someone else railed against this with their own poem - read it here.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

Maximum PC recently ran an article titled 50 Skills Every Real Geek Should Have, I wanted to go through and see how I ranked in their skill list.   Let’s find out.

1. Name the Connectors - yes I was able to

2. Run your essential apps on a USB stick - no I don’t do this, I could - I just prefer to run everything in the cloud or on my N810 - which is with me most of the time.

3. Straighten Pins on a CPU - I have done this too many times

4. Know the 13 basic HTML Tags - well I kinda know most of them - I use freaking wordpress I hardly need to use HTML and when I do I look it up and hav ethe answer in seconds.   Though I do know quite a few by heart that aren’t listed in the basic 13.

5.  Get through to executive customer service - hey I read the consumerist.

6.  Beat quake in 60 minutes - maybe at one point in time, but I’m not big on FPS games.

7.  Build a Hackintosh - I know how, I just don’t the components that seem to work, and I’m a cheap bastard that won’t buy parts just to run OSX - I’ll stick with ubuntu as my alternative OS.

8.  Watch TV Online legally - um that’s how I watch 100% of my TV these days.

9.  Get around a content filter from a public computer - yes I know how, I’ve helped friends at other companies, it’s not worth it to do it at my own job though.

10. Recite Pi to 23 decimal places - nope - I have no inclination to ever learn either.

11. Replace the controller board on a hard drive - hey I did that once, it’s not a skill that comes up at parties though.

12.  Benchmark your computer - really?  Is this even on this list? Yes, I was doing this before I fully understood what the benchmarks meant on my 386 DX40.

13. Decorate your room with only printer paper - am I physically in the skill set to be able to do this?  Yes I am - would I?  No.  I’m more likely to decorate with NES cartridges.

14. Securely erase your data so it can’t be recovered - yes I am capable - it would be easier if you encrypted it first though.

15.  Get into a windows computer if you don’t have a password - yes I’ve done this quite a few times.

16.  Hide data from anyone - yes encryption, hidden volumes, stegnography (which I got bored with in 2001) - I am capable of doing all that - I’m more likely ot share my data then hide it though.

17. Explain what e=mc2 means - yes I would like the e=MC2 with a side of fries please - yes I am capable, but refuse to put in the details here since I want to make it through this list.

18.  Abstain from buying extended warranties - I may have bought one, once - it was on something i thoguht it fall apart though - so it’s all good.

19.  Use photoshop or gimp - yes I am capable.

20. Use a DSLR in full manual mode - I can - I’m just lazy and prefer it to do the work.

21. Mooch your neighbors wi-fi - my neighbor doesn’t have wi-fi but I’m ready to mooch when they do.

22. Protext your wi-fi - Wep2 currently - For a while I had mac filtering, I hated to keep getting mac addresses from visitors though.

23. Create an animated spray in Valve games - um - I don’t think I’ve played a single one for more then 5 minutes….so this one is a no.

24.  Setup RAID - yes I’ve done this a few times over the years for my home network.  Now implement Iscsi raid across multiple computers - that’s a challenge.

25. Calculate a Pitchers ERA - no I don’t know how - but I know google will give me the answer quicker then I can calculate it.

26. Run two Operating Systems - um I dual boot currently……

27. Install a hard drive in laptop - done before and some day I’ll do it again.

28. Pull off an elaborate prank - I think have the skill set and knowledge - I just never have - unless stealing street signs as a teenager counts.

29.  Rocket jump with a macro - um - I said I don’t really do FPS games - so no I can’t do this.

30.  Wire your home with ethernet - um every place I’ve lived with my wife we have had wired ethernet - we even used RG58 at one point.

31.  Know the 6 most important linux commands - yes I get command not found when I’m not thinking and run them in windows.

31. Rip your CDs to Flac - we did this for awhile then went back to MP3

32.  Stream Music, Movies, Pictures to any TV in the house - I’ve done this before - now we just carry our laptops around - shrug.

33.  Install and configure a VM - yes I’ve done this for literally years (maybe even a decade by now)

34.  Run multiple monitors - yes I use to dual monitor and run SWG on two different ones at the same time - I’m sad I know.

35. Run hacked firmware on a router - yes liek the rest of hte world I have a hacked linksys router /yawn.

36.  Pick a lock - I’m not good at it, but I’ve done it a couple times.

37.  Tell the difference between Dr. Pepper and Mr. Pibb - it’s been awhile but I think I could.

38.  Avoid DRM on everything - well streaming video legally that they talked about above seems to contradict this one doesn’t it.   However all my local video, music, picutres, and ebooks are DRM free.

39. Download a flash video and reformat it - yes I’ve done this - youtube videos locally stored on the N810 ftw.

40.  Get around in DOS - I grew up and DOS and resisted windows for a long time - so let’s just say yes.

41. Rip a DVD to h.264 - yes been there done that.

42.  Overclock your PC - yes I’ve done this my pride and joy was overclocking my AMD 133 mhz 486 to 160 MHZ - and it benchmarked and ran like a pentium 133 for half the cost.

43.  Use remote desktop - it’s part of my job - so yes.

44. Debate the merits of a star destroyer vs. the enterprise - yes, and the star destroyer would win.

45. Buld your own computer - built too many to actually count - I’m serious to - I worked at a small PC store and we sold hundreds - thousands of machines - so I cna build my own.

In irony they don’t seem to actually have 50 things on their list - so I think most geeks should know how to count also.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

It seems November is just a bad month for me.   I had to change alot of things around to make it as far as I did.  But life happens.  I know that isn’t a true excuse since  there are plenty of other people just as busy as myself that will manage to finish their novels.   I hope to get back and finish this story, but I truly don’t believe I will have it done by the end of the month.   This will mark my third attempt and third failure.   I’ll keep hacking away, but I just don’t see it happening.

On a plus side, I have actualyl written more then 50k words this month within blog articles and other things.   Just haven’t been able ot concentrate it all on the novel.   Maybe next year.  I won’t give up trying, it just may take a few more tries.   I’ll keep you updated, I made it about 10k words in.   Here is to National Novel Writing Month and all those that do manage to complete their stories.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

Picture from here

Well in preperation for my NANOWRIMO challenge of writing, I’ve mentioned that I didn’t want the blog to be neglected with no new posts showing up.   I still have some more writing ot get done before Nov. 1, but I managed to clean out most of my drafts now.   Granted a lot of these were quickie movie’s I own posts, but hey they are cleaned out and done.

FYI - the movies I own posts are two fold, the first being it helps me keep track of stuff I own so I can lend it to friends.  The second since I use Amazon.com links in it, it gives me the psuedo chance ot actually make money on this blog.  Not that I think you will, but if you are interested in buying any of the movies I post about click the Amazon links from teh referrals on my site.

Having gotten rid of 30 drafts today does make me a happy panda.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

Picture from here

National Novel Writing Month is once again almost upon us.   I’m hoping to “win” this year by actually finishing my first novel (now decades in the making).  I’ve been trying to pump out blog content to be published over the next month, some good, some bad and some “meh”.  But I’m planning for nanowrimo now and I was wondering, would it be possible (with enough caffeine) to sit down and write the 50,000 words in one session.   My first instinct is it wouldn’t be (for me), not that I’m going ot attempt it.

Though I looked over my past track record, I’ve knocked out 3000 word blog articles in an hour before (very very rare), why couldn’t I?  With enough caffeine I could see me doing it in under twenty hours.  I just wonder if anyone that is trying to finish is actually going ot attempt this.   I’m hopeful that the first night I will be able to break out and do 5000 words.   I only need to do 1667 words a day to finish the novel.

Heck this post is a little over 200 words, it took me just a few minutes to write.  If this was practice for my novel I would be already 1/8 the way there for the for the day.

All other NANOWRIMOers - I wish you the best of luck.   See you on the other side.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

My family has always talked about each other behind their backs.  Back and forth, just some things don’t get said.  I’m more of a lay it on the line and let it hang out.   My brother and I don’t see eye to eye on most thing.   I’ve already started in on my mother online.   Is this however still talking behind their backs?   They all have the url to my homepage.   Most of my family at least check my site out in passing.   I don’t see how I could be more public about it.  I’m not secretive, but I also don’t send out a blaring e-mail saying “I JUST WROTE ABOUT YOU ONLINE - YOU BETTER READ IT NOW”.

The reason this comes up goes to a yahoo group I used to manage of just close friends a few years ago.   I was egged into talking about another friends marital problems on the message board.   These issues were not a secret.   My post only stated that we should give them support in their time of need.   Ironically the people that blasted me the most in regards to “talking about this other couple behind their backs” were the ones that were spreading this the most through IM and phone calls.   Everyone on the list new, but it was secret since it wasn’t in the open.

This type on mentality is what pisses me off the most when it comes to the “behind the backs” argument.   If everyone already knows and you speak about it publicly to get the whole thing out in the open, how is it behind their backs?  Since I’ll be writing a bit about my mother, and I won’t keep any e-mail comments she sends me to myself - I’ll lay it out in the open.   It won’t be behind a closed door - it will be transparent like glass.   If she wishes to have a discussion in the comments where everyone can read what she has to say, the more the better.   I’ll be happy to have it out in public.

This is having things out, secrets just destroy people.   I share my life online because it’s cathartic.   I do abide by certain rules.   If you send me an email it’s more then likely not going show up on my blog.  I respect and adore privacy, even when I will share so much of myself online.   I love having discussions in public, if I’m wrong - show me I’m an ass.  I don’t mind.   I’m well aware there are consequences to all of my actions.  I’ll own up to those and suffer accordingly.  Let’s have it out and start a discussion.  If your part of it, I definitely can not be accused of talking behind your back.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

I really didn’t have time to write about this last week when it first came to my attention but it seems that Creeva.com has been banned from Technorati for gaming the system.   It states that I republish materials from other sites onto this blog.   This is not untrue, though 90% of my posts actually originate from there.   If I write something I centralize it all on creeva.com.   It’s simple.  It’s efficient.  It allows me centralize and backup my writing.

That being said, they aren’t wrong.   One of the underlying experiments that this blog does is crossposting.  It crossposts to myspace, facebook, tumblr, blogger, and many more.   I don’t make huge piles of cash (haven’t made a dime in my pocket yet).  I don’t blast people with ads, though on some sites including the main there are some that are there.   I’m not doing it to drive up profit in any way.  I’m doing it so different communities can read my stuff.  I won’t harp on it, I’ve written about my crossposting before.

The question is how relevant is Technorati becoming.   I know this question has been asked before, and I used to believe in Technorati.   I didn’t start 500 blogspot accounts to promote the material.  I used 1 public site per service.  For the point of experimentation and proof of concept.  I also have been slowly working on a whole article series on how to crosspost.   With the myriad of services and the fact that data is not yet truly portable, but beginning to become so.   How can these services accurately  track where information is originating from.

Like I said I’m not annoyed, I can live without technorati.  When people are posting links to their site on tumblr, friendfeed, twitter, and others how long before there are more people like me?   Services like Ping.fm and HelloTxt serve in a market segment only to fuel this further.   I’m not someone who has a targetted truly branded blog beyond self branding.   I don’t have a certain topic set I cover and regulary write about.  I’m a schizophrenic writer that is all over the place.   The only thing I hope is consistent is my voice.  Beyond that take away from my writing what you will.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

Picture from here.

Looking at my access logs on the site I noticed a referral from this page.  At the top of the page it stated this:

Blogged without permission to: http://creeva.com/2008/08/08/i-cant-link-to-your-web-site-man-your-retarded/.

Now my first instinct was “What the Hell”, I then checked and verified this came up under a creative commons search and made a screenshot.

Now under creative commons that applicable (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs) (I searched to see what was allowed to do to the image after this came up) it states:

Under the following conditions:

• Attribution. You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work).

  Attribute this work:

  <input ... > <input ... > <input ... > </p>
  What does “Attribute this work” mean?

  The page you came from contained embedded licensing metadata, including how the creator wishes to be attributed for re-use. You can use the HTML here to cite the work. Doing so will also include metadata on your page so that others can find the original work as well.

• Noncommercial. You may not use this work for commercial purposes.
• No Derivative Works. You may not alter, transform, or build upon this work.

I did copy (well I linked to the photo on Flickr) and I distributed the work because it was embedded in a blog post.

The conditions:

Attribution - I followed the norm for creative commons licensed Flickr images which is to link to enclosing page where the picture is from.   No other conditions were specified by the creator, so I took the industry norm for such usage.

Noncommercial - Though someday I would like to get paid, my blog is a non-commercial work and I would testify under oath and in court that my blog has never netted a single penny into my bank account, into my pocket, and in any tangible meaningful way.

No derivative work - when speaking of the image I did not alter, transform, or build upon the image in any way.

Using this image like I did I was well within my legal rights.  I left this comment on the page:

You know you stated that this was blogged without permission to my site on the page http://creeva.com/2008/08/08/i-cant-link-to-your-web-site-man-your-retarded/

The problem with this is that you released your photo under creative commons.  For all my posts I only seach for flickr photos licensed via creative commons, just so I can use images legally.

I clearly underneath the photo linked back to this page which is attribution - I didn’t obfuscate, nor did I claim it was my original image.  If anything it was to help drive traffic back to your site since I didn’t want attribution given to me any way shape or form.

Now I don’t mind the fact that you state it’s blogged without permission, but this comes down to the fact that you licensed your photo under creative commons originally, and you don’t seem to understand the rights you’ve given up by this.  I’m not using this commercially, so I am within my right.

Please see this flickr search:

http://flickr.com/search/?q=Kitty+Reindeer&l=cc&ss=0&ct=0&w=all

and you can verify that this image is listed under creative commons use - or see this screenshot http://flickr.com/photos/creeva/2909390861/

Under more in depth searches - you are not allowing commercial use of this photograph, which I am not doing.   You are also not allowing anyone to modify, adapt, or build upon - which I also am not doing.

Also though Flickr allows you to remove a creative commons license legally once something is released under creative commons it’s eternally released and irrevocable.

While my first instinct was to remove this image I’m letting it stand because of the license you chose regardless of your understanding of the license.

If the creator had contacted me in any way shape or form this may have been a different issue and I may changed the image (at least on this site I don’t know if I could catch everywhere I crosspost to).   Now however since I am a firm and hard believed in public domain and creative commons rights for creators, it’s become a matter of principle.  If someone doesn’t understand what creative commons is, they shouldn’t use it otherwise they will loose rights that they thought they had.  I did not publish this in a book and made no commerical profits off htis image.  I followed the license as it was written and intended.   If the creator didn’t understand those rights, well that’s another issue.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

Image from here

Because of my article about removing certain feeds from my lifestream, it prompted an e-mail from Iminta.  I just received an email back from Iminta saying ” I just wanted to know if there was anything that we (Iminta.com) could do to make the service more useful for you?”.  I replied back that the point of the article wasn’t them, it was me.  I couldn’t handle all the RSS feeds from my uber producers.   I think Iminta is a great service.  They thought their might be issue and contacted me quickly.

I’ve had the same experience with Plaxo, Sezwho, and Lijit.  They are on top of their game searching blog posts or posts on their own sites and reaching out to their users.  While I’m at it I’ll shout out to David Cramer and his Lifestream Plugin, when I have an issue I let me know and he’s put up with me and all of his other users over the issues we may or may not have.

If more traditional companies had the outreach and proactive customer service that these companies did I couldn’t even manage how much better the world would be.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

Image from here

You know how your browser tries to guess where you go by what your typing in?  These are the sites that come up as my suggestions (from browsing history) when I go through each letter of the alphabet:

A -Google Analytics

B - The Other Guild

C - Creeva’s World 2.0

D - Digg

E - Gmail

F - Feedburner

G - General Discussion -Vermilion News

H - Slashdot

I - The Other Guild

J - Journey To Get Paid

K - Kwippy

L - My Lifestream

M - VCMA

N - Network Solutions

O - Oh My Yod

P - Ping.fm

Q - Disqus

R - Google Analytics

S - Slashdot

T - Twitter

U - Yahoo Login

V - General Discussion -Vermilion News

W - Statcounter

X - Yahoo Login

Y - Yahoo Login

Z - Dad Hacker

Interesting?  Not really.   I found this post amusing however.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

It seems the news media broke the story about my last minute presidential run before I had a chance to announce it on my blog.  Watch the video below.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

The first two people that leave a comment below on the main site this story came from (here) will receive an invitation from yours truly.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

Picture from here

Yesterday during a windstorm we lost power. Well since my wife was out all day, it’s more apt to say that I lost power.  It’s alot harder for me these days when I lose power then it was when I was a kid.  The first thing you think of is that it’s ok I have a laptop.

Well the wifi and other hunbs and routers all need electricity - so no internet.

Ok……   I’ll watch a movie on my laptop then, my movies are stored on a powered USB drive……..

How about read a book….we’ll it’s getting dark and I’m not sure where the usable and not decorative candles are……

It’s very annoying to loose power in the digital age.

Also did you ever notice that most of the time the power goes out it’s at night?  That’s doubly annoying.

I then go to pick up Xie from my in-laws, when we get home power was still off and the power had been off in the neighborhood for 5-6 hours.   She lights 3 candles….power returns…………

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

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There was a movie I saw in either my pre-teen or early teenage years that I’ve been trying to track down.   If I remember it may have been a canadian movie.   It was aired on Channel 43 or Channel 19 in the late eighties or early nineties (that doesn’t really help when the movie was actually released).  The plot line involved a teacher and her students being kidnapped.   They were taken to an old farm which seemed to have an underground complex???  

The kidnappers/attackers all wore masks that were howard the duckish, but one was defintely Daffy Duck, and the other kidnappers did refer to him as Daffy.   At one part in the movie Daffy had his head chopped off, when they found the body they pushed to wake him and the head fell off and rolled to the side.  In the big climactic scene the teacher and one of the older male students stripped down to their underwear and swam through an undergound stream/p[assageway.  Along the way there was air pockets they struggled to suck air from, and eventually they made it free. 

Is it a good movie.  No I think it’s very much B-movie fair, expecially from the memories I’ve imparted out to you.   I used to have this movie recorded off of tv and onto VHS.   What I would like to know is the title of this film, and try to hunt it down to watch it one last time. 

Can you help me?

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

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The sex talk, it’s something teenagers dread and so do parents.   I think I was a pre-teen the first time my parents tried to broach the subject.    I had already been aware from enough TV shows were a parent attempted to have a sex talk with their child that it was not a good thing.   I avoided it like the plague, just not wanting to deal with it.

The first time my parents were watching the show Dallas and we’re all aware how much sex is shown non explicitly on prime time soap operas.    My parents were discussing and wondering if I understood what was happening and if it would effect me.   Now I’m not going to say I understood completely, but I knew enough to understand where this conversation was headed and I didn’t want any of it.   I replied that they were just going to bed and getting ready to fall asleep.   That was the first time I avoided this conversation.

It was a tight end-run in sixth grade when I scored the highest in class on a sex education test.   Actually it was more a genetics test, but I got both the extra credit question correct, plus 100% on the test - this brought my score to 106%, the highest out of the whole 100 students in the sixth grade.

Over the following years I mastered avoidance of the subject, until the week before I was going to leave for college.   My mother sat me down and started to explain sex to me, at this point in time why bother.  I realized for some reason my avoidance tactics were not going to work this time.   I told my mother point blank, “I don’t want to talk about this, I lost my virginity three years ago and I don’t think there is anything you can tell me.”   That shut her up, she mulled around and I went back to my day of packing.

Now I have ot start planning down the road how I’m going to talk to my kid about sex and when.   I understand the avoidance tactics so they won’t be able to pull that one.   Of course if it was only my decision I would let them learn the same way I did, school gossip, school education, and practicing it themselves.   Sadly I’ve already been told it isn’t going to work out that way.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

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I was King of the Circus.  Seriously.   When I was somewhere between four and six my mother won a radio contest where we got free tickets to see Barnum and Bailey’s Circus at the Richfield Coliseum.  Part of this prize pack included the child being crowned King or the Circus - I also had a  Queen of the Circus whose parental unit must have also won a contest.   I don’t know where my queen is, we haven’t kept in touch.

The memory is fuzzy, but I remember being taken down and sitting at the sidelines for a little bit with the circus performers.  I was then put on a little train (next to the queen) and taken on a circle of the Coliseum and waving to the whole crowd of thousands.   At the time it was the greatest day of my life (the worst day was finding out I was no longer going to be an only child).   They cheered and I got to take home my cape (I told you I had thing with capes) and a crown.

I was as high as a kite and bragged to all of my friends over the next year that I was king of the circus - at the time I even had pictures to prove that - so take that disbelievers (for all modern disbelievers the pictures are now lost so please suspend your disbelief, thank you).  Life was good and I was king.  Nothing could knock me off my thrown until the following summer.

The following summer the news announced it was going to do a little piece on the Barnum and Bailey circus coming back to town.  I thought “great I’ll go back and ride on my throne again”.   However, during the piece the newscasters showed another kid wearing the crown and taking the tour.  HOW COULD THEY?  USURPER TO THE THRONE PREPARE TO MEET STEEL!!!  I went to the back room of my grandmothers house and put on my crown and cried.   I think I through away that crown that day too.

The situation had to then be explained to me - I was not happy.

I don’t hold a grudge though.

I haven’t been to the Barnum and Bailey’s Circus since.

But I don’t hold a grudge.

Bastards.

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Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

I’ve done the community band circuit for a year now and I’ve played with two community bands.  The one thing I have noticed is that the bands don’t really seem to be growing.  When they do grow it’s usually by an older member decides to join in the band.  The youth market seems to be completely disenfranchised.   I can understand part of that, though I declined to the join the VCMA when it was first formed due to not liking the director.   It wasn’t because I didn’t want to play, I still had the yearly Vermilion Alumni Band to play in, then I moved to Oregon.   While there I hardly ever pulled out my trumpet and when I did it was just for a half hour stint every few months.   My lips didn’t have the range or stamina they once did.   After blowing out my lip the last couple years at Alumni after moving back to Ohio, I decided I need to bring more regular playing in my life.  This led me to community band.  Since I am young(er) I have a different perspective on the band.

The first thing is that the music (at least over the summer) is extremely heavily weighted to music written before I was born.   If we play anything done after I was born it was an arrangement of a pre-existing piece.  I hear the director say things like, “we’ll play this piece because everyone will know it”.   Most of the time this is said, I neither know it, nor do I recognize the melody.  I feel attached and not a part of something I can recognize.  This is not to say that I think the old music should be ignored, no matter how much I dislike traditional marches.  I think we should play a wider variety of music that encompasses all eras.  Young people that really aren’t in to band music should have something that is recognizable to them and not just something that there parents kind of remember or their grandparents danced to on their first date.    There needs to be a mixture.   A mixture that should appeal to all those involved.

Rules I would follow to achieve this if I was choosing the music:

1.  Choose at least one movie/television theme song- preferably something recognizable to all ages.   While we are playing Moonriver in the VCMA and I adore, it is not something that the majority of under-forty crowd would recognize.  I think you would have to go to the over fifty crowd to truly appreciate and remember it.  My wife said she would forever be in love and be inspired to work harder at learning an instrument if she hears The Muppet Show Theme Song.  My personal favorite is video game theme music, something as traditional as The Legend of Zelda Theme Song or a number from the Final Fantasy series.   There is a national company that tours and just does live concerts on video game music, it sells out pretty quickly.  These types of concerts have a great deal of appeal to the under forty crowd and that should be taken into consideration.

Some TV themes I would like to hear:

• Batman the Animated Series Theme
• The Muppet Show Theme
• The A-Team Theme
• The Adam’s Family
• The Star Trek Theme
• Farscape Theme
• Benny Hill Theme
• Monty Python’s Circus Theme
• Futurama Theme
• The Incredible Hulk Theme
• Inspector Gadget Theme
• Macgyver Theme
• Mission Impossible Theme
• Quantum Leap Theme
• Bonanza Theme
• Scooby Doo Theme
• Twilight Zone Theme
• X-Files

Movie Themes I would like to hear:

• Anything by John Williams
• Anything by James Horner
• Harry Potter
• Anything large movie made in the last 20 years.

2.  Choose at least one pop arrangement - the VCMA did the Beatles and this would fit into this category.  The real problem with pop music is that so little of it actually sounds good for a concert band.   The fifties and sixties popular songs actually sound the best, though there are a few later pieces that sound quite good also.

3.  Choose one classical piece that easily recognized, so far in neither of my community bands have we tackled any classical music.  We have done some “traditional” pieces, but nothing classical.   Where is the Bach, Beethoven, or Chopin?  There is an abundance of this that has been arranged for concert bands, but the bands I belong to seem to overlook anything pre 1880 and post 1960.  Christmas music doesn’t really fall under “classical”

Out of these 3 areas community bands should be able to play one piece from each of these genre’s through out there year of performing.  I’m not saying it has to follow that one of each of these pieces get played every concert, but out the forty or so pieces I have played in both bands, they should be able to accommodate one of each of these in their play rotation.

There are other rules I would follow also.

4.  No more then 20 percent of your music can come from any decade.  If it was all arranged in the eighties, that’s fine but the melodies and original music was composed according to this guideline.   I’m not going to pick on arrangers for doing a modern arrangement of In the Mood, its swing era song.   With this rule you could also still fit in easily a whole concert and still have music written from before I was born.

5.  No more then 40% from any single genre.  Whether this is marches, swing, classical, theme music, etc., etc. - variety makes more people take notice unless you’re doing a theme concert.

6. Theme concerts (usually X-mas concerts for community bands) - In a theme concert you should play a maximum of 80% of the music that follows the theme.   One or two pieces should be reserved for something unexpected and interesting that doesn’t fit the norm of a particular theme.  Whether this is a Christmas march or a summer playing of Sleigh Ride, the unexpected brings peoples attention by breaking monotony.

7.  While conductors normally choose the music in most circumstances, there should be one or two pieces chosen by the band members themselves to work through and play.   These people are there to have fun, play something they really want to play.

8.  Encourage your members to compose or arrange something for your band to play.  This makes the music all their own and gives your band something special.

That covers my notes from music selection.   So how do you attract new members?   Other then people moving into the community or the rare person finding out about you and showing up, there is little in the means of growth.  Community bands are competing with the Internet, Social Networking, video games, hanging out with friends, going to the bar, or clubbing.   Having lived through my twenties already most of these are more fun at that age then community band.  You need to hook members while they are still young.

I’ve always played for the love of playing.  I really started when I was a sophomore in high school, by my junior year you couldn’t keep me from auditioning or volunteering to play for whatever group was available.  This alone helped me grow into a much better musician.  I used to be able to transpose music from the key of C or the Key of F in my head automatically and play along from that sheet music.   My range and stamina were much better then they are still today.   My technique today is better in a lot of ways, but I feel I was a better player in a larger scope back then.  That was after only a year of playing back then, I have some of that memory still in my head and I’m old enough to have gained wisdom.  My knowledge should have grown.   After my single year of college I stopped playing with any group outside of Alumni band.  It wasn’t out of disinterest as much as effort.   If I didn’t love playing I wouldn’t stay with the community band, there is no one in my peer group and for a large part of it it’s not really “fun”, at least not in the sense it was fun back when I was in high school.

Most players fall off because they are not engaged early enough into the community band cycle.  To give an example what non engagement with playing can do, for alumni band out of the 160 of us that went through 3 years together, only 5 showed up last year to Alumni Band, only two of us regularly play now.  That’s hovering around a 1-2% rate of a player likely to stick with their instrument after school form my personal experience.  Almost all community bands explicitly state that will accept members that are in high school with their band director’s permission.   Now while I would have gladly played with a community band when I was in high school I was not going to go up and have Mr. Henry sign a permission slip or call to ask if I could join the band.   This is a turn off.   What should happen is that community band should be actively engaging the high school and middle school band directors for members every single year.  If community band members are worried about middle schoolers, then they should make a junior community band where the regular band can show up if they so choose and the younger players can show up.

Younger players are looking for people to emulate, to try to sound like.  Having mentoring by accepting is only going to raise their skill level.   Players that show up are not getting school credit, they are not getting paid, and so why have any stipulations.   If the music is too hard for them they are not going to stick around.   If they don’t really enjoy playing and are only in the school for socialization or the fun from that they are not going to show up.   If community bands are there to make its own members better, then the younger the better, they can make the band as a whole be better.  The older players get the benefit of mild teaching and understanding of what they are doing and the younger players gain a mentor.

Once the younger players are hooked they are more likely to stick with music, since they then have a place to play after they graduate.  They will be informed about the community band and will be regular members.   If they are anything like I was they will find a great relief about having some place to play over the summer.  Older members may even make a little bit of side cash by giving lessons, even if they aren’t as good as a true instructor they could still impart wisdom and teach a student to the edge of their abilities, at which point the student could move onto someone else. My high school self could play rings around my present self. I think community bands under estimate the skill levels of these players.

Is there a strong future for community bands?  It depends.   The older generations need to realize that playing in band is not “cool” at least not until your in your thirties, and I still get the occasional snicker about it - I just don’t care.  A community band is considered a tired thing by the younger generation who would prefer most of their live music to contain electric guitars.  The ability to evolve and bring new members in is essential for most community bands to last another twenty years.   Showing players it can be fun by playing music they can identify with and accepting them as peers within their membership.  You could still have a stipulation where the younger members couldn’t vote in elections, I’m sure you wouldn’t want your board run by four sixteen year olds - but having one of them in a position with a voice may give you greater possibilities then someone like me who is already twice that age and out of touch.

I’ve gotten the VCMA website in a stable place.  I can quickly edit it and make changes, so before any radical redesigns I’m now working on moving them over to Google Apps for internal paperwork.  I plan in the near future signing the VCMA up for a Myspace page and a Facebook account.  People in the younger peer group will be able to see it as an organization to identify with.  The older members need to realize why they started a community to begin with, which includes - hanging out with friends, playing for people, becoming better musicians, and having fun.  None of what I have written breaks any of that.  It may take them a little bit out of their comfort zone, but the mantra of business these days is to embrace and extend.   Growth happens once some of these things are followed.  If the bands I play with don’t start embracing this I’m not sure they will last another twenty years and things will get shaky in another ten.   Growth has not continued, but rather it has stagnated, unless there is something done to counter-act this, the downward trend will continue.

In my band I’m still considered just a kid, though my father had his fourth child by my age.   I’m too young to them to be anything but a kid so what do I know.  I’m too old for any of the young people to truly listen to me, plus I’m over thirty so I’m to young to be trusted.  If we go by Cory Doctorow’s book Little Brother - they don’t trust anyone over 22.   Somehow I’m stuck in the adult version of the tweens.  So no one will truly pay attention, but that doesn’t mean this shouldn’t be said.

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Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

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You know those moments when your a kid and you find something that you can do that you think is extraordinary?   I had one of those moments and it dealt with climbing walls.  I was so convinced it was extraordinary that I thought I had been bitten my a mutant spider.  I think it helped that I was into Spider-Man at the time thanks to the Electric Company.

My super power was being able to climb walls, literally.   In the townhouse I grew up in (it was called a condomimium, but I don’t really think it was a condo) the walls in the stairwell were close enough together that I could shimmy up the walls by putting a set of hands and feet on both sides.   My grandmother’s house was the same way.   I’m sure having a child somewhere between 5-8 years old literally climbing the walls of the house was enough to run my family up the walls themselves.

They spent hours trying to convince me that I wasn’t related to Spider-Man.  I also remember them not being happy about scrubbing footprints off the wall at eye level.  Somewhere along this time frame I also managed to get a picture of myself on Spider-Man’s lap taken at Midway Mall in Elyria.   I had that picture for years, but for some reason it’s now missing :(.

I do remember attempting to fly and levitate for years, but I wasn’t as successful as I was at being a wall crawler.

Originally published at Creeva's World 2.0. You can comment here or there.

When I was young I loved capes.   I don’t know why.   The first cape I can remember (I’m sure there were predecessors) was one I had at my grandmother’s house.   It was dark blue with red trim.  I did the normal pretend I was Batman or Superman routines, but I just like wearing it.  I don’t know why.

Following that for years I had inferior capes, normally the halloween vinyl capes.  I hated those capes.  They would tear within an hour and most the time you were left with the collar and no cape.    Then I finally made it to working at the haunted school house (picture above though the cape is somehow behind my back enoguh you can’t see it).   I designed a character named “Vlad”  who I played off an on for 3 years - note the costume all put together probably ran me 400.00.

Since I stopped working at the school house I’ve only pulled out that cape on a couple occasions.   I still have it and it’s in the closet.   Maybe sometimes I dance around naked only wrapped in my cape…..wouldn’t you like to know.