Saturday, 01 January 2011
Guess what? I started out by writing “Saturday, 01 January 2010,” and only realized my mistake several minutes later. Geez. I need to wake up.
Whenever I attend a funeral, it always gets me thinking about my own mortality. I wonder what people will do to mourn (or celebrate?) my passing. I wonder who will be in attendance. This line of reasoning usually leads me to conclude that I have nothing in writing; nothing set out that clearly says what my wishes are. And, it’s times like this, that I start to think I should write some of this down.
But then I wonder…have lawyers fucked with this, too? I mean, I know the answer is yes, but I wonder: if I write up something that says what I would like done with my body when it expires, and what sort of post-death party I would like the survivors to hold, and how I would like my estate apportioned, and what I would like read at my funeral, would it be respected? Or would some lawyer say, “Oh, well this wasn’t signed by 12 public notaries and placed on file with Dewey, Cheetum and Howe, so it’s not valid. Anyway, we’ll be taking all his money”?
Either way, I’m gonna spell some things out in written form. It’s tough to plan though, because I might live for 7 more decades, or I might live for 7 more days. I know that sounds morbid, but it’s reality, and if I didn’t want to live in reality, I would be a Jehovah’s Witness.
Sunday, 02 January 2011
So, I was hanging out with my friend Ryan the other day, and he was telling me about XtraNormal. I have seen some of the videos created (or perhaps “assembled” would be a more appropriate verb) using this site. They’re entertaining. But they’re not quite right. Probably because using stock footage and selecting from a limited number of options could never make something turn out ‘right.’ Anyway, Ryan showed me a video he was creating regarding Jehovah’s Witnesses (sorry for bringing them up in two consecutive days), and, once again: funny, but not quite ‘right’.
I don’t mean to rip on Ryan, because I can see that XtraNormal is a fun tool to use, but the voices sound funny, the gestures don’t line up perfectly, and sometimes, it’s way too obvious that this was built from the top down. For example, in the video he showed me, the main character was ‘Witnessing,’ so he should have had some literature with him, especially when he was reading directly from the magazine he was trying to offer.
Either way, I’m happy that after a two month absence from the WWW, Ryan has finally contributed to our virtual reality once again. Check out his new videos. Here they are – a beautiful mashing of Ryan’s wit with XtraNormal’s weirdness: