Paying Attention in Class

Almost 2 years ago I wrote this blog, about multi-tasking and not paying attention in class. I maintain that paying attention in class is my prerogative. But having just got singled out for not paying attention in a lecture of exponentially dwindling numbers, I'm gonna talk about it again.

I'll set the stage. In order to finish out our Global Education requirements for the School of Social and Behavioral sciences, Jake and I are taking a History class. The class is about everyone's favorite topic: World War I. What's that? Nobody cares about World War I, and everybody is interested in World War II? Oh yes, that's right.

Now, when we signed up for the class, it turned out that a whole other group of people we knew were going to be taking the class as well. Good sign for the class! The teacher of the class got a 4.6/5 on RateMyProfessor. Good sign for the class! It's a lecture. Good sign for the class!

So when we showed up Day 1, and it was a lecture, our friends were there, and we saw that there was indeed a professor, we thought we were batting a thousand. Boy were we wrong. The professor was actually a visiting professor from the University of Minnesota or something, and his teaching style involves him standing at the pulpit, going on about World War I, consulting a page, with a map on one of the old school projectors. Did I mention he loves reading us World War I poetry? Cause he does!

Anyway, Jake and I decide, "Alright. We'll stick it out. Maybe it'll get better once the actual war starts?" Well it didn't. Hell that other group of kids I was talking about? Yeah. They dropped the class. I wish we'd joined them. Now the once full lecture hall has dwindled to about one person every 3 or 4 seats. So us even showing up to class is some kind of miracle from the teaching gods. There's absolutely no way to take notes, because he talks and talks and talks and talks, about random people or battles that you're expected to know. The topography, the socioeconomic implications, the politics; he might honestly believe that he's lecturing to a class filled with other World War I professors.

So the fact that we're here should give us some kind of pass right? Well apparently the fact I'm on my laptop, and Jake looked over to see what I was looking at is some kind of crime against the professor. Jake looks over for arguably 2 or 3 seconds, and our professor goes, "HEY! You two in the back! What's going on?!" Was he really calling us out? Really Bro? We decide to come and sit through your lecture that sans laptop would arguably bore me to death, and you're going to call us out for sitting, minding our own business not paying attention. That's how it's going down. Okay. Great.

If we're not yelling or throwing things, and just sitting there minding our own business, not paying attention, you leave us the hell alone. College is a time where going to class and paying attention is up to the student. I'm here at least. If you want us to pay attention make your lecture more interesting. Stop talking about the romanticism of one soldier from Britain who was in battles X,Y, and Z, and kept a diary, and talk about a battle. Talk about something that will catch my attention. The turning point in the war. Anything! I mean I realize that there was 4 years of stalemate due to trench warfare. But I had to find that out from Wikipedia, because I couldn't listen to you longer than to realize you were talking about something that might make my IQ lower if I kept on listening.

All I'm saying is that we had the decency to come to this awful class, my last class of the week, and you are going to call me out for minding my own business? Go back to Minnesota or wherever you came from. This class sucks.

Editors Note: On Thursday, October 20th, Jim and Jake dropped that class like a bad habit, ate a victory dinner, celebrated and slept like babies. Everyone cheered.

I'm Writing Something Gorram it!

I have been slacking. Yes. I admit this. I apologize. I've been mad busy! See what I did there! Italics! For emphasis! Anywho, what's up guys? How's it been? Good? Good.

With that out of the way, lets move on to more pressing matters. Television is addictive. Over the summer I had at least one show every night of the week, with the exception of Saturday. We had good ol' TNT Sundays, Syfy Mondays, USA Tuesdays, Franklin & Bash on Wednesdays, Suits on Thursdays, and Haven on Fridays. "Wow Jim, you watch a lot of TV!" Yeah. I know. Thanks. But I mean Wow! Someone somewhere decided to step up their game this summer. New series like Franklin & Bash, Falling Skies and especially Suits and Alphas (both of which I got Kevin hooked on) all were just top-shelf stuff. Plus the return contenders like White Collar, Covert Affairs, Leverage, Eureka, Warehouse 13 and Haven all had solid seasons.

So maybe it's just me, but I really get into TV shows. I was listening to a podcast as I drove home today for the long weekend, and they said that the reason the mainstream public is into the whole Kardashian, reality show idiocracy is because they can't get into a great television show. You know, something that really takes them out of it. Some of these shows, I watch them and I just get caught up. What's gonna happen next? I don't know. Or maybe I do? But these people are story tellers, and they are damn good at it.

As for what's coming up, you got the perennial classics How I Met Your Mother, House, Psych, SVU, Chuck, Parks & Recreation, Community, The Walking Dead, Sanctuary, and the second half of Covert Affairs as well as some new guys like Terra Nova, Grimm, and Once Upon A Time, all of which have my interests piqued. I'm also getting the Dexter and Breaking Bad vibe going. Which is interesting.

So basically, I'm a TV snob, and even though I didn't mean to write a blog about my unusual TV habits, but here it is. Maybe this is a step in the right direction? Here we go Jim! You can do it! Go team! If you've got some show that I'm not watching that I should be, or some other comment on my wide variety of  legal/cop/sci-fi shows, let me know!

Wow. Have I Been Slacking or What?

"Jim! What the hell? You haven't posted a blog in forever!"

Yes. I hear you. MY BAD. But I've been caught up in this whole thing called Life. I mean living in an apartment with 3 or 4 (depends what day it is,) of your best friends doesn't exactly leave you with a lot of free time to write about nonsensical things... I mean. I turned 21! I'm about to be a senior in college! I don't know how to manage my time! But I guess now that school is done, maybe I'll have more time to write. OH WAIT.

I'm working 40 hours a week at the Garden Center, interning at RunKeeper in Boston, and trying to maintain what little social life I claim to have!

Basically what I'm saying here is; Nerdventures, I love you, but right now, you're on the back burner. Frowny face, I know. But life is coming at me pretty fast right now. I'm getting home from work, and it takes pretty much all of what little energy I have left to not go to bed. On the bright side, I've slept better in the last 2 weeks than I did the last 6 months at school! Aside from that, the only things I've got going for me right now are the Bruins and my sweet, sweet playoff beard. I've been reading a lot of books. Been watching 30 Rock too. As I type even! Radio's been going pretty swell. Kevin and I added our good friend and my former trainee, Noel to our hosting staff, and I got the DJ Training Director gig. All in all, life is pretty good. Busy, fast, dirty, but good. (What I work at the Garden Center, I just scraped dirt out from under my nails!)

So here's to you Nerdventures. Two years old. This was a very unproductive year in terms of blogging, but for writing on the whole, my 58 page screenplay nods it's approval. I'll try and write more, honest.

Much love.

James

PAX East 2011: 3 Days of Awesome

After a week of meditation and recovery, I finally can regale you with the awesomeness that was Penny Arcade Expo East 2011. Now, if you remember reading my two posts from last year, you'll remember the generalities and the basics of the convention, like who Penny Arcade is, my compatriot Beckett (@beckettnoyes), and the amazingness of it all.

Well, just to get this out of the way early, this year's convention was even better. First of all, Beckett and I committed to going to all three days of the show, instead of just one day. This was so clutch, in that even though we were trying to scurry from place to place on our first day trying to see everything, we knew that we still had two more days to double back. This also allowed us to see the Friday Night Concert as well, which consisted of The Protomen, MC Frontalot and Metroid Metal. The Protomen, a group whose songs are based loosely off the tale of Megaman, had their amps turned all the way up to 11. It was a good thing that the Enforcers, the volunteer security force of PAX, were handing out earplugs because if I didn't have those, I am pretty sure I would have gone deaf. They are essentially a metal band, so there was shredding and general ear exploding done on their part, which I might have liked a little bit better if they weren't so loud. MC Frontalot on the other hand was pretty awesome. Being a nerdcore rapper, as only he can be, he covered topics like Xenobiology, Goth Girls, Diseases, Star Wars, and then song a remix of the Penny Arcade Theme Song, like he does every year, this time to a backing track of Katy Perry's California Gurls. It was Amazing.

After that, we decided to skip out on Metroid Metal, as we weren't really feeling like getting our ears assaulted again, and we made the long trek back home to get 3 and a half hours of sleep, before getting up and making the trek back to Boston. At this point, I should also mention that due to the overwhelming success of last year's inaugural PAX East, this year the convention was moved from the Hynes Convention Center to the much larger Boston Convention & Exhibition Center. With a total attendance of 69,500 people over the three days, the place was packed.

Yours truly at the top of the escalator down to the show floor, and the show floor itself.

Day 2 was a lot of the same, running, gunning. There was this year's Make-A-Strip panel, where Mike and Jerry script and draw the comic strip for that Monday, as well as a lot more exploring and buying merchandise from booths. But we also took some time out to wait in line for the exclusive Portal 2 preview, as well as wait and play a game of Dungeons & Dragons for beginners. Can't even lie to you, it was a great time. And if you're thinking, "Why is Dungeons & Dragons at a video game convention?" Well it is because PAX is more of a nerd convention than a video game convention. While yes, a lot of it focuses on the new hot video games, there's also a huge portion dedicated to tabletop games like Magic The Gathering and D&D. While waiting in line for the Friday Night Concert, the kids behind Beckett and me invited us to play a game called Munchkins. It was actually pretty cool and it was just one of many indie card and dice games represented at PAX. Once again, that night's festivities included the 3rd Round of the Omegathon and the Saturday Night Concert. This year's 3rd Round of the Omegathon was THE MOST EPIC GAME OF JENGA EVER PLAYED. There is absolutely no way a more intense game of Jenga has ever been played. Two sets of Four Two person teams competed against each other with "Omegablocks" instead of the little baby blocks regular people play with. Only allowed to use one hand at a time, the first game was incredible. As was the second game. Words can not describe how the tremors literally shook one girl's arm to the point where it was visible from the back of the theater, and then how much applause she got when she successfully freed and replaced the block from the tower. Simply incredible.

 An Omeganaut in the midst of a pull while other Omeganauts watch with bated breath in the background.

Following that intensity, the Saturday Night Concert of Video Game Orchestra, Paul & Storm, and Jonathan Coulton reprised their roles from last year's concert. Video Game Orchestra and Paul & Storm played a lot of the same stuff, with some new stuff, and overall were just as good if not better than last year. Jonathan Coulton on the other hand, as opposed to last year's acoustic set, this year he came out on an electric guitar with a bassist and a drummer. He played rock versions of a lot of his hits, as well as some new songs from his upcoming CD which sounds like it should be pretty good. 

After Jonathan Coulton finished his set at about 2AM, Beckett and I walked from the Convention Center to Cambridge. It's about a three and a half mile walk. And then with the time change, it ended up being about 4:30 in the morning before we got to my sister's place where we crashed for the evening. Getting about 3 hours of sleep, Beckett and I made our final trek back to the Convention Center the next morning, waiting to see Bill Amend, creator of newspaper comic section favorite, FoxTrot. Then the day just flew by, and after waiting for about an hour for a 20 minute demo of L.A. Noire, we got in line about 2 hours early for the closing ceremony, where the final round of the Omegathon played out in a two on two match up of the crazy game Ikaruga. After that Mike and Jerry said their thank you's and goodbyes, and PAX was concluded.

As I said last year, PAX isn't for everyone but for three days out of the year, I can let my freak flag fly. I fully intend on going next year, and every year because at PAX you can do no wrong if you follow the cardinal rule: Don't be a dick. Clearly I skimmed over a lot, like the QR code quest, and playing the Nintendo 3DS, but just know that for 72 hours, I had one of the best times of the year. If you think you want to, or can handle the intense nerdism, I encourage you heartily to try it. I'll be back for three days next year, and if you'd like to join me on one or more, do yourself a favor and do it.

If you want to find out more, check out my pictures on Facebook, my Twitter, or my videos on YouTube. If you can't see the pictures from this post check out the full post here.

Helpful Hints Vol. 2: How to Erase Your 7 Page Paper and Still Not Erase It

Let me take you back about 12 hours now.


A young man has been working on a 5 page research paper with an annotated bibliography for about 7 hours. He has been killing it. He's drank a Monster, and he doesn't even know what Facebook is. When he's not typing away listening to classical music, he's on Google Books, reading research. 


That's it. He's finished. It's a miracle! All that's left to do is copy and paste the bibliography from one word document into the other, and it's a done deal! 3:40 AM? Not bad at all.


But wait! It's 3:40 AM! He confuses one document for another! He closes a document... NO! Sweet baby Jesus; No! What has he done!? All his work! His research! His paragraphs! His footnotes! WHY!?!?!?!

Hi, my name is Jim Redding. That young man was me. I know what you're saying to yourself. "How're you still alive? How did you re-write your paper? What gave you the mental fortitude?" True, there was about 20 solid minutes there where I was absolutely convinced that I had one option: my untimely demise. But let me walk you through the 4 Steps of Post-Deletion Grief, or PDG as I believe the clinical term is called.

Step 1: Disbelief.

No way. I definitely saved it. I had to have. Right? Everyone saves right?.There's no way I didn't save it. NO. I know! I'll just turn off the computer, open Word, and it'll be there waiting!

It should be noted that it took me a solid 20 minutes with my head pounding on my table to get my computer back up. 1st time I restarted it, it tried to check my disk. There was absolutely no time for those shenanigans. Also, it helps if you pray to RoboJesus. I did. Jesus just wasn't cutting it. I mean really, what does he know about computers? He's a carpenter.

Step 2: Anger

It's not there. I opened Word, and it's not there. !@#$%^&^%$#%$#@#$%$#@#$%$#@!@#$%^$#@!@#$#@$%$# THIS IS ^%$#@%^%#@$%^%$#@#$#$#@#$%$#.

This is not a fun time.

Step 3: Remember the Power of being a Nerd.

You've been training your whole life for this. You've been on a computer since kindergarten in one form or another. You can do this. YOU HAVE THE POWER.

Fact: When you're a nerd, you've got options. Now I knew there were temporary files, only problem was I didn't know how to open them. I was weak of heart and downloaded some backward mal-ware installing program that said it could read .tmp files. I did have the constitution of mind to not let it download most of it's other crap on my computer. I mean does anyone really want Yahoo Toolbar installed? No. But I bet most people have it and five other obscure bars, because they don't realize during those things that say "Quick Install" or "Custom Install" you should always pick "Custom." Anyway, after realizing that the product was absolute crap, I turned to sweet, sweet Google. I literally typed in "how to find temporary files for word documents" and hit search. Digging around I found that you can force Word to open those Temporary files. Better yet, there's another file type called .asd, or AutoSave Document. After searching "My Computer" for those file types, (search *.asd) I found a recent file, forced Word to open it, and Bam-za-dam, you've got your file back, or at least the last auto-save of it.

Step 4: Thank your lucky stars, and for the love of god SAVE THE DAMN FILE.

Heavy breathing followed by collapse. And tweeting.

Pretty self explanatory. Realize that you got lucky. So lucky. Realize that the Save button shall now be clicked every two minutes, like clockwork. Clock. Work.

For a solid half an hour last night, I thought my heart was going to explode, I was going to have to re-write a 5 page research paper, I was going to kill myself, or a combination of all three. It is not a pleasant experience, and I wish it on no one. However if this horrible catastrophe happens to you, follow my guide, or worst case scenario send me a message. I've been there. To Hell and back. I survived, and so can you.

Godspeed fellow writers. Godspeed.

The Bizarre Dreams of Jim Redding

Okay so I just woke up from a dream. It started as I was a little kid going on a walking tour of Amherst as a grade school field trip with my roommate Andy. Then somehow it wasn't Amherst but the road that I get off Route 2 onto to get to Amherst, but it was still the place we were supposed to be. Now in reaity this is just a long stretch of road with some gas stations, a batting cage, a mini golf course, and an ice cream shop on it. Those were all there albeit on a much smaller scale. Also, this outdoor road somehow ended up in some kind of mall food court. But there were only two places in it, and one guy working the two places. It just so happened that my friend Beckett was said guy. Apparently we could only order after getting selected. By this time I was the right age again. Beckett's first pick was my friend Brian who I had apparently been standing next to the entire time. The menu options were only chicken cutlet sandwiches. After Brian ordered I got picked next. But now the menu options were only roast beef sandwiches. I remember I thought about getting two roast beefs, and a small soda, cause I'd just refill it with water in the bubbler after. But I ended up ordering a double roast beef sandwich. With bacon. So as Beckett put this into the machine that produced the roast beef, a siren or something went off and everyone was looking at me wondering why I hadn't taken my tee shot yet. I was now Christopher Chance, the guy from Human Target, and I was on a golf course. I had never played golf before but I knew the basics and being this guy I was just naturally good at everything. So I step up to take my shot, which was now not my tee shot, but my approach shot, and I got it real close to the hole. Then as I turned my back to the hole, and put my club over my shoulder, and the view switched to a camera angle facing me as a mid-close up, where somehow you could see me and also see the ball, in focus, some long distance away, roll and roll and roll into the hole. It was a hole in one I guess. So then as I'm walking to get my ball, I started talking to Winston, Chance's partner on the show, over the radio, the view switched to him, and next thing you know, some random chick starts talking to him, he realizes she's packing heat, he yells and tells me the op is blown over the communicator, and then next thing I know he tackles me into a portal or something, then I think I saw zombies or something. The next thing I saw was my mom opening my door asking me if I had anymore laundry in my room. I told her I put it all by the laundry machine.

That last part actually happened, but the rest of it was just as real. If anybody can tell me what my dream meant, please, enlighten me. But as far as I can figure, sometimes a dream is just a dream.

The Power of the Internet

I’m sure absolutely everyone knows this by now, but in recent news there has been a homeless man, by the name of Ted Williams, who is the man with the golden voice. It’s really astounding. I first heard the story on Barstool Sports, and as charming as I thought it was, I thought this is just another great story that would fly under the radar. 

Fast forward 24 hours.

Twitter, Facebook, Digg, CNN, Fox News, ESPN; Everything is blowing up with news about this guy. It's incredible. I know my Mom hadn't heard about it until I told her, but of course I told her after I not only saw it on ESPN, but on their show Around the Horn. She then proceeded to tell all her friends about it. It's an immense boon to the human spirit to think that one video, one small little YouTube video, could get put up about a man who has fallen on hard times, and not much later he would be doing radio appearances, as well as getting job offers from sports organizations. I'll keep this short, but this is a shout out to everyone who saw this, and told someone about it. Whether you wanted to show someone how funny it was, or how talented he was, or just because you were bored. Whoever you are, you gave this guy a second chance in a world that isn't known for second chances. Good work. For every story they run on the news about how something bad went down, they eventually let one of these good ones seep through the cracks, and I'm glad that this is the story that everyone picked up on. Good job on being you, whoever you are.

Thanks for renewing my faith in the human race everybody.