tell your friends, to get with my friends and we can be friends. "hi, this is my friend ." you've just been introduced to a friend of a friend, what do you do in this situation? do we (as a species) have a social obligation to be nice to our friends' friends? i mean, if we are somewhat measured by the company we keep, shouldn't it make sense that a friend of a friend would also be cool? shouldn't any friends of friends be given a fair shake? there are two schools of thought on this matter: yes and no.



for the "no we shouldn'ts" the reasoning goes like this. in befriending you, i've already used a highly organized selection process to cull six billion other people; and now you want me to accept someone else based on your (possibly flawed) standards? in the immortal words of william sun, "aw hell no." i am quoting only william's favored verbal expression, not his individual thoughts on the matter.



we forgive our friends for many things: bad taste in clothes, faulty opinions, horrific choices in people. plus, what a friend likes might not be what we like. said in a more straightforward way, just because a friend likes it doesn't mean you like it. this friendship principle 2a also extends to people. while it might make logical sense that if A likes B and B likes C, then A should also like C, it doesn't work that way. the way it works is that the chances of you liking a friend of a friend is about the same as you liking a totally random stranger. the bonds that tie you to a mutual friend make no difference and should have no impact on how you receive or perceive an individual. this is how the "no we shouldn'ts" think. and it is a very valid way of thinking. logical in premise and efficient in execution. some people are tards, should we be friends with them just because we share friends? aw hell no.



now, the "yes we shoulds" consider a friend of a friend their friend already. at least in the beginning. if a "yes we should" meets a friend of a friend, they are immediately inviting with their langauge and action. their reasoning is simple. "i will extend my friendship and hospitality to everyone and everything that encompasses my friend, up to and including his/her friends." on a fundamental level, it makes a lot of sense. "if this person is important to my friend, i want to get to know them, or at the very least, try to be nice to them." this method of treating friends of friends is of course, in our altruistic society, preferable. but is it better?



some would say that any friend who can't, or won't, treat a friend of a friend nicely is not a real friend at all. but this is simply not true. i personally prefer it if my friends would give the benefit of the doubt to my other friends, but i understand that this cannot always be so. i've actually gotten semi-upset or confrontational when faced with the prospect of friends disliking each other. i want to hear reasons, explanations. i want to see diagrams, evidence and testimony. i don't want to hear "i just don't like'em." why don't you like them? why why why? over time, i've come to understand that some people just don't really want to bother extending themselves until it occurs naturally. i can respect that. i guess.



the way i handle friends meeting friends nowadays is that i don't expect certain people to be "friendly." i understand that specific people would rather just operate in their own space, and as much as i want all my friends to be friends with each other, it can't work out that way all the time. so now i just expose only certain friends to certain other friends. i go into situations trying to "even the odds" if you will. i know which of my friends are more likely to be more social and which are more likely to be anti-social. either is cool, i don't take it personally anymore, as long as everyone is civil.



the weird thing about all this kind of stuff is that you never know who will get along and who won't. you think that two of your friends will really get along and then they totally don't. or i've had situations where one friend gets along best with the person i would of thought they had the least in common with. you never know. some people are reading this and thinking "who cares? this is stupid. just have everyone hang out. why are you even thinking about this?" i have to think about this because this is what hanging out entails. you can't just have everyone hanging out willy nilly at random. it has to be carefully pre-planned and thought out. otherwise you get social disaster.



okay, maybe it ain't that deep. or is it?

stop it, just stop it. serious pet peeve. when people use nicknames for any city but their home city. examples: hotlanta, the d, illadelph, frisco, daygo, saint looie, brick city, oaktown, skeeno, big apple...whatever. i'm way not cool enough to know any of the nicknames for other cities; as you've surmised, i'm not up on my transitory hip hop. but i'm sure there's a nickname for every city, even if your city is so off the map nobody knows what you're talking about. san bernard!!! i think it's only okay to use a city's nickname if you're actually from there. it's also passably okay if you're doing something deragatory with your statement. comma, period, end of story. i'm actually against anyone using certain nicknames for their city -- some nicknames are just stupid -- but whatever, i'll let it slide.



while we're on the topic, i'm sort of against anyone who uses the term "peeps" to describe their friends. i know people who do this and it never fails to amuse me, and not in a good way. maybe "peeps" isn't even a "cool" thing to say anymore. i don't know. be safe, don't say "peeps." i might have to start a list of things that people should never say. or if you have to say them, say it in a psuedo-mockumentary, self deprecating manner, which is what i'm convinced i do. although my friends disagree. anyway, stupid friends.



while we're on the topic of cities. this summer, when everyone was here for memorial day, i woke up to a rabid discussion about the use of the term "the d" for detroit. not whether "the d" should be applied to detroit but rather who could use it. i only walked in on the back end of the discussion so i missed most of it. but the point was that unless you lived within a certain acceptable distance of geographical detroit, you were not from "the d." where to set this imaginary line? no solid answer was provided. now, why would anyone want to associate themselves with a city that they lived thirty miles away from?



ah, i see you've never visited the midwest.



let me help you out. because of the vastness and relative obscurity of the midwest (no offense), it's usually much easier to say "i'm from detroit" instead of "i'm from troy." if you say "troy," you get a blank stare. it's easier to just pick the biggest most recognizable city and say that you're from there. this is perfectly acceptable. i may live thirty minutes away from downtown san diego but i'm from san diego if my mailing address says so. this should be the rule of thumb actually. you are from wherever your mailing address says you're from. it's simple, the us postal service has separated us out, why not listen to them? it's not like they're crazy or anything.



the other, more despicable reason to say that you're from a particular city is for the social cachet it provides. unless you hail from bethlehem or smallville, chances are your little town ain't shit compared to the big one nearby. so the natural tendency is to associate yourself (at least nominally) with the big city. who wants to be from "a suburb of san jose" when they can be from "the bay." or in our aforementioned case, who wants to be from "a little town near detroit" when they can be from "the d." street cred baby, everyone needs some.



now, the city that this "city cred" phenomenon most occurs with is new york city -- or more specifically, manhattan. manhattan is an epicenter of cool and cosmopolitan. because of this, i've heard people declaring their allegiance to new york city when they live ten hours away (within the state of new york) and have been to manhattan twice in their lives -- both times in middle school. hypocrisy. oh wait, but jon you say, didn't you used to declare "i live in new york," when clearly you lived not in new york but across the river, in the armpit of america, new jersey? do i suffer from this social malady too? did i feel the pressure to present myself as cool and cosmopolitan and say "new york" instead of "new jersey?" maybe yes, but i doubt it. i mean, technically i was half a mile away from wall street and the world trade center. i was closer in distance than any of the boroughs outlying manhattan. and if i had to, in a pinch, i could run to manhattan in fifteen minutes. which allows me to say manhattan right?



but, as it was pointed out to me, technicalities cannot save the man. so, ever since i realized that i've been saying new york instead of new jersey, i go out of my way to declare that i actually lived in jersey city, not manhattan. because i wouldn't want to falsely lead someone on and bask in the glory of the city that never sleeps. am i not admirable in my honesty? yes, i was a new york poser okay? are you happy now?!

studio 57. i've been listening studiously to talk radio while i'm at work. to get the independent's perspective i listen to democracy now with amy goodman. to get the corporate side, i listen to everything else. right or left, i'm not sure which side makes less sense to me. sometimes i'll drive home while listening to the conservative station and get so worked up about what the host is saying about a certain issue that i'll get all agitated. but almost as often, i'll hear some liberal loony (not meant to be totally derogative) talking and rationalizing away and i'm thinking "they are just trying to create trouble." clearly i'm not sure which side i stand on, but some things about both angles just make no sense to me.



for example, depending on what your sources were, last week between 300 to 1,000 people were arrested while protesting the republican national committee. everyone can protest, it's their god given right. but at a certain point, these "peaceful" demonstrations just get ridiculous. i understand that protesting is an important weapon and i'm sure it's very effective. however, if you're going to protest, how can you be surprised when you get arrested? i'm sure the police were a bit over zealous in their cattle roundup but i don't think you can expect the police to be overly patient in such a situation. innocent bystanders were taken? well duh. if you're going to stand close enough to the fire to feel the heat, don't be surprised if you get burnt -- even if you were just watching.



a part of me thinks it's slightly wrong for the protestors to be there. part of some group's stated goal was to disrupt the convention and to harass the conventioners. that's wack man. everyone has a right to affiliate with whomever they want to, without having to fight through throngs of people throwing verbal tomatoes at them. i know there were protests at the DNC too but for the most part, the democrats got their chance to have a nice convention, why can't the republicans? to me, it's just disrespectful to take pride in the fact that you can slip past 10,000 security people and onto the convention floor. and then flash your underwear or start chants in an effort to embarass the speaker. have some respect man. sure you may not agree with what they're saying but there's a right way to protest and a wrong way. going on guerilla missions to get beat down by bodyguards is not heroic, it's idiotic. it's screaming for attention instead of earning it.



and of course the police is going to hold the protestors as long as they can. what's the point of arresting people, slapping them on their wrist and then releasing them back into the wild again? that's not how it works man. think about it from the police's perspective. how are they gonna catch and immediately release, and then do it over and over again? from what i've heard, the conditions at pier 57 were nasty and that's kind of wrong but the point isn't for police to catch you, put you up in a hotel and then let you go. they don't want you to stir up trouble again so they're gonna do their best to dissuade you from doing things that will result in you re-visiting detention. isn't that what you would do if you had to hold up some disruptive folk?



sure this is america and the land of the free but there are boundaries. once you start to infringe on other people's liberties and opinions, you should get restrained. everyone has the right to protest but they should also have the right to gather in peace too. everyone and their mother may want bush out of office but show it through your voting, not harassing folk who are supporting something they strongly believe in. i'm not saying the protestors deserved to get locked up but in a way, what did they expect?



and when i say that there are "right" and "wrong" ways to protest, that's just my opinion. people make themselves heard in different ways and we should respect that too. some situations call for peaceful protest, some call for violent protest, whatever it is, just know that as soon as you put yourself out there to support something, people will be lining up to attack you, republicans or democrats alike.



many of the protestors organized via cellphone and text messages. cool eh? do you think it adds credibility to a protestor/demonstrator if they've been arrested? like a rite of passage or a badge of honor? and do you think if a political (or any) organization didn't have the .org address it would be like "oh they ain't big time, they ain't even an .org."

of course, the immortality that goethe talks about has nothing in common with religious faith in an immortal soul. what is involved is the different, quite earthly immortality of those who after their death remain in the memory of posterity. everyone can achieve immortality to a smaller or greater degree, of shorter or longer duration, and this idea already starts occupying people's minds in early youth....



naturally, when it comes to immortality people are not created equal. we have to distinguish between so-called minor immortality, the memory of a person in the minds of those who knew him, and great immortality, which means the memory of a person in the minds of people who never kenw him personally. there are certain paths in life that from the very beginning place a person face-to-face with such great immortality, uncertain, it is true, even improbable, yet undeniably possible: they are the paths of artist and statesmen.

-immortality, milan kundera-

king me. sometimes when you're at work, you gotta go. it's not the ideal place to spell relief but sometimes, even if you've structured your diet and lifestyle accordingly, you just can't avoid the work place dump. this is not so bad if you work in an office with three or four people. i mean, at home you probably share the toilet with three or four people so you're used to a small number of exchanged germs. but what happens when you work in an environment with forty guys and one bathroom?



to its credit, my office maintains a very clean bathroom by office standards. it's no sanitary delight but it's no gas station bathroom either. we all know the fear and technique that goes into going number two in a public place. you try not to touch anything, you squat a foot in the air, you throw in toilet paper for cushioning against the inevitable splash down, you wipe the seat, you pray for your bowels to release quick and dirty and not slow and squirty -- after all, a man can only squat for so long. this is basic information.



but one specific situation is sometimes troubling. what happens when you are ready to go to the bathroom; you've mentally prepared yourself to go into the stall and do your business; you've waited till the absolute last minute to go; and then there's already somebody in there doing their thing. this is a difficult situation. you're stuck between a rock and a smelly place. you need to go real bad but you don't want to assume the position right after somebody else perched on the throne right? it would be ideal to wait five or ten minutes for the air to clear but in five or ten minutes you might explode. what do you do?



i try to minimize the mental anguish of this situation by trying to make the guy going before me as anonymous as possible. once i see that someone is in the stall, with feet facing the "right" way, i turn around and leave the bathroom. i try not to remember what shoes they were wearing, what color their pants/belts were and i station myself far from the bathroom in order to not to see him exit. i figure that the less i know about the person whose ass was just hovering in the same position as mine is now, the better. and that is what comes out of working on labor day. a lot of crap with nowhere to go.



by the way, this situation was related to me by a friend. i've like never gone through this personally. ever.



ps. it's shocking how many people don't wash their hand after using the bathroom. especially if there's somebody already using the sink. patience people! we work at a video game company, we touch shared controllers/keyboards all the time. wash your hands! i feel like i should bring in my latex smoking gloves and wear them for protection. this is just way too unsanitary.



pss. and i've seen some people actually take their food (on uncovered plates) into the bathroom, set it down somewhere, go take care of biz and then walk right back out and resume eating. what is this? what kind of a world do we live in? is there no hope?

uncanny, new, amazing, ultimate, x-treme, astonishing. now that i'm on the verge of turning twenty six i need to really take stock of my life. have the x-men been turned into a movie? yes. have the x-men been turned into a videogame? are the x-men now cool? yes. have i found secret x-fans among my friends? yes. they made a street fighter-esque x-men videogame? yes. have the x-men been turned into itty bitty pixelated versions of themselves, complete with every single costume they've ever worn? amazingly, yes (and this site contains just about the most amazing things i've ever seen). have they created the technology for implanting fully functional adamantium claws? not yet, but in my lifetime i hope.



sidenote: really, is this too much to ask for? people can get new breasts and butts and body organs and i can't get implanted claws? why is this? would surgeons not make a killing selling this service? do you know how many fanboys have been saving up for this life altering process? millions. maybe implanting metal knives into people's hands isn't the best idea right now, what with the stringent security measures that we've had to deal with recently, but what if they only allowed "heroic" people to have claws implanted? wouldn't that be a great idea? by the way, if the teenage mutant ninja turtles can be a musical, why not the x-men? the angst, the drama, the songs that could be written. and hugh jackman is already a broadway vet. might this be my calling in life? to pen the first x-men musical? actually, there is already a wolverine song based on one of jewel's work, and it's quite excellent so i'm not sure i could live up to the challenge. sample lyrics: cold shiny claws / pop out from my paws / to slay the evil mutants, / but they can’t stop / anti-mutant laws /which spread with such virulence. the mp3 is located here. i highly recommend that you download it.



obviously, many of my life goals, or things i want to happen before i die, have already been achieved. and now, one more item can be added to that list. jubilee is a playable video game character. this is huge. jubilee has always been one of my favorite x-characters. i know, everyone says that. it's so trite, so banal, so cliche. god, i feel like such an epigone. but really, how could she not be one of my favorite characters? she's chinese for one, she's got great style for two. she chews gum all the time, she wears sunglasses indoors, she's wolvie's sidekick, she's got tons of attitude. she used to live in a mall. what is there not to like? well sure, she's not the most powerful superhero ever. and she's kind of annoying at times. she's somewhat insecure, irrational and pompous. she likes to say "when i was with the x-men..." way too much. but jubilee's got spunk and spunk a commodity in short supply.



since the chance of finding the real life jubilation lee is somewhat slim, i'll have to settle for a video game version. for the record, three actresses have dared to assume the role of jubilee: heather mccomb, katrina florece and kea wong. note that only one has been asian. so far my favorite depiction of jubilee has been the job heather mccomb did in the short lived generation x series. then again, she's the only jubilee who had more than one line of dialogue so she kind of wins by default. but i think all these women, as talented as they are, will pale in comparison to video game jubilee. why? because jubilee is now starring (along with fourteen other x-men) in what could possibly be the greatest game of all time.



the game in question is an "action rpg" game based on the x-men called x-men legends. it's part gauntlet, part diablo two. it's sure to be all amazing. things to get excited about aside from the presence of jubilee: the game looks terrific graphically and it sounds like it actually plays well -- fast furious action and some serious strategy too. you can multi-player this game with up to four people (i've already come up with my fantasy x-men legends video game fantasy team, based on my friends who are the most dedicated and experienced x-fans, you know who you are). you can aslo combine with other x-men teammates to do classic team up moves like colossus and wolverine's fastball special. i ask again, does this not sound like the greatest game ever?



x-men legends drops on september twenty fourth, exactly seventeen days after my birthday. there must be some incredible numeric symbolism to that, i mean, seventeen has always held a special place in my heart for reasons unknown. maybe the magazine? possibly. anyway, i'm so geeked about this game i could cry.

i like to mash snow. it gives me a tremendous sense of self-satisfaction. so i finally watched garden state. and it was about what i expected. a few ups, a few downs, scenes that were great, scenes that were lacking. my biggest problem with the whole thing was how quickly some of the characters went from total strangers to the best of friends. there would be moments throughout the movie when i was thinking "wait, why are they doing this for each other?" i felt like i was being force fed the fact that the main characters were really really getting along. this is not a knock on the acting abilities of anyone, it was a script issue. the movie really held so much promise but i think it failed to deliver. i really want to watch it again however, if only to see if it appreciates with each viewing. i thought the best parts of the movie was when it went quirky and shied away from normal movie convention. but the quirkiness only lasted so long and by the end of the movie, it was all about revelations and kissing. i've decided that once kissing is used as an expression of revelation, that's it for me, i disconnect from the movie. using kissing or sex as the denouement just seems too easy. write around the kissing, not into it.



i think lost in translation ruined me. the ending there was just too perfect. bob harris' inaudible whisper to charlotte was just the cherry on top. not knowing what was said allows your imagination to run free; without having to listen to some writer trying to put in words that are never up to the task of describing the moment. the characters' attachment to each other was also much more gradual in lost, and that made all the difference. they had a believable synergy, while garden seemed to thrust zach and natalie together. adding blatant romance to a movie relationship must be reallly hard. having nothing to mask emotions or feelings kind of inevitably drags your movie into cheesedom.



it took me a good thirty minutes to get into the movie, as my mind couldn't quite let the eyes and ears roam free yet. i was analyzing everything and wondering if i liked this or that. but then at some point i just let myself go -- or the movie pulled me in -- and i stopped thinking. i did cringe heavily when natalie portman first appeared on-screen however. i didn't want her character to be annoying. i really wanted to love her in this movie. and luckily, she was fine. she was wonderful in fact. she was channeling her marty character of beautiful girls. but instead of intelligence and wit, her sam character relied mainly on personality quirks to make us love her. i prefer the wit of beautiful girls. but as marty said in beautiful, "i might grow to be five-ten. i'll be hot." and natalie portman has grown up and is indeed, hot.



beautiful girls is so underrated as a movie. like criminally underrated. the dialogue is ridiculously good. christina shattered my world when she told me that the writer of beautiful girls, scott rosenberg, also wrote con air, gone in 60 seconds, kangaroo jack and spiderman 2. so lines like "put down the bunny" sprang from the same creative well as "you go to the penitentiary and i become the laughingstock of the brownies." how can this be? so much brilliance in one movie and then so much crap in all the others? i've cast mr rosenberg aside as having had just one inspired year and then just cashing in the rest of the way. he's like the nas of movie writing. "that's a one hot album every ten year average..." plus, the sparks between 30 year old willie and 13 year old marty was so much more evident, despite having very few scenes together and not being the central focus of the movie.



so, in terms of a movie about two people finding it each, i'd say garden state ranks much lower than lost in translation, lower than beautiful girls, but still worth watching. i'll have to re-watch before sunrise again to see how that fits into the whole rubric. but i'm guessing garden state will rank higher than before sunrise. having said all that, garden state is probably still the best film i've seen all summer. not that that's saying much since i've seen nearly all duds for the past three months.



"peace out, playa."