The Closet Case that is Stephen Crane

Note: I don't SERIOUSLY believe any of this. I just wrote it because... Well, I was supposed to be writing an essay on Stephen Crane's "The Open Boat," but writer's block got the best of me. Someone told me that if I wanna get rid of writer's block, I should just start writing. This obviously didn't work, as I haven't written anything for my actual essay, except maybe the first sentence below.

Stephen Crane's "The Open Boat" takes us through the experience of four men stranded in the ocean. These four men are an oiler, a cook, a correspondent, and a captain. When reading between the lines, one will realize that these men are obviously attracted to each other. The cook, the captain, and the correspondent clearly admire the masculinity of the oiler and totally want in his pants.

This story is filled with homosexual undertones and should be burned by churches all over the world. Anyone who buys the e-book should have their Kindles confiscated and reformatted so that this work can never be read in them. As much as this would piss off Jeff Bezos and the publishing industries, I think Stephen Crane's works should be kept as far away from the public eye as possible. His stories a) are super slow and b) do not teach anyone about the philosophy of man. (Unless, of course, the man is a raging homosexual.)

Not only on The Open Boat does Crane do this. His novel The Red Badge of Courage was slow and filled with homosexuality. Except instead of four being in the middle of the ocean, there are hundreds of young men in a battlefield contemplating their cowardice and sexual preference. And honestly, if anyone can be so descriptive and poetic about anything, they are obviously gay. They should not be published. They should not have their works be required reading for high school and college students all over the United States. These kids are being brainwashed by the work of Stephen Crane and will eventually realize that they too want to be homosexuals and surrounded by men at all times.

Sure, George Orwell has published books about how the government works (or doesn't work), but at least the men (and animals) weren't flaming queens. Winston Smith was interested in having sex with a woman. Only a woman. The way it should be. And honestly, no one ever takes George Orwell seriously. He is a wonderful fiction author, and that is all he is. Stephen Crane, on the other hand, pretty much writes his life experience into his works. He doesn't have the mental capabilities of making anything up for his own. Everything is writes is SOML-type shit.

(didn't bother to proofread, so sorry if there are a lot of mistakes!)

Now,  I should start working on my actual essay!

Ode To Community College Students

Yes, I know. This video doesn't apply to every community college student, lol. Only to those who are in their first year, don't have much going on, and live with their parents. This will be how you feel most of your first year at a CC and, well... if it IS your first year it might not've hit you yet (it's barely September, after all). But it will... once they start posting pictures on their Facebooks... and when they tell you all those cool stories about roomates, getting drunk, going to parties, school traditions, etc. Beware.

For those of you watching that don't know what community college is, here's a description: public institution of higher education. Community colleges are characterized by a two-year curriculum that leads to either the associate degree or transfer to a four-year college. The transfer program parallels the first two years of a four-year college. The degree program generally prepares students for direct entrance into an occupation. They are also referred to as junior colleges.

I always told myself I wouldn't end up at a community college. Specifically, the one I'm going to right now. Though it feels like a giant bowl of suck a lot of the time, it's not that bad at all.

Summer Books

This video came out longer than I wanted it to be, despite the fact that I cut out a lot.

Oh, and...
I'll be reading 3 books in September because they all have really close release dates:

Bran Hambric: The Farfield Curse
by Kaleb Nation

Catching Fire
by Suzanne Collins

The Lost Symbol
by Dan Brown

Church Etiquette

I'm not necessarily a religious person, but I do go to church every Sunday because of my parents. I've noticed I have a lot of pet peeves at church, especially when I attend baptisms, weddings, and quinceañeras. It's obvious who goes to church regularly and who doesn't. Anyway, here's a little list I came up with of things you should and shouldn't do at church. Most of these things just require common sense and respect to others.

• Arrive to the mass early or be there right when it begins. If you get there after the mass starts, you are a distraction. Also, seats tend to get full after a certain amout of time. Being on time to church will not only save you the embarassment of walking into a quiet room and heads turning to look at you with disgust, you will also have the freedom of choosing to sit near someone you know rather than a total stranger.


• Dress appropriately. I know my mom always tells me to wear my sunday best when I go to church, but nowadays more and more people are starting to dress casually for church. If you want to dress that way, it's okay with me (as long as it's accepted by the religion). Just don't wear anything that you would wear to sleep like sweats, a tank top, a muscle shirt,  or an oversized t-shirt. And use common sense: don't wear something that says "I'm with stupid." In fact, try to avoid wearing anything with words or logos.


• Turn off your cell phones and electronic devices. Wait... Who am I kidding? No one turns their cell phones off anymore. Put them on silent. No, not vibrate. Silent. I know for a fact that if it vibrates, you will be tempted to sneak a look into your pocket to see who called or texted you.


• Don't walk in and out of church during the service. Go to the restroom and take care of everything you need to take care of before the mass starts. On a similar note: don't leave church early. That's disrespectful.


• Try to avoid talking. If you talk, it implies that you're not paying attention and disrespecting the word of God. Even if you don't believe in what's being said, have some respect for everyone else.


• Don't chew gum. That's just tacky.


• If you have small children, don't feed them snacks. The opening of wrappers and chewing of food is annoying and distracting. (Also, I hope you have the sense not to be eating snacks yourself.)


• If you have a baby and it begins to cry, please take it outside. There's something just not right about people who go to church against their will covering their ears to drown out the sound of a baby's cries instead of the preacher's sermon.

People at libraries should be more literate

Okay, maybe that title's kinda mean. I apologize.

If you know me pretty well or follow me on Twitter or DailyBooth, you've probably noticed that I visit the library a lot. If I talk to you regularly, you probably know the type of people I run into at the library. I'm flattered that somebody would go out of his way to write me a note and/or talk to me. Really. But I always laugh at the type of people that seem interested in me. I know this isn't the first I've talked of this, but it gives me something to write about and maybe have a little laugh at. I don't know if I feel bad for making fun of these guys or not. Anyway, I wanted to talk about two people that have confronted me when I've been at the library.

Library guy number one. If you haven't seen this video, go watch it now because I don't wanna type the story. The guy I'm talking about in that video is the same one I'm referring to below.

Since this guy was so eager to contact me on MySpace, I decided to take a look at his profile when I got home that day. Even though a lot of people have totally different identities on MySpace than they do in real life, you do learn a lot about them through their profiles. Some of them are just a total lolfest. Here are some things I found on this library creeper's profile.

This guy's name is Johnny and he lives in two places. Probably leading a double life. His headline makes me wonder who this so-called Jason is and what he's got to do with natural organic hair products. Maybe it's his alter-ego. I'm not sure which one lives where, though. Don't worry, Johnny. Your secret's safe with us.



I scrolled down a bit and found out that yes, he will. Only me. Zero Nine Two Two. Perhaps he shares a birthday with Tom Felton.



That's his About Me. If you're too lazy to click and read it, just know that the first and most important thing he wants you to know about him are his birthday (which is already in his URL), and the fact that he can type really fast without looking at the keyboard. He also lets us know that he lives with his grandmother and tells us who lived in the back of his residence and when they moved out. He goes on to inform us that he has soft hands and juicy lips and gives us a very concise history of his parents' relationship. After that, there's some sort of fragment saying "HONDA-CRV 2009." The end. Thank you, Johnny...or should I say Jason? I feel very enlightened.


This is his favorite book. It's pretty safe to assume he went to a midnight release party when its sequel, "More Natural 'Cures' Revealed," was released. Maybe he even got to meet Kevin Trudeau himself there!

Library guy number two. I was about to sit down and read Little Brother on my netbook when I made eye contact with a guy sitting a few feet away from me. He wasn't hideously ugly, nor supre cute. Just kinda meh. He looked like he was doing some sort of math or science work. I dunno. All I know is he had a calculator on him. About two hours after I got there, I decided I wanted to go home, so I packed my stuff and headed outside. I stopped by this tiny store outside the library where they sell cheap books that no one wants any more to see if I found anything interesting. When I was in there, I noticed that guy look towards my direction and walk outside. He seemed to be stalling. As I walked outside, he tapped me on the shoulder, and said "for you." He handed this note and walked back inside:

I was about to take every sentence in that letter and be my stupid/smartass/sarcastic self analyzing that shit... but I'm feeling too lazy. Just take a look at it and see for yourself.

Sucks. When he tapped my shoulder, I was thinking "yay. this guy's gonna talk to me." Then I heard the accent he said "for you" with and was skeptical about him. Some people have thick accents but are still decent with language, so I gave him the benefit of the doubt. When I opened the letter I had a total FML moment. Hahaha. I'm such a bad person. And to think I'm always complaining about how nobody likes or notices me. Like my mom always tell me, soy pobre pero delicada! (I'm poor but delicate. I guess that saying is a cousin to the English saying "beggars can't be choosers.")

Question: If I e-mail this guy back (for the lulz), what should I say? Leave a comment!

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Movie Review (sort of)

You can either watch the video:

... or just read it here if you don't feel like listening to my obnoxious voice:

So I finally saw HBP. I wasn't fully satisfied with it, but not too disappointed either. I guess this is the part where I talk about a few scenes, and tell you what I thought about them movie in general.

Fred and George's joke shop was exactly what I pictured it to be inside. So colorful, noisy, and fun. It was just... perfect.

During quidditch tryouts, Ron Weasley le daba unos cabezasos a esa quaffle! He swears he was playing soccer! It was funny to watch, though.

What the hell? They burned down the Burrow? I mean, it didn't bother me as much as it did other people, but did they really have to? If they wanted more action in the movie, they could've added a lot near the end with all the death eaters. But whatever.

Tumblr

I don't have much to post about right now, but I wanted to let you guys (whoever the hell you are) know that I got a Tumblr account. Well, I've had the account for a while. I just never used it. I thought it would've been dumb to use it since I already have a blog here and my shorter posts are usually just tweets. Somehow I ended up using it anyway. It's my middle ground between WordPress and Twitter. I'm not sure how often I'll be using it, though. Maybe I'll just stop with a while. But for now, here's the link if you wanna check it out and/or follow me: http://reinix.tumblr.com.

Google Verb: an internet meme