The Stewart Adams Project

Quality Content for Quality People Who Appreciate Quality Content for Quality People

 

April 29, 2009

Opposites

Posted at 8:35 am

They say that opposites attract…so invariably we should see patterns following this social epistemology on a regular day to day basis: Super hot beautiful young women with acres of wealth should always be attracted to ugly homeless old and busted beggar guys. Car crash statistics should show that most automobile accidents occur between 2008 Ferrari 360s and 1972 El Caminos. Dogs and Cats should be the best of friends. Apple and Microsoft should do commercials for each other. North Carolina and Duke should refuse to play each other and just let the game go on forever. Yet, none of these things ever seem to happen…why is this?  I’ll tell you why, because these things are socially unacceptable.

Gorgeous rich women don’t follow their inmost desire to be with a bum on the street because society tells them that it is not cool despite what their feelings are.  Society has also set up traffic laws that would prevent opposing vehicles from being attracted to each other on the highway.  Dogs and cats are supposed to fight like dogs and cats because our culture has defined it as such.  Apple and Microsoft have to hate each other or they will be suspected of conspiring and stealing money from the government.  North Carolina and Duke’s campuses are way too close to each other and society states that to mean that they have nothing in common and must hate one another.  As you can see, society is an evil that changes what is good and natural into something not good and natural.  The fact is that opposites do attract but social opinion does everything within its power to reject and redefine this truth.  Look at the marriage issue in this country…nature, physiological common sense and absolute moral truth state that opposites attract…yet society wishes to change what is natural to what is backward.

So what is the answer dear friend?  I’ll tell you…we must destroy society.  Societal homicide is the only way to truly allow free market attraction of opposites in this culture of ours.  Of course…that would put us in a position of opposition to society…to be consistent with our own philosophy we would have to let ourselves become attracted to society…resulting in the complete failure of our original plan to murder-death-kill it.  Dang, never mind.

Stewart

Filed under Blog Entries | 4 Comments »

April 22, 2009

Movie Review: Twilight

Posted at 7:24 am

Preface

Twilight is based on the book with the same title written by Stephanie Meyer.  For our purposes here, I will be reviewing the movie alone…on its own merits (or lack thereof).  I have not read the book, so before you go off on a fan-girl soap-box about how great the book is, please keep in mind that I am not reviewing the book.  In addition to this, please also keep captive in your minds that this review is not a review of the “Twilight” franchise and in no way reflects the opinions of this writer in regard to any of the three sequels including but not limited to: New Moon, Eclipse, or Breaking Dawn.  Yes, it is highly unlikely that the pending movie adaptations for the sequels will garner any considerable difference in verdict upon their eventual release and subsequent review, yet I leave room in my heart and mind for the slight chance that those forthcoming films may in fact be decent.   Moreover, let it be understood that I do not fit the profile of this film’s target audience in that I am not a 13 year old female. Thus, I am less likely to become easily enamored with the film’s clichéd emotional devices that are supposed to make the viewer actually care about the characters. If anything, this should serve to provide my review with a more objective viewpoint but not necessarily the opinions that the filmmakers intended their target audience to hold…if that was even intentional.  I will also note that this review will not confront any technical issues of production or filmmaking aside perhaps from the actor’s performances.  The film meets acceptable standards for cinematography, music, editing, sound, lighting, etc. therefore this critique will focus primarily on the story, characters and underlying message.  Please be reminded that I am in no way profiting monetarily for my opinions and have not been compensated for an attempt to libel the Twilight film by any competing franchise including: Smallville, The Bachelor, The Bachelorette, Days of our Lives, General Hospital, Harry Potter, The Young and the Restless, Hannah Montana, Dora the Explorer, Barney & friends, the Wiggles, or Teletubbies.  Please remember also that this review is by no means exhaustive and is more or less a statement on a few key points regarding the film known as Twilight.  Yes, there will be a plethora of information that I do not address as it is unnecessary to my purposes.  If you wish to read a complete review of every aspect of the film without any details being left out, you might as well just watch the movie.  Bear in mind that I do not by any means recommend this course of action as it will likely prove disappointing for you as the viewer.  However, I do understand that there is a curiosity in the minds of the masses as to just how lame the film actually is, and it is that same bewonderment that led me myself to watch this epic fail of modern cinema.

A Brief Synopsis:

(Contains spoilers.)

Twilight begins with the heroin (no, not the drug, though she may have a similar effect on you) Bella, being forced to go live with her father in Forks, Washington because her mom’s new husband is a minor league baseball player and thus will be traveling a lot.  So being at a new school and being the kind of girl that walks around with a sullen disturbed attitude and a more homely-than-attractive appearance, Bella immediately makes a boy fall in love with her.  You later find out that he is a vampire, his name is Edward and that he only loves her because she smells good and he wants to eat her…trust me, there could be no other reason.  Because of this, Edward at first pretends to hate her and avoids her at all costs…except to sneak into her room at night and watch her sleep – yeah, not creepy at all.   Bella eventually realizes that there’s something different about Edward after he stops a speeding car with his bare hands, has skin that is cold to the touch, never comes out in the sunlight, and seems to be everywhere without any time for transportation.  Bella then seduces Edward into giving away his secret and Bella is not shocked in the slightest and shows no normal human emotion to this news.  Edward then takes Bella to meet his vampire family all of whom have made a life decision to show self control to not eat people by only feeding on animal blood.  But then a rival clan of vampires smell Bella and are determined to eat her because she smells so good.  Obviously Edward can’t allow this so he and his ‘vamily’ set in motion an epic plan to hide Bella which for some reason includes lying to her father by making him think she hates him.  The plan is an absolute failure and the evil vampire James captures Bella but then makes the cliché mistake of monologuing and toying with his victim which gives Edward time to get there and fight him.  Edward would have lost the battle and died had the good vampires not showed and ganged up on James in a completely unsportsmanlike display of 4 on 1.  They kill James and Edward sucks the vampire venom of James out of Bella’s wound in order to keep her from becoming immortal and powerful as the rest of them. 

A Pro

Twilight does an excellent job of showing the inner nature of man and his depraved state as evident in the vampire’s strong desire to kill and eat people.  The true heroism is portrayed as Edward’s family makes the conscious decision to resist this desire and live at a higher standard than those who kill humans without remorse.  The fallacy comes in when Edward is told to ‘find the will to resist’ and it is never explained where he found it. The obvious interpretation is that he found it within himself but this is contradictory to the initial premise that the desires inside him were to kill and eat people.  So having this circular moral reasoning only serves to raise the question of the source for his moral strength without ever providing an answer.  So in many ways, the Pro may actually be a Con.

A Con

The most blatant flaw found in Twilight is that the main character is just about the most unlikeable, selfish, uninteresting, plain and boring character to ever tarnish the silver screen.  As an audience member I could not relate or sympathize with anything she did and in many cases just wished she would take a long walk off a short pier.  Bella’s entire plot line is a weak attempt to replicate the Romeo & Juliet theme of forbidden love but without the motivation for the viewer to want her to have a happy ending.  The result is an onscreen romance that feels completely empty and meaningless because there is no empathy when something bad happens and no joy when something good happens.  It certainly doesn’t help that Bella is portrayed poorly by Kristen Stewart whose performance is often laughable.  This may be partially due to bad script writing, but Stewart’s deadpan emotionless act is ridiculous when delivering lines such as “you’re beautiful” (speaking of Edward) or “your skin is pale white and ice cold.” Once again let me remind you that it is irrelevant as whether or not this is how Bella was in the book, what works in print does not necessarily translate to film.

An Other Con

Twilight seems to be one of those films that just contains moments of absolute retardation.  These are the parts that make one wonder what the heck the filmmakers were thinking and you find yourself being a little embarrassed for even being seen in public while watching the movie.  According to traditional vampire lore, sunlight kills vampires upon contact.  In Twilight, Edward exposes his skin to sunlight and rather than exploding into a heap of ash, he glitters and shines like he’d been in a fight with a bedazzler and lost.  In another scene, when Edward stops an out of control vehicle with his bare hand, crowds of students are in the parking lot and watch the whole thing happen, yet no one questions the fact that the laws of physics were just defied and for some reason Edward is standing right in front of the car when he had just been standing on the other side of the parking lot.  In yet another scene, Jacob, an Indian friend of Bella’s family who is really a werewolf tells Bella that his dad gave him $5 to talk to her – what ensues is a lengthy staring competition between Jacob and Edward in a poor executed foreshadowing of the next film’s inevitable plot.

Is Twilight one of the worse films of all time? Certainly not, but it is definitely not worthy of the praise and hype it has garnered from those who have praised and hyped it.  The weak acting, poor writing and overall ridiculousness of the film label it as a high-quality B-movie at best and a solid 3.5 stars out of 10.

Stewart

Filed under Movie Review | 5 Comments »

April 20, 2009

Caveman Hero

Posted at 2:02 pm

…Not just the stuff of GEICO commercials anymore.

I was recently on a business trip 2,670 miles from home when I was surprised to see my relatively small town on nation-wide news. It’s not often a small Georgia town makes national news, and even less often that it makes the news for something remotely praise-worthy. It’s not that I think that little of my place of residence, it’s just the plain and simple truth of the old saying, “if it bleeds it leads.” While there may in fact have been some bleeding in the story, 1- it wasn’t mentioned and 2- it would have been due to injuries sustained by the culprit and completely justified on the part of the customer.

————————————————————————–

caveman

ACWORTH, Ga. — Police said a would-be robber got more than he bargained for when he tried to rob a Quik Thrift store with a knife. A quick-thinking customer, known only as “Caveman,” grabbed a step ladder and hit the suspect at least once Monday. The customer chased the suspect from the store using the ladder as protection.

Police said the suspect had threatened to cut the store clerk’s neck if money wasn’t handed over. Police said the suspect escaped with some money, but he dropped much of it when he was hit with the ladder.

Police are still searching for the suspect.

(http://www.seattlepi.com/national/1120ap_odd_ladder_thwarts_robber.html)

————————————————————————–

I’d like to give a Stewart-Adams-Project-Salute to Mr. Don “Caveman” Smith for standing up to a no good hoodlum and for finding new and ingenious uses for the average household step ladder. Convenience store robbers will have to think twice before stealing from places that are packing step ladders.

So what was his motivation? There are several theories.

1. He had been watching too much WWF and couldn’t find a folding chair…so a step ladder had to do.

2. It’s all a part of the new GEICO viral marketing campaign to encourage people to do the right thing. “Standing up for what’s right – so easy a Caveman can do it.”

3. He had been watching too much WWF and he was fed up with GEICO’s “so easy a Caveman can do it” campaign.

As intriguing as these theories are, they are all wrong. We now know straight from Mr. Smith the reason he was compelled to act:

“There’s a lot of thieving that goes on around here and I don’t like it,” Smith said. “People work for their stuff and they ought to be able to keep it without somebody taking it away from them.”

If you would like, take a second to watch the slide show of Mr. Smith in action…it’s quite inspiring. Also, watching it while listening to the Chariots of Fire theme greatly increases the inspirational value.

http://www.wsbtv.com/slideshow/news/19176925/detail.html

Filed under News Lash | 4 Comments »

April 16, 2009

News Lash: Woman Attacks Polar Bear

Posted at 9:38 am

polar_woman BERLIN, Germany (CNN) — A polar bear attacked a woman at Berlin Zoo Friday afternoon after she climbed a fence and jumped into its habitat during feeding time, police said Saturday.
One adult polar bit her several times after she plunged into the moat, police said.
Zoo workers tossed rescue rings toward the woman to hoist her out and distract polar bears swimming nearby, said Goerg Gebhard, a Berlin police officer.
At one point the woman fell back into the water and was grabbed by a bear before she was eventually hoisted to safety.
“They saved her life,” Gebhard told CNN.
The woman was severely injured and was being treated at a hospital, police said.
It’s unclear why the woman entered the bear habitat, but police issued her a citation for trespassing.
Berlin Zoo is home to Knut, the first polar bear to be born there in over 30 years. The bear became a huge talking point in Germany when his mother gave birth to him in December 2006.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/europe/04/11/polar.bear.attack/index.html?iref=mpstoryview
——————————————————————————————————————————-

I just read this story and I realized that CNN got the story completely wrong.  Let me correctly state it:

Crazed Woman Attacks Innocent Polar Bear

BERLIN, Germany — On the afternoon of Friday the 10th in a zoo in Berlin, a rather large woman who isn’t very good at swimming somehow managed to defy the laws of physics and haul her body over the fence and into the moat surrounding the zoo-habitat of a poor kind polar bear. 
While the woman violently barraged the animal with verbal abuse, intimidating arm flailing, and high frequency vocal noises the benevolent polar bear bore it quietly. 
Zoo officials tried desperately to help the woman by throwing life savers and other gummy candies at her in the hopes that it might increase her buoyancy.  Despite their noble attempts it was the bear that came to her rescue with a couple of swift movements he was able to plop her back over the fence like a really really giant beach ball. 
The bear has received the Order of Schwarzenegger for his weight-lifting feat and the woman will be doing community service indefinitely.

-Aric Stoph
Associated Preposterous

                                                           aricsig

Filed under News Lash | 6 Comments »

April 15, 2009

Tax Day

Posted at 8:05 am

He comes like a thief in the night, causing utter misery and heartache for thousands – once a year on April 15. He takes up to 35% of your earned income and there’s nothing you can do about it. He is the Tax Man.

Taxes have always been an interesting issue in America since our independence as a nation was practically forced upon us in reaction to the insanely high taxes put on the colonials by England. “No taxation without representation!” was their battle cry as Americans stormed Boston harbor and implemented ransackery on vast payloads of imported English tea. In a well executed tactical operation, the Sons of Liberty single handedly spat in the face of King George while at the same time framed the entire race of Indians for the crimes of trespassing and destruction of property. Pure genius.

Today we are a little less heroic, we just let a computer program figure out what we owe and don’t think twice about where our money is going. Our biggest concern as Americans on Tax Day is ‘how much am I getting back?’ And since that tends to be the main concern I will leave you with some handy dandy tips for keeping your taxes low:

01. Become and Illegal immigrant. Sure, you might have to move to another country for a few years and establish citizenship there – then give up your US citizenship. But hey, Mexico isn’t very far away…and millions of Hispanics are already not paying taxes, so why should you?

02. Deal only in cash. This tends to be a little more risky since cash can be stolen and you will have no recourse with the law since you never claimed those “monetary gifts and tips” on your 1040. The plus side is that US cash also works in Canada and Mexico.

03. Invent your own charitable organization. This is as simple as coming up with a convincing name like “Stewart’s Charity of Love and Giving” to include on your tax form. If no one at the IRS suspects, you can basically write your own deductions.

04. Evade. This method for tax savings is simple in concept but a little harder in practice since you must become virtually invisible to the US government. You must not have your name on any paperwork anywhere. No social security number, no driver’s license, no phone number, no home address, etc. The best way to accomplish this is to become homeless and never talk to another human being for the rest of your life. Not the most ideal situation but these are tips for paying fewer taxes, not providing you with the highest quality of life.

Stewart

*Disclaimer: The Stewart Adams Project in no way, shape or form recommends or condones any of the aforementioned methods for not paying your taxes. These tips are to be used strictly as a means of entertainment and The Stewart Adams Project denies any and all responsibility for any persons actually practicing these methods. The Stewart Adams Project ‘S’ and stewartadamsproject.com are trademarks of The Stewart Adams Project © 2009, SAP.

Filed under Blog Entries | 8 Comments »

April 13, 2009

Confessions of a Female Geek

Posted at 9:01 am

I’m not sure when it happened. I have some idea as to how, but the change came so gradually and seamlessly that by the time I finally noticed it was too late. Perhaps the most tragic thing is I’ve never heard of anyone turning back from such a condition.

I’m speaking of course of being a geek – or in my case, being assimilated by geeks.

I completely blame this evolution on my husband, Max and Frank – though they would argue I have a propensity to geek-like behavior as it is. (So, I liked LOTR to the point of wearing shirts with bell sleeves and writing my name in elvish…that doesn’t prove anything). We can argue nature versus nurture some other time…

One of the first tip offs was the realization one evening that I could recognize what weapon my husband was using on Halo 3 (in social slayer) just by listening from the next room. From picking up on the distinct clicking of the needler, the rhythms of AR and BR to the solid echoing quality of the sniper rifle, I feared I was beginning to slip irrevocably into the realm of geekdom.

Then one day, I caught myself inadvertently passing judgment on an individual who only used Internet Explorer as her web browser. She didn’t even know of the existence of Mozilla. I then began questioning the mental capabilities of those who refuse to investigate the wonders of gmail, tabbed browsing and keyboard shortcuts – but these are all basic, right? This doesn’t in and of itself make me a geek…but it gets worse.

I’ve begun to pick up geek-talk. Yes, I can use “assimilated” with the full knowledge of its reference to the Borg. I accidentally use gamer terms like p0wned in everyday conversation. I’ve taken part in debates as to whether Captain Picard is better than Kirk (my answer is Picard, if you’re wondering). I am untrusting of AI’s ability to hold to Asimov’s laws and fear the development of a system of Skynet proportions. I even noted when we were out to dinner that leftover skewers if kept in one’s purse could come in handy in the case of a zombie apocalypse, and I don’t even like zombie stories.

Oh, and don’t even get me started on comic books. I’ve caught myself correcting guys on their super-hero facts, such as Superman’s father’s name, Spider-man’s girlfriends (the ones from the comic books, not the movies), Batman’s real name and fictional comic book towns.

I was inwardly proud of myself yet somewhat scared when I began to understand the t-shirts on thinkgeek.com, including the on that reads: “There are 10 kinds of people in the world, those who understand binary code and those who don’t.” I’m not sure if that’s worse than the hatred I’m harboring for Billy Mitchell upon robbing Steve Wiebe of his title in Donkey Kong or not.

At any rate, I think it’s safe to say that I’m showing early (or perhaps more advanced) signs of being a geek. All in all it’s not a bad thing. I’ve learned a lot and if nothing else it has enabled me to engage in a wider variety of conversations and be a more proficiently efficient user of technology – not to mention knowing how to defend myself against aliens, zombies, vampires or the flood. In closing, as I sit here wondering if I would rather have a high medi-chlorian count or own Scotty’s teleportation device, I would just like to say: Be warned, girls – you are what you marry.

Filed under Blog Entries | 15 Comments »

April 8, 2009

Ten And A Half

Posted at 8:43 am

The more you study, the more you know. The more you know, the more can forget. The more you can forget, the more you do forget. The more you forget, the less you know. So why study?

This was Patrick’s mantra, his thesis, his banner flying high atop the siege tower of his life. Sure, he was only ten and a half years old but already the combined hatred of school work and overwhelming love of using logic to disprove reason had taken him. For the most part, Patrick was a pretty good kid. He brushed his teeth regularly and only threw rocks through the neighbors’ windows irregularly. Occasionally Pat would play practical jokes on the Statham’s by taking one of their bunny rabbits out of its cage and burying it alive, but these instances were few and far between. After being punished and asked why he had done such a thing, Patrick replied by saying, “The rabbit was already dead; I just told you I buried it alive because it sounded more dramatic.” This worked the first time, but Patrick’s parents began to suspect when the dog dug up a fourth bunny skeleton and Pat answered with the same explanation as the first three. Either there was a bunny rabbit death epidemic at the Statham’s and Pat just happened to be the first one to notice each time, or Patrick was a liar.

One day Patrick and his brother Simon climbed into a storm drain man hole. When cars would pass, Patrick would stick his arm through the gutter inlet and grasp for the pavement of the road as someone who was trying to escape certain doom. Almost always, the car would slow down and as soon as it did, Simon would reach out with a gloved hand and pull Patrick’s arm back into the drain. Occasionally Simon would add a pounding to his ‘victim’s’ hand before dragging it into the darkness to add to the drama. Sometimes people would get out of their cars and call down into the drain; the boys would just move down deeper into the blackness and try to keep from laughing out loud.

This kind of behavior went on through most of Patrick’s adolescent life. Eventually Pat stopped brushing his teeth altogether and in doing so, lost all recognizable signs of morality. Patrick was labeled as one who is made of pure unadulterated evil and his actions would soon catch up with him. On March 29, 2001, Patrick was imprisoned on false charges of assault and gross negligence. His accuser was listed on the police report as a Mr. Benji Statham.

Stewart

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April 1, 2009

Fools

Posted at 4:36 pm

There is a sizeable quantity of the world’s population that falls into the infamous category titled “Fools.” In case you are the type of person who wonders whether or not you fit into this category, I have provided a list of things that will most certainly qualify you for such placement should you find yourself doing any or all of these things one or more times within the timeline of your life.

Have you ever…

01. Built your house upon the sand?

02. Dressed in a jester costume?

03. Rushed in?

04. Thought you’d struck it rich upon finding some pyrite?

05. Identified yourself as being able to relate to Quasimodo?

06. Bit the hand that feeds you?

07. Melted the inner workings of all the doorknobs in your house with a propane blow torch so that upon cooling they locked up and became unusable…then hoped your parents wouldn’t notice?

If not, then you’re safe…nothing else could possibly label you a bona fide fool other than this exhaustive list. Happy April 1 everybody.

Stewart

Filed under Blog Entries | 3 Comments »