For the last few months I have been debating whether to get an iPad or a Kindle Fire. The debate was between the price of an iPad and the deficiencies of the Fire (when compared to an iPad). Before I was able to decide, however, I received a Fire for winter solstice celebration (aka xmas). So I’ve had it now for about 2-3 weeks, and in that time I’ve used it extensively.
Maybe it’s because it’s new and different but I really like the carousel on the Fire. I have found Apple’s iOS to be getting bland and boring, but that has accelerated since I started using the Fire. (As a quick aside I think the Apple iOS needs a dramatic over haul stat). Maybe it’s just the way I like to categorize things or the way my brain works but I enjoy how the carousel breaks up the various different media sources (newsstand, music, video, web, apps etc) and then has a favorites and recently used section.
As a media consumer the Fire is outstanding. It has completely replaced my laptop when it comes to reading news, surfing the web, watching videos, reading books, comics, listening to music etc. Speaking of reading books, everything that I wish my Kindle reader had the Fire does. For instance, the ability to google and wikipedia words terms etc. (Amazon’s whispersync technology also is a big plus and works great when I switch between my reader and my Fire.) But I’ve always preferred the Kindle reader to iBooks. If there is one thing that amazon does better that’s it. I find iBooks to be slow and clunky but the Kindle app is like butter. Throw in the ability to check out books from the local library with Kindle and Amazon Primes new book rent service and I’m sold. The Fire’s native browser Silk works quickly and smoothly. It’s really fast for me and works better when you turn off flash. Is it faster and better than Safari? I don’t know I haven’t busted out my stopwatch to check, nor do I really care. Both my iPhone and my Fire load up pages quickly on WiFi. The problem I have on both is the same–advertisements on non-mobile websites. Need an app like ad blocker for Silk (if someone knows of one let me know as I haven’t been able to find one). Other than that I’m liking it and as more websites on going to HTML 5 (thank you Apple) I find less and less websites where you need flash to view them.
For reading comics the Kindle has been fantastic. In conjunction with my box.net account I can download comics as I need them. Unfortunately, there’s no native .cbr reader on the Fire so you have to buy one (there’s no free comic readers either) but $3 for a reader in the long run in not a bad deal. Videos from amazon and netflix load quickly and run smoothly, and the shape of the Fire is conducive to watching videos, but more on that later. Music on the Fire works well also. Pandora works flawlessly and Amazon (like Apple) provides 5GB of free space that allows me to upload most of my favorite music to the cloud and access it from anywhere–including work since I can access it from the web and don’t need to install any new programs on my work computer (which I like others can’t do). Also if I want 20gb of space it’s cheaper on Amazon ($20) than it is on Apple ($40). In this day and age that extra 20 per year is a lot.
Now the Fire is smaller in size than the iPad and this is good and bad. Good because it’s very comfortable to hold in my lap or one-handed whilst laying on the couch. It’s the perfect proportion for widescreen movies and TV shows and also retains the feel of a book when held upright. It feels less unwieldy or more normal than an iPad. On the negative side it’s smaller and that sucks especially when not every app includes a pinch-to-zoom feature (I’m looking at you comic reader, fix that shit stat). However, I still feel, like the iPad, that it’s a bit weird typing on it. For that reason, I only use it for writing short emails or blogs. For now, my laptop is safe.
Worst Novel: Kurt Vonnegut’s Slapstick or Lonesome No More! takes the cake here. I feel like Vonnegut jumped the shark on this one but I did find his introduction to be interesting–much more so than the actual book.
Worst Movie: Sucker Punch was godawful. I couldn’t even make it through this movie and ended up turning it off after about 15 minutes.
Worst Actor: Sam Worthington by a mile, which should be blatantly obvious since he wasn’t even in a major movie this year. However, I find him insufferable especially since he is always trying to hide his accent but doesn’t have the skills to pull it off. He ruins everything he’s in, even commercials for video games.
Worst Actress: January Jones (Wtf kind of name is that anyways? Did her parents aspire for her to be a porn star?) is the absolutely the worst thing to be inflicted on entertainment in quite some time. Besides the fact she always looks like she’s smelling shit, she is also the worst actress I’ve seen in a long, long time. I often wonder how she ever became famous (sucking dick and spreading her legs probably). She delivers her lines like she’s being held hostage. Stop using her please.
Worst TV Show: Mad Men of course. I didn’t watch this show this season but I’m pretty sure I know what happened. There was some drinking on the job, lots of smoking, infidelity and general sexual harassment by the manly men. Weaved through a boring, blase story-line, where absolutely nothing happens, is a ham-fisted attempt at social commentary. I’ll never understand people’s (and the critics) love affair with this show. I think they all like to think how great they are because only they get how good Mad Men is. Mad Men isn’t even the best show on AMC let alone Cable or TV in general.
Worst TV Show (that was supposed to be good): The Walking Dead, seriously what is wrong with you. This half season there were three good episodes and the rest ranged from unnecessary to complete garbage. Added to that, this is a zombie show with a serious dearth of zombies, and way too much babbling betwixt the characters about meaningless topics i.e. god. Also Plan B is not an abortion pill for chissakes. Get with the times. One can only hope that the next half season is better otherwise TWD is entering into Mad Men territory. There’s too many good shows to be stuck watching garbage.
This list is a bit late because I have been migrating the site to a newer, cheaper server. Hopefully this new server will be able to handle the crush of 12 people accessing my blog. This list also may includes books, movies, games, etc that didn’t actually come out in 2011. That is because I’m old and it takes me awhile to get around to things so just deal with it.
Best Novel: EasilyEast of Eden, Steinbeck’s grand tale spanning three generations. Absolutely loved the book and can’t recommend it enough to others.
Best History (or otherwise scholarly) book:Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era, this massive tome delves deeply into the politics, military, and social history of the Civil War. A great starting place for anyone who wants to learn more. McPherson’s prose never bores but keeps you engaged through 800+ pages.
Best Comic: I read a lot of comics this year and enjoyed the majority of them. The ones I have been looking forward to the most though have been X-Men schism/regenesis storyline particularly Uncanny X-Men, Wolverine and the X-Men, and Uncanny X-Force.
Best Movie: Winter’s Bone. Yep I was about 8 months late on this one but still it was one of the best movies I saw this year, much better than The King’s Speech.
Best Movie (that I expected absolutely nothing from): Hall Pass. Hah! Seriously, I got this movie on Netflix and expected one or two funny jokes but it was hilarious and had one of the funniest/grossest laugh out loud moments of any movie I’ve seen for a long time.
Best TV Show: Damn there was a lot of good TV this year: Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, Board Walk Empire, Louie, Modern Family, and I could go on and on. However, I think the show that I enjoy the most, can’t wait to watch every week, and am disappointed when the season ends is Justified. It’s easily one of the best/funnest shows on TV that literally no one watches or knows about.
Best Game: I slacked on the game playing this year but the most enjoyable game I played was Batman: Arkham City. GTA style Batman fun with tons of side missions and plenty of bad guy skulls to crush. Plus Mark Hamill reprises his role as the Joker. What’s not to like.
Best Album: This may be because I have been listening to it constantly for the last couple weeks but by far (and I admittedly didn’t listen to a ton of new music this year) my favorite album of the year is The Black Keys’ El Camino. The quality of their albums doesn’t seem to diminish with time or listens and it never seems like they release a lazy album. Pick it up.
Best Gadget: This is a tough one because I have picked up quite a few gadgets this year but I’m sticking with the latest one, my Kindle Fire. I absolutely love it. Full review coming soon but so far it’s fast becoming my go to gadget.
Next up my worst of list, because the only thing better than things you like are things you hate and get to trash.
Well this is it; the final list in my series on presidential nicknames. This one is reserved for the most badass nicknames. Not all of these presidents are military heroes (nor should they be), but they all have badass names for one reason or another. If you haven’t yet, you should read Part I and Part II first. Hopefully, this series has been as enjoyable for you to read as it was for me to write, and hopefully it has sparked in you some interest in history.
10. William Henry Harrison
Nicknames: “General Mum”, “Tippecanoe”, and “Washington of the West”.
Anytime that you get compared to George Washington you have to be doing something right. A tip of the ol’ cap to Harrison.
10. John Quincy Adams
Nicknames: “Old Man Eloquence” and “The Abolitionist”.
John Quincy Adams although alive during the founding era is not one of the founders. His time came a bit later. The scion of “His Rotundity” proved to have great eloquence and also character. He was an outspoken supporter of abolition in a time when it wasn’t exactly popular. Also for bonus points and real badassitude, legend has it that Adams didn’t take the oath of office on a Bible, but on a book of laws. Now that’s badass.
8. William Jefferson Clinton
Nicknames: “Bubba”, “The Comeback Kid”, “The First Black President”, “Slick Willie”, and “Teflon Bill”.
Slick Willie for somehow weaseling out of every single scandal that he was involved in and the Comeback Kid for some how always rehabilitating his image after said scandals. Aside from Nixon, Clinton probably is one of the most resilient presidents ever. Every year his presidency (and thereby himself), despite the scandals, looks better and better.
7. Theodore Roosevelt
Nicknames: “The Cyclone Assemblyman”, “The Hero of San Juan Hill”, “The Lion”, “Old Four Eyes”, “Theodore the Meddler”, “Teddy”, “TR”, “The Trust Buster”, and “Teedie”.
The Lion and The Hero of San Juan Hill are pretty fierce names for a dude with glasses thicker than Professor Farnsworth’s. Oh yeh and he was a weak, sickly kid with asthma who learned boxing and started a fitness regime to overcome his weakness. On top of that believed in the conservation of our natural resources and helped protect millions or acres of wildlife. He also didn’t let himself get punked by a bunch of plutocrats. Trust Buster indeed. On top of all of this he is the inspiration for the Teddy Bear, Bam! Bonus points for being the first president to go by his initials.
It’s time for round two of presidential nicknames. This time we move on to the funniest, most ironic (hence the hipster edition) nicknames. So these nicknames will be funny, or ironic, or both. Huzzah! If you haven’t done so yet read Part I.
10. Chester Alan Arthur
Nicknames: “Chet”, “Gentleman Boss”, “Prince Arthur”, “The Dude President”, and “Walrus”
The Dude President. I have a sneaking suspicion that Arty wasn’t really elected president. Instead it was one Chester Alan Arthur of Ohio. However, our Chester A. Arthur, from California, preferred drinking white russians whilst bowling. Unfortunately, he spent his entire presidency trying to get a new rug from the English PM after a couple of limey thugs peed on his (if you don’t get any of these references punch yourself in the face now). Also did anyone ever call him Chester the Molester? I dunno but that definitely would’ve made for a great attack ad.
9. John Adams
Nicknames: “The Colossus of Independence”, “The Duke of Braintree”, “King John the Second”, “Old Sink or Swim”, and “His Rotundity”.
Here we have one of the founders who accomplished a lot to bring America into being. He was also the second President of the United States, but he also spent more time on vacation on his farm in Quincy than actually presidenting. He spent more time on vacation than George W. Bush (and that’s saying something) Perhaps we should add “His Vationness” or “Vacation-in-Chief”. Of course Adams was also a colossal cock who rubbed everyone the wrong way (his own party didn’t even want to endorse him for a second term). Adams also was particularly fond of seemingly British titles and procedures, hence all the Dukes, Kings etc. in his nicknames, despite the fact that the US had just fought a war to get rid of a lot of that shit. He is a complete contradiction. Oh yah and he was fat. His Rotundity is one of my favorite nicknames ever.
8. Thomas Jefferson
Nicknames: “The Apostle of Democracy”, “The Man of the People”, “Mad Tom”, “The Negro President”, and “The Sage of Monticello”.
Jefferson the first President elected because of the three-fifths compromise hence The Negro President. Jefferson helped his own cause by fathering a horde of half black kids. Jefferson begins a string of presidents from the south (not all in a row) who get elected primarily because of slavery. The only reason he could be a sage was because he didn’t have to work. He had plenty of time to think and contemplate philosophy whilst his slaves did all his work. One of the few things that Jefferson ever let get in the way of all of his sageing was all the slave banging he did.
While reading Battle Cry of Freedom McPherson, at times, uses the nicknames of presidents. When I read a couple of these immediately a dim light bulb went off in my head and I thought “I should write a post about presidential nicknames”. Because I’m too lazy to do the research I am going to use this list from Wikipedia as my source, but because I am excited about the prospects of this post I have decided to turn it into a trilogy of posts (Huzzah!!). We have had 44 presidents so I figure I will keep the lists to 10 name plus some (dis)honorable mentions, which should pretty much take care of all the interesting ones. The rules for this exercise are fairly fluid but the main one is no president will be on two lists. If they have a good one and a bad one I will pick which ever I like the best or worst and go with that one. This list will be of worst presidential nicknames, with worst being defined in two ways. Either boring uninspiring names for boring uninspiring presidents or bad nicknames for presidents who should have fared better. Here now is my subjective list of the worst presidential nicknames:
10. Warren Gamaliel Harding
Nickname: “Wobbling Warren”
Not a name that helps inspire confidence.
9. John Fitzgerald Kennedy
Nicknames: “JFK”, “Jack”, and “The King of Camelot”
For all the bluster about the Kennedy years and how wonderful they were and how much JFK inspired the nation these are some pretty weak nicknames. And the whole Camelot meme is seriously worn out, especially as time drags on.
8. Andrew Johnson
Nickname: “The Tennessee Tailor”
Profession + State = boring and uninspiring. Johnson was the first President to be impeached. So hows about “Commander Impeach”.
7. Franklin Pierce
Nicknames: “The Fainting General”, “Young Hickory of the Granite Hills”, and “Handsome Frank”
There are many, many (you could say a plethora or myriad) attributes you would like your General or President to have. Fainting is not one of them. I see the situation playing out like this:
“General the enemy is coming.”
“OOOOH the enemy is coming!”
“General?!? General?!? Shit he fainted again. Sound the attack and carry the Generaless to her tent.”
Also I would say that “Handsome Frank” was probably a sarcastic nickname.
Last night I rewatchedAkira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, and I was reminded about how awesome samurai movies are when done right–sometimes even if they are done really wrong. It gave me the idea to write about one of my absolute favorite samurai movies. When I first heard of this movie, many moons ago, it was spoken of in hushed tones. It was supposedly so awesome that upon viewing it there was a chance that your face would melt like the asian dude from Raiders. No one we knew had, or even knew of where to get a copy of it, but we luckily had the first few minutes on a beat ass warped VHS tape. After the first few minutes, however, the picture would turn to mush and all that was left was to be teased with sounds of slicin’ and dicin’.
I was completely sold after watching the short intro, and I made it my mission to find this video. Over the next few weeks the intro to the movie played through my mind like a familiar melody. It was like having a song stuck in your head and yet not knowing which song it is. But no matter where you go you hear snippets of music that bring it back to the forefront of your mind and hopefully closer to recognition. Everywhere I went I could hear it playing, but it was an incomplete tune. For the sake of my sanity I had to find this movie, and let the full melody of samurai savagery be unleashed. After weeks of procuring small second hand stores, retail outlets, and garage sales, I finally found someone that could order me one, but it would be expensive. Was it worth it? There was only one way to find out. I had to complete my quest pick-up the wooden carpenter’s cup and take a drink (if you’re counting that makes two Indiana Jones references in one post).
A few long weeks later my copy came in and we all decided to make an event of it. We bought beer, food, and then crowded around our TV like the first cavemen upon encountering a fire sent down by the gods in the form of lightning. Could this movie live up to the incredible hype that we had created around it? Of course it could, but would it? This movie, Shogun Assassin, melted my brain with its sheer awesomeness. One of the greatest martial arts or samurai movies ever created. Our brains quivered, heaved, and spasmed as OgamiItto embarked on his quest for revenge with his toddler son strapped to his back. Facing the Masters of Death, ninjas, and countless hordes of samurai all with his son on his back completely unscathed or fazed by the danger (in fact the movie is narrated by his son). All enemies were mere sword fodder for Itto. His skills were unmatched, his form flawless.
This movie is a definite must see if you like good movies that don’t bore the shit out of you. If you haven’t seen it you may have heard it before. The movie inspired Quentin Tarantino, and can be heard in Kill Bill 2 during the scene where Beatrix puts her kid to sleep. Luckily you won’t have to go on some arduous trek to find this movie. Thanks to the conveniences of modern technology I found it on YouTube in about thirty seconds. It is only the first 10 minutes, but it will give you a taste of this movies greatness. I’m sure there is a digital copy out there somewhere. If someone finds it let me know. This movie is best seen with friends, alcohol, and on a real TV, but its greatness is in no way diminished by watching it on the computer:
