I Love Eating Horses

I came across an article recently which stated that Obama has apparently legalized slaughtering horses for the sake of eating them, or something like that. I didn't pay much attention (article here). The fate of the horses is irrelevant, mostly because I don't care about horses at all. What's interesting is how people responded to this.

So who's up for a Seabiscuit Burger?

I like eating meat. The idea of slaughtering something and feasting on its remains really doesn't bother me that much because that's kind of how most animals work. Obviously vegetarians and organizations like PETA would disagree with me, because they're more fond of animals than I am, and that's understandable. Also obvious is the fact that most people don't look at a horse and think "Yeah it's pretty and all, but it would look better if it was roasted and covered in seasoning." Needless to say, when a friend of mine on Facebook posted the aforementioned horse article, a few people flipped out. Comments included "thats wrong," and "this is so wrong!! :( ," which is extremely insightful. Further investigation (Facebook stalking) revealed these commenters to be avid equestrian aficionados. 

As a human being, I can see why a person who's fond of horses would be upset if they were presented with a horse salad. I myself am a fan of dogs, and subsequently I wouldn't last a day in Vietnam because I'm fairly confident they eat dogs there. However, from an objective point of view, there isn't a big difference between eating a dog, a cow, or a horse. Dogs have been domesticated and hold the prestigious title of "man's best friend," making the very thought of eating them repulsive in America. The Vietnamese couldn't give less of a shit and don't see anything wrong with eating them. Likewise, India as a country is pretty fond of cows, and doesn't really view them as a viable dietary option because of that whole "cows are sacred" thing. Americans also like cows, but only when they look like this.

Mmmm...grilled Hindu deity.

Sure, horses and dogs are generally seen as pets in America. But from an objective point of view, there's no reason why shoving My Little Pony into a meat grinder is somehow worse than shoving in Bessy the cow or Old Yeller. Sure, if Obama legalized eating dogs, I'd be pretty upset too. But think of it this way: somewhere in the world, there's a lonely pig enthusiast who cries every time he sees someone eating a bacon cheeseburger. Talk to him about your horses and see if he gives a shit.

WILBER!!! Oh God, WHY?!?

This Was Awesome

So I auditioned for the school play the other day, and accidentally failed myself into success.

I showed up in the green room (which is basically the locker room for actors) and got settled in. I had over an hour to kill before my audition, so I decided to look over my monologue and maybe make some conversation with people. This soon proved to be impossible, as trying to make conversation with an actor while they're practicing for an audition is tantamount to blasphemy and likely to get you ostracized from a community that generally prides itself on being batshit insane. Bit of a double whammy there, really.

After a moment, something struck me as odd. I nudged a guy that I know kinda sorta well and asked "Did I miss the memo or something? Why is everybody dressed up?"

He replied "Well, most people dress up for their auditions."

"Are we supposed to do it? Like, is it required?"

"Well...only if you want a part in the play, yeah."

I looked down at my grey sweats and brown t-shirt. "...Shit."

There was no way I was gonna find a suit, so I resigned myself to just trying to do amazingly well and hope they didn't care that I looked as if I had just crawled out of bed. Now, the drama teacher usually gives us 4 monologues (2 male and 2 female) to choose from for our auditions. After asking around, I discovered that virtually every guy and several girls were doing the same monologue as me. This annoyed me greatly, as I didn't want to do the same thing as everybody else. "But Johann," I said to myself, "there's no way you're gonna be able to memorize another monologue before your audition. You've got, like, half an hour left!"

"Fuck you," I told myself, which is what I consider to be a great pep talk. I decided that my monologue sucked and memorized another one in less than 15 minutes. Feeling much better, I tried to find a way to calm my nerves as well as take up the rest of the time leading up to my audition. The senseless babble of the other students (there was 40ish of them) was driving me insane, and in a bid to find a quiet spot, I ran to the men's dressing room.

In the dressing room, I stood in the middle of the floor and just stared at myself in the mirror. As I was psyching myself out, I noticed that the closet door was open. With an idea forming in my head, I gingerly opened the closet door and discovered....

A ton of purple robes. There was about 20 them.

Seriously, who needs that many purple robes? I sighed and was about to exit the dressing room when I noticed another closet was unlocked. This time, when I opened it, I discovered dozens of suits. "This is exactly what I need!" I thought. "But wait...no, this won't work. I'm 6"2, none of these are gonna fit me and God knows how long they've been sitting in this closet." Defeated, I left the men's dressing room.

2 seconds later, I said "damnit, I'm finding a suit." After much scrambling and changing of clothes, I found myself in a terribly ill-fitting suit that looked something like this.

Notice the unbridled enthusiasm and the pink phone. My parents should be so proud of me.

And here's my Clint Eastwood impression, before he turned into leather. Also, the ruffles on that shirt were sick.

Unfortunately, I was unable to find any proper dress shoes, so I ended up using my basketball shoes instead.

Awww yeah.

So I performed my audition with a monologue that I had memorized less than half an hour ago in a suit that I cobbled together in all of 5 minutes. The teacher apparently liked me enough to include me in the callbacks, so that's nice. I'll be sure to update this when I find out if I got a spot in the production.*

*Editor's Note: I got a spot in the play. Win.

Sir Francis Chesney: Johann Mannloch (Donovan Lynch).

Why I Will Never Buy Modern Warfare 3

Sometime around 2006 or 2007, it was announced that Call of Duty 4 would break from the WW2 backdrop that the previous games had occupied, and would instead take place in the modern era. This was a bit of a shock, with some seeing it as an attempt on COD's part to break from its rivalry with the Medal of Honor series and stand as its own entity. When Call of Duty 4 was released in 2007, it was a game changer. The game was incredibly polished, innovative, and above all, fun. One DLC (Downloadable content) was released shortly after the game's debut.

This is good.

After that came COD: World at War, which apparently forgot about the whole "breaking from WW2" thing and promptly returned to it, albeit with much more grit and gore than any of the previous entries. World at War also introduced the Nazi Zombies game mode, an incredibly creative and original addition which soon became the only reason anybody bothered to play World at War. Treyarch quickly realized the power of their Nazi Zombies mode and proceeded to whore out 3 DLC packs in rapid succession, each of them featuring another Zombies map. World at War was released in 2008, 1 year after COD 4, and sold for $60. The DLC packs sold for $15 each, bringing the total up to $105 for anybody wanting the "full experience."

This is good too.

COD: Modern Warfare 2 released in 2009, and it was at this point that Infinity Ward slowly began to lose their grip on reality. MW2 featured one of the most convoluted batshit storylines ever conceived in a videogame, and decided to drop the concept of reality in exchange for trying to cram as much extra crap as possible into the game. They apparently didn't cram enough, as they soon released 2 more DLC packs, bringing the "full package" to $90. Unfortunately, Modern Warfare 2 didn't possess Nazi Zombies, as that was Treyarch's territory, so they couldn't whore out quite as many DLC packs. 

This is - wait, what are you doing? Stop that!

COD: Black Ops released in 2010 for the standard $60. As Black Ops was developed by Treyarch, the game featured Nazi Zombies. Treyarch released 4 DLC packs in rapid succession, bringing the full package to $120 dollars. Personally, I gave up playing Black Ops after awhile because I couldn't afford to keep up with all the DLC. When I finally managed to buy one of the packs, a new one was announced the very next day. My friends bought it shortly thereafter and I was left in the dark. 

Stop it! Quit stealing my friends! Damnit, no!

Who's noticing a pattern? The Call of Duty franchise is much more than a series of games. It's a behemoth, a leviathanic monstrosity leaving nothing but destruction and unspeakable horrors in its wake. The money-sucking entities that are Infinity Ward and Treyarch have collectively released 5 games in the last 5 years, pimping out their wares to the poor bastards dumb enough to buy them and doing their best to drive the gaming industry as a whole into the dirt. Infinity Ward hasn't leeched out quite as much money because they don't have the appeal of Nazi Zombies. Treyarch does, and those people are soulless. Their abusive DLC makes it nearly impossible for the average gamer to stay up to date with the games. In addition to all of this, Call of Duty is one of the least innovative franchises in the history of ever. The only game mechanic they've added since COD 4 is the ability to dive, and they didn't do that until Black Ops...which was 3 games later. No change in the game engine, or gameplay, or formula, or...anything.

You twisted bastards...is nothing sacred?!

The effects of all this cannot be overstated. Batman: Arkham City comes with a similar hook designed to maximize profit. The narrative of Arkham City includes several segments where the player takes the role of Catwoman. While they aren't vital to the narrative, they're pretty important to a game as story driven as Arkham City. However, the Catwoman segments are only available as DLC. You can either get a code for the DLC by purchasing the game new, or you can shell out $10 for a copy online if you get the game used. The creators of Arkham City also released a DLC immediately after the game's debut. The only thing featured in this DLC was the ability to play as Nightwing, which is...a bit underwhelming. Admittedly, Arkham City is possibly one of the best games I've ever played, but keeping the Catwoman storyline as a separate DLC was a dick move. 

The point is, COD is setting an example that is both extremely profitable and completely lacking in morals or the whole "caring for the consumer" thing, which sounds a lot like the cesspool we know as Hollywood. While this hasn't affected every single game studio (studios such as Epic Games, Bungie and Valve are prime examples of being badass with their customers), it's still a disturbing trend.

Because of this, I will not buy Modern Warfare 3, or the subsequent Call of Duty that will undoubtedly release next year. I consider Treyarch and Infinity Ward to be evil studios with no consideration for the fact that many of their consumers are feeling the financial pressure of our shitty economy and maybe can't afford all this random crap. Call of Duty is also a horrible franchise that has never heard of innovation, change, or really doing anything different or creative or good at all. Unfortunately, I can't blame either of the studios for wanting to maximize their profit, but I'm doing it anyway. 

Weaponized Apathy

Tired. That's how I felt. Tired, with a raging headache and a sore jaw from grinding my teeth, which is an odd habit that I seemed to have picked up as of late. School had dragged on for what seemed like an eternity, and I wanted nothing more than to curl up in my room, shut off any and all light sources and vegetate in my bed for a while. Which is exactly what I did.

After about half an hour of this, I finally conceited to the fact that reality was still there and I needed to deal with it eventually. Fully aware of the large amounts of homework that awaited me, I reluctantly pulled myself out of bed. Except I didn't. After a bit of struggling, it dawned on me that I physically couldn't get out of bed.

A little history lesson: In my freshman year of high school, I did a short stint in therapy, for various reasons that don't need much elaboration. After a few visits, the therapist reached the conclusion that I was incredibly depressed, which is pretty much exactly what you want to hear when you're a hormonal unhappy high schooler. This depression has been prevalent in my life for quite a while now. I gave up on it ever going away and eventually, I internalized it to the point that it's now a fundamental part of who I am. The problem with this is that, every once in a while, my depression gets bored and decides to beat the ever-loving fuck out of me, which does a wonderful job of destroying my motivation. For whatever reason, in the brief time that I was laying in bed, depression and apathy came upon me like a massive weight. Nothing in the universe could have possibly convinced me to leave my bed.

Time continued to drag on while I remained motionless. My mind, normally a restless orgy of nonsensical thoughts, was completely blank. My dog was laying in the bed with me and eventually got bored. She punched me, licked me, nudged me incessantly, buried her face in the crook of my neck. No matter what she did, I was unresponsive. At one point, it occurred to me that I had a lot of things to do and there was no way in hell I was getting any of it done. I tried to lament this, but I soon gave up on that endeavor and went back to being borderline comatose. 

Then something happened.

My brain was choked with an apathy-induced haze, and none of my thoughts could coalesce into anything coherent before being whisked away by the wind. But through this thick fog, a blinding light appeared. A brilliant idea occurred to me, instantly dispelling the smoke of my mind.

I could totally use this to my advantage.

My apathy and depression had reached such a point that I didn't care at all about what happened to me. Hell, my house could have burned down and I probably wouldn't have twitched. But therein was the beauty. All my chores, my homework, things that I generally detest, could be accomplished and none of it would elicit a reaction in me. I entered a sort of autopilot, watching with perfect detachment as my body went through the motions of the day, plowing through my work like the automaton it was. 

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I could feel excitement trying to crack through the shell of depression and make its way into my brain. I quietly snuffed it out, and instead simply acknowledged the fact that I now had a new tool at my disposal in my personal war against depression. Not that I particularly cared, but I was capable of acknowledging the fact that this would probably be really useful in the future.

As I have no real way to end this post, here's a picture of Guatemala.

Disclaimer: The author of the blog "Hyperbole and a Half," which I hold in very high regard, has made a similar post here. I'm putting this here because I don't feel like being accused of plagiarism or getting lazy and hijacking her ideas. I would never plagiarize any piece of writing...unless it's school related. Then that shit's mine.