And so it has begun…again.

Yesterday saw the beginning of the second year on the cheese' road to two master's degrees. Here is, for your consideration, the cheese' reading list for the semester…which seems a bit light, thankfully.

Eng. 520 – Early 19th Century American Lit. (Overall, the cheese is not overjoyed about this class, but it worked for his schedule and the professor is fairly rockin')

Nature and Selected Essays – Emerson (the cheese is fairly indifferent toward Ralph Waldo Emerson

House of the Seven Gables – Hawthorne (the cheese believes this book is briefly mentioned in Ed Norton's first movie…but has no further information)

Moby Dick – Melville (quite dreading this one, actually…the cheese attempted to read it once and nearly bored himself, literally, to death

Sovereignty and the Goodness of God – Rowlandson (the title does not endear itself unto the cheese)

Slave Narratives – Andrews (Yeah! Down with Whitey!)

And the ever present course reader...chock full of 200 years of American Lit!

Eng. 536 – Modern British Lit. (The cheese hasn't had this professor yet, but first impressions are favorable, and it's a subject of great interest unto the cheese)

The Secret Agent – Conrad (already started this one, and surprisingly, it reads very similarly to Pratchett or Gaiman…which, as we all know, is right up the cheese' alley)

Dubliners – Joyce (read Portrait of an Artist…as an undergrad and enjoyed it, so this should be decent)

The Good Soldier – Ford Madox Ford (this guy's name is actually Ford Madox Ford…seriously!)

Heartbreak House – Shaw (meh)

Selected Short Stories/Snake and Other Poems – Lawrence (double meh)

To the Lighthouse – Woolf (WORST NOVEL EVER WRITTEN IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, HANDS DOWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats – Yeats (stupid poetry!)

Vile Bodies – Waugh (no clue about this one, but the title sure is promising…)

Molloy – Beckett (a novel originally written in French, by an Irishman, then translated to English…make what you will of that)

Four Quartets – Eliot (Finally! A professor that actually wants to teach Eliot's greatest work…and the really great thing about Eliot is that he's taught in both American and British Modern lit…of course in American the text was The Wasteland…which is a much more "American" poem than Four Quartets"

Eng. 503 – Techniques in Writing

No required reading, apparently, which seems a bit odd. Anyway, this course will officially begin "Operation Ingratiate Oneself into the Good Graces of Professor Blaylock" which was about 90% of the reason the cheese wanted to go to his particular graduate school.

A little breath of sanity...

It seems a constant theme of late; depression.

Maybe it's the sleep deprivation. Maybe it's the constant stress and anxiety that's part and parcel of having a three week old infant. Maybe it's the pending return to graduate school, now with three classes instead of two! Maybe it's the soul sucking job at miscellaneous advertising agency. Or maybe it's some sort of demonic curse placed upon him by his enemies.

Whatever the reason, the cheese has entered into a definite "funk" of some kind. Where can your generous overlord turn to stem the seemingly overwhelming tide of suicidal thoughts...why Penny Arcade of course!





But what are the odds of rolling two 20's in a row for a successful dive/roll/attack where your opponent ends up in four even pieces from the damage done by your two powerful blades? Well, what it is?

Yo, Yo Check This

The official minstral for the dukedom of Degyte has been gracious enough to release the single from his upcoming album. You can download and listen to it here. He has also released the video for this song as well. I can't wait for this album to come out. In the meantime, check out the album cover.

You don't get to choose which ones you want to keep.

For regular readers here this will come as no surprise. The cheese is a liberal. Actually, he hates that term. Since Fox News and other right leaning media have co-opted the term, the cheese no longer believes it has the same meaning it once did, and has, for many years, called himself progressive instead. The cheese is a registered member of the Green Party. During that illegal re-call election we had out here in California the cheese voted for Peter Camejo for godsakes! The cheese is pro-choice, anti-drug war, anti-immigration laws, etc.

But here's the thing. All of the cheese' political/philosophical opinions stem from a belief that the Bill of Rights is what this country is all about. It is, in the cheese' humble opinion, the foundation on which this country is built. And the really crap thing about it is, people like to pick and choose which parts of it they feel are more important that others, but that's just not the way it works.
There are a lot of people who tend to think that the 2nd amendment needs to be protected above all others. Now, certainly the intention of the framers is an important point to consider, but so to is timeliness. This thing was written at a time when the country had just fought a bloody war for independence, and your ordinary farmer could take up a musket and defend his country with the career soldier. But today, if some rogue general were to declare a coup, your home arsenal of handguns and shotguns wouldn't do a whole lot against that tank rolling over your house (but what about automatic weapons available to ordinary citizens you ask, not doing much against that f-16 homeslice!). So even though, in his world, the cheese would destroy all guns, rockets, bombs, etc (let's get back to the days of swords and mounted cav, damnit!) he can't really argue this one too much. It's right there! Guns are in. He has no problem with gun control. No matter what anyone says, an AK-47 is NOT a hunting rifle! But the guns are in.

Also, some like to take the 1st amendment, and chop it up, putting more value on freedom of speech than on freedom of religion.

This article, for instance, really infuriates the cheese. At first glance it seems like, hey, this church is discriminating. They won't allow this woman to teach because she's a woman. And if this were, say, a public school, clearly this is discrimination. But we're talking about a church here, and how this particular church interprets it's own holy text. In a way, these individuals, who have come together to form this church, are simply expressing their beliefs, which is a form of freedom of speech. It's not a coincidence that the framers put speech and religion together in the same amendment. So which freedom trumps here? The woman's freedom to keep her job, or the church's freedom to act in accordance with it's beliefs? Unless this church happened to believe (and practice) virgin sacrifice, the cheese has to say the church because the woman is free to go find another church.

Look people, you can't pick and choose the Bill of Rights. Whether or not you "like" something protected by one of them, they're all here for a reason.

Degyte's Demovie Dereviews

Over the weekend, Tengu and I witnessed a masterpiece, Snakes on a Plane. Now I know many of your were/are skeptical of this fine feature film. I am here to alleviate those doubts.

Now granted, you have to suspend some reality to really appreciate this flick. Mostly you need to not get hung up on the particulars of how and why the snakes are on the plane. Once the snakes get out and start killing people, the movie really comes into it’s own. It is very much like any disaster film even down to the stereotypical characters on the plane(stewardess on her last flight, man scared to fly, urban streetwise gangstas, etc.). Where this film shines is in the absurdity of the whole thing. Rather than scream or cringe at the many gruesome deaths, the audience is left chuckling and laughing because they are so over the top. I won’t detail them here in case anyone is moved to watch this film.

The performances are corny and a little silly but all done with a wink at the audience like the rest of the movie. It’s a movie that doesn’t take itself too seriously.

Overall I recommend this movie.

Also I wanted to point you all to the best show none of you are probably watching:

Metalocalypse.

It’s new show on Cartoon Network’s Adult swim. It is about the world’s most popular metal band Dethklok and all of their adventures. If you are a fan of metal or just a fan of humor I can’t recommend this show enough. Their mission is to do everything the darkest most metal way. Including coffee commercials, recording at the deepest part of the ocean and birthday parties. If you don’t get Cartoon Network, you can find the shows on You Tube. Here is a brief clip:

This Post: Not Work Friendly

Don't think it's because the cheese is going to post illicit pictures of females...although...no...it's because he should probably not be typing this from work.

As many of you know the cheese has spent the last three months toiling at miscellaneous advertising agency. Now, this is a fairly small company, something along the lines of 40 employees. Today, the cheese was informed that one of the Account Executives would be leaving next week. This is just the latest in a rash of employees leaving said company. The cheese doesn't posses a degree in business, but it can't be good when, over the course of 4 weeks, nearly 30 percent of a company's employees either leave or quit...

Could the cheese be next?

Sure...what with his rampant use of the internets...but when one is going on no sleep, and has to stare at ads all day, one needs to break up the monotony.

Two unrelated itmes...

While perusing various news sites today, the cheese happened upon two items of interest.

The first involves a family so involved in "defeating demons" that all ten of them must chant and pray all night. Well, that's certainly their right to try, except that they live in an apartment tower. If the cheese lived there, they'd be gettin' a heapin' helpin' of "demonic" action against them...mostly in the form of petty vandalism and threats.

The second is about a guy suing the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. No, it's not because of their stupid name. Apparantly, on Mother's Day 2005 the team gave away tote bags to all females in attendance to that days game. The guy claims it was discrimination against men. Really?! Is this what it's come to? All those years good people fought real racism and discrimination and now some guy can sue a business because he doesn't have a vagina on Mother's day? See why the cheese hates the OC?

The Baseball Season Has Officially Opened...again

Just when he thought there was nothing left in the ol' Los Angeles Dodgers of Los Angeles, they turn around and win 13 of 14 going from 7 1/2 game out, to 1 1/2 games in first place of the NL West.

Tonight even saw Russell Martin hit a walk off homer in the 10th off the Giants...if they can keep it up for a couple more weeks, the boys in blue will be back in the post season...

R.I.P Albus Dumbledore

I hate to bump the pictures of the newest and most precious citizen of cheeselandia but I think the cheese would approve this interesting post. It appears that dumbledore is in fact actually dead and will not be "doing a Gandalf" in the last book. Rowling recently put this rumor to rest a charity reading event in New York last week. You can find a transcript of the Q & A here.

Bask in her glory

Behold the splendor of Cheeselandia's one day ruler, Princess Isabella Kathleen, Defender of the Realm, Blessed of Light, First Daughter of House Cheese:

Vader being a jerk

Leave it to the guys at penny arcade to point you in the direction of hilarious videos. Check this one out.

A quick update faithful cheeselandians

A hearty welcome to the cheese' close(?) friend j_pyle who will update us all later tonight on the impending birth of our one day ruler Princess Isabella...

Cool Jedi Powers

This has got to be one of the coolest videos of Jedi ever created. This is a tech demo that was shown at this year's E3 for an unannounced starwars game. I can't quite figure out the era though. It is either between ep.3 and 4 or post 4. Although being a tech demo it may not relate to any specific game or era. Anyway check it out here.

I recommend viewing the larger format. There is a lot of detail that can be missed.

And you wonder why the cheese loves San Francisco?

Aside from the mild climate one gets from being surrounded by water on three sides (and it's really only foggy in the Sunset and Richmond...well, mostly the Sunset and Richmond), and the general "urbanness," the city (and by city the cheese means, city government) tends to do stuff like this more often than most other places.

Movie Reviews

Monster House

The cheese and momma cheese decided to spend the sweltering late Sunday afternoon in the comfort of a large environment controlled box and headed down to the local googleplex. The nearest starting film was Monster House, which momma cheese wanted to see anyway, and we quickly ushered our way into theatre. Overall, the cheese is getting sick of all the cg animated films being produced (sidenote: just because you're "famous" does not mean you are entitled to voice a character in a cg film, that's right Martin Lawrence, the cheese is talking to you!) but this one was actually quite good. It wasn't the greatest thing ever, it ran a fairly predictable plot. From about the 5th second it's evident that the supposed "bad guy" is not, in fact, "bad." But the animation is in a more realistic style than, say, Pixar, though not like that crappy Final Fantasy film. More importantly, the three main characters (which are kids) are pretty realized (well, maybe not Chowder). Some of the sequences at the end are actually pretty inventive, when the house starts to "go crazy." Plus, the voice cameos are actually done well (i.e. they're understated). Overall, the cheese rates Monster House at a solid B-.

Clerks II

Last night the cheese finally made his way to see the new Kevin Smith offering. Look, the cheese loves Kevin Smith. In fact, the cheese is even willing to defend Jersey Girl. And on one level, Clerks II delivered pretty much what was expected. Gratuitous cock and pussy jokes, offensive matter, and beastiality. On another level, though, the cheese wonders whether or not Kevin Smith isn't running out of material. The concept of looking at Dante and Randall ten years on is a good one. But the execution seemed lacking. In much the same way as Jay and Silent Bob, the cheese wonders if a Clerks sequel wasn't better as an idea. Remember after Dogma when everyone thought that a Jay and Silent Bob movie would be the greatest thing since Jesus, and then it came out and it was good, but not exactly great. Same thing here (sidenote: the parts of Clerks II with Jay and Silent Bob made the cheese wish for a Jay and Silent Bob movie, until he remembered it was already made). Parts of Clerks II were inspired, but unlike, say Dogma or Chasing Amy, it had a lot of down time, and was the donkey show really necessary. The cheese doesn't object on the ground of content, but rather, it seemed a bit forced. Nice turn on the "Kelly" thing, but overall that whole sequence seemed forced. The film did have a satisfying ending, in that Dante and Randall, as characters, now have some closure. But, where the hell was Justice? Are you honestly telling me that Jay would let her get away? Come on! Either way, Mr. Smith needs to do something like Dogma next. Something that incorporates his "style" without over powering the plot. Final rating B-.

Stephen Colbert: God Among Men

It's a struggle to stay up until midnight now that the cheese is a bit older, and most nights he is not up to the task. Such golden pieces of infotainment are, therefore, inevitably missed. Thank god for the internet.








A small part of the cheese now wishes he could move to Florida to vote for Wexler and his huge testicles.

A Call to Arms

Ho there loyal citizens of Cheeselandia,

Your benevolent overlord is coming to you, faithful followers, and asking for your assistance. It has been nigh on two years since the big cheese began, and yet we are still wallowing in the murky and uninspired format of the blogspot default layout. The cheese has not the time to invest in redesigning the domain, and so it is up to you to help bring about the proper majesty befitting our realm. The cheese has full faith in you citizens, make him proud!




As an aside, that may have been the first time we had two posts up at the same time...Sorry Jezmon, the cheese wanted this on top for a bit...

Simpsons Movie Footage

They showed some footage of the new Simpsons movie over the weekend at Comic Con. Someone was nice enough to put this footage on You Tube. There are 2 different clips. You can check it out here or here.

Lance Bass is gay: nobody cares.

Look, all those 12 year old girls that swooned over N'Sync are now way too old to give a shit. And now he's developing a sit-com pilot where he plays, wait for it....a gay guy! Holy shit! He's a genius! No's done that since Will and Grace ended two months ago.

The baseball season is officially over!

What's that? Wasn't the All-Star game played just two weeks ago? Doesn't the regular season end in September?

Technically.

Yes.

But if you're a true red-blooded citizen of cheeselandia, then for you the baseball season is over because the Dodgers have now lost 7 straight, and 12 of 13 since the mid-summer classic. They sit 6 1/2 games out of first in the NL West, and the only positive thing to have occurred recently is that Odalis Perez was traded (for a pitcher the Dodgers RELEASED at the end of last season).

So now that the Dodgers have no real hope of making the post-season, yet again, we can all turn our collective attention toward Liverpool's title challenge in the Premiership during the upcoming season.