Don't Be Afraid of The Dark

      Honestly, stress has been having a prolonged stakeout in my head for these past couple of days. If you ask me about the origins of the nervousness, school's the culprit. This part of the "Drugs and Disease" course was said to be easier than the other two parts. Easy my ass. I studied for hours on end and I still came out of that final with a "what the fuck just happened" look. In all seriousness, I can't afford to fail this course. As you can see, I need an outlet. So, why not a movie post. With my current luck, I'm bound to watch a really bad flick but this won't necessarily be a bad thing. It'll give me an excuse to flip shit on it. That'll speed up the healing process a bit won't it?

      What do you know about director Guillermo del Toro? Name sounds familiar? It should. He directed mainstream movies which include: Pan's Labyrinth, The Hellboy Series, Kung Fu Panda, Splice, and yadayadayada. What's the common theme in all of these flicks? Don't say that they were all crap. Tell me, who didn't like Kung Fu Panda? Not even I will dare to write a bad review on it. The underlying theme in all of these is the idea of fantasy or the belief in the fantastical. So, it's easy to predict what's to come from this film. Matter of fact, the whole introduction of this movie came off as very animated. Now wait a minute, I first chose to watch this film because I wanted to watch a new horror film. When you have a title like "Don't be afraid of the Dark", I mean, you should have ominous music spilling out of every pore in the scene to compensate right? Not Disney introductions. It looks like del Toro thought he was exempt.

      Guy Pearce, Katie Holmes, and Bailee Madison star in this 1973 horror movie that retells their troubling experiences with the goblins of the Netherworlds...Ok, it's not a movie from the seventies but hell, it sure seems like it should have been. The music, the crude transitions, the repeating screen shots of the Blackwood Mansion, all made it seem as if the movie industry rolled back the clock a billion times. Just as a side note, is it just me or is Guy Pearce seem like a cross between Brad Pitt and Matt Damon? 

      Anyway, Pearce played the role of Alex, a work-oriented father, divorced, who wants to get his career back on track by remodeling and selling the Blackwood Mansion. Little does he know about it's daunting history that was forcibly hidden from the public. Besides, one or two lines, I thought Pearce did a good job. Nothing much to say about Katie Holmes since the movie was predominantly centered on Bailee Madison, who played the role of Sally, a medicated, troubled, divorce torn youngster. Child actors tend hit home every time. I'm pretty sure that if I did say something bad about her acting, I would be escorted straight to the gates of hell without a seconds notice. 

      I'm trying really hard not to give away the ending but it's not like you wouldn't figure it out within the first fifteen minutes of the movie. This review is long enough. Would I hit the replay button on this one? Hell to the no. I'm telling you it's a waste of time. But if you are bad-ass and watch it anyway, I want you to let me know what you thought about the librarian's comment about the Vatican's involvement in all of this. I thought that idea was pretty freaking hilarious. Since when did the Vatican like to share children? 

Wednesday the Fourteenth

      I know about two hundred students who are exponentially increasing in anxiety as each day comes to an end. Coincidentally, you can count me as one of those students. No, it's not because of either the half-empty threats of the nearing apocalypse or the possibilities of another brutal act of terrorism. The problem is Wednesday the Fourteenth. Curious as to what happens to us students on this particular date at 7:30 in the morning? Listen closely. At this time, renown professors and the doctoral elite of the university gather sleep deprived, fast food-filled, memorized-knowledge-vomiting machines into an auditorium. Here, these students spend the next two hours prying their brains open to complete fifty life-numbing questions. Yes, I know I'm exaggerating a little bit but only by a little.
      Students that came before me warned that the fourth year of the program would be the likes of one I never faced before. Within the first few days of the new school year, I experienced exactly what they were going on about. The Drugs and Diseases Midterm is standing on my doorstep ready to rap furiously at the pathetic barrier in front of it. Isn't it too soon to be having a midterm? It's certainly, not a wrong question to ask but it is a futile question. It will happen, whether I like it or not, on Wednesday the Fourteenth.
      This semester I will be taking three midterms and three finals. Doesn't sound so bad right? Well that's because those exams are contained within one course, Drugs and Diseases. I have five more courses, each with it's own midterm and final. Blew your mind yet? It's something all the graduates before me had to go through. It's only fair that I have to experience it as well. I have been doing pretty well with staying on the same page with the coursework and lecture materials but it feels like no matter how many things I cross away from my list of assignments it's no use. My agenda book is swelling by the minute with projects, group tasks, and projected dates for concussion dealing exams. As we speak, I'm racing to finish off the last of my "never-ending" readings so I could, finally, dive into previous lectures on Medicinal Chemistry.
      Prioritize. I hate the word. Although I should be spending time within the chaos that is Structural Resonance and Mechanism of Action, I'm bombarded with coursework of my other classes. It looks like I'll just have make do with the phrase, "Tough Love." You know what the funny thing is? If I was a Liberal Arts major, this would have been my senior year of college. I would have been a young mind ready to be thrust out into the "real world". Yet next year, you'll find me in a lab somewhere creating assays of drug compounds. Neat huh?

New Follower Jitters

      September 1, 2011 marks the day when this blog received its first follower. Once I saw the news on my dashboard, I felt great and there was happiness just radiating out of me. Man, was I ecstatic. I called and messaged some of my best buddies and let them know what was going on and how excited I was. Then after descending from Cloud Nine, something else set in and took the emotion's place. Slowly, I started to become nervous and self-conscious. Uninvited questions started to tear through my train of thought and made things more complex. Would this person like what you have to say? Is your  blog going to be geared toward this person? Will you change yourself, like you have before, just to please people?  Are you going to be satisfied? Do you feel like the chase is over? Maybe it's not a big deal to some, but it's something I have been dealing with for a long time.
      There's something you should know about me. I'm always up for trying new and exciting things and I will be attached to this particular "thing" by the hip for a while. Then, I'll hit a milestone and then the thrill is no where to be found. Let's just take blogging for example. One of the main things about blogging is that people, that are not familiar to you, will read what you have to write. After this, they have to determine whether or not they will follow you so that when they sign on to their respective account, they are able to see any of your new entries that you posted. If the answer is "no" then the process stops here. If not, they have to either copy your URL identification and paste it in the managing section of their reading list. Or maybe there's a simpler way that I am not familiar with. There's always an easier way. Having a follower is one of the biggest accomplishments a blogger will have. Once I find out that there is a person who is interested and following what I have to say, I start asking myself; What should I look forward to now? If I have no answer to that, then it's on to the next best thing.
      After thinking about all the work that this person had to do to follow this particular blog, I started to become nervous. What do I have to do to keep this person interested so that he doesn't angrily eradicate me from his reading list? After talking with a good friend of mine, I started to remember exactly why I made this blog in the first place. This blog wasn't made to please people and force me to change to the beat of other people's hearts. It's main purpose was for me to share what I think and my experiences. If I lose that, then this blog will just be another unnecessary burden on my life. The very point other people come to follow your blogs is to experience a new way of thought and the person you are. If you lose your sense of identity, then you become the generic, lifeless, bland reading material that you promised yourself that you'll never become.
      Unfortunately, I have a loose sense of identity. Throughout my life, the only thing that stayed constant about me is my bad sense of fashion. Everything else just changes with the tide, it's why being consistent is so difficult to me. It may have been the way I was programmed or maybe I'm just a guy that bores easily. But nevertheless, this blogging experience has been great and is something that I do want to continue. If I ever do start slacking. I give you each permission to give me one backhand across the face until I regain my senses.