MKOTBlog

I’m loving this music video for Oren Lavie‘s Her Morning Elegance:

A collection of clips from various news broadcasts announcing the victory of the 44th president of the United States, Barack Obama. More to come… please email me with links to any other videos that captured this amazing moment in history.

CBS

FOX News

NBC

MSNBC

A hilarious feta cheese commercial we discovered while in Europe. So bizarre yet catchy!

As the Democratic National Convention wrapped up this past week, the event only confirmed that this is one of the most fascinating election seasons that I can remember… which I guess isn’t saying a whole lot because I can really only remember 3. The sad thing, though, is that I realized I haven’t been paying as much attention as I should have been. However, it’s now time for a change. All these speeches, talks, presentations, and round-the-clock coverage have really motivated me to get involved with the whole political scene, and what has impacted me the most are the upcoming debates.

Welcome to the generic college dorm room poster sale...

What could be more exciting than watching two gigantic political rivals, butting heads over the core divisive issues that face this country today? What could be more exciting than scrutinizing each and every word the candidates say, knowing any slip could destroy the integrity of an entire campaign, an entire career, an entire life? So much drama and so much action…

Alright, enough talk! I now put myself out there to join this irresistible action! I want to know what it feels like to take part in an intellectually and emotionally stimulating debate, to argue my case for the issues and beliefs I hold dearest to my heart. I want to be challenged by a very worthy opponent, who forces me to step out of my comfort zone to see the other side’s point of view while using all the available neurons of my brain in an attempt to make the other side see my ways of perception. And most importantly, I want to engage in a polite yet heated, but also civil conversation, without having to resort to immature tactics like personal attacks and pandering to the public.

...where you can make a unique and bold statement by buying and putting up the same poster as thousands of other fellow college students!

Okay… so now that’s set, what to debate about? How about the big story making all the headlines, presidential candidate John McCain’s running mate choice? Sarah Palin, a little-known governor of Alaska, has already proved herself to be a polarizing character, and a perfect topic of my self-debate.

I will first take the side of pro-Palin. I present to you that my lengthy research has shown that Sarah Palin is a worthwhile candidate because of the facts:

John McCain’s vice-presidential pick, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, is an evangelical Protestant with… an openness to teaching creationism in the public schools.

Wait, what? Creationism in schools? Screw this, that’s stupid.

I had a major brain fart today, and would like to share my moment of absent mindedness with all of you.

Where's your head?

This sunny, beautiful afternoon in Philadelphia, I decided that I needed some sun after being stuck indoors for the majority of the time I was in Georgia. I was too lazy to leave the house, however, so I decided to grab a book and lie out on my “porch” outside of my bedroom window. For those who haven’t been, I use the term “porch” here very loosely, as it is just an extension of the room below, and probably about to collapse under any weight at any given minute. Despite its questionable safety, it is one of my favorite places to hang out in (outside) my house, and the fact that I can see everything happening in the backyard of the AEPi chapter house during their house parties and uh, “pledge get-togethers,” just adds to its appeal.

Anyway, as I made myself comfortable on the roof, I decided I didn’t want any bugs flying into my room, so I started to shut the window screen behind me. An inch away from the bottom, I pushed a little too hard and closed the screen, while simultaneously realizing that there was no way to open up the screen again from the outside. If you’ve listened to David Cross’ stand-up on his It’s Not Funny record, it was exactly like his bit about locking your keys in the car… you know what you’re doing as you’re doing it, but you don’t stop yourself from doing it. I was fully aware that by shutting the screen I would lock myself outside on the roof, yet I pushed the screen closed. I was stuck on the roof of my own house.

Realizing my predicament, I decided to explore my surroundings. The first thing I did was to not look like as if I was panicking, as there were guys in the AEPi backyard, and construction workers in the house next door, and all of them, I was convinced, would laugh at me if they saw me stuck on my roof, helplessly crying, rolled up in a fetal position. Then, I came up with an easy solution… why not just call one of my roommates, who could come into my room and save me from this embarrassing situation? Well, that would’ve been too easy, and I had conveniently decided to leave my phone on my bed, mere inches away from the closed window screen. Great.

So now what? I thought to myself, well, it can’t be that hard to break open a window screen, right? I decided to use brute force. I crouched, swung my elbow back, and braced myself for an easy breakthrough of the screen. I pictured myself ripping open the window screen like those football players who jump through a banner before a big game. My arm then swung forward, my elbow bounced off the screen, leaving a little dent but not a sign of any significant damage to the screen, while also smashing any confidence I had in my physical strength. This process was repeated thrice.

Well, panicking, calling someone, and using physical force were, at this point, all out of the question. The only option left was to MacGyver myself out of this situation. On the roof next door, I spotted a rusty nail. I stepped over the gap in between our two houses, which actually looked exactly like this, retrieved the nail, and cut two holes in the screen, allowing my hands to squeeze in and open the screen from the inside. I dove headfirst through the window, like an awesome stunt man, on to my bed, and took a nap. The whole thing took about 3 minutes. I guess it really wasn’t that big of a deal.

And now for the most beautiful of them all...

I can’t remember the last 11 days of my life.

Okay, that’s probably a bit of a dramatic over-exaggeration, but the point still stands. After a rough morning of waking up at 5 am after two hours of sleep, flying back to Philadelphia (thankfully the plane was nearly empty), and almost napping through my LSAT class which was the reason for my early return (the rest of the guys are coming back tomorrow), I reflected back on the trip and realized I couldn’t distinguish the different days of our Georgia excursion. All the events and people blended together into an incomprehensible pile of miscellaneous memories… and it wasn’t for the lack of sleep.

The unfortunate thing is, its not like I was partying myself into a drunk coma every night, which would somewhat explain this mental week-long blackout. To be fair, overall I had a great time hanging out, relaxing, and taking in the new experiences of the Deep South. I do hold incredibly fond memories of golfing, catfishing, swimming, etc… however, unlike the Florida writing retreat of last year, I felt that the bad outweighed the good of this trip. As the week progressed, in conjunction with the mad cabin fever caused by the frequent thunderstorms and the general lack of things to do in Douglas (the best restaurant in town, for example, was a Ruby Tuesday), I began to realize that Mask and Wig, despite all its positives, is full of its share of drama and politics that have really begun to wear me thin, and that I no longer care to remember as distinct memories.

The worst part of it all, I realized this week, is the double-edged impact on friendships these types of organizations have. If it wasn’t for Mask and Wig, I probably wouldn’t have met all of my best friends in college, with whom I have shared life-defining experiences. This side of it, I would not change or give up for anything in the world. But on the other hand, as the years go by, and you get more involved with the behind-the-scenes work, I’ve realized that some people have stopped seeing each as other as friends, and rather only judge each other by the achievements they have accomplished within the context of the organization. I don’t place blame on anyone, as I am also guilty of doing this, but I’ve been incredibly disturbed and saddened by this trend, and only recently realized how common this was throughout the entire group.

Now, at this point, my dear friends and cast members of Mask and Wig, I have realized I have no idea what I’m trying to accomplish by writing this post. Don’t get me wrong, I love Wig, and believe whole-heartedly that it’s one of the best things to have ever happened to me. But it is also true that nothing else brings me more challenges and difficulties on a day to day basis. I guess all I’m trying to do is explain to you my quiet aloofness that some of you noticed this week. So that’s it.

On a positive note, though, I have come away with a back up plan to my life if my current non-existent life plan fails: a veterinarian. Well, not really, because to become a vet requires years of education… so a pet-owner. But I guess owning a pet isn’t really a career, so let me rephrase: I have come away with a back up hobby for my life, regardless of whether or not my current non-existent life plan fails. As any of the guys will attest, I was found at any given point during the week playing with Pat’s dog, Misty. I didn’t care that it was covered with fleas and smelled like, well, a bad-smelling dog, but I couldn’t help but play with it, feed it, and pet it all week long. And then, half way through the trip, a stray but incredibly gentle cat started to follow us around in the neighborhood. It eventually made Pat’s house its home (which I’m sure the family isn’t all that crazy about) and whenever I wasn’t hanging out with the dog, I was playing with and feeding the cat. Normally I HATE cats, and still probably will hate most cats, but this was one was too cute and amazing. Anyway, I picked up a new nickname on this trip: the dog whisperer. So watch out if you have a dog, because I will be… okay, I’ll stop right there because this passage already sounds incredibly creepy.

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And in other, completely unrelated yet exciting news: I have been accepted to be a blogger for The Spin, the Daily Pennsylvanian’s opinion blog! I don’t know any specific details yet, but stay tuned…

Thoughts?

I’m sorry, I have to break a rule today. I usually write one post a day, but I found the headline of this article so funny that I have to share it immediately.

U.S. swim star goes for 6th gold in Beijing against Lochte, Canadian Beavers

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On top of the awesome Canadian stereotype, picture a bunch of beavers swimming against Michael Phelps in the Olympics, and try not to at least smile. I dare you.

So, before I get into the real stuff (Olympics, duh), I want to say hello to my Finnish readers.

I’ve been getting many referrals from this blog for the last couple days. Using Google Translator, I tried to decipher the paragraph that linked my site:

The advertisement (of which postaisin image, if it should be the camera – until you look in the tank) has been accompanied by lisa dissuasive photos rullaportaiden hyokkayksen, the dispossessed victims. Shoes, flipfloppeja, lahkeita, sandals – everything under the sun to power. Kieltamatta amusing, but noinkohan is effective ..?

Ahem… not exactly helpful. If any Finnish speakers could help me out translating this, it would be greatly appreciated.

Anyway, I thought I might as well try reaching out to my Finnish fan base (if any), and not having learned my lesson about how poor online translation services are, came up with this:

I offer these flowers as tokens of our blog-riendship.

I’ve devised a drinking game to play while watching the Olympics.

It is called the “Failed high fives, hugs, handshakes, or any other botched attempts of physical congratulations drinking game.” When it happens, you can bask in the fact that these seemingly superhuman athletes are in the end, just people after all, and drink yourself silly.

Here’s the beauty of this kind of occurrence. The Olympians are such graceful specimens with elegant yet powerful bodies, but even these perfect athletes cannot escape from some of the most mundane interactions that can potentially lead to the most cringe-worthy awkward situations. I noticed it most during the men’s team gymnastics competition, when the Americans would celebrate the latest successful performance of a fellow team member. For example, one of the men would do a marvelous dismount off the rings… time would slow to a crawl as he flipped and turned in the air, his eyes searching for the blue mat… his feet would find its landing mark with brute force, sending impact waves through his lean, muscular body… and then realizing his accomplishment in front of millions of viewers, he would stretch his arms out like a soaring bald eagle in glorious, American victory.

The camera would then follow him graciously stepping off the platform, shouting things like “Yeah! Number one!” or “U! S! A!” to his fellow teammates who were celebrating in the same manner. He would be greeted with solid high fives and handshakes from his coaches and teammates… from all except one guy. This one guy, from outside of the camera’s frame, would extend his hand out towards the gymnast, anticipating the manly slap of hand-skin signifying approval. But the gymnast, in his victorious moment, would completely miss this other guy’s hand. The cameraman, realizing there was a hand in the way of his shot, would move his camera so that this other guy would now be in the frame, looking more uncomfortable as the seconds tick by, with his arm still extended, just waiting. And just before you cringe and start vomiting because of the awkwardness, the gymnast saves you, finally realizing his mistake and gives the guy his well-warranted hand slap. Just beautiful. DRINK!

I wanted to take this time to talk about someone I haven’t talked about yet: Michael Phelps. At the end of August 13 (US EST), he made Olympic history by winning his 11th gold medal, the most by any Olympian ever. Not to mention that he won his 10th and 11th gold career medals (4th and 5th of these Olympic Games) an hour apart from each other.

Let’s just briefly breakdown his performance in Beijing so far. In less than a week, he has already won 5 gold medals and has shattered the accompanying 5 world records. So far, that counts for 19.231% of the US total medal count (5/26). He seems well on his way to winning gold medals in all of 8 of his events, in an attempt to beat Mark Spitz’s record of 7 golds in Olympic Games back in 1972. Looking at all these facts, I have now conclusively concluded that Michael Phelps is not human, and in fact has reached a level of badass beyond any level to which Jack Bauer or Chuck Norris could even hope to aspire.

First of all, he never seems to get tired. He swims multiple races a day (his routine consists of 166 laps daily, according to NBC), kicks ass, breaks world records, and goes through two medal ceremonies, while most people would be lucky to even attend a medal ceremony in their entire lifetime. I’m pretty sure I breathe heavier than he does at the end of a race, running once up the stairs of my house, and I’m pretty sweet, so I guess that will give you an indication of how sweet Phelps is.

Second, he won the 200m fly yesterday despite the fact his inferior goggles failed him. In an interview after the race, he said that his goggles malfunctioned, and water started pouring in during the race until he could barely see out of them. While I (and again, remember I’m pretty sweet) would have stopped immediately, thrashing in the water and blinded by the burning chlorine, Michael Phelps trudged on and kicked the world record in the face, knocking a few of its teeth out.

So, now that we’ve determinately determined that Michael Phelps isn’t of the human race, here’s how I think he was spawned onto the face of this Earth. When God and the Devil were still young and resolved their disputes over physical acts of prowess (that’s how the Olympics were started, I think), they got into a brutal Old Testament Cagefight (pay per view only, of course). God convincingly won with his mighty fists, but the Devil, being the speedy little rascal he is, cut off a chunk of God’s flesh with his scorching pitchfork. The piece of skin flew over the towering cage, through space, punched holes through a few planets, stayed intact upon entry into our Earth’s atmosphere, and landed into the vast ocean somewhere off the coast of Pangaea. The skin, though, did not sink, as only mortal flesh sinks into the ocean, but was gobbled up by one of those sea creatures that existed before land-roaming animals (see, Michael Phelps is proof that creationism and the theory of evolution can co-exist!). Millions of years went by, and this sea-lizard creature, acquiring invincibility by eating God’s skin, developed legs and crawled onto land. It lived for another few millions of years until a T-Rex started roaming around and hunted these creatures to extinction. God’s flesh, which was still intact as it refused to be digested into the sea-lizard’s system, took control of the sea lizard’s body and made it jump into a T-Rex’s mouth, figuring it was tired of its genetically weak host. This T-Rex then also got immunity and lived for millions of years. During this time, the piece of flesh started developing into a fully formed human fetus that fed on the innards of the dinosaur. It then exploded out, Alien-style, out of its belly, just as a huge meteor was hurtling towards Earth. The fetus flew into space, vaporized the meteor with a swing of its fist, and landed on the Earth. It tried to take a nap but the dinosaurs, doing the Charleston and celebrating their escape from certain extinction, were making far too much noise. So the baby fetus single handedly killed all the dinosaurs, and took a nap.

Once the fetus fell asleep, its blood temperature ran so cold his body started freezing the land around him. This was the first Ice Age. Millions of years passed again… species came and went, and the continents shifted. The location where the fetus was asleep just happened to end up in the Arctic North of Canada, where he was frozen for many years. He woke up, disturbed by the sound of Vikings exploring the area, so he rose from the ice and killed all of them with his left baby finger. He then, with his mighty strength, threw all of the possessions of the Vikings back to Norway from where they came, which the Norwegians accepted gratefully. This was the first Christmas. The fetus then roamed the Arctic North, feeding on baby seals and polar bears. During this time he became a full grown man. He also became a topic of Inuit legend for centuries, and they called him “Yeti,” the Inuit word for “Michael Phelps.”

Michael Phelps on the hunt. Michael Phelps not seen, as he is invisible.

Fast forward a few years. In 1944, with the war going terribly for Nazi Germany, Adolf Hitler started funding numerous projects to defeat the Allied powers. A German special task force was sent to the Arctic North, which the Canadians didn’t stop because they figured nothing valuable was up there. The Nazis, after a grueling journey, found the man, quickly appreciated his superhuman strength, and took him back to Germany. Phelps normally would have devoured anything that came close to him, but this time, he was amused by their funny little uniforms so decided to play along. After flying to Germany (during which he almost killed himself from boredom since he could’ve flown there by himself in 1/8 the time), he was welcomed by German scientists who proceeded to try to learn more about their discovery. Phelps quickly got tired of the Nazis, and decided to break out. At that moment, Indiana Jones, who always seemed to be aware of when the Nazis were trying to get their hands on some new power, busted in to the German complex, defied death, and told Michael Phelps to follow him to safety. Phelps, proclaiming that he needed to be rescued from no one, smashed Indiana Jones’ face into his rock hard abs, breaking every bone in Indiana Jones’ body. He then threw Jones into a pit of snakes, laughed maniacally, and brought the Nazis back to life just to kill all of them one more time by himself.

Finding he was unsatisfied with life, he left Germany to try something he hadn’t tried yet, swimming, but not before having sex with all the women in the country. When he got to the Atlantic, he started swimming to the Eastern coast of America and then back to Europe again, in a swimming marathon similar to Forrest Gump’s epic run. Phelps then used the Cold War to enhance his training. While most people believe that the US and the USSR didn’t break out into all out war because of nuclear deterrence, this is not simply not true. The two superpowers of the time actually fired hundreds of nuclear missiles at each other, but before they could be detected on radar, Phelps dolphin kicked out of the ocean and swallowed the missiles whole to satisfy his hunger, thereby ensuring the continued existence of the human race. While some may perceive the digestion of nuclear materials as equivalent to taking performance enhancing drugs, Phelps’ blood was already radioactive at this point, so it didn’t count. After training in the ocean, Phelps went to the US and declared he was on the Olympic team, to which no one opposed. “The rest, they say, is history.”

This is the true story of the life of Michael Phelps. The US government, however, created their version of the life story of Phelps, in an attempt to inspire its children to become great athletes like him. This is all a lie. The US government is setting the standards too low for American children, when in fact, following Phelps’ footsteps, one could aspire to preventing to the nuclear holocaust while destroying their opponents using just their abs. Imagine how much better off our children would be if they knew Phelps’ real story.

I'm watching you.

One thing I really like about WordPress is that it allows me to keep track of the search terms people use to find my blog. Here is a list, in italics, of some of the more interesting ones I’ve noticed.

“apex bus” any good – The answer is no.

man in front of tanks

gelled hair suit tie

“beefcake”

mother freedom polar bear

lost camera on top of Europe - Lost Korean guy, is that you?

starter flashing jogging shoes at walmart

let me regale you with a tale about how

vancouver airport staff call in sick aug

snowboard knick knacks

urinating or urination or urinate “drunk

The most significant jump of search terms occurred after I started writing about the Olympics, with terms like,

phelps sees funny side as anthem fails

did michael phelps put hand on chest dur

But the most prevalent of search terms involves the Manaudou vs. Pellegrini swim/sex scandal…

french italian swimmer rivalry

federica pellegrini scandal

olympics italian swimmers love triangle

french italian swimmers love triangle

olympic swimmer love triangle photos fre

“french swimmer” rivalry

french & italian woman swimmer rivalry

I find it slightly disturbing that as soon as the NBC spotlight that highlighted the sex scandal and nude photos of Laure Manaudou aired, people jumped to their computers to search for more “information” for themselves. I can imagine finding my blog was probably somewhat of a disappointment…