Doctor Why Bother?

Next time you find someone bothering you, tell them to “Make like the moon of Poosh, and get lost.” If that's the funniest thing you've ever read, please read on. If not, fire up your NetFlix device of choice, and free up your schedule, because it is of paramount importance that everyone get that joke. That is my life's work right there, my magnum opus. You won't be disappointed.

I am about to talk about Doctor Who. That was the explanation that you were probably hoping for, if the title that I stole from a "Big Bang Theory" joke didn't tip you off. If you haven't watched Doctor Who, you totally should, it's really good, ect. Ect. There's no need to pretend that anyone's doing anything at my suggestion, so we'll just skip that part (Though, seriously, if you do watch it, you should watch the episode “Blink” first. Season 3).

For those of you who are unfamiliar, Doctor Who is the longest running show ever. In actuality, that's a lie, but it's 50 years old, this year. Some of the more clever of you may have noticed that no one was alive back then. Regardless, Doctor Who managed to spring into existence on the BBC as an educational show, or something. Like Sesame Street, but with less realistic special effects. In it, a crotchety old alien called “The Doctor” (Or “Doctor Who”, if you feel like getting mauled by ravenous fanboys) traveled through time and space, teaching kids about history and science, respectively (Because we all know that science doesn't happen on Earth). If you think it sounds lame just because it's for technically a children's show, just know that it's considerably more mature than most children's shows stateside. If nothing else, I can assure you that there is noticeably more implicit prostitution. The Doctor travels throughout time and space in his TARDIS, which stands for Time And Relative Dimension(s) In Space. There's a pretty big debate about the inclusion of that parenthetical “s”, one that I have no desire to get into. The TARDIS is a hyper-advanced piece of Time Lord technology that can teleport to any point in time and space, is “bigger on the inside”, has a chameleon circuit that allows it to take on any disguise, and enjoys biting, because it's like kissing, but there's a winner. However, because the show was conceived before the concept of a budget was invented, and props cost money, the chameleon circuit broke in the first episode, forcing it to take the now famous form of a blue police telephone box.

The secret to the show's longevity is the fact that it's designed to last forever. With only one recurring character, an infinite universe of time and space to explore, and no plot to speak of, the only limitation on the show is its writers' collective ability to fabricate psuedo-scientific jargon. As a special bonus, that one character (The titular Doctor, in case you were wondering) has an in-universe excuse for changing faces, meaning he can be played as many actors as there are quirky British gentlemen willing to play him. But, if there's no plot, then what's the appeal of the show, you might ask (I feel like there should be a question mark somewhere around here, but I'm not sure where). Well, to as a response to your maybe-question I say: “... It's good?” Because I'm evidently really terrible at question marks.

As you may have noticed if you've read this far, I don't really have anything to say about Doctor Who. Reading this is basically like reading a Wikipedia article on Doctor Who, and about as fun, I'd imagine. The reason I'm trying to talk about Doctor Who, despite having nothing to say, is because I'm terrible at blogging. But the more superficial reason is the mid-series premiere (Apparently the British think that's an actual thing) of the 7^th season of Doctor Who (I trust you know what I mean when I say 7^th) is airing tonight, an episode that I will be watching tragically alone, as my brother has decided that hanging out with girls is cooler. (Note to brother and girl in question: Everything I say is a joke. Please don't take anything I say seriously. Actually, that sounds kind of sad, so please don't take that seriously. In fact, please recursively disregard everything I say, from here on out, including this, I guess. Thank you for your cooperation.) Despite my lack of faith in this season so far, I can't help but be excited for new Doctor Who, because if the series is on its deathbed, then I believe it can just up and regenerate into a newer, cooler, David Tennant-er show, because that's how television ought to work. Since Doctor Who is scheduled to go on forever, the Law of Large Numbers suggests that it will eventually be good again. Sticking around until then is just a matter of persistence, and if there's anything that the jury admired me for, it was my persistence (This description of my crime was intentionally left vague.)

Did you see what I did there? This was what I was doing there.

Limiting my ability to talk about Doctor Who is the potential propagation of spoilers, as well as my confusing use of the passive voice. During the eras of previous Doctors David Tennant and “Who cares, he isn't David Tennant”, spoilers wouldn't have really been considered a big deal, because of the whole “no plot” thing discussed earlier. Each episode or two was its own self-contained story about some monster of the week, occasionally hinting at the big confrontation to come in the season finale. This is somewhat different with the 11^th Doctor, Matt Smith, who's had something of an over-arching storyline for his whole tenure as Doctor. I can't really say much of it, but I feel confident in saying that “Silence will fall”, because it's said in his first episode. The particulars of when Silence will fall, where it will fall, and on whom it will fall, while known by me, (I think?) will not be posted here, because... well, I'll just let you hear it straight from the expert:

I actually couldn't find a picture of River looking like she was saying "Spoilers". So gun instead

On the subject of River... well, I can't really say who she it, or what she does without incredible spoilers. And while science says that people actually enjoy stories more if they're spoiled, that's not a risk I'm willing to take, because you can always rewatch a show after it's been spoiled, but you can never unwatch a show that's been spoiled. I'd like to give a humorous example of some TV show that I'd like to unwatch, but I really don't TV, so my hands are tied. If you want to learn more of River, watch the Season 4 episode “Silence in the Library” (No relation to aforementioned Silence), and prepare to have your mind blown. There's also good music in that episode. Man, what a good show...

Anyway, I think my standards are low enough that this will suffice as a blog post. Did you know that “sufficient” and “suffice” almost certainly came from the same root? I'm not entirely sure if I did before autocomplete suggested it to me just now. Isn't life funny sometimes? In fact, I think our every day lives might just be a series of small miracles. No... perhaps they must be.

"Delicious!"

Haha! Oh, man. I'm sure no one got that, but trust me. That was a hilarious thing I just did.  

Martyrdom

I am hoping that this will be a short post. Like, REALLY hoping. As hard as I can. I am hoping so much, Obama just called me up and expressed concern that I might be overdoing it. I am having trouble falling asleep. I guess this means that my attempts to outwit my body were soundly crushed. But all is not lost. At least I can use this time to give you guys a few laughs at my expense. Amn't I just the best ever?

Usually, when I have trouble falling asleep, I blame it on my brother staying up all night talking to his friends, like some kind of big hotshot cool-guy-with-friends. However, my brother is not here tonight, for reasons I am unable to divulge. I can say for certain that he ISN'T killing drifters, if that's what you were assuming. But sleep eludes me still, so it seems that there is no one to blame but myself. Except... except Obama! That's right! I forgot the first rule of whatever the hell, I'm making this up anyway: You can always blame the president. That's what our great nation was founded on.

Double-fun: I have work tomorrow morning, and I have to get up at the inhumane hour of 6:10. IN THE MORNING. As of this typing, it's midnight where I am. It doesn't take a math major to realize that I also used this joke in the last post. Actually, beginning writing this was probably the worst thing I possibly could have done (Besides telling everyone in the world that my kin is commiting felonies). Now, I'll just stay up out of a sense of duty to this blog, rather than get the sleep that I so desperately need. The funny thing is that I've been stupidly tired all day, but now I can't fall asleep now that I need to. As long as we all agree that "funny" now means "worse than getting flinched by an Excadrill Rock Slide". But I'm just kidding. Nothing is worse than Excadrill Rock Slide flinch.

That's a real purty mouth you've got there

You know what's kind of strange? Wookiepedia, the Star Wars Wiki (As well as runner-up in the "Absolute Worst/Best pun ever competition) has more than 100,000 pages. Now, Star Wars has a ridiculously detailed mythology. Especially if you count the Expanded Universe. By the way, if you do that, I hope you get flinched by every Excadrill you face. But still, that's way too many. How do they have that many? The answer is that they have pages for things that aren't even Star Wars. Like Limbs. I'm don't mean to take away from the importance of limbs in Star Wars, or even in life in general. They really get me through when times are tough. But they're so universal that I'm not really sure why they need an article on a Star Wars wiki. Same goes for Minutes. I'm sure that it's just as important to keep track of time long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, but I think we all know that there are 60 seconds in a minute. Maybe if there were a fictional unit of time, like a rel, it would be worth an article, but this is just ridiculous. Same goes for pages about Trees, Eyes, Photons, and Soul Calibur. I don't know which is more stupid: The fact that that's something that actually happened, or me, for not realizing until now that "Calibur" is misspelled. I think it's also kind of adorable how all the articles use past tense, because it takes place "A long time ago".

Red Squiggles don't lie.

If you're wanting some kind of reason for why I bring this up, prepare to be disappointed. Not because I won't tell you; you'll wish you were so lucky. No, the reason is far sadder than anyone's imagining. My usual DM (Dungeon Master, which is not common knowledge among those with girlfriends it would seem) has set his sights on a Star Wars campaign. I doubt he'll ever read this, so I'll take the opportunity to confess that I have absolutely no faith in him. Yet I'm a sucker for creating characters, so I've been browsing Wookiepedia for details to flesh out my justice-hungry bounty hunter with a grudge against the Jedi Order. You know what they say: The fun is in not knowing.

Also, I'd like to point out that I'm not writing this because I, like, LIKE you or anything. I just don't have anything else to do, and I bet you guys are so pathetic that you don't have anything else to do with your time! I mean seriously, who even reads this stuff? Baka! B-but... I mean... it's not like I mind writing for you. If it's not too much of an inconvenience for you, I guess it's cool.

TSUNDAY TSUNDAY TSUNDAY! AT THE TSUNDERDOME!!

Apologies to the non-weeaboos out there. I feel like I may have done a tsundere bit before, but I don't really have the time to go back through my archives and check. I am just now realizing just how arbitrary and ridiculous a word "weeaboo" is. Heh. Weeaboo. Say it out loud. I promise, you won't regret it. Wii-uh-boo. Good stuff. I basically just wrote this because I thought the "Obama" bit at the beginning was funny, so I'm not sure how to end this. I guess I could apologize to him for telling my dog to "kill the president" in whispered tones on many occasions. I realize that saying such a thing is maybe illegal, at least if internet sketch comedy is to be believed, but I assure the secret service that it was all in jest. If my dog actually did kill you, Mr. Obama, I would be horrified. OK, I admit, at first I would think it kind of cool. I mean, a dog that's an assassin? That is owned by me? That is objectively, unarguably cool, Mr. President. But once I realized that I would probably go to jail, I'd change my mind so quickly it'd be undifferentiable. Since calculus humor is always the best note to end anything on, (Try it next time you're eulogizing!) I'll fare thee well. For now.

Creep Deprivation

A wise man once said that the easiest way to fix something is to break it so hard that it becomes fixed again. Actually, I believe it was said by a most curious man made entirely of grass clippings, who rode through my house on a glitterific unicycle not to long ago. He seemed pretty wise to me, so I've decided to follow his advice. Results so far have been inconclusive, as the police managed to wrestle me away from the drifter that I was trying to pound back to life before my research bore any fruit. Wait, is "I killed a drifter" humor in line with this blog's sensibilities? I have a feeling that corpse mutilations is one of those things that wouldn't make the cut if my mentally faculties were fully intact. Then again, I'd hope that a full intactness of my mental faculties would prevent me from wasting my time in the first place, but whatever.

Anyway, the thing that I'm trying to fix through egregious breaking is my sleep schedule. As hinted at in my previous post, I'm currently engaging in spring break. But through some cruel joke of fate, spring break doesn't last forever. My sleep schedule was immediately and ruthlessly screwed on my very first day of spring break, and it certainly hasn't gotten any better since. I've been going to bed at hours around 5 AM for most of break, and I'm going to have to start waking up at around 8 AM for college. It doesn't take a math major to tell that this is a recipe for bad times (though a culinary arts degree might help). So, in order to outwit my body, I've decided that, instead of falling asleep tonight, I'll just stay up all night, then fall asleep at a reasonable hour the next day. Now that's what I call strategy!

Clearly, trying to be productive during this time would be a fool's errand. I can hardly be productive when I'm firing on all cylinders, (This is just a metaphor. It's not like I actually have cylinders  like I'm some kind of engine, because that would mean I'm a robot, and we all know that's impossible and ridiculous and you should be ashamed for thinking that) so trying to get anything done when I'm mega-tired is laughable at best, and also laughable at worst, because laughable is really the only adjective up to the task of describing this. So, instead, I'm doing this. You know how everything you say is super-hilarious at 5:00 AM? That must mean that it's the perfect time to write for the internet, because we all know that it's because of an increase in quality, rather than a decrease in standards that causes this phenomenon.

So now I have get to the most difficult part of the post: thinking of something to write about. I've already explained my situation, and my content manager is reasonable enough to be asleep right now. There is literally nothing more that I can say about Virtue's Last Reward that isn't a spoiler. I've talked way too goddamned much about Fire Emblem. There's nothing interesting to say about my intricately arranged collection of buzzard scalps. It seems I am at an impasse

Well, my content manager recently convinced me to write a "stream of consciousness"  piece, where I basically just typed out whatever I found in my head. The problem with this is that I can type far faster than I can think, so the process kind of ground to a halt. I deleted it, but I can't say it was too funny, so you're not missing much.

And now here I am, at 5:00 PM, and I'm hardly tired at all. Why, I could probably go days without sleeping! You heard it here first, folks: sleep is just a trick by the government, trying to steal your free time. Every time you fall asleep, President Obama gets a dollar richer, and he uses that dollar to buy the dreams of orphans, which he then messily devours as his nourishment. In fact, I'd say that this lack of sleep is enhancing my reasoning capabilities. There is absolutely no way that I'd be able to pierce this shadowy conspiracy after a morning of being tired and cranky. In fact, I think I'm going to take this opportunity to solve all the world's problems. Buckle up, because it's about to get genius in here.

First of all: A cure for cancer. Easy enough. Criminalize all sexual activity from September 22 to October 22. This will be enforced by highly skilled "sex police". I doubt that I need to further expound on what they do. Any outliers can be handled by a special offspring task force. Kind of like Fahrenheit 451, but with live human infants instead of books. That's kind of messed up.

Or, we could just tell them that The Moon isn't  even a planet.

The energy crisis. Well, if there's anything I've learned from my physics class, it's that to deal maximum damage to your professor's head, you're going to want to throw a large object, buy you're also going to want it to have high velocity, to maximize kinetic energy. But the second most important thing is that everything is relative. Sure, you may be stationary with respect the ground, which means that you have zero kinetic energy. But you could be moving at about 30,000 m/s with respect to the sun. So, if you have a mass of, say, 72 kg, you would have a kinetic energy of about 3*10^10 J, which is about 10 times more than the energy consumption of the average clothes dryer in a single year. Doesn't that make you feel better about energy? You're like 10 clothes dryers hurtling through space!

I can't get a girl. Wait, what? Who let that in the list of problems? One, that isn't even a problem. Logicians the world over have derived many proofs for the statement that if one is of the female sex, that individual may be assumed to be psychologically impaired, a result often shortened to "Bitches be crazy". Two, I very definitely could, but I know of good reasons not to, so I don't. Tired me is a deceptive asshole. Don't listen to him.

Pic Unrelated

Global Warming! That's a big one. We could go with the tried-and-true Futurama method of dumping ice cubes into the water every year, but cubes are a choleric shape by nature, so their affinity for fire may reverse any good that they could potentially do. What this requires is some design thinking. Using metaphors. Let's say for a moment that the earth is like a bowl of soup, despite the fact that that's a simile, and I specifically called for a metaphor. The oceans are the soup, and the continents are the... edges of the bowl? The crackers that you crumble in? The third, funny thing that might be found in soup, thus completing this joke? Perhaps. And what do you do with soup when it's too hot? You blow on it! And why do you blow? Peer pressure! Because it never actually helps, but we all do it anyway, because we saw grown-ups do it when we were young.  Now, skirting right by the crude joke I just made, we can apply this to the earth by making... like... a giant machine that blows? Like a vacuum in reverse. Or one of those Dyson fans that doesn't chop the air, but rather propels a pleasant breeze by the will of the Heart of the Zephyr. That would be a pretty convenient truth, amirite?

Education. Honestly, I have too many actual ideas about education to come up with a suitably ridiculous one. And since I sincerely doubt that many school board members will end up reading this, there's not much reason to include actual ideas. So I guess I'll just have to think something up. Sledgehammer olympics. I'm not quite sure what that means, but I like the sound of it, and I'm sure your elementary school children will think the same, up until they begin participating.

Music. As we all know, music hit its peak when you, the reader, were a teenager. So how do we get back to the good ol' days of music? Just look for music that matches your tastes on Spotify or whatever. It's as simple as that. There is too damn much music out there for you to say that none of it is good. Just because you can't find something doesn't mean that it isn't there. The cops can pretend that the corpse of that drifter isn't out there somewhere out there, but they know, and I know that it is. In this metaphor, the corpse is the music, you're the police, and... the artist is me I mean the murderer. I dunno man, I'm just trying to get some running gags going, because my gags have been rather sluggish of late.

Wow, there sure are a lot of unrelated pics in this article.

Crime, war, ect. How about everyone stops being terrible? Like, for even just a couple days, every human being makes a conscious effort to not be awful to his fellow man. I'd say that I'm more familiar that most with just how terrible the dark side of humanity is, and it's not just because I'm an egotistical jackass. It's also because I literally cannot differentiate between real people and fictional characters. But anyway, consider this a decree, a mandate from on high. I hereby order the human race to just stop being despicable. Did you know that every person you meet, every person you see, every person you hear about, is a fully realized individual, with hopes and dreams, and secrets, and fears, just like you? You know how it sucks when someone is mean to you? Well that exact same thing happens to other people when you're mean to them, regardless of your justification. As the great Raymond Smuckels said "No one should be a cock to a stranger, ever." In fact, I believe this courtesy should be extended to those you know. Is that so terrible?

Oh. Oh dear. It seems that, in my state of fatigue, I've forgotten the first, most important rule of blogging: Give the people what they came for. And preachiness is not what my readers come here for. So I apologize. Without further ado...

THE BEST TIME TO WEAR A STRIPED SWEATER
IS ALL THE TIME
ONE WITH A COLLAR
TURTLENECK
THAT'S THE KIND
BECAUSE WHEN YOU'RE WEARING
That... special... striped... sweater...

There's no need for me to type anything. You're singing it in your head already.

Hooke's Break

Ah, Spring. The season of Easter, Spring cleaning, and... Pilgrims? Mayflowers? You guys get what I'm getting at, I'm sure. And, now that I think about it, spring cleaning may be a reasonable explanation for why I woke up this morning to find my room a bit tidier than I was when I stumbled asleep last night (That's how synonyms work, right?) So I offer a traditional sacrifice to the godliness gremlins, that I may continue to live under their watchful protection. Amen.

I am sure that by now you have surmised two facts from my title: I am currently experiencing spring break, and I am still every bit as clever as I was in my golden days. And, from the way I used "surmised", you may be able to infer that I really don't know what that word means. It's called "reading between the lines, folks".

Only the finest middle-school humor for you, my dear readers

And, now that I've the free time to do... this, I figured I might as well, since I've little else to do. Unfortunately, it seems that the inspiration gnomes did not visit jointly with the godliness gremlins; I have no idea what to write about. But that never stopped me before, so I guess I'mma do this up. And  I guess I'll just do what I always do when I don't know what to do on this blog, which is let my friend (Who is now officially given the position of "Content Manager") tell me what to write about. And, because she has absolutely no consideration for my image in the eyes of my readers, (Although I can't much say that I do either, since I willingly admitted to reading glorified handicapped porn.) I guess I'm going to talk about 5 Centimeters per Second.

Unlike my devastatingly clever title up there, 5 cm/s is not really a physics reference. Yes, it is a measure of velocity, but there's little physics-based about the work itself. The title is derived from the supposed terminal velocity of a falling cherry blossom petal, which should make it crystal clear to you that this is an anime that I've tricked you into reading about for at least a few sentences. I'd prefer not to talk about weaboo things here, but desperate times call for desperate measures. I loathe spoilers, but I feel that it would be cruel of me to not at least administer the following warning: This anime is tragic. If you know me in real life, (and let's be honest, there aren't people just popping in from the aether to check up on some scrub's blog) then you know that I'm not much one for feelings. You'd be forgiven for thinking I didn't even have them. But goddamned if there weren't proto-tears in my eyes, even as I watched in the middle of the Physics room, surrounded by people who would not hesitate at the opportunity to make fun of me if they knew I cared about something.

As for what it's actually about... I guess I could link to the trailer, but that honestly doesn't tell much, except that the animation is really good. Like, I don't know nuthin' 'bout nuthin', but I can tell you for damn sure that that animation is top-tier, especially considering that it's from 2007.

Have you ever seen such a beautiful hallway? Don't you lie to me.

But I didn't come to gush about visuals, or even the music. In fact, I'm not entirely sure why I came here. If you could tell me, it'd be pretty neat. Also, since I'm entirely sure that you watched that trailer, I'll now reference something said in it. It says "At what speed must I live to be able to see you again?" I don't want to spoil a major plot point, but if they just dropped the petals in a vacuum  they could accelerate their lives at 9.8 m/s/s, and then they'd be getting shit done. If by some terrible accident anyone out there actually does watch this on my suggestion, (it's about an hour long, subs over dubs 4lyfe) tell me if you found it similar to "The Great Gatsby". I need to know whether I'm an insightful literary critic, or a just a raving lunatic, and I'm not insightful enough to just look in a mirror and let the torn flesh of my enemies, adorning my face, tell me the answer. But, as always, I am just kidding with you. I got rid of all the mirrors in my house ages ago.

And now that I've said all I care to say about that, it's time to shamelessly plug the next thing on the list. And that would be Bo Burnham. Jesus Christ. If you like everything about this blog, except its inoffensiveness, you should check him out. By his own description, he is "Creative and offensive, like handicapped porn", which I am allowed to say, because there is legal precedent. He is like the evolved form of me, except a twice-evolved form. Like, he's the Charizard to my Charmander, or the archsage to my mage (Because people played Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn, right?). At this point I'd like to take great offense to the fact that spell-check does not recognize "mage" as a word. Honestly, you should check him out whether or not you like my blog, because there's not much similarity between us, except that we both do math, poetry, and be funny. Except he does them all so much harder than I do. But because I'm incapable of suggesting things that don't require warnings, I'll say this: He takes pride in being offensive, and all of his songs are sufficiently edgy that I'm not terribly comfortable linking them. Oh yeah, I forgot: He's a musical comedian, and he does music, and a lot of it is actually pretty great. A lot of it could reasonably be considered "rap", and while that used to be something I'd be ashamed to admit, between him, Mr. B the gentleman rhymer, and Professor Elemental, (whom I may have to preach about some day) I'd say rap is now a good thing again. I'm sure you're all so relieved.

While I'm not comfortable with any of his entire songs (Which can be found on Spotify, if'n you're interested), I can quote specific lines, because that's a hell of a lot easier than trying to make my own funny things. For example, in his song "New Math", he says "What's the opposite of ln(x)? Duraflame, the unnatural log". I assure you, this is quite funny. In another poem/rap, he's talking about Shakespeare, and he says "[Shakespeare] had puns and quips and tons of trips of suns with ships and nuns with hips and buns and lips. But I had something he never had... Penicillin." He then goes on to say that back then they only had "quillicilin", which is great. All these things, and some much funnier ones that I'm too timid to mention, await you. If I had to recommend some songs in particular, it would probably be "Bo Fo' Sho'" and "Oh Bo". Oh yeah, also, he says "Fractions speak louder than words." If you don't think that one of the best puns you've ever, then you're either a terrible person, or you have a cache of unimaginably great puns that you need to share with me.

Well, I think that's about all I've got for today. I don't want this post to get your hopes up. I tactfully avoided mentioning the fact that this is the first post in a couple of weeks, but there's no need to beat around the bush. This in no way guarantees that I'll start being more active over the break, and I almost certainly will lapse back into hiatus one school starts up again. But really, I have no idea what's going to happen, so you should check back every day, just to make sure. It all depends on the whims of my content manager.