Five years. My god, has it really been that long?!
It's a hell of a milestone, especially since I haven't blogged much for about two of them. Click here to visit the first ever post for a trip down memory lane! Hey, Feb. 27th was a Wednesday back then, too! Neat.
This is the latest in a long line of "I'll blog more, I swear!" messages, but take this with a grain of salt. But fear not, I WILL be blogging more again real soon.
But going back to those old entries, I've learned plenty this past year:
-Don't make promises you can't keep.
-Don't expect people to keep their promises.
-Having a job that pays a decent salary is awesome!
-Not having a job is not.
-Two days is not enough time to explore New York Comic-Con
-Adam West is completely awesome in person. I knew this already, but I got first-hand confirmation!
-You meet lots of interesting/weird people at places like NYCC
-I need to post my pics of NYCC
-Viral videos like the Harlem Shake have a shorter shelf life than they used to. It's been what, a month, and everyone's already sick of it?!
-I can beat my anxiety problems. One day at a time.
-The following foods are awesome: Ranch dressing, derma, brussels sprouts, edamame.
-I am human. Can't really eat as much as I used to. Maybe it's better that way.
-I need to stop spending money n Teefury.com shirts.
-As long as you blog at a constant schedule, everybody is happy!
And here, have some Five-related pictures to celebrate!
If you aren't aware of my spin-off blog "In 10 Words" (Don't worry. According to current statistics, you probably aren't reading it), the blog that sums things up in exactly ten words, well I've got good news from it.
It has reached 500 Entries. Yes, the magic #500 was reached in a little under two years. Granted, it's a few months behind 1000 Awesome Things, but any blog that goes beyond ten entries is considered a great success.
Well, if you haven't heard by now from the sidebar (or from my excessive attention whoring), Beaming For Bunnies is now on Twitter! The Social Revolution shall commence momentarily, and I'll send for the rest of you later.
You know, watching the trailer for "Paranormal Activity" reminded me of something that seriously grinds my gears:
I fucking hate commercials that show the audience outside the theater and saying how good the movie was. The people, usually girls in large groups, say stuff it was "AWESOME!" or "BEST MOVIE OF THE YEAR!" or even "MADE ME DANCE IN THE STREETS, SAID DICK PATRICK OF THE LA TIMES!"
This isn't limited to movies, either. I live on Long Island, so I see ads for Broadway musicals all the time.
At least Spamalot made fun of this when they did it.
It's giving unnecessary hype to a movie that CLEARLY needs it. Notice how they never do those type of commercials for movies that are actually GOOD. And they're usually kid's movies, too. You'll never see Pixar or GOOD Disney movies use this, it's usually the Country Bears, or some other non-Disney flick like Hoodwinked or the live-action Alvin & The Chipmunks movie. And they'll always, ALWAYS show these ads at least the 2nd or third weekend after their release.
"They're not seeing the movie!" "Let's pay actors to gush on how they don't mind giving generic compliments to the movie! That'll drive attendance!" "Brilliant!"
...The reason why you don't see more videos that describe this phenomenon is that...there aren't really any on Youtube. That, and it's a pretty hard to describe term to search for.
For a movie I DID recently see, Zombieland was pretty awesome. I'm not a fan of zombie/horror movies, so the first five minutes was a little...nausea-inducing and full of nightmare fuel, but I got through it and I'm glad I did. If you're a horror junkie, or just think that The Tar Monster is your favorite movie character ever, this should be no problem for you.
It was pretty much an American version of Shaun of The Dead: Woody Harrellson in place of Simon Pegg, a variation of "the infected" in place of traditional zombies, a "will they/won't they" romance bet, usage of a Hummer, and scenes taking place in Texas and an amusement park in California. There was even a cameo by Bill Murray! (Btw, I apologize, because that's the only thing that amounts to a spoiler to the movie). By the way, I am in no way using that as an insult. It pretty much IS what the US equivalent of "Shaun" would be like.
If I had any negatives about this flick, it would be that they used "the infected" as zombies, and that there was no shout out to SotD with the usage of a cricket bat. The scene in the grocery store has him whack a fat zombie with an aluminum bat was awesome, but it just wasn't the same. An In 10 Words entry can be found here.
I can't believe it's been this long, but Beaming For Bunnies officially turns one year old today!
It's grown so much, I feel like it won't be much longer until it sprouts legs and waddles off into the sunset and have some new adventures that may or may not involve pie.
Let's fire up the Wiki and see what other important things occurred on February 27th:
-Henry IV is crowned King of France. (1594) -Washington, DC is placed under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Congress. (1801) -The Dominican Republic gains independence from Haiti. (1844) -Germany's parliament building in Berlin, the Reichstag, is set on fire. (1933, is rewrapped in plastic 70 years later.) -Lebanon declares Independence. (1945) -The Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution, limiting Presidents to two terms, is ratified. (1951) -People magazine is published for the first time. (1974) -Beaming For Bunnies founded (2008)
For kicks, let's see who has a birthday today:
-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, American poet (1807-1882) -John Steinbeck, American writer (1902-1968) -Elizabeth Taylor (1932-Probably died 11 years ago) -Ralph Nader (1934-Soon) -Neil Shon from Journey (1954-1986 [career]) -Danny Antonucci, creator of Ed, Edd n Eddy (1957-) -Chelsea Clinton (1980)
And on a grimmer note, let's see who died on this day:
-Louis Vuitton, whose name increases the price of a bag by $300 (1892) -Ivan Pavlov, famous for Pavlov's Dog experiment & embedded into the minds of Psychology majors everywhere (1936) -Spike Milligan, famous Irish comedian in the 60's & 70's, worked with some of the Monty Python guys (2002) -Mr. Rogers! What!? No! You died before they discovered that liquid concentrated Kindness led to immortality! (2003)
Despite that gruesome discovery, I think that this year was pretty good for me...for blogging. My actual, non-Internet life? Pretty boring and not fun to live in. Here are some things that I have learned in the past year:
-People love to read about Animation Villains, White Castle, Muppets, and the Letter Q.
-People don't comment when I ask for them.
-People don't enter contests if they don't like the prize being given away.
-I just can't get the chutzpah up to do "Casual" blogging. I don't think that my life is all that interesting to blog about, but many potential entries have died horrible deaths because I never bothered to write down my thoughts. Thankfully, the Curling blog (previous entry) was one of those moments that were spared the mental cutting room floor.
-Blogging for 28 straight days is insane, I have no idea how other bloggers manage to do it.
-It's as easy to lose friends as it is to gain them.
-I've unwillingly made quite a few enemies this year. Say the wrong thing at a College talent show or a blog, and suddenly everyone's out for your blood. Also, never piss off Competitive Eaters. You never know if one of their blogs somehow comes across yours.
-TV Tropes is the best site ever, and as such, it will ruin your life.
-Wordpress is actually a better blogging site than Blogger, but Beaming For Bunnies will stay here until I can get a Wordpress theme to match this one. Also, I have too many blogs, links, pics, and videos on here that will disappear if I attempt to move this thing.
-I need to better prepare myself for things like speeches and presentations, but I just can't do it.
-Speaking of which, it's a possibility that I might actually have ADD.
-Something I learned today: How long does it take for 6 guys to change a flat tire on my car in the SJC parking lot? Half an hour.
-Having your 21st birthday on Easter is not fun.
-Exploring the Natural History Museum in NYC for 5 fossils that correspond to the 5 original Power Rangers' dinosaurs, however, makes for a great day.
-The Iron Sheik is awesome in person.
-Ice cream perfectly chases away the horrible taste of a Mind Eraser. Not only does the drink live up its promise, it also erases several of your taste buds.
-It took the tragic, untimely death of the father of one of my good friends for me to realize that all of this petty arguing, "drama" and fighting in life is totally meaningless. Most of it is one-sided and could pretty easily be solved with communication. Hating for hating sake is simply unnecessary, and life could blink out in an instant. Drama is just. not. worth it.
-I'm unable to start a conversation. At all. I just awkwardly wait around for people to stop talking, I feel like I'm interrupting them. I usually am, and I hate that.
-I have an obsessive personality, and a few relationships have been or have been at risk of being ruined because of it.
-Jon Stewart is really that tiny in person.
-The Onion is in print form!
-Everyone in Chinatown sells the same thing, and no one minds at all if you go back and forth to each shop. I'm convinced that every Chinatown Shopkeeper is the same person, in a Nurse Joy kind of way.
-The reason that I didn't make a Dennis Christmas Special was that I had no ideas for a "plot," and I kept thinking that it wouldn't be as good as the Thanksgiving one.
-Embezzlers are always the people you least expect.
-I keep thinking that people talk about me behind my back. If you have something to say to me...SAY IT.
-Any video player that isn't Youtube is a complete sack of crap. I love the NostalgiaCritic, but the time it takes for his videos to load is approximately three times longer than the actual video itself, even on a good computer.
-This vid:
is simultaneously the dumbest & greatest thing that I've ever seen.
I think I'll go find a cake and carve a Bunny shooting lasers out of its eyes into it to celebrate. Here's to another great year of blogging!
As you may or may not know, I run another blog besides this one. In 10 Words is a small blog that sums things up in exactly 10 words. School House Rock, Rent, Barack Obama, what have you.
Yesterday, it had its most epic day ever. Now, when someone distinguishes something as "Epic," it's usually as an overblown hyperbole. But I think this one is justified.
Sunday's visits: 32 Monday's visits: 7,891
Holy. Crap. It's all thanks to a site called AlphaInventions.com, a site that links thousands of blogs together. These blogs appear instantly on the front screen as soon as they get updated. Somehow, last week, In 10 Words got linked there and got me about 50 hits in two days. Not bad at all from my standards.
But then I noticed something: On the main site itself, there is a collection of blogs that mention the site, at least in their title. So Monday's entry, AlphaInventions.com...In 10 Words was born in hopes that I would get some traffic.
It worked. Possibly too well. It seems that this particular entry was the only one to get views. I'm seeing a few repeat visitors, which is nice.
In a single day, In 10 Words got more visitors than THIS blog did in 11 months. And so, I'm writing this entry as a ploy to get traffic.
If it works, welcome one and all! Stay a while, look at other posts.
One entry in particular to look at: Beaming For Bunnies: The Essentials, a collection of my favorite & popular entries of the first 100 posts on the blog.
It's one week into 2009 and I haven't written a new entry yet?! For shame, myself. For shame.
That's going to change right now.
Usually the start of a new year means Resolutions, goals, and/or predictions for the year to follow. I'm not one to make resolutions, because that would mean that I want to change something about myself. I'm already the World's Most Perfect Blogger™, as a trophy that sits on my computer desk proudly elaborates.
I also usually sum up the year that recently closed, month by month. But 2008 wasn't much of a good year for me, despite a few positives.
The year started without much fanfare, until February came along. A week before Valentine's Day, my girlfriend broke up with me. Via a text message no doubt.
Cue myself being a depressive wreck for the next five or so months. We've since mended our severed ties and become friends again around a month ago (we were friends before "taking it to the next level," if you will), so that's a plus there.
February was also important for two things: During the pledging process in my fraternity, I finally gained a Little Brother to call my own. Each pledge gets their own "Big Brother," their mentor/sponsor/guide for the whole process, and the bond usually sticks around after it's over. It was about time, since for a reason that I don't remember, I didn't get one the year before. But that's all forgotten now. I have my Little Brother and that's that.
Second, I launched this very blog at the end of February! I've amassed well over 100 posts, and I'm aiming for 100 more. Beaming for Bunnies was mostly launched due to my 50 Greatest Animated Villains of All Time list, to give the list a more...legitimate exposure. It has since been my most popular series of entries. If the search entries are true, it's also the most likely reason you found this blog in the first place.
For March, I turned 21 on the 23rd, which was Easter. Yeah, I'm going to skip explaining all the other stuff that happened this month as well. Aside from the fact that I finally procured my Wii, my $250 God-like Fun Machine.
May: Discovered Buffalo Wild Wings, which has become the only Chain restaurant that I actually want to go to on a regular basis. I also added the counter to the right.
We now come to one of my favorite months: June. It was the only month where I actually blogged daily with the "Things That Start With ___" Series. As such, it gave me my highest period of traffic ever. It was also helped by the fact that a Competitive Eating Blog had somehow found my entry for N, which enraged Competitive Eater "Beautiful Brian" Seiken. I didn't know about the CE site until a few months ago. The content within explained why he was so angry at me. Not to mention the reason why I never received the free sample of his CD that he promised to send me.
July & August weren't that eventful, sadly.
September is when I launched my second blog In 10 Words. Updated every weekday! Please go visit.
October: Halloween! I went as The Dude from "The Big Lebowski." I did it because three weeks prior, The Dude himself came to me in a dream and basically said "dress up like me for Halloween." I grew out a beard for the occasion, which I still have. I'm lazy about that whole "shaving" thing, and I'll probably be bored of it in a few months and shave it off.
November: I don't recall any elections going on during November 4th, even ones where someone important, intelligent, history-making, and articulate (for once) got elected. Must have slipped my mind. The next day, I went with a friend to see a taping of that night's Daily Show, which was awesome. I got to see both John Oliver & Jason Jones! Oh, and Jon Stewart is freaking tiny in real life. They also compensate by having the desk be low to the ground, so that helps.
I also posted the "A Very Dennis Thanksgiving Special," which was proved to actually be popular. The things that prevented me from making a Christmas Special were time and a lack of ideas. Yes, the process from thinking it up to actually posting it took five days, but I didn't have many ideas for the Christmas version. I also didn't have much time between school and work to actually work on it. I assure you all that I WILL make "A Very Dennis Christmas Special" a staple of the 2009 Christmas Season.
December: Christmas, whose season went by WAY too fast.
So that's my 2008. I'm fairly optimistic for 2009. In fact, I already accomplished one of my goals for this year: Try the "Blazin" sauce at Buffalo Wild Wings. It's the hottest sauce they've got, and I'll admit to the fact that I'll never try it again. It's not that the sauce was too hot. It was, it was the taste. I'm not a fan of sauces that are hot for heat's sake, and pretty much leave out the flavor. It could possibly be due to the fact that your tongue would have melted out of your mouth before it even bothered to register any other sensation to the taste buds.
I'll leave off with this note: If it burns going in, it'll burn just as much coming back out.
Election Day: The Reckoning is finally here, and I hope everyone voted! Reminder: Elections for Republicans has been moved to Wednesday!
...Ok, that didn't work. NY, as well as a majority of the states have their polls closed already as of typing this (10:40pm). I voted for the man pining for change, instead of the man asking for change with an empty Pepsi can. They all jumped on the change bandwagon if you ask me.
As of 10:40pm, Obama has 207 electoral votes, with McCain having 138. Frankly, Obama's already winning Pennsylvania, New York, and Ohio...McCain's not looking too good right now.
I'm not a McCain hater, I rather respect the man. I'm just too concerned with the people that he's going to be bringing with him.
I hope everyone voted Robot Nixon/Galileo! It's been a grueling month of faux-campaigning, and I'm sure that I'll win the office of Vice President somewhere!
So, let's get busy, and I'll show you some other Election Day-themed entries around my blog circle!
It took me only eight months for Beaming for Bunnies to reach 100 posts. All I know is, I'm halfway there! There are some blogs that haven't come close to 100 posts, or have yet to do so. Screw them, you're reading me, and if you don't like it, you still show up on the view counter!
So, to commemorate this special occasion, I have compiled a list of my most favorite and popular of the first 100 blog entries. For those of you who have discovered this blog in recent months, or have merely forgotten what I wrote about, this should serve as a handy reminder of history in the making.
By far my most popular work, and the main reason that I moved away from Myspace blogging and created Beaming For Bunnies in the first place. I knew that this series had major potential, and that I realized that I wasn't going to be taken seriously on Myspace. I said "screw it" and created the blog that you read now and haven't looked back.
This series was originally going to be completed one year ago. You see, Myspace had a habit of eating my blog entries, so I wrote every entry in Word. Around June, my trial version decided to crap out on me, so I had held off writing this series. When I finally got Word up and running again, I simply had no chutzpah to write it, and left the list to gather dust until February. What was originally planned to be uploaded over a few days turned into eight months, with 3 month waiting periods between the first 3 parts. Now I know how Joss Whedon feels.
People have asked me who was going to be next, that the list was awesome, and when will the next part be written. Well, they're all done, so I've expected the latter question to cease. In truth, the reason why the last few entries have been sporadic was because I wanted to get the energy to finish off the list, and then move on to THIS entry, #100. It wouldn't have been fair to hold a retrospective of the list with the most important part missing, now would it?
Back when the Villains countdown existed as only a mere Part 1, it was this entry that proved to be my most popular. I loved the Muppet Show, and so did you, so it was only natural for me to create a list of the 20 greatest moments of the show. You'll have to click the link to see who made #1, but it's pretty obvious. I've also mentioned in the past that I'm working on a sequel entry, highlighting 6 more great moments from the show. Expect that one...eventually.
My entry where I proclaim my love for White Castle! While I do love this entry, it seems that a good amount of the searches that this blog appears in is for the phrase "Crave Crate," which of course is a package of 100 White Castle burgers. Crave Crate, Crave Crate, Crave Crate.
Speaking of which, it's all thanks to this entry that Beaming For Bunnies gets a few of its views. It was based on the hit blog "Things Younger Than John McCain." It has since been adapted into book form, "72 Things Younger Than John McCain." This in turn has led some confused Googlers to type "72 Things Older Than McCain" and somehow getting this blog as a result. I thank you all for it.
On the topic of Google searches, I created this entry to list random phrases to get this blog into more searches. And then months later I found out how to find search results for this site. Not many of the enclosed phrases has really brought anyone here, but I'm still hoping. Crave Crate.
I am personally a fan of my "Soundtracks For Summer" series. It is a series of entries where I write about songs that define "Summer." Four months, and I only made it to 9 entries. I would write more, but it's not summer anymore. I may have tried back in September back when it was still technically Summer, but I kind of accept its exit right around now. It's October. It's Halloween. It's autumn. The trees are finally turning colors now, I can't possibly write a 200 word entry on "Little Deuce Coupe." No way. Speaking of which, the line at beamingforbunnies@gmail.com is still open for suggestions for future entries.
There's no doubt about it that June was my busiest month of all. Taking a page from a few blogger buddies who did similar entries about things in their lives that began with a certain letter, I set out to join them by writing an entry about the letter "A." After writing that entry, I thought "Hey, I should do an entry on all the other letters!"
Thoughts like that are so much more positive at the beginning. I considered quitting around "H," but my stubbornness prevailed and completed it all the way to Z!
But there are 2 entries in particular that made June my best month ever. The entry for "N" had a spiel about the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest, in which I critiqued the songs styling of one "Beautiful Brian" Seiken, who was a competitor at the Strawberry Shortcake Eating Contest that I saw the day before. I had also made the mistake of providing my non-Gmail email address in the same entry.
Why, you ask? It turns out that two days later he sent me an email saying how I shouldn't, well, act like a blogger. I obliged by freaking out in pure joy that someone of notoriety had found this blog and then adding his homepage on my blogroll. This somehow led to a slew of visitors arriving here on that very same day, making June 19 my Best Day Ever™. Then I never got visitors again, with my sole reader being a sock monkey glued to a mousepad.
"Beautiful Brian" never did tell me how he found this in the first place. Oh, and if you're still reading this, Brian: I'm still waiting for that CD.
This entry was a favorite of mine, but it sadly didn't catch on. I decided that we should protest nothing. Sometimes life is boring and we must demand something to happen!
These are the first of my "story blogs" that involve a little character named Dennis. I've been meaning to write a fun little storyline concerning a depressed Bob-Omb and his as-of-now-unintroduced menagerie of buddies with a "Douglas Adams/Pushing Daisies" style of narration. Like everyone in college, they're being written to provide inspiration for my novel...which is not written yet.
The second part to "Dennis & The iPhone Train Blues" has been on the backburner since August, but it'll get written eventually. I said that about the Villain Countdown too, but I managed to get that done.
Due to the timeliness of the Beijing Olympics, I decided to look back at the lame Olympic Mascots of years past. It seems that I missed one:
Magique from the 1992 Albertville Winter Games. I can't believe that I forgot to include this guy the first time around. He's definitely the wussiest mascot ever. For one, he's French. Also, he's a Man-Star-Snowflake Thing wearing a Fez. None of that speaks "Global Unity" for me. He kind of reminds me of Maggie Simpson's star-shaped winter onesie. I wish we all wore Fezzes, though.
This is another favorite of mine. Combine Frank Caliendo's John Madden character with a ramble about a movie about Brett Favre. All thanks to my co-worker Tim for his love of frank Calidendo, and for Newsday for giving us Brett Favre's picture for inspiration.
With the Election next week, I suppose it's time to revisit my entry where I compared various political figures in the '08 Election to their Muppet counterparts.
Summing up the musical Rent in 10 words stemmed from a conversation I had with a few friends roughly two years ago. Somehow the topic of Rent came up and I offered my summation: "I have AIDS! I have AIDS, too! Yay! The End."
A few months ago I realized that this little summary was exactly ten words long. This led me to launch my spinoff blog "In 10 Words." Go read now!
On the topic of election, you might have known that I'm running for Vice President. It doesn't matter what I'm elected Vice President of, I just want to be Vice President. I'm of course, technically competing with dohopoki, who is running his "Vice Presidential Exchange Program," which is an entirely different campaign than mine. He wants to be Vice President of the United States. I simply want to be Vice President.
Despite this, he had the nerve to run a smear ad against me:
Ha! The last part of the Villains Countdown is up now! Your mudslinging has all been dried up! And before you make your vote this November 4th, just look at our competing Facebook groups: Mine currently has 41 members, while dohopoki's has only 9. And here I thought I was going to need that 30 minutes of airtime to preempt Obama's 30-minute ad.
By the way, this seems as good a time as any to announce my running mate for the top of the ticket:
So vote Robot Nixon/Galileo in '08! "Because: Why Not?"
So that's like...41 out of 100 entries that were really that awesome. What were YOUR favorite entries of mine so far?
Let's hope the next 100 entries are just as awesome!
Hey, Y'all, I got an important announcement to make.
No, I'm not Iron Man, but it's just as awesome. I'm launching a new blog!
That "Rent In 10 Words" entry inspired me to think up other things that can be summed up in 10 words. Hence, In 10 Words! And it has Wordpress goodness! I will say, Wordpress is much more awesome than Blogger in every way.
It's gonna be updated weekdays only, takin' off on the weekends. Don't worry, I've already got 3 1/2 weeks of posts all ready to go, so you'll be satisfied for a while.
And that doesn't mean I'll stop updating here. Hell no. To keep your interests piqued, the next two posts are confirmed to be Parts 4 & 5 of my "50 Greatest Animated Villains of All Time" list. Yes, you heard me right, both will be up roughly around the same time. It's gonna be awesome.
So, until then, check out In 10 Words. Update all your blogrolls and links, and tell everyone you know! It's gonna be huge I tell you! HUUUUUUUUUGGGEEEE!
