Thoughts On... The Nuances of Morality

This past weekend I was given the opportunity to try a new activity. One that, when I first heard about it, I thought went against my established principles and morals. Granted, I wanted to do it, after all, trying something new is always interesting, but something in my head put the brakes on, and I was locked in indecision.

And that was the key thing. Normally, when I find that something goes against what I believe, I just refuse and drop the matter. But something kept pushing me to reexamine the situation. It was like I knew I would be making a mistake by refusing. And it turned out I was right. In re-thinking the issue, it turns out that I was refusing because the opportunity was being provided by someone who wasn't acting according to what I thought should be done. And once I figured that out... everything changed.

The single biggest rule in my personal code of conduct is that my rules apply to ME. I can't expect the rest of the world to live by MY rules. Who am I to tell everyone else what to do? God? Hitler? The Republicans? No. Just because someone is acting by what they believe is right instead of what I believe is right doesn't make their actions wrong. I don't eat snails or frog's legs, but I don't say that the French are wrong to enjoy that. In re-examining the situation from that perspective, my whole outlook on the matter changed and I think it became much more accurate.

However, in looking back, I'm surprised how subtle the influence of my principles are. It was a gentle pressure to guide my "kneejerk reaction" to land against something that turned out to be greatly to my benefit. I think that in the future, I will be much more vigilant in how I apply my philosophy to the world around me.

Diet Update X2

As you may have noticed, I skipped my diet update last week. There wasn't any real reason for it, I just forgot. Hey, I'm human, I'm entitled to some forgetfulness every once in awhile, right? I still went to my diet class, I'm still on the diet. Nothing's changed... Well, that's not exactly true, but we'll get to that a bit later. Because I forgot, today you're getting a DOUBLE DOSE of diet magic!! Here are the numbers for last week's meeting (8/9):

Previous Weight: 486lbs
Current weight: 482.2lbs
Weight Delta: -3.8lbs

Now that was a bump up in the right direction! Unfortunately, I broke my diet again this past weekend. I had some Chinese food on Sunday and then some bar snacks on Mon. I don't really have an excuse except to say that I did it of my own free will, and I accept the consequences of my actions. Those consequences are below:

Previous Weight: 482.2lbs
Current Weight: 480.8lbs
Weight Delta: -1.4lbs

I checked with the diet people and today I've closed out my 4th week on this diet. I've looked back on my progress and my biggest issue is exercise. I've upped my physical activity a great deal this past month, but I need to really step it up. My calories burned need to jump drastically. So, by the end of this week, I will have joined a gym and started working out on a daily basis. And this will be IN ADDITION to my lunchtime walks! I'll just have to see which gym I can afford.Now, one month is a good milestone, right? So lets look back and see how I'm doing by the numbers.

Career High Weight (just before the hospital stay): 506lbs
Current Weight: 480.8lbs
Weight Delta: 25.2 lbs <===== Can you BELIEVE THAT!!! In just over FOUR WEEKS!! Right??

I mentioned earlier that something's changed. It's always been my belief that I wasn't going to be able to afford this diet. And at some point, I was going to be unable to continue because of the financial burden. Well, the first domino in that direction has fallen. In looking back on the past month, the higher ups in this program have identified that I'm struggling with the fees of the program. So they've moved me out of the medically supervised level of the diet. This by necessity means I'm now in the track that allows fruits & vegetables as part of my diet. This is the big change I was talking about earlier.

I'm hoping that this will help me save some money (since I don't have to pay for the doc visits any more) and make my life on this diet easier. We'll see how that plays out.

A Chill Falls Over Gotham....

There's two months left and my anticipation builds with each passing day. So far, every thing I've heard & seen for Arkham City makes the game look even more awesome. Yesterday, they jumped to a new level of awesomeness!!!! They revealed a new boss and he looks off the HOOK!!! To modify a phrase from a tv show I'm watching:




THE FREEZE IS COMING!!!


Now, I have to admit, when I first read Mr. Freeze in the comics, I wasn't too impressed. He just seemed like a blank slate villain of the week to me. But when the people creating Batman: The Animated Series re-wrote him, he became much more fascinating. They maintained the hard-nosed aloofness of the comics version, while simultaneously adding a layer of tragic sadness & misery to him that made me empathize with Victor Fries's plight. These same people are working on the Arkham City game and they are carrying on with Dr. Fries's story in excellent fashion. Check out the trailer:







Wasn't that amazing? And I noticed a few things. One (and this is really awesome) they managed to get Michael Ansara (the voice actor who played Freeze in Batman:TAS and Batman Beyond) to reprise the role!!!!* Second, in terms of game mechanics, it looks like the boss fights in B:AC are going to be more customized to the style of the villains you're facing, which is amazing considering that the repetitive nature of the boss fights in B:AA was one of my pet peeves with the game. October 18th can not come fast enough!! What are YOUR thoughts on Mr. Freeze?

*NOTE: Turns out I was wrong on the actor playing Mr. Freeze. It's actually Maurice LaMarche.Another great veteran voice actor. 

A Young Cimmerian ...

Below, I have a video that I found of the first scene of the new Conan movie. It shows a young Conan eager to fight with the Warriors. There's nothing really spoilerish about it, and there's a trailer afterwards.

Check out the quality of the fighting and cinematography here...





After watching this scene, I'm feeling a GREAT DEAL better about this version of Conan The Barbarian. The trailer afterwards is pretty good too. Let me know what you think in the comments!

Top Ten Book Movies....

So, there I was taking a 5 min mental health break at work and I decided to cruise some of the blogs my friends like reading and I came across the blog of a new author, Jennifer Hillier, who had a post about her top ten favorite movies based off novels and the idea caught fire in my mind! Come on, I'm a movie buff and I read a lot. Are you seriously surprised that I'm enthusiastic about this idea!!

But, being a movie buff, I can't just spit out a bunch of movie titles. After all, there are so many great (and not so great) movie versions of books. But the rules here are very simple: I can only include movies based on novels I've ACTUALLY READ. So, a great movie like, Shawshank Redemption, is out because I never read the story it was based on. Let's see if I can actually make it to ten!

10) Harry Potter & the Sorcerer's Stone by JK Rowling - While I did have some problems with the pacing of the film (it came across like a series of vignettes and not a school year in the life of Harry Potter), the movie managed to capture that sense of awe & wonder that is part & parcel of being a child and that the books had in spades. For me, it's what made the books so enjoyable to read.

09) Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy by Douglas Adams - Reading this series of books is taking a trip into a sci-fi wonderland built on complete and utter nonsense. A feat that I thought would be impossible to bring to live-action film. This movie proved me wrong. Now, I grant you the dry British style humor didn't really carry over to American audiences, but I still LOVED the movie.

08) Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton - In every book-to-movie translation, there are ideas that have to be dropped for many reasons. Watching the movie, I was amazed at how the filmmakers managed to retain so much of the core philosophy of the book with just a fossil (get it?) of the story line. And despite the media hype over the special effects of the movie, I was very relieved that the story had just as much importance as getting the dinosaurs as photo-realistic as possible.

07) LOTR: Fellowship of The Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien - Unlike the other two movies which mostly descended into a pattern of walking, fearfully waiting for major battle, inspired speech to dispel fear, major battle, and repeat, the first movie did exactly what the first book did: Make you fall in love with the Hobbits and their way of life. Pulling you into their world through kindness and affection and then gripping you with fear as that world is threatened. It was awesome!!!

06) The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown - This movie was basically a carbon copy of the book. Since the book was so awesome, the movie was therefore just as awesome. There's nothing like a good religious conspiracy to get the blood pumping!!!

 05) Noble House by James Clavell - This is probably the longest book I've ever read without it being assigned in some class. The incredible depth of detail that Clavell poured into that book was masterfully reproduced in the movie. (Granted it's a made for TV movie that was split over 3 nights, but it was such an amazing work I had to include it!!)

04) The Dark Half by Stephen King - As this blog proves, I like to write. And given my predisposition to the Sci-Fi & Fantasy genres, I had come up with the idea of writing something that becomes real, but Stephen King did an EXCEPTIONAL job with this book and the movie really captured that spirit. It's one of the few movies that EVER creeped me out.

03) American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis - When I heard that this book was being made into a movie, I thought it would suck. There was no way a human being could portray the multi-faceted psychological landscape of the main character. Then I watched the movie and it was like I was watching the book play out before my eyes. I was riveted. This was also my introduction to Christian Bale, who soon became one of my FAVORITE actors.

02) Interview With A Vampire by Anne Rice - This book was recommended to me by the chaplain at my college. Yes, that's right. A man of God recommended a vampire novel to me. And I was with Anne Rice when she made it publicly known that she disapproved of the movie and the casting. Then I WATCHED the movie & I was blown away. The movie captured the book so well it was startling. And, I still owe Tom Cruise an apology for doubting his ability to play Lestat. I just wish the other movie in this series had been done as well.

01) Silence of The Lambs by Thomas Harris - This movie introduced my all time favorite movie villain, Dr. Hannibal Lector, to the rest of the world. And while the movie modified certain details (as they all do), it did a fantastic job of capturing the soul of the book and the style of Hannibal himself. This movie is by far my all time favorite adaptation!





Honorable Mention:

A Stir of Echoes by Richard Matheson - While it couldn't find a spot on my top ten list, this movie definitely deserves an honorable mention. Again, the movie captured the creepiness of the novel, but it also managed to perfectly display the escalating frustration of the main character, a normal blue collar worker, who has to deal with an exceedingly bizarre series of events occurring in his life. This is probably my favorite Kevin Bacon movie!

My Daily Walk

As part of my new diet program, I have to burn about 2000 calories a week. I'm not there yet, but in an effort to comply, I have started to do a ten minute walk around my office buildings. I checked on Google's Distance Calculator and if I stay on the asphalt, one lap is equivalent to a quarter mile. I've been trying to do it on a regular basis. Normally, I wouldn't remark on something so mundane as walking, but yesterday something rather interesting happened.

Usually, there's someone walking with me so my walk goes by in conversation. Yesterday, I went by myself and about a minute into my walk, I decided to sing. There's usually no one around, so I just started up with "Swinging On A Star". As I was singing, a blonde on the other side of street (walking past the Crowne Plaza hotel next to my job) started smiling at me and told me I have a beautiful voice! Then on my second lap, I was joined by a co-worker who after I told her what the blonde said, virtually begged me to sing and she concurred!!

Like I said, the song I was singing was "Swinging On A Star". It's the version I heard on this amazing hidden gem of a movie called Hudson Hawk. Rather than torture you with MY version of the song. Here's the one I learned from:





Isn't it a great song???

Diet Update

My weekly weigh-in this week did not go as well as I'd hoped. This past weekend, I broke my diet twice. It was partially emotional eating (I was stressed out due to car issues.) and part of it was strategic due to a mis-calculation in the needed amount of diet food. I'm back on the diet now, but the consequences of my break were felt this week. The worse part is I did an unofficial weigh-in in the morning at my house and the scale reported 476.8lbs!!! I was ecstatic!! But the official weigh-in told a different story. Here are the results:


Previous Weight: 487.2lbs
Current Weight: 486lbs
Weight Delta: -1.2lbs


That's what I get for breaking the diet. I should be back on track with my "aggressive" weight loss next week. Here's hoping!!!