My first memory of R.E.M. is from the late 80s. I will admit, my musical tastes were not that wonderful back then. My musical diet consisted of Christian Rock and whatever the top 40 stations played. Even then, I knew subconsciously there must be more. So one day as I’m riding my bike with my headphones on, I hear the song Stand playing on a top 40. My emotions swelled up – it was such a great song! I felt such hope, such joy – all from one song. From that day forward, anytime I heard Stand, I had to blare it as loud as I possibly could! I remember some of my classmates saying the song sucked – my pre-adolescent mind didn’t know what to think. I wanted to fit in, and thus I had to hate the song because my peers hated the song. On the other hand, I freaking LOVED Stand. Looking back, this may very well have been my first experience in liking a song that wasn’t “cool.” I may very well owe my musical tastes today to that one experience.

Fast forward a few years – I was a junior in high school, and a fundamentalist Bible thumping conservative republican. I still listened to top 40 radio and Christian rock, though I was a little more open to other types of music. The song Loosing my Religion was being played everywhere. As a fundamentalist, I disapproved of R.E.M. encouraging people to give up their religion – little did I know the song references a Southern term meaning to lose one’s temper. But my hatred for R.E.M.’s (alleged) anti-christian stance did not stop there. One day as I was sitting in Bible Study discussing sin or something, I popped up by saying “Yeah, that song Shiny Happy People is a good example of how New Age is just old sin because it’s just what the hippies did.” A couple years later, I’m watching TV and a commercial for a radio station comes on. I hear “they put a man on the moon…man on the moon.” My thoughts were, “what liberal junk is R.E.M. moaning about now?” If I ever own a time machine, I’m going back in time and slapping myself silly at each of these moments.

A couple years later, I hold the same beliefs, but I’m less dogmatic. I’m in a pizza parlor. I listened to mostly alternative rock, with a little Christian Rock mixed in. I shunned top 40 music (and I still do). I’m sitting in a pizza parlor with some friends, and the song What’s the Frequency Kenneth comes on. One of my friends starts to sing along, but changes the lyrics a little – lampooning the style change between Automated for the People and Monster. The second line of the song, “I was brain-dead, locked out, numb, not up to speed,” was replaced with “grunge is dead, now gotta relearn electric guitar-ar.” We all laugh. Maybe you had to be there, but trust me – it was funny.

It’s the year 2000, and I’m working graveyard. There was really nothing to do, and so I kind of slept most of the time – everyone who pulled a graveyard at that job did the same. We all kind of joked about “being in the zone,” meaning we were mostly unconscious, but awake just barely enough to know when something needed our attention – but I digress. I had my CD player and a copy of Up. I’m listening to the song Daysleeper repeatedly. I’m not sure if it was the half-conscious feeling of graveyard, or just the subject matter of the song, but I was in the song. I was living the song. I was saying “Good morning Taipei , good morning Hong Kong!” At 7:00 AM, I’m riding the bus home with a bunch of people going to their day shifts. I kept dozing off. My bed was indeed calling me….gravity.

About a year later, I went back to school. Every finals week, I would make a mixed CD called my “Stress Mix.” There were certain requirements for a stress mix, among them, a different version of It’s the end of the world as we know it. I’m happy I graduated when I did, one more semester, and I don’t know if I could find another version of the song. Looking back, I’m surprised I found as many as I did – as I know I found more than the wikipedia page lists. I think my favorite was a salsa version sung in Spanish.

When I first heard the news that R.E.M. decided to call it quits, I wondered if this is how people felt when the Beatles broke up. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. I wasn’t alive at the time, so I couldn’t really compare the two band splits. I have the feeling comparing the two splits is a bit of comparing apples to oranges. The Beatles split due to internal strife (and Yoko Ono). They just couldn’t make it work. R.E.M. lasted a lot longer than the Beatles did, and split because it was time. I wanted to call this article It’s the end of the world as we know it (and I feel fine), but I figured a hundred thousand other bloggers had also used the same title. It does, express the way I feel about R.E.M.’s break up – it sucks, it’s (semi) life changing, but I’m ok with it. However, given the fact that this article is more about memories – more about where I am, or where I was, I think this title fits the article better anyways. In each of these memories I write about, I’m standing where I am. I’m being myself. In some cases, I wish I had been a different person, but I was being true to myself nonetheless. There are a lot of bands that can write a decent song, but not all bands can influence their listener’s lives so much. So long R.E.M., and thank you.

Transformers 3: The Dark of the Moon had a thin plot-line to say the least. The characters were so-so, and the effects were par for course. This was a movie made to make money and I doubt Micheal Bay cared the art of film. However, I loved almost every minute of it. OK, so the first few minutes I hated. The actor that played JFK did the worst impersonation of JFK I’ve ever seen. It was so bad, it was like a bad impersonation of someone doing an impersonation of JFK. There’s also the effects in the beginning of the film:  while I appreciate the fact that Bay tried to insert graininess into the some of the shots from the 1960s, it felt a little forced, and did not mesh well at all with the non grainy shots. Of course, then there’s the up-skirt shots of Carly climbing the stairs. That was the point of the movie I rolled my eyes, and braced for impact. Anytime some streetwise jive talking autobots would bust into a rap, and some huge robot made of constructions would be tea bagging the audience. Thankfully, those scenes never came. Instead Micheal Bay focused his testosterone on giant robots blowing each other up. My inner 9 year old breathed a sigh of relief.

Again, I say that Transformers 3 will not be winning any Oscars, but at the end of the day, I spent ten bucks to be entertained for 2.5 hours. I saw massive amounts of explosions and icons of my childhood in a massive war in the middle of Chicago. I give Transformers 3: The Dark of the Moon a solid B. You might not enjoy the film if you weren’t a 9 year old boy in 1984, but if you are of my age and gender, go see the movie. Now. You’ll love it!

One final thought. Now that we’ve gotten through the trilogy, can we get alive action  Transformers movie with Unicron? Pleeaaasee?

Let me clarify my stance on the matter before anyone thinks that I’m siding with the church in Florida. I do not support their efforts to burn the Koran. Having said that, I do support their right to protest, however blindly, anything they wish to protest. Sure, they’re wrong, and downright stupid – not to mention hypocritical – but as Evelyn Beatrice Hall once said, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” These people have the right to peacefully protest Islam, just as the Muslims have the right to practice religion. And like I said, I do NOT side with their beliefs on this matter. I believe they’re being hypocritical and unloving. They are proclaiming their hatred for another religion – one they probably feel should not be covered under the first amendment. However, they are not actually harming anyone, and they are not forcing any censorship – that’s what makes this specific book burning different then the Nazi book burnings.

Twice in this article, I’ve called these soon to be book burners “hypocritical.” This is true on two levels. There’s the obvious level. They are, essentially saying the first amendment is only for Christians. They are saying that you only have the right to practice religion if you are practicing their religion. The second level of hypocrisy is somewhat ironic. These “Christians” are not following the commands of Christ, and hence they are being hypocritical to their own religion. Christ himself commanded his followers to “Love your neighbor as you love yourself,” (Luke 10:26) and to “Do to others as you want them to do to you” (Luke 6:31). How is taking another religion’s sacred texts and burning them following either of these commandments? Would these “Christians” like it if the Muslims were burning the Bible? Would these Christians stand up in outrage if another religion wanted Christianity exempt from the first amendment? I guarantee you that these “Christians” would be outraged if either of these things happened. And yet, these “Christians” do the very thing to the Muslims. Oh, and this is not just about banning a religion. They chose to do this on September 11th – this is about vengeance. Never mind Mathew 5: 38-42 (turn the other cheek), never mind Romans 12:19 (Vengeance is mine sayeth the lord) – these “Christians” want revenge.

Again, I say that while I support the rights of those who plan on burning the Koran, I also wish they wouldn’t. It seems like something that will do more harm than good. It’s not going to attract any more followers to Christianity. It’s not going to change the first amendment – which is a good thing. It’s not going to change the hearts of any Muslim. Rather, it’s going to scare away would be followers of Christianity. It’s going to make more and more people wonder if perhaps the first amendment should exempt Christians, and it will give more ammo to the extremist factions found in Islam. So while I certainly respect the rights of these “Christians” to protest, perhaps it would be better for all parties involved if they worked on other efforts.

Before everyone lists the shops and roasters everyone I already know about, let me list a few that I know about:

• Starbucks - they used to be excellent. It’s OK if there’s nothing else around.
• Stumptown Coffee Roasters – again, they used to be good, and they still are I guess. But I’ve noticed a major slip in quality recently. I think they’re on the Starbucks path.
• Dutch Brothers – worst. coffee. ever.
• Pete’s – not the best, not the worst. I do have to say they’ve stayed consistent at least.
• Portland Coffee Roasters – Pretty decent. I would rate them somewhere in between Pete’s and Stumptown.
• Blue Gardenia – They very well might be the best coffee out there right now, but there’s only a few places one can get their coffees.
• Folgers, Maxwell House, et al -coffees that use robusta beans are worst than Dutch Brothers!
• Trader Joe’s – Decent coffee, limited selection though. And not used at any coffee shops
• Panache - Let’s just say they’re a half point above Dutch Brothers.
• Illy - a little too mass-produced. But it’s decent espresso.
• Longbottom – ew. Ick. Gross.
• Seattle’s Best Worst - I think you can guess my opinion here.

There’s a few others I know, but trying to think of every name of every coffee is a bit of a daunting task. So have at it! Give me your opinion, dear readers! What are your favorite coffees and where do I get them?

As a writer, I tend to hate the fact that every detail in a story has to mean something. Life is simply just not like that. Life is a chaotic spill of random events, which sometimes interlock, sometimes hold significant meaning, and sometimes mean absolutely nothing. Consider the following: You’re driving to work and you’re running late.  You look down and discover a mysterious rash on your arm. In real life, you might put some Cortizone on the rash, and think nothing of it. In a  work of fiction, this rash would probably have a meaning. This rash would later be revealed to be a deadly disease or a mark of greatness. Writer’s choose their details for a reason. Writers usually don’t insert random events just for the sake of inserting random events. Random events confuse people! But random events are all a part of life. Random events are in fact reality. Going back to Lost, the writers insert many random things that apparently have no meaning. Why were the numbers so prevalent and what do they mean? Why was Desmond able to see Charlie’s future? Why was Walt Special? Was it the island, or was it the smoke monster that healed John Locke’s legs? Why didn’t Kate grow any leg or armpit hair? OK, the last question was more about aesthetics and sex appeal, but the other questions will never be answered. They remain huge mysteries. Well, guess what? That’s life. We never find out what the rash on our arm is, and we don’t really care because the cream took it away. But Lost is a work of fiction, therefore it should wrap up into a tidy little package, shouldn’t it? Nope! Arguably, one of the key themes in Lost is life and death. What better way to emphasize this theme than to emulate something that happens in life? What better way to emulate life, than with random happenstances and unanswered questions?

But the unanswered questions are not just about life. The unanswered questions go hand in hand with another prevalent theme in Lost: the theme of spirituality and religion. There’s a reason that mysticism is a synonym for spirituality, religion, and the like. Mysticism shares a root word with mystery and mythology. Mysticism indicates a sense of not knowing the whole story. And that is precisely the sense we get with Lost; we don’t know the whole story. We don’t know where the island came from, we don’t know what the island is capable of, and we don’t know why the island behaves the way it does. We know some things, just as in all myths we know the basic concepts. We know the island is a cork that keeps evil from flooding the Earth, just as we know in the book of Genesis that it was God who created the Earth. But just as we don’t exactly know how God created the Earth in Genesis, we don’t know why the island exists in the first place. We can speculate all we want to, but we are never going to have all the answers. This is the nature of religion; this is also why having some of the big questions remain unanswered works so well in Lost. These unanswered questions emulate mysticism, and thus adding to one of the major themes in Lost.

I’ve been reading all kinds of comments online since Lost ended, indicating that JJ Abrams is a hack. Such comments state that JJ Abrums relied on MacGuffins; that he intentionally led the viewer on so the viewer would keep watching. Well, considering my stance on the intentional fallacy, I am not about to say that Abrums did anything of the sort intentionally. But even if Abrums was just being a jerk to the viewers, even if he was just trying to string us along for six years, in the case of Lost, it worked. In the case of Lost, MacGuffins served a purpose to illustrate it’s key points. Besides, said commentators also state that JJ Abrums does this in everything he touches. While that’s certainly an exaggeration (ahem, Star Trek had none), even if it were true, it doesn’t matter. If JJ Abrums did this in everything, then that would  cease to be a plot device used to hoodwink the audience, and start to be Abrum’s style and form.

So what are these rules? Well, I’m sure if you’re reading this, I’m probably preaching to the choir, but I’ll tell you anyways. Number one. CLEAN YOUR FREAKING EQUIPMENT AND CLEAN IT THOROUGHLY!!! The coffee at work is usually made with a coffee press. Said press is washed several times a week with soap and water, but it never gets clean. Why? Well, it’s because the press is never taken apart. The whole thing is dipped in the soap, rinsed, and called good. WTF! And even IF they did clean the press properly, they haven’t actually replaced the filter in the year and a half I’ve been working there. Those filters don’t last forever!

Ahhh but clean equipment is only one part of the equation. It is only the first stone in a long trail of stones leading you across a sea of burning hot lava  that will surely kill you if you fall in. Wait, where wast I? How did I get on that tangent? Oh yeah, number two: the beans. Ok, dear beloved co-workers if you are reading this, please know that you do usually buy decent beans. They are almost always fair trade, and they are almost always roasted to match their natural flavors. Kudos in that department. But…….THEY ARE ALMOST ALWAYS GROUND FOR AN AUTOMATIC DRIP! Not cool, not cool at all! So what’s the big deal? It has to do with the amount of contact the beans have with the water. In an auto drip, the beans need to be ground finely because the water drips from above and travels through the beans. Gravity is pulling the water away from the beans, so the beans don’t have a lot of contact with the water. It is why espresso is ground so finely too – the water is forced rapidly through the grounds, thus making the contact with the beans minimal. But, with a coffee press, you have the water and the beans mingling in a stew for FOUR, count them FOUR, MINUTES! More exposure to the water means more bitterness! Oh, it also means more caffeine – so if you’re trying to cut back on the caffeine, that’s an added bonus to having the right grind.

Number three is closely related to number two, because it ALSO has to do with the beans. I’m half tempted to show pictures of what I found in the cupboard. Five, yes five, bags of coffee dating back to the end of last year! Last year! That’s six months people! In a cupboard! Exposed to air and everything! Ewww! Just ewww! They don’t put expiration dates on coffee, because technically the stuff could last almost forever, but maybe they should, because while coffee  won’t spoil, it will loose it’s flavor! Think about it this way: you leave a half empty bottle of soda on the counter for six months. What’s it going to taste like? If you leave an open bag of chips out for six months, they are going to go stale. Technically, the chips or the soda are going to cause you to get sick, but they are not going to taste good at all! The same thing goes with coffee. If you leave it out, exposed to air, it is going to loose it’s flavor! At the very least, keep it in the freezer. The freezer isn’t perfect, but it will keep the coffee from going totally stale.

Lastly, but perhaps most importantly, don’t just let the grounds sit in the water. Plunge the pot after FOUR minutes! This goes right back to the grinds people. The more exposure the grounds have to the water, the more bitterness is going to seep out of said beans! So leaving the grounds in the water for an hour? EWWWWWWWWW! I know people who drink folgers who wouldn’t even drink that swill!  The recommended time for brewing in a coffee press is FOUR minutes. This is a time frame that has been tested for hundreds of years!

If any of my coworkers find this, especially those that happen to be those that make coffee, please don’t take these comments personally. See it as constructive criticism. You’re all brilliant people who I respect very much, but you just don’t know how to make coffee! Heck, if you want, I’ll teach you how to make coffee. We’ll have an office wide seminar on the subject! Ok, ok, maybe that’s taking things a little too far. And maybe I need to mellow out a bit. Maybe I need to just go quietly back to my office with my mini one cup press and perfectly brewed coffee. Or maybe I should cut back on the caffeine altogether. But regardless of my need to chill out, coffee is something that should be enjoyed. So please don’t take this article to be mean spirited and/or back stabbing. Think of this article as a way to help you enjoy life more.

For now, please enjoy Geeky Poetry!