A conversation with C. S. Lewis

Scene: C. S. Lewis is in the middle of a Barnes and Noble, signing copies of his wildly successful books series, now film franchise, The Chronicles of Narnia. All around him crowd reporters trying to get the latest scoop.

Reporter 1: Mr. Lewis, are you taking questions at this time?
C. S. Lewis: Inquire of me what you will, and I will do my best to satisfy your curiosity.
Reporter 2: What do you think of the films that have been made out of your books.
C. S. Lewis: I believe that as movies they are entertaining, but I believe as adaptations of my novels, each new movie fails even more than the last one to capture the true spirit of my books.
Reporter 3: Mr. Lewis, at this time there is a another immensely popular book series that has also been made into a film franchise out at this time known as the Twilight series. What are your thoughts on this series and it’s various different knock-offs?
C. S. Lewis: The concept is certainly nothing new, taking a creature that has traditionally been considered evil such as a dragon or an ogre, or in this case a vampire, and creating a sympathetic character from it. The story then claims that it only does wicked and evil things because it cannot help itself and really deep down inside it is a lovable creature. This kind of thinking can even be found in the original Frankenstein novel, is a monster that due to neglect and a lack of love commits horrific and gruesome murders. This type of thought arises from people observing their own dark side and the evil nature of the world around them, and attempting to justify and rationalize it. As for the Twilight novels themselves, they provide the subtle romantic notion that is currently delivered to young women everywhere, that even if everyone around you claims that a relationship will not work (Because the man you love has difficulty controlling his primal and violent instincts.) It might work out if you give it a chance. This kind of message is harmful to young women, because it encourages women to stay in abusive and/or unfruitful relationships, because of a false sense of romanticized hope. Hidden in Twilights flowery poetry, and romantic sentiments is a truly awful excuse for a protagonist. When her father and her friends and even the man himself all tell her that their relationship is doomed because of his violent nature and tendencies, and the dangerous group of people that he associates with; She still refuses to accept this and pursues him still. To some it seems romantic, but in reality it is self destructive.  Though there is an abstinence message in the series, it does not excuse the book, for encouraging rebellious, self destructive, and foolish behavior. The fact that the book is well written makes it even more deadly, because it is another way to hide it’s true nature. The film series seem almost humorous in their faithful representation of the book series, but are mostly a sad reflection of our times. It is something of a cultural statement when a man can utter the phrase, “I have never wanted to suck someone’s blood more” and it is viewed as a romantic expression rather than a horrifying statement of homicidal and cannibalistic intent
Reporter 3: So I take it you didn’t like it?
C. S. Lewis: Not particularly

Random poem

Another feeble attempt at poetry. This is what happens when you demand too much of the talent.

Fear not, for I shall save the day indeed.
And you my friend appear to be in need.
Of these words I beg of you to take heed.
Don’t let yourself be overcome by greed.
Even though men may speak of me great ill,
I shall be your fearless leader still.
Some make promises they will never keep.
But I promise to look before I leap.
With me you will never have cause to fear,
I have a never ending supply of beer.
Every single word from me you hear,
will make you want to stand up and cheer.
There are many more things that I could say,
but I shall end with have a pleasant day.

Tech Age

Hmmm, I'd give it a B-. A somewhat coherent collective of thoughts, but spends too much time dwelling on the negative, when there is supposed to be an overall positive message to this essay. I'd tell my past self to rewrite this, but he doesn't listen to me

Tech Age: An Essay on Technology Dependence by Michael Rauser

                Society today has been transformed by the advancement of technology, especially in recent years. From the invention of the computer to creating a music player the size of a quarter, technology has moved in leaps and bounds for the past twenty years. But is technology advancing too quickly? Are new inventions becoming so indispensable that the very idea of several days, let alone weeks, away from them is simply ludicrous to most people? These questions and more we shall explore in today’s essay.

            Convenience and entertainment are the main driving force behind most technology today.  Thanks to the incredible advancements, tasks that used to take hours can be performed in minutes. It is because of this that we expect that kind of speed and efficiency in all areas of our life, even entertainment. Or perhaps I should say especially entertainment.  All the ad campaigns for new computers and internet services always say the same thing: faster. So much time and energy is spent trying to minimize the amount of time and energy spent looking for entertainment.

            Personal privacy is no longer something that is of great importance to people today.  While we can choose which photographs we upload to public web sites like MySpace and what we’ve written on our Twitter and which friend requests we accept on Facebook, it’s impossible to completely safeguard our identity.  Surprisingly, this seems to be something that people are somewhat comfortable with.  People understand the risk of sharing personal information on Facebook or keeping photos that they’d prefer to keep secret on their mobile phone’s camera, but do it regardless.  The freedom that technology permits is more important to them than the potential risk of their secrets becoming common knowledge.  Rational thoughts and common sense seem lost in this age of constant communication.

But despite all this constant connection with other people, kids today are some of the angriest, discontented, and miserable kids in history. Depression, suicide, and shooting sprees are all things that seem to be natural occurrences among today’s youth and yet this generation are the most connected and well off as far as conveniences and entertainment. The reason for this is that electronic connection, despite popular opinion, is no substitute for actual human interaction something becoming more and more rare. In fact it is not uncommon at all to see young children today willingly give up the chance to interact with an actual person in order to text message someone miles away. Even more surprising (but also not rare) is when someone will text message a person who is in the same building as them. However, I am not saying that Technology is solely to blame for this. It does have its part, but the real problem lies with people themselves. As I said before many children today will choose electronic interaction instead of personal face to face interaction all by themselves. With electronic interaction, you cannot create a meaningful and lasting friendship at all; all you can do is find people who have similar interests as yours.

The thing that is most interesting about modern technology is how indispensable it is. Fifteen years ago, there was no such thing as cellphones and now they are considered an essential part of any trip no matter how short. (From five weeks to five minutes) You might tell that I don’t think much of text messaging. First of all it has caused kids to become even lazier in their writing than ever; spelling and grammar are old fashioned things that aren’t necessary anymore. It is also completely pointless. They are holding a phone in their hands! Why not just call their friends instead of sending them indecipherable messages.  It’s the modern equivalent of passing notes. (Just think, only ten years ago kids still used to perform such an old tradition) That's not to say there is no practical application for text messaging, but it is a degrading experience altogether.

Despite the many downsides of modern technology, it is still more useful and convenient than ever. In fact I am even writing this essay on my laptop while I eat lunch. Technology has advanced to a wonderful state and in the future it will continue to become even better than it is today. And just like today new inventions will have their disadvantages. But in the end, life is made much more efficient and enjoyable by the many amazing developments in technology.

The Thoughts of Sir Reginald

The chairs name was Sir Reginald. He was a strong regal chair.  He seemed almost snooty as if to say, “You may sit if you like, but you are not worthy.” He was a chair that had seated kings and now his only purpose was a resting place for overweight tourists who liked to stare at shiny things. The chair had no rubies or diamonds, he was not made of gold or silver; but he still seemed more intimidating than the wonders around him. The back of the chair was long so as to intimidate the shorter people who dared to sit there. The back was directly perpendicular to the seat, in order to prevent laziness. It was because of this that many of the tourists found the chair irritating, because they were used to slouching in their chairs. You could tell just by looking at the chair that he didn’t think much of recliners. He thought them to be poor white trash versions of sofas. The chair despised anything that tried to lie about its identity. He had a history of servicing royalty, and because of that he was spoiled. In other places of the world people use their chairs as weapons. Other people set their chairs on fire just because they are tired of them. Still other chairs, although saved from such fates as this, they would not be treated with an ounce of respect. They would be spilled on, jumped upon, and otherwise abused.  Reginald the chair (he preferred the name throne) sat quietly in the corner, becoming more and more irritated with the tourists and the lack of respect they had for their property.  They would drop their cameras, phones and wallets and not care in the least. Some of the tourists had ripped their clothes and never bothered to sew them back together again. It made the chair wonder, if he had lived in America, would they repair him if he was broken? Or would they throw him out at the even the slightest tear. Watching the tourist he couldn’t help, but feel sorry for those American chairs.

A Mythical story Involving Great Adventure

            Once upon a time, in the mythical kingdom of Fargo; I found a piece of lint in my pocket. Now the circumstances leading up to this event are almost as interesting as the event itself. It started out like a normal day; I woke up, ate breakfast, did school, and other boring daily routines. Little did I know that this boring, perfectly ordinary day, was about to turn into something completely unexpected!

            I was out doing more boring rituals, that were required to complete the day, when I stopped and had a lovely conversation with my good friend Alfred the vending machine. Now Alfred didn’t talk much, but I still considered him a good friend; because he supplied me with the one thing I wanted most, a bag of M&Ms. However, on this fateful day, he did a most peculiar thing; he denied, my request for M&Ms!

“How could you Alfred!” I screamed, “I thought we were friends!” He simply stood there silently, and when I asked again once again for the candy he said, “Out of stock. Please, make another selection.” I was stunned. Another selection? But M&Ms were all I had ever known! Who was he, a lowly vending machine, to tell me that I had made the wrong choice of candy? How dare He, (Just a old worthless vending machine!) refuse my request. I gave him the money he asked for! And yet he still refused, with that constant, now irritating, “Please  make another selection” I was becoming very angry at this point, so much so that I was considering finding a sledgehammer and breaking him open, once and for all ending his reign of refusing candy to people who need it.

But then, I began to think about my friendship with Alfred. We had known each other for a long time, and this was indeed the first time he had refused my demands. I decided, as a favor to an old friend, I would humor him just this once. I selected a Hershey’s chocolate bar. This was of course, that delicious milk chocolate, that would literally melt in your mouth. The taste alone, was worth whatever Alfred wanted me to give him. Of course,, I was not a pig. I would not eat this delectable treat all at once. No, I would save some for a future date, where I once again desired to feast on something so pleasant.
               

             Hours passed, after a while I had all but forgotten about the luscious delight that lay in my pocket. I reached down and grabbed that which I had tasted only a few hours ago; and realized with horror, that the scrumptious delicacy that had been there, naught but a few hours earlier, had now been transformed into a gooey, sticky chocolate mess. And that’s when I saw it, a piece of bluish greenish fuzz mixed in with this delicious chocolate. It was most certainly ruined now! How could I, put such disgusting matter inside my mouth, even if chocolate was included?

And so, that is why, I know have a deep seeded hatred for that putrid blue-green filth that migrates into the pockets of many. If you or someone you know has been afflicted with this cruel trick of nature, just remember: It’s never too late to tell someone. I know that each and every one of you will suffer by the hands of this wretched abomination, but I can only hope that you will not know such pain as I have.

A modern day Greek Tragedy

Keep in mind while you are reading this, that I actually turned this in for a school assignment.

It was 7:00 in the morning on the 8^th birthday of young Jimmy. He was quite excited about it. His father however was less excited, because he just realized that he had forgotten to get Jimmy a present. Instead he had been out drinking the night before with no regard as to the time and had, in fact, only gotten back three hours ago. You see, Jimmy’s father was a battle scarred cop with years of experience and only 3 days left until retirement. He said to young Jimmy, “I am terribly sorry, but I forgot about your birthday. Let me make it up to you, Today, I swear on the river Styx that I will grant you any request you have of me.”(You see, ever since Jimmy’s mother died his father had become very superstitious and started to believe all the Greek legends that he had read when he was younger.)  Jimmy promptly replied, “I wanna drive the car!”  Even through the father’s alcohol-impaired judgment, he saw what a foolish idea it had been to grant the passing whim of a young boy. But because of the father’s superstitions, he could not conceive of breaking a promise that had been made on the river Styx. He tried to reason with the boy, “Son, you are simply not old enough to drive. There are many dangers inherent to driving the car.” But his plea fell on decidedly deaf ears as young Jimmy imagined the splendor of driving his father’s shiny red Lexus.  Because of the massive amount of alcohol in the father’s system, and a rather potent mix of superstition and stupidity, the father decided he had no choice but to grant young Jimmy his foolish request. With glee, young Jimmy leaped into the driver’s seat and started the car.  The first of casualties of Jimmy’s rampage were two small chipmunks that attempted to flee the scene by means of the same lawn that Jimmy had decided to use for his exit of the driveway. Young Jimmy soon realized his folly in the request he had made, as he realized the vehicle was not as easy to command as he thought. Unfortunately by this point it was going at quite dangerous speeds and he had no choice, but to attempt to maneuver it through the oncoming traffic. As his father lay curled up into a ball in the passenger’s seat begging Zeus to deliver them, the roar of an oncoming semi frighten the passengers of the doomed Lexus even more. The resulting explosion made the 6:00 news that day as police were baffled by the fact that the wreckage seemed to imply that young Jimmy was driving.

New Year, New Blog

As you may have noticed by now, I gave up the movie reviews. Why? Several reasons, first, I have a complete inability to keep any sort of deadline whatsoever. Second, nobody was actually reading the blog, therefore, nobody complained when i stopped doing it. And finally, It's tough work constantly writing new reviews, espicially when nobody knows they exist. Apparently I suck at self promotion. Anyway, I have now decided to start a new blog filled with nothing but randomness, here you will find opinions, thoughts, cookies, shameless self-promotion, poems, songs, and some older essays for school I find buried deep inside my computer hard drive. It won't always make sense, but at least now I don't care that no one is reading this,and I no longer have to deal with deadlines, because the only way there will be any deadlines is if people actually read this and want more. So actually it's a good thing you are not reading this right now, or I might actually have to do some sort of weekly update. Anyway, If by some odd coincidence, someone is actually reading this right now, you can expect more randomness when you least expect it.