I haven’t posted anything in here for about a month and a
half, and that’s not okay. I started this blog as a way to both update readers
on events in my life, and also as an outlet for me to write freely about what’s
on my mind. I enjoy writing in here, I really do; and I've had a ton on my mind
the past month that I need to get out in writing.
So,
what has been on my mind?
How I Spend My Free Time, or The
Origins of Firelord Mike
Well,
let’s start with why I haven’t written on here for so long. I’d like to blame
schoolwork, but that’s only part of the reason. It’s true, the semester is
slowly but surely coming to an end, and as usual, the homework is piling up;
but even though I have more homework, I've still had some free time, that I
could have used to write, I guess I just chose not to. Writing on this blog is
one of my favorite things to do, but when I have so many papers and responses
to write for homework, I generally want to take a homework break that doesn't involve more writing.
For the past month I’ve usually
gone to one of three outlets for free time: TV, games, or guitar. I’m still
attempting to catch up on the recent episodes of Agents of SHIELD and Once
Upon a Time, I just finished watching series 8 Doctor Who, and I’ve been trying to catch up on Parks and Recreation before the final
season starts. I also finally finished watching Avatar: The Last Airbender with my roommate, and I have to say, it
was actually really good. It’s not anime like many people think it is; the
animation style is similar to anime, but it’s a completely American show. The
show consists of three seasons (or “books”) of twenty episodes, each around 22
minutes long. The first season, entitled “Book 1: Water,” was a bit slow at
times, but still enjoyable and a good setup for the rest of the series. The
second season, “Book 2: Earth,” was a lot better, and the season two finale was
excellent. It reminded me of the ending of The
Empire Strikes Back, but I won’t go into any spoilery details in case you,
the reader, want to watch it at some point. The third and final season, “Book
3: Fire,” was also very good; the ending was satisfactory and had good closure
for the characters. Over the past few years I’ve developed a passion for fire
and burning things, which in past few semesters at school has turned into an
acute form of pyromania: all that to say, I enjoyed the amount of fire and
burning that was present in season three. Also, Firelord Ozai, the show’s
central villain, is voiced by Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker from the original Star Wars trilogy and the soon-coming Episode VII: The Force Awakens). Overall it was a great show and I would
recommend watching it at some point. I may have to watch the sequel series The Legend of Korra at some point.
Apart from watching these shows I also spend
free time playing various games on my computer. Usually I will play either LEGO Marvel Superheroes or Minecraft. One of my favorite activities
in LEGO Marvel Superheroes is
wreaking havoc by either destroying cars and creating traffic jams or stealing
cars and hitting everything on the side of the road. I’d like to blame my
arsonist tendencies on Minecraft but
I think they started before that. All Minecraft
did was give me an outlet to burn all the things I want without doing harm
to real-world trees and structures. I also sometimes build things on there, but
nothing gives me more pleasure in Minecraft
than watching the world burn >:D The door to my room, which originally just
had a paper with the names and majors of my roommate and I, now has the word
“Firelord” written over my name on that paper, an “Arsonist of the Year” award
given by a fellow unitmate, a warning sign about explosives, and a paper with
this comic excerpt:
Speaking of fire, there may have been an incident that
occurred a few days ago in our unit. I will not go into further details at this
time, but I will say that the smoke alarm might have gone off for a few
seconds. Fortunately it didn’t sound long enough to warrant anyone coming to
the unit. If someone had, and if they had seen my door, I’m not sure what would
have happened. Though to be honest, I technically had no part in what may or
may not have taken place. I merely watched, smiling wickedly, doing nothing to
prevent the oncoming disaster.
But
back on the original topic, when I’m not burning things I also enjoy playing
guitar during my free time. I don’t know if I’ve gotten any better at it, but I
haven’t gotten worse. I only practice a couple times a week, which is not as
much as I would like. What I love about playing guitar is the fact that it
employs a great use of hand-eye coordination. When I look up chords for random
songs on ultimateguitar.com I read the chords and sing along with the lyrics
while at the same time moving my fingers to the right chord shapes and
maintaining a strumming pattern that sounds right. Since I’m not doing Men’s
Glee this year it’s cool to still be doing something musical for fun. It’s a
great way to take my mind off school and also a great way to exercise my brain.
Recent songs I’ve looked up chords for are “Wonderland” and “Clean,” a couple
of my favorite songs from Taylor Swift’s new album 1989, which I’d like to write a review of eventually. Yes, I
pre-ordered the deluxe-edition album – deal with it.
Michael Newman and the Order of the Phoenix
In a
sad bit of news, I had to get my hair cut a few weeks ago. I would have
eventually cut it; I don’t want it that
long, but it would have been cool to grow it out a little longer; maybe just as
long as Aragorn’s or the Winter Soldier’s hair. During the week before I cut
it, the intramural ultimate frisbee team I was on made it to the tournament. In
several of the previous games I didn’t play quite as well as I could have
because my hair kept getting in my face. But during the tournament, my hair was
long enough to tie it back into a ponytail. Don’t ask for photographic
evidence, because I don’t have it. I only know of one picture in existence of
my ponytailed hair, and it is currently in the possession of the student body
chaplain, a guy in my unit who was also our team captain. The reason I cut my
hair was because I was cast in a film project that requires me to wear a wig.
With my long hair, my head was too big to fit in a wig.
The film org on campus is working on a
shot-for-shot film replication scene of a scene from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, and I was cast as Lucius
Malfoy, the father of Draco Malfoy and a Death Eater. If you’ve seen the movies
or read the books, you know that Lucius Malfoy has long blonde hair. My hair
wasn’t quite long enough to dye blonde, and I was told that dying dark hair a
light color is difficult, so I cut it. I may eventually post a picture of me
with my short hair, but for now, here are a couple pictures of me in my Lucius
Malfoy costume, one with the Death Eater mask, the other without:
The scene we are replicating is near
the end of the movie when Harry and his friends find the prophecy in the
Department of Mysteries, then Bellatrix and I show up and try to take it from
him. However, just recently there was a last-minute decision to cut the scene
shorter; so it now ends before Bellatrix even shows
up, meaning a large part of my scenes were cut as well. I don’t mind however;
it was still really fun being a part of this. The purpose of the project is
study what it’s like to work on making a real film, which is actually really
neat. I now understand why movies take so long to make. Even for simple one or
two-second shots, it is often necessary to do many different takes. A green
screen is used for all the shots because a model of the set inside the
Department of Mysteries is being created on a computer. Once it’s all finished,
it should look pretty similar to the actual scene. Everyone involved in the
film will receive a digital copy of the scene when it’s complete, so I may be
able to post it on here at that point. I just finished filming the last of my
scenes today, so now I’m almost completely done. The only part I have left is to
come back sometime during post production and re-record my lines for audio
clarity. Unfortunately I didn’t get to keep the costume or the mask, but they
let me keep the wand and walking stick. Overall, it was great working on this
project; I can now put this on my résumé if I decide to pursue some kind of
film career.
An Update on Classes, Graduation, and the Future
For the most part, this semester
has been surprisingly easy, especially for a penultimate school semester. But
as usual, I’m now finding myself having to finish up all the papers and
projects I didn’t work on (or didn’t need to work on) earlier. My History of
the English Language class (or H.O.T.E.L.), is going alright. The class is more
of a history class than an English class, so the class format and the
information we’ve learned in the class is not something I’m used to. I think (or
hope) I’m doing decently enough to pass the class, but I’m honestly not too
sure. Theology II is going much better. I’m like half a point away from an A-
right now. The class is engaging and I love how much of it actually applies to
my spiritual life. We also get to answer big theological questions like “Was
Jesus actually ever tempted to sin?” My Graphic Novel class is going pretty
well. We’ve been reading a ton of graphic novels; the most recent of which, Persepolis, I greatly enjoyed. As the final
project of that class, I, along with two other students, will create my own
graphic novel, though only 12-15 pages. The other students are doing most of
the story writing while I’ll be the illustrator. I’ve had practice with comic
art in the past. For years my brother and I wrote comics that were originally
based on Disney’s Kim Possible TV
show, though now they’ve gone completely away from anything similar to the
original show. All that really remains are the character names and likenesses
(except for that character we turned into a shark…).
Advanced Composition, as I’ve said
before, is probably my favorite class. I love the essays we read in it, like
George Orwell’s “Why I Write,” and I’ve been greatly enjoying the writing as
well. Many of what I write is similar to this kind of writing, only more
focused. This semester I’m also taking World Mythology Online, a class that sounds
more exciting that it actually is. I’ve enjoyed reading many of the myths, but
I recently found out that the class doesn’t count at all towards graduation. Now
that I know this I have like zero motivation for the class. I now have a 5-7
page research paper due tomorrow night for that class, but I really don’t want to work on it. I
sincerely hope my senioritis is cured before next semester begins…
Next semester is going to kill me;
that is, if I’m able to sign up for classes for next semester. Registration has
been open for me for a couple months now, but I haven’t been able to sign up
for classes due to countless financial things that get in the way, putting
business office holds that prevent me from registering. I’ve talked to many
people but I still don’t know what else there is to do.
So assuming I’ll be here next
semester, I’ll be taking Survey of British Literature from 1800 (AKA Brit Lit
2), Contemporary Studies in World Literature, American Literature from
1820-1865, American Women Writers, and the dreaded final capstone class,
English Seminar. This last class alone might almost kill me, but tied together
with the others, I’m going to die almost as many times as Rory from Doctor Who next semester.
After I graduate, it’s beginning to
look like my best option now is take a year off from school, work and raise
money, then go on to grad school somewhere else the next year. At this point
most grad schools are going through applications that have already been
submitted, so it would be too late for me to submit one; I’m not sure where I
would even go. It’s still a dream of mine to one day go to school in Oxford and
stay at C. S. Lewis’ house, so I’ll keep that in mind for the future.
