Namely, I wonder what it would have looked like had I access to a fully-fledged Photoshop program, as opposed to the absolutely primitive Adobe PhotoDeluxe 98 or whatever we had at the time.
One thing I know for sure would have changed would have been the font. The font that's used on my book's cover isn't what I wanted, or what I asked to be used. I guess when typesetting the thing, they weren't able to download the font I asked for, and so they stuck me with some not-exactly-Times-New-Roman font. Granted, it was italicized, but it was still much more plain than the font I had asked them to use (and I don't remember what that font was, so don't ask).
I also think that I might have messed with the picture a bit. If I were to remake it now, I think I would take the picture and make it starker yet more minimalist. It would be abstract, as opposed to showing you exactly what it was showing you; it would make you think.
'Course, I really have no idea if I this is because I have access to greater photo-editing software or because I've changed my own style in the...God, three to four years since I've worked to get the book published. I know I've matured, perhaps gotten a little darker and grittier (or, at other times, more wacky and light-hearted), so perhaps I'm trying to superimpose my current personality onto my older (er, younger) one.
Anyway, to give you an idea of what I mean, I decided to give the cover a little push through Photoshop. Here's how the cover looks to the purchasing public:
And here's what the cover would look like if I had published the book today:
Is it better? Well, I can't really give an unbiased answer. All I know is that I would be more likely to pick up the latter cover at a bookstore...much more likely. Who knows, maybe in another 5 years, I'll be totally turned around on the subject, or maybe I'll think there should be yet another version.
So, I had my interview with Lucasfilm yesterday. I'll refrain from saying anything about it for the moment (aside from the fact that I overdressed), but I should find out by the end of the week whether or not I have the position, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed in a cautiously optimistic way.
In the meanwhile, I'll show you some pictures I took while at the place where I could potentially work! While this may not sound exciting, Lucasfilm is located at the San Francisco Presidio, which is, in a word, gorgeous. I had arrived early, so I walked around. I also walked around after the interview. I walked around quite a bit, taking in the scenery. These cell-phone pictures really don't do it justice. However, justice was never one of my strong points, so I'll show them anyway. Let's take a look.
The Presidio is a very green place. There are lots of trees. This tree was particularly large and interesting. And I also believe this is the first time I've gotten an honest-to-goodness lens flare in a photo.
More trees. The place was quite wide-open, as you can see. And although I'm completely ignorant about botany (by choice), I think those might be fairly robust Eucalyptus trees. Prove me wrong, science, prove me wrong!
So, this is one of the several buildings which encompass the Letterman Digital Arts Center, which houses the various branches of the Lucas Empire. While definitely modern on the inside, the outsides have a definite 1920s retro feel to them. This isn't the building that I would be working in, should I get the position, but it is the most red building, so that's worth something.
Okay, look at this picture and tell me with a straight face that your mind did not wander here.
Now, that is the building I would be working in, complete with an outdoor stream that seems to spring from nowhere. I wonder if there is something therapeutic about creeks and streams, because they always seem to make me feel better.
A pond mean to imitate celebrate the wetlands that used to exist in the Bay Area before it was all built up and industrialized.
I don't know, I just thought this was funny.
And this is the entrance to the main lobby. As you may be able to tell, there's a fountain there. And no, that's no munchkin on top, that's Yoda, whose not munckin nor elf, but an unknown tridactyl species. The Lucasfilm headquarters is actually pretty nice, because it allows people to come in and look, at least into the lobby. While that may not sound like much, the lobby is pretty decked out.
This, for example, was in the lobby. I'm not exactly sure who the guy is, but I'll hazard a guess and say he has something to do with King Kong.
Also in the lobby. A very nice statue of Boba Fett.
And this blurry fellow is, of course, Darth Vader. Compared with the Boba Fett costume, this one is actually somewhat disappointingly plain. And that heavily-padded codpiece has to go, Vader.
Betwixt the two villains is a cabinet filled with all sorts of knick-knacks, trophies, etc.
Shelves filled with the severed, shrunken heads of a number of characters. Somewhat disturbing.
And cute little figurines stand alongside books and Han Solo's blaster, which I never realized had a silencer before. Why a laser gun needs a silencer, I don't know.
Now, those shelves seem to house some classy books. For the most part, they seem to be dictionary's and hardcover books without the slipcovers. Honestly, I think this looks so much nicer than the modern personal library. Were I to become rich and have my own large house, I would decree that no book should be publicly viewable unless it had an "old-world" look to it.
This actually wasn't in the lobby, but in the belly of the building. It's one of the world's oldest film editing machines. There was plenty of stuff that seemed more interesting to take pictures of, but I took a picture of this because the recruiter I was speaking with told me I could. So, I did.
And finally, we have this blurry mess, in which I'm standing next to (and showing off my folder, for some reason) an actual suit of Stormtrooper armor from the original Star Wars movie. And here you can see how overdressed I was.
I blame Haas. I was told to dress in business casual. At Haas, that essentially means "Skip the tie; keep everything else." So, I arrive, snazzily dressed, and find that nobody else is wearing so much as a collared shirt. Hell, one of my interviewers was wearing a hoodie. Hopefully, they'll see me as some misguided youth rather than some business school prick.
Anyway, there you go. Pictures. I'll keep you updated as the week goes on!
And no, I am not talking about the cat himself, although it would be a little strange to see a bright orange cat (particularly one that's supposed to be overweight) walking around while speaking with you telepathically.
I'm talking about the comic itself, or at least it's popularity and tremendous money-making ability.
I'll admit, when I was but a lad, I was an Garfield reader. You could even describe me as avid. Every single day, I would eat breakfast, reading my comics, starting with Garfield.
I look back on those days, and I am ashamed.
Now, it's not just Garfield. If you take a good, hard look at it, about 95% of traditional comics are just plain awful, using tired gags and puns (God, puns!) instead of taking us further. Really, there's only a few print comics that I consider - at a mature age - to be good. The first is Calvin & Hobbes, which just goes beyond the realm of humor and into that of imagination and even social issues. The second would be Pearls Before Swine, which mixes simplistic drawings with occasionally dark humor (somewhat like a certain comic we all know and love). The third would be The Far Side for, well, obvious reasons.
With those - and a few more - exceptions, the rest is just drivel. (And in case you think I'm warming up to the webcomic crowd, keep this in mind: there are less than 10 different webcomics that I pay attention to on a regular basis. There are 3568 webcomics registered on the TopWebcomics database [where you can vote on comics daily]. That's about 0.28%. And that's just considering the number of comics registered. There are a sickeningly large amount more out there, and they're all horrid.)
...Where was I?
Right - Garfield! So, yeah, if you look at the collection of comics on the official website, you can see what I mean. The jokes are really lame, and often repetitive. Yes, you could say that a comic that's been around for 30 years is bound to repeat jokes. However, it almost seems repetitive on a monthly (or, to be fair, yearly) basis. Not a good sign. And apparently, the drawings aren't even done by Jim Davis himself. It's just a bunch of people that were hired to create the strip, so that Davis can take care of the merchandising. Sweet deal.
You: "So, Andrew, you're just going to sit here complaining about Garfield?"
Oh, of course not; that's just the introduction. I am actually here to give you some Garfield-based humor!
You: "Zuh?"
You see, there is humor to be found in the humorless. This was the whole idea behind the cult-hit TV show Mystery Science Theater 3000 and it's spiritual successor (of which I am a loyal follower) Rifftrax. (I may talk about them later.) In the comic world, this kind of heckling can be found in things like the Comics Curmudgeon. While not exclusively about Garfield, the Curmudgeon looks at exactly what is wrong with a number of American newspaper comics, and does so in a way that somehow makes them tolerably funny.
But there's even more when it comes to Garfield. By manipulating certain things about it, you can create something new and perhaps even great. It's almost like a Garfield-based culture, primarily made up of people who follow Garfield mainly because they dislike it. There are three examples I'll present.
The first is the Garfield Comic Randomizer. It was created by someone who noted that you can create a comic just as coherent and funny as a normal Garfield strip just by taking three completely random panels and slapping them together. Sometimes (and particularly because you can lock panels to keep them from randomizing) you can create some comics that are genuinely funny for some sick reason. Here's an example of one I made.In this, you can see that Garfield's wonderfully-planned day has just fallen apart because of his inability to keep his guilt at bay, caused primarily by an abusive relationship with his owner (my interpretation). This had me silent laughing for a minute or so. It just worked so perfectly (if you can make any good ones, be sure to post it in the comments).
The second thing I'll show is Garfield Minus Garfield. This was based on an observation that when you remove Garfield from the strip completely, leaving only Jon, it takes on an entirely new level, appearing to be a strip about, and I quote, "a journey deep into the tortured mind of an isolated young everyman as he fights a losing battle against loneliness in a quiet American suburb."
Here's a few samples, which makes you wonder why we don't have a comic devoted to a schizophrenic main character.
Similar to this idea is that of Realfield, in which the cartoon Garfield is replaced by a realistic-looking (and silent) cat. Unfortunately, there's only a few of those.
Finally, we have Lasagna Cat, which features videos. (In fact, it might be easiest just to go straight to their Youtube page.) Each video is comprised of three parts. The first part is a live-action reenactment of some Garfield strip (reinforcing the point of how lame they are, despite the canned-in laughter). The second part simply shows said strip. Finally, the third part is a music video (or, rather, a "tribute" to Jim Davis) which will usually feature parts of the previous clip shown to some real song. The production values are surprisingly good. And while there is a scant 27 episodes, there are definitely some gems amongst them. Here are a couple of my favorites:
The rest are definitely worth checking out, as well.
And that's about that. Really, I hope you'll forgive me for enjoying Garfield when I was but a lad (because you know you did too, people under 40!). Perhaps by the time my children are reading comics, they will be reading those which use intelligent humor, and which have lofty themes and ideas...
So, April Fools Day has been over for a couple days now. I think it's safe to come out from your hiding places. I thought it'd be good to go over what I experienced on that most crazy of days.
But first, some background!
I used to hate April Fool's Day until 2002.
HATE it!
The reason for this is pretty straightforward. I've always been the fool. The April fool, as it were. I have memories of my father waking me up when I was a child, telling me in subsequent years that my bird, dog, grandmother, and mother had died during the night!
(Now, I'll be fair; I'm not sure if these memories are accurate - I don't remember very much about my childhood - but they're the only memories I have regarding the topic, so you better sort things out, Dad!)
And yet, despite all my efforts, I could never be the fooler. Imagine, if you will, a 10-year-old Andrew Schnorr walking up to you, saying in his choir boy voice (and this is verbatim): "Say, how old are you?" You: "Um, 25." 10-Year-Old Andrew Schnorr: "25? I thought you were 26......April Fools!"
...Had I a time machine, my first order of business would be to go back and slap myself.
Anyway, as I said, I didn't start tolerating April Fool's Day until 2002. The reason for that was because a website that I worked on at the time called UberNintendo.com (later changed to UberGaming.net, which doesn't look like it's been updated in nearly a year) had an April Fool's Day prank in which the entire site was replaced by a background repeating image of Dark Helmet (from Spaceballs) and the entire text (in size-72 font) of a short story called "Repent, Harlequin," Said the Ticktockman, which I consider quite influential to me. The story brought about my creation of the "Temporal Master," which in turn got me started on my Chronicles of Fate storyline, which is (er, will be) seven books plus a prequel. Pretty damn influential, I'd say.
So, yeah, I became okay with April Fool's Day.
However, I would say it's only after I came to college and became more entrenched not just in internet usage, but in internet culture, that I actually came to enjoy the mock-holiday. April Fool's Day is basically the day when all bets are off on the Internet. It allows for much easier and more creative ways of pranking people.
That's not to say pranks should be relegated to the net, though. There's plenty of fun to be had in the real world, especially after I've become better at fooling people. I've also become more aware (that is, paranoid) of any potential pranks that could be pulled on me. And that's key: staying one step ahead of the game.
...Now, let's take a look at some of the things I was involved with this year.
Joke #1 - In the Halls: So, the first April Fool's Day prank I was involved in actually began one-and-a-half before the day began. It was actually a collaboration betwixt some residents and I. ...Okay, it was their idea; I have to claim limited liability for, y'know, the job's sake. The last thing I want is an angry resident telling the powers-that-be that I'm ruining their life. So, my involvement, although limited, was strategic.
Here's the premise: We chose a resident of mine who is a really nice guy, and also extremely involved (he's actually going to be an RA next year, and he's also campaigning for the ASUC). So, he's not around terribly much. Basically, we wanted him to think something bad had happened. Namely, he got robbed.
So, at least half the floor was in on it. While the resident was out at campaigning rally with one of his roommates, his other roommate was messing up their room, opening drawers, moving stuff around, and - most importantly - removing all three laptops from the room and putting them in someone else's room.
Now, where did I come in? I was the one who set-up the last domino in the rally. After giving my advice on how the "crime scene" should look (based on typical thief habits), I sent a text message out at 10:30pm. It was sent to the resident and his roommate, but I made it seem like a mass text message. Here's what it said:
"Hey everybody! Sorry about the mass text message, but we've gotten reports that there are trespassers in the halls. We haven't caught anybody yet, but we're working on it. In the meantime, remember to lock your doors when you're not in your rooms, and to not let strangers into the halls. Stay safe!"
See? It's mostly just nebulous information coupled with some advice. Pretty believable (especially more believable than the original idea that I should call the resident personally to warn him). And it's good advice to follow anyway, with or without trespassers in the halls.
As fate would have it, the resident arrived at 12:15am (making a legitimate April Fool's Day joke) and found his room messed up. Unfortunately, he thought nothing of it; he's a college student after all. But after his roommate (who I was worried wouldn't be able to keep a straight face) asked where all the laptops were, he became...I guess you could say desperate. But before he could go report it, everyone appeared and showed him how he got prank'd!
He may have had a minute heart attack, but he'll be fine. ;)
Joke #2 - On The Lobotomist's Dream: So, as some of you may remember, last year my April Fool's Day activity on TLD was my coming out of the closet. Of course, it was promptly changed the next day, adding a single - yet vital - word to it, so as to avoid any confusion.
I wanted to be a bit more all-encompassing this time, something a little less in-jokey. And, truth be told, I had thought this idea up last November. So it wasn't just a spur-of-the-moment thing. Basically, I thought to myself, "What if this blog was actually about Lobotomy?" And the rest fleshed itself out quite well.
You can read the post a little below this one (or just click here). However, you're still reading that with about 20 of my faces staring at you. Hence, I recommend you read it the way it was meant to be read, and that means going to the Alternate Lobotomist's Dream. (I apologize for the funky formatting; even though the Google Page Creator is cool, they don't allow you to control the base HTML of the pages.)
The most tedious part of this was making it so you couldn't see any of my other posts. On Blogger, you can do this by saving them, one by one, as drafts. Do that 230+ times (and again to publish them again) and you have yourself some grade-A frustration. The rest was relatively straightforward, and quite fun.
Some fun facts: -The picture of "Dr. Frank Corlin" is actually some random doctor that got arrested for buying sex with pain medication (or, um, selling pain medication for sex; whatever, it's all bartering). I found it on, like, page 26 of an image search of "old doctor". -I actually learned quite a bit about Lobotomy when researching for the joke. -I don't know if you can tell, but there are several places that I would have used italics that Doc C used bold. I don't know, using bold for emphasis just seems like an old-person thing to do. -I'm not sure, but someone may have actually thought it was legit. Look at this one comment I got:
It's an interesting argument..."why alter all of the brain when you can create an effect with a localized solution." I think that actually has merit. I suggest you pursue this argument in your defense and compare the two with brutal honesty. Bravo
Now, this could have been someone I know continuing the joke (how could I tell; it's anonymous). However, if it was someone who did think I was for real, then that made my week! :D And perhaps I (or Doc C) will end up writing an argument to this extent.
THE JOKE'S ON ME 1: Okay, this is a little aside for things that happened that, while pulled by nobody in particular, came back to bite me in the butt. I kept my Alternate TLD up for two days. Why? Because I thought that nearly nobody had seen it on April Fool's Day. Why would I think something like that? Well, look at my Analytics report on visitors. That's, like, a 98% drop in readership. I was livid! Why would people abandon me on Fun Day? It wasn't until I got the site back in normal working order that I realized the truth: when I switched the format of the site, I inadvertently deleted the Analytics measuring tool.
Joke #3 - On Elderly Apple: Oftentimes, comics (both the traditional and web- variety) will do something crazy for April Fool's Day. However, Elderly Apple's a tough nut to crack. How exactly does one do a "crazy" comic when the whole goddamn series is just one big non-sequitur?
So, I decided I should change my medium. Instead of my normal marker/colored pencil combo, I went with Photoshop painting and a picture (a real picture!) of an apple (you have to stay true to your roots, dawg).
But, even as whimsical as EA usually is, there is some logic to the madness. I decided to throw that out the window, though, when I created WAAAAAAAHHH!!!
There's three instances of the word "WAAAAAAAHHH!!!" that I put in the comic; one in the picture itself, one in the picture's title (which you see by holding your cursor over the image on the main page; if you never knew about that, you're missing out on some of the better jokes), and of course, in my comment.
(P.S. If you have a good memory, you may remember me using a similar phrase before...)
Interestingly enough, an enlarged version of this comic is my current desktop background.
Not My Joke #1 - Youtube: I probably got Rickrolled a dozen times on April Fool's Day.
What's that, you've never been Rickrolled? Here, let me assist you. Enjoy.
In case you didn't know, that was Rick Astley singing his hit 1987 song "Never Gonna Give You Up." As far as internet "trap" pranks, this is probably safest, cleanest, most wholesome of them all (and trust me, you don't want to know about the others). Basically, you set up an unrelated link that tricks people into watching Astley's soulful performance.
So, Youtube decided to pick up on this. On April 1st, every single one of the videos on their front page went to a video of "Never Gonna Give You Up." They even had created an entire profile for it.
Good fun. Except now I have a cheesy 80s song stuck in my head. The horror.
Not My Joke #2 - Google + Virgin = Virgle: Google is always decent with their jokes, but I really have to hand it to them for their work this year in creating a much broader, more interactive prank. As always, it was simple; when you went onto Google, you saw a little link for something called Virgle, which is a cooperative effort between them and fellow giant company, Virgin. To do what, exactly? Well, to colonize Mars!
You know what, it's too involved for me to explain. Here, just go read it yourself. Go on. I can wait.
Finished reading? Good. Now, if you went through the whole thing, you'll be able to see that there were introduction videos by the co-founders of Google and Richard Branson. Now, I really like Richard Branson; always have. However, the Google boys (especially the gray-haired one) desperatelyneed to work on their public speaking abilitities.
Now, you'll also see that you could send in a 30-second video response as a sort of "application" to become a Virgle pioneer. Now, there were 300+ videos responding to this. Half of them were well over 30 seconds, and about 85% of them were either totally crappy or the people didn't seem to understand that the whole thing was a joke. I decided to join along. Here's my entry.
(Oh, and here's a copy of that flag.) The hope was that I would get a "At least he's honest" acceptance into the program.
THE JOKE'S ON ME 2: Unfortunately, things didn't go as smoothly as planned. For some reason (and I still cannot figure out why), there was some technical problem preventing my video from being used as a reply to theirs. So I went through all that work, blood, sweat, toil, and heartache for nothing except a 3-star rating from some random jerk (I would have given it a 4, personally).
Okay, that's all. This is by no means the full extent of all that occurred on April Fool's Day, but it is a healthy sampling. And to think that I used to hate this holiday, an opportunity to have so much fun...shameful. In any event, I hope you enjoyed your April Fool's Day shenanigans. From Doc C and all of us here, take care and God Bless.
A hearty hello and welcome to my colleagues and colleagues soon to be!
My name is Dr. Frank Corlin. I am a licensed lobotomist, and I have been practicing it for 36 years without ever taking a vacation from my beautiful Maryland home. In fact, I've lived in Maryland for my whole life, sharing the last 40 of them with my beautiful wife, Barbara. We've had 2 children, and are just now watching our 2 grandchildren growing up. (Little Chester calls me Doc C; I love it!)
But I'm not here to talk to you about my personal life (though I will mention it from time to time). No, I'm here to talk about my profession.
Lobotomy has been, I think, unfairly singled out in the medical world as a dangerous operation at best, and a crock at worst. This seems to stem from people's ideas that no science relating to a brain's physical state has any merit. Oh, yes, psychology and psychiatry are well-respected, because they tackle the mental issues, but lobotomy has been lumped in with phrenology just because we have to touch the brain.
I once had a patient who came to me (or rather, I was referred to her by my colleague, Dr. Phillip Kohl) and asked me, without a moment's hesitation, "Doctor, isn't lobotomy just a pseudoscience created by the Aztecs?"
I must have scared her, I was laughing so heartily.
"No," I replied, "You're thinking of trepanation, a process created by the Incanpeople in which they removed a piece of the skull in order to relieve pressure from the brain."
"Oh, then what is lobotomy?" she asked with genuine interest.
I smiled back at her as I said, "We remove a piece of the brain."
Of course, the concept scared the living daylights out of her. But after the procedure was done, she was calm and quiet as a clam. I'm sure she was pleased by the procedure, and by the fact that she didn't let her preconceptions get in the way.
Now, lobotomy first came into general use in 1890, by Dr. Gottlieb Burckhardt. Here is a picture of him. A brilliant Swiss man, Burckhardt removed pieces of the frontal lobes of six different patients who were suffering from psychosis. As with all brand new procedures, the results were somewhat mixed. One of the patients died after the operation, and another was from in a river 10 days later. The rest exhibited some form of altered behavior, mostly for the better. While this may sound like poor odds, a 2/3 success rate is actually quite high, particularly for 19th-century European medical practices. In his work, Dr. Burckhardt showed what miracles could be achieved simply by eliminating some uneeded gray matter.
In more recent times, lobotomies have reduced in frequency, mainly due to a lack of proper information, and because of mind-altering drugs. Now, you'll forgive me if I'm a little biased, but why are people so opposed to removing a small part of their brain, but are completely keen on doping up the entire organ? There's a bit of irrationality there, mainly brought on by the crafty advertising (or some would say propaganda) of the pharmaceutical companies.
Because the practice has diminished, so have the practitioners. I am one of only a handful of certified lobotomists in the United States . And remember, you should never let an unlicensed lobotomist operate on you - that's called homicide. (Sorry, that's a little bit of lobotomy humor for you.)
Unfortunately, I can only reach and teach so many people in Somerset and it's surrounding cities. That's when my daughter suggested that I create a "weblog," which is a kind of online journal. I thought that it was a brilliant idea. And so, here I am, spreading my knowledge and passion for this science...and art!
Now, I think this is a good start, but I definitely want to hear what you are interested in. In these weblogs, visitors are allowed to write comments. There is a button that says "comment" below. If you click on it, you can write a response to what I say. It's somewhat like a bulletin board! So, if you are interested, leave a comment. Give any suggestions and hard-hitting questions you have about lobotomy, or about Doc C. I'm here for you, so let's make this weblog a powerful tool for lobotomy enthusiasts everywhere!
And here's what the cover would look like if I had published the book today:
Is it better? Well, I can't really give an unbiased answer. All I know is that I would be more likely to pick up the latter cover at a bookstore...much more likely. Who knows, maybe in another 5 years, I'll be totally turned around on the subject, or maybe I'll think there should be yet another version.
Now, lobotomy first came into general use in 1890, by Dr. Gottlieb Burckhardt. Here is a picture of him. A brilliant Swiss man, Burckhardt removed pieces of the frontal lobes of six different patients who were suffering from psychosis. As with all brand new procedures, the results were somewhat mixed. One of the patients died after the operation, and another was from in a river 10 days later. The rest exhibited some form of altered behavior, mostly for the better. While this may sound like poor odds, a 2/3 success rate is actually quite high, particularly for 19th-century European medical practices. In his work, Dr. Burckhardt showed what miracles could be achieved simply by eliminating some uneeded gray matter.
