Paranormal

It is raining. I dislike the rain. Yes, the rain is wonderful if you are wearing sweats, sitting with a warm cup of hot cocoa, listening to the crackle of the wood in the fireplace. No, the rain is not wonderful when you have stuff to do, people to see, places to walk, places to drive. Rain causes delays--in everything. Don't get me wrong, the rain replenishes this earth, which is necessary.

I'm finished with that.

This morning was interesting. I was thinking about what I would wear and I instantly thought to be a British businessman. This made me sad because, according to this post, I had already pulled this one off. So I pulled something else off, just a normal businessman who has some sense of strange style, matching his tie and sunglasses, but wearing gray colors to symbolize the color of the sky. So I thought...

I am sorry if this blog takes forever and a day to load. The last post is the problem and I will try to make sure it doesn't happen again. If it does, I apologize. If it doesn't, I apologize I don't have enough content.

Speaking of content, I have an interesting piece of business to decipher.


With the recent unpredictable success of Paranormal Activity, mainly attributed to its marketing and Internet following, the success reminds any cinema follower of 2008’s Cloverfield. Sitting amongst excited moviegoers waiting for Transformers to begin, I, like everybody else, paid particular attention to a previously unseen home-video clip. The theater quieted down as the preview pressed on. The clip depicted a first-person account of a New York City party, fiercely interrupted by an intense explosion, breaking the “home-video” up, inducing a multitude of confusion. The preview ended with two textual phrases: “From Producer J.J. Abrams” and “In Theaters 1-18-08;” no movie title, no other information, only the madness of a vague trailer and two simple statements. This quickly got people talking. The trailer confused the masses, nobody knew what to think of it, and, naturally, turned to the Internet. At an incredible pace, the Internet movie database followed the film referred to as “Untitled JJ Abrams Project” to number one on its ranking system. The marketing for the film that would soon become known as Cloverfield was risky, but absolutely brilliant. The people fueled this film from the beginning; the filmmakers simply introduced an incredibly vague movie trailer to the outspoken public without a title.

Not only was the marketing outstanding, but the people behind the film kept their mouths shut the entire time. Hollywood has a tendency to leak information such as titles and plot lines, but Cloverfield’s people did not give a hint. According to imdb.com, there were six different names, all fake or promotional, that were given to Cloverfield before official release. The public was kept guessing, and it paid off, seeing $46 million in the Martin Luther King Jr. weekend.
Cloverfield took a chance at a new marketing scheme that easily proved worthwhile.

In the light of Cloverfield, Paranormal Activity, originally intended for less than 150 screens, has been “demanded” over 1,000,000 times and will be released in theaters worldwide as soon as possible. “Paranormal Activity, like Cloverfield, unconventionally advertised and will undoubtedly see remarkable results.


The spiel on Cloverfield was an assignment for class so don't be alarmed. If you are asking why you should be alarmed, then you clearly are not alarmed, therefore you should not be concerned.

I have two more topics to talk about.

NUMBER ONE: this blog has changed a lot and I think I know why. I originally made it to simply remember the events of my senior year. When people started reading it, which blew me away, it turned into a little more than simple account of the day. At first, and you can track this, I used people's names, referred to many instances that people who knew me pretty good would understand and maybe even remember because they would have been there. Now I'm in college. The vast majority of you, the readers, know me from when I was in high school, in Simi Valley. If you went to Royal High School, even if you did not know specifically who I was talking about, you could gain a certain perspective because you spent 7+ hours at the same place I did. Times have changed. Now I'm at Biola, and you, the reader, can be right where you were last year or perhaps, like me, you have moved on to bigger and better things. Because of this, if I were to mention specific people, 90% of you, the readers, would have no context of what I was talking about. Do you understand the dilemma? I hope you do, because I feel like I'm explaining something that is indistinguishable. Point is, I will see what you, the readers, enjoy reading about and I might do a little experimenting...

NUMBER TWO: I want to explain the original intention of the "Collared-shirt Wednesday." We all know that Wednesday is the middle of the week. Especially in a five-day school week, Wednesday is not the beginning and not the end, justifying a lull in the middle of the week. So why not spice the least exciting day of the week by dressing up a little bit? Seems to have worked. A decent number of Royal High School students asked me permission to continue on the tradition by dressing up on Wednesdays. However, almost a dejavu, I have been informed that the numbers are dwindling, just like they did when the four of us started the "Collared-shirt Wednesday" August 5th, 2008. I don't know what I think of this. It saddens me, but yet, it was expected. I can say this though: stay strong collared-shirt Wednesday continuees.


And I have a last thing: boy this is a long post.

I was reading "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis the other day for class and I came across this:

"There is no need to be worried by facetious people who try to make the Christian hope of 'Heaven' ridiculous by saying they do not want 'to spend eternity playing harps'. The answer to such people is that if they cannot understand books written for grown-ups, they should not talk about them. All the scriptural imagery (harps, crowns, gold, etc.) is, of course, a merely symbolical attempt to express the inexpressible. Musical instruments are mentioned because for many people (not all) music is the thing known in the present life which most strongly suggests ecstasy and infinity. Crowns are mentioned to suggest the fact that those who are united with God in eternity share His splendour and power and joy. Gold is mentioned to suggest the timelessness of Heaven (Gold does not rust) and the preciousness of it. People who take these symbols literally might as well think that when Christ told us to be like doves, He meant that we were to lay eggs."

Mr. C.S. brings the heat. What's funny about this is that this argument was brought up the other day and I had never thought about it before. I forget what I was going to write about this and I'm kind of bummed. Anyway, C.S. Lewis is the man when it comes to determining real life simplistic examples to clearly demonstrate complex situations. It makes me appreciative.



That was a mouthful. I'd suggest of nice swig of some iced water imported from the mountains. It will quench your thirst for sure.