If there is one piece of photographic knowledge that everyone on earth knows, it’s that taking pictures of people on railroad tracks automatically makes said people way cooler. If I had a nickel for every time I’ve seen Facebook pictures of angst-y teens taking dramatic pictures of themselves walking down the local railroad tracks all ‘lost in their own thoughts’, I would have enough nickels to fill a pillowcase and break one of the Ten Commandments. I’m not sure what makes these metal transportation pathways so goddamn iconic and edgy. Perhaps it’s because they are dangerous. Kids are rebellious these days. They would like nothing more than to put back a couple 0.5% beers, get buzzed off white board markers, then go waltzing across literal deathtraps with the camera they got for their 14th birthday clutched in-hand.

“Okay, you just go down there and I’ll stay here, then you just like… look over into that direction and pretend that you’re thinking.”

One press of the shutter button and one brain-dead teenager becomes a figurative Nostradamus in the eyes of all his peers. It’s not enough to just take the picture, oh no. One would be so severely ridiculed that the next trip to the train-tracks would be a messy, messy suicide. Aforementioned picture must first go through the grueling transformations of no less than six different pirated-Photoshop filters, accompanied by a coloured font that must be quoting mildly relevant song lyrics as well as miscellaneous punctuation that seems to be accidentally added onto the end.

There you have it. Through the magic of Photoshop and the total lack of design knowledge, millions of teens around the world have turned angsty amateur teen photos that suck into angsty amateur teen photos that suck even more.

So, just discovered that early in 2008,we saw a star explode. That alone is not the crazy part.

Get this:

• The star set the world record for furthest object that can be seen from earth with the naked eye.
• The star was 40 times as big as the Sun.
• The star was 7.5 billion light years away.
• 7.5 billion lightyears is roughly halfway to the edge of the universe.
• For reference, one billion seconds ago, it was 1977.
• One light year equals 5.9 trillion miles.
• So, standing on earth, we are capable of seeing something 46610000000000000000000 miles away.
• The star’s explosion occurred when the universe was about half its current age.

I don’t know about you, but I am reeling in collosal amazement. Seriously, HOLY FUCK.

(If your brain is still partially intact, finish it off with this video: The Most Important Image Ever Taken)

Wikipedia is a literal treasure trove of information. In this day and age, where the internet is chock full of porn, meme’s, and photos of Barack Obama skateboarding and holding nunchucks in-front of a helicopter exploding , it’s a nice change to have somewhere where you can go and learn about millions and millions of things that you are actually interested in, instead of having mostly useless information force fed to you at school. However, like any hero, whether it’s human or technological, there are always haters. If I had a nickel for every authority figure that has ever told me not to use Wikipedia because it is Satan reincarnated in pure HTML form, I would have a satchel full of nickels both large and heavy enough to seriously kill someone if I was to swing it around and around in a violent manner above my head. Who would hate on Wikipedia? you might ask. Why would they try and bring down such a wonderful and knowledgeable website? Well, the answer is very simple. They are d-bags. And the d, if you didn’t know, stands for douche.

The hater’s main argument, and only real argument, is that Wikipedia is not a ‘respectable’ information source, or that it’s ‘full of lies’ simply because anyone can edit it. Well I’m here to prove them wrong, and give you the upper hand when you are doing any sort of online research assignment. Firstly, I want to show you a picture that will quite obviously both blow and boggle your mind at the same time:

You see that? Those conveniently highlighted superscript numbers enclosed in square brackets are called references, and they are here to help you! You see, it’s sad to say it, but Wikipedia isn’t 100% accurate. There are millions of stunned children around the world that can throw up any kind of crack-speak into Wikipedia, and although the Wikipedian moderators try their best to keep these garbage spewing kids out, there is undoubtedly some false information that seeps through. However, there is a surefire way to double check for this legitimacy, and it’s called references! You see, those itsy bitsy numbers are actually links. If you were to click on them, they will bring you to the very bottom of the page where you can see another link. This link, however, goes straight to a source!

That’s right folks, a source. This six-lettered ‘S’ word is something that teachers everywhere can appreciate. Basically, it gives you direct access to the article or website that the user took the information from. In other words, it’s your portal to a legit bibliography! Instead of putting down Wikipedia as your source of information, you can simply put down this other link and BAM, your teacher/professor is content.

There, that was easy wasn’t it? Now stop bitching that you failed your English paper because your teacher didn’t like that you used Wikipedia’s list of zombie films when describing the past and present Canadian funeral rites and customs.

Why is there such thing as ‘new car’ scented air fresheners? Firstly, new cars don’t smell very good – it’s like a combination of factory and robots. Secondly, why would you want to make your old car smell like it’s new? It’s obvious that you did not just buy your car, so making it smell like you did is pretty much calling yourself both a liar and an unskilled hoodwinker.

It’s like a nasty old lady wearing a skirt and fishnets. We can all see past your little tricks.

Today I saw someone run down the hallway at school. Normally an event like this wouldn’t even deserve a second thought, much less a post on one of the most esteemed blogs on the internet. However, this dude running down the hall wasn’t a normal dude, he was ULTIMATE-DEATH-METAL-FAN-DUDE!

He looked sort of like these fellows, except way more hardcore and scary. One of the differences was that the dude I saw was wearing approximately 20lbs of chains on, about, or near his body. He simply loved them! They covered his pants, his jacket, and his Cradle of Filth t-shirt. Even his big black boots were covered in chains! I would have approached him and called him Alice (link to Alice in chains), but he unfortunately ran away.

The remarkable thing about him running was that it sounded totally unlike the music he most likely enjoyed listening to. All those chains were clinking and clanging together so wonderfully that it sounded like there was no less than a DOZEN horse-drawn sleighs covered in jingle bells being pulled down the street on Christmas Eve as snow lightly powdered the ground. You can image his obvious embarrassment when he realized that his badass appearance, instead of spreading depression and moshpit tenancies, instead produced beautiful Christmas music.

I would have yelled out “Play ‘Deck the Halls’!”, but I was very afraid that he would stomp me with his giant black army boots.

It’s not fucking fair.

I have never been an avid follower and worshiper of the newest styles and trends. I like my band t-shirts, jeans, and black Chuck Taylors. I’ll admit that the thought of me throwing a pair of skinny jeans on struts though my mind every now and then, but that is beside the point. What I’m trying to say is that I do my best to look presentable, but i don’t go out of my way. This is exactly the reason why things are not fucking fair.

About eight years ago, the spawn of Satan that my mom refers to as the ‘optometrist’ told me that I needed a pair of glasses. I told him that he could go to hell. i would have won the battle of words, but he also told my parents who thought it would be in my best interest to get a pair. For those of you who were never 10 years old and in Elementary School, having glasses was on-par with being the kid who didn’t like recess or the guy that put glue on his sandwiches. I was a perfectly normal kid then, well liked by many of my peers, so you can obviously understand my horror and intense loathing of not only the bastard optometrist but also of my parents who practically sentenced me to social seclusion and depression.

Monday rolled along and I was on the playground with shiny new glasses hidden in my backpack, doing my best to enjoy my last game of grounder while I still had friends. When class time rolled around I unhappily withdrew the spectacles from my bag and placed them on my face. At that exact moment, every single kid turned around and looked at me, their faces contorting with laughter and their fingers pointing at my face, directing their ridicule and teasing. I’ve never cried so hard in my life.

This is why it’s not fucking fair.

Now, 8 years later, I have been redeemed. The pair of brown-framed glasses that I was reluctant to purchase are now considered ‘cool’. All those days of teasing, those intolerable recesses spent playing with the blind kids, and God-knows how many painful wedgies were now finally paid back in full. Instead of being the stupid-white-kid-who-can’t-see, I am now the stupid-white-kid-with-cool-glasses. Oh, how the heavens have blessed me! I was all smiles and sunshine for several weeks until I read an article in the University newspaper entitled ‘New Hipster Style For Fall’. After reading it, I wanted to drown a panda.

On the front page, a girl’s face accented by dark bangs and a couple piercings stared me in the face, right through a pair of FAKE GLASSES!

How fucking dare you?! I suffered through Elementary School wearing these abominations and now you, in the name of fashion, choose to wear these cheap plastic LIES on your face. The article stated:

…thick plastic glasses with removed lenses will give you a sexy ‘geek’ look, perfectly accenting your clothes and hair.

For all I cared it could have said:

…thick black glasses with removed lenses will give you a FUCK GARRET AND HIS PAINFUL CHILDHOOD.

My time to shine has finally rolled around, and it was shot down by fashion-worshipping dream-smashers. My only hope is that cowlicks come into style someday soon. Lets see those hipster kids replicate that shit.

I catch a ride with my mom to University everyday. She works at the University Hospital, so riding with her not only saves me gas money, but it also saves me having to pay to rent a parking spot that’s a 5 kilometre walk across hardened lava, rickety rope bridges, and quicksand pits. The unfortunate this is that mom has to be at work at 7:30am each and every single day. 7:30am. This may not seem too bad, but take into consideration that my classes start at 10:00am every day. That’s right, 10-fucking-o’clock. Not only does this rob me of precious time that could be spent drooling on my pillow in my underwear, enjoying a comatose-like state, but it makes me sit at the University for two and a half hours with absolutely nothing to do.

Mom always tells me that I can use this time for ‘catching up on homework’, but that’s bullshit. Everyone knows that homework only gets done if it absolutely needs to, and thus far there have been no such assignments. So, for the last couple weeks, I have been sitting on a bench and either reading a book or reading my RSS feeds; both of which I lost interest in on about the 4th day. Now what is a young boy to do with all this free time on his hands? I tried to sleep in the car once, but I quickly learned that car seats are the most uncomfortable beds ever, and that the airbag does not make a good pillow due to the fact that it doesn’t stay inflated for long. I tried searching around campus for a secluded room or bench that no one sits on where I could bring a pillow and blanket and nap, but it seems that the 20,000 kids going to the U of S are out to get me by inhabiting every single plush bench on campus.

So since sleeping is out of the picture, it seems that I would have to find an activity that I could do while awake to fill my free time. Days went by with me wandering the lonely halls of University, searching, craving for something to do. I was like a ghost, floating past classrooms and lecture halls without a destination, and only the unhappy knowledge that I could be laying in bed right now. It wasn’t until I went for some coffee that I realized what I was put here so early to do. I would become friends with the women that worked at Tim Hortons.

It was so simple, I couldn’t believe that I hadn’t thought of it before. I went there almost everyday to purchase some coffee that would help me through those cold, lonely mornings, and there was always dudes that went up to the counter only to be greeted by the middle-aged woman that knew their first name, their method of transportation to school, their drink, their drink size, and what they had planned for the day (ex: “Oh hello Robert! Must have been a cold bike ride to school today I bet. Let me guess, large coffee with two sugar, one cream? … Here you go! I hope you have fun at your Biology lab this afternoon!) Just hearing this makes me jealous of the biker who drinks large coffees. How awesome would it be to come to school, and have the woman working at Tim Hortons grab you your desired hot-beverage without you even having to say a word? It’s like you have your own personal robot, except instead of an antenna on its head, yours has a brown visor and a hairnet. Just thinking about this new possible University-residing friend fills me with such warmth that only a large mocha could replicate.

The friend-making will begin on Monday. Watch out ladies, here comes your new best pal.

Today at University I saw a zombie. It was like the textbook definition of an undead human:

• he was very pale, almost a pasty white
• his expression was one of emptiness, with a touch of sadness and remorse
• his eyes were open and aware, but it was obvious that he wasn’t seeing anything; a blank stare
• his mouth was open slightly, as if about to speak, but never actually doing so
• his legs seemed to be very limp – his feet dragged more than they stepped

The only thing missing was the decaying skin and absence of limbs or other vital body parts. It took note of all this in the 5 seconds it took me to walk past him. He was shuffling his way in the opposite direction down the hallway, and I couldn’t help but pull my sweater down over any exposed skin, as not to taunt him with my non-undead flesh. I’ll keep my eyes and ears open for any reports of bitings. If none, I will safely assume that he either expired somewhere near a dumpster or his head was removed/brain was destroyed by some brave zombie hunter.

(For those of you who have seen the movie Shawn of the Dead (absolutely excellent, you must watch it if you haven’t), It reminded me of the zombie kids at the very beginning of the movie, when they are all shuffling down the back alley, nodding their heads to their music. You will also be the only people who see the humour in the post title.)

Dear obvious weight-watchers,

I can’t help but notice how my workplace has been plagued by people who think that eating a whole donut is going to bombard them with excess body fat. You unnamed defilers of sugary, doughy goodness open the box of donuts sitting on the table, then take a knife and cut your preferred donut into halves, thirds, even FOURTHS, as if eating a whole donut is going to cause raw calories to spill out of every bodily orifice and your gut to protrude out of the bottom of your shirt. C’mon, give us a break. Not only are you making yourself look like those paranoid calorie counters who have to measure out the amount of skim milk they pour into their Special K, but it ruins the donut-eating experience for the rest of us as well. Put yourselves in our position.

You are working in the warehouse when you hear the rumour that some kind soul has graced the lunchroom with a couple dozen donut-y treats. Happiness exuding through your skin, you practically skip your way through the warehouse and into the offices. Arriving in the lunchroom, the aroma of dough and icing tantalizes your nostrils. Mouth drooling, you stumble over to the boxes and open them like a pirate would open a chest full of booty. Your high hopes are blown to smithereens when you see that your favorite donut, the maple glazed classic, has been raped by a knife-wielding rapscallion. A once marvellous bakery creation is now torn to bits, the pieces lying at the bottom of the box, unwanted and forgotten. You finish them off to end their misery, then take a different donut and walk back to the warehouse. The donut is good, but it’s just not your favorite. You spend the rest of the day silently cursing whoever destroyed something so beautiful, and promising that you will return the revengeful favour, no matter what cost.

I understand that you care about your body. It’s normal to want to eat healthy and shy away from junk food and other sinful delights. However, you have to take into consideration that it’s one fucking donut. You’re not overweight because you eat a donut once a week when someone happens to bring them to work. You’re overweight because you sit on the couch at home and eat bags upon bags of Doritos, washed down by a 2L of Mountain Dew instead of actually watching and taking part in those workout videos that you bought 3 years ago.

I’ve been thinking lately about how someday I’m going to die. It’s not that big of a deal to me. Hundreds of people die every second, so really, in the big picture, my death is pretty much insignificant to most. However, what I am worried about is how people will remember me once I’m dead. Sure, there’s the chance that I could do something great with my life like find a cure for some kind of disease, write some all-knowing computer program that finds a cure for some kind of disease, or becoming something awesome like the best Frisbee thrower in the world. Although grand if accomplished, one always needs a back-up. An easier, simpler backup that would give one the same everlasting results, but in a more convenient package. This is what I’ve really been thinking about.

In my head, I’ve been picturing my death. It’s always been a curiosity of mine to see if I could die standing up. Not straight standing (I don’t think that’s a physical possibility), but more like leaning in a corner and locking the legs. Hopefully when my heart has pumped it last pump, and my mouth has been fixed in an everlasting smile, I will pass on, but my shell will remain standing, as if saying ‘Hey guys, I’m dead and I’m still good to go.’ That’s the kind of impression I would like to leave.

Still, there’s the chance that my death won’t be slow, and that I won’t know exactly when I’m going to kick the bucket. Perhaps it’s a sudden, unforeseeable death. Maybe I fell down the worlds longest flight of stairs, and after finally reaching the bottom, beaten to a pulp, bruised black and blue, and bleeding from places that I didn’t know blood flowed, I would have only seconds to leave a lasting legacy (other than, you know, falling down like a million stairs). It is in this situation that I came to the conclusion that a phrase would best keep the memory of me alive. I read a couple quote sites here and there on the topic, but none of the quotes really fit what I’m about. It was then that I decided to come up with my final words ahead of time, so when the time comes, I will be orally prepared.

Even now, I’m still not sure exactly what they should be. Loud proclamations of ancient mythology or the sense of approaching doom would be a good way to go I think. It would leave everyone in a sort of mental blur; their brains lost between feelings of sadness and fear. It’s the kind of reaction that would really tear a family apart. Or there’s always the option of yelling out a random phrase that sounds like you’re some kind of war hero about to enter his final battle. A phrase such as ‘ONWARD… TO EVERLASTING GLORY’ or maybe ‘YOU THINK THE DEVIL CAN STOP ME?! I ACCEPT THE CHALLENGE!’ would probably be good terminal phrases to utter. It is vital that there are as many people as possible around to hear you, which allows for talking amongst themselves after, discussing what the words meant and why they were yelled at such as decibel level. The confusion and worry that you would leave them with would be worth the fact that you are now deceased and about to be buried in the earth.

There is really no final conclusion at this point. I think that in this case, one would have to keep a couple different phrases or ideas in the back of his/her mind, then when the time comes, choose accordingly. If all else fails, I think it would be pretty cool to just start laughing, and then die mid-laugh. Then everyone could say that you laughed yourself to death. Not only is it happily optimistic, but for years and years people will wonder what the fuck was so funny.