Day 5: Rising stars, the art of blogging, Xperimental Theater

Rising Stars

So I truly am a cinefile. I love movies. love Love LOVE them. I am also studying to be an actor and so I really follow actor's careers a lot. If there is an actor I like I will seek out their entire filmography.

This section is about four actors. Two females and two males. Within the last years their careers have started to take off. I will set up a poll question for each pairing. A deathmatch if you will. I want you to choose the actor you think is going places. We cane revisit this post in say... five years and see who is right.

Jennifer Lawrence

Jennifer Lawrence exploded onto the scene right away. In 2010 the world was introduced to her for pretty much the first time (other than some really small movies parts and some minor television). 2010's Winter's Bone was horrifying, intense, and Jennifer Lawrence gave an Oscar-deserving performance. Now she has had a few other movies (Judi Foster's The Beaver **shudders**), but the next film people will know and recognize her for is of coarse The Hunger Games. I didn't like that movie as a whole but Lawrence brought another brilliant performance to that role.


                                                           VS.


Emma Stone

Emma Stone is a stone cold fox. She doesn't even need that going for her though because she is funny. Incredibly funny.  2010 and 2011 were very good to Stone. She starred in Easy A  the Scarlet Letter themed John Hugh homage where the world truly discovered and appreciated her talents. Next year it was  Crazy Stupid Love and The Help. She is going to the be in the Spiderman reboot, which if I see this movie she is the reason I am going.

Criticism

An interesting critique of both Lawrence and Stone is so far they have pretty much played one-note characters. In Both Winter's Bone and Hunger Games Lawrence has played a bad-ass rebel who puts on a face of fearlessness but inside is terrified. Stone on the other hand has played to awkward pretty girl who is insecure even though she is like the prettiest one on screen. In the coming years it will be interesting to see these actors break out of their shells and really see who grows more.

Don't forget to vote in the poll!


Men, men, men, men, manly, men, men (I hate the show, love the theme song guilty pleasure)

Chris Hemsworth

You might remember him as Captain Kirk's father in Abbrams' Star Trek but you better remember him as the lovable oaf in Thor. I don't know if Thor is enough to say that Hemsworth has taken off, but then I looked at his IMDB page and was amazed. Not only is Hemsworth going to be in Joss Whedon's The Avengers, arguably the biggest action movie event of all time. He is also in Cabin in the Woods (another Whedon horror), The remake of Red Dawn, and Snow White and the Huntsman. if 2011 was the year of Michael Fassbender (It was but we will get to him tomorrow!) than 2012 is the Year of Chris Hemsworth.


                                                             VS.

Andrew Garfield

I am very conflicted about this one. On the one hand I loved The Social Network. In my opinion Social Network defined our generation the same way The Graduate defined my parents generation. On the other hand... He is Spiderman and as a admitted fanboy that annoys me to no end. Andrew Garfield is so not Peter Parker. There is no doubt in my mind that Garfield's career is on the rise but I have serious reservations about his choice in film projects.


So those are the deathmatch Lawrence vs. Stone and Hemsworth vs. Garfield. Please vote in my polls!


Art of Blogging

So in my opinion blogging is not a very defined art form. There is a lot of variance. On the one hand you have college professors at MIT and the experts in their field blogging on their research. On the other end of the spectrum you can have a fat kid in the basement writing fan-fic about Twilight. In this form both of these things are legitimate. That is both fascinating and confusing to me. I've realized now that I have blogged for about a week that it is A) very hard B) it takes a lot of commitment C) needs to be clearly defined.

I did have a mission statement-y thing on my first post. If you are new you can read that here (read the introductions section or all of it if you want). I do think I need to go back and maybe more clearly define the mission of this blog.

What the goal of this blog is:

• A way to force me to write every day without fail (which is really hard)
• An artistic journey I am sharing with the world. I am not fully-developed in this world as a writer, artist, or critic
• A place for me to vent and rage from time to time to keep my sanity
• A place where I can start to form and articulate my ideas about things

What this blog isn't

• Journalism- in my opinion at least there is a certain level craftsmanship and professionalism that Journalism is held to. I am also writing for an Internet newspaper and in college. Professional fully form papers already exist in my life, This blog is an attempt to break free from those conventions and try something different.
• grammerifical- I am going to level with the Internet. I hate grammar. I am really bad at it. I thought I was going to be an English major and then I realized I just do not have a firm understanding in linguistics to complete that task.  Like I said above, this blog is not intended to be a final product or a fully-realized idea on issues. It is more a starting point, a mind-dump, the beginning of a conversation. Do I try to edit this blog and make things as coherent and grammerifical as possible? Yes. Do I fail? YES. I plead you accept me for my short-comings and join in on the conversation.

That was really all I wanted to say on that topic. As more issues or criticism arise I will attempt to address and correct them. I hold my audience in the very highest regard and I truly respect you opinions. I hope to grow and change from this experience. I hope in three years looking back at these posts I will be embarrassed because I have improved. So join me on this journey of growth and experience.

Xperimental Theater. 

So there has been a very terrible and tragic death in my family: the student-run theater organization that had a strong legacy at my University has been killed. I am not here to dwell on what has happened but instead look to the future. What Socialist Alternative has taught me is when you go into this process of building something new you have to clearly define what you demands are. If you do not know what your demands are then you will never fully realize or be satisfied with you end product. So here is me taking a crack at my list of demands. I want others to challenge my demands and fight for their demands. This is a collaborative process. 

My Demands

• We need the money. The $3000 budget has to be there and available for students to create art. It is not a lot of money by any stretch of the imagination, but that money does three things
• It provides freedom to fail. It grants students working on projects the freedom to not worry about how ticket sales will work or with they will "Break even"
• It gives the organization legitimacy. I can put the Xperimental Theatre on a resume and it means something. A place wanting to hire me can look into the X and see that is a legitimate organization and funded by the U. While spontaneous art is important and has a place too it will not be viewed on a resume the same way. 
• It teaches student how a real theater company can work. Directors have to answer to a board who have to manage a finite amount of funds. Yes in the idealistic world you can make art out of nothing, but we live and work in the real world. A world where money, structures, and boards exist. This student organization should teach a theater student the good and bad behind a structure and how to deal with it
• We need a place where students can practically experiment with designing, stage managing, acting, directing, ect. I have been interested in directing for awhile, but I have never been really able to give it a shot. In the real world if I were to try and fail it could have very negative implications on my life.  College is a time to experiment and fail. I want to be able have a student organization where I can direct and fail and have that be ok. this doesn't just apply to directing, but all aspect of the theater. 
• This organization needs to have upperclassmen and underclassmen involvement. One of the best parts of the X was it introduced me to people. When i joined this program last fall I felt very much like an outsider who didn't belong. Doing a show in the X helped get to know some upperclassmen of the department and start to feel like part of the theater community here at the U. I love the way that almost the entire department went to every X show to support each other's art. The sense of community as well and breaking down barriers between upperclassmen and underclassmen need to continue. 

These are really all my demand for the new student organization. I look forward to working with our wonderful theater community in building a new student organization. It will be great whenever this process ends to know that we create this thing with our own blood sweat and tears and that it is ours and we truly own it.

That's all for Day 5 (no it is NOT a day late and I am NOT cheating....)

Peace and love,

Will

Day 4: The Joys of Posterings, Million Hoodie March, and Male Slut Shaming

The Joys of Postering

So for those of you who do not know I work in the marketing department for the Theater Department. The show we are working on is the Broadway smash-hit musical Spring Awakening. I wont go into details on the premise of the musical because y'all have the interwebs for that. Basically all you need to know is the show involves sex. Lots of sex and sex sells (we have sold 602 tickets without any posters up!). This is also the show that launched Lia Michele to stardom (for better but mainly for worse).

here is a small sample of the style of music from Spring Awakening:




Working in the marketing department one of the incredibly fun tasks I get to do is wander campus with a staples guns and put up posters everywhere. This may sound not so fun, but you obviously are not a 12 year old boy at heart like me. (I could just shoot a staple gun all day long).

Today was beautiful and it was amazing walking around outside from building to building. This campus is huge. Living on the West Bank and spending most of my time in Rarig (the theater building) campus can start to feel really small. I walked through about a dozen different buildings today. 80% of which I have never seen of or even heard of.

Having class in STSS, Carlson School of Management, and Fowell, I can forget how nice I have it in those buildings. Walking through some of the buildings I wandered through today it was like I was on a different planet. Some of these campus building seem like they have not have renovations since campus opened. This leads to journeys as you wander through floor plans that make no sense and you can smell the mold and see the crumbling drywall.

I encourage everyone to get out and enjoy the great weather of Spring and explore some areas of where ever you are that you never have even thought about. It can only end in a new perspective.


Million Hoodie March for Trayvon Martin

I am not really going into the story behind Trayvon Martin at this point. You literally (yes "Literally" you goddamn hipsters) have to have been living under a rock the last few weeks to not hear anything about this scandal.

So tonight Socialist Alternative participated in Minneapolis's Million Hoodie March for Trayvon Martin. The turn out was incredible. There were almost 5000 protesters there tonight (Source).  Just to put this protest in perspective there at launch day for OccupyMN (yes I was there too) there were about 2000+.

People bused in from Mankato, Duluth, and Minneapolis Technical College (MCTC) as well as all around the city. There were students, parents, elderly and children all united to not only bring justice for Trayvon and his family, but to end the institutional racism in our country.

I won't bore you with more details, but in the coming days a more thorough report written by a one Will Sullivan might come through the magic tubes of the internet (thanks Al Gore).

Here are pictures of signs we sported at the protest tonight:

Hey stalkers you can start to see my dorm room! Where do I live? I sleep with the door unlocked!!!


Male Slut shaming

Gender reversal?

Let me start by saying I stole this issue from @fakedansavage. Dan starts his podcast each week with a mini-political rant (the source of Will's inspiration starts to shine through).

The skinny basically is a male substitute teacher was fired from a Florida school district over the fact that he had a history of working in the porn industry. Now as an actor (who someday might be on stage or camera nude) I find this very troubling. What kind of standards or bars are we setting for future teachers? This man did nothing unprofessional in the classroom at all, but because of his other job the school district up and fires him? (also he broke no laws. I obviously don't support a teacher who sells crack as their other profession).

This entire issue reminds me of Wienergate of last year. Just to make my stance perfectly clear on the Anthony Wiener scandal I thought his actions did not justify him getting thrown out of Congress. The reason I did support him stepping down is he lied to the press and his constituents for several days. That is why he deserved to go. Politicians (and teachers) have private lives. As long as those stay out of their career then they have every right to do what they want between two or more consenting adults.

What kind of bar are we setting for ourselves in the future? I know how my generation works. To quote Dan Savage's rant "everyone under the age of 40 now as a mini-porn factory in their pocket. it's called their iphones and they are all using it." If porn is a thing that prevents us from running for public office, or teaching, or applying for a job then in another 10-15 years when the next generation takes over who will run our government? Teach our children? Provide goods and services to drive our economy?

Just food for thought. I know as a performer I never want to be held accountable for anything I do on stage in future employment endeavours. If I play a white supremacist in a show, that doesn't make me a racist. Performing in a porno does not make anyone  a pervert or dirty.  A job is a job.

Here is the teacher I am referencing on Dr. Drew defending himself I agree with everything he says:



well that's enough blogging for one night. I still have to write a lab report for Biology of Sex (and here I thought it was going to be a thirsty Thursday)

Night world,

Will

Day 3 Business, Supreme Court, and Killing Boundaries

Business

So let's get the boring stuff out of the way. Today I started attempting to structure and build my blog. I got google adsense and google analytics. Let me start out by saying I do not know anything about computers. I installed and signed up for both of these applications without knowing anything.  I was instantly blasted with HTML and other techie lingo.

Luckily Google is the most user-friendly and basically greatest corporate entity ever ( a socialist praising a SP 500 corporation?) Other than their massive disrespect for copyright law and people's fourth amendment rights. The Google (you ever miss W.?) walked me through step by step with clear images, youtube videos, and english ( I said english motherfucker do you speak it!) how to get accomplished what I needed. Today for the first day ever I feel like a web designer which is pretty freaking fantastic.

So what's new?

I added a search engine to search through my copious amounts of content!

I added a sweet little welcome message to hook (deceive) new readers into staying

Well I added an option for people to follow and suscribe to my blog by email.

I also added a poll question I will change once a week (this weeks poll question will be very relavent to my next subject)

finally I there are now ads! Yes, this blog has become a big evil for profit corporation. No co-op here. Only exploiting workers.

things so to know about the ads on my site:

• I hope to make this blog a source of income someday so please click an ad every once in awhile it would be very appreciated
• I have no control over the ads that stream through my site they are all through google ad sense
• the more traffic and high profile readership I get the bigger advertising I get which in turn results in more income which encourages me to keep attempting to entertain you

I am continuigly working on making this the best blogging experience for everyone. I have started to work towards completing all of the 21 Tactics to Increase Blog readership (if you follow the link to this blog you will find this was one of the 21 steps...WINNING)

That being said I can use your help too. I post on Facebook, Twitter, and G+ this blog everyday. spreading the word to your friends or even personal recommendation could help readership take off in a real way.  I would love for this to become a big beautiful blog that had an active and powerful voice on the internet. It is the small steps that everyone takes now that gets us to that incredible place. 

moving on to real content...

Supreme Court

So as anyone who reads, listens to, or watches the news know there is a historic Supreme Court case dealing with the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare, also Romneycare). Never before has the Supreme Court decided the outcome of a sitting President's single domestic signature achievement in an election year. The court started by saying that they were not here to play politics, but there to answer the very serious question in the hearts and minds of many American citizens (I don't really know a scenario where they could have possible made all of this more political). 

Here are the Opposing sides of the issues:

GOP

The individual mandate that requires most citizen without health insurance by 2014 is unconstitutional. Next the government will regulate and require citizens to buy broccoli. 

Holes in this problems. It was originally a GOP idea. Which can be traced back to 90's the last time there was an attempt at healthcare reform. Also this would set the precident that organization such as the EPA and other governing and regulating bodies cannot regulate. Not to mention the mandate penalty is a pseudo-tax. Can the government tax?

Democrats

The biggest argument for the law is there a provision within the law that clearly states it cannot be challenged in court until the law is effect and citizens have actually been penalized for not having healthcare

There is significant precident in the government has the right to regulate and tax citizens. Not to mention it seems kind of rediculous that the federal government has the right to arrest, detain, and execute without trial or warrant any U.S. citizen if they are a "terrorist" or enemy of the state, but they don't have the right to force Americans to purchase life-saving healthcare. 

I am very frustrated in the way the Supreme Court has handled this case. By closing the courtroom doors, turning off the cameras, the case has been a media circus ring. You have people on all sides of the issue coming out of the courtroom speculating where they think the trial will end. I have seen every media pundit on cable news comment on every angle possible of the case without having real access to any amount of facts other than obscure court transcripts. By delaying this decision until June it allows the speculation to build and build and build for two months.

If you want to weigh in please comment on this blog. I would love to have a calm civil discussion on this issue and I hope we could find it stimulating and reaffirming for both sides. If you are looking for a more passive way to make your voice heard there is a poll on the right hand column you can participate in. 

enough of this crap.

Killing Boundaries

Well as you can see at the top of my blog other than a lovely introduction there is a link to Socialist Alternative (my political organization) and Killing Boundaries Press. Killing Boundaries Press is a new project me and some college kids started. The goal of it will be a monthly internet blogzine. We will have hard news, politics and editorials, arts and literature, entertainment, technology, and probably a section I am missing. 

I will link this blog audience to my articles in the magazine and encourage all of y'all to read all of the other information as well. 

My articles in this issue include:

• A Review of Hunger Games (as Promised)
• An Editorial on why I got my Tattoo (oops spilled the beans to the internet!!!)
• An article entitled "What I am doing with my Tax Refund"

I am very excited to be part of this project. I am working with many other talented voices and it will be nice to see all of our stuff come together to create something relavent and engaging. 

I hope everyone enjoyed today's blog. It's going up pretty late and I have felt exhaused writing it. I do have some fears it is not my best work.  

As a little preview for tomorrow's blog which will be very good I hope. I have been so far very silent on the giant Martin Scandal out of Florida. That is for a very specific reason. There will be some fascinating cotent and hard reporting on events tomorrow that you will not want to miss. 

Peace and Love,

Will

Day 2: Joys of Professors not caring, Where is our Nadar, and Twitter rant!

Howdy y'all

just like Mitt Romney I have tried crayfish once or twice and truly enjoyed it (BULLSHIT)

*Warning this blogpost is being written under the severe influence of being tickled and does not necessarily  reflect the views of a calmer, soberer Will Sullivan*

Professors not caring in the slightest

So I have the joy of being in two classes where my professors really don't care at all. Like not even in the slightest. My German professor realized early on that no one was ever going to do homework and showing up to class was a great honor for her. Instead of cracking the whip she has made increasingly more absurd concessions to the laziness of our class. It is very clear she does not want to fail anyone. Instead of doing her job she just gives us nice grades so she doesn't look bad as a professor. I will lay out the pros and cons of this teaching method of my German professor (perhaps we will revisit my theater professor in future blogging endeavours)

Pro's

• I feel truly terrible when I skip her class cause I know she won't be collecting homework or grading our actual understanding of the material
• I don't have to do homework
• I am now learning German because I am interested in the topic instead of because I have to fill a CLA credit
• She acknowledges that most of the homework is busy work bullshit and therefore doesn't actually check homework
• I have a much deeper understanding of the class materials because I, on my own accord, want to learn German

Con's

• I miss a lot of classes
• Next semester will be rough because I will be so out of practice for actually doing daily homework
• no matter how lenient my professor is I still am very begrudgingly taken this course (screw CLA language requirements!)
• I have zero respect for my Professor.
• I stand by the position that respect is something a teacher demands, not something a teacher can acquire through "being my friend"
• This course is a waste of time because:
• I am burning through taxpayer money because I am learning the bear minimum and am only in the class because I have to be
• I am wasting my professor's time because she dedicates time, energy and resources to a student who is at best passively interested and at worse very angry he is being forced to learn a foreign language

These points considered I truly enjoy my work and time in class I just feel the University could be spending its resources towards students who actually want to learn German and I could be using this time to work on my craft as an artist. 

Where is our  Nadar

*rant alert* (lots of political nonsense to pursue. Read with caution)

So for Socialist Alternative tonight we all read the national organization's grueling 16+ page document on the election season of 2012. The article was comprehensive,  well-written, and disenheartening. The article raised the question "Who do we support and campaign for in 2012 that is a solid opposition of the two Corporate parties?" The response was at best a shrug and at worst a session of beating one's head against the wall in frustration. 

We are at a time where BOTH corporate parties ( Republicans AND Democrats for those who are late to the party) have some of the lowest approval ratings in history. Also the political conscienceness of the electorate has not been this active in a very long time (with first battles in Wisconsin, and then Occupy, and now the revolt against the GOP's War on Women, and Trayvon Martin). The working Class people are angry motivated and ready to jump to action. 

So where is our Ralph Nadar? Where is the left- wing alternative to the two party corporate system? The ground has not been this cultivated for a serious third party candidate run in a very long time, and yet no one promising has risen. 

My personal hero, Russ Feingold, has sold out to the Obama re-election campaign. Even though the campaign is using Super-PAC's (something Feingold fiercely opposes). Dennis Kucinich has been kicked out of his own home district of Ohio. Bernie Sander's refuses to run as an independent. 

This is my plea to all of the left-wing, national-status activists that read my blog (LAWLS). We need a Ralph Nadar. I promise that if he or she were to step forward and run a serious election campaign against the two corporate parties that not only would Socialist Alternative work to expand your message,  that you would get the BIGGEST third party voting results ever. I repeat: EVER. 

Nadar has laid the ground in how an effective third party campaign can be operated and  run. Those opportunities can only be expanded with new social media mechanisms and a very activated pissed-off  youth base (me included HOLLA).

*rant ended*

Twitter rant

So I can't actually have two rants in one post (people might start to think I am a cynical negative bastard (AKA the truth HAHA)) <-- I just tapped my high school math skills to use parentheticals inside parentheticals. Is your mind blown?

So instead this is a calm twitter response....jk

So I created a Twitter account today. I was reading a blog on how to boost my readership. they suggested a whole number of things, most of which I am in the process of doing, but the biggest thing was, I HAVE TO BE ON ALL SOCIAL MEDIA SITES POSSIBLE TO LINK BACK TO MY SHIT!!!! ( they may have stated it slightly more eloquently...) 

So I created a Twitter for this blog. Hotdamn. After four years of avoided the Twitter phenomena I am now a convert. I sold my soul to the devil of the Internet (Because GOOGLE is a purely intentioned corporation and FACEBOOK has ALL my best interests at heart... sarcasm included no extra charge :) ) 

To create this bullshit account I had to follow five people. AND then  five interests. AND THEN five people in my email. I created my Twitter at about approx. 6pm and when I got back from Socialist Alternative at about 10pm there were 57 new tweets. 57! I was only following 14 thingies! UGH the awfulness and stupidity of the Internet!!!!!

Now that you have read my ringing endorsement of the social media site: Twitter, please follow me for blog updates at: @youngthespian42. 

^

|

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See what I did there? COMEDY!!!

that's all for tonight, I hope the "tickling" (air quotes required) didn't lead to too much nonsensicalness and bullshit,

Will

Day 1 (attempt 2) Lip-service, First and Last Midnight Premiere, and Looking forward

Lip Service

Like every politician in history I have fallen into the Habit of making promises I cannot keep. I talked big and bold about the 365 day challenge and then didn't even make it to day two. This whole blog is a work in progress. It is an intellectual journey as I find my artistic and critical voice. I still intend to complete the challenge someday and so every time I flub up I will just start over.

I am aware I have a very small audience, but hopefully it will grow over time and y'all can brag about how you were in here on the ground floor before Will had his shit together. Like I said apologies for not getting ANY blogposts out this weekend.


First and Last Opening night

I lived a very sheltered life as a youth (now that I'm a grown-ass man at 19. Basically I know everything *sarcasm alert*). Because of this I never experienced the thrill and wonder of a midnight release for a new movie.

That being said I did not find ANY of said thrill and wonder as I went to the midnight premiere of "The Hunger Games." I am reviewing "The Hungers Games" (HG) on an internet magazine I am part of so I will not go into details about the film itself (two second spolier: meh...). instead I am going to discuss my experiences at my first midnight premiere.

Firstly I did not get the joys of the waiting in lengthy lines or camping out early or anything like that. I saw HG at an AMC in downtown Minneapolis (stalkers start taking notes). This theater was screening HG in 4 different spaces and each was full to the brim. Since I am responsible (and by me I mean my friend). We went and picked up our tickets early in the day (and by we I mean the responsible friend).

Instead of playing the engaging three slides of movie trivia I instead walked around Hennipen got some delicious Jimmy Johns and walked calmly into the theater with twenty minutes before the screening.

What I thought would be twenty minutes before the movie. I guess since its a midnight premiere and there are no screenings afterwards they just go fucking crazy with previews. I looked at my phone and actually title credits started rolling at 12:21. UGH.

Highlights of previews included approx. 40% of the audience booing when the lastest (and final PLEASE) Twilight trailer started playing (you could heard all the boyfriends getting smacked in the arm by their ladies after that stunt). The next highlight was Snow White and the Hunstman. I predict that movie will be crap considering is comes from the producers of 2010's "Alice in Disaster-Sreenplsywrighting-Land. I will admit the trailer I saw looked beautiful. I also nearly had a hernia over the Spiderman trailer. (the UNTOLD story? REALLY? Minus the decapes of comics and televison and the THREE Movie franchise).

As for the actual "event" of the midnight premiere it was not anything special. I actually fell asleep (partially the lateness partially the filmaking). I just don't see the appeal of midnight screenings now that I stay up late every night. It seems like I would rather just see a film with high energy and a less fan-crazed audience. Not to mention I had to walk back home cause the busses stopped and got back to my room at 330.


Looking Forward

I thought I would give y'all a snapshot of the post upcoming this week so yo know which blogs to look for/ avoid.

Tomorrow- at Socialist Alternative we will be having a giant discussion on the 2012 election. I will definitely be charged and have some ideas about that.

thrusday- I will be participating in the Million Hoodie March for Treyvon Martin so I will have some background and reporting on that

friday- the day we have our department town hall meeting about why the X-board thinks it has the right to dismantel the Xperimental theater that the student body elected and created.(can you read my opinion of the issue?)

things to look for- I have an editorial already handed in for the blogozine, I'm also writing the Hungers games review this week

misc. I will have a very passionate post dedicated to my new ink in the upcoming days as well. I don't know if that's going in the blogzine or here. Look forward to this all.

Captain James T. Kirk Signing off,

Will

PS The writing of this blog was fueled by the gorgeous guitar licks of My Chemical Romance and Audioslave. I hope it reads as whatever that hybrid creates.

Day 1: A real petition, a fake petition, and the merits of free stuff

Real Petition

So last night I went to Socialist Alternative for the first time in almost two months. My activist urges were almost on overload so it was good to go back and plug in. It was interesting to hear all that the gang has been up to in the last two months.

Occupy Minnesota has kind of petered out and died a tragic death due to a mixture of cold weather and police brutality. I think this is a good thing because the campaign has shifted into something much more productive in my opinion called Occupy Homes. This campaign is focused on going to homes where people are going to be evicted and organizes with the neighborhood to build an on-call citizen force to resist and prevent forcible eviction. While this goes on occupy activist and neighbors send mail and set up phone banks to request that the bank reconsider the eviction decision and sit down with their client to negotiate a payment plan that is both realistic and preserves the homeowner's shelter.

If you are more curious about this campaign and their actions please go here: http://occupyourhomes.org/blog/2012/mar/15/m14-mn-march-on-us-bank/

If you want to help please feel free to sign this petition to stand strong and help Joe Vinje keep his home. That link is here:
http://signon.org/sign/us-bank-and-its-minnesota-1?source=s.em.mt&r_by=3400956

iF you are feeling truly ambition feel free to send emails the the VP of US Bank and his staff here:
1) thomas.joyce@usbank.com
2) valerie.norris@usbank.com
3) kimberly.nelson2@usbank.com

your help and time in this fight against the eviction crisis is very appreciated.


Fake Petition- Middlebrook Elevator Manifesto

All of this real activism has encouraged me to find my own political cause. As I was walking around campus today looking for an issue it hit me. I was riding the elevator from 11th floor down to one. A girl got in on five and went down and got off at three. I was like REALLY? You can't walk down three (theatre major don't know math!) flights of stairs? This disrespectful elevator culture drives me crazy. So I am writing a manifesto and creating a petition that hopefully lots of people will sign (one day this very petition will be so powerful that it will be too politically costly for even Barack Obama not to sign it!).

here are the rules:

1) Floors 1-3 don't get to use the elevator ever. Ever. They can walk up three flights of stairs. I run up and down 11 as part of my workout everyday.
a) exemption is granted for copious ammounts of luggage, laundry, or physical disabilities

2) If you are on 6 or lower please just take the stair if you're going down. Its faster anyways.

3) There NEEDS to be an express elevator that only goes to 10,11,12 and only goes back down to one. I have been late for so many classes because the elevator decides to stop on every floor
a) You may say this is floorist but think about who gets to walk down and back up all those stairs when there is a fire drill. Not to mention heat rises. Nough said.

4) The person that runs into the elevator and then holds the elevator for his friends to come 5-10 minutes later needs to loose elevator rights.

5) If you and your friends decide to have very intimate and personal conversation in the elevator around strangers you loose the right to be offended when the stranger looks at you with judgement "seriously Tracy it is kind of Whorey to suck three dicks at one party"

This is my Manifesto.

If you want to join my real (fake) activist cause please follow this link and sign the petition here: http://signon.org/sign/middlebrook-elevator?source=c.url&r_by=3745597


Free Stuff

Being a poor, starving (well honestly well-fed and financially supported by my parents) college student there is nothing that makes my day more than free stuff. Walking out of German today I received a free Novel and Cd by a guy handing them out on the street. The concept of this duo I find very ambitious and interesting. The CD is intented to be a companion to the book with each track specified to certain pages in the novel.

I've Decided to do a "Review in Progress" reading and listening to each track and reading each section for the next few days. I am going to start this "Review in Progress" a week from Friday March 23. This will give the interwebs a chance to find their copy of the work-in-question so they can agree or disagree with my opinions. If this is something that doesn't interest you feel free to just skip this section of my daily posts.

here is the book's website for more information: www.toofar.com

and about the author and musician in general: www.richshapero.com

Well Thats all for now. Until tomorrow (which may actually be 1 am or later friday TEHE),

Will

Introductions, 365 day challenge, and The end of Santorum?

Introductions

Greetings and welcome fellow citizens of the internet. My name is Will Sullivan and I am currently a college student and the University of Minnesota--Twin Cities. I am studying Theatre Arts and potentionally double majoring in Political Science. I am starting this blog as a way to get back into the habit of writing everyday. As an artist it is very important to me that I find my voice.

One of the lines from one of my favorite plays, Laramie Project, brings across the idea of changing your piece of the world-- to make it better. In this life, that is the legacy I hope to leave behind. I want to be remembered as someone who strove to actively change the world around him. This blog is my first step as finding my voice as an artist to objectively reach that goal.

Now that the pretentious side of me is out the way we can get on to the fun stuff. This blog is going to be about whatever I feel like: critiquing, ranting, raving about in any given day. Topics of interest to me are theater, film, literature, television, and politics. All of my writing will be very opinion based, but I encourage and long for discussion on what I write. Critique opens us all up to new ideas and shapes us into becoming more well rounded people. In the words of Porky the Pig (I really hope people appreciate that allusion) That's all for now Folks!


365 Day Challenge

As mentioned earlier I want to get back into the habit or writing everyday. So starting tomorrow March 21, 2012 I will begin the 365 day challenge. The goal is if I put a big scary number on each blog post it will actually encourage me to write daily. I can't promise you that every day will be good, entertaining or insightful. What I can promise is that each day will be unique and strive to be all the previously mentioned things. I want to use this as a way to become a better writer so any constructive criticism is encouraged and appreciated. That being said, I do want to leave the internets with a sense of real content. I'm not starting this blog to talk about myself; rather to entertain and encourage thought and discussion. So lets end this with a small smakeral of Santorum!

The Small Smakeral of Santorum

So Rick Santorum lost the Illinois primary tonight. For the non-political junkies that haven't been following the GOP primary here is the short 411:

Rick Santorum is an asshole who hates:
1) government
2) gays
3) women
4) abortion
5) contraceptives
6) institutes of higher education
7) Separation of Church and State

He thinks:
1) Obama is not a Christian
2) Mit Romney is an empty suit
3) Iran should be nuked
3) Woman who are raped and become pregnant should "Make the best out of a bad situation"

Misc. Facts:
1) He lost is his seat in the senate in PA by 18% margin (he was the biggest looser *ques drums*)
2) google Santorum. LAWLS.

It is a good reality check that the majority of the state of Illinois isn't bat-shit crazy and doesn't support this candidate. I can't completely conceal my disappointment though. This primary was Santorum's last stand (REALLY google Santorum). His disappointing showing tonight marks the beginning of the end of Santorum in our politics (pun Pun PUN). Romney is becoming the inevitable candite in this long string of GOP Front runners. Here is a little timeline of the past year or so:

GOP frontrunners:
1) Mitt Romney
2) Donald Trump
3) Michelle Bachmann
4) Rick Perry
5) Herman Cain
6) Newt Gingrich
7) Rick Santorum
8) Newt Gigrinch ( I swear it happened twice!)
9) Rick Santorum
10) Willard Mitt Romney

While this primary season has been nothing short of comedic gold (Daily Show has never had higher ratings) it seems the republicans have finally found their baby. I was team Santorum because I wanted to see this thing dragged out as long as possible. The longer Santorum stayed in, the more right the whole dialogue of the debate got and the harder and harder it becomes for Romney to beat Obama. Now Romney seems to have firm ground to stand on the focus will now become, (to quote a GOP bumper sticker to illustrate the GOP's racism) American doesn't "Re-Nig in 2012". Romney is a weak candidate but Obama hasn't done much for his base in these last three years so it will be a long haul to the ballot box in November.

top five Santorum phrases American will never get to use:

1) President Santorum
2) 4 more years of Santorum
3) Santorum deadlocked in debate with Putin
4) I have gained some respect for Bush; at least he wasn't Santorum

Goodnight interwebs see you tomorrow!

Will