What I'm Really Learning From College

Have you ever seen the movie Saving Silverman? If you have not, stop reading this sentence immediately, go rent it, and come back here in two hours. The film centers around two dimwits trying to save their buddy from his new girlfriend from hell. Anyway, the common link in their friendship is an obsessive passion for Neil Diamond "He's the greatest songwriter of this, or any generation." They even have a cover band called Diamonds in the Rough. It's actually a pretty hilarious movie, with the likes of Jack Black, Steve Zahn, Jason Biggs, R. Lee Emery, and Amanda Peet to name a few... but I digress...

What the hell does this have to do with Corey? So glad you asked, bored reader with nothing better to do.

My friend Steve gets ahold of me Thursday evening and tells me he has some "very important news." Incidentally, if you haven't had the pleasure of meeting my old roommate Steve, well I'll just sum him up in two words: clinically insane. Steve, lo and behold, has won Neil Diamond tickets for Saturday night by calling up the local radio station during a contest on his way to work (a number which I highly suspect he has on speed dial, or at the very least, committed to memory). I should point out that neither one of us is exactly what you would call a Neil Diamond "fan" or "listener." This aside, I do enjoy the aforementioned movie, as well as Will Ferrell's several renditions of Neil on SNL, and this is just too absurd to pass up.

Steve rolls into town around 2 o' clock. By about 2.30pm we realize we're going to have to get hammered to really enjoy this concert (at 8pm). We start off by watching the Family Guy movie, followed up by the only real (and ridiculously stupid) reason we are seeing Mr. Diamond at all - Saving Silverman.

Fast forward approximately 5 hours.

Steve has drank an entire bottle of whiskey by himself and I have ingested a large, yet, undetermined amount of refreshing Busch Light. Steve, in his incredibly intoxicated and incredibly loud state, convinces Mike to drive the two of us to the Schottenstein Center (roughly 5 or 6 blocks from where I live). Steve brings a Neil Diamond vinyl determined that the man will sign it, and his digital camera- which he stuffs down his pants because they are prohibited. Both items pass through completely undetected by security. Good thing Bin Laden isn't a fan of contemporary adult soft rock.

Oh yeah, the always lovely and talented Miss Alex was working that night, whom happened to be right pass the crack security force. Somehow, I think her keen intellect was able to pick up that we had been drinking for five hours, but perhaps not. Then again, when Steve demanded to know where Neil Diamond's tour bus was, it may have sealed the deal... in his defense, though, I could see a lot of the people who were also there willing to sprint to the singer's tour bus... if they were about 40 years younger. Man, everyone at that concert was old. Crazy old.

Oh yeah - our seats. We had to walk past ten people in our row to get to them, squashing many a fan's foot. This, booze was not to blame for, however. The Schottenstein Center's seats and aisles are about the width of the screen you are reading this on. So right off the bat these people probably didn't like us. Then some of them were irked by the flash the camera occasionally put out. By the end of the night Steve and I were yelling "ComeOnAYeah!" and "I will smack you in the face, I'M NEIL DIAMOND!!!!" I can only guess that they were wondering what the hell we were doing there at all. To that I say - Thank you Jack Black, Will Ferrell, and of course, Steve Patrick (and Alex for the ride home - what a hottie).




Next time I'll post some video of the super-political correctness that arose after the concert when Latimer turned the video camera on Steve - and my futile counterpoints.


*Come On A YEAH! refers to Neil Diamond's live performance of the song Holly Holy where he consistently interjects the phrase after several Yeah's. J.D. McNugent (Jack Black) also uses the phrase as his rallying cry in Saving Silverman, and in the process of doing so, making a somewhat obscure Neil Diamond reference. Got that? I hope you had to enlarge this to read that tidbit you will never find useful.

I couldn't resist posting about this.

Google talk was leaked on the internet around 7pm, just a little ahead of it's scheduled release date of August 24th (Google offered it publicly a few hours later). Google talk is an instant messaging program released by the almighty Google corp. (duh). In runs on the open protocol called Jabber, and supports both text IM's and voice chat. While AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, etc., can not be used as of yet in the official version, based on the way the Jabber protocol works, this should be quite able to integrate all your IM programs. Google is also in official talks with these companies regarding official interopability, however, I don't see what's to stop someone from adding another Jabber server and connecting to these... but I don't want to get too technical.

So what's the big deal? Well a couple things, the first being that GT integrates your email and IM in one interface, which, as I imagine is Google's bet, will drive more users to GMail, which in turn would drive up overall contextual AdSense revenue displayed alongside GMail messages. There are no advertisements in Google talk. When you first load up GT ( a quick download at just under 1 meg, by the way), your contact list is blank to begin with. Then, like it calls up your GMail account (which is also your login info) and imports contacts from there. Also, when you instant message a new contact in the program, they are automatically inserted into your contact list at GMail. It also takes the liberty of unistalling the GMail Notifier if you have it, as there is now no need for it.

The other thing that is going to make this attractive to tech-savy folks is it's VoiP capability (voice chat). I would not be suprised if this gives Skype a run for it's money once (or if) Google talk gains massive popularity. Why? I have never heard such crystal clear sound when I was chatting with my roommate who is at home in Lima. I wonder if the VoiP will be embraced or not, simply because it feels weird to talk to your computer the first few times.

However, Google is going to have to step it up very quickly if it is going to win over users from AIM, Yahoo, and MSN (ICQ is owned by AIM). The program could be the greatest thing in the world (it is isnt), but the program is still useless if no one else adopts it. If Google talk is going to be taken seriously, it is going to have to work with the big three (or at the least, AIM, the most popular IM program in the States). And the sonner, the better.

That being said, Google talk certainly has the potential to do so with it's massive integration into GMail (and Google Desktop's 2.0 release yeaterday), Google is bit by bit trying (and somewhat succeeding) at taking over many a user's computer.

An interesting sidenote, Google's company philosophy (found here) states their number two philosohpy is

Google does search. Google does not do horoscopes, financial advice or chat.

Guess they might need to amend that, huh?

EDIT: A few hours after I posted this, Google's philosophy changed. It now reads

Google does search. With one of the world's largest research groups focused exclusively on solving search problems, we know what we do well, and how we could do it better.

Google talk can be downloaded at http://talk.google.com

Those who live in Columbus year-round without moving play witness to a strange phenomenon that recurs annually like clockwork. The Mass Exodus of Columbus, Ohio occurs in two very distinctive phases.

Phase One

It begins when the students living in dorms move out of The Ohio State University for the summer, which usually occurs during the week of Spring quarter exams (however this also occurs for other breaks). I find this to be a particular treat when watching students who have never experienced this before. I say this because the only thing they know about the moving process is when they move in during Welcome Week. This process is quite honestly, planned and strategically implemented as a tactical military strike. Police direct and reroute traffic, cars queue up very efficiently at dorms, teams of other students swarm a vehicle and unload it of all its contents in record time and transport this to the students dorm room. All in all, it's quite a marvel, highly worthy of praise and often leaves parents with a good impression of "how well Ohio State is run."

The move out process is complete shit.

Quite simply, there is no process. The mandate from OSU is to move out by Friday at noon. Now, there's a smart idea - schedule exams all that week and then demand you be moved out by noon on Friday, yeah, that's intelligent. That being said, here's what this causes.

• Traffic around campus comes to a standstill from about Wednesday - Friday, producing congestion I will hereby accurately refer to as "clusterfucks"
  
• Behind the wheels of many of these cars are parents who can not drive, or are seemingly driving with one arm and/or leg. How idiots like this keep getting issued driver's licenses is beyond me.
• Many local restaurants, fast food places, and bars change their hours, because they no longer have the high volume and drunk college students to make them profitable.
• The Lantern reduces publication to twice weekly (not that I care about The Lantern in any form, but a fact nonetheless)
• I'm sure there are others that are slipping my memory at the moment.

On the plus side, during July - September you can actually get good service at Applebee's.


Phase Two

It was during the past weekend (8/20) that I became aware of Phase Two. The origins of Phase Two lie in the magic month before new residents move in to apartments and houses on campus, but after the old ones move out so the owners can clean and fix them up... yeah right... dont get me started on that one....

By some weird coincidence or twist of fate, most if not all realty companies designate this particular weekend for the old residents to move out... again, how incredibly smart. There are really only two significant things that happen during this time.

• Columbus becomes even more barren, and much more significantly...
• The trash. My gentle, Jesus.... the trash buildup.

Trash is everywhere... EVERYWHERE. And Columbus doesn't pick any of it up until Tuesday morning. I happened to be up all night, so I had the extreme pleasure of being awake when people finally started coming for this disgusting crap.

5:30am Broken down truck comes and random guy with a flashlight digs through the dumpsters behind my apartment.

5:34am I swear, not even 5 minutes later, another random pick up truck pulls up and two other people with flashlights dig through. I briefly considered hitting the car alarm on the truck, but then I felt bad thinking about it, figuring these people probably have enough problems and feel embarrassed enough as it is.

7:30am The city trucks finally come to haul everything away. It takes them about 15 minutes before I heard them leave. I should note they drop both dumpsters 3 times, and dropped a substantial amount of trash onto the street in the process.



Well anyway, I thought it was interesting the impact a large group of people being forced out of a small space in a short period of time has. Campus has been the West Bank of Columbus for awhile it seems. Except, you know, without the 3000 year old religious conflict or persecution or bombings or hot political debate or military enforced disengagement . Yeah.... exactly like the West Bank...

Time is a weird thing. Take this picture I found cleaning some drawers out today, for instance. On the back in my Mom's handwriting it reads "Corey and Ryan, Halloween 1987." For those of you not good at math, I was three years old in 1987. I can remember this almost as clearly as if it was yesterday... now why is that? Nothing extraordinary or traumatic happened that Halloween. I remember Ryan, myself, and our parents went to the store together so we could have matching Halloween costumes, and we ended up picking these Viking ones, hardcore, right? I can even remember the font on the box, and how the swords were unusually strong for plastic toys. Hell, I remember the old lady at the end of the block who gave us homemade cookies, back when you could live in a small town and not worry that some pyscho was going to jam needles into it or something. I can remember things like this without breaking a sweat... but I take a basic Plant Biology midterm and I can't remember seven stages of cell division.

It's kind of surreal to think of all the growing up I have done in the 18 years since my Mom snapped that picture on Mulvane St. Learning about death, friends gained and friends lost, moving, finding the love of your life, learning about death all over again, graduating high school and going to college, and then losing the love of your life. Soon, graduating college will be on that list. After that - the real world, marriage and possibly a family of my own. There's not exactly a lot more growing up to do after that. To think... I'm actually almost a full-blown adult, and yet, something is more than mildly comforting at looking at this old picture, at the smile and look in my eyes. Here is little Corey, no stress, no loss of innocence, completely happy and content with the world around him... a world he knows primarily as one that gives him candy for knocking on a door and saying "Trick or Treat" on a certain day.

Ahh, to be a kid again......

So I get a phone call on Monday asking if I want to go to Ozzfest the next day. Being appreciative of heavy rock's roots, I agree to go, if only to see Ozzy and the rest of Black Sabbath. Presented below is the account of how the day spiraled into Suckfest 2005.

First of all, any day you wake up at 9am after going to bed at 4.30am, you're gonna have trouble on your hands to begin with right off the bat. A shower and a McGriddle popped me right back into action, though. Before heading over to Germain, Latimer suggested we buy some footlong subs from Subdway - since the website said we could bring in food in a clear bag. The internet never lies, right? More on that in a minute.

I go up to the Will Call desk to pick up my ticket and am greeted with the following signs everywhere:

Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath will not be performing tonight.

Son of a bitch - that's really the only reason I came. Strike One. We're here though, so no sense in leaving. Besides, the tickets were free, so I walk into the security line with Latimer and Mike bringing up the rear. I get through three.... three security guards, my ticket is scanned, and am promptly bitched at for having my sub sandwich with me. A very manly woman tells me I can't bring that in because Subway is a friggin' sponsor of this concert. She tells me I can go outside and eat it though and then come back in.

Now, if you are thinking, well, at least this woman is smart.... you should be beat with your own shoe. You can't get a re-entry when your ticket is scanned, a mind-shattering peice of knowledge this woman who works the gates at a concert is not aware of. She then explains she would be happy to throw my delicious turkey sub away for me. Bitch. Long story short - I throw the sub to Latimer and Mike and they give it to the 99.7 guys, who give them some energy drinks. Guess what? These aren't allowed in, either. Thanks guys. I'm not at this festival for 5 minutes yet and it's already got two strikes against it.

While Mike and Latimer are outside with the Blitz guys, I head over to see Colin working The Devil's Rejects booth. Thank God for Colin and his unlimited stash of water and shade. I ended up spending a good part of the day there with him.

Anyway, all the other crap that comprises "Strike Three" can be surmised in the advice and anecdotes below.

• Bring sunscreen if you are going to be outside for 10 hours, that was my fault.
• If you are an incredibly unattractive and overweight woman, please, for everyone's sake, do not walk around topless all day. This was most decidely not my fault.
• "Eight dollars for a beer? Fuck you!"
• Don't go to Ozzfest until at least 4-5 hours after it has started. All the bands will sound the same - with the suck knob on the guitars and mics turned up to max.
• Girls passing out condoms all day. Actually, this was more humorous and ironic to me than anything, since it was about 95 degrees all day, rendering the condoms useless and melting them unless used immediately. Colin cracked one open to verify the melting theory.
• Hey dickhead next to me, don't analyze Rob Zombie's performance as it's going on and let me enjoy his set. You are not a rock and roll historian or expert. You are a 45-year old alcoholic going through a midlife crisis who took the day off from work at the gas station, now shut up.
• Furthermore, everyone came to see the guy on stage dance around and sing really loud, not you. Dumbass.
  
• Mudvayne - don't smoke so much pot right before you go on stage and maybe you won't blow. Oh but you did. You lose, try again next year.
• Oh, and if three security guards are forcing you out of the ampitheater, is there really any point in trying to fight it. Especically if you're wasted? Oh yeah, I guess that's probably why you try it. Repeatedly. Like an Alzheimer's patient.
  

The day wasn't all that bad of course. I got to see a lot of friends who are more into this stuff (or in Colin and Jill's case, much less into this stuff). Plus I got a bunch of free Devil's Rejects stuff out of it, which is pretty cool. All in all, probably better than staying at home and watching Boy Meets World like I would have.

All I know is this - Ronnie James Dio should be on standby at all times to front Black Sabbath when Ozzy has a boo-freakin-hoo tummy ache. He could fly in on a dragon or some shit, if anyone could do that, it would be him or Jack Black.

Shit, scratch that, put Jack Black on standby, screw Dio AND Ozzy.