Sunday, August 13, 2006

I was a jerk 5 years ago

SEE VIDEO ABOVE

While organizing my stuff this weekend in preparation for the trip to China, I happened upon my old Digital Hi8 tapes from 5+ years ago. Mostly video from 2001 when I went to the UK, France, and Italy. About 2 hours of video is me walking around with the camera, operating it like a simian with Parkinson's and murmuring soporifically into the microphone; making stupid, stupid jokes (I have no idea when to use a semi-colon, but it just felt right, ok?). When I'm not boring my non-existent audience with wise-cracks about the testicles on a lion statue, I'm making fun of my brother, annoying the crap out of him. I mean, its funny to pester people sometimes, especially family members. But there's funny annoying, and then there's too far. I went beyond too far, into the realm of O'Reilly-esque jerkitude.

The sheer number of times I say, "Luke!" or "Luke, its Scotland, aren't you so amazed?" or "Luke, stop being a jerk, the Beatles were advocates of peace. You want to ruin their dreams?" or something to that effect. You'd just have to see/hear it to believe it. I'd hope that I've dejerked some over the years, but then again I don't have the objective ability like I do now of seeing myself behave from the third-person's perspective. I just would have to take other peoples' word for it. And I don't people (maybe a snapshot of the reason I was/may still be a jerk, who knows?)

But its very informative to see these old videos. I wonder if I'm still that boring sounding today. I know I'm droll, but that might be giving myself too much credit even there. Its just that I severely lack outwordly expressed enthusiasm, or as my internship boss once said, "Professional Tenacity". I know it troubles some people when conversations go like this:

Girl: "Drew, I got engaged!!"
Me: "Ok."

Guy: "Drew, this might come as a surprise to you, but I'm gay..."
Me: "Huh."

Guy: "Drew, I got fired from my job and I have no money"
Me: "That sucks"

Sometimes I wish I could express emotions when its necessary, and not sound fake about it. I'll be posting these videos, which I've been vehemently downloading to my laptop, as soon as possible. They're great...

No really... completely...


totally...

...

great.

4 comments:

drainpip said...

A semi-colon is used as a period. Techincally you could use it instead of a period all the time; it's frowned upon though. I asked my English prof. when I should use it, and he replied "When you want to piss me off."

He wasn't a very good teacher.

Drew said...

I *just* turned 25, I knew I felt something happen that night. It was as if fart jokes instantly lost their hilarity, and I started liking Bloomberg TV.

Glad you could make it, "James" hehehe.

Alright, so semi-colons are basically redundant forms of punctuation? Thats good to know...

Lauren said...

kind of - you'd use a semi-colon to show that two sentences are related. If you have two separate ideas, use a period bewteen them. if you have two ideas that are related, you CAN use a semi-colon to show that relationship.

Some professors hate semi-colons because they're so misuesed; I think they have a place in writing, as long as they have the proper effect. ((Fech's use of the semi colon is also a good example))

Lauren said...

bah - zozo is me, lauren, aka annalira, aka angoleth.