Pre-Burnt

I heard something interesting the other day... though I am not sure it is was a few days or a few weeks ago. Obsession really distorts ones sense of time...

Humans have lived in fear of fire for a long time. There were many great fires in memory. Half of Chicago burned, London burned, The White House burned, etc. But have you noticed that we do not hear of these kinds of things any more? I never really thought about until I heard this: "We do not live in fear of fires because we live in pre-burnt structures"!

We burn out anything that might burn from bricks, steel, glass, etc. If all of the materials out of which we build no longer have anything left that can be burnt, there is no stored "fire energy", hence no fires. Interesting, no?

This got me to thinking about the current love of my life - food. We Humans cook our food, and by doing so are removing some of the energy from that food. The foods we cook have less energy to stoke our inner fires, so to speak. So maybe the Japanese are on to something with this Sushi thing...!

This leads to a personal note from me - I love burnt food. I love burnt cheese especially. Grilled meats are amazing because they are burnt on the outside. Yum! If other people think it is burnt to a crisp - beyond eatable, I'm there cooking it a bit longer for my tastes.

So, does this mean that by my love of burnt foods that I am depriving myself of the energy content of the foods that I eat? How about you - how do you want your steak cooked now?

The Edward

Hellsing

I just found this DVD series called Hellsing.  Then found it was based on a Graphic Novel, so I am in the process of reading them.  Very interesting tales of vampires!  Or more precisely, there is one main vampire, Alucard, and his half vampire slave, Police Girl.  There is a lot more to the story, but the master vampire is obviously what drives the fan base.

So, why are Vampires cool?  They are always portrayed as monsters who kill more people than the most prolific series killer, and yet have an air of aristocracy about them.  Alucard kills other vampires because he thinks that they are not true vampires, that they lack that sense of propriety.

I believe in the original mythos, vampires weren't cool.  They were the undead, so they reeked of death - ie had a funky smell.  More like brutal killers rather than the anti-heroes of today.  When did all of this change?  And why?

The other thing I found interesting was Police Girl, other than the fact that they draw her as always wearing very short skirts.  They seem to often have someone like this, someone who became a vampire willingly, but doesn't want to embrace the vampiric ways.  In this story, she avoids drinking blood, even though it causes her many problems.  Same thing happened in that Anne Rice novel as well.  Is this supposed to represent the last vestiges of the main vampire's humanity?  Is this to show that they aren't all bad, that at first they resist drinking blood and taking human life, and even though they eventually give in, they still probably have that resistance?  Are we trying to humanize our monsters?

What makes mass murder into entertainment?  The Showtime show Dexter is about a serial killer, and it is devastatingly popular.  Would it be popular with someone who survived this kind of tragedy?  Do we as a people take pleasure in other's suffering?  Are these shows and books a way to secretly rejoice in it, knowing that we are not alone, that others out there must feel as we do?

Are all of these signs that we just live in constant fear of ourselves - our true feelings, and of others and what we think they are capable of?

The Edward

More on Spoilers

After my Harry Potter spoilers, I was talking with a good friend about it.  My contention was that there is no such thing as a spoiler, the idea that was espoused by my blog entry.  He pointed out something that I hadn't considered - people want to feel the effect of the master story teller as she weaves her spell with words to convey the sense of wonderment when that which a spoiler so crassly spoils, is revealed to full effect.  I was captivated by this idea.  People just wanted to be taken on a journey by the story teller.  Spoilers would ruin that, since the shock/effect would be diminished with knowledge of what would happen at some point in the story.  Wow, how did I miss that!

After pondering this for a few days, I decided that though it was a good idea, and was  lulled by its logic, it didn't ift my blog.  See, there is no such that as a spoiler!  That's right, I am going to spit in the face of logic!  Though, I will now explain why.

Let's say that there is a book coming out soon and I tell you that the main character dies in the end.  Now what?  You can choose to believe me or not.  Before I said that the character dies, if you had spent any time at all waiting for this book, you probably thought that it the main character might die.  So, what have my words changed for you?

Let's say that I show you a picture of the page that clearly states the main character dies.  How does this change anything?  I could easily have faked this.  And this actual did happen with the Harry Potter novel - there were fake pages out there claiming to be "spoilers".

Unless you didn't think anything at all about the future and what might happen in the book, anything I say or show you, you probably already thought about.  Does this mean that you have already spoiled the story for yourself by thinking?  Do my words and/or pictures carry more weight than your thoughts?

Before I saw The Sixth Sense, I read a review that spoiled the movie.  While watching it, I saw the movie differently than if I knew nothing about it going in.  The movie kind of sucked.  Why?  Because it totally depended on the surprise factor.  I know how many of the Shakespeare plays end, yet I will still watch them.  Why?  They should be "spoiled" for me, based on the logic of spoilers.

It is all about letting go.  When I see a movie, I analyze it death.  I always know who did it near the beginning of the movie, which means most dramatic movies suck for me.  I think most people could know who did it, but they fool themselves - they purposely do not think about the possible "spoilers".  The people who didn't want to know how the last Harry Potter book ended probably didn't think about how it might end.  Any thought about it might have spoiled it for themselves.  Letting go and not thinking about any aspect of the story is the only way to let the story teller move you to the place they are trying to get you to.

So, if you want to enjoy a good story, enjoy a play about which you already know the whole story, or to watch/read a Mystery, don't think.  If you think, you will spoil a good journey.

The Edward

PS Actually, I'm sure I would have figured out the secret of The Sixth Sense and would have found the movie to be just as annoying. It doesn't matter to me if I figure it out or if someone told me before the movie begins - knowing what will happen just makes watching it play out very tedious for me.