The Mist

A friend of mine, Leigh, who is a big Stephen King fan, got me excited about The Mist and I remembered the story from King's anthology of short stories, The Skeleton Crew, which I read two years ago and I was super psyched to see how it turns out. The movie starts out with David Drayton painting a picture of Roland from King's Dark Tower series, which I think is an excellent touch because most of King's stories are interlinked. The story is basically about David, his son and the grumpy neighbour who go into town to get supplies after a vicious storm and when they get there a thick mist envelopes the whole town and they are all stuck in a supermarket. The strange mist conceals Jurassic bloodthirsty creatures. A psychological battle ensues in the supermarket when people get hurt and people start losing their sanity. Some people want to leave the market, others want to stay and a crazy zealot lady wants to sacrifice people to the creatures in the mist. The movie is faithful to the King's novella and the ambiance the mist sets up is superb. I'm not sure whether you'll like the movie or not if you've not read the story but if you're a fan of Mr King's work you're in for a treat and don't miss the end, the movie throws in a little twist that left me astounded.

Respekt to t3h Hippies

With all this madman stuff happening around the world I'm planning on getting myself a hippie van and driving around South Africa banging out tunes about flower power and giving out free hugs. People like Robert Mugabe (I guess my hippie van will have to make it all the way to Zim ^_^) seriously need hugs. I'm an idealist and Utopian dreams are like crack for me and I'm thinking if we all quit our jobs and got ourselves hippie vans we could rid the world of war, hunger, disease and rabid dogs. Watch out for my pimped out hippie van on the major South African roads, my team and I will be spreading the love and peace like mad.

Mobile Horror Stories

My noodle is pretty much fried by this book I'm reading. It's like being in the Twilight Zone... I leave home in the morning and jump on the bus which allows me approximately 45 minutes to read, which translates into about two or three stories that I get to read and thus my bus rides become all murky and people I know on the bus quickly look away if I happen to spot them staring at me - it's quite amusing. I remember reading Stephen King's Skeleton Crew (I see The Mist has been turned into a movie, and a good one too I'm told) and a few of the stories freaked me out but this is different... most of the stories in here are disturbing in a way that leaves you agitated as opposed to outright horrified. Last night I was outside in the yard filling a bucket with water when I kept looking over my shoulder worrying about weird guys with teeth filed to points and the darkness being sinister. I ended up only half filling the bucket and scurrying back inside the house. The stories have lodged themselves firmly in the dark corners of my mind and once in a while they pop up to harass me. You'd think that I'd stop reading the book after all of this... but I can't, it's like crack cocaine, I have to keep getting more. One of the stories in the book is titled The Ropy Thing; the ropy thing just keeps consuming everything until there's nothing left. That's how it is with me and these stories, I'm just going to keep reading until there's no more... and then what? I might go insane! That's how good this book is. If you can get your hands on it, do so. I think I'm in love... .

I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy it. - a joke I read

Dualities Continued

We die and rise the same, and prove
Mysterious by this love. - John Donne, The Canonization

This post is an expansion of an entry I posted on the 14th of February (Valentines Day... hey people pair up on that day! Dualities are everywhere). I've been doing some thinking about soul mates (again) and asking people (mostly girls) what they think of the concept and many of them believe that there's someone out there tailor made for each and everyone. Billions of people go through life without getting into meaningful relationships at all and people are getting divorced all over the show but people are still keeping the faith. I did some thinking and reading about couples who have been going strong for decades and I believe that there are probably lots of people tailor made for each other on earth. A great number of people go through life without experiencing that kind of thing though. If people know about dualities then maybe we can all be a bunch of ridiculously happy people who live on a blue ball. [I]f there is such a thing as true love then it could probably only occur in relations of Duality.

It's amazing how everything seems to come in complementary (or antagonistic) pairs, almost everything is 'lock and key'. Ask any StarCraft player and they will tell you about the supremacy of the keyboard and mouse control system. When God created the earth He made night and day, the sun and the moon, man and woman. In the animal kingdom there is the predator and there is the prey. Obviously this is super general but there's no escaping it, it's like Neo's antagonistic dual, Smith, says "It's inevitable" (this doesn't even fit but I'll just shove it in there somewhere and ruin the whole 'lock and key' vibe I have going on). What do these dualities mean? Is it a case of good and evil and one eventually having to come out victorious or is it a symbol of how things must seek harmony and complement each other. In Christianity one must help one's brother carry his burden and share his load. Is that what humans have to do to live in harmony? Complement your brother's strengths and weaknesses? God (again in the Christian sense) is a tri-unity, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. The Son's will is in perfect accordance with that of the Father and there is a Spirit of love that binds them/emanates from them. Maybe that's what duality is about. Man should hook up with woman and from that union emanates the spirit of love. Man should love his fellow men and bam! the spirit of love flows from that. Maybe it's like John Donne notes in his poem, The Canonization, we find in us (the whole human race and couples) the eagle and the dove, in us there is both strength and weakness but these things in one body of people can make them transcend into a phoenix, something eternal. Could it be that duality then is not the end but the means of transcendence?

Let me know what you guys think, leave a few comments on your thoughts and I'll rope my goodbuddy Dean to come say something about dualities and socionics. Lex Luth will also probably have something worthwhile to add.

Harry Potter Competition Winner

A heartfelt thank you to everyone who entered our Inklings Too Harry Potter competition. We chucked all the names into our sorting hat and pulled out a certain Amy Peters. Enjoy the magic of Hogwarts Amy!

Inklings Too Book Club

This has been a whirlwind of a journey, but finally things are falling into place - it's as if the universe has a quirky sense of humour. Inklings Too has been on my mind for quite some time and things seem to be happening naturally and we're building this club. People have been wondering about the strange name so let me loop you guys in. Two of my favourite (hmm... that makes them sound like a dish I like) authors, J.R.R. Tolkien (The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings) and C.S. Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce) were part of a group of 20th Century writers who met up in a pub to discuss literature and things they were writing. Their group was called The Inklings and we're hoping to create the same atmosphere where we can all meet up and discuss great literature and other topics related to literature. We had an office with the other societies on campus but things went sour and we're trying to find a nice place (a pub would be awesome) to meet. If anyone knows of a place around UJ please e-mail me at fr33charles@gmail.com. For the past few days my buddy, Lex Luth, and I have been running around promoting the Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows competition we're running to raise funds for a second hand bookstore we want to open on campus. It's a massive project and any fund raising ideas you guys might have would be appreciated. We'll be announcing the Harry Potter winner on Monday morning - so watch out for that! Thank you to everyone who entered, thank you for being patient with us and thanks goes to Lex Luth and Lydia for helping me out. Please leave any ideas you have here by commenting or e-mail me at fr33charles@gmail.com.

The Children of Húrin Review

I'm writing this short review as an ardent admirer of Professor Tolkien's great imagination and as a result, this review can't help but reflect my love for the man's work. The Children of Húrin is a beautiful story that is tragic in every sense of the word, I would say that it's Shakespearean in scope but Professor Tolkien would write me a scathing letter from his grave for saying such a profane thing. I've you've read The Silmarillion, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings and enjoyed them you will find that this book is a gem of Fëanorian standards. The Children of Húrin is the longest of the lays of Beleriand and takes place in the first age of Middle-Earth. Melkor, the fallen Ainur, wages war against the people of Middle-Earth from his stronghold, Angband and Elves and Men unite against him in the Battle of Unnumbered Tears in which the Man, Húrin openly defies Melkor. For this Húrin is taken alive into Angband and Melkor puts a curse on all of his kin. The Lay of the Children of Húrin is an account of how Melkor’s curse causes the tragic downfall of Húrin’s children, Túrin and Nienor by the devices of his servant, the wingless dragon, Glaurang. Middle-Earth has a rich history in which tales like The Lord of the Rings are only a pebble in the pond. If you want a beautiful and epic story, I recommend The Children of Húrin.

This is probably a mad thing to do but what the hell I think it's hilarious. I found this picture of my very eccentric English lecturer, Dr Graham, on the university's intranet system thingammy. For some reason I thought I should share it with the world. I have heaps of respect for Dr Graham and his lectures on Hamlet were mint. So if you ever see this Dr Graham, thanks for the insightful and hilarious lectures.

The Struggle to Live

I was watching Morning Live as I do every weekday morning (I still think Lee Anne Manas has a sexy voice) and they were covering the widespread poverty in Zeerust. Thousands of a years and many grand civilizations down the line and people still struggle to live. I can write from a view that there's a conspiracy by the elite class to remain in power by squashing the poor or I can say that for all of humanity's greatness we're still sad little chumps who don't know how to efficiently run our lives. I have no evidence of the former view and I don't actually believe in it because I believe that humans can govern their state no matter what surroundings they find themselves in. It's quite scary is it not? Our species has been around for thousands of years and we've done great things and some pretty stupid things. It seems that we sometimes rise to lofty planes and at other times we fall very low. We have the thoughts of great philosophers recorded in our libraries and yet we still don't seem to be able to get this living thing right. The ancient civilizations rose and fell; nothing we do seems to lasts very long. At the end of the day all we can do is look back and marvel at the splendour of the pyramids and wonder how they did it. For all our greatness we're still chumps who are still trying to figure it all out.

The State of Christianity

You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltness be restored? It is not good for anything any longer but to be thrown out and be trodden underfoot by men. - Matthew 4: 13

The things I'm going to be saying in this post are very generalised and don't apply to everyone in the universe, so please don't show up on my doorstep armed with pitchforks and torches. I might be right, I might be wrong and Heaven knows I might not even be saying anything useful at all. Bear with me if you can.

I suspect most Christians have been in some environment where the conversation gets to a point where you have to reveal your state of Christianity and you try to state your case by analysing how the company you're in views the religion. Such situations usually end up with people saying things like, “Uhm... yes I'm Christian but I don't mind things like lying too much, in fact I tell a few white lies once in a while.” So depending on the company you find yourself in your degree of Christianity changes. This happens to me all the time where some guy will say something offensive about Christians and I'll try make out like I'm not really too deep into the religion to avoid the offense. After the interaction I'll sit and think hey wait a minute! When I'm alone my faith is concrete but when some random dude pokes fun at what I believe in I try to make as if I don't believe in that stuff at all. This the same thing that happened to the disciple, Peter [Matt. 26: 69 – 74]. A really awesome string of thoughts popped into my head during the Easter holidays and it stemmed mostly from a quote by Lord Hailsham I came across in The Da Vinci Code – a response:

The first thing we must learn about him [Jesus] is that we should have been absolutely entranced by his company. Jesus was irresistibly attractive as a man ... What they crucified was a young man, vital, full of life and joy of it, the Lord of life itself, and even more the Lord of laughter, someone so utterly attractive that people followed him for the sheer fun of it ... the Twentieth [Twenty first in our case] Century needs to recapture the vision of this glorious and happy man whose mere presence filled his companions with delight. No pale Galilean he, but a veritable Pied Piper of Hamelin who would have children laughing all round him and squealing with pleasure and joy as he picked them up.

Thus I think Christians have no business walking around looking glum and in no way should they feel that their religion is like a collar meant to restrain them from having any fun. Many people have this view of Jesus as being the force that spoils all the fun and it's not true at all. Man is built for happiness and his happiness is attained by following the laws that govern humans. Free will allows us to break many of the laws that govern us but eventually the consequences catch up with us. A man who steals from people will be caught eventually and he will suffer for his crime, a woman who gossips about her friends will lose them before long. Even though we can break the rules we cannot run away from the consequences. To be happy one must abide by the laws that result in happiness. Many people who aren't religious know that to build wealth, happiness or whatever they must do things that are in accordance with the laws to get the results they want. You hear of many people who go to church and get bored out of their minds and they hook up with friends who don't go to church on Monday who claim that their weekend was off the chain, they went to the rock show and it was awesome. These people sit in church the next week and get super bored because they're thinking that other people are out there having so much fun. I used to get bored at church because I simply felt out of sync with the stuff they were talking about. The pastor would go on about all these virtuous things that seemed nothing more than fancy ideals to me. I read some C.S. Lewis and I've come to realise that all the things in Christian scripture aren't meant to bog you down and make you feel like rubbish but to give you a goal to strive towards. That goal is perfection, Christ came and set the example and He continues to help anyone who wants His help no matter what their state. If you're Christian (or even if you're not) don't be a wet blanket and walk around as if you are personally carrying all the world's burdens on your shoulders. Cheer up.

Know Your Place!

Dean and I always talk about people who settle for things simply because they believe it's their lot in life. It's quite terrible. People who see themselves as being average settle for average things, an average boyfriend or girlfriend, an average house, an average dog and basically an average life. A part of it is social conditioning. Society needs poor people, middle-class people and rich people in order to function. I'm fine with this as long as there's some sort of dynamic where people transcend the state they find themselves in if they're not happy with it. A street sweeper's son growing up to be a street sweeper (unless they honestly love it) is just plain wrong. As long as a society has a steady sort of flux it's okay I think. A street sweeper's kid should become a cop if he wants to or the President of Mars. Things are terribly wrong when social conditioning dictates to you that you should know your place and stay there. Let's say you're chubby, socially awkward and have dirty finger nails and you want to date Rihanna. You sit and think this girl is way out of my league and then you decide to settle for some girl who is in your league. I say (and everyone with sense says) forget about the league and improve yourself to until you can honestly say to yourself that you deserve to date a girl like Rihanna or some boy like... er... some hot boy if you're a girl. Lose weight, learn to value yourself, get a manicure, beat up her boyfriend and befriend her dog. The thing with Rihanna is that she's human and she might still reject you after you've become excellent because she's making eyes at Josh Hartnett. With things like cars, houses and teddy bears it's easier I suspect. If you want to drive a Cadillac I doubt it will turn you down after you've come up with the money for it. Luckily self-improvement is always a good thing regardless. If you constantly oil your machine you get more out of life. The point of this ramble is to tell you to go after what you want without fear of leaving your comfort zone. Leave your comfort zone and explore the world. It's worth the effort.

April Fool

It's the first of April and I'm feeling rather foolish. I'm quite disturbed by the shocking reality that people will walk over you when you let them and I'm extra-disturbed by the fact that I walk over people without a second thought if they let me. In the last two days people have let me down and I'm super peed off at them. I relied on these people to keep their promises and they didn't! The whole thing got me thinking about the times I've let friends and family down and now I really feel like a hypocrite. Here I am whining about the universe being against me when I do the exact same thing to people I claim are important to me. So I asked myself, why do I let people down? Usually I sit there and think this is my buddy/family, they'll understand. If I tell a stranger I'm going to do a thing I'm more likely to do it for them as opposed to doing it for friends and family. Now I'm thinking that this is just plain crazy. What I'm doing is trying to prove to people I don't know what an awesome person I am and skimping on the people that do think I'm a cool person. This is just plain twisted. I have to fix this.