Wow I’m sitting here going through the deaths of some popular people and feel sad about it. Kind of wakes me up that life is something very important. I’m glad for the friends I have and the ones I got back in contact with. Plenty of changes in my life this year and things are looking up. Getting in contact with some friends from high school and grade school was important to make me feel better about life. I’ve always been a person who put friends and family over anything. I would do anything for my friends.

 Watching some of Billy Mays infomercials really brought back some great memories. His new show was actually interesting and good. Reading a letter from his best friend Anthony Sullivan really put friendships in perspective for me. Sorry to see him go. Michael Jackson’s death was a great surprise too and will be missed. Hope the scandals won’t make things worse for his children and family. Was a great artist and changed our lives for the better.

 I‘m still listening to all the podcasts which have started up from the demise of 97.1 radio station. Lot of changes there and plenty of drama. I still listen to Frosty, Heidi and Frank’s podcast. I’ve also started to listen to the Pretty Good Podcast which is actually pretty good. Might check out more if I can find some good ones. I want to have fun and laugh while I work. Thanks to all the fun podcasts out there! Check out Fake Leykis Podcast too. One of the funniest impressionist I’ve heard and I love his Rick Dees impression. Best of luck to you, Brian Whitman.

I‘ve been a Big Brother fan ever since the first season in the UK and the USA. Recently a former contestant from the UK version season 3 has died. She died of cervical cancer at the age of 27 on March 22, 2009. Jade Goody was the most controversial and the most popular of the regular contestants. She became a millionaire from magazine articles, other reality shows, her own perfume and other business ventures. The reason I am bothering posting about her is how she died and the reaction from people in the UK and other places.

Back in 2002 she entered the Big Brother house and made a name for herself. She was made fun of due to her stupid comments and weight in the tabloids. I thought she wasn’t very intelligent but she had a funny personality. I found her and Kate to be my favorites for different reasons. She did have a temper but it didn’t get much attention until after the show. I next saw her on another reality show called Back to Reality where her bully side really came out. She bullied people in that show and I really started to hate her. The next time I saw her I really hated her. She entered the celebrity version of Big Brother in 2007 where she bullied an actress from India named, Shilpa Shetty. The backlash from the UK and Indian public was strong and harsh.

After the show she tried to make amends and apologized for her actions. Shilpa forgave her and they actually became friends. I always found Jade an interesting person for being so strong with all the hatred against her. She became successful with all the publicity. I still disliked her but interested to see what she would do next. I was surprised when I found out she entered the Big Brother in India. Shilpa Shetty was the host of the show and their reunion was interesting. It shows how two people can forgive and leave the hatred behind them. During the show she was told she had cervical cancer and later found out it was terminal. She went through operations and treatment but the cancer spread too fast and she had months to live.

The most important thing she did was getting women to be aware of this cancer at younger ages so they could go for a screening. She stayed in the public view to make people aware of this cancer. She also wanted money for her 2 children after her death. All the publicity got the government health ministers to rethink the practice of not offering screening for young women until age of 25. This also got lot of women to go in for a screening which they might have not done before. If this publicity saved 1 woman it’s a great thing.

I used to play a game called Lord of the rings online every day. My friend and I would play together and share stuff in the game with each other for almost a whole year. I really got hooked with the PVP, Player vs Player, where I can play a spider and fight other people. That has changed with the last update. It made the creep side a bit too easy and the freep side is struggling now. Not much fun when there are no fights. Maybe in the future it will get better but I’m taking a break from it.

The PVE side of this game doesn’t give me much hope too. The kinship I am in lost some good friends I had so all I do is log in for the raids so I can help out. I already lost a great friendship to this game and I’ve lost some of my new friends as well. The Kinship I am in just isn’t the same without those people I got to know these past months. I never would believe a virtual game can be so emotional and make things so difficult in real life. A break from it will be good and lot of other people have decided to do the same. I bought a lifetime membership to the game so I’ll be back just hope everything gets better.

I wrote about Frosty, Heidi and Frank in my last post. They have a new podcast which comes out every monday called FHFU. It is uncensored and they do get a bit raunchy at times so beware of language. Frank needs to put up his microphone volume though because it’s hard to hear him sometimes. They are still funny and I wish I could hear them all the time. I really miss their shows. Their show is only 1 hour and I hope they can do more in the future.

Only thing I like about radio are the talk shows. Been a big fan of FM talk radio 97.1 and especially of Frosty, Heidi and Frank. Haven’t been listening to them on a regular schedule these past weeks but I download their podcasts every day. Was driving today when I found out the radio station changed to a music format. We don’t need another music station in Los Angeles.

Got home and started to search for news about this change and found some good posts about it: ben tao’s thoughts and mikenopolis with some good links. Such a sad day to find it out when I was driving hoping to have a good day laughing. Oh well.

Now I have to find another station to listen to or wait for the personalities I liked to find another place to talk. The only other station I liked was KFI but I find some stuff a bit too political. KABC is way too political for my taste too. I want a fun relaxing talk show to make me laugh. I remember when Phil Hendrie retired and now he’s back on radio stations again. So I’m hoping for the best but it really got me sad to find out about this. I’m glad I saved a lot of the podcasts so I can continue listen to their shows until they find a new home. Best wishes to them and all the fans.

I always like to see the fun side of things in life. Very rarely will I get offended by a joke made by someone. If I do find it offensive I would rather tell them and move on. In the last month there were plenty of events which were not fun at all. I’d like to address some and end with some fun stuff.

First the Virginia Tech massacre was just a total shock to me. I just have no words to describe how sad that event was. Some think gun control would stop this from happening in America. The problem is that the guns are already out there. People won’t be willing to give them up at any cost especially the criminals. I don’t have an answer to this problem in America. Some people will always think killing is the answer to their problem. Trying to help problem kids at the earliest age would be the best way in my opinion.

There was something very interesting that happened after this event, though. Some bloggers thought they found the killers blog and it started to get talked about throughout the internet. Guess what happened next? The professional TV and radio news people found about it and started to report it as fact. Perfect example why I don’t watch the news anymore! They don’t look for facts anymore. All they want is to be the first at the story for ratings. Now I have this guys blog bookmarked so I can read more about what he has to go through for his beliefs.

Then something else I just read that went in another direction which didn’t even cross my mind. This article about how violence against women have been dismissed throughout the news really made me take notice. In the beginning everyone thought this was just a domestic dispute and wasn’t important to anybody else on the campus. That should change. Violence against women is still violence and should not be tolerated in any circumstances. Now we find out the killer wasn’t even in a relationship with the woman he shot first. Would anything have changed if the school took the stalking reports more seriously? I don’t think it would change his mind. He probably would have done something like this sometime in the future. But it doesn’t mean we should look away from these issues! Maybe if we do address this issue more it will stop the next killer who thinks it’s ok to kill innocent people.

The IMUS thing got me on defensive because I like listening to radio a lot! I never really get offended by a comment someone says. I might find their language a bit rough if used excessively. IMUS deserved a warning or a stern talking to but a firing over something small compare to the other things he has said about other people? I am always for dialogue which will help more people than just trying to stop everything that’s offensive. Let’s find out why words can be offensive. I say boycott the killers, drug dealers and take back some of the gang controlled cities. That would make a HUGE difference rather than forcing a talk show host off the air.

But I must stop and get back to the fun side of life. Recently trying to get away from all the bad news I found a great site which makes me laugh, groan or just think what was that all about. The site funnyordie.com is a place to watch funny videos which are submitted and everyone can vote if it’s funny or not. Of course not everything that I think is funny will be funny to you. We are all different and that is what I love about life. Don’t be offended just move along and we will have a fun time with our lives.

I‘m actually having fun playing a MMO game called “Lord of the rings Online” which has take a lot of my free time. It’s a fun game and really keeps me entertained for hours. I also have been playing Command and Conquer 3 which is a really good immersive game. I love the games with a story that makes me believe I am actually in the game. C&C3 is basically an updated C&C generals with better graphics and better equipment. The little videos before each campaign has been great especially with a great actor like Michael Ironside playing in it.

This is the best time of the year for me. October has always been a month I wait for. I have always loved scary movies ever since I was around 10. I remember watching the movies on Select TV late at night. Covering my eyes when it got too scary or to explicit. My grandmother and mom used to love watching the movies too so it was totally natural to watch them.
One thing I do in October is go to a local theme park called, Knott’s Berry Farm. During the Halloween season they change their name to Knott’s Scary Farm and decorate the park and rides with cobwebs and spooky stuff. At night they will close the park to regular guests and prepare the park for Halloween. About 7pm to 1am the park is opened to the guests who want to get scared. They have people dressed up in costumes trying to scare people in the park all night. Their are also plenty of spooky mazes in the park where you can walk through looking at gory scenes or monsters walking around with you.
This year was a lot more crowded then previous years. I usually go on Sundays because it’s not as crowded but this time they had a premiere event for the movie “Grudge 2.” They also had a Grudge 2 maze that was closed almost all night so we couldn’t go through it. I hear it’s a good maze. Maybe next year they will have it again so I can see it. We only missed two mazes this time. I rarely get scared when going to this event because I always prepare for someone around the corner. I love watching other people getting scared though.
I hear the best time to go is during the weekdays instead of the weekend. The crowds are less because most of the teens have to go to school the next day. Don’t go on a Columbus weekend because there are schools that have Monday off still. I also must tell you to go the prescare dinner before the park opens because you get a buffet of the best fried chicken and get into the park 30 minutes before everyone else! Sometimes they won’t let you in on time or they let everyone in at the same time but usually the prescare dinner is a lot better!
If you’re interested in this halloween event or others like it you should check out Theme Park Adventure! I also wrote about some things they have in Second life at the VTOR blog I write for also.
[tags]halloween,knotts scary farm, theme park, halloween events, scary fun, johnramirez[/tags]

I‘ve recently started watching a show called Heroes on NBC and I find it a very interesting show. I like the whole idea of getting people who find out they have super powers together to save the world. Each one has a strength and a weakness but together they can help each other. There are many similarities with this show and the x-men but It’s more of a psychological story rather than a straight hero movie.
Following all these people with special powers and wondering how they all are going to join together is the best part about this show. The character that I really like is Hiro Nakamura who can manipulate time and space. He gets a bit excited sometimes but that is what’s so funny about him. He doesn’t know much English so he will have a hard time trying to get with the other heroes. At least his friend knows english to help him out.
The other character I like is the cheerleader, Claire Bennet, who is indestructible but she can be stopped. She doesn’t have the strength or power so she will have to depend on other people to do some damage. The most interesting one of all of them is the woman with two personalities, Niki Sanders. Her other personality has a lot of strength and is very dangerous. She doesn’t seem to have complete control over her second personality yet. I wonder how will she use her power if and when she controls it.
The strangest character is Peter Petrelli who can fly only around his brother, Nathan Petrelli. Nathan can fly anytime but not peter. I think Peter’s power is going to be an interesting addition to the rest of them. It will be interesting to see how he plays a part with all the rest of the heroes. It seems like he gains the power of the nearest hero. A very interesting super power In my opinion.
If you aren’t watching this show it’s something you might want to check out. It comes on NBC on mondays and I hear it’s doing good in the ratings.
[tags]heroes,tv show,television,nbc,johnramirez[/tags]