How is it that terrible teachers exist?

With my last final finished today I am officially on spring break and as such finally done with one of the most condescending butt hole professors that I have ever had the displeasure of learning from. This got me thinking about how there can be terrible teachers out there. I am going to be a teacher some day and more often than not I find myself taking note on what teachers are doing wrong rather than what they are attempting to teach me. I mean, I'm assuming that most people who are teachers today went through a similar education process as myself in some capacity. They were there, they saw it first hand, how did they come out the other side having dealt with all manner of crazy ineffective instructors and gone, "yeah, I'm going to pass this douchebaggery onto the next generation". One would assume they would learn from all of the terrible experiences they've had, and come out the other side knowing what not to do because they experienced it themselves.

Don't get me wrong I have had wonderful and inspiring teachers and professors before, they are the ones who have compelled me to become a teacher in the first place. That being said, the concept of a bad teacher just boggles my mind. How does it happen? What alchemy of cognitive dissonance is taking place here? In any case, this quarter is done, here's hoping I rolled the dice well on my next set of professors.

I will always watch the credits

Whether it be for a films, video games, television shows, etc. I always have this sense of moral obligation to watch the credits of a creative work in their entirety, at the very least the first time through anyway. A collaborative creative work is something to be respected. Whether or not I personally enjoyed such a work, I can acknowledge that many hours of dedication were poured into making something out of nothing. I know I'll never remember all of the names of those who worked on projects of this nature, but I feel as though I owe it to them to watch as their names pass over the screen. It's a minor acknowledgement of their contribution to something that in most cases, good or bad, will have an affect on the way that I perceive the world. I guess the best parallel would be similar to why people visit cemeteries. In truth, it doesn't accomplish anything tangible, it's more of a form of respect for a person who's participation is invalid. I'm not saying that those who don't do this are bad or disrespectful, it's just a personal quirk of mine.

The results are in

Well this experiment threw me a bit of a curve ball, but it all worked out in the end, and maybe even for the better.

A minor social experiment

I went to go see The Wind Rises a few weeks back and as expected I enjoyed the film immensely. So much so that I actually wanted to go see it in theaters again before they stopped showing it. But more than that I wanted to share the experience with other people, and not just some of my friends who are animation buffs anyways. While I do love going to see movies with my friends, we all tend to have more or less the same opinion afterward. This is a somewhat intellectually challenging film and I felt it would be interesting to get the perspective of some who wouldn't normally go see this type of movie. My birthday is coming up this week and I thought it would be a neat idea to go with my family to the movies. Normally they would tell me no if I told them to come see an animated film with me even though thus far every single one that I have convinced them to watch they have enjoyed to some degree. I don't really ask for much for my birthday and by having this as my sole request I think they felt a little obligated and agreed. I'm just really curious to see how they will receive it as for the most part they tend to have a very ethnocentric view of the world. Not that this movie is 100% historically accurate, but it does provide a small glimpse into another culture during the time period of my great grandparents.

Let's talk about Yoshi's New Island

I finished this game yesterday and I have a lot of feelings about it, I actually wanted to write this last night, but I figured it would be best for me to step away for a bit and let my thoughts simmer, so here we go, spoilers ahoy! This is your chance to jump ship if you don't want to hear about it. Yoshi's Island was one of my favorite games growing up, I have such fond memories of it and it's still probably in my top 10 favorite games of all time today. I didn't get the opportunity to play Yoshi's Story for the N64, or the one that came out on the DS in 2006 so I was really excited when they announced this one for the 3DS. Sadly it turns out that Yoshi's New Island is exactly the same as the original and worse at the same time. Allow me to elaborate.

42 is my lucky number

In past generations of Pokemon, the battle facilities have always felt a little out of reach for me. The gratuitous time sink involved in IV breeding and EV training pokemon even as recently as Black 2 and White 2 made the whole prospect not seem worth the effort. Enter all of the new mechanics of X and Y and suddenly it seems a lot more doable. In early November when everything was still new I made a team not really to win at the Battle Maison, but to be able to farm a reasonable amount of BP for Wi-Fi battling which is what I was really interested in. I EV trained them, but at the time I was still unaware how much easier it was to IV breed, so their IV's were all wonky. Time went on and occasionally I would hit a 25 streak if I was lucky, but I wasn't really worried about it.

Let's talk about Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze

Well after a little over a week of playing on and off I managed to beat all the main levels in DKC:5. I still have a few secret exits to find, but for the most part I have a pretty good grasp on the game as a whole and I'd like to share my thoughts on it. I will make mention of some spoilers so this is your chance to head for the hills. One last note, I will be making a lot of comparisons to Super Mario 3D World as I just finished it right before starting this game and they are both prominent platformers on the Wii U. So with all of that out of the way, let's get swingin'.

Getting Started

A forum that I belong to, thespeedgamers community, recently switched over to a new format that supports a blog function, and that got me thinking about starting my own. While I do have a Tumblr, I use it about 98% of the time for rebloging other peoples posts that I like. I like the format of Blogger, but I'll probably reach more people via the forum, so I think I'll post the same content in both places, a bit redundant, I know, but oh well. Anyway, I think these are good places to write rants and essays where my thoughts won't get bogged down by other random posts. Mainly I'll probably writing about games, film, cartoons, and whatever else tickles my fancy. Stay tuned for plenty of angry ramblings.