Ferris Beuller Would be Proud

Posted on September 30, 2009 by Justin Scott

One of those Kennedy/Lincoln situations.

In Ferris Beuller‘s day off, Ferris faked his health as an excuse for a day off. Barack Obama is being blamed for using the healthcare crisis to draw away attention from the war and economic problems.

Ferris Beuller was from Chicago. Barack Obama was Chicago senator.

Ferris Beuller borrowed his friend’s dad’s car, convincing him there was no other way. Barack Obama convinced Congress et al. that we needed to borrow money and buy out General Motors.

Ferrish Beuller was an incredible speaker that ultimately always got what he wanted. Barack Obama (see Ferris Beuller).

So what do we have here? Like a scene out of Ferris Beuller’s Day Off when Ferris runs through a Chicago parade getting the entire city in on his song and dance. Well, Barack Obama is pushing for a more socialized health care system, not unlike Canada, the UK and France‘s systems, for America while simultaneously trying to win the 2016 Olympics for Chicago, which of course would bring a lot of song and dance to the city.

Follow me?

So here’s the two coming together. A French Canadian, university (UQAM) gathers 172 of their communication students to perform a massive lip-sync of an American hip-hop group, The Black Eyed Peas, in a style ripped from the venerable 1986 film. They did the entire thing in two hour and fifteen minutes and as you’ll see below, it’s pretty freaking incredible.

Moral of the story? We need socialized healthcare, the 2016 Olympics and more mass-lip-sync performances.

Not too proud of my Americanism to say… I’d kill to be a French Canadian going to l’Université du Québec à Montréal!

For All My Kiwis

Posted on June 26, 2009 by Justin Scott

I’m not really sure how many New Zealand readers I have here. Actually, I do know. It’s 91.

Nevertheless, PayPerPost wanted me to spread the word about this new service, KiwiSelect. They help make this blog possible by sponsoring it through advertisements on the blog.

Interested in saving money, I went to the site kiwisaver and played around with it a bit.

KiwiSelect

The service is beautiful to play around with and allows you to easily calculate how much money you can save by retirement based on your age and “attitude”. The site allows you to choose an investment risk profile, choose a fund manager, and then to apply online for the best fund choice and pretty much finishes up the whole deal.

If the service is as easy to fully implement as it seems, I say it’s a slam dunk. Do wish there was something out here, in the United States, that worked similarly. So far I don’t know of any. But a quick check with this site had me with $406,000 by retirement age! That’s not too shabby.

Plus, this whole deal is government backed, to me that’s a good thing, while at the same time it’s free and independently owned. What more could you ask for? Plus, whoever did their site certainly had an eye for style.

We need people to save more and prepare for the economies we are in today. KiwiSelect is a move in the right direction.

It’s My Birth Day

Posted on August 2, 2008 by Justin Scott

Twenty four years ago today my parents’ lives were changed forever. They finally had the son they had always wanted.

Well, I guess that had happened about a year earlier but this time they had the son they… Ok, ok, I was just the summer release sequel of the last year’s hit, Patrick.

I think I was a pretty cute kid, of course I’m partial to thinking so. I think I was born to be a model, now I don’t dare claim to have grown into being a model, sadly, but I sure had the look.

Here I am pretending that I’m bulimic. No, not really, but it’s anyone’s guess as to what the hell I was doing with my hand.

It is crazy to me that I have changed so much, but clearly, I have always been gay. I mean, look at that picture, gay gay gay!

Today however, 24 years after birth, I’m headed home to Houston with my mom. With Ryan in Tennessee and nothing really happening in Columbia, I figured, why not? Sadly, I kinda ruined a surprise birthday from Micheal, Jenny and Co. That sucks, if I had known I would not have purchased my return flight and just hung out in Columbia. However, we are planning to do something when I get back in town and you are all invited!

As of right now we have about seven more hours of driving. I’m lucky to only have the task of sitting in the car since I’m not insured on this rental car.

I’m hoping to be able to visit my cousins in Rockport Texas who I have seen once in like four years and will miss not seeing Joseph who now lives in Seoul Korea! Joseph has always been the highlight of visiting Houston.

Well, that’s really it for now I guess, I need to read my blogroll which I am way behind in doing. Catch you guys later!

Remember the Alamo

Posted on July 14, 2008 by Justin Scott

Saturday, after picking up my new iPhone 3G, Ryan, my dad and I met up with my mom at the Valencia Hotel on the Riverwalk. From the hotel we walked down to the water to get some tapas. They were tasty and the view was great. I had not been to the Riverwalk in quite some time.

After the snack we took a stroll down to the Alamo and other similar sites.

We've Certainly Got Direction

We passed my great grandfather’s pharmacy and the old zoo that was indoors, like in a building downtown… how crazy. If the bears got loose… holy shit!

The Alamo

Ryan and I

The Alamo from the back

Always Busy

Posted on July 5, 2008 by Justin Scott

It seems like every week I’m flying out somewhere or otherwise taking a trip out of town.

Texas, Birmingham, Chicago, Kansas City, Saint Louis, San Francisco… This Monday I’m flying out to Raleigh North Carolina and giving a presentation to the North Carolina Sweet Potato Commission and then Ryan will join me in Texas to spend a long weekend with my grandmother and grandfather at their home there outside of Austin.

I am really excited/nervous about the trip to Texas. This is the first time that I have really integrated a boyfriend in my family life. I have always wanted to do so with my past boyfriends (namely, only, Landon and Geoffrey) but a mixture of my fear and my family’s obvious distaste for that quelched any chances of something like this.

However, my family seems to just love Ryan, a lot. I mean, why not? He’s smart, funny, loving, cute, incredibly diligent, charming and so kind. He has helped me grow and feel comfortable in my skin. He is such a light in my life and my family must see that. He emails back and forth with my grandmother and my parents ask about him everytime we talk on the phone. How great is that?

So anyways, going to be busy traveling but it will be a lot of fun and let’s be honest, getting out of Columbia is about the best thing one can do in the summer!

On a Mission (in the Mission)

Posted on June 30, 2008 by Justin Scott

Our last day in San Francisco was a busy day. Ryan had a lot of paperwork to get processed and needed a few LiveScans for a job application and ambulance license so we marched down Powell to the Bart station.

Wow, I guess I forgot all about the Pride Parade. Thousands of people met us at the Bart station, completely hiding it from our field of vision. We hung out, watched a few floats go by, reveled in the fun, friendly good times and took a few pictures.

As with any gay event, not everyone there was there to celebrate equality. Some religious zealots where protesting the parade, the weekend, the gay marriages in California and just whatever popped into their heads.

They blamed the fires on the gays. They blamed the terrorist attacks in 2001 on the gays. They blamed the salmonella on the gays. They blamed the storms on the gays. Apparently it’s our fault. Sorry guys. Our bad.

[flv:Religious_Zealots.flv 500 375]

The kicker was when he said, “If you guys are such a loving, kind and friendly people, why do you need all of these police officers? It’s because you cause hate and destruction that they are here” and then went onto something about paying good Californian’s tax dollars for us to celebrate our heresy…

I guess what he was missing was this. The police are there not to protect us from ourselves but from people like him. Pride is about as safest I have ever felt in a city, day or night. The only thing one gay guy wants to do to another gay guy is fuck him (excuse my vulgarity and obvious exaggeration).

Well anyway, we finally made it to the UPS Store for Ryan’s LiveScan only to find it had closed for Pride. Haha, a UPS closed for Pride, how awesome. We took a seat at Squat & Gobble for lunch while we figured out a Plan B.

Squat & Gobble is the perfect little brunch place. I always think of Landon when I go there. I’m pretty sure you would love it Landon, reminds me of The Café in Washington DC only… better. It was delicious. While there we found another LiveScan place, hopped on a bus and back to the Mission we go.

LiveScan went easy enough, then back to the hotel. I’m leaving Ryan here to go to Pride for a bit. Catch you guys later!

Porn Stars and House Parties

Posted on June 28, 2008 by Justin Scott

The night began and ended at the same place. Nick Starr called us up and told us to meet him in the Castro at a particular address. Knowing the area a bit, I realized quite quickly that we weren’t going to a club, no businesses exist past 600 Castro…

Ryan and I make it down Castro and are searching for the address Nick txt’d me when someone calls from a window inviting us into the house.

It turns out it is the very house where we are supposed to be meeting Nick. We glide up the stairs and into the house meeting some wonderfully friendly and fabulous people. Of the first we met was Skye, pictured to the left. Skye (with an E) work for Southwest Airlines and lives in San Francisco. He was a whole lot of fun.

Ryan and I helped ourselves to the free booze in the kitchen keeping them strong and keeping them coming!

The person who welcomed us into his home was Adam. He is pictured below sitting with Brent Corrigan (aka Sean Paul Lockhart), who is my favorite porn star… Seriously, he is beautiful. Also, a wonderfully fun and friendly person. We talked about his new, legitimate, movie and other random things. He’s smart, capabile, funny and adorable (read, hot).

Sean Paul Lockhart or Brent Corrigan ( brought in a few of his porn star friends, which are always welcomed, but really didn’t help the party… Let me explain. Everyone there was pretty darn hot, some of them were sinfully so. It was enough to make you insta-anorexic-workout-addict. Damn girl.

Speaking of porn stars, these two guys certainly have a future in the business, if only they weren’t so camera shy, or rather, so damn bitchy. Cool it boys, and why don’t you get a room? I swear the couch had a wet spot once they finally peeled themselves off. Cute/hot but the attitude has got to go.

So we hung out, drank, chatted, had a fabulous time. I didn’t take many pictures though, felt kinda weird doing it in someone else’s home and with all the porn actors, it felt like maybe I was taking pictures of them and not of the fun times? Hmm, not sure. Adam took a ton of pictures, wish I had his memory card haha.

The highlight of the evening had to be meeting these two guys. Tyler and Sean. Tyler is a graphic designer and Sean is a graphical user interface creater… GUI-C. They have been together for three years through the whole long distance thing and now live in San Francisco together.

Basically they are just awesome guys and when/if Ryan and I move here, we will have to hang out with these two guys. After about an hour of talking with each other, we were fast friends. I’m pretty sure living in San Francisco and having friends like these two… we’d be living life famously.

After a while we decided it was time for the obligatory Myspace photo.

The party ended at 2:30 and Ryan and I found ourselves walking home around 3:00 until I caught us a cab for the rest of the cold, long walk home.

I hate that I didn’t take more pictures. All the people there were so nice and fun, we had Marc (with a C) and his friend, and another Sean and a Mark and three Johns (Jons?) and… the list goes on. It sure was a fun fun night.

It's Just Justin

A gadget, news and life blog by Justin Scott

Tag Archives: Society and Culture