I have had the fortune to talk to many people in the past couple years, those searching for businesses and the path to financial freedom. Its been very interesting and I have spoken to people of all types and educations. The quality of people on this earth is very breathtaking, even for those who lack any sort of ambition or quality of action.

Case in point. I got to know a Professor, someone who spent their life in school, supposedly learning and becoming smarter, more educated, wiser. A supposed PHD who really couldn’t understand the beginnings of commerce or common sense. A person who didn’t know how to take the pen and formulate a sentence that couldn’t get him in trouble – not a real clear thinker. And this was evident in our conversations. I feel sorry for those type of people. People that have spent a fortune on an education that has not served them well at all. An “education” that has not fixed the core of what they need in their life, a fix of themselves. This happens only by looking inward and making change.

And change comes with action.

Instead, this person was bridled with fear, educated enough to place blame on anyone but himself for his misfortunes in life. Fear drives some to take action, others to cower and avoid action at all cost. And pride causes those that cower to place blame on others. Its laughable but then sobering. Again, I feel sorry for those who cannot take action in life.

The collective experiences I have had with people who have degrees, who don’t have degrees, and those who are actively pursuing the American Dream are vast and could fill volumes of books on the topic. I may write about it one day in great detail…

In the meantime, let’s embrace those who take action and achieve!

Michael Jackson, as we are seeing each and everyday on the news around the world, was one of the influential media people of all times.  At the risk of offending those who love Elvis, yes I say, even bigger than Elvis.

He had an opportunity to walk out on stage one day and say, hey, “I am black”.  I’ve tried to be white, but today I am saying, I am a proud black man.  I think that would have been a very strong message to many in the world who struggle with the trials of being black in what some consider a white controlled society.

He could have further united the races and eliminated much racism by extending a hand and saying, “we are the same”.  Its this writer’s opinion that he started to do that, I saw it, I felt it.

We are the World

Black or White

Jam and many more!

Michael Jackson, despite the allegations that were dismissed, was a phenomenal musical legend.  I watched Marines in San Antonio Texas try to dance to Thriller in clubs after having their limit of beer.  Okay, I was one of them…but that’s not important.  What’s important is that we not forget the good messages in much of his music.  The world is an important place.  We are one people.  We must protect the children.

Many focus on an isolated incident in his life to make him something bad, an allegation is an allegation only.  He, in my opinion, has done much much better for this world than bad.

Rest in peace MJ.

In my brief experience with Face book, I do have to say this. After being hit with a tomato, having a funny icon of Hillary tossed at me or graphiti written on my wall, I come away from the site knowing that between Facebook and Myspace, Facebook rocks. Myspace is a mess of code, no standard in any sense of the imagination (and it shows in almost every other site visit), its a mess. Facebook on the other hand has a nice, clean, bland standard, something like this site. While it can be cluttered with extras that you can add or delete a will, the overall theme remains clean and unscrambled with code and banners and flash and java.

When I read the other day that Facebook was opening its code up to developers and the creative element, I swallowed hard, my left eye twitched and I readied my battle gear. As a fervent critic against Myspace, I was ready to take arms up about Facebook – the chapter remains to be written.

My eldest son said, dad, everyone uses Facebook- it’s easier than email.   That appears to be true and it seems like everyone is embracing it. When e-mail came around, traditional letterwriting took a hit and now that we have the social networking behemoths like Facebook, will traditional communications take a hit as well? I believe that we will see a change in the e-mail process as well as traditional telephone calls. I predict that everyone will be able to communicate via video using your Facebook account either a computer or handheld device at any time.

This will revolutionize communications and wow that is wonderful, I still have reservations about mapping our minds on social networking sites.  People must step back and ask themselves, why are they given us this great thing for free?

In my personal opinion, there is no greater credit report being built then the mapping of your minds on a social networking site like Facebook. MySpace has already mapped many of people’s seedy sides and Facebook is collecting the rest. And then with the data collection monsters like Google, there is going to be a very unique report on every individual in this world, accessible by anybody with money.

Growing up in church, one of the biggest and most frightening aspects to the churchgoing community, was a prediction that we would be faced with the mark of the beast. It was predicted that it would be a number 666, or something that would have to be attached to the body or the forehead for easy identification. And that was very fearful for many people growing up in the church community. There were sermons upon sermons educating the church community that they may be confronted with the decision to die first or take the mark. And the same people that were educated in such a manner are freely mapping their minds and committing their souls to entities that they don’t even know.

That may sound extreme to many of you, and I think that is funny. People could brand me as a conspiracy theorist or somebody who is overboard with the worry factor. But that is okay, I firmly believe that the mapping of every desire and every thought and every image in every activity that you do in your life will come back to haunt you! You may not see it directly, but it will affect your insurance rates in the future, you’re ability to get and keep a job, and even to get and keep a spouse. The information that you’re putting online now, will be accessed by those to make decisions for you in the future.

One of the comforts of growing up in this country was that we had the freedom to say, “the government can’t read our minds”.

They can now.

I must credit the visuals as being unique, especially the scene of the diving dragons, etc. Pretty nifty but I found the 3D glasses irritating and somewhat nauseating overall. I left with a headache, as if I had a fabulously vivid dream that left me drained after waking up…

Does anyone else consider the near naked blue Avatar chick a certain level of pornography? I kept watching the show, clearly seeing her nipples and wondering if anyone in review land would make a mention of the nakedness of this splendid blue female Avatar. If it was not for the very hot actress behind the voice, i would have been downright displeased with the reckless placement of clothing over the nipples and general breasts of this beast.

But then again its okay to show a computer animated depiction of nudity to our children, since its not real, right? Crazy, but under FTC and regulatory guidelines, it may very well be true!

Reviews from Variety to others, have pegged the movie as “genius”, not to be topped, and other incredibly lofty statements. I believe that cinemagoers truly want something like this – they want to be altered from traditional movie experiences. But in my view, Avatar was just another film which did not live up to the hype and in fact, disappointed me. Batman – the Dark Knight (in Imax) had more interesting art captured (take the scene from the skyscraper)….

Overall, I left with a headache and a grin as I thought of the documentary I watched about how the film was made and realized that the documentary was much, much more incredible than the film itself. (If you haven’t seen it, you should!) The technology used to develop this film and the facial expressions of the animated characters was much more titillating than the film itself. But if you are looking to see blue boobs on a hot beast with a long tail, wait for the DVD and for God’s sake – use discretion when showing your kids.

Otherwise, shit – just give them a subscription to Playboy – there really is not a difference…

I am simply amazed that such a piece of garbage film would make it to the theaters without a cigarrette type warning label, Warning – this movie is unhealthy for children and adults – take it in at your own risk.

Director Zach Snyder was quoted as saying by Borys Kit, “I’m proud of the movie. It does everything I wanted it to,” .  I wonder if Snyder has an agenda to numb the nation to horrors of death and dying, to numb the youth into blurring the lines between right and wrong, to question all authority or to succumb to certain defeat?  Hmmm, perhaps that is what he meant…

To Parents: If you do not mind exposing your child to very visual effects of a person taking an axe to the head repeatedly, in full color – send your children to this film.  If you do not care that your kids develop many messages that there are no right and wrong, that super-heros and police and all of the system is bad, then by all means buy them this dvd.  If you think there is value in programming kids whose frontal-lobe is not yet fully developed to believe that the only way to solve problems is violence, then this is the ticket.  If you don’t mind your kids seeing a blue “super-hero” walking around in full nudity, with it swinging in the blue lit wind, go ahead…no wait, actually don’t.  That would be wrong.  Geez…

To Warner Brothers: Is it really that bad in your industry that you have to stoop to shock our children and even adults?  Seriously, was there a boardroom meeting where you determined to keep the axe scene in?   Was it determined that this would be “home movie entertainment”?  Oh wait, your staff probably took a corporate trip to Russia to hunt live humans – that’s my guess anyway.  And without any scruples whatsoever.  One would have imagined that such a wholesome company would at least file a separate DBA labeled Cutting Edge Entertainment or something similar.  Nope, just brutal honesty and the “we don’t give a f**k what people think” decision to put out such garbage.  Now, parents and those who care about children and other family members, (yes kids older than 11 – 25 who could watch your film) will be encouraged otherwise when the label says “Warner Brothers”.  ANY film labeled as such.

To Zach Snyder: We have not met but I must give you my congratulations.  I forced myself to watch this movie, to get past the first 20 minutes in order to effectively write this review.  Throughout it, I kept waiting for the film to melt, the camera to cut away to a bright lit stage where a well-dressed director would walk out and apologize.  To shed a tear and say sorry.   Zach, you can do better.   I must say that even the artistic value of the film was a stretch.  You could have eliminated many scenes and made this a watchable film.  Now, parents us like us will have to avoid ALL films directed by Mr. Zach Snyder.  Your talent is better than that.  I envy the opportunity you have to correct this.

Watchmen (by Warner Brother’s standard) is a horrible waste of cinematic investment.  My 17 year old son who was allowed admission, had sense enough to walk out 3o minutes into the film, call his dad and say, what a bunch of garbage.

Out of the mouth of babes…