Pave Paradise and Put up a Parking Lot

I think i'm about due for another post here, so this one would be it. I just got this inspiration last night; the wierdest thing happened to me.

About a week ago, I had cancelled my subscription to a video game, feeling bored of it, and it wasn't worth 15 bucks a month to get bored by a game. However, I had not planned on getting a new game. I practically forced myself to go "cold turkey" to video games. So, I needed a new pasttime.

One thing about me is my lack of reading. Ask any of my English teachers, I sure write well, but my reading is sub-par. I'm not motivated to read a book, especially without reason (like a grade.) However, my cold turkey (and i'm not addicted to the game itself, just I usually have some video game to play when I get bored.) has changed my perspective instantly.

Last night I was restless. I had just spent 3 hours right after work finishing one book in a series I had read in 8th grade, and couldn't sleep. I spent 3 more hours til the time was 3:30 reading the next book. I was getting a pang of boredom and needed something other than stupid tv shows, facebook, and music. (I had already made 2 new songs in a week just to stifle boredom.) I picked up a book, one that I really didn't fully enjoy last time I had read it.

In 8th grade, I was interested in the book since it had a cool plot, the main character was short (like me), lots of sex and naked women, and scifi and fantasy together in one book. However, I now can really understand the book. I had thought in 8th grade that Piers Anthony was just a sexaholic and wrote these beautiful women falling in love with the main character just because. However, I see a new perspective now. The sex has a reason; Stile, the main character needed love to know who he himself was, and it continues to the plot. An Oracle tells him to "know thyself", which plays an important part of the book.

Anyway the unique thing is that I was almost drawn to the book, I had been so blind from the video games to realize the wealth in a book. I never knew what I was missing, til it was gone. You could say I had a grass blade growing through the paved parking lot's crack.

Recommended Books:
If you're into a straight fantasy world series that is full of literal puns and enjoyable storylines, Try Piers Anthony's Xanth Series; it starts with A Spell for Chameleon.
Piers has a few more series that I've read, mostly sci fi or like the one I stayed up last night for a mix of both. If you're for an intellectual interesting perspective series, try the Incarnations of Immortality, beginning with On a Pale Horse.
Lastly, The Apprentice Adept series is the mixture of the sci fi world and the fantasy world, beginning with Split Infinity.

I'll post some more good books from other authors once I read a little more.

There's no I in team, but there's definitely me.

Somedays I feel like I'm the most important thing in the world, and the next day I'll feel like the world is against me. Well I've figured it out to be something like this:

My personality is very much so like identity forebarence, or being what others want me to be. I notice in certain classes I'll feel very shy, quiet, and introverted, and the next hour I'll be up on my feet crazy and silly, very extraverted.

It's quite funny when I take a personality test since they always change, one day it will be the math genius part of me and the other it's the center of attention jokester part of me. Not surprising, many people think I'm shy while others think I'm the craziest guy on the earth.

I think a large component of it is my want to be liked. Now I know all you can say "oh i'm my own person" but then again, you're nothing like it. You may think you are your own person, but there has to be some influence. Unless you never wear any clothes, never do anythign at all, I'm certain that someone else has influenced you.

Me? I'm a huge mix of everyone I know. I have a little bit of my best friends in me, a little bit of my brother in me, a little of my parents, a little of my enemies, my political leaders, my teachers, my favorite bands, everything. I know this makes me different than everyone else since I can change my own personality to match what I need. I know I am my own man. In the words of Thoreau, "Cast Conformity Behind You." Sure, i'm conforming to a degree, but not to one thing. I combine everyone else to form a new un-conformed identity.

One thing everyone agrees about me is that I'm different. My good friends and I look nothing alike. We aren't in the same classes. My fashion sense is what I like, not what models like.

Music

Okay, perhaps you didn't know this about me, but I really love music and have made it a hobby of mine to create it in my spare time.

I have made a few songs on the piano, but recently I've started to use Garageband to make music.

Garageband is a Mac only music editor that is very user-friendly but can be as complex as you wish it to be. It sorta looks like this:















I uploaded a few of my songs via betarecords.com and you can reach them at:
www.betarecords.com/avi.morgenstern

I'll briefly explain each one that you see there.

Funk: My dad plays the bass guitar and he has sorta brainwashed me in acknowledging them equally as the other band players. He's also very enthralled by a good horn section. Thus, this song's for him. This song, although simple-sounding, was actually fairly hard to create for me. Apple didn't have any "funk" horns, and most of the concluding section I made from scratch.

Cool: I really can only think of naming this song "cool" since it is just that, it's cool. I really like all these loops (most aren't custom made) and together it makes a cool feeling and sound.

Haunting Bass: Well.... that's my best name. One of my newest songs, it features a bass melody that gives at least me some shivers. Sorta a classic rock setup with several guitars and a classic rock beat. Still a work in progress, I think the end could be redone to be better.

Messaround: One of my favorites, I made messaround a few days after getting about 2 thousand more loops for free from Apple and was just messin' around with all those new loops to create this song. Really a fun song. Oh by the way, my cousin uses this song in a reality TV show found at www.thetalentvault.com I believe it's in the background of the 2nd episode.

Qwerty: Again a fairly uncreative name, but the song in it of itself speaks for it. Another fairly new song, Qwerty features a techno deep melody. I also found a new sound with this song called atmospheres, the moving sounds that encompass the main part in the beginning and the end.

Cutesy: I made this song for a show at school, supposed to be a happy-upbeat song. I really got carried away and made this a very fun song that deserves more than just being in a show for 15 seconds. My brother thinks of Ben Folds when he hears this :D.

Battle of the Unknown: One of my newest songs, this is sorta a trance song based off those awesome songs that my friend Kyle plays for me when I'm at his house. A little repititous to follow the similar style of those songs. Anyway it's a fun song to dance to. By the way that is my voice :D

Spring: At last, my newest one. Mom helped me think this one out, and name it. She called it spring since it sounds a little like an April shower with the rain hitting the roof. Anyway, combined together, it is a very relaxing, happy, creepy, song.

Mysteriousity: A new song recently added to betarecords.com, Mysteriousity is a song very similar style to a part of a song I really like, Evanescence's Eternal, where there's a background environmental sound while a haunting piano/synth combination. It's becoming of my favorites.


well anyway, download, make cd's, spread the name of my songs, and think of some good names for them, since as you can see most of mine are crappy :).

-Avi

My Blog

Okay, my brother decided to make one and I think I'll have to follow him. Anyway, I'll give you some good stuff if you continue checking this, such as stories, links, and music. 'cause afterall, the best knowledge I may have may not be the best knowledge you have, and vice versa. Perhaps you can learn from me and I can learn from you.