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My Top 5 Favorite Movies of 2015

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2015 has been a great year for movies. Many were surprisingly good and in honor of the great movies this year I have created a list of my 2015 favorites. How I decided what I put on the list is by asking could I watch it more than three times and still enjoy it.

Photo credit teaser-trailer.com

#5 Mad Max: Fury road
Many people didn’t see this and I highly recommend it. I went into the movie expecting the worst movie of the year but was pleasantly surprised. The movie is based on Mad Max a low-budget film from 1979. The major reason why I enjoyed the movie was because the first time ever I went to the movies and saw something with a really basic plot that was entertaining. There wasn’t a moment in the entire movie that I disliked. They cut out all the slow scenes that are just there to add time like in every other action movie post-2000. Along with the great plot, the costumes, scenery and vehicles are astounding. It was also refreshing seeing a dystopian movie without teenagers.

Photo Credit to marvel.wikia.com

#4 Ant-Man
Ant-Man was great it was a perfect combination of action and comedy – plus the film makers did a fantastic job with character development. I liked this movie more than Avengers age of Ultron and that is because marvel has finally introduced the Wasp. After age of Ultron, I was outraged that they expanded the team and didn’t have the Wasp. Then when I saw the trailer for Ant-Man I was even madder because I thought “OMG there replacing the wasp with an Ant!” But at the end of Ant-Man I realized, “wait the girl is the Wasp” and sure enough at the end they reveal she is going to be the Wasp. I really did love Ant Man and even if they didn’t introduce the Wasp. An expert thief turns to a badass superhero who doesn’t love that?

Photo Credit to cinedude.com

#3 Jurassic World
I was on the Jurassic World hype train since the day the preview came out. Jurassic Park was a huge part of my childhood and I am glad they made a new one. It was great from the special effects to the acting. It’s just an all around entertaining movie.

Photo Credit to teaser-trailer.com

#2 The Man From U.N.C.L.E.
The Man From U.N.C.L.E. was made spy movie of the year in my books. The perfectly executed 1960’s theme, pretty girls, and unique plot are a rare sight in most spy movies recently. Based off of the hit TV show The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (which I binge watched prior to the movie), has Russia and the United States working together to save the world during the cold war. Between the tough Russian and the arrogant American, all the bases are covered. I love the 60’s – just the time period alone made me put this above Mission Impossible.

Photo Credit to potentash.com

#1 The Martian
Mark Watney portrayed by Matt Damon was left behind on mars he has to find a way to survive against all odds. After contacting NASA the whole world is shocked by his survival and space programs join together to bring him home. This movie was so good it even made interstellar look bad, and for that reason it easily made the top spot on my list.

Urban Exploration

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Just the other day I was browsing some dank memes on Reddit.

I got really bored so I went to “reddit.com/r/random/” which directs the user to a random subreddit.

After three attempts I finally stumbled upon a decent-looking subreddit that I had never even heard of: /r/urbanexploration.

I spent the rest of my evening on that subreddit. The subreddit is dedicated to exploring ruins in urban areas. It’s all about people’s findings of abandoned monuments frozen in time.

Spanning from secret basement doorways that lead to a massive tunnel system that were likely used by Al Capone, to old Yugoslavian monuments from the 1960s.

Photo credit to Michael Mehrhoff

The subreddit is mostly crap, but every few posts is an amazing story. The stories are really just a bunch of captioned pictures in the order of their findings.

My favorite was the post titled “Bad Ass Bunker.” The album is a series of 31 pictures with detailed captions.

The person who explored the bunker was visiting his old friend in northern Germany, which was formerly GDR.

They found a massive bunker. Some of it was already explored and had been tagged by teens. But the further and deeper they went, the more they found.

Eventually, the bunker was flooded and they had to turn back.

Photo credit to Johnny Joo

Urban explorers find a thrill in going through these abandoned buildings. Some even travel around the world.

They love it because the building tells a story and they get to be the ones to figure it out. Like what is this place, who was here, why was it abandoned?

Urban explorers are each like a modern-day Indiana Jones. Some of the explorers are photographers that actually take photos of abandoned places for a living.

Photo credit to Daniel Barter

For those who want to get started, the subreddit is a great place to get advice and learn of new locations.

Keep in mind, in most cases breaking into abandoned places is trespassing, and a lot of people on the subreddit have been arrested.

But there are websites that can be found on the subreddit that help avoid this issue.

Time Travel

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Time Travel is real, and I can prove it.

Let’s start with my favorite, often referred to as the time-traveling hipster. In 1940, a photo was taken at the reopening of the South Fork bridge in Canada.

In the photo, everyone is dressed in very time-period-appropriate clothing; all except one man, who I call the Time-Traveling Hipster.

He is wearing a cardigan with a graphic tshirt. His sunglasses are very retro and his haircut does not really fit the time period.

The strangest part is what is in his hands. In his hands appears to be a DSLR camera which weren’t invented for another 50 years.

Film cameras were around during that time but they were mainly silver. His camera is black. The time traveling hipster has been debated over for years, but no conclusion has been reached.

In 2008, another unexplained mystery emerged when a Chinese archeologist opened up a 400 year-old tomb. The tomb is believed to be untouched by anyone since it was sealed 400 years ago.

But that makes it hard to explain how they found a small ring made of metal, shaped into a watch, with the time 10:06 and “Swiss” engraved on the back.

It was in the soil on the outer layer of the coffin. The ring is believed to be only 100 years old. The question is, who in 1908 would enter a tomb, not open the coffin, not loot the place, not announce the discovery, then close the tomb they were in.

The best answer would be time travelers. Maybe time travelers have a creed, and they gather research and try to leave little evidence behind.

Although another theory attempts to debunks this theory, saying it is more likely be some sort of “quantum strangeness”, where random object disappear and reappear in different places for unknown reasons.

I think that theory is far-fetched, and I’ll stick with time travel.

Of all the far-fetched stories, this next one beats them all.

It has the potential to be real, but odds are if it was, we would not know about it.

The story from Andrew D. Basiago seems to be loony. In 1970, the defense advanced research project agency A.K.A DARPA worked on a top-secret project known as Project Pegasus.

Basiago claims to be a child participant in the program. I say “claims” because all the websites are not what I would call factual. The mission statement which has not been confirmed by DARPA is to research and perform “time sensing”; it is the US time-space exploration program.

Several children were a part of this program, but I had trouble finding names. But Andrew D. Basiago says that on one of his temporal trips he was at the Gettysburg address, and he is in a photo, in which he claims to be the boy in the bottom left.

I looked at Basiago’s childhood pictures; there were very few, and in none of them he had long hair. But it would make sense that he didn’t have photos from the time he was a part of Project Pegasus.

This is either a massive government cover-up, or just a man who wants attention. Either way, the government doesn’t care, because it would be nearly impossible to prove, especially with his reputation.
Don’t take this too seriously. Most of these examples have explanations which kill imagination. I believe in time travel, and I wish I believed the stories. But whether or not I believe is not the purpose of article.

My purpose for writing this is to raise curiosity of time-space and open up minds to different views even if they are far fetched.

Geniuses are the downfall of society

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Throughout history there have been people who are different from the rest. These “different” people are famous in the history books and are considered geniuses. I’m not talking about great warriors or generals. I’m talking about the scientists, engineers, architects, the innovators of the world, the geniuses. People like Davinci, Wright brothers, Alexander Fleming, Marie Curie, and Steve Jobs. They are some of the smartest people to have lived and most people are thankful for their contributions. I’m not thankful, however; I say screw them. The human race will die at their doing. The contributions they made have greatly impacted the earth. The damage done is beyond repair and at this rate, Earth has 100 years left. I am thankful for the lack of contribution made by everyone else; they should be the ones in the history books. Sure, there have been people that have made designs that help the world, but it’s not enough. I can only think of a few things that could save the human race: Intergalactic travel or time travel, and I don’t see that happening anytime soon. Thanks a lot smart people.

White Students Terrorize an American Classmate

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I recently watched a shocking video where a little boy named Harsukh Singh is terrorized by his classmates who claim he is a terrorist. It seems to be a common occurrence when he rides the bus, because he felt the need to film it. Why is it fair that one child can be excluded from the rest of his fellow-American classmates, and be blamed for a series of horrible events that happened all over the world?

I guarantee that the boy is not responsible for the World Trade Center, the Boston Bombing, or Charlie Hebdo. In the video he says “Kids are being racist to me and calling me an Afghani terrorist. Please don’t act like this towards people like me you don’t know. I’m not Muslim, I’m Sikh”.

The bullies think they are different from a terrorist. But the definition of a terrorist is someone who inflicts fear and has a political aim. I believe it’s more than just scaring the government; it’s about inflicting terror into the people, making it seem like not even the government can help. Everyday, United States citizens make people who look like Harsukh Singh feel like they are the bad guy and go out of their way to verbally, or even sometimes physically, attack them.

Each person who contributes to creating the terrorist stereotype is, in fact, a terrorist themselves. Maybe not individually, but in the bigger picture a large number of people bullying people of one specific skin tone is a form of terrorism.

Harsukh Singh is a smart boy, and he has already changed many lives by realizing the real way for power is through social media. I hope that a big news story is written on this, and the title should be “White Terrorists Terrorize an American Student”. Nowhere in that story should they blame Singh, or even mention religion. Even if this video isn’t covered in the news, hopefully the bullies will look back on this and realize what they did was wrong.

Am I Right?

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Photo Credit to www.clipartlord.com

We live in a world where we have to be politically correct at all times to avoid offending others. One aspect of being politically correct is avoiding racist terms. Racism occurs when one race is referred to as being superior or having special characteristics that only they have. Calling an African-American person “black” isn’t considered proper by many people – most would say it’s racist. But is it worse than associating a group of people based on a region even if it has no connection to the person?  Personally, I would much rather be called white than European-American. I was not born in Europe, neither were my parents or my parents’ parents. I’m sure there are African-Americans that feel the same way. Many so-called African-Americans have no association with Africa; is it logical, therefore, to classify people that way? I strongly believe in equality, that all are born equal, but I don’t believe that it is okay for us to say that something is racist when we are simply referring to skin tone. I think categorizing people by region is more racist than calling a “black” person “black,” because you are saying that people with that skin tone are all from one region. This is classifying people as a whole and is still racist.

House in the clouds

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It all began in the dusty lifeless town of Lancaster, with extreme winds that carry the tumble weeds across the hot cracked asphalt. The white Adidas shoes on the telephone lines purchased at the Payless ShoeSource are a reminder of the lack of success. There’s nothing there except unemployed college dropouts who have many offspring who will go down the same road. Those who are employed are the lucky few. They’re the ones who want to break the never-ending circle and go to college. But most of the time, that job was just temporary because those few that do graduate know they can leave this ghost town, and they take the first bus out, leaving nothing but a trail of dust that goes on for miles across the dead Mojave desert. I was fortunate that my parents saved me from a life where being ambitious is becoming the manager at Payless ShoeSource.

I spent the next chapter of my life in a place I am proud to grow up in: The wonderful town of Ventura where surfing is not a hobby; it’s a lifestyle. It’s how people talk, walk and dress. It has this relaxed feel to it — the sound of crashing waves and the fresh sea breeze. Day and night are nothing alike. The day is colorful and full of life; the buildings are colorful and are spread from sea to the mountain; and the beach is always full, looking like a 1950’s Coca Cola poster. Ventura is not just limited to the beach. It’s next to a beautiful mountain. On top, there are the iconic “Two Trees”, which you can see the whole city from. Although there’s all the commotion below, you feel isolated and alone, like there wasn’t a city for hundreds of miles. It’s the best place to watch the sunset. There is nothing like it in the world. The night is much more quiet. I could take a walk on the beach and hear nothing but the crashing tide and see maybe one or two silhouettes of people, outlined by the moon. Main Street at night has a sense of liveliness, even though it’s less than the day. It must be the bright neon lights and all the meter parking that is completely filled, even after shops are closed. As great as this town is, I am not the type of person who can live in one place his whole life.

After College, and winning the Mega Millions a dozen times or so, I would have a custom-built airship I would live on that is basically a flying aircraft carrier, but a little more complex. It wouldn’t be all modern and futuristic; it would be held up by two large balloons that look like they came off a blimp, attached by 100 feet of thick rope like the ones used to tie a cruise ship to a dock. The balloons would be just the right height so I can take off in either of the two planes I would have. One of the planes would be a HU-16 Albatross, a large sea plane that could carry a lot of cargo. It would be military green with a 1950’s pin-up girl with red hair riding a large bomb. The other plane would be a P-51, with a pair of white sharp teeth and a red mouth toward the propeller. A little behind the mouth would be a pair of eyes with a fierce look to them. It would be painted the same tone of green as the cargo plane. The planes would perfectly fit the overall theme of steam punk meets sky captain of tomorrow. Any metal on the airship would be either copper, bronze, or gold. And anything else would be a dark-colored wood. The outside of the ship would be rough wood, the wood used on a pirate ship, but the inside would be detailed refined wood with fancy floral engravings. Polished copper pipes would be visible through the halls and outside of the ship, and two large bronze smoke stacks near the control tower would be used to collect the clouds, turning them into steam and using it to power the ship. When I’m on my ship, I would wear khakis with a brown leather jacket, along with aviator goggles around my neck just to add to the feel. I would only do this on my ship, because it would already be strange going places by old planes.

The seaplane would allow me to go anywhere coastal and my P-51 would allow me to fly to any airport. From the airport, I would take the much more conventional, but less adventuress, method of transportation known as taking a taxi. Transportation would be inconvenient but limitless. I could go anywhere in the world, and that’s what would be so great. I wouldn’t even need to pack bags, because I could just take my ship with me. Once I got married and had kids, I would live on the Ship until the first one turned 5. Then, I would ask them where they wanted to grow up. It could be anywhere in the world; I would then move there so they could have a great place to call home while growing up like I did.

I would live in that town for the rest of my life because it is the end of my adventure and the start of his or hers. I would stay there, so when they come back and visit they will remember the great times they had at their old home where they spent the greatest years of their lives. Wherever it is, I know I will be happy because all I would want is for my children is to have a good life, like my parents have for me. Whether it’s the snowy mountains of Colorado or the cherry-blossom filled streets of Japan, I will gladly spend the rest of my life there.

 

Beyond Earth Part One

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Intro:

The year is 2044, the population is over 20 billion, but the world is at peace. All the worlds problems like hunger, disease, and pollution have been solved. It’s a perfect utopia. All the mysteries of the world have been solved – there’s nothing left to discover except what lies beyond Earth. A space program called SEA was created to look beyond. SEA stands for Space Exploration Association. SEA is highly selective, there’s only 100 pilots. Being a SEA pilot is the new celebrity. They’re all over the news and the face of SEA is Zach – a new pilot only 25 years old.

“I am honored to be a SEA pilot. It’s the greatest job in the world. I can’t picture myself in any other job. In a world where everything is known, most fear what lies beyond, but I grow excited. I was born to do this.” says Zach.

“Okay thank you for coming to talk on are show, that’s all for tonight folks.” says the TV host.

It is weird I haven’t even been inside the office building. I passed the test and got the job and already I’m a celebrity. “We are here sir,” says the driver. I get out of the car to look up at a large skyscraper. It’s strange it took them a whole three days to build. Normally it would just take one or two. I get in and a lady from the front desk gives me an ear piece. She then says “It’s also your ID badge and access pass. As you can see, security is pretty low. It is because without your earpiece, you can’t go anywhere besides the lobby,” She pauses slightly “Oh almost forgot your office is in B30” she smiled then walked back to her desk. I went to the elevator and it asked what floor I wanted. I said “B30” then the elevator responded “going down to B30” I found it strange that I was 30 levels underground when it is 350 floors tall.

When I walked in, it was really different from the rest of the building. High security, entirely cement, but very open, and the furniture was very basic. I assumed that it was so you can’t hide bugs or steal information. I walk up to the group of 24 pilots that are all sitting around a conference table, and at the head was a very intelligent and powerful looking man. The man said: “Okay lets begin. None of you will know me because I don’t exist. But for simplicity you can call me X.” At this point I began to sense something much bigger was going on. X continued: “Unlike the other 75 pilots this group has been selected to work on the more delicate matter. This means that every thing in this room can never leave this room. There is a major problem and our head scientist, Z, will tell you what is going on.” Z then said: “Okay so there’s a problem and we have 5 years to fix it. Your job as pilots is to fly to other galaxies and collect data. The problem is that the moon has been rotating around the earth at an inconsistent speed decreasing by 15% on random date. There are no coincidences from when it happens. But if we can’t fix the problem in five years, the earth will be covered in half ice and the other half fire. Your mission is to find a moon with non-livable and livable planets and collect the data so we can try to find a solution, or at least find out why.” X then said: “Okay go to floor 350 and get ready to take off. Each of you will have a partner which you will be assigned once you get up there.” This will be the first time in human history that they leave the galaxy. But the people wont know because of the secrecy of the mission.

The Great Adventures of Tim Part 2

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About four weeks had gone by since Tim had been trapped in the 2D world. He thinks he had been dreaming. Until he was walking to class and he suddenly  appeared in a semi trashed apartment with a man wearing a black and red outfit. Tim asked this Mysterious man where he was. The man replied “Hollywood.” Tim was confused, thinking how did he end up in Hollywood. The man interrupted his thoughts and said “My name is Deadpool, owned by 20th Century Fox, and I am a video game and comic book character. I am fully aware I am trapped inside in this game.” Tim was in shock and he asked the Deadpool “we are in a video game?” Deadpool said “yes.” Tim asked: “How do we get out?” Deadpool paused for a minute, then said “I don’t know, I have never tried. I like being the star of a game. Its pretty awesome.” Pausing for a minute, “But there’s these minion things I’m supposed do to beat the game but I tend to just kill people for fun rather than go do the mission. I’m sure if you do them you will get out.”

Tim was on his way to his first mission when he suddenly woke up. He was back in his dorm room and it was two days before the Deadpool indecent. He was really confused. He decided to do some research on Deadpool. He researched his game, how he was aware he was in the game and what other game characters know there in a game. That was when he came across a batman game. The batman game had a villain named Fear. Fears power was that he could find people’s deepest fears and exploit them. In the game, this villain figured out batman was controlled by someone whose biggest fear was losing unsaved progress. He decided that it was all crazy, that games are just games and he was simply dreaming. So he got dressed and went to breakfast. At breakfast he noticed some people did not have cups, but they still would make movements to drink like they had cups. He immediately thought that it was a joke. After breakfast, while he was walking back to his room, he saw two cars drive through each other. There wasn’t a scratch on either car and they just kept going. Tim say to his friend “Dididid you see that?” Everything turned black, and there was no sound no light. Just blackness.

EXPLANATION: This is for those who are totally lost in what just happened. Part one is where Tim gets trapped in a Mario like game, but he did not realize its the worlds famous Mario because the game was a spin-off. Tim is not a normal person he is in fact a character from his own game. This is implying that all of us are trapped in a game. The system that the game is on has corrupt files so when the user switched games Tim would enter that game. Deadpool and fear are game characters that are like Tim. They realize what they thought was reality was in fact just a game. The story is written from the perspective of the computers monitor and the blackness was because the computer crashed. Before the computer crashed things where missing because the corruption had destroyed it. The black screen was because there was nothing for the monitor to display after the computer crashed.

 

The Great Adventures of Tim Part 1

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Tim is a student at a small school. He is known by all his teachers and classmates and he is a very responsible student. His life was very normal and things always seem to work out just fine. Until, one day, during his math class he asked to use the restroom. When he went to the restroom he got sucked down the toilet and popped out in a 2D world.

Immediately after entering this 2D world, a giant Ape took a princess. The princess said “Save me time. You’re my only hope.” The ape ran off. Tim was confused and didn’t know what to do, so he went forward. It was his only choice ,considering the world was 2D.

He jumped from brick platform to brick platform until he reached a wall with a door. He entered the door and a new setting appeared. Now there was not only brick platforms but there were coins and angry muffins walking around. The angry muffins chased him, so he instinctively ran, collecting as many coins as he could. He ran through about 5 doors before he reached a merchant. The merchant had what appeared to be an apple hat. Tim was unsure if it was a hat or an actual part of him, so he just didn’t ask. The Merchant sold apples, but these were not just any apples. They had the ability to make whoever eats it large or shoot fireballs.

Tim Bought one of each apple and when he went to pay he pulled out coins and a star he found. The merchant instantly said “HIDE THAT STAR!” Tim asked why and the merchant continued: “The star has the ability to make you invincible. Its your only hope to defeat the ape.” Tim put it away, then asked how the merchant knew about his mission. The merchant was unsure, he just did.

Tim moved on to the next door. Through this door was a bunch of slanted platforms. At the top of these platforms was the ape. He was holding a bunch of barrels, and then he heard the princess scream for help. Tim rushed up the platforms as fast as he could as the ape began to throw barrels. Tim jumped and jumped over the barrels until he reached the top. The ape said in a very confident voice “Do you think you can beat me?” Tim reached in his back pack and ate all the apples and the star. Tim became an invisible fire shooting giant and attacked the ape, winning the fight in seconds. He saved the princess and was talking to her when he suddenly appeared back in the restroom. Only three minutes had passed since he left the math room. He went back and sat down at his desk still confused about what happened.