Thoughts from August 23 and 24ish, 2001

I watched the show Big Brother 2 last night. Survivor has been on for a couple years and this is the second year of Big Brother. This is the first time I’ve seen any of these shows. I used to watch The Real World on MTV and the premise is really the same except there’s more of a goal in these other shows. They’re actually more reminiscent of the MTV show Road Rules. I’ve watched some of those shows, but I didn’t find them as entertaining as The Real World shows. I’m a watcher of people, but not of sports. The objectives in these other shows make them more like sports.

As I always do, I must point out the following was written on 8/24/01. That being said, I will return you to the action.

“Reality shows” as they call them are the latest thing. Just as miniskirts were the “thing” in the past, now the reality of other people’s lives compels us, whereas the fabricated stories of the past used to compel us. We as a society have grown tired of fictitious tales. We don’t want to see a film based on a real story; we want the real story itself. We want to look at people in their houses on the internet, to spy on our neighbors if we can see them without them seeing us, and to watch every moment we don’t normally get to see of other people’s lives. The formulas of old (plot, theme, character development, etc.) are just not enough anymore (though, all of them appear in the “reality shows”). I’m not saying that everyone loves reality shows or watches them. I’m just saying society is definitely looking beyond the normal formulas for something more. Like most forms of entertainment, they are not the most efficient way to spend your time, but they take us away from the boring formulas of our own lives.

In days of old, it was exciting to hear about people from other cultures. Today, it’s still interesting to hear about them, but most of us know the basics of almost all other societies by the time we are in High School. By basics, I mean the inner workings of other societies, how their governments work, and the differences between their society and ours (American society – because that’s where I’m from and I know it like the inside of my nose). Someone can be born, raised, and die in Omaha, Nebraska, and still know what a penis gourd looks like and what it is used for. I’m not saying everyone in Omaha knows what a penis gourd is, but they certainly can know it if they watch PBS once in a while. Television, radio, and the internet have changed the ability of everyone to know as much about the world as they have time. What this vast knowledge has done for us is make us bored with the world. We keep seeking new forms of entertainment because the old forms are just that – old.

(Future note: I found this look back at the beginnings of reality shows interesting. First, I called them “reality shows”. They were new so forgive me for not being fluent with the term. Little did I know, this was a new thing that would continue to this day. There are definitely more reality shows now than there were back then. I didn’t know then how much cheaper they were to produce. That is definitely a factor in their success. As far as the penis gourd, I think I have to admit most people today don’t know what that is. The look into other people’s cultures has not remained as interesting to modern audiences. Only old farts like me watch PBS. If you want to look it up and you feel weird about looking up a penis gourd, look up “koteka” or “horim” on Wikipedia. You probably shouldn’t look it up at work, though. There are pictures.)

And now – a completely new topic.

I’m going to write to the guy who created “Alien Song.” What is “Alien Song” and why am I writing to him? Because he created an animation called “Alien Song” in Animation Master (the program I use). He has subsequently gone to work at Pixar studios. I want to work at Pixar studios. I want to know what his actual background is and how he did it because I want to do it. Patti wants me to look up The Salton Sea right now on the internet, so that’s what I’m going to do.

This paragraph comes from several days after the original beginning of this Thought. I looked up the Salton Sea. It’s about two hours from us. We didn’t go there on the weekend. It’s weird (and smelly).