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Hank's Journal!!!

2009-01-21 · Hank · watch on YouTube · Personal life · personal update

Hank reads through his high-school journal, finding dorky biochemistry drawings, baffling box diagrams, bad serious songs and teenage angst, and concludes he pretended to know himself because he knew nothing about himself.

What is said

00:00:00 — Hank's high-school journal: organic-compound drawings, possibly the Krebs cycle; getting better at vlogging

  • ★★ Hank goes through a gigantic journal from high school, including fancy drawings of organic compounds, one maybe the first step of the Krebs cycle. (hedged) — 00:00:00
  • ★ After rewatching many old Brotherhood 2.0 videos, Hank says he is very certain he is getting better at vlogging. (playful) — 00:00:00 · Brotherhood 2.0

00:00:40 — More unfunny than funny finds; the obsessive red/green box diagrams for personal interactions

  • ★★ Hank says he went looking for funny things and found plenty, but was surprised how much of the journal was not funny at all. — 00:00:40
  • ★★ Teenage Hank was obsessed with a detailed box-diagram system of red and green boxes to simplify personal interactions and life goals, which he can no longer understand. — 00:00:40

00:01:09 — Many high-school songs, why he writes funny songs, a teenage rap about hacking, contradiction and angst

  • ★★ Hank finds his songwriting is older than he thought: he wrote far more songs in high school than he realised. — 00:01:09
  • ★★★ Hank says he now realises he writes funny songs because his serious songs are invariably very bad. — 00:01:09
  • ★★ His high-school songs range from rants against capitalism to lyrics raunchier than Eminem, which he won't share for fear of embarrassment or being flagged on YouTube. — 00:01:39 · YouTube
  • ★ Hank reads an embarrassing teenage rap about working on viruses at his computer, and concludes he apparently liked to rap about hacking. (playful) — 00:02:04
  • ★★★ Hank says contradiction is a big theme of the journal: he was trying to figure out God, girls, computers and biochemistry, all jumbled into angst. — 00:02:04

00:02:52 — John appears in the journal; takeaway about pretending to know himself; new president and a recommendation to watch Obama's inauguration speech

  • ★★ Hank tells John he appears in the journal at least twice, though Hank was never in John's journal; one entry is about John and Marie, apparently discussing phenomenology or something. (hedged) — 00:02:52 · John Green
  • ★★★ Hank concludes he is glad he wrote it all down, and that he pretended to know a lot about himself because he knew nothing and had to pretend to get somewhere. — 00:02:52 > «I pretended like I knew a lot about myself and really it's because I knew nothing about myself.»
  • ★★ Hank found the journal enlightening and says he both really hates and sometimes really likes the guy who wrote it. — 00:03:32
  • ★★ Hank cheers the new president and recommends watching Barack Obama's inauguration speech, calling it pretty amazing. — 00:03:32 · Barack Obama

Humor (significant)

  • Hank shows fancy drawings of organic compounds from his journal. — 00:00:00 > «I don't think that you could get much more dorky than this»
  • Hank reads a teenage rap lyric about a Pentium CPU, viruses and skipping class. — 00:02:04 > «apparently I like to rap about hacking»
  • Hank imagines being a parent who finds this journal. — 00:02:04 > «I would also be concerned for the safety and well-being of children near him»
  • Hank finds he and John apparently talked about phenomenology. — 00:02:52 > «I don't think that I knew what phenomenology was then because I've kind of forgotten what it is now»

Threads in this video

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