Birthday Boy

About that hiatus? I half-lied.

Congrats D.C. and M.C., and happy birthday to S.C., June 13, 2008!

Random Scribbling

Things are about to get busy at work, so I'm going on hiatus again. Well, that and I've been half-assing this for the longest time.

***

Some leftover text from my novel that didn't fit in anywhere right now. Some of it is good, some of it is not. Most of it doesn't even really apply to the story proper. Maybe it will fit somewhere later.

***

sometimes, when you’re about to pass out, you just gotta hold on to something familiar.

***

When you wake up and you haven’t opened your eyes, everything seems that dark grey, even during the brightest day.

***

The problem with answers was that he wanted the solid, unambiguous answers, like what you’d get with a mathematical equation. And though our universe is based on these mathematical equations, there’s an emergent diversity that leads to complexity. As a result, there are few, if any, simple answers. Thus, none of the answers he would get would satisfy his craving.

***

“We have to become greater than the sum of our parts.”
“Seven, then.”
“What?”
“Two arms, two legs, one head, one torso, that’s six. So, we have to become seven.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“I guess you’re right. We have fingers and toes, ears and noses. Give me a second while I count.”

***

You have to hurt before you can empathize. That’s why children are so cruel. They’re the prize of their parents, and now little, if any, pain. That’s why rich kids are such pains in the ass, because the’ve never hurt. Of course, you go too far, and people just hurt too much, and don’t care about how other people feel, they’ve hurt too much themselves.

***

remember when you fought because you thought you were right? Because you thought you were doing good? Then you got older, and realized you were fighting more to prevent yourself from going crazy, by realizing there was nothing special about your life.

Mecha Approach

Let's say walking robots did ... walk ... the earth. What would I pilot? I'd need a "light" mech (if such a thing can be classified as light), under forty tons. It would need a lot of speed, and modified jump jets to act as a speed boost while running.

I'd need an advanced sensor suite and electronic countermeasures, as well as chaff and flares, so I'd have a better idea of what was coming, and be able to dodge it. The cockpit would also be kitted out with some truly advanced targeting systems and information layouts.

Weapon-wise, I'd need mostly long-range weapons. Twin light missile racks, to explode on impact, in case I needed a close range desperation attack. As for pecking, either some sort of sniper rifle/rail gun, or twinned long distance lasers if I needed to engage.

Melee Approach

In a pinch, if I ever needed it, my weapons of choice would be a short crowbar and a hammer, with a Leatherman tool as the backup. The main reason for this is because I actually own all three of these things, and they are all within arm's reach as I type this.

K.C. gave me a great idea for the approach: tear out the throat with the crowbar, then smash the head with the hammer. Or, in the alternative, I could bust out with mad carpentry skills. Who doesn't need a credenza in eight hours?

Of course, note this is all moot should mecha combat take over our society. In such an event, I become a mechanic, and carry around a pipe wrench and screwdriver. I stay in the repair bays and become the crotchety, well-respected mechanic who alternates between trash talk and subtle advice.

Picture Time

L.C. mentioned that my Gtalk icon needs to be changed, because I've never been that happy. And maybe this is true for the most part, but when that pic was taken, I was having a great time.

What does it say about me that I don't often have a big goofy grin on my face like that (which some people have interpreted as maniacal)? What does it say that I was playing football, and probably getting knocked around?

I probably am lying a bit, and need a new pic, but I also subscribe to the Amish (Pennsylvania Dutch?) belief that pictures steal your soul. There really aren't that many pics of me, though maybe I should throw up the pic of myself when I graduated from school?

Random Running

Twenty-two minutes, forty-nine seconds for three miles. I think I ran each mile at the following: seven minutes, twenty seconds; seven minutes, fifty seconds; seven minutes, forty seconds. Yay incremental progress.

I need a rabbit when I run. There's just something about being able to chase someone down from behind that does it for me. Whenever there's a lot of people, I find myself just chasing down the next, and the next, and the next.

Just got a new pair of shoes because I'd worn a hole through the canvas of my old shoes with my toes. It was getting kind of uncomfortable when I'd start running on the balls of my feet, and my toes would slam against that hole.

Book Burned

Z.M. asked me about my novel, and internally I started freaking out. Didn't realize I'd feel that way, but I did. It's still like me baring my soul, even though it's just a story. It's just a story, it's just a story.

It's not just a story. It's potentially a validation of my existence. It's a tangible reminder of all my dreams, and a bulwark against the culmination of all my fears. It's a focus for my creativity. It's right now one of the few things, living and not, I actually give a damn about.

Damn it, I think it's a great story, I really do. I'm not going to pretend to be modest, it does have it's flaws, but I think it's an engaging world, interesting premise, and "realistic" characters (yes, they need to be more consistent in their motivations and mannerisms, but I'm getting there). Still, sometimes (most of the time) I'm not sure how to react, or if I can relate how I feel about it to other people. It makes me want to get another undergrad degree in English, just so I can be around people again that understand this, how it drives you crazy, how it consumes your waking moments, how you think it's crap, but keep doing it because else-wise, you'd die.

Scattered Rambling

Lie to me, tell me it's all gonna be OK. Sing those stupid nonsense songs that came out of nowhere in your mind. Hold me till the sun rises.

***

You have to hurt before you can empathize. Otherwise, you're just going through the motions without the underlying feeling.

***

People that bike in the middle of the street, I should just run over them. No, it doesn't matter if you pull your shirt down or not, I'm staring at your ass because your spandex shorts are old and ripped because your ass is too fat, not because you're sexually enrapturing.

***

I went clothes shopping on my own because I had to. This growing up shit is weird.

***

I expect too much of people. The standards need to be lowered.

Warcraft Addiction

It feels like much of my life is going to involve the struggle against starting World of Warcraft, again. It's such a time commitment. If I could get by on four hours of sleep a night, I would devote the extra four hours to World of Warcraft. But as it stands, I just don't have that sort of time. Would that there was a way to play the game without sinking so much time and energy into it, or if I could directly translate my efforts into something tangible.

It's not like I don't want to play. I do, badly sometimes. It's fairly simple, fairly straightforward. I know the basics, and I can play it fairly well. K.C. told me that J.L. recommended that I get back in, get power-leveled to maximum level, and go nuts. I actually toyed with talent builds for a little while, dreaming of What Might Be.

Of course, Wrath of the Lich King has to come out soon, and spell inscription is going to be one of the new features. That excites me, the ability to mod your spells. Damn, that is outright enticing. But, I just can't do it. I dare not do it, do I. Argh. Rest assured, if I did do it, I would not mention it in this space.

Animal Run

Yes. One is correct. I've also rocked number fifteen enough times that if you didn't realize I do that, you've probably been on the receiving end of it.

***

I went running, and there was a dead trout in the middle of the trail today. Yes, a fish. It couldn't have dropped from a great height, because it was still intact. So, the next question, who would drop a fish on a trail? Or, even worse, are the fish coming out of the water and coming for us? Damn them.

A few days past, a ladybug attached itself to my shirt while I was running. The thing just would not come off, no matter how fast I ran, though I didn't try to flick it. A good fifteen minutes it stuck to me. Why? I don't know. Maybe it liked me?

Japanese Television

Human Tetris. There's a version of this coming to America. Brilliant.

Ninja Warrior. This is so hard, every time someone beats the entire course, they remake it even harder. You have to watch people keep failing to get how hard this is.

Start a laugh, get a paddlin'. From the Simpsons, not entirely accurate, but from a Japanese game show host: "In the West, gameshows reward knowledge. Ours punish ignorance."

K-TV Song

I sang karaoke in a non-college, public setting for the first time in my life. We went to the bar to play pool and drink, but it so happened they'd set up for karaoke night. B.F. and myself decided to give it a go. He sang this, after five minutes of arguing with me as to the lyrics and tune. He did a bang-up job, it was pretty fucking impressive, and I must say he melted all of our panties. Yes, mine included, he was that sexy.

In between our goes, there was a man who requested a song, and I thought he sounded very strange, his voice halting and stuttery. At first, I thought he was deaf, and thought that it was pretty impressive. Well, when he started singing, it turned out he was actually mentally challenged. I feel kind of bad, but we all turned to each other, trying to repress laughter, not knowing how to react. I kept trying to pretend he was deaf, while someone else was insisting (correctly) that he was mentally challenged. Another little failure.

Then was my shot. This was the song. Remember, I hate people, so I stood there, arms crossed across my chest ("the best Russian karaoke singer in history"), my back leg shaking after about thirty seconds. Let me tell you, you can't really whisper a song and be heard. I had to belt that out, and did the best I could, given that I was also trying not to wet myself. In retrospect, I shouldn't have been that nervous, no one was really paying attention, or if they were, they weren't showing it. Well, personal growth and all that jazz, right?

Baby Talk

It's strange that there was a discussion about newborns and babies at lunch, though not entirely surprising. C.E. and C.L. are parents of relative newborns, while D.R. is expecting (which, by the way, we have several pools for, contact me at my work account if you want in on that action and you work with me). As with much of my life, I listen to what is important to everyone else, and feel disconnected from it. Someday, I'll want to raise two kids (single child is too lonely, which I learned the hard way, while three outnumbers the parents). However, best case scenario, it would be at least nine months and one day from now, and seeing as how I'm currently alone in my apartment, maybe nine months and two days is more realistic.

How do I relate? I've not had a pet since I was four. When I'm drinking with others, I'm usually keeping tabs on the drunkest, belligerent, "olympic champion" drunks, so it's sort of like taking care of a baby, but you can't leave a baby near a toilet and hope everything will be OK in the morning. I do what I can to make sure everyone, if not happy, is at least not outright dissatisfied with matters. I have no frame of reference.

This is what is referred to as an Outside Context Problem, though I exaggerate, as is my tendency. What should I do, aside from nod my head and say OK? Who knows? On a somewhat unrelated note, why would M.B. suggest that J.R. and Z.M. (now roommates) have a child together (keeping in mind they're both females and not lesbians)? That was quite possibly the most insane thing I've heard all week, and I live in my own mind.

Breast Fed

I was on the metro, and a mother tried to keep her crying baby quiet. After a little while, she laid the child down on her lap. I thought to myself that this would be a weird place to put a child to sleep, but whatever. Then, I saw her take out a blanket, and I thought, OK, she's going to cover the child to keep it warm. A little unusual, but whatever. Then, she started lifting up her shirt, and I go, what the f*ck?

On the jackass note, I think it's unfair that there's no drinking on the metro, yet the kid can drink to her heart's content. On the flipside, I understand what they're going for, and it's fine to breastfeed a child on the train. At the same time, damn, can you give more warning? My head hasn't swiveled that much since I was sitting on that nude beach.

Again, the metro's another place where you have to deal with strangers, for the most part. It's hard to ignore people, but when I looked around, maybe a third to a half of the riders had some form of earphone or headphone, trying to carve out their own private world in the midst of that cramped public space. Wish I had some video glasses, so I could watch something, anything else.

Sub Twenty-four

I ran three miles in twenty-three minutes, twenty-eight seconds. This breaks down to roughly a seven minute fifty second pace. At the same time, My first half mile split time was eight minutes, twenty seconds, so I was picking it up for the rest of the run. I do believe that's an all-time new record, running wise.

It turns out that running fills the void that video games filled, namely, the need to beat some challenge that involves numbers. This is somewhat scary, because it implies that if I became a mathematician, I'd be as happy as a duck in heat, getting it on with another duck. It also doesn't jibe with the whole writing thing, seeing as how that's as divorced from numbers as you can get.

Still, I'm now two minutes, twenty-nine seconds away from breaking a seven minute pace over three miles. Every so often, I'll throw up numbers here, partly (mostly) to brag, partly to remind myself that I am making some sort of progress. It's strange, I could easily go play a massively multiplayer online role-playing game and get obsessed over the numbers. Here, I get too tired to play for hours on end, but it's also keeping me from sitting around. Strange how that works.

Story Time

All my abortive attempts at writing a novel have finally led me somewhere. Despite what Stephen King says, I've got a basic outline for the story, because I just can't keep it all in my head and keep working. I know where this is going to go, and what's at stake. I don't know the exacts of it, but there is enough of a basic framework to hang the characters upon. I basically know who they are, what they want, and all I have to do is get them to clash.

This is one of those things where I need to take a two week vacation to make some inroads on this thing, though, realistically, if I took a two week vacation, I'd sleep the entire time. Still, there's a lot that needs to be put down, but it feels like a real story, a complete story. I can write this, yes I can.

Of course, there's that fear that I may get this done, get this done great, and no one will publish it. You think you've seen me flip out? You ain't seen nothing yet.

Away Messages

I've become known at work not for the quality of my work, nor for my personality, but for my Gtalk away messages. It started, as so many traditions do, as a joke. I put a lot of people on my Gtalk list and realized they didn't know who I was, so I had to put up an away message stating I was a newhire. Then, I realized that was boring, so I got the "jeenius" idea to put up movie quotes and replace one word with the name of my company.

That was around 9 months ago.

Every single work day, unless I can't get access to the intarwebs, I post a new quote. People are kind of amazed, wonder where I get them from. It's really just whatever the first movie is that comes to mind when I hit www.imdb.com. Not that hard, and apparently it brings a lot of people fifteen seconds of joy every day. That's a lot more than I was able to give my last girlfriend, but I digress.

There are a few people that complain, but they're outnumbered by the silent majority, whom I follow. If nothing else, it's also a way to ensure tha tI haven't been fired, and my job is safe for another day. Kind of a code, or a secret message. Which is amusing, because T.F. remarked to me the other day when I made an offhand comment that he'd been wondering for the better part of a year what it meant. He just didn't want to appear stupid for asking.

Waiting Around

Elevators are fun. You're trapped for about thirty seconds with complete strangers. I've been on both sides, trying to completely ignore them, and interacting as if they were old friends. It's strange how some people are able to put you at ease immediately, while other people make you wish you'd never had to stand around them.

I wonder what's the greatest amount of time you're surrounded by strangers and doing your best to ignore them. It's probably the waiting room at the doctor's, or the emergency room. Suffering people, ailing people, you're probably ailing also. When I had the flu this winter, and I went to the doctor because I was coughing up blood, there was an overwhelming imperative in my mind: Just survive. Didn't feel like talking to anyone.

What is the greatest amount of time you could be around a stranger, and still not know them? Some argue there are marriages that operate in that fashion. How much would it suck to devote your life to a complete stranger? And I don't mean in the charitable fashion, there's something honest, noble, meet, right in that. I mean devoting yourself, your soul, to a complete stranger. That would suck.

Less Gaming

I now no longer play video games unless in the presence of others. This is a disturbing turn of events. This is maturity? Couldn't it have manifested in any other fashion? Why couldn't I have just developed a desire to donate blood, or plant a tree, or something else, and held on to my game-playing ways?

There's no desire whatsoever. Maybe if another game comes out that really entrances me, I might be enticed to stumble back into the game playing. Maybe the Star Wars game coming out for the Wii in September. Maybe not. Right now, I'm going to pretend I still play video games, so my coworker won't keep asking to borrow my Xbox. Or, I could just say that there's no reason I don't want to loan him the console, aside from the simple reason that I don't want to.

Social video games are great. I think I could play video games multiplayer in the same room or rooms all the freaking time, but it's just so sterile over the internet, or by myself. Digital masturbation at its finest.

Serious Dickism

If you have to keep saying "I'm really not an asshole" over and over again, are you trying to convince us, or yourself? I got to play poker with seven really nice people, and one complete dick. From the start, he was trying to lord both his extensive knowledge of the rules and his superior skill over us. Only problems were that some of his statements weren't necessarily true, and yours truly knocked his ass out of the game in sixth place.

One of my favorite moments was when I'd folded a hand to him, and he showed me what he had. Then, he told me I had him beat preflop, but he had me beat after the flop. The dick asked me what I had, in order to confirm his suspicion. I didn't ask to see his cards, so I certainly wasn't going to tell him what I had.

K.T.: Five kings.
The Dick (T.D.): What?
K.T.: I had five kings.
T.D.: There are only four in the deck.
K.T.: Yeah, I had five.
T.D.: You can't have five cards.
K.T.: Five on the table, I had five kings.

I'd forgotten that when I have my serious face on, people take me absolutely seriously. He then told me he felt sorry for me, and wasn't going to show me any more of his cards. Thanks, jackass.

Sweetest moment of the night, I had a king and a jack, and two jacks fell on the flop. I went all in, he called. He flipped a jack and a three. A king fell to give me a full house, but more importantly, that king shut him up. Five minutes later, when he left the table, I traded fist pounds and hand slaps with everyone. From that point on, the game got fun, because nobody was a dick. Kids, let that be a lesson.