Livelock

It's relatively late, and there doesn't seem to be much promise of sleep in my near future. Do I need to lose sleep over something? Not really, but sometimes I just get this way. It's not really serious insomnia (like I'm qualified to say that), I just can't get my mind to slow down long enough to feel tired.

The problem with this state is that it tends to be wholly unproductive. I have plenty of things I could be doing and many things that I want to be doing. However, my brain is racing in so many directions at once nothing really gets accomplished.

Now that I think about it, this state of existence almost always results in a blog post of some sort or another. I find that throwing some thoughts down onto virtual paper helps me focus and eventually tone down some of the craziness in my head. Okay, that last sentence just made me sound like a nut. Don't you just love this extremely extreme stream of consciousness writing style?

I wish I had something more interesting to say at this point. I guess I thought something would coalesce out of the random. Yet another delicious entry for the inane tag... what would I do without it?

Time Capsule

I guess it makes sense to do another one of these post things. Having one a week allows me to pretend that this is a regular deal. I could probably be writing more if I wasn't a few weeks away of finally moving away from home. It's not that sissy going to college style moving away neither... this is full on, change of permanent residence, we're turning your old room into something else, don't come back because your own parents will charge you rent, for serious moving out.

The first lesson of all this? I have a ton of stuff. It's quite ridiculous and fairly surprising. Most of my time is being spent systematically categorizing all of my belongings into one of three categories: haul, ship, trash. The first two is everything that comes with me to California, everything else goes in the trash (or gets donated if applicable).

My overall operating footprint is pretty small, but apparently I haven't thrown anything away since middle school, so there's tons of junk that I have no reason to keep. It's been a very interesting experience, as I dig through piles of things I'm slowing going backwards in my own past. Quite strange really, because you don't properly appreciate how much you've changed until you start following the paper trail. I've found notes from 7th grade that make no sense but we're clearly important enough to stash away in a drawer.

The whole process has been surprisingly emotional. As things resurface from the depths of my room, memories both good and bad come along with them. Then, more often than not, the physical remnants get purged from my existence. That can be a good feeling as it reminds me how much I've grown over the past decade. On the other hand, it can be a reminder of good times long past, spent with friends that were once close... our interactions now limited to the occasional email or phone call or the even more rare reunion-like gathering.

More than anything it shows me how important relics are to the process of keeping one's history. They act like pointers into a memory that's generally hard to freely access. It makes me want to keep a camera on my person at all times, in hopes of not missing or forgetting something potentially important. It may not be a life recorder, but it's a start.

Shocking

Shock of Pleasure

Do yourself a favor and check this group out. They're a Dallas area group that got plugged on the radio this week. They probably aren't everyone's thing (they call their style "electro-lounge"), but I've had the songs on repeat all day. They've got an EP of four songs (plus a remix) out on iTunes. Definitely the best five bucks I've spent in quite some time.

Now I've just got to find a way to see them live before I leave town.

Nature of Human

I've been watching quite a bit of television series scifi recently. I've watched three seasons of DS9, four of SG1, and one of Atlantis. This doesn't count my re-watching of TNG, Voyager, and Firefly. Oh, and let's not forget the wonderful show that is BSG. This all leads me to believe, without a doubt, that I have a problem. (And no, that problem is not a lack of B5 or Fascape or Doctor Who or whatever.)

Regardless, when you watch lots of programming in the same vein, you can't help but notice the patterns... start comparing and contrasting... it's what we do. The one thing that I'm stating to find irritating is the general portrayal of humanity presented in these futures. There are plenty of examples (or so it seems) of us, as a species being one of two extremes. Either we're intergalactic do-gooders, or we're arrogant, corrupt, meddlesome beings.

The former is the essence of the Roddenberry vision that permeates much of Star Trek. It's easy to see why this has infected much of scifi, certainly on television. The glorious human race with it's high-minded directives and whatnot swoop in to save the day time and time again. Anyone who shows hints of bias or lesser thinking is either an alien or someone to be despised as the villain of the episode. While I'm all for an optimistic outlook, sometimes it's taken so far that it makes the actions of the characters just seem so unbelievable... and that's where you see the heavy hand of the writers trying oh so desperately to make a point.

Now, the latter tends to make for some interesting shows, but in the end it feels like the same thing in the opposite direction. The whole Firefly world is a corrupt one, and nearly every series has the episode where humans try to play god or whatever. Mankind tries to force their values down everyone else throats... like all the freaking time it seems. Okay, we get it... we're flawed creatures... and we've got tons to learn. I don't think we need a human population of pure evil to drive the point home.

I guess what I'm getting at is that the subtlety just isn't there. I don't know why I'm surprised, because that tends to be how science fiction is written. Extrapolation and exaggeration are par for the course in scifi. It all comes down to those two little words: "what if?". It just feels like the TV writers like to scrawl those words on a bat and beat us all senseless with it.

Also, the whole simple good versus evil bit works so much better in pure fantasy where the suspension of disbelief is in full effect. I feel that scifi has to at least feel remotely feasible, otherwise some of that "hey, what if this happened at some point?" message gets lost... or at the very least muddled. Maybe that's why I've found BSG very compelling: it's tries to be realistic and its overflowing with moral ambiguity and grey areas.

Oh, which reminds me... why does the military feature so prominently in a lot of science fiction? I suspect it has something to do with the fact that action sells and the military brings the action. Regardless, it seems oddly prevalent.

I guess I should follow this whole thing up with a giant [citation needed]. I do have some choice episodes and trends in mind when I talk about this. I just wanted to avoid this becoming a ten page paper (I'd do it too). It's obviously flavored by my admittedly limited expose and probably focuses too intently on American TV scifi. Oh well... yall can deal.

Drawing a Blank

Ten days and I'm still struggling for something blog worthy. It could be that it has been a boring ten days. Of course, the real problem here is my standards are way too high. I mean, anyone that even makes an attempt at grammar probably hits the top 10% of blogs. I fear that may be far too generous, but I sincerely hope that I'm mistaken. I guess proper use of language doesn't necessary reflect on the quality of the content in either direction. The evidence is correlational at best. I'm willing to allow for the possibility that someone has something intelligent to say on the internet without regard for the intricacies of the written word.

Ugh... I'm actually writing about grammar. This is pathetic and boring. A double threat. Moving on...

For some bizarre reason I thought it would be fun to do another webcomic. Well, it will be fun once it actually gets out of the planning phase and starts running. I'm under the impression (delusion?) that I learned a thing or two from my first foray into the world of online comics. I'll approach the whole operation a little differently this time around. Foremost, I am so not drawing this one.

My drawing ability tends to sit somewhere between "it's not terrible" and "it doesn't quite compel me to blind myself, but I considered it". While I did learn that practice helps a great deal over time, I would never be able to create the comic I would want given my current level of ability. It was always the limiting factor before, and I've got the scrapped comics to prove it. No, you can't see them... I'm doing you a favor here. I shouldn't mislead you here... it's not completely my choice to abstain from drawing, as my friend and I came up with the concept together. He can already draw quite well, so it's natural that we put our best foot forward in that department.

Being relegated to a writing-only position is actually what I wanted. Of course, now I'm faced with a problem similar to my blogging issues. I "succeeded" before by literally transcribing real events with a bit of creative exaggeration. The whole thing was really one huge ongoing inside joke with not much in the way of broad appeal. Now I'm trying to write for real using "fake" characters and aiming for a broader audience. I've always considered myself a good writer, but I don't really know that. It's a completely untested theory.

Fortunately, the theme does still draw on some personal experience. I'll let you wait to find out what exactly that is. Don't go holding your breath, though. The artist decided the summer would be the perfect time for an internship where he doesn't have access to a scanner. The first signs of life from this project may not be for a couple of months.

At least that gives me time to make this thing funny.

Retirement

It's happening. The addiction is all but a fuzzy memory and that empty void has been filled by many other things. That's right... I'm officially departing the World of Warcraft.

It seems silly to make such a post. It reminds me of a certain retirement announcement made by a friend quitting the drug that was DDR. I'll admit, that bit of writing makes a whole lot more sense to me now. It's a relatively big deal when you take your leave from an activity that you not only did for years, but also formed friendships because of it. The new social dynamic of some games is a very intriguing and powerful force. There comes a point where it's not really about the game anymore... it's about the community that surrounds it. With the notable exception of DDR, there hasn't been a game that I've played for such a long period of time (nearly 2.5 years). It's no coincidence that both involved strong social components.

I began as one of the many nay-sayers who scoffed at the likes of Ultima Online and Everquest. Besides, the mere thought of paying a monthly fee to keep playing a game was absolutely absurd. My friends slowly chipped away at those objections... damn Evercrackheads. I believe that the only reason I finally consented to play was because it was Warcraft, a series I enjoyed greatly. I figured it would be an interesting diversion for a few months and that would be the end of it. I couldn't have been more wrong.

Release day was incredibly exciting as the hype had taken complete control of me by that point. Not even the very scary 40-something at Best Buy who was appalled that I wasn't getting the collector's edition for the free pet panda/zergling/diablo could bring me down from that high. As cheesy as it sounds, the first login was jaw dropping. I had never experienced a game that even compared up to that point. Mind you, I was no stranger to the basic concepts of the game, having spent some time with D&D and various MUDs... so the gameplay was nothing spectacular. The world, the environment, the experience of being surrounded by other players... that was completely new and different.

Honestly, I don't think the gameplay is the real beauty of the game. Sure, it's fairly solid mechanics... but they get old fast. I actually spent most of my time playing solo in that game. Besides the occasional small group run (of 5 friends), my first character's rise to 60 was an individual effort. By the time I was done, the mechanics of the game were pretty much played out in my mind. Playing a different class might be entertaining for a dozen levels or so, but the gameplay is really just more of the same.

The real reason I kept playing after hitting the level cap was the people. Group play was so much more enjoyable than anything else in that game. I managed to get a second character up to 60 simply because I wanted to play with a person who started the game a few months later than I did (and who I may or may not have personally corrupted... bwahaha). The end game content is all about grouping... a blessing because I loved it and a curse because you start needing more and more people to keep playing. It got to the point where I just wouldn't really play unless there was a group going on.

At the pinnacle, I was going with groups of 20 people into areas and we just had and all around good time. Then that pesky expansion came along and ruined everything. Don't get me wrong... a lot of good came out of the Burning Crusade. In fact, I think it was a step in the right direction. However, I do believe it's the reason I lost all interest in the game. It threw me back into the single-player game that I had abandoned many months prior. Not to mention that the sudden change turned the entire social dynamic on its head.

Sticking it out would have landed me back in the larger group content I came to love... but my will to play was already drained. At that point, I was the last remaining active player of my friends who started with me. Most of my personal friends and many of my in-game friends had already taken their leave from the game. That's not to say that I didn't like the remaining folks... quite the opposite was true. It just wasn't the same... and it never would be.

Well, it was a fun couple of years in Wowland... now it's time to catch up on all the games I missed, read a good book or two, and start working in the real world.