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Last year there was a documentary released entitled The King of King: A Fistful of Quarters (Tagline: "Don't get chumpatized") about the world of competitive videogaming. Many of you, I suspect, weren't aware there was a world of competitive videogaming until just this moment. Not only is there, but it's a booming business and full of drama and intrigue, apparently.

The documentary follows Steve Wiebe as he attempts to break the official worldwide high score in Donkey Kong. The score he was attempting to break was 874,300, set in 1982 by Billy Mitchell , who also held records in Pac-Man and Centipede. I won't give away the rest of the movie, as it is strangely fascinating, even if you don't play videogames yourself. (Note: if you live near me and would like to borrow it at some time, just let me know!)

Donkey Kong is a particularly hard classic game, and anyone who has even gotten to the elevator-filled third screen is even now shaking their head at the remembrance of it. Games have changed significantly since then, and many modern games don't even have a point system. In the early days of videogames, though, the points were the thing - indicators of skill, bragging points, and goals to be reached. Twin Galaxies has, since 1981, been the "official" keeper of gaming records, and as the documentary revealed, the process of submitting a score is quite rigorous. One referee talked about the eight hours of videotape he was needing to watch to verify someone's attempt a breaking the record for Nibbler, a game I was only just barely aware of.

While I loved videogames from the first time I ever saw one, I've never been all that good at them. The idea of breaking any sort of record for Q*Bert or Defender is so foreign to me that it passes into the realm of the laughable. I found out somewhere along the way that there's always someone you're better than... but there is also always someone else who's better than you. My ability to finish Guitar Hero in Medium might be impressive to someone who struggles with Easy, but someone who can play a song flawlessly in Expert puts me to shame.

That mindset has filtered into the rest of my life, for better or for worse. I don't have a desire to compete for the most part because of it - I know the chances of me ever being the best at something are so ridiculously slim that I've learned to get to a "happiness level," a place where I enjoy what I'm doing but am not stretched to push myself further. It doesn't take a very sharp eye to see where the problem lies in that outlook. While it has, for the most part, removed certain stress causers, it has made me complacent and even stagnant.

These days I play through videogames for the stories. I want to enjoy them like I enjoy movies, and even fighting games have a layer of storytelling to them. I want to beat a level so I can see the next part of the story. A really engaging game can be a 10-, 25-, 0r 100-hour movie, and I want to see what happens next. That's carried over into other areas, too. I enjoy what's going on right now, and I'm curious to see what happens next.

I'm just hoping against hope that I don't get chumpatized.

Labels: IMJW, life, videogames

3 comments

My brother is two and a half years older than I am. While that means a lot of different things, one of the things it means is that he started getting mailings from the various Armed Forces a lot earlier than I did. Unfortunately for him, the Army was always offering him all these what I thought were neat things for him to request more information. A seventh grader thinks a pair of wristbands or a T-shirt is infinitely cooler than a high schooler thinks they are. So, since he could get these cool things for requesting more information and I couldn't, I would sometimes send the postcards back. In a few weeks, the bundle of more information would arrive at the house, along with whatever thing I thought was cool at the time.

What I did not understand at the time was that the arrival of the postcard at Army headquarters meant - to them - that my brother was interested in joining the Army. So, to follow up with the more information and the silly whatever, they would often call my brother. I remember him more than once saying on the phone, "Um, I'm sorry, but my brother actually sent that card in because he wanted the compass." I think he even made me tell them once.

Seriously, though, what else were they expecting to have happen? The whole point of them offering the pencils and hats and carabiners was to pique someone's interest and maybe hit on someone who thought, "okay, sure, why not?" and join up, all because of the little thing that got mailed along with the more info. I'm sure it happened all the time.

My brother never did join the army, and neither did I (I often considered it, but my fear of water kinda made that decision for me). I have long forgotten most of the Army-branded things we collected around the house, except for one: an Army flashlight.

It was cheaply rubberized and had a camouflage pattern, with a stark-white "ARMY" emblazoned on the handle. It was about six inches long, and there might have been a hole in the end of it to loop a cord through, I don't remember exactly.

Like most of the Army stuff we got, it was fairly cheaply made, but it did work. Two AA batteries would give it enough juice to light the tiny bulb. Make no mistake - this was no Maglite, this was a pathetic attempt at impressing kids. Sure it worked on me, but it was still pathetic.

I remember this flashlight so vividly because it was so poor. My room at night was pitch black. We lived out in the country, so there were no streetlights providing a soft glow through my windowshades. Lights out meant lights out. I kept this flashlight by my bed, and if I needed to get up during the night, I would use it to light my way to the door of my room and to the stairs. Only it wasn't a powerful enough flashlight to show me where the door was - seriously, this was a majorly poor flashlight. The only thing I could do was set out in the general direction of the door and point the flashlight at my feet. There was enough light to illuminate any obstacle that threatened to trip or maim me, even if I couldn't see the doorway. By adjusting each footfall, I was eventually able to reach my goal.

I'm not sure what eventually happened to the flashlight. I suspect it just fell apart one day of its own accord. I have a couple of new little flashlights now, both of them have bright LEDs in them, and they more than light up where I need to go. But I still occasionally remember that old Army flashlight.

A couple of years after the flashlight had shuffled off this mortal coil, I had occasion to speak on the 105th verse of Psalm 119: "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." The verse made a whole lot more sense to me after having that flashlight - as long as I set out in the generally-right direction and took care to take carefully-illuminated singular footsteps, I'd eventually get to where I needed to be.

I still have problems setting long-term specific goals, but I like to think that I carefully consider each next step, and I'm ever hopeful that I'll end up where I'm supposed to.

Labels: family, life

3 comments

Dove Chocolate is at it again. It thinks it's so smart, with all of the advice and "wisdom." Here's today's big life-changing piece of guidance:


This is the most ridiculous piece of nonsense that ever was. First of all, people do this anyway. Why does Dove Chocolate think a person is eating a bag of Dove Chocolate, hmm? It's like reminding people to open their eyes when they drive or put a coat on when it's cold outside -- actually, now that I've typed that out, I realize that teenagers do need to be told those things, so maybe this particular piece of chocolate-encasing advice was meant for a teenager. Hmm. If so, that's still a ridiculous thing to tell a teenager to do! Yikes.

Secondly, following my instincts is what got me where I am today, for the most part. So... yeah.

I was immediately reminded of the episode of Seinfeld entitled "The Opposite." George decides that since his instincts have gotten him where he is, from then on he's going to do the opposite of his first instinct. Here's the pivotal scene:

George: Why did it all turn out like this for me? I had so much promise. I was personable, I was bright. Oh, maybe not academically speaking, but ... I was perceptive. I always know when someone's uncomfortable at a party. It became very clear to me sitting out there today, that every decision I've ever made, in my entire life, has been wrong. My life is the opposite of everything I want it to be. Every instinct I have, in every [aspect] of life, be it something to wear, something to eat - It's all been wrong.

(A waitress comes up to George)

Waitress: Tuna on toast, coleslaw, cup of coffee.

George: Yeah. No, no, no, wait a minute, I always have tuna on toast. Nothing's ever worked out for me with tuna on toast. I want the complete opposite of on toast. Chicken salad, on rye, untoasted ... and a cup of tea.

Elaine: Well, there's no telling what can happen from this.

* * * * *

Jerry: If every instinct you have is wrong, then the opposite would have to be right.

George: Yes, I will do the opposite. I used to sit here and do nothing, and regret it for the rest of the day, so now I will do the opposite, and I will do something!

Dove Chocolate and George Costanza: two diametrically opposed fonts of knowledge for the ages.



And, yes, before anyone starts in on me, I'm well aware that neither Dove Chocolate nor Seinfeld episodes are anything a person should be basing their life on. Thank you for worrying.

Labels: life, Seinfeld

4 comments

Song Info (from Beatlesongs): "Yesterday" is on the Help! album (and is probably one of the most famous Beatle songs ever - it's certainly the most covered, having more than 2,500 artists covering it by 1980). Authorship is 100% McCartney, and the group was surprised by how big a hit it became. Lennon had this to say about it: "Wow, that was a good 'un," and "Well done. Beautiful - and I never wished I'd written it."

As far back as I can remember, I've liked science fiction. We didn't watch much TV while I was growing up, but I have vague recollections of watching episodes of Dr. Who and Star Trek with my dad here and there. My earliest recollection of Star Trek is actually one of my earliest recollections of being scared. Our family was over at another family's house and the parents were all talking (and probably playing Rook), and we kids were in the other room flipping through the channels. One of the channels was showing Star Trek, so we stayed on that channel for a while. Come to find out, the episode showing was "The Man Trap," which featured a salt vampire that would kill people by sucking all the salt out of them. If you click that link, you'll get an episode synopsis and a picture of the thing that scared me for a couple days following. It still looks creepy to me today, but I know a bit more about special effects and costumes and the like, so I'm not afraid of it anymore.

A big staple of sci-fi is time travel. Dr. Who was centered on it (what with him being a Time Lord and all) and several episodes of Star Trek featured it, including what is widely considered the best episode of Trek ever, "The City on the Edge of Forever." Plenty of TV shows and movies use time travel as a device - Quantum Leap, Back to the Future, the Terminator series, and even Somewhere in Time for the romance-minded set.

What's the appeal? Why is it so intriguing to visit a time long since past or see a possible future? It's a combination of knowing and dreaming, I think. Imagining what the future could be is mind-boggling. Cast back 100 years and imagine them knowing all the advances we've seen since then. Now apply that to the next 100 years. It's funny to see what Popular Mechanics predicted even 50 years ago, and there's no way to know what life will be like.

We read books and see pictures or paintings from long ago and we wonder what it would have been like "back then." It would be nice to just know, wouldn't it? To know for a fact, rather than deal in conjecture. I've long thought it would be awesome to somehow travel back in time and be able to video historical events - the meetings of our Founding Fathers, the birth of Christ, JFK's assassination (probably would be best with a 3-camera setup), Lincoln's Gettysburg Address... It would be so neat to see these events as they actually happened.

For me time travel ties in with the age-old "what would you do differently?" question often asked as a get-to-know-you question in groups. For me that question is almost paralyzingly broad - I've seen enough sci-fi to know that even a small change at a critical point could make huge differences down the line. If I hadn't pretended to trip David S. in first grade and gotten an unearned spanking when he tripped himself and blamed it on me, would my course through my elementary grades been different? Would my "well, if I'm going to get spanked for things I didn't do I might as well do things to actually earn spankings" attitude never have been born? If I hadn't chosen to sing on the bus too and from school every day, would I have avoided creating the weirdo outcast image I stuck myself with? It's impossible to tell. We don't get the chance to re-live our lives.

For me, these thoughts lead directly into "What would you tell yourself if you could go back in time?" First - and I have given this a lot of thought - you'd have the problem of convincing your younger self of who you were. If you couldn't do that, why should this younger you pay any more attention to older you than any other adult in younger you's life at the time? I hit upon the idea of writing a series of letters, to be opened at certain moments in time, some with records of events ("Hey, today you got hit in the head with a basketball at recess. Sorry I didn't tell you about it sooner, but I needed you to know that I was the real deal.") and some with advice ("When you're tempted to tell [NAME OMITTED] tomorrow that you like like her, don't. It will just mess up your friendship."). Still, I'd have problems with specific dates because I can't remember them, and younger me would probably open them all up and read them ahead of time and it would really mess him up, maybe more so than he already was.

And, really, how would you tell your younger self to change?

"Hey, it'd really help me out if you could develop some sort of eagerness to study and willingness to work hard on things."

"Uh... okay. How?"

"I don't really know, as I didn't figure it out when I was younger. Also, stick with the piano playing, as it would be better for you than the football thing turned out. Also, try to learn how to like food that's good for you. Oh, and start saving money. Got all that? Don't make me travel back through time again, mister. If I happen to run into my future-self here in the past, there could be trouble, and I'm not talking about in-school suspension kind of trouble, like you'll have in your sophomore year of high school."

"What?!?"

"Nothing, just forget it."

In pondering all the changes I'd make, though, I'm struck with the thought that if I made them, I wouldn't be who I am now. Most of our important life lessons are learned through mistakes that we've made. If I somehow were able to avoid the ones I have made, I'd most likely make completely different ones, thereby learning different lessons and, in the end, becoming a different person. I wouldn't know the people I do, I wouldn't have the friends I have, I wouldn't know this life at all. Time travel paradoxes aside, there's too much that could go screwy with even just a little bit of fiddling.

While it's fun and even good to reflect on yesterday, it's bad to focus so much on it that it cripples your forward progress.

Labels: Beatles Week, life

3 comments

Song Info (from Beatlesongs):"Here Comes the Sun" is on the Abbey Road album and was 100% written by Harrison, who also sang lead on it. He was quoted as saying it seemed like winter in England went on forever and responsibilities with Apple (The Beatles' recording venture) were getting him down, so one day he took off, went to Eric Clapton's house, and wandered around in the gardens with one of Clapton's acoustic guitars and wrote this song.

Earlier this year my cousin Jim posted suggestions on how to wake up early. A few months later, Gretchen did a post on gaining more time in your day. While I'd been mulling Jim's thoughts for a while (six months!), Gretchen's was a kick-in-the-seat sort of enabling post that got the ball rolling for me.

During the summer I had gotten into the habit of going to bed really late. This, of course, made it difficult for me to get up on time in the morning. With that kind of start to my day, I was having difficulties just getting stuff done and even feeling like getting stuff done. Every few weeks I'd hard-crash and have to take a day to try and catch up on all the sleep I'd been missing, something "they" always say is impossible to do. Once your sleep is lost, it's lost, man. Best you can do is try better in the future.

With the new school year fast approaching, I decided a change was in order. So, pretty much just like that, I started getting up at 5:00 a.m. And, just like that, it was a good thing. I had time to eat breakfast, do some reading, catch up on email, forums, blogs, and comics, and still get to work on time, even early many days. I was up before the sun, even when the sun was getting up earlier than normal (stupid DST *grumblemutterfume*).

There were other benefits, too, harder to define. Because I started putting some order into this area of my life, it seemed like other areas of my life started feeling more orderly. I felt better throughout the day, my thinking was more clear, I was organizing all of my time a little better, and I was being a more effective friend. Living on a schedule was helping me live more specifically.

There were a few downsides, of course, the main one being that I would get tired earlier in the evening. To get up at 5, I needed to be in bed somewhere between 9-9:15 p.m. Any later than that and it started getting difficult to get up at 5. Too many days of that in a row and it became almost impossible. The only solution was to go to bed at the right time. This meant forgoing "just one more level" on my latest game or that "one more episode of Seinfeld" while sitting on the couch. Just like anything worthwhile, it meant giving up something in the now for benefits in the future.

I kept at it very well for a few months - like most anything, a habit can be made of it. But, then, somewhere along the way, and for reasons I can't specifically point out, it fell away. I'd stay up past 10 one night and then feel too sleepy to get out of bed until closer to 6 in the morning. Since I wasn't resting well, I'd be sleepy during the day, but get a burst of energy in the evening and stay up late again. I'd be out with friends and not want to leave at 8:45 to get home in time to go to bed when I needed to. Little things kept creeping back in, and pretty soon I was back to living haphazardly, along with the malaise and the lack of will to go along with it.

One of my original intentions with getting up early was to eventually start exercising in the morning. I never got to that point, and I'm certainly not at that point these days with my late rising. Winter seems to make early rising more difficult - even those of us who aren't "outdoors people" feel the difference that less sunlight in a day makes.

I know what I need to do, and I know it can be done - after all, I've done it before. I'm a firm believer that a person can change from being a "night person" to a "morning person" because I've done it a few times in my life. It takes effort, though, and that's usually what stops a person - it's what stops me from doing most of the things in my life that I ought to be doing.

I think it's high time I get back to it. Regardless of the snowfall we had last night, I feel the ice is slowly melting. It feels like years since it's been clear.

It's all right. Or at least it will be.

Labels: Beatles Week, life, Seinfeld

8 comments

It might not seem like much to you, but polls like my last one are quite intriguing to me. As of this writing, the results sit at 43% set radio favorites the way I do, 46% set stations in numerical order of preference, 4% don't set favorites, and 7% don't listen to the radio.

While I realize the poll has a margin of error and also cannot be used to determine the preferences of the nation or world at large, it's still a good reminder to me.

See, while it's logical to think "Not everyone thinks the same way I do," I don't tend to act on that assumption. I tend to think my way is the only way (or the right way) and when I'm faced with a different outlook, it boggles my mind. Even a silly little poll about how people set their radio favorites can help me remember that kind of thing. If I'm reminded enough, I might eventually take it to heart and start operating under that ruleset.

The sooner the better, right?

Labels: life, poll

2 comments

I have long wanted to take a train somewhere. The idea of being on the ground appeals to me, as does the idea of being able to get up and walk around if I want to. I doubt they have an Internet connection on trains, but if they did, that'd really seal the deal. I've looked into train tickets many times when I've been planning a trip, but it always ends up being too expensive and taking too long. They just aren't practical for weekend trips. The closest I've gotten is rinding the El in Chicago, the subway in New York City, and the little train that runs around Six Flags.

I'm not a train aficionado, really. I don't long for the days that steam engines roamed the plains, nor do I think monorails are the wave of the future (despite what Lyle Lanley says). I really don't even know much about trains, other than they run on tracks and that if cars are hooked to an engine, they'll follow that engine wherever it goes.

It's that last part that is the basis for a philosophy taught at my church. If it's got a specific name, I don't know what it is, but it goes like this:

1. Think
2. Do
3. Feel

Yeah, it doesn't really look like it's got much to do with trains, I know. It's more that a train is used as an illustration of how those steps work: if you do the first two, the third will follow along as a natural result.

Expanded out a bit more, the teaching says that, yeah, a lot of the time we don't feel like doing what we need to be doing. I haven't gotten enough sleep, things are rough at work, the cats are throwing up, I stubbed my toe, I'm out of cookies -- any number of things can make me not feel like doing what I ought to be doing. But... it's no excuse. I need to do what I need to do, feelings or no. This little three-step process tells me to think about what the right thing to do is and consider why it is right. Then I need to do the thing that is right. Once I've done that, the feelings will follow. It's that simple.

And that difficult.

Labels: life

3 comments

I bring nothing new to the "what I hate about going to the doctor" discussion. People have had the same gripes about doctors for longer than I've been alive. Those of you familiar with me will have already figured out that this won't stop me talking about my recent visit to the doctor.

It had been a while since I'd gotten a physical, and what with me getting older and all, it seemed like maybe it would be a good idea. After all, if you've got some sort of disease where your thumbs are going to fall off, it's probably best to find out about that early on in the process so you can adjust to what life might be like without thumbs: using your nose to hit the spacebar, buying thumbless mittens, retiring from the thumb wrestling circuit, that kind of thing.

I went to the doctor after work on Friday and wasn't even in the waiting room long enough to get my forms filled out. (This, sadly, prevents me from complaining about the age of the magazines in the waiting room, but gets me right to the complaining about the actual checkup.) The secret to not waiting, I think, is to have the last appointment on a Friday afternoon. Members of the medical profession like their weekends as much as anyone else does, so you're on the fast track.

First comes the weighing ("Miss, my shoes weigh 34 pounds. Really. There's no way I way that much.") and the height measuring. If you've shrunk since your last visit, they know something's up.

Then it's off to the little room. I've still got my unfinished forms with me, but I can't do anything with them because the nurse has to take my pulse and blood pressure. Getting my blood pressure taken is my least favorite thing at the doctor's office. That pressurized armband causes a weird kind of pain and I'm always afraid that my stressing about it is going to give them a false reading which is going to make them need to do it several more times. Sure, there's plenty to not like, but that one is the thing I dread the most.

When she was done with her tests, she told me to prepare for the doctor to be by in a few minutes. I do not want to get indelicate here, so I'll just say that it's a little surreal to fill out the rest of your forms while in the state you are normally in while awaiting the doctor. It's also cold.

There was a sign in the room that said my cell phone needed to be off, but I needed to get some phone numbers off it while filling out the forms. This caused my first words to the doctor I'd never seen before to be, "I'm sorry I had my cell phone on." Not "Nice to meet you" or "Hello," but "I'm sorry I had my cell phone on." I'm worried about failing authority figures, you see. I assume that he's going to punish me in some way if I don't 'fess up, and I'll end up with typhoid or something. Now is not a good time for me to have typhoid.

The rest of the checkup went fine - my blood pressure was good, my heart sounded okay, my abdomen was able to withstand poking and prodding, my knees reacted properly to the little hammer, and my doctor only swore once. I don't know why it's weird to hear a doctor swear when I've heard so many other different career representatives swear, but it just is.

So I'm thinking "That wasn't so bad" when he hands me a piece of paper and says, "We'll need you to come back so we can draw some blood and run some tests." Come back?!? Man, I was hoping it'd be a one-stop shop and I could get all this done in a day! Nope, I gotta not eat for 12 hours before they draw blood, they say. I'm assuming this is because they want you to be as weak as possible when they take your blood because they have some sort of office pool going on how many people they can make faint in a week.

I'm thankful for doctors because we need them and I could never be one. I wouldn't want to be around sick people all day and I have zero interest in seeing anyone's insides. I can't even watch medical-based TV dramas without getting squeamish. I appreciate people who can do what they do.

Now if only I could find some lighter shoes...

Labels: life

8 comments

I love writing that makes its point by stressing the opposite. It can be tricky to walk that line, because some people won't catch it and end up being hurt or offended, but I think the payoff is generally good.

I was going through the Rhymes With Orange archives and found "The Rhymes With Orange Checklist to Feeling Pathetic," and thought I'd share it with you. It's in comic form originally, of course, but I present it to you here in bullet points:

• Choose someone and compare yourself unfavorably to them.
• Examine your face closely in the mirror. Note all flaws.
• Relive embarrassing/awful moments that occured years ago.
• Make a mental note of all the people you regularly disappoint.
• Disregard all compliments, especially from people who (supposedly) love you.
• Resign yourself to believing that from now on, this is how you will always feel.

I don't know about you, but I can check many of those off on many days.

I should probably knock that off.

Labels: life

3 comments

It was one of those "so stupid it's funny someone would even do it" things. We were in the computer lab and Jack B. started typing on two different keyboards, one per hand.

Jack: Eh? Eh?
Me: Uh...
Jack: Stereotyping!
Me: *groan ... into laughter*

That was in college, years and years ago. Still, though, whenever someone says the word "stereotyping," that's the image I get.

People like to deal in stereotypes - it helps them have some sort of handle on whoever they're dealing with: "I know this person and everything about him because he's very obviously a biker." We compartmentalize and assume, based largely on appearance or actions. It works in reverse, too. If I say "socialite" or "skateboarder," you immediately form a picture in your mind and have an idea of what that kind of person fits in that group.

Some of us even try to fit into a particular sterotypical box. You see this a lot in teenager groups (goths, jocks, nerds, etc.). I myself have gone to great lengths to put forth the image that I'm a "geek," the game playing, the pasty white skin from avoiding the outdoors, the love of computers, the pile of worthless trivia, and all the rest.

Thing is, just like typing on two different keyboards at the same time, stereotyping people is ultimately pointless. Rarely does anyone fit the complete stereotype, so the stereotype doesn't paint a complete picture - it's more like a caricature, emphasizing some parts and diminishing others. The label doesn't allow for change or growth. Since I don't like to go outside, any idea that I might do so at some point in the future is laughable. Since I don't like to drive, the idea that I might take a weekend trip should be looked at skeptically.

It's my own fault. I've worked hard at fitting the stereotype, so it shouldn't surprise me that people look at me through that lens. But what about others who've been assigned a label, maybe even one they don't want? There's not a whole lot a person can do except live outside the stereotype.

Do it long enough and people might eventually figure it out.

Labels: life

3 comments

It's been a little over eight years since I was last on a ski hill. At the time, I was in charge of organizing student activities, which included one ski trip a year to Cascade Mountain. The activity was always well-attended, and I went along - ostensibly to oversee, but more because it got me out of the office.

I've long been fascinated with snowboarding, and my second time going on the trip I gave it a try. I had moments of actual boarding, but I mostly fell down a lot. It was when the back edge of the board got caught and slammed my head into the well-packed snow cover that I called it quits for the night.

My third time on the trip, I boarded a little bit, but then traded in the board for skis, as there were lessons available. I remember being laughed at by the friend who was with me, but I did pick up skiing a little better than I had boarding. Granted, I was snowplowing most of the way down the beginner hill (higher and longer than the bunny hill), but I did do some actual skiing, and I actually enjoyed myself.

What I remember the most, though, is the lift back to the top of the hill. It was nervewracking to have to maneuver myself into place rather quickly to let the lift grab me and pull me along, as I wasn't very good at getting around on the snowboard or the skis. Getting off was tricky, too, but I don't think they ever had to stop the lift to get me out of the way.

There was something about that ride, though...

I'm not a good judge of height, but there were times when I was 25-30 feet above the ground. Normally I'm not too good with heights, but there on that lift, with the black sky, the lights on the hill, and the cold air... it was so beautiful. The beginner hill was set apart from the major hills where most people were, so it was quieter already, but the height of the ski lift made it even quieter, and I never rode up the lift with anyone - "I'm not too good at this, so it's not a good idea," I'd say.


All alone, floating above the cold, white earth, with the infinitely black sky above is the most peaceful I've ever felt.

Labels: life

3 comments

It’s common to hear phrases like “mind-numbing” or “rot your brain” when people talk about how bad videogames are for people. I see them differently, and feel there’s a lot people can learn from games:

1. Persistence – Many times there are puzzles in games that require a certain set of actions to be done in a certain order, and it can be difficult to accomplish the actions on the first try. Sometimes it can be difficult to accomplish these things on the 7th, 13th, or 20th try! Fast mechanical actions are the biggest challenge for me, and sticking with it to get it done is a good reminder to me.
2. Problem solving – Sure, most things that need to be solved in a videogame don’t have much bearing in real life – I mean, it’s not often that you need to find a red gem from an ancient statue so that you can open a box that has the magic feather you need to open the door to your kitchen, after all. But the idea that problems have solutions is a solid one. Issues can be worked out.
3. Creativity – as technology has advanced, so has the ability for games to offer multiple solutions to a given problem. “Sandbox games” (defined as “games that let you interact with the whole game world rather than limit you to specific areas at a time”) are very popular, and YouTube is full of videos of
   people doing crazy things in-game that the gamemakers never intended. See that building way off in the distance that looks unreachable? Let’s find a way to get to it! Sure, the creativity is still limited to the confines of the game, but it’s still an important skill to cultivate.
4. Learning to work in a system – Have a job? There are specific ways you have to do things, right? TPS Reports must have a cover sheet, taxes have to be filed, and procedures must be followed. While “thinking outside the box” is encouraged and better solutions are generally welcome, there will always be rules a person needs to follow. A videogame gives the player specific abilities and a specific world where those abilities can be used, and it’s up to the player to determine how best to use those abilities in the confines of the game world.
5. Team-building & Organization – As I’ve already mentioned, working on a solution to a presented problem with someone else can make all the difference. I might only see the ledge and a switch, but someone else might notice that the animal carcass is movable and can be placed on the switch. Guild leaders in games like World of Warcraft spend hours organizing people from all over the country to accomplish tasks that sometimes require 40 people – imagine trying to do that! Granted, I’m not interested in doing organization on a scale as grand as that, but making plans of attack for two-player games can still teach planning and organization.

Labels: life, videogames

16 comments

When I get home after work, Nutmeg comes to greet me from wherever she’s been scheming.

Less than a minute after I get in my bed at night, Dala has hopped up on the bed (if she wasn’t there already). Nutmeg’s there within five minutes.

When I open the bathroom door after I’ve showered in the morning, both of them push their way in.

These things happen every. single. day.

My apartment has a utility room right off the kitchen. The washing machine, dryer, water heater, and airconditioning/heater unit are in there and there’s a door to the room. I decided before even moving in that the room would be perfect to house the litter box and the food and water dishes. That way if I ever needed to lock them up for a while they’d have everything they needed all in one room. They’d still freak out about being locked up, but at least they wouldn’t die.

I feed them every day at both 6:30s (or thereabout), a half-cup of food per time. This, too, has become part of their schedule, though they’re not exactly right about it. At night they start pestering me for food about an hour and a half before the actual time. In the morning, Nutmeg starts batting at me and purring as loud as she can about a half hour before it’s time. When I head downstairs, they almost trip over themselves hurrying to get to the cabinet where their food is before I do. They’ll stare at cabinet door and meow, pacing back and forth like expectant fathers. Once I get the food, they bolt for the utility room, and I can barely pour the food because their heads are in the way.

A few weeks ago I moved their food and water dishes out to the end of the counter in the kitchen, maybe eight feet away from where the dishes have been for the past year and a half. I did this for a couple of reasons:

1. Most “cat experts” tell you the food and the litter box should be in different areas. Makes sense. I don’t think I need to explain the thinking behind this one.
2. Sometimes feeding time intersects with laundry time. I’ve noticed during these times that Nutmeg won’t eat. The noises scare her. And while Nutmeg could stand to not eat and Dala could stand to have more unmolested access to the food, I still feel bad that Nutmeg gets scared.

A funny thing has happened. When I get their food from the cabinet, they both still head for the utility room. I realize they have brains the size of a walnut, but it’s been a couple of weeks with this new setup, and I’d have guessed they would have figured this out by now. It’s become a lab experiment of sorts, and when Dala actually did head to the end of the counter the other day, I got the same sort of thrill you might get when your team scores a touchdown. Sadly, the next day she was back to the utility room.

It’s particularly odd because to get to the food cabinet, they go right past the food dish. You’d think that they’d see it on their way and remember, “Oh, yeah, the dish is over here now,” but I guess a starving cat isn’t so much concerned with little details.

They’ll eventually figure it out, I know, I’m just surprised it’s taking them so long. But then it strikes me that I’m exactly the same way. It’s no surprise to anyone who’s read this blog for more than a week that I’m one for ruts – I do things the way I’ve done things and that’s how it is. I get the same things at the same restaurants, I drive the same routes, I do the same things over and over. For me, there’s comfort in familiarity. For as much as I like Star Trek, I’d make a lousy space explorer. Spock would alert me to sensor readings indicating a never-before-seen lifeform on a nearby planet and I’d say, “Yeah, but… we’re headed to that other planet and besides, the lifeform’s probably dangerous and most certainly ugly. Let’s skip it.”

Some habits are good to have and keep – brushing your teeth, making your bed, being nice to other people. Other habits aren’t so good, and just like the origin of the phrase “stuck in a rut,” it becomes next to impossible to get the covered wagon up out of it and on to a new course.

Note those words “next to.” It’s hard, but it can be done. About two years ago, I changed what hand I use to brush my teeth. I know, it’s such a weirdly random thing to do, but I read an article that talked about different things you could do to exercise your brain and that’s the one I remembered. I’m a righty and have brushed my teeth with my right hand for however long I’ve been brushing my teeth. Switching to my left hand was hard and felt awkward and I wasn’t so good at it for a long time, but it eventually became natural. In fact, these days I can’t brush my teeth with my right hand. Now it feels weird and awkward.

My brain’s slightly larger than a walnut (but still smaller than a watermelon), so it should be easier for me to make these habit changes, especially if the habit’s destructive. If the cats never figure out the food dish thing, the only problem they have is two extra seconds of walking when they hear or see me pour the food in the bowl. My bad habits could cause infinitely more damage, so why’s it so hard to change them?

I think tomorrow I’m going to start re-training myself to brush my teeth with my right hand.

Labels: cats, life

7 comments

I don't know if this is the sort of thing a person ought to mention on their blog or not. I worry a lot about appropriateness, if you hadn't noticed. I like for people to have a pleasant experience when they show up here, and I don't want to make anyone uncomfortable.

But this seems like kind of a big deal, so I thought I'd chance it.

I'm not even sure how to put this, so I guess... well, I guess I'll just say it like this, separately spaced, centered, and bolded:


It's taken me some time to come to this point, but I'm finally ready to announce it. Sure, it might not mean much to some of you - most of you, even - but for a select few, it might put a spring in your step, a gleam in your eye, or a flutter in your heart. To those select few I say this: contact me. My email address is in the upper-left corner, the comments section is open - I'll even give you my phone number if you want. Just give me a holler.

We'll have fun, I promise you. Oh, there'll be rough times, but if we work through them, we'll come out on the other side of them a better team, more prepared for the next challenges. But if you're up for it, so am I. With enough work, maybe we'll eventually be able to take a crack at something a little scary, very difficult, but ultimately rewarding: "Freebird" on Expert.

Considering I'm just now starting to try songs on Hard, it might take a while. But if you're available to work on it, I am, too. So if you wanna play some Guitar Hero until your fingers fall off, give me a holler.

I'm totally available. For playing Guitar Hero.

Labels: life, music

18 comments

My current song obsession is one I discovered watching Scrubs. I can't recommend the show 100%, but it does some things very well. One thing it does well is balance comedy and tear-jerking drama almost perfectly, all within the same 22-minute episode. There are many episodes that have caused me to tear up, and they are invariably my favorite episodes.

Another thing Scrubs does well is use music to not only advance the plot but also capture a particular mood.

While I was sick last week I started Season One and ended up getting through all of it and Season Two. One of the characters in Season Two, Episode 13, "My Philosophy," needed a transplant and prospects were grim. At one point J.D. (the main character) is talking to her about death and she says she hopes it's like a big Broadway musical. As sometimes happens, things go bad and she doesn't make it. At that point that show goes into "musical mode" and she and the cast sing this song:

Waiting for My Real Life to Begin

Any minute now, my ship is coming in
I'll keep checking the horizon
I'll stand on the bow, feel the waves come crashing
Come crashing down down down, on me

And you say, be still my love
Open up your heart
Let the light shine in
But don't you understand
I already have a plan
I'm waiting for my real life to begin

My real life to begin

But don't you understand
I already have a plan
I'm waiting for my real life to begin

On a clear day
I can see
See a very long way

While I think the music is beautiful, the staging of it on the show made it more poignant. You might not feel as attached to the characters, but seeing it might still help you see why it makes me tear up:

There's something about that concept of "waiting for my real life to begin" that hits me. It's the idea that all of the mistakes I've made up to this point were just practice and that the real deal is starting any minute now, so I'll be able to start in on this plan I've got in mind.

I like the way the song makes me think. I've listened to it literally 20 times today. I'm sure I'll burn out on it soon, but for now I'll keep hitting replay.

I already have a plan
I'm waiting for my real life to begin

Labels: life, music, TV

17 comments

My videogame boss (the guy who runs the site, not, you know, Bowser) said once that he doesn't make New Year's resolutions - if he decides to make a change he does it no matter what time of year it is. That's a good philosophy. Trouble is, I get stuck in this mindset that beginnings must coincide. Going to start brushing my teeth with my left hand instead of my right one? Can't do it until February. (I did this a little over a year ago, by the way. Now I can't brush my teeth with my right hand because it feels weird. Might be time to switch back.) Trying a new route to work? Can't do that on a Thursday. Beginnings of weeks, months, or years: these are the appropriate times for behavior changes. For me it's because it's easier to keep track of progress. If I started something at the beginning of the year, I can easily tell how long it took me to fail at it. "Let's see, it's January 7, so... one week!"

Labels: friends, life, new things

8 comments

Here's what my 2006 looked like, according to my blog:

January

• Created webcam archive site
• Mom and Dad's great cat Zumba put to sleep because of health problems.
• Announced intentions to start School Memories series

February

• Started School Memories series with a bang: Kindergarten through Fifth Grade

March

• Went to Lansing, Michigan, went to a Chocolate Festival there.
• School Memories: Sixth and Seventh Grades
• My third collaborative comic with Joerules was published at Theater Hopper.
• Went to Wisconsin for my Dad’s 60th birthday.
• Sold my minivan (The entry title, "Call Me Vincent," was a pun on "Vincent Van Gogh," as in "van go bye-bye," but this went mostly unnoticed. It was probably for the best.)
• Started driving my mom’s Cadillac

April

• Got an email from GV from Partners In Kryme! about my post on the lyrics to his group’s song from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie. There's no guarantee it was the actual guy, but I like to think it was.
• School Memories: Eighth Grade and Elementary Wrap-Up

May

• Turned 34
• Watched my 153rd movie of the year (Serenity)
• Used Crest Whitestrips in preparation for Mike & Meags’ wedding
• Had a bird in my server room at work.

June

• Bought an iPod (but didn’t talk about it until July)
• Went to Canada for Mike & Meags’ wedding. LOVED it.
• Had Tim Hortons hot chocolate in Canada. LOVED it.
• Met my 20-year friends Dave and Josh in Sturgis, Michigan for dinner
• Went to a Sheryl Crow concert in Indianapolis. LOVED it.
• School Memories: Ninth Grade
• Watched Superman Returns, felt it was the best Superman movie I’d ever seen

July

• Recorded my Snakes on a Plane song
• Ed Horn passed away
• School Memories: Tenth Grade
• Met some THorumites in Indianapolis, including Brian (for the first time), Angela (for the second time), and Andelyn (for the first time). Didn’t actually talk about it until August, though.

August

• Overdrew my stupid checking account.
• Bought Steel Magnolias and got made fun of for it
• Ran with scissors
• Bought a moleskine. I still haven’t written a single word in it. Anyone surprised by this?

September

• Read Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers and was completely fascinated by it.
• Went to Dallas, Texas, to meet people and watch a Cowboys game
• Met Brian (for the second time) and his wife Lisa (for the first time). Brian's one of my best friends and it was great to meet him twice this year and get to meet Lisa, too. I hope there'll be many more meetings in years to come.
• Went to The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza and learned a bunch about the JFK assassination
• Met Teri, the Cynical Tyrant. There are some people you meet that you immediately wish you could be friends with. Teri's one of those people.
• Watched the Cowboys beat the Redskins, 27-10

October

• Got new glasses
• Made up a Norman Bates joke
• Bought a new travelin’ bag. The entry title, “Call Me Papa," was a callback to the song "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag," but this, too, was mostly overlooked. This, too, was probably for the best.
• Started to think about moving

November

• Created an “about me” crossword puzzle
• Got a new-to-me car, gave Mom back her Cadillac
• Sold my iPod, bought a Zune (didn’t talk about it until December, though)
• Got locked out of my Yahoo!/Flickr accounts for a couple of weeks
• Filmed a commercial which never aired (didn’t talk about it until December)

December

• Finished School Memories series with Eleventh and Twelfth Grades
• Attended art shows
• Used a review of Grosse Pointe Blank as a plea for a second chance
• My next-door neighbors moved out
• Traveled to Wisconsin for family Christmas
• Watched my 371st movie of the year

In some ways, 2006 was a huge year for me - traveling all over and meeting new people isn't my usual cup of tea. In other ways, seeing everything boiled down to bullet points like this makes it seem like not much happened. I either need to blog more or do more. Maybe I should do more and then blog more.

I hope your 2006 was good and I hope your 2007 will be even better!

Labels: life

4 comments

It's generally difficult for me to come up with "Top Five" lists on my own. If given a list of things, I can put them in order, but I can't pick from, say, a vast field of movies and pick my favorite five. My default answer to "What's your favorite movie?" is Batman (the Tim Burton one), most likely because I've seen it more than any other movie (and because, well, it's awesome). But rounding out the rest of the list is difficult. Ghost Busters, Garden State, Unforgiven -- how do you rank things so vastly different?

So I tend to speak in nonspecifics - "This movie's in my top three," "that song's in my current top ten" - that kind of thing.

This movie's definitely in my top three: Grosse Pointe Blank. John Cusack movies are in their own category (reference: Better Off Dead), as he's got this certain character that he does/is that's infinitely cooler than any other movie characters out there. I've heard it explained this way: Girls want to be with him, guys want to be him. I've heard rumors he's not so cool in real life, but let's stick with Martin Blank, Lane Meyer, and Lloyd Dobler here, shall we?

(There might be spoilers ahead, I don't know. You've been sorta-warned.)

In Grosse Pointe Blank Cusack plays Martin Blank, a hit man who goes to his 10-year high school reunion. He's in town to do a job, but he's also wrestling with seeing the girl he left on Prom Night ten years ago without so much as a "by your leave." On top of that he's got competing hitmen trying to kill him and some government guys after him, too. He's been kind of down lately and has been kind of seeing a shrink, a guy who really doesn't want to talk to him because he's afraid of Martin.

Debi (the girl) finds out he's a hitman after stumbling across him over a recently deceased "bad guy," and any sort of "we might be okay even after the ten year absence" thing is quickly destroyed. But then Martin goes on to save her father's life and the end of the movie sees them heading off into the sunset together. Too pat? Maybe. Unbelievable? Sure. Hoped for? You bet.

I love the movie for many reasons. Cusack, of course, and the traditional Cusack snappy dialogue. The humor. The juxtapositions. The music.

But it hit me recently what I liked most about it: the redemption. Here's this guy who kills people for money. He loses his taste for it (not quite the same thing as "realizes it's wrong," but, hey) and wants to pick up where he left off with the girl he loved. Not a chance, she says. In fact, after she finds out what he does and she is storming out, he tries to call her back. She whips around and says very deliberately, "You don't get to have me." Translation: You messed up, and because you did, I'm forever out of your reach. It's a powerful, sad moment. Of course, by the end of the movie things are different, but right then it's big. She leaves and Martin lays on the bed, knowing he's out, he's done, he has no hope of ever being with her.

Then he does something heroic, saves the day... and gets another chance. I love that. Sure, we don't know what happens after the movie ends (can we get a sequel already?!?) and he could go on to mess the whole thing up in normal, everyday ways that people mess up relationships, but he gets that second chance and to me that's awesome.

I've recently had the opportunity to re-meet people I used to know "way back when." They've been happy to see me, and it's weird. I kind of feel like I'm getting that second chance myself. And I see how they've done since I last saw them (and some of them are doing really, really well) and it reminds me of the reunion - Martin's going through this great crisis of life and he's meeting happy mothers, succesful realtors, near-death experience survivors - all these other people, and it throws into contrast what he's been doing the last ten years.

At one point during the reunion, he sits down at a table with a friend from high school who has her very young baby with her. She asks Martin to hold him while she gets something from her purse. Martin initially balks, but then holds the kid on the mother's further insistence. There's a good minute or two of Martin looking at this baby, and you sense he's realizing he might want to settle down and have one of these himself (which would, of course, require him getting out of the killing people business).

The baby's mother at one point asks Martin, "So, how's your life?"

"In progress," he responds. He's right on the edge of big changes and he senses that things could maybe turn out right.

"In progress." I like that. It's going on and I'm doing stuff and who knows how it'll end?

"In progress" indeed.

Labels: life, movies

4 comments

If you’ve been reading my blog for any amount of time at all you’ve probably noticed I don’t get very personal very often. I’ve taken an “editorial” approach here, using observances to make a point or to make a joke – what I like to call the “Dave Barry Approach.” While I think you can piece together an accurate picture of me from what I post, it is by no means a complete one. If you were to meet me, I don’t think you’d be surprised. I pretty much am in real life what I am here, all quirks and smart aleck comments.

But there’s plenty you don’t know about me, plenty I keep to myself.

That’s a function of two different forces, I think. First, I grew up in Wisconsin. There’s something about Wisconsin – and, really, the whole Midwest – that doesn’t encourage sharing. If you’ve ever heard Garrison Keillor talk about his fictional town of Lake Wobegon you know what I mean. There’s an encouragement to “soldier on” and be nice to each other without letting on about whatever turmoil rages beneath the surface. It’s fine to have strong feelings, just keep them to yourself.

The second force is good old-fashioned fear. I am all about honesty, but honesty is a double-edged sword. In the one direction, it cuts through all the nonsense and gives a solid base for any relationship. In the other direction, though, it lays a person bare, open to ridicule, attack, and disgust.

I want people to like me, as a general rule – even people I’ll never see again, like waiters or people at the register. I want them to look at me, assess me as nice, and continue thinking that after I’ve said something.

But as much as I want people to like me, I also want to be safe. Safety, in fact, can outweigh a hundred other things. While I might not worry that someone else is going to stab me (though I sometimes actually do worry this), I certainly worry that they won’t accept me for who I am. Think back to high school and that crush you had. Why didn’t you tell them? You were afraid they wouldn’t feel the same way about you and when they didn’t, it was going to hurt. Carry that to its logical conclusion, though: the only way to really feel safe is to not reach out at all. If you never reach out, you’ll never get hurt. I think the editorial voice I’ve adopted here is a safety zone of sorts. You might not like my cats, you might not like trips I take, you might not like a bunch of things, but if I haven’t revealed my inner self completely, there’s still a chance you could like me.

See, what I want is for you to think I’m worth the effort, worth getting past all the quirks and the failures. I want you to think I’m worthwhile, but I have no way to prove I am. (And, in fact, I have a whole pile of evidence that I’m not. I feel like anyone I think is really great and I’m interested in being friends with deserves to have better friends than me.) I think there should be some sort of “Friend Résumé” we could hand out: “Excuse me, hi. I think you’re really neat and I want to be friends with you. Here’s a list of my faults and failures, but this other list is of friends I’ve had who found the experience to be worth the effort. You’ll see I’ve included a few phone numbers – those are people who are willing to be references, so feel free to call them. Thank you for your time and I hope to hear back from you soon.”

Nobody wants to invest time in a bad friendship. How frustrating to keep working and working at something that ultimately comes to nothing. So often, though, it’s our faults that make the relationship stronger. What’s the best way to show love, by liking someone’s qualities that are likable? Nope, it’s by liking them in spite of their failings. 1 Corinthians 13:5 says love “does not seek its own.” 1 Peter 4:8 says “love covers a multitude of sins.” Think about the best friend you’ve ever had. Were things always perfect? Of course not. How’d you get past those times and remain friends? “Love covers a multitude of sins,” is how. One of the best friends I have right now I’ve known for over twenty years. Our Junior year in high school we were sitting at a lunch table and he was making fun of me for something and I threw an orange at him, hit him right below the eye. We got past that and a hundred other rough patches and here we are, still friends – in fact, I’d say we were better friends for it.

In the beginning stages of friendship, though, it’s difficult to know what to do. A series of faults right at the outset can strangle off what might have been a fantastic friendship given time, but isn’t it important to be honest from the get-go? How honest is too honest?

I think that as I get older, I’m coming to the conclusion that I want people to like me for who I am, not who I can present myself as. I still feel the same way I did in high school, not wanting to be hurt, but I think it’s more important that the other person not be hurt. “I think you’re really great and I want to be friends with you, but I want to let you know up front what you’re dealing with so you have the chance to back out now before you get stuck with it all down the road.”

I want to be worthwhile, but I guess that’s really up to you. All I can do is be who I am. And, just like Dave Barry’s writing, you’ll either like that or you won’t.

Labels: friends, life

8 comments