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Matt's Journal
Now most of this will mean nothing to anyone, but I thought it was interesting. As most of you know I play online games, or should I say “Escapism.” There is this thing called “twinking” on these games and it mean when a veteran player gives a new player a lot of stuff they shouldn’t have, thus making the new player much more capable of playing than they should be. I don’t practice this save for my close friends but occasionally I’ll have equipment I just feel like giving away. I’m a bit of a role player so I like to keep things in game so a while back I had a sword and some armor that was pretty nice and I found a low level ranger running around named Werena. I stopped her and asked; “Does the true heart of a Ranger beat within your chest?” She answered, “I believe so.” And with that I gave her the stuff. I like to get other people to show interest in the game at a level that’s deeper than, “Oh a spider, must bash spider.” So I kept running into her, and never once did she ask me for more gear, and that impressed me so I gave her more stuff that I don’t use anymore.
Now she’s a good friend in game and last night she asked me if I remembered what I first said to her. I couldn’t remember because I always role-play when giving away equipment but when she reminded me and I recalled most of our first meeting. Then she told me that at that moment she had decided her path in the game, and is now very much the same level as me. I told her that I tend to bring out the best in people. It made me feel good, and to be honest it’s always been a gift of mine. I would like to think that everyone feels comfortable around me, even the people I find highly annoying but don’t have the heart to tell them to fuck off.
But then it made me think. Where is the person who brings out the best in me? I don’t seem to have one. No one has ever motivated me to do anything. I’ve always been impressed by other people for things they can do better than myself but I learn what I can from them and very rarely ever put them on a pedestal. And I’ve realized I’m a parasite.
I make the people around me happy so I can suck up their good vibes, and then I do nothing with it. Like right now I have a religious friend on aim right now and when he asked me what I’m doing I told him writing deep things and thinking about suicide. This automatically put him in the concerned religious friend mode, and for the record he’s been trying to get me to join a bible study thing so I don’t feel bad about doing this to him because right now he’s feeling good about himself because he’s sharing something with me that he thinks he can make better. But it makes me a fucking scum bag for doing it.
It’s like my love for chex mix.
And in closing, my ode to thunderstorms.
And she beats her drums, of sky bound cotton, and let fall her life giving cries while the trees below offer up their bounty of emeralds.
If you haven't watched the final trailer for the Matrix, before its release next month. This trailer hands down whoops all the asses of the other trailers, and then promplty curbs them for good measure. We get glimpses of all the new bads and some of their abilities as well as seeing Neo fly. And if I could just mention, I get really exicited seeing Neo fly, I mean really excited. Its everything they tried to do when the original Superman films came out, here is done perfectly. So, www.whatisthematrix.com, go now, see it, long for it, make sweet love to your monitor.
This evening I had the unrequited joy of viewing the first two seasons of a show I had only heard of; “Red Dwarf.” Smeg me if it’s not evil beyond evil to only have the first two seasons to watch, and worse yet the rest of the seasons are not even for sell on DVD yet. While not achingly funny, the passion of the actors and some truly wild plotting delivers a very memorable show. In my opinion this is what LeXX tried to be and failed horribly.
So what is “Red Dwarf” some of you are asking. It’s a BBC sci-fi comedy. It follows the exploits of Lister, a janitor of sorts, who manages to escape death when he’s put into stasis and the rest of the “Red Dwarf’s” crew is irradiated. Worse yet he ends up in stasis for three millions years. When he comes out of stasis he finds Holly, the ships computer, Cat, a man-cat which is the descendent of the cat that Lister was keeping as a pet which is what got Lister thrown in stasis in the first place, and lastly Rimmer.
Rimmer is the key, see he’s a hologram, a hologram of Lister’s obnoxious authority brown nosing bunk mate. See Rimmer is dead, because he failed to prevent the explosion that killed the crew of the “Red Dwarf” and for some odd reason Holly is sustaining him as a hologram to keep Lister company on his long trip back to earth. It’s their relationship that makes the show. These two guys are of course complete opposites, Lister a slob, Rimmer a card carrying “I’m Anal” membership holder.
The show takes jabs at everything from just about any sci-fi genre show as well as every episodic comedy. The characters have bizarre adventures and slowly grow on one another. Dozens of odd characters mingle in the timelines of the show. Cat being the oddest in my opinion, as he’s a descendent of the cat that Lister once kept who managed to avoid the fate of the rest of the crew, spawned, and over the three million years that Lister was in stasis the cats have evolved into men. They even had a war as two factions fought over what was thought to be biblical scripture left behind by Lister, but was in fact his laundry list. Now Cat is the last of his kind, he’s a black, and desperately wants to be James Brown.
The show is really a gem. Crap production values only add to the ambiance of the show, making it all that more enjoyable. Its also funny as hell to hear characters who are supposedly from the distant future make reference to present pulp culture. I can’t say it would be for everyone though, not everyone likes Brit comedy, but I’ve always found the less spastic shows, like “Chef”, to be really enjoyable and I have to say this is where “Red Dwarf” lies. People have described it as Monty Python like, but I disagree its not skit based at all.
Well I should really get to bed.
Woot I’m feeling all accomplished and shit this morning. Woke up and decided to get my mp3 collection in order and rip some of the new CD’s I’ve gotten lately. So now my MusicMatch is tip top shape and thanks to that I can enjoy my music just about in any room thanks to my wireless router. Better living through technology.
Yesterday I had to go in for the training I missed back last Friday. It sort of sucked because the training didn’t start till two in the afternoon and was scheduled to run till eleven. So towards the end of the class I was all but falling asleep thanks to my new schedule. On top of that the training was the same exact training I got a few months ago, not one new piece of information that would help me taking the calls on the phone. But you know what, I wasn’t on the phone.
Jon, a friend from work, brought in some killer bean dip. I’m not a fan of beans but all I wanted to do was hang around his cube and eat bean dip. He’s promised to either bring me some of my own Monday or show me how to make it..
Well I should get in gear and get busy. Need a shower, need to clean. Need to log into EQ and say hello to everyone since I haven’t been around all week.
So at the beginning of the week I was sort of pissed. I really didn't want to go back to work after my 4 days off. It didn't help matters to find that upon returning to work I was stuck in the worst two skill sets, Home Networking and Satellite. Home Networking really isn't all that bad, just time consuming. Sat calls on the other hand are just fucking horrible. There is nothing to tech; it’s a god damn signal being beamed up and down from the planet. I hate those fucking calls. Well then comes the straw falling, lazily through the air, towards the camel's back. Seems my boss got chewed out because I was on vacation on Friday, and missed some training. And this is what pisses me off the most. Two weeks ago he tells me I have training. I look at the dates the training takes place, and it was last month. I bring this to his attention. He didn't have an answer and was going to look into. Later that week I get an e-mail saying the training has been cancelled. I assumed my boss had looked into it and found that it was a mistake. I didn't put in for my vacation until long after I got that e-mail. Well it turns out they had the dates wrong and I missed the training. And so the straw came to rest on the camel's back, and it sighed for the strain. Well I recently reinstalled XP on my system just as a way to get the system squeaky clean. Well I went to reinstall Kazaa to continue to download stolen music at blazing speeds. This of course is when the Air Bus came falling from the sky, a fireball of pain, and landed on the poor unsuspecting camel. No matter what I did I couldn't get kazaa to work and I wasn't willing to go back to auto get and mirc to steal my music. So I was in a funk because I really wanted to get a hold of the new "Children of Dune" soundtrack. So I got the shit calls and things simply weren't working out at home. Then things sort of shifted back towards the positive.
First came the whisper of my mistress, Countess Da'Winter. She passed through town, her ivory smile blanketing the land in a virgin snow. I woke to her gray veil stretched out across the sky, and I felt my heart lift. Then
Best Buy opened their first store in the area. Yes I know that’s something not worth getting excited over but after having to leave Fry's Electronics back in Phoenix I've been having withdrawal. Well I allowed myself to swing by there the other day, which I may have already mentioned. Anyway I got the wireless card for my laptop which has worked better than I thought it would. Well as luck would have it Tivo sent the update for my Tivo box and now I can disconnect my home phone and save forty bucks a month. And a friend from work swung by the house and we shot the shit and talked about computers and movies.
Then today my boss comes up to me and says there is second training class I can catch. My ears perk up at that. Time off the phones is a plus in my book. Then he tells me the training is an all day thing but won't start till one. Blah the thought of coming in at 8 and staying till 11pm is not my idea of fun. But I had already managed to get him in trouble once because of my vacation so I took it like the little peon I am and said, "Cool, I'll be there." Asked him when and he was sure said he would get back to me. Later that day he told me it was Friday and I wasn't to come in till the class started. Woot Fucking Snootch! I get to sleep in and not take calls; it'll be like a three day weekend.
And I have to thank V, although she doesn't read this anymore. She made me sit down and write. It wasn't much but the burst of imagery it unleashed in my head flashes behind my eyes like a movie. I hope you’re feeling better V.
Well I should get a shower and get to bed. I'm hungry though, and all I can think off is Mrs. B.'s Cajun pork chops. I can feel the sting on my lips right now, and I whimper knowing that I am denied such a dinner.
After only a week of mid 70’s the Mistress of Winter returned, a train of grey dragging behind her, and took Spring by the throat and beat it senseless. Everyone else is griping, and I’m happy as a kid in a candy store as the snow falls. So I took a hundred bucks out of my tax return and used it for myself as the rest of it went to bills. Got a wireless PCMCIA card for my laptop so I don’t look foolish with that stupid USB adapter taped to the lid of my box. This also freed up the USB adapter so I can use it with my TIVO. WOOT!
Well I wish I had something more life changing but I don’t so oh well.
Just got done watching “Cube 2: HyperCube” and all I can say is it’s a hyper piece of crap. Yeaa I know your saying, “Cube? Cube 2, no less? How could you think it was going to be any good?” Well I’m glad you asked because it gives me the excuse to tell you about the original “Cube.”
What was suppose to be some stupid horror flick turned out to be a thrilling little number about the worse kind of experiment, social behavior. Sure the movie took place in some bizarre man made death trap, for which no reason was given for its construction, it was the impressive screen play and the interactions between the people stuck in the trap that made it a great little film. I think it was a total of eight people, all of which by the end of the film revealed they had something to do with the trap they were all stuck in. But as clues were found and a possible plan of escape became apparent it was fun to watch these eight people work together as well as conspire against one another.
Sadly the sequel manages not to pull any of this over, save for the fact there once again a group of strangers is dumped in some man made death trap. This time of course they couldn’t give the audience the same thing they offered in the first film, because that would be boring or at least that’s what studio execs think. In the first one the group figures out that the death trap is one big mathematical puzzle. Each of the rooms in the death trap is marked with a serial number that pinpoints where the room physically existed in the huge cube. Well in this second one the film makers try to trick you by having the characters scrawl numbers and markings on all the walls but it’s pointless because it turns out that this death trap is a quantum construct. So there is no thrill in figuring out the puzzle. Instead you’re just hit over the head with 60659, a number that keeps showing up which in the end sort of equals the answer but really isn’t an answer to the cube. So instead of the nifty numbered rooms, as well as the color coding of the rooms from the first movie, your left with “Star Trek” speak when the characters talk about alternate realities and temporal shifted rooms.
The worst part is the social experiment is gone. In the first the people meet but hardly trust one another, yet bond out of fear. Well in this one people are way too quick to make friends, and way to excepting of the fact that they’re in some bizarre maze. People die pointless deaths, only to appear later because of alternate realities within the cube. In the first film people died because they fell victim to the traps in the maze, and they’re deaths often meant something, a new clue to the way the maze worked, or something along those lines. But in the second film its more of a who can survive to the end by simply wandering through the cube. By the end of the film your just wish it was over because it lacks everything that made “Cube” worth watching in the first place.
Well that’s my two cents for the night. See you all on the other side.
Wow its amazing to come back to your journal a month later and find you haven’t posted. It sits there like a weathered ruin, much like the Aztec temples, and Stone Hedge. They grow old with the passage of time yet everything they are just sits there to be viewed by passer bys. Well I guess its time to come back to the ring and put in a good TKO.
Well the real big news is the change in schedules at work, it would also be one of the main reasons I haven’t posted in a while. They told us it was a shift bid but that was a flat out fucking lie. So I got stuck with 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. mon-fri. Yeah I’m sure some of you are like “What the hell are you talking about; I would love to get stuck with that schedule.” Well if it means anything you can take the sheer and utter disgust I wake up with every morning and see how you like it. I’m not some goth freak but I am a child of the night. I so miss staying up till 4 or 5 in the morning. What worse I could often go to bed at 5 and wake back up at 11 and be completely refreshed. Now I go to bed at 11 p.m. to wake up at 7 a.m., eight full fucking hours, and I’m more tired than ever. It doesn’t help that I’ve started taking my showers before I go to bed, which seems to infuriate my upstairs neighbor who takes it upon himself to start flushing the toilet over and over again while I’m in the shower. But I’ll be honest I would rather take a crap ass shower then wake up any earlier than I already do.
Luckly I’ve only had one more dream about the children, and it was several times worse than the others I’ve mentioned, I’ll spare you the details. I’m happy to say I’ve taken control of my dreams thanks to some tips I’ve come across. If the kids bother me these days they get a nice dose of blazing white light, I know that sounds silly so I’ll explain. The tips I’ve read told me that if I become panicked or anxious to think of course of something that makes your feel safe, or better yet something that makes you feel empowered. Well that’s easy for me, with all the comics and anime I’ve sat through its easy to think up a sphere of protective energy around me. Needless to say my dreams have gone from being disturbing to being simply childish and fantasy filled. Hehehe I’ve learned to fly in my dreams, which is a real kicker. The point is I look forward to sleep again which is the whole point.
Let’s see what else is going on. Yeah I’ve tried to make it a point to star calling old friends. It’s met with some initial success but I’ve yet to get a hold of Mrs. B. I really do miss her, it’s just not the same on my days off without her and her bo around. Don’t worry J, I don’t hate you or anything. Its just most of the time when you’re on I don’t have anything to say, or you’re not on at the same time as me. Other wise I’ve been in touch with most of the people from Phoenix and El Paso.
Not much else going on. There is of course the “War.” But I have a hard time calling it that. I haven’t watched a lick of coverage, and I’ve only picked up on things said in passing at work. I don’t really have an urge to discuss it simply because I don’t know all the facts, but I found it highly entertaining to listen to others talk about it. I heard someone the other day going on about how it’s only days before we use a Tactical Nuke. I just chuckled. I very much doubt we’ll be using any type of weapon that matches those weapons that we were supposedly upset about Iraq having in the first place. The other thing that gets me all giggly is the peace protesting. Sorry but your all a bunch of saps who obviously need a hobby. You got parents crying because they’re kids are being sent over seas, um yeah that’s why they joined the army. You got others saying that this is all Bush’s doing. If you ask me it all comes across like DejaVu, I mean is this not exactly what happened when his dad was in office. Well it suits me fine. If anything else at least Bush will go down in the books for doing something politically motivated, and not having his cock sucked, then lying to the world. The funniest part is this war will be forgotten long before all the Cigar Jokes, and we can thank the general quagmire of “Public Opinion” for that.
Speaking of the quagmire of our Nation, I see there are still plenty of reality shows on TV these days. I had the joy of listening to “Married by America” the other night simply because I was too lazy to get up and shut of the stereo while I was playing Everquest. What was I treated to, some obnoxious father trying to show the world he was a big man by swearing and making an ass of himself. Yet people tune into this crap for some reason. I even saw the ad for a new show today where a woman will be courted by dozens of guys, but they will all be masked and must rely on their personality to win her heart. Funny none of the guys were fat; I guess fat people must have no personality. I give kudos to the show for trying to say that looks don’t count for everything, but when all the guys are 6 feet tall and in perfect shape, I think the studio has missed the point. And that point would be that every single person who is on one of these shows is a whore, plain and simple. Men and Women alike, the whole lot of them, whores. Yeah I don’t want to hear about how the shows are entertaining. Let me try to give you another point of view, think of these shows as nothing more than softcore gang bang videos. That’s right, now do you get my point. For a culture that claims to be squeaky clean we sure have some disgusting crap on TV. Where is the Catholic League when all the whores on TV are being voted on by the audience that is America? Yeah that’s right they’re attacking films like Dogma, which in the end is a movie that’s got a positive outlook on faith and belief.
That reminds me because of course this leads into the whole realm of “PC.” As most of you know I play Everquest, tend to enjoy fiction on just about any level, and like to write. Well I’m sort of in charge of the message board for my Everquest guild. I setup all the threads and such and keep an eye on things. Well the message board has a game/fantasy theme. I named one section, “Tavern of the Whining Banshee” for the purpose of people to put in rants and complaints. So I labeled the thread “Rants” with “Listen to her whine!” As in listen to the Banshee whine, because in most banshee mythos the banshee is often a “her.” Well some one actually took offense to it, saying I was belittling women. Oh my fucking god. I had to sit and explain that it was a message board for a fantasy/role playing based game, and that it had no bearing on real life. Yet she was pissed, and instead of coming up with an intelligent response, she simply said that my “explanation didn’t mean jack.” I swear this “PC” crap has to go. America needs to be taught the definition of “Context” because all things have context that explain what is being said or printed. I don’t remember the congressman’s name that used the word niggardly, but my god the shit storm it caused was so out of proportion it s not funny. The word has no racial context in the first place, it just happens to sound like nigger. Hell it’s a word used to describe Scrooge for Christ’s sake. Yet people couldn’t see beyond opaqueness of the “Politically Correct” looking glass and instead flipped out. Its just like this bitch (yes she was one) who busted my balls about a theme orientated fantasy message board. Lord I wish Mrs. B. could have been there, I would have loosed her upon this idiot. Sadly because I hate conflict I changed it to “Listen to the Banshee Whine!” But to be honest it doesn’t have that, I don’t know, that je ne sais pas.
Well its 2 a.m. and I’m dead tired. Man it feels good to get stuff down on paper again. I guess I’m going to need to try and get back into the habit of it all.
Current mood:
accomplished.Current music: The Hives "Hate to Say I Told You So".
Hey all, I’m in fact not dead, although several times I felt like death warmed over. Makes you think, does Death ever like to curl up in a nice big comfy chair, next to a roaring fire, wrapped in his gran’s hand knitted afghan, just to enjoy a good book? You think Death enjoys a nice warm cup of coco every once in a while? I only ask because what exactly is death warmed over? Just a little food for thought.
Well it’s been two tumultuous weeks of little sleep and long days at work. But I think I’m getting back on track with sleeping. I found out while doing some reading on sleep deprivation that you can actually end up dreading sleep. I think I was damn near close to that because I was afraid to sleep simply because I feared that I might wake up early. It was an interesting little research project. It also proves a theory that I’ve had for a long time. Only humans could come up with the countless, no endless, amount of psychocies that fill the tomes of supposed medical fact. Did you know there is a fear of “work,” there was a scientific word for it and everything? What a joke.
This week did have a bump in my sleep exercises. I got home Tuesday night and had a little bit of dinner, watched Buffy and Smallville (Christopher Reeves rocked!) and then went to bed with four tablets of Melatonin in my tummy. I feel right asleep. I live alone, so it was odd when I was nudged away Wednesday morning. I screamed like a girl when I found some stranger in the dark expanse of my room. Little did I know I had forgotten about the electricians coming to run new wire in my apartment. Not the most pleasant wake up call for someone as jumpy as me.
Work is the same save for the fact that we have a lot of new people on the phone these days. Shift bids are coming up in two weeks and I will soon find myself with a four day work week and a three day weekend. I’m looking forward to that on so many different levels its not funny.
When we left work tonight everyone groaned at the sight of the falling snow. I instantly became giddy. Snow fucking rocks. Its probably the only reason I’m sitting here typing, because I’ll be honest the last few days on the phone have been real drains. We’ve started talking a lot of Time Warner cable calls. I can’t tell you how simple most of these people are. Bless their hearts but fuck me if they don’t manage to gum up mail clients better than a mob informant in non commercial meat grinder. I’ve spent the last few days baffled at what they’ve manage to do to a tool I completely take for granted.
Wow I just opened trillian and its getting an illegal operation error. XP is asking if I would like to send a report or not, if I tell it no, trillian closes. But if I just move the error off the screen trillian is fine. Is that not hilarious? XP is telling me that it’s had a fatal error and needs to close the software, but as long as I ignore the error the program is fine. HA.
Anyway back to what I was talking about, well I guess I said what I wanted to. I’ve never had a problem with Outlook Express but yet I spent hours today, on like three calls, where they had royal fucked it up. And I can’t even figure out how.
That’s all I have to say, save for maybe that I’m jaded about what constitutes a lot of snow these days. There is about three inches of fresh powder out side but all I could think was “this is bullshit we need more snow.” Now I won’t be impressed again until there is another two feet sitting on the ground.
In the night the overcast sky takes on a shade of grey. It’s not black, not like charcoal, the snow grabs and holds the wash of the orange sulfur road lights and where the night once owned the land there is a sheet of ash slowly drifting. But it’s a trick. For around my feet there is ivory, unsoiled white. It stretches out before me in every direction, and it’s beautiful. But like satin it stains. My foot prints mire the landscape but at the same time rally the truth of my existence. My tracks play out behind me like my past, some of them not so clear as I stepped lightly, others messed about with unsure footing, some deep and purposeful. And no matter how careful I’m not able to make my way back; as the past can’t be changed no matter how careful you are when placing your feet. Instead looking back across my past I’ll remember not to tread on the fresh snow in the first place.