Choo-Choo

I've been mildly, hopelessly, miserable lately. It could be that I haven't been significantly mentally stimulated for the past little while. My solution thus far has been to force the matter into a pool of self improvement. Every day for the past month or so I've been writing in my journal, playing an instrument, exercising, and sketching. I should feel pretty proud of myself, but to be honest the journal entries are perfunctory, the sketches are lazy, and the music is scarcely more than a few plunks on a few chords. They're my end-of-day chores that I do to most uninspired of capacities.

It's having the opposite effect to what I had in mind. I'm losing more and more faith in myself as I look at the (lack of) results. There's no sense of self and a conspicuous absence of improvement. It's all rather disheartening.

I'm a big fan of delayed gratification. That's no secret. So usually at the end of the work day I unwind by putzing around online, doing some gaming, and watching whatever videos catch my attention. But you see, I don't really actually enjoy much of any of that. It's like being led along by the carrot, except the carrot is just a rock. Once I get my hands on it, and at the end of each day I always do, I find myself thinking, "Wait, what is all the fuss about?" An abundance of attention, but a void of intention. It's become distraction for distraction's sake.

Part of this could be my lack of mental/intellectual stimulation during the day. My girlfriend is a good example: I could never understand how she can spend the entire evening just vegging out with iPad games and crap TV. I do freelance! I work on my car! I work on sorting out an estate! The catch, though, is that during her work day she's doing big-brained things that she gets a lot of satisfaction from. And once she's done, she's satisfied by taking it easy with some mindless entertainment.

Meanwhile, I spend most of my work day mentally checked out so that I can complete what gets passed across my desk to meet the low standards and small expectations. Then I do some simple freelance or whatever, which helps me make up for a lackluster salary. No one wants something new or challenging; they're paying me to make something that looks passable and can be turned around quickly. After that, I try to unwind and check out with internet/videos/games. But it turns out that I've already been checked out since I sat down at my desk first thing in the morning. Which raises the unfortunate question... when was the last time I was checked in? Hell, when was the last time I was even in the building.

It's not surprising that I can't find enjoyment or satisfaction from anything.

And so for the next two weeks, my therapist has challenged me to cut out games, videos, and internets from my mindless repertoire. Oof. Take those away, and what else do I have? Sleep. It makes me want to give up and go to sleep. Almost like a toddler; once my favourite toys are taken away I just want to pout and hide away.

So things are going to get interesting. I can start reading all the things to occupy myself. I can delve even harder into my extra-curricular professional tasks. Or maybe I can write, draw, exercise, and play music like I actually mean it. The question is whether or not I can jump from the Chore tracks, clean over Mere Distraction, and onto the Actual Hobby line. That's a big ask for a freight train of mindless productivity like me.

Here's hoping.

-Cril

When I wake up
Someone will sweep up my lazy bones
And we will rise in the cool of the evening
I remember the way that you smiled
When the gravity shackles were wild
And something is vacant
When I think it's all beginning

I been drifting along
In the same stale shoes
Loose ends tyin' a noose
In the back of my mind
If you thought that you were making your way
To where the puzzles and pagans lay
I'll put it together
It's a strange invitation

Beck - Jack-Ass

Just a [Simulated]

Maybe we are living in a simulation. Not even necessarily that the entire system is simulated, just that all of the parts and components are simulated.

Politicians simulate the personality most people will support, and then their policies simulate what people will tolerate. When we get sick of that, we'll turn on the TV that shows people simulating interesting characters in a plot that simulates what the producers think we want to see. It's naturally interrupted by by ads that simulate the lifestyle we should want in order to get us to buy their stuff. Then we whip out our credit cards and buy things using a digital transaction that simulates physical currency that simulates the exchange of labour, time, and expertise. We then use our new possession to simulate a version of ourselves that we think other people will like. Blah, blah, something about 'the masks we all wear' concept that seem to get all the Fine Arts students weak in the knees.

Does anything even exist?

-Cril

If they weren't there we would have created them
Maybe, it's true
But I'm resentful all the same
Someone's got to take the blame
I know that this is vitriol
No solution, spleen-venting
But I feel better having screamed
Don't you?

R.E.M - Ignoreland

Keep It Clean

 A Facebook conversation, in two messages:

Me:

Hey dude, I don't know if you remember me or not, but we attended [highschool] together for a couple years. If you do remember me, you probably think that I'm a total dick. 

Those years sucked for me, and I tried to make myself feel better by being like the cool kids and picking on other people, like you. I remember hassling you about a lot of stupid stuff, and I don't have a single good excuse for it.

I'm sorry for what I did, for whatever that's worth. I can't take it all back like I wish I could, but if I had another shot at it I would've tried to do right by you. 

I hope your life is kicking ass, and things are way better for you than those crappy [highschool] days.

Him:

ya i remember alot of people from those day mind you i went to 5 or 6 high schools and was bullied in everyone of them do i deserve it probably but school was hell for everyone and better me then those who cant handle it as for life kicking ass not really seems im in for more punishment had cancer once and am now fighting it a second time but surviving either way thanks 

---

My first couple of years in highschool were amazing in one single, tiny regard: I discovered that the few nerdy friends I had meant that there was, in fact, one single rung below me on the social ladder. Those six inches were intoxicating, because we had someone to look down on. And that last remaining caste? Other nerdy, mal-adjusted individuals just like me, but without the protective safety of numbers. For the first time in my life, I got to pass along some of the bullying that I was oh-so-accustomed to receiving.

I directed it at two or three other boys, and it was something that I (thankfully) grew out of within a few years. It's true, kids are terrible to each other. And as much as I wish(ed) I was above it, I was not. So verbal harassment ensued.

One of these kids knew how to give as good as he got. I like to think we're even, and I have some respect for the guy.

Alas, long after getting out of public education, my experience with the last two lurked around the back of my head. In search of relief, I took to Facebook.

My second, er, victim, was a strange one that was always alone and compulsively lied about everything. He made it easy to systematically pick him apart, until one day someone casually mentioned that he had probably never owned a new jacket in his life. I stopped teasing him from that moment onward, and was internally embarrassed that it took someone else to open my eyes. Ten or so years later, I found this kid on Facebook, apologized, and he accepted. He added me as a friend (whatever that even means these days), and although we haven't talked since, I think the air was cleared.

The third guy took some work. He had the misfortune of moving a lot and therefore not having any friends and maybe being socially half a step behind. Like a good pack of wolves, we knew how to isolate the stragglers and circle around. Unfortunately, I couldn't for the life of remember his last name. I even browsed through my single, cringy yearbook. No luck.

A girl I didn't recognize added me on FB, and in talking to her I discovered she was one of the odd ducks from our grade. Turns out she was being sexually abused as a kid, and has since owned her past and is working as an advocate for the issue. Mad respect for her. It's a not-so-subtle reminder to be kinder to those who don't quite fit in because you don't know what they're dealing with. I asked her about the name to Bullied Kid #3, and she remembered who it was.

I found him, and the above conversation occurred. I sent one unsolicited message, and received a single reply. I never wrote back.

How do you reply to what essentially boils down to "Everyone was shit to me, I probably deserved it, and now I have cancer"? With silence, that's how. Like the self-serving coward I am.

I don't think I'm equipped to reply. Even if I could empathize with a life experience of that caliber garbage, words of solace wouldn't mean anything coming from someone that actively contributed to the heap. Did you know that stress is believed to be linked to cancer risk?

I've been sitting on that two-message conversation for years now. It makes me feel incredibly shallow that I can't even offer up some kind of platitude. Instead it's been reduced to an eternal ellipsis in the back of my head. Maybe that's punishment enough. Which, really, is some weak-ass karma. I deserve worse.

The length of my earthly journey has pretty much doubled since those awful highschool days. For the latter half I think I've done a better job of approaching everyone with a bit more grace and sympathy. If nothing else, I think I can confidently say that I don't contribute the same toxicity into the world.

We were just kids. Dumb kids, with developing brains trying to understand how to fit in with a world full of other humans. Maybe I deserve to offer an apology to myself for what I've done. And maybe I -deserve to forgive myself too.

-Cril

If you want to go to heaven when you D-I-E
You got to put on your collar and your T-I-E now
Got him over, give him Coca-Cola lemon soda, saucer of ice cream
Takes soap and water for to keep it clean

Willie Watson - Keep it Clean

Eyes in the Clock

This indifferent malaise of a Summer is moving on. Autumn is taking his place, and despite her brilliant coat, she always rolls right over to offer her soft neck to Winter. It won't be long. Another season of change has arrived.

And I feel the same, except for this pebble of discomfort in the shoes of my soul. I mean, I'm doing things, technically. I'm trying out therapy, I'm on drugs. Every Sunday I religiously attend to my hobby at the altar of the engine stand. Oil is the blood, and the body is the... body. And I partake faithfully.

Plus there's home cooking, date night, cats, freelance projects, and the ever-present sludge of unsatisfying video games that seep into any remaining crevasses of free time. I need to find a game to play that I actually enjoy. Anyways, my point is that I'm staying occupied.

And yet the dry rustle of leaves on the branch make me too aware of the change going on everywhere around me, but not within me. I get this way every once and a while; the best way to describe it is that I want something. Something frustratingly undefined. Should I splurge on a fancy game or piece of tech or a car in order to cure the unease? Maybe I need a new hobby. Maybe I need to write more (why, hello there).

There'll be some birthdays, nauseating elections, media releases, and more than a few holidays to look forward to as the year draws to a close. It all seems very exciting, but it's like I'm looking at it through a frosted pane of glass. I know something interesting is going on, yet my lack of ability to engage prevents me from really caring one way or another. It's tiring.

I'm going in circles here over what could be summed up as the words 'unfulfilled', 'melancholy', and 'discouraged'. I don't know what else I can add to this. I just wish I knew what to do with what I feel.

-Cril

She's been down in the dunes
And she's dealt with the goons
Now she drinks from a bitter cup
I'm trying to get her to give it up
She was just here, I fear she can't be there no more

And as my mind unweaves
I feel the freeze down in my knees
But just before she leaves, she receives

The Band - Chest Fever

Games I'll Never Play

I find that I'm becoming increasingly interested in games with integrated layers. Being an assassin is cool, I guess, but improving businesses that generate money I can use to buy better swords and armour? Sign me up. Exploring the universe is great and all, but slowly collecting resources to create a fleet to do missions for me? I'm all over it.

There's something about that power curve I love; starting off as a nothing and ending up with greater systems and abilities that make me near unstoppable. That's where the action is at. I don't think a lot of games understand that dynamic. Sure, it strips the late game of challenge, but the game is front-loaded with difficulty. The payoff is kicking ass without breaking a sweat. Don't give me none of that 'enemies scale with the player' crap.

That being said, I want two games. Problem is that they don't exist.

---

The Skull Admiral

The third person gameplay of Assassin's Creed Black Flag, some of the sailing technicalities from Sea of Thieves, the economy of No Man's Sky, the ship customization of Mech Warrior, plus crew and fleet management.

I want to start off with a single dingy running simple trading missions. I want to work up to a sloop, and a brigand, and a galleon. I need to be able to customize the ship with weapons and hull types and sails and such that all have their own tradeoffs. More armour means less cargo capacity. Bigger guns mean less speed. As the ship grows, I need to recruit more crew and assign them to appropriate slots depending on their skills. Eventually I recruit other ships, appoint captains, and give them tasks.

I want to develop trade routs that involve buying a product from a port where it's abundant to a port where it's rare for a big profit. The route will have hazards along the way. Maybe I can assign some of my fleet as escorts so that I can gamble big on sensitive cargo. Like Drug Wars, that simple game for early Palm Pilots and T-83 calculators.

Of course there big fights with ship to ship combat where you need to mind the wind, ocean currents, line of sight, and weapon characteristics. Damage that impacts your maneuverability. Maybe you start taking on water and need to assign gun crews to start bailing. After a particularly bad fight, you can to go to port to repair, rearm, and resupply. If you're feeling ballsy, you can try boarding an enemy ship and fight back and forth on the deck. You can recruit defeated crewmen, steal their cargo, and maybe even salvage the ship for your own fleet.

There will also be ther factions and bounties and wanted levels and all that. Maybe you get into such big trouble that you start hurling parts of your fleet and your enemy. Maybe even a big showdown. And once you're done you can claim a territory and port, which will help your trade routes. Oh yes, get things really moving and watch the money come in. Enhance your fleet; more ships, captains, upgrades. You're on top of the world and unstoppable.

But now you've become too powerful that all the other factions form an alliance to take you down a peg. A new armada from the Old World arrives in force to carve out their spot. Maybe you can stand your ground, or maybe you watch your empire crumble until you're down to a single port and handful of sorry ships and need to start all over.

Also, storms, finding treasure, ambushing treasure ships, basic diplomacy, running blockades, smuggling, and all those other delicious pirate-y things.

I tried replaying Black Flag recently to scratch this itch. What was more disappointing than the dated graphics and simplified gameplay was the sheer potential that was left on the table. It was an alright story wrapped in arcade-y mechanics. They had a simple Fleet metagame, but it was so simple and inconsequential it kinda hurt. So close, yet so very far away.

---

Limited Slip

Here's the thing with most racing games: you get a car, you attend an 'event' of 3-4 races with one car, and then you move on to another event with a different car. Their idea of progress is an arbitrary XP system that unlocks faster and faster cars. There's no real connection from one event to the next.

I want Forza 7 combined with Motorsport Manager. Hear me out.

Simulation Arcade racing is the best - it can be accessible while having enough depth to challenge you and add substance to the driving itself. Screw all that 'SWEET DRIFT AROUND THAT CORNER, NOW YOU GET MORE NITRO!!' crap (I'm looking at your NFS). I want to worry about apexes and undercutting and off-camber turners that upset your suspension. I want to feel like I'm driving, not watching an anime cover of Fast and the Furious.

So along those lines, I want driving with a hood cam, tire wear/temperatures, fuel, drafting, damage, weather conditions that affect grip, understeer, lift off oversteer, manual transmissions, and pit stops. Mmmm.

A step above that, I want a racing league with *gasp* seasons. That means you earn driver and team points that impact where you start on the grid. And in the right conditions, you can win a season by never finishing a single race above 5th place. It's all about that consistency, after all.

Wait a minute, team points? That's right. Teams. You can run your own teams, minding the mechanic salaries, hiring a team mate, selecting sponsors, creating your brand, building infrastructure, engineering parts, applying upgrades, etc.

That means you get buy the car you want, build it up how you like it, and tune it to driving perfection.

So how about that power curve? It goes like this: you start as a free agent driver, getting paid a pittance here and there to race for other teams where you can. Once you get a podium here and a bonus there, you start your own team. You start off in some low-end spec series with a cheap car. Season over season you improve and build your garage. With enough money you can buy better cars to compete in faster series. With enough wins and points, you get invited to higher and more prestigious series. With those come better sponsors and prize money. Eventually you have all the money and rep to race whatever car in whatever series you want, with a kickass team that will give you the edge over anyone.

If you don't get emotionally attached to the the very first shitty car you purchase, the game isn't doing its job. You've gotta take that haggard old Civic or whatever and squeeze every inch of performance out of it. It's gotta be one tired and abused war horse that's seen you through many a track battle. Eventually you'll have to choose between a big overhaul to take it to the next level, or simply putting the cash towards a better vehicle.

I get it, the variety of vehicles is what sells most car games. But that shouldn't mean that the game holds your hand through driving every single one in its own event. Give me a series, with seasons and points. Give me team infrastructure and personnel management. Then put me in the drivers' seat to enjoy the fruits of my labour.

---

What can I say, I'm a man of simple tastes and attainable desires.
-Cril

I Am Not Okay: A Rebuttal

But on the other hand, I believe in the power of the mind. Somethings gain more influence just by being acknowledged and being granted permission to live in your head.

I've read and known about tinnitus for a long time, but I regret that fateful evening when I actually paused  to wonder if I actually had it. Turns out, yes, I do. I wish I had just left it alone and not taken 20 seconds to look for (and find) a problem. Now I can't escape it. Especially when I'm lying in bed at night, trying to doze off to the high pitched squeal of an overlayed B and A flat. Thankfully it goes away when I listen to music. I'm like Baby Driver, but without any discernible talent.

The point is that maybe by admitting I'm depressed and feel like hot garbage, I therefore am more depressed and feel like even hotter garbage. It opens the door for my head to overindulge in self-inflicted burden. I don't want to have anything wrong with me. No one does. No one wants to be weak, or have to admit that there's something off with their mind. That's having to admit that the very fabric of your reality is tainted, twisted, and torn. 

I don't want to go to therapy and discover more issues. I don't want to become reliant on another person to help me cope with day to day life. I don't want to depend on prescription medications to be functional. I want to be stable, reliable, and self-sufficient. Screw needing a 3rd party to help you stabilize your own place in the world. This is not something that a strong individual does. This is something a weak individual does.

I used to like to think that I was a decent person that was on top of his life. Responsible and all that. Someone you'd want on your team. Someone who knows what's going on, does his share of the work, and will pull through when you need him most. I'm no longer that person if I'm wildly depressed.

If I don't believe I'm depressed, how can I possibly be depressed? It's impossible to be a slave to the trappings of a mental condition if I just force my head to be in the right place. I think therefore I am. I don't think, therefore I am not.

A horse walks into a bar. The bartender looks up and says, "You always seem to be going into bars. Are you an alcoholic?" The horse replies, "No, I don't think" and POOF he disappears. You see, this is a reference to the philosophical theory of 'I think, therefore I am', but if I would've explained that first it would've been putting Descartes before the horse.

I want my problems to go POOF. If I can make my mind certain that everything's fine, my mind will make it so. It's a self regulating, isolated system, isn't it? Just gotta suck it up. Be strong. Be better.

I still feel like garbage, and I hate how weak and useless that makes me. Perhaps I just need to suck it up and do the strong thing by ignoring the problem away. That's how it works, right?

-Cril

I Am Not Okay

 I used to be in a rather unhealthy relationship with this lady. We were stuck in this feedback loop of drama; we'd find problems, drift apart, have soul-searching conversations, come together into a passionate renewal of our affection, which eventually cooled. It was either hot or cold, we never found a solid balance and became addicted to the emotions and sensations we found at the extremes.

Deep down I knew this was exhausting and untenable. If you're listening to this relationship on the radio, you'd start off by listening to the saddest station. Keep going down the band, and if your fingers are nimble and ears acute, you'll just pick up a small oasis of funny between the static. It was a truly absurd dynamic. At this particular point, though, we'd gone far beyond and were tuned into the station for just plain stupid. It was that stage where we were "taking space" from each other, again, for whatever reason.

I was hanging out with my uncle, and he made a casual inquiry about how things were going with the two of us. I sheepishly told him that we were taking a break. He replied with, "Aw, that's too bad. I guess some things just don't work out. You'll be alright." Conversation moved on, and it took me a few days to untangle a quizzical expression left on my face.

He didn't say, "When will you get back together?" or "I hope you two will work it out". Instead it was "That's too bad." With a sense of finality, like hearing about a dead pet. We weren't just taking a break, we were broken up. Cleft in twain. And I didn't correct him, for some reason.

That comment, whether intended or not, made me pull the emergency brake and bring the whole flaming disaster ride to a halt. Because I had actually told another soul, I had to own the situation and see it through. Sure, we could've gotten back together, but that would've made me look like a weak-willed idiot. Which is what I was. There's something about moving an issue out of your head and into the real world that puts it into context and gives you the perspective to appreciate just how messed up it is.

A few months ago I approached a doctor to get on anti-depressants. I did the whole schtick for a while when I was a teenager, so I recognized the signs and knew what the solution would be. As an adult, every few years I'd have a short stint that would work itself out. I never told anyone, I just muddled through. For the last couple years, though, I've been stuck in a short stint that isn't exactly short any more. So to the doctor I went. There's no shame in it, mental health is a legitimate priority, medications can help, and all those other cheery platitudes.

I skimmed the surface with my doctor, did a few tests, and she prescribed me some meds. What all those mental health advocates don't say is how hard it is to get on a stabilized medication that doesn't screw you up worse than before. I thought crossing the threshold into the doctor's office and admitting the problem would be the hardest step. I was wrong.

Treating a mental issue as a physical problem gave me a tool to box it up into a tidy little container; there's not something wrong with my mind, it's just a chemical balance in my brain that needs to get sorted out. Go pills!

But pills haven't been the quick and easy solution that I seem to remember as a teenager. I'm about to start my third different medication, and my doctor said that I should really consider some "talk therapy". She gave me a referral. I submitted my patient information on their website, and they scheduled an intake appointment call. Then something peculiar happened; in our phone discussion I had to describe not my general mood or feelings, but who I was and what I'm actually thinking about. In those fifteen minutes, I shone a light into a remote corner of my brain that I've always known is there but conveniently avoid acknowledging.

Almost like that missing kid in that creepy movie where everyone in the small quiet town says, "Oh, we don't talk about that." Yeah, you know that something's not right and it's a giant neon sign short of being as obvious as possible.

I am not doing okay.

Sure, depression. I feel empty and can't remember the last time I was passionate about or looked forward to... anything. Blah, blah, whatever.

But I can't do anything creative. Never mind inspiration, I can't get I can't even look at creative things without feeling like a failure.

I'm becoming stupider every day. It started off with a weird misspelling or forgotten date, and now I'm making bizarre typos (when was the last time that you spelled "challenge" as "channel"?), missing details on a label right in front of me, misremembering my weekly schedule... I've heard that your mind slows down as you age, but this simply can't be right.

Fixing a garden-variety depression may be one thing, but is there any bouncing back from watching your mind is unravel itself in a desperate frenzy? My professional life is a mess, and how on earth can I possibly dig up the gumption to find a new job when I'm a creative failure and can't even pretend to be a semi-intelligent individual.

By removing the ugly paper mache mask obscuring my insecurities, I'm feeling like the mess I've been hiding. And damn, this was just an introductory call. I don't even have my first appointment until the end of the month. But just having to say neglected things out loud to another human being has opened the floodgates.

Here's the kicker: I now have the opportunity to do something about it and get off the flaming disaster ride again. I hope I have at least that much left in me.

-Cril

Oh, I've changed my number
Wore disguises and went undercover just to
Just to hide away from you
Oh, my ghost came a-calling
Making noises 'bout a promise I had broken
Oh, I'm gonna be lonely soon

Oh, here comes trouble
Put your helmet on, we'll be heading for a fall
Yeah, the whole thing's gonna blow
And the devil's got my number
It's long overdue, he'll come looking soon
Yeah, the whole thing's gonna blow

"Everything's gonna be okay"
Oh, I keep telling myself
"Don't worry, be happy"
Oh, you keep telling yourself
"Everything's gonna be okay"
Oh, I keep telling myself
"Don't worry, be happy"
Oh, you keep telling yourself
"Everything's gonna be okay"

TV On The Radio - Trouble

TENNO! Pt 2

I've never spent so much time playing a game with so little experiential/artistic value and enjoyment. Let's face it, on some level I'm addicted. It's a wonderfully clever loot box and grinding simulator, with a clearcoat of gameplay on top.

Movement doesn't have concequence. At first it was freeing to travel around so effortlessly, but now it just feels like nothing has weight or inertia. Some of the weapons are satisfying, but there are so many that you blow through them without really getting too attached. The level design is an awful mess. The whole tile-based system they use is clever, but it generally teaches you that nothing matters and everywhere you go is the same as where you've been. Environments repeat, as do enemies. There aren't any vistas or surprises or variety. There aren't any different levels, just a random number generator throwing crap against the wall with slightly different rules thrown in.

And for a game that lets you jump around like mad, it has a curious habit respawning you after jumping to a part of the map that looks like it should be accessible. This isn't about an exciting use of movement, but the speed of movement. So that you can feel like you can finish the level faster, so you can do it again to grind for that XP/mod/weapon/loot spawn.

They're so clever with their systems, with grinding layered on top of grinding. Each Warframe (basically a character with unique stats and abilities) is constructed from four elements: the blueprint, neuroptics, systems, and chassis. For one particular Warframe I wanted to unlock, I got the blueprints from a boss. I got the neuroptics and chassis by grinding different bosses which had a 25% chance of giving what you need. The last component came from a boss that was two worlds further down the progression from where I was. Fine, play a bunch of levels, unlock junctions, get to where you need to go. Alas, in order to fight the boss once for a 25% chance at the part you need, you need to grind admission points by beating the previous level twice. Grinding on grinding on grinding. It's a deviously sly way of keeping people 'playing'.

What else is there? A million different currencies? Check. A trading system deliberately hindered by the developer? Yup. Stories/campaigns totally disconnected from the gameplay? You betcha. A complete and total disregard for user experience? One YouTuber summed it up by saying, "Warframe doesn't come to you. You need to go to it." What an eloquent way of saying that the developer knows they're so good at being addictive that they know players will do whatever it takes.

I'm a couple hundred hours in and I still don't fully understand all the different little economies and systems. Mods, relics, sculptures, focuses, weapons, Warframes, syndicate standings, Arcanes, Forma, Nightwave challenges, Nightmare levels, Kuva, conflicts, hunting, nemesis, experience, mastery levels, mining, fishing, boarding, credits, ducats, platinum, companions/pets, decorations, cosmetics... All of these have their own little system intertwined with other little systems. It is a rats nest of addictive meta structures built around gameplay that's shallow and repetitive, but just occasionally enjoyable enough to make you think you're actually playing a game. I truly believe that the jumping and shooting and fighting itself is secondary to the massive economy that surrounds it. Like a five foot fungus that has grown off of a 6" tree stump.

I don't like this game, but I'll probably keep playing it because it's mindless and stupid. Just like me, apparently.

-Cril

I see my red head, messed bed, tear shed

Queen bee, my squeeze

The stage it smells, tells, hell's bells

Miss-spells, knocks me on my knees

It didn't hurt, flirt, blood squirt

Stuffed shirt, hang me on a tree

After I count down, three rounds

In hell I'll be in good company

The Dead South - In Hell I'll Be In Good Company

TENNO!

I have a question: What's wrong with me?

For some reason I want to ask this to other people, in hopes that they'll have the insight I need.

Here's the thing, I buy video games twice a year: the summer and winter Steam sales. It's a way of making sure I don't overindulge on games and that I keep my spending in check. Usually I get one big game and a fistful of smaller indie releases, and it gets me through six months. Variety and all that stuff.

After chugging my way through Red Dead Redemption the other month and binging on some Stardew Valley, I've found myself looking for something to play. I cruised through some old favourites - Black Flag is two steps away from greatness, Zen Drift is fun but gets old after a half hour, and I've burnt myself out on Civilization 5. A couple races on Forza are nice, but I'm not as hooked as I used to be.

And now with the whole COVID-pocolypse, my self discipline seems to be withering away. No joke, I kept cruising through the Steam store, adding and reviewing and adding to my wishlist. Once a week. Twice a week. Every other day, cruising what's out there and adding games to my list that I ordinarily would never give a second glance. I needed something to play to unwind every now and then. So I figured, hey, I'll try Warframe! It's free, so that's not breaking the rules, right?

I installed it last Sunday. I've since played 32 hours. The real kicker? I don't even enjoy it that much.

The gameplay is spastic at best. The art direction is ugly and the story is barely there. The UI, while gorgeous, can't obscure the fact that the UX is horrid. I needed to look up beginner guides just to figure out what I should be doing beyond the game's introduction tutorial. And what's with the unwritten rule that says all free to play titles must have an economy that with a minimum of 27 currencies and resources? Yeesh.

But play it I must. Some dark corner in my brain is telling me THIS IS YOUR LIFE NOW. But why? What's wrong with me?

Is a crappy distraction better than no distraction? Is it all because I don't let myself buy games regularly? Or that I'm desperate to occupy my mind from the current circumstances? A couple years ago I told myself I wouldn't get in this cycle of playing (or replaying) games I don't enjoy. I'm at a point in my life where, god damnit, I can afford to buy something worth playing. Life's too short, and all that.

I don't even know any more. Yes, there are definitely more important things I should be doing. But I need to get back to jumping around like a crack rabbit and spamming my flame sword into whoever the bad guys are supposed to be. Obviously that's what's important here.
-Cril

Dead Dead Redemption 2 - Riding Down a Beautiful, Long, Beautiful Road

I went to see a show. A cabaret, or whatever it's called. The only reason I was there was because it was part of a side mission. The lack of story and action left me feeling pretty bored, until the curtains closed after the second act. And this is where things started clicking into place, because oh my god, the curtains closed with the smooth jerkiness that betrayed a set of hands pulling on ropes behind stage. Yes, they also had simulated fabric physics and the flickering lights around the stage cast dynamic shadows. But for the movement of opening/closing the curtains themselves, a lesser game would have done a simple linear movement with some brief acceleration at the start and end. But in Red Dead Redemption 2, they put extra effort into the stage curtains in order to convince you that there's a some poor schlep slaving away backstage that you'd never really care to see in the first place.

And this, really, is indicative of the rest of the game. Stunningly stupid attention to detail across every axis of the experience. Side missions and chance encounters feature unique dialogue pared to appropriately unique motion capture, with enough writing and quality voice acting make it just half a step from being a core experience of the main story. In most games, it definitely would have passed for being part of the core campaign.

Have you ever zoomed with your sniper rifle to watch the birds? It most games the immersion is immediately broken - the birds are low polygon models rigged with chunky animations. In Red Dead 2, you can see the individual feathers on an eagle's wing flutter about in the wind. Stunning.

I started with these small touches because they are executed so well and there are so many of them that permeate the experience. It's truly mind boggling, and I have never seen another game that's so dense in this regard. GTAV is child's play in comparison, so much so that it feels like these games were two generations apart.

If I'm not careful I'm going to ramble my way through this whole COVID thing. Let me try fit all the fat lady folds of my impressions on this game into a corset of structure and coherency.


Characters & Story
Let me just pause here to say that the rest of this review will have more spoilers than a 2008 Honda forum meetup.

One of the main things that stood out to me in this game was how much I fell in love with the main character. I don't know if I've ever done that before in such an authentic way. It wasn't super witty dialogue or sheer badassery, but a slow, steady burn of little moments that hooked me.

A guilty pleasure of mine was the journal. It really fleshed out Arthur and endeared me to him as a character. On the outside he's a rough, no-nonsense gunslinger. Within his journal were his private thoughts that showed his anxieties, punctuated with sketches of the things you come across in the game. And then once John picks up the journal, of course he writes with a different style of cursive, and of course he sketches in a totally different style. That means that for however many hundred animals and plants and vistas there are, they were all drawn twice so that the journal was authentic to your path through the world and story. All for just a bit of unnecessary character development which irreversibly endeared the cast to me.

The rest of the story was incredible too - there was a great variety of other people in the story, and it was a pleasure to watch them all interact. The way that they served the plot felt genuine and integrated, building a social atmosphere that blanketed the entire tale.

Scattered throughout the game are a fistful of parties that the whole gang attends. And you can roam around and talk to each person and interact. At one point I sat down at the fire to listen to people chat. Javier started playing something on the guitar that everyone started to sing along to, and I received a prompt to join in. I started singing, and it was just so slightly off tune and rhythm that you really felt that these were a bunch of imperfect people making the best of what they had.

Have you heard about the bar scene? You know, 'LENNNNNYYY?!'. It takes place early on in the game, and basically you go out for a night of drinking with the aforementioned young man. The entire thing was goofy as all hell and put a smile on my face. No serious objectives or dialogue, just stumbling around the bar and singing and drinking and goofing around. A wonderful sense of play. It helped to ground and contrast the events later on in the game. It hurt that much more when Lenny was killed. And those gang parties helped to make it hurt that much more when the group began to splinter off at the very end of Arthur's time with the gang.

The antagonists, Dutch and Micah, were wonderfully written and portrayed. It was kind of tragic to watch Dutch slowly succumb to Micah's way of thinking. And you just hated Micah so much.

Maybe it's obvious to everyone already, but I felt clever when I realized that the camp locations match the mental state of Dutch. The first real camp was a beautiful locale that no one had been to before. The next location was taken over by some thugs shaking down a guy for ransom money. Following that was a huge mansion run by rascist ex-confederates, and the final camp took over the home of cannibalistic savages. As you progress through each of those, Dutch keeps bending his moral code from noble optimism to outright taking advantage of and killing people that inconvenience him.

I like that the game was never about OMG WE HAVE TO SAVE THE WORLDDD!!! or even just trying to beat one consistent baddie. It was one long scene about a group of people pulling together to slowly fall apart.

Amusing anecdote: I'd been excited for the game ever since it was first announced, and carefully navigated the slew of reviews and articles following the console launch to avoid spoilers. The PC version hadn't even been announced, but just in case it would be, I wanted to go into it blind.

At work part of my job includes creating profiles of a bunch of individuals with various disAbilities (ugh, that capital A kills me every time, but that's a discussion for later). One guy I talked to was named Matt. He has an intellectual/developmental delay, but one of the things he was really passionate about was Red Dead 2. I ran into him some time in late November - I had begun purchasing parts for a new PC (I was that excited about the game) and was about a week or two from the launch on Steam. I wade an offhand comment to Matt, saying how excited I was to play. Then he said, "Oh, just wait for when Arthur dies and then you start playing as..."

I cut him off and told him I didn't want to know. He kept trying to finish the sentence. I told him to stop, and then had to change the subject to derail his determination to completely spoil the biggest twist of the game. Years of suspense ruined in a casual attempt to make small talk. It was hard to blame Matt, really. It was funny, but I wish I hadn't have been expecting this spoiler the enter time I played.

But there was something I still didn't know: Arther dies of tuberculosis. Well, the death itself changes depending on arbitrary honour choices made along the way (more on that later), but TB leads him to the grave at the very least. How ballsy is that, kill the main character by a common disease that's later totally curable?

Here's the thing, I remember back in Call of Duty Modern Warfare where they killed the US protagonist in a nuclear explosion. That stuck with me as a fantastic gaming memory. Wait, they can't just KILL my character, can they? And it was a well executed, beautifully horrific moment to stumble out of that helicopter and into a radioactive horrorscape. Definitely a pioneering moment for the genre.

But that character? I don't remember his name. White Bread American Soldier Protagonist Template #47, if I recall correctly. I had no emotional attachment to the guy. But Arthur? Losing him hurt. And it was so drawn out, too. A masterclass in writing, character development, and plot. I don't think I've played any game that had storytelling and atmosphere like this in such a large, dense world.

The World
I think I've already given you the idea of how immersive this place is. So much so that it's hard to separate the world from the stories and characters and everything else.

The other thing Rockstar executed flawlessly was the size and variety. They nailed it to absolute perfection; the different biomes are all charming in their own way. Settlements range from small hick-ish towns, to the big bustling city, large raches, and small work camps. These are found in dense forests, rolling plains, the desert, the snowy mountain passes, an oil field, dirty swamp... It's all there, and it's all lovingly crafted.

A big gripe I often see about Grand Theft Auto V is that the map was too small. This is something I never understood, because most players spend 60% of their time downtown, 35% spread between 4-5 other locations, and 5% for the entire rest of the map. Quality > Quantity, people. Making anything larger would've just been a waste of space. I would take a tighter environment with variety any day over huge areas that are so big that you get bored trying to travel from one place to the next.

Red Dead has the right size with the right frequency of new scenery. Yes, as boring as it was to always be riding your horse to and fro, that extra bit of environmental spice kept me impressed with the world I was passing through.

Of course it was dotted with little easter eggs and strange encounters and little vignettes hinting at a greater story. You kinda enjoy peeling back the wrapper of the world one layer at a time. I didn't get quite as addicted to sheer exploration as I did in Breath of the Wild, but it nonetheless captivated and amazed me along the way.

In the final chapter of the game you're running the farm you just built. If you follow some of the icons on the map, you can feed your animals, collect eggs, chop wood, milk the cows. All the standard farm stuff. But because this is in your home territory, you have to walk everywhere. It's slow and tedius. And once your tasks all done you can drop your new goods off on the wagon to sell. And you make a whopping $8. The pittance you get for all that slow effort really highlights what you were bringing in as an outlaw. It's a nice intersection of character development and world-building not through crafting a pretty environment, but the small details that help you connect with the context of the time and place.

Gamplay
Red Dead Redemption 2, though, is still that: a game. It's a champion of the genre in many ways, but falters in some. The thing is that it's a slow game. Sure, the action is alright, but there is so much surrounding it that requires your attention. You have to travel to/from everything you need to do. You can only walk through your camp. Guns need to be cleaned, supplies purchased, animals hunted, horse brushed, stamina filled, health bar to feed, bullet time charged. Looting a dresser? Arthur has to open each dresser, on at a time, in an accurate animation. It's all very meticulous.

And for a long time, I loved it. Pouring over the details, really immersing myself in the world. I think the title is about day to day life just as much as shootin' dudes. I had a blast planning these little excursions half way across the map, stopping to camp along the way, hunting for critters, talking to strangers. I'd feel some tangible relief once I roamed back into camp several days later, excited to sleep in a bed and have someone take care of my horse after I unloaded all the game I had killed for camp supply and furs. I'd set out again a day or two later. Seems silly, but having this home base in a huge beautiful world really made me feel like an expolorer. I loved it.

But I'm not sure if I loved it (checks Steam library) 100 hours much. By about two thirds of the way through, I just kinda wanted to get things over with. The world is stunning and I loved the exploration, but damn that was a lot of sitting back watching my horse on autopilot between destinations. Why can't I just loot an entire desk at once? Is there a way I could just eat food I scavenge right away? How come I can't fast travel on my way back from a destination? Do I really need to travel for 5 minutes for a 2 minute shootout and another 5 minute trip back? Yeesh.

I finished the game because the story had me freaking hooked. I wanted to know how it all unfurled. Here's the catch; I was engaged and enjoyed all the parts of the story. How would you cut it down? I'm not sure, exactly. The epic length and scope brought the story and cast to life. But the gameplay itself was boring the hell out of me.

Part of me was okay with that, in a way. Maybe the designers meant it to be a slow, immersive experience. And yet to get the only way to get a gold rating on most missions was to complete them within a tight time limit. Seems antithetical to all the other design choices they've made.

Other gameplay things: The gunplay itself was satisfying most of the times. There are so many complex actions you need to do that the controls got pretty convoluted. If you buggered up one interaction outside a main mission, you can't just reload and try it again - the world 'resets' after loading a save. On the surface it made it hard to understand how to do things properly. Under the surface, my inner gaming perfectionist was infuriated that I couldn't redo an encounter until I was happy with the results.

Speaking of bad controls, the UI was a mess, especially when it came to quick time events. Do I rapidly tap the button? Hold it down, press it once, click in time? All those interactions were used, and it never really gave you a clear indication of what you were supposed to do. It really broke the immersion, failing a few vital encounters because I was pressing the right button in the wrong way.

The honour system was just weird. I get the point, and I like how it tied into the characters trying to do and be better. Implementation, though, was something that missed the mark. Killing a random stranger? Bad. Looting him? Also bad. Looting a random body you find mauled by a wolf? Bad. Looting a corpse that unlocks a little bit of extra story content? Oh, that's okay. Holding up a store? Bad, obviously. Murdering a whole family because some guy said they had a treasure hidden on their farm? No problem! Yeesh. Rather than feeling like it was an integrated part of the story it was a set of hidden landmines scattered throughout the experience.

Did you know that you can't mail an item that you're currently holding in your hands? Nope, that obviously needs to be stowed on your horse before the postal agent will touch it. Arthur isn't a good swimmer, and drowns after 60s or so of flailing around. Unless you're in a cutscene, where he has no problem swimming a mile back to shore. Back at camp, he has a bench set up by his bed for servicing weapons. Even shows a disassembled pistol and gun oil. But you can't use it, of course - you can only access your arsenal outside the bounds of the camp.

I mean, I get it. The game is massive and requires complex systems to make everything work and serve the story and atmosphere. It sucks to stumble on these weird, small quality of life things jutting out from the pavement. You're walking along totally engrossed in what you're doing, and then something seemingly stupid and inconsequential throws you off stride.

Visuals & Audio
It's gorgeous. You know it's gorgeous. It's probably the prettiest game with a realistic art style you've ever seen. Detailed geometry draped in crisp textures. Fabric dynamics. A masterful use of lighting (like that lamp-lit cabaret I mentioned). Did you know that ear and nose cartilage glows pink when backlit? Another one of those stunning details.

Sound is great too. I ain't no audio engineer, but everything felt... Complete. Footsteps were different based on the surface you were walking on. Opening a dresser drawer sounded like wood-on-wood, and not the same door noise you always hear. Guns and a punch.

The music was expertly crafted, and matched by how effectively it was employeed. A great score and theme music, and a select few haunting conventional songs placed at just the right moment. It would've been so easy to be too heavy-handed with it, but the restraint is what made is impactful.

Again, this game is a masterclass for the genre.

Conclusion
I've written enough, methinks. And I'm pretty sure that, like Red Dead 2, the duration of the experience does not necessarily increase the quality of the experience. And I'm pretty sure that my efforts are no where even close to having a comparable level of finesse and detail.

It's an amazing experience. It's rich in every facet of the experience, and so comprehensively so that it boggles the mind. They through the kitchen sink at every single part of the game, and not a corner was cut. It makes for an intimidatingly high bar for open world games, and I don't know if or when it'll ever be surpassed let alone met.

I just wish things could've been condensed a bit. Even though it was so dense and rich, lingering on slow mechanics and stretching the story out over such a long frame made tedious what could've been satisfyingly captivating.

I've put 105 hours into Red Dead Redemption 2, and feel like it was worth quite a bit more than I paid. It's the defining pinnacle of a generation in the biggest entertainment industry. I just wish I still had the desire get back into the world now that the main story had drawn to a close.

Pushing Buttons

I know it's serious business and all that stuff, but I find the language surrounding abortion to be amusing. PRO CHOICE! PRO LIFE! It just kinda reeks of market-tested corporate political correctness. That's why I've decided to come out as being ANTI-CHOICE AND ANTI-LIFE. That's right: I think we need more forced abortions. Bear with me.

You know all this talk about income inequality? We could kill two birds (and a few babies) with one stone by forcing poor people to abort all their pregnancies. Instead of having to tamper with the secret sauce that is FREE MARKET CAPITALISM by ensuring people are paid a living wage, we could simply breed the poor out of the picture altogether. Or, rather, unbreed them out of the picture.

All we have to do is making a rule that stipulates you must be earning an average of at least $100,000 per individual in a household. Think about it, all of the sudden we don't need to worry about child labour, we could practically get rid of public education all together, no more pesky concerns about lunch programs, etc etc. The cliche of the single mother sitting back on welfare will be eliminated. Let her save to buy rights to have a child, and maybe by the time she's 60 she'll have enough income. By then menopause will save us from The Poor Person Gene eroding society.

It's stunning to realize what kind of solutions are lurking underneath the sheen of clever verbiage. Makes me wonder what else is out there. I'm looking at you, Members of the Mutant Albino Genetic Recessive Global Minority.
-Cril

Cover Letter

To whom it may concern,

Is it even necessary to pretend this will reach an actual person? Or this application immediately filed away and/or deleted for not meeting the invisible criteria set for screening prospective employees?

My name is Chris, and I’ve been a designer for 15 years. I’ve collected experience and skills being an art director, graphic designer, a 2D animator, and sometimes even an ad-hoc project manager. I can present to boardroom clients, plan marketing campaigns, work within budget constraints, develop a visual brand from scratch, and collaborate with a number of other professionals and positions to make sure I get the job done right.

What I can’t seem to do, though, is believe that I bring any value to the table. Have you seen my portfolio? It’s mostly student work to be honest, and I got out of school over five years ago. My other pieces are split between uninspired marketing junk and generic UX/UI stuff. So what have I been up to over the last few years? All I know is that I’ve been busy doing projects and issuing invoices, but somehow too busy to make something worth showing you, apparently.

Did I mention that I can also do copy writing? I’m really good at it too; I create a first draft of something, send it to my clients, and then they send me back some (totally different) text they actually want to use. I just make the fonts slightly less offensive and remove the ALL CAPS in the middle of SENTENCES used FOR EMPHASIS. It gives me the illusion that I can be an arbiter of taste and have some sort of standards. It’s a pretty good self-delusion that helps me cope with the fact that, at the end of the day, I’m just ayour average Photoshop monkey. Or InDesign. Or Illustrator. Or whatever Adobe Creative Cloud Primate you want me to be.

I get paid, though, which is nice. Not a whole lot, but enough to pay rent until I build up the minimum viable savings so I can retire at 70. This career stuff is fun, isn’t it?

My resume has Many Points why I’m awesome and all that stuff. Truth is that I’m fishing for an opportunity to not feel like shit about my work and abilities. Sometimes only getting a nibble on the line is worse than nothing at all. Maybe I’d be better off just standing alone on the shore in hip waders, early morning fog rising off the water, with a dumb grin on my face. There isn't even a lure or bait at the end of the line. Look ma, I’m a workin’ man! I paid all that money and did all that time, and someone taught me to fish!

Please visit my portfolio and read through my resume. I think I’d be an excellent fit for your team and would bring a lot of valuable experience and a wide skill set to your organization. I look forward to hearing back from you soon.

And don’t worry–I don’t know why you should hire me, either.

Torque Trouble

Let's say you're inflicted with a near-terminal case of mechanical ineptitude. Let's furthermore say that you're working on a BP-ZE engine, popular in mid 90's Ford Escorts, Mazda Miatas, and a few other low-to-mid-range vehicles. Let's also say that you're at the part where you need to reinstall the camshaft caps.

Given these assumptions, I have some tips for you.

• Your standard large torque wrench has numbers that go all the way down to zero, but there's a good chance that the minimum force it can handle is 20ft-lbs. If you try to use such a device to reinstall the caps, you'll shear your bolts off in the shaft and need an extractor kit to proceed. Get yourself a decent in-lb torque wrench for later.
• Now you need replacement bolts. Your options are overpriced OEM units or going to the wreckers. The latter is more palatable, and will probably cost you $5 for a full replacement set.
• It can be surprisingly difficult to find a BP-ZE engine at the wreckers. They're getting pretty old, and most of the Escorts and Protoges and such you find aren't quite the right trim to have the DOHC plant you're looking for. Good news: the plentiful, eighth generation of Mazda Protoges (1998-2003) has what you need. Undo eleven bolts on the valve cover to crack that sucker open (watch for the center bolt hidden under the ignition wires), and extract however many bolts you need. They're the same height, thread, and head size as those from the BP-ZE.
• Take your bolts back to your engine, wipe them down (oily bolts, apparently, will bugger up your torque tolerances), set your new in-lb torque wrench to 100-125, and get your project back on track. That's assuming, of course, you can find the goddamn 10mm socket.

Now go forth, advice, and may the seas of Google carry you into the hands of those poor schmucks like me that have found themselves in a tough spot of their own making and ignorance.

-Cril

2019 Trimmings

Bits and fragments I've accumulated over the last year but haven't posted. It's like that crack between your desk and the shelf that eats to do lists on sticky notes. Don't worry, in five years when you move the shelf you'll find all the notes and be simultaneously horrified at how you don't recognize what any of your scribblings refer to and how life just seems to be an endless source of minor tasks.

I apologize in advance for the anxious overtones and existential angst.

---

2019 was terrible. I guess I've been laid off twice within the last year, and somehow I managed to jump straight into a new position each time. The pay has been getting worse, but at least it's something, right?

I've been pretty unsettled and, dare I say, rather unhappy the last year. I've been working hard but not finding any fulfillment professionally, monetarily, spiritually, or otherwise. I guess things have been okay in my personal life, technically, but the work scenario is definitely whittling away at my sense of self worth.

As they say, though, if you're not happy in your life, MAKE A CHANGE! Drained, though. I'm drained of my drive and hope and belief that I'm even capable of being happy. I oscillate violently between thinking maybe I can make it through life with this simple little career versus being squashed by the weight of feeling like I'm not fulfilling any potential.

Heh, potential. When we're born it's our most plentiful currency. We start by trading it in for speech and first steps and feeding ourselves using a spoon. These days I'm trading it in for savings accounts and health benefits and Other Such Sensible Decisions. Potential ain't a renewable resource, folks. Maybe its wallet is deeper than we think, but we make a withdrawal from it each day whether we like it or not.

Dear 2020, please, for the love of life and all that's holy, give me something I can work with in spite of myself. Either the ability to find peace in my station or a miraculous opportunity from above to lift me up and forward. I'd even settle for a patch of fertile soul soil with a planted seed of self-determination to make the changes I need.

Please.

---

I went to two Christmas parties in particular this year. One was at a business consultant's place, and was a small affair. By that, I mean that there were only a dozen of us there. The space itself was an open, multi-level corner penthouse with a view of downtown. Apparently the owner had already bought another penthouse on this floor he was about to move into, but when this one with the killer view came up for sale he just had to have it. So he bought it as well.

The other event worth mentioning was in a beautiful heritage home, and was technically called a 'cocktail party'. We just got back from it this evening, and by looking around the room and then out at the cars parked along the curb, I'd estimate that the average household income was probably a solid $250,000 a year. Lots of VPs and lawyers and department heads and such.

Both left me feeling a bit uncomfortable, as if putting on my good pants and a nice sport coat was an exercise in playing dressup for a poor person. Just doing my best imitation of someone that belongs, and knows which one is the salad fork, and pretending that it's totally natural to drink Perrier when you just want water.

And thus this season I've seen how The Other Half Lives. Nice things everywhere, a relaxed air of confidence and security, and lots of nice white people chit-chatting about nice white people things.

I don't want a massive penthouse or a heritage home, I don't want seven kinds of scotch on hand, I don't want host catered parties with little prime rib sandwiches. I know money doesn't buy happiness, but I certainly didn't see people stressing out about their job security or retirement contributions. It'd be nice to go to Paris or Dubai or whatever just once, not every other year like some of these people do.

At one point I was giving my usual background speil to someone I was engaged in small talk with. The kind of person who I don't remember the name of two hours later, and they certainly won't remember mine. I mentioned I returned to Calgary after school in New York, and got the inevitable, "Why on earth did you come back?". In this setting with all the other well-travelled guests it made me quite aware of my lifestyle and career shortcomings.

In the car on the way home my girlfriend remarked that she hopes I can get into a situation where I can take some time off so I don't burn out.

Here I am, with my full-time job paying me a junior's salary while I balance two or three freelance clients on the side to get me back up to par. Compared with these other people, I'm burning myself out over table scraps.

Could be worse, yes, I know. Part of me wishes I wouldn't have attended these parties, because it's stripped me of the ignorance of just how far down the food chain I still am.

---

I saw The Star Wars and there are many rambling thoughts that no one really has the patience for. But I will mention two things. First is how blatantly obvious it was that they tried to distance themselves from everything Last Jedi. This was quite disappointing, because that movie laid a lot of interesting groundwork.

Second was the Rey/Palpatine reveal (fun fact: my first inclination was to spell it as 'Papaltine', raising some interesting religious commentary). If they were going to discard a lot of the Last Jedi, I found this shared Emperor lineage to be an interesting premise, albeit absolutely botched. I think it could've been really powerful if the rest of the trilogy a) foreshadowed this twist and b) didn't rely so much on nostalgia of the original series. Imagine if they had gone through the whole series until the last half of the final movie and then they reveal how shadows of the original trilogy were lingering and pulling the strings in the new sega. Could've made a more interesting reveal and a chance to properly confront and deliberately cut ties to the previous films. Instead it just felt like they were desperate to include every primary character, secondary character, and off-hand reference to those movies everyone seemed to like from A Long Time Ago.

Imagine if they had done that and embraced the themes from Last Jedi about how the force doesn't pick sides, it just tries to balance itself out. We get to the end of Rise of Skywalker (don't even get me started on the name/family thing), and Palpatine and the Skywalker Good Time Gang are all dead, and only Rey remains. Then she needs to confront the fact that if she chooses to be a Boy Scout Jedi the force will raise a Sith of equal magnitude to create balance in the galaxy. Does she go all noble and be a Jedi and risk creating a new evil? Or walk away from the force as Luke had. Sure, that might create balance for a time, but someday down the line another force user might arise and restart the whole process anyways.

It'd make for an interesting dilemma for the character to confront and elevate the universe above JEDI GOOD, SITH BAD.

It was a great popcorn flick with lots of spectacle and favourite characters. On face value it was good entertainment. The longer I chew on it, though, the more it feels like Game of Thrones and the finale turns sour in my mouth.

---


I have a problem.

A few years ago I started using Spotify. I really enjoy the Discover Weekly feature, and I've been using it to find lots of good tunes. And when I find one, I favourite it (to further refine my discovery algorithm, as all modern society now operates), and manually type the track name into a separate list I keep.

From there, every six months or so I go through and try to source/download all the songs in that document, so that they can be added to my iTunes library and synced to my iPod. This is, afterall, the way I've been managing my music since I was a teenager.

I've been using Spotify more and more and don't particularly enjoy the arduous task of re-downloading and tagging songs so that they could be added to my other library. That library, though, has a lot of music Spotify does not. So now I'm stuck with two collections - one of convenience, and one of personally curated, immaculate depth. That I don't really find myself wanting to use (iTunes has long since passed its days as a piece of well-optimized behaviour).

What, oh what, to do...

---

As kids we were tought the Three R's: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. In that specific order, too: first you should concentrate on using less stuff. Next most important is to repurpose what you can instead of throwing it away. Finally, if you can't use something any more, hand it over to the Blue Bin Gods, who do whatever it is they do with the random bits of almost-trash you discard in the right place.

Funny, then, that there's so much emphasis on recycling. You seldom hear about the first two R's, and I have a theory why: they're bad for business. Sure, recycling is great if you no longer want/need the thing you have. But buying less and using the same item more than its intended? That makes for bad business. We can't have people buying less. That harms the economy, don't you know. You need to be a good consumer.

Buy all the things, use them up, throw them away at your first convenience. But make sure they go in the right bin! That's what really matters to a progressive company.

---

I saw a thing on the internet today. It said: Attend school to learn, not for the GPA.

Well there's a little piece of advice that's a few years and several thousand dollars too late. I definitely focused too much on getting the grades and meeting the course curriculum. I wish I wouldn't have been so terrified of receiving crap marks every once in a while - it might've given me the breathing room to experiment a bit more, soak up the knowledge around me, and enjoy the process. Instead I went through four (five/six) years in a soft terror, striving to deliver projects that'd result in that sweet, sweet first letter of the alphabet.

Yeah, I definitely had a sweet GPA at the end of it all, but I can't help but wonder if that was the wrong motivation and target.

---

Let's say you own a Imitation Muffin Shop. Boy oh boy, when it comes to muffins that are made out of non-muffin materials, you're at the top of your field. People come from all around to sample your handy work.

Now let's say your local flavour of alt-right political party comes to the store and orders a flat of your individual-sized non-baked products. They're throwing a big shindig to celebrate their Immigrants Bad & Walls Good: A Manifesto of Many Other Grievances. Are you within your right to tell them to piss off and get their non-muffins from somewhere else?

My first inclination is that, yes, you can turn away service to people you don't agree with. It's a personal freedom that you don't have to do business with individuals at odd with your values and you shouldn't be forced to overstep your beliefs. I'm not anti-abortion, but I even think that doctors shouldn't be obligated to perform these kinds of procedures if it's against their moral code.

Hell, let's switch the tables around: say you want to order some Display Purpose Only Cupcakes for your hippy dippy Gathering of Peace, Love, and Progressive Things. If you stroll into a local branch of Neo-Nazi Non-Consumables, it'd only be fair that those business owners can turn you away as well.

That's what this whole 'free market' thing is all about, right? Find another organization that shares your beliefs and give them your dollars instead. If no one shares those beliefs, the business goes under. Those that support societies' values float to the top. It's natural selection of the capitalist variety.

But what if instead of turning someone away because of their outspoken political beliefs, you turn them away because of their skin colour?

That's where this whole things falls apart, and I can't quite reconcile the two views. Because the reasoning behind "You don't need to provide services that cross your boundaries" and "Don't discriminate against a person's inherit attributes" intersect in some pretty awkward ways.

I want to say that if a church or minister thinks it'd be against their beliefs to marry a gay couple, the they shouldn't be obligated to do so. But what about when churches refused services to people just because of their skin colour? That was objectively wrong, wasn't it?

I don't know the answer to this one. While it's easy to take up a position when you're dealing with extremes, inevitably you'll have to deal with the shades of grey. That's where it gets sticky, and points of view don't hold up the same. I'd like to say that, no matter what you believe, we can at least be decent and respectful to eachother.

Some days that seems like a less and less realistic expectation.

---

I have this reoccurring fantasy about an omniscient Doctor Manhattan-esque person who suddenly appears in our world. They'd know exactly where to look to find incriminating proof against the crooked politicians and CEOs exploiting the system, and deliver unavoidable justice. It'd feel so good to know that all the crooks would get what's coming to them, and they couldn't weasel their way out with money.

Recently it dawned on me that I started having this particular fascination around the time I began losing my faith. This means the whole 'divine justice' idea is essentially me wishing that there was a God. It's sad that my loss of religion means a surrender to the fact that people can be awful and never face consequences. In an ugly non-religious reality, divine justice is just a construct for those who can afford it.

---

Maybe we should have a vote, and let all the neo-Nazis go off on their own. We could have completely separate societies, so we wouldn't have to put up with each other's bullshit. Except that, you know, segregating society to get away from the people you disagree with is a pretty Nazi-ish thing to do. Anti-Nazi Nazism.

--

I have a question. Please read it devoid of any pretensions or grand concepts or preconceptions:

Will everything be okay?

I'm straddling this weird line between unemployment, stalled career, and job security. I don't know where anything's going, and any hope I grasp turns to sand and filters through my fingers. What am I doing? Where am I going? Every day I freak out that I'm in a downward spiral that will lead to a financially and professionally and personally unsatisfying trajectory. I don't know where to look for help.

Will it be okay? Maybe I'll end up basking in the faux-self-worth of being a fast food shift manager while in my 30's. Can I survive my life on just-better-than minimum wage? If I'm not capable of anything more, will I be able to avoid a retirement spent panhandling at busy intersections and sleeping under a forgotten overpass?

There are things I want to do. I want a cat. I want join the Big Brothers program and give a kid a hand like the one I was given during the soupy-thick fog of my adolescence. I want to join a community band and pick up the sax again. Right now I keep telling myself that I need to wait until my employment stabilizes, so that I can focus on one thing at a time. Taking on more than that would be irresponsible, wouldn't it?

But if everything will be okay in the end, maybe I can do those things now instead of later. Maybe I can find a way to contribute something to the world on a personal level, and find a patch of shade in my tumultuous desert of uncertainty. And then I can travel onwards.

---

Here's an idea: this is heaven. We're in it. Like, now. In front of whatever sized screen you're staring into, while trying to put off paying the bills after cleaning up from another bland dinner that makes you worry about your weight.

This is all based on the notion of living in a simulation: My guess is that, if such a thing were to be possible or even likely, the simulation itself would need a bit of built-in discomfort to keep us engaged. Maybe the real world is 2000 years in the future or whatever, and we have it all: resources, peace, technology, perfect health. Everything except adversity. There's nothing left to do, so we all plug into this experience that is, quite frankly, kinda unpleasant. So we play it all the way through, and once we run out of lives, we get dumped back to the surface where we compare notes on how we did and discuss how this vintage-themed MMO on steroids is progressing.

We are God. Some of us go into the simulation just try try living a different style of life as a poor kid in the slums of Bombay, and then take it easy the next round as a office worker in Versaille. Sometimes we play as assholes, sometimes we play as people-pleasers, and sometimes we play with the Self Confidence slider set all the way to 0.

It makes sense to me that if this were all a simulation we'd need a source of conflict to maintain engagement. It think we'd get bored if it was just one big sandbox with infinite resources.

---

When I die, I hope people won't hesitate to speak ill of me, if that's how they genuinely feel. If there's a sandpaper grudge lurking between their skin and soul, it doesn't need to be repressed under the guise of 'respect those who have passed'. Screw that. Death is the one, final, ultimate catharsis. And it doesn't need to be limited to the person that moved on to the big summer cottage in the sky.

Speak your piece, whether uplifting or not. I'm dead. Not you nor anyone else owe me anything. Hopefully by bringing all the ugly things to light it'll help others steer a more peaceful course through their existence and make the world the tiniest bit better.

---

I went to dinner with my girlfriend to her best friend's home. We got to talking after, and her husband mentioned how he keeps a living bucket list. Among other things, he wants to read all of the New York Times best sellers and wants to see a baseball game in every MLB stadium. He freely admitted that he doesn't expect to ever complete these goals - the idea is just to give him something to keep an eye out for when opportunities present themselves. He's not taking leaps and bounds with his life, but stretching himself just a little bit when and where he can.

I don't want to write down my bucket list. That means I need to admit there are things I want to do that I might never get to. If I have an actual, factual list, there's a declaration of intent to live a full life and that there are things I want. And if I admit I want something, it obviously makes it harder to cope when it doesn't come together.

We can't have that now, can we? I'm much too busy collecting meager paychecks and watching the weeks slip past me.

---

I've discovered the secret, two-step process to guaranteed weight loss! 1.5 pounds a week! Doctors HATE me!

First Step: Just be hungry all the time.

Second Step: When you do eat, make sure it's something you don't like.

I've been eating a lot of carrots. Boy, do I hate carrots.

---

Lately I've been putting in some pretty late hours. Essentially my full time job pays me, shall we say, below market average, so my paycheck's momentum slides me right up to the 'barely making do' marker. Not much further. So now I feel like I need to be taking advantage of every freelance/side opportunity I can clutch in my spiny, greedy little fingers. It's the only way I can feel like I'm not falling behind.

That means, inevitably, that all my freelance income goes into the bank and stays there. It stays there until it smells kinda off, and it stays there until it starts growing some fuzzy green... What is that? Ew, it looks like it's collecting some kind of... interest.

My younger self would be appalled at the concept (but that's a lie, and we both know it).

So I'm working stupid hours and chucking everything in the back of my financial fridge. It's boring, and I wish there'd be a more immediate and tangible benefit to the long hours I'm putting in. I mean, I'm obviously just tired and burned out, but that doesn't really matter. Instead I find myself thinking, 'as soon as a freelance check clears, I should be spending, say, $100 of it on something fun'.

But on what?

Another video game? I'm working so much that I'm slowly becoming less interested in staring at screens (now that would appall my younger self). Junkfood I can't or won't eat? Tickets to movies I don't want to see? Tools I won't use, books I won't read, clothes I'll maybe wear once?

An entertainment budget is an honourable intention, at least.

---

I inject pure kryptonite
Into my brain
It improves my kung-fu
And it eases the pain during
Acceleration
When the pedal hits the floor
This thing burns nitroglycerin
And powdered C4

And I will always love you

Dan Reeder - Clean Elvis