Change

Sometimes I wonder if I am the emotional equivalent of a hobo. It would make a lot of sense. I am among the emotionally needy. I am constantly begging for love from any source I think I can get it. I want a lot of love, enough love that it's suffocating.

Yet to those I beg, I am repulsive. People resist giving me their love to the point they are willing to be rude to do so. They spit at me, or hide their wall from me on Facebook, or call me emo even when they've been telling me how they want to fuck other guys while still with me. (Guess which of the three didn't happen to me.) Or sometimes they'll say sweet words of rejection to me because they have nothing else. If I'm lucky, I'll get a little love, but not nearly enough.

People say that instead of begging, there is something I must acquire. For the hobo it's a job, but for me they say I need to get self confidence. I say to get self confidence I'll need a little love to get me on my feet, it's proof that I'm not a total loser. But they refuse to hear it. To get love, I need self confidence; self confidence, love.

So lovelies, could I have some change?

Grumpy pants

Today on Facebook I logged in to see that one acquaintance of mine had changed their status to "married". Knowing she isn't married, this annoys the living fuck out of me. But the question is, why?

My natural inclination is to say this: "Okay, look, this is basically making your relationship look more substantive than it really is." Particularly, this couple has been dating for a half of a year at best, so to me it seems gaudy to me that they'd even joke about marriage. So I say, "Look kids, you're about several years off from this, at least."

But then again, that isn't the REAL reason I'm annoyed.

While there is a lot of truth to what I'd like to say, the crux of the matter is that this time last year, I was the one with the blinders on. I was, for all extents and purposes, as puppy-eyed for Shanndra. We were the ones who were happily dreaming about marriage and a seemingly endless future together. But then everything went to shit, and I was hurt harder then I've been since my childhood.

So what's really happened is that I've gotten incredibly cynical. Instead of taking it as a cute gesture, I get angry since because I have problems with the concept of that kind of relationship lasting. That kind of romantic love didn't last for me right? So why would it, or should it, last for anyone else?

Pardon My Dust

Since I dispelled those negative feelings through making them public, I have one request for you, the reader.

As anyone who is a regular reader of my work can contest, I'm really bad at self editing. I just read over my own words as how I want them to be, not how they actually are. So, dear reader, if you ever see a mistake, please don't be afraid to point it out. In fact, try reaching me by email at so I can fix my grammatical error for the good of all mankind.

I thank you in advance.

The Lesson of the Day

This weekend has been full of many lessons.

One lesson important lesson I learned is that it doesn't matter if you try to get as many of your friends as possible to see a movie. The rest of America just won't. They prefer to just watch the same old crappy action movie over and over again.

The other important lesson I learned, which I should have learned six months ago, is to never tell people you take fancy with any of your negative feelings. Always pretend everything is peachy. Fuck your depression. It doesn't matter. Bottle it up until you can't feel. Because putting up a front is better than letting guys or girls know how you feel.

Because knowing is half the battle.

(/snark)

Scott Pilgrim's Overrated Girlfriend: Why Scott Shouldn't End Up with Ramona Flowers

Warning: Spoilers for up to Volume 5. You have been warned.

About this time next week, we'll all know how Scott Pilgrim ends. When Volume 6 comes out, canon will be canon, and the only hope alternative shippers is in fix fics and fan comics. Thus, this is the last chance to say what I want to say about the relationships of Scott Pilgrim without sounding like some crazy and bitter Harry/Hermonie shipper who, after the release of the Deathly Hallows, sent JKR death threats regarding how she ruined their OTP.. So while I still can, I must assert that I don't really want Scott to end up with Ramona.

Let me start off by saying that I don't detest the couple. They have had their moments, here and there. In fact, the entirety of volume 4 almost sold me on the relationship. However, there have been a couple consistent threads throughout Scott Pilgrim that have given me reason to think she's bad news.

One such thread is that the vast majority of her exes turned evil after her, or in some cases explicitly because of her. In the Matthew Patel flashback, we see him gritting his teeth in anger after Ramona dumps him. Lucas Lee sells out after Ramona cheated on him with Todd. (Todd, admittedly, is perhaps the only evil ex that we know was evil the whole damn time.) Roxanne's abrasive demeanor was suggested to stem from bitterness over comments that Ramona made about her. And let us not forget the twins, whose creepy twin act was directly born out the incident where she played them off each other.

Speaking of the twins, Ramona is very much so a hypocrite. Okay, what Scott did in volume 1 was fairly reprehensible, it wasn't nearly as bad as anything that she's done, given that she mutually cheated on a pair of brothers. She has little right to get as angry as she did at Scott. Besides, he at least ended it fairly quickly, where as with regards to Ramona, we still aren't sure if she really ended with Gideon.

Her still being involved with Gideon is a distinct possibility. Envy's suggestion in volume 3 hinted her work for Gideon was less than legitimate, and the journey into Ramona's mind during volume 4 gave me the feeling that Gideon was very controlling in the relationship. (She was sitting right next to him, like a pet.) Combined with Ramona's disappearance at the end of volume 5, we can probably guess that Gideon still has her around his finger.

But let's be honest, the main reason I don't ship Scott/Ramona is that I think he can do better. Let's see if you can guess who I'm thinking here.

Knives Chau? No. She's batshit insane and immature. Besides, she's probably going to end up with Stephen Stills in the end, so I think she's covered.

Wallace? Hey, look, Wallace already has a boyfriend. Besides Wallace is too awesome for Scott. Moving on...

Lisa? Okay, while I think she and Scott would make a very good couple, I think I should remind you that Scott ignored her in highschool for someone else. Someone snakier. And more talented. Someone with freckles and looks very good chained to a wall.

Yes, I'm a Kim Pine shipper, and I think I've been since the flashback sequence in volume 2. Kim is not only one of the funniest characters in the book, she's proven herself to be the most loyal, leagues above Ramona. Whereas Ramona has done very little to show that she cares for Scott, Kim did an extremely self sacrificing act during volume six in order to get him motivated enough to beat the twins. And even though she occasionally call Scott an idiot, or chews him out for doing something stupid, she has demonstrated a degree of faith in him that's missing from Ramona, which can be best summed up in her repeating mantra from volume 5, “Come on, he's Scott Pilgrim!” And judging by her behavior over the book, it's very obvious that she still has feelings for Scott, even though they broke it off in high school.

Now while I would prefer Scott/Kim, I know that series will end up with Ramona magically changing into a better person after Scott gives Gideon the beat down. I will have no choice but to accept it and smile at the end. But tell me, fellow Scott Pilgrim fans, who really deserves Scott? The person who has constantly cheats and turns people evil? Or the smart, sarcastic girl next door who is loyal till the end?

Not Wily's Castle

Okkusenman always gets me. Almost every time I watch that video, the original video, I cry. There is something sincere about it. The animation and the song lyrics depict a view of life that should remind I think everyone about the pains of growing up. Who doesn't remember imitating their favorite super hero? Who hasn't moved apart from friends, only to wonder what happened to them years after? Or am I the only one who has picked up a toy from childhood, wondering happened to the those simpler times?

Yeah, I didn't think so.

As I said, every time I get to the second recital of the chorus, when the protagonist sees himself as a little boy out the train window, I cry. I cry, because it reminds me of what I've lost to grow up. I think it's a universal loss.

Something I'm Writing

Okay folks, I haven't written here for a while. I actually haven't been writing much period. But I realize that's because I have some lingering feelings that I have to express and remove. So I've begun writing a little personal entry about events from six months ago.

What I'm writing I don't think will be quite suited for this space. It's not something I feel should be seen by the light of day. However, if any of you want of copy of it, just shoot me an email. Depending on who you are, I might give you a copy, I might not.

Expect more frequent updates to this dear blog of mine. I've neglected it, and I intend to show it the love it deserves.

Goodnight blog, goodnight world.

Level 20

As 9:15 this morning, I had accumulated enough experience that I was no longer a mere teenager. Now I am twenty years old, starting a new decade, or maybe a new era, in my life.

I feel old.

In most pen and paper roleplayer games, or western RPG video games that ape their systems off D&D, level 20 tends to be the level cap. After that, new life experiences will no longer effect abilities. Going by that qualifier, I am done. I am who I am and will forever be.

Mass Effect 2 instead had the level cap be thirty. However after level twenty the amount of skill points afforded to the player seriously decreases: from two a level to one.

Though some might find this comparison to levels a case of overabstracting, I feel as if am faced with a truth. The amount I am able to learn at my age is considerably diminished, if not completely removed. My writing can improve, so can a lot of other things. But it's not like I can just pick up a new language now, and expect to learn it, like a child or even a lucky teenager can.

I also have to face the fact that I'm no longer a child anymore. As such, I have new responsibilities, and there are things I can no longer do.

I no longer have the hope of ever attending a prom. As of today, that experience is no longer afforded to me. That ship has forever sailed, though my chances of ever attending did diminish when I skipped my senior prom two years ago. (I have regrets).

To that point some of the last people I know from my high school are graduating today. Argo is now to become a foreign entity to me.

I no longer have the ability to claim teenager culture. Justin Beeber and Miley Cyrus are no longer a part of my domain. I count this loss as a blessing.

I am now one less teenage anime fan. That means I'm still an anime fan, but I have to list myself among those old farts who still watch the original Mobile Suit Gundam, which I do, and yell at youngins for watching Naruto and shows with Moe girls in them.

If it wasn't before, liking lolicon would be extremely creepy at my age. Thankfully, I can count that as one of the things I don't fap to.

On that note being twenty does have it's perks. Or perk, as the case may be. I can now stay out past eleven in the state of Illinois. Apparently, that was illegal here, for some reason.

Yet, I still can't drink, gamble, or rent an automobile. Well, legally, anyways. I'm still in draft range too. I'll be for awhile.

In two years time, I'm going to be out of college, unless I go to graduate school. The chance to be a young fuck up is starting to slip away. Soon, I will have to get a job, and live life in the confines society.

Damn, am I old.

Yet, a strange thing has occurred as of late. As old as I am, I notice things that filled my childhood are now being peddled to youngsters.

Last weekend, the fourth Shrek movie was released. The original came out when I was eleven years old. Assuming that the movie was targeted to children who were my age, to tykes as young as three, no one who in the target demographic when the first movie came out is a child anymore.

Then you think about Toy Story. The first movie came out when I was five. For the second, I was nine. Next month, the third Toy Story movie will come out. At this point, some of the kids who saw the original in theaters a decade and a half ago have children, who will be begging to take them to sequel to something that was part of their parent's childhood.

Then you think about what ABC Kids is doing now, and it's just baffling. Nearly twenty years after the original broadcast, the original Power Rangers is being aired. Sure it has stupid new special effects added in. But it's still the same show that captivated me when I was three years old, 17 years ago.

Every Saturday I turn it on, and I'm reminded how old I've gotten. In retrospect, a lot of seems really stupid. Bulk and Skull antics especially, though I've noticed one or two parental bonuses from them. That the green ranger 5 parter seemed scary to me then is astounding to me now. That Zordon would choose a group of “teenagers with attitudes,” instead of say, a highly trained group of fighters, seems like a decision based more on marketing than out of the wisdom of a interstellar entity.

It's also gotten really easy to spot the cheapness of the whole thing. Like, I can tell the parts that the American producers did themselves from the stock footage they took from Super Sentai shows. I can also spot that the mechazord looks like cheap toy.

But somehow, somewhere in me, is still the kid who was in love with the damn cheap costumes, the giant robot, and the poor dubbing. (Well, at least until I see one of those damn stupid new effects plastered over my precious childhood.) I guess as old as I get, the kid in me won't die completely. Heck, for completionists sake, I'm probably going to go see the new Shrek movie and the Toy Story 3 as well.

Growing up, after all, is overrated.

A Musing on Who

Sorry for not updating for two weeks, dear blog. It's been a bit weird. And busy. With papers and scripts and stories needing to be done. It's been very hectic as of late. I just haven't been afforded time to update you. However, there's been a lull in the action, and a thought just occurred to me, one I must get down.

Since this season of Doctor Who began, I've been a fan of Amy Pond. She;s been smart, sassy and sexy, not to mention I really, really like the sexual tension between her the 11th Doctor. I've been sincerely shipping them.

However, after this week's episode...I'm not so sure. I was somewhat put off by her actions in that they reminded me of a certain someone and a certain situation. I mean, I know this guy that Amy is supposed to marry is going to be set up as a total douche, or not as awesome as the Doctor at the very least, but her infidelity to her fiance and her inability to take accept “No” from the Doctor is totally reminiscent of what happened.. The Doctor's reaction was also similar to what happened, and I think that's what set me off.

Then again, the romantic development so far has been nice, so part of me still wants them to get together very badly. It's just that I've been the normal guy put up against an amazing guy, and it was not fun at all. In fact, it was very horrible. Situations like that are not as fun and clean in RL as they are on the telly.

In related and ironic news, I'm planning to cosplay as the Eleventh for Anime Central. I'm going to need to lose a little weight, and get another haircut, but I should be able to pull it off. I even have a Sonic Screwdriver. It is among the reasons why Acen is going to be totally awesome.

Now all I have to do is get through the next couple weeks. Then I'll be living it up, convention style, and I'll finally be able to write to you dear blog, without restraint.

Roger Ebert, Would You Kindly Please Come Off It?

I personally think Roger Ebert is an awesome man. I think he's a great critic, a great mind, and considering what he's been though over the past couple years, a truly remarkable individual. That said, Roger Ebert's well known animosity towards video games used to instill in me a certain animosity towards him. Then when things went south, the man didn't make any more rants about video games, so my feelings about the matter had cooled to the point that I it almost seemed like a distant memory. After a while, I was sorta hoping that the legendary movie critic would shut up about the subject until the world robs us of him, so he could die with me completely respecting him. Yet, even though the man lost his mouth, even though he faces the approach of death, Roger Ebert did not lose his remarkable and highly opinionated brain. Roger Ebert is still as sharp as ever, and quite frankly, just as much of an ass. In a good way of course, but his article brought back up the venom I have for his opinions on the subject.

http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2010/04/video_games_can_never_be_art.html


Roger's legendary problem with games is based on perception. He usually boils games as whole down to a basic premise, winning or loosing, and then completely ignores anything else, including emotional response, theme, and artistic purpose, aka, the things that make art art. The fact you have goals in games, a win or lose proposition, disqualifies us completely.

In his simplistic rebuttal of an argument about games as art, Ebert takes down Braid. Ebert has obviously never played Braid, because he speaks about it in very general terms, and without going much into the plot. Now while I'll admit Braid isn't a perfect video game, it is worthy of the term art. Yes, I contend a puzzle game can be art. The reason that Braid wins this illusive status is because of how the games ends. At the end of the game, the player makes his way through the last level, a strange world where the time seems to be moving in reverse around the player (ie, all the enemies are walking backwards, objects “fall up.”.) This pattern continues onwards till the last room, when the player finally gets to save the princess from a burly man in a stereotypical and intentionally cliché fashion. The player and his trusty character follow the princess back to her house, as she helps him past obsticles, and it seems like he is about to rescue her...until the player is forced into one last rewind. It turns out the flow of time was reversed in that room as well. Then the player is forced into watching as the main character chases the princess, as the princess tries everything in her power to stop him, (instead of clearing traps, she's actually springing them to stop him), until the princess is saved by the aforementioned burly man. The actions of the player and character through out the game are called entirely into question, as it's clear that the character has been stalking the princess.

Basically what works here, which is something only games can do, is that the Braid emotionally manipulates the audience using the very goal systems Roger Ebert decries. The goal of the game is “obstinately” to save the princess, and fix whatever mistake that character made in the past, but in trying to do so, the game sets the player up for failure, force the player into unwittingly becoming the villain. The player IS what's putting the princess in danger, and that revelation hits the audience like a brick.

Braid isn't the only game to do this. The original Bioshock infamously used a similar tactic to fuck with the player. Bioshock was one of those games that advertised on the box, “YOU CAN BE GOOD OR EVIL, YOUR CHOICE!” Which isn't really all that new, though killing little girls is still creepy no matter how you cut it. Now, what was brilliant about Bioshock was it took its advertised premise, player freedom, and thematically turned it on it's head. The story of Bioshock sure does allow players to kill little girls or save them, but otherwise the story is a fixed path. For the first segment of the game, some guy on the radio named Atlas orders the player around, towards objectives. Mindlessly following objectives in a game supposedly based on player freedom may seem counterlogical, and it is, until you get to the middle of the game, and the player meets the supposed antagonist, Andrew Ryan. Control is stripped from the player for segment that must be seen for full impact.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bncxTilQKAs
Bioshock very clearly has something to say on player agency, ie the ability of players to actual control what happens in the game. Even more generally speaking, it takes Ayn Rand's philosophies and runs with them. When we follow orders, any order, do we still retain our humanity? Do we retain our ability to choose? And by ripping away the choice to take Ryan's life, the game very clearly makes a powerful artistic statement.

Is that not what art is supposed to do?

Even with games doing such wonderful things, Ebert would probably still ignore the possibility that games are art, because to him Braid and Bioshock are indistinguishable to chess. I make this judgment due to all the comparisons to chess he makes in his article. I can see how this strategy works for him: chess isn't art, chess is a game, so all games are not art. But the logical jumps he makes are awfully familiar, much like the famous scene in Monty Python and Holy Grail where Sir Bedevere decides that if a woman weighs as much as duck, she must therefore be a witch.

Ebert makes this logical fallacy without even playing video games. I really think that is the worst part. The insults he lobs at Braid, at Flower, he does without even playing them. It is, essentially, the equivalent of grading books by funny little pictures they put on the cover. Imagine someone making an opinion on Van Go's “Starry Night” by hearing a description of it. Imagine how ridiculous that sounds. That is exactly how ridiculous Roger Ebert's assessment of games is. But to be fair, it is only as bad as judging “A Voyage to the Moon” on a single still one saw in a film history book.

Ebert ends the article by asking why we gamers want to defend games. You see we defend games for the very same reason he defends George Melies. It isn't because we want to justify them for the sake of justifying them, it's because we see something in them worth justifying. Games give us an emotional response. In games we can find truth or beauty. Games have the ability to tell a message that no other form can tell. Because it takes talent, planning, and awesome to create a truly great game. Any asshole can create a Pong clone. A group of soulless assholes can churn out the latest Call of Duty game, but it takes true vision to create a Braid, or Bioshock.

We also defend games as art because tiny little men in ivory towers always go about deciding which things aren't art and those things are subsequently put into ghettos. How long has Science Fiction been wrongly placed in a ghetto, and judged as low minded? Animation has too long been placed in a similar ghetto: strictly for children. We have seen what such ghettos have done to both mediums. I do not want some bastard making games less sophisticated because video games are “for children” thus robbing me of titles like Braid and Bioshock and publishers thus filling the market with crap would make Barbie Horse Adventures look like Moby Dick.

So Roger, we defend games as art, because if society judges them as “not art”, we feel like will lose something precious. I really wish someone with your judgement would understand that.

PS: For those still waiting for my C2E2 write up, I'll have it up tommorow night. For now, bedtime guys. See ya later.

Fuck, I give up.

Someone is making adopt a new rule for my Facebook. It's not a rule I want to adopt, or that I even considered having to adopt. But necessity necessitates.

Someone just recently dropped me on Facebook. She was a cool person, but fuck knows why she dropped me this time. Yeah, the first time was understandable, but this time it was all out of the blue. I thought things were becoming cool again, but this is just bonkers.

So, I don't give a shit anymore. It's my new decree that if you drop me on Facebook twice, the second time I'm just going to let it happen. Especially if I'm not given a good reason for it, which I wasn't. Yeah, I'll accept the friend request if she or anyone else readds me, but otherwise...it's very clear you don't want me in your life and thus my obligation to give a fuck is going to dissolve.

kthxbai.

The One I'm Looking For

I'm not one to believe in the concept of the one true love, or the perfect puzzle piece or any of that crap.

Yeah, even as a romantic as the idea is, hearing it brought up gets me annoyed. It looks good on paper, but reality is not so simple. Facts are that any of us could find several assortments of people and at the end of the day be perfectly content. The “one” is not needed, nor does he or she actually exist for a given person. Sometimes it just works out that way, as life isn't particularly well written, if it is at all. And if only we could be as lucky enough to be paired off by two by a benevolent author. As practical and fair as that would be, the idea has no utility in the real world, so I'm not delusional enough to obsess over the idea and waste my life trying to achieve it.

But even as the curmudgeon Machiavelli wannabe inside of me complains, it doesn't change the fact that the idea sounds nice. I mean, wouldn't life be great if things were truly that simple, if life really was like it's portrayed in fairy tales or on TV? The idea of the perfect person, is kinda like the idea of the perfect place. We know we can't create utopias IRL, but we can't stop making them up and trying to get reality as close to them as possible.

So as foolish as it may be, I've thinking about the “one” a lot the past couple days. I know it's very unlikely to exist, but she's nice to think about when you're single and alone. I feel she's also a good standard. Yes, no girl is ever going to live up to that impossibly high goal, but it does prevent one from choosing any Dick or Jane off the street. Which means at least one won't go into something that is diametrically opposite to what you're actually looking for.

---
Let me start off by saying that my one true love is a complete romantic. My one true love is a reader of romance novels, and shoujo manga. She likes sweeping gestures of love, she wants marriage somewhere down the line. While she is open to anything, she's looking for a guy she can spend the rest of her life with.

But at the same time, I want her to be pragmatic. She knows relationships are tough and require a lot of work. She knows that not every guy she dates is Mr. Right. She knows she's unlikely to find me. But the important thing is that despite her deep knowledge in the world, she's at heart an optimist, and a little bit of an idealist. She's knows it's a long road, but she just knows that it's around the corner.

I want my girl to be an open book. I don't want her to be the kind of girl who keeps secrets, or lies to cover up the more embarrassing parts of her past. If she has a bad day, I don't want her to take it out on me, but expect that I am there to help, to make it all better. Likewise, I want a girl who is interested in my problems, who will be willing to hear me whine every once in a while, and when I'm truly in the dumps will wrap her arms around my neck while telling me everything will be all right.

My girl is physical. She will be close. We should be the kind of couple that spends every other night at each others house, because we a) don't live that far from each other, and we b) like being close. My perfect gal likes to be held, a lot. She also likes to hold. We are the couple that will fall asleep in each others arms every night, and wake up in the morning feeling cozy and warm. We will hold hands in public, and kiss in the movie theater. We shall be so close, so physically intimate, that the levels of oneness we shall achieve while cuddling will make sex will become jealous.

Sex will of course be important, though. My gal will be adventurous, have a large appetite, but sex shall not consume her. She may be a lovely virginal figure, adventurous and eager, willing to explore the frontier together with me as we both strive to get better to please one another. Or perhaps she's at the other end of the spectrum: a gal with experience, who loves teaching and likes to be called sensei. But the most important thing is that she has patience. Not “waiting till we get married patience”, of course, but instead the kind of patience that's willing to understand that sometimes I fuck up, and realizes that it's okay.

She has to be accepting. Of me, my newness, my awkwardness, and even me when I'm somber. She doesn't need to fix my problems, I don't expect her to. I just want to know she has my back.

I want her to be smart. She should be well educated, interested in, and ready to talk about a variety of subjects. We don't need to be into the same things, but she should have a passion for something. Something she can on about forever, even when it grates my nerves. And she must be willing to listen to me as I am able to listen to her.

The gal for me believes that gender rules should be boned. She believes in the first amendment, all of it, even the parts that don't particularly jive with her religion, or lack thereof. She may believe or not, but she should agree that extremists are stupid, even on her side.

My soulmate should love kids. Not be so enthused about having some at the moment, after all we're both young, but excited at the idea. She wants three, two boys and a girl. I want the ratio flipped, of course, and we'll playfully argue about which one is more likely to happen. We shall pick out names, some serious, some silly. One of our children will end up with a silly one, because we are funny like that.

My perfect girl wants me, and me especially. She finds other guys cute, and may even feel tempted every once in a while, but at the end of the day, she loves me the most, just as I love her.

I will never find her, but as I'm young, it doesn't hurt to look, right?

PS: Sorry if I haven't been as ranting as you guys were probably expecting me to, but I must be honest, I'm not sure how good the rant I wrote tonight about the genre ghetto is. I got to give it a look in morning and decide then. You know, tommorow.

Anyways, good night blog. Good night world.

Not a Bad Day

Hello blog! Hello world!

Funny that the first day after I create you is a day of awesome. I mean, seriously today was pretty pimp. Shall I attribute today's success to you, dear blog? Perhaps your mere existence gives me a new attitude to move forward in my work/ That even my father considers your existence humorous a great relief? In any case, I must say it is good to have you, dear blog. Because you are just awesome. You might need a face lift to look less drab, but I'll get something sometime.

But it's not like you're the only thing in my life that is a little bit awesome right now. In fact there are a couple things:

I love how I've gotten into Scott Pilgrim. I feel really tempted to buy the three remaining volumes that I have to own, minus the final volume that's not out yet, and buy tickets to the movie as soon as they are available.

I love Durarara! cause, like Scott Pilgrim, it's awesome. It has such a well crafted and well structured plots and is certainly one of the best anime of the season. It also make me want to watch Bacano! Which is awesome too.

I love having friends. I love how certain friends of mine have become trusted advisers of sorts, the kinds of people that try to make me feel better when I'm down and that snap me out of thinking things are all my fault all the time. I love having fun with these friends and fun conversations with them about nerdy things.

I love that my creative streak is now fully in force, that over the past week I've gotten an exceeding amount of work completed and gotten myself back on track whereas before I had lagged behind. The best things are yet to come, as tomorrow I shall work to get closer to finisning my comic script, and getting another churned out.

I love how mistakes can turn out to be blessings in disguise. Like how the fuck up last Wednesday forced me to rework that story into something awesome, something much better than I was planning on turning in.

Finally, I love getting praised by young ladies who are better writers than I am. Especially for a line that I was hoping would work.

As I said, it was a great day.

Looking

Last night I was talking to a friend and I asked her if any of her friends were single and "weren't creeped out by the thought of me." While informing me that just about all of her friends weren't single or were creeped out by me, she offered me a piece of advice which I'm feel a bit conflicted about.

She told me that it was foolish for me to start looking, especially so soon after Shanndra. It was her philosophy on relationships that if one goes out looking for them, the ones one will find will just be ones one has already gotten: the ones that break one's heart. She tried to make me promise that I wouldn't look, that I'd just let love find me. In the end, I did, but I'm still not sure whether or not to follow her advice.

To a certain extent, I agree with a deal of her logic on the matter. Just rushing into a relationship is not going to end well at all, a certain friend's experiences has taught me much about that. To the same end, I know I need to "love myself before I can love others," as my friend Rob so frequently stresses. But to not look at all and just wait for love to come to me? It sounds romantic, it really does, but it also evades practical sense.

The reason it evades my idea of relationships is matter of sense and personal experience. Anyone and everyone has told me that I have to put myself out there, that opportunity doesn't just come up to the door and knock. Just as an amature writer lacks the weight of JK Rowling or Alan Moore, and must submit to publishers in order to get known, I really do not think it is as easy as me just standing up and waiting for the first girl to glomp me. I'm not some super hot guy that girls fawn over. (I'm not my brother.) Nor with my emotional awkwardness am I particularly attractive in personality. Yeah, as much as I'd like the girl of my dreams to walk up to me and tell me, "You're cute, you're nice, I love you, let's get married," I'm not good enough for that to ever, ever happen.

The first 19 years of my life were spent waiting, waiting for "the one true love" to find me. It didn't. The closest I ever got to waiting for a connection to fall into my lap working out was Heather, and my lack of action is part of what I think caused that to fail. The lesson I learned from my thing with her was that the idea of economic risk was at work in love. You have to risk money to make money. To the same end, I think you must risk getting hurt to find love. So I must beg to differ, Julie. Life for a nerd like me does not work that way. Love will never seek me out, so I must find it.

However, there are a couple things that I can incoperate from your advice that make sense. I already mentioned that I shouldn't rush, but I think the basic rule to substitute to your rule of never looking ever is to just not be desperate. I think there is a fundmental difference for looking for a person with specific traits that one desires emotionally, and just not having standards. Because I have standards; afterall, my standard of loving the person I'm with and having her love me is what ended the relationship between Shanndra and I. Still, I need to meet people in order to at least see if they'd work or not, hence why I'm trying to see if there is anyone avalilble and willing to go out with me.

One More Thing

One of the main events that led to the creation of this blog was that a certain person complained about the content of my wall posts. That person complained that I was swearing too much, which led to a very weird and heated conversation over dinner at IHOP. Now that I have my own blog, a blog which is behind a neat little content barrier that should make it clear I can write whatever the hell I want, I have one word to say to that person...Dad.

Fuckstick.

The blog is now officially Christened. Goodnight, and good luck.

The Start of the Shindig

Hello blog, hello world! If you're one of my friends visiting here, and you actually pay attention to me, then you already know why this blog exists. I guess to those who aren't and/or haven't, I owe you a little bit of explaination.

This all started one beautiful spring day, when after class, the idea popped into my head. I was lonely, and frustrated with my inablity to express my feelings about matters. I wrote in my journal:

"Hello Journal! Ain't it such a beautiful day out? Spring is now officially in bloom: the sun is shining, the flowers are blooming, and young women are dressing up in outfits that are sure inscence young love and...other things. Unless you're an allegetic mess, isn't this just great?

"Perhaps it's not great, though. Lately I've been feeling the worst I have been in a long time. I have just broken up with my first girlfriend, I have no prospects in dating, and old feelings keep baring down on me, all of which has made it a fun time to be Brendan. It's gotten bad enough I have to talk to you about it. Bad enough that perhaps you aren't good enough alone. Bad enough, that I'm thinking of starting a blog.

"You see, lately I've been having some problems with expression, and I think I have to set the record straight with you. Talking to you journal is talking to wall. Except that you're a wall made out of paper. Crappy recycled paper. So it's really like I'm talking to myself. I don't think talking to myself is getting any of the problem I have off my chest.

"At the same time my old way of dealing with things has become corrupted. I can no longer tell the world about my problems in a single Facebook status. The issue is that I've gained too many people, too many dear people on my friend's list. People who, let's just face it, might be part of my problems. Who might be opposed to me politically or religiously. People who don't appreciate me swearing.

"I feel like I have become a slave to my friendslist in what I can or cannot say. So the reason I must start a blog is to free myself.

"The value of a blog to is that it is far enough out of the way to give me the illusion of privacy, but is pubic enough by it's very nature to make me feel like I'm being heard. With any luck this will become a mild form of the therapy I'm too lazy to get that certain people won't read, but some people will. And if so perchance that the people I don't want to read it do?

"Well that just means they really care."

After that I posted something about the idea on Facebook, to largely negative reaction in that people thought I shouldn't worry about being confrontational there. It was a duly noted point, but one I still must act in opposite to. Yes, I'll try to be more open there, but I think my original point still stands. I must have a place where I can be completely and utterly unfiltered.

This blog, dear readers, is where I shall vent, where I shall debate, and where I shall post funny pictures about cats every now and then to lighten to the mood.

That is all, dear blog.