Just for fun, how geeky are you? I’m 45.75937% - Super Geek. d(^_^)
Hell, I should get extra points for that Database post I just wrote yesterday. Database design, programming, AND roleplaying systems, all in one. *flex* 
An article from MSNBC reports:
Harry Potter’s imposing pal Hagrid — Scottish comedian and actor Robbie Coltrane — was made a member of the Order of the British Empire.
All hail the noble half-giant knight!
Another new year. Babel is coming up on its first birthday in February March, but since we’re still pretty much in the same place we were when we started, it’s not much of a landmark. But that’s okay. Babel remains pretty much a place for me to explore with and vent through, so I am happy with where we are.
I’m continuing to work on the technical knowledge that I’ve been learning throughout the year (jump-started, I might add, by the act of creating this blog) - thanks to my family for the phat lewtz (two links there ) that will hopefully grant me massive bonuses to my Ruby and CSS skills (Book of Ruby+5, anyone?). I have a project that I’m half working on that will eventually utilize both; it’s Earthdawn related, and I have high hopes for it (mostly that I can find the motivation to get off (on?) my butt and work on it).
Along with the technical bounty, Santa brought me a nice lot of new clothes, more movies than we know what to do with, and a few other nifty miscellania. Jon and I have started watching Firefly again, thanks to another viewing of Serenity. We found the special features on the Serenity DVD to be amusing, especially Joss’s introductory commentary (that I guess was aired before the pre-release showings?) including his reference to “the most cancelled show” ever. Speaking of Serenity, this book is incredibly awesome. Not only does it contain the film script in its entirety, with pictures (shiny!), it also contains a few chapters in the beginning with an interview of Joss Whedon about the making of the movie and the tv series.
Anyway, ramblings aside, I’m hoping 2006 will be a good year (aren’t we all?). I have hopes that increasing my technical skills (mostly with Ruby/Rails and CSS) might lead me to a new job/career, I’m pleased that I’ve managed to stick with the blogging thing for nearly a year, and maybe somewhere along the way I’ll find time to clean up around the house and/or organize my overlarge book collection (that hasn’t yet made it to Listal). Oh, and finish Jade Empire, which I finally own and am playing through. Plus, our dear friend Kleos and his fiancee may be running an Earthdawn game that Jon and I might be playing in. Hooray! Ahem, I did say “rambling aside”, did I not? Here’s to a shiny new year~
Bryan Veloso, who has a neat blog, wrote a post recently that sort of underscored my growing ill-content with people in general. Apparently, someone left Bryan a comment demanding that he “make” them like his blog again. This kind of self-centered, self-important bullshit is at the heart of half our problems these days. This “I deserve whatever I want” mentality. This “The world should work how I think it does” mindset. It’s blind, it’s foolish, and it’s so far beyond arrogant that I’m appalled to think I might have fallen into that mindset on occassion. I originally started to comment on Bryan’s post, but after my comment got longer and longer, I decided I’d do better to just write here.
I’ve never understood why people get like that. I see it happen in every MMO that I play - there are always players who take every change personally and proceed to flame away on the forums because the server maintenance cut 2 hours off their playing time. Or because their class changed and wasn’t wtfuber any more. It’s like some people just expect their every whim to be answered, and if they come across anything that doesn’t fit into their narrow view of what it should be, then they cry up a storm. Oh you suck now, WoW, make me like you again!
It’s especially frustrating to see that on a personal site, though. What exactly does this reader give Bryan that justifies his courting their approval? (Besides an interesting subject to write about, anyway.) The MMO example at least has money changing hands - Blizzard benefits from its fans liking its games, since they continue to pay for the privilege of playing. But on a blog? Who are they to demand that the blogger deviate from his own mindset to suit theirs? A blog needs its readership, surely, but that doesn’t make the blogger subject to every whim of its readers. You’d never get anything written if you tried to cater to everyone. Bah, it just makes me angry, and I don’t even have to deal with it.
Why is it that so many people cannot accept anything that flies in the face of their own personal wants? I want my character to be badass, and these changes bring me back down to the same level as everyone else, so I’m going to bitch and moan about it until they fix it. Does this sound familiar to anyone? It sounds an awful lot like my nephew-in-law, who’s 4 years old, when he can’t play with the toy he wants. I want the whole world to be just like me, so I’m going to go bully anyone who’s different into being just like me! Who cares if they don’t think the way I do, I’m making them better, cause *I* know best! Is the world so plastic-coated and instantly-gratifying that we don’t have to grow up anymore? Maybe that’s what’s really happening in America. It’s not that we’re really dumbing down, it’s that we’re not growing up.
I read an interesting article that makes some strong points about the dumbing down of America. Jon says, “it really is Rome 2.0″, which I find absolutely hilarious. d(-_^)
Things have been really busy at work lately, so I haven’t had much time to write. We’ve hit the year-end holiday rush, which has once again driven home why I hate the month of December. There’s just something about the end of the year that makes so many people think they have to finish everything, even if they haven’t thought about it in months. Add to that the joys (:eyeroll:) of the ever-more-commercial Christmas holiday season, cold weather, and traveling in said cold/snowy/icy weather, and we have all the makings of a month that is anything but joyful.
I’m a Scrooge, I’ll admit it. Fortunately, Jon is too, so we can commiserate together and roll our eyes every time we hear another bad rendition of a Christmas song. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy getting to see the family and spend time catching up with them, but I really dislike that obligation that our friendly marketers have fostered to buy awesome gifts for everyone that I love. Or like. Or just, y’know, sort of know, or work with, or met at a diner three years ago. I know these gifts are supposed to be “gifts of the heart”, and we’re supposed to give them because we genuinely want to brighten our loved one/friend/acquaintance’s day (and for many of my loved ones, I do want to give them something), but after the gift-giving message gets rammed down my throat every damn time I turn on the radio, or walk into a store, or go out to eat, I’m finding myself feeling just a wee bit contrary.
And that’s ignoring the fact that the local stores are one and all swarmed with friendly holiday shoppers, fighting over the last Super-trendy-gotta-have-to-be-cool Toy or clothing item, or whatever (where’s my friendly Protoss Zeaot when I need him, anyway). The parking lots are filled with massive SUVs, freely guzzling their gas and nearly running over the crowds of suckers gift-givers; the scene is overlaid with the sweet music of screeching tires, screaming children, and cell-phones tinging out a midi rendition of Deck the Halls. Hallelujah!
And the fun becomes even more joyful when we add in that other mainstay of December, cold, snowy (or better yet, icy) weather! Then we have even more crazy drivers, sliding about on slushy roads, backing up traffic even farther and blocking intersections in their zeal to get that one perfect gift.
Honestly though, December just makes me tired. The thought of competing with all those people, filled with the joy of Christmas, makes me think longingly of my (semi) isolated townhouse, where I can barricade the door, ban all Christmas music, and huddle in a blanket, free from the yearning masses. The cold weather saps the energy from my limbs, until I just numbly drive home after work, trudge up the stairs (narrowly avoiding a slip on the ice), and collapse in my computer chair, wanting nothing more than to go to sleep until spring. My creativity is shot, my mental faculties are verging on nonexistent, and my already deficient motivation for anything has fallen through the floor.
I think I just need to hibernate; someone wake me up when it’s spring again, okay? I’ll be in a den somewhere, tucked away out of the cold. Just be careful, I might be a little cranky.
Oh neat! A huge list of Japanese style emoticons. v(^o^)
That’s what I want to wake up to tomorrow morning. Weather is currently calling for 4-8 inches of snow by morning; I suspect we’ll only get the low end of that, but I really would love to get the full 8 inches. Granted, I mostly just want a day off from work, but having snow really makes it feel like Christmas time.
I recently went to our local Walmart and had a somewhat bizarre realization (for me). I was walking along, and there was that TV hanging from the ceiling with commercials playing. I don’t even remember what the ad was, I just remember hearing this woman talk in the ad and thinking, “Y’know, this is what I hate about the world we live in.” Her voice was smooth, friendly, just giving helpful advice - your typical testimonial-type advertising trick. It was *so* smooth and friendly that some part of me was screaming, “How fake is that?”
It’s weird; I’ve been listening to ads like that one all of my life, just like everyone else. I never really paid them much mind. For some reason, though, this time I found myself disgusted by the whole thing. Are our lives so meaningless that we’re comforted by the kind words of complete strangers? Strangers who’re just acting, even. It’s like we live in a world where we’re more intimate with the people in the TV than our next door neighbors. Strangers offer canned advice for “feminine problems” or any other number of things that I would be mortified to find myself discussing with any but my best of friends (if even then!). I guess, in a way, that’s why it works, because that person in the TV isn’t real and doesn’t have to be embarassed or whatever. It just feels so impersonal, even though I think the intention is the opposite.
Reading back over what I’ve written, I’m not sure I’ve really gotten my point across, if indeed I had one. I just had a brief moment that I can’t really explain and hoped that writing it down would help me muddle through it. I’m not sure it’s really helped much, but I suppose I should just let the thoughts go and see what happens. Anyone else ever had a moment “like” that (”like” meaning whatever you can manage to take from my account, since I don’t think I’ve explained well enough for a true comparison)?
Ten reasons why gay marriage should be illegal - not what it sounds like, just a nice summation of the “logic” in charge of our society these days.