Old friends, new times.
Wow… Yesterday was… well “Wow” pretty much sums it up.
I’ve been thinking about the past a lot lately. I suck at keeping in touch with people. And so I’ve lost contact with a lot of people just because I hadn’t seen them in a while. This isn’t counting the number of people that have been driven off when my life/attitude/emotions took a downward spiral. Instead of trying to get better I spend/spent my days moping about not being better. And I’ve been thinking a lot about that. During that time I was a self-centered jerk. And I’m probably still self-centered, I just hope I’m less of a jerk. I’ll come back to this in a bit.
Most of you probably don’t know this, but since I took a near permanent hiatus on creative writing projects, the only thing vaguely creative that I’ve done in the last few years has been to create micros, also known as microheroes. They’re fun, and I’m just a frankensteiner, meaning I just cut apart bits of micros that other people have done and put ‘em together in new formations all the while trying to remember to credit the original artist. I do make a few of my own, but so far I have yet to make a 100% new outfit that every single pixel was put their by me.
I made several friends in the microhero community and I there are a few that although we had talked a lot, we lost contact. And I saw one online after nearly a year without seeing them more than once or twice and said “hi.” And we started talking again and it was a good time but weighed a little on my mind. There were other friends I’ve been a lot closer to that I hadn’t seen/talked with in longer. And what about them?
In 1996-1997, we got internet at home for the first time. Dial up, the same company we use now (Lord, please grant me the patience to not be irritated with GRM for not including us when they were laying highspeed internet cable). Back then I was just a nerdling as opposed to the full blown nerd/geek/doofus/”appropriate sounding badge of honor/shame” that I am now. I had no comic book shop. And only an antennae. So the television high points of my week were when I could get Fox out of Omaha to come in so that I could see the occasion rerun of TNG, and Friday nights when Iowa Public Television would show old scifi programming from BBC (classic Doctor Who and Red Dwarf anyone?)
But the internet? BOOM! Instant community. And after a few circles around, I found a little website called “Axe’s Animorph fanpage.” Ok, actually that probably wasn’t the title. But it was a fanpage about the Animorphs started by a guy who used the handle of “Axe.” Now, TV show aside (which I still have yet to see and I’ve been told to avoid it). Animorphs was a fantastic series. To be honest, it wasn’t going to win any major literary prizes. But what do you expect from a monthly book series that was probably targeted at 10-15 year olds? It was a fun little series with a nice blend of teen drama and scifi, and at least during the time I was reading it took itself seriously. The villains weren’t too over the top, and the heroes didn’t’ always win, or when they did win it didn’t always seem like a victory. That might have changed after I stopped reading (lost my collection of the first 30 or so books in the housefire and after that, I lost the urge).
I go off an tangents and lose my point a lot.
Through Axe’s site and the related chatpage I formed friendships and acquaintances with other fellow fans of Applegate’s little series. First through the very shortlived screenname of “C1999” and then as Belgarion, a name I shamelessly steal from the Hero of David Edding’s fantasy series (the good one, as opposed to trilogies which just rip off all the elements of his quintologies). Most of these friendships lasted well into my college years when the inevitable things happen. We had fallings out. I honestly don’t know who’s fault it was. But I was particularly down at that point in life. And so I’m more than willing to accept the blame. Because I’ll lay good odds that it was my fault, or at least predominately mine. I was so obsessed with my apparent problems that I just ignored the possibility that maybe my friends where having problems too. So.. fallings out occurred.
And I’ve been thinking about one a lot lately. I’ve been trying to access my ICQ account since August or October for the first time in 4 years since that’s the chat program that most of them used to use. But I can’t remember my damned password and I can’t figure out what e-mail I used to set up the account.
I had another tool at my disposal, but I hadn’t wanted to feel like a cyberstalker, but after talking to my friend from Micro Sanctuary, I figured “screw it. I should at least try” So I googled. And low and behold, there was an LJ group for Axe’s Animorph Chat, and not only that, there was a post waiting there for me. It seems that at least as of September of last year she had been looking for me as well. So I sent her a line and spent a few hours impatiently waiting.
“C’mon, she was wanting to hear from you.”
“Yeah, but that was seven months ago. A lot can change in seven months.”
“Like what?”
“Well Gary Gygax and the creator of Howard the Duck can pass away for one thing.”
“That’s true, but…”
“Ok, how about this she could have decided that it was a crazy idea.”
“Hrmn.”
Imaginary conversations with one’s self are fun, in small doses.
Long story short, we’re talking again (On the chance that she reads this, “Hi Terasa!”) and I hope that things stay cool this go around. And I’ll have to figure out her schedule so I can adjust my sleep time accordingly. I have no social life outside of the internet and weekend D&D really. So I try to sleep/clean house when people are offline and plop my butt in the computer room when they’re on.
I won’t say we caught up because it’s been 4 or 5 years since the last time we talked, but we did talk and that was a start and I just couldn’t bring myself to leave. As a result I got only 2 hours of sleep before work last night. Not fun, but so worth it.
Anyway, I gotta get going, if Mozilla will let me post this instead of deleting it like last time.
Take care everyone.
-Shaun.
I’ve been thinking about the past a lot lately. I suck at keeping in touch with people. And so I’ve lost contact with a lot of people just because I hadn’t seen them in a while. This isn’t counting the number of people that have been driven off when my life/attitude/emotions took a downward spiral. Instead of trying to get better I spend/spent my days moping about not being better. And I’ve been thinking a lot about that. During that time I was a self-centered jerk. And I’m probably still self-centered, I just hope I’m less of a jerk. I’ll come back to this in a bit.
Most of you probably don’t know this, but since I took a near permanent hiatus on creative writing projects, the only thing vaguely creative that I’ve done in the last few years has been to create micros, also known as microheroes. They’re fun, and I’m just a frankensteiner, meaning I just cut apart bits of micros that other people have done and put ‘em together in new formations all the while trying to remember to credit the original artist. I do make a few of my own, but so far I have yet to make a 100% new outfit that every single pixel was put their by me.
I made several friends in the microhero community and I there are a few that although we had talked a lot, we lost contact. And I saw one online after nearly a year without seeing them more than once or twice and said “hi.” And we started talking again and it was a good time but weighed a little on my mind. There were other friends I’ve been a lot closer to that I hadn’t seen/talked with in longer. And what about them?
In 1996-1997, we got internet at home for the first time. Dial up, the same company we use now (Lord, please grant me the patience to not be irritated with GRM for not including us when they were laying highspeed internet cable). Back then I was just a nerdling as opposed to the full blown nerd/geek/doofus/”appropriate sounding badge of honor/shame” that I am now. I had no comic book shop. And only an antennae. So the television high points of my week were when I could get Fox out of Omaha to come in so that I could see the occasion rerun of TNG, and Friday nights when Iowa Public Television would show old scifi programming from BBC (classic Doctor Who and Red Dwarf anyone?)
But the internet? BOOM! Instant community. And after a few circles around, I found a little website called “Axe’s Animorph fanpage.” Ok, actually that probably wasn’t the title. But it was a fanpage about the Animorphs started by a guy who used the handle of “Axe.” Now, TV show aside (which I still have yet to see and I’ve been told to avoid it). Animorphs was a fantastic series. To be honest, it wasn’t going to win any major literary prizes. But what do you expect from a monthly book series that was probably targeted at 10-15 year olds? It was a fun little series with a nice blend of teen drama and scifi, and at least during the time I was reading it took itself seriously. The villains weren’t too over the top, and the heroes didn’t’ always win, or when they did win it didn’t always seem like a victory. That might have changed after I stopped reading (lost my collection of the first 30 or so books in the housefire and after that, I lost the urge).
I go off an tangents and lose my point a lot.
Through Axe’s site and the related chatpage I formed friendships and acquaintances with other fellow fans of Applegate’s little series. First through the very shortlived screenname of “C1999” and then as Belgarion, a name I shamelessly steal from the Hero of David Edding’s fantasy series (the good one, as opposed to trilogies which just rip off all the elements of his quintologies). Most of these friendships lasted well into my college years when the inevitable things happen. We had fallings out. I honestly don’t know who’s fault it was. But I was particularly down at that point in life. And so I’m more than willing to accept the blame. Because I’ll lay good odds that it was my fault, or at least predominately mine. I was so obsessed with my apparent problems that I just ignored the possibility that maybe my friends where having problems too. So.. fallings out occurred.
And I’ve been thinking about one a lot lately. I’ve been trying to access my ICQ account since August or October for the first time in 4 years since that’s the chat program that most of them used to use. But I can’t remember my damned password and I can’t figure out what e-mail I used to set up the account.
I had another tool at my disposal, but I hadn’t wanted to feel like a cyberstalker, but after talking to my friend from Micro Sanctuary, I figured “screw it. I should at least try” So I googled. And low and behold, there was an LJ group for Axe’s Animorph Chat, and not only that, there was a post waiting there for me. It seems that at least as of September of last year she had been looking for me as well. So I sent her a line and spent a few hours impatiently waiting.
“C’mon, she was wanting to hear from you.”
“Yeah, but that was seven months ago. A lot can change in seven months.”
“Like what?”
“Well Gary Gygax and the creator of Howard the Duck can pass away for one thing.”
“That’s true, but…”
“Ok, how about this she could have decided that it was a crazy idea.”
“Hrmn.”
Imaginary conversations with one’s self are fun, in small doses.
Long story short, we’re talking again (On the chance that she reads this, “Hi Terasa!”) and I hope that things stay cool this go around. And I’ll have to figure out her schedule so I can adjust my sleep time accordingly. I have no social life outside of the internet and weekend D&D really. So I try to sleep/clean house when people are offline and plop my butt in the computer room when they’re on.
I won’t say we caught up because it’s been 4 or 5 years since the last time we talked, but we did talk and that was a start and I just couldn’t bring myself to leave. As a result I got only 2 hours of sleep before work last night. Not fun, but so worth it.
Anyway, I gotta get going, if Mozilla will let me post this instead of deleting it like last time.
Take care everyone.
-Shaun.