The Road to Madness
Is it cheating if I make a post today about events that happened yesterday? Perhaps not, so long as I do it consistently. I think I like writing in the morning more than the evening as well. My mind feels less worn, and for some reason I am more inclined to divulge events.
So my cousin Ryan came over early yesterday. I think he's a person that some of my friends have met, but only once. He's shorter than me by at least three to four inches, and if you thought I had any kind of complex because of being short, then you certainly have not met Ryan. He is vain, aggressive, and always putting down others around him or harassing them, especially my brother David. He bothers David into playing countless rounds of competitive video games until David's will to participate is exhausted, while yelling out taunts and jeers for the duration. In other words: he's a dick. Not long ago I was having a conversation with him about something trivial; apparently David had offended him by inserting his face into a video in which Ryan's face was substituted on some pink cutesy creature dancing around, and David implied Ryan was homosexual for it. I said to Ryan, "The thing I don't understand is why you even care" apparently he was offended by me saying this and said something to the notion of "Wow Dan, after all the times I listen to your issues and acknowledge them, you sure return the favor nicely by completely ignoring my feelings on things" He was mostly upset about being called gay.
Not a day later when he was in my bedroom he sees I have a lot of papers and photos spread out on my table. "Hey Dan, what's all this for?"
"That? It's for scrapping."
"Scrapping...as in scrap-booking? Wow, Dan. That's something only gay guys do"
So now I officially can't care less about any sufferings Ryan must endure at the hands of my brother. Ha!
So he's aggressive, vain, and a complete hypocrite. And this is just one example; I could come up with one for almost every time he opens his mouth each time he visits. I think there is a bit more I'd wish to say about Ryan, but I think that will come in due time.
We spent a fair amount of time in our day going to the mall, which was a mistake if a sorts.
Saturday...
at a mall...
on the day after Christmas.
Yeah, it was packed. There's something about large numbers and timing with things such as these that makes people lose a good portion of their rationality. I saw an entire intersection nearly blocked-off from people who were too impatient to wait for traffic and ended up stuck in the middle of the intersection. They would have continued their turn into the lot, but as soon as there was space the cars from an adjacent direction drove right through. Then those drivers became impacted when two lanes of traffic tried to merge into that single space which cut off the now isolated car. It was a veritable Christmas-clusterfuck. So I went all the way to the end of Arden Mall, by where the Men's Warehouse is, and came in through a small back entrance of a sorts. The intention was to go to Best Buy and get a new headset for my computer. The ones I (still) have now have a plastic frame which performs very poorly under fatigue conditions. I would always remove the headset with my left hand, and as such it would never be bent on the right, and be only slightly bent on the left when taking them off. But, you do a slight bend hundres of times...and after about 6 months, it split straight across the frame. It's duct-taped together now, but don't have anything to offer it support from bending out of shape giving them a sort of lopsided fit.
The ones I wanted to get have all metal frames, but unfortunately are only available to be ordered online. I didn't come home with my hands empty, however. We also stopped by Barnes & Noble, and it was here I decided I wished to take on some different things for the coming year. Most people who know me well are aware that I am not much of a reader. I mean, I read the newspaper, and scientific things, but not literature. And when I think of my lack of reading, I think of a quote:
"You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them" -Ray Bradbury
I'd like to think of myself as being somewhat cultured, but that is still only being half-assed about something. So I picked out three books for myself:
Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
Smoke and Mirrors by Neil Gaiman [book of short-stories]
The Road to Madness by H.P. Lovecraft [book of short stories]
I figure that I'd get a nice handful of short stories as a means of introducing myself to regular reading, as they'll be a bit easier for starting out with. I also talked with the employees of Barnes & Noble for any auhtors they could recommend, to which I now have these names: Brian Lumley, Philip K. Dick, and Jack Kerouac. I am of the distinct impression that my cousin Brian (another cousin, obviously) would have Kerouac's children if it could be done. So to this notion, my friends, if you have any books or authors you can name which have had some affect on you please tell me of it. I'd like to adopt having a broad range of reading once I start doing it regularly.
Back to the day at hand.
Once we got out of the mall, we came back home, and I played some more video games!
This time an adventure game by Lucas Arts, called "The Dig" It's not bad so far. There's never really any threats in the game, but I don't mind a pace that's different from the conditioning of point-and-shoot or command-and-conquer gaming.
And after The Dig, I played more X-Com. I enjoy that game a bit much.
So the plans for today? Probably reading, guitar practice, and maybe even some running.
No, definitely some running.
So my cousin Ryan came over early yesterday. I think he's a person that some of my friends have met, but only once. He's shorter than me by at least three to four inches, and if you thought I had any kind of complex because of being short, then you certainly have not met Ryan. He is vain, aggressive, and always putting down others around him or harassing them, especially my brother David. He bothers David into playing countless rounds of competitive video games until David's will to participate is exhausted, while yelling out taunts and jeers for the duration. In other words: he's a dick. Not long ago I was having a conversation with him about something trivial; apparently David had offended him by inserting his face into a video in which Ryan's face was substituted on some pink cutesy creature dancing around, and David implied Ryan was homosexual for it. I said to Ryan, "The thing I don't understand is why you even care" apparently he was offended by me saying this and said something to the notion of "Wow Dan, after all the times I listen to your issues and acknowledge them, you sure return the favor nicely by completely ignoring my feelings on things" He was mostly upset about being called gay.
Not a day later when he was in my bedroom he sees I have a lot of papers and photos spread out on my table. "Hey Dan, what's all this for?"
"That? It's for scrapping."
"Scrapping...as in scrap-booking? Wow, Dan. That's something only gay guys do"
So now I officially can't care less about any sufferings Ryan must endure at the hands of my brother. Ha!
So he's aggressive, vain, and a complete hypocrite. And this is just one example; I could come up with one for almost every time he opens his mouth each time he visits. I think there is a bit more I'd wish to say about Ryan, but I think that will come in due time.
We spent a fair amount of time in our day going to the mall, which was a mistake if a sorts.
Saturday...
at a mall...
on the day after Christmas.
Yeah, it was packed. There's something about large numbers and timing with things such as these that makes people lose a good portion of their rationality. I saw an entire intersection nearly blocked-off from people who were too impatient to wait for traffic and ended up stuck in the middle of the intersection. They would have continued their turn into the lot, but as soon as there was space the cars from an adjacent direction drove right through. Then those drivers became impacted when two lanes of traffic tried to merge into that single space which cut off the now isolated car. It was a veritable Christmas-clusterfuck. So I went all the way to the end of Arden Mall, by where the Men's Warehouse is, and came in through a small back entrance of a sorts. The intention was to go to Best Buy and get a new headset for my computer. The ones I (still) have now have a plastic frame which performs very poorly under fatigue conditions. I would always remove the headset with my left hand, and as such it would never be bent on the right, and be only slightly bent on the left when taking them off. But, you do a slight bend hundres of times...and after about 6 months, it split straight across the frame. It's duct-taped together now, but don't have anything to offer it support from bending out of shape giving them a sort of lopsided fit.
The ones I wanted to get have all metal frames, but unfortunately are only available to be ordered online. I didn't come home with my hands empty, however. We also stopped by Barnes & Noble, and it was here I decided I wished to take on some different things for the coming year. Most people who know me well are aware that I am not much of a reader. I mean, I read the newspaper, and scientific things, but not literature. And when I think of my lack of reading, I think of a quote:
"You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them" -Ray Bradbury
I'd like to think of myself as being somewhat cultured, but that is still only being half-assed about something. So I picked out three books for myself:
Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
Smoke and Mirrors by Neil Gaiman [book of short-stories]
The Road to Madness by H.P. Lovecraft [book of short stories]
I figure that I'd get a nice handful of short stories as a means of introducing myself to regular reading, as they'll be a bit easier for starting out with. I also talked with the employees of Barnes & Noble for any auhtors they could recommend, to which I now have these names: Brian Lumley, Philip K. Dick, and Jack Kerouac. I am of the distinct impression that my cousin Brian (another cousin, obviously) would have Kerouac's children if it could be done. So to this notion, my friends, if you have any books or authors you can name which have had some affect on you please tell me of it. I'd like to adopt having a broad range of reading once I start doing it regularly.
Back to the day at hand.
Once we got out of the mall, we came back home, and I played some more video games!
This time an adventure game by Lucas Arts, called "The Dig" It's not bad so far. There's never really any threats in the game, but I don't mind a pace that's different from the conditioning of point-and-shoot or command-and-conquer gaming.
And after The Dig, I played more X-Com. I enjoy that game a bit much.
So the plans for today? Probably reading, guitar practice, and maybe even some running.
No, definitely some running.