Musing

Escaping Through Video Games: No Man’s Survival Craft

Chris 2 Comments

I don’t know about you, but one of my favorite things about video games is their ability to take the player away from their present situation. Whether the player is avoiding eye contact on the bus via phone Tetris or Sudoku (my personal preferences) or trying to get away from a bad day by delving as deeply as possible into their favorite RPG (Skyrim), these games provide a quick escape from the primary world. For a lot of people, that’s all they really need: a break from the pressures of their life and the opportunity to put it all away for a little while.

I enjoy that kind of escape immensely, almost as much as I enjoy reading. However, when I’m at my most stressed, at my most worn, when my OCD and anxiety are at their worst, this level of escape either isn’t possible or only puts my problems off until I stop playing (and I can’t tell you the number of nights I’m played games or read books until I’m falling asleep in order to put off that moment when they all come rushing back). I always need something that takes it a step further, that provides something beyond just the escape of a different world.

For a long time, that something was Minecraft. I’ve been playing it since my sophomore year of college and I’ve probably logged more hours to it than every other game I’ve played since. It was a world that was constantly changing and improving, a world where I was in complete control of the world provided I placed enough torches out to prevent Creepers from spawning. I could imagine whatever I liked and, with enough work, the game would come to reflect it. I leveled mountains, built lakes, and created entire mine cart pathways that took more than 10 minutes to go from the central hub at any of the ends.

Unfortunately for me, the game has lost a lot of its appeal as it has added a lot of features and items to create an adventure mode. The more features they added to make it an adventure game (The End, XP, potions), the less interesting and fulfilling it became for me. Even the exploring and building aspects that I loved started to become boring and monotonous, good only for a couple of hours at a time before I lost interest.

Then along came ARK: Survival Evolved. This seemed like exactly what I had been looking for: a game focused on taming the environment and surviving the harsh realities of life on an island inhabited by dinosaurs. I can’t tell you how much fun it was for me to make a character with maximum movement speed whose whole purpose was to give me the ability to run up to a T-Rex, punch it in the butt, and run away before it could hit me. All while cackling like a madman, of course. Unfortunately, that quickly went the way of Minecraft as well. As soon as survival stopped being an issue, I lost interest. Leveling up became a necessary chore and finding enough resources to feed myself and my pets was simple. I tried to challenge myself with made up games and the idea of making a base my character could carry to the middle of the island and deploy, throwing myself into the most dangerous area in the game. Even that started to bore me when nothing even tried to attack my new base.

For a long time, I listlessly cycled through these two games, trying to recapture my earlier feeling of tranquility and happiness. Almost nine months passed before I found a glimmer of hope. One of my friends had called for all to board the hype train for a game that was set to come out the next week: No Man’s Sky.

Now, as anyone can tell you, the hype train and marketing team killed any chance No Man’s Sky had of being a success. They promised more than any game could hope to deliver and left an enormous and outraged fan-base with a game they hated. I, however, managed to avoid the hype train until the week before the game came out. Everything I read pointed toward simple resource gathering, space exploration, and the quiet wonder of finding something new on every planet.

Judged based on those scales, the game is amazing. I get to fly from world to world, collecting resources I can sell to purchase more hyperdrive fuel or to outright buy a better spaceship. I can spend time getting to know the language of the locals through exploring their planets and interacting with them, my status in their society changing based on how I interacted with the few people I ran into during my travels. Sure, a lot of the actual exploration parts can get a little monotonous, but there’s always a new cave to find, a new word to learn, or a new pillar of gold to mine. I’ve named a half a dozen star systems and about four times as many planets. I’ve left my mark on the universe of the game and have yet to find another player.

I am alone in the universe and, for the first time ever, that idea is uplifting. I have no demands but those of fueling my exosuit and my spaceship. I can go wherever I like, do whatever I like, and just enjoy the scenery. I am alone in the universe and I am fine with that.

I know a lot of people hate the game and I know a lot of people want them to add a story or features to make it more action oriented. I don’t. Sure, it’d be nice if the flying controls were better or if it was easier to fight off space pirates, but I’m fine with things the way they are right now. It is refreshing to play a game that is just so calm and relaxing. Even the soundtrack is relaxing.

If you like action games, if you want to go on a bad-ass adventure to save the universe, don’t buy No Man’s Sky. If you want to just wander around the universe just to see what’s going on someplace else, buy this game and let it take you to places you never expected. Let it take you away from everything you want to leave behind and escape into this nigh-limitless universe.

I’ve Always Enjoyed a Little Dungeon Play

Chris 2 Comments

In news that should be surprising to no one, I am a huge fan of Dungeons and Dragons. I prefer 3.5 since the rule system requires a bit of ingenuity to be pretty broken, but I’ll play Pathfinder if people prefer. I tend toward DMing even though I prefer to play, but that’s mostly because I’ve got so many stories to tell and I’m generally pretty clever at sneaky little plot details or creating a world that’s just fun to experience.

I tend to stick to one of those two things. For instance, in the campaign I’m running for my friends from college, I gave them a climbers kit in their second session that they were then able to use to nail vampires into their coffins two months (nine sessions) later. At the other end of things, I’ve created a world where magic is the dominant force in the world so flying ships are safer than ships on the sea. I mean, physics is completely disregarded so often that it stopped caring and, as such, buoyancy is hardly dependable. All the fish already started flying, so the mortal races took the hint and switched to air ships. Not to mention the king of the largest city (by election, of course) is done in my best “Elizabethan Rich/Noble Mother” impression. Think Mrs. Bennet from the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice and you’re pretty much there.

I like to play because it gives me a place to get a feel for some of the characters I’m writing. Sure, I could sit down and writer some stories about them, but that’s getting to know about them rather than getting to know them. Place them in situations for which they’re entirely unequipped or force them to make difficult decisions they’d never face in their world and you really get to know them beneath the surface.

There’s this old adage common to lots of religions that more or less amounts to the deity of choice not making one’s life more difficult than one could handle. When it comes to writing, that tends to be especially true. What kind of story would it be if they character just quit halfway through or died and everything just fell apart without them? I’m not talking Game of Thrones kinds of deaths either, deaths that serve the purpose of advancing a story or making a point, but deaths that are truly pointless. No one would read it. That’s exactly why I like to place my characters, especially the protagonists or the people who are the sole stars of stories, into D&D campaigns. They’re always in the wrong place and they can just die pointlessly if they make the wrong decisions.

One of the things I enjoy the most, either as a DM or as a player, is the cooperative story-telling you can get with a good DM and a good group of players. If everyone is focused, paying attention, and genuinely participating, you can wind up with a story none of you saw coming. The DM lays the groundwork, they provide the opportunity for stories to happen, and the players take the threads and weave a story with them. There will always be loose ends and there will always be missed opportunities, but a good DM can weave them into the story to create something ultimately fulfilling for all parties.

The best DMs I’ve ever had weren’t the ones who could paint pictures with words, nor where they ones who fulfilled their players’ every fantasy. The best DMs I’ve ever had, and that I try to model my own DMing after, are the ones who helped their players tell the story they wanted while still making it a mystery to them. My very first DM was one like this and he was the reason I kept playing and started DMing. I was very lucky.

My weekly D&D sessions, playing or running, are the highlights of my week. There’s nothing like getting together with a bunch of my friends and doing some interactive story telling.

How am I Supposed to be Optimistic About This?

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I spent Monday playing Overwatch today, enjoyed myself immensely, and wound up feeling like I wasted the day. It is always difficult to allow myself to have fun when I’ve got a lot of anxiety about my job, about my future, and about my life in general because I’m constantly sending myself on a guilt trip for not putting my time to what my asshole-side calls “good use.” Gaming? Not a good use of my time. Reading? Better, but still not a great use of my time. Watching a show I love? The worst possible use of my time.

I know this voice in my head is not the authority on what is actually a good use of my time and its sole job is to just make me as miserable as possible because it doesn’t think I deserve to be happy. Which is BS. I’m always telling people that they deserve to be happy. Most people do deserve to be happy, so long as their happiness isn’t contingent on the misery of others. So why would I be any different? I’m not a horrible person. I don’t kick puppies or drown kittens or anything like that. I may not be super fit or super attractive, but I’m good to people, I work hard, and I try to be empathetic. So why shouldn’t I be happy?

That seems to be the million dollar question, though. Part of my is convinced I don’t deserve to be happy and the rest of me seems to have had little success convincing myself otherwise. Which is why I’m trying to take a step back from everything and more consciously focus on how full of shit that little voice in my head is. I DO deserve to be happy. While spending a huge amount of time playing Overwatch didn’t do much to advance my goals or my passions, it was a hell of a lot of fun and I got to spend a bunch of time hanging out with some online friends.

Sure, I have to go back to work most days, where I have to deal with the difficulty of a new boss, the dumb expectations of corporate employment, and my nigh-constant money issues (even if I’m not constantly broke, I sure live like it so I can pay down my loans more quickly), but I know exactly what it is I need to do to succeed. I have a plan. I know the path forward. I just need to keep my eyes focused on each footstep forward and watch out for all the potholes.

I know the path to what I would consider success and I know that I can walk it. All I need to do is constantly remind myself that I know where each foot is going and that taking an evening to play video games is nothing but a small rest stop, perhaps a seat on a park bench at a conveniently scenic location, along my path.

It’s not a particularly nice thought or feeling, but it’s probably the best that I’ve got for now.

I Turned 25 the Other Day

Chris 3 Comments

You know, most of the crap I deal with on a day-to-day basis (both the crap that falls upon me as a worker/inhabitant of this world and the crap I heap upon myself because I can’t seem to just leave myself alone) really isn’t worth the effort of being upset about.

I get angry about it a lot and I can get really fired up from time to time, but I eventually settle down and get on with my life because it didn’t have much of an impact on the grand scheme of things. I also get really upset by it all the time. I try to avoid self-pity but it’s truly hard to avoid feeling like the world is out to get you when you’ve got a laundry list of unfortunate truths you have to deal with every day. Still, though, I’m only down for a while before I pull myself out and get on with my life.

I’m going to try skipping a few steps in these processes. I want to see if I can bypass getting bent out of shape over ultimately inconsequential stuff in order to keep myself focused on putting my energy where I feel it is important. Like writing. I haven’t been updating this blog much because I don’t have a lot to say and I’m often exhausted by the time I’m settling down for the evening. I also haven’t made much headway in any of my writing projects for the same reason. I spend all of my free time trying to recovered from just how whacked out I let myself get before correcting the course of my emotions.

It’s all very zen, really. Going to ignore all the pleasures and pains derive from this sort of emotional involvement in my life so that I can better focus my passion and interest toward what I feel is in the best interests of my future: paying off my student debt and writing my books. Since I started this on Thursday afternoon, I’ve noticed a marked decrease in the level of sheer rage I feel toward other drivers on the road, only truly feeling the need to swear at them or make obscene gestures when they cut me off in such a way that I’m forced to slam on the brakes to avoid rear-ending them.

I’m not really sure how well this is going to work, yet. I have a habit of coming up with these kinds of resolutions and abandoning them before too long. Not because they don’t work, but because I feel like I don’t need them anymore, that I’ve become so invested in whatever practice I picked up that it is second nature to me. Which it never is. If I could change myself that drastically in one or two months, I doubt I would still be as much of an anxious, stressed wreck as I still am most days.

It is supposed to help me focus on the good parts of the day and my life by not engaging the negative parts and by not engaging in self-destructive behaviors that feel good in the moment at the cost of feeling good later. I could really use something like this right now as I’m feeling rather self-conscious about my weight and I’ve had to face the fact that I might be spending more time paying off my student loans that I’d like, so its difficult to stay positive and working on my long-term goals when they feel so unachievable.

Well, I’m going to go play some Overwatch, finish washing my dishes, and eat some kind of dinner (definitely not in that order). And I’m going to let myself take a breath and calmly continue playing instead of yelling at my monitor that these silly little jackasses need to learn to function as a fucking unit and not just run around like they’re invincible so we can take the freaking objective instead of letting their dumbass snipers pick us off one-by-one for five minutes. The main point is that I’m TRYING. As are they. Hopefully, I can do better than they are.

This Sounds Kind of similar to Feng Shui, but it’s Really Basic Psychology

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What do you need to create a positive environment? I’m being specifically general here. Positive work environment at whatever job you hold, positive home environment, positive creative environment, etc. Seriously, Its super open-ended.

Mine tend to shift depending on which ones. For my creative environments, I like low light, no glare, some kind of music playing softly (though the music changes depending on what I’m doing), and something to drink. Usually water or tea are my beverages of choice, but I’ll drink anything but alcohol. Alcohol and I have some significant creative differences. I also need someplace away from movement and activity since I’m constantly distracted by anything moving. Like all the dogs from Up. Its horrible.

At work, my positive environment has a lot less to do with what’s around me and a lot more with what I’m doing. Sitting still too long bums me out, so I take walks around my building and drop by my coworkers’ offices to give them candy. I am known, and worshiped, as the Candy God by my peers. Mostly I like making people happy and you’d be surprised how much positive effect a bite-size Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup can have on Twenty-Somethings. Other than that, I like to change my office around fairly often, do lots of different work tasks, and get heard when I’ve got something to say.

Positive environments are important to me because I have a tendency toward dour outlooks, depression, and jaded negativity as a result of, well, mostly student debt. That’s the biggest cause. For pretty much everything that isn’t just super awesome in my life. Honestly, aside from that and its side effects, my life is pretty awesome. This is a rare moment of real appreciate, brought to you by the power of a positive environment and two hours of ass-kicking exercise.

Literally ass-kicking. Someone snuck up behind me at my foam fighting practice and was going to nudge me in the butt except I started backpedaling right into their foot. It was a cat-ASS-trophe.

This sort of environment something I’ve spent a lot of time and effort into learning to create. And to do without. As a writer who has a full-time job to pay my bills, I can’t really afford to spend all my time in this perfect little world. I can’t create this kind of environment on business trips. Hotels generally frown on burning candles and I’d hate to have to buy matches at every destination. I also tend to work late so I can’t always get my writing time in at home, sometimes its done sitting on one of the couches in a lounge somewhere or on a bit of shady grass.

That being said, it’s always so much easier to work when I’m at home. I’m more relaxed, better able to focus, and a lot more creative. I do my best work at home.

I think a lot of people underestimate the value of a positive environment. A lot of introverts have it pretty well-figured out since we need this sort of thing to really relax at all, but every can benefit from knowing what you need in order to do you best. Maybe its collaboration with a group of peers or the quiet of an office by yourself with signs warning people away. Maybe you need complete silence or maybe something rhythmic to keep your mind focused and sharp.

There’s nothing wrong with needing a specific setup to work. Knowing how you work best and doing what you can to create that sort of environment can not only help you excel, but it can help those around you and your relationships with them. The more relaxed you are, the easier it’ll be to interact with them. A lot of workplaces do studies on exactly this sort of thing, which is how we’ve gone from cubicles to the “open office” concept that removes privacy and gives everyone access to you at all times (can you tell I’m not a fan? Thank god I’ve got an office…).

What do you need? I’d love to hear about it.

Take a Chill Pill

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I have a hard time relaxing. I get the concept pretty well, but the actual execution often eludes me. You could ask any of the people I’m close to and they’d all tell you that I constantly complain about being tired and needing to relax. It is a constant state of being for me, one that I can’t seem to get a handle on despite my success managing most of my other issues.

Anxiety? Got a cure for that. OCD acting up? I got a remedy to take it down. Feeling super depressed? No worries, I got that covered! Feeling kind of tense of wound up? Well, shit, I suppose there’s video games? No, that’s not working… Books! Well, that didn’t work either, though I really should read more that author. How about taking a vacation? Shoot, I’m all out of ideas. And so on.

A lot of the suggestions for relaxing is finding something that frees your mind of your concerns and genuinely brings you joy. That eliminates meditation because, while pleasant, I wouldn’t really say that I enjoy it. Its more like medicine I don’t mind taking. Exercise is also very good for relaxing, but that tends to only work for physical relaxation and I get plenty of that. Hanging out with my close friends is also very rewarding, but it takes energy to do that, energy I need if I’m going to get through another tense, wound-up day.

I’ve had various things from time to time that help with the whole relaxation thing. At certain points in my life it was the relationships I had. Just spending time around a partner who expects nothing from you but is still a comfort to be around is one of the most relaxing things I’ve ever experienced. I’ve had a game or two I could play to really just cut loose and let everything slip away. Minecraft was that game for several years and Pokemon can be from time to time, though both tend to lose this ability if I play them much.

Dungeons and Dragons is also very relaxing. It is always fun to take leaving yourself behind for a bit more literally than usual. I enjoy role-playing immensely and love building worlds/situations for my players to work through. It has a level of freedom and independence that video games have yet to truly capture. The first virtual reality D&D campaigns with fully interactable environments are going to be freaking awesome.

The truth is that I’m not sure I really can relax. Hell, I worry about not being able to relax. How messed up is that? I can’t seem to relax so I’m getting more tense and stressed out, which is why I need to relax in the first place so I’m only needing to relax more as I worry about not being able to relax.

I even bought some of those relaxation/meditation candles to burn in the evenings when I’m trying to calm down and unwind before bed. All I’ve wound up getting is a rather pleasant smelling bedroom. Which, you know, is nice, but not exactly what I was going for. I’ve installed light alteration applications on all my electronic devices to test the hypothesis that all this blue light is making me tense. I’m only a week in, but I’m not seeing much change in terms of LESS stress and tension.

I have one hope right now. One potential chance at something that might relax me. A new game coming out this weekend is supposed to be super visually stunning, sound great, and just be a chill way to hang out and just BE. No Man’s Sky. Comes out sometime on the 12th. A lot of those playing it on the PS4 (release date was the 8th and 9th for two major markets), not to mention articles that interviewed developers and testers, all seem to indicate that this game is just that. No major multiplayer stuff, no need to interact with people unless I want to, and a glorious, vast universe to explore with no agenda other than to find what’s out there.

That would be amazing. I really hope this game is everything I’m expecting it to be. I could REALLY do with some R&R.

If you’d like a review of the game, check back on Saturday or Sunday. I promise I’ll tear myself away from it long enough to post my initial reactions to it no later than 24 hours after I start playing it.

Who Doesn’t Love a Bit of Political Discourse?

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As a citizen of the United States of America, I must admit that I am somewhat concerned by the state of things. As a citizen of Earth, I must admit to being downright terrified that it seems like everyone is having reactionary issues. None worry me more than the US political scene, though, given that I don’t really have much in the way of options should the worst come to pass.

There’s a lot wrong with the US’ political system. The people I spend most of my time with trust comedians more than newscasters, the older people I know tend to place the blame for all our collective problems on the young, and no one seems willing to do anything constructive about any of it. There’s lots of yelling, posturing, and pedantry. It gets tiring.

I tend more toward the moderate part of the spectrum. Not because of my personal beliefs, I’m very liberal in that regards. But I tend toward the moderate because positive change takes time and the only way forward is if we all work together. “A house divided cannot stand” and all those pithy quotes. In truth, my ideologies and beliefs can probably be best summed as “everyone has the right to do whatever they want so long as it does not infringe upon the rights of anyone else.” It’s the sort of nice simple statement that sounds so easy but truthfully is almost impossibly difficult to broadly apply. There’s a lot of errata that goes along with the statement to help it fit several of the more difficult situation.

Really, though, at the end of the day, I’m against polarization. “Them or us” is exactly the wrong kind of mentality. So many other political systems, each with their own flaws of course, get beyond that by actually representing the whole population, rather than just the largest group. To be honest, though, US voters are pretty lazy and that’s half the reason we have problems. That said, there’s a fair amount of disenfranchisement and ignorance playing a part in the lack of voter participation.

See, nothing is every simple, is it? Nothing every breaks down into nice simple statements that are correct or true. There’s either always some qualifiers or the statement is so long and winding that it makes almost no sense. US politics is always trying to paint issues as black and white when they’re often barely distinguishable shades of grey. Sure, there are two main sides to a lot of issues, but there’s so much shared ground in between that is ignored in favor of snappy one-liners and campaign slogans.

I’d really like to say more, but the entire thought-process is a freaking novel and I’ve got things that are much more fun to write. Let’s just say I’m really dissatisfied with the current system and have few options to make my displeasure known other than shouting into the void or voting in such a way that our reality becomes the worst possible reality. The Darkest Timeline, for you Community fans out there.

So, no matter what country you live in, don’t be a jackass! Prevent the Darkest Timeline! I, for one, know I can’t grow a full goatee to save my life. It’d be really awkward being in the Darkest Timeline without one.

Finally back after Suffering from Plumber’s Block

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I definitely suck at regular updates.

Now no one can say I didn’t warn them when I fall silent for a few weeks. I played a bunch of Pokemon Go until the 3-step bug made it impossible to find anything and then a lot of work-stress coupled with relief from a lot of different work stress has left me avoiding writing for a while. I’m working on getting back to it now (as you can plainly see), but I tend to wind up doing this a lot.

The first thing to go when I get stressed out or my depression starts acting up is my writing. The one thing I have that always grounds me, my most complete escape, my way to speaking out about what troubles me and I abandon it when I need it most. I want to be able to write because it is all those wonderful things for me, but it takes so much from me that I sometimes need to choose rest or not-writing instead. No matter what I want.

The first time I attended an event at which Patrick Rothfuss was appearing/answering questions, someone asked him about writer’s block. Patrick Rothfuss hemmed and hawed for a moment before saying that it was sort of ridiculous that writers have this condition unique to them that explains why some of us can’t seem to get anything written. He saw the somewhat negative reaction of the crowd and asked us to bear with him for a little bit while he explained what he meant.

He explained that, just like a plumber with a broken arm or the flu wouldn’t be expected to fix your plumbing, a writer shouldn’t expect themselves to write if they’re not feeling well. And that’s not just physical illness. He talked about mental illness and the impact it can have on a writer’s ability to work. Writer’s Block isn’t a diagnosable thing. We often use it to talk about times when we can’t write because of our mental health, but it is usually better to recognize what is actually in the way of us writing rather than blame it on something similar to the boogeyman. I often can’t write because of my depression and anxiety, so I own up to that, even if it is only to myself. That makes it a lot easier to get back to writing again since you know when you’re feeling better.

His thoughts about writer’s block really struck home for me and woke me from the sort of blind Hero Worship view I had of him. It made me really start to see him as a normal person. As a Human, rather than some object of worship or reverence. It was kind of like when you look at your parents and realize that they’re only humans as well. They’re not superheroes and to expect perfection from them is to deny them their humanity. To expect perfection from myself is to deny myself my humanity.

I wrote a poem on day when I was feeling a bit more cheerful and bit more blasé about the high expectations I have for myself. Like a lot of my poems, it started off with a bit of a random thought and ran from there.

 

If I were a god
I would be worshipped by frat boys and single mothers.
A god of beer drinking, simple living, and neat little recipes that your kids will love.

If I were a god,
I would be capricious and mighty but also incredibly lazy.
A god of harsh judgment and terrible wrath who just asks you to try to be better.

If I were a god,
I would stride the land cloaked in wind and thunder and rain.
A god of storms who brings nothing but rain on windows and thunder in the distance.

If I were a god,
I would grant my adherents visions of what might be.
I’d give my true believers the sight to see just what they could make of themselves.

If I were a god,
I would have the power to change the world to my liking.
I’d get so tired and angry with all the humans begging for help that I’d strike them down.

If I were a god,
I would encourage self-help and doing it yourself.
A god who helps those who help themselves and let the lazy stay in the dirt and dust.

If I were a god,
I would be most terrible and fearsome to behold.
I’d be the most beautiful entity in all of creation but far too bright to actually see.

If I were a god,
I would rid the world of evil and all that is wrong.
I’d strike down all of those who oppose me and bend the universe to my will.

If I were a god,
I would be an awful mess as you can clearly see.
I’d be breaking all my own rules and constantly at odds with myself.

If I were a god,
I wouldn’t be another human just trying to get by.
But that’s all I am so maybe I shouldn’t expect quite so much of me.

 

Silly and kinda peaceful, but with a bit of something to think about at the end. Exactly my preferred style. Definitely not my best work, but I’m not convinced I’ll ever be able to point to something and say “that’s my best work” so that phrase doesn’t really mean much. But it feels good, you know? To give myself permission to be just a little bit more human than usual.

But that’s why I tend to stop writing. Writing is hard. I have to spend a lot of time in my head and that’s not always such a great place to be. Gaming and reading get me out of my head and into something else. It’s a different kind of escape, specifically for when I need to escape me instead of the world. But now I’m ready to deal with me again so here I am. Updating my blog and working a daily writing session into my schedule.

Cut yourself some slack today. Just, you know, let it go for a bit and pick it up later.

 

Pokemon Go – The Latest in Fitness Apps

Chris 1 Comment

Apparently, all I need to do to make something I post or say wildly popular is mention Pokemon Go. I’ve been tracking the changes in my exercise habits since I started using the application and making a few remarks about it on Facebook. Each remark, and even the few tweets I made, have all been very popular (by my standards at least, since I generally don’t get more than handful of interactions on any kind of post). I almost want to see if I can start planting references to it that will tickle peoples’ subconscious like they do with subliminal advertising.

There’s definitely a lot of health benefits to it. I’ve started walking an average of 6 miles a day, been getting plenty of sunlight and bug bites, actually making use of my evenings for something more than watching TV or playing video games, and really started connecting with my area. I’ve explored parts of Madison I’d normally never visit and walked through neighborhoods I never even knew existed. I’m not even chasing a Pokemon all the time, either. A lot of the time, these past few days, I’m just going out to see what’s out there. Its like I’ve always wanted to do all this walking and exploring but I needed an excuse to do it. So now I have one.[

Pokemon Go is definitely a ton of fun, there’s no denying it. I’ve never been all that outgoing, but seeing a bunch of people walking around on their phones is like having a keyword search to identify the other nerds in my area. It’s the best. Its like, suddenly, everyone is just embracing their inner nerd or child and banding together to enjoy this magnificent application. I’ve met and partially befriended more strangers in this less than one week than in the past few months. I can’t imagine that my life will ever be the same. Never again. Heck, I doubt life as we know it will ever be the same again. This is the start. Going forward, this type of game and this integration of VR/AR is only going to get, obviously, more popular. There will be more games just like this one.

The community already forming up around this has so far been amazing. You meet people wandering through the woods and compare notes on which Pokemon you’re trying to catch, giving each other advice on which paths to take to find which Gyms or Pokestops, and while the competition for Gyms is definitely fierce, no one seems to get so into it that they’re being rude or lying to people on other teams.

I’ve managed to avoid spending any money so far, but part of me just wants to dump money into the application so that the creators, Niantic, can continue to do their amazing work (and, you know, add more servers so they’re not constantly going down).

If you like to meet new people, it seems like Pokemon Go is the way to do it. Just look for people with their phone constantly in their hand who randomly stop walking  for a few moments before continuing forward.

Happy Independence Day

Chris Leave a comment

I’ve always loved the idea of Independence Day. The entire world caught unprepared by the sudden and hostile invasion of an alien species who just completely kicks the world’s collective asses until the (of course) scrappy USA-based resistance force finds the weak spot and saves the world by valiantly sacrificing of itself in order to do so. US exceptionalism at its best. Such a great movie. In the few years I had the money and autonomy to do so before I left the state for college, I’d buy myself some Chicago deep dish pizza and watch it every 4th of July. It was my tradition that I’ve only had the opportunity to reproduce once in the 7 years since then.

This year, however, I was given the wonderful gift of celebrating US independence by watching the sequel. If you’re curious, it’s basically the same movie except the rest of the world is pretty much destroyed, the US government is killed, and the US exceptionalism is a bit more subtle. Just a bit. Oh, and they totally set the stage for more sequels. I’d kind of be okay with a few dozen of those movies, if I’m being honest. I’m not going to see them because I think they’re going to be wonderful examples of cinematography. I watch them because they’re decent action flicks with good pacing, funny bits, and not enough narcissism to take themselves seriously.

That last element is key. Not taking itself too seriously. I’m a big fan of that idea. I enjoy anything that can take a step back and laugh at itself. A lot of the better meta humor is a pretty good example of this. Shows like Community, comics like Order of the Stick, writers like Terry Pratchett. They’re all very good at poking fun at themselves.

I feel like any attempt to do that with a national US holiday is met with some resistance. There are the inevitable trolls of course, but a lot of people can’t seem to understand that making jokes about something isn’t necessarily disrespect. If you think about it, the general rule for humor is that it’s not considered bad taste to make fun of a particular group so long as you’re a part of that group. Since I’m a citizen of the USA, I should be able to make fun of my own country. People should just chuckle and crack a few jokes of their own. I’m pretty laid back as well, so I wouldn’t even care if citizens of other countries made a fun jokes as well. Humor unites us and all that.

Unfortunately, there is inevitably at least one person who just wants to rain on everyone’s parade because they think their country is the best and deserves nothing but “respect.” Otherwise known as unquestioning loyalty. I will admit to being inspired to write this post by the series of grumps I’ve seen across social media CAPS-LOCKing at people about being disrespectful.

Thanks to this holiday, though, they’re free to do as they wish and I’m not going to do more about it than make a rambling, critical blog post. That’s what today is about, you know. Independence. Freedom. Eagles, fireworks, and charred meats. Oily pasta salad and potato salad with enough mayonnaise and eggs in it to clog all the arteries of the original signers of the declaration of independence. Public intoxication and drunk driving. What a day.

As always, the biggest consolation is I can log off and go about my day without thinking about them or carrying their negativity with me. They, however, are stuck with their insipid self constantly.

One final thought before I go scare some pets and consume processed meat tubes: If you’re a member of the political tea party, can I call you a Tea Bag? I’d call you a wet blanket, but… Well, it’s not as funny.