The word of the week is relief.
March 12 - Wrist Ouchies!!
Well, this was a first for me: I hurt my wrists this weekend… using the PC and playing Xbox. Feels like someone's kneeling on the inside of both my arms; classic Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. I'll be seeing the doctor to confirm this week, but I'm doing what I need to to minimize my distress and long-term damage. Yes, I'll admit I'm worried and damn frustrated, as I have the TIME to write but as of today I can't due to the pain; twangy tendons do not a good typist make. If this is part of getting older, it sucks… and the irony of not being able to write when I have the time, as I've said, also sucks large.
Thankfully, I have technology at my disposal to help me along as I recover from my ironic irritation: voice recognition. Some time ago I purchased a program called Dragon Naturally Speaking, which allows fairly accurate and speedy speech recognition for most mundane tasks to do with text on your computer. Previous versions were fairly slow and inaccurate due to the slow computers that I was using on. My current setup is fairly speedy and seems to do the job, though I am finding I'm doing a lot of correcting as I have not used it in some time so it is overall much slower than it would be typing. But it spares my wrist. Also it is rather cool to be able to type with my voice and not have to take sips of coffee in between sentences; see the entry below!
March 13 - Nerds
Nerd or g33k? Seems in this Information Age, where gadgets are proliferating and tech has become mainstream, the Age of the Nerd has arrived. Which I'm somewhat hesitant to ascribe myself as part of, as there's still a stigma of sorts attached to being a nerd. Yet when I really think about it, what is a nerd except someone who is steeped in the wisdom and the knowledge of technology? I'll admit that being part of the mainstream is something that appeals to me, in that it's only doing what a lot of other people are doing and loving it's because tech is what I love. And there's a lot of history to being a nerd... ahem, g33k. Whatever.
Yet being a nerd doesn't exactly do wonders for your social life, though I'm finding more and more that it's not as much a matter of acceptance as of tacit indifference. Movies like Revenge Of The Nerds once showed a complete separation between those who steeped their lives in knowledge and trivia and those who simply got about living life while acknowledging their ignorance. Now after the dot-com boom and bust, we live in a world where technology follows us around in her pockets and often shapes the way we go about our daily tasks. Being part of the culture within a culture that helps define the culture as it develops is a very heady thought, don't you think? I like it.
March 14 - Finally EI!
After over a month of waiting( not the 28 days EI states... )the phone rang this morning: a woman on the other end wondered if I knew I had been approved for EI coverage? I said I didn't, she said I was. I said I was smiling like crazy, she said have a good day. And that was that. So I have coverage for the remainder of the year, thereabouts, for a comfortable amount similar to times when I wasn't working like a madman and becoming more like one each day. The EI means I can take the time I need to look for a job that will suit me, instead of one that will just hire me for a paycheque. And in the meantime, I can continue to pursue my dream of writing, chapter by chapter, with a lack of outside pressure - it's all on me now, to produce and perform, for me. Only.
March 12 - Wrist Ouchies!!
Well, this was a first for me: I hurt my wrists this weekend… using the PC and playing Xbox. Feels like someone's kneeling on the inside of both my arms; classic Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. I'll be seeing the doctor to confirm this week, but I'm doing what I need to to minimize my distress and long-term damage. Yes, I'll admit I'm worried and damn frustrated, as I have the TIME to write but as of today I can't due to the pain; twangy tendons do not a good typist make. If this is part of getting older, it sucks… and the irony of not being able to write when I have the time, as I've said, also sucks large.
Thankfully, I have technology at my disposal to help me along as I recover from my ironic irritation: voice recognition. Some time ago I purchased a program called Dragon Naturally Speaking, which allows fairly accurate and speedy speech recognition for most mundane tasks to do with text on your computer. Previous versions were fairly slow and inaccurate due to the slow computers that I was using on. My current setup is fairly speedy and seems to do the job, though I am finding I'm doing a lot of correcting as I have not used it in some time so it is overall much slower than it would be typing. But it spares my wrist. Also it is rather cool to be able to type with my voice and not have to take sips of coffee in between sentences; see the entry below!
March 13 - Nerds
Nerd or g33k? Seems in this Information Age, where gadgets are proliferating and tech has become mainstream, the Age of the Nerd has arrived. Which I'm somewhat hesitant to ascribe myself as part of, as there's still a stigma of sorts attached to being a nerd. Yet when I really think about it, what is a nerd except someone who is steeped in the wisdom and the knowledge of technology? I'll admit that being part of the mainstream is something that appeals to me, in that it's only doing what a lot of other people are doing and loving it's because tech is what I love. And there's a lot of history to being a nerd... ahem, g33k. Whatever.
Yet being a nerd doesn't exactly do wonders for your social life, though I'm finding more and more that it's not as much a matter of acceptance as of tacit indifference. Movies like Revenge Of The Nerds once showed a complete separation between those who steeped their lives in knowledge and trivia and those who simply got about living life while acknowledging their ignorance. Now after the dot-com boom and bust, we live in a world where technology follows us around in her pockets and often shapes the way we go about our daily tasks. Being part of the culture within a culture that helps define the culture as it develops is a very heady thought, don't you think? I like it.
March 14 - Finally EI!
After over a month of waiting( not the 28 days EI states... )the phone rang this morning: a woman on the other end wondered if I knew I had been approved for EI coverage? I said I didn't, she said I was. I said I was smiling like crazy, she said have a good day. And that was that. So I have coverage for the remainder of the year, thereabouts, for a comfortable amount similar to times when I wasn't working like a madman and becoming more like one each day. The EI means I can take the time I need to look for a job that will suit me, instead of one that will just hire me for a paycheque. And in the meantime, I can continue to pursue my dream of writing, chapter by chapter, with a lack of outside pressure - it's all on me now, to produce and perform, for me. Only.
March 15 - The Ides Of March
Today marks the day of the murder, more than two millennia ago: the death of Julius Caesar. This is referred to as the Ides of March, where famously Caesar was warned by a prophet that he would not live out the day. The fact that we remember this so long after the fact is somewhat staggering, as so much of history tends to focus on the violent rather than peaceful. Another good example is Guy Fawkes Day in Britain, which is a strange holiday in my eyes as it celebrates the almost-destruction of the UK Parliament by a liberal. Sometimes I wonder about our tendency for remembering things simply for remembrance and letting the context slide into obscurity; seems to be a failing of ours.
Today marks the day of the murder, more than two millennia ago: the death of Julius Caesar. This is referred to as the Ides of March, where famously Caesar was warned by a prophet that he would not live out the day. The fact that we remember this so long after the fact is somewhat staggering, as so much of history tends to focus on the violent rather than peaceful. Another good example is Guy Fawkes Day in Britain, which is a strange holiday in my eyes as it celebrates the almost-destruction of the UK Parliament by a liberal. Sometimes I wonder about our tendency for remembering things simply for remembrance and letting the context slide into obscurity; seems to be a failing of ours.
However, being famous does have its perks at least when it comes to famous persons of antiquity. Julius Caesar as much written about him when it comes to deeds done in tasks accomplished, both good and bad. I think I would rather be remembered if it came down to it the way that many of history's notable personalities have been: for what they accomplish rather than just what they were, as many of today's personalities seem to be instead. The old phrase "those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it" seems very apt in an age when nothing can be forgotten and much can be measured against the giants of the past.
March 16 - World Of Tanks
All right, I'll admit it: I love tanks! Ever since I was a little boy I love playing with model tanks, usually ones made out of metal so I could beat the crap out of them. The sense of invincibility that obtained gives to someone who commands it appeals greatly to me, though now as an adult I see that these metal dragons and the all too easily slain. Such seems to be the case with a new online game I am trying called World of Tanks which is a free to play MMO that anyone can jump in and try. Which I did, and I have to say it was fun for the first week or so, until I ran into the 'Dollar Wall', which happens with a lot of Free-To-Play games. You use up the initial credits and then have to enter into the 'grind' phase, where like every other MMO you 'kill rats' until you manage to accumulate enough gold to advance. In the case of World Of Tanks, I played with the scout tanks until I got tired of dying in EVERY battle… and had my eyes bug out when I calculated the cost of advancing if I 'bought' a few mid-range tanks. We're talking potentially hundreds of dollars here, for someone like me to go from 'newbie' to 'Wallet Warrior' via the magic of in-game purchases! It's no wonder that Free-To-Play games have taken off in popularity with publishers; they can make two or three times the retail price off their user-base and KEEP doing it as long as they control the release of new content that people can buy… to avoid killing rats. Smell a rat, do you?
March 17 - John Carter and Irish Fizzles
Today turned out to be spent mostly OUT of the house; I went out for breakfast and ended up getting back late in the afternoon, with a movie in between. That movie was John Carter( Of Mars )which I had the delight of seeing in IMAX 3D, which really brought me totally into the experience. I was completely absorbed in the film almost all the way through, as it was a grand spectacle along the lines of the greatest of adventure films. It was quite obvious that a lot of money had been spent on the special effects but they were done in such a way that they didn't draw attention to themselves, for the most part, throughout the movie. I'm disappointed that Disney didn't to the film justice by bungling the marketing, as you can tell by the lack of 'Mars' in the film's title - here's a few more reasons the film flopped at the box office. I hope it picks up in DVD sales for a sequel~!
March 16 - World Of Tanks
All right, I'll admit it: I love tanks! Ever since I was a little boy I love playing with model tanks, usually ones made out of metal so I could beat the crap out of them. The sense of invincibility that obtained gives to someone who commands it appeals greatly to me, though now as an adult I see that these metal dragons and the all too easily slain. Such seems to be the case with a new online game I am trying called World of Tanks which is a free to play MMO that anyone can jump in and try. Which I did, and I have to say it was fun for the first week or so, until I ran into the 'Dollar Wall', which happens with a lot of Free-To-Play games. You use up the initial credits and then have to enter into the 'grind' phase, where like every other MMO you 'kill rats' until you manage to accumulate enough gold to advance. In the case of World Of Tanks, I played with the scout tanks until I got tired of dying in EVERY battle… and had my eyes bug out when I calculated the cost of advancing if I 'bought' a few mid-range tanks. We're talking potentially hundreds of dollars here, for someone like me to go from 'newbie' to 'Wallet Warrior' via the magic of in-game purchases! It's no wonder that Free-To-Play games have taken off in popularity with publishers; they can make two or three times the retail price off their user-base and KEEP doing it as long as they control the release of new content that people can buy… to avoid killing rats. Smell a rat, do you?
March 17 - John Carter and Irish Fizzles
Today turned out to be spent mostly OUT of the house; I went out for breakfast and ended up getting back late in the afternoon, with a movie in between. That movie was John Carter( Of Mars )which I had the delight of seeing in IMAX 3D, which really brought me totally into the experience. I was completely absorbed in the film almost all the way through, as it was a grand spectacle along the lines of the greatest of adventure films. It was quite obvious that a lot of money had been spent on the special effects but they were done in such a way that they didn't draw attention to themselves, for the most part, throughout the movie. I'm disappointed that Disney didn't to the film justice by bungling the marketing, as you can tell by the lack of 'Mars' in the film's title - here's a few more reasons the film flopped at the box office. I hope it picks up in DVD sales for a sequel~!
Deserving special mention is the character of Dejah Thoris, whom I have to say is one of the strongest women in cinema history and before that science fiction in general. It is a great pity that her example of a strong, smart, capable woman did not carry far beyond the pages that Edgar Rice Burroughs wrote due to society's views of women at the time. Lynn Collins played the character of Dejah perfectly, embodying the warrior princess who was the equal of any man yet able to accept the help of a capable stranger when fate offered her the chance.
As it turns out, I stayed in for St. Patricks' Day; there's few people here that I hang out with and nobody extended an invitation for tonight - so it goes. Probably for the best, as there's NO bus service to the Mountain here and last time I checked wait times were around four hours for a cab. No thanks; I'll see what I can get up for for next year and see if I can make some new memories.
March 18 - Being Me. And Phil.
Those of you who know me know that I'm not a complicated person, yet I do have my layers. Lots of layers, I do a lot of thinking about a lot of things a lot of the time; my brain is constantly making connections here, there, everywhere. Lately I've been thinking about a lot of things to do with the future: where I am going to live, what I am going to do for a living, who I might be living with - if anyone. My current situation, one that I planned over a year ago to be in, amazingly has turned out to be pretty close to what I hoped for. Where I am right now in my life and be easily examined through the camera lens of one movie: Groundhog Day. Again, those of you who know me know that this is my favorite film for many reasons and I refer to it again today for one of the simpler ones: change. Bill Murray's character is offered a chance to discover and change the things about his life that he is lacking or doesn't like. Through self-discovery and difficult process, he is able to become a better man and see more of what life has to offer him.
March 18 - Being Me. And Phil.
Those of you who know me know that I'm not a complicated person, yet I do have my layers. Lots of layers, I do a lot of thinking about a lot of things a lot of the time; my brain is constantly making connections here, there, everywhere. Lately I've been thinking about a lot of things to do with the future: where I am going to live, what I am going to do for a living, who I might be living with - if anyone. My current situation, one that I planned over a year ago to be in, amazingly has turned out to be pretty close to what I hoped for. Where I am right now in my life and be easily examined through the camera lens of one movie: Groundhog Day. Again, those of you who know me know that this is my favorite film for many reasons and I refer to it again today for one of the simpler ones: change. Bill Murray's character is offered a chance to discover and change the things about his life that he is lacking or doesn't like. Through self-discovery and difficult process, he is able to become a better man and see more of what life has to offer him.
For myself, I am in that very same position now, minus the timewarp. I have placed myself where and when I need to be, so that I can work on discovering the better parts of myself. I have the time now for my writing, for my other searches, for my thinking and relaxing and all the things I have not allowed myself due to necessity or hardship or stress. Much like Phil in Groundhog Day, I have a lot to do to get ready for the coming Spring - I have seen my shadow and I am not afraid of it, as I know I have a lot of work to do.
It's been an interesting week, not being able to type or play video games... but good in that all the same. I've kept busy and with the stability that EI will provide, I can concentrate on doing what I want, what I need to do, for myself. Took me long enough to get here...
