Additional Chances

I was going through my GReader (soon to be RIP) and was reading Patrick Rothfuss' blog and his post on second chances inspired me to finally get something down.

But first, I should probably come to terms with the fact that this blog has disintegrated into a personal re-hashing space. I originally started it with the idea that it would provide useful commentary on the interesting things that I do and experience. And it still could be a sort of review spot, where I list all of the events, books, movies, and games that I've gone through, but since I have a bit of a completionist streak, I'd want EVERYTHING to be put down. I read six books on vacation last week, which is more than I've read in the last six months. I spent a lot of time in planes and a lot of time lounging by the pool/beach and I am so glad that I got a Paperwhite to make reading in the bright sun possible. I'm sure I could lump the book reviews into one post, and there are a few in there that are worth mentioning, but some of them were pretty lame.

Probably the one I liked the most was called To Have and To Code, which is a completely stupid title and had a somewhat confusing alt world where witches existed. And yes, it was a contemporary romance novel, but several times it hit me right in the feels. Which is probably why I continue reading them for fun.

Okay, back on topic. Originally, it seemed like a cop out to just write about personal stuff, especially since I don't go into specifics and use initials. It's like VagueBooking. But I've come to grips with the fact that this blog is mostly for me and always has been. I'm someone who doesn't usually think about things too deeply, but I'm a careful writer, in the sense that I re-read what I write, multiple times, and spend a lot of time thinking about what I actually want to say. So when something's been kicking around in my head with half formed opinions and ideas, the only way for me to muddle through it is to write it down, sentence by sentence, the way I used to write my school papers. Otherwise I just can't let go of it. It makes me feel better when it's been written down, documented, analyzed, and it feels final, something "physical" I can point people to. One of the reasons why I like having SOPs, I'm offloading my knowledge and never have to worry about forgetting some key step because I've written it down. Also, I love when someone asks me about a process or has a question and I can point them to a SOP I've written months and years ago. Now that's efficient.

But I haven't really openly advertized this blog. I somewhat recently went through and added it as a link to a few of my profiles, and while yes, I'm an attention whore and like compliments, it crosses some line for me to actively try to get people to read about what I'm thinking. But I would be the first to say that I love reading about other people's lives, especially those that I know. The little window to get inside their head is always interesting, which I guess, is a small part of the reason why I keep this online instead of offline.

My old blog from my college years was full of angst and lots and lots of posts on random stuff, I truly used that as more of a journal, since that was kind of back when Facebook was just starting up. Now I can document the funny or interesting things that happen to me on a daily basis in chunks, which pretty much just leaves this for introspection. I always think I'll go back some day and re-read posts from that era, but I tried that with a journal I kept in elementary/middle school and omg I just wanted to burn it. It was so embarrassing. I think luckily, since then, my writing has improved and I'm a lot less whiny and even more surprisingly, some of the things I've re-read I've been shocked that I actually wrote it. Which then begs the question, am I a worse writer now than I was back then? Has the creative and interesting writing been smothered by lack of writing/being too efficient? When I write creatively, I find I have to go back over and over again to fill in details and flesh out moments. Writing in a torrent has never been my style but I'm worried that I've forgotten how to make a piece of writing fun and interesting to read. Structured writing is clean and has its own style of beauty, but it's also not usually easy and fun to breeze through while on the beach. Anyway, the solution is probably just to write more creative pieces and then getting into that mindset of being loose and easy with my words will come more naturally.

Now, back to what I originally wanted to write this post about - having additional chances that I don't deserve. I find that recently I've been constantly trying to remind myself of how fortunate I am and imagining what my life looks like from an outside perspective. Some things just look better in print you know? But it's hard for it to sink in because it's not something that I feel in my heart, but that I know in my head. The one thing that I have been grateful for is additional chances. Times when I've been able try again and use the past mistakes to be better and do better instead of having them hold me back.

Adventures and vacations end. They must, and you know from the beginning that they will. It's easy to know in your head that there'll be other adventures and other vacations, but it's difficult to know in your heart that you'll ever feel the same thrill or sense of contentment that you have. I think that's what makes letting go and coming back to routine tough. No matter how many pictures you took, or souvenirs you acquired, you can never have that exact feeling. The memories are there, the impressions of how it felt, but the raw emotion...that is fleeting. All we can do is strive towards the next moment and savor each moment and the feelings it brings.

Or until technology catches up and we can have feelies.

How to Entice a Nerd

Having a nerdy boyfriend is becoming more popular these days and not just because of the potential financial gain, but because the nerd of this day and age is no longer merely a programmer, he is the handyman of all things computer-related and most importantly, can quickly self-educate on anything else you need. Most nerds are loyal but have issues with self-esteem and being social (think of it as a challenge).

Now, it is extremely easy to attract a nerd's interest, but to truly develop a lasting relationship, you need to do your homework. If this comes naturally to you, congrats! All you need to do is go out there and drop some references. If not, use the lists and suggestions below to find at least one or two nerdy things that you feel you can get into. Remember, it has to be genuine interest! Nerds are smart, they'll eventually see through you if you feign interest in a nerdy activity. For the good-looking ones, it'll be a big bonus if you are at least down-to-earth pretty. It's been my experience that most nerds like girls that don't spend an inordinate amount of time looking good every day (it also intimidates them). This means minimal to no makeup day-to-day, but feel free to glam up for special occasions.

Required Reading List:
Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (for extra credit, read the entire series)
Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
Recommended: Snowcrash, 1984, Dune, A Brave New World, The Name of the Wind, Harry Potter series

Required Watching List:
Star Wars (original)
At Least 5 episodes of Star Trek (The Next Generation version)
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (for extra credit, watch the other Monty Python offerings)
Office Space
Evangelion
Firefly TV series
2001: Space Odyssey
The Simpsons TV series
Recommended: Futurama TV series, South Park TV series, The 5th Element, Ghost Busters

Websites:
Slashdot - News
Digg - News
IGN - Gaming News
Wikipedia - Information about everything
xkcd - Comic
Penny Arcade - Gaming Comic
Homestar Runner - Animated Web Comic
Bonus: research Internet Memes, such as All Your Base Are Belong to Us

Basic Terminology:
Monitor - the screen that you are looking at. Is connected to the
Computer - the box that holds the various parts that allow you to do stuff, like access the
Internet - a network of cables throughout the world that allow your computer to be connected to servers and millions of other computers, not to be confused with
Internet Browsers - programs that display the content of the Internet such as Internet Explorer (IE), Mozilla Firefox, Opera, etc.
Motherboard - core piece of your computer that determines how much RAM your computer can handle and the other types of pieces that your computer can use.
Random Access Memory (RAM) - the part in your computer that controls how many items you can have open at a time and running. Not to be confused with
Hard Drive Space - what your computer uses to store files and programs.
Sound Card - is considered to be "on board" if the motherboard comes with one. Used to produce sound. Can be bought as a separate piece from the motherboard.
Video Card - same as sound card except for video/motion, especially important for computer games because their graphics are more intense.
Ping Time - the amount of time it takes your computer to access a game server or website.
Lag - used to describe what happens when you have a high ping time. For example, games tend to look like they're moving in slow motion and websites take a really long time to refresh.
Framerate - used in games to describe how quickly the screen refreshes. Measured in seconds, framerate per second or FPS, which is not to be confused with
First Person Shooter (FPS) - a genre of games where you are the person shooting things. Examples would be Halo, Quake, Doom, or HalfLife/CounterStrike.
Leet (written as 1337) - elite or cool.
Über - a german word meaning super or extreme.
Fail or Epic Fail - when you or someone has messed up.
w00t or woot - exclaimation of pride and accomplishment.
Pwn or Pwned - to win against someone or to say that someone has been beaten. For example, "I pwned you!" would be equivalent to saying "I beat you!".
Bonus:
Frag - to kill someone in a first person shooter game.
Modem - Short for modulator-demodulator. Enables a computer to transmit data over telephone or cable lines. Computer information is stored digitally but information sent over telephone lines is in the form of analog waves. A modem converts between these two forms.
Router - directs Internet information.

Games:
*Note* - Games can be pretty expensive and it is not necessary that you have actually played the game. An interest in playing a game is just as good and is a ready-made date idea. For any of the titles below, you can look up information from various websites (IGN).
Computer (also known as PC) games - Spore, Quake/Doom/Half-Life/CounterStrike, World of Warcraft (WoW), Diablo, StarCraft, Portal, Fallout, Might and Magic, Warhammer 40k Dawn of War
Console (an extra piece of equipment you need to buy to play the game) games - Halo, Gears of War, Guitar Hero, RockBand (extra credit if you can play the drums), Burnout, Final Fantasy
Different types of consoles:
XBox 360 - made by Microsoft
Wii - made by Nintendo
Playstation 3 (PS3) - made by Sony
Bonus: read up on Jack Thompson and listen to a few Jonathan Coltan's songs (Still Alive (though it's the end song to the game Portal), Code Monkey, Re: Your Brains).

Book Review - The Mystery Method: How to Get Beautiful Women Into Bed

Though this is definitely not a book to be taken word for word, and it definitely takes a lot of effort and talking A LOT, I would say most guys that are dating out there could learn something from this, if anything not to make stuff a big deal or to freak out over things like calling a girl and all those unspoken dating rules.

Basically, if you talk a lot, say interesting things, you can probably get most average girls. For the really beautiful ones, you have to employ a few tactics.

Honestly, I'm not sure what to think about Mystery himself or those that really put in the effort to become pickup artists. There's probably a point where they become interesting guys and not just sleazy liars that are playing you. It's fun for a girl not to have to make an effort in making the experience fun, just being there for a ride and having someone along that always has something to say, some fun story and knows what next fun place to be at. Even if he's always negging you, making you jump through hoops, conditionally testing you, or giving IODs so that you're strung along. I'm looking forward to reading this other book in the pickup artist world: The Game by Neil Strauss. Apparently, Mystery is one crazy mofo (I suppose this is probably unsurprising) and it's like a documentary of pickup artists and their lifestyles.

Mostly, I'm glad I'm not a guy and am not about to delve into trying to become good at picking up hot chicks. It sounds like a LOT of work, memorization, rejection, and feeling stupid and like a loser. Though if I was already a guy that was desperate and I actually saw some improvements, maybe it wouldn't be so crushing. And you have to talk ALL THE TIME. However, if I ever meet someone who is actually out there practicing opening sets and such, I'm not sure what I'd do, if I'd purposefully try to f-him-up or go along with it or tell him that I'm on to him and that he's gaming. So yeah, I really hope I meet a pickup artist in training someday because it would be supremely interesting to see one actually at work.