The Last Great Forest

The modern office consists of a detestable maze of gray cubicles intertwined and intersected though out a room large enough to house 2 families of 5. Today, mainly due to a late night gaming binge, I leaned back into my chair closed my eyes and cleared all thought from my head. My advice to you would be to try this and prepare to be amazed at what you hear. The longer you keep your eyes closed and try to reach out with your hearing the more organic seeming the dark world will become. The soft blowing of the fan vents, the low pitched rumbling of the ventilation system, the slightly perceptible buzz of the fluorescent lighting and low moans of spoken phone conversation. Of course there are the millions of tiny clicks and chirps of keyboard and mouse combos. If almost for a moment you can picture yourself not in your office but in an alien environment an unknown forest, pure virgin and unspoiled perfectly attuned with the alien nature that thrive within it.

At that peak moment of personal insight my boss slammed down her ham sized fist onto my chair. I spun around to stare at her horse tooth grin as she cackled, “Sorry to bust up your nap but I need to know when that invoice will be going out.”

I burst into tears. Mumbling through a mucus filled nose and rash red eyes I croaked out something about getting back into my special forest.

After a second of pity followed by a second of disgust, the moment became awkward so she walked away. I love Fridays.

My kind of town

The Smoldering Ruins of Centralia

Don't pass the link above off as another random post about some new instance or zone in WoW. This is actually a true account of a city that litteraly had to be abandoned as it burned from the ground up. Well, something like that my summarization skills are not the most attuned at 9am.

Today is a terrible day to be working. For the first time in six months Chicago may be looking at a 70 degree day. Believe me I have already asked around for the availability of golf clubs. The warm weather reminds me that we are approaching the beggining of April. Everytime I think about how quickly the days,weeks, months are passing I get a sick feeling in my stomach. I had always enjoyed the idea of not being a spectator and always starring in the role of the lead in the movie titled "the Life of Brandon. " but I firmly believe the more involved you are the quicker time passes and the less opportunity you have to enjoy things. Yet, while some will stop and smell the roses I always thought that it would be cooler to be the guy that planted them. This rambling paragraph actually leads me to todays topic.

Being average

When you do a self review in life or at work, you list your categories assign your criteria and designate a scoring method. The typical response to a category tends to fall within the high to above average category. Bottom line: everyone typically will rate themselves above average, which in fact makes them average, and due to their averageness they have no easily acceptable method of criticing themselves as by rating themselves as average they admit to not having a complete mastery of the topic therefore the criteria established for themselves to score themselves in a defined category is limited. Run on sentences are a patented trademark of this blog.

Another mark on the board for Tyler Durden.

At this point the only method I can see that could be effective in combatting averageness is simply role modelling. As a youth my role models were drug addicted rockstars, well mission accomplished now can I please get those years back. Actually keep em I don't want them. Moving forward I believe that the secret to improving or making adjustments to your life revolves around the adaptation of the methods used by those who are succesful in that field.

Unfortunately this means that should I want to start working out regularly, I should befriend some meat head gym rat. Great I can just hear the conversations now.

B: Whats up man?

Roided Freak: Not much just doing reverse leg pulldown lat squats! Whats up with you?

B: Oh not much.....Hey remember that time you got so hopped up on roids that you had sex with the change dispenser on the Gatorade machine? Good times man good times.

Is no news good news?

Not always but lets just keep it on the down low.

Pic of the eclipse from space

Nintendo DS gets its own web browser

Gaming and astronomical phenominon.... What do these two things have in common you ask? The eclipse of the sun gives us gaming addicted nerds our first chance in a long time to step into the outdoors and not shriek as the sunlight pierces our cornea's and tans our corpse grey skin into a shade up from white. You roll +1 to vitamin A +27 to cancer cells.

Do you always laugh when someone tells you that what your doing at that exact moment will give cancer? You shouldn't cause it will. In fact you have cancer right now. My bet is that the final culprit will be revealed to be No. 2 pencils.

The opening 30 seconds of this clip is funnier than the last two paragraphs. Funny if you play Wow that is. Keep the speakers low theres some crass language.

Seven Career Killers

I read an interesting article out of Kiplingers. link

It is in regards to seven hard don’ts for a new grad’s starting career. Today we turn the microscope on myself in relation to these principles.

1. Procrastinating
1. Oh, man ghosts of college past seem to have put me into a seriously problematic habit. No I cannot cram and make magic. Seriously it shows when you have put something together in the business world.
2. Having a sense of entitlement
1. Man, it is hard to let go of pride. However the quicker you lose it I believe the more opportunities you will see.
3. Settling into your job description
1. This is not a problem, this is where you put your last pieces of entitlement. If you feel entitled to something more do not accept being something less.
4. Avoiding office politics
1. This is tough for me and my introverted leanings. Not something that comes easily for me. Typical relation question: How was your weekend? Honest response coming from me: Awesome I’ve almost achieved a reputation status of exalted with the Frostwolf clan!
5. Not being a team player
1. Today I saw my bosses boss doing faxes. Swallow that pride!
6. Not dressing the part
1. Thank God that I have the most uber-casual office environment ever, but a sharper form of dress definitely could go a long way to improving the impression that I make around the office.
7. Failing to network
1. Going golfing with a fellow grinder this Saturday. If I was smart I would invite the CEO. Maybe its time to get smart.

Forever Young

As I age I wonder why I still do some of the things I do. One of this is gaming. Without a shadow of doubt I have been for the lion share of my life a gamer. It’s fun to see the American culture slowly swinging a more open hand to those who choose to live their life digitally. For those of us who have always been there it feels like a movement that has been long overdue.

Gaming is a portal to the fulfillment of dreams. I admired Michael Jordan. I used to grab my nerf ball and run throughout the house cutting and slashing between invisible defenders. I would find my spot, jump to a height unblockable by midgets and children and perfectly throw a foam ball through a plastic and nylon net. Inside my head the crowd roared team mates gave high fives and cheerleaders wept with joy and lust.

Gaming allowed my to leave the imaginary world and have a visual representation of myself. In games I am the star, I make the plays, I call the shots. It’s escapism at it’s finest.

As I age I realize the dependency I have. My characters have the svelte and lean build of my high school years. In the game I am forever in that perfect shape. I become perfect balance of skill and polygonal immortality. I wonder every now and then how life would be if I had decided to be the star in my own life.

Or maybe I’m just depressed because it’s Monday. Game on!!!

Gaming Now and Then

AdSense, Learning, Pining

Adsense honestly made my day today. Before my application for Adsense was approved I had a nice little donate to charity ad sitting atop my postings. Today I get my application completion confirmation and lo and behold what is the first ad featured on this blog. Alchoholism treatment centers now available!! I may need to lighten up.

So we are going to adjust our learning goals into something more managable. To be honest the Pro Tools dreams are unecessary and the PHP/SQL while being a skill I would bennefit from picking up, just does not fit into my passions right now.

So were going to focus on three things.

Athletics
Vocal
French

And they will be focussed on in that order. Strangely this brings me back to square one from last week but such is the mystery of the dance.

Today I was pining for the lost days of communal living. I wise sage friend of mine reminded me that life only becomes mundane if you let it. I think he's right, and the sooner I can get over the past the better the future will be.

What I wouldnt do to have it stop snowing. You can see it in the faces of all the people around me. My fashionably pale skin is beggining to regress into a strange shade of blue making me resemble a bloated corpse. I look into the souless eyes of those around me and it seems that If we don't see the sun soon were burning this whole operation to the ground. Or maybe thats just whats going on inside my head. Happy Friday!!

Baseball is steroids

Sigh, just when I fall back in love with my childhood pastime. Up creeps the horned dragon of controversy and its lieutenant ogre shenanigans. Seriously in 20XX A.D. no one will remember our time for the greatness of the Chicago White Sox. No, it will be remembered as the dustup beginnings of the World Baseball Classic and the public outing of Major League Baseball’s courtship of athletes whom embraced steroids. I can’t stand it.

My personal opinion on how to right this wrong; Commish Selig gone, McGwire, Sosa, Bonds and any other guy who claims that they were around or that it is revealed that they were around steroids has there record wiped from the historic tomes of baseball. What is needed is to do the right thing and cleanse ourselves of these players. Black list them harder than Pete Rose, deny them entry to any ball parks, deny them any profit while using Baseball trademarks. Let the public know that these people are the last thing that we want as a representation of our sport.

Unfortunately, there is a lot of fond memories related to these players. I actually was sitting on a couch with my soon to be wife when a game came on. Mark McGwire stepped up to the plate. I turned to my future wife and said If he hits a home run we will be witnessing history. During that at bat McGwire did it, a looping shot that barely cleared the fence. Baseball has used these memories to generate a large sum of profit. When there’s profit to be made it’s hard to do the right thing. These sluggers rejuvenated the sport, rejuvenated fan interest and therefore rejuvenated revenues.

If your checking the score its zero to zero, there are no winners here.

On a totally unrelated note: Jeez theres alot of gaming goodness available this week. For the DS Metroid Prime Hunters is now available and on top of that Oblivion is now on shelves. Seriously between these two new additions, my WOW addiction, Animal Planet during lunch, and Madden 06 flare ups where will I find the time to eat. The answer is that I will discontinue eating for a time perhaps forevor. Ciggarettes and Multi-vitamins is the new hot diet.

****French Update*****

- Things are not going to smoothly.

****Athletics Update*****

- Got on the elliptical for a whole two minutes

****Vocal****

- I wonder how people react when they see a dapper young man with a business haircut and rockstar sunglasses singing at the top of his lungs in bumper to bumper traffic.

****PHP/SQL***

- Haven’t even tried. Think I will be setting new priorities this Friday.

****Pro Tools****

- Major set back as I have realized that I don’t have a spare rig available to run the program. This also may be dropped.

Clearly I am not having the most productive week. I am going to address my personal learning initiatives tomorrow. You know it’s personally frustrating to not be able to accomplish anything that takes me more than 30 seconds to do. Therefore we continue to smother our pain with laughter. Enjoy another video game related clip.

Video students are awesome

Having a quality the day. Work issues/projects moving at a stiff clip. Not much time to post so here is a moment of hilarity.

Reset

Some days you just wish you could regroup and get it together. Today would be a model day for a perhaps wristwatch activated day resetter (patent pending). Things just falling apart thank God work has been slow.

The more youthful me had a common strategy for dealing with days like this. In a single word summary the term would spell out, Avoidance. It was always easier on days like this to simply call it in. Regroup. Rethink. Slack off. Play some games. Nap in the middle of the day, not be able to sleep that night. Rinse and repeat for tomorrow as I will now be of heavy eyeballs and countenance.

The me approaching thirty has diverted his course and now we can reflect on what exactly caused todays events.

1. Yesterday I came home lazy and it will now cost me. I admit I am going through a bit of the depression stemming from a variety of useless topics.
2. Inaction created panic. This morning was a mess. Had to do something the second I woke that I had forgotten to do the previous day. This caused me to be late for work, plus now I have to act at %200 percent to compensate.
3. If I had not slacked today would have been a swim.

The heavy handed moral of the story is! You may mentally check out of the day, but that doesn’t mean the day quit as well. In fact, when you quit the day, the day will screw you just to let you know that it can’t be quit. The race is never over.

*****French update*****

I keep drifting into a Spanish accent. I’m more than ready to quit this whole interest. However I truly believe it’s a skill that is worth obtaining and fighting for. Ha, and were not even to day three yet!!

Straight Edge Kids, The French, Jogging

Why do straight edge kids look like heroin addicts? I'm not the guy who rips on emo kids as i have been known to don a angular haircut and struma guitar. However here we have a faction of kids who are saying that they are completely against non natural stimulants and depressors. However they look like the biggest drug addicts/people to avoid that could be imagined. Perception is everything kiddos. One of the hardest things to learn is even though you don't want to be judged you are. Even though you try not to judge you do. I look at you and I see myself 6 years ago and thats not a good thing. So you've decided to look like that and not have the wonderful side effects of addiction? I looked like shit cause I was shit. You choose to look that way. Screw fashion, you say? Yeah you're no sellout you and the millions of kids just like you screaming the same anthem.


So I sucked it up and picked up a French language curiculum. It's only day one and I enjoy the topic but i have to admit even the most masculine phrases still sound weak. I'll have updates later.

Weather is picking up and soon it will be time for joggin! Which i have never kept up since my junior year of college. But this year will be different oh yes youll see!

A final summarization of St. Patties day.... If i told you that drinking this liquid i have in this cup would make you so mad that you would be willing to fight a cop would you drink it? Seems like the answer was yes for the majority of those partaking. Seriously, if you can't handle something what makes you think that "this" is the night I don't end up in jail for a bar fight. I know, I know he was looking at ya funny. Yeah you should go beat his ass. I'll just be outside hailing a taxi and wondering why i didn't just pony up the dough to go to the "good" bar.

Tame the beast

Alchohol makes strange monkeys of us all, but some more than others. Just why is that? St. Pattys day ruled FYI.

School of the Self Taught – Part 1

Happy St. Drunken Irishmen day!! Typically when I willingly setup a weekend of drunken debauchery I counter my guilt with scheduling a new direction or focus for a month. Starting Monday I enter into a new game plan.

Since college is done I feel that I have dropped the lines of structured learning. Of course I have learned and grown from dealings within the business world, but when I was younger and a bit more idealistic I dreamed of a world where I could learn at my leisure and pursue my passions. College forces you to abide by a curriculum of required topics necessary to receive a certificate. I want to actively pursue the knowledge I have always wanted. Well the time is now:

Goal: Pursue Educational Passions

Time Frame: 6 weeks

Courses:

1. French
2. PHP programming
3. Fitness
4. Voice
5. Reason/Pro Tools

Estimated Costs:

1. Language Software/ Audio Cd - $100
2. Plenty of free info on web or torrent a book - unkown costs of hosting
3. If the sun comes up new running shoes - $100
4. Vocal Cd’s - $200
5. Already purchased hardware and software - $600 sunk costs

Week 1 goals

1. Learn 100 words/ and pronounce alphabet and numbers up to 100
2. Hello world website up and running
3. Work out 3 times/Duration 30 minutes minimum
4. 1 hr/ 4 times a week
5. Alternating drum beats segments w/time changes

Updates will be on each Friday.

Today I saw a cloud that looked like a Dragon. Then it ate my dog.

Today would be one of those days, where you have a limited number of items on your plate yet you have no drive to be the guy that gets everything done before lunch. Today is a day where I am looking for inspiration and don't give me any of that crap about family or responsibility or just doing it for yourself. Sometimes the idea of action creates the action of inaction. Frankly I would rather be somewhere else than work today. Maybe it's the type of day that 1.5 hour lunches were made for. Either way I should probably get cracking and this entry is simply one more distraction I put in the way.


I read an interesting article on the relationship between audio dynamics and cd sales.
http://www.cdmasteringservices.com/dynamicrange.htm
Unfortunately it's still to early in the day to give this article a good drubbing but here's a synopsis of my thoughts. It's true the digital sound recording has brought a new level of Uber-compression to music. Everyone wants the loudest mix possible. I am left to wonder how the final mixes of my upcoming album will shape up sonicly. Guess what, engineers are mixing this way to provide bright audio mixes on the doomed cultural outlet known as FM radio. Once we get digital audio integration fully into the homes, the mixes will be a little less cone rupturingly bright. As for a timeline see ya next decade when blogging is known as a gutter art form, and the new modern format known as hypno bloggin allows rss feeds to tap directly into your mind.

Ok that got a little random. Lets test the Boredom Meter and wrap this up since I have a conference call in 15 minutes. Boredome Meter Rating (1-100) ..........83!!!.......

Question of the day: If you are aware of the employee handbook but fail to sign the conduct agreement are you still liable for misdeeds? I've got no schemes in the works but it's an interesting thought.

Happy Thursday!!

Woz Raises $150 Million For, Well, Nobody Knows

Looking to capitalize on the Apple halo effect, three former company executives, including co-founder Steve Wozniak, took their new company, Acquicor Technology, public yesterday in an IPO raising $150 million.


Note to self. The power of perception. Work on portraying power worth 150 million with no product on the table. Investors are willing to invest in a name only. End Note.

For Research: Trademarking my last name?

Lunch Note: Avoid Arby's Chicken fingers

read more | digg story

Addiction

All or nothing. It would be nice if for once I would find myself addictive to a beneficial life activity. Athletics hold my interests at intervals as random as solar flares. I used to read rabidly but now in semi –monthly bursts. Proper diet is something I care about in 3 week spurts.

Drugs, ha! Now theres something that caught my fancy. Gaming Yes!! Now were talking a lifetime love affair. Now in there own sick and twisted way these two things have contributed into personal growth, but never in a direct impact way that the topics in the earlier paragraph could. So I wonder why? Why do the things that are less beneficial so darn fun? When does your break from the norm become your norm and therefore a chore or a monkey on the back.

I admit I am either obsessed with a topic or don’t care about it all. I think the real test of this blog thing is if I can keep it up for more than a month. Deep down I feel that despite the minimal posts these moments where I organize and pen my thoughts have helped me focus and capture moments, thoughts and feelings.

Drugs made me a waste of space. Thank God that habit was kicked. Gaming now seems to be my primary way to waste my time. Here is a list of things I want to do.

1. Exercise regularly
2. Learn a second and third language
3. Eat better
4. Quit Smoking
5. Visit Europe

Now lets outline how gaming is destroying these goals.

1. Why exercise when my virtual avatar can jog the miles for me. He is a bad ass who can hop is way around a cave for hours.

2. Learn a second language. Hell my guy already speaks orcish and tauren! I’m ahead of the game!

3. Eat better. No time for dinner, shoppin for groceries cuts into game time + food prep is never as quick as you think it is.

4. I smoke like a chimney when I play. Waiting in a queue is actually when it goes on. You feel like time is flying but when you’ve had 5 ciggarettes in an hour for 5 hours your lungs will let you know.

5. Well, the late nights certainly aren’t making me a beast at work. I love a challenge and fortunately my youthful body can take a pretty good pounding and still be fresh. However that won’t always be the case.

So now this is even worse. I am keenly aware of what this addiction is doing and I can’t give it up. Moderation, moderation, moderation!! Easy to preach hard to reach. If I knew the answers I probably wouldn’t be posting this. So I’ll just lay it out there and let it poke at my mind.

See ya in Tichondrius

Brandon

-LvL 60 Shaman
-LvL 34 Rogue
-LvL 11 Mage
-LvL 14 Warrior
-LvL 6 Druid
-LvL 16 Hunter

Something Fun

Battleon.com Since were on the topic here is a fun little time waster completely done in Flash.

Maybe Tyler Durden was right…

I like most mid twenties American youth seem to suffer the delusion of entitlement. I’m proud to say that I worked and worked and put myself through college, and now, I am left with the insatiable feeling that I am owed something for my efforts. Statistically only 25% of the American population has fulfilled their college education. So there seems to be a lot of frustration building in me as to where I should be in life. I feel that I have achieved and then over achieved in the fields of academia. Where is my exciting job? Where is my office with a window? Where is the German engineered luxury auto that I should be driving to and from one trendy urban hot spot to the next?

The horrible chasm of understanding seems to be plunging me into the realization that I am just meat, not the clothes I wear not the car I drive. My ugliness is not a reality, it is a comparison to a imaged male stereo type created by marketing firms.

Oh no jonny boy! That is loser talk you have to be all you can be! Race the dream!! Ten more minutes on your elliptical!

The question stems from my greatest fear. Failure. Who wants to be “that” guy? You all know him he’s the Jones that couldn’t keep up. The guy who missed the boat. The one with the shortest straw. The last guy on earth to realize the awesomeness of an Ipod. The words of the fictional character Tyler Durden ring true but if taken the wrong way they are just an excuse to half ass your way through life. Don’t judge me don’t compare me to what “society” deems correct.

As I progress in age I notice the rebel who died his hair silver and blues slowly fading. The new person emerging wants something more in life than to claim I didn’t sell out to a minority group of degenerates who themselves have sold out to a theory of anarchy or trendiness. Complete mass appeal can never achieved and I am doubting that I’ll ever find peace with myself so whos standards do I live by?

The condition I fight every day is to not live by is fear. The fear of failure causes one to hesitate, to not approach a situation rationally. You begin to approach life as a series of lined up tasks rather than pieces of a puzzle that are meant to be put together.

So any tips on combating this plague dear non existent readers?

Something Fun

Looking for something to read? How about some free books available online.

http://www.blackmask.com/

Respect the old Italian

Granpas b-day today and it was good to see those you leave behind. Circle of life and all that but I envy the young ones storming around, breaking dishes and touching nerves. Blind parents smile and laugh at the shenanigans while an elitist twenty something like myself looks on in disgust. Happy Birth day Grandpa!

The world give you a kick in the back

Ugh, car drops dead. Hundreds lost in repairs. Had a nice little article all mapped out but today is a day to lement and let go. Word to the wise cars need gas to go.

A catalog of the end of my youth

I'm not going to lie to you and say that I have had a bad life. In fact at times I have walked among the charmed. This blog is my account of my fall from grace. Scratching and clawing I fight to delay the shedding of my skin. The epedermis of youth and emerge from lifes cocoon as a 30 year old moth.

Lets not pretend that age does not bring it's bennefits. However I and many like "I" will declare the generality that few of us ever hear the word "I wish I was older". The irony of life is that we spend the first 18 years of our life saying this very thing and then get our wish for a wonderous 7 years of sex drugs rock and roll, perhaps college, and perhaps meaningful work.

Now it hits me at age 25, I will soon be 30 years old. I'm college educated but can't seem to escape the service industry. My hairline receeding. My stomach exceeding, Ive got a bad feeling about the backend of this decade. This writing is my therapy. That moment of solitude in a cubicle where you only hear your name if someone is unhappy with you.

Topic for next post: Fear

Something Fun:

I've been using this program for a while and its a great way to add to the Ipod Library. Occasionally a song gets ruined by station breaks and what not but overall you have the opportunity to pick up a good range of music on the super cheap:

www.stationripper.com/