amazingadrian

( Observations and windbagging inside )


Basically I could sum up this post by saying "So far so good. Still got insecurities, still don't know what the future holds, though the entire framework the future was set in seems to have changed somehow; like some rules somewhere that used to be set in stone have been misplaced or altered. New Normal ahead. Still recovering."

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Recent years have seen some pretty major disappointments come out of the gaming sector, one of the most visible being the controversy surrounding the end to Mass Effect 3. Interestingly, now more than ever before gamers are raising their voices about their grievances and they are actually making themselves heard; BioWare recently released appending DLC that provides an alternate ending to the game. However, some would say this is indicative of another issue facing the state of gaming; that of consumer entitlement. Do you think this is an issue? I suggest you read the article, it's a good read.

We've sent some probes to Mars before and what they found was a whole lot of nothing....Or did they? According to some new research that applies mathematical algorithms to conditions in Martian soil, some scientists are saying Viking rovers found life on Mars in 1976.

Speaking as someone who's lifelong pipe dream has been to be a superhero, I must say that the ideas of superpowers are pretty cool; but everyone knows by now that such super abilities aren't ever going to be seen in real life...right? Well....there are actually a few examples of some neat 'super powers' that have been made to work in the real world.

On May 3rd, I went in for Cochlear Implant surgery and had one installed in my right ear. Everyone I talked to felt it was the right course of action, except for me, right up until the end. However, the alternative, the healing ministry that I was considering going to...Well, I was lead to a place of enlightenment about that by reading the following three articles.

http://bible.org/article/review-more-excellent-way-henry-wright#P57_14625

http://wrightiswrong.wordpress.com/2009/08/27/hello-world/

http://cicministry.org/commentary/issue68.pdf

All this time I feel now that God was showing me these things to get me to trust Him in doing this work in my life. It came down to a point where I could only have afforded to do one thing, and I realized with the help of these articles that I didn't need to pay a man $500+ to ask God for healing. Looking back at it now, the whole thing seems rather presumptuous; that he seems to indicate that he knows more than the general church; like he's the only one that can lead you to healing...You can ask God to heal you as much as you want, but if He's going to do it, he's going to do it in His way; and I've seen some very strong evidence that He uses doctors to heal just as well as instant miracles. Maybe Pastor Wright is correct in some of his discoveries. I feel that he very well may be, but the form his ministry has taken doesn't seem right. Plus the guy had a heart attack recently which means that he isn't practicing what he preaches! I'm glad he recovered and all, but needing an emergency double-bypass surgery is pretty far from "100% disease eradication", and if he's promising this is what God offers for us today you would think that he'd be a model of it.

Regarding my surgery...It was a difficult process to go through. I was anesthetized, so I experienced nothing...but the recovery has been long and difficult. My right ear is now dead; even the tinnitus I've dealt with all my life is much reduced. When I first came to after the surgery I heard sounds like a train full of crickets rushing past, but that's not happening any more. My head was wrapped in a huge bandage. It felt...really sore and was mostly numb for many days. Felt strange sensations in my jaws and teeth and my sense of taste was lost on that side of my tongue. The pain actually was pretty tolerable up until yesterday when it got to a point where I couldn't stand it for a moment.

Today things are much better. I can still feel this thing inside my head, but it does not hurt as much. The bandage is gone now and I even have feeling in my ear again. Some of my sense of taste has returned as well; I've been practicing with different flavored candies such as shock tarts and gummy bears, and with a bit of time and concentration I'm getting good results. Did this at the Avengers, which I decided to see in spite of having one ear now, and when the movie let out I was able to taste a free sample of apple juice at Wal-Mart..so I'm making progress there. Solid foods are still giving me a problem, especially meats and breads, but I'm going to continue practicing and try not to think too much about it; I'm sure it'll come back to me without my really noticing.

Today I am going to try going back to work. I have my doctor's orders regarding restrictions; I think I can manage this. Right now it's just steady going for a while as I recover. In a months time the doctors will activate the implant and I will be able to start using it for hearing. I am told that things will not sound natural at first, but in time it will normalize. They think I have a good chance with it since I came into the surgery already being able to hear; my brain knows what things are supposed to sound like, so it will interpret signals from the implant easier once it gets used to it. Really I'm just waiting for the feeling of having this in my head to normalize. I need that to happen first.

Things are going to be different now. I trusted God in doing this; I'm giving it an honest shot.

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Experts suggest that mounting damage to the world's oceans could end up costing us $2 Trillion a year to recover from/maintain our current lifestyles. This isn't something you see Congress factoring into their budget now, but if they continue to do nothing about it, it will be.

Here's a look at some of the manliest homes in America. Guys can be pretty great homemakers too, y'know!

A Time Capsule from 1912 was opened by General Electric officials in Cleveland to commemorate the 100th anniversary of their industrial park. Among the usual photographs and newspaper clippings, some original lightbulbs from the era were included, some of which were discovered to still work!

This has been one hell of a year already, and it is only the end of March.

In mid January my hearing changed. Following a pattern that has been ongoing since (at least) the last two years of college, it got worse over the winter, but the difference this time is that it got worse than it's ever been before. I went to the audiologist to make sure my ears weren't blocked or that my new hearing aids weren't broken and neither of these were the case. An audiological test revealed that I had actually gone deaf in that ear, with 0% speech recognition.

I decided this was the time then, to pursue my last resort options, starting with the one that isn't completely science fiction or fantasy; the cochlear implant.

I determined that if the Implants didn't work for me or if I wasn't satisfied with the quality of sound they gave me then I wasn't interested in continuing to live my life. Shortly after I made this determination, I discovered a book written on spiritual healing by a pastor who had discovered why today's church was unable to heal the masses. Finding truth and scriptural accuracy in this book, I took it as a sign that God could heal me and I made a pact with Him that I would do everything within my power to sanctify myself so that He would. My hearing loss does not fit in any of the book's descriptions of spiritually rooted diseases, but I believe that if I am sincere about myself it can be fixed by a creative miracle, assuming I'm worthy. I don't know if I am.

I did a complete 180 in some areas of my life. I cut back on interaction with some of my friends, I got rid of things I had previously been collecting, I found I had lost some of the respect I had for hard metal music...I debated leaving the furry fandom and quitting roleplaying entirely and even abstaining from video games to try some other hobby. I don't know what God wants from me in this area or if it counts toward the area of scripture that tells you to guard your thoughts. I suspect this may be what is preventing God from meeting me in my time of crisis.

While trying to change my life I developed symptoms similar to those of a panic attack while at work, and came to realize that I was accusing myself before God, something that the book warns not to do. So I got rid of the self guilt and accusation that had been ruling my life and developed a newfound sense of confidence. Also some of my hearing returned!

Today I went in for an appointment to have an evaluation for the cochlear implants. After a very thorough and intensive audiological test, the results came back to show that my formerly deaf ear had returned to hearing that was -better- than what I had in my other ear...but was still poor enough to make me a candidate for the Implants. The doctors now want to put the implant in my poorer ear, the one that ironically, was not the one to suddenly decline to 0%. The doctors also advanced the time scale (ironically, at my request. I was trying to have the implant in and activated before Bronycon, but that was back when I was still essentially deaf in that one ear) so now I'm not sure if I'll be giving God an adequate chance to heal me before turning to man for help ( something the book also warns against).

I'm so conflicted and confused. Both my mortal life and my spiritual life seem to hang in the balance. I don't think I could be satisfied living into my old age without music. I'm only 30, and I need to talk to people. I've already gotten over the idea that cochlear implants will be seen as disfiguring features to some prospective mates; another area of my life in which I was being ruled by negative self-evaluation. I don't need anyone in my life to feel happy as long as I have all the great friends I've made online, who will stick by me even if I go completely deaf.

But then I think about the implications, what my life would be like if something were to go wrong, and I hesitate. I don't think I'd be able to tolerate it for the rest of my life, and I'd rather guzzle pills and end it quickly than possibly get to a point where I psychologically snap and take my frustrations out on others.

So that's where I stand, and I don't know what to do! To complicate matters, recent deaths in the furry fandom have lead me to renew efforts to find a significant other, and to my surprise I'm actually getting bites this time! But even though I shouldn't be, I'm kind of afraid to tell them about my problems, since they're kind of deal breakers between "Let's find out more about you" and "Let's just be friends."

I'm...I'm going crazy, aren't I? So this is what going mad feels like...

Article's source is here. I didn't write this.

( We, the people of the United States, have a duty to ourselves and future generations of Americans to oppose government censorship of any kind. )

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Now playing: Zoo - Manhid
http://foxytunes.com/artist/zoo/track/manhid

There's something strangely creepy about early photographs sometimes. But usually they aren't this creepy...

A documentary was made recently to chronicle a day of Life on Earth. The feature-length film was composed of footage sent in by everyday people from around the globe, and is available in it's entirety for free viewing on Youtube, the website that made it possible. If you'd like to see more amazing things like this come out of the Internet please write your congressmen about opposing the bills spoken about in the article above.

In today's global market it seems you can get all kinds of food; Mexican, Japanese, Chinese, Thai, Greek...surely the Americas are diverse when it comes to cousine. But beleive it or not, there are some things that just aren't offered in the United States, even at restaurants that originate in America. Some of these look sooo delicious too...

I suppose I should update with what's been going on in my personal life more often. My whims on the Internet tend to shift with certain changes...like my reading a front page article in the life section of a major American newspaper saying that Facebook was tracking it's users in a manner which I found to be a serious invasion of privacy...so I'll probably be posting here more often again.

I had a terrible Halloween, an average to mediocre Thanksgiving, and a decent birthday. Around Halloween I began running into problems of poor luck and circumstances that caused me to be within a hair's length of losing my job. It was a difficult time to go through; but I've been having this happen at around the same time every year now, for at least two years. Next year I plan to schedule vacation around the holiday. Anyways, one good thing about the experience was that I realized that this is where I need to be. I don't have any other options if I lose my job right now, so I might as well make this into my career. I'm getting paid more than I ever have, I've got the benefits that I've needed...Even though it's just a warehouse job, It doesn't make sense to approach this work as a bridge job when I have nothing to reach for on the other side of that bridge. So I'm going to see how far I can get by staying here.

Thanksgiving was ok. Work pushed us hard on Black Friday; put in a 14 hour shift (usual maximum is 12). I ended up not getting home until 1 pm because I had wanted to get a television on discount. I got a new HD flatscreen to replace my last generation box tv...Now that I finally have a HD cable the difference is astounding! I never really put much stock into HD before, but I can definitely tell the difference now that I've experienced the upgrade personally. Image quality is so much better.

Birthday was good. Just the typical stay-at-home thing, though I did treat myself to some Pizza from Mellow Mushroom, which is one of my favorite Pizza places. Got the Mega Man Zero collection (Nintendo DS) and Monster Hunter Tri (Wii). I haven't tried the Wii game yet, since I need to reset my motion sensor after getting a new tv. I'll get around to it this weekend mayhaps. Been working on some of my X-Box 360 games recently. I should really get back into the habit of writing my reviews, but it's hard to find the time any more, much less stay topical.

So there's your update! I'll post with more stuff soon.

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Now playing: Ralph Saenz - Be Good To Yourself
http://foxytunes.com/artist/ralph+saenz/track/be+good+to+yourself

Old news but awesome. Nike made Marty McFly's 2015 sneakers earlier this year, putting out an auction-only limited run of the famous power-laces shoe! Of course, we don't quite have the technology yet to be on par with the shoes in the film, but these are still really neat replicas of the authentic custom props. And hey, there's always next year to get down that power-laces thing. ;)

College Conspiracy: Is college just a scam? This little documentary raises some excellent questions on how the college institution is run here in America, and it reflects many of my feelings, having experienced learning at the community college level.

Hilariously interesting. Apparently former Libyan dictator Ghadaffi's death was accurately predicted by an 80's sitcom.

They really let the cat out of the bag this time. It seems for the past 20 years we've been being poisoned by arsenic and lead, and have been likewise poisoning our children. Note to Republicans: This is why environmental issues are important.

I'll just copy/paste a few selections from the full article, which can be found here.

( Arsenic in fruit juice, baby food, rice, and more )

So there you have it. Doctors and scientists have been saying for a while that the rate of childhood diseases and chronic adult diseases like diabetes has been skyrocketing in the United States, and that the current generation could be the first in quite a while to have a shorter average lifespan than their parents. Now we know why. It's because we've been ingesting arsenic since we were able to eat. Thanks, corporate farms!

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Now playing: Journey - Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)
http://foxytunes.com/artist/journey/track/separate+ways+(worlds+apart)

Old news by now, but a big one. Cern, the laboratory that runs the Large Hadron Collider, became the first people to break the speed of light.

Full Scale functioning Tron Lightcycle!

10 Epic gaming glitches. My favorite is the swing o' doom.

I've been doing well lately. Still plugging away at work. I paid off my hearing aid bill, so got that knocked out of the way. Dwindling down my personal expenses to a possible pair of concerts while I work on knocking out the rest of my bills so I can focus on buying a home.

The first concert is this weekend. Journey, Forienger, and Night Ranger will be playing in Atlanta. It will be my third time seeing Journey, though my first since they got Arnel Pineda as thier lead singer. Should be fun! I've never seen either of the other bands before but I jumped at the chance to see Foreigner, another band that I like. Night Ranger should be good too but I haven't heard much of thier stuff. I just know that Jack Blades wrote a lot of hits for other bands.

A few months earlier I attempted to see the Journey Tribute band Frontiers. They were supposed to have been playing in Augusta, a city in Georgia 88 miles away from me (a 2 hour drive). I went all the way up there only to discover that the venue was closed. There was a used bookstore in the area so I poked around in there and bought a Genesis and Nightwish album (which turned out to be dirty, and won't play). At go-time the venue was still closed, so I drove back to go to work; I was able to salvage the vacation day I had taken by flexing back on the clock, as I was only an hour late. I've decided from this experience not to see any club-playing bands unless if they are performing in my city.

The second concert I'm looking at is Dream Theater in October. The meet & greet is nicely priced, but I dunno if I want to spring for it. Autographs would be cool...I still want to see them perform though.

Not much else going on really. PR's fallen apart for real now so my weekends have been more open than usual. I've also been putting in more hours at work lately; we've fallen behind at around the same time we were dealing with an insane amount of volume. Some of the jobs the various departments have been needing to do have been neglected because of it, so it's pretty bad...but we're starting to calm down now. Had a bunch of new hires. I've still been good with sleep; no problems. I've been drinking those relaxant drinks less but have taken to energy drinks again, as I sometimes am really sluggish upon waking. Mom keeps saying I need to cut them out of my diet since family has a sudden "history" of heart disease. I can't tell if she's just paranoid or what but she's been going off on my energy drinks for a while. I know they aren't particularly healthy to rely on but the good thing is that I haven't been needing to rely on them as much as I used to.  Coffee is supposed to be healthier for the same kick of energy but I still can't bring myself to drink the stuff. Had a can of energy coffee by accident and it actually made me retch.

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The epic battle between pop tart cat and waffle cat, NES style.

At first glance these criminals and their crimes appear to be incredibly stupid but on closer observation they were secretly brilliant.

Also, Guess who turned 30 this month?

What I really need to do is stop worrying about my future and have more confidence in myself and my ability to command my own destiny (or at least give things little shoves in the direction I want them to go).  There are indeed things I could to that would make my life goals much more attainable (yes, all of them).

It's probably a truth that only you see yourself the way you do, and history has shown that you aren't as easy on yourself as others are. Suck it up, Adrian. Get out there and do what you need to.

That was for me. For the rest of you, here's my review of Scott Pilgrim vs The World. Looking forward to seeing Captain America this weekend.

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A list of qualities that make you irresistible to employers.

With all the talk of armageddon flying around (we seem to have dodged the Rapture bullet but now have to face 2012), some have turned to the possibility of leaving in case of a disaster. Turns out that prospects aren't really that good yet.

The Batman Villain in the upcoming film "The Dark Knight Rises" is slated to be Bane! Here's your first look at him!

It's been a long time, livejournal. Much has changed.

I spent a long time; nearly a year and a half, suffering from the effects of sleep deprivation. Yes, I finally found out what the problem was and I was able to correct it. It turns out that too much sunlight was getting into my room since I only had window shades. Blackout Curtains fixed it handily. It's been over a month now since I last had to take an emergency energy shot to stay awake at work. I've also been drinking relaxant drinks like Drank and Koma on days that I feel I may need it, and it has helped tremendously. I'm starting to feel like my old self again, though I've also been changed by the experience.

By the grace of God, I managed to keep my job in spite of my slow  physical, mental, and emotional breakdown. Now I'm back to getting good reviews at work again, and I'm in a department that is much more easygoing than my last one was. I've even formed something of a rapport with my boss over a love of the same kinds of music. I'm making good money and looking at moving on to the next stage of the plan: moving into my own place.

I've decided to buy my own house rather than rent. I have no idea what I'm doing. I'm unattached without so much as a girlfriend, no local friends, no real plans for the future beyond the immediate...but that's what I'm going to do. I figure if my life ever changes I can always sell or rent out the place. With my own pad though, I think I'd also have an outlet for independent expression and...well...I anticipate becoming increasingly neurotic as my loneliness mounts. Being able to decorate however I damn well please should help some. I've got plans for an entertainment archive kept separate from the main living room; sort of like a study I can geek out with old video game, superhero, movie and gaming paraphernalia. If I were to win the lottery or something, I'd have it as a fireproof add on, or install a 60's style bomb shelter. AvantGuarde, fun, yet also practical if need be. As it is, I'll probably buy the first house that meets my needs, and is cheap (on a monthly payment basis) without being a total shithole or handy-man's fixer-upper. It's not going to be easy, since the Anderson area is chock-full of the latter two.

Meanwhile, just as I get my real life together, everything starts falling apart in my "social life". I'm coming to realize that even in a room of people with common interests I'm always still an island in the sea of people. I've stopped going to the Magic games as often as I used to for that reason; there's no one there I've really hit off with and there are a few folks who I'm not sure I entirely trust. The GM of our old Starfox game stepped down, handing the game off to one of the players (really, the best one suited for the job) but things have been faltering since then. Now we're down a player just as we're trying to pick things back up again. PR is more or less done with, for the same reasons. It's done. If my remaining two players really want to continue it, I'm probably not going to say no, but as far as I'm concerned it's now just a side rp. It's not it's own thing any more. Honestly, I probably should not have tried to run it during the period of time during which I was falling apart, as I'm pretty sure I played no small part in driving off some of my players, but whatever. I know from back during the Gaming Guardians that my games have always been hit and miss. Do not ask me to GM something major, but a minor game I seem to be good at handling.

I'm still friends with these guys, but there's probably not going to be any gatherings at Las Vegas any time soon. Now I just want to get a house before hitting up any conventions anyways; get that over with and schedule any me time around monthly payments...But I dunno. I keep thinking about the time when I could have gone, but decided not to. I could have seen everyone when we were all at the top of our game. Maybe all our relationships would have been stronger for it? I really wanted to go but I let my Mom talk me out of it. I thought I was being responsible by not going, but it's turning into the biggest regret of my adult life so far.

Speaking of the Gaming Guardians, iv'e been gone for so long that now I'm afraid to go back. Who will I find there? Is anything even there? It won't be the same.

And yes, I'll go ahead and say it here since it keeps coming up...I've more or less stopped using livejournal. While at first it was because of my collapsing condition thanks to sleep deprivation, I came back to adds that slow down the website, adds you can't back out of , adds that prevent you from seeing anything until you see them first, adds positioned so that they're easy to click on accidentally when you're trying to edit your posts...So, no, I don't think I'll be contributing to this site much any more. Having a livejournal was primarily experimental in the first place; another way I could keep in touch with all my friends who live miles away from me. I knew when I started that the temptation would be there to dip into the shitty emo aspects of my life, and that nobody wanted that, and yeah you all can tell me that I was right. In my infinite wisdom, I let my family rope me into using Facebook, so you'll likely find more sound bites from me there (It also helps that Firefox doesn't spaz on the site like it does when I'm writing paragraphs here. Some of these sentences take nearly a minute to show up after I type.)

So in closing, I offer a very hearty "Fuck You!" to the Livejournal team for going back on their promises (but not my friends who still use the site. I love you guys) I'm also going to give out a "fuck you" to the artist, who's name I forget, that got scans daily closed down. Because of what scans daily introduced me to, I've started spending money on comics again! Fancy that.

I'm probably not going to do anything so drastic as wiping out my journal here. I may even post something from time to time. Just don't expect to see stuff from me here as often. On the other head of the coin, you're probably going to have to tell me through other means if you've got something on here that you want me to see.

I didn't take as many photos this year, for several reasons.

1) My camera still sucks

2) I forgot my camera on all but the second day. Most photo ops occured the first day of the con.

3) For some reason, I still had old photos on my camera. They should have been erased when I removed the batteries.

Regardless. Here are the images that were good enough to keep.( Photos and Furries )