cybrpunk.com

The steady decline continues

cybrpunk — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 05:06:07 +0000

It may look like I have abandoned this website and that would only be mostly correct. In fact, I’ve only abandoned it in all practical terms but not in theoretical terms. I still think about it now and then. On days like today. I wonder, should I wipe it out and start fresh? Should I continue with it as is? Will I continue to let the vines take over and see what nature does with it? OK, that only works with old buildings but you get the idea.

I predicted the end of Blogging being pretty fucking nigh many years ago and my usage reflected that prediction. It was not self-fulfilling really. The whole community that I corresponded with fell apart as well and the links that I used to visit daily started turning into SEO search sites and dead air. Sure, there are still millions of people out there who probably still blog but the hey day came and went years ago. Now everyone wants bite sized chunks of Twitter and the social news of Reddit. There’s this thing out there called Tumblr that seems to be pretty popular but I haven’t checked it out yet.

So, what better time to write a new post? Who cares if no one reads it. I’m long past checking multiple times a day to see if my unique visitors has gone up at all. I’m not even sure I remember how to check the stats. I do think that if I were going to come back to do some writing it should be a fresh start. But I don’t want to lose the years and years of writing I put on here. I wonder if there’s a way to tell WordPress to archive everything I have so far so it is still searchable but not display anything old by default?

In sickness

cybrpunk — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 02:16:10 +0000

Kira started daycare a few weeks ago. She’s two and a half years old now. Time flies by so quickly. Well… until she brought home the plague.

It was bound to happen of course. I’d been home for pretty much eight months straight while out of work and then starting a work from home job so I wasn’t bringing home other people’s germs anymore. Kira rarely got to play with other kids (which is the main reason for putting her into daycare) so she was hardly ever exposed to anything. So yeah… two days of daycare later and we were all sick.

We got over it; we got better. A week or so passed and sure enough – sick again. I seemed to get hit with the worst of it first and was miserable. Constant drainage which led to a sever sore throat after a few days. The weird thing was that it was only really bad at night. I don’t mean when I laid down to sleep… no, I mean at around sunset. Soon after Kira started showing signs and we both got on antibiotics which helped me immensely and Kira is recovering still. Michelle was spare for the most part… for a few days.

Now Michelle has it worse than any of us had it. I think it was the plague just waiting for her to utter the words “I guess I got lucky” because a day later she was miserable. That on top of everything else and she has been miserable. Now I’m just hoping that it doesn’t mutate and infect me again. Ugh….

To change the subject

cybrpunk — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 14:08:16 +0000

Well, enough of the depressing posts for the time being. Time to change the subject.

As some of you may know and many others don’t, I was laid off from my previous job back in June of 2010. I was out of work for the longest span I have ever experienced and it was tough. Our savings took a royal beating and it is going to take a while to recover. We skipped birthdays and Christmas for the most part.

Yeah I know I said no more depressing posts for now and I meant it. Oddly enough I wouldn’t trade that time off for the world. I have gotten to know my daughter so much better than I ever had time for before. We’ve bonded over that time at home and it has been wonderful. Sure things were rough and even a little scary now and then but that was minor compared to getting to see my baby girl learning and growing and transforming like my wife has had the privilege to experience since her birth.

Being a stay at home parent is hard. I knew that before and this time has only confirmed it. But it has its own rewards. Its own compensation. But still… I’m glad I’m now back to work.

I started a new job a few weeks ago before the end of the year. That was supposed to be the start of a happy 2011 but you know how that has turned out so far. But this new job is good. I like what I’m doing and the compensation is good. Plus its for a non-profit who is making a difference every day for people who need it. What else could I ask for? Well how about working from home? Yeah, I got that too. It’s freaking sweet.

Memorial for a friend

cybrpunk — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 04:30:46 +0000

I haven’t been to a funeral in years. I guess I’m lucky. Well, at least in that it’s been a while. I’ve been to quite a few funerals in my life with most of them being before the end of my high school days. People that I now barely remember in blurry memories, forgotten pictures and a whiff of smell now and then. People that I wish I could talk to once more. Learn from them. Share with them. Tell them how much they meant to me. But that is the nature of loss, remorse and regret. And the forgetting? That is the nature of humans.

Tonight I attended the funeral of one of my father-in-laws. Well not necessarily a funeral. More of a memorial. There was no service planned. He had been cremated so the only reminder of him was the hundreds of pictures throughout the room and the innocuous green marble container with his name written on it. I know people were planning on getting up and telling stories or just telling others how they felt. My wife among them. I didn’t get to stay to hear those speeches because I had to take Kira back home. It was getting close to bed time and she was starting to fade into crabby-land. It was expected – no regrets.

The crowd that I had to excuse myself was enormous. Everyone loved him and everyone he met considered him their friend. He was a great guy. There were people from every walk of life present it seemed. Including appearances by my families which I didn’t even expect. It was nice. My wife did a great job of putting together a very nice slideshow and I compiled the background music. But the important thing was the people.

People need to be able to grieve. And they all do it a little differently. I remember thinking at one point yesterday or the day before: why are my mother-in-law and wife doing all this work to put all this together for this memorial? Why put yourself through the heartache of rummaging through hundreds of photos, editing digital pictures, creating slideshows, picking out music, spending hours at the funeral home deciding on so many many options? Why do so much?

Because it keeps you busy. It keeps your mind working on something… anything… and gives you a goal. It makes those first few days bearable by numbing the mind and the heart by keep them preoccupied with so many other details and tasks. Anything to keep those closest to the departed from collapsing into uncontrollable fits of sobbing or crawling in bed to emerge days later.

So who is the memorial for? It’s not for the deceased – it’s for the survivors. The people who don’t understand why what has happened had to happen the way it did. The people whose lives will never be completely the same no matter what their connection. The people who will, over the years, gradually start to realize that those cherished memories are starting to become blurry around the edges. It’s their nature. It’s how we stay relatively sane. We’re only human.

Larry Shake you will be missed my friend. Take care, watch over us and don’t be sad. We’ll see you soon enough.

2010 in the end

cybrpunk — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 02:48:12 +0000

This is not the way to start a new year – or the way for the previous one to end. 2010 was a horrible year and we were only too happy to see its end on the horizon. Unfortunately it went clawing tooth and nail like a wildcat slipping into a well and made certain one remaining casualty would haunt the first day of what should have been a happy new year.

There was no countdown, no champagne, no celebration. Only the sadness of family so emotionally and physically exhausted too confused by the state of family stricken down in an instant. There were no party hats, no music, no resolutions. Only anger at the injustice of it all and the unfairness of losing someone who deserved to live more than just 46 years.

But to the year of 2010 I say piss off – you will never be missed. Yes, you spoiled these first days/weeks/months of our new beginning in 2011 but no matter how hard things are now we will carry on. Prayers fail, begging fails, pleading fails and we know that life is just life and that we are on our own. How we handle things now, then and forever are ours to own and no one else’s to lay blame.

Life is short. Be good to one another and to yourself. And hope that those around you do the same. We’re all each other have.

Life List

cybrpunk — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 18:40:10 +0000

I’ve decided to participate in my first Topical Tuesday and the topic for the day is Life List. As stated on that page: “This weeks challenge is to write a Life List of ten things you would like to do before you die. Only ten mind – make them count.“ That’s a tall order. Ten things I want to do before I die? I want to do everything before I die. If you do them after you die then who would know?

Well, here’s my attempt. This is going to take some brain strain.

Visit Europe. Anywhere in Europe is fine although I’m particularly interested in England, Ireland, Scotland, Iceland, Czech Republic, Austria and Turkey.
Get a six figure income. Bonus points if it starts with a number higher than one.
Live long enough to see my baby girl grow up to be a happy and successful woman and hopefully watch some grandbabies grow up.
Make a positive and profound impact on the lives of other people. My dream job is to be a philanthropist.
Go on a road trip from one coast of the United States to the opposite coast.
Retire early enough that I might get to enjoy some time off before I die. By the time I’m 65, the retirement age will probably be 130.
Have something published and sold – even if it’s not successful. A novel, comic or screenplay I suppose.
Become passably fluent in a second language.
Ride at least five of the fastest roller-coasters in the world. Preferably in at least two different countries.
Own and operate a bar & grill or a pub of my own design.

Wow. That was a lot harder than I thought it would be with narrowing it down to only ten entries. So many things come to mind but with only ten spots its hard to pick the things that would actually mean something to me in a way that was more than just saying, “OK that’s done” and then checking it off a list and never thinking about it again.

It’s March already

cybrpunk — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 17:19:10 +0000

It’s March already. March 2nd to be exact. Ten days away from another birthday and another day closer to the grave. Yeah, not much activity on here lately. No real posts this year and not much towards the end of last year. No revival over at A Little Scary and if you follow me on Facebook, Twitter or Plurk then you know I’ve not been very active in those areas either. I’m well aware – and most of the time I’m OK – with that.

I guess my priorities changed. Having a toddler, yeah Kira is almost 16 months old now, means having a lot less free time. A lot less freedom too. If I have free time, I usually just want to relax or play a video game or maybe watch a movie. There are a hundred and one things I’d like to do but I just don’t have the time or ambition to do them all and sometimes that means I don’t do any of them. Writing is one of those things. Drawing is another. Sculpting, I finally started and will hopefully post some pictures of my first piece (in progress). Reading, playing, sorting, organizing, learning, designing… all things that don’t happen all that much.

Now I know that there are people out there who go to work full time, go to school, work out and still take care of their kids. I have the utmost respect for those people. I have no idea how they do it. I want to be like that. I just don’t know how.

I watch things like Extreme Makeover: Home Edition on television and say to myself “I want to do things that impact people like that.” But I don’t have – or at least make – the time to better myself. How can I expect to make the lives of others better if I don’t even make my own life better? I don’t know.

Is this whining? I’m not sure. Is this a plea for help? I have no idea. Is it me venting and just spinning my wheels in the life I have put myself in? Yeah, probably. What do I do about it all? I don’t know.

I want the easy way out. I want to win the lottery so I can quit my job and become a philanthropist. But I don’t even buy lottery tickets but a handful of days out of the year. I guess that shows how much faith I have in the “easy way”.

It’s easier to be a “dreamer” instead of a “doer”. I’m guilty of both. What about you?

Oh.

cybrpunk — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 22:09:08 +0000

Oh. Hey. Look at that. It’s 2010.

Wooo.

Well… that’s done. Carry on.

Overdue updates

cybrpunk — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 18:24:54 +0000

OK, so much for my updating at least once a week idea. Work has been a little busier lately and Michelle hasn’t been feeling 100% all the while Kira seems to be developing a temper as a couple more teeth start ripping through her gums.

I’m glad I don’t remember that process. They say that is one of the worst pains ever but truthfully how would you know? Babies can’t tell you how it feels or how it compares to childbirth, root canals or drawn and quartering. You can’t hook them up to a meter and see the pain on a graph. I guess it’s like most things… a guess.

Michelle and I took a little time last weekend away from the baby and went to have lunch at Red Lobster and then off to see Zombieland. If you haven’t seen Zombieland yet then you are truly missing out. It’s funny, goofy, scary (stupid clown), self-deprecating, a bit gory and full of action. There’s even a touching moment so there’s something for everyone. Meaning emotionally touching… not inappropriately touching… you know what I mean.

I’ve got a bunch of vacation days that need to be taken before the end of the year so I am figuring out how to plan that out. Everytime I think I have it all sorted something new comes up. It happened again today. Urgh.

Oh, I have a Playstation 3 now! Yay! Although I really don’t have any games for it. I got it used on eBay and it did come with Street Fighter 4 (which I really don’t like surprisingly) and Singstar (which is kinda fun but quite limited compared to other music games). So I don’t count those. I’m hoping to get the Game of the Year edition of Little Big Planet for Christmas because that just looks fun to me. Maybe I should download the demo and try it out first but it seems interesting. Plus God of War 3 will be out eventually although since the main guy involved in the first two is no longer part of the franchise I’m not holding my breath.

I got the old 60GB PS3 which is why I got it on eBay instead of going to the store. I picked that one specifically because it is the only model that has the hardware emulation for both PS1 andPS2 games built-in. So of course the first thing I did was play We Love Katamari. Because I just can’t get enough of rolling stuff into balls. Don’t ask because I don’t know.

Why not?

cybrpunk — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 18:37:54 +0000

Tons of money and man-hours are spent researching, chasing and getting chewed on by tornados. Meteorologists are given useless jobs to predict tornados when everyone knows they can’t really do anything. The idea of people who chase and research tornadoes is kind of interesting and edgy but what does it really give us?

I say they are taking the wrong approach. We all know that tornadoes do massive amounts of damage in terms of both life and property as well as lost revenues for businesses. OK so we’ve established that there is expected to be some damage. Great. So next time a big tornado touches down why don’t we scramble a few fighter jets and have them shoot to air to surface missles at the base of that big bad F5? If the concussive blast from that doesn’t disrupt it then maybe they could also fire an aire to air missle and remote detonate it inside the tornado at the same time. Disrupt it at the ground and in the air. Those blasts should have enough force behind them to make the tornado falter if not die out. The changes in heat in the air should also help.

Why hasn’t anyone thought about this before?

I mean seriously, we talk about fighting these natural disasters but we never actually confront them. We don’t fight them. We just have tons of people scurry about and guess a lot while spending money that could be better spent on more important ventures. And worst case, would testing this theory really cost any more than what we are doing now?

If we could spend $100,000 to launch a jet and three missles and save lives, property, livestock, businesses, crops, and a fortune in insurance claims (if the victims were covered) then wouldn’t it be worth it? And be awesome at the same time? What pilot wouldn’t be volunteering for that duty? Talk about your homeland defense.

What do you think?