Parking job

Ugh. I hate people. I think I've made that obvious, but I really hate people. This guy just pulled into the parking lot in his weird H3 knockoff, started looking like he was going to park in the same spot as my car, theb started backing into another spot behind him. I thought this was a little weird at first, but then I realized he was making a 3 point turn to go back the way he came. The real issue here is the fact that there was a COMPLETELY OPEN SECTION OF THE PARKING LOT NOT 20 FEET FURTHER DOWN THE WAY! Why would you ever pull your car close to other cars when the obvious owners are mere meters away when you could have driven a bit further and made a single point u-turn? What a maroon!

Musings

Turns out it is a LOT easier to write on my phone when I use the blogger app instead of the mobile website. Who knew? I think some of the reason I feel so much anger is because I'm tired and forced to spend time in locations where I don't have access to things I want to do. For example, right now I'm working on a design for a ship. I can see a lot of it in my head, but I can't really draw it, especially at isometric angles. I really want to fire up Creo and start making the model, but I can't because I'm in class and not at my computer. This, of course, makes me feel more antsy and less tolerant of my continued presence in this class than normal. I really need to get my tablet fixed so I can at least browse the internet a bit better. Even that is less than satisfying when it comes to these sorts of feelings, but at least it'd be something, right?

mean thoughts 11/12

I figured any time I feel like saying something mean or writing it on someone's post, I'll put it here, instead. A Mormon facebook page posted something about agape love, saying it was Greek and it meant unconditional love. What I WANTED to write was "The Greeks also believed that only 2 men could have Agape love and that love between a man and a woman could never be more than Eros, or erotic love." I figured that might throw a wrench in their effort to promote good values and all it really does is make it look like I'm posting to show how smart I am. And, while that may be the case, I didn't post it because I know what they're trying to accomplish, and I don't want to get in the way of that.

Mean thoughts

Sometimes I can barely suppress the urge to say the things I want to say about the idiots I run into out in both the real world and the virtual one. For example, someone posted today (Veteran's Day) "Just took a vet out for breakfast. What did you do today" or something to that effect. What I WANTED to write was "Well, I didn't falsehumblepost (it's a word now) on Facebook about how great a person I am and inviting other people to compare their lesser greatness to mine." What I DID write was nothing. Just saw some other individual post just the one word: "Miserable" as his Facebook status. What I WANTED to write was "NO ONE CARES!" What I DID write was nothing. I try really hard not to be a mean person. Well, sorta hard. It's really hard for me to NOT be mean sometimes. But sometimes I slip a bit. Today on a forum about development ideas for a game I like, someone posted something that was kinda relevant to the current thread, but wasn't a development idea at all. What I STARTED to write was something like "We're trying to have a discussion about the future of this game, not your mediocre ideas about how we can work around the current limitations of the game." What I DID write was a bit more subtle. I merely pointed out that his idea was interesting for the current limitations of the game, but that integrating something similar into the game would be a good way to go. See, I actually do control myself most of the time. But it's difficult. Really difficult. Today my Capstone project group members scheduled a meeting for the big chunk of time in the middle of the day, the same chunk that I have repeatedly mentioned is the time when I have to be at work. Apparently none of the rest of them had to work today (Veteran's Day, remember) and so doing the meeting earlier in the day was more convenient or whatever. Meanwhile, I'm feeling more and more the outsider as they continue to schedule meetings for times when I'm not available, which means the project moves forward without me. I'm not really complaining, mind you, just nervous about my grade. I've already missed out on the meetings with the writing guy that we're supposed to have, and the syllabus is unclear whether that's recorded individually or as a group. The group is meeting with the professor on Thursday, once again in the middle of my work schedule, so that's also great. I really hope I'm not required to be at that meeting, but I fear that I actually am supposed to be there. I emailed my professor, of course, but I have yet to hear back from him. I want to take these people and yell at them. I'm really not TRYING to be difficult with the whole "having to work to support my wife and 1.5 chillens" thing. No, I don't really want to be part of this group working on this project, but I'm willing to do my part, IF the rest of the guys are willing to work with my schedule, which they don't seem to be. Oh, another instance of me being a lot nicer than the thoughts in my head: Right as I arrived at work, as I was on the way up the stairs, I was stopped by a certain co-worker that I just CANNOT stand. He had a request for a project that REALLY shouldn't be my responsibility, since it's a programming thing and I'm not really a programmer, I just play one on TV, you know? But because I'm the only guy in the company, apparently, who can program in VBA, I get to do the work for a bunch of departments to which I don't even belong. That's what I get for being curious about something new and teaching myself how to do it. But I digress. Anyway, as I'm talking to him I WANT to say "No, I don't want to be responsible for that anymore, it really should be sent over to IT or teach one of YOUR engineers/interns how to deal with this crap." But instead I find myself saying "Yeah, probably, I might have time, etc." In times like this I think I really should tell them to turn it over to someone else, but I just can't, you know?

Song/poem I wrote in january and just found

Stars are born in fire
live in fury
die in power and ice
and still live so much longer
than the history of men
and mice.
our star brings light
and with it, life;
allows us to go on
and they tell us it will be there still
long after we all are gone
and yet we reach and search and hope
for more than what we see and feel
and though our senses tell us no,
we believe that there is more than what we call real
so we look for greater meaning
for more purpose, or a plan
something greater than what we know
be it God or Superman.
We dream and scheme and wish and long
to make something happen, see some sign
that what we wish and hope and dream
is more than just an errant thought in our mind
we look to the stars, implacable guards of the night
where dreams and reality overlap
and truth and perception bend.
and the stars wink back and tell us we're right
and we consider them our friends
-Z

Short story that has potential to become a full book...

Dreamers

Aaron awoke suddenly, sitting up against the wall by his bed. His breathing was quick and heavy, his heart racing, his body drenched in a cold sweat. The dream had been so vivid, so real, and the memory of it was not fading. That was his curse, his cross to bear. His dreams were as much a part of his reality as his waking moments and memories were. More so, on oft occasion.
But lately they’d been getting worse, more vivid, more powerful. This dream was perhaps the worst he’d ever had. He’d been running through a city he’d never seen, heading for some unknown destination that drew him inexplicably onward. He’d felt a desperation, a visceral need to find out what it was that pulled him, barely able to run fast enough to satisfy the urge. He’d been about to round a corner, convinced that we would immediately come into view of the source of his desperation when he had been grabbed and thrown to the ground. In that moment he was jerked awake, reaching towards his destination…
And Rhianna…
Another facet of his nocturnal adventures was his constant companion, Rhianna. As long as he could remember she’d been in every one of his dreams. She was his closest friend, and she wasn’t even real. She was always there, every night. She was Spanish, and slightly older than him. Sometimes it seemed to him that he was in her dreams, because they’d be in places he didn’t recognize with people he didn’t know, but she did. His parents had been astonished when he could speak fluent Castilian Spanish as a young child, and when he tried to explain that he learned it from Rhianna and those dreams where he was in Spain with Spanish-speaking people, their jaws dropped farther. They’d taken him to psychiatrists and he had realized that he was different and that no one really believed him. They couldn’t deny the evidences, but the still didn’t believe him. He’d eventually stopped talking about his dreams with other people.
But now he and Rhianna were in a city neither of them knew, and they’d been there for months, every night. Before now, he’d never had any recurring themes to his dreams outside of Rhianna’s presence. Now, they’d been exploring this city and its streets, following clues that he didn’t understand while awake, searching for something they couldn’t name. Every night, they’d been making progress, getting closer to whatever it was around that corner. She’d been a half-step behind him, hand in his when he’d been hurled to the ground and awakened.
He found himself in his usual dichotomy of feelings, hoping she was ok while chiding himself for caring so much about someone who didn’t exist outside of his REM cycles. Glancing at his clock, he noted that it was nearly time to get up. He stretched, yawned, and rolled out of bed. After getting a drink and rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he grabbed a pen and his dream journal and began to record the dream. He’d been doing this for years, ever since his last psychiatrist had suggested it as a way to make sense of his dreams, search for patterns and meanings and messages. While he’d stopped seeing the shrink, he’d found the dream journal to be fantastically therapeutic , especially through the last few months.
He finished up the journal entry and began to sketch a few of the things he’d seen. He was a decent artist and his journal was full of sketches of places and people. Most of the drawings were of Rhianna, though, as she was the one constant he had. He drew her now as he had last seen her: terrified for him, looking over his shoulder at whoever or whatever had grabbed him. Her dark eyes were wide, her long black hair tousled from running pell-mell through the streets of the foreign city, her mouth open in the start of a scream. She was beautiful, in a way that he had never seen in anyone else, and he felt a familiar twinge of pain and regret as he gazed on the face he only saw while unconscious.
He’d dated other girls, had had some steady relationships, but that twinge he felt stopped him from ever fully opening up to any of them. He hadn’t spoken of Rhianna to anyone since he was about 10, so he’d never been able to give a good explanation for ending those relationships. He was 21 years old and his parents were still trying to encourage him to date and find someone, telling him that there were plenty of great girls out there that would be good for him if he’d just give them a chance. He didn’t know how to give anyone that chance. He tried, he really did, but every night when he saw Rhianna it would call to his mind how no one ever measured up, and he would give up.
He shook his head at those thoughts and got up to start his day. He was used to this, resigned to his lot in life. Even so, nagging away at him was the worrisome question, why? Why was he in that city? Why had he started to dream of it every night? And why was he drawn to that location, even now, while awake?
A few days and several returns to the unfamiliar city later, he found himself with a close friend who had just returned from a two-year trip to Italy. They spent some time catching up, swapping stories of their separate lives during the time they’d been apart. Then his friend pulled out a photo album. Aaron listened as his friend described the places he’d been and the people he’d met, wondering at the experience. As he gazed on the photos of ancient ruins and verdant countrysides, he saw an image that nearly stopped his heart mid-beat. Barely able to breathe, he pointed, finger shaking, at the print.
“Where is that?” He asked.
“It’s a city called Cagliari, on the island of Sardegna. Why? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” his friend laughed.
“I’ve seen in before,” Aaron replied absently, “in a dream…”
“Yeah? That’s pretty crazy. Maybe you saw it in a movie r something first and then it showed up in your dream?”
“Could be,” Aaron replied. He didn’t really believe it, though. This was the city he’d been seeing eery night for months. This was the source of the pull. Now that he’d seen it, now that he knew that it actually existed, he had to go there.
Remembering something, he turned to his friend. “You said you were going back soon, right?”
“Yeah,” his friend replied, “I’m going back in a coupla weeks with my folks.”
“Will you be going to this place, what’d you say, Cagliari?”
“Yeah, we’re planning on it, why?”
“I’m coming with you.” Aaron’s tone was firm and decided, and took his friend by surprise.
“What? I mean, yeah, sure you can come, but are you sure you want to?”
“More sure than I’ve ever been of anything. I have to see this city.”
He could tell his friend wasn’t quite sure about this sudden interest, so he continued, “I can’t really explain, I just really want to go.”
It took his parents by surprise when he asked if he could go on a month trip to Italy, but he had the money and he had the time, and in the end he wasn’t asking their permission. They were equally intrigued and confused by his spontaneous desire to travel, but he was adamant about it and they finally wished him well.
The next few weeks dragged on as he waited to go, to find out what lay around that corner in Cagliari. He packed and repacked his bags, read his dream journal entries over and over, turning into a nervous wreck. Finally the day came to leave, and while he knew that he would have to wait a few days more before they got to Sardegna, since they were going to visit some locations in mainland Italy first, his excitement could barely be contained.
He passed those days in a blur, barely noticing what was around them. They visited Rome, Venice, and Sicily, but he wasn’t in the frame of mind necessary to enjoy or even notice the wonders of his surroundings. The pull overwhelmed him, drew his gaze ever to the west.
Finally the day came. Together with the family of his friend, he boarded the boat that would take them to the island of Sardegna. When he first set foot in Cagliari, he was flooded by feelings of déjà vu. This was exactly what he’d been seeing in his dreams for all these months. He began to run, following the path that he knew would lead him to that corner he’d never been able to round. Something was wrong, though, nagging in the back of his mind as he ran. He realized that he was holding his hand out and slightly behind him like he had every night in his dreams, but this time there was no hand clasped in his. Feeling foolish he dropped his hand and continued running on.
He finally found himself in the courtyard where he’d always ended up, where’d he’d been grabbed and thrown every night since that first night he’d found the corner. There, ahead of him was the formation of bricks that marked the turn from the courtyard into what looked to be a small alley. He stopped, overwhelmed by the full significance of what was happening to him.
Taking a deep breath, he started forward, gaze focused on the corner that had haunted his nights. His footing faltered as he felt a twinge of fear from some unknown source. He took another deep breath, squared his shoulders and continued forward.
In retrospect, the hand on his shoulder shouldn’t have come as such a shock, but as he was grabbed he yelped and whirled around, terrified by the though that his dream was coming true.
When he turned around, he found himself staring at the face he knew better than his own. This time, his heart did stop as her mouth opened to form his name.
“Aaron?”
It had never occurred to him that if the city from his dreams existed that the girl from those same dreams could be equally real.
“Rhianna…”

Stuff

So here's looking at you kid...
Sitting here in the institute listening in on some conversations that are going on, participating when I feel the need. I really have become bored with the internet in a lot of ways. I can't find any cool MMO's that please me, I never know what I want to look up, Facebook doesn't entertain me for very long periods of time, and it definitely doesn't satisfy. Odd that. So I just browse for things to do, and as I said recently, I remembered that I had this here and wanted to try it out for a bit.
So yeah.
So people are stupid. I know a lot of rather intelligent individuals, but people as a whole are really stupid. Case in point, the current administration. Voted in by ignorant and above all stupid people. I mean, seriously. I wanna see someone run for President without making impossible claims. I'd vote for him in a heartbeat, just for being honest. I mean, nothing else has really worked for us, so lets try something new: an honest and straightforward administration. Imagine this. The candidate's campaign promises are that he will do everything in his power for the good of the country and its people. The end. No promising to be out of debt in x amount of time or out of the war in y years or bullshiz like that. I mean, there is obvious a large amount of information about the way the government works and what we have available to us and how our relations are with the world that isn't privy to anyone until they become the president. A first-year rookie senator isn't gonna know beforehand what he's gonna be handed when he gets elected, plain and simple. I mean, he even made the official statement after being elected that he was aware that he'd made promises he couldn't possibly keep. I mean, lets get everyone out of Guantanamo right away. yeah right. I mean, seriously. Its like campaign promises made when people run for student body office at their high school. "I'll get vending machines put in every hallway and free pizza in the cafeteria for everyone!" Ummm.....duh. Not happening. Ever. But everyone votes that way cause they have this irrational trust in promises made by people running for any office. I have an idea. I'll run for president and just Topper my way through the campaign. My opponent says he'll reduce the debt? I'll claim that I'll turn the deficit into a surplus, start government industries to make money and give it to every citizen. No more taxes america! who wouldn't vote for that? I would...if I could be shown that it is not only viable but that its actually going to be done. Cause I make a point of using my God-given intelligence to rationally and logically think about the things people say to me. Duh.
-Z