I had the strangest dream
I tend to have pretty vivid/horrendous/wild dreams, and thankfully I don’t remember them for too long. This one, however, has stuck out and I’ve been turning it over in my head quite a bit lately. It’s really made me do some heavy thinking, and changed my view of things at least slightly.
So in this dream my girlfriend is diagnosed with a brain tumor, and I have some form of rupture (like a stroke) from constantly keeping my anger in check. I don’t know what this by itself means, but I’m not a pansy so I’m going to say that these preliminary facts mean exactly nothing. The point is that we’re both given 6 months to live.
We spend the next 5 months in a montage, apparently, but we’re obviously trying to wring every drop out of the time we’ve got left that we can. It’s all very somber, but very peaceful in a way. We know what’s coming, we know what we have, and we’re just determined to enjoy the bit we’ve got left.
So after these 5 months are up, we do something that I’d have never imagined in a million years. We go skydiving. From a plane. Without parachutes.
Let me say that again. We jump from a plane tens of thousands of feet above the ground, and we don’t take parachutes. We hold each other the entire time down, surrounded by rushing wind and nothing else. This is amazingly sweet and sad at the same time, because there’s literally nothing else for us but each other, and we’re forced to bask fully in the presence of the other person. But we know it’s going to end.
But we know exactly how it’s going to end, when it’s going to end, no surprises. There are no weeks of torture. There is no lingering sadness. And most of all there is no loneliness. Neither of us has to live, even for a short time, without the other.
That was the dream.
Anyone who knows me will tell you that I’m not one for sappy crap. I’m not the type of person who generally thinks like I apparently did in the dream, and I’m even less inclined to talk about such thoughts/feelings. But something about this dream really got my brainmeats all fired up. Obviously I care a lot about my girlfriend, I don’t have any problem saying as much. But I can’t help thinking that there’s something else there, too. Fear of being alone now that I’ve found someone I love sharing my time with? Hell if I know.
But no matter how I slice it, it was a powerful dream. I really love that woman.
Arguing with religion
I’ll briefly touch on a subject that really irritates me: arguing religion (or anything, really) with someone who is religious.
The thing that irritates me is how alien arguments from the non-religious camp are to theistic arguments. The arguments are so far apart in terms of every damned thing that it’s a wonder people even try. Here’s an illustration:
Science: It’s impossible to turn a macaroni into a toad.
Religion: PURPLE!
I had a discussion recently with someone in regards to the “War on Terror” against my better judgment. We talked in a friendly enough manner to begin with, and then we reached an interesting point in the conversation: wasted breath. Now, I don’t have any kind of problem with someone having beliefs. Good for them, I’m happy for ‘em. I do have a problem with them trying to excuse human behavior based on their beliefs.
And there’s just no middle ground! They can say “Because God says so” (or whatever their own personal leaning/argument is) all day long and it won’t change my opinion, nor is it an acceptable answer to any question from someone outside of your particular brand of theism. That’s because your faith is all well and good, and you can firmly believe what you say and really really mean it, but you absolutely cannot change anyone’s mind when you’re not speaking on the same level as them. I say apples are delicious, I could give a flying fuck about the corn on your big toe.
I’d just be a happier person if people weren’t so goddamn SMUG when they use their fairy tales as arguments against something that someone put work into. Your drug-induced or brain damage-fed logic doesn’t work against me! Stop trying! All it does is pluck at my nerves and make you look silly.
Tweet!
So I’m finally getting on board the Twitter-train. I’ve always admired the site and what it’s done. It’s a clean, simple web app that seems to be staying true to it’s original goals - I like that.
I was afraid it’d suffer from the same bloat and feature-creep that plague(d|s) Facebook, but my fears were wasted!
Also updating to the latest version of WordPress soon, ’cause I’m so gorramned lazy. Don’t worry, I’m still here, I’ve just been boring lately.
Htrae - Bizarro World
I was playing around with a few ideas on what to blog about today and decided to put the question to some guildmates from WoW (yes, I still play - sometimes). B was less than helpful, I was a smartass. Pretty standard stuff. Then D gave me an idea that I initially laughed off:
TehBilly: D, gimme a topic to blog aboot.
D: ummm
D: abstinence
TehBilly: I need a topic I’m familiar with.
Gun control, voting, superiority of the female gender - these were all suggested and dismissed (though I did take time to comment on the horrible ability a woman’s nethers has at swaying the minds of men). Abstinence was revisited, and I decided to run with it (after another suitably snarky remark)
D: I still think you could write about how you would handle being abstinent
TehBilly: A blog entry about suicide might get people talking.
This got me to thinking about how I felt about the idea for reals. I started having sex at the age of 15 (my 15th birthday to be exact, go me!) and haven’t looked back since. My first moments of awkward groping and disjointed coitus taught me one very important fact about myself: I really (really) like bumping uglies with the womens. Only through forced reclusive time periods (jail, military, etc.) have I had any period since then where I haven’t been knockin’ boots with one woman or another. And there have been quite a few, and no I won’t divulge the exact number in such a public locale.
Over the years I’ve learned many things about sex and what it does to individuals, couples and situations.
I have been cheated on. A lot. I’m talking one girl slept with four other dudes in an extremely short time period. Four other guys that I knew about. And many others had single jaunts with such-and-such or so-and-so, but my initial statement is the most important part: I’ve been cheated on. A lot. Some of my lowest moment are drawn from the discovery of infidelity and learning to cope with it. Protip: I’m extremely poor at coping with a partner’s infidelity. I’ve gone into murderous rages, lost motivation regarding just about anything I’ve been into at the time and other such drastic emotional swings. All brought about by the same thing I dig so much: a bit of beaver bashing.
Then again, sex has strengthened relationships and helped propel me groin-first through getting past/over/around many of my juvenile wiles. My pog collection became much less interesting and personal hygiene became much more important in my life, for example.
Morally, I see nothing wrong with pre-marital sex. I may be slightly biased as I’ve done more than my fair share of fornicating, sod off. That’s why it’s my opinion. My only hangup is sex with virgins. Why? Because I’ve noticed a trend: one of a deep (if irrational) emotional attachment with their first physical partner. For two people who believe in waiting for someone they care about already this could be quite teh awesome, however many a heart has been broken due to a callous and uncaring bedmate.
Despite it’s many hangups, pitfalls, dangers and misery I would not want to change a bit of what I’ve gone through. I’m not a sex-centric freak, but it has indeed helped shape me into who I am today. Life isn’t clean, pristine and safe. Everyone, in my humble opinion, needs to be free to explore life’s dirty secrets and discover things on their own without having the mystery neutered and sterilized before being force-fed into children before it can become “dangerous” to them. That’s how 90% of the world’s adult population was raised (Wanna stick a penny in a light socket? Sure, go ahead. You’ll only do it once!) and holy fuck we’re all still alive!
I fear for our species should we continue to “protect” children and teenagers from making their own mistakes and learning on their own. How the hell are they going to know what to teach their children when the knuckleheads who stuck their hands in the fire are dead and gone?
Screw abstinence. Screw it with the pulsating phallic presence of freedom.
Less QQ
Meh, it’s been awhile since I’ve posted my last rant. Shut up, it’s what I do.
Something I’ve been giving a lot of thought lately is what to do with my free time. Free time is any time I’m not at work or running errands. It used to be that my extra time was dedicated to playing WoW and hanging out a few nights a week, but I find that my priorities and feelings are shifting pretty drastically.
I still enjoy playing WoW, but it’s not the all-consuming beast that it once was. Could it be Conan/Warhammer on the horizon? I don’t know, but it’s definitely a possibility. Mostly though I think it’s because my mindset about ‘all things life’ has changed, I’m wanting to smoke in front of my computer less and am inclined to want to be hands-on with different things more. Softball season is coming up, I have my bike and a couple of cars I can work on (which I really enjoy doing) and there’s the kids that I enjoy hanging out with.
Even in the area of gaming my sights have changed, I believe. I’m getting back into FPS games, but not the ultrafast twitchy UT-ish games I loved in the past. Call of Duty 4 or Battlefield 2142, games that are still fast-paced but with more strategy/teamwork involved.
All in all, I’ve spent a lot of time and money on World of Warcraft and I’m giving some serious thought to how much I want to play. I’m in a good guild now with good folk, and they’re quite laid back which suits me. But how much do I want to play even then? The game is all about grinding this or farming that, and for a game I’m paying for that’s not very… fun.
