Well either people are viewing my blog, or the views I'm getting are just me checking my work. IDK, it's a bit unsettling, I had a feeling this wouldn't be completely private, but if it's gathering attention THIS fast, I'm genuinely impressed. Anyway, I'm having trouble thinking of what to write about so I may as well start with where I've been during the little less than 10 year gap between my last post. It's funny to think of how much has changed in 10 years, sites that used to look impressive (like this one, not that I'm any shining example) look... Well, dated. I've even been doing some HTML tags manually just so I don't get too rusty.
So that brings me to my first point. I finally went back to college and got a participation award degree in Computer Science. College is fucking expensive, thankfully my grades were good enough where I could get Pell Grants, so that's been my main way of paying for college. Due to some failed marks back in ECC, it took me a while to get my GPA back up. By the time I graduated, I managed to get it back up to a 3.5. I JUST missed the honor roll. I also had a friend that would've been on the honor roll but he said they could kick rocks. I also had another friend (I could still talk to her too) that fully embraced it. I see her post on my FB from time to time, it seems like she's doing well. In any case I'm qualified to say I know some of the basic principles of programming, but I strongly prefer working with C#, I hate to admit it but the .NET framework is pretty useful. I've had more success as a programming/engineering student than I did with liberal arts. Heck one of the courses I failed was Philosophy, who fails that? But that was probably Dr. Burke's fault, in hindsight he wasn't that great of a professor, but part of it was my own fault too. Philisophical reading is very obtuse to the uninitiated, and I didn't have the motiviation to produce a paper on Descarte. It just ended up being a blank sheet of paper with my name written on it. Ironic, but irony doesn't make the grade. I did however ace his college level Logic course and ended up being why I loved the works of Lewis Carol so much.
Well, at some point I would like to get my bachelor's but I'll be damned if I can afford it. My work DOES offer tuition assistance programs but the problem is residency. Back in Iowa most of the colleges were CHRISTIAN. NO THANK YOU! My choices would've been either NICC or University of Dubuque I think it was? IDR and I don't feel like looking it up right now. At least here I could POSSIBLY return to ECC? I still have an account there on their student portal so getting me back into the system wouldn't be a big deal. I just hope they have a bachelor's program for software engineering, that's what I'm trying to focus on these days. But I also entertained the thought of working for the EPA, I just wish I knew more about what they do. If I could get paid to protect the environment then that would be great because even though I'm okay with volunteering it doesn't pay the bills. Maybe volunteer AND work? Maybe I could learn some useful skills that way, but during a pandemic I'd rather not be out in public. It's safer in here in the crypt basement. I'll get my Vitamin D in pill form, thank you, please keep the sunlight away from me, it's too bright. And harsh.
Aside from that, I've met a lot of people online who I could call friends. I had my first taste of an MMO in the form of Shin Megami Tensei: Imagine, at the time colloquially known as "Megaten". I think this was where I was first exposed to cyberpunk before I even saw Blade Runner for the first time. For those unfamiliar it takes place in futuristic Tokyo, it has been demolished by nuclear warheads. Ruins of cities are what remain, if that, and demons walk freely on the Earth. The mainline games took heavy inspiration from a trilogy of novels made during the internet's infancy. Megaten in particular, IIRC, took place between the first and second installments. You are on a mission with a demon buster by the name of Kuroe. She's sort of like a tutorial character. Things quickly take a turn for the worse when one of the game's antagonists, Ogami, breaks into Second Home (think of it like a giant fallout shelter where the world's inhabitants can live safely... Yeah right, when is any place safe?) with a giant demon at her command. She turns the innocents (android-like beings who keep the place running) into these paper demons (not Shiki-Ouji, but the other ones, IDR their names off the top of my head...) and during the fight Kuroe is killed. Cut to Third Home and it's revealed you're saved by her demon, Cerberus. You are then given training by a figure known as Snakeman, which leads up to a plot unraveling somewhere in the largest city in this post-apocalyptic Tokyo, known as Shinjuku Babel, so named after the biblical tower in which God scattered the names of Humanity when they attempted to become close to him. That's a brief yet detailed synopsis, the international server got gypped because we never got to see the ending.
I was in a dark place in my mind when the game came out, and it did help me through some tough times, and I've made some lasting friendships along the way. I spent years playing that game, how many I don't exactly know, so I was of course saddened when shortly after being handed back to Atlus from AeriaGames, the servers shut down. I missed the big farewell party but I've seen videos and heard stories. The game had a dedicated community and they still keep it alive in the form of a private server. I guess catching that Phoenix really did work, but that's a load of superstition. "Phoenix will bring the game back from the brink of death!" PFFT, that had nothing to do with it, but I guess it gave me something to latch onto, I suppose.
So in conclusion online gaming and college were the major things that I've spent my time on during that time gap. I might've forgotten other things, too. I did work at a racetrack/ballroom for a while, but it was washing dishes. I had an awful habit of being squicky about that sorta thing so even though the manager paid me under the table, I had to move onto something else. It wouldn't have lasted long anyway, it was under new management not too long after and the place sucks now, it was better under old management. I think a lot of people would also be inclined to agree to that, too. Hopefully the next entry will be more substantial and less filler, I guess I just spent the time writing about nothing in particular. Seinfeld, eat your heart out.
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