Comment "WORDS" to this entry and I will comment back with five words I associate with you. Then you post this in your journal elaborating.

Here are padparadscha's words.

Baking: I first learned to bake cookies when I was something like 5 years old or so. Later on, when I was HomeSchooling for a couple of years in late Elementary and Middle School, my Mom used baking recipes to teach my Brother and I fractions. Stuff like making 1 2/3 of a recipe instead of doubling it, or 5/8 instead of halving it.

After I completely failed to find a job in Oly, and moved back to the Island, I got a job at a Bakery/Cafe doing soup/salad/sandwich-type stuff. I got sick of that right at about the same time as one of the Night Bakers moved down to California, and the boss thought I'd be pretty good at that, so he was willing to train me. Most of a year after that, I came to the realization that basically everyone I liked there had left, and took off for the other bakery in town, where I still work, and greatly enjoy it.

Thoughtful: Well, I try to be. I've always had a tendency that way, which was rather strongly reinforced in College, when I spent a fair amount of time hanging out with and arguing with Econ and Philosophy Majors. Those kinds of folks can rip you apart if you haven't very carefully considered what you're saying and mad sure you've covered all the exceptions and counter-examples. This does lead to much of the sort of thing padparadscha was talking about here, with adding in unnecessary qualifications when speaking to an audience that wants a quick overview, but it's definitely a good thing to keep in mind while you're preparing a concept, and then stripping it down later.

Like so many things, it becomes a double edged sword. I have missed many opportunities by overthinking things for so long that the moment had passed before I decided to act. On the whole, though, I'd say it's been a good thing for me.

Capitals: Ever since I first learned to write, I've rather liked Capital Letters, and always tried to find grammatical ways to fit more of them in my sentences. Then, somewhere in High School, I read that it had been in the past common practice to merely capitalize letters for emphasis, and my informal writing has never been the same since. I particularly like the effect of InterCapping, and often do so with Compound Words. Hell, one of the attractions German held for me is the fact that all Nouns are Capitalized in German.

Introversion: Possibly one of the most defining features of my life, especially after it became exacerbated by the bouts of depression that have been steady companions since sometime in my late preteen years. One of the big struggles of the last few years has been trying to sort out what is Depression (and what I can do to get rid of that), and what is Introversion (and how I can work around that, since it not only can't be changed, but it comes with a number of benefits that I rather like).

The book The Introvert Advantage has really helped me in both regards, but I've still got a long way to go. I've gotten very used to being alone, even though I often feel lonely. It does make it hard to meet people, as I become tired very quickly when hanging out with people who I'm not really comfortable with. In many situations, I even end up feeling more alone when I'm surrounded by people, if I can't make some sort of real connection with at least a few of them.

Gaming: I first started playing D&D when I was 8 or so. Some time After that, I got into M:tG, and then BattleTech introduced me to Table Top Wargaming. From there, it was only a matter of time until I got into Warhammer Fantasy and 40K, which I've now been playing for something like 12 years, and I'm even captaining a Team from my local Gaming Group for the Ordo Fanaticus Club Challenge in August.

I still play D&D, Magic, and BattleTech occasionally with the friends that I used to roll with in Middle and High School, and my Brother's talking about starting up a RoleMaster Campaign this summer.

In fact, almost all my male friends who I've managed to stay in touch with are people I regularly played D&D or 40K with.

Interestingly enough, I've never been that much into Computer games. There were a handful of old Turn-Based Strategy and RPG titles that I enjoyed for a bit, but anymore, if I'm not interacting with real people, in person, games don't seem to hold my interest.

Just the right picture for a LOLCat I've had in my head for a while. It's here.

W007! Finally got off work before it was completely dark! Particularly nice since I'm working seven days this week to cover for a vacation. A couple of them are only going to be partial days, since a couple of other people are pitching in a bit, too, but I've still got to be there every day until my Birthday.

I'm messing with my sleep schedule, trying to figure out if I just have a phase delay problem. Fortunately, I have a job that I don't have to get to until 1:00 in the afternoon, so it's not really a problem to stay up until 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning and sleep in until 11:00 or Noon. Seems to be helping a bit so far, we'll see if it keeps up.

I had more to put here, but my brain, it does no work so well right now. Perhaps later.

A little while ago, I found out that a couple of the guys on a message board I frequent are gay. They aren't closeted or anything, it just hadn't come up on the board. Now, consciously, I know that this really doesn't change anything, but every time I see one of them post now, a little voice in the back of my head goes "He's gay."

Even though I haven't noticed any other change in how I perceive them, it really bothers me that some part of my brain latches on to this. I didn't have similar reactions when I found out that people on there were Asian or Black. Why the fuck do I give a shit about this, even on a subconscious level? There are people, some of whom are in love with each other. That's all that matters.

I'm so glad this week is over. Four days of trying to make Croissant in 80+ degree weather makes for considerable stress. Of course, now that I'm done with that, it seems to have cooled down a bit again. Most of them came out really nice, though, so that's a load off my mind.

There should be video of the cake incident I mentioned up on YouTube soon. I'll post as soon as I know, because it was pretty cool.

Now I'm going back to bread and water to buffer the caffeine headache from all the coffee I had to drink to make it through the last couple of hours of work last night.

Too fucking hot yesterday! I ended up having to go back home to lie down and drink water for a couple of hours to fend off Heat Stroke. Worked out for the best, though, I think. If I'd tried to make Croissants at 6:00, they would have become a melty mess, but I'm pretty sure that the ones I did when I came back later were pretty nice. I'll find out for sure tonight.

The other night was the first night so far I had to open up windows and put on the fan. It wasn't so much the heat as it was just stuffy and still. It seems to be edging up that way, though.

So there's this girl at work. Been working with her perhaps 8-9 months, hung out a few times outside of work. She's not really my type, but I've been getting pretty tired of being single, and I started thinking "Hey, maybe a short fling would still be kinda nice. She's fun to hang out with, even if not really my type. It's time-limited because she's moving to England in the fall, could probably be a nice clean bit of fun."

The day after I really start considering this seriously, she says something about a Boyfriend who she's apparently had this whole time, but has never mentioned. Not one "So, the other day, my Boyfriend and I were..." or "Nah, I can't do that, I've got plans with my Boyfriend." or "Hey, is it cool if my Boyfriend comes along too?" No hint anywhere in the last nine months that she had a Boyfriend.

I swear, it's some kind of fucked up quantum thing, like she didn't have a Boyfriend that whole time, but as soon as I started to think about asking her out, she all of a sudden has had a Boyfriend for two years. And this is something like the fifth or sixth time something almost exactly like this has happened to me. What. The. Fuck. I'm sick of this shit.

OK, losing my job has been removed from the list of options. Feeling much better now.

My sleep schedule, however, is completely fucked. Just got up at about 5:00 this afternoon.

Had another shitty day with the Croissants again today, but this time I was more prepared for it, and so didn't take as much of an emotional hit.

Now that I've gone through it twice and had some more time to consider, I really don't think it was a failure of the anti-depressants at all. Even when one is not depressed, shitty things happening can result in feeling bad, and that is normal and healthy. And the consequences of this particular set of shitty things may include having to find a new job :`( Which sucks the wrong end of an incontinent camel, because, even with a couple of things/people I don't like taken into account, this is still the best job I've ever had.

Doing better now. My boss's response to my screwups resulted in me getting pretty pissed off, which is much easier to channel productively than Depression is. A decent night's sleep didn't hurt either.

Actually, I think a big factor in both the fuckups themselves and my response to them has been due to exhaustion and overwork. I about a month, I'm going to be cutting down to 3 shifts for the Summer, which I think will help some. I just don't seem to be cut out for a 40 hour week, at least not in my current physical condition.

I'm still gonna have people who see me regularly keep their eyes open, since I do have trouble telling how I'm doing, and it's sometimes easier to spot those gradual slides from the outside.

...Who's going to be at FolkLife? I don't really care enough to make the trip just for the event, but if there are friends around to hang out with, that's totally worthwhile. I've got plans in Seattle Friday evening, so I could roll over earlier and hang out during the day, and I've also got Saturday and Sunday wide open. Let me know if you want to meet up.

But I need to put it out here, because it's too tempting to try and hide this kind of shit. I've not been doing terribly well on the mental/emotional front for a while now, but it's just hit a low point that I haven't seen for several years.

There are some things that I've been screwing up at work recently, and having a great deal of trouble fixing. As I tend to, I've been giving myself a lot of shit about it, but tonight it started triggering suicidal thoughts (NOT suicidal intentions, I feel the need to point out. Don't worry, I have no intention of doing anything that stupid.). Despite the fact that there is no intentionality attached, the fact that these are popping up again really scares me, and it's a sign that things are really getting out of control. And I don't know what to do about it.

I'm going to try to get out and see people more, but I've been trying to do that for a couple of years now without much success. There are a couple of people around here I trust to keep tabs on me, and I'm going to let them know, so I've got someone else watching out, in case I keep sliding downwards, since I'm already past the point where it's really hard for me to spot changes unless I hit one of the big benchmarks like this.

I'm still on the Citalopram, and I don't know which possibility bothers me more: That it's stopped working (or never really was in the first place, and it was all just placebo effect), or that it is still working, and I'd be in even worse shape without it.

We had a Costume Day at work yesterday. It was awesome. I'll try to get copies of some of the pictures and put them up here.

Also, despite what I'm listening to at the moment, I've been totally rocking out on the Misfits lately. How did I not get into these guys earlier?

How did I miss that that fits even better than the "Kirk out" one?

The more I think about Star Trek, the more one thing really bothers me, but it's a pretty significant Spoiler, so it's going behind a Cut:

( Read more... )

I saw Star Trek last night. It mostly served to underscore how badly film connects with me as a medium anymore. It was an awesome movie, very well done, but I just couldn't get enough connection to give a shit.

It does totally reinforce my longstanding belief that Casting is far more important than, say, the script as far as making an enjoyable movie. They did a great job of finding people who managed to capture the feel of the characters that I know so well, but make them a bit younger, less experienced.

It also made me kind of sad that James Doohan and DeForest Kelley didn't live to see it, as their characters were particularly well captured, I thought.

Finally, padparadscha was right: The Soundtrack is a total Fanboy. "OMG, IT'S THE ENTERPRISE!!1!!!111"

Unrelated: Last night was one of those wonderfully unseasonal times. A perfect October evening in May.

I saw some Peanut Butter and Jelly flavoured M&Ms at the store yesterday, and got them on the basis of "What the hell, they're only 50 cents."

They were kind of nasty, really.

I just totally burnt my Sammich. Stupid Toaster Oven.









It's still pretty good, though.

Got through with all my work faster than I ever have before on a Thursday. Feels very nice, I've still got some time and energy to get some stuff done around the apartment before crashing out.

Gonna go donate Blood tomorrow, and then head out to my Mom's for most of the weekend. Hopefully gonna get some D&D in. Things is good.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but if you can manage it, you should really head down to Enumclaw next weekend. Stage Door Productions is putting on Man of La Mancha at the Enumclaw High School Auditorium, and it's an amazing production. Great cast, amazing orchestra, well directed, just a wonderful show all around. One of the best, possibly the best stage production I've ever seen. I don't see that many, so that's not necessarily saying a lot, but it's still a damned good show. And I'm not saying that just because my friend Luke has the lead role ;)