S.C

Dr. W's Space Travels
2021-10-11 20:08:45 (UTC)

Space Cadet Lives Off Pickled Plums

A whole five days without writing a post feels like a long time. For someone who has “nothing going on in his life”, I sure have a lot I could write about. Like how I’m improving massively at Valorant! The friends of The Friends Club continue to be stellarly encouraging and it drives me to want to get better and better. Yesterday when we played, there was even a consensus that I was the most improved player on the server. Wowzers, right?! It helped that they said that following a triple kill I executed to win that round. Still, I have a long way to go. It’s not uncommon for me to be at the bottom of the scoreboard, so I’ve gotta get to the point where I’m consistently doing better than “just decently”. I mean, I guess I don’t HAVE to. I could also pour my time into volunteer work, community service and calling family. But I’m a man of my own whims, and I no longer have inhibitions towards following them. If I’m really into playing FPS games with my online friends, fudge it, why stifle myself? I haven’t gotten close to the point of destructive behaviors or anything. Not that I should wait to get to that point, but I trust my judgment enough to moderate my playtime. Admittedly, I’ve been going to bed pretty late these days – yesterday I went to bed at 12:30am, and I couldn’t fall asleep for a while. Needless to say, I woke up feeling exhausted. And I’ve been waking up quite often with my eyelids not wanting to separate. As fitting as this idiom may be: I make my bed and sleep in it.

This week is the week that I’ve been… hmm, I wouldn’t say dreading, but… awaiting with mild trepidation. On Wednesday, Eric will be coming over so that I can drive him to the airport Thursday morning at 4am. This coming weekend is the weekend of the breast cancer walk, and while he won’t be walking, he’ll be joining us in SC. I’ll then be leaving Thursday afternoon to go to the airport myself, immediately after work finishes. I recently organized my transportation to get from the airport to the place we’re staying, and it was quite pricey. It is what it is, though. I kinda feel bad admitting this, but I’m not exactly excited about the whole thing. The walk and weekend themselves are fine – I love walking each day, love the festivities, and especially love hanging out with the family on my mom’s side (though my mom and sister won’t be there). It’s more so all the other stuff that I’m not looking forward to: the 4am drive to the airport to drop my brother off, the rush to the airport after work, the fact that I haven’t flown since the start of the pandemic so I don’t know what to expect, the anxiety of getting a read on my driver’s personality as I find her and she drives me to where my family is staying, finding time to catch up on my seasonals without being reclusive, coordinating the ride back to the airport, driving home at midnight from the airport, and ruing the impending barrage of emails from when I get back to work since I’m taking off from work this Friday. Yeah, for as positive of a person that I claim to be, I sure have a lot I could complain about. But as I always say – this is where I can whine, moan, and cry about how hard life is… even when I live on Easy Street.

Seriously though – I’m quite the worrier anymore when it comes to stuff I have to do outside the house. It’s so comfy here that doing stuff for long periods of time outside of it takes a lot of energy. As I’ve been watching Pripara, I’ve come to absolutely adore Sophie Hojo, who appears as a model idol on stage, but in her off hours is sweet, softspoken and unimposing girl who is easily exhausted and needs pickled plums to rejuvenate her. I feel like I can relate in some ways, although I don’t know what my “pickled plum” would be. Being home is kind of like my pickled plum, I guess. Being home alone, that is. Oh, and having weekends all to myself. That’s a great example of the perfect pickled plum. That’s why I plan to have a weekend to myself in between my breast cancer walk weekend and my Friends Club meetup weekend. Although, I’m genuinely excited like crazy for The Friends Club meetup. That shizz is gonna be so fire. We keep talking about all the stuff we’re gonna do when we meet up, and the to-do- list is piling up. I’m a bit afraid that it’s gonna fly by. I’d better hold on to every moment. Interestingly, I won’t have to worry about my addiction to the server at that point since I’ll be around a few of its “residents” in person. Gosh everything about that meetup has my adrenaline rushin’!

Oh, so remember when I broke away from the Christian fellowship group? (Don’t know who I’m asking this to but whatever, consider it a rhetorical question to myself.) There was a meetup for the subgroup that was just recently formed, and I was on the email chain (though I wasn’t really specifically called out in it to come – which did alleviate any pressure to attend). I decided to show up though. And I have to admit, we had a lovely time. We just watched four Youtube videos on Buzzfeed Unsolved Mysteries, which was actually really entertaining and funny. We also had chips, dip and soda, and just had a good ol’ time talking about things that were not God, Jesus or Christianity. Which is my kind of thing. I consider myself very accepting of religious beliefs, and I see a lot of good in popular belief systems like Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, etc. But I’ve come to realize that there’s a sort of stifling aura that comes about when talking about such things. I know with me being among Christians, it’s pretty ridiculous to complain about Christian talk. But now that I’ve voiced where I stand spiritually, I feel a bit more vindicated in not really wanting to be a part of it. So when there are gatherings like these where such talk is kept at a minimum, I feel a bit better. Granted, it’s still a social gathering, so Christian or non-Christian, I’m still a tad bit of an anxious mess. But it’s assuaged by the fact that the people who are part of this mini-group are absolutely swell, unjudgmental individuals.

All right, so what am I gonna do tonight? This is really gonna be my only normal night of the week, as tomorrow I’ll be packing up and Wednesday I’ll be entertaining a guest (my brother, haha). I’m really hoping I can play Valorant with the server before I go a week without it. Not sure what they’re doing right now, though. Actually, it looks like some of them are streaming Squid Game, which I heard was supposed to be really, really good. I actually do wanna watch it too, but it’s on Netflix, and I’m balking at investing in ANOTHER streaming service (just recently caved in on getting a Funimation subscription…) I’m slowly adding more and more seasonals to my watchlist, BTW. I think I’m gonna hit 10 or 11 seasonals this Fall… oof. But I’m sure I’ll manage somehow. So I mentioned before that I’m watching season 2 of 86 and Mushoku Tensei… I’m also watching Takt Op, a BEAUTIFULLY animated original that has my interest heavily piqued! Also watching Demon Slayer Mugen Train Arc, Sakugan, Selection Project (my FAVORITE so far – oh yeah I did mention this one already), Muteking the Dancing Hero, and Shikizakura. I have an idea for two more shows to add, and I’m debating whether or not to also watch Komi Can’t Communicate (I wanted to watch this, but think I might sacrifice it due to having so many other shows I’m already watching). I’m planning for this season to be low-stress in terms of watching a lot of different anime, as I’m undertaking Pripara among it all, which is 140 episodes alone. That’s not including Idol Time Pripara, which has… 51 I think? I really like Pripara, though – it’s surprisingly standing very well next to the legendary Aikatsu series. All right, I’ve talked enough about my anime shows – now it’s time for me to stop typing and either practice some Valorant or play some Love Ribbon. Or just sit in the corner of my own home and cry like a baby because no reason. Mm, enticing… but not so much as video games, hehehe.




Ad: