On Dying…

Or as most people call it “growing older” or “aging.”

As many of my friends know, I started school a year early. My birthday falls in late October, which for most grade schools is late, and pushes you into the later year category. But considering I was already reading chapter books at the age of four or five (Roald Dahl primarily, but I was also reading The Hobbit… apparently I was smart, what happened?) they let me start… I was also apparently supposed to skip a grade (fifth or sixth, I can’t remember) but the school decided not to let me because they weren’t sure I’d be “mature enough.” On that second part… I’m actually glad they didn’t let me, because that would have messed with a lot of the good things that have happened in my life (going to Europe when I did, meeting the people in college that I did, taking certain classes that changed my outlook on life permanently when I did… etc.). But now that is all behind me. I have grown old. Older anyway. At this point in my life there is nothing resembling an “age boundary” that I still need to hit, except for maybe “retirement” age… which I probably will never retire anyway, so I doubt I’ll care about that when it comes (and I certainly don’t now).

So what am I talking about? Well – a funny thought occurred to me the other day. A lot of my immediate familys (and friends) birthdays are in this three month period. My mother and father are both in early August (the 5th and the 10th), then Tom’s on the 11th, my good friend Dave’s was the 14th, and my good friend Will’s is the 29th (muahahaha). And that’s just August. Then Brandon’s is in late September, along with a few other friends. Then October… October is the bitch. We kick off October with my uncle Michael Thomas Ford’s birthday, as well as Erica’s. Then Crista’s is on the 4th, followed by my cousin’s on the 5th. Then mine is at the end of the month, followed by Dave’s right at the tail end of the month on the 28th. And there are a bunch of other friend’s in the middle of October as well. If you would note, I called out half of the Blogenning members here, but conveniently left mine absent… some of them know it already. So what exactly does all this mean? Well… I realized that I will be turning 26 this year. And my mother had me when she was 26, making me exactly half her age. Huh.

So this came as a bit of a shock to me, really. I finally hit an age that has some small amount of meaning to me. 16 didn’t really matter, because driving is fun, but it wasn’t a privileged for me… 18 didn’t matter because at the time I didn’t smoke (I didn’t start till I was 21… and recently quit). 21 didn’t matter because I had been drinking since I was 16 (and had learned to respect alcohol and drink responsibly, which is what is lacking in most American youth… but that’s a story for a different topic). But now I have hit an age that actually makes me think – my mother was my age when I was born… huh. And this pulls through all of the other life questions like “is this where I want to be in my life,” and “where do I want to be five years from now,” etc. Additionally, this is something that only happens once in a person’s life…

So am I where I want to be at this stage in my life? Ah… no. Honestly, no. But am I working on that? Yes. Very much so. And you will probably see some changes because of that here in the near future. Big changes. Massive changes. Huge tracts of… wait… no. So I guess that’s not all bad. More like… 50/50. I’m halfway to where I want to be. Which, yes, I should just be there, but shit happens. Now, as far as where I want to be five years from now? Meh. Don’t care. That’s five years from now. If the changes I’m making now are successful, then I’ll worry about that. One step at a time, as many people have said. So where exactly does that leave me in all of this? Behind… but on the path I want to be on. And as I have said, it’s the path that matters, not the destination. Because the destination is the same for all of us, right Heidegger? (Please don’t hit me Brandon, I had to tie this back in to the title.)

Projects: A Current Look

A fancy title for a simple post. Now that I’m not working I actually have a lot more going on than before in my life. Quite a few projects have fallen at my feet since then, plus I’ve reinstated a few that had been tossed aside when I started the overnight hell of Walmart employment. One of those tossed aside ones that I have rebooted is of course the Blogenning. However there are others. So, this is just a list of projects that I’m currently working on/involved in.. kind of to give an update of what is going on in my life.

Lazarus – Lazarus is a movie idea that a friend, and the manager of the local gaming store, approached me with about a year ago. October 2010 he mentioned this movie idea he wanted to work on, and I told him casually “Hey, I’d love to help if you get it off the ground soon.” Well apparently that sparked his motivation, because now I’m directing, and co-wrote the movie with him. We’ve cast it, and are working on getting our location set up and getting some finances in order. It’s a short film, we’re aiming for about 45 minutes, about zombies. We’re attempting to do a different approach to the zombie phenomenon, while keeping it similar enough to the main genre to keep the zombie fanatics (like myself) happy. For more information go check out the Facebook page here.

Critical Table – Critical Table is a gaming/geek culture website that announced it was looking for writers a few weeks ago, and I hopped on board. The site is just getting off the ground, but hopefully once there is a steady stream on content rolling it will be a paying gig for me. I got my first article up the other week, and am wrapping up a second on now. The site centers around game reviews, editorials, and honest reporting. Too many game reviewers get paid to give games good reviews… and it’s ruining the landscape for a lot of gamers. That is what Critical Table hopes to fix. So go check it out!

Writing – I’ve been writing a great deal, and not just on here. I’m working on a short story that I aim to get published. I also have dusted off an old horror movie script I was working on to finish. Also, the comic I was almost done with, but stalled out on while looking for an artist to work with, and I’m pulling together ideas for this years NaNoWriMo, which I hope to actually complete this year. In addition I’m always working on shorts that I hope to do something with one day. I have about 10 completed short stories that are currently sitting on my computer, waiting for a direction. Perhaps I’ll decide what to do with them soon… working on it. And of course there is here… and the Blogenning.

Music – This is kind of a small one, but the band Far From There asked me to write and record a short, spoken word intro to the song they are currently working on. I completed this and sent it to them, and once the rest of the song is mixed and finished I’ll have a link to it on here.

Remodeling – I’ve been remodeling my parents’ house since I quit Walmart. It’s been how I’ve been making a living, so to speak. After completely gutting the bathroom I redid the shower, knocked a wall out and fixed that, painted, redid the floor, replaced some of the various hardware around the room, and over-all made it look entirely different. And they love it, so I’m happy. Since then I also painted their half-bath, and am currently working on the living room. In the living room I sanded the floors and re-coated them, and now I’m going to paint and put up french doors. An easier job. I also installed some ceiling fans and re did the garage and did a massive cleanup in the basement. Oh and cleaned the gutters… there’s more but it’s eluding me currently. So yeah, big project. Here are some photos…

I think that about wraps up the project list. I just woke up so if I forgot anything, sorry. Look forward to a more legitimate post tomorrow!

~Ian

The Plague

Today is a short post… more of an apology than anything. I am feeling rather sick… stomach thing. Feels like it’s trying to play jump rope with my small intestine. Not the greatest feeling in the world… and my normal response to beat it into submission only makes things worse… So you get… nothing today. Sorry.

Wait! No! You do get something. Shortly after my announcement of the continuation of the Blogenning, I convinced my friend Will to join in on the madness, so he is our newest member of the order. You can find Will over at A Chain of Letters. Enjoy!

And now… I leave you with this Youtube video, to show you how much I care… or something.

The Blogenning! 3.0

Let the Blogenning begin! Those of you who are longtime readers may remember the Blogenning. For those of you who are new to here, I will explain. The Blogenning was started by Brandon Schory and I as a way to motivate each other to write on our sites more often. Then we gathered a few more victims friends for our little game. And it worked out very well, for a while. Then someone (probably me) started lagging behind. Then another person… then another. And we all just kind of quit, without really saying anything about it.

Then, shortly after I moved back to Delaware from Boston, we tried again. This time we got even more victims friends together. And it went very well for a while. Then I got a high-stress job working nights. And I stopped posting. And they kept going for quite some time… then it slowly died again. Of course, even though I had stopped writing, I was still reading most of their posts. And about four months ago I realized it had been almost a year since Brandon had posted. So I started scheming. I knew I could get Brandon to start again, but what about everyone else? The only person still posting on a semi-regular basis was Tom…

So I schemed. And I pondered. And finally I plotted to get everyone posting again. So I set myself to a rigorous “one-a-day” posting schedule. Then I e-mailed everyone asking if they were interested in starting again. Obviously, being “unemployed” gives me an advantage over everyone else… but I said that instead of the previous “post for post” rule, we’d go “three a week.” Everyone agreed… and here we are! So without further ado… I give you… the Blogenning!

Aberro Specus, Dimestore Romance, Extant Musings, Independent Thought Alarm, Jaco’s Random Writings, Rachel Ober’s Life & Times of a Female Software Engineer, Time with Tom, and last, but not least, Words, Words, Words.

And for those of you interested… here are the rules of the Blogenning.

• The first rule of the Blogenning is that you always talk about the blogenning.
• The second rule of the Blogenning is that you ALWAYS. TALK. ABOUT. THE BLOGENNING!…
• *ahem* The third rule, three posts per week, minimum, is expected from all members of the Blogenning, ere they risk countless ridicule, name calling, and badgering (with sporks… arse eels, and possibly even badgers).

Or these guys will be coming for you!

• The fourth rule of the Blogenning is that of “The Rotation.” The Rotation is a thematic challenge, started every week by a rotating member* of the Blogenning. The first post of this week by the scheduled member becomes the challenge theme, and the same topic/category of post must be written by all members of the Blogenning that week. This means that if I write about rabid bunnies as my first post on my week, you all have to write about them at some point. Or if my first post of the week is a poem, you all have to post a poem by the end of the week. This post does count towards your weekly total, so it is not “extra.” The punishment for failing The Rotation is to produce an extra post the following week to make up for it (meaning that if I do not make one of my weekly posts about furries during Jaco’s week to meet his challenge post of “The Wonders and Joys of Furries” then I will owe an extra post the following week covering that topic. If I still fail to produce said post… the group shall think up an appropriate punishment.
• And finally, rule five of the Blogenning… have fun. This is meant to be an enjoyable and inspiring project. So if it begins to feel like a chore, or even like a second job… let the group know.

*The Rotation is alphabetical by blog title. So the order is Aberro Specus, then Dimestore Romance, then Extant Musings, etc. Also… Monday is the start of our week for The Rotation.