small things

... might seem unimportant to most. I get a lot the ...advice or whatever that I should be more serious or to not waste time with the stuff I am ... waisting my time with :)



I understand that when you are very sick, or someone from your family  is very sick, or in an extreme situation like war or famine you would not spend time on small things, or you would feel guilty to do so.



I was never in such very bad situation, well one time but was young and stupid so I didn't get the degree of seriousness :)



But really me and I see that many people also do spend time on small things and enjoy it and somehow do appreciate and give importance to it.



But also it brings joy.



Let see, to some people chatting with unknown people online brings them joy or whatever, for me sometimes it seems stupid but whatever I do also understand this: if makes you happy, do it.



All hobbies or however you define such activities seems stupid and frivolous to other people.


But I can honestly say that one or another of these activities made me happy even in my bad momments, no matter that they were not like life and dead moments or something.



Was it music or gaming or football... does it matter? If it gets you out of shit?

But I many times hear an idea like: there are so many people in the world that suffers and you... play games, or read books, or more in the line of me not doing some significant shit.



But most of the people want to have a decent, civilized, without problem, life, right?

What are you going to do then? Fight another war? What I think is that then people will have time for: spending it with family, play games, do sports, enjoy whatever the fuck they like. Am I wrong?

To be honest I do think that even in bad times these little things will help.



A good book will help no matter when. Maybe different book for different times/situation.



And then: why so serious?

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750 words not

When I was a kid on one hand I was not so lucky, having bread rationalised, no meat in shops and no tv, national tv was a joke and there was none other. Later on I moved 2 big city and got salami and other stuff and I was like: would be SO good if I can all my life eat salami, like EVERY DAY! And cheese. Then came the "revolution" and there you have everything in the shops. But not enough money. And then you want $. Later on I started to work and lucky or not got into IT and got a house but of course you need 2 work all your life 2 pay 4 it, so you are stressed about this. Basically you are lucky if you can be a slave but can have your own place. I mean most of the people will envy you for what they say you live a decent life. Why are you complaining? Don't you see how lucky you are? You want to have a decent life, as many other people, you got it now, stop bitching about it, so what if you have to work all day for only 30 years to pay for it, only for the house... You are a bit stressed because if you do not work you will lose that house and you have family that depends on you. Of course anytime throughout history people were stressed about similar things, if they were ... lucky, unlucky ones had to go through war or famine and/or great depressions or just cold war(s). So you are lucky if you are mildly stressed.
On the other hand I was lucky as a kid, I grew up without too much (no) meat (except Christmas time :)) and toys and tv but what we did eat was from our gardens mostly so was healthy, I was walking barefoot all the summer so I guess my immune system got pumped up, you can see the kids 2day all of them have allergies and wear glasses, and is no wonder with the supermarket shit or fast food, they try to poison us to be able to feed us all or for whatever else reason. Also I went to school no more than 4 hours per day until I was like 14, kids these days stay at school all day; I could come home, do my homework and play and play and play until dark sets in, also parents were giving the bigger kids the key to apartment and that was it, we kids were all with the key on a rope around our necks and roaming wherever, myself went in woods and hills around the small city and indeed I could play and have fun in the nature or just outside playing football or all kind of games with the other kids, but there was no worry about strangers or whatever other dangers, no mobile phones to be able to know where the hell is the kid. And I do remember my childhood as a happy one. So yes i was also lucky.

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Why I think religion is not good for you, and me

I am afraid or unlucky that I am around of more religious people than ever. Or am getting paranoid.

And I am not that against it as long as it is not disturbing me. But i guess I notice it because they do disturb me,

are more aggressive. In wanting to show that they are right and I am wrong and not only that that I am sinful only for the fact that

I do not believe in the true God. Well i do not believe in any God. Why? I cannot believe there is a God that comes with all this shit.

What I say is if there is God than he doesn't care about people, all the atrocities happened that happened for same reasons: money and the power, some started from "religious" matters.

Somebody will say that God should not be understood as a wise man and judged as I just did, well then the only way to conceive it is as the nature.

And I think also that religion itself is bad, bad for people, not true and not helpful ...anymore.

And others can say it better than me why:

"Most Americans are convinced that faith in God is the foundation of civil society. Society Without God reveals this to be nothing more than a well-subscribed, and strangely American, delusion.
Even atheists living in the United States will be astonished to discover how unencumbered by religion most Danes and Swedes currently are.
This glimpse of an alternate, secular reality is at once humbling and profoundly inspiring--and it comes not a moment too soon." - Phil Zuckerman 

“Be ye not unequally yoked with unbelievers,” says the Christian Bible. “They wish that you disbelieve as they disbelieve, and then you would be equal; therefore take not to yourselves friends of them,” says the Koran (Sura 4:91).
At best, teachings like these discourage or even forbid the kinds of friendship and intermarriage that help clans and tribes become part of a larger whole.
At worst, outsiders are seen as enemies of God and goodness, potential agents of Satan, lacking in morality and not to be trusted.
Believers might huddle together, anticipating martyrdom. When simmering tensions erupt, societies fracture along sectarian fault lines. I got this from somewhere on the internet.

Church forces parents to treat their kids with other sexual orientation than the norm as sick or sinful.

This is like a list with whatever points I think that will show how wrong applied religion is.

Free will: If God has a plan for me, I have no free will to choose, and if I have free will, then God is not an all-knowing and all-powerful deity making things happen in my life.
And the plan is not good at all, just recently, historically, human beans have a bit better and longer life. It is simple put yes but cmon is logic also.

Look back and you can see that many rulers were declared very religious, but that didn't stop them to start wars that killed thousands and they didn't try to stop poverty,
they did keep the poor poor and obedient, they were marched to wars since ever.

I know you can say that people are people but the true doctrine has nothing to do with the fact that people say one thing and do terrible things like the catholic church did over and over with children,
witches and so on.

I am really curious on how people comes to believe, I mean except weak and scared of life people :)
And except idiots that were trained and brainwashed from childhood.

Anyway back to the start of what i thought will be a small diatribe :) : if you do not Allah Akbar on me for just not believing and wearing whatever I wear and drink whatever I drink
is still ok but if you do organize some people to walk and check who is not behaving, not as the democratic rules of the country you are in but of the religion YOU adhere to I do not feel too good, I do not feel free.

Is not that I believe in democracy, giving rights to all idiots doesn't seem like a good idea anymore...

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how to (short) story?

How difficult is to have a short story that makes you feel something and with the same intensity as a very good novel or the best movie.
My memory is not good at all so I think I was looking for the best short story and because Umberto Eco is one of the masters of storytelling and one great theorist of it I read one that he recommended but right now cannot remember the name and the author although I read more amazing shorts buy the guy. I (hope) will come back with the name(s).

Anyway was about the way to start and end, to arrange and follow the elements, ideas and actions int he short story, the setup and characters...
And this short story is well written no doubt.
And it touches the readers into, onto, one primal emotion :)
Which it should, like a good story.

Part 2: in which there is this guy that goes on his bike, its snowing but he is thinking and not paying 2 much attention to the conditions...
Nevermind that but I was thinking next that even if you have a good written story with all the elements BUT is in the future on SF many people would not like it.
And I do not mean people that do not read good literature.
And I do see a reason behind it, check this example: if you set Romeo & Juliet in a place with dragons or 1000 years in the weird gadgets future people will like it , of course, but will not feel the same intensity on it. I think. Because they will not identify themselves so much to the same degree with the context and all.
Don't get me wrong I do like or even love SF and fantasy stuff.
But I think our subconsciousness is conditioned by our century context,  more or less, in which we are born and raised, in the similar way in which we perceive something as beautiful or ugly because in our lives most people pointed to same type of beauty or ugliness, being a person or a  monster.

(a quote: "According to Immanuel Kant, beauty is objective and universal (i.e. certain things are beautiful to everyone). But there is a second concept involved in a viewer's interpretation of beauty, that of taste, which is subjective and varies according to class, cultural background and education.

In fact, it can be argued that all aesthetic judgements are culturally conditioned to some extent, and can change over time (e.g. Victorians in Britain often saw African sculpture as ugly, but just a few decades later, Edwardian audiences saw the same sculptures as being beautiful).

Judgments of aesthetic value can also become linked to judgements of economic, political or moral value (e.g. we might judge an expensive car to be beautiful partly because it is desirable as a status symbol, or we might judge it to be repulsive partly because it signifies for us over-consumption and offends our political or moral values.)").

So, like that, a Romeo and Juliet in Game of Thrones setup might not trigger the same intense sentiments. But even if it is fiction and it is set in the past people would feel it can be real, and cry and all that. Does that mean that a story should take this into account? I think is somewhere in between, because for me, for example, it does not matter to much, and I say that because I saw it is true, (almost) it does not matter what is the movie about, if is well done and acted, and it does not matter the time and place, it can lead me to catharsis!
But from early age I read, a lot, SFs and fantasy novels, from Jules Verne to Russian SFs :) that I could find in communist times.
So I guess, from an hedonistic point of view, I am lucky.

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10 or 20 games 2 play before you stop being alive - Part 1 = numero 1

For sure in one of the top spots there is this series of games called The Elder Scrolls, developed by Bethesda Softwork and I have to say is not a coincidence that it is like on a tie with another series by the same company: Fallout. Fallout was actually my first love, gaming speaking. Will talk about it next or soon. Or not.

Anyway, The Elder Scrolls. I have to admit I didn't play the first 2, Arena and Daggerfall.

But Morrowind (The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind), with the story (IGN's reader's choice for Best Story), the mood, the music (Morrowind was nominated for the category of "Outstanding Achievement in Original Music Composition")!

It is a truly open game, you can do it your way or even don’t do it, you do not need to fulfill any prophecy, actually there is one and it is about you if you … care about it.

It is a true blood RPG, you are born under one of the 13 signs, each gives you different abilities, 10 races, each with its own specialties, and then you can choose in which of the 27 skills you put your points. Cool huh? But there are many cool things that combined created for me one of the best gaming experience, like you can skill and level up by exercising abilities, you want to increase your 1 hand combat? Then get a one hand sword and stab something. You can also read some training books and also ask some people for training. Also I liked the combat that is in a way more free than in other RPGs, first of all is not turned base but real time and like in real world, multiple enemies can and will attack you in the same time and you can kill them however you feel like, melee or magic. Or run away, I did that in the beginning cause you are very weak and with no armor. And there are consequences, you cannot go berserk and kill people in the cities, the powerful guards will put you down like a mad dog. Almost, cause depending on the level of guilt you might be able to pay your way out of prison. And talking about guards, they are different from land to land with different character types but also armors and at the time the graphics were amazing, also for the “different locations that you will travel are highly detailed. The rivers and lakes that you come across look so real that it seems that you can drink out of them to quench your thirst”( Reviewer: Michael Knutson).

I do not remember if was in Morrowind or Oblivion that I was not walking or running but jumping so I can improve it ;)

So we go to Oblivion, the next game of the series:

“The plot begins six years after the events of The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind in 3E 433. Emperor Uriel Septim VII is assassinated as he attempts to flee from the Imperial City after learning that assassins have killed his sons. However, before his death, he hands the Amulet of Kings over to the person who would become the Hero of Kvatch, a lowly prisoner which Uriel had seen in his dreams, with instructions to 'close shut the jaws of Oblivion'.

The adventure begins after a prison escape and with a quest to find a man named Jauffre - and eventually the long lost illegitimate son of Uriel, the last surviving heir to the Septim throne, hidden away for protection since his birth. Ultimately, the Hero must stop the invasion from Oblivion and stand between the future of Tamriel and the Prince of Destruction himself.”(http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_IV:_Oblivion)

EPIC, huh?

Like the world of the series, Tamriel(also known as Dawn's Beauty in Aldmeris, Starry Heart in Ehlnofex, Starry Heart of Dawn's Beauty, Taazokaan in the Dragon Language, and the Arena, is one of the several continents located on Nirn), its stories, deities and creatures.

Oblivion is somehow a love / hate affair for many ES players. Whatever.

I loved it!

You can join many factions but the most of the quests comes from these:

The Fighters Guild – did all the quests and become the Master of it! And are 7 guildhalls with 10 ranks to climb till you become the big boss ;)

The Mages Guild – similar to the fight guild I climbed also the ranks of the mages one till the Arch-Mage!

The Dark Brotherhood – if I remember correctly, I have a very bad memory, this was the best series of quests I enjoyed in the game; basically you must assassinate people, sometimes even many, like one quest where you must kill everyone in a house (name: Whodunit?) but that does not mean you kill innocents (well sometimes) like in a quest you must find a missing girl and you find out that a town wants her to be sacrificed … and of course I killed them all, all village, that was also crazy there were in a basement some armed with clubs … and there is this quest where there is someone’s mother’s head on some shrine… crazy.  

The Thieves Guild – very very nice also, of course I become guildmaster.

The Arena – is actually a place where you can fight, under some rules – fight to death but do not loot the fallen ones, until you become the grand champion when you can also challenge the ex-one and after that you can choose a name, like The Messenger of Death or The Crimson Blade or Dragonheart ;)

But many additional side-quests were cool, like that where you must find a painter and for that you go into another weird world that resides in one of his paintings, this quest is called … A Brush with Death ;)

In both games I talked so far about there are books spread that contains stories about the world, deities, all kind of heroes, some of these are made by fans and some followed a story contest started by the Bethesda folks. So you can spend months in both games, playing and reading, np.

Skyrim

War, war never changes. No, that is from another game.

But is about to be unleashed in the land of Skyrim when you are brought in. To be executed. But I am the Dragonborn so fuck you bitches I cannot be decapitated just like that.

Is already more than 3 years since Skyrim came to life but still the graphics are amazing, even without the cool mods.

The story is not as good as Morrowind’s. But there are new creatures to the series that include Giants, Frost Trolls, mammoths, Frostbite Spiders, Ice Wraiths, Hagravens, and Dragons! And the graphics :) So you are Dragonborn and will learn to speak some of the dragon language and shout, shouts are powerful and useful, mostly as a weapon, as an attack.

We have no more classes but perks that are skilled-specific organized in a tree. NPCs are more intelligent and do more whatever tasks not only roaming around aimlessly. You can get married J

I liked it that the pace, furiousness of the fight was dimmed compared with Oblivion, not only that is more “real” but for me it suits better.

Anyway is a game where, also like before ones, you start on a quest and can get lost so that you can even forget why you went that/one way in the first place. I remember the feeling on going on some quests on a snowy mountain and encountering all types of dangers difficult to fight with my current level and spending a lot of hours on it. So for me is a moody game that the main story kind of disappointed me but other quests and the settings, the beautiful scenery, the fighting were good and compensated. There are a few fights involving a lot of people that felt good to participate in. With the new radiant story (used as with Fallout 3) AI allows the game to make an infinite amount of miscellaneous quests and also adapt the quest to the player “moves” and style perceived till then by the game, like the fighting preferred style. There are creatures that have their fixed stats but most of the others scale to your character, maybe sometimes the challenge is lacking because of this, so much as many fights are kind of easy to win, one way or another, is not like in Morrowind when I was killed in day 1 by some rats. Some people say Skyrim was dumbed down so more can play it. And the pleasure of just exploring around is not so great as in Morrowind despite the gorgeous surroundings. This is just my feeling.

When I finished the main story I actually didn't believed this is it, I thought there must be something more spectacular or something but no, after another month of playing and noticing no more marks on the map I just stopped :)

But I did played it for like ... hmm .. from xmas till april so ... ;)

Anyway I played each of these 3 games a few times, not to mention the add-ons, I almost forgot about it but I feel tired already writing this so will not talk about the add-ons now, but they each add cool stuff.

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talks

I wanted to tell you about my talk I had with this guy in the train. I also have the strange felling I already talked about it...

Anyway so I was on the train, late - that is why I meet him,  and chatted about what can it be done and what can you do to live civilized and in an civilized ...environment, and I said that one thing that motivated me to leave my country was that, meaning here in Holland, sorry - Netherlands, the fact that people do not need to worry to much for the basic needs make them less prone to commit stupid, unnecessary shit. But I also added that everywhere are idiots, crazy ones and just plain evil or stupid ppl that will do commit shit anyway. But less in this environment, country, system. What I was after angry with is not that he didn't agree with my simple point of view but this: as if he didn't listen to what I say he had this idea: no, is not like you said (me) because no matter where you are people will be bad and is nothing you can do about it. Ok, next I tried to explain more: don't you think that if people are poor, if the governmental does not care and if all the system is bad and corrupt, let us overreact a bit..., then the people are at least angry, maybe confused also and for sure many will be desperate so then is more likely shit to happened? Again he just disagreed and his argument was again just: no, many people are bad and that is it. I thought I have some arguments to consider and I had the felling that is not at all the case.

My surprise was in this case also that I thought this guys is a clever and smart one like he always at works speaks first in gatherings and most of the times makes sense, has a good logic and all.

In a way his way of speaking and not listening reminded me of the religious people. On the train, again :), many times I go with a(nother) colleague that lives in my city and he does believe. And when rarely I say things that for me do not go well with existence of God, like the shootings form Connecticut and such, I got always this ambiguous answers and the understanding (a bit condescending even ... maybe) look.

Anyway. You just cannot convince them no matter what.

Next time I want to remind me of a thing that happened 3 years ago when I went home, and was coming back from pizza and a car almost ran over me.

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how can people do this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=aWSOIXS5o3c

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