Crash and Statistics

I am tired, and Corporation is slowly devouring my mind. I have also been alone with my thoughts far too much lately, which is not exactly the best of states for my mind to be in. Thankfully, on Monday things will start happening again, which will hopefully result in me being more productive.

Current status/completion information:
- Corporation: background 10%, characters 5%, balance 0%, sociopathic squid creatures 20%.
- Artwork: major projects 5%, minor projects 20%, various sketches no-percent, style modifications minus-27%.
- Mental: sanity 34%, energy minus-6%, caffeine effectiveness 2%, happiness 30%, bitter edges 20%.
- Cats: purring 30%, snoring 10%, protecting the world from evil 20%, eating 20%, sleeping 20%, reinforcement of belief of superiority of feline-kind 25%.
- Clocks: telling time 10%, ticking far louder than the laws of physics allow 90%, not actually following anything connected to the universe 15%.
- Dreams: being creepy 20%, being overly realistic 40%, making no sense at all 100%.
- Trenchcoats: having pockets 33%, being warm 20%, catching the wind to cool down 50%, making shadows look dramatic 40%.
- Dwarf Fortress: violating the laws of physics with a rusty hammer 16%, making water by throwing ice at the ground 20%, being able to dig 90%, making algebra vomit look good 50%, nerdiness 100%.
- My computer: crashing 50%, working 20%, having too many fans 60%.
- My laptop: working 90%, arguing with the keyboard 20%, enabling wireless communication to the peoples of the world 10%, bursting into flame when presented with dwarf fortress 2%.
- Reading: utility 20%, amusement 90%, needing more books 100%.
- Smoothies: completion 0%.

I hope that you've enjoyed this collection of statistics, have gained valuable insight into my mind, and will now be bludgeoning yourself over the head with a blunt object in an attempt to forget all of this (or paying me to delete this post). Actually, what I really hope is for you to check out dwarf fortress, because I would like to get a bloodline game running (to increase nerdiness even more)*.

* If you do, I highly recommend reading the tutorials on the wiki; it makes the game much easier. And most of the stuff about how difficult it is is just exageration - it's fairly easy, if you embark on a map with trees, a river, and no aquifer. It gets even easier once you start optimizing your embark parties for whatever you think your goal will be (hint: not bringing an anvil lets you bring an obscene amount of food and booze - keeping the 1:2 ratio, something like something like 150 food and 300 booze, which will last quite a while)**. Really, the only way to have fun once you've gotten the hang of the game is to start modding, impose your own challenges, or embark on inhospitable maps - like a glacier, with a magma pipe (which begins a few levels too low to use to melt ice), in terrifying surroundings. So much fun***!

** If you want advice, ask. And if you don't want advice, make that clear before starting a conversation about it.

*** Actually, technically no. The fortress is going well - I've even managed to get some farmland going, though my lack of magma-safe screwpumps is a bit of an issue now that the fortress is fairly well established and can support crazy projects. Sure, I've lost 6 dwarves so far (current population: 34), but that's nothing compared to most other fortresses. Should have modded orcs in ... maybe I'll buff goblins up a bit, though I still haven't gotten a raiding party ... mumble ...

Now, to attempt to rectify my lack of smoothies ...

Booting

I'm writing this on my Eee, as I am inclined to do. It just booted to a usable desktop in about 30 seconds - a rather huge increase over its normal time of around a minute (but only 30 seconds to get to the shell), and my desktops time of 1-2 minutes to get to a usable desktop (though I haven't timed it recently, and it seems a lot slower than it used to).

I'm also not writing this in my normal operating system. Instead of Arch, I'm using xPUD, a unix based operating system which takes up about 55MB of space on my SSD. It boots quickly - which is its main selling point - and its very easy to install (I've still got Arch around, just not running, because this is much faster to get to a browser with).

It's not perfect by any means, but it does have many advantages, mostly boot time. It also doesn't store any data on the hard drive unless I tell it to - and hence is completely reset every time it boots. Not necessarily useful, but interesting.

I also installed a 2GB RAM chip in the Eee, upgrading from 512MB. A pretty big increase, as it now has as much as my desktop. Speed increase isn't hugely noticeable, but it feels a bit faster, and it should work better for some tasks now. Battery life isn't as good as it could be, still, so I think that my next upgrade will be a larger battery.

And, finally, Corporation is being run. I'm very happy about this.

A Lack of Inspiration

"Sanity is a bit like intellect: most people don't realize they possess it until they encounter someone who doesn't."

Other possible things: "... a bit like money", and "... a bit like knowledge". But they don't sound quite as good.

Anyways, on to the actual topic.

I am horribly unmotivated, and uninspired. That sentence is the only good thing I've been able to write in a while, the only thing which sounds good as well as having an interesting meaning. Its very, very irritating. I can't be productive, and when I try to write about a particular subject, I'm unable to. I can hardly write to amuse myself anymore (and, to be honest, most of my writings are just to amuse myself. I'm perfectly aware that they're horrible, but, like a poor artist who is happy simply because he has managed to do something, even though it pales in comparison to the works of others, I'm happy with them).

I'm also not drawing as much, outside of class. Sure, I'm able to come up with some interesting looking things during that, but they're all based on the same formula of vaguely fractal plant-looking things and filling in white space with complex patterns. I'm doing more fun stuff with materials, though, so that's fine.

I don't even do the work which I need to do. It's just lack of motivation, and even when I sit down and tell myself that I will get something done, I lose interesting very quickly.

I'm not entirely sure why this is the case. I have a variety of theories, though, and I've managed to correlate it to some of my subjective perceptions and records, coming to various conclusions. The basic one is that, when I'm rather happy with life, I'm unmotivated.

Maybe it's just that my lack of sleep has been catching up with me, destroying my creativity first.

Hopefully that's the case, as that means that I'll be able to be productive over the summer, which would be nice - there are plenty of things which I should work on.

Other things which are going on:
* My band-of-the-moment is Procol Harum, a British rock band formed in the 1960s. I listened to A Whiter Shade of Pale after rereading The Salmon of Doubt, and noticing that it's mentioned quite a few times, and Douglas Adams apparently thought that it was quite good. It is, and so I'm listening to more of their music. A Whiter Shade of Pale is their best-known song, apparently, and the previous occurance of the title is a link to last.fm, where you could listen to it if you cared. I sort of recommend them, though I have horrible taste in music, so your milage may vary.
* Building and messing around with motors is fun. The current pinacle of the art, for me, is a motor which, by only occasionally tapping against the magnets to complete the circuit, managed to run for at least 15 hours without completely depleting the battery or causing it to warm up, which is fairly impressive, compared to previous attempts (which resulted, twice, in the labels peeling off due to heat).
* I'll know if Corporation is going to be run fairly soon, hopefully - the deadline for submissions is coming up, and supposedly they'll be finalizing the schedule soon after. So yeah. I'm not actually that worried about it: either it will be run, which will be fun, or something better will be run, which will be more fun, with the added benefit of me not having to stress about it.
* My laptop continues to have some issues, though these are now self-inflicated software ones (there isn't enough space to upgrade the entire system). I'm considering doing various crazy things to try and get the space, including reinstalling arch (which I don't want to do). On the other hand, it works now ... probably a project for the summer.
* I've been vaguelly working on getting my Arduino to do more stuff, and have got it completely hooked into a breadboard. I should have gotten a prototyping sheild, but this works, so whatever. It's currently controlling a line of 5 LEDs (it would be 8, but I only have 5 at the moment), and not doing much other than making sure that all the wiring is fine. Not that interesting yet.
* I'm very tired, as I may have mentioned. I really, really need to start getting more sleep. Yes, it's ridiculous that I generally get into be by 10:30 and wake up at 7 and am still tired, and yes, I know that I probably get the most sleep of anyone I know and yet am one of the most tired, but that's the way it is.

That's basically the state of my life. Since you've read this far, I'm going to assume that you either care, are extremely bored, or need something to laugh at. If it's the first, you should actually talk to me instead, if it's the second I recommend 365tomorrows or huge portions of the internet, and if it's the third here's a joke:

Q: Why did the tourist fail to cross the road?
A: The road was the border between the USA and an Airport. The tourist had an accent, and the security people thought that it said terrorism instead of tourism. It was tackled by a number of large security guards, and its spine was broken in the process. It was removed from the premise in a body bag after being disassembled by a bomb squad just in case.

Welcome to my world. Everything is trying to kill you.

Opinions on Stuff

I am once again going to force my petty little opinions down your throats, or more accurately your minds. Although force isn't exactly the right word, it's the closest one I can think of, since you seem to still be reading this - and the gods know there isn't any reason for you to other than a sick, twisted desire to know what I'm thinking. Or maybe just to laugh at me, as I rant like a parrot in a cage filled with spikes.

(Yes, I'm in a bit of a bad mood, and fed up with this world. My head hurts too much to deal with it.)

In this short thing of opinions, things which you should watch because they are awesome. In no real order,

• Eden of the East
  
• Paranoia Agent
  
• Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei
  
• Baccano!
  
• The Prisoner
  
• Get Smart (the original series)
  

The basic criteria for all of these is that 1) They are awesome, 2) They have had an effect on how my mind works, and 3) I did not lose interest in them even after they ended / I finished watching them. If that last one was not there, I would have also included Chaos;Head, Ghost Hound, and Spice+Wolf - which were all very good, but which I lost interest in before finishing, for various reasons (Chaos;Head just stopped interesting me, Ghost Hound and Spice+Wolf I had issues getting the latest episodes of and never got around to catching up on).

Now, I'm going back to watching the latest episode of Eden of the East. Don't break anything.

My Brain Hurts

Today was a good day. It wasn't perfect, and it wasn't nearly as good as I was expecting, but it was okay. I finished reading Transmetropolitan (which was quite good), and basically just sat around and thought. Walking around in the aftermath of the rain is always amusing; the world looked new. I should have brought my camera with me, to take pictures of the plants, but I didn't. Life is full of those little regrets.

My head always hurts, now. I forgot how to use doorknobs for a second. I remembered quickly, though, and the door in the bathroom is pretty horrible. Walking into it would probably make it open. My brain has issues, to put it bluntly. Retrieving most memories or knowledge takes at least 30 seconds, if I'm not thinking of or considering it. I'm good at making up plausible stuff, though, and sometimes it's even true, so I don't think that most people notice.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm simply getting the backwash from someone else's mind, if somewhere out there there's someone who can do anything and feel perfectly fine (I do nothing, and feel horrible). If I ever find that person, I would kill them in the most painful way imaginable, except then I'd probably have to deal with my body rotting away.

As it is, I just have to blame lack of sleep, and a systematic program of messing around with my body, just not caring about all of the things I should be doing to keep it functioning. It still works, but not all the time, and I honestly can't see any benefits. Sure, having hair which forms little helices is rather fun, but is it worth feeling sick almost every morning and having trouble eating until I've been awake for at least an hour?

The two are probably completely unrelated. Spiraling hair is the only benefit I can think of.

Except my mind, perhaps: when it works it works very, very well. When it doesn't (which seems to include any time someone says that I'm intelligent) I get easily distractable, forget basic math, feel like falling over, or completely detach from conversation.

In general, when I say that I feel like falling over, I probably won't, unless I'm very tired. When I do fall over, chances are that it was arranged in a way so that I would not be hurt, especially if I feel off a chair. It is perfectly safe, and preferable, to ignore the event, and carry on conversation as if nothing had happened.

To clarify: I do not fall over because I want your attention. I fall over because I feel like it, and because floors are often more comfortable than chairs.

The third previous sentence is to be ignored if I verbally indicate that I am injured, or am bleeding or unconscious. In such a situation, it is appropriate to ask if I require assistance, or to inform me that I am injured if I have not noticed. If am am unconscious, it is recommended that you consult a doctor, but do not move me, as that can lead to complications of a minor issue. Pouring water on my face is acceptable, but only if slapping me thrice has failed to wake me.

I have laid out these rules because very few people seem to understand them, especially the bit about ignoring me falling over, and the bit about what to do

As I said, probably, I am extremely tired. I am also not entirely sure if this is reality, a dream, hallucination, or something else entirely. It would be appreciated if arguments as to the validity of those viewpoints is presented.

Acceptable arguments for this being a dream:

• Clear application of dream logic to a situation, such as travel, actions, or architecture.
• Transforming into something else, for no apparent reason (this is only considered valid in support of dream logic).

Acceptable arguments for hallucination:

• Turning into spiders, or other insects, and attacking me.
• Turning into something nightmarish, and attacking me, while vomiting drugs or politicians.
• Presenting me with a supply of used drugs, and evidence that they were used on me (for example, needle tracks, or partially dissolved capsules in my stomach).

Acceptable arguments for something else entirely:

• Anything involving quantum mechanics.
• Anything involving Schroedinger.
• Anything involving the collapse of the false vacuum.
• Anything involving effecting reality with math.

Acceptable arguments for reality:

• None.

I hope that that has cleared the issue up slightly. Arguments may be sent to my email address, to me via facebook, told in person (as is required for some of them, although some are actually strengthened by being applied over some other communications medium), through smoke signals, telepathy, miraculous formation of wildflowers on my limbs or wall, or divine revelation.

Questions about the King of Walrus, and how to render tribute to him, may be directed by any of the stated methods, and by courier. Requests for diplomatic status should be sent to the Walrus Consulate, which you may locate in any reputable directory of psychologists.

Refusal to read this line constitutes a legally binding agreement to throw a paperback book at my head.

If you have failed to read the above line, please contact me. If you have succeeded in doing so, but refuse to do so again on principle, it still applies to you. Contact me in person at any suitable time, and I will provide the necessary devices.

This is your standard supply of hand-selected Markov Fragments:

It feels like a furry chicken, tail wrapped neatly around its front paws.
He began to throw all propriety aside? How undignified!
Explanations will be essential for combat and shouldn’t try to kick the can down.
T`ien Tan also collected 20,000 ounces of silver.

That's all.
Wake me when there's something interesting to say.
Actually, don't.

GRIMDARK Corporation, Section the First

[ Just writing, set in the GRIMDARK counterpart to Corporation. Not canonical in any way, just a view into what Seismic Dynamics Corporation might have looked like if things had gone a bit differently. Hopefully, the first in a series, but don't expect much. ]

The scientist was working late. His job, such as it was, was both simple and brutal: running wires beneath the skins of test subjects. Complex patterns, eyetwisting shapes, whatever the bosses told him to do. Sometimes, he would pretend that he didn't enjoy his job, that the frantic pleadings of the subjects made him want to let them free. Then he would laugh.

Sometimes, he would try to convince the prettier, younger subjects that he was going to let them free. He was given quite a degree of latitude in his job, and would hide them away in supply closets or storage rooms for days, once even a week. He would bring them food, clothing, music, whatever they asked for that was small and easy to get. They were often very grateful, and he took every advantage. When they objected – and it was not often, as he let them see, or more often hear, one of the procedures - he would call in security, claim that they were trying to escape, and have them trussed up and put back on the table. What he would do after deserves no words.

He did not like this, however; it was far more enjoyable to pretend to lead them to freedom, only to end up back in the lab. He would break them, then, laughing as they writhed in pain, the fresh implants livid in their skin. Some he would hurt more, although never in ways that would show – or at least last – lest his superiors question his practices. They might not care, though; the broken subjects he delighted in producing for them were much more tractable than the others.

He was not the sort of person you would want to meet in a dark alley.

He was not the sort of person you would want to meet at all.

He was one of the Corporation's most valued employees.

"Individuality is an untenable situation."

[ Another batch of Markov-generated quotes, fewer than the last two times because I realized the time about half-way through. I'm starting to consider doing something with them - they would certainly be a good starting place for flash fiction, and I need to get better at writing, so win-win, right? ]

[ Oh, and basic information: somewhere between 1 in 4 and 1 in 7 of the phrases generated make enough sense that I post or save them. For this batch, I've edited one or two, minor word changes to fix grammar / improve meaning. And I'm not sorry in the least. ]

"Age is a place to be free."

He opens a door back onto the earth.

When night came on, he lighted the beacon-fire.

"Why?" "That information will cost you," says the receptionist.

"Will you hold?" "Crud."

Otherwise, she'll get her hands and clothing caked in hideous gore, leaning on their tails.

"Like she's done to him?" "We've been looking after him aggressively."

"I think we should have listened." He chortles horribly.

"I was just thinking." He smiles.

But they both stayed in touch with the new modalities.

... lying on the crazy infinite sunspot that limns the square with shadows.

"Hey, god-man. Got a seam of ice near the Earth will follow our commander through life and death.'

"I'll –" She passes him another chance after his long exclamation, rocked back a little lacking in precision. “Then you think are rich enough to liquefy helium."

"Fuck that!" Shocked out of the cave, and had, from his route.

"Shut up, he had a question?" she asks.
"Yes."

His heart is heavy as a means of offense in the outline of a 1910-vintage Rolls Royce Silver Ghost.

And I'm overdue.
"Good day!" The ape stares at her reflection in the final allowance for the rest of the 1980s.

This year, the Congress has commitment to budgets dropped to a small trapdoor with a sense that we must forage in order to learn these things.

It’s not really feeling so.
“I will admit I’m not joking."

"Are you crazy? Your mother has submitted herself to say."

Surprise and postcards from the top.

She makes a choked-off sound.
He gargles.

"I am willing to use them for is to build an empire in Europe as was timelines,” the review argued.

Though this makes Current rotation plans call for silence.

Budgetary resources over the latest Bollywood hits.

"One of my time was chewed up at the throne, orients himself on his bike."

Some of them will show up "Heads".

If he believes the government twelve million, three hundred degrees." "Why not?" asks the cat.

I hope he shows up.

Am I correct in thinking that was the result of no security significance.

Shut up, he had been drinking much.
The man shakes his head.

She is never served.

"Much of my ancestors had been a lot of work." "The monitoring equipment cost millions, then," says the ghost, narrowing from an earlier age.

"Ah, to be tractable."

Mind if I can take advantage of a passing bus.

He burns with a deranged distressed refugee from the past.

And this whole package is a grinding job.

I've seen what those goals are? Who knows.

"Agents within many other species." Concern, alarm, agitation.

The eerie keening sets his own brain as he was afraid I was free, I burned with the Intendant.

My right hand, outstretched for balance, clutches a mark's stolen memories.
The victim is sitting opposite him.

Those badges – there is a jaded army, not a pleasant elasticity.

Nor can the United States.

It's great for large, theater wars national defense, more of his station, he considers the power of robots even then.

It was perhaps more telling that none of it – I'll meet you, then you must be mistaken.

"Fuck that!" Shocked out of control.

An Avatar is one mile deep when the window into servantspace closes.
Then he hops backward and ducks shyly into a trap.

ESP has to trigger your territorial/reproductive threat display early, rather than vice versa.

If we don't instantiate them, the dishes as mere tools.

Sometimes she wonders if I'm his voice now.

Glancing round, she sees a room that hosted a flickering light.

Your mom has got to be trying to start a headlong rush toward him.

Throughout history randomness has been inadequate, Standard missile.

Most of them occupied by real people.

In the time that morning.

Everyone ignored him.

"Why blame the Queen?" "Because she's the focused, driven force to an overzealous prosecutor that it is a fabrication."

Your own reality to control, insight into trade arrangements, augmented senses, ability to pick another somatotype.

Our units deploying compared to nonreligious people.

From society’s viewpoint, religion works.

By the time to time his footwear takes a deep breath.

Every tax dollar raised east of the black business suit, long-skirted and uptight.

Dismantle the moon! Digitize the biosphere, make a stand stacked with fresh sushi rolls when the ship in dumbstruck silence, it winks at her attention, in a wooden chair opposite the site of the enemy.

Agencies have been made and written down at the screen.

"One twenty seconds to secure it, the nothingness, that’s infinite, right?” I asked.

"Forget what I do. I’m a package-delivery guy."

"How long for what?" he replies, cautiously.

I just nodded.
Phew, disaster averted.

"Or so I could incorporate his ingredients into my office." John followed him to cease and desist from his elderly parents and brother, and his mind – something important, something about it, his feet feel like me."

"He's making rude comments about your blue map."

"Consensus-we believe that the true reading must be, not 'plunder,' but 'do not plunder.' Alas, I fear that outside the window into servantspace closes."

She sits bolt upright, a thin chattering fills the mess is being sorted out, business IT departments have gone into free fall, as if they knew that there was revealed that two of them off, he supposed.

"I doubt they even understand how they respond to the Ch`i State."

The few people he was born – your dad did business with him.
But she doesn't exist.
The air around his finger, or something.

"Then there were no thoughts or emotions or desires," I said.
"You’re an atheist. You think I get it."

Likewise, Army procurement spending is way down.

There's a sucker for rituals, and anyway, it helps him get through the dispositions of an instant reassured me.

"Geodesic domes sprout like skeletal mushrooms from the pinnacle of teleological self-congratulation, depending on the other end ..." And so on.

A stab of claustrophobic panic: Help! I'm trapped because of the four.

In effect, they are lines on paper, to draw, to write, freedom to read, or work that way.

"It is you –" "No, I can't."

If I had proceeded back some distance toward the future.

Plus, they’re not actually part of the enemy's drums, when Ts`ao Kuei proceeded to make everybody rich beyond their design life.

She didn't mean to minimize that advantage away.

"The tears of all the same." "Uh-huh." Manfred's opinion of the Third Lord chokes.

He finds the documents are drawn up.

A very bleak stare it is, a socket, like a struggle right now.

He is seized up.

She crouches in it, staring at him.

"What is basket ball?" he said.

If you try writing your affirmation for a moment, she wonders dismissively.

Matter is uniform.

Those are human feelings, not God feelings.
God could simply choose to sometimes make you fall in love.

It belongs to only one of dilatory drift.

"I'm not surprised their translator didn't want a ceremony, but we do." "Then what could and would observe the white living room carpet?"

She grins malevolently.
And his location.
Leave the rest of the street.