Jumping Plumber, Fallen Dinosaur

I stumbled across the picture above in my daily wanderings among the interwebs and it made me laugh. Wish I could give credit due as to who created the pic, but couldn't find anything. Then, being my completely over-analytical self, I had some deeper thoughts on it.

So, first a little background for my non-nintendo playing friends. Pictured above is Mario jumping off of Yoshi mid flight to get a little extra boost to either reach an otherwise unreachable area, or (more commonly) get an extra jump to save from falling into a pit (because you made a mistake). The problem is that by doing so you lose Yoshi in the process. When kept he helps you fly longer, kill enemies easier, and you need him to find pretty much any secret area in the game. If you can keep him, it's definitely worth it to do so.

However, sometimes we act like Mario in the picture...on top of the world voyaging on a conquest to save the princess and won't let anything get in our way. If we aren't careful, then sometimes we will even ditch out on our closest friends in order to obtain our goals. We've all done it in some form or another.

Much the same, there are times when we feel like Yoshi, working with somebody towards a common goal then all of a sudden, to our dismay we find ourselves falling down a pit, used, abandoned, and then alone.

Neither situation is exactly ideal.

So here we have two extremes: the overbearing, reckless individual that will not let anything in his path, often charging into things without planning it through and getting stuck into situations that are hard to get out of; and the helpless, broken individual that can't do anything on their own. Neither of them have a very strong chance of beating the game on their own...yet if they work together, then some synergistic symbiotic relationship forms, and the two together are able to accomplish which neither could do alone. They help make up for each others weaknesses.

Life is kinda like that. Sometimes we can be a bit bull headed, and other times we can feel helpless and defenseless. Yet the solution to both problems is to press forward, helping and being helped by those around us. If I'm going to play the game, I can see no better way of doing it than with a friend. They help prevent us from rushing into things without thinking, or lift us up when we're feeling down.

Potential

Potential is something that’s really been on my mind lately, and I think it’s because I don’t feel that I’m completely living up to my fullest. Funny though, because I don’t know if anybody really is…but in an attempt at self-improvement I came up with these few thoughts the other night as I was trying to fall asleep. I remember watching an old Simpsons episode where Homer, in attempt to improve sales in Marge’s self-owned pretzel making business, makes a deal with Fat Tony and the mafia to get rid of the competition. Marge’s ex-business partners-turned-rivals respond by hiring the Japanese mafia…fondly known as the Yakuza to even the odds a bit. At the end of the episode there’s an epic mafia war between the Italians and the Japanese. As they’re watching, Homer notices a guy just standing there, arms folded, not moving and dressed all in white. Marge ushers the family quickly inside to avoid confrontation, but Homer complains, commenting that you know the guy in white is gonna do something amazing and he wants to watch. Sure enough, just as they get inside the house you hear his battle cry followed by the sound of someone undoubtedly getting their butt kicked by a well-trained martial artist.

In a roundabout way, I wouldn’t think it uncommon for many of us to want to be like the super ninja in white. When the time comes for performance, no matter the circumstance, we want to be able to perform in the absolute best way we can, and should the need arise to kick some butt…so be it. I love the implications of such a person, because if you think about it, he would have to have an immense amount of self-control to contain all that raw power, and channel it in a direction of his choosing. He’s like some mega energy converter (MEC). Martial arts aside, I think that any skill or personality trait is that way. Inside all of us is a massive amount on energy, albeit in a dormant state. Through training and practice we can learn to convert such dormant energy into active and useful energy.

It’s like learning to throw a baseball. If you practiced throwing every day for six months you would undoubtedly see improvements in your results. However, the nature of throwing a baseball itself has not changed, only your ability to do so.

So then there’s the tricky part. I’ve been tr

ying to figure out the best way to convert that potential energy, into useful and active, perhaps even kinetic energy. How do we become MEC’s ourselves? If I’ve learned anything then really it’s that there is no secret, at least not in the traditional sense where a secret pathway will get you to your destination with little or no effort. Sorry, there are no warp zones in real life. Nor are there cheat codes. That’s actually a good thing though. Just like it’s been discussed before, many times we need the journey to help us prepare for destination.

Humor me for a second, because I’m going to continue using the video game metaphor.

Usually throughout a video game the protagonists gains more abilities and skills with experience. You start out as a simple character with a few basic moves, but the longer you play the game, the more abilities you get, and the stronger you become. The simplest game I can think of to back up my point is

Zelda…any of them will do. You start out with a basic sword and shield and three hearts, but as the game progresses you gain access to bombs, boomerangs, bow and arrows, etc…each item needed in a particular scenario to beat the game.

Honestly our lives are not too much different than that. The more time we spend playing the game, or developing a skill, the more return we get out of it, the better we are at it, and the more adaptation we have in using it in various scenarios.
I was watching the Prestige the other day (SPOILER ALERT…but honestly if you haven’t seen that movie by now you’re way behind), and you see an old Asian man perform a magic trick. Immediately the protagonists try to think of ways of how he was able to do it. The only rational answer, however, would imply that the old man had immense strength, yet when watching him walk he was feeble and required constant assistance, even after the show was over. It’s rather clever foreshadowing, alluding to the rationale that one could be so devoted to their art, so passionate towards the idea that their life was constantly a stage that they would spend their entire lives “performing”. And why not? “All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players”. If we had such devotion towards a good and worthy goal, would that not lead us all to a great and new heights?

Think of Star Trek: First Contact. Captain Picard tells a man in the

21st century that Starfleet was formed after mankind was able to put aside their differences, and devote their time and energy to the common good…which therefore maximized mankind’s potential, at least as far as space travel goes. Granted that that idea is a bit idealistic, nevertheless the desire to go where no man has gone before transcended men’s petty differences and led to the establishment of the greatest accomplishment of mankind in the 24th century. What if we had such passion, dedication, and motivation as those in Starfleet? Perhaps we’ll never see that happen to our civilization, but many inventions we call necessities today came from the hands of such dedicated individuals, anomalies in a broken system.

So here it is…my epiphany. In order to become the white ninja (not to be confused with the white power ranger…stupid Tommy, stealing Kimberly from Jason) I have to not only work and train hard, increasing my level of self-discipline, but I have to be emotionally invested…fully dedicated. It’s the only way to maximize the rate of converting that potential energy we all have, into a skill or attribute that we desire. It’s two mechanism’s working together, the mental and the physical. If one isn’t working as hard as it should then the other tries to compensate…leading to fatigue and problems down the road. The opposite is true too, however. If both mechanisms are working as they should then there’s a synergistic sort of effect that can readily lead to greatness. To quote a line from one of my favorite motivational speakers…

”see you at the top” - Zig Zigler

Inspiration Comes in the Strangest of Places

Video games and dating life usually don’t intertwine, and that’s most likely for the best. That’s not to say I don’t like girls that are into video games…for I very much am…I’m just saying when I want to take someone on a romantic date I’m not gonna bust out my game boy color and show her my pokemon collection. (not really fair, I haven’t played pokemon since 6^th grade but you get the point.) However, every once in a grand while the video game universe does give some applicable advice as to the more emotional side of us men.

For the past few weeks, maybe even months, I’ve been feeling rather apathetic when it comes to dating and relationships. Every time I’ve put myself out there I just get stressed and frustrated…mostly due to my deep-thinking, over-analyzing self. Then after a while I build myself up, put myself out there again and repeat the process over completely. Insanity right? I know! It’s like a never-ending rollercoaster, and to combat such an emotional ride I’ve tried not caring…enter apathy. Now I know it’s not an ideal solution...but it wasn’t without its charms. After all…It worked. I was no longer stressed, confused, or frustrated. Dating life was a giant MEH…

Then I had an epiphanic moment. (Yeah, I know that’s not a word, but it really should be. It’s really fun to say.) And of all to places to realize such a thought, it happened while playing a video game. The original Super Mario bro’s to be exact.

Your everyday, ordinary plumber sets out to save the princess who was taken hostage by the evil Bowser, King of the Koopas. Honestly, what guy doesn’t have some dream about rescuing his damsel in distress? At the end of every level you battle against Bowser thinking that you’ve saved the princess…only to have Toad tell you that your princess is in another castle. It’s messed up! Here we are, after putting in all this time, effort, and energy into saving whom we thought was the princess, only to find that you’re still 6 worlds away. That’s when I had my thought. It was right there on the screen, and for a brief moment the life I live in video games and dating combined to provide some sort of synergistic epiphany written in tiny 8-bit letters. “My princess is in another castle.” That means that she’s out there, somewhere at least…and that even if I have to beat 8 worlds to find her, then it will be worth it in the end. Many of us have been and will continue to go through multiple levels, finding out that the one we were saving, the one we were putting forth our time and efforts towards, was in fact not your princess, but that she is still in another castle.

That’s ok though, because when you finally do reach the last level and find princess peach, you’ll realized how you really weren’t ready for the game to be over on level 1 anyway, and that’s it’s taken your adventures to really appreciate the genius of the game designer.

...there's more to come

Wow, my bad guys.

They changed the way they filter our internet at work, which was where I wrote most of my articles and stories, so now I have to come up with some other ways to do it. I promise some good stuff is to come though...such as:

- a few thoughts on why Opportunities are never lost
- what I learned from a short bout of apathetic living
- why I think I'm turning into an old man

and I'm sure I'll get some more dating stories in there as well.

In the meantime, for all three of you out there...make sure to check out some new pics I posted on facebook and cdeskins.photoshop.com...they're from the Sugar House firework show and I'm pretty happy with the way a lot of them turned out.

Washington D.C.

So if you're reading this right now then obviously you know that I have a blog. Haha, surprise surprise. Well what you probably don't know is that I have another site that I'm starting up where I hope to post a lot of my pictures. I recently posted a few pics from my vacation in Washington D.C. there so check it out.

In case you missed the link it's cdeskins.photoshop.com

I've only posted a few there (40 or so from D.C.) and have a ton more on my laptop, so if you'd like to see those as well then you'll have to let me know.

Enjoy!

I'm Never Eating Chili Again

I hate being sick. Not fake sick where you stay home from school or work to play video games or watch TV, but really being sick. It sucks. You don't want to do anything, sleeping is a chore, and you're usually bored out of your mind.

Yesterday I must have eaten something pretty bad because I didn't feel too well at all. Nevertheless I went with my friend Parker to pick up something from his brother's house. Turns out he wasn't feeling to well either. It reminded me of a story of something that had happened to us in high school.

(fair warning, this is a vomit story...so stop here if you don't wish to go on)

One of our friends had just received some award for a writing contest. As part of the awards ceremony they had dinner at golden corral...the buffet restaurant. He invited Parker and I to come along, I can't remember why but food is food so of course we went.

They say that pride is the downfall of man. I'm inclined to agree...or at least if it's not his downfall it will make him miserable...for Parker and I had to see who could eat more that that buffet, and my man-pride would not let me lose. Somewhere around the 3rd or 4th plate I started to feel the pressure of a full stomach. Did I stop? Of course not...I would only be finished when Parker was unable to continue. That's how man-pride works. It's a complete "anything you can do I can do better attitude". Comes in handy for sports, not so much in nutrition of digestion. I believe it was the 5th or 6th plate that did it. I had won. I felt alright too. I mean, as well as you can feel after eating probably 2 days worth of food in one sitting.

Slowly I got into my friend's car, his dad drove...so it was my friend that had won the award and his dad in front and Parker and I in the back. We started the long drive home when my stomach let me know that it wasn't doing too good. We pulled to the stoplight and I said the quintessential line, "I think I'm going to throw up."

Nobody believed me.

I tried opening the door as quickly as I could as it all came out. I'd have to say I did pretty darn good under the circumstances, but in all fairness I'd have to say I was 50% accurate. Half going outside the car...the other half inside. Yeah, I know...insanely gross. That's not the reason I'm telling this story either, but rather it was what happened after that made the event so memorable.

Here I am, dangling outside of a car at a stoplight having just puked my guts out after eating 6 full plates of food, and I hear a roar of screams coming from the car next to ours. I slowly lift my head only to find a car full of beautiful girls our age staring in disgust at what had just happened. I didn't know how to react so I did the only thing that seemed normal. I smiled at them. Now I'm sure that had to be extremely attractive, but the looks on their faces was priceless. I bet the only logical explanation as to my behavior was to tell themselves that I was drunk.

Well we drove to a gas station on the corner and cleaned it all up and all was well. I've since wondered if my friends dad will remember me as the kid that threw up in his car. I think I'd remember if one of my son's friends did something like that.

White and Nerdy

I really wish that I could stake claim of creating this hilarious chart, but I can't. I simply came to it in my daily reading.

If I were to make an honest assessment of myself using this diagram as a guide I'd have to place myself as a Dork or a full on Nerd. I don't consider that a bad thing at all. My favorite part of this chart though, is the social ineptitude qualifier.

I was in a conversation the other day with a friend and we were talking about nerdy people. Now, I use nerdy to signify people that have a love for gaming, sci-fi, technology, math, anything which would just seem...well nerdy. You see them all the time, and to be honest they scare me to death. Often they smell bad, have horrible social skills, and are so detached from the norms of human interaction that they basically become a leech on society (I know some of you are thinking names...I'm not (at least, I'm trying not to), this is a generalization). Now I'm not scared of what they do or what they like, but rather that our interests are so similar that I'm afraid I'll become one of them, or worse off...that I already am. I confess. I'm a fan of Star Wars, Star Trek, Lord of the Rings, Dungeons and Dragons, and everything else that makes nerds across the globe buy extra elastic underwear for fear of an atomic wedgie from some jerky jock. Don't judge me.

I realized something though that temporarily let me regain some composure. As much as I like playing video games, submersing myself into a world of sci-fi, or reading up on the latest technological battle (apple vs. google for example), I've been able to maintain a pretty decent and productive lifestyle. I have a full time job, I'm still attending school, I've been playing basketball, golf, and soccer each week, I have a lot of great friends (couldn't tell that from this blog...all 3 of you that read it, haha), and have continued to be active at church. Now that's only a small list of things that I do, and I've previously shown how I use my time each week, and I'd have to say I feel quite productive.

I think that's were some of social stigma towards nerdiness comes from. It's not necessarily the fact that nerds like science fiction, playing games, etc... It's that they let those things take over their lives. You've heard horror stories of people that play computer games so much that they've taken on alternative virtual identities, neglecting their basic needs such as social relationships, diet, and even personal hygiene.

Gross. Please don't let me become like that.

As has been mentioned before, everything needs to have proper balance. I feel it's perfectly acceptable (and necessary) to enjoy some relaxing recreation for both the body and mind, and if that's watching some star trek, playin' a little D&D, or heck...building an arcade, then that's OK by me...as long as it's kept in moderation and doesn't detract from your other obligations and responsibilities as a human being. Maybe I should start an advertising campaign..."Game Responsibly".

Nah...