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Hmmm, big post to follow (you have been warned). Whether you think it’s sad or not technology is a very big part of my life, both social and personal. It always has been and I’m pretty sure it deals a lot with me being an only child in the city. Both of my parents worked full time so when I wasn’t at Daycare I was at home watching TV (or playing with Lego’s, boy did I love my Lego’s) with my dad or watching TV on my own. I had plenty of friends growing up (and by no means did I spend all my time indoors, I loved to ride bike and hang out at the park with friends) but I suffered from a lot of anxiety when in large groups of people so I tended to stay home more than hang out with friends (I still suffer from anxiety in large groups of people but I’ve learned to cope with it, I still prefer to be alone though). It was just more natural for me to sit home and watch TV so I went with it. I also did a lot of reading as a child so my hermit ways come from that as well (still do spend a lot of time reading from books to educational stuff, nothing is off limits anymore with the internet when it comes to reading). My gaming addiction was brought about by my first babysitter/daycare. The lady who ran it used to let me play her kids Nintendo and Atari 2600 whenever I wanted to so I spent a lot of time from when I was 5 until I was 8 playing a lot of Mario and Missile Command (she’s still a very good family friend). Ever since that day I spent almost all my time playing either my Gameboy or going over to friends places to play on their consoles (heck it was one of the main reasons I went over to their places to begin with). When I got my first Playstation for Christmas one year that was it, I spent almost all of my free time outside of school and Basketball practice playing on it. Hours upon hours were spent in front of that machine (even when friends came over). When I met my best friend in sixth grade our friendship was based primarily on playing video games (not anymore mind you, we did a lot of stuff together outside of gaming but that’s how we became friends). It progressively got worse from their as newer consoles came out and I fell deeper into my addiction. Now-a-days I don’t spend as much time gaming as I used to. Between working all night and sleeping all day I rarely have the chance to put in any serious gaming on my consoles (I do play a lot of MMO’s but that’s a different story altogether). When I was first introduced to the computer I instantly fell in love and it started an addiction that I still can’t pull myself away from. It started as a mild addiction at school, back when I rushed through computer work so I could play games like Oregon Trail and Number Munchers. As I got older and the computers starting to get better as I progressed further in school it just got worse, to the point I would rush through daily assignments just so I could get the chance to get on those spiffy new iMacs the library had so I could surf the internet. In high school my parents finally broke down and bought a desktop for the house with internet access and well my addiction spiraled out of control from there. Seeing as how I got my first computer around the time Toonami started airing I had two addictions to satisfy and I found my drug in message boards and chat rooms (like AF, AP, GF, SS, etc.). These are the places I met some of the greatest friends I have to this day, though I’ve fallen out of contact with a few of them due to them moving on from their internet days (like Veggie and Anime Pimp to name a few). I eventually found AC through Cloud on GF and found myself coming here every day, if not to chat with Cammy/DX/Eppy/Drak/Anime Pimp/aqu/etc or plot the takeover of AC with Veggie and Cloud (way back in the day here people, no current plans to try a takeover (does not want a railgun shot to the face)). Hell my addiction to the internet and anime got so bad it lead to my shut-in days back in 2007 (ask Epples, he knows full well what I’m talking about. We spent many a long hour talking about anime and manga during this time (hell he nicknamed me Hikki-chan because of it)). I’m proud to say I grew out of that when I moved to Arizona for college and actually rediscovered what the real world was like again. When it comes to social media I basically ignore or have nothing to do with it. Facebook is a waste of time and I only say this after having watched my Mom spend hours upon hours on the damn site. You want to talk to me call or text my damn phone (and if I wanted to talk to you I’d of given you my number). Twitter I just use to follow my favorite bands and actors, keep up with what’s going on with them and what not. Don’t actually tweet, mostly because I have nothing interesting to tweet about, live a pretty boring life. Anything else related to social media just hasn’t come to my attention or interested me (though I did use Livejournal for quite a long while, quit using it years ago though). Honestly I have no problem with people texting or surfing the web on their phones when they're around me because I’m generally doing it myself. When I get together with friends we spend a lot of time on our phones but we still keep conversations going, not that hard to multitask. However it is an unwritten rule to keep them out of site when we’re drinking (aka out getting plastered) or eating, just rude to be playing on your phone in that setting. The only real reason I got a cell phone was for emergencies so the only real thing I use it for now is to surf the web and play the random mobile game that currently has my attention. I probably wouldn’t even have a phone if I didn’t need it for emergencies (though it came in handy when I lived in Arizona). Honestly technology and I have had a rather sorted history of addiction. I can’t live without it but I’ve mostly come to the conclusion that outside of gaming and keeping in touch with you crazy people it’s mostly just around to provide me with a distraction from the problems I face out in the real world. That’s really all it is to me now since I’ve been setting more time aside lately to read my backlog of books and to start getting back into painting/drawing (oh how I miss sitting down for long periods of time with a pencil in my hand and a sketchbook in front of me) when I’m not playing FFXIV or STO.

I used to dread getting home from school and slogging through the pm "books" from you and Vyper and then having to read through 6 or 7 pages worth of RP material before I could even start formulating how I was going to respond to what had been going on. Then I had to pm you back with ideas, send a pm over to Vyper to find out a few things, and then go back through and reread the RP material then get around to actually writing my post in Word, reread that, and then finally post it hoping GRX or one of you guys didn't post in the meantime negating what I had just wrote. GRX did pretty well adapting to what we were doing, had to give him props for that since he wasn't in our little inner circle and didn't have prior knowledge of how things were going to go. Have to say he sure made the RP more interesting. Hell we probably had enough material to make a series of novels with all the crap we went through and it would of been a damn good read. During schooling for my degree I actually played around with the idea of adapting some of what we did with SICD into a game demo but after I reread all the material I gave up on that idea. Just too much material to even try to adapt it >.< (though I still think this makes for one hell of a game idea). Gah, what I wouldn't give to have the free time do another RPG on that scale. Such fun and epic times. Just talking about it makes me want to head over to the archive and reread the entire thing again.

I remember the hours I'd put in to a post for Struggle in Cold Darkness. The PMs between You, myself, and Vyper about where we wanted to take the story, how to go about encounters, and the liberties we could take with each others characters within our own update were just as time consuming. I'd type put a few pages of story in MS word, and then edit it 100s of times based on those PMs. I'd say one update was almost an all day affair.... hell, I think the PMs were almost as long as some of our updates. GRX added a pretty good antagonist too it, but the poor guy was left out of our loop really. That was a hell of a time. I would never have the patience to write a book, but when we were all interacting, we made a pretty damn good novel, or at least a decent movie trilogy script.

I grew up in the country 3 miles from the lake. No video games no internet. I never even owned a computer until my kids were 3 and 5. I didn't get a cell until after I broke down w the car one night on the gorge road (scary). In my teens I worked on a farm where the most tech savvy thing I did was drive tractor. After that I worked retail at the time everything was transitioning to bar code scanners. I stuck with retail until it got to the point where I needed to be home w my kids full time, I was working to pay a baby sitter. It wasn't until my youngest started school that I actually had time to do something on the computer. I met Sledgers that year . Early on I realized the best part of the net was the free education I get from the fucking thing. Before internet I read a lot of books. With internet I spend most of my reading time studying the topics of internist to me. Facebook is convenient for communicating sometimes, but I use my wall like the corporate tool it is and share things like animals that need rescue, politics, new science etc. Personal stuff stays in private messages. I have no interest in broadcasting what I cooked for dinner or what I think of what so and so did. Not into the gossipy celeb bullshittery. I've made friends with other activists via fb and its hella convenient for sharing articles. My news feed is mostly news. I use it to get all the crap I wanna look at in one place. Video games... well I OCD that shit. I find a game I like and I will master that motherfucker. I can multi task while playing. Boss fight in the middle of cooking dinner no problemo. My hands have some playstation ninja muscle memory thing going on. I read on my phone a lot cuz I'm outside with chu. Endless streaming education, love it. I have read a novel on my phone; Stephen King's Cell of course. Texting is usually how I talk to my kids. I send my mom and his cute chu pics. As far as kids go, they're not just expensive they're time consuming. Evey time I go to a fucking Walmart I encounter parents not parenting and their out of control kid results climbing in the frozen food. Fuck that shit dude I get right away from that. If you're going to have kids you have to do the time or you'll create assholes the rest of us have to deal with. You have to pour your time into a kid. Toilet training a kid can take months. A cat will learn to shit in the box within two weeks.... I'm very pro furbaby. Marriage is involving the state in your personal life, a license is cheap compared to the cost of a divorce which pretty much benefits lawyers only.The benefits of marriage should out weigh the the consequence of being legally bound to the other person or don't bother. Been married and divorced and with the old man for thirteen years not getting married no need.