In Defense of Twitter

Every business is designed to separate you from what they need in order to stay afloat. For a normal business, that would be creating products and service that would make you want to spend your money on them, like Netflix or McDonalds. In the context of social media, they want to separate you from your time. Social networks survive based on how long you stay on their websites and apps, how many things you interact with, and how many people you follow, creating a network of humans staying on that network for as long as humanly possible. With so many different ways to waste our time staring at a rectangle from the future, everyone has their opinions on what social network is the best. It may surprise you to hear that my favourite social network to interact with is Twitter by a considerable margin.

BLOG_015: Get to Know Me

Day 15: Write fifteen interesting facts about yourself.

Now that I’m halfway thorough this challenge, it’s time we talk about something totally awesome: me! Here are fifteen interesting facts about me:

1. I’m 25 years old. I’m also 5’6″ and I weigh 150 pounds. In other words, I’m pretty small as far as grown men go.
2. I’m writing the second draft of my first novel. As of right now, its title is Aegis Alliance.
3. I was born with a skin condition called neurofibromatosis. Basically, it makes me skin real weird. I hardly ever notice it anymore.
4. I’ve been told on multiple occasions that I look like the kind of guy who would own a pet turtle. I have no idea what the owner of a pet turtle is supposed to look like, for the record.
5. When I was younger, I was a big fan of David Letterman’s talk show. According to my parents, one day I just stopped watching and when they asked me why I told them David Letterman was a bad man. They don’t remember what he did/said and neither do I.
6. Green tea is by far my favourite beverage.
7. I can’t whistle.
8. I also couldn’t snap my fingers until a few years ago because I had an irrational fear of breaking my fingers if I ever tried.
9. I’m lactose intolerant, but I consume it anyway because I love dairy. I do try not to eat dairy if I’m with friends because I get some seriously bad gas.
10. I hate it when people dress twins exactly the same. I’m not joking when I say that if I have twins and you buy me two sets of the same clothes, I hope you have a receipt because I will send it back.
11. I’m afraid of heights. But weirdly enough, I love the adrenaline of a high-speed roller coaster. My transition from horror to excitement is pretty hilarious.
12. My first and middle name were accidentally switched on my birth certificate. I’ve been filling out forms the way I’m personally used to, so I don’t think it’s that big of a deal.
13. I’ve broken my left wrist on two separate occasions. Once in seventh grade, and once in the eighth grade. I also chose orange for the colour of my cast for some bewildering reason.
14. I couldn’t join my high school football team because they couldn’t find shoulder pads in storage small enough for me. I’m pretty fast, but if someone twice my size tackled me, I’d probably snap like a twig.
15. I’m allergic to hazelnuts, meaning I will never know the glory of Nutella.

I am a very interesting man, as you can plainly see. Or maybe I’m not, I don’t know.

BLOG_014: Why I Hate Ronald McDonald

Day 14: Your earliest memory.

One thing I don’t like about myself is the fact that I can be pretty forgetful. I can leave something somewhere and forget about it minutes later if something more important occupies my attention. And that goes double for childhood memories.

I have a few vague memories from when I was a year old. One that has always stayed in my mind was when I was at a family friend’s house, I was getting my diaper changed, and I was looking up at a ceiling light, crying. I was a baby, so I was probably crying because I had poopy in my diaper. That’s the earliest thing I can remember from my life.

My earliest memory that is actually clear happened when I was three or four years old. We were at the McDonald’s PlayPlace across from my house. In this PlayPlace there was the usual: slides, tubes, a ball pit, and a fifteen-foot tall statue of Ronald McDonald with his stupid boot sticking out. So, I was running around the PlayPlace in my socks, and then I slipped and fell…

And I cut my tongue open on Ronald McDonald’s stupid-ass boot.

It wasn’t a deep cut, but I couldn’t eat anything hot or solid, so I got to eat a lot of ice cream in the week after that happened. That’s the earliest thing I can remember, and that’s why I hate Ronald McDonald so much. Because he is a bad man, and he made me cry.

I’ll “put a smile on” when that clown gets the boot as a mascot.

TOMORROW: Write fifteen interesting facts about yourself.

BLOG_013: Dream Vacation

Day 13: Somewhere you’d like to move or visit.

You know what’s fun? Bucket lists. And everyone seems to have some form of travel on their bucket list. I don’t exactly have a bucket list, but there are a few places I plan on visiting.

I am a city boy. I grew up in Toronto. We moved to a smaller town in Brampton way back in 2003 due to my family being worried that the area being dangerous. When we moved there it was a lot smaller. I distinctly remember the view of the first house we lived in. It was a large expanse of absolutely nothing except this one random barn in the distance. At some point, some kids burned it down, so there’s that. Over the years, Brampton has grown into a much smaller version of Toronto, and just like that I was in another big city.

You might be surprised to hear that I’ve grown pretty sick of the city, but not to the point where I’d want to avoid it entirely. If I had it my way, I’d move a little to the north in Ontario where all the smaller cities are. I took my driving test there a few years ago – specifically because taking a driving test in a smaller city is way easier – and I really liked it. It was much more peaceful and quiet, a stark difference from the crowded cities I’m used to.

As for my number one dream vacation, it would have to be Japan. I’m also a big fan of anime. Shocking, I know. I’ve only seen a small taste of Japanese culture and it would be awesome to get a taste of what it’s like in person. It also looks like a beautiful country. I want to spend my prime years travelling as much as I can. I’m not getting any younger and I need to do everything I want in life while I can. Absorbing the culture of Japan and changing my surroundings is priority number one.

I’m not a weeb, I swear.

TOMORROW: Your earliest memory.

BLOG_012: A Day Like Any Other

Day 12: Bullet your whole day.

Here is a brief list of what my day is like when I’m not working. Then, things start to go into flux. Until I actually have a job where I always know when I’m working, I won’t know true structure.

• 7:00am – Wake Up Grab a Brush, Put on a Little Make Up: I wanted to make it a point for 2017 to wake up earlier in the morning. Using a Sleep Cycle app helps a ton.
• 7:00am to 7:30am – Read: My Goodreads goal is to read twenty books for the year. Reading at least an hour a day will get me that much closer to my goal.
• 7:30am to 8:00am – Exercise: It’s been tough to get myself to exercise regularly, but I’ve actually been going out and going for morning runs, provided the erratic Canadian weather is accomodating.
• 8:00am to 9:00am – Breakfast, Brush and Bathe: I eat breakfast much earlier than the rest of my family. I also prefer cooking without anyone looking. I have a bowl of cereal or oatmeal with black tea. Then, I have a cold shower and brush my teeth
• 12:00pm to 12:30pm – Lunch: I’m usually hungry by this point. So, I drop whatever I’m doing and shove some food into my mouth.
• 1:00pm to 2:00pm – Write: As hard as it can be for me, I try to get at least some writing done during the day, whether it’s my manuscript or writing this blog. Slow progress is better than no progress.
• 6:00pm to 6:30pm – Dinner: More food!
• 10:00pm to 10:30pm – Brush and Bathe: I try to turn off all my screens between 9:30 and 10:00pm. At this point I take a nightly shower and brush my teeth again
• 10:30pm to 11:00pm – Read: I like to read at night more than during the day. Doing something relaxing gets me tired and helps me sleep better.
• 11:00pm – Sleep: This is kind of a lie. I have a lot of trouble actually falling sleep, depending on how much goes through my mind at the time.

All the time gaps are filled with unimportant activities like watching YouTube videos or anime, or possibly getting some extra reading and writing done. I don’t live a very exciting.

TOMORROW: Somewhere you’d like to move or visit.

BLOG_011: Every Day I’m Shuffling

Day 11: Put your iPod on Shuffle and write down the first ten songs that pop up.

This is sure to be a short one.

iPod? How old is challenge? Well, seeing as it’s not 2005, I’ll be putting my Spotify playlist on Shuffle and see what comes up:

1. “Frodo’s Dream” by Van Canto
2. “Introduction to a Broken Heart” by Prozzak
3. “River” by LIGHTS
4. “The Handler” by Muse
5. “Lost Souls in Endless Time” by DragonForce
6. “Cryin'” by Aerosmith
7. “The Source” by The Naked and Famous
8. “This Will Be Our Year” by OK Go
9. “Feeling Sorry” by Paramore
10. “You” by The Pretty Reckless

Well, that certainly didn’t turn out as expected. This ended up being my musical tastes over the years. My teen years (DragonForce – I was really into Guitar Hero III), my tastes now (Muse and OK Go), and my childhood (Prozzak – just saw them a day before writing this. Serious nostalgia trip). I was expecting a list of random indie stuff, but then again, my Spotify playlist is littered with stuff I haven’t even listened to yet.

TOMORROW: Bullet your whole day.

BLOG_010: Guilty Pleasures

Day 10: Your guilty pleasure/s.

According to Urban Dictionary, which is the premiere place to find edgy definitions for things, a guilty pleasure is defined as “something that you shouldn’t like, but like anyway”. This tends to apply to things in entertainment, like movies and music. I don’t really like that. You should never feel bad for the things that you like. To me, a guilty pleasure is something that I enjoy, despite all its flaws. In some cases, even because of them. For me, it’s especially because of its flaws.

I feel like my tastes are more eclectic than the average person. One type of music I don’t like is the direction of modern hip-hop that takes over Billboard’s Top 40. They’re all dark and bleak and quiet, they all bleed into each other, and nobody seems to be enjoying themselves. And I have a really perverse desire to listen to those songs sometimes. I don’t consider Desiigner’s song “Panda” to be a good song at all, but I have it on my Spotify playlist and I bump it in all its ridiculous.

But by far, my favourite bad rap song right now is Trinidad James’ “All Gold Everything”. It is one of the most ridiculous things that I think everyone should watch. It’s just good, dumb fun to have when you don’t want to think about what you’re listening to.

Like I said, a true guilty pleasure is something that you would not consider conventionally “good”, but still find enjoyment in, and the granddaddy of them all is Tommy Wiseau’s magnum opus, “The Room”. If you don’t know about “The Room”, I want you to put two hours aside, and watch it. Incoherent dialogue, repetitive scenes, wooden line delivery. All of it is bad, and it comes together in a perfect storm of bad film-making.

It’s even to the point where the director, Tommy Wiseau (who was also the writer, producer, and the freaking star!) wants people to believe he was actually making a dark comedy. “The Room” is the worst movie that everyone needs to watch. By the way, it’s got some seriously awkward sex scenes, so watch out.

Don’t feel bad about liking bad things. Unless you’re a fan of crime, there’s nothing you shouldn’t be “allowed to like”.

TOMORROW: Put your iPod on Shuffle and write down the first ten songs that pop up.

BLOG_009: Write or Die

Day 9: If you could have any job in the world, what would it be?

If what my parents tell me is true, I was not a normal kid. Most people remember watching Teletubbies back in the day. Apparently, I stayed up until 11:30pm, watching David Letterman. That’s one memory I wish I had. At five or six, my dream job was to be a bus driver because they made people happy. I still want to make people happy through my job, but now I want to do that through my writing.

I’m pretty jealous that small percentage of writers who have attained the level of success that they are able to sustain themselves through their art. That’s what I want because writing just makes me happy. Given the choice, I would take a job I love that pays decently, over a high paying job that I would have any day of the week.

I firmly believe that no matter how much you want to believe otherwise, money cannot buy happiness. Sure, you could probably trick yourself into thinking you’re happy because you have a lot of money. But you spend eight hours on most days of your limited time on this Earth doing something you don’t believe in. So, is it really worth it?

That’s why I want to be a writer. Because I’m constantly chasing after what will make me the happiest person possible. Because at the end of the day, most of us would rather be having fun instead of working. Getting to do both, and getting paid for it? That’s the dream.

I hate that it’s “normal” to not like your job and I don’t know what I would do with myself if I fell into that trap myself.

TOMORROW: Your guilty pleasure/s. 

BLOG_008: What Makes Me Satisfied

Day 8: A moment you left the most satisfied with your life.

It feels weird to determine the point in my life where I felt the most satisfaction. I can’t think of a moment off the top of my head where I felt the most satisfaction in my life. I have a bunch of scattered moments that make me feel good.

I’ve had a lot of trouble sitting down to write. I know writing is what I want to do and that it will make me happy, but I still don’t do it. That changed when I started writing a blog post every day. It’s forced me to write every day and it just feels really good to be able to create something every day. It’s been eight days since I’ve gone to bed at night, thinking “I’ve gotten nothing done. I’ve wasted the entire day.” I hate that feeling. You don’t know how many days you have to do everything you want to do so it’s imperative that you utilize every day to the fullest.

When I’m being productive and when I’m working, those are the moments when I feel happy. Now, I get pretty bummed when I’m not doing anything productive with my time.

It’s a good feeling, and I aim to keep that feeling all the time.

TOMORROW: If you could have any job in the world, what would it be?

BLOG_007: Do You Want to Play a Game?

Day 7: Your favourite childhood toys

I know the challenge dictates that I talk about my favourite childhood toys (plural), but I’ll be using this to talk about one of my oldest and longest-running fascinations.

In the Christmas of 1998, my parents got me and my two brothers a Nintendo 64 with a copy of Mario Kart 64. I don’t vividly remember my experience the first time I played the Nintendo 64, but I imagine playing Battle mode more than anything because you couldn’t play Grand Prix mode with more than two players. My parents hated seeing one person left out while the other two played.

Not long after that, we had some new neighbours who also had an Nintendo 64 and we all really hit it off. During the age of the console’s life, the five of us had long summer days of playing Mario Party (the third one is best), Super Smash Bros, and WrestleMania 2000 (even though No Mercy was the superior game). Then, when my family moved to a different city, we both got a PlayStation 2 and kept in touch, still gaming it up. And then in high school, I found myself associating with people who were as passionate about video games as I was.

My childhood when I was the most artistically-inclined in my life and I got most of my inspiration from video games to the point where my grades suffered because I was caught up in my own head, doodling when I should have been working. And now it’s taken me to the point where I wanted to create something that was inspired by action/adventure video games in the form of a full-fledged manuscript.

I don’t really have time in my life nowadays to play video games as actively as I used to. I own a Nintendo 3DS which I play regularly and I usually keep it in my bag whenever I go out, but sitting down to play isn’t really something I do anymore. Despite all that, I don’t know what my life would be like if it weren’t for video games. It freaks me out to think I might not have the passion for art if it weren’t for that.

I’ll always love video games, and I’ve never once wanted to shoot someone for cutting in front of me. Take that, conservative media!

And to think it all started with this.

TOMORROW: A moment you felt the most satisfied with your life