On overwhelmed by gaming

As of late I have picked up a game for every system I owned that I seek time to play... it is generally terrible for my school work!

Playstation - Final Fantasy 7 (Feel like replaying it again)
PSP - Final Fantasy Tactics (Kyle gave it to me as a joke, I think I am willing to give tactical RPGs a shot again)
Ninendo DS - Rhapsody/ Pokemon Platinum (Pokemon consumes most of my time)
Xbox - Resident Evil 5

I may even end up buying No more Heroes finally for the Wii...

But yeah.... working full time and going to school full time really does suck sometimes. Honestly though, I mostly have Kelly to blame! With the exceptions of Sundays and Tuesdays, if there is free time to be had, it is to be spent with her!
That isn't terrible though, that isn't bad at all. This is the first relationship that I can honestly say that 100% of the time there isn't something I would rather be doing than hanging out with her. It's great, the feelings I find myself being overcome by.

The feelings I have for her leave me realizing that she is one of the few friends I have now, that 30 years down the road better still be in my life. Ben and Decker are probably the only two other friends I feel that strongly about, friends that have been in my life for a very long time... people that have been there for me for as long as I can remember.

Not that I don't love all of my friends, just the feelings I have for them are something unique.

Ben
Dan
Kelly

They are the individuals I trust heart and soul, no questions asked. If hypothetically one of them told me that ejecting myself into space out of a space shuttle was the only way I was going to survive, even if it was a terrible idea at the time... I would probably do it.

Although Decker has a habit of saying red lights are green...

I suppose I can't emphasize enough my inability to trust people completely, as a result of my belief that trust leads to manipulation.

I can't emphasize how difficult it is to demonstrate and convey my feelings for my friends and family.

I know I love my friends, I know my love for Ben and Dan is equal to that of my immediate family.

I also know that love doesn't begin to describe what I feel for Kelly.

Gawd Pokemon is so nostalgic

A Travy smitten with love!

I was sick of restrictions sick of the boundaries about to close the door
Such a lack of conviction no real connection what should I settle for
But you caught my attention you built on the tension and you left me wanting more
Now I don't know what to do with myself do with myself
I don't want nobody else

I let you in I let you in and you infected me Can' t get enough of you
I breathed you in and now I'm in too deep
Don't think I'm pulling through
Can't get enough of you

You're so contagious Running through my veins
you're so contagious Holding onto every word You're so contagious
And I can't get away
You're so contagious and now I know for sure there is no cure

I saw your intentions i gave you permission Go ahead and start the war
I was out of addictions by my own admission oh I've been keeping score
But you made an exception you taught me a lesson
Who cares where I've been before
You would never leave me all by myself you don't want nobody else

I am burning in your fire
I have only one desire
i can not deny her

Now I don't know what to do with myself I don't want nobody else

You keep running through my veins

On Hallucinations

The other day I ended up getting terribly sick. It's unfortunate, I'm not a normal person who gets sick when the weather is terrible out, I get sick when it's nice. Regardless, it ended with me missing 2 days of work and a day of classes. The advantage to my getting sick was that it sent me on a delusional spree of creating some fever induced mathematical system that didn't make sense, and only confused me greater.
Okay, that wasn't the real advantage, the real advantage was that whenever I was conscious Kelly was around. Generally speaking I would pass out when she wasn't here, and wake up to her being here. It was excellent.
Still, in my state of mind I was afraid I was going to die as a result of my brain melting from the fever...
I fear death.
I am sure I have said that before.
If there is one fear I have above all other fears it is that of death. It isn't because I am a god fearing person I fear death either, I am fairly confident that if there comes a time for me to be judged God will see that I am a wonderful individual. Or at least, in my mindset he should. The only issue is I refuse to follow organized religion. Most religions deem that I should burn in hell or something along those lines as a result of that refusal, which is something I would rather not do. Still, while the morals organized religion teach are generally fine and dandy, the war religion breeds isn't.
I'm a firm believer that God generally doesn't want us waging war in his name. The crusades, 9/11, those are all no-nos in my eyes. I don't think that the god our respective religious books teach us about would approve of such actions. If he does, I'm not confident I would want him as my god anyways.
Still there is always the idea in the back of my mind that I may be making those reasons up to use as excuses to endorse my own sloth. After all, I am not the kind of guy who wants to get up every Sunday morning to go to church.

Of course, I lie when I say I would prefer not to burn in hell. While generally speaking if I was given the option of not burning in hell for eternity or burning in hell for eternity I would obviously pick the later, there are situations where I would pick burning in hell.

Being aware

I want to be aware forever, for all eternity. As I said... I fear death, and I fear that death because in my mind that means I become unaware, non-existent and unaware. Honestly, if I was given the choice between suffering agony for all eternity and being aware; or being peacefully non-existant forever I would pick the burning agony.

Or at least I used to think that...

Now there is a third option I look to, that generally keeps my mind off those options. If I could spend the rest of my life aware and with Kelly, I would be happy with the non-existance at the end.

My life feels complete with her around. Our personalities, our thoughts, our feelings; they aren't all identicle, but they all complement each other perfectly. If ever I could be inspired to write a poem or a song about something, it would be about my feelings concerning her. And even then, I wouldn't be able to do it because I just can't shape words around how I feel for her.
My relationships of the past all arguably had their ups and their downs.
I've had my good and bad life experinces.
But nothing, nothing I have ever felt concerning anything has ever once touched the level of feelings I have for her.

Everything I want in a girl, everything I have wanted for so long.

The person I have wanted to be with for so long

It's finally all there.

A happy Travy

If heaven and hell decide
That they both are satisfied
Illuminate the no's on their vacancy signs

If there's no one beside you
When your soul embarks
Then I'll follow you into the dark

On Solidarity and not so Solitary

With the wonderful Mid-semester Break from BCC this last week, I managed to take a Saturday off from work and play in a Legacy tournament. I haven't actually ever managed to play in a Legacy tournament before, but way back when we were all planning a trip to play in a Grand Prix or something along the lines and we proxied up some of the archetypes we might see to play test the decks we built. It was at that time I first played Solidarity, and fell in love with it. After we were done with the proxy decks, I saved Solidarity, slowly replacing the proxys until finally it was completed in Philadelphia. But I never actually played it until this past weekend in a real tournament, and while I didn't do win or place incredibly well I still had a great time with it. I actually did better then I expected to...

Solidarity

//Spells

2 Brain Freeze
4 Brainstorm
2 Cryptic Command
3 Cunning Wish
2 Flash of Insight
4 Force of Will
4 High Tide
4 Impulse
3 Meditate
4 Opt
3 Remand
4 Reset
3 Turnabout

//Lands

12 Island
4 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta

//Sideboard

1 Chain of Vapor
1 Deflection
2 Disrupt
1 Evacuation
1 Mana Short
1 Remand
1 Stifle
1 Stroke of Genius
1 Train of Thought
1 Turnabout
2 Twincast
2 Wipe Away

Arguably I fumbled a bit on the sideboard, I ended up sleeping in and not going through my collection with enough time to spare, leading to some mishaps such as Train of Thought...

My matches were relativity simple, most of them I either managed to go off or I didn't...

Match 1 - Threshold
Game 1 we both mulled down to 6, he drops a bunch of critters which I wish + evacuate after he empties his hand before going off on his next turn.
1-0
Game 2 he gets mana boned against me, allowing me to build up enough lands to hardcast fows on his disruption vs me, I go off pretty smoothly from there
2-0

[1-0]

Match 2 - Merfolk
I may have been able to win this if I though straight, although the player I played against was pretty good and at the very least top 8'd. My first game he ended up Fowing one of my resets, which I wasn't ready for and the second game he managed to counter most of my shenaigans as well. If my sideboard and mind had been better prepared I may have been able to pull out a win here. Merfolk are going to be tricky for me for a while...

[1-1]

Match 3 - Elves
The first game I managed to go off without a problem, although if I hadn't of managed the turn I did he would have had lethal damage on me, part of the fun of playing Solidarity I suppose! The next game he managed to overwhelm me with his creatures a tad too fast, although the Choke he dropped was mucho unnecessary. And finally game 3 I managed to counter any shenanigans he played against me, it was a good time!

[2-1]

Match 4 - Cephalid Breakfast
I probablly played this match too defensivly, and at the wrong spots. But it happens I suppose, I am rather confident in the future I will be able to win this match up a tad more. Although it was pretty cool the second round of our match I managed to win with just 3 cards, Reset + Brain Freeze + Brain Freeze hehe

[2-2]

Match 5 - Elves (Again)
This deck actually looked like the same elf deck I used to run back in the day, my casual janky elf deck and for more irony points was piolted by someone else named Travis! I did lose the first round though as a result of my inability to draw any of my engine, the rest of the match was cake.

[3-2]

Match 6 - Really not sure XD

The deck had Tarms in it... I remember that much, and I came close to going off the first game but couldn't draw a brain freeze for the life of me... was very lame sauce. The second game I got smacked around on a bad draw... boy do I hate bad draws...

[3-3]

22nd place out of 40 something people isn't terrible, especially in my mind because of the fact that I haven't previously run this deck in anything serious. I think with more playtime I could win some of the matches I lost, even though the deck is relatively unplayed now a days. It was very satisfying though, people routing for me because I was the solidarity guy...

My life is pretty brilliant right now. Me and Kelly are finally together, which is something I have wanted for a long time. I am generally a very cheerful individual, with some depression buried beneath my cheerful visage. But I am definitely happy now, honestly happy. This is also the first of my few relationships I have been in love with, honestly in love with. I haven't felt the level of feelings I do for Kelly as I have for anyone in the past. Arguably many of the people I have been interested in over the years, or have been interested in me I compared to her... I should have done things differently a long time ago, but in the end it worked out to the now. So I suppose the ends justify the means to some extent.

Of course we have our differences, she prefers Pepsi and I prefer Coke, but that is something we can work on.

I am glad my first run in with fruit on the bottom yogurt didn't ruin it for me.

A Solidarity not so Solitary Travy

I don’t want to fight
Every single night
Everything I want is in your eyes

You and me go back
To places I don’t know to care
The spoils of all I got were left for scraps.

Don’t let me say this,
but you’re no worse than me,
It’s crazy

We are the real, if real ever was, and just because
We are the real, they feel we have enough,
We are the real, ‘cause someone gave us up

I want to be there when you’re happy
I want to love you when you’re sad

Can’t stand the morning rain?
Get out I'll take your place then
Can’t stand the blazing sun?
Then close your eyes you’ll see
The angel dust

I don’t want to be
Anything believed
A million watts of sound can’t compare

Come along you’ll see the world
The pulse ripples, the crowd unfurls
The current starts to flow and then you're on

Oh it’s white hot soul they want,
to sing for

We are the real, if real ever was, and just because
We are the ruin of every living soul
We are surreal, ‘cause someone gave us up.

Don’t break this oath!
I want to love you when you’re happy,
Don’t break this oath!
I want to be there when you’re sad,
Freeze-frame the pouring rain.

We are the real, as real as any ghost,
So easy now,
We are the real, in every living soul
Oh don't they know

Can’t stand the blazing sun?
Can’t stand the morning rain?
Oh get out I'll take your place again.

I don’t want to be alone
Oh I don’t want to be alone
I don’t want to be alone at all

If it’s a white hot soul they want
then a black heart they’ll get.