04 - The Streets of my Mind

So, this night I got blown off two times in a row.
And then I said: Fuck it.

So I loaded the iTouch with some music and PsychS3E1, took my car and... Set off.

First one hour of simply driving. In the rain. In the dark. Without a target.
It was bloody brilliant. Relaxing. Mind-freeing. Soothing.

Then I pulled over the nearest Burger King, got myself a menu, pulled to the nearest parking lot, and watched the Episode of Psych while eating in the car, with the rain falling on the roof and utter darkness around me. Like having a cool cinema all for yourself.

Then, again an hour of driving. This time with some targets. The places my first two girlfriends lived, when I dated them. The place my most fondly remembered affair lived, when I dated her. The places where I had my first dates. The place of my first working experience. My schools. Forgotten Bars and Pubs and Places I Met Friends At, back when.

And I thought. The car drove itself by pure instinct. My mind was full with memories. Good and bad. Slight and Intense. Simple Pictures and full-on memory-movies complete with sounds and smells. I let it all flow over me.

And then I headed home. Via the darkest and emptiest route I could think off. I opened the windows, blasted the music loudly and put the pedal to the metal, so to speak. I let the engine have some fun, too.


And now I'm here. Writing this all.
Telling you about it.

And feeling good.
With a much less troubled mind.

Number 03: Coming Home.

The last few days made me realize something. About a few very different things in life. Those disparate points of interest being: 1. Word Processors and 2. Old Stuff.

Not much correlation between them, so I will not mix them up. And start with number 1.

Recently, I installed Microsoft Office 2007. After a brief stint of working with Open Office for a few months. The switch had a profound effect on me. It made me write more. More concise. More focused. More regularly. (As a matter of fact, I’m typing this in Word ’07 right now)

And a very strange simile jumped into my head. Word processors as homes. Buildings. Rooms.

This year, I worked with six different ones.

1.       Word ‘03

2.       Dark Room

3.       Open Office

4.       Various web input forms

5.       Thunderbird Mail Interface

6.       Word ‘07

Now let me get to the comparison to homes and building now.

I’ll start with the program I like the least: Open Office. Oh, sure, it’s free and all. But I can’t work in it. I was raised with Office. I always worked with Office. I can think and feel Office. So whenever I work with Open Office, I tend to stop and search for functions I need but don’t know where they are. Or simply being subconsciously put off by the design and look. – For me, Open Office is like walking into a messy’s  place and having to work there. It’s uncomfortable and I never know where to put my feet down.

Then Dark Room (http://they.misled.us/dark-room). I love it. Not for university or even gaming stuff, but for creative working. Plug in a nice playlist, shut down Thunderbird and open up Dark Room. BANG! I’m in my happy place and can type away. And often DO. – So, Dark Room is… Effectively my room, at night, with some nice music. I don’t need anything else, I am focused and I damn well know where everything is.

Word. From Windows 3.11 (my first Office experience was back then) to XP, Word has been a trusty sidekick. I type, I format, I print, I share, I correct, I highlight… I do it all, and I don’t have to think about it. Sure. It’s expensive as hell. But it delivers. Right now, after feeling my way into ’07, I’m in love once more. Clean, functional, efficient. – Office (Being Word and Excel and One Note for me) is a well taken care of living room. Surroundings I feel at ease with, and which allow me to work undisturbed and concentrated, without much distraction, but the ability to quickly get away if I want/need to.

And now the weird rooms.

Web Input Forums are… Workable. Focused. But very lightweight. And prone to failure. – They’re pretty much offices. You could work from home, but as long as you’re there, you can use them. You won’t do nothing fancy, but you’ll probably get the task at hand done.

Thunderbird. Thunderbird is the kitchen. You go there, sit down with a pen and a piece of paper and scribble down your thoughts, to post them on the fridge. Sure, some get longer, but most are concise enough to be kept short. Or at least short-ish.

Yeah. Office’s my living room. I like it there. And even if I move, I’m pretty likely to decorate the same way, no matter where I am.

Point of Order No.2 – Old Stuff

Be it music (recently started listening to old Blind Guardian stuff again), TV (Night Court is my to-bed-series right now) or PC games (Why I play Drakensang? Because It reminds me of the Nordlandtrilogie and old CRPGs. And I’m re-playing Discworld 2: Missing Presumed?, too.), I really like stuff from my past.

Even though some hurts (especially regarding certain songs), most of it makes me smile. Brings long-gone memories to the front. Sounds of laughter. The smell of smoke and whiskey to the sound of heavy metal. Marathon RPG-sessions. Driving around with one or two close friends on a rainy autumn night, just because you could. Simpler times. People long gone. People forgotten.

So imagine my surprise when one of my closest, yet still slightly removed due to time and life in general, friends contacted me a few weeks ago. And we started planning. And we will start up a new roleplaying group with her and her boyfriend and another old good friend. To keep in touch, have fun and see each other more regularly.

During the last few days, this thought has helped me to stay together. And even make me smile.

So I’m putting lots of energy into it.

And you know what? It feels good. Being so creative and driven for an RPG again.

Also, in a very ironic and fitting coincidence, we’re going to play Das Schwarze Auge. My first RPG.

Funny how old stuff can be balm for the soul, mh?

Signing off,

Matt

Number 01

And so it begins. Again. But this time, a clean slate. There will be no old stories (Ah, well, most of the time. Sometimes some old stuff simply comes to the surface, and then all bets are off.), because the last 2 months alone would've been way too much to convey. So I will keep them in my memories.

Last weekend, Cologne. With Alice and Susanne.

Friday. Arrival, getting slightly lost, the Queen Musical. It rocked.

A Saturday full with walking, shopping, talking, exploring and getting lost some more. It rocked. And hurt. Mostly the feet. Mostly Alice's feet.

The Sunday, spent on Melaten cemetery. Beautiful. Relaxed. Relaxing. Not morbid at all, surprisingly.

More things. Mostly emotional. I guess I have to deal with them.

...

Oh yeah, the "Mission Statement".

Posting of thoughts, experiences and short ideas.
Posting of Music, from time to time. Weird stuff. Rare stuff. Mostly good stuff (I hope).
Keeping it updated. Regularly. This time for real.
Perhaps (peeeerhaps) a consolidation with the LJ, at some point. I don't know yet.

...

So yeah.To all the people intent on reading stuff, welcome to the void. Enjoy the whispers.