Poem: The Backward-Looking Window

Yep, just for the sake of posting, I decided to give you a poem. Just made it, it's been at the back of my head for some time now, though. Don't be too harsh, I haven't done poetry in quite some time.
Oh, and please leave comments on its deviantART page. Don't have an account? Sign up, it's free. (promotion much? XD)

The Backward-Looking Window

Through the Backward-Looking Window I
look with eyes shut tight I
see images clear, distorted

From without I see outside
From within I see inside
Through the Backward-Looking Window

With legs locked still I
move, with eyes unopened I
peer the Backward-Looking Window

Through lidded eyes I see
people, objects
Time, forgotten.

With arms unmoving
I reach,
I grasp

The Window shatters.

PlayStation emulators! (aka Nostalgic Fun)

Yep, I downloaded an emulation program to play PS games on my comp. Well, my cousin's comp, actually. Think it was because I was playing MGS3: Subsistence, which had ports for the original MSX Metal Gear games (Metal Gear and Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake). That made me interested in trying out the first Metal Gear Solid game, which was for the PSX. Which I don't have anymore. So I googled emulators and related info.

Found one, ePSXe, pretty decent, needed to set things up first though, which was a handful. Isn't it troublesome playing PS games with the keyboard, you might wonder. Well, fortunately, I have a PS3, and the wireless controller comes with a USB cable to charge its batteries, so I thought I'd google again and see if I can use it on emulators. Turns out I can. :D

So lately I've been playing old games that I liked and remembered, like Spyro, MegaMan Legends, Harvest Moon, and obviously Metal Gear Solid.

It's been really fun, not to mention nostalgic, playing these games. It makes me realize that it's really the original games that were so easy to get hooked on. Compared to current games, they're relatively short to play, and obviously have inferior graphics, but the games are really engaging, and fun to play. It's kind of hard to find games like those nowadays, games that really get you hooked to the characters, the story, while at the same time being fun to play.

Well, anyway, if any of you are interested (and your computer or laptop is up for it), go ahead and give it a go. You might find a better emulator out there too, if you want. :D

-Zet

Just some comments (aka hopefully a short one)

No in-depth discussion today, people, sorry. Just a few things that crossed my mind today.

1. Birthdays.
Why is it, that when someone is celebrating their birthday, they're the ones who have to treat their friends to food, movies, etc.? I mean, it's their birthday, shouldn't they be the ones who get treated to stuff?

2. This article on yahoo. Isn't it just so sweet? Guess stuff like that doesn't only happen in movies. :) Kinda makes me wanna write a story.

3. The bombings last Friday. Tragic. Very tragic. What's even more tragic is what's gonna happen next: increased security at malls. No, I'm not saying that it's a bad thing, I'm just saying that our country's penchance for increasing security AFTER terrorist attacks is kind of.. well, sad. Not that it's an easy job, but still. You know.

Lastly, I'm officially asking you, reader, to give me something to think and/or talk about. I'm running out of interesting ideas here.

Much obliged,
-Zet

blog.. blog.. blog.. (aka it's been a week)

It's been a week since my last update, aand, i've got nothing to say today. Well, nothing important, that is. XD
Truth be told, i don't remember much about what's happened in the past week. Sometime in the last 7 days i watched Inkheart with my girlfriend, Sandra. I think we spotted something funny after the movie, but for the life of me i can't remember what.

Oh, I bought the Blu-Ray for Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children Complete that day, too. Well worth the wait and cost, which might push back some of my other expenses. *shrug* Win some, lose some.

I hear school's back in. Might have to go back there some time next week for the paperwork. Preferably with my girlfriend. We've been spending most of the holiday together (me visiting her place, vice versa out of fairness) just messing around, watching the Friends dvd, playing games on her DS, her avoiding my PS3.. man, i have got to get something she can play too.

I can't go over to her place today, got bass lessons this afternoon. She's got stuff to do as well, so in other words, we're not seeing each other today. XD

(switching languages for once) Sebagai gantinya:
Perkenalkan Lope. si boneka beruang nan lucu yg gw beliin dlm rangka 1 bulan jadian. :D Ceritanya lope adalah anak kami, dan sesekali dia 'menginap' di rumah gw. hahah. lope loh yg ketik judul blog ini. XD
Lucu? Swt? peduli amat, daripada bengong d rmh. :P besides, it's good parenting practice.

I don't think i've nothing more to say. XD
See ya!
-Zet

Previous QotD (aka Pathogenic Humanity)

Last post's Quote of the Day was something that I had really connected with when I first read/heard it. There are a lot of other memorable and (in my opinion) significant quotes from the Metal Gear series, but this one in particular was one that I could really connect with.

Why? because it was how I saw the world. No, maybe that's going overboard. It's more like it was how I thought about things in general, and what I try to be and do in life.

I mean, think about it. Most of the problems we have now is because people try to change the world, instead of leave it the way it is. And for those of you who think that we shouldn't just change the world, but make it better, I respectfully disagree. Trying to make the world better is no different from changing it. Besides, let's face it "better" is a very loose and relative term. You don't need me to tell you this, but my "better" and yours may not be the same. Besides, look at wars and conflicts (and some other points) in the past; I'm no good at history, so I'll just mention the obvious ones.

Do you think that Hitler thought he was doing an evil thing when he tried to eradicate Jews? Or the Popes who ordered the Crusades on Jerusalem? Or the industrial revolution, which I view as the starting point for pollution, over-exploitation, and every other environmental issue?

No, these people thought that they were doing the world a favor. They thought that what they were doing was the right thing. They thought they were making the world better.

Still not convinced? Here's you're Quote of the Day:

"I realized that you're not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with their surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to another area, and you multiply, and you multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet."

-Hugo Weaving as Agent Smith, from The Matrix

Again, think about it. Imagine some place on earth where humans haven't yet inhabited. There's an ecosystem; plants, animals, predators, a river, maybe a volcano, whatever you want. Ideally, the food chain would be balanced; plants are eaten by plant-eaters, which are in turn eaten by meat-eaters, which are eaten by... well, bigger meat-eaters.

From what little I've picked up on nature documentaries, carnivores are usually naturally careful about their prey. Eat too much, food runs out. Same goes for the herbivores.
In short, imagine a place where it really is "survival of the fittest"

Say a disease comes along, infects one species. Disease spreads, many die, but said disease has no more hosts. Eventually some other species comes along, reinhabits, end of story.

Now, advances in medical technology may have cured many (and I mean many) diseases, but you could say that it's also accelerated the "evolutionary arms race" against viruses and bacteria. The above scenario is totally ideal, and I think isn't very likely to happen anywhere, even without humans. But the fact that the disease (let's say it was caused by a virus) would run out of hosts and eventually die out is - well, also unlikely, but at least it's plausible. Back on topic, advances in medical technology also causes viruses and bacteria to adapt to the antibodies more quickly than it would "naturally" (i.e. the above "ideal scenario)

I'd say more, but if you've actually bothered to read this far, I'm guessing you're more than capable of thinking up scenarios where the world would be better without humans, so I'm gonna end this post abruptly (for a second there it crossed my mind to just hit "publish" right there) with a final note that I'm not suggesting that we go back to the way things were and live in the dark ages. Please, as idealistic as I sometimes may be, even I don't want that to happen. I'm just saying, let's think about just living life the way it is right now, not changing too much of the world.

Think about it.
-Zet

Sleepy Thoughts (aka "Female Ego?")

So I read this article a couple of weeks ago, can't remember when or where, about relationships, and how ego gets in the way of a good relationship. The way it was written implied that said 'ego' isn't only on the male half of the couple, but the female as well.

Now to be perfectly honest with you all, this was quite something new, because I never thought of it like that before. But then it did make perfect sense; after all, those people smarter than myself who classified the psyche with the "ego, superego, and id" didn't apply it strictly to guys.

Anyway, the article crossed my mind again as I was about to sleep last night, and that got me thinking (which is kinda hard to do when you're sleepy, in case you didn't know) about this so-called "female ego" - if there is such a thing. What am I talking about? There is such a thing, but I don't think it's a fundamental flaw like guys have. The only way for me to explain this would be through an example.

Okay, so say that there's a girl, and maybe she has a job, or is looking for one, a specific type of work that she's good at, or just plain interested in. She applies. Her boyfriend comes along and tries to offer an alternative to that work, maybe something closer to home, or nearer to the route he/they usually take day-to-day, something that (he thinks) is more practical. But she doesn't want to, no. She's pretty satisfied with the job she's already got, which he can't quite understand, so he keeps pestering her to take the other job. They get into an argument, with him saying that she complicates things, while she says that he's limiting her space/freedom of choice.

Now, in this case, whose ego really got the fight started? The guy? No, he isn't thinking about his self (his ego), he's just trying to offer alternatives. No, I think it's the girl's ego is what got in the way. He offers something else to do, and what she does is think that he's closing her space. While in fact he isn't trying to limit her, he just can't understand why she doesn't go with something that he thinks is more practical. Which makes his fault being stupid. I mean insanely stupid. Seriously now, if you girl doesn't want what you suggest, don't force it. That goes the other way too, and not just between couples.
Back on track, it's the girl's ego that started the mess; all she could think about was how he was crushing her space, forcing her to do things she didn't want to, locking her in. When he was only trying to help.

Seriously folks, they're both to blame here. But ego-wise, I think it's the girl's ego that got in the way.

Thoughtfully,
-Zet

Quote of the Day:

"It's not about changing the world, it's about doing our best to leave the world the way it is. It's about respecting the will of others, and believing in your own."
-- Big Boss, Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots


P.S
I'd add another example, but as I was typing, it occurred to me that it's actually happened to me. Better not wash one's linen in public, eh?
Since I'm likely to get flamed for this, leave any comments in the Comments section, and not the shoutbox please.

One Long Day (aka Just for the Sake of Posting)

It's been quite a long day for me, despite the fact that I got up around half past ten this morning. Funny thing how some days seem to pass longer than others.
Things I've been up to today:
1. Watching LotR: Return of the King. The extended edition, which lasted well over 3 hours. Quite fun.
2. Playing video games on the computer and PlayStation. Not much to be said there.
3. Continuing writing this short story I've been writing. I call it short, but it's already 6 pages long.
4. Text messaging with my girlfriend.

And that's about it. I'm so bored I don't even know what to write. XD

-Zet