Here Goes Nothing

Connections Aren't Bonds

nickplaysgames — Sat, 05 May 2012 14:29:26 -0500

Stephen Marche, writing for The Atlantic:

…A connection is not the same thing as a bond, and that instant and total connection is no salvation, no ticket to a happier, better world or a more liberated version of humanity.

The article focuses on Facebook, but in my experience, these observations and findings are representative of our transition to living our lives in a digital, representative state. Literally speaking, I grew up on the Internet — among what I consider the first generation to do so — and I’ve always been fascinated by the opportunities of online expression. The flip side, of course, is the impact developing and maintaining an online presence has on your “real” life.

Like the telephone or car, social media are tools. What we expect from them — the gratifications we seek — defines our perceptions.

It seems logical to me that bonds are developed and friends are made in the real world, and that happens by chance or by serendipity, whichever you prefer to call it. And for the most part, I think we all get that.

Really, the only kind of person who could conceivably wind up exclusively meeting people through Facebook is the one who moves across the country to go work at Facebook. But that’s a very specific subset of the population, so let’s not waste any time there.

On food

nickplaysgames — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 13:22:30 -0500

I think I want to go exclusively vegan. I wish I could say it’s because I finally had some epiphany about animal rights and the environmental strain of commercial livestock farming, but that’s all stuff I’ve known for ages. The truth is far less noble:

I ate a frozen cheese pizza for lunch yesterday and felt like shit for the rest of the day.

That’s the straw that broke the camel’s back. Never mind the countless books, magazine features and blogs I’ve read exposing and decrying the commercial livestock and dairy farming industries; forget the influential and impassioned arguments in favor of veganism that I’ve heard over and over from some of my closest friends. Nope — all it took was a shitty lunch for me to reconsider.

But now that I’m thinking about it, going vegan sounds like a pretty obvious choice to me. I’ve been completely vegetarian for something like 15 months now, and while I’m completely happy with that decision, I’ve always kind of known that I’m half-kidding myself about the impact of my diet on animals. Dairy and eggs still come from the same farming industries with the same lax regulations and heavy government subsidies. Cows and chickens are kept alive under those same horrendous conditions that livestock raised for meat are raised under; the big difference is that animals raised for meat are slaughtered earlier in their lives, which might actually be a far more merciful outcome.

I don’t know how an animal thinks or feels. I do think we distance ourselves unnecessarily in terms of how we experience life from other animals, probably out of a fear of learning some uncomfortable truths about ourselves. But I do know that I want to be efficient in how I live my life. I want to avoid waste wherever I can, whether it’s my time, my body, or the world around me. And when it’s just as easy to maintain a healthy diet without any animals or animal products whatsoever, that really kind of ends the argument for me. Why eat animals when I don’t have to? Why have an exponentially more damaging impact on the environment by supporting these industries?

Anyway. I’m not writing this to preach or to promote any sort of agenda. I just really wanted to take some time to articulate (mostly to myself) why I’d decided to change the way I eat, and why I think I’m going to follow that same line of logic to its natural conclusion. But it’s a fun (maybe not the best word) mental exercise to question the things you’ve always taken for granted.

mikeymo: People are so creative. I love this idea.

nickplaysgames — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 11:22:14 -0600

mikeymo:

People are so creative. I love this idea.

Thought Catalog: 1998’s Primetime TV Listings As Written By A Man In The Throes Of An Existential Crisis

nickplaysgames — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 12:47:38 -0600

Thought Catalog: 1998’s Primetime TV Listings As Written By A Man In The Throes Of An Existential Crisis:

A brilliant amalgam of two cultural touchstones by Ted Pillow:

Sister, Sister
8:00 – 8:30
Tia and Tamera come to grips with the realization that their twinship is not a playful flourish from the idiosyncratic hand of God, but merely a production error from the mechanized assembly chain of creation.

Return of the Herculoids - a 1-Page Hip-Hop RPG

nickplaysgames — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 11:56:59 -0600

Return of the Herculoids - a 1-Page Hip-Hop RPG:

My buddy Dan, maybe the only person in the world with the broad cultural cachet necessary to bridge the gap between traditional game design and the decades-long history of a musical genre’s evolution, was hanging out in class one day and thought it’d be way more interesting to develop a ruleset for a hip-hop RPG than to pay attention.

It is the year 3030, and The Herculoids have returned from deep space to find a world where Total Control has surrounded the earth in an Anti-Hip Hop field. Unable to enter, The Herculoids granted a fraction of their power to the Heroes to seek out the Four Pillars. Only when the four pillars are brought together can the Herculoids return and bring peace to the earth.

The Decemberists - “January Hymn”

nickplaysgames — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 14:21:16 -0600

The Decemberists - “January Hymn”

The Head and the Heart performs “Rivers and Roads”...

nickplaysgames — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 15:08:55 -0600

The Head and the Heart performs “Rivers and Roads” in a tunnel.

See you in 2012.

First Aid Kit - The Lion’s Roar

nickplaysgames — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 20:25:21 -0500

First Aid Kit - The Lion’s Roar

An Open Letter to Writers of Open Letters to Concepts, Places, Theories and Inanimate Objects

nickplaysgames — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 12:02:00 -0500

Dear Writers of Open Letters to Concepts, Places, Theories and Inanimate Objects,

Please cut that shit out.

Thanks,

Nick

Franz Kafka's The Metamorphosis in brief

nickplaysgames — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 20:08:00 -0500

What time is it?
Oh shit, I’m a bug
Hope they don’t miss me at work today
Man, whatever — my job sucks
Wait, Mom! Don’t come in here! Goddd
My boss is pissed; guess I’ll get up
Oh, right — I’m a bug
Suddenly feeling apathetic
Opening a door with insect apparatus sure is tough
Mom, goddd, it’s just a phase; you act like you’ve ever seen a bug before
Goddd
Whoa, check it out — I’m totally Spider-Man up in here
Wheeeee
Suddenly feeling apathetic
Hey, guys? Guys? I’m getting kinda hungry
Oh, don’t play at that feigned-horror schtick with me
I don’t think they’re feigning anything, actually
Suddenly feeling apathetic
Better climb some more walls
Wheeeee
Fact: Human-size bugs love the violin
Fact: Human-size humans hate their deformed son
Gonna crawl over here and die if that’s ok with everyone
Family: “Sure, go right ahead”
This would be symbolically compelling if I wasn’t so dead

Why No One Is Getting Laid

nickplaysgames — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 19:13:40 -0500

Why No One Is Getting Laid:

Maybe Facebook and texting has turned us into a bunch of judgmental jerks who would say no to sex just because someone uses an emoticon or lists Dave Matthews Band under their favorite music. “Ugh, total dealbreaker!” Really? Well, have fun sleeping alone tonight next to your cool Beach House poster.

An awkward response to a reasonable question by Ryan O’Connell.

"You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your..."

nickplaysgames — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 12:16:00 -0500

“You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.”

- Steve Jobs, Stanford University class of 2005 commencement speech (YouTube)

More thoughts at my blog over here.

The National - “Runaway” Director/Editor/Producer:...

nickplaysgames — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 01:44:54 -0500

The National - “Runaway”

Director/Editor/Producer: Sophie van der Burg
Actress: Tara Richard

A Fat, Mad Baby

nickplaysgames — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 17:01:05 -0500

A Fat, Mad Baby:

The Economist:

America is a scooter-bound glutton who, when its continuously increasing mass finally overwhelms the doughtiest scooter’s capacities, shakes its fat fists like a mad baby and demands deliverance from the laws of physics. America needs an extreme makeover, a heavy dose of tough love. America needs to grow up and get real. But our politicians always only tell us how beautiful and brave we are here in the best country in the history of the world.

From The Economist’s blog Democracy in America

"I know you’re scared and angry. Many of you have lost your jobs, your homes, your hope. This was a..."

nickplaysgames — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 13:24:00 -0500

“I know you’re scared and angry. Many of you have lost your jobs, your homes, your hope. This was a disaster, but it was not a natural disaster. It was made by Wall Street gamblers who speculated with your lives and futures. It was made by conservative extremists who told us that if we just eliminated regulations and rewarded greed and recklessness, it would all work out. But it didn’t work out. And it didn’t work out 80 years ago, when the same people sold our grandparents the same bill of goods, with the same results. But we learned something from our grandparents about how to fix it, and we will draw on their wisdom. We will restore business confidence the old-fashioned way: by putting money back in the pockets of working Americans by putting them back to work, and by restoring integrity to our financial markets and demanding it of those who want to run them. I can’t promise that we won’t make mistakes along the way. But I can promise you that they will be honest mistakes, and that your government has your back again.”

- The inauguration speech Barack Obama needed to give on January 20, 2009, as imagined by Drew Westen. Read his entire opinion piece here — it’s excellent.

The National - 90-Mile Water Wall

nickplaysgames — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 03:15:33 -0500

The National - 90-Mile Water Wall

"I’d like to dedicate that song of homoerotic love between soldiers to that party flotilla of..."

nickplaysgames — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 18:15:04 -0500

“I’d like to dedicate that song of homoerotic love between soldiers to that party flotilla of yachts over there. Hope you dudes are having a good time and you’re keeping the rosé chilled, because Lord knows mine isn’t.”

- The Decemberists’ Colin Meloy at the Newport Folk Festival after the band played “The Soldiering Life.” Listen to the show here.

jasoncashdollar: The revolution will hover.

nickplaysgames — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 00:10:20 -0500

jasoncashdollar:

The revolution will hover.

Our Bloodstained Roof

nickplaysgames — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 23:05:06 -0500

Our Bloodstained Roof

Never Date a Writer

nickplaysgames — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 23:28:33 -0500

Never Date a Writer