Oh, So

I talked to everyone. People were pretty cool considering what a hard time I've been giving some of them lately. We all agreed, basically, that I need to change my ways to some degree and I decided to... well, I'm not sure exactly what I decided. But something has to happen. Most ambiguous blog post ever? Oh, internet, you know I can't tell you everything.

Uh-Oh

Now I done it. I guess I had a few too many last night, and yelled at some people, so now the housemates are planning an intervention or something tomorrow.

What terrors could this new development hold for Captain Drunkypants and his Blog of Might?! Stay tuned.

Quick Update

The last week has been incredibly stressful. I'm glad it's over, though my work is far from done. At least I've managed to go more than four days without feeling compelled to drink my sorrows away. Tonight I can have a good time knowing I'm doing it just to do it, and not to suppress my emotions.

A couple weeks ago I "canceled" my facebook account, on a whim. It's sort of freeing, not feeling compelled to log on daily or semi-daily just to live vicariously through others. I'm sure I'll get pulled back in soon enough, but for now I'm pretty content.

Oh, blog-world, what a strange year it's been! The highs are immense and the lows are crushing. One can only look towards the future with clear eyes and hope in one's heart. At least I have an outlet to express myself when all else fails. For now, as always, I remain earnestly yours.

Upgrade U

I'm sitting at work, for some reason listening to Beyoncé, thinking that I've not appreciated Beyoncé's music enough, but more prominently thinking about an awkward series of interactions I just had at my house, wondering whether or not I should be embarrassed if awkward things happen in my own digs, trying to shake off the whole thing in general so I can do some fucking work, and finally attempting to finish this post, ending a drought of activity for this sorry little on-line journal of mine.

Here's what I wrote and left unfinished and unposted yesterday at work (yes, after sipping a certain measure of amber liquid):

"A few things happened last night. None of them were important.

I am unsurprised, yet dismayed all the same, to find that my friends seem to grow funnier and more rich in character every day, while I just get drunker and sadder. Sure, it's fine material for my forthcoming memoir, to be published by HarperCollins in 2024, but I"

It ends there. I don't really know where I was going with that--likely toward some snarky twist that would resolve the thought logically without actually having confronted its twisted mental origins. Upon the urging of a few of my housemates I will be seeing a therapist this coming week, and how that will come out I can't say. But regardless, I'm going to try and avoid the spirals into shameful, self-destructive behavior that have tended claim my mid-week activity as of late.

I don't know what "A few things happened last night" refers to; nothing actually did happen on All Hallows' Even, I simply sat around in my regular clothes and did not have great experiences with exciting people. I did lie on the couch and zone out to melancholy tunes, so, maybe that's a night well spent. I don't know.

This week might be interesting. I'll keep you posted, invisible audience.

You're Tearing Me Apart

Last night I got high and went into town to see Rebel Without a Cause. At the theater I noticed a guy from one of my classes working concessions and, due to my reactions being slowed, I stared at him for about ten seconds before realizing who he was. By that time he had noticed and tentatively waved, and I had made my awkwardness completely apparent. Normally I can use my quick wit to deflect moments of tension or social anxiety. Unfortunately, I cannot make jokes when I am high. My attempts at humor come out like the schizophrenic ramblings of a middle-school ADHD case.

I attempted to ask him for something and it came out like this: "Ah, yeah can I get some of the.... ummmm.... behind there the... over there... Junior Mints." It was among the top-five worst candy requests I have ever made.

It was all right, though. The movie was fun to watch and the Junior Mints were the perfect choice. When I got back I took a shower and drank a lot of beer. Last week I got way too excited and rowdy and really pissed off a friend--the first time I've ever done so in college. (I think.) So this time I promised myself I'd stay fairly mellow, to undercut the possibility of any more ill-advised shenanigans.

I capped off my night by throwing a pumpkin off the balcony.

College, it’s the best

I’m sitting in the library attempting to prepare notes for a presentation that I have to deliver tomorrow morning for an article I don’t really understand in a class I’m not smart enough to comprehend. Sometimes I wonder if I shouldn’t have just saved the scratch, skipped higher education, and got a job at the local DQ. Oh, who am I kidding? I’m not driven enough to make Blizzards and shitty burgers all day for small-town yokels! I need the quiet fulfillment of superfluous, occasionally inebriated academic exploration to satisfy my youthful urges.

Everybody Loves Me

I made the most of this past weekend. Even after scrubbing myself vigorously in the shower, I’m sure I must still smell faintly of whiskey and cigarettes. If that wasn’t evidence enough of my indulgent ways, the slight whiff of emotional damage lingers in the air. I guess I should explain, for the sake of compositional comprehensiveness, that I am socially paranoid. I’m pretty sure people are pissed off at me most of the time (except for those blessed souls who I’m quite sure don’t care about me one way or another), unless they tell me directly that they are pleased with my actions, and even then I’m not certain they’re not being sarcastic.

So I proceeded to progress, during each of the last few days, from sober and solemn in the morning to exceedingly rambunctious and abrasive as day turns to night and my scowl morphs into a mischievous grin. I couldn’t be more off-putting if I tried, which I know because I often do (try, that is; sometimes it’s fun to be weird).

Yesterday I woke up around 11, stayed in bed until 15 minutes before my shift, then ran out the door intending to grab some snacks near the library where I have to pick up the keys for work. The place was swarming with high school track kids having some kind of huge race. The school store wasn’t open yet and the café was closed as well. I didn’t have time to go back home and make a sandwich or anything so I just went to work intending to order some delivery. For some reason, I temporarily forgot that good food existed and ordered Dominos. Halfway through the pizza I was still hungry, but I had to force the carboard-y slices down my gullet; my stomach was screaming out in anguish. I believe I heard my name cursed in the watery gurgles emanating from my midsection.

Six hours later my shift ended and I went home. I knew I wouldn’t be able to get any work done, so I resigned myself to the night and poured a stiff whiskey and cola. I hung out with a couple of my housemates, we watched a bit of Happy Feet on TV. God damn it, that movie came off as bizarre. I’ve seen plenty of shitty animated films, but for the life of me I couldn’t figure out what the point of this movie was. To its credit, you couldn’t call it formulaic; I had no fucking clue where they were going with this tap-dancing penguin and his Mexican-Robin-Williams pals. I remarked that I’d imagine the film executives would assume the producers to be stoned when they heard the pitch. I hear it made a bajillion dollars though, so good on them I guess.

At some point, I remember trying to have a discussion with somebody that I had been rehearsing in my head all day, about how pleased I was with my life and all my clever and attractive friends, but I must have messed it up because he didn’t shower me with adoration and mutual appreciation.* I spent another hour or two furthering my drinking career, barging into people’s rooms, and playing music at an inappropriate volume. (I made a playlist on a computer not my own entitled “FUCK MUSIC,” which I realized afterward has a pleasing double meaning, and which I am excited to slip into the programme at our next social function.)

A couple nights ago before going to sleep, I opined to one of my housemates that nobody understood my insecurities, and that I just felt like I should be constantly apologizing to everyone around me. I remember saying that I felt like the social equivalent of George W. Bush: it is just my way to always ruin everything.

“I don’t know what to tell you,” she said. “We all really like you.”


*Mutual Appreciation is the title of another movie I watched over the weekend. It’s like the indie-est fucking picture you could imagine, but somehow it manages to totally steal my heart. I recommend it.

Back in Back

I've been back at college for a couple weeks now, and it's been super!

I've been back at school for a couple weeks, and it's been all right. I watched some movies and had a few laughs, but all in all the experience is lacking a certain verve. I'm living with nine other motherfuckers this year, so that might be okay. We'll see how everything stacks up after some more time has passed. Maybe I'll write a post tomorrow. Don't count on it, though; you'll only be setting yourself up for disappointment.

-HFC

VIDEOGAMES

As during most breaks, I spent the summer vacation going through some of the videogames from the last decade that I forgot to play until now. The two that I'm on now represent different points on the "cult favorite" spectrum; they're idiosyncratic experiences, but lovably so.

Skies of Arcadia is a traditionalist--some might say reactionary--Japanese Role-Playing Game that follows the premise of "Sky Pirates" performing daring feats in a sky-locked world in which "airships" have taken the place of conventional watercraft, and Air Pirates rule the skies. I haven't played through an entire RPG in years, and I'd forgotten what an investment of time and energy it is. It's still incredible to me that games like this can be such cultural events, even outside of their birthplace of Japan (which I understand is a mine of idiosyncratic delights). But this game has such a magnitude of the quality that I would describe as "utterly winning"--it's almost bursting with magic and gallantry--that I couldn't help but be won over. I'm actually playing Skies Of Arcadia Legends--an enhanced port of the original from Sega's failed Dreamcast system to the Gamecube. It's the definition of a cult classic, and I'll certainly see it through to the end.

Ubisoft's Beyond Good & Evil might be the ultimate archetype for the critically-adored-total-flop, a game whose sales were almost inversely proportional to its review scores. Intended as the first part of a trilogy, it was the dream project of the auteur Michel Ancel, creator of the classic Rayman series. I have fond memories of the exhilarating Rayman 2: The Great Escape, and I'd played the underwhelming Rayman 3, the first in the series without Ancel's direction (he was working in BG&E instead) about a month ago, so I was eager to try this vaunted favorite. All I've ever heard about it, when it's brought up in retrospectives of the last console generation, is How terrific it was, What an accomplishment, What a unique vision brought to life so incredibly, and how None of you bastards bought it. Oh, well. So I finally got around to playing it this summer, and it's pretty easy to see why it wasn't a huge hit. Simply put, the game has no "hook"--no simple gimmick that grants it an edge in the competitive market. Far from the explosive light shows of smashes like Gears of War and Halo, it's an action-adventure that really asks the player, at the outset, to give it the benefit of the doubt. When it came out, it was no wonder gamers flocked to snazzier fare, not coincidentally including Ubisoft's own Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (a personal favorite). That said, the game is bone-deep greatness: the graphics, music, and gameplay are all not only solid but original and wonderful in design and execution.

Unfortunately, four or five pretty brilliant hours into the game, I've run into an infuriating glitch where, with a digital screech and a flip to a green screen of death, the game freezes every time I try to take a photo of an animal. Since taking pictures of animals is, like, one of the main components of the gameplay, this would be a problem. I can live with the occasional glitch or error of design, but when a game repeatedly refuses to allow me to experience it, I stop giving it the benefit of the doubt. So back on the shelf it goes, another masterpiece tossed to the wayside. Summer apathy, in bloom.

Happy Birthday/Summer Sunset

I'm sitting in the basement, drinking a PBR, watching Anthony Bourdain No Reservations, waiting for my frozen pizza to cook. I just got back from my friend's birthday party, elsewhere in the state. It was a good time; spirits were high, not to mention our good cheer (get it?... ah, forget it.) I turned 20 myself a couple weeks ago. The day was slightly less depressing than I expected it to be, largely due to the smothering presence of friends and family. I can't really speak on the act of leaving teenhood itself; it doesn't mean much to me at the moment. All I can say is that I enter my twenties with more confidence than I entered my teens, though that's not saying much.

I'm going back to school in a few weeks. I have no idea what the school year will bring. I hope for the best, and I can't even envision the worst.

The summer was mixed. It was neither a great success or a huge failure. I planned to go through a huge reading list; I read a couple of books. I planned to get in shape; I ran and played frisbee occasionally. I planned to get my driver's license; I failed to do so, but I learned to drive.

So, I don't know. I don't even know what the point of this blog is anymore. But I enjoy writing in it, when I manage to get around to it. Have faith, friends; I imagine the school year will bring more excitement than I can hope to document.

The Summer Aches

About a month left of summer vacation. I hope I can make it. The last couple months have sort of blended together into a homogeneous souffle of suck, and time has become an abstract concept detached from the reality of existence. That sounds very dramatic, but mostly it's just a way to describe how bored I am. I've tried to stay healthy, going for runs and so forth, but that hasn't kept, and neither has my reading list for the summer; I'm about halfway into my third book for the season. No, I lied: my second.

I'm keeping up with my videogames, though! Sure am. Last week I played Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars. It was all right. I've played less Grand Theft Auto in my day than many of my generation, but even so I'm sort of tired of it. There are only so many crazed rampages one can enact upon the plasticine populace of Liberty City before it occurs to you that you're having less fun than you ought to be. Still, I appreciate how defiantly witty and self-aware the games insist on being. One of my professors last semester instructed the class not to play that game, so I feel like I've won some sort of intellectual victory by completing the main quest with my critical ability intact.

Let's see, what else. I got back from New Jersey a week ago, and last week I shed a layer of burned, useless skin, much like some exotic lizard. I wish it made me feel like I was starting anew, fresh and ready to take on the world, but no such luck. Goddamn lizards, always getting my hopes up.

Complainy-Pants McGee, That's Me

Connecticut is terrible. My seasonal allergies have been acting up lately, and I blame it on these New England environs, in which agitating plants are allowed to grow and spew pollens and such into the air. Or maybe it's just this dank basement I spend most of my time in, who knows. In any case, I'm fed up with these parts. Hopefully I'll get to spend the weekend in New Jersey, a trip down south-aways might do me good.

...................

I had a fight with my pop today. I don't even remember why, exactly; I think it started when he came downstairs and saw me watching Jarhead on TV and got angry for some reason. Later I yelled at him, and he replied with some smugness that I can't recall, but I remember the conversation ended with him sneering that I don't read Jane Austen. Growing up, I was always jealous of those lucky children whose fathers drank Bud and belched while watching "The Game" and threatened to take a belt to their kids if they didn't buck up during football practice. I don't think my father's oppressive brand of passive-agressive, myopic intellectual elitism really instilled the right values in his children. When he gets mad because my brother blasts his shitty extremist hardcore music with total disregard to the other people existing around him, and I lose my temper and tell my bro that if he doesn't turn it down I'll fucking do it for him, he has nobody but himself to blame. Anyway, I get my silent revenge by drinking all his booze. I'm going to read Mansfield Park and then tell him to shove it. Ah, family.

Brother Bear/Boilermaker

Tonight I had a talk with my brother in the dark while he dozed on the futon in the basement and I sat on the couch, The Twilight Zone glowing in the background. I feel like we made some progress. My brother and I have had a complex relationship throughout our lives. I won't get into it here, but basically, I expressed that I thought, since we're both adults now and all, we should start trying to do things together, to repair the damage that's been done, etc. I proposed that we go for a run together tomorrow. We'll see how that works out.

After, I downed some whiskey and watched some Gilmore Girls. DON'T JUDGE ME. I might discuss the Gilmore Girls in this space at a later date. I have some things I might say. You might want to have a look and express some emotions. We'll see.

One Week Later

Having my teeth removed sucked even more than I imagined it would. The last week has been terrible. The meds they have me on make me drowsy and dizzy, and aren't really even strong enough to keep the pain at bay completely between the 8-hour intervals in which I may take them. In any case, I'm about to take my last one, and I likely won't refill my subscription, so I'll have to wean myself off them with healthy doses of ibuprofen. It would be great to be rid of this persistent gross feeling in my mouth, and hopefully I'll soon be able to eat food naturally without the sides of my lower jaw aching and crumbs getting caught in the gnarled sockets from which they pried my awkwardly slanted wisdom teeth. I'm really just tired of being tired and sitting around the house, unable to do much except watch TV and whimper and drink milkshakes. I must refocus and attempt to reclaim what is left of this summer (most of it--Christ, it is long) for active/creative pursuits. Or I could just drink and play videogames, whichever comes more naturally.

Wisdom

I had my wisdom teeth taken out this morning*. The worst part--technically, the only part—was the needle in the arm at the beginning. I was told the drugs they inject are supposed to put you in a kind of “trance,” but I just fell asleep. When I awoke I was higher than I’ve been in a while. I vaguely remember trying to ask the doctor and nurses about their favorite Michael Jackson songs, and then realizing they couldn’t understand a word I had said for the bloody gauze stuffed in my mouth, which was completely numb. After getting home and drooling quite a bit of blood onto myself (attempting to drink a milkshake, I’d thought my lower lip was my tongue) I settled onto the couch to recuperate. It’s kind of an interesting sensation, the swelling and so forth; you basically look like a Dick Tracy villain, and not being able to open your mouth very wide makes communication a challenge.

I was just relaxing on the couch, watching Krull on my computer, when a flash thunderstorm arrived and then left, taking with it the power in the town and the entire surrounding area. We were without electricity for nearly half a day, which caused my otherwise contented family to stress and yell at one another continuously during the very time allotted for peace and quiet, due to my sister’s sickness and my own ill capacity. I couldn’t even join in the angry fun, what with switching between lying on my back to ease the dull pain and going to drool out gobs of blood into the sink every other minute. Summer is fantastic.


*It was actually yesterday morning, several hours after which I wrote this post, and was unable to post it until now for reasons detailed above.

LIVING AT HOME IS BULLSHIT, cont.

GODDAMNIT WHY WON'T MY BROTHER GO INTO ANOTHER ROOM WITH HIS LAPTOP SO I CAN JUST FUCKING WATCH CONAN THE BARBARIAN IN PEACE WITHOUT HAVING TO LISTEN TO HIS SHITTY STRAIGHTEDGE REGGAE MUSIC IN THE BACKGROUND AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Breakdown (It's Alright)

It seems I can't do anything right. The last few times I've mowed the grass, I spent a couple hours painstakingly grooming every inch of the front and back yard with the gangly, shuddering hunk of metal and plastic that is our mower. My parents don't seem to think I've done well enough; their complaints mainly pertain to the few blades of grass on the immediate perimeter of the house and on the precipice of the rock-lined flowerbed in the back yard, areas which range from exceedingly difficult to evidently impossible to reach with our current machine. My mother purchased a trimmer for this very purpose, although when I went out today to mow my father instructed me to ignore this device and just get all up in the flowers, "really put some muscle into it."

I finished the front without incident (though I avoided the patchy area encircled by the ankle-high upraised tree root, the terrors of which I detailed in this post) and did the bottom half of the back with somewhat less enthusiasm than usual. (When your progress is impeded by your inability to determine which sections of grass you have and haven't mowed, the result is a small but not insubstantial existential dilemma.) When I got to the top I attempted to put into action this half-baked muscle-based method of which my father spoke. After murdering some innocent flowers and dislodging several rocks from their decorative positions, the mower let out a violent snap, ejected one side of the filter casing, and--either from the damage done or from my terrified release of the safety bar--died with a whir, slumped halfway over the mulch. Somewhere in the near distance an alarmed dog barked in agitation. I left the mower strewn in the plants and went inside, utterly trounced.

So Hot It's Retarded

I've written about The Real World here before, and you can refer to that post for enlightenment on the history and rationale behind my fixation with the show. The new season begins next week, and will likely command my attention at least for the rest of the summer. I watched the trailer (which you can see below for yourself, if you please) and it indicates a viewing experience much in line with the series norm: a handful of fit, samey youths live in untold excess for a few months, occasionally finding random miseries with which to briefly disrupt their revelry for our viewing pleasure, etc.

The one aspect of this year's set-up that kind of sticks in my craw is the setting. It's not like it really matters much where each new version takes place; the cast utilizes their house and the nearby booze dispensaries to the same general effect each year. (Though I did find the un-forced lushness of the Hawaii season especially alluring.) But the Mexican city of Cancun, which I'm sure is quite a beautiful, industrious place in any context, takes on a special significance in the MTV dominion. It especially refers to the brief but intense pleasures of the vaunted college Spring Break vacation, and the network's past coverage of such events has a certain flavor that doesn't necessarily jibe with the slower, more minutely focused (albeit fancifully so) style of the reality series. I remember enjoying the MTV Spring Break programming in the mid-nineties, watching Sugar Ray and Puff Daddy prance around onstage as tanned babes bopped in unison, drinks in hand, projecting a careless spirit that I found genuinely moving. Perhaps it's this younger, less critical version of myself that doesn't want to see the two franchises muck each other up with incompatible attitudes. Don't get your Spring Break in my Real World--I don't think they'd get along.

The creators of the show actually made a movie, years ago--The Real Cancun--detailing such a scenario. I don't intend to ever see it; I don't imagine one and a half hours is nearly enough to convey the breadth of encounters, however repetitive, that occur on a regular season of the show. The only reason I watch it anymore is the chance to slowly get to know the personalities of each housemate every week, and then reel in ecstasy as they drink and fuck their way into TV oblivion.

I must also mention that one of the cast members (apparently the one selected by popular vote, and--according to Wikipedia--the second in the cast to work at the Hooter's restaurant establishment) is named Ayiiia. Yes, with three i's. I'm not usually one to ridicule another human's given name, but, I mean, Jesus.

Real World 22 Cancun - MTV Shows

Fasten Your Seatbelts, etc.

I stayed up ‘til 5 a.m. killing an old bottle of Merlot and watching this British soap called Skins. All these kids just fuck and do drugs and shit, it’s pretty good. Miles ahead of anything out of the States, as expected. I wish life were as simple as it is in these shows. I think relationships of any kind would be quite more enjoyable if you only had to keep track of like seven characters, like if God could only be bothered to cast so many roles and so, for instance, the chick who is very forward (as is the wont of her archetype—though of course she harbors a relatable sensitive side due to her sympathetically trying home life) would eventually run out of bit players to shag and would have to come around to you. I turned around to pour another glass of sour wine and found a box of Cruncha Buncha (Buncha Crunchas? Crunch Buddies? It’s already lost to me) on the shelf that I had forgotten I’d left there after purchasing for no reason. It was like my birthday come early.

Today I woke up around four. I made my sister some spaghetti and went to mow the lawn. I hate mowing the goddamn lawn. Adding to my general annoyance is the difficulty incurred by the thick tree roots protruding on the right-hand side of the yard, which cause the mower to make a terrifying sputtering as the spinning death-blades whack-whack-whack against the wood. Tomorrow (today) I have to finish the lawn and go to the dentist, who will likely wrench all my teeth from their sockets with an electrified pincer, the bastard.

Four more days until Frisbee. Then, if it works out, back to Massachusetts for a weekend of petty revelry. Jesus Christ, this summer needs to be over.

So Then…

Last week the folks gave me a wildly unfocused and over-emoted lecture about the importance of spending my summer wisely. I can’t ever seem to decipher their faux-conciliatory doublespeak, because the straightforward content of what they’re saying usually conflicts with the tone in which it’s presented. They’ve never actually told me that getting a job is imperative, yet the urgency with which they impel me to find an activity leads me to believe that if I’m not making money, I’m not doing anything important with my life (which could be true, but, well). I spent the whole conversation sitting on the edge of their bed, facing away towards the wall and the drawn curtain, with my head down. I didn’t want them to see my expression, whatever it was.

Later I went to play pick-up Ultimate (poorly) after not having really exercised for about a month, and I also didn’t stretch thoroughly. Halfway through I slipped and hurt my, um, quad or whatever. (The part of the thigh just below the buttocks. Is that the quad?) I just kept playing. Oh, and then I walked a mile and a half home. By the time I got back I was so sore that I could barely stand up. It was one of the better nights I’ve had this summer.

I Hate My Life

I slept all day and now I can’t even go upstairs to get something to eat, for my certainty of being yelled at for not job-hunting (which I suspect would be as big a waste of time as spending the day in bed). I can only live in my little underground lair solely on books and video games for so long. Someone please rescue me.

Summer Vacation 2: The Secret of Akthar’s Tomb

Things can happen at an alarmingly rapid pace when you’re young, and I’m conditioned to it now so much that—to my great dismay—it was a simple matter to shift from the breakneck pace of college to the infinitesimal flow of suburban nothingness. Two weeks ago I was reveling in the crazed abandon that is the last week of the college year: laughing maniacally, soaked in beer, as I writhed rhythmically on a table, surrounded by like-minded peers in a house full of mirth. (That image is a metaphor and also not one.) And then, as if by some temporal anomaly, not a day later I found myself sitting in the basement of my parents’ house, alone and frustratingly sober, confused as to my purpose and what my next step ought to be. Okay, maybe it was a little jarring.

The Return has been neither as great nor as awful as it could have been, but the sheer plainness of being back home is enough to turn every day sour. Objective Number One was ostensibly to get a job, and I’ve yet to even begin my meager attempts, trying to ward off inevitable failure for as long as I can. (Shit, I couldn’t find employment last summer, when the economy and job market weren’t in the shitter.) I suppose the next step is to find some volunteer work, which would be fine, really, except that I’m not sure where to start. This is problematic on another level, which is that I fucking have to do a bunch of community service for college—like, by a year from now—and not knowing what the hell to do just serves to reignite my infinite anxiety about the general directionless nature of my expensive college education.

But, enough moping. Maybe the summer will hold some grand surprises. I’ve at least made contact with some high school friends, and shared a few hopeful laughs. The summer is long, but that length is a boon, not a burden. So much time, so many possibilities! I can do anything. I can learn so much. I can self-improve. Out of tedium and despair, a man is born anew.

Ah, who am I kidding. This summer’s gonna blow.

End of an Era

Well, here we are. Here I am, anyway. I don't know what this year has meant. When I started this blog in September, in a drunken haze, and even when I started writing in it semi-regularly, at the end of that semester, I was in a very different place than I am now. My living situation, my scholastic plan, the country I live in have changed in superficial and genuine ways. I don't know if I accomplished much of anything. One thing that I did succeed in doing was becoming closer to the people in my daily life, and having fun and exciting experiences. (Yes, this is corny. Go fuck yourself.) I've decided I don't really mind anything as long as there are people around who I care about and who will have my back. I hope I can keep that feeling in the future. I hope I can honestly profess to have it. In any case, it won't be long, Hampshire College, mon amour. I put that in italics so it would have more of an impressive bilingual appearance.

'til next year,
HFC

P.S. I'll write in the blog over the summer, though it may change in format and/or title. We'll see.

The Final Sprint

In the airport lounge. It's 4:30 A.M. Workin'. Workin'. Workin'. Beer, coffee, and Subway in my system. Saw Star Trek earlier. It was rad. Shit's happening this weekend. Too much. Have to read. Exam... Tuesday. No. I. Can't. But. I. Must. Yes. It's on. Last week. Long summer. What the hell.

?

God Damn It

We went to the grocery store today and I forgot to get more Ovaltine. This makes me angry. It makes me want to drink. Sometimes I drink in an attempt to fill the deep void inside myself. The void that would normally be filled with Ovaltine.

Alas, no beer. Sad times indeed.

Pardon Me, I Must Say I’m Kinda Like a Big Deal

No, not really. In reality I’m pretty unimportant, but I suppose in my own little narcissistic world I am the biggest deal there is. So, there, I’ve just betrayed what an egotist I am while justifying the awkward use of the hook from the new Clipse & Kanye jam as my blog post title. Yay me?

I’ve finished almost all my work for the semester with weeks to spare, so for the first time in quite a while I can spend a whole day being indulgent and unproductive without feeling too bad about it. To illustrate how slothful I’m feeling: I spelled almost every word in that previous sentence incorrectly the first time. The heat certainly doesn’t help; it’s at that temperature that falls just short of unbearable but still manages to saturate the environment and slowly drain your energy as the day goes by and still prevents you from easily falling asleep by the time you’re completely spent. It’s going to be a good last couple of weeks here at the College. I hope.

People That I Want to Punch, Episode 47

Today’s entry: the tender lovers in their bubble of self-importance who, in situations that traditionally warrant silence, communicate with urgent whispers that they think cloak their interactions from the rest of the room but end up being more distracting and irritating than if they’d just talked out loud. I’m sitting in the library as two such vermin whisper-fuck each other and it’s making my skin crawl—the pop of their hard consonants puncturing the grating whoosh produced by their unvocal enunciation. What makes them think they’re not being annoying? I’m no silence Nazi—it’s fine if you want to say howdy-doo to one of your mates when you see them in the library, or to ask to borrow a pen or whatever but to sustain such a lengthy and unnecessary conversation in such an inappropriate environment is pretty rude and takes quite a lack of awareness.

Maybe I’m being hasty in my annoyance here, but it’s not just limited to situations like this: last year I was in a film class, and during a two-and-a-half-hour screening a couple appeared to be planning their entire class presentation, among sundry other unimportant topics, through covert whispers throughout the entire goddamn movie. I could probably have ignored them had they not sat directly to the side and front of me. I mean, Christ, at least sit in the back, back row, if you’re going to completely tune out the rest of the people and activity in the room. It was all I could do not to summarily summon them into the hall and, well, um… and excoriate them very uncouthly indeed.

99 Problems...

… but a bitch ain’t one. I kind of wish a bitch (literal or derogatorily figurative) was one of my problems, though; that’s a kind of problem I could stand to bear. As it is, I fill my days alternately with marathon literary exploration and hard drankin’. Pretty standard college fare, I’d imagine, and yet, I feel totally separate from that venerated American experience. My little sister facebook’d me earlier* to ask how “college life” was. How the hell should I know? I’m out here in the boondocks of higher education, watching my life veer wildly between noble experiment and spectacular intellectual car crash. It’s less intense than I make it sound, yes, but it’s disconcerting all the same. Wherefore, if not towards the professional world or the social life level-up (to awkwardly utilize gamer terminology), is all this energy, however responsible, being expended?

The end of the semester brings about an unhealthy flurry of frantic non-activity. Life is day-to-day, rather than week-to-week; there are the expected rituals, yes, but it’s less routine than necessary, at this point. The maintenance of habit (I’m being intentionally abstract here: use your imagination) in the attempt to latch onto something meaningful, to connect with my life itself if not the people in it, is the new primary objective. In the midst of all this hurry-up-and-do-nothing anticipation lies my inability to retain any sort of moral knowledge from the multiplicity of experiences I encounter. Sometimes the failure to change my indolent ways is overbearing, and I react, stubbornly, by becoming less responsible. I intentionally slept for almost twelve hours today, and I’m not sure why. Maybe I thought if I kept at it awhile I’d wake up an adult.

---------------
* Being privy to my sister’s daily social thoughts and interactions has become a horrifying fascination. What happened to the sweetly dumb little creature with whom I used to enjoy a bowl of Froot Loops and a Spongebob marathon? When did she start calling her friends on her cellphone to chat unreflectively about the gloriously empty-headed goings-on in the anxious pre-teen social world? When did she start doting on new school heartthrobs/hair-gelled mannequins like the Jonas Brothers? (Not last summer, I tried unsuccessfully to bond with the little one by mentioning how I found the vaunted JoBros to be, of the entire Disney Channel coven, the most tolerable. At the time she replied confidently that she didn’t care for them—how fickle these ones can be.) She seems to be surely transforming into the type of person I used to resent so much in my angrier days, and I’m frightened not by the expectation that I’ll feel the same way about her, but that I won’t be able to.

Spring Broke

I got back from spring break at around 3:30 a.m. Sunday, and I’m still reeling. Going to Georgia turned out to be neither a huge mistake nor a great relief, but I don’t have any idea what would have happened if I’d stayed at HFC or went home or whatever, so I guess the fact that I had a few laughs and got some reading done colors the week somewhat nicely. Still, I’m glad to be back; a week of pure aimless revelry is really tiring in a way.

The trip down was pretty painless, save for the three hours where we had to wait around in the middle of the night due to this weird new rule of the college board that says, I guess, their insurance doesn’t cover driving between the hours of 2 and 5 a.m. We timed it so we pulled into D.C. around 2, and we managed to kill a couple of hours wandering around the monuments. It might have been fun except I thought it would be great to get high beforehand, and my initial mood of casual silliness quickly devolved into a deep and draining paranoia. We spent the final hour just sitting in silence in the dark, in the van, and—when I wasn’t completely mesmerized by my friend’s screensaver—I literally thought my life was coming to an end. Don’t do drugs (in the dark, early morning in a strange and dangerous city), kids.

I spent most of the week tired and drunk, played some Frisbee pretty poorly, played a fuck-ton of videogames and went into the ocean naked once. Maybe I’m getting old and boring, but it all just felt kind of routine, enjoyable enough but predictable in its various developments. It’s like the way I once read Roger Ebert describe the plot in some movie, maybe A Few Good Men or something—they tell you what they’re going to do, and then they go do it. Sure, it’s satisfying on some level, but where’s the twist, where’s the spark of interest? I thought I would go drink and run around for a bit, and I did.

And now I’m back, and I’m already tired of doing work (or, I’ll be honest, considering doing work, which is really what it is most of the time). I feel like a Hollywood producer; I need that goddamn twist, baby. Preferably not like a trauma or anything tragic, but something cool, like I win some sweet internship or I get invited to join a sex cult. Hit me.

Tuesday's Gone

I don't know what happened today. I felt really shitty in the morning, waking up after like 5-6 hours of sleep, and then I dozed my way through a couple classes, came back to the house, read some Philip Roth, then drank the remainder of our booze and went to play frisbee. I guess it was as good a Tuesday as any. Whatever. I'm feeling better about things and stuff, so no worries, I'm not gonna take the shortcut to Hades anytime soon, Fun Fans. I think I just need some Me Time. Hopefully being crammed in a house with 25 other people for a week will be able to accommodate my needs next week, otherwise, it's back to Crazy Canyon for yours truly. Contemplating life and personal destiny and shit... how narcissistic can a motherfucker get? Reading Philip Roth really makes me want to be a better person, at least in comparison.

Rats

I'm so pissed off right now I can't even think. I don't even know what I'm doing anymore; I feel completely lost. Part of me thinks I should skip spring break to stay and work on my research paper, but then I realize that it wouldn't work, I would just get frustrated anyway, and not get anything done or get something done but it would be so terrible that I might as well have just gone to Georgia anyway. But then I realize that Georgia would be equally unproductive, and I don't mean in an academic sense but in the sens that I would go, have some okay times, get drunk and run around like an idiot, funfunfun, but then I would just come back having gained nothing from the experience, back to my middling life and my old anxieties, and with the added stress of not having worked on my paper. Okay, so maybe I finish my work in time. Maybe I do. Maybe I get by. But even if I get the credit, it isn't worth anything if it isn't worth anything, you know? Progress without quality is not progress, it's all superficial and a waste of time. I'm just very angry at everyone, mostly myself but also my parents, and my old teachers, and everyone who told me lies about the way that life was going to be when I grow up. Nothing good has happened in my youth, and the prospects of future glory only start to crest as I begin my decline into a stagnant adulthood.

We've cheekily nick-named the wireless network for our house "Miss Maplethorpe's House of Regret." Fuckin' A.

Let Me Ride

Sometimes I wonder whether I have the patience and the stamina to get all the way through college in one piece. I find that anytime I set out to do something big I lose interest or get lazy after a little while, and the rest of it is a pained, forced slog through my own indifference for the sake of school credit. The end product is usually sub-par.

I wonder if it’s just that I’m doing the wrong things. I really like the stuff I study, for the most part, but maybe I haven’t found my academic niche yet, or my forte or something (which is maybe finicky BS, but whatever). Maybe it’s all a kind of “the grass is always greener” sort of thing, where I assume my drive is directly proportional to the excitement of the task, but in fact it’s just in my nature to be unmotivated toward whatever is on my plate at the moment. Certainly, in high school, I looked forward with a sort of reverent anticipation to the college days ahead, where I would throw myself into study with wild abandon, finally having my intelligence met by the material, being challenged in a way that was impossible in the controlled monotony of the public school system. It’s only when I look back on those dark days past that I feel fully satisfied by my current position. I don’t know if this is a common condition or if there’s something terribly wrong with me. Sometimes I feel like I’m wasting time and money, and I should just drop out, go home and get a job before I’ve thrown away the entirety of my youth in search of something that won’t ever come. But there’s that suspicion that resides always in the back of my mind, poking its head out now and again to remind me that I’m capable of greatness—that great things will come if I just persevere and push myself ahead. This feeling fills me with an even greater anxiety; I don’t know if it’s intuition or blind arrogance, or some mutant combination of the two.

At the tail end of last night’s festivities, after everyone else had left, as per my usual habit I ended up in a drunken convo with the host and we were talking about this kind of thing, our respective collegiate callings and whatnot. I wondered, aloud, whether the truth was that I was too talented (as I sometimes suspect) to be doing what I'm doing, or if I wasn't talented enough (as I often suspect) to be doing what I think I should. "It’s a very fine line," he replied.

Don't Do This To Yourself

B

I waited longer than most, or many, Hampshire students to take a Five Colleges course, and the pitfall of waiting so long is the widening of the gap between high school and the "normal" college course, the eternal months spent in the dark valley of experimental higher education making the return to normative conventions of academic evaluation a shattering reunion.

That is: I got my first grade. I like to think that the jarring cognitive reaction this has triggered is a product of my success with/True Devotion to the Hampshire ideal: less strained objectivity; extensive verbal evaluation; no institutional randomness. But I have to say, there always was a certain carnal thrill in the gamble of submitting work for alphanumeric evaluation. The losses, when they come, can be crushing; the triumphs exhilarate like nothing else in this world. Despite my confidence that the "system," as it were, is essentially "broken" (man) I freely admit that I missed, in my heart of hearts, those big sparkly letters, assigned from on high like divine judgment.

But I'd also forgotten what an existential mindfuck it can be. I received a "B," which sounds about right: I guess I didn't use enough specific textual evidence to back up my claims. Also, my sentences are apparently too "hump-backed." (?) But the fact that this is the first letter grade I've received in so long meant that when first I laid eyes on that solitary figure of judgment, I couldn't help but feel as though my very human worth had been evaluated. This is especially accented in the heightened hyper-reality of college, where the academic, social and self-estimating fragments of normal teenage life are merged forcibly into one. All I ever do, these days, is read and write... so if my writing isn't up to snuff, then what the fuck am I even doing?

This is not to say that my previous college work has all been unequivocally brilliant, but... I thought this was a pretty good essay. Damn. I guess when I write my next thing, I'll really have to bring the thunder.

A Belgium Election Gila Monster in the Motherfucking System

Yes, and I want...
And I want...
And I want THIS
I want THIS
I want a tractor and I know what I want
And it is this
Fuck the Grape Soda that stands on the corner with a
Goddamn Pie
And if we are to make anything of this it will be
A new shoe
With
Apple Pie
And
Fine wine
With
The Same Man
Who came onto Alexander the Great's face
With a new shoe
And if
We are to
Believe
Then
There is another
That will seek
The one
The one time
That is to say
What fresh hell
Are we to expect
In the crimson place?

Again and Again

This week was weird. I had so much going on that I just didn’t stop working, at all, the last week blending into this one, the days merging together into one marathon opera of sadness. Apart from a short, late-night whiskey-and-bull session with “the guys” on Saturday night, I’ve basically just been reading and writing (with a break for over-exerting exercise) non-stop for six or seven days. I was incredibly frightened this week that I wouldn’t finish everything (and technically, I didn’t) but now that it’s over I feel pretty good. I’m officially a Division II now, so I guess that’s a deal? Okay.

One of my housemates made goddamn soft tacos for dinner tonight, which made me feel pretty inadequate. I continue to cop out and just boil some pasta each time it’s my turn. After all the energy I exert on schoolwork I just can’t cope with the mental calculations it takes to go bigger with the dinner menu. On Sunday I thought I might use our curiously unending supply of bagels and make pizza bagels, but I just didn’t have what it takes.

A little while ago I went over to the nearest vending machine to purchase an orange soda. They were sold out. Let me repeat that for those hard-of-hearing: the machine was sold out of orange soda. I was instantly filled with an eternal melancholy, as if nothing could ever be right again.

Scarce Words

I haven't posted on the blog in a long mo'fuckin' time, due to both business and lack of inspiration.

I was going to do a post about Valentine's Day on Saturday, but I ended up just getting really depressed and aborting it. Plus one of my housemates' relationship vaguely imploded on that day, so I ended up just drinking and consoling him instead of the usual pontificating.

I'll write some more next week, hopefully. Stay strong, all my many fans.

Night of a Thousand Tears

I went to the growing-in-repute "Night of a Thousand Beers" for about a half hour tonight, thinking I would have a semi-good time, and mostly just felt like a loser. This is about as big as parties get at Hampshire, and it's one of those things where if you don't know a lot of people you end up sort of wandering around trying to find an anchor point that never comes. Except this is in a room crammed with people in a great exponential excess of the fire code, so you're basically just being propelled around by the crowd, which is fun for like twenty seconds and gets really old after you realize that any human interface apart from inane five-seconds yell-eractions are impossible. (And yet you always see these cool-ass cats just hanging out on the wall, sipping a beer and carrying on a convo like they're at the fucking yacht club. How do they do that? These people should die in jail.)

I like to get drunk in a comfortable environment, and thankfully life at this college provides many instances for such activity. But going to big parties makes me feel like I have no identity. I really am like a social ghost at these things--and in general. I just kind of float around, and float through people, and they can see me, but no connection can be made. I knew a bunch of the people there, but I might as well have been a stranger because I can't seem to get in the same mode of frantic revelry as everyone else.

When I walked in the door I heard "[my name]!" from like three different directions. This happens sometimes, and it is always very exciting, and yet it never seems to amount to anything. I find when people yell my name out it's not necessarily that they're overjoyed to see me but they're rather reaffirming their own involvement in some social spirit that I seem not to be privy to. I don't mean to be such a downer, but it's like, when someone I know says something to me and and I can't hear what the fuck she's saying because there's a hundred people yelling in this room and I'm being pushed up against a wall by a beer-hungry mob, so all I say is "I'm being pushed up against a wall" and I sound like as much of an idiot as you'd expect, what else am I supposed to do next but go home and listen to fucking Nine Inch Nails and write in my sad goddamn blog.

Also my family is poor.

Got Tha Fever

I seem to be just now recovering from an illness that has plagued half our residence for the last five days or so. Someone said they had the flu, which seems plausible; I was more or less at 25% earlier in the week. I walked into a CVS on Tuesday and forgot why I was there, so I just dreamily wandered around for 20 minutes or so. On the bargain music rack I saw a copy of the Scorpions Greatest Hits, and I thought maybe that was what I had come to get. But it seemed unlikely. I overheard some old guys talking about who invented electrons. That's silly, I thought. Nobody invented those. Eventually I just decided to buy some CVS brand razors and a toothbrush and be done with it. It was one of my more economical shopping sprees.

Fear and Loathing at Amherst College

I took my first class at Amherst today, and it proved an unsettling experience. That place really scares the shit out of me sometimes. Just being there makes me resentful, all with their brisk New England charm, their buildings and facilities that aren't total eyesores. I'm always worried that one of the students will point at me and let out one of those Body Snatchers screeches, sensing my unkempt constitution and my lack of institutional pride. I saw not one dude wearing a t-shirt. Not. One. (Granted, I wasn't either; I was wearing the one casual button-down shirt I own, which I purchased at a thrift store for about five dollars.)

The class is held in this opulent lecture hall known as the "Red Room." I think of the crowded conference tables and broken window blinds of Hampshire classrooms as I sit down in a sea of padded leather swivel chairs. The professor is this geriatric guy who wears a suit and tie. I had forgotten teachers wear things like that, or lived to be that old. The syllabus claims that the course will conclude with a "Two Hour Exam." I see the words, and I know their individual meanings, but their combination appears before me like hieroglyphs on some ancient scroll.

No More School Assignments on the Blog

The Real World "magazine piece" was it, I promise.

Stranger Song

In my formative years of media consumption, the Music Television network provided much of the impetus for any interest in mainstream cultural discourse that I might have shared with my peers. In the 90s, MTV’s flash-bang program lineup was fucking irresistible, a flawless amalgam of pop-culture shimmer and glowingly pre-packaged “rock and roll” sass that held infinite appeal for even the most discerning young eyes. I once saw one of their hosts claim off-handedly that MTV programming wasn’t intended to be viewed by children. What a good joke!

Before the screaming idiot-parade of shows like Total Request Live melted the cultural appeal of the network into a lifeless, cynical muck, the flagship of their youth conquest was The Real World, the original model for the reality show—a genre that has, by now, become so prevalent and post-relevant that it’s damn-near folded back on itself. It is a testament to the original calculations of The Real World’s producers that it has largely avoided the black hole of irrelevance that has befallen its offspring. The reason for this, and the beauty of the show’s design, is that it was pointless to begins with—created before the reality show rules were written, The Real World was flying blind, inventing narrative from the loosest strands of petty human interaction. Despite the best efforts of the show’s “writers” to manufacture conflict and change, the whole affair remained thrillingly amoral. I’ve watched almost every episode since the 1999 Hawaii season, and it provided some of the more exciting television moments I witnessed as a young man. The various threesomes and hot-tub-related indiscretions during the Las Vegas season, for example, were understandably compelling viewing for a 13-year-old kid in the suburbs.

MTV has ceased to be exciting on any level. Beyond the obvious complaint that music and comedy have taken a back seat to maximally smutty dating shows and the most monotonous reality bullshit imaginable, the smallest pretense of anti-establishment swagger has been unceremoniously sucked from the network’s soul, and at times it is vaguely indistinguishable from its sickly-sweet cousins Nickelodeon and Disney Channel. But, somehow, against all odds, The Real World remains magically watchable and addictive. It’s not exactly smart or respectable, but the formula of youth and visibility plus alcohol and excess still makes for damn fine television. Meanwhile, its very concept makes it practically immune to criticism. The old and obvious insistence that it doesn’t even resemble our conception of “real” life has never even come close to being relevant: the show’s production style seems to readily admit that its design was always clearly intended as a heightened replica of modern life, a human zoo. And the animals never disappoint.

The new season of the show—its twenty-first—takes place in Brooklyn (seemingly running out of big cities in which to place their cast, the producers recycle New York for the third time, though previous seasons took place in Manhattan) and has a few new gimmicks. Arbitrarily, there are now eight cast members in the house, and for the first time since the mid-90s the roommates won’t be assigned a shared job in the city. Whatever. The more notable addition to the show is that, amongst the usual Abercrombie hardbodies and uber-cute art school pixies in the cast, there is a transwoman, Katelynn. In the premiere episode the others—apart from J.D., the gay roommate with whom she shares a teary declaration of solidarity—fail to seriously raise the subject or, in the case of one amusingly doltish bodybuilder, even realize it, and Katelynn has yet to show signs of becoming an LGBT icon like the famous, HIV-positive Pedro from the San Francisco season. But it will be interesting to see how the show reconciles its experiment in out-there sexual politics with its usual agenda of self-satisfied but passé tolerance.

Apart from their momentary serious aspirations, it seems we’re in for another season of young, beautiful anger and drunken amorousness. But I’m pleasantly reminded at once of how the show’s ambling, directionless pace affords instances of quieter voyeurism. In the premiere, at least, what really makes it for me are the little moments of un-manufacturable, genuine revelation: hipster Mormon Chet’s self-assured dancing around his obvious sexual confusion; fun-loving army vet Ryan’s repressed-trauma-bordering-on-denial; aspiring therapist Sarah’s unconsciously overbearing inquisitiveness. Between the time-warping jump cuts and the pop-up music referrals, The Real World still manages to capture fascinating moments of genuine human inadequacy. In its slow dive into cultural worthlessness, MTV should thank its stars it still has the clout to command something so spontaneously captivating. They couldn’t make this shit up if they tried.

Play Your Part

Yesterday I was playing Frisbee and someone put on Girl Talk. Okay. I can listen to it for a few minutes. I’ll grant the first few moments of the Feed The Animals album, where he interpolates “Gimme Some Lovin’” and “Intl. Players Anthem” are pretty energizing. But then it kept playing. And kept playing. And it went on and on, and on and on and on. And I wanted to tear my shirt off and scream to the heavens what I thought about this interminable dirge of Top 40 patchwork. I kept it to myself in the name of good will and good spirit, but I need to let it all out now.

Girl Talk is really, really not good. There, I said it. Come and tear my face off, rest of Hampshire student body. I know I’m alone in this. But try as I might to conform (and I do try—oh, how I love to let others dictate my tastes! I’m not being sarcastic) I cannot seem to comprehend the significance or the quality of this artist.

Musical mash-ups are a cool idea, and I suppose a Girl Talk show might be a great party, but that’s it. It holds no other value—and it’s funny that it doesn’t do anything for me, because I’m all for rethinking the arbitrary barriers and genre divisions that we impose on popular music. The basic thesis of Greg Gillis’ thing is that we should try to understand how the music we listen to is connected at its essence (or some similar, vague hokum spun by the enraptured hipster music writers, presumably on a mind-melting caffeine bender that could make the “Peanut Butter Jelly Time” song sound groundbreaking) but all I ever think when I’m listening to these self-satisfied art school audio collages is that I’d rather just be hearing a playlist of the individual songs. The general promise of the concept, and its utter failure to be as entertaining as it should, makes Girl Talk not only annoying but depressing as well.

Girl Talk is one of the most overrated acts of the new musical age. It is the sonic equivalent of the color brown—a mixture of all the other colors of the rainbow that doesn’t, shockingly, produce a magical super-color but an ugly, disposable muddle of meaningless cacophony. Girl Talk’s popularity is unbearable, as well—the result of the enraptured bleating of the musical snob-mob comprised of critics and bloggers too snooty to find enjoyment in the actual canon of modern mainstream music, trusting some guy from Pittsburgh to splice all the good parts together on his laptop, trusting that their peers will appreciate their selective taste for musical consumption in the postmodern world. I guess I should be more compassionate, and usually I would be, but I’m on the internet, so fuck it. Fuck the Pitchfork generation, fuck the falsity of Cultural Capital, and fuck Girl Talk.

P.S.: I was searching around for some validation that I am not completely insane (because, you know, I lack a single thread of confidence in my convictions). I found it—written far more eloquently and eviscerating-ly than I could ever manage. Props, random internet critic guy. You are the one sane voice howling for reason above the din of hipster idiocy.

Legends

[WARNING: massive geekery ahead]

Among my few goals during this break was to drag out the dusty Nintendo 64 and finally finish playing through The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask after all these years.

After a few hours of playing I sort of remember why I never finished it: it’s one hell of a stressful game. Majora’s Mask is one of the most admirable mainstream video games I can think of, and one that I’ve always had a hard time rationalizing as a genuinely great piece of gamecraft. The fucked up thing about it is that its biggest flaws are also its most original qualities, and they are necessary in order for its greatest achievements to occur. But before I get into that I should provide some context as to why this 8-year-old toy is important:
(Click "Read More" to... read more.)


Every guy around my age remembers Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Even if you were a Playstation kid, it was an event. It was unlike anything we’d ever seen before. Actually, that’s not true: it was very much like the old Zelda games—maybe even less complex and difficult than the previous one, A Link to the Past for the Super NES—but flawlessly transmuted to 3D. It was amazing—to this day I’ve yet to see a video game as perfect an exercise in interactive narrative. It sold all the copies; it won all the awards. ’98 was a pretty landmark year for the industry, and Ocarina dominated most of the dialogue. (I never actually even bought the original cart; I just played through the game—more than once—at a friend’s house when it came out, though I’ve since owned one or two of its several re-releases.)

So when Majora’s Mask came out in the fall of 2000, it was rightfully a big deal. And while it’s undoubtedly less well regarded than its predecessor, it received pretty fair acclaim. But its conception (and reception) highlights a sometimes-illusory perception of the nature of innovation in this medium.

The Legend of Zelda is such a venerated and important franchise that the pressure to innovate or satisfy expectations is greater than in most other cases, more so even than with the Halos or Grand Theft Autos of the world, I’d argue. Nintendo has been successful on this charge to varying degrees, sometimes with wildly unexpected results. After the first Zelda came out and blew the collective mind of the industry, Nintendo decided they would take a creative U-Turn, and thus we have Zelda II: Adventure of Link, a bizarre, very difficult action-RPG hybrid. (I like to think it’s this kind of forward, fearless thinking that earned Nintendo the clout to make their current hit games about losing weight and waving plastic sticks around.) Zelda II has since settled comfortably into its modern position as a kind of beloved black sheep, a late-blooming cult classic, and it wouldn’t be for another couple generations that they would tamper with the formula again. The pressure is such that it is tested even before people get their hands on a new game: when we gathered ‘round to watch the unveiling of the first Zelda game for the Gamecube, a couple years after Majora’s Mask, we were ready to be blown away by some bad-ass, hyper-real Lord of the Rings-esque shit akin to what we’d seen as a Gamecube tech demo:

Instead they gave us some weird cartoon bullshit:

People were pretty pissed. “The Legend of Cel-da” was one of the biggest controversies of the year, but the fuss all turned out to be for naught; the eventual product, The Wind Waker, is one of the most beautiful games ever made, and not an unusual Zelda game in any regard other than its visuals. But the post-script to this story is the next game in the series, Twilight Princess. This, Nintendo seemed to insist, was the one the fans had been waiting for, the souped-up, grown-up heir to the throne of Ocarina. And, well… it was. Twilight Princess is near perfect, but the problem, I guess, is that it was exactly what everyone hoped it would be. There was very little to be surprised by; this was the epic, grown-up (so to speak; the game was just as silly easy as Wind Waker) experience that the fans had been waiting for. Don’t get me wrong: Twilight Princess was an incredible game, one of the most amazing ever made. But when I finished it (in three weeks, somehow—that was a long one) I couldn’t shake the feeling that it was missing something, some spark of joyful experimentation—the very ideals of exploration and discovery that are the series’ foundational hallmarks.

Which brings me back to Majora’s Mask.

It was originally referred to as "Zelda Gaiden," a kind of sequel/side-story to Ocarina, and the sentiment holds up. The gist of the game is that young Link has been transported to Termina, a world in an alternate universe of his home of Hyrule. Termina is very similar to Hyrule, but one unique, important issue facing this place is that it’s fucked: the moon is falling, and in three days (two hours or so in real time) everybody is going to die. The story, while less gravely epic and way weirder than past games in the series, serves the same function as any: to encourage the player to go explore the world, kill monsters, collect some magic doodads and save everyone. The key difference here is that they’ve instilled a sense of urgency in the player by including an underlying time limit in which he must complete his task. This idea is, from a conceptual standpoint, a stroke of genius, the solution to the problem of how to enhance the player’s engagement with the story and his suspension of disbelief. But in an expansive, exploratory genre like this, it generally doesn’t work by itself: giving the player a finite amount of time in which to complete the entirety of the adventure is pretty intolerable, a type of pressure that few developers have the balls to impose on their eventual customer. (This is not to say that some haven’t tried: Nintendo’s own Pikmin for the Gamecube tasked the player to complete the game in 30 short in-game days, a requirement so arbitrary and unfair that I stopped playing what was otherwise shaping up to be a beautiful and fascinating game after the first level. And I understand Xbox 360 players had a similar experience with Capcom’s Dead Rising, a zombie game that forced players to restart from the beginning if they missed certain time-sensitive events.)

The solution to this, of course, was to introduce a mechanic that allowed the player to rewind back to the start of the three-day period, and this was no problem; Zelda had all kinds of time-travel shit it could whip out of the bag o’ tricks. They didn’t even have to come up with a new magic song for you to play! And so the basic mechanic was set: do what you have to do, then turn back time to delay the destruction of the world. And save your game.

This mechanic is what I refer to when I mention the game’s simultaneously genius and maddening construction. Making it so that you can rewind time in no way removes the frustration of a time limit entirely. You’re still undoing virtually everything you’ve done in the world, apart from a few things that are inexplicably saved—you know, so that you’ve made some progress.

What this also does, however, is allow the developers to give the game’s world a very specific and cohesive routine that you have to observe and interact with in order to progress. This mechanic affords Majora’s Mask an amazingly cool Groundhog Day sort of element in its overall structure, and the player, repeating the same three days again and again, must refer to this structure to solve many of the game’s major puzzles. (One elaborate side-quest forces you to follow complex interconnecting routines so that you can influence the events and actions of several townspeople over the three-day period—very Groundhog Day.) The result is that the puzzles and quests of Majora’s Mask are far more ornate and satisfying than those of the other games. But it also makes them more stressful, which often makes you not want to bother. As I said, it’s fucked up.

The reality is this: we say we want innovation; we want experimentation; we want new ways of looking at things and experiencing entertainment. But how much of that is just an attempt to accrue liberal cred? At some point, we just want to sit back and let the screen suck us in, as opposed to actively engaging ourselves in the world it depicts. This dichotomy is well expressed in Zelda games: they’re not especially diverse, but the diversity that is present in the series conveys the vast nature of interactive entertainment very clearly; maybe this is why the series is such a vanguard of the medium. Or why it used to be, at least.
I thought I liked Majora’s Mask more than I maybe do, and maybe I liked it for different reasons besides its polarizing time mechanic: its diversity of gameplay, or the whimsical, insouciant weirdness and melancholy darkness of its story. But I think when I finish it I’m going to replay The Wind Waker, the Zelda game of which I am most fond. I remember Wind Waker to be not much more than a series of gorgeous, exciting set pieces, an interactive animated adventure whose beauty and originality are wholly and unapologetically aesthetic. I remember that game being very light-hearted, very soothing, and none too stressful. Cool stuff just happens to you. Would that it were like real life.