chasm

Stop Pointing the Finger

He camps. He just throws grenades. He is in a tank the whole time. He gets the power-ups. He snipes. He hides in the dark.

ENOUGH!

I've talked for quite some time now about modifying the basic game types that my friends and I play in HALO but the optimist in me has been hesitant to actually implement those changes. I hoped time and time again that we wouldn't conclude every HALO evening with finger pointing and name calling in light of "cheap" play but to no avail. Even my more reticent friends could not bite their collective tongues hard enough to prevent them from reciprocating the verbal abuse from some of my more outspoken friends.

The perfunctory banter between friends to open the night inevitably turns to rancorous indictments and accusations decrying opponents for myriad offenses of some unwritten HALO Manual of Noble and Honorable Gaming Techniques. As they say in the most prestigious and hallowed gaming halls, “Don’t hate the playa, hate the game.”

The game type changes I’ve long proposed will come to fruition the very next time we gather in hopes of allaying rising tensions before, during, and most importantly, after the game. It’s sad that the game has to change instead of the people and I’ve already admonished myself for taking the “easy” way out by changing the game types, however, these are not my children nor my congregation. I feel no need to preach to them. Besides, I don’t have to convince my game of HALO to change, I simply change it. I don’t have to persuade it to give the new game type a chance, I just play it. I ask more of my Xbox than of my friends because many of my friends argue for arguments’ sake and, quite frankly, that’s just wasted time and energy when the Xbox is so accommodating.

I WOULD like everyone of my friends to be an “adult” but not an “adult” in the HALO sense. Let’s be honest, I’ve seen “adults” play this game with less patience and more whining than a two-year old. By “adult” I mean old and wise enough to understand that HALO is a GAME and is meant to be played for FUN. Do whatever you have to do WITHIN the game in order to have fun playing the game. However, there is one VERY important caveat to that maxim: do NOT impinge on anyone else’s right to have fun playing the game OUTSIDE of the game.

For those of my friends that are reading this and thinking, “this changes nothing”, well, you might be right. I didn’t say “don’t do this” or “don’t do that”. I’m not going to regulate HOW to play the game. The game already comes with rules that govern the interactions between teams and within those rules you are free to devise whatever strategies you find most effective regardless of how “cheap” they might seem to opponents. Have faith in the game and your team that there is an effective counter attack to EVERY devisable strategy. Work on the implementation and execution of those strategies instead of belittling and degrading the strategies of others.

Alright, that got a bit preachy at the end … I couldn’t help it.

Poll Time

Alright, it's been a couple days and I've got some time so let's poll the audience. Who would you want to play the part of YOU if Hollywood was going to make a movie of your life? This is YOUR choice so shoot for the stars. I don't care how paper-thin your justification is for your choice, just give a SOME basis for your logic. Have fun.

Direction

I suffer from wanderlust physically and intellectually. I’m languorous by nature and, for the last two and a half years on the internet, by name as well. Listlessly dreaming and incessantly analyzing I spend my days bouncing from one thought to the next without any singular, coherent direction. Maybe that’s why I continue to spend so much time thinking and not doing. Maybe if I actually found a distinctive direction in which to head I would pursue it with all of my mental faculties instead of supplementing my currently inadequate daily routine with intellectual meanderings that are only rarely pertinent and are often fruitless in providing me with what I so desperately need: direction.

Walking aimlessly

After getting to bed early with a sinus headache last night, I awoke to a blazingly bright morning sun for the first time in days. Feeling rather refreshed from a long night's sleep, I broke out my digi cam and headed to the Rose Garden with a renewed sense of photographic ambition. Before I say anymore, I'd like to make excuses.

Shooting nature in the Lehigh Valley can be difficult for several reasons. First, it's humid damn near all the time and "hazy" just doesn't do it justice. Second, the sky is almost always overcast making landscapes difficult to photograph unless you're going for "ominous". Thirdly, when it IS nice enough to get out and snap some pictures, I usually go out, walk around aimlessly and do more thinking than shooting. Lastly, I'm not a very good photographer.

Here are some of the better ones. (By "better" I mean I can stand to look at them anyway.)

Another day, another poll

Alright, forget about meeting your favorite athlete. How intellectually stimulating could that be anyway? If you could delve deep into the mind of any two people living today, who would they be? Who's brain fascinates you? (No, "women" is not an acceptable answer.) Who's lifetime has been truly fascinating? Who could impart the greatest pearls of wisdom?

I've limited the poll to those alive today because, let's face it, it would be nigh impossible to choose just two minds from the annals of human history.

BTW - to those who didn't post a favorite athlete, I'm concerned. What red-blooded American doesn't have a favorite athlete???

Another day slips by

All day long I planned to post something on CHASM ... well, this ain't it. Seconds became minutes and minutes turned into hours and now it's 8:30pm already and I haven't posted. Maybe tomorrow I'll post something a little more worthwhile (time will tell). For now, another poll ...

This time, forget cartoon or comic book characters. Who's your favorite REAL person? Allow me to narrow. I was going to ask "If you could meet any person living in the world today, who would it be and why?" but in trying to answer the question myself, I realized how daunting a task that could be. SO, let's start with sub-categories like athlete. I'll even allow two answers per category (trust me, that'll still be challenging if you are into ANY sports). SO, if you could chill with any TWO athletes for a day, who would they be and why would you chose them?

HALO Wars

8:00PM, my house, free ass-whoopin's, 4 on 4, call ahead for reservations.

Expectations

This is gonna be brief but I've GOT to post SOMETHING, it's simply been TOO long. SO, here goes...

It struck me the other day as I heard Bill Parcel's (head coach of the Dallas Cowboys for those living under a rock) describe "Jap" plays and the media cried out for fines and stiffer regulations regarding political correctness that maybe, just MAYBE we shouldn't hold our expectations of athletes and people that play games for a living quite so high. I mean, really, do I expect Bill Gates to hit above .300 against the MLB's finest? Do I expect Jack Welch to dunk on Shaq? How about Briane Greene trying to run by Ray Lewis? Nope, nope and nope.

People that play professional sports are some of the most impressive athletes to ever walk the face of the earth. Why do we expect them to be great public speakers as well? There are VERY few people that can excel in everything. Most people have to sacrifice brains for braun and vice versa. The crime here is not that professional athletes and coaches say stupid things but that professional athletes and coaches are expected to be as eloquent at the postgame press conference as they are athletic on the field. The American public always wants it all.

Maybe the American public should'nt have incented all of these professional game players with huge salaries so that they would have valued an education equal to their athletic endeavors. As it stands, Joe Schmo that throws 90+ MPH would be NUTS to use his mind to get an education if he could get $2.5 million working with just his arm. This is just simple economics.

This isn't Joe's fault ... he's making the economic decision that he should. As much as I HATE to say this, it seems like society's fault for placing such high importance on athletic excellence that grave and sometimes irrevocable intellectual sacrifices are made to "win".

Society created this rampaging, must-win-at-all-costs machine and now it's upseat that the machine's cogs can do nothing but work within their designed athletic specifications.

Unfair expectations if you ask me.

Back in Town

Hey, hey, hey, I'm back in town and catching up on missed work. This afternoon still looks busy but I hope to post later today at some point.

Time Away

Tomorrow morning I'll be leaving for a six day trip to the Carolinas. I would have loved to post a couple things before I left but, in truth, I don't even have time for this post let alone anything substantial. Too much to do before leaving town has made posting damn near impossible the last week or two. There's a chance I'll post from the road but I make no promises. When I get back I'll probably have too much to catch up on to post anything worthwhile but hopefully I'll get a chance soon after. Have fun in my absence!