Life, as it were

Right now... I hate my life.

My marriage ended on the sixth. This after about two or three weeks of staying with my (now) ex and mother in law.

We'd talked about this for a while. And I'd have been more than happy to stay friends with her - but the moment I walked in the door, I got nothing but dirty looks and attitude from her.

Now, if I had been out sleeping around on her, I'd understand. (Hell, she probably would have, too... we haven't exactly had a physically close marriage - or emotionally, forthat matter - in quite some time.) But I was always faithful to her. I'd lost jobs over trying to care for her, being concerned for her.

I'd done nothing to warrant that attitude... but I got it.

A week and a half later, after thedivorce (March 6 for that - 8 if you want the official paperwork-signed date) she had a seizure. I slept through it - I was on the second floor, she and I weren't sleeping together - haven't for a long time. I came down the next morning, she wasn't in bed, I made breakfast for myself, assumingshe was in the bathroom or womething. Her mom said NOTHING. A few hours later, I came down again - still not there. "What happened to her?" "She's in the hospital." Well thanks a fucking lot for telling me that BEFORE.

Doesn't matter that the house has no real heat. Or is drafty as hell. Or that the weather was changing. No, obviously my staying up and out of the way, going looking for work, etc. was stressingher... and caused the seizure.

So I got kicked out of the house. With about two hours notice. Slept in the truck one night, got my unemployment check and drove, panicked, to Wisconsin to be with my family... where I'm given two weeks to find a job and apartment...

I have a friend elsewhere - someone I've known online for a year plus - offering his apartment (wanting to split rent) and lining up a job... and my family's telling me not to go. Yet sittinghere, I'm nothing but reminded of how big a failure I am...

Wow. Long time, no update

Yeah. Haven't been back here for a bit. Let's see, what's up.

- Haven't worked in months. This sucks. Lack of money. Blah. BUT...
- Have been playing City of Heroes. If you haven't played this, play it. And get City of Villains when it comes out, too. No increase in monthly fee for that. :)
- I seem to be in better shape. At the worst, I wasn't able to walk down to the damn mailbox and back without being sore... I can now.

OK, bigger stuff...
Going down to see the wife for our anniversary. We've lived apart for over two years now. Why are we even calling ourselves married? Moved up here because taking care of her was driving me in-fucking-sane with stress, lack of money, the works. Her mom's been taking care of her. The gub'mint (yeah, yeah) said I can't be paid to take care of her. We planned on divorcing.

Well, now, I can. get paid that is. And she wants me to move back to coos-fucking-bay. We'll just call it CFB for short. Know what's in CFB? Jack Shit. One mall that's half empty. No decent restaraunts. Two half-ass movie theaters. Ton of churches. Which are probably empty because most of the population is high on something (meth being the biggest industry there.) And she fucking wants me to move back, in her mom's house, take care of her, and get a fucking job THERE (of which there ARE none besides Walmart, and even that's hard to get because that's where the crackheads that aren't stealing everything get their meth fundage.)

The town is depressed. Not just economically. But you drive into fucking town and already just want to kill yourself.

Why the fuck does she want me to come down there and... STAY? Oh, did I mention their gas is typically 20 to 30 cents MORE per gallon than Eugene, or here? And their on a highway. Not theInterstate, but not something hard to get to. They get gouged. I'm surprised the fucking town can WALK being bent over and reamed on *everything* (not just gas) the way they are.

And to a techhead like me... fuck, no. The one actual "computer store" there gets reamed, and passes the reaming on to customers. Example, GeForce FX5200. Can get them for under $50. They want nearly $90. Saw a card I priced for between $75-$100 listed for OVER $250. As far as net access, ONE trunk coming out. It goes down (like it does about twice a year,) not only does the net access disappear, but banks and businesses can't do jack with things like, oh, credit cards, atm cards...

Y'know, we had THE PLAN. Get divorced, move, move back in, I get paid to care for her, her mom moves back east... The Plan is now hosed. I'm not sure I want to stay married... I don't *feel* married. I'm not interested in anyone else or anything like that, but... I've gotten used to being essentially single. Keep my hours. Talk to anyone. Go out when I want to do what I want, not skip a movie because flickering could put her into siezure, or it gets too warm, or she can't eat this or that or needs meds, or can't walk, or....

I know, I'm a fucking heartless bastard. No, I'm not. I finally HAVE myself again. I am my own person again. But how do I tell her we should split, that I don't *want* to give up my life again, that...

See, she's afraid of ending up alone, or in a home. I don't blame her. I don't want that for her *either.* All our friends (save 1-2) are up this way or north. We game. We talk. We hang out... and she wants to pull me away from that instead of her coming up and becoming part of the group again. *I* don't want to leave her alone. And truth be told, I'm horrid at meeting folks, and am frightened of ending up alone as well... but ...

I guess I just don't know what to do. One way means leaving everything and everyone BUT her and ... just losing myself again, becoming nobody, a golem to care for her. The other way means...what? I'm myself, but she's alone and probably depressed (a problem for her) - and I end up feeling like a bastard, and a failure, and guilty when she suicides (something she has tried in the past.)

Everything I want to say just ends up sounding selfish and petty... but if you haven't been here... Take food shopping now. I don't have a heck of a lot of money, but I can buy cheap. Bunch of TV dinners, just pick what looks good. Pizza or two. Just stuff. It looks good, I like it, I can eat it. Shopping with her? Well, she can't eat this. Or that. Allergic to that. That doesn't mix well with meds. That brand seems to cause problems. There are like five things that I can buy. Or take "life" right now. I can TAKE an hour-odd drive to see folks, hang out 'til 3 AM, drink if I'm not driving, crash there if I do drink, come back and crash at home otherwise 'til 2 in the afternoon... with her, I can't. She *has* to eat at certian times. She can't stay up late - no energy to. If she falls asleep at 9 or 10, well... kinda keeps her out of gaming. Half the time we don't get STARTED 'til 8 or later. Right now, I can decide "Oh, I need this or that," hop in the car and get it. With her I have to worry she'll need medical attention. I can be driving down the street and, if it gets warm, oh well, that's what a window's for. It causes her to go into siezures. I can decide to stop and buy, oh, Mexican for lunch. Drive home and stop somewhere along th eway because "ooh, want to check to see if book.magazine/video/game is in" and stay and browse.... with her, I can't.

Like I said, it sounds so selfish of me... but it's stuff like that that does make life, not just existance...

I just don't fucking know what to do any more.

Yeesh... *pant pant*

OK, the following should come as no surprise since:
(a) I'm a gamer,
(b) have worked in tech support for most of the last decade - all sit down work, and
(c) don't get out much these days,

but man, am I out of shape.

I used to walk to school every day. Granted, this ended 15 years ago with my graduation from high school, but still... It's currently 71 degrees (!) here in Salem, and I had to get out and enjoy it. There's no park I know of nearby (unlike the parks along Lake Michigan in WI,) but I wanted to see how far I could walk before starting to "feel it."

Now, this isn't a "cardio walk" or whatever those mega-arm-swinging, stilt-legged, rapid walks people do are called. No, this was a "use feet to go from point A to point B" walk. I think I made two, maybe three blocks before my back started hurting. Turn around, 1/3 of the way back, and my calves start complaining.

Damn, but I'm out of shape... time to really do something about that. Just need the time.

OK, admittedly that couple of blocks was after coming out, checking out the yard, taking a picture of one of the mountains in the distance, and having to walk around th ehouse to get to the street, but still - that's - round trip - maybe 1/3 of what I used to walk to school every day.

This just will not do.

Faith in my Fellow Gamer

Well, I spent today being completely unproductive - and I loved it.

Yes, I have one of those screwed up schedules that change weekly. So I had Thursday off. What to do on a Thursday - the day before payday? Hmmmm.... How about play online!

I picked up City of Heroes last week (given (a) it was the DVD edition with the first two expansions, (b) it was $20, and (c) you get a month free.) I've played it a little, getting my Mutant Tanker up to lvl 8 going mostly solo.

Today, I started playing around 8:30-9 AM. Stopped around 1 for lunch and to call my wife (maybe it was around 2,) and again around 6 for dinner. Other than that - I played for nearly 12 hours, and had a LOT of fun.

Yet, what about the title - faith in my fellow gamer? Well, since the 1337-733\|\s took over on Diablo and D2, which *were* what I used to play online (years ago,) I have not liked playing online - not unless I'm going with people I know (usually in person.) This steals part of the whole online experience - meeting people (sort of) and playing with them, seeing different play styles and builds and the like. It makes the game much less enjoyable. Prior to that, the main game I played online (this is dating myself) was NetMEch - Mechwarrior II online, and we had a *great* group (Clan Black Sheep) to play with.

Well, mix that with a monthly fee (on top of paying $50 for a game,) and I've given most MMORPGs a pass. Why would I want to pay for that sort of annoyance and frustration?

During the last few months, though, my (in person) gaming group had started playing Silver Age Sentinels - yes, no D&D, but a campy, fun superhero RPG. Unfortunately, due to some real life situations with two of our gamers (who live about an hour and change north of here,) we haven't been playing for a while. Oh, the southern group was playing (somewhat, with the holiday break and all) but - well, let's just say the itch to get back into Silver Age was very strong.

I spent $10 on Freedom Force - a squad-level RTS game, essentially, themewise similar (vaguely) to Myth. (No resource building, etc. just get your troops and go.) It's similar to Silver Age in feel - campy, 50-60's ish comic book, over the top uniforms, throwing cars to stop bad guys, that sort of thing, but it didn't really fill that need. (Don't get me wrong, it's a great game, and for $10 it's a *steal.*) So - City of Heroes it was. Hey, I have a month free, right?

How good is it? Well, let's just say sinc elast weekend, pretty much every moment I'm not sleeping, working, eating or in the bathroom, I'm playing this game. Yet, that doesn't explain the title on its own.

No, today restored my faith in my fellow gamer - specifically in my fellow gamer not being an ass. Today, I joined a team (temporary) and went cruising through a few areas I wouldn't have bothered trying on my own. First team? Awful -at least for me, being the lowest level on the group, and a tank as well. Then that team got trimmed down, and it was *great.* City of Heroes with a 3-4 person team is a great time.... It was true with the second team (which was down to two people, both lower level than me, and needing help.) We took on a number of (larger) bad-guy groups - all NPC these days, since City of Villains isn't out yet - and did better than expected. I tanked and beat on things, the Protector healed and occasionally drew out isolated enemies (so we didn't have to deal with large groups) and - I forget what class the third guy was - but they buffed, fought, and isolated enemies as well. We had a *really* good time, what can I say...

Far different from my filled-with-cheats/hacks/"hey n00b"/PK-filled Diablo experiences, what can I say.

If you want to try an MMORPG, give City of Heroes a try (and if you're on Pinnacle and see Memphis Bill, say hi.) If you don't want that, my housemate's been trying World of Warcraft and says much the same thing... the community rocks.

I suck.

Well, not entirely. I just have no ambition at the moment - not even to screw around with my hobby sites.

I wanted to seperate out the Gundam and other mecha from one of my modeling sites into their own site, since they were getting more space... and I just can't find a layout I like. Nor can I get CSS to do what I'm trying to do - and I can't figure out why.

That last bit pisses me off.

That, and I realized how bad my hobby page was to read, all of a sudden. Damn.