Warren Shea - World of Warren

Archive for the ‘Past’ Category

…in two years…

Saturday, January 7th, 2012 at 7:15 pm

To recap…today is a special day for me. It’s the 2 year anniversary since I quit World of Warcraft. I know, it seems stupid in retrospect or hindsight that I would celebrate something like this. But World of Warcraft was an addiction of mine…and life’s been great since kicking the habit. I wrote another post last year on this day about the one year after I quit WoW. This is a followup post to that….tradition, if you will.

What did I ask myself at the end of …one year ago…

How much will change by Jan 7, 2012?
What will I accomplish?
How will my life have changed?
What will I have figured out?

What I’ve done in the last year

worldofwarren.com (previously warrenshea.com)

New Google+ Theme on worldofwarren.com
Got worldofwarren.com domain and moved content from warrenshea.com to worldofwarren.com
Heavily cleaned up code on worldofwarren.com
Fixed old themes on worldofwarren.com

I was able to separate my site into 2, a personal and professional site. Just what I wanted to do this year :) Not that it was hard…and this…

warrenshea.com

Almost done

….yeah, this is almost done. :D

Blogging
187 posts between Jan 7, 2010 and Jan 7, 2011. On average, roughly 15.58 posts/month. The number actually falls almost too perfectly inline with my hope of 150-200 posts this year (that I wrote I wanted in my …in one year… post). FYI – Last year’s stats were: 300 posts since my first one, on Jan 26, 2010. On average, roughly 25.25 posts/month.

Twitter
2831 tweets since Jan 18, 2010. 1345 since Jan 7, 2010. Just shy of what I did last year (1486). As expected.

Improved development skills
I definitely did NOT improve my ASP.NET C# skills and only improved my PHP by a little bit.
I had a good amount of improvement on HTML5, CSS3, and jQuery while building warrenshea.com
I’ve also learned quite a bit about Web Accessibility knowledge due to a large project at work.

Reading

Dragon Ball Z Vol 1 – 26 [Manga]
Bakuman Vol 1 – 2 [Manga]
Hikaru no Go – The Neverending Road – Chapter 1-79 [Fanfiction]
Azumanga Daioh [Manga]
Street Fighter: The Ultimate Edition Book 2 [Comic]
Street Fighter: The Ultimate Edition Book 1 [Comic]
Get Backers [Manga]
L, Change the World [Short Novel]

This is obviously not a complete list of all the things I’ve read as I’ve got so many comics and random mangas in the list too. This is just from my accomplishments post.

I haven’t read that much this year…and that’s okay. Steve Jobs book this year…and we’ll see what else.

Gaming

Super Mario Kart 7 [3DS]
Kirby: Return to Dreamland [Wii]
Kirby Mass Attack [DS]
New Super Mario Bros [DS]
Super Mario 3D Land [3DS]
Star Fox 64 [3DS]
Catherine [PS3]
Zelda: Ocarina of Time [3DS]
Zelda: Ocarina of Time [N64]
Super Mario Bros. [Wii]
Hard Corps: Uprising [PS3]

Last year was pretty quiet but this year was…not. More on that here

Art
Is it still okay to say this is a hobby of mine? I don’t think I did a single art piece this year.

What I hope to accomplish this year

worldofwarren.com
I’m going to get rid of the Blogger theme I have. I guess that one’s never really been mine anyways….not that the GMAIL or Google+ themes are really mine either though >_< I want to make a professional theme still...I guess that would be next on my design plate. warrenshea.com
I’m going to finish this..and soon!

[sideproject].com
I still plan on making this. It’s not my epic project. It’s a blog that won’t be updated too often. It’s based on a product line of toys I really like. Anyways, I’ll get this made this year, for sure! Right after warrenshea.com! I’m kinda waiting on my new camera for this because I want to take photos of my toys FOR this site.

Blogging
I’m getting a bit tired of blogging to be honest. I think blogging once every 4 or 5 days is a good amount…maybe a bit too little though? That would only be like, 7 posts a month! I really like having 10-15 posts a month…anyways, we’ll see.

Reading, Gaming, Art
I don’t care so much about reading or art. As for gaming, I would still like to continue gaming…but maybe game less than this last year.

Improving development skills
I’m not going to set any really high ambitions for this this year. I learn best and most when I have a practical project to work on….so I guess I’ll really try to focus learning through working on my current site and projects, worldofwarren.com, warrenshea.com, [sideproject].com, and [epicsite?].com.

I guess what I learn will all depend on the projects I do. I’m try to focus less on learning, and more on working on practical work…and let the learning come naturally and automatically.

How I’ve changed professionally this last year

To be honest: At this point, I think I’m at my lowest point of motivation ever. Part of it happens to be my work friends. It seems like the new friends I’ve made at work really affect my productivity. Not surprising. All I want to do nowadays is chat. It’s been really bad (professionally). Personally it’s been really fun and great lol.

Part of it is being on these super really long projects. They’ve been delayed and delayed. I’m afraid to take on new projects that will end up going and then falling at the same time as these big projects, and physically and mentally stressing me like they did earlier this year. I hated it. All work, no play. And then I got sick. I don’t wanna go through that again. To be honest, I’ve been avoiding projects for what seems like a long time. I guess it’s only been since Sept/Oct though.

How I hope to change professionally this year

I need to get out of my rut. Should I volunteer for more work projects? Maybe new job might help. But I dunno. I guess I’ve been in this job/role for about 4 years. Maybe it’s time for a change? I just need some motivation…

…in two years…

I’ve done a lot since I quit WoW, two years ago today. I like where this is all going. I like the websites I’ve done. I like the friends I’ve gotten in touch with again and the new friends I’ve made this year. I like that I’ve watched a lot of new shows, listened to different music, played lots of games. Basically, I’m really happy with all the things I’ve done since I quit WoW. I can’t imagine doing 1/2 of these things had I still been playing.

Let’s see what this next year brings :)
BRING. IT.

Posted in All Posts, Blogging, Daily Randomness, Games, Introspection, My Life, Past, warrenshea.com, Web Developer, Work, World of Warcraft, worldofwarren.com, Writing | No Comments »

Gamer VS Developer

Friday, January 6th, 2012 at 1:05 am

As my “two years” since the day I quit WoW (World of Warcraft) comes up, I’m reminded of what I wanted to do this last year. And I honestly fall pretty short of what I wanted to do (more on that in Sat’s post).

I wanted to focus this year on development. But I didn’t. I didn’t learn most of the stuff I wanted to learn. And I think that I learned that I’m fundamentally more of a gamer than a developer. But maybe that’s only true when I’m not motivated to develop :P

In recent years, I played a lot of WoW. Then, I took a break from games and did worldofwarren.com (previously known as warrenshea.com). And then I went back to games this year.

Look at the 2 lists below, they speak for themselves (thank you bi-weekly Accomplishments posts for making this so easy to compile).

In this last year, these are the games I’ve played and beat completely (in order of most recently beat to least recently beat)

Super Mario Kart 7 [3DS]
Kirby: Return to Dreamland [Wii]
Kirby Mass Attack [DS]
New Super Mario Bros [DS]
Super Mario 3D Land [3DS]
Star Fox 64 [3DS]
Catherine [PS3]
Zelda: Ocarina of Time [3DS]
Zelda: Ocarina of Time [N64]
Super Mario Bros. [Wii]
Hard Corps: Uprising [PS3]

This doesn’t include the games I played but didn’t beat (cuz there’s no ending) – Marvel VS Capcom 3, Initial D: Extreme Stage, Gran Turismo 5, League of Legends (LoL), DOTA, DC Universe Online, Counter Strike: Source, Plants VS Zombies, and even occasional (but non-addicting) WoW….plus all the iPhone games: Cut the Rope, Cut the Rope: Experiments, Drop 7.

In this last year, this is what I’ve done development wise (from a personal perspective….I still did/learned a lot from work)

New Google+ Theme on worldofwarren.com
Got worldofwarren.com and moved content from warrenshea.com to worldofwarren.com
warrenshea.com (but not complete…80% done)
Heavily cleaned up code on worldofwarren.com
Fixed old themes on worldofwarren.com
Read CSS Mastery book

Honestly, while I did a lot of dev, I think I spent most of my time playing games (well, actually most of my time would go to watching and re-watching shows, sitcoms, anime but I do other stuff when I watch stuff…like eat/dev). I think the year after WoW was working hard on development to balance/catch-up the time I’d lost gaming due to WoW. And then this year was to catch up in the years I’ve missed in gaming :P I didn’t mean for this to happen…it just…did.

I don’t know what next year will be like: Dev or Games? I think professionally, it’d be better to focus on dev….but I can only do that if I’m motivated. Lately…I just haven’t been (this looks so bad to any potential employers coming to my site looking for a self-motivated individual). It’s hard because I’m not one to finish projects….starting warrenshea.com, finishing most but not completely finishing it. And then I don’t want to start a new project because I should really finish warrenshea.com. And then I don’t wanna finish warrenshea.com cuz it’s the boring stuff, clean up…nothing challenging. So then what do I do? Game. I guess it’s all about procrastinating….and gaming is my most fun, efficient use of time-wasting. I imagine I’ve spent a little more time gaming than blogging…but maybe not, it’s hard to say….I blog a lot but I don’t game a lot…just in concentrated spurts.

I guess my next most efficient time wasters would be reading: comics, manga, fanfiction, a novel here or there…followed by art/design.

Still, Web Development is not a time waster. It’s my professional field…and while many people don’t do professional stuff outside of work, I try to be an exception. Because I certainly do love development, and I think keeping a current skill is incredibly important for future opportunities. My skill with a blade must be sharp, like the blade itself. It can’t be dull, or it’ll take more hits to take out a Stalfos. OMG too much Zelda. But seriously…out of the other 14 developers in my department, only 2 develop frequently. And they’re both senior and incredibly skilled. Less than 5 do occasional development and the rest don’t do any outside of work. And that’s okay if they’re okay with that.

But I’m the least skilled of the 3 most skilled in our department….and the least hard-working of them. And yes, while I’m in the top 4/5 in terms of skill…I’m the bottom of the top. I don’t like that at all. I’m not saying I want to be the best if it sacrifices my life…but both of the people above me seem to have a pretty normal social life. More normal than me…

Anyways….I’ve really been reflecting on my “two years” post and this is something related, on my mind, but not what I want to focus on….which is why it’s a separate post.

Good night for now, talk to you soon :D

Posted in All Posts, Games, Introspection, My Life, Past, Web Developer, Work | No Comments »

Real smooth </sarcasm>

Friday, December 16th, 2011 at 1:19 am

This is one of my more embarrassing and funny stories when Z and I were first going out. Some of you may have heard it before.

Within the first month or so of our relationship, we went to China Buffet King for lunch one day. I was wearing this tattered T-shirt…that I still seem to have (6 years later) and Z was wearing this Red Roots sweater.

Anyways, Z had just gotten up to get some food and I followed shortly after, going separate ways. As I was getting food, I saw her from behind getting food. I walked up beside her on her left, put my right hand around her waist and pulled her close so that our asses were touching, side by side. We held that pose for a moment…and then she turned away and walked away. No words needed to be said.

I sat down, with my food…and noticed Z was already sitting down. “That was fast” I thought. But as I sat down, I noticed that the hood on the red sweater she was wearing was down. It was down the whole time. But when I put my arm around her, the hood was up. I then noticed another girl still getting food, in the exact same Red Roots sweater. Hood up.

I asked Z ‘Um, Did I just put my arm around you?’ and Z, perplexed said ‘No….why?’

…

Yes, apparently I had walked up to a complete stranger, put my arm around her waist, and pulled her in close, held it for a moment…and then let go. No wonder she walked away without saying anything. She was probably freaked by the perv! …which was apparently me!

Needless to say, I was pretty damn embarrassed.

Posted in All Posts, My Life, My LOLs, Past | 2 Comments »

An analogy for chopping someone.

Tuesday, December 13th, 2011 at 11:24 pm

First, let me explain chopping, as I’ve only recently discovered this slang this year (I think I’m two thousand and late).
To chop – To court, to flirt, to mack. They all mean the same thing.

Chopping comes with an analogy of holding something for chopping though.
“I brought out my big axe for chopping this girl” means “I was really using my A game to hit on her”
“I was only chopping this girl with a plastic butter knife cuz I didn’t have much sleep” means “I’m too tired to flirt with this girl”
“This girl was fugly so I didn’t even bring my axe” means “I’m just going to be friends with this ugly girl”
I think this is me talking ghetto or gangsta, with a hint of my regular, well behaved self so you’ll have to pardon my gangsta english. It’s not natural to me.

Anyways – to my analogy.
When I was in high school, I used to equate chopping to being in a war.
The guy brings out his army. He plans his methods of attack. He tries to attack from different angles. He covers as much area as he can. He sends all his troops out to get the girl/win the war. He does all this sh!t. But the girl on the other side of the battle just has to press the “NUKE” button to win the war. It’s THAT easy for her.

It equates to basically – A guy can spend lots of time and money chopping a girl. He can play subtle games, be manipulative, cock block other guys, he can plan things out, read into signals, I dunno, whatever guys do when they chop. He can do everything in his power to get a girl to like him. But when he asks her to take the next step (go out, date, be boyfriend/girlfriend), it’s a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ from the girl that can end the war. Either the guy wins the battle or he cries out “Nooooooooo!!!!*” and everything he’s done is blown to smithereens.

.
.
.

Sometimes listening to girls is really weird, they’re so oblivious to a guy’s intentions [and no, it’s not always about sex]. But I guess it’s fair that men don’t really understand women either.

I can’t say my track record with women is great. I’ve generally tended to often go for girls that were already in relationships (homewrecker!). The (best?) part about that was….I never really put myself out there to be rejected for no reason. As in, if I ever told anyone I liked them, there was always either “Uh, I’m in a relationship…you idiot” or something like that. An excuse. I can’t say I’ve ever been flat out rejected because I never really went with someone full force, where there wasn’t an excuse of some sort for being together. I guess that’s a way of protecting myself from true failure.

I’m glad I’m out of the game. Being out there is not fun and I imagine it’s pretty difficult at this point [at the age of 30ish] for a guy where many of the girls our age are married or in relationships. Yes, there are eligible single girls out there. But you have to find them out of the non-eligible single girls. Of course, you can always go for a younger girl. That’s what I’d suggest for a guy my age…but I always did like younger girls. Except in one case.

I’ve had relationships on my mind lately. Engaged couples and single guys and girls. People that are looking for that special someone and people that have just crossed a special someone off their list of people to be with (a break up). I’ve been thinking about that stuff a lot lately…how some people don’t know how to get what they want. Or how people don’t know what they want. I always find it bizarre how two people can care about each other, but after they break up – hate each others guts. It occurs in messy divorces, it occurs in teenage romances, it occurs all the time. I guess people change, but I just find it a bit strange that you can love someone at one point, and hate them later.

As I was saying, I’ve been thinking a lot about how people don’t know how to get what they want. I guess that’s easy to say from the other side. I’ve got a good thing going as long as I don’t blow it. I’ve never thought of love or a relationship as a race, it comes when it comes. I don’t think you need to look for it actively but you need to actively make yourself open to be looked at. If that makes sense. I think love finds you whenever it does, sometimes it just takes a little longer than usual. But that was said given my old, and ironically younger mindset. At this age, love can be tougher to find than 10 or 5 years ago.

I just want all my friends to be happy, in loving relationships :) And I will try my best to ensure that happens for all my friends. Is that too much to ask?

Posted in All Posts, Life, Love, Love, My Life, Past | No Comments »

Confidence in my voice.

Thursday, December 8th, 2011 at 2:35 am

I’m not referring to singing voice here. I’m finding as I grow older that I’m more confident in my voice. By that, I mean I have more confidence in voicing my concerns, my opinions, my advice, my knowledge.

I don’t think I ever had trouble voicing things I knew. I remember in Grade 4 going up to the blackboard to teach division, having learnt it well before we learned it in elementary school.
In early high school, I had tutored math. I was really shy at it…at first. But I was always strong at the teaching math part, just not the talking to students about non-math. I believe Kumon + my high school friends/life were the 2 most influential aspects to coming out of my shell.

But I can’t say I was ever really comfortable with my opinions until recently. I’ve lead a somewhat sheltered life. I don’t think I was ever one of the cool kids…even if my friends were the cool kids. I was probably the weird one of them most of the time. Even with my co-workers, I’m probably the weird one. Hm. Eccentric, not weird. Eccentric. Anyways, I haven’t done a lot of things in my life when everyone else did them…I had bubble tea for the first time well after (months after) it was popular. I didn’t go clubbing until late first (?) or second year of uni whereas most other people went as soon as they entered college/university. When my friends started drinking, I tried but didn’t like it cuz it tended to put me to sleep and give me headaches. (Obviously, I’m very different now…10 years too late). My first, and only *real* relationship was started when I was 22, later than most (but not as late as some). While most of my friends have traveled many places, I’m still not one to travel. Unfortunately (for Z), I don’t know if that will ever change. The only thing I like about travelling is staying in a hotel (I feel so special!).

Anyways, I’m just…late to things. And with that, comes the lack of knowledge to accurately voice my opinion on things. Also the fact that I don’t know squat about religion, politics, world news, (and many more things).

Still, over time I’ve been able to gradually learn and catch up to a point that I feel confident in giving myself a voice. Work has helped a lot. I know that as little as 5 years ago, I had peer evaluations that say I was shy and that I needed to speak up more often, because I had good ideas but was afraid to express them. Truer words have never been spoken. I can’t say that this comment applies to me now though. I think the combination of work and doing well at work, as well as being in a relationship which gave me more confidence in life, as well as talking to women (yes, seriously…i used to be very very bad at it…) helped a lot.

But I think what really helped solidify my voice has been this blog.

It’s a wonderful feeling being able to express myself through the written word, in which I’ve been historically poor at, and being not only praised, but connecting with other individuals. To write about anything and everything about life, and having that occasional post touch someone. I’ve had co-workers occasionally, or even regularly read my blog. I’ve occasionally sent posts to co-workers to inspire them (and successfully done so). I mean, I write a lot of stuff. Most of it crap or updates about life or whatever. But sometimes I’ll write something that applies not only to myself, but to other people. To give them something to think about that they may not have. It’s just great to be able to write about everything…and have someone randomly say something about my writing. That they like reading my blog. Or that they like my writing style. I don’t know where my faults are (other than lack of proof reading and many grammatical errors) but I know I grow with everything I write. I’m able to organize and express my thoughts better and more clearly.

I know I haven’t blogged as much about anything real lately, before this month. It was a dry spell on this blog and to be honest, I didn’t seem to really care. Even now, I feel I’m slowly losing motivation to keep this blog up to date. But that doesn’t mean I want to stop now, or ever.

It’s never a bad thing to keep a journal, or just to have an emotional outlet. These blog posts aren’t deep talks but they can be pretty close sometimes.

Okay, time to sleep.

Thanks for reading everyone. I hope my writing has helped motivate you, given you a smile, and even helped you grow, just as it has helped me. I started blogging almost 2 years ago (1 year, 10 months) and it’s been a wild journey. I never knew I would have so much fun writing and sharing my thoughts with others.

Posted in All Posts, Blogging, Friends, Introspection, Life, My Life, Past, Writing | 3 Comments »