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Warren Shea

Archive for the ‘Miscellaneous’ Category

What do me, Dexter, and Sai have in common?

Tuesday, May 18th, 2010 at 9:55 pm

You know when Dexter has those moments where he narrates what he’s thinking…asking himself how to react in certain situations or what face to display…sometimes I ask myself the exact same things in my head IRL (in real life).

Perhaps somewhat complimentary to my lack of empathy, I find that sometimes someone will say something and I won’t know what face to react with. I ask myself: Do I smile? Do I give a concerned look? Where are they going with this? It’s not a natural reaction…sometimes I just have problems reading people even when they’re not trying to hide things. I think I’m better at reading subtle things, a smirk, a glance, a comment…but when someone waves a flag infront of me, I miss it. For example, my gaydar. I’m totally oblivious to such obvious things. But I might sense someone likes someone else by a slight hesitation or a glance.

There was this teacher I was talking to once….and she was telling me a story of how her student’s mom hugged her and thanked her for teaching the student to read. Touching right? I mean…my reaction was supposed to be “wow, that’s so sweet…that really touches your heart” but my actual reaction was a puzzled, perplexed look. “Why would she hug you? That’s weird” I thought to myself. Obviously, I had missed the whole point or aspect of the story she was telling. I just couldn’t feel that emotion…

It’s weird…I’m not very emotional in real life. I don’t know what it is…if I try not to let things in or if I just feel this empty void in my soul. A lot of the time, I act how I believe I should act. I smile because I think I should smile. But my emotions are very…dull in real life. However, I get pretty emotional when I watch stuff…I can get really emotional if something hits the right spot. There’s a scene in Gundam Seed where Cagalli thinks Athrun killed Kira (between eps 26-30). Cagalli’s really pissed and then Athrun admits that he knew Kira and doesn’t know why he did what he did…there are tears streaming down both their faces. When I watch that scene, I FEEL Athrun’s conflicted emotions…his sadness and confusion. It really hits that spot for me. That’s just an example…I really feel this…sadness…but it’s a feeling I don’t really get in real life. I guess that’s a good thing?

Anyways…back to Dexter…he’s able to pull off fooling people with his fake emotions. And so am I. While that character is fictional and definitely more devoid of emotion than I, I do sort of relate to his thought process sometimes. I dunno, my natural fake reaction is to react with a smile…it’s kinda weird, I do find I’m smiling when I hear totally unsmilable news. That either makes me look creepy or like an ass. I’ll have to watch out for that.

When I was re-reading Naruto Part 2 a month ago…I was reading about Sai’s character, whom I originally heavily disliked. But then he started talking about his lack of emotion, not knowing how to react to things, and he started showing his fake smile…and I started feeling like I could relate to him. Then, he stopped being so bad…

From a “Warren in society” POV, it’s probably not a good thing that I’m relating to Dexter and Sai…but it’s okay, no one reads this blog anyways :)

One of the worst things I’ve ever done…

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010 at 2:31 pm

It was grade 5 or 6…and I was collecting money for Jump Rope for Heart. I went around my neighbourhood collecting money. I had raised about $60 from strangers for this good cause. And…well, I kept it. Again, I was young and stupid…money was hard to come by at that age and I didn’t have any real sense of a dollar. For me, having like, $10 was awesome. There was so much you could do and buy with that. Having $60 was…well, that opportunity wouldn’t come around again for a long time. Not to justify or rationalize it now but that IS what I was thinking back then. It made sense…and I didn’t really feel bad about it. Back then. It was selfish and maybe even then, I had a lack of empathy, I didn’t really feel bad for the people I stole from. I mean, they didn’t know…they felt good for donating.

I knew it was stealing back then but I did rationalize it. But it was blatant stealing. Stealing from strangers and depriving a good cause of money and support. As an adult, anytime people are raising money for things…well, specifically Jump Rope for Heart, I’m reminded of this young, stupid child I used to be. I’ve had a lifetime of guilt over what I did…when people are raising money for Jump Rope for Heart, I generally donate more than I usually would. I know I’ve donated well over that $60 I stole but I still feel guilty. I doubt this guilt will ever go away. Throwing money at the problem doesn’t seem to work…a guilty conscience is/was not worth the $60.

An interesting night…

Thursday, May 6th, 2010 at 12:31 am

1. My gaydar is malfunctioning. I can’t tell if someone is homosexual…like, at all. What takes people literally 3 minutes takes me 3 days…and even then, I’m not really sure.

2. I had like, every deep conversation possible tonight…it was pretty awesome…given my deep conversation dry spell, I’m very satisfied.

3. My last post did not go over well with my co-workers or Zena…some of it too dark they couldn’t even finish. I want to clarify that this blog is probably as close to Real Warren that you’d get…I’m (trying) not to filter content or write what I think people should write or think or react to. I’m writing what I feel…what I truly feel, not holding things back. I realize the mistake I might be making…Real Warren would not be accepted by society. Friends, co-workers, potential employers, random strangers…might read some of my posts and think “WTF is wrong with this guy”. And that’s not the Warren I want these people to know…not because I care what people think but because it affects my life. I don’t want to not get a job or scare my friends or co-workers because of what I write. I don’t know…I still want to continue writing the way I’ve been writing…but the world in general probably won’t ever accept Real Warren. I’m still unsure if that matters or not…

4. Regarding the last post…not to justify it…but I completely understand some of the homeless/bums aren’t there by choice, some of them are mentally challenged. Zena said that giving them food is better than giving them money…some of them might be addicts. And when she said the word “addicts”, that’s what made me then think again that the path they’ve ended up on is their own fault and I feel no sympathy for that. The mentally challenged thing…that’s a bit different I guess…but there are many who aren’t…who are where they are because of the choices they’ve made in life. I have no sympathy for that. I have no understanding for that. Sh!t happens to everyone, everywhere…some rise about it, some fail. But like school, if you fail that much, you get kicked out. Or in this case, if you fail in life…you should be…uh…kicked out…from life. Bad analogy >_< Basically, the way I see it is that they have a lack of value/worth in their lives. Who am I to judge, they challenged. But the fact is that everyone instinctively judges others all the time. We are ALL guilty of judging others in some way or another. So I don’t feel any wrong in myself judging another’s value or worth in life. I’m not intentionally causing harm to them, I just wish something unfortunate upon them. But that doesn’t mean anything though…I think my readers have to accept that I feel what and how I feel…they might not agree and that’s fine. Just accept that I think differently about this subject than others. If you can’t do that, if we can’t agree to disagree, don’t read my blog you stubborn, close minded jerkface. I don’t want you reading this. And if you still read it, don’t complain. /end rant

Gate Keepers + Gate Keepers 21

Saturday, April 17th, 2010 at 10:50 am

Skimmed through Gate Keepers 21…

I loved the original Gate Keepers, it was like a Saturday morning cartoon…lots of over the top excitement, fun, great characters. There was a bit of darkness…from one character but it was generally very fun. It takes place in 1969 and deals with the darkness of society and the direction it was heading.

Gate Keepers 21…was pretty different. It was much darker…if Gate Keepers was a series about defeating the darkness in society 30 years ago, Gate Keepers 21 is the future of that world (actually, the present) if the world continued to get darker.

And not surprisingly, the world in GK21 is just like the world we live in now. While Gate Keepers was fun and a favorite when I was younger, I’m a bit more jaded and realistic now. No longer the idealist I once was, Gate Keepers 21 speaks more to me now than Gate Keepers.

It might be because the main character form GK21 is a lot like me. The way she thinks…that humans are insects…the way she gets bothered when laws are broken, the way she feels like the world is a terrible place…it’s all too familiar.

I loved each episode (there are only 6) for very different reasons…despite disliking the character Miu…episode 5, titled after her, might be my favorite of the 6. When she opens her hands at the end of the episode…I was just speechless. That moment was so powerful for me.

When I loved Gate Keepers, I thought GK21 was okay. Now, I feel the opposite. I love GK21 and Gate Keepers takes a back seat to it. I guess I’ve matured a bit…or become more jaded.

Maybe I should watch Digimon S3 again, which was the darkest of the first 3 Digimon seasons…

Blogging about blogging part 3 + Why I wear black + Love, compatibility, and complementation.

Thursday, April 8th, 2010 at 12:24 am

I’ve been reading someone’s blog lately, someone who posts about the same random stuff I post about, someone who posts more than me, and someone who, I didn’t know until I read the blog, is pretty similar to me.

Because of the sheer volume in posts, I skip over anything that isn’t particularly interesting to me. I imagine that’s what most/some of you do for my blog as well. Too many posts makes the content…trivial. If I were reading my own blog, I’d probably skip over the LOLs posts and read the interesting, well thought out ones, of which there are few. Though to be fair, some of you may like the LOLs and ignore the other posts…so I guess it’s okay to have the balance.

Despite taking a lot of time and sometimes a lot of effort to write posts, I realize that lately I’ve been trying to force others to read my blog in the same way those religious people try to make me believe about sh!t. Honestly speaking, I do sort of guilt others into reading my blog. Like a child, trying to get people to do things for the wrong reasons. I’m going to have to watch out for that, it’s not a good quality to have. My blog is important to me but my blog is not important to you. I have to make an effort to remember that.

Part 2:

I too often have high expectations of everyone and equally often, they let me down. But it’s not their fault, it’s mine. Everyone’s only human but I often put them on a pedestal…until they disappoint me enough that they fall off it. I can think of only a handful of people in my life that still remain on that pedestal but they’re not people I know that well, it’s probably that I just haven’t given them enough time and opportunity to disappoint me. I admire those who are truly…good people. There aren’t many out there…Zena’s godmother comes to mind when I think of a very loving, truly good person. But I don’t know her that well. It’s rare in the world we live in to find an untainted light. Being cruel, negative, selfish….that’s easy. Being genuinely good……that’s difficult…and rare.

Side Note…but possibly very interesting:
It might be why I like Itachi from Naruto…despite being a mass murderer…in my eyes, he’s a very good person (I guess you have to know the story to understand that sentence….). Even before Itachi’s origin is explained by Madara, I thought he might be a good person. There was something about him, some things that didn’t make sense….He was powerful but never really hurt anyone other than Sasuke, of whom he had reason to (in an ends justify the means sort of way). He also spoke very politely. I was really happy when his origin was revealed and I confirmed what I thought about him. It would be revealed that he was bad on the outside, good on the inside. It reflects me and the way I’d like to be, as well as the way I dress.
I wear dark/black on the outside, and light/white on the inside. When I’m walking around, alone, I really…try to look unfriendly, unapproachable, cold on the outside. I try to convey “eyes that have been out in the rain too long”. But as soon as I’m approached, I’m very friendly, very polite, very nice. I try to be as helpful as I can and I always have a smile on my face. Something about seemingly bad guys being good…just…relates to me.

Part 3 (this goes after the last paragraph, ignoring the blockquote):
It might be why I love being around Zena…her…light hearted attitude brightens the darkness inside me.

Until I met Zena, I always thought that I would end up with someone similar to me. Someone equally fracked up, someone who hates sh!t and people like I hate sh!t and people, someone who understands me. But…that would never work. Two jaded, cynical people would just….be jaded and cynical together. But that’s not happiness.

A lot of times, people try to find things in common with the person they’re infatuated with. They think: “We both like movies, we can watch movies together!” or “We both like rock climbing, we can go rock climbing together!”. Zena and I have talked about this a number of times but we have almost nothing in common.
She loves to cook. I hate to cook.
She wants to travel. I don’t want to travel.
She likes going out. I don’t like going out.
She’s happy, outgoing. I’m <insert negative trait here>, introverted.
She has facts about cooking, science, daily news. I have facts about comics, anime, math, technology.
and now, She plays WoW. I don’t play WoW.
Given our difference in lifestyle, I’m shocked and surprised we’ve lasted as long as we have. When you look at us and the type of people we are, we don’t work. There’s no connection. There’s no similarities. From an objective point of view, I would look at us and think we’d never last.

But when people see us together and the way we interact (and it’s not to brag, I’ve had a number of people tell me this)…we have this…very unique dynamic and people can see that we just…work.

All that stuff about the similarities we don’t have, the differences…none of that matters. And I may be wrong, I am by no means any type of relationship pro….but the key with us is that we complement each other well. I’m not sure what she loves about me but I love her BECAUSE she’s different from me. Because she makes me do stuff I wouldn’t generally do. I make her watch shows she wouldn’t watch on her own (Hikaru no Go, Initial D, and now: Battlestar Galactica). She makes me watch stuff I wouldn’t watch on my own (Gilmore Girls, the Sex and the City movie, Wicked – the musical, Julie and Julia). She brings me out to try new things. She teaches me about tons of information that I generally don’t know or care about. It’s a life-long process of complementation (and yeah, I’m as surprised and -_-; as you are that this non-existing word actually makes a sort of sense given what I’ve written). We’re fundamentally different people. And that’s why we work together. I always thought “Birds of the feather flock together” would work…it makes logical sense to me, and it’s what I’d always believed in. I’m quite surprised that this “Opposites attract” thing is working…

Note: Doh, Complementation IS a word…it involves genetics and…homerzygous simpsomething. I still like my use of it though…