When changing the words make it sound less sketchy

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I’m on the fence on whether or not I’m going to bother to try and game another temporary free subscription trial for SiriusXM upon hearing about how Howard Stern is changing his format yet again, dropping down to now just one show a week, along with the news that there have been a large number of layoffs within his camp, including some notable personalities that I’ve gotten to know throughout the years.  Change is inevitable, especially over a long period of time, Howard’s not getting any younger, and the finish line is inching ever closer, and without the King of All Media, I don’t see much point in indulging SiriusXM, even if I’m not paying for it.

That being said, when I feel the need for streaming music, I’m still an old head using Pandora, and much like most other streaming mediums, Pandora is no exception to being filled with gradually more ads, bringing their medium, one step closer to being no different than terrestrial radio.

One of the ads I’ve been hearing a lot of lately is for a sports betting service, because gambling available to everyone is totally not problematic in the world.  I’ve documented multiple times my lack of success in sports gambling and why I don’t imbibe in it anymore, and I should feel fortunate that I’ve taken such lessons to heart, because otherwise I’d probably be absolutely fucked in today’s world, where the persuasion to get into gambling is being inundated to the people like it were clean air and water.

The interesting thing about this particular ad is the boiler plate legal they blab out 1.75x speed at the end of the commercial about the dangerous risks of gambling, but the thing is how they’ve transformed the word “betting” into “predictions.”

The “prediction market” sounds a whole lot less scary than “sports betting,” as if one agency doesn’t have loan sharks, bookies and shady types behind it as much as the other does.  Also the prediction market doesn’t contain terminology that pigeon holes it solely to sports, because people can make predictions on all sorts of things that aren’t just sports, like betting on new Popes, what cities will land a large corporate client, what car manufacturer will release their new model next, etc, etc.

And therein lies the increasing dangers of the world of gambling, because the prediction market name has opened the door for all sorts of official betting on things outside of just sporting events.  I had no fucking clue to what was being advertised throughout the World Cup with all those weird Kalshi ads starring Timothee Chalamet but when I remembered at one point to actually Google the name, that’s when I learned that it was just a betting service but being called predictions.

I’m not above gambling by any means necessary, I’m just way more cautious with my money than I used to be, primarily on account of the fact that I have a family that depends on me continuing to make it, and not piss it away betting on shit like a real degenerate.  If I were younger and still unattached and uncommitted to anything would be a different story, but as a generally risk-averse person in nature, I probably would’ve been able to resist, but in this day and age where the masses are usually still like gambling = bad, but the market has like 100 different gambling services being advertised down our throats.

It’s just funny that in spite of the negative stigma that comes along with excessive gambling, a rebranding of the whole concept, simply by calling it ‘predictions’ seems to have reinvigorated the whole industry, and I predict that there are going to be some seriously broken families and people in the near to distant future, whose lives are going to be completely ruined by, predicting problems.

There are probably predictions on such metrics available on some prediction platform, for people to bet predict on.

We all know that college football is mostly rigged, but goddamn

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

ICYMI: #16 ranked University of Michigan avoids getting upset by unheralded Western Michigan by virtue of refs allowing them to have a second chance at a Hail Mary in spite of them running out of time on the final play of the game

Throughout the history of sport, most sports fans have seen their share of bullshit finishes in just about every sport that they follow.  Questionable calls on hits or pitches, foot on the line in basketball, blatantly missed call in football, a phantom offsides in futbol or hockey, it really doesn’t matter.  If there’s any form of competition, there will inevitably be a controversial finish every now and then.

But this game, between Michigan and Western Michigan, is definitely up there as one of the more notable instances in modern history, because it’s not often that we see on a such a national level, flagrant favoritism and game-rigging, with their absurd ruling to finish out the game.

The television clock, the scoreboard clock, and even the clock shown on the camera operators all showed that time had expired, when Michigan failed to convert their initial Hail Mary game winner, which for all intents and purposes would have meant WMU defeated Michigan, and we’d have the upset of the year on Week 1 of the CFB season, calling back to about 20 years ago when Michigan lost to Appalachian State on the opening week of the season.

But instead, we witnessed one of the most blatant cases of game-rigging in the history of sport when the referees spun a masterclass of bullshit, citing all sorts of moonspeak about clock accuracy, some sort of grid, global time and space continuum and other nonsense, but the conclusion was that there was actually still one second left in the game, repeat second down.

In all fairness, Michigan did have to convert the Hail Mary, but given a second chance, QB Bryce Underwood clearly recalibrated his throw, and didn’t overshoot the end zone, and the Michigan receiver was able to haul it in, for the game-winner, but the obvious reality is that this attempt should never have been allowed to take place, without the obvious fixing of the game to ensure that Michigan was supposed to win.

I have no doubt in my mind that if Michigan failed to convert on their second attempt, there would’ve been a late flag thrown, probably for a phantom pass interference, and they would’ve gotten a third attempt, but 15 yards closer, since games cannot end on penalties, and probably a fourth attempt and a fifth attempt, and so forth, until the desired outcome was reached.

‘Ball don’t lie’ is a fate-based phenomenon where whenever a bullshit call occurs, an equally improbable occurrence happens not long afterward to rectify the imbalance of fairness; but is still dependent on there being game time available in order for the scales to balance.  In a perfect world, WMU immediately picks off Underwood and returns it for a pick-six to close out the game, but I think the situation was so egregious that even the mythical gods of sport were too busy cleaning out their ears and glasses to realize that Michigan had capitalized on their second chance before they could do something about it.

Unsurprising, the Big-10 and the NCAA have tripled down on their stance, absolutely denying all accusations of game-fixing, and have been trotting out all sorts of supposed experts and league officials and technology talking heads to try and explain to the rest of us peons why there was absolutely, irrefutably one second left in the game, in spite of just about every official clock in existence saying otherwise.  The masterclass of attempted gaslighting is crazy and impressive, and later on in the season, fans are just going to hit a point where they’re just going to say that nobody’s going to be mad, we just want to hear someone admit that the shit was fixed.

And to think I thought week 1 of this CFB season was a snoozefest with absolutely no upsets, with all the notable teams just blowing out scrubs by Madden scores.  Even the James Franklin era beginning for Virginia Tech where they hung 70 points on VMI was so boring I went to bed early, and have little to say about it except I was disappointed that they still allowed three points.

Hopefully, the Ball Don’t Lie gods are quite disappointed in this situation, and we see Michigan falter to some unheralded team later this season, because WMU was screwed and Ball demands the scales be balanced.  Would be funny if Michigan gets bounced by like UTEP or Rutgers as retribution for this farce, but with the higher powers clearly on their side, it’ll take some Herculean scoring and evidence to make sure they’re irrefutable.

X-Men ’97 S2: the speedrun continues

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

As part of my holiday weekend, I had the luxury of being able to do something I hadn’t really done in a long time, which was to sit down and simply shotgun a show.  I had X-Men ’97 season 2 on my list of things to watch, and I admittedly drug my feet a little starting it, mostly because I had such questionable feelings about the first season of the reboot.

Primarily the fact that the pace of the show moved at a breakneck speed, rushing through a number of arcs that in the comics would’ve been 5-9 months worth of storylines, somehow condensed and absolutely blown through in a single episode, and sometimes two, when they’re rushing right into the next one without any sort of pallet cleansing.

So after sitting down and watching all of S2 of X97, I can say that nothing changed, and the show picked right up going 280 mph, and covering at least five notable arcs and touching on at least two others, within the span of nine 30-minute episodes, which seeing that in writing is absolutely bonkers.  To my recollection, they dealt with Days of Future Past, X-Cutioner’s Song, X-Tinction Agenda, Fatal Attractions, that one arc surrounding the Brood, and a couple of other arcs that I don’t remember the names to and can’t really reference the plot without giving things away.

The series moves so fast between everything that it’s difficult to breathe, and I admittedly like to glance at my phone sometimes when I’m lazily imbibing in television, but I can’t really do that with X97 because they’re cramming so much context into every second of the episodes, that I found myself having to constantly rewind 10-20 seconds to figure out what’s going on before punting on multitasking.

It actually becomes comical just how fast they’re moving, because there are events that happened in the last episode of season 1, and they come full circle in 4-5 episodes in season 2, which was funny to me, because it took nearly three years in the comic books from event A and event B occurring, with a tremendous amount of fleshing out and making some interesting storylines in between.

The Brood are basically reduced to a single episode, and Apocalypse’s Horseman of Death is limited to the final 2.5 episodes of the season, and the crazy thing is that by this point, I became very casual with my following of X-Men comics, and even still I think that these were rushed to the moon and I can’t believe just how rapid-fire the series executes.

That being said, I’m not sure I’m going to continue watching future seasons should there be more coming.  It’s absolutely nothing like the FOX Kids cartoon from the actual 90s, that gave episodes time to breathe, and for viewers to develop rapport and attachment to characters.  I know all the players, but the show doesn’t really ever stop to let viewers care about anyone that the show isn’t intending on you to focus on.  It’s clear the show has a real big hard-on for Rogue, and Gambit by proxy, and they spent a lot of time on Professor X, and feeding into the current narrative of his general slow burn character assassination of today, seeing as how Charles’ go-to attack tactic is to make his opponents re-live traumatic moments in their lives.

It’s ADHD pace makes me less inclined to want to continue watching it, and seeing as how the show is close to having caught up to as far as in the general X-Men comic arcs that I actually followed, it might not be a bad place for me to bail on the show, seeing as how I’d be missing things that I hadn’t even known existed, so out of sight, out of mind.

The WWE fan meet and greet experience brought to you by Cricket Wireless

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Despite being a shitty wrestling fan these days, one of the things that I still like to try to do is meeting wrestling talent, and when possible getting signed 8x10s because one day I’ll have a personal space again where I can frame and hang them, and just in general, getting autographed photos is one of those things that if I don’t get them if the opportunity is there, I’ll inevitably end up regret not doing so later on down the line.

That being said, The Algorithm fed me intel about a free meet and greet that was happening in the Metro Atlanta area, where Alexa Bliss and Penta were going to be appearing at a Cricket Wireless location out in Norcross.  I don’t hide the fact that I am a fan of Alexa Bliss, and I’ve grown to appreciate Penta more and more throughout the years, so I thought to myself that this was one that I was interested in, but probably not likely to do, because of being a dad, as well as the fact that I’d heard that these meet and greet experiences, especially the free ones, typically require fans to arrive in ungodly early amounts of time, in order to ensure not getting cut off.

But then as the weekend approached, grandma took the girls and suddenly I really had nothing stopping me from attempting to brave the experience and see if I could get autographs from a prime Alexa Bliss and Penta.  The idea of waking up in the middle of the night and then have to go wait 5-6 hours didn’t seem at all that appealing at first, but the fact of the matter was that it’s not that I wouldn’t really be able to do what I’d probably have end up doing in the first place, which was dicking around on my phone, being lazy, doing Duolingo, etc.  I would however be forfeiting an extremely rare opportunity to turn the alarms off on my phone and sleep in, but again, going back to the thought of potential regret, I would’ve been disappointed to pass up on Alexa Bliss, and Penta to a degree, in circumstances where I could’ve been available.

So I made the decision to go for it, got an 8x10s of each to try and get signed, and I got my ass up at 3:45 am, with the intention of getting to Norcross as early as possible and hope that I would be far up enough in the line to where I wouldn’t be cut off, and had a chance to get autographs.

I got to the shopping plaza right around 4:30, and I came prepared based on the intel of netizens who have detailed their experiences; lawn chair, a snack, and a water bottle, despite the fact that I really didn’t want to figure out what to do if nature struck over the six hours I had to kill.  From what it looked like, I was unfortunately not early enough to be the front of the line, but it only looked like there were like 40 or so people in advance of me, so I knew I would probably be good enough to stay and wait; my biggest fear was making the trek out there, only to discover the line was already wrapped around the building, and then be immediately defeated, but at least I’d be able to go back to sleep, but I was pleased knowing that I was possibly okay.

Honestly, the waiting wasn’t really that bad.  I did my Duolingo, did my Wordle and Connections and a crossword puzzle on my phone, and caught up on the previous night’s Week 1 College Football scores, feeling disappointment in Virginia Tech for allowing VMI to actually get on the board with a field goal in spite of hanging 70 points on them, and fascination at the masterclass of gaslighting done by the NCAA and Michigan to justify allowing Michigan to get a second, and ultimately successful chance to avoid the upset despite the fact that the clock struck zero but that’s possibly a post for another time.

I made a single-serving friend with the person next to me, whom I figured out the bathroom problem, by offering to get them a Red Bull while I jetted off to the nearby QT to take care of business since we still had like 4 hours to go, and we chatted wrestling and it helped chew up a lot of time.

However, it’s when the sun started to rise and the schedule event time neared did things start to progressively go from dubious, to hairy, to dishearteningly deflating, and frankly this post probably doesn’t happen if everything were as perfectly successful as I’d hope they would be.

When it was the darkness of the 4-5-6 am hour of the morning, the temperature wasn’t bad at all, but once that sun started coming up, the heat started to rise, and the impatience of the constantly growing line started to emerge.  All the while, Cricket employees would at first just be checking in, but the manager of the place would get on the megaphone to go over some of the expected rules of the event.

At first, they pissed off a lot of people by saying that there would only be one autograph per party, so all the people who wanted to get both Alexa and Penta to sign something now had to pick; it was an easy choice for me, and I was at least satisfied knowing that I could still get Alexa’s autograph, since I didn’t know I would really have a shot at it, coming into the event.

Then, they stated that photographs would be limited to a single group picture, meaning no individual pics with Alexa and individuals with Penta.  Presumably also, entire groups had to go in at once, and no family pic, and then pervy dad alone with Alexa pic in the same group.

With each successive announcement, there would be some grumbles, none more than from this one party of like 9 in front of me that brought like the whole fuckin’ family, including the kids and presumably a grandma with a cane, and I often ask myself why I’m such a fan of something that also has such downtrodden rednecks as superfans of it as well but that would be overly judgmental of me.  I had an idea of bringing the girls to meet Alexa with me, with their tag blets, since Alexa is a multi-time holder of those specific blets, but I definitely wouldn’t have wanted them to wait 6-7 hours like I ended up doing, and I’m surprised but not surprised at the families who actually did have their kids do such.

10:30 rolls around, and nobody’s seen any limo or luxury SUVs to indicate that the stars of the appearance were there and ready to go, and as if he knew what everyone was thinking, manager announces to everyone that the talent is “en route,” eliciting more bitching and moaning, specifically from the party of 9 rednecks in front of me.  I’d learned from stories of other Cricket appearances, that talent tardiness does tend to occur fairly regularly, and as disappointing as that is, it’s a free event, that alone right there gives all associated pretty much all the leeway in the world to do whatever the fuck they want to.

Probably around 11 is when two black SUVs arrive, and it’s obvious that the talent has arrived.  But the meet and greet doesn’t happen immediately, and the sun is up and blazing, and people are getting ornery at why things aren’t starting and the line not moving.  Nosier people than me who meandered up to the front to peep inside the store were reporting that Alexa and Penta were doing photos and autographs with the employees first, inciting even more angst from those in line.

And then the shit really hits the fan, when manager announces to the crowd, that neither Alexa or Penta will be doing any autographs, and that it’s just meet and photos only.  Maybe the first 10-15 parties got autographs, and those who were coming out of the store were clearly getting way more than a single article per, and combined with the employees who got to bogart talent time in advance of all the people, now everyone started getting pissed.

Party of 9 were basically screaming NO! NO! and loudly proclaiming their protest at the news of no autographs.  It’s clear they brought the whole family, thinking they would walk away with a Kay-Bee Toys worth of signed crap, and progressively complained more and more throughout the morning about the escalation of policy.

I felt the gut punch of disappointment at the revelation that I wasn’t going to get either of my photos signed, much less from Alexa, and it was agreed that the general mood of the whole event deflated tremendously from everyone in line, many of whom had been waiting as long, if not more than I had at this point, who were going to be going home empty handed.

But again, this was a free event, and nobody asked anyone to wait 6-7 hours for this, and they owed nobody anything, since they were not getting paid.  The manager, exasperated by the sudden rage, hilariously got on his mic to remind everyone that this event was being done by their generosity.

Obviously, seeing as how I’d already burned seven hours, I wasn’t going to leave without at least meeting Alexa and Penta, so I stuck around and got my ten seconds to shake their hands, and get a few rapid-fire shots on my phone as evidence that I did get to meet them.

Also to ask Alexa who her favorite Disney princess was because my daughters wanted to know (they didn’t, but it was a good conversation starter that made her stop and think) – she said Elsa.  

Needless to say, I’m not mad, just disappointed, in the whole experience.  I’m glad I got to meet two talents I like, but like many, I’m extremely disappointed in not being able to have a keepsake in the form of an autograph from it.  I’d rather have had the auto and no photo, than the other way around, but as many have documented these events being, it truly was a cattle call to churn people in and out of line as quick as humanly possible.

Again, as it was a free event, there’s a very low ceiling to how actually mad people are really allowed to be at it, and its rapid-fire changing of policy during it, and as is often the case, I’d frankly rather pay money for a guaranteed meet and autograph, and had Alexa Bliss done a paid appearance in advance of Saturday Sunday Night’s Main Event, I probably would have done it.

I take the whole experience as a valuable educational lesson learned, in the end.  Hearing how they were and experiencing it for myself weren’t far apart, and although it didn’t cost me much in terms of money, it had a massive time cost, to which that time is so precious to me, that I’m not willing to go through with this kind of thing again in the future.

I wish I could be a police officer for one working day, vol. 2

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I had this thought whilst driving into the office, but then I couldn’t help but wonder if I had written about it before.  It definitely sounded like a topic or a title that I would’ve used before, and lo and behold, it turns out that my instincts were correct, and nearly thirteen years to the day, I did in fact write about how I wished that I could be a cop, for just a single day.

Well, that clearly hasn’t changed, except the impetus for this iteration of wanting to be a cop for a day isn’t so much about HOV violators and turn lane-cutters, as much as it was spurned on by the fact that I drive past multiple schools on my commute to the office now and I’m amazed at how many people completely disregard school zone speed limits, as well as how often I see people whipping U-turns in clearly marked No U-turn intersections with impunity, and I would like to see such circumstances be rectified, even if I had to fantasize about doing it myself.

So there’s not really much else to elaborate on.  I pass multiple schools on my way to and from the office, and depending on the time in which I walk out the door, I might hit one of them, or I might hit both of them, but the only times in which I hit neither of them is when I’m late.

As a law-abiding citizen, and a parent, I slow my ass down to the 25 mph limit, sometimes 27 when I’m feeling anxious about the time, like a reckless daredevil, but it chaps my ass when in my rear view mirror, I see a car(s) in the adjacent lane closing the gap between us, sometimes overtaking me, and/or choads who tailgate me as if I’m choosing to adhere to the law to spite them, before they whip around me, in the middle of a school zone.

Whenever these scenarios occur, the first thing my mind is screaming is, where the fuck are the police, to pull over and ticket these cocksuckers and get some easy money out of it?  It’s evident that people speed and ignore the limit because they’ve been able to get away with it for so long, and I know America hates Flock cameras and any sort of unmanned surveillance, but the two schools in my county in which I pass, has neither school zone cameras or any sort of law enforcement actively monitoring the school zones, and it’s aggravating to me that so many people shit on the law and get away with it so frequently.

Next, right at the turn into my office, is a double lane left turn, with a clearly marked no U-turn sign at it.  I always take the inside turn lane, because unlike 75% of the people turning into my office park, I don’t need to make the immediate right that causes occasional road rage incidents, and I’d rather take the scenic route and get to the same destination 20 seconds later, without having to contest and go over some gnarly speed bumps in the process.

However, in spite of the no U-turn sign, pretty much every single morning, at least one car whips the U-ey anyway, and naturally there’s no recourse for it.  An officer would have multiple tickets from this intersection alone, because there’s a convenient parking lot at the corner of this intersection where it would be easy to sit in wait and just start issuing tickets, but again, none are ever around, and often times I almost rear-end some U-turning asshole, because they have to stamp their brakes extra hard in preparation for an illegal U, instead of just cruising into a left turn entry.

So once again, this is where I wish I could be a cop for a day, and seeing as how Zootopia didn’t released until three years after my first volume of this topic, I would 2,000% be just like Judy Hopps, and issue 200 tickets before noon if I were.  I would just take my little meter maid cart doing circuits in the loop I see in my head, where I’d go bust a school zone speeder, go ticket an illegal U-turner, back to the school zone, another ticket, then back to the no U-turn intersection, another ticket, and so on and so on.

I don’t want to deal with any serious business police work.  No detective work, no investigating violent crimes.  Just actual, meter maid work, being the scum-sucking cop accused of generating revenue for the county.  That’s what I want to do, and troll the roads with the law, while creating teachable moments all across the county.

A New Level of disappointment

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

First of all, I’m a big fan of Austin Creed and Kofi, formerly known as Xavier Woods and Kofi Kingston and The New Day.  They are incredible workers, seem like amazingly positive personalities, and in the few lucky interactions I’ve had with Creed at past Dragon-cons, he’s always been chill.

When the WWE basically forced them to quit, I was definitely and immediately on the side of Creed and Kofi, because they were clearly being disrespected, insulted, and getting the rawest of deals.  And I use the accusation that they were forced to quit, because that’s precisely what a company is trying to do to an employee(s) when they demand that they take a paycut allegedly between 50-75%, lest they be released from their contracts and it makes me wonder why the fuck contracts exist if they can be treated like at-will employment, and it continues to feed my general resentment of the whole progression of TKO owning the WWE and how in spite of his horrific history, thinking Vince McMahon still had his superior attributes when it came to running a professional wrestling promotion.

Obviously, everyone knew that they were far from finished as far as their careers were concerned, and that it was not an if, but when, they were going to migrate over to AEW.  There was never any question, no hypothetical going to Japan for a shake, even though Austin Creed is a giant nerdy weeb-type who would probably love it out there, no pulling a Karrion Kross or Matt Cardona and going the route of indies, in case the E would ever want to scoop them back up on a moment’s notice.  They were going to end up in AEW, and the only question was, when?

Well when had arrived, and they were unveiled as Swerve Strickland’s (not-so) mystery partners at their All-In show in London, and as is often times the case for most former E talent who make a splashy arrival in AEW, they immediately were given gold, in the form of winning the AEW Trios Championship.

As is often times the case, I do think the formula is a little overused, trite and a little eye-roll-ey, but at the same time I know these guys are human beings and their livelihoods are partially tied to their on-screen successes, so I’m still happy that they’re given some shots of Nitro upon arrival.

But in spite of my general love for the performers, I can’t help but feel disappointment in the package that they are presented as in AEW, and I’m very curious to know which party had the lion’s share of responsibility for going in the direction they went, between Creed & Kofi and Tony Khan.

“The New Level,” just makes me kind of cringe and disappointment face meme just reading it.  It seems like really low-hanging fruit to swap out a word in their old name, but otherwise keep the general presentation and the brand exactly as their prior iteration.

See, this is why I want to know who was in the driver’s seat when it came to their AEW branding, because it will help me gauge how much I feel like I can criticize, because if this were all Creed and Kofi’s doing, I just feel not mad just disappointed, but if it were primarily at the behest of Tony Khan, it’s I knew it, that fucking money mark dork.

Regardless though, as much AEW wants to (constantly) proclaim that they’re an alternative to the WWE, they sure lean on WWE property when it comes to often times not really changing much about the presentations of former E talents that make the switch.  I get that there’s a small air of deception at trying to hook the less-educated fans that don’t really know the differences in promotions as much as they know of the existence of specific talents, but in this day and age, pro-wrestling fandom is so dedicated by those who follow it, that such a notion doesn’t seem necessary anymore.

I feel as if any time a worker has the opportunity to jump ship, they also have the opportunity to really repackage and restart themselves as performers, and regardless of if it’s AEW to WWE or WWE to AEW, it always seems like a disappointment when they basically end up being the same character, but just under a different name.

Hey, I can (often) be wrong too and sometimes it just works, but there are plenty of characters out there where some degree of change is necessary, it doesn’t happen, and then the same creative walls that handcuffed them in one promotion, just carries over to their new home.

But getting back to The New Level, the fact that such potential change was limited to a single fucking word seems kind of lazy in my opinion, and I feel like someone could have done better, creatively.  Like, if the name weren’t already taken by an eSports franchise, something like Unicorns of Love is just so campy and extra, that I feel like Creed and Kofi could really have some fun with a name like that or similar.  Plus, it keeps the merchandising vein of unicorn shit open to them, and lord knows just how much useless unicorn shit they moved under the E banner.

At the end of the day, it’s just a name, but AEW really relies hard on the grand entrances of incoming talent, because lord knows they have had a tendency to forget about old toys when shiny new ones become available, and although I don’t imagine a lot of former WWE guys mind occasionally getting forgotten in catering, while they enjoy a lesser workload and get paid, some of them never get back on television, save for the occasional too-many-men tag team match.

But as fans of Austin Creed and Kofi the human beings, I want better for them, because I want them to enjoy all the successes they are deserving of, and I look forward to their inevitable clashes against the Young Bucks and Creed’s inevitable showdown with Kenny Omega.

Feeling despair, vol. #1,256

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Recently, my kids have both decided that they really like the lullaby tune playing on their Hatches while they go to sleep.  It’s the sweetest tune that everyone knows, but when I listen to it playing on the monitor coming from both their rooms, it takes me back to the days when they were but little nuggets of babies, and it absolutely melts my heart, reminiscing of those days.  I do not deny the feeling of tears welling up from time to time when I think about it.

I’ve been in a bit of a rut lately, and I’m having a hard time getting out of it.  Times like this, there’s really little else but for me to try to put it down in writing to see if it helps me process and figure things out which sometimes happens when I put it all into actual words.

Also, it’s because I don’t really feel like there’s anyone I can speak with much these days, because everyone is understandably busy with their own lives and matters and everyone’s time is important to them, but it still doesn’t change the fact that I feel so utterly alone these days, but at the same time I’m so absolutely over feeling like I have to be the initiator of every single human interaction, be it with my own parents, my wife, colleagues or anyone else, that lately I just want to be left the fuck alone after all and not have to do absolutely anything.

But I guess that’s really what depression kind of is at the very root of things, feeling down about anything and everything, hoping someone will notice and offer to help out, but subsequently not wanting to deal with other people and their own personalized bullshit, so it’s just this kind of negative swirl in the brain where you think you know what you want until you realize it comes with some variables attached to them, things that you don’t want, so it’s maybe for the best that I’m just left alone, and then it just regurgitates over and over again until it’s time to go to bed and hope that you wake up not feeling so shitty about things.

What it all amounts to is a version of me that’s kind of going through the motions, where the mundane is the easiest part of the day in the sense that I don’t have to think about things too much, because my job is monotonous and obnoxiously busy, but I get to go to the gym there and I don’t know what things would be like for me if I didn’t exercise as much as I do.

I come home and try to make the absolute best of time I have with my kids, reading books, playing with Legos and other building toys, occasionally watching some television together, and both girls are currently in the midst of reading Harry Potter books, and they both seem to really like them, so it’s been a pleasure reading some long-form stories to them on a nightly basis.

They go to bed, begrudgingly, and not without tremendous resistance, and then dad-mode disengages, but then my house is a fucking disaster zone because everyone treats my home like a storage facility where nobody knows how to throw anything away and shit continues to accumulate within my walls, and bringing it up to anyone results in snappy rebuttals and nothing gets done, but I try to do my best at being really the only one who puts forth any fucking effort at straightening the place up, because I no longer have an office or any dedicated space to call my own where I can hide in and decompress, so I’m constantly trying to make the public areas of my home more to my liking, but that eats into the time I have available to me to not be dad.

I feel underappreciated and taken for granted by just about everyone in my life these days, and my kids are the only ones who really get a pass because they’re still just kids and don’t really understand such complexities of human behavior yet.  But whether I’m at home, or at work, I just feel very underappreciated and taken for granted, and it feeds into the perpetual cycle of being down on a daily basis, probably getting worse.

My medium at work is oft-overlooked and not at all taken into consideration by the decision makers of the company who are all so easily distracted by all things shiny and digital, but when the day is over, our retail locations would sure look like shit if they didn’t have people like me who put forth the work to give them any sort of visual identity.  Just this week, I’ve heard colleagues absent-mindedly proclaim their general ignorance for the work that my team and I do, and I’m just like, great, good to know that you’re not as qualified for the job you have despite probably saying you were, good times.

At home, I feel like a glorified housekeeper, seeing as how I’m the one who does the vast majority of any sort of house work, but the difference is that I’m not getting paid to do it, and in fact, my credit card debt is actually only getting worse after an expensive trip to Asia where I’m shouldering the brunt of the financial lift, and any sort of recompense is going to be slow, small, and generally inconsequential to the fact that I’m the one eating the interest on any balances carried over month to month.

Nobody respects my time, which makes me feel like nobody respects me, and with as limited time I have in order to do anything remotely close to being for myself, dwindles with every 5-10 minutes chunk that is burned by my kids not listening, or anyone else just not respecting me or my time.  Almost nothing in the world is a bigger pet peeve than my time getting wasted, I state it as clear as day, and people either ignore it, or consciously choose to not give a fuck, with neither being a particularly respectful decision.

Subsequently, my temper has been short, probably more than usual, because it just feels like nothing is easy, and nothing is really good right now.  The littlest tasks end up going tits up real fast, because wanting to do A, requires B, C and D to happen, but not before you move E, F and G out of the way so that H could be gotten.  I usually snap and curse the sheer amount of unnecessary crap that exists in my house, and my wife just assumes I have anger issues when she, or anyone else doesn’t seem to give a flying fuck enough about my state of being to try and find out what the problems are to see if they could possibly help.

No amount of break, trip or escape would be close to helping me out when I’m in this state of mind, because I know that if I were to be away from my house for even the smallest amount of time means coming home to a disaster zone, which is usually what happens whenever I do go away for like a weekend.  And then it’s usually worse than before I started because now I have to retroactively clean other peoples’ shit, which just ends up being a lose-all scenario.

My wife suggested I come down to a day of Dragon-con this weekend, and I don’t think I could have possibly shot that idea down any faster.  I have no ill-will towards the convention, or any of my friends or acquaintances that are looking forward to going.  But it is not something that I am at all interested in anymore at this juncture in my life, and I definitely am not remotely close to being in a mental state to where I could even fake it for a few hours, even if it means not seeing a lot of people that I think fondly of.

The con is just so different than it used to be, and I understand that that’s a me problem and not the con’s problem, but it’s no longer an event I can go to without an agenda, and wing it.  I used to say about conventions in the past, let the con come to you, but that’s a dated mentality that isn’t valid at conventions today, because everyone comes in with plans, agendas, and schedules, and old fucks like me without are usually left to just aimlessly wander, and hang out and hope to run into people they know, who usually can’t stop for more than a minute because they’ve got shit to do.

I’ve never felt lonelier at an event boasting 50,000+ people than I had at the last two Dragon-cons I’d been to.  I don’t really want to feel that way again any time soon, or spend the $2,000 that usually comes along with room, food, parking and booze.

Mythical wife has a purpose this year, and actual tasks to do, and perhaps that’s something I could consider in the future if I ever felt the itch to ever go back to any convention ever again, but for this year, hard pass on Dragon-con.

Well, I can’t really say that feel that much better putting all of these thoughts down into text.  I don’t think I really have any true takeaways from all this swill that can help me process the depression I’m dealing with right now.  I’m trying to eat better and working in a two-a-day workout, usually some sort of 30-35 minute in the evenings that I’m sacrificing out of my scarce free time, in the sake of improving my health.

But I can appreciate myself in doing it at all, instead of intending on doing it, not doing it, and then getting anxious and upset about not doing it, to which it then becomes an Inception-like layer of angst in which to fuel a future rant.  And I guess that in itself is somewhat of a pyrrhic W, and these days I have to take any wins that I can get.