Ahh Spring, probably my favorite season. Winter used to be my favorite season, but that was a long time ago when I was in the worst grips of anxiety and depression...as well as a teenager....ugh...

But now...hahahha...NOW...Spring has become beautiful and wonderful to me in so many ways. It's a time of new beauty, change, new beginnings, things coming to bloom, etc. Part of the reason I've also come to love Spring is because, in a lot of ways, it reminds me of...me. I had to go through a dark, cold spell for a long time -- my own personal Winter, I s'pose -- but now I've come to a whole new sunshiny world. Spring reminds of all the beauty in the world, all the hope, love, joy and so on that we should be conscious of all the time, as we're constantly surrounded by it. It also serves to remind me of the beauty not just in the nature all around us, but in each of us living beings as well. :)

So am I happy that Spring is here? Youbetcha! :) Am I being a bit too gushy? Maybe, but I don't care. :)

I hope that, whichever season happens to be your favorite, you're enjoying this festive and beautiful time of year. :) Have a shiny day. :) 

http://www.whedonopolis.com/article.php?story=2009...

My review of tonight's FANTASTIC supernatural episode.

So for many, many years, whenever I would write, I'd have to restrict myself to listening to music with no words in it. Soundtracks, classical music, jazz, Spanish guitar music, you name it. This was because the words in the song would distract me from what I was writing and therefore make it much more difficult for me to write anything. However, that seems to have changed...

Lately at work I've been writing my tail off. Hundreds of articles on various topics for our websites (a lot of Search Engine Optimization is content generation), so I'd been listening to a ton of instrumental stuff. Now, as much as I love that stuff, a lot of it can be somber, and the other day it was putting me to sleep while I was writing, so I decided to try something new and radically different. I'd listen to rock music while I wrote, and would see if I could do it. I figured I've gone through so many positive mental changes in the last year or two that it wouldn't hurt to see if old belief's like this one just didn't apply anymore.

Imagine my delight and surprise, therefore, when putting in the normal music I listen to -- rock, pop rock, disco, etc -- that not only did I write just fine with no increase in difficulty, but I wrote FASTER. I mean I'm sure the music helped in getting the blood going a bit, but I was shocked as to how much more quickly I was writing stuff. It was definitely a noticeable difference.

So what happened? I have a feeling that, along the way from my changes from Brian 1.0 to my current 4.5 iteration (yeah, I use version numbers to describe the progress of my mental and emotional growth, what of it?), all the crap that was blocking up my brain before...anxiety, depression, fear, you name it, got in the way of me being able to do other stuff like write while listening to music that containing words.

Now I'm thinking, what ELSE has improved? ;) What other things should I try in order to see if there's been improvement? I'm not sure yet, but I'm sure I'll figure it all out as I go. I'm just thrilled about this, as it shows growth in areas I never even thought of, and it's damned exciting. :)

Anyway, that's my little rave for today. Hope y'all are having a wonderful day. :)

In the last year or so -- since breakthroughs in therapy opened up my mind in all sorts of new ways -- my nights have been riddled with crazy, good, nightmarish and always-vivid dreams that, honestly, don't help me getting a good night's rest. Usually these dreams are never really TOO good or TOO nightmarish, but just enough of either to never let me REALLY relax. Since this began, there have seen a couple of real zingers, but nothing like what happened last night.

Here's what I remember:

I'm on either the moon, or a desert, or something resembling both, I can barely tell. I can see the ground, dust, dirt, rocks of varying colors and hills off in the distance. It's an odd scene, and it's cold, windy and empty.

I see someone walking in my direction in the distance, but I'm not sure who it is. I can't really walk toward them either, all I can do is stand in place and watch their approach. As they approach, I get a feeling of unease and calm at the same time, and I'm not sure why.

As soon as I can see who it is, it hits me.

It's my father. My real father. The father I never met and have only a few pictures of. The father who died when I was in my 20's and I never got to know, and who never got to know me.

I'd only seen maybe three pictures of him; a couple when he was younger and dating my biological mother, and his last driver's license photo. In spite of this, I knew in my heart and mind that it was him.

He walked up to me and smiled at me with vivid, blazing eyes. He then put his hand on my shoulder, smiled some more in a comforting way and said, "You're close to finding what you've always been looking for, my son."

I could barely speak, shocked at what I was hearing and seeing, and slightly teary. All I could get out was, "What's that?"

He said, simply, "Clarity."

And I woke up, sweating a little bit, panting, as if that simple word shocked me into reality with a jolt. When I awoke, I felt...odd, strange, good, uneasy, peaceful, and a ton of other things.

It's one of the most vivid, most moving, and most haunting dreams I've ever had.

What did he mean by clarity? I honestly have no idea, as it could mean just about anything. Clarity about my past...my present...my future...a specific person...something about myself...who knows?

I certainly don't...not yet anyway. But honestly? I'm pretty excited about it, whatever it is.

So that's my dream...one of the...I don't know which word to use...most intense dreams, yet the simplest, I've ever had. Hopefully it's meaning will become clear soon enough, but if not, I'll enjoy the journey along the way. :)

So hey everyone, how y'all been? I've not written an actual blog entry in quite some time, nor have I had time to check my flist to see how y'all are doing (sorry!). This is because I've been so busy with work and such I've barely had time to write down anything substantial, so most of my day-to-day stuff is on Facebook or Twitter. However, I thought I'd give y'all a rundown of how things are going and what's going on with me:

• Earlier this year I spent some time in Phoenix, AZ for the first time with my awesome friend Randi and totally loved it. (Pictures)
• I had two movie days in January which went quite well and one this month, but none for Match since I need a break nor do I have a free weekend to do it
• Work has been INSANELY busy, with multiple overlapping projects that have totally drained my brain juice. Sadly when I get home I barely feel like touching the PC at all (I know, shocking right?).
• This past weekend was the Gallifrey One convention, and I TOTALLY loved it. Best small/non-Comic-Con convention I've ever been to. I'm going every year now, no question. (Pictures)
• Work from my second job has dried up for the moment, the downside being I have less money, the upside being I can now relax in the evenings after work.
• With my newfound free time I've been catching up on TV shows, most notably Six Feet Under, which I absolutely adooooooooooore.
• This Sunday is the first in what I hope will be many Serenity RPG sessions with an entirely new crew. Totally excited about it.
• The kitties are doing great, if y'all are wondering. ;)
• Next weekend my friend Tony and I will be driving up to San Fransisco for WonderCon, and I can't wait. Not only will we be hanging out with the Browncoats and such, but we'll be running a screening of "Once More, With Feeling" at the end of the con.
• My money situation is slowly improving. I've cut back on a lot of things, and still need to cut back on more, but I'm paying bills and debts better than before, and have actually set up my first budget ever.
• Sadly, one of the things I needed to cut back on, for the time being, is therapy, since it cost over $300 a month that could be going elsewhere at the moment. I plan to go back once I'm on better financial footing.

So that's basically what's been going on with me of late. I hope y'all are well, and I hope to catch up with y'all soon. :)

Hey kids, just wanted to let y'all know that the Whedon-related news site I help run, Whedonopolis, just launched its latest incarnation that I worked my ASS on to get live, so if y'all could get over there, sign up and such, that would really rock my socks.

http://www.whedonopolis.com/

Thanks guys. :)

OMGOMG! Y'all don't know how long I've been waiting for something like this. LA LA Records (located over in Burbank, no less) have recently released an official, two disk soundtrack to Batman: The Animated Series. As BTAS is my favorite cartoon ever, and had some amaaaaaaaaaaaaaazing music, this is something I've wanted for a long time.

I mean sure, I had basically all of the OTHER available music from BTAS, it's various movies and Batman Beyond, but this looks just amazing. It's a fairly complete looking set that includes music from episodes like "On Leather Wings," "Two Face Parts 1 and 2," "Vendetta" and much more, as well as a 20 page booklet with notes from Paul Dini as well as composers Lolita Ritmanis, Michael McCuistion and Danny Freaking Elfman. And it's only about $30 for all of this!

Yeah, I totally purchased it. ;)

Hey kids, I just wanted to remind y'all that Mystery Science Theater 3000 Day is in a week, and that the poll is closed. The winners of the poll, which will be shown in one week, are as follows:

Manos: The Hands of Fate - 14 Votes
Space Mutiny - 10 Votes
Mitchell! - 9 Votes
Puma Man - 4 Votes

If we wanna fit one more, we can choose between the following three that had a tie with 3 votes apiece:

The Beginning of the End
Fugitive Alien
Time Chasers

See ya in a week!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkIcg1FSw54

Amazing video, thanks to Josh for showing it to me!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkIcg1FSw54