Thread: Sender? I hardly know her!

Sender's long, supplemental.

Originally Posted by Mantis

Damn, long time no see!! Welcome back, RTSender. It's nice to see an old face.

Mantis, my dude!!! It's certainly great to see you again, and yes my face has grown a bit older since my sabbatical haha. Though it's got the same feel, I love what you and the mods have done with the Nexus! Obviously I'm still getting my bearings and finding my identity - I rolled Melfina on the quiz, so there's a start - but I'm looking forward to being part of an online community again. Also congrats on the Patreon, that's looking to be a slam dunk!

Originally Posted by pseudohippie

Oh wow! Good to see you, man! Been quite a long time indeed.

Well well, my favorite hippie, how've you been?! I've got a good feeling this tour of the Nexus is gonna stick, what with all the changes that have happened within the past five years, which I'll go over tomorrow. Not sure if you lurked on the Nuzlocke Pokemon Yellow thread I made way back when, but I do remember you having a pretty rich background in Pokemon. It's hidden on my external hard-drive somewhere, but I gotta unearth that Universal Pokemon Randomizer and see what kind of crazy stuff can happen with that.

Sender's log, stardate COVID-19+46.

Block of text incoming.

I skimmed my previous entries in preparation for getting back into the swing of things here at the Nexus, and...wow. Five years definitely changes a man. I look back on those days and smile at how relatively carefree and enthusiastic I sound with the words I typed in those entries about my jaw surgery, my job at the restaurant, my family excursions, all those small things. I know it's odd reading words trying to figure out their "sounds"; I guess "feel" would be a better term. Notwithstanding, it's really interesting to see at a glance how much has changed in my overall outlook just by looking at the words I typed way back when. The same applies to the words I'll be typing now.

First things first: my return to the Nexus all started with an automated e-mail I received about eight days ago. It was my birthday, the time when I successfully evaded the 27-club. I saw in my secondary e-mail inbox that the Outlaw Star Nexus community wished me a happy birthday. I admittedly recall receiving similar e-mails from the Nexus about the five birthdays that preceded this one, but something about both the macroscape and microscape of my life really made this notification significant. On a macro level, the reign of Corona-chan has tilted the world like a pinball machine, and the constant suggestions to stay indoors has shifted all of our social media into, well, social media. On a micro scale, the ebbs and flows of my social life have transitioned from introverted by nature - not ideal, but comfortable - to introverted by necessity - in one word: infuriating. I'm not trying to discount any of those who have been hit way harder by COVID-19 than me; I sympathize with those people as much as I can, but this is coming from the perspective of one man, not every man. Notwithstanding, being a homebody during this pandemic has given me plenty to time to catch up on anime and shows, make a sizable dent in playing any of my unplayed board game, and...turn toward forums to satiate my social appetite.

Which brings me back to the Nexus. I remember finding out about the Nexus - then Outlaw Star UK - when I was in a similarly vulnerable state back in May of 2012. I was part of a study abroad program in Italy trying to find out if foreign language education really was my calling. Long story short, it wasn't, and being trapped in a country without being able to fluently speak its native tongue brought me to the brink of a downward spiral. Thankfully I still had the internet, and I also had the intuition to bring my DVD box set of Outlaw Star with me. When I found out about a relatively robust forum dedicated to the anime of my childhood (sit down, Dragonball), I had to contribute. Those formative years on outlawstar.uk were a joy: from ranking Outlaw star characters into tier lists to polling names from the forum for my abbreviated Pokemon Yellow Nuzlocke journal, even to recording drum samples for some music ideas that a certain Lloyd Skelton was drawing up - pressing all the F's for you, bud - I really felt like this was a online community that I not only belonged to, but also something I can proudly share with my IRL friends as a part of my identity.

Unfortunately for me, life has a way of drifting me into so many directions that it often sends me into priority overload, and that's what happened to me back in 2015. I remember juggling working full-time at the restaurant and going back to get my undergraduate degree at Cleveland State University, while fighting with the concept of moving out of my parents' house. Looking back I have no idea why I abandoned something that had been an integral part of my early adult life, but hindsight is 20/20 as they say. Then again, I was 23. Five years definitely changes a man.

How about now? Well I will say that I am incredibly fortunate to have a job during these trying times. Let me preface this by stating I was able to finally grab my undergraduate degree in History (with a minor in Communications, of all things ) back in December of 2018, which gave me the opportunity to apply for a handful of "big boy" jobs. One of these opportunities was with Metlife as a temporary client service representative in their legal plan department. I started my temp position in August of last year and accepted the full-time gig this past February, PTO and benefits included! My timing could not have been more perfect; a month later I got the call to prepare to telecommute, while the temps who had not received an offer yet were unfortunately let go. I'll go into more details about the nuances of working in a incoming-call call center, but I gotta say I'm blessed to have a revenue stream during the reign of Corona-chan.

Phew, I'm confident that's enough content for now. I will say that typing this entry has reminded me how much I enjoy writing in general. I will admit that my creativity impulses have been dulled over the years, so hopefully restarting this log will give me the shot in the arm to flex those linguistic muscles again. Perhaps updating this log again will help me branch my creative interests off to other media, like playing music again or creating more elaborate backstories for RP characters in DnD or Shadowrun. As for when my next entry is expected...I'll try not to conform to a set schedule to help mitigate personal disappointment if I can't abide by said schedule. That said, weekly updates don't seem like a bad idea to consider while I get back in the saddle.

Much love to all of you. And remember: while five years definitely changes a man, all men were once boys.

Block of text resolved,

RT

Sender's long, stardate COVID-19+54

Hey yall, great to be here. I remember trying to make this a weekly update in order to avoid incidents like those which I've explained in the previous post. I almost made it an even seven days since my last block of text, but here we are.

Now, I was sure I had a significant update to share with you...geez this is embarrassing. It was on the tip of my tougue, I was really excited for this moment, but I honestly can't remember what it was right now...



OH, that's right! Huge shoutouts to Ironside Computers for providing me with my new PC rig that I've been waiting six months to get together the funds needed for this boi. I was actually hoping to build a second PC from the ground up, like my previous one, but my laziness and Corona-chan had other plans. Those two factors were the reason I waited six months between when I got my new rig and the rig I build myself died. Back in November I recall smelling something burning coming out of my power supply. Unfortunately, the moment I noticed the burning smell was when my computer shut down. I tried replacing the PSU with a new one, but the computer would'nt get past the boot screen, which most likely meant something shorted out on the motherboard. Instead of immediately getting a diagnostic done on the rig, I figured it would be a good idea to take a break from almost constantly being on the computer during my free time, especially with the holidays coming up. Plus, I still had my phone to keep up with things electronically and my Switch to satisfy my gaming needs. Though as the months went by, I really missed Steam, and when my finances became a bit more stabilized thanks to the Department of the Treasury, I decided to pull the trigger on a custom pre-made PC, which has been performing fantastically so far!

So yeah, it feels good having a stabile computer again. The only real upgrade I'm considering at this point is a socond monitor with a souped-up framerate. 144Hz seems to be the standard for primary monitors, so I may look into getting one of those after my next check.

Other than that, not much to report at this time. Still feeling healthy despite our current situation, so I'm thankful for that. My hope is that when the quarantine is lifted that we don't experience a second wave of infection, but here's hoping when that happens we can all put it behind us and get back to some semblance of normalcy.

Stay beautiful,

RT

Sender's log, stardate COVID19+84

Apologies in advance: this is an unfiltered, off-the-cuff update that's been a long time coming.

This may feel like an offshoot of what I posted back when I came back to Nexus, but while it's amazing how so much time can change so much - in light of what transpired in Minnesota - it's even more amazing how so little things can change, given what we've all been having to deal with around the world. It's like that French epigram: plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. And yet, I feel like not much has happened personally that I felt was worth mentioning in a forum post, but the more I think about it nothing could be further from the truth.

On one hand, businesses are starting to become more active where I'm living. I took my parents out to dinner last weekend to a local gastropub, and it was great to get out and enjoy the activity of going out to eat again. But on the other hand, while I enjoyed the atmosphere of eating at a restaurant, still seeing the staff wear facemasks and gloves while serving food still kept the dream of a quarantine-free society in check, not to mention the place we went to was empty. I'm sure more people will start populating restaurants in due time, but for the time being eating at restaurants now will always have that void about its atmosphere while will be missing.

Speaking of void, the main reason it took me this long to post an update here has been lack of motivation to do pretty much anything except work. I truly am blessed to be able to make an honest living from home during this time, but being restricted at home like this has cut pretty heavily into my psyche. Lack of motivation outside of work has led me to lose sleep, worsen my diet, and just feel a prolonged sense of malaise. I had to take two days off this month not because I was physically, but mentally sick. These changes in my well-being really suck, and I really wish I could do something significant about it. But I can't. I still can't see a doctor/dentist/therapist in good conscience because of this quarantine. There's only so much supplementing my work down time with random YouTube/anime/sitcoms I can take before going insane. Call this a cry for help or just me venting my personal frustrations, I really want things to change.

That's probably why I came back to the Nexus to vent this. Creative writing is one of the many things I wished I picked up and took more seriously at a younger age, so I feel like posting my thoughts in this manner is the closest I'm going to get at this point. Also, unrelated, I saw the update video by Mantis and it guilted me just enough to get off my lazy ass and get these feelings off my chest. Truth be told, this is definitely quality of writing I'm not proud of, but getting this monkey off my back in the face of this personal adversity may motivate my future posts to be more coherent and more focused on more precise things that are happening around me.

Either way, thanks again for all your support. Hopefully doing more active things like this to pass the time will motivate me to do more things I enjoy during this crisis.

Keep the change,

RT