For the spring to come

I've been waiting for warmer weather for a long time, even though it's been one of the warmest winters I've ever experienced. I think I only used heating for a few nights, and that was because I couldn't stop shivering despite all the layers I was wearing. I'm eagerly awaiting the new season.

It's been difficult for me to be productive over the weekends, lately. After I get home, I tell myself I'll study- and I do, at least a little. But the weekend should be where the bulk of my work is done, because of all that time I have. Instead I choose to sleep in (because sleeping in is a total luxury for me these days), and I cook myself a nice meal (because eating well is also a luxury) and I waste the afternoon away by reading in the sunlight or I play some video games with my friends. It's a nice way to spend a day, but not that great when I should be studying. On Sunday I think all I got up to was domestic chores; taking out the garbage, vacuuming the carpet, laundry etc. It makes me feel proud in a way, that I can look after myself, and knowing that I don't enjoy living in filth, so I clean up.

I wish "study" wasn't always a priority in my life. Ideally, I'd like to learn for the rest of my life. I don't mind the idea of flipping open a new journal, attending lectures and attaining new information. Practicing cool tricks I learnt in the classroom and applying them to the real world. It becomes a problem, however, when the "study" is compulsory and takes precedence over everything else in my life. In truth, I think I care about other things more, and I don't like how my values are set. I feel like if I give it any less than my current effort, I will undoubtedly fail the course (I've come so close so many times, ewww), and that's not something I want to deal with either.

I was talking to my friend earlier this afternoon about what I'd do if money wasn't an issue in my life. I reckon I'd spend most of my day drawing, and on other days I'd write. Opinion pieces for whoever is willing to publish them, and I'd continue to read and learn so that I can be informed, so that my opinion is worth something to other people. Wouldn't it be nice, if people cared about what I thought.

Even though I had a holiday not long ago, I'd love to start another one. I don't feel like I've done much work this term, and I wish it'd change. It's not because I don't have work to do, it's because I lack motivation and I don't push myself as hard as I should. Well, an actual holiday would be terrible, because I don't really want to be seeing my "family" again so soon. I know it's sad, but I really like it sometimes, when they're just completely out of my life, and I don't pay them any thought. My friends sometimes tell me how they miss home or miss their parents- I think I still understand how that feels, it's just that the people I miss aren't my parents, but I wish I had a place called "home" which I would yearn to return to.

If it was warmer I'd go back to the beach. It's weird how I feel more at peace when I'm at water's edge, even though I'm convinced I'd drown if I ventured out and be swallowed by the tides. But it's kind of comforting, in a way... If I died and my body was tossed in the sea, everything would start dissolving, and eventually even my bones would return to their mineral components, and get swished around...

Actually now that I think about it, it's not that romantic. Never mind.

I just want the school year to be over. Goddamn.

Erased, Live Action Movie

Spoilers: anime + live action

I watched the anime "Erased" a couple of months ago, and I got hold of the live action movie last night. I found it while looking up the actress Arimura Kasumi, because she starred in one of my fav movies. Anyway I recognized the actor who plays the main character as well- I forgot his name, but he played Light in the Death Note live action movie. So I had a lot of reasons to watch the live action for Erased, and I did that last night.

The movie was mostly okay, following the script religiously. The had a lot of child actors because most of the story happens with the main char and his primary school buddies- I thought they acted incredibly well for their age. It was a shame that a lot of the story had to be cut out- I heard that the anime was already abridged, and the movie was cut shorter from that. Towards the end of the movie I started wondering how it would resolve, and the ending was pretty much wtf.

So in the anime, the main character, Satoru, goes back in time to save his friends from a series of child-abduction/murder cases. Turns out his teacher was the culprit, and Satoru only finds out when it's too late, and his teacher traps him in a car and he goes into a frozen lake. Satoru gets saved, but goes into a coma, wakes up like, a decade? later. His teacher's still around, so Satoru traps him and his teacher gets convicted. Happy end.

In the live action... Satoru learns that his teacher is the murderer BEFORE he gets trapped. Like, he could've gone the safe route, enlisted the help of the adults (because he was in his childhood body at the time, being 11 yo or something), or just backed the fuck out. Instead, he GOES WITH HIS TEACHER into his car, even though he's an 11yo, and decides to confront him in the car. That was a total wtf moment for me. His teacher promptly throws him off a bridge in the middle of winter. I don't wanna sound like an arse, but Satoru had it coming. That was fucking retarded.

Then the scene skips to Satoru waking up in a hospital, but he wasn't waking from a coma like in the anime. He wakes up after a traffic accident, and his identity in the timeline is apparently a manga artist. That means the timeline is non-linear, which breaks all the premises the show has been working on. Like, wtf, he got thrown off a bridge? Who saved him? And if he woke up after, why didn't he report his psycho-murder teacher? He just lived as a manga artist? Then got his "memories" back after getting knocked by a truck? In the anime, his psycho murder teacher only left him alone because he was in a coma, and the teacher had this weird thing going on of "only you understood me and saw through my plans". He also tried to kill Satoru once he woke from the coma- which made a lot of sense.

Anyway, major plot holes.

So it deviated from the anime. Oh well. I thought it was weird, but it's an adaptation, so w/e, right? They show some scenes from the ending of the anime, and I was a bit panicked thinking, "wait what? This is where the anime ended. Is the movie going to end here? They hadn't resolved anything with the teacher yet??". Then uh, the plot goes out the window, He decides to confront his psycho-murder teacher ALONE, AGAIN, and I was like, "dude wtf is wrong with you". He'd already gone to his lawyer friend and his lawyer friend was running in with police reinforcement, so why doesn't he just stand back and let the cops do their thing? Instead he like, gets into a knife fight??? with the teacher, and gets sliced in the neck while trying to stop his teacher from killing himself.

But why would you go in a knife fight when the psycho murder is trying to kill himself. It's not like you have your fingerprints on that knife. It'll look like a clear suicide, and no one's going to bother arguing otherwise. Worst comes to worst, you have a lawyer friend. Idk why he thought going into a fight would be a good idea.

Anyway my anatomy isn't real good, but that knife wound didn't look like it penetrated deep. The external juglar vein, maybe, but it'd be okay if he put pressure on the wound, and called an ambulance. But they have this classic movie-drama moment, where Satoru puts a hand on his neck (yay pressure?) but then delivers some shitty speech (I can't even remember what he said), and after he finishes talking THEN his lawyer friend and the cops rush over. They got there before the speech started. They couldn't have run over sooner? I won't question why Satoru decided to give a speech with blood gushing out of his neck, though--- he's done so many questionable things, it's probably more in character for him to act this way, at this point.

Then we cut forward to another scene, "2016". Yay for the future. Except it shows everyone at tombstone, and uh... it's Satoru's grave.

Wait what. He died? He died from what looked like a shitty superficial neck laceration? Woah okay, assuming it was deep and his carotid artery got hit--- well, NOW I have to question how he gave his fucking speech after he got knifed in the neck. But what the fuck, they just killed the main character for no fucking reason! We had a happy ending, but they had to kill him? For what? Most fucking, pointless death, ever. It wasn't even heroic, the way he died. He wasn't saving any one, he just decides to run up to the psycho murderer and get into a brawl. And dies.

???????

I know the Japanese title translates to "The town where only I am not here", and in the anime this referred to how he went into a coma for near a decade, but he saved his friends by doing so. So it's like, he wasn't around the town, but his friends grew up happily. But in the live action, he was already in a future timeline, none of his friends were in danger, and he just dies to fit the title??? Like, everyone else had reached their "happy ending" status, and he just... dies AFTER that?

Anyway the live action was a huge fucking disappointment. The end. Watch the anime.

Can't forget, won't forgive

It's been half a year since my mother told me that she'll never accept me for who I am. Actually she said that she'd rather if I'd been born retarded. I can't remember if I posted about this before, maybe I didn't. It hurt a lot back then, so I didn't want to say much about it.

Well I gotta tell ya, she sure struck a nerve. I remember how for the first few weeks I was back at school, I'd feel miserable quite spontaneously, and at my (embarrassing) worst, I started crying at a bus stop 10 in the morning. It was fucking weird, but I couldn't control myself. The words she said echoed in my mind at the worst times, I could barely do my job. I was convinced that I had PTSD, and whew it was hard to sleep at night.

Then I forgot about it. I moved on, for a while. Until my "Father" sent me a reminder of our conversation, and I was in agony all over again. I can't even use the word "triggered" because it's a fucking meme now, but that's essentially what it was. I blacklisted him for a while, and whew it felt good not to hear from him.

A few weeks ago he had some minor surgery. I was made aware that his body was not as robust as before, and my mother tried to evoke sympathy. I found nothing. Nothing except for sickening giddiness, knowing that he will become a frail old man while I am in the prime of my years. I don't need to hurt him, I just need to ignore him, and watch him be consumed by helplessness in old age.

I'm disgusting.

It's funny, people always try to convince you that your parents are everything. And not long ago I sincerely believed I wouldn't give a shit if my "father" died from cancer. Maybe I'd be troubled for finances and the logistics of looking after the rest of the family, but I wouldn't be sad.

I give my darkest imaginations too much thought. It's too cruel and uncomfortable to think about, too embarrassing to admit how often I think about it. Too hard to face myself when confronted.

And I once swore that I'd let it go.

I can't, I can't forget. It comes back to my mind time and time again, fresh trauma overrding my festering wounds that did not heal, as if I had run out of undamaged surfaces. I'm being so ridiculously dramatic, I hope when I see this post in another 3 years time, I laugh and say, "I guess I was still in my angsty teenager phase despite being older".

It's a luxury, to go over your old posts and say "well that was cringey as shit", because it shows that you've moved on. The hurt that was so very real back then, the event that made your sky crash down- non of that matters anymore. You think it's no big deal now, and you know if the same thing were to happen, you'd act differently and you wouldn't be half as pathetic, ending up crying in broad daylight (at a bus stop! Of all places, tsk).

And I think, wouldn't it be better if I was born "retarded"? If I didn't have enough connections in my brain, to understand the words that came out of their mouths, would I be here writing this dramatic post, or would I be blissly ignorant in an orphanage somewhere (because I'm sure as hell they would have given me up). Or maybe they wouldn't have? Maybe they would have loved me, because that's "how God intended" me to be? Hah, fuck that. They can't live with me as I am now, how could they have lived if I was less than "normal" in any other way.

A good friend of mine told me, that while it was very frustrating, I should learn to accept that my parents will never change. Was it Einstein that said, madness is doing the same thing over and over, but expecting different outcomes? I may be misquoting him. Adjust expectations, live with reality, get on with own life. Simple, concise instructions.

Why are they so hard to follow? What the fuck is wrong with me?

I wanted to vent but I didn't want this post to turn out this way.  I feel like I keep writing and writing and it just becomes a cesspool of bitterness. Dear God, please save me from myself.

Holiday Summary

Well I'm back at school, and it's sad, so I thought I'd write a bit on what I DID accomplish these holidays, to show that I've had a good time.

1. I played so much league. LoL is life-consuming, and because I have much better internet when I'm not at school, I magically become so much better at LoL because I'm no longer playing with 200 ping. I think I just enjoyed being better at the game, and I was able to play with my friends a lot more. My rank is officially "I am not shit at this game"

2. Caught up with friends many times

• Saw the Ghostbusters movie. It was silly, but delightfully so. Though my friend did comment that I was like some kind of "laughter slut", laughing at literally everything in the movie. I didn't think I was that bad, but maybe I am too easily amused by the wrong things.
• Played Articulate one night, that was fun. It's like, pictionary with words? So you have something that you have to describe to your team, and your team must guess what it is. I think you're not allowed to spell it out, say it starts with a certain letter, or say "it sounds like __". But we bend the rules a bit, and on that night I learnt who "Francis of Assisi" was.
• Played cards and other silly board games with other friends. There was one about exploding kittens, which I think is a variation of UNO. Then we played coup- and I really hate that fucking game, because I keep losing. It's not even that I'm terrible at lying, it's just that when I lie, I don't even know WHY I should lie, or what my end goal is. 

3. Played too much Pokemon Go. It's the new hype, but I gotta say it's a fucking terrible game. There's just...nothing to DO most of the time, and it took me like, an hour, to discover it was more efficient to camp at the library, where there are 3 pokestops and permanent lures, as opposed to walking around town looking like a tool. Except, I had so much fun the first couple of days, just playing it on my own. I was so keen I left the house for an hour or two JUST TO PLAY POKEMON. It was kind of unreal- I never had that much enthusiasm for outdoorsy stuff. 

4. Then I ended up mountain climbing with one of my best friends. I tripped and left myself with a bruise on the back of my foot, I also managed to crack my phone screen, but luckily I got that fixed the same day. It was worth it though, because it was actually super-duper fun, and I got to play more Pokemon on the way. Found a wild Aerodactyl and Rapidash. It's sad that they took away the tracking option in Pokemon Go, I saw the silhouette of a wild snorlax only yesterday, but I had no idea where the fuck it was.

5. I went clubbing for the first time, and it was as miserable as I expected it to be. My feet were sore, the music was probably ruining my hearing, and when I saw the other kids having fun I just felt... out of it. Like, it wasn't my idea of a good evening or good fun. The alcohol tasted like medicine, except it's not even good for my health. I think I should just accept that I'm better off listening to an orchestra or watching a play, as opposed to going clubbing. I have no idea why my friends are so into it. They say it's easier to pick up girls- and I dare say it is, because the bass gives you the illusion that your heart is beating fast, and the adrenaline rush mimics the feeling of being in love or having a crush. The rising temperature, grinding bodies on the dance floor, plus all the alcohol- undoubtedly, it is easy to pick up girls. But you know what you also pick up? STDs, unwanted pregnancies, and regret the next morning because you're with someone you wouldn't have been with, if you even had a half-decent conversation with her. I guess if you're into one-night stands and just a "good time", sure, but for my friend who swears he's after "true love" and "long term relationships", it seemed awfully dumb.

6. My main regret is that I didn't draw as much as I wanted, and I didn't play piano as much as I wanted to. I worked a bit more on a song, but it really wasn't much. What I need is constant practice, which unfortunately I don't do often, because it's harder to access a piano up here now. 

7. Oh, I watched some anime and binged some manga. Re-Life was pretty good. I won't say really good, because it wasn't anything special, but it was enjoyable. It's kind of scary how now I'm into all the seinen material, whereas when I was in my teens, I was shounen only. I mean, yeah I'm getting old and I've shifted off the target audience, but I don't like being reminded that I'm getting old. I say "getting old", but I'm actually incredibly young compared to a lot of the people I work with, and because I'm so fucking clueless these days, I just earn zero respect. I guess it's better than being old an clueless, because then it'd take a lot more effort to learn, and people would look at you like you're retarded, as opposed to just inexperienced. I guess my problem is, if I don't speak with confidence (and I rarely do have confidence in myself, unless I know I'm at 90-100%), then people kinda shit on me and assume I know 0%, when in reality I'll know about 70%. 

I better go make up the other 30% now. Holidays are over, after all.