it doesnt feel a thing like falling

i'm in ellijay. where the 2006 tire events took place, but in present day. im glad to see its still mostly the same despite the years that have passed. im at the top looking down to justin and a woman. mentally im debating on climbing down and settle on it being a good decision.

im hanging on the side of the cliff and not quite sure how to best maneuver myself to continue my descent. i realize its a dream and think, "what i do doesnt matter right now." i think to just jump back and let whatever happens happen.

i let my hands go and push off with my legs. falling backwards. slowly. watching the top of the mountain get further, feeling the weightlessness and a slight fear of what may be behind me. but at the same time, feeling free. even a bit happy.

it doesnt feel a thing like falling.

don't call it a comeback, no...

so, a while ago i turned off my facebook account. i wasnt really using it, but for some reason did spend quite a bit of time on it. i lost contact with a few people, sure, but not the people i talk to the most. i do that more directly. and a lot of those people that are on my friends list...i dont even remember them. and when they drop off my list i dont even know who's gone (if i even notice)

so move forward a year. a month. a week. a day...and i've reactivated it. im making this post a few months after the fact, and now that ive had some time to get back into it i can say that im fine without it. it doesnt make things better or worse. a bit smoother at times i guess. its good for keeping in touch, but i really dont see the hype. though people dont seem to be ranting about it as much anymore. seems a bit more commercial now if anything.

the good left undone

when this all came up maybe i was in a worse place than i thought. i dont know. its possible. very possible. i mean, i had to be... but whats done (or undone) is done (or not done).

there are a lot of things that come to mind when i sit here to write this. so in times like this they say its best to just start going and let it work itself out. im a firm believer that things will generally work themselves out, so im going to go with that.

there were a lot of things i had in the last few months that i didnt have in that same span of time last year. things that actually kinda meant something. and even some of the material things were looking a little better than usual. and you know what? it doesnt even matter now. it kinda does, sure. but in a more important way, it doesnt.

the things i had to walk away from were the things that ive been wanting. and just as it is every time, when things are looking good they go bad. but its my own fault so how upset could i really be?

and the way this played out was mostly terrible too. hopefully theres a light at the end of this tunnel that makes it worthwhile. im assuming it wont be, but i guess ill have to wait and see.

as im writing this im listening to bright eyes. it only makes sense really. unfortunately its a more solid reminder of this situation than i care for. on the upside i did end on a high note though. i used to go out to shows that were pretty great but alone you can only enjoy them so much. this time around i had a group of the best friends you could have and a couple potential new ones.

goody, like two shoes

so i like to rush in the morning. well, i dont. but i dont care for preparing early which leads to rushing. this morning on my way to excerising i was rushing out the door as i tend to and reached for a pair of shoes. as i put them on i noticed i was trying to put the left on my right and vice versa. simple correction and im off on my way. at the gym i realize this was because rather than grab a pair of shoes i had grabbed two different shoes. i guess thats what happens when you have several of the same shoes in different colors.

this picture is from toronto 07, not the time i wrote about.

1000 good intentions

1000 different sounds. 1000 different bands. i like to use music to take my mind off of something, to put me in a better mood, or any of 1000 other reasons. each band or artist brings something different to the table. recently i hit 1000 different artists on last.fm. perhaps not the most meaningful achievement to some, but i think its worth acknowledging. i am not fully sure, but am quite confident that bon iver was the 1000th of these good intentions.

minor update: so, i got a little curious as to what my first artist/song scrobbled to last.fm was. mxpx. kkk took my baby away. the artist? expected. the song? not so much.

grab your hat and fetch a camera

even if its not yours

well, no more filming the world before it happens for me. somebody decided to fetch my camera at warped tour so now its not mine. hard to say its theirs. but i guess it is. i wish i had at least gotten my last few pictures first. so much for tangible memories of the rx bandits farewell show or the bayside tour. obviously warped tour. and 311/sublime with rome...there is enough identifiable information on there that if the person wanted to return it, they could. im sure they wont. and another thing that kinda sucks is that i lost it in a pit for a band that i didnt even want to see.

all that aside, warped tour was a good time. had someone told me last year of the crew id go with this year, i probably wouldnt have believed them. as expected the line up needed a little work, but there were still some good bands. i would have liked to have seen more new bands, other than august burns red, but there just werent too many that interested me.

i ordered a new camera the following day so i guess now i can get back onto building -- excuse me, rebuilding -- my picture collection. its a weird feeling to look at my new memory card to upload p1000001.jpg. and i have to relearn how to use this one. i was hoping the fx78 would be similar to my fx30, but its not. maybe its because of change, but there are a lot of things im not liking right now. i cant seem to do the various functions as quickly due to a touch screen. and some stuff i just dont know how to do like scroll through pictures. oh well. in time ill get it. or get a different camera. starting to think maybe i should have gone with the zs10.

what's my name?

well, according to google (on google+) it's whatever your birth certificate says. none of those internet handles or well-known nicknames there. i've never been one to get into all that and ive been doin' this since '96. it's funny when catch phrases and such are actually true and can be used. so yeah, tristan_stewart, tristancs, tristan792, the oh so famous tristanstewart - whatever - it's all variations of the same thing. with the occasional number. i guess i missed a memo about creativity and anonymity. moving on.

so yeah, google is against people using their nicknames and such on google+. do i support that? i cant really say yes or no flat-out, but my answer is close to a yes. very close. let me explain this...

there are a few cases out there where people are well known in the online world by a certain handle. to the point that people call them that in real life. and same goes for actual nicknames of course. for those few cases, yes it is a bit of an inconvenience. however...most of the time when i see these aliases being used it's not really that serious. and while on the subject...i support their stance on brands. leave that where it is. back on topic...

a friend of mine is all about the fake name thing. i dont have a clue why. im sure he has his reasons. we both know each others stances on the matter and we dont discuss it because theres no point. i say if people know what your name really is why - for lack of a better word - "hide" behind something else. but in a way you could use that same arguement either way. if you meet someone in real life, outside of whatever community they float around in online, theyll probably introduce themselves as whatever their name is. and id be more willing to interact with someone thats not portraying themselves as something else. its a hard thing to explain, but thats just my thought on the matter.

in short, you have a name. use it.

pay the man

this time around it was cheaper, so thats kinda cool i guess. it still kinda sucks. really the worst part of it was dealing with the company. they advertise a 24-hour operation, but dont tell you that their shack of an office is never manned. and it takes over an hour to get any service. it put quite the delay on my trip home. i didnt have anything to get home to, but i would have liked to have left when i wanted to leave.

while im talking about this, i may as well round out the story. i went up to dc for an rx bandits farewell show. its always a sad day to watch a band youve like put it all behind them. ironically as i type that, an mxpx song came on my last.fm radio. they did the same thing some time ago. mike's keeping hope alive and not giving up the fight though. the same? no. better than nothing? yeah.

it was a good show. a seemingly endless encore blended three songs into one. that does not for ol' trissy a happy shoulder make.

i've become a cliche

looks like reel big fish was right(ish), but i definitely wouldnt call myself a guitar player. regardless, that's the newest addition to the family.

running right through the world

i started playing infamous 2 the other day. june 30th to be exact. it's pretty all right. apparently it was all right enough for me to pour minute after minute, hour after hour into it without really noticing. in the end i beat the final mission yesterday morning. july 4th. usually even with a game i like, i rarely beat it. and if i do its stretched out over no less than two months.

after i finished running through that world, i took a nap. at about 10, 10:30. then i ran through this one. the real one. not like the on on mtv. possibly not like the one the all american rejects sang about. but the one thats real to me.

a trip to the beach with people. i almost learned the secret of the green ball and how to harness its power. dude got stung three times by jellyfish. the beach whisperer and i told him to pee on it, but hed have none of that.

the weather got mostly terrible and we tried to wait for it to 'die down' at evans. 'how the states got their shapes' is on. the weather lightens up (compared to what it was doing). but as soon as we got in the car it picked up again. same thing happened on the way back.

at dude mans house. again. been there a lot lately. its a good place to be though. from there we eventually headed to a little shindig.

not much of a party person, but this was cool. much better than the party we ended up at last week.

while i was running around in infamous 2 i had music on just to make the time pass a little easier and to get an idea for how long id been playing. one of the albums i listened to was don't let the bastards grind you down. later when i was at dudes house, i heard a lot of that album on kablam. the song title in particular was one of them. this happened after i had already decided on it for my blog title. kinda ironic. or coincidental. im not sure.

two birds stoned at once

so i went up to dc this weekend again. wait, let me back up. since this weekend did have a bit more going on than just that. nothing important, but im writing already so why not throw it in? im thinking maybe rather than try to type it all out i can break it down in simple statements to save time.

friday - killing time before our work picnic faggotry. oil change. long overdue. drop off the text book i rented from barnes and noble? why not? later that night i remember i had the book because i still had a test to take. the first in a string of craptastic happenings. remembering why i hate planning things.

saturday - off to dc. this is where the main part of this whole thing is. the drive was terrible. i left at 9:30 in the am and didnt get there until 1pm. in a somewhat funny/ironic moment, "the end" came up on my ipod and because its been my ringtone for the last 4 years i automatically thought of my phone ringing. then the song went off. and within 10 seconds, the phone rang.

i was supposed to help someone move. wasnt looking forward to that because of my shoulder sucking. so i did that. and as i expected, it sucked. but there was one good thing that came of this. and pretty much the only reason im writing all this.

person: are we out of gatorade?

other person: no

person: oh, so we still have some left?

other person: no

*person and i exchange looks of confusion*

*other person doesnt see the problem*

and this wasnt a joke. this was pure seriousness on each person's part.

later that night i saw nick 13 and billy woodward & the senders. good stuff all round. nicks voice is amazing. almost hard to see imagine one singer of two totally different bands. billy woodward would probably make for a nice show with musicplayer. speaking of which, i missed a musicplayer show and that makes me sad, but i cant catch 'em all.

sunday - the drive back was just as awful as the drive there. i left around 1:50. got home around 5:50. think ill stick to my late night trips. cooler. less traffic. less chance of accidents slowing me down. whats not to like about that?

tranquilize

theres an alligator. or maybe a crocodile. i dont remember. i think it was an alligator. for some reason theres a pulley system setup. hes pulling the rope to left something. this "something" is over the fence and i cant see what it is. suddenly im on the other side. the fence is gone. now its just trees. i can see both sides of the action. hes lifting an alligator. much bigger than himself. like a 6 ton alligator. not sure why i knew that. but i did. and he himself was your average sized, 10footer or so.

the pulley breaks and the big alligator crashes to the ground.

people appear out of nowhere as the two alligators prepare for a fight. clearly the smaller alligator will lose. its like the technodrome compared to a mouser.

the men pull out tranquilizer guns and they all fire repeatedly at the big guy. its like a scene in 'the mechanic' but with a lot more people. as they unload into the big guy, one guy looks at me "now he'll win"

it made sense. i couldnt argue with it. but i did kinda question the why of all this.

i woke up. told tony about it. and he gave the same reaction i did.

they call him boss

sometimes it really makes you think about what used to pass for tv or movies. i had a conversation about this this weekend. and about this...

apparently i stumbled across this some time ago, but only recently did i discover its true magic.

wait for it...

in together now

i had that dream about subnetting a while back. this is the same, just different.

i was at roberts house and got caught up in a conversation about data aggregation with kelly and anthony. how and why these things keep falling into my dreams is still a bit of a mystery and im still not sure how i feel about it. to quote an obvious source, id rather they "shut the --- up"

they have a new cd out. supposedly its back to how they sounded before. i didnt know they took the time to sound different. hm...

flavor of the weak

so part of my arts class involved a trip to the chrysler museum. i kept thinking chrysler hall. i even got directions to the chrysler hall. luckily i remembered this before i left. i didnt quite estimate the travel time right and there was a train i had to wait for so i didnt quite make the 10:00am meeting time. i was only off by a few minutes. less than ten. but still, i dont like being late. the idea of people waiting for me. i dont know. it just doesnt sit well with me. how some people can just not be bothered by that blows my mind. another story for another day though...

i get to the place eventually. it doesnt look like the right place. mostly because when you get there youre at the back and other than a sign or two it doesnt really give you the idea that youre where you want to be. i saw a girl walk up to what seemed to be the entrance. *ill see how it goes for her* that wasnt it. i notice a sign saying theres an entrance to the left. i get out of the car and start walking towards the building.

lots of build up. all for no reason. i shouldve just skipped this.

so the girl and i happened to start talking about where the entrance is and everything. i make a few jokes because thats what i do. and we find the entrance. shes there for a project. me too. once inside i meet up with my class and she goes off to talk to a front desk person. well, theres that. or so i thought.

a moment later shes standing next to me. hmm, ok.... she decided to a) join what she thought was a tour or b) hang around me because it made sense at the time. c) is for combo. see that, jokes. its what i do. in my case c is often for clever.

teacher: who's your friend, tristan?

me: she just--

girl: "says her name"

me: *caught off guard* "repeats her name"

i was going to say that she just happened to be here too, but she'd have none of that.

she stuck around for the tour. walking. talking. all that. afterwards we strolled around town as i navigated us SUCCESSFULLY to subway. all those trips to the norva paid off. so we had lunch, got to know each other. it was a good time. and we agreed to do it again. we kinda went together like kool-aid and a hamburger. those two go along well, yeah. but youd expect them to be with something else. im the kool aid for obvious reasons.

of course that made me think this would go somewhere. and thats why i dont like having expectations. i also dont like planning. and i was reminded why. all at once.

in short, follow up plans fell apart. nothings coming of this. we did have one fine day though.

****

in class monday

teacher: so was that a friend, girlfriend,...

me: i met her on the way into the building

teacher:....building? what building?

me: the museum building

teacher: you work fast

that couldnt be further from the truth, but rather than keep the attention i chose to let it go.

painted by numbers

i had an interesting dream last night. maybe it's not that interesting, but i want to remember it.

*****

a girl needed help with something. she showed me a piece of paper with x.x.8.0 written on it. she wanted to know how to split that into two subnets. i wanted to explain to her that she could split it into x.x.8.0 and x.x.9.0 by using a /23 (or 255.255.254.0). before i could, she started telling me how she thought she figured it out but was unsure of her answer. she begins to write out a long, complex math equation using simple addition and binary.

i had never seen her method before. it had the right elements involved, but used in a way that would surely not find a solid answer. however, because i had never seen this method i didn't know the logic behind it. in situations like this, rather than tell the person they are wrong i side with a small part of me that thinks i may learn something. i watched her quickly scribble across the paper.

i sense that the follow up question will be about what to use for a specific amount of hosts. i envision how i will explain it to her. she's still writing out her math from the previous question.

*****

waking up and trying to find a word to describe how i feel about that dream. lots of little adjectives, but i cant find anything to sum it all up. i dont usually - or ever - dream about subnetting so it's a bit weird.

after i woke up, i had the afterthoughts stuck in my head and couldnt sleep. so i worked them out to make sure i still had it. i do. yay.

***PART TWO***

a few days after this i had dream somewhat along the same topic. i was at roberts house and got caught up in a conversation about data aggregation with kelly and anthony. how and why these things keep falling into my dreams is still a bit of a mystery and im still not sure how i feel about it.

things that make you go hmmm...

what do cats need stickers for?

...

marking their territory

the crows are coming for us

another dream post. a friend of mine writes a lot of his and its a bit inspirational. i sometimes have dreams that make me think, but i tend to forget about them before i unravel anything. maybe this way ill remember them and reflect on them later and make sense of that nonsense.

im at my grandmothers house. none of my family is around. im standing on the edge of the porch as i liked doing when i was younger. and still do when im there. i guess i liked the feeling of being high above the ground when i was younger. moving on. for some reason i know how to do bird calls and i do that to pass the time. a small flock of birds comes around.

a man shows up and says, in expression and body language alone, that he is going to join in. he begins and a murder of crows lands on the neighboring roof. after their group has fully landed and all are accounted for, they swoop down to the ground. around this point a bus appears. i dont recall it driving up, and i dont recall people being on it. but its there. and yellow or white.

suddenly the birds that myself and the mystery man had summoned morph into humans. they all join hands and ask me to join. somehow i understood that we were going to do something as a group and that they needed my help. i jump from the porch as ive done many times as a child and join the group. in perfect harmony and unison they begin flapping their arms like wings. my timing is slightly off, but i fall in soon enough. we start to leave the ground flying into the sky. i see that we're somehow taking the bus with us.

and then the wake up.

some kind of monster

donkey.

bear.

man.

...

?

i drew that - exclamation point - happy face.

i've got so much to talk about

but it's a sad, sad song and i dont wanna let you down.

machine gun blues

so its not exactly uncommon for things you see, think about, or experience in the daytime to find their way into your dreams. it happens for me a lot and happened recently. earlier in the day i watched a video on the youtubes. it was a nice watch, but i didnt think too much past that. later that night i had an interesting dream regarding that and a few other things i didnt mention.

so, there i was...in some building that was somewhat like the one i work in, but more open. like a hotel with external entrances for the doors, but internal halls and such as well. in retrospect, its similar to an early level of left 4 dead 2. the one with the fire. im with a girl and inside somewhere is a man with a gun killing everybody. the reason is unknown. all i know is that he doesnt want any survivors.

i know that if i attempt to escape with her we will likely be caught and killed. the other option is to keep the man busy with me while she gets away and then take him out. theres a reluctant acceptance and i tell her we'll meet up later. we both know thats not likely. she goes on her way.

i find the man and enter the room where he has others. its a hostage situation and he seems to be determining which person to eliminate next by some sort of written test. i have to last as long as possible to make sure she gets away. i am confident that my test score will let me outlast the others. as i test i watch for an opening and consider possible options.

the stress and anxiety made it hard to stay calm, but as in waking life, i manage somehow. i grew a bit more tense and suddenly woke up. it was a bit unfortunate. i really wanted to see how it would play out.

blacktop rollin'

so, i went to an evasive driving course. when i first heard about it my inital thoughts seemed a bit excessive and unrealistic. reason being, lots of courses are never what you expect. a bunch of class and some watered down versions of whatever we talked about. well, after i actually read the thing and saw talk of speed and planned/unplanned high-impact "events" i figured maybe my initial thoughts werent so far off. truth be told, i was a bit apprehensive of the whole thing. but in the back of my mind i was still skeptical that things may have been slightly exaggerated.

in class instructors were fairly persistent with reinforcing what i'd read. they also killed off my idea of the one-sided class to driving ratio. hmm. again, the apprehension. i wasnt sure how i'd feel about this.

in the end, it was pretty awesome. i got to do some things i wouldnt get to do anywhere else. j-turns, backwards driving courses, donut tracks -- with water patches sometimes. and the operation shenanigans was a nice finish. on top of that, my group was perfect. i also got along really well with our instructor, john. same goes for the whole class. generally i like to just blend in. by wednesday i was having daily back-and-forths with the instructors in class. i got really good reactions too so that was nice. thanks to my year-round dress attire i was known as t-shirt guy and on the last day my crew got me "THE JACKET" we saw at wal-mart.

so back to the friday. six on one, instructors versus us in a what was much like twisted metal without guns. or maybe that burnout survival mode. somehow i managed to down three cars. i did a pretty fantastic running jump into one car. unknown to me at the time, one of my crew members were stuck in the old car. at one point we had a head on collision and the hood flew up. driving away like that was quite the experience.

the class was in my high school town of fort leonard wood so i got to see some old faces. the days started early and ended late. they also took a lot out of you. regardless, i took the time to see my friends afterwards. when else would i have the time?

id like to include more of the details, but for brevity i'll pass on that. i have the memories so that's good enough i guess. in the end, the class was much better than i expected and im glad i went.

i've got a bad feeling about this

one whole decade. some ups, some downs. sadly lately it's been more the latter. at least i can say ive kept my own values and such. i havent changed from the person i am. i mean, once that happens, what do you really have?

i dont know if i can do this again.