Some days man...

"I am tired of Earth, these people. I'm tired of being caught in the tangle of their lives." - Dr Manhattan
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATDmVbHIQ7E

Walpurgis Night

I wonder if my strong feelings about Madoka Magica are not another reflection of the same themes that draw me to Persona 3.

 Madoka Magica another story with strong themes of the inevitability of defeat a large grinning monster towering over the protagonists. No matter what is throw its way it keeps on coming. The protagonist forced to rise again and again to face it but never defeating it. The smiling face starring down, it has no need for fear, or anger its going to win it can not be stopped and it knows this.

Yet all the while the protagonist fights on again and again looking for some final way to defeat it despite the ever increasing sense that there is no way out. But they keep on going, and that's something I'd admire in them, and want in myself.

It seems timely ....

To all the other Triss Merigold's out there bless us all.

A single sentence I toyed with but left in draft form a few weeks back.... why not post it now

Maybe someday we'll stop playing with fire...

Reflections on persona 3.

Persona 3 is easily one of my favourite games of all due in no small part to persistent themes and symbolism of death, dread, the tower card in tarot and perhaps most importantly the choices we make in the face of these things.

I've heard from more then one friend that I always come of as possitive. I'm enthusiastic and optimistic while other people are freaking and worrying I'm taking it all with a grin and coming out on top. Much like the title of the game my outward appearence is just a persona while not a lie its not the whole truth either. Its a mask that doesn't hide my face but obscures it and to some extent protects it.

Through out persona 3 the main characters deal with a series of increasingly dark themes. People around town being dried of energy and deisre, a so called apathy syndrom leaving them bleak and lifeless. Stories of individual loss both of friends and in the lives of people they meet, divorces, failed relationships abound. Further more the specter of death literally haunts the game. A powerful monster thanatos stalking the party through the dungeons, and the growing presence of Nyx the final boss of the game. Nyx a black winged elegantly crafted monster wearing the porceline face of a former friend grinning down on the party in the final encounter. Unstopable, unkillable an ever looming threat, through the course of a grewling 14 stage battle each defeat yielding only a new form and a continuation of the fight. Its grinning face never changing as you combat each stage.

It seems an apt face for my troubles, always looming in one form or another even in the best of times, strikeing mostly at night, the midnight hour the time in the game when the monsters appear. It brings me low beats me down and I struggle and fight to vanquish it. It goes away but never for long, hours, days, weeks and its back, the black looming monstrosity grinning down at me. Knowing all too well that my victory was fleeting it is back again a new form, a new shape a new struggle, as I muster the energy to push it back again.

True to all predictions Nyx can't be killed. The after 14 stages it unleashes waves of energy crushing the player and their friends to the ground. The party unable to rise as wave after wave flow over them. It is only through the power of his social links, the friendships and people he's come to know that the protaganist can rise off the ground an vanquish Nyx. But it is not killed, no it takes all the energy the protagonist has to seal it away, unable to harm the world for a time as the main character slips away and dies with his friends a few months later. There is something... comforting in such an end. I've long found the heroic sacrifice of the main character strikes a deep chord with me. A meaningful death...

And so to some extent is is with me the night falls the walls close in my mood drops and I fight and struggle to regain myself but my foe is never truly gone always returning but I rise again and again to meet them. I sometimes find it scary how helpful my friends are. They are a great source of my optimism, enthusiasm and energy, my ability to rise and struggle against my dark moods. I fear my times away, my journey's home, how i will manage without them for days on end, no one to see or talk to, to joke and play and head off on simple adventures with. And yet I always manage and I go on, much like the protagonist I choose not to hide from it but rise again and again to face my foe. Always know they'll be back as I push them from my mind again and again. Maybe it's something about this central struggle that has had such a lasting impression on me, but I know I'll climb the dark tower of Tartarus again some day, and battle Nyx to the battle for everyone's souls....

Cranky news links

Weee good day for cranky news stories.

Some nice cranky news stories on subjects I like. Vitamins generally a big scam unless you are suffereing from a serious condition, scurvy, osteoporosis chronic wasteing etc.
http://www.alternet.org/vitamin-industry-scam-says-medical-journal-annals-internal-medicine

For all the conspiracy theories around big pharma, (justified and not) very few people seem to think the same way about "natural" health remedies or vitamines and all the money in their industry.

Another product sold without much real evidence of effectiveness antibacterial soap.
http://io9.com/theres-no-evidence-antibacterial-soap-is-more-effectiv-1484817036

Not to mention possible harm.

Found kittens

Pictures of the kittens we found at the cottage this past weekend.

Dorm room photos

Assorted dorm room photos starting on roomie's side then over the kitchen and my side.