Wandering Mind · 5:22am Dec 23rd, 2016

So I have a nice cup of chai and I'm sitting here editing a chapter of a commission, and my mind's wandering a bit. It occurs to me that I don't post very much to my blog on fimfiction that isn't direct information about one of my stories or where I am working on a story either for myself or somepony else. So here's a different big block of text.

I have no interest in Star Wars, Pokemon, or modern PC gaming.

Mind you, I don't hate any of these things. It's just interesting how often I am asked about them, or am approached with the natural assumption that I like them. I find, however, that just because of the type of fandoms I am into, I actually have a pretty decent bit of knowledge of Star Wars for somebody who isn't really interested in it. I watched the latest movie because it had Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher in it, which I thought was cool. The Rogue One thing, I have no idea what that is and am not particularly excited about it, much as I wasn't interested in any of the other movies they did after the original three. And yet - I still know a fair bit about them! I had Star Wars toys as a kid and I thought it was cool back then, but Star Trek was there during my impressionable years. Star Wars simply wasn't.

Pokemon started up in this country at the wrong time for me - a time when I was extremely into anime, and saw the show as an excuse to get people onto a 'collecting' bandwagon. I like cute things, but I wasn't really into the 'collect furry friends, confine them in tiny round cages, and then pit fight with them' angle. It felt kind of...well, mean, I guess. I can probably name somewhere around a dozen Pokemon offhand, but then, there we are again - because of my background in anime and the position I once held as the 'anime guy' at a local comic and game store, where I had to make it my business to know, I know more about Pokemon than you'd think for somebody who doesn't really care for it. Of course, that knowledge is now very dated...I have no idea how many precious gems or times of the day they've used to name their video games. Even at work, I was approached several times by folks who just naturally assumed I would be playing Pokemon Go. Nothing wrong with asking, of course - just it's interesting how easily that assumption can be made.

It's also interesting to note that as long as I capitalize it, my spell checker is not picking up 'Pokemon'. It's that into the vernacular that my spell checker knows what it is.

As for PC games, they went out of fashion a long time ago for me. With a family to mind and a job where I'm already staring at computer screens all day long, I'm just not willing to invest the time in staring at said screens even longer just to obtain some intangible achievement in a game. I got FPS and kill-and-level MMOs out of my system long, long ago, to the point that they just never came back into my field of interest (long ago as in, prior to the turn of the century). FPS gets repetitive really fast for me - shoot that dude half a dozen times and I start wondering what else I can do other than shoot things all the time. Can you believe I once had a friend who went as far as to get angry with me because I wouldn't invest a few grand in a 'gaming PC' so I could play some whatnot online shooter with them? Wow, can't we just talk?

My computer is probably by specs considered very subpar, but I could care less - I built it myself at a fantastic price, it does everything I ask it to do, and it does it all extremely well. Don't get me wrong, I do like video games. I'm just not progressive. I have a 3DS and a Vita so I can talk to you about those, and I'm big on homebrew with the DS and PSP, but other than that I'm quite happy with my NES, Atari, and the various emulators I can set up on my Wii. I also have a classic gameboy that I did a backlight/bivert mod on myself - I'm kinda proud of that. Retro for life! (Mind, I'm old enough that to me, N64 and Game Cube are not retro. They're too modern for that distinction.)

MMOs? I don't play MMOs anymore, nor will I, no matter how interesting they look. That includes Star Trek Online, which you'd think I would be ga-ga over because I'm such a trekkie. It's because of the original Everquest that I have such an aversion to these sorts of games. For one year in college, I became badly, badly addicted to that game. Must have new equipment. Must have next level. Playplayplayplayplay until the sun comes up. It began to affect my interest in the other aspects of life, as well as my grades. I came to understand that 'the next level' actually means nothing - that's fine for people if they want to do it, but I was wasting huge chunks of my life to achieve...nothing. I swore off, and I'm frankly frightened of a relapse, so I will not play them. The only posssssssible exception to this personal rule is Legends of Equestria, but we'll see. When it comes back around I'll probably play it, but as soon as I get any indication that it's trying to take over my life, it's gone.

Plus I can't be my OC there because you can't choose more than one coat color

Maybe the above is why I get asked about these things a lot. Because of what else I'm into, and the face that I sound like I'm interested! I don't hate any of these things and it's sometimes a shame I can't keep up with the conversation, but I simply don't care for them enough to change that, so here we are.

Oh, I don't like Harry Potter, either (another thing I know a bunch of stuff about without being interested in). But I'll talk to you about Star Trek, Lord of the Rings, PONIES, and a handful of other things if you like