Who Needs Cupid Anyway?

Well internet, it's almost time. That one time of year when a guy who is in any form of ongoing relationship is forced to fork out some hard earned cash on chocolates, flowers and puppy themed Hallmark cards. Yep, it's Valentines Day!! (val-innie-tuin-dag for my Afrikaaner peeps)

Now before I get started on what a waste Valentines Day is, a quick mention of the history behind this nonsense. A quick read through the Wikipedia entry on the topic talks about St Valentines Day starting out as a worship party/celebration in honor of some saints named Valentinus. Apparently Valentinus of Rome was sentenced to death for illegally marrying soldiers (it was illegal for soldiers to marry at all) and preaching to Christians (also illegal before Emperor Constantine came along). At his execution he left a note signed "Your Valentine" for a girl that he helped during his stay in prison. At this point I got bored and skimmed the rest of the page which went on to mention a couple of poems and an ancient Roman festival. As to why some dude getting hauled to the gallows has caused me to have to buy a girl chocolates will remain a mystery. The Wikipedia article was sketchy at best, and cupid didn't feature.

Anyways, back to the business at hand and a few reasons why I find Valentines to be a waste. Firstly, that cupid thing is just stupid. Ever try give a girl chocolates after shooting her in the bum with an arrow? She won't want chocolates, she'll want to moer you!! Shouting surprise afterwards just adds fuel to an already raging fire. I don't recommend it. 

Secondly, the whole mass marketing thing that accompanies the month and a bit long campaign gets tedious very quickly as well. I say month and a bit because as soon as January 1st and Happy New Year come off the shelf, up goes February 14th and Valentines Day. And it gets aggressive too. Sweep her off her feet with this, bowl her over with that or smother her with love this year by buying her (insert expensive stuff here). Are they trying to get you to show affection or quietly suggesting ways to kill her and make it look like an accident?

My third and final reason is a bit more on the serious side. Why is only one day important enough to warrant showing someone how much they mean to you in a fun and hopefully creative way? Why not once a week or even once a day? It doesn't have to be anything huge or ostentatious. Just a text or a note if possible to say "you're on my mind" or doing something unexpected like a surprise dinner. This goes for the married folk out there as well. The romance doesn't die when you take the vows. Do a few extra chores now and then, whisper "I love you" in her ear as you're walking past or bite your tongue and be more pleasant next time the mother-in-law swings round for an interroga... I mean a coffee.

When did we become so busy that we allowed the corporate machine to guilt us into shelling out on expensive gifts and over-priced dinners? Because we're all guilty. Too busy working, too busy playing, too busy doing everything else to be noticing the little things that matter. 

I hope everyone has a great Valentines, well those of you that have to celebrate it anyways haha! I'll leave you with this quote I thought was rather fitting. Cheers!!

True love comes quietly, without banners or flashing lights. If you hear bells, get your ears checked

Erich Segal

Yes, I'm a Gamer... So What?

"So what do you do in your spare time?" I was asked. An obviously common question with a very weighty answer. The answer to this question can tell you a lot about a person and will probably form at least half of your overall opinion of them. Why I don't enjoy getting asked this question has a lot to do with what I enjoy doing in my spare time... I'm a Gamer!!! For some strange reason people add this to the negative column when summing up their opinion of me, and I can't figure out why.

When I started writing this post I was going to write about a conversation I had with a very interesting person about the amount of time I spend playing computer games. The more I thought about what to put down here in "defense" of my favorite past-time, the more I started thinking about how many people stereotype nerds in general and even though technology has become something of a birthright, geeks and nerds are still misunderstood to a degree.

I love being on my computer. I play games with my friends, listen to music, watch movies and series, browse the interwebs, do my writing, etc. Not only that, but I am a Server Administrator by trade. All in all I spend on average 16 hours a day at a computer of sorts… and I love it! I get paid to do my hobby. But the sticking point for most people is how I spend so much time playing games instead of doing something “constructive”. I’ve heard it all but basically the general consensus is that games are for kids. Apparently upon reaching tax-payer status I should be doing grown up things like spending hours on a couch watching TV or (insert grown-up activity here).

Since I got my first computer as a kid, the majority of my time spent on it was playing games. Back in the day this made me, as well as my friends, social outcasts. Computers weren’t seen to be cool. They were stuff the nerds and geeks played with while all the cool kids went to parties and did cool-kid stuff like getting drunk or falling pregnant… or sometimes both. Fast forward a few years and those same people think you’re pretty friggen weird unless you have a Facebook/ Twitter/ LinkedIn/ Tumblr/ Pinterest/ Instagram/ Google+ account set up on your smartphone/ laptop/ tablet/ phablet/ blackberry. Don’t even get me started on the shocked expression on someone’s face when you tell them you’re on neither Whatsapp nor BBM. It’s almost like they don’t know how else to get hold of you haha!

Back to the topic at hand, why is it weird that I play computer games so much? What’s wrong with being a gamer? As far as relationships go, gamers make the best boyfriends. If we’re not out with the girlfriend we’re at home playing games, not out at a bar or strip club spending money on beer and loose women. Girlfriends will always know where to start looking if they needed to find us. Over the years games have increased in complexity and depth to such a degree that they offer a degree of realism very similar to the real-world. Flight Simulator allows me to enjoy my love of flying without having to spend tens of thousands on renting and licensing the real thing. Starcraft is a real time strategy game that I compare to playing chess at a million miles an hour. Like chess, the game involves outsmarting and outmaneuvering your opponent on a battlefield, controlling hundreds of units and buildings simultaneously. The ability to multitask is an important aspect to winning matches, which are played against human opponents across the world. Unlike chess, which is turn-based, Starcraft is real-time which means that decision making happens in split-seconds rather than minutes. Both Flight Simulator and Starcraft are games I’ve played for close to 20 years. How many kids can get 20 years play time out of any of their toys, or even adults for that matter?

I could go on about how gaming allows me to indulge my competitive side or how it allows me to escape from reality giving me time to relax and think about things from outside the box. However the main point I want to stress is that gamers are no different to anyone else you come across in your life. Of course there are exceptions like there are in any activity, but most of us are what everyone else would call normal, well-adjusted human beings. My real-world friends are also my online friends and I've known most of them since we were kids. We discuss politics, argue sports and make stupid fart jokes just like guys getting together at the pub, except we’re doing it over a game of Battlefield or Dota. The only differences are far less hangovers and a few extra bucks in the wallet.

At the end of the day, we all have our interests, our hobbies and things we enjoy doing. Stereotyping people based on what they enjoy doing is something we're all guilty of, perhaps if anything we could do more to keep an open mind when doing so.