A Long Time Coming?

Well, it sure has been a while. Almost a month, in fact. I am most definitely not been living up to my expectations with this blog at all. Oh well.

One of the reasons is that I've been so busy. Now that I've started my job, I don't get home during the week until 5:30 or so. My curfew is 10 (although, frankly, based on how tired I am every day after work, I can't really go much past that safely during the week anyways. The weekend is a different matter entirely, and can become really lame sometimes due to this fact). Once a month I work 8-12 at Shadow Mountain, meaning my Sunday once a month doesn't start until about 1. I also work every Sunday night, so I'm busy Sunday nights ~5-7:45. Each of these jobs provides something important (namely money or community service hours), but it is becoming the death of my social life.

Anyway. On to life. All's going pretty much to plan right now. Pretty much all I can say on that matter. Wish my car got better gas mileage, wish my curfew wasn't so early, but besides, no real complaints. For the first time in my adult/teen life, I'd have to say. Summer is nothing like what I had expected, but I'm not upset at all about that.

I haven't been chainmailling at all yet, besides winding quite a few coils and cutting most of them. I've got 1800 rings cut, but not finished....I just don't seem to have the hours I want to sit and crank a bunch out at a time. Something to work on, maybe even next week.

If I have neglected to hang out with you or call you, I'm very sorry, I've had almost 0 free time...and a lot of that has been reserved ahead of time for various purposes. I'll try to be better from now on.

At this point, in terms of my philosophies, ideas, thoughts, etc, there is very little happening on that front overall. One reason is that I've been so busy I haven't had much thinking time. The other is that, as of now, I'm getting closer and closer to solidifying my philosophies, I think (I'm always learning and open, of course, to new ideas.). They seem to be, for the vast majority of them, being proven that how I view things works.

The last thing, I think, for now, is to apologize for the lack of development on the writing front. I've promised more of the Ace's story, and have completely failed to deliver. That is my fault. I've put that story aside for a bit, while I was working on some other things. I plan on getting back to him soon, before the story stagnates. I think this is the first writing I've started that I feel I can continue to completion. For those of you that actually read it, and enjoy that story, maybe by the end of the month I'll have the next chapter up and done. Once school starts again, I should be writing more. We'll see.

So, in closing, this summer I'm looking forward to:

A host of epic movies, like Public Enemies, Harry Potter, etc.

Getting to Dizzy's more this summer and enjoying some epic jazz.

Figuring out skype on my macbook so I can start talking to my buddy across the country.

Doing more photography and digital arts.

Improving on guitar.

COMIC CON!

Spending time with her.

What are you looking forward to?

Signing off,

Tiberius Jones

So after some major turbulence last week, things are really looking up. I can honestly say I am, if not THE happiest I've ever been (despite some retarded constraints), I am definitely tied with that time. In fact, for those who know me well, this is odd. I never really talk about how happy I am. But I am going to, because I really am that much.

Some of this has come from a relatively radical shift in perspective (which has been happening over the last several months, really).

More to come when I get some time to explain more...

But for now, enjoy the music, and no matter what is happening in your life at the moment, whether it's in the shitter (I've been there before), or if it's as awesome as it could be, listen ot the following two videos, and look towards the new day.

Singing off,

Tiberius Jones

For this next song, it doesn't matter if you drink, take the idea and live it.

In looking over some recent events, I fear that some of the things I have interpreted and/or inferred are grossly incorrect. I hope I'm wrong about that, but as of now, it looks like some of the things I had hoped were going to happen this summer will not be happening.

Especially since yesterday evening, I have been losing control of certain parts of my life that I previously did have power over. Many of these things are not major or really meaningful, except that I could control them.

The reason why many people develop anorexia/bulemia is said to be that they don't have control over much of their lives, and so the one thing they can control, food, then becomes the forefront in their world. I don't know enough about the research to say this is true, but I believe it.

I feel a bit like that (don't worry, I'm not becoming destructive in any way). I just really hope that the one thing I was really holding out on will still work out. It's mostly my fault, to be sure. I have trouble in this area as it is, I'm inexperienced. But maybe I'll pull through and go ahead. Only then will I know whether or not it works out or not.

It's easier to keep this particular part of my life in limbo, but the longer I do, the closer I get to Hell rather than Heaven (terrible metaphor, but it describes it basically enough).

Don't put too much thought into this if you're reading this; this post I think is mostly for me (and a few people, who hopefully all know who they are). If you do give a crap though, I'd be happy to talk to you, privately.

Signing off,
A Very Worried Tiberius Jones

Fibonacci Sequences

I believe that with conscious effort, we all grow. Not necessarily physically; in the beginning, that is more true than later. To use an example, in the movie "Big Fish," Edward Bloom begins to grow too fast for his own body, and realizes that he, like the goldfish, will grow to the size of whatever bowl he is placed in. He needs a bigger bowl than the small Louisiana town he lives in, and eventually leaves. Edward's goldfish problem is mainly physical, but I have come to believe that the physical is only the beginning.

I think that, with the ever-important conscious effort included, that we grow not like goldfish (linearly), but like the Fibonacci sequence. For those of you who don't know, the Fibonacci sequence is an important mathematical formula that goes like this: 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, etc. The last two numbers are added to create the next one. There is a great Wikipedia article on the sequence, if you care about such things.

When we are small, we grow relatively slowly. But as time goes on, everything we learn builds on the previous things we have learned. School is a good example, but I ultimately am talking about life itself. We learn important lessons every day, each one only accessible when the last lesson has been learned. And as each successive number is created, we grow as people, until we become bigger and bigger. But the important thing here is consciousness of this. Without being aware of this phenomena, you will still keep adding your numbers, but much slower, and you will eventually stop much earlier in the sequence than someone who is aware of how it works.

If you can't see the pattern, how can you add to it?

There are good and bad patterns, some with upward spirals, and some with downward spirals. They all add up, are calculated into one large spiral, that defines you and your path. Sometimes, you'll derail, but you can get back up and continue. Sometimes, you won't. There are such things as making an unredeemable mistake. But they are fewer and farer between than most people think. There is almost always something to be had out of any situation, if you know how to look for it.

This brings me to my realization of this phenomena. Over the last year, I have made many mistakes. Some were huge, some didn't matter so much. But what I have been doing differently with these mistakes (and my successes) than before I left (or, much more so) is learning from them, consciously.

I realized another today/last night. I realized I had again fallen into the trap so many of us fall into: giving advice, but not following it ourselves. Talking the talk, without walking the walk, if you excuse my cliche saying. I have over the past year begun to try to talk less talk and walk more walk.

So when I realized what I was doing today/last night, I started thinking more about it, and eventually came upon my Fibonacci theory. Believe in it yourself or not, but it is one more of my theories that I will try to live my life by now, so now I must venture into another difficult realm for me, to overcome my talk and to start walking my walk in this particular facet of my life. If I fail, I will be disappointed in myself for not acting earlier, but will learn from my mistake. If not, then I'll still have something else to learn. Wish me luck.

"Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions."

        Oliver Wendell Holmes

"You learn something every day if you pay attention." 

        Ray LeBlond

Signing off, 

Tiberius Jones

River of Dreams

NOTE: This is fiction. Also, the last post was fiction too, but I forgot to put a heading on that said that. I have edited that post to include that heading now. Both this post and the last one are two of a couple one-pagers I wrote, bored. They're just random thoughts I expanded on and gave a voice to.

        What’s in a dream? Is it nothing? Are dreams what scientists believe, simply your brain rebooting, organizing, filing away random memories and ideas? Or are they more? Are dreams your subconscious, a way of your mind working out problems and issues without your conscious mind there to interfere and screw things up? Are they your subconscious trying to tell you something?

        Could a dream be a real thing, a real place that you build out of thoughts? Is it that you travel there when you sleep, transporting yourself to a private universe that you are master and commander of, where you float above everything as if on a cloud, and watch down as events unfold beneath your watch like raindrops, each one falling, falling, falling towards the ground of your constructed world?

        Perhaps these universes float past each other like an immense river, each person’s universe a tiny bubble, each one jostling and rubbing against another, where every person asleep on Earth is connected to each other, linked in this river of dreams.

        Perhaps, in the middle of the night, when you are sound asleep, dreaming of a rainy day where you sit, sit, sit in front of the crackling fire all day and drink cup after cup after cup of tea, that when you wake up suddenly and sit up fast, sweating for no reason because the fan is on in your room and the covers are all kicked off, maybe it’s because your personal bubble in the river of dreams was jostled too hard. Maybe your bubble popped, and your universe imploded around you in an instant. And you sweat because deep down you realize your mortality, and that even though this time it was only the death of your dreams, maybe next time it will be the death of you.

        And if these worlds existed, these tiny universes all sifting and flowing past each other in an endless river, simultaneous creation and extinction as people across the Earth fall asleep and wake up, if this river were real, what would make up the fish? And who would be the fisherman?

            

Signing off,

Tiberius Jones

Why Do I Always Feel So Strangled?

*EDIT*: This s fiction; I forgot to put a notice up. I wrote a couple random one-pagers. Here's the first one.

I feel strangled by the world around me. I have these feelings, thoughts, emotions, within me.

They make me feel like I have unlimited potential.

The world is at my fingertips. Whatever I so choose as to include in my domain, is. But I do not seek power, nor glory. I seek neither fame, nor fortune (not for the sake of itself). I seek fulfillment.

I have been undergoing a transformation lately. I believe that I am taking myself to a new, better place to be. I still make mistakes. I know I always will. Sometimes I see the future, in my dreams. I see nothing eventful, nothing of importance.

Eating fast food with a friend. I laugh and a fry falls from my mouth. We both laugh harder. The sun shines on us, reflects off the windows, off the concrete. Off the linoleum table and plastic umbrella above us. It is so bright I squint until my eyes are pinpricks trapped behind a prison of eyelashes. I reflect, in this dream, and again in the future when it happens, that this is as good as it gets. I will experience no greater joy, than the mutual feeling of being completed together. I will experience joys as powerful as this. But none more so.

I am not sure if I am normal, or if I am extranormal. I do not use extraordinary. I cannot literally fly. I do not have supervision. I am human.

I wonder if everyone feels this way. I am told that it is so, a part of growing older. Hormones, chemicals pouring through my body. An artificial feeling. Is all of this Evolution's dictation, or am I the exception to the rule?

People tell me they feel the same way. What if they only wish that were true? What if I do not feel this way, but wish I felt the way I think I do? Why does it matter?

I am not deep, introspective. My thoughts are abstract. If I tried to logically answer all of them, in a straightforward way, I would lose my life. Live is meant to be lived, and answers are only to learned from experience. To try to answer them in any other way is useless, mental masturbation. True answers are only revealed through experience.

I greatly fear not accomplishing what I need to in life. I do not fear the work. I do not fear failure. I fear complete failure, where I don't give up, but I can't win. Sometimes, it doesn't matter how hard you try, how good you are.

I waste time here, making up excuses. I disgust myself.

I have these feelings, thoughts, emotions, within me.

They make me feel like I have unlimited potential.

Why do I still fear what may happen if I unbind myself?








Signing off,
Tiberius Jones

Help Me Out Here

As much as I'd like to write a good long blog about something I have a strong opinion about or just write some short story, I am turning to you guys, ye few who read this. I've got a couple questions that I'd like and answer to, just a poll if you will. Please comment with your opinion, I like the sample of people who read this, and I'd like a comment from each of you. If you don't want to do the whole list, just answer them in a row until you're done (I want them answered in order of appearance)

Here are a couple of questions I'd like your opinion on:

1. Are you interested in/do you enjoy stories (articles, story, novel, movie, song):
a) about Investigative Journalists?
b) about Private Investigators?
c) with a bar/club/restaurant that serves as a major setting
d) based in San Diego? LA? New York? England? Europe? Asia? Africa? (basically, where's your favorite setting)

2. How often do you read for a reason other than a school/work-related one?

3. How long, on average do you read when you do so for non-school/work purposes?

4. What type (book, newspaper, blog, etc.) of reading do you prefer, and what genre (journals, fiction, history, etc.)

5-6. Same as 2-3, but for television/film (including internet video)

7-8. Same as 2-3, but with music?

9-10. And last time, same as 2-3, but with the internet (also, additional date on your social networking only data)


Signing off,
Tiberius Jones


Thanks guys. And here's something to listen to while you answer: