Why Would I Write

Category: Thoughts

  • Drinking Ain’t What It Used To Be

    Yesterday I was at a drinking party and I wasn’t the one making a fool of myself. It felt strange. Like I knew what it was like to be that guy and I was no longer him. Trying my best to appear sober, while downing more drinks than my body could handle. Talking out of line, loudly, and acting ridiculous.

    Younger George wouldn’t say no to that drink. At least that’s what I remembered. Younger George would never say no to any drink. After all, if it had alcohol, it was delicious and bound to be fun. I wonder if there’s a way to measure how many brain cells I’ve had destroyed by drinking past my limit.

    Then again, younger George has been through some shit. Fortunately for younger George, he had amazing friends who looked after his drunk ass when he went down. Honestly, those guys are all champs. Younger George didn’t deserve them, but they were there for him anyway.

    I remember during my initial days of clubbing – a group of us would have trouble even finishing one bottle of whiskey. Then we got more tolerant and could even do a single bottle between two people. Now I can’t drink that much anymore, also I believe I’m much better at controlling my intake. Because even though it was fun talking about the adventures of younger George, it only seems funny because I was being an idiot – and I came out of my incidents mostly unscathed.

    It took a serious car accident to make me realize how stupid I was but in reality, that didn’t need to happen.

    Anyway, I still enjoy some alcohol every now and then, but I can go for weeks without a drink. It’s not a necessity in my life. I’m equally happy having conversation over sips of hot coffee or tea, and a cigarette or vape in my other hand. There’s no need for the high of alcohol when you have the company of good friends around you. Younger George would have suggested afternoon drinks instead.

    “You’re a shadow of your former self! What happened to you?”

    It’s alright, I’m okay with having less ‘fun’ these days – at least my friends and family won’t have to worry about me every time I go out. Also, I won’t have to spend so long shitting out the previous night’s drinks in the toilet or wasting the day nursing a hangover. It’s a win-win situation. Farewell, younger George. It was nice knowing you.

  • Macroblogging and Dead Links

    Every now and then, I read through some old posts on my blog and go through the comments section. Commenting on blogs used to be a thing. I remember. That’s how I made some friends on the internet. These days, people just comment on the Facebook post about the link instead. If not comments, you just get likes or some reactions.

    I guess it’s just how things have evolved. Back then there was no such thing as microblogging. The only way you could update people about your life was through MSN nickname statuses or blogs. I remember, almost everybody had a blog back then. It was the normal thing to do. Now I think having a blog is probably out of fashion. But that’s okay, it’s my way of practicing writing and putting out whatever is in my head.

    Anyway, back then when people commented on my blog, they would leave links to their own blog so I could check them out. That was one way of meeting new people online. I could check out their writing and if I found it interesting, I’d leave a comment and link their page if I liked it enough. Friendships would live and grow in the comments sections of posts.

    I guess all the long breaks I took in between blogging kinda killed off the steam and interest people had in visiting this page. Blogging is kinda like the YouTube of the past. If content creators don’t constantly churn out new content, they’d be forgotten. It was even worse for blogs because unless you had an RSS reader or subscribed to email updates, you wouldn’t have any way of telling whether the blog had new posts short of manually checking it out yourself. At least with YouTube you get emails or notifications on the site itself telling you about new videos on channels you subscribed to.

    But then again, who has time to read these days? I’m blogging for an audience of less than ten people daily (haha) but that’s okay. It feels good to write anyway. And I might as well make up for all the times I didn’t blog in the past. I mean, keep throwing shit against the wall until something sticks right?

    I don’t even read many blogs these days. I do read a lot of posts on Facebook though. It’s the modern version of blogging. And I don’t have to exit Facebook to read them. I guess that was the Zuck’s plan all along – keep everybody on the site so they don’t have to leave.

    Anyway I was prompted to write this post when I was clicking on links left by people who used to comment on my blog and realized that they were all dead links. IMO blogging died when everybody started doing advertorials instead of content about their lives. Shout out to Albert for keeping it real!

  • dreamingtosleep

    I enjoy dreaming. It’s a hobby though it’s not something I can control. If I had my way, I’d dream every night. It’s like combining two of my favorite pastimes into one – watching movies and sleeping. The best part is, I don’t miss anything (unlike falling asleep in the cinema),

    I’ve always been curious about the significance of dreams. Most of the time they don’t mean anything. But there have been times where I have acted on my dreams for no good reason. I mean, they’re just dreams right? No need to kick up a fuss about them. That’s what I did anyway. I remember I had a dream that (after looking it up online) signified I was looking for a change in my life, and I decided to take it to heart – so I quit my job. Granted, I was already thinking about it before the dream, but the dream somehow prompted me to finalize my decision.

    But looking back, it was confirmation bias – I was looking out for some sort of sign to justify the idea. I mean, it wasn’t like I quit my job to start the next Facebook or go on to be a successful entrepreneur. I didn’t have to act on it immediately, but I did it anyway. I did the same thing in my first relationship too. I asked god to give me a sign, and when she asked to end the relationship, I agreed because I thought that was a sign from god. Again, I was young and dumb (now older, still dumb) and it makes no sense to me now. But that’s just how life goes.

    So anyway, I’ve had some pretty vivid dreams over the past few weeks, some outrageous (like meeting a person who turned out to be a ghost), and some realistic (ever dreamed about going to work before? I have). Last night, I dreamed that someone I knew was a mechanical keyboard fan (that person probably has no idea what a mechanical keyboard even is) and showed me their collection of keyboards. It sounds stupid, I know – dreams usually do, but I find it fascinating that your brain can stitch together your thoughts into a somewhat cohesive (at the time of dreaming) story line.

    Sometimes you have no idea if it’s a dream, sometimes you do. Sometimes you’re in control, sometimes you’re not. It’s like going to the movies without knowing the title or genre of the film. You’re in for a treat every time (I’ve probably had some boring dreams before, I just don’t remember them since they were unmemorable). One thing I’ve noticed from all my years dreaming – if you don’t record down what you dreamed about the moment you wake up, details become increasingly harder to recall with each passing second.

    I’m still looking forward to the day where we have the tools to record our dreams. I wonder if they’ll be as interesting as we seem to think they are, or just random nonsense. Which reminds me of those apps that record your speech in your sleep. I’ve always been curious to know if I’m a sleep talker. However, I’m also afraid that I might record some shit I don’t want to hear (i.e. me saying creepy shit, or voices other than mine in the room in the middle of the night).

    “Dreams should just stay fading away” – Jason Chan, 2017.