We’re All Special, Even if We Don’t See It.

I’m  weird as hell. That’s for sure. I tend to get along with others that are also weird as hell. But everyone who knows me knows this.

I have this discussion with every actor before we get into anything. But everyone has their own special abilities or something that makes them awesome and irreplaceable.

I generally bring up Barrett when I speak of this. You have someone who’s caring, compassionate, loving, and so creative… but with a quirky exterior. People can and will judge you on that alone. I’m the same way. They see I’m kinda quiet, make vulgar jokes and remain politically active and big on the social justice front.  What they don’t see is what you can really do and what you can do for them.

That includes being a good friend, having a kind word to say in a time of crisis.

And people won’t always defend you in your time of need. Simply because because it really doesn’t suit them or whatever imagine they’re trying to portray of themselves. Though shitty I understand why you wouldn’t stand up for the guy over there who seems unhinged. Everybody is worried about their own bottom line instead of worrying about what’s right.

Me personally a lot of it is that I don’t talk with my balls out like I’m the next great american filmmaker or I’m out to make the next Godfather. I’m not big in creative circles because I’m have to make work that people can enjoy and lose themselves in. I’m not here to jack anyone off. It’s not nearly my purpose. I’m not being paid for that. Pay my rent and send your penis this way.

But seriously…

I just don’t want to look back and say I should have done this or that in a creative space. Barrett even told me t Simply on the fact that I made an assumption about how someone is. You could lose a lot.

I just make it a rule to see how people tick. Sometimes they’re good, sometimes bad. It’s always worth it.

Now let’s make this movie Barrett and I wanted to make, and see what crazy stuff will happen.

The Last 4 Months: Views on Love, Life, and Trying to Make Positive Lemonade

2017 was a rough year. I didn’t really get anything done creatively like I wanted and I was dealing with one of the worst times of my life in September through January. It’s rough because all I really want to do in life is create stuff and let people have fun.

But anyway, as the title suggests, we have a lot to talk about, so let’s get started.

Things were terrible. I had to sell all my film equipment to just make rent. So yeah, it was hard to say the least. I was still living in my apartment in a certain city. But being out of work since October and only working minimum wage after that so I was barely making ends meet. My landlord, who’s a great guy just couldn’t let me stay there anymore. I was months behind on rent and he knew the situation and helped as much as he could. The end of September came and it was time for me to go. I got rid of almost everything I owned to be ready to live in my car (again).

The day came and I had no where to go. This is where… we’ll call her.. Ida comes in. I had know her for close to a decade. Wonderful woman. We had actually had lunch a few weeks ago prior and we talked about life, romance and whatnot. But now she was assisting me in my move.

Like I said, I had no where to go. And she had gotten into town the same day to stay for good and was moving in with her good friend Ken. He was having issues and troubles and stuff and came all the way from across the country, straight uprooting herself to do so.

That’s a good friend in my book.

Anyway, Ken heard that I was in trouble from Ida and he was like, bring him with you. I had my doubts at first. But the property they were going to live on is also where my old friend Tom lived too. So, living with 3 good friends? What could possibly go wrong? Not that I had many other options I really wanted to explore at the moment. This was a chance to go in  different directions and not fall into old patterns.

When I got to the house, we had been unpack other stuff for a while but alas it was time to sleep. The house was smaller than me and Ida had thought.

Here’s how it was. There were 2 houses on the property. A big house up front where Tom lived and the three of us crammed into the much smaller rear house. Yeah. We’ll get into that later. That said, I should have asked for specifics but I was just glad I wasn’t on the street.

That night I, I had nowhere to sleep and Ida was like, sleep in my room. Tired me wasn’t quite registering what she was saying, but I was on the floor orf her room and she asked what I was doing? And which side of the bed I wanted. It still didn’t register, and my 2 hours of sleep had me in a confused haze. Then she took her clothes off and I was like… okay… I get now. This doesn’t require anymore detail.

The next morning I went down to get some breakfast, Ken was there and we talked for a bit about movies and stuff. And he told me that I’m pretty much everything he looks for in a boyfriend.

Now let’s stop right there. Take note because I’m sure this comes into play.

But Ida came down soon after  and everything was business as always. She was going with Ken to his appointments and whatnot. He would almost act as if he owned her. She was truly not feeling it. And I truly wasn’t feeling it either.

The second night we slept together yet again, and we’re like okay, this is going to be a thing. She was excited, as was I. It was nice, I’m not going lie about it.

But there was trouble a brewing.

Ken confronted me and didn’t want me to sleep with her anymore because of her bad back. I We of course know it was because he was just jealous. Of both the relationship and the fact that I had a lot of her attention. Mostly me listening to her talk. Not a bad thing, I like doing that.

And that night I was on the couch, which was comfortable as hell. I want one of them. But anyway, this is where me and her spent nearly every night night talking about stuff, watching King of the Hill, and frequently drying her tears among other activities. But this first night, my head was in her lap and we were just talking about random things and she stopped me self depreciating humor to ask me why I hate myself.

This conversation of course went to about 4am with her grilling me on all my insecurities and convincing me that I was worthy of love, especially hers. Never in my life had anyone shown me that type of compassion, patience and kindness while listening… actually listening to my problems and giving me real solutions.

These late nights went on for weeks.

But as the days and weeks went by, Ida was crying… a lot because Ken was getting more controlling, starting to lie, and making her feel like she made a huge mistake.

Meanwhile, Tom was in the other house, saw and heard things that were going on… and decided to be passive and ignore it.

I decided it would be the best of I got out of there. But I wasn’t going to just leave her there and have her suffer. So I stayed, just to make sure she stayed all right. And I tried to keep her as happy and positive as possible, getting her out of the house sometimes. When we were out together she smiled a lot, she was happy, so I was happy.

But now things get a little hairy. Ida as I learned was polyamorous (or so she says) I actually did talk to her boyfriend in her old city. He was a chill dude, beard and all that. I’m like okay, I don’t know how long this can truly last. But as long as everyone is happy, so was I.

A couple of weeks later she was holding it together as well as she could, as was I. But I could tell she was at her end. She was crying more, smoking more. But it all came to a head when she went to her sister’s house.  I of course went along with my day and was like… I don’t want to hang around with the unstable liar all weekend. So Ida told me to come hang out with her and play with the dog.

So I jumped at that chance, and I spent the night there.

While I was eating breakfast with her, Ken calls me and tells me to get my shit out of the house. That he and Ida don’t want me there. Which is weird to hear when she’s sitting in front of me. She of course was pissed and decided she was leaving too. So we went and got our stuff. And that was that. All the whole way, hearing Ida scream on the phone about how I stole her.

But a day later, I’m at my friends, where I reside now. I was seen Ida about one a week, we’d talk and enjoy each other’s company. But things were a little different. Quite a few times, we were interrupted by her other boyfriend, even when we actually out on a date. Is that a rude thing? I’d say so. But anyway, the weird thing about this one is that I had zero contact with this one. I just knew she would always get texts from him at the worst time and she’d get preoccupied.

And I even planned some things in advance, and of course I get trumped by a much more expensive thing planned by the other boyfriend… on the same day. Naturally this doesn’t make you feel good. But she apologized, said we’ll hang out and stuff for Christmas. There’d be lots of dogs and it’ll be fun. Awesome.

I got her a very heartfelt gift and everything, but there was one problem.

I didn’t hear a word from her.

-Days went by.

A week, two weeks.

I was able to catch her, and told her that we needed to talk, because of course, just ignoring a person you say you love for that long is a little disconcerting. She agreed and said we’d meet next week.

I still haven’t seen her. She never responded to any more of my messages, and took the time to change her profile picture to her and her boyfriend so yeah, that was kinda it for me dawg. Like, just doing something like that to somebody isn’t fixing whatever problem it is. You’re just telling someone to fuck themselves.

It’s just abusive quite frankly. She knew quite well I have a problem with that and I’m sure it was purposeful.

It was really a new emotion for me, heartbreak, I mean true heartbreak. But then again, maybe it’s not new. I felt the same way when my dog died.

This was at the turn of the new year, so it’s taken me a minute to write about it because I wanted to write about it in a positive manner, and I was just upset to levels unknown to myself. Had I written this then, I wouldn’t have had a lot of nice things to say about her. Terrible, vile things. But even if they do deserve it, I’m not going to be the one to dish out anger and insults. I have better things to do.

But all in all I just know this. I NEVER EVER EVER want to make anyone feel the way I felt and honestly still do. Even if it’s not working out, that person deserves basic love and respect.

She even told me, “If we’re going to be rubbing our genitals on each other and shit we need to talk about everything.”

I have so many issues that were actually being dealt with and helped with, including the monster known as abandonment issues.

She looked me dead in the eye and said she’d never leave me.

She said I needed professional help with that and a few other issue.

I sure as fuck do now that’s for sure.

I’m not even so mad about breaking up and all. I’m mad that all that personal growth really feels like a lot of wasted time. And there were betrayals at every turn that really put me in a worse place mentally than when I actually started. That pisses me off.

And I have to go ahead and say, she doesn’t represent those in poly relations. Not by a long shot. The people I know in those relationships are some of the happiest people I know. They put a lot of work into it but reap a ton of great benefits. This is just a perfect example on how those relationships shouldn’t be. I don’t want to be jaded or anything, I’ll just write it off as a bad experience that doesn’t represent that whole.

When it comes to be, in a romantic capacity, I’m a naturer, which shouldn’t be much of a surprise to anyone who knows me (Did you eat breakfast, did you take your medicine, are you feeling okay today). But I just hope they return the favor and make me happy… however

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So I tend to be nervous as hell and question every move I make. Simply out of fear. Even if there’s really nothing I have to worry about.

It’s like this, it’s not the sex I’m worry about the most. Granted it was good, quite good, the best part was the thought that something thinks I’m cool enough and worthy enough to love all the time. Someone who’s legit excited to see you every day and can’t stop thinking about you. That’s true love and it’s just the coolest thing to experience. And that’s what I want more than anything.

All I can be glad about is that I’m still alive and have my physical health. Here’s to good women… or those that are at least trying to be good.

Do I harbor any hatred? If there’s any it’s only towards certain individuals who were THERE and saw things happening but just ignored it because it wasn’t effecting them yet.

As for the woman… no, I don’t have any hatred at all. I’m sad that she’s missing out on someone like me. Think about it, anyone who’d stick it out with you through those levels of bullshit is a keeper.

I’m worthy of someone, just a matter of who and when. And it’s okay because it’ll happen when it happens.

Bad, but in a good way. Bad Moms Christmas

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Well, last year, Bad Moms came out. It was a fun little movie that was a lot funnier than it really should have been. The tale of three suburban moms trying to take the stick out of their asses and live life. At least that’s what I got from it.

Now, a year later. We have the same group of women getting the stick out of their asses… at Christmas. With the parents coming to visit conveniently at the same time.

Susan Sarandon, Christine Baranski, and Cheryl Hines join the cast this time around as the grandmothers and as you could guess, are all clashing with their children in one way or another.

If you’ve seen any Christmas movie, you’re already seen the one. From the buildup of the anger, to the blowup, to the reconciliation. It’s all standard stuff. You’ll have some really good laughs in there though. They don’t always feel organic, but they’re laughs nonetheless.

And yes, there’s a swath of movie that’s literally a commercial for Jumpzone. They Adam Sandlered a commercial into the movie. But the scenes were funny so it’s okay I guess.

3/5… it’s fun and you should see it after you make the better choice and see Thor. And there’s a sequel coming so you might as well be up to date. It’s not as good as the first. But that’s a rarity these days anyway.

So go see Thor AND this. It’s a good combo.

 

Welcome to Purgatory: Trying to understand life after trying to take your own.

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Welcome to purgatory my friends.

Of course I mean a mental one, not an actual physical one… or is purgatory purely spiritual? But that’s for another day. I’m simply referring to a negative state of mind you can’t get out of. It feels like you do everything you can, but you just end up right back where you started. Like you’re fenced in by failure, anxiety, or whatever else you might perceive is weighing you down.

You’ll spend your days, not necessarily depressed, but more hopeless. You haven’t given up but you just seem to be spinning your wheels.

In my case, it comes off my suicide attempt. Of course I didn’t die (this was almost 10 years ago now.) But as you’re going through all those failures and hardships, even a decade later, no matter how many good things happened, you’re brought back to this terrible place where you started.

You sit there some days and you just want to die. But you know you’ve already tried that. That shit hurt and didn’t even work out for you then. Maybe you just weren’t meant to die then for whatever reason. But now you know that you’re stuck in this world for the time being whether you want to or not. It’s completely out of your hands.

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What can be done?

People will tell you to “Just get over it”. Well you can’t, this mess is going to haunt you in one way or another for the rest of your life. So there’s no simple fix. Drinking and drugs only mask it.

I honestly can’t tell you. What you can do is take every day one at a time. I’m not going to pretend to be an expert on the issue, because it’s really not that simple. Everyone’s going to feel the way they’re going to feel. I just choose to work on making other people happy. Movies and stuff are always a great escape for me when I’m at my lowest. So I want to give back that way. And memes, I love to share memes and laughs with others. Not to mention dogs. I love dogs. I love working with them and petting and loving them.

Between those things I find it makes the days almost tolerable.

In the end, I think it’s about making sure no one feels the same terrible way I do every single day of my existence.

I wanted it to be a good movie. Skiptrace (2016) review.

Jackie Chan.

Okay, you already know it’s going to at least be worth a watch. And Skiptrace is.

But wait, there’s more. You got Jackass’ own Johnny Knoxville in it too? This pretty much guarantees someone’s going to get hurt for no reason.

Yeah, I forgot about this movie too. But I finally got around to watching it.

Jackie Chan plays a cop (surprise) who’s always after this crime boss called “The Matador” and his partner and best friend is killed.

Knoxville plays a conman who witnesses a murder in a Hong Kong casino and ends up being shipped off to Russia by the mob. Yeah, there’s a lot going on here and it’s not really  completely thought out. But we do have WWE’s own Eve Torres with a bad Russian accent.

From there, we find Jackie coming to Johnny’s rescue and the embark on a road trip from Russia to Hong Kong. All the while being chased by both the Russians and the Hong Kong… crime whatever. They learn more and more from one another and find a little common ground.

There’s a twist. It’s actually pretty okay.

But obvious ADR problems and numerous plot holes keep this from being great. Which is a shame because Jackie and Knoxville make a great team. I hope they make another movie together. Hell, I’ll take a sequel to this even.

5/10. This movie could be a lot more fun if the Russians weren’t always randomly showing up. They didn’t even give a valid reason for randomly running into them. But you can also never go wrong with watching Jackie awkwardly fight people.

Let’s Talk About some Damn Puzzle Games

I’m going to keep this short.

I love Puyo.
I love Tetris.

Puyo and Tetris together. Yes!

And yes I know it’s been out in Japan for quite some time. And yes I’ve gotten to play it a few times. But now I can read stuff. Because it’s finally getting an (official) western release.

 

Here’s the video. I just can’t right now.

I knew it was coming. I just needed a date. And there we go. The question remains, do I get it for Switch or PS4? I might just go with PS4 because arcade stick. But I’m going to the Switch Event next week and will get some hands on time. So I’ll figure that out.

All right. Back the the grindy grind.

 

Cursing, Axes, and MacBook Pros: Fist Fight (2017) Review

We’ve all gotten into a fight after school, sometimes with a bully. And that’s when we truly learned to stick up for our damn selves… or just got our asses beat into the ground like the chickens we were. That’s the concept on the whole film. Standing up for your damn self.

A high school teacher (Charlie Day) is accused of getting his fellow teacher (Ice Cube) fired because he was acting all crazy towards the students. This of course prompts the crazy teacher to challenge him to a fist fight after school. You know, because he’s just that nuts.

This is, at it’s core a remake of the (I guess) classic 3 O’clock high. But instead of the a kid trying to avoid the fight at all costs, we have an adult doing it. That’s where the MacBook Pro comes in. But I don’t wanna spoil anything for you.

When the fight DOES occur, you’ll be treated to one of the best fight sequences I’ve seen in many many many many years. All while the laughs keep coming.

It’s also worth noting that Tracy Morgan is finally back on screen and still hilarious as always. Good to see he’s getting better and hasn’t really lost a step in his time off.

Come for the fist fight. Stay for the Big Sean song. It’s worth the price of a ticket alone.

And as an added bonus, there was a Q&A with Charlie Day and director Richie Keen. Got a picture with Charlie, it’s on my twitter.

But yeah, give this movie your support. They talked about what they would do for a sequel. So please go see this so it’ll happen.

9/10. I came out of it smiling. That’s rare for me these days.

 

 

Is it the Shoes? Kicks (2016) Review

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It’s just like the time I went searching for the perfect DDR shoe.
Except it’s not like that at all.

What we do have is Justin Tipping’s first big foray into the wide world of features (welcome yo).

I’ll keep this spoiler free as always.

The movie follows 15 year old Brandon. He’s not that special a kid. He’s really small and he doesn’t have the nicest shoes. He and his two friends hang out everyday, doing the same thing a lot of us high school kids did. Go to the corner store, smoke, play ball. That shit.

But a chance encounter gets him a pair of red Jordans. Yes, the originals (Being from Chicago, I know them well.) And people start to notice him finally. That is, until he gets robbed by a thug named Flaco and his goons. So after feeling sorry for himself, he decides to go find his shoes and get them back. Setting him on the most epic adventure your average 15 year old can get.

On the way, he learns about what really matters, friends and just doing the right thing. Not continuing the violent cycle.

The film really spoke to me not only because I was a nothing special kind of kid. I’m a nothing special kind of adult to many. We have this greatness inside of us all the time that we know is there. It’s just a matter of getting someone else to see it as well. And that’s what Brandon does, even if he’s not feeling the results of the matter.

At the end of the day, it’s one of the things I like best. Just a modest story, told on a modest budget. That’s where the real human stories are.

Check it out on demand right now. Or you can come to my house and watch it if you want. But I’m kidding, don’t come to my house.

Can’t wait to see how Lowriders comes out, and hire me. Please. lol.

“Don’t Be That Guy” Overwatch Edition

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We all know that guy.

Don’t be that guy that fucks your whole team up because you’re a dumbass.

1. Don’t play “X” Pls.

I play with my buddy Bigfoot all the time (He streams! Yay!) And (almost) every time he plays Symmetra. Symmetra is a good character. Symmetra has the highest fucking win percentage in the game right now. So that must mean everyone wants a Symmetra on their team because math, right? You would think.

Nope.

“Plz don’t pick Sym. She sucks.”

That’s not what the numbers say. Yet Bigfoot is raking in those Golds. So, make of it what you will. You never know who can be balls out crazy with a character.

 

2. Telling folks to change their characters (at the start)

Now okay, I know that competitive is serious business. I take it pretty seriously too. But you have to remember that at the same time this isn’t professional eSports here. A certain team comp isn’t going to prevail every time and you’re generally playing with a bunch of randoms. You don’t really know what their strengths and weaknesses are as players right from the start.

However, whenever I do see folks struggling, I either switch characters to give THEM some back. Or I simply just ask them if they’re all right playing whoever they’re playing. I’m not just gonna be a dick about it. I need the other team to be salty. Not mine.

3. Less Time Typing. More Time Playing

This goes without saying. If you have time to type and complain, that’s valuable seconds where you could be in position or backing up your teammates.

4. Don’t leave the game.

Don’t fucking do it.

5. Healz Pls

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If I’m playing support, I’m generally hanging around the group… you know, supporting. If you wanna run out alone like a dumbass and expect me to run in there and bail you out, that’s most likely not going to happen. Which kinda goes with number 3. In that time typing, your ass could get over to the group so I can heal ya’ll up.

 

Just remember this shit. And other stuff I might not think about. And maybe you’ll at least not have your team pulling their hair out.

Or everyone will still suck regardless.

With love.

A Lúcio main.