A Little Bit of Geekery

Well guys, guess what. Today was both E3 and WWDC. Playstation and Apple announcements all in one day. My tech-obsessed and nerdy self really can't handle much more excitement.

Let's face it, I game all the time. In fact, I'm usually gaming when I should be doing probably anything else. Like, say, writing, or keeping my blog up to date. (I feel the shame.) I've been so excited for any whiff of news about PS4 since rumors first surfaced that a new console would be out soon.

All the months of being teased and tempted with blogger speculation and general whispers finally culminated in tonight—Finally, we know what PS4 will look like. Now if only I could get my hands on one right this second...

And the games! Oh, the games that will be coming out soon, not only for PS4 but also on PS3. I really can't even... There's simply not enough time in my day for all the play I want to do.

Yeah, I'm pretty stoked.

I'm 50% excited about PS4, 50% distracted by the Watch_Dogs ad in the background.*

And then Apple, you sly dog, announcing iOS 7 at WWDC this year.

If you guys have followed my blog for awhile, and a lot of you have (THANK YOU, you folks are fantastic), then you know I love Apple. Any and all things Apple. It's what I grew up using. The only kind of computer I've ever owned. And when they hit the cell phone market? Well, all my days of switching SIM cards when I got sick of whatever phone I currently used were over. From the second I picked up the original iPhone, I was hooked.

But okay, I admit, some of the new phones out there that aren't iPhones have been starting to look pretty nifty. The thing is, like I said, all I use is Mac. iPhone seamlessly moves between my iMac and my MacBook Pro, and everything is where it should be, and my calendars sync, and my iTunes—well, you get the idea.

And it's just like Apple to announce something that completely obliterates any piquing interest in any other kind of phone just as that little tickle of stagnation hits. See, upgrading from iPhone 4 to iPhone 5 didn't feel like much of a change as far as the operating system. But iOS 7 look to be a serious reimagining of iPhone's OS. And I honestly love everything about it. At least as far as I can tell from this video.

Now if only I could get a solid release date for iOS 7. Then my tech-brain would be satisfied.

As it stands, I'll be content eagerly waiting on both counts!

*Copyright, all rights reserved to Sony. No infringement intended.

A Short Short Story

A trick of the light. A strong gust of wind through the branches and he's there.

The wind settles and he's gone again. 

Was he even there in the first place? 

A trick of the light. Or maybe much more. A glimpse of the truth behind the veil. A brief and fleeting moment of utter reality, wherein he has no where to hide. 

Wherein you realize—you should be the one hiding. 

But where did he go? 

Gone again with a gust of the wind. 

Perhaps just a trick of the light.

End of a Quarter

This is it, folks. Tonight is the last night I'm 25. Ok, ok. On the surface, that's not a big deal. But look, if—IF—I live to be 100, I'm already a quarter of the way there.

That's so surreal to think about.

I know when you're young, birthdays can't come quick enough. And time seems to lurch forward at a snail's pace, lingering at all those stages you don't like. Right before you're 13, when you're so sick of being a "tween". Again at 14, 15, when all you want to be doing is driving. 17 when you wish you were 18 and a legal adult. 20 when you want to be 21 and REALLY a legal adult.

But speaking from experience, after 21, I really want to hit the brakes. Or maybe just encourage time to go back to that snail lurch again. Because soon you're in your mid-twenties, staring anxiously at your mid-thirties , and forced to reevaluate where you are and what you're doing and who you're doing it with.

And it's not that there's no excitement left. I get really excited thinking about what the future holds. Where I'll be when my next birthday rolls around. Even though I'll be one step closer to thirty.

But you know how your parents tell you, or told you—or both—all those times in between then and now that one day you'd wish things would slow down? That although it seemed impossible at the time—because everything you wanted in life hinged on the earth making one more full rotation, everything depended completely on reaching that next milestone and adding another tally to your "years alive" scoreboard—that yes, even still, you'd reach a point where you'd want to go back. Even just a little. Even just one day. Because the lurch has morphed into something more like a sprint and the finish line is maybe just that much closer than you'd like.

Well, they're right.

And on the cusp of 26, I'm feeling that truth, and looking back on my 25 years and wondering at how all of that time, which seemed like so much as it happened, feels like so little now that it's passed.

But anyway. This is it. I'm standing in 25 and looking at 26 and clearly I'm a cluster of conflicting emotions like reluctance and anxiety and expectation and hope. And by tomorrow I'll be 26 and looking back. And forward. And trying to figure out how to do both of those things at the same time.

Wish me luck.