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Huh, been a year since my last update, has it? This journal is pretty irrelevant since I started updated my ell-jay.

I really don't like Gaia anymore. I don't know why I keep coming here. I'm 26, I have a full time job, a boyfriend, pets, books, music, games, and friends. I don't need this place. Hell, half the time I post in any of the remotely interesting forums, I just get ignored. All that's really left is to play games in the Music forum and snipe morons in the Ragnarok subforum.

But, I think I got sick of things when the cash shop came along. I can understand why the cash shop went in... Improvements to the site are coming faster and getting better, no doubt due to more $ being available, etc. etc. But still, paying good money for something that's theoretically not worth a goddamn cent?

And perhaps I don't understand economics, but things have really risen in general price since the cash shop came up. I remember when the average monthly collectible was 10k or so on the 16th. Now its 20k, at least. I suppose its because people can almost literally trade real cash for Gaia gold, making the amount of gold that can pour into the economy nigh-infinite.

It seems one can have prosperity on Gaia in one of two ways.
- Buy a s**t ton of cash shop items
- Spend every waking hour on the site making gold (posting,games,etc.)
- Offer some sort of profitable service.

Its not like I can't afford to buy Gaia cash... I make enough money to pay all of my bills with some cash left over. But I don't want to spend it on Gaia. I don't think I would even if my salary were double what it is. Seriously, ******** it. I don't even like spending money on food.

I don't really have the free time to play games endlessly. And most of the gaia games can't keep me busy for longer than 15 minutes or so. I'm not even gonna go near zOmg.

Profitable services? Pfft.

So why do I keep coming to Gaia? Is it the avatars? Do I like to play dressup? I didn't play with dolls as a little kid, my own wardrobe consists of one pair of sneakers, 6 pairs of jeans and 20something baby-doll t-shirts, I hate all manner of girlie accessories. Is it the avatars? I honestly don't know. And if I refuse to pay for cash shop items, doesn't that beg the question of "well, do you even care about avatars?" Ugh, that was a terribly written paragraph.

So why I am still butthurt about it? I don't know. Perhaps because I'm a sad, strange little person. Or maybe I've just co-opted the NERD RAGE stewing in me over RO getting outrageous s**t like Lucky Boxes in its cash shop.

SHITTY s**t s**t BURN YOUR BRAS BOMB THE CASH SHOP FASCIST ******** BARBARA STRIESAND TITTYSPRINKLES SHITTY s**t ********.

Music:

Syd Barrett - Gigolo Aunt

Ever notice that a huge portion of the Top 100 Images of the day are always stolen? And just how retarded the art thieves that post them are? Even the ones that don't choose blatantly obvious works from professional artbooks and fansites make all sorts of mistakes that give them away.

Usually what an art thief chooses to steal is some sort of huge, complex CG with hundreds of tiny details, each of which could have gone wrong very easily. Yet all they have to say about it is "I like red so I used red" or "Spheroth is my favriote char so I drawed him," which is a GIGANTIC warning sign. It seems that if they'd ever even picked up a pencil or opened photoshop, they would have figured out that art is more complicated than that. Colors, textures, character anatomy, time constraints... There's a s**t ton to comment on. And most artists take the time to do that when they post. And uh... they try to sound at least remotely professional as well.

Another thing that's funny is when the picture's level of detail is consistent with being done digitally at a high resolution, but the version submitted to Gaia is tiny and has TERRIBLE quality. Or even better; scanlines, page numbers and crossed-out watermarks. And the art thieves still think they're being convincing. Sure image hosting sites do warp things at times, but they don't usually turn an 11x9 CG into something the size of a business card. And even then, most artists know how to save lower res versions of their pictures and still make them look decent.

I've also noticed that most of these thieves have names like "NartuoSasekeK" or "BaaByGuRLie5725," which is another tipoff. Why would a professional level artist wanting to get people to remember their work use such an awful name? Take a look at the top artists. Most all of them have easy to remember, literate sounding names.

Why are these people such idiots? Maybe its just because art theft is such a pointless endeavor to begin with... I can only see profiting from it if you're too stupid to make the distintion between praise for you and praise for someone else. But even then, can't you just write "Wow, you're talented!" on an index card and pretend it came from the president? Why go through all the danger of getting caught stealing?

Music: Gogol Bordello - Think Locally, ******** Globally

Posting in the Chatterbox is quite a lot like sleeping with a whore. Even once you've had your way with her and run to the hills, you may find she left you with something nasty and incurable.

In my case, it was a forum troll who PMed me to say RO sucks. Evidently he was too cowardly to say that in public. I probably shouldn't have PMed him back, but eh.

Forum trolls have the unique ability of being right about everything, whether they actually are or not. They answer everything with "you're reacting exactly how I want you to!" whether you tell them they're pathetic shitheads, agree with them, or ignore them entirely. The best you can do is hope that whatever you said lodged a tiny little needle into some part of them, and made them hesitate for just a second before they typed "LOL U SUCK."

Music: Coachwhips - Hands on the Controls

I should probably put this in my Livejournal, but none of my 20something friends ever leave comments. So I've decided to put it on Gaia instead just because I know for a fact that it won't appear on any friends pages, and people won't look directly at it and decide to bypass it. It'll be a pleasant surprise if I get any comments because I don't expect any at all.

But its just easier for me to write as if I were speaking to someone, so I'll continue addressing my invisible reader.

Today I failed my second driver's test. For various reasons I'd rather not go into. But no, I didn't hurt anyone or damage the car or anyone else's.

Do you know how insulting it is to be talked to as if you were a four year old who ran the wrong way during a soccer game?

I'm a 24 year old graduate from the University of California at Irvine. I have a Bachelor's degree in English, with a minor in Biological Sciences. I maintained a 3.4 GPA and never failed a class. Not even Linguistic Syntax or Molecular Biology. If I'd failed a class, I would have been terribly disappointed with myself. If I failed it again, I'd say I'm blind stinking stupid. Or at least bad enough at the subject to never try it again.

But this is driving. A task that is certainly different from studying, writing essays and taking 3 hour long finals. But I don't know if that's reassuring or not. On the one side, its something I can't "cram" for or read about in my spare time. I can't do it independently because my permit requires that someone be in the car with me. Its not an academic subject like I'm used to. But on the other side, its a task that millions of people are capable of doing practically in their sleep. Thusly it should be easy for anyone.

I really don't know what the solution is. I paid 200$ for a 6 hour driver's training course that I passed 4 months ago, and I've been driving at least 3 hours a week for 3 months without feeling as if I was getting any better. I don't feel like practice will help me. But maybe I just need to do it anyway, even though it just feels like a waste of gas, a waste of time, and a waste of the patience of my loved ones.

And here I am pouring my feelings out onto a website whose key demographic consists of people 10 years younger than myself. Apparently I just have to pull my head out of my cowardly, pretentious a** and grow the ******** up.

Today's Music - Bob Dylan - Ain't Talkin'

Gunner Coats, Wulf items and Doggy Style items should be banned from the Avatar Arena. Holy ********. HEY LOOK I'M A GOTH ASSASSIN VAMPIRE WOLF DEMON WITH A TRAGIC PAST AND NOBODY LOVES ME AND s**t.

>_>

Today's Music: DJ Shadow - The Tiger

Figured I'd activate this thing because I can't really think of anything better to do. I also changed my avatar's look a bit. Mostly because Mai gave me a Spirit Falcon yesterday ("for my favorite Sniper, because she needs a falcon of her own" :-3) Oh, and 95% of my clothes on Gaia are blue, gray or black. Hurrr.

I really have been spending too much time on Gaia recently. Ever since my personal computer (aka my source of RO) went kaput, I've been struggling with what else to do with my free time. But really, Gaia is probably the least constructive thing out of all my options. I keep wondering why there's such a dearth of interesting conversation here, then it occurs to me that I'm about 10 years over Gaia's key demographic range. Even when I find intelligent conversation, I'm too scared to participate. My feelings get hurt way too easily. Le sigh.

Come to think of it, what do I even do on Gaia? The only forum(s) I'm active in is the RO forum, and occasionally the Music forum. But I can't really contribute much to either. I play RO almost entirely by intuition, so I can't really offer people much except my opinions and general observations when it comes to that. Aside from that, I just try to restrain myself from completely unloading on the private server kids. Which doesn't work very often, just for the record.

As for the Music forum, its the same way. I know I love certain bands, but most of the time I can't even name the members, much less talk trivia or who's hawter than who else. And the whole forum has this self-obsessed "indier than thou" vibe, as if liking a particular band is some sort of fine art that only certain people understand. I guess when you base your whole identity on some self-obsessed notion about non-conformity, you have to work extra hard to make sure you stay alienated if you decide to like a popular band. "Hey, my favorite band is only popular because 90% of the fans are posers who wanna be awesome non-conformists like me."

I think the only thing that keeps me coming back here is the stuff. I'm the kind of person who feels accomplished when finding pennies in supermarket parking lots. So what do I feel like on Gaia? WHOASHIT LOOK I FOUND GOLD. Even though I never tektek, quest, donate or anything else. I rarely even go window shopping.

I should just read or draw. But then I just end up staring out the window and getting angry at myself for minor things.

Today's Music: Talking Heads - I Zimbra