if i keep holding my breath, all of this will fade away.

So here it is, a semester over, nothing else to really go on with. I have had my ups and downs this semester, but I have dealt with them all. I sit here now, reflecting on some of these moments, and trying to figure out if there is anything else that I have left to do. I know there are things I want to do, but do I have the courage to act on these things. I want to say that in the next 3 days I will be able to do all these things that I haven't been able to do the whole semester, but I can't say that I will for sure. It is a strange feeling to doubt yourself. I have been so sure of so many things before this year, and for some reason, coming up here has made me doubt myself.

This post may seem a bit scattered, but bare with me, I am just running through everything that is going through my mind. I turned 21 this last wednesday, and I really had a shitty birthday, but whatever, that happens. I turned it around by going to the Thursday show the next day. I saw Sage Francis, and some of the things he said made me think twice about being ashamed about being an American at certain times. Then Thursday took the stage and I realized why they were my favorite band. I went all out and was damn pleased with everything. I was angry that no one in the crowd seemed to know who thursday was, but whatever, fuck them all. Rise Against took the stage, and I stayed in the front row for them until it turned into a fucking acoustic sing along, that was when I decided to go back to the Thursday merch booth. I got to meet and talk to Geoff from Thursday for like 10 minutes and that made my entire month, maybe semester. I came out of the concert with 2 shirts, a hoodie, a couple bruises to my head, and a nasty fucking cut down the outside of my hand/wrist that is about 3 inches long.

I will be returning back to NY in 4 days, and I have to say that I am excited to see my family. I can't wait to see my animals and just get to sit back and hang out with my brother for once. I will be home for 2 weeks, then returning to my other families. Burlington is waiting for me, and I am waiting for it. I still feel bad for the fact that I took myself out of it and away from my entire family at college for a full 4 months, but sometimes I guess you have to do things that hurt others. I am ready to get back to where I can just blow off some steam by haning out with others and where I feel that I am needed for more than the homework assignment from yesterday's class.

I have so much that I want to do and that I need to do, and such little time to do it in, but I will have to just make it through one way or another. When it comes down to it, we all just do whatever we can do, whether that is the most or least is up to the person. I can honestly say that I have completely checked out mentally for finals, but I will make it through and hopefully end up doing well in all of my classes.

I am going to miss certain things about the Montreal campus. The administration up here is amazing and so much fun to just hang out with, they will deffinetely be missed. Along with that, there are my two gaming teachers who have helped me out this semester. My game engine teacher especially has helped me understand alot, and also has given me real life training on what I may be doing one day. I am damn proud to have worked with him and hopefully will be able to continue working with him in the future. The freedom of doing pretty much anything we want up here will be missed, but that one is easy to understand. Finally, the closeness of myself and 5 others up here. I find that we all connected really well, but we seemed to have done it a little bit too late in the semester. I would like to say that next semester I will be connecting with them, and I will be making the effort to. Eric I knew before coming up here, so I know that we will be able to hang out when we get back. Jaime will be going abroad next semester, so she won't be seen until next fall. Mark and Adam both were strangers to me before I came up here, but we have become pretty good friends and I hope that carries through. Shayna, we knew eachother before, and hopefully we will still be able to hang out once we get back. Most of the other kids that are up here were nice, for the most part, but we didn't necissarily connect as much as I did with these 5. I'm glad I ahd the experiences with these kids that I did, and hope for a future where we all get to stay close.


Tonight I end the post with lyrics from the Thursday show along with a quote from Geoff.

"I've never had much use for politics or religion, but music.....now there is something worth fucking fighting for."


Is this how it feels
when you dont even fit into your own skin?
and its getting tighter,
every day i'm getting smaller
if i keep holding my breath i'm going to disappear.

War All of the Time

I'm sitting here, second energy drink in hand, trying to focus on a subject that I couldn't care less about. I look back at a class that I have spent 13 weeks in thus far, and I realize that once I leave this class, I will not be using anything that I "learned" in it. I have yet to find a reason to go to the class besides the fact that I need to pass it. I am at college because I want to take certain classes, and this is not one of them.

With two weeks left, I can say that I am ready to leave. I have gained some knowledge from my time up here in Canada, but I am ready to get back to the life that I left behind in Burlington. I am trying to finish everything up with projects and classes in hopes that I won't be stressing out extensively later on this week.

With my birthday coming up in 3 days, I find myself not really excited for it. I will be in classes for most of wednesday, and when im not in calss I will be at Ubisoft getting a tour of the studio. I am excited for the tour, but we are supposed to be going to 3 different studios(A2M, Ubisoft, and EA) in 2 days. These tours will be taking up a lot of time, and I really don't have that much time anyways. I will make it work, but it just sucks that I will have to be compromising homework and presentations to do these events.

The 11th, the day after my birthday, I will be heading to a Rise Against, Thursday, and Sage Francis concert. This concert has been the thing that I have needed for the longest time. I need the release and it couldn't have come at a better time. I will be going so crazy throughout the show just so I can relax when I get out of it and be relaxed through finals week.

In the recent down time that I have had, which isn't much at all, I have returned to my old online home, Barren Realms. The place where I spent a good portion of my younger days has re-entered my life. I have reconnected with some people that I haven't talked to in almost 2 or 3 years. I have decided that during my work as a RA next semester, I will be building an area for the game based off the book "The Book of Three." This area will be used not only as a repayment for all the time and fun i have had in the game, but also as a possible portfolio piece that I can present. Progress will be charted on my gaming blog. I will be updating three blogs next semester, this being one of them. The other two will be my Personal gaming blog, and the other will be a blog for my Production II class. The Production blog will be edited by both myself and Anciello and will follow our...."adventure" through the class.

Thats all for now,

If the sun doesn't rise
We'll replace it with an H-bomb explosion
A painted jail cell of light in the sky
Like three-mile-island nightmares on TVs that sing us to sleep
They burn on and on like an oil field
Or a memory of what it felt like
To burn on and on and not just fade away
All those nights in the basement, the kids are still screaming
On and on and on and ON!