I Think I'm Becoming Racist Against Vampires

I'm already pretty racist against High Elves (They think they're so damn perfect. Wood Elves are okay though. Usually.) but generally I like vampires. I get them. As other people have pointed out they're supposed to represent what happens when a person stops thinking of others as people and starts thinking of them like prey. They're powerful because they're willing to step on and/or kill people to get what they want.
Hey, I even get why people find them attractive. The bad boy/girl mojo usually wrapped up in a package that also contains supernatural abilities and generally comes with wealth. Score. Sure you might end up dead if you date a vampire but I suppose that's also part of the allure. It's dangerous, which makes it interesting and they'll change their ways for a person they like. It would make a person feel special to be involved with someone like that. It's the same reason people date absolute bastards sometimes- they feel special because they treat them differently than everyone else.
Smart, sexy, worldly, powerful- so why am I not liking vampires? Guess what, it's not because of Twilight, though that may account for some of it.

Real surprise.

It's because I like werewolves.
Yeah, say what you will about them, but I think werewolves are totally awesome, especially the White Wolf kind. I'm a canine kind of person. I have both a wolf and an Anubis tattoo. I think there's so much that could be done with werewolves and they're just not getting the kind of love that they should.

 This is the basis for my tattoo, if you're wondering how lame it is.

While werewolves are getting the shaft, vampires are becoming the coolest thing ever, to the point where no one's really surprised if a vampire shows up in a story.

If a werewolf shows up in a vampire story, the wolf gets to play second fiddle if he or she is lucky. Don't know what I'm talking about? Let's review. 

True Blood- All photos are from the True Blood Wiki.

The show, not the books.

To be fair, I really like this show, it's just one of the ones where it has stood out for me that werewolves are getting shafted.  Despite the fact that season three was promoted like this:

 

The aforementioned werewolves spend most of the season getting ordered around by this guy:

To be fair he is actually pretty threatening.

Now the story goes that Mr. White Horse has a group of werewolves following him around like a pack of hunting hounds because he feeds them addictive vampire blood. He's been doing this since vikings were roaming around and messing up the place. Maybe even before then.

The problem is that so far only one werewolf  isn't completely under a vampire's thumb (also maybe the hairdresser one?) and despite the warnings of how powerful they are, said weres have proven about as effective as a regular German Shepherd would be.

 Aww who's terrifying? You are! Yes, you are!

This might be because everyone else has a heavy dose of plot armor while the werewolves are red shirts. It might be because having werewolves more like the usual  kind (the kind that can turn into 8 foot death beasts) are too damn expensive to make for a TV show, but it just serves as another reminder that a werewolves just aren't as cool or smart as vampires. Heck they can't do anything unless a vampire is ordering them around, can they? They'd just be running around in the forest peeing on trees if it weren't for the blood-suckers.

Jerks.

Underworld

I hate this movie, so if you like it, I'm sorry.

Someone told me that this movie is kind of like the White Wolf story but really, I don't like it. Werewolves were once slaves to the vampires. Werewolves rebel (with the help of a vampire) and become hobos.

Let's pull something from wikipedia on the werewolf leader, Lucian:

 "Lucian is portrayed as being significantly more sophisticated than his fellow Lycans. He usually makes a point of being polite and rarely gets angry. His calm and cautious demeanour contrasts with other Lycans. His species are not always civilized; an early scene in the first movie shows a pair of Lycans fighting while being cheered on by a group of other Lycans. Lucian berates them for acting like a pack of rabid dogs and it appears his leadership is what keeps them disciplined. Ironically Lucian's former life as a servant to Viktor [an f'ing slave-owning vampire] is probably the reason for his greater sophistication."

(italics and small rant mine)

Lesson: vampires are twats and you'd be much better off if only you'd just behave like a good doggy.

Being Human (North American Remake)

This show is, as of now, only into it's third or so episode but already the poor werewolf (Josh) is getting kicked around by vampires. Now he's the traditional form of werewolf- meaning he changes unwillingly during the full moon and has no control during that time, so I can forgive some things.

This show is notable in that I realized I automatically despised every vampire except for the main one (Aidan), because he seems like a pretty cool guy and doesn't give the werewolf any crap.

 You can live, vampire guy on the right, you can live.

What really irked me- a fledgling vampire (maybe a week old?) kicks Josh around and kills one of his friends. EAT HER ALREADY MAN.

Twilight
Do I even need to say it? The werewolf hits on the vampire's girlfriend and protects her sorry bum when the vampire isn't around. Of course he doesn't get the girl. There are vampires around, man!
 

Conclusion

Think about it. If someone said to you "Oh they're just animals really. Without our help they wouldn't be much more than savages" about another section of humanity, you'd probably rip their tits off for it.

But vampires get away with it. All. The. Time.

 I think if there ever comes a time when we can all change into werewolves and vampires, I'm going to the wolves and leading a revolution against the long-toothed oppressors. 

 Berets optional.

Maybe the humans will attempt to drive us out and both species will band together and learn something but I doubt it. The vampires will probably try and blame everything on us. Damn socialites.

 

I'm supposed to do what now?

XKCD has hit on this before- the feeling that people shouldn't be trusting me with nice things or responsibilities because deep down, I'm pretty sure that I'm nowhere near ready to handle that yet. In fact, I'm pretty sure that my maturity level has gone down as I've aged.

 

You can always test the deadness of things by poking it with a stick.

In a way this is a good thing. I’m not longer the terrified wreck I was as an adolescent, too scared to talk for fear of saying something wrong. I’ve learned that things just go wrong sometimes and that I’ll probably never understand fashion, along with a few other key truths. The need to just survive the day without doing anything embarrassing was worn down in the days where I just had to survive long enough to pay the rent.

Sleep was for the weak.

And for those that valued their sanity, but they worked somewhere else.

But despite all I’ve learned, I keep having the nagging feeling that I really don’t know enough yet. I don’t understand stocks, bonds or any of that (what the devil is a mutual fund?). I’ve been in school for years and keep running into things I don’t understand (though I suspect financial aid is unclear on purpose). I don’t really know how a car works or how to take care of it properly.

I get the feeling that I’m not really as advanced as I should be.

I probably would’ve been good at that whole hunter/gatherer thing. I could have made a fire. Heck I probably could’ve been the person who drew animals on cave walls and made stone cairns. 

My one area of pseudo-expertise, knowing monsters and how to combat them, probably would’ve landed me a cool cave-man job. 

Right now I’m just the person who sits on the couch thinking of how vampire/werewolf prejudice would play itself out in a realistic setting (damn fangs are always keepin’ a brother down) instead of one of those awesome people who are good at responsibility and time management. You know, those people who actually know how to invest money and can hold down two jobs while taking classes. The people who can start businesses and show up at 8 am looking polished and professional.

Damn them and their bar-raising.

Despite clearly not being one of those people and the fact that I’m probably not cut out for this advanced a society, people keep handing me responsibilities. They ask me to watch their children, houses and pets. They give me grants and loans. They come to me for advice like I actually know what I’m doing. There has to be some kind of explanation for this.

Is it all an elaborate ruse? Are we all still five years old inside, wanting nothing more than to blow off what we’re doing and pretend to be Batman instead?  Are there only a few real adults on the planet, getting things done while we just make it up as we go along, hoping no one will notice?

I kind of hope so. I mean at least then if I get caught doing something really goofy people will understand.

 Reason #332 of why I should not be a teacher.

Plus it makes the world seem less boring. I mean, should my hypothesis prove correct, you could potentially talk your co-workers into a giant game of hide and go seek.

Or a water balloon fight.

What is wrong with you Brain? I thought you were on my side.

The mind is a weird, complicated, dangerous and sometimes back-stabbing entity.

Most of the time it tries to do what is best for you and –by extension- itself. It can fail on you but most of the time this is the logical outcome of over-stressing or poor maintenance.

We ask a lot of our minds, so we really don’t get too miffed if they go into hibernation mode unless it comes as a very inopportune time.

Sometimes, however, our minds can turn on us. I’m not talking about medical conditions, or things like mental disorders. I’m talking about the good, old-fashioned; what-the-hell was that moments, thoughts and dreams that our minds sometimes spit out in all contradiction of good sense and sanity. This mostly occurs in dreams or in sudden, alien thoughts. Sometimes our minds are actively trying to ruin things for us, like that guy who constantly gives you links to terrible, terrible things on the internet.

I was thinking a bit about this while reading a thread on people trying to conquer addictions, like drinking and smoking.  Many of them shared the experience of having dreams about ‘falling off the wagon’ or giving into their addictions. Was their body so addicted to the substance that triggered these thoughts? Was their brain trying to cheer them on in a different way, a ‘look how terrible it would be if you went back! Think of the guilt!’? 

Then I thought: maybe the brain is like a really dumb puppy. It’s trying to do the right thing and gives us the things it thinks we want and then doesn’t understand when we get all mad and yell at it. The dreams are just the dead animals the simple puppy brings to us, thinking it will make us happy.

Say you’ve been really lonely. It will give you a dream about meeting someone, but then you wake up pissed off because it was like that dream was mocking you. It gave you something; something you thought was real in that dreamscape, only for it to vanish into nothing in the morning. The brain doesn’t understand this. It was only a dream, right? It gave us what we wanted, didn’t it?

 Or say you’ve been really bored or not too sure about the direction your life is headed in.  The brain will give you an awesome adventure full of enough explosions, butt-kicking, and romantic interest to fuel three Jason Statham movies. This only serves to undercut just how boring and uninteresting you think your life is at the moment.

The brain was just thinking ‘awww you’re sad. I will try to cheer you up for a while!’ To us that was terrible- why would our subconscious ridicule us? Why would it tempt us with something we know we can’t have?

Maybe it’s just that simple- our brains are dumb and we overthink things in our waking hours. We really should just kick back and enjoy the ride, content in the knowledge that our subconscious can give us a really bitchin’ lightsaber battle if it so desired.

Note: Even if it’s true that doesn’t mean I can’t still be pissed at you brain. I mean, Gaspard Ulliel? Why would you do that to me?

This Person Messes Up my Brain

Sometimes we meet people that we ‘get’ right away. We share with them, feel open with them, and in the case of socially awkward people such as myself actually talk to them.

Sometimes we meet people we don’t like right away. Maybe it was a bad first impression and you eventually grow to like the person or maybe you just end up not liking them forever.

There are the people in between.  There are people so dang cool that you’re afraid to even talk to them.

My point is that no matter what, if you know a person for long enough, you get an idea of how you feel about them. This sometimes changes of course but generally there’s no one that, no matter how often you talk to this person, you have no idea how you should feel about them.

I have met this person. I shall call him K.  I have known K for a while and below is the transcript of what happens to my body every time we interact:

Defensive strategy engaged. 

What? Heart, what are you doing?

We shall protect this person to the death.

No. That’s seriously weird heart. You’re going to freak him out and oh god he’s showing us some writing and it’s amazing. What do we do? Do we even like him? I mean of course we like him but do we like him in that way? I don’t know what to do.

Death to all unbelievers

That’s not an answer, heart. I’m seriously freaking out here. This person is amazing and oh my god what if we say something inappropriate? Mouth, have you got anything?

Buhhhh….prettttyyyy….

Jesus we’re going down in flames here. What’s wrong with all of you? Instinct/guts? Help me out?

Don’t ask me. I felt protective once and look what it did to heart.

We must not say anything to hurt or scare him. Ever.

That’s….well of course we wouldn’t intentionally…oh now he’s talking about something else and it’s amazing. We need to get it together. I don’t think we’ve said anything in a while. We need some kind of strategy. Cute and flirty? No he seems kind of sensitive about that. Ummm….look I really need to know what kind of angle we’re trying to play. Wait. Libido! What have you got?

I got nothin’.

What? We don’t find him attractive? But he’s…

Oh no, he’s attractive. I’ve just got nothin’. I don’t even know where to start with this kid.

But….you ran the show for years. You’ve made some pretty serious decisions. You always know how to feel about everyone and now the one time I actually need you YOU HAVE NOTHING?

Yup. 

I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to respond to anything! He’s still talking and none of you are giving me any signals aside from heart and she’s being creepy as hell and….Error-system shutdown. Your brain has been deactivated to prevent explosion. Please be patient while we reboot. 

Ha you’re so awesome K. You really need to write more. 

*growl* You are being too forward. Do not make me eat you.

It’s bad. Really bad.

It’s like if you saw a unicorn leap by and it’s all happy and glitter just seems to be showering down and also there’s money falling from the sky and little hearts promising you eternal love and happiness. You want to believe that it’s actually happening but no, it just can’t be.  Can it?

Imagine that brief second of confusion and happiness and hope mixed in with the terrible feeling that you might just be going insane.

 

That’s how I feel every time I talk to this person.

You Guys are Jerks

This blog is pretty much just for fun.

It has been inspired by other great blogs, such as Allie's hilarious Hyperbole and a Half. 

However I'm not Allie, or any of the other great bloggers. They do wonderful, inspiring work and I don't intend to make this my day job.

So what is Paw (Post-Apocalyptic Wonderland) about? It's mostly for the stuff I can't get out of my head. The little jokes, quips and ideas that I just need to put somewhere. The things I feel like sharing and that hopefully someone will look at and think 'hey, that's kind of neat' or 'yeah, I feel the same way'. Maybe it won't end up that way but really I just need to dislodge this stuff from my brain.

So what's today's blog about? Writing. I've been trying to write for years, however I've run into some problems along the way. Maybe this will answer my friend's questions about why I don't write more or make them understand why I abandoned that one storyline that they kind of liked.

The first problem is Jeremiah. Freaking Jeremiah.

He's been a character in my head for years. If you're a writer or something similar, you know that sometimes characters show up of their own volition and you have to kind of get a feel for them before you understand how they work and where they belong. Jeremiah just showed up one day and the bugger won't leave. The problem is that he doesn't make any sense. He won't 'talk' like other characters, I can't get a feel for why or how he does things and some of his actions just plain don't make sense.

He also jacks story lines constantly. I've tried just making stories without him, as I know he'll come across as flat and one-dimensional without any characterization or backstory but he just shows up and takes over.

Like so:

 

 

 

There's also Will. We won't get into Will.

There's also the problem of explicitness. What I mean by this is the choice whether or not to add in sexy times, swearing, violence, and other such 'adult' themes. If you want to write a realistic novel, you pretty much have to have at least a little bit of this and there's only so much you can gloss over. Not everyone wants a grimdark tale with lots of blood, guts and sexy ladies but what if you're writing about a war, or in a dystopian setting where bad things sometimes happen to good people? What if you add in demonic themes? Sure, it's going to get a little bloody. You have to set up the bad things so the hero can eventually right all those wrongs.

I want to write something semi-realistic and if you've been paying attention the last five minutes you probably already realize I have a few characters who are not good people. It happens.

"Well!"- you are probably thinking- "The issue is surely that you don't want to glorify such actions, so that the reader won't mistakingly think that you are some sort of psychotic pervert, yes?" You probably are smoking a pipe and are wearing a monocle at this time. "That merely takes some skill as a writer. Do you fear that you are not up to snuff?"

Nope. I'm worried about my parents.

Sometimes I go to write a certain scene (not a specific one, mind you, just some scenes in general) and I worry. I pause and think about my mother. My wonderful mother who pushed me to be creative and bought me all those books that inspired me. The one who didn't mind when I dragged along a notebook to family events, just so that I could write.

I imagine finally getting a book published and my mother picks up her fresh, signed copy, a smile on her face. Her little girl made this. She's so proud.

 

She sits down, beaming as she cracks the book open, noting that it is dedicated to her, my father and my friends. So considerate!

I check on her some time later, dreading each moment as I walk up to her perch on the couch. With growing horror I notice the look on her face. The look of shock and dread, the realization of what is unfolding before her eyes.

Her child wrote this. She knows now what has been going on in her child's head, what she has been writing about in those notebooks for so many years.

Later, when the shock wears off, she'll wonder what she has done as a mother to cause this.

That is why I'm still stuck with these people in my brain.

There are other considerations as well. I don't wish to blame others for my failings but at some points I just really do not want to unleash an Eldritch horror upon my mother. 

I don't think she even knows who H.P. Lovecraft is.