Um... hiiiiii~? I'm not dead, I promise.

Some things that happened over the past decade:
1. Started (and am still) dating Kamunt in 2014.
2. Started dating Kim Chee in 2024, as well.
3. Moved to Michigan in 2014....
4. Then moved to Chicago in 2023 to be with Kamunt.
5. Am planning to move to Buffalo, NY next year-ish?
6. Got back into pixel art, kinda?

Those are probably the major milestones? There are a lot of minor ones, too of course!

I don't really know what I was aiming for in this journal, to be honest. XD I just hated the fact that I hadn't been active here in over 10 years. I should probably upload some of the art I've gotten or something.

Who else is going? Who wants to hang out and stuff?

Hey, guys. Hotel reservations for Anthrocon open in about two weeks and I've yet to make any plans. I'd like to know who's going, who would be open to rooming with me if I reserved a room, and who would be open to having me in their room if I didn't reserve a room. Ideally, I'd like to room with people that I know and that know me pretty well. Please respond if you fit any of the criteria I just laid out. :3

Found a room to stay in.

I'm afraid of coming out my room. I'm afraid of answering my phone and responding to texts. I'm afraid of making phone calls and texting people. I'm afraid of meeting new people. I'm afraid of meeting people I know. I'm afraid of getting online and talking to people. I'm afraid people will want something from me and get upset when I don't want to give it to them, like so many others have done to me in the past. I'm afraid of people leaving me when they have no more use for me. I'm afraid of what people are going to think of me when (and if) they read this journal. I'm afraid that people won't care when (and if) they read this journal. I'm afraid that people won't want to deal with me after they've read this journal. I'm afraid of sounding stupid. I'm afraid of asking for help. I'm afraid of being completely honest. I'm afraid of being thought of as weak. I'm afraid of being thought of as worthless. I'm afraid of being thought of as a lazy bum for not having found a job in the three years I've been out of school. I'm afraid of being thought of as a leech on society for relying on disability benefits to get by. I'm afraid of being judged. I'm afraid of a lot of things.

On top of that...

I don't know how to communicate my feelings. I don't know how to open up to people. I don't know how to trust people. I don't know how to talk to people. I don't know how to take care of myself. I don't know how to stand up for myself and be assertive. I don't know how to ask for help. I don't know what I need. I don't know what I want. I don't know what I'm looking for. I don't know if anybody can help me with the issues that I've got. I don't know how to show people that I care about them. I don't know what I'm doing with my life. I don't know what lies in my future. I don't know a lot of things.

Consider this a cry out for help. I don't know what I'm trying to accomplish with this journal. Admittedly, I feel a little better after writing all of this, but I've been going through some serious emotional turmoil for the last couple of years. I don't know what I'm doing, and if I have been acting strange, this is probably why.

Also, I'm sorry if I've been a burden on anyone. I never meant to be. I'm also sorry that I haven't talked to a lot of folks lately and about being really distant. Although I have been more busy lately than usual, I was never as busy as I led folks to believe. I pulled away partly to protect myself, partly because I can't be the Retna that you guys know, and partly to not burden you with my issues.

Anyway, I don't know what else to say right now. I don't expect anyone to respond. If you do want to respond, feel free to respond in the comments, in a note, or some other medium that I check frequently. All I ask is don't hold back if you feel I've wronged you or anything like that. At this point, I'd rather know the truth than be consoled.

Nothing bad happened, didn't feel left out at any point during the convention, didn't get pissed off at anyone, had SO much fun, hung out with SO many people... it was pretty awesome. :3

The only way that it could've been better for me was if I had more time to relax in between stuff. Had a headache that lasted nearly a whole day from the lack of rest/food. AC needs to be longer. |3 Went by waaaay too quickly this year.

 houndoomed tagged me, and now I must do my part to continue and spread the meme around. BWAHAHAHAHA!

But first, the rules!
1. You must post these rules (Very Important indeed).
2. Each person must post 11 things about themselves in their journal.
3. Answer the questions the tagger set for you in their post, and create eleven new questions for the people you tag to answer.
4. You have to choose 11 people to tag and post their icons on your journal.
5. Go to their page and tell them you have tagged him/her.
6. No tag backs.
7. No stuff in the tagging section about "you are tagged if you are reading this." You legitimately (AKA, really, truly, with all honesty) have to tag 11 people.

Eleven things about me

1. I was born practically deaf. For the first two years of my life, I couldn't hear a thing because my ears were clogged. Only after I had my adenoids removed and special tubes placed into my ears to drain everything did I start hearing anything. I hear things just fine now, though my ears still get clogged pretty bad whenever I get a cold or the flu.

2. I spend about 12 hours of my day sleeping. That's 8 hours at night, and 4 hours during the day. My mother's side of the family always required a lot of sleep, so it's not too weird to them. It's usually everyone else that gives me weird looks when I tell them I need to nap for a couple hours everyday. XD It is kinda annoying that I need so much sleep, but eh, I deal with it.

3. I went to boarding school for a year. The school uniforms sucked, having religion forced on me wasn't fun, and being stuck in the middle of nowhere bored the crap out of me, but overall, I have to say that it really was a great life experience. It was a lot like college except with less freedom, but more free food. Not to mention, I kissed my first boy there. <3

4. I know how to ride a horse. The boarding school that I attended had a class that taught people how to seriously ride horses, and despite me wanting to take home economics, the people there enrolled me in horseback riding. So, I got to learn how to giddy-up a horse and stuff. Granted, I ended up riding a pony rather than a horse, but eh, not much a difference.

5. I was a summer camp counselor for 3 years. Because my parents didn't want me "laying around the house all day doing nothing", during my summer months off from school I'd volunteer at the YMCA as a camp counselor at their summer day-camp program. Funnily enough, I ended up being the cool counselor that let kids get away with stuff that they're not supposed to do, like climbing on trees, sneaking into the woods to play manhunt, and playing in the mud. In return, they offered me free snacks at the end of the day. :9

6. I know how to play the paino and can read sheet music. This is due, in part, to my parents signing me up for paino lessons when I was, like, 8 years old and forcing me to go to them for a couple years. I still know the basics, but I can't just hop on and start playing something anymore. With that said, I can still read sheet music like a pro.

7. I am a huge professional wrestling fan. Started watching it when I was a kid, and I still watch it to this day every week. It's a guilty pleasure of mine. Yes, I know it isn't real, but that doesn't make it any less fun for me, so fuck you. x3

8. I learned computer programming when I was 15 years old. I expressed an interest to my parents in programming and making games, and they bought me this special software that actually taught me how to program in BASIC. It was pretty cool. Didn't make anything cool with it, but it did give me an advantage going into college over other students in my CS courses.

9. I stole a lot when I was a teenager. Mostly candy and drinks from convenience stores. It was exciting for me! I liked the thrill of taking stuff off shelves and sneaking it out past the cashier. Luckily, the novelty of it sort of wore off for me around high school, and I haven't done it since. In total, I probably stole about $500 worth of stuff, and not once did I ever get caught. Oh, and I stole pokemon trading cards, too, haha. XD

10. I am considering starting up my own business in the near future. I don't know exactly what I'm going to do yet, but I've got ideas that I'm developing. Doesn't everyone?

11. Retna's not my only character. I've also got a kangaroo and a blue jay that few people know about, as well as a couple other characters.


Eleven questions for me to answer

1. Who's your favorite troll from Homestuck? Feel free to skip if you haven't read it. Or, better yet, go read it. ALL OF IT.
I haven't read it. x3

2. First person shooters: yes or no? If yes, what's your favorite?
They're okay, I guess. I really suck at them, though. XD I guess my favorite is Halo 2, mainly because that's the only one I've consistently played. TF2 looks fun, though. :3

3. When was the last time you accidentally locked yourself in or out of a place?
The last time I remember locking myself out of a place was my second year of college, and I locked myself out of my own dorm room.

4. For sake of 11/11/11, what are you looking forward to on that date: Skyrim, Minecraft (which is actually moved to a week later, but meh), Homestuck act 6, or staring at the clock until 11:11? Or "other", I guess.
Minecraft, I guess.

5. What's your favorite type of Youtube video?
Ones that make me laugh.

6. Assuming all other obstacles are irrelevant, would you show up if I invited you to a gaming party?
Definitely. :3

7. Favorite cartoon character from the 90s?
Man, that's tough. I'll get back to you on that.

8. Preferred pizza toppings?
Sausage.

9. Are you my food, or am I yours? ;9
You're mine. :9 You should know that by now.

10. How mad are you at me for tagging you with this nonsense? <3
Not mad at all. :3

11. When does the narwhal bacon?
Uh... what? o.O;;


Eleven questions for my tag-ees

1. If you could speak any language, what would it be and why?
2. How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are?
3. If you had to move to a state or country besides the one you currently live in, where would you move and why?
4. Would you rather have less work to do, or more work you actually enjoy doing?
5. Would you rather lose all of your old memories, or never be able to make new ones?
6. At what time in your recent past have you felt most passionate and alive?
7. What’s something you know you do differently than most people?
8. How would you describe me to your friends?
9. What animals do you like and not like?
10. What don't you like about me?
11. Are you planning to go to AC next year?


Eleven Tag-ees

1.  ty_the_fox
2.  lukesnowcat
3.  twile
4.  lengban
5.  stabox
6.  monolithtyriss
7.  taniciusfox
8.  kyouti
9.  toriceidolon
10.  aethian
11.  nikykita

I'm not going to each of their pages to leave a shout though. They all watch me, and if they read journals, I'm sure they'll see this. :3



Also, someone should tag  blaccy in their journal meme. <3 I was going to tag him myself to annoy him, but  aethian hasn't been pestered by me in a while. Since I get to annoy  blaccy whenever I want (he's my roomie),  aethian won out this time.

There are no guard rails at the Grand Canyon! NO GUARD RAILS! o_O You could just fall off and die if you're not careful!

Also, never go hiking down the Grand Canyon. :< I had the most unfortunate experience of hiking down it with a couple friends and getting stuck halfway back up due to it getting too dark. It was 22°F and there was snow and ice everywhere! I now have a better idea of what it would feel like if I had no home or food and had to sleep out in cold freezing weather. >.<

Anyway, don't expect to see or hear from me until this Sunday. I'm on vacation for Spring Break and I haven't been able to get the interwebz until today (I'm writing this from a hotel just outside of Las Vegas). :< You can always try sending me text messages on my phone, but that has been proven to be unreliable, too, since my phone is always dying. x3

I'm going gamblin' nao, kthxbai.

This is the follow-up journal to my previous journal (http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/872751/) in which I asked for your thoughts and opinions of Retna, the character, and, more importantly, me, Retna's player. The general feelings that I got from reading the comments you all left for me is thus:

For Retna, the general feeling seems to be that people simply don't know Retna well enough since I haven't interacted with them in character. :3 I sort of expected this, actually. Admittedly, I don't role-play as often as I used to, and when I do, it's usually only with people I feel comfortable role-playing with.

Those that do have a better feel for him explained that they believe Retna is a manifestation of who I am and who I want to be. One person in particular (admittedly, the person that probably knows me and Retna the best out of my online friends), however, believes that I limit the mindset, moods, and contexts in which I play with him to those that may be considered more appealing to other players, and that I often push myself to play Retna, even when my moods and mindset don't match the ones I set for my character. To a degree, this is true, and it's why I've been trying to create a new character with whom I'd feel more comfortable portraying these specific moods and feelings when I'm experiencing them. It's also probably why I don't role-play often anymore. :P

For me, the person behind the computer, the biggest concern people seem to have is that I'm way too guarded and closed off around them. I won't deny that am a little cautious about opening up to people. It's just my nature, I suppose. :P

Anothing thing people mentioned was the dedication and commitment into stuff I do, which includes role-playing but also extends to things like accurately and concisely expressing my thoughts and feelings to people when I'm having a conversation with them.

The general feeling I got was that the positive traits people perceive in me far outweigh the more negative ones. :3

---

Now, as promised in the previous journal, I'm going to give people the opportunity to ask me, publicly or in notes, what my opinion is of them! :D Just a quick disclaimer, first:

Expressing thoughts and feelings, for me, takes time... a lot of time. First, I have to reflect on how I feel about you, and then somehow, put those feelings into words. It's not an easy task for me. :P Thus, I'm warning you all right now that I will be taking my time with this. Do not expect a response right away. In fact, I do not plan on responding to any comments in the first 24 hours after I post this journal. All I ask is for patience. :3

So, that's it! Go ahead and start leavin' comments! :D

Stolen directly, word for word, from  twile and convinced by  kaoru to actually do this...

Honesty and transparency can cause drama, but bottled up feelings can cause it ten times as bad. So let's lay all our cards on the table.

Tell me what you think of me. You can do it in two parts if you want, talking both about my character and me, the player... but what I'm most after is the latter. I want to know what sort of vibe I give off to people. Am I a quiet guy who mostly keeps to his own space and watches politely? Am I an opinionated jerk who seeks out beehives to stir up? Why do you think that? I promise to take any negative feedback or rumors in stride.

Respond in a comment if you want. Or in a note if you have stuff you don't want to mention publicly. Or email from an account which I won't be able to tie back to your FA account, if you want to be totally anonymous.

For my next journal, I'll do the opposite--people can comment and I'll tell them what I think of them and why."

... because I ate it. :9

((Note: This is only a semi-serious journal. I don't expect a lot of people to read it, let alone express any interest in it, but I feel the need to write about this since Twile is a close friend of mine and role-playing has always been important to me.)

I met Tweek (a.k.a.  twile ) approximately four years ago on Furcadia, which easily makes him one of my oldest friends in the furry fandom. However, when I met him, he wasn't technically a dragon by Furcadian standards (you had to pay money to be a dragon there x3). He was actually a fox! A cute, adorable, if not also tasty fox! :D

So, over the past few years, his fox form hasn't seen much use in terms of his art and maybe even, perhaps, in roleplaying (I don't know if that's accurate since I don't know who roleplays with him or what he does with people). This morning, the subject of perma-vore came up in a conversation we were having. I felt the desire to explore it a little more, and those of you who know me really well can probably guess what happened. :9

Once all was said and done, we realized we had somewhat of a dilemma with regards to where to take this. I don't do perma-vore often anymore in role-playing (let alone roleplaying in general), and when I do actually do it, the other player doesn't usually treat it permanently in-character. This, and the fact that Tweek has never done perma-vore kinda made things complicated... at least, until he suggested that since I ate his fox form (the form in which he and I had gotten to know each other IC-wise), he'll get rid of it. Supposedly, he's been trying to get rid of it for a while now! x.x

Anyway, here's to Tweek's fox form! *raises a glass!* It was an honor knowing ya and having a hand in getting rid of you. ;3

You can reach Twile's dragon form here:
http://www.furaffinity.net/user/twile/

And you can read his journal concerning this right here:
http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/826288/

(The first one was kinda long, so here's a shorter one. n.n)

The Good
* I didn't have a lot of people to hang out with last year. This year, I had plenty of cool people to hang out with. So many, in fact, that I didn't have time to hang out with all of them! x.x
* I met a lot of people that I have known online for years for the first time. n.n It was really neat to finally fit a face and personality with the screen name or user name they use in chatrooms and instant messengers.

The Bad
* Because I didn't have a lot of people to hang out with last year, I had the freedom to explore the con on my own without being tied down to a group of friends. This year, I had less flexibility in that respect because I was always with at least one group of people.
* I was able to form close bonds with the few people I did hang out with last year. This year, I don't feel that I established as many close bonds with people. Aside from Eidolon, Kaoru, and Blaccy, I don't feel I got the chance to hang out with anyone individually.
* I didn't get the chance to hang out with everyone that I wanted to hang out with. x3 (i.e. Keeya, Servus Anohil, Eamus, etc.)
* I did get a con-badge, but I'm not happy with it.
* Having pizza for dinner three nights in a row wasn't fun. :<

The Ugly
* I found out kinda late that we're supposed to pay for the hotel room upfront before we get our keys. x3 It didn't prove to be a problem since we had enough money. I just wish I had known. x3
* I feel that we didn't do a good job coordinating everything when it came to getting everyone together to do something. There were a couple times, especially in the morning and the evening, where it would take us at least two hours just to get out of the hotel to get something to eat. x.x
* Long lines everywhere. x3 The lines for the elevators to get upstairs to our room were the worst!
* Climbing stairs is no fun, especially after you've spent most of the day walking around. x3
* The food at the Steel City Diner was awesome, but the wait to get it was simply ridiculous. x3 I can't say that I'll be going back there next year.
* Scrambling to get downstairs on the last day in order to get checked out. x3
* Everything closes at 7pm in Pittsburgh supposedly. x3

The Funny
* Old creepy guy sitting down with us at the Chinese restaurant.
* Random, quiet, but not creepy guy joining us after the vore party on the way back to the Westin.
* Troy, the homeless guy, pestering Kaoru and the rest of us for money. x.x
* Unintentionally scritching Blaccy's crotch when I was really aiming for Eid's shoulder. x3
* "4 x 5 = 45"
* Blaccy popping a package of creamer at the Steel City Diner and the ensuing lewd jokes that followed.
* Solez somehow acquiring a star on his head at the vore party while in a drunken state and him pointing it out every 5 or so minutes. XD

The Memorable
* The puns that Eidolon supplied us with that made me smile and groan at the same time.
* Watching fireworks with Kaoru from our room on the 4th of July.
* Hanging out with Eidolon nearly every morning at the con. n.n
* Riding the bus to and from the hotel to pick up Leng.
* Kaoru, Landon, and I running into Uncle Kage in his TF2 Spy costume, and interacting with him. XD
* Sitting down with Blaccy and learning about him the first day of the con before everyone else got there. :3
* Meeting people I've known for years for the first time.

In general, I think I enjoyed myself a lot more this year than I did last year. :3 Thanks guys. n.n

Since last year I was kinda annoyed that I couldn't find anyone, I figured that I'd ask you all who's going and try to get your contact info before the con so that I don't have to go searching for people when I get there. XD Just send me a note if you want to hang out and tell me how I can find you. I'll be getting in on Thursday at 12:45pm.

P.S. I need to talk to everyone that's rooming with me together either tonight or tomorrow night, 'specially Leng and Ty. I'd prefer to do it tonight. Is 10pm-ish (Eastern Time) good for you all?

Because I'm conceited and I know that everyone loves me, I would like everyone to show their love for me by filling this meme out. <3

1) Who are you?
2) Are we friends?
3) When and how did we meet?
4) Would you kiss me? (There's no need to answer this question. <3)
5) Give me a nickname and explain why.
6) Describe me in 1 word.
7) What was your first impression of me?
8) Do you still think the same?
9) What reminds you of me?
10) If you could give me anything, what would it be?
11) How well do you know me?
12) Are you gonna put this in your journal and see what I say about you?
13) Would you meet up with me?

Thank you! :D

I thought the title, which is quote from Mitch Hedberg, was appropriate considering what day it is today. :3

Merry Christmas everyone! n.n So, what did you all get for Christmas? :3

I don't have one yet, but I'll come up with one 364 days from now.

So, what's your New Year's Resolution? :P