Moving In Slow-Motion: Premise

 

Over the past year, or so, I've been trying to put myself in a position to buy a house.  This has been a long exhaustive process that I expect to continue going through for a very, VERY, long time.  As a consequence of this process, my writing has suffered due to a drop in the amount of things I can write about due to the drop in the amount of things I can buy, do, and experience due to the sacrifices that I've chosen to make in order to buy a house, which I have to keep on telling myself will pay off someday.  This drop in the amount of content I have written for my blog weighs heavily on my mind.  As I was thinking about this burden that I have put on myself, I came up with a solution that will allow me to write more while also putting myself through the masochistic-like torture that is trying to buy a house.

I have decided to go forward with a series of blog posts where I compile a list of things that I could have bought if I wasn't saving for a house.  This will be a series put out once ever other week, due to the fact that I only get paid once every other week.  If you want this series to occur more frequently, I suggest buying my books so that I can actually start getting paid for doing that shit.  As a part of this I will not be factoring in things like taxes, shipping and handling charges, and other incidentals because, in the world in which I am writing this series, bad things do not happen, everything goes smoothly, and bright, shiny rainbows fly out of my butt.

Several products will be seen on a frequent basis on this new series.  Those products are alcohol, video games, movies, TV shows on DVD, music, or books.  Other products may make an appearance, but in the world where this series takes place, I get drunk often and play video games while also drunk drunk drunk druknak drukndku drunk druknk drunk.

This series will fall under the title "Moving In Slow Motion".  The phrase "Moving In Slow Motion" comes from a line in the Ben Fold Five song Regrets.  Regrets is how I mostly feel about putting myself through the process of attempting to buy a house, regret that I will feel untill I finally succeed in my goal, or fail in a spectacular fashion.  And by spectacular, I mean tragic and sad and other synonyms for bad.  Enjoy!

Project Buy A House: Saving For A Down Payment: 46.9% Complete

Volume 11: Part 4- Vierdestad: Monday, October 24th, 7:37 P.M.

Monday, October 24th, 7:37 P.M.

Rinoa's checkup got done just after I finished my last entry.  They put some bandages on the cuts on her back, but other than that Rinoa's fine.  Kind of an understatement on the doctor's part.

After we were done in the medical facility, Captain Alie ushered us over to a centralized command office.  They wanted to ask us who we were, what we were doing, and how we came to be in Vierdestad.  So we went from a sterile medical facility with a small number of military troops to a concrete block-shaped office building with a great many number of military troops in it.  Wahoo.

As much as I disliked waiting in the medical facility waiting room, I disliked waiting at the command office more.  The many secretaries, each sitting at a desk, endlessly and loudly typing away, made the experience even more unbearable.  At least this time I had someone I could talk to sitting next to me, although the look on Rinoa's face did not put me at ease.  As I studied Rinoa's face, I asked her the most obvious question I've ever asked anyone.  "Rinoa, are you okay?"

Rinoa's expression didn't change, she just started looking around the room.  "No, I don't- Not really.  Are you okay?"

I wanted to say something upbeat and positive.  Instead, I said, "No, me neither."  There was a long pause while we both looked aimlessly around the room before I said, "And this room isn't making me feel any better."

Rinoa looked at me and said, "What do you mean?"

"I mean we went from a waiting room in a medical facility, which is an unnerving environment, even without the people with guns, to this waiting room with just a fuckton of people carrying guns."

My statement seemed to brighten Rinoa's spirits.  "Yeah.  Not only are we in a room filled with people carrying guns, but we are in a room with people carrying many different kinds of guns.  I mean, right now I can see a guy carrying a pistol on his hip, an assault rifle on his back, and a sniper rifle leaning against the wall behind him."

"And they stick us in this room with no one talking to us, not even giving us some water or something to nibble on, to wait for someone we've never met with and no timeframe as to when we're going to meet them."

It was just after I finished my gripe that the secretary who's desk we were sitting near looked up from her work and said, "You know, if you'd have said something, I'd have gotten you something to eat."  As she was making this comment, the phone on this secretary's desk began to ring.  After picking it up, the secretary turned to us and said, "Commander Lider will see you now."

From the tone in her voice, I'm betting a woman being indignant toward Rinoa doesn't set well with her.  "We don't know where Commander Lider is, missy."

The secretary pointed toward a door and Rinoa started walking over to it.  The attitude that Rinoa exhibited with her walk was intoxicating.  We entered the door and was met by an older opfer gentleman wearing a uniform that made it clear that either he or his wife knew how to use an iron.  After greeting us an inviting us to sit, the man said, "My name is Captain Jonathan Lider.  I am the lead commander of the Vierdestad Opfer Military."  The Commander then glanced up from his desk and looked at me.  "Are you okay, son?"

Rinoa took the initiative to answer the question directed toward me.  "He's feeling a bit uneasy about the uniform you're wearing.  Also, we haven't eaten since Friday night."

Like a reporter doing a serious interview, Commander Lider asked Rinoa, "Why is that?"

"Because we took off sometime Friday night or early Saturday morning."

"What do you mean took off?"

"We took off in Gin's plane in the middle of the night Saturday."

"So you two were in the plane that crashed into the Cooper Forest on Saturday."

"Yes, we were."

"Was that your intended destination?"

It was clear that this question annoyed Rinoa.  "Why the fuck would we crash land into a forest?"

Maintaining his reporter's composure, Commander Lider replied, "So, where were you going?"

"Amcan."

"In Velas?"

"Are there any other Amcans?"

"Yes, there is an Amcan in the Jansch province in the country of Nash."

"Oh.  Then yes, we were heading toward Amcan in Velas."

"Was it just the two of you?"

"No, we had a pilot."

"Who was it?"

"It was Gin something.  I can't quite remember what his last name was.  Hato, do you-"

This was when Commander Lider broke his reporter's composure.  "Was it Gin Ayah?"

Rinoa didn't seem to know the answer to that question, so he looked to me.  After a second, I started rambling through an answer.  "I remember Gin was desperately looking for his father in Dha Chathair, and the person he was describing seemed like The Father to me, who's real name is Eugene Ayah.  So it stands to reason that-"

"Why was Gin looking for his father?"  The scared look on Commander Lider's face as he asked that question only increased my anxiety.

The anxiety I was feeling paralyzed my speech, so Rinoa took over answer questions.  "When we left Dha Chathair, the city was being overrun with a mob of members of The Church Of The Lord.  These people were looking to ransack, ravage, and destroy anything and anybody having to do with the Church of the Holy God.  The church that The Father runs, or ran, was among the things targeted.  We don't know if The Father is okay or not."

I could see that as our conversation was progressing Commander Lider was slowly unraveling.  "Okay.  Okay.  Okay, you said Gin was with you."

"Yeah, it was his plane and he was flying it."

"I haven't seen him, I mean Gin, with you.  Is he, Gin, okay?"

Rinoa looked at me, before she said, "No, no he's not."

Commander Lider was unraveling further.  “By he, you mean Gin?"

"Yeah."

"You're sure?"

"Yes."

"Well, where is he, Gin?  Is Gin, he, hurt?  Is he crawling around, Gin, in the forest, the one you and he, Gin, and he, the other he next to you, crashed into?"  The early evening light filtering in from the window in Commander Lider's office made the sweat on Lider's forehead glisten.

Seeing Commander Lider unravel was finally getting to Rinoa.  "Well-  Um-  I"

The anxiety I was feeling prevented me from stopping myself from saying something really blunt.  "Gin is dead.  He did in the plane crash."

You could tell that statement was the last straw for Commander Lider.  "Oh God.  Oh God no."

I continued with my bluntness.  "What's wrong?  Why are you reacting like that?"

Commander Lider started digging around in the drawers in his desk, untill he produced a pair of binoculars.  "Look out that window, will you son?"

I got up, took the binoculars, and started looking out the window.  "What am I looking for?"

"Look far off in the distance."

"Is that why you gave me these things?"

"Be serious, son.  There's a line of vehicles about ten miles outside of Vierdestad.  You see it?"

It took me a minute, but finally, "I see it."

"Can you describe what you see?"

"Tanks and cars and a couple of trucks with giant guns in the back."

Rinoa came over to the window to take a look for herself.  She took the binoculars from me as Commander Lider kept on speaking.  "Those vehicles have been sitting there since September.  Around the eighteenth is when we noticed it."

Rinoa started focusing in on the vehicles.  "They don't look very organized or uniform."

Commander Lider continued.  "No, they're organized.  They've made a ring around this city, a ring that has prevented anything from getting in or out over the ground."

I asked, "Like a blockade?"

"Yep," the Commander replied.  "Exactly like a blockade.  Factor in Vierdestad being a relatively poor city, the result is that after a month of being blockaded, we're about out of food and clean water."

Rinoa lowered the binoculars and said, "Why don't you just call or email or message somebody somehow?"

Commander Lider answered Rinoa's question, but it was clear he was slightly annoyed by it.  "We tried that.  However, the lines that supplied our phone and internet service here have been severed, we presume by them.  Also, cellphone coverage is gone  Even satellite communications are being jammed."

I followed up with, "What about radio?"

Commander Lider seemed less annoyed by this question.  "We tried that, and they've managed to jam that communication method as well."

As Rinoa began using the binoculars to look at the line again, I asked, "So, what's the plan?  What's our next move?"

Commander Lider looked at me dead in the eyes.  "We don't have one.  We don't really have a plan, we don't know what we're going to do about the blockade.  The next move is theirs."

That statement offended me.  "What the fuck do you mean you're not going to do anything?  You can't wait for them to move.  If you do that, they're going to slaughter us!"

Commander Lider rose to defend himself.  "That's absurd.  Who in their right mind would think they would do that?"

In an attempt to elevate my point, I elevated my voice.  "I've seen it happen.  You say the blockade was setup in mid-September.  Mid-September is when this verbrecher led slaughter started.  They hit Moenia Prima on September 22nd, Dha Chathair on October 8th, and Trebyer on October 22nd."

"I haven't heard anything about this."

"Of course not!  This city has been cut off from the world since September eighteenth."

"But why would they do this?"

"I don't know why, I just know they are.  They have been doing this, and I know they're about to slaughter people again."

"How can you say that?  What would make you think that would happen?"

I turned toward Rinoa, who was still looking out the window.  "Rinoa, look at the people roaming the blockade.  Tell me, what race are they."

Rinoa took a long, hard look through the binoculars.  After slowly scanning the line of vehicles, back and forth and back again, Rinoa said, "Verbrecher.  The people there are verbrechers."

I needed verification of my suspicion.  "Are they all verbrechers?  All of them?  Is there even one opfer among them?"

Rinoa took another look them came back.  "They are all verbrechers.  All of them."

After getting my verification, I turned back toward Commander Lider.  “All of them are verbrechers.  All of the people that are poised to attack are verbrecher.  In Moenia Prima, it was a verbrecher led slaughter against the opfers.  In Trebyer, it was the verbrechers in the middle of the night sneak attaching opfers.  In Dha Chathair, it was thinly veiled under a religious context, but it was still verbrechers attacking and slaughtering opfers.  They've done it before.  They've done it recently.  I've seen them do it.  They have killed my friends and family.  I found my friend's mangled, bloody corpse in the tatter remains of her apartment.  They will do it again and they will do it here."

Commander Lider watched me as I laid out my point.  The look on his face was one of pure fright.  He was stunned and slow to speak when he started responding to me.  "Son, you've laid out a nice argument.  However, I can't go on your word alone.  We've sent a team out to the blockade to talk to the people in charge.  Untill they report back, we don't have a plan.  The next move is theirs."

Now Rinoa was offended.  "What the fuck is-"

Commander Lider interrupted Rinoa mid-curse.  "As far as you two kids, we need to get your situated."  The Commander picked up the phone on his desk and started talking to his secretary.  "Emily, arrange for Mr. Shurtleff and Miss Ann to be taken to The Redford untill we can find a more permanent living arrangement for them."

My annoyance with Commander Lider was evident when I said, "What about Rinoa."

Rinoa looked at me and said, "My last name is Ann."

The embarrassment I felt at that moment prevented me from objecting as Rinoa and I were shuttled back into the waiting room we were previously in.  So, we're here again, waiting for someone to bother to do something with us that we're not that interesting in doing.  Hurray.

Later.

Hato Shurtleff

Red Review: Arrested Development: Season 4

There's a technique that I use as a writer that I question the effectiveness of.  In Random Generation- The Long Version and A Jumbled Perspective On Love, I utilized what I call the Random Approach.  In the Random Approach I write out the piece on full, number each of the sentences in the piece, pull out my random number generator, and start generating random numbers, putting the corresponding sentences in the random order that the random number generator is giving me.  Such an approach forces me to think about how a narrative is put together and how I should approach storytelling in my future projects.  That is the thoughts that I have, my audience may have had different thoughts.  It is my belief that some, if not many, if not all, of the people that read the piece that I put together using the Random Approach looked at the piece and went "What the fuck?"  Such a reaction can happen when a writer uses an approach to narrative storytelling that the audience may not understand or is not used to.  Such a reaction is what many people may be having to the fourth season of Arrested Development, recently released on Netflix.

The fourth season of Arrested Development follows the Bluth family in the time between the end of the third season, set in 2006, and the end of the fourth season, set in 2013.  Each of the episodes follows one of the main characters of the series, most significantly Michael, George Sr., Lindsey, and Tobias.  There are many events that take place in this season, which are told from the perspective of each of the main characters of the series, each adding in their own details and their own various roles to the events that go on.  Often events that occur in one episode play into events that are seen again in a different episode from a different character's point of view.  Often episodes begin from earlier points in the story than where the last episode left off.  Often things that are said or occur in one episode are referenced, and sometimes made more funnier, by things that go on in another episode.  The result is a complex, interconnected, interdependent, narrative web that makes up the entire season, and that is the problem.

Many people watch TV while doing other activities, such as cooking dinner, eating, checking email, working, or drinking large quantities of alcohol.  Such viewing habits can prevent the viewer from being actively engaged in the television show that they are allegedly watching.  It is that active engagement that is needed to fully enjoy the fourth season of Arrested Development.  In order to fully understand and enjoy the fourth season of Arrested Development, viewers need to watch all of the episodes in order and without distractions.  While watching in order may not be such a tall order, undistracted watching may be.  If you do not watch this season of Arrested Development attentively at all times, there may be something, or several things, that you will miss, and thereby not achieve full enjoyment.

That's not to say that the new season of Arrested Development is bad, it's just something you need to devote time to.  You can't just watch this show in the same passive manner as you would other shows.  The narrative web utilized by Mitchell Hurwitz and the other writers on Arrested Development requires you to pay full attention to what's going on at all times, which is not something that the audience may not understand or be used to.  There may be times that, while watching this season of Arrested Development, members of the audience may go, "What the fuck?"

Arrested Development: Season 4: B+

Volume 11: Part 4- Vierdestad: Monday, October 24th, 4:37 P.M.

Monday, October 24th, 4:37 P.M.

Rinoa and I were making our way to the top of a hill near where Gin's plane had come to stop.  We weren't going too fast, due to the two of us being in a deeply packed forest and Rinoa was concerned about my headwound.  As we were walking, Rinoa heard what she thought were people talking.  Thinking they could help us, Rinoa and I started looking for them.

It didn't take me long to find them.  They were pretty loud and pretty close.  However, once I saw the people I got down and hid amongst the brush.  Rinoa wasn't far behind me, and when she came upon me, I yanked her down beside me.

"Hey!  What's the deal?"  Apparently Rinoa doesn't like being yanked to the ground by her arm.

In a hushed tone I said, "Quiet," and pointed toward the people.  There were three men, all about my age, looking around at the wreckage that is now Gin's plane.  They looked to be opfers carrying assault rifles, but what made me anxious was the uniforms.  I know those uniforms.  I've seen those uniforms before.  The men inspecting the plane were wearing the exact same uniforms as the police in Moenia Prima.

In a normal tone of voice, Rinoa said, "What's going on?"

"Keep it down, they'll hear you."

Now in a hushed tone of voice, Rinoa asked, "What's going on?"

"You see those guys over there?"

Rinoa popped her head up and saw the men by the airplane.  "Oh, I see them.  Maybe they can help us."  When Rinoa raised her hand to wave at the men, I pulled it back down.

"Stay down, I don't want them to see us."

"Why now?"  Rinoa seemed sincerely puzzled by this.

"You see the uniforms they're wearing?"

"Yeah."

"Those are the same uniforms worn by the police officers in Moenia Prima."

Rinoa lifted her head to get a look at the men.  "Are you sure?"

"Yeah."

"Oh."  There was a short pause.  "So?"

"So?"

"Yeah, so what if these men are wearing the same uniforms as the police in Moenia Prima?"

Rinoa's question was a valid one, so I searched my memory to find a reason for me to be so apprehensive about those men.  "There was a story on the news about the Moenia Prima Police Department infiltrating the opfer community center, catching some people doing something slightly illegal, then saying the community center was a central hub for some kind of opfer crime syndicate."

Rinoa lifted her head again to look at the men.  "But their skin, it's dark like ours, like all opfers."

"It's makeup.  When the police officers infiltrated the community center, they wore greasepaint.  They're wearing greasepaint, using blackface to deceive us."

Rinoa thought for a moment and looked up at the sky.  "But it's raining.  Wouldn't the makeup wash off, or start running at least?"

Rinoa's point may have had more sway with me if we were talking about someone that I in any way trusted.  "It's really good makeup.  Come on, we need to get out of here," which is exactly what we did.  I ran about as quick as I could in a direction that was away from the wreckage of Gin's plane.  I couldn't run as fast as I could because I had to make sure Rinoa was still behind me.

After some time and what I thought was a considerable distance, Rinoa and I stopped to catch our breaths, at which point Rinoa asked a critical question.  "Where are we going?"

I didn't have an answer to that question but I wanted to appear like I did.  The map program on my Hipster should have helped me get an answer.  Unfortunately there are no roads in the forest and the GPS coverage was spotty at best.  After looking at my Hipster for a while and trying to not make my lack of knowledge known to Rinoa, I pointed in a direction and said, "North.  The map on my Hipster says there's a town to the north of here," and started walking in that direction.  I took about a step and a half before Rinoa stopped me.

"Hato, given the time of day and the way the shadows are falling, isn't north that way?"  Rinoa may have been right, Rinoa may have been wrong.  All I know is the direction Rinoa pointed to was away from Gin's plane, so we went that way.

We continued running through the lush, green, naturally abundant forest untill we encountered something that was in no way natural.  A fence.  A fifteen foot tall chain like fence with razor wire on the top.  Due to the razor wire, we couldn't scale the fence besides I doubt Rinoa could have done so without making a lot of noise.  Going through or under the fence was obviously not an option, so Rinoa and I had to move along the fence untill we reached the end of it while still remaining under the cover of the forest.  As we followed along the fence line, it became clear to me that Rinoa was beginning to wonder if I really knew where we were going.

"Do you really know where we are going?"  I couldn't say yes to Rinoa's question but I couldn't really say no either.  So, rather than address Rinoa's question, I asked one of my own.

"Have you seen any more of those uniformed men around?"

"No, I haven't seen any since we saw those other ones.  Do you know where we're going?"

"Maybe we should take a break to catch our breath."

"Catch our breath while you figure out where we're going?"  Damn, Rinoa's persistent.  I found a nice large rock where I could sit down and pretend like I was looking up our location on my Hipster.  Rinoa, after several attempts to glance at the Hipster I was protecting, decided to look at something else.  "Hato, look at that building over there."  Rinoa was referring to a building beyond the fence slightly obscured by trees, but still plainly visible from where we were standing.

As I continued to look at this building, I noticed something.  "Are those people over there?"

"Yeah."  Rinoa left the forest and approached the fence to get a better look at the building.  "Those are people."

I joined Rinoa standing by the fence.  "People in normal clothes, not the uniforms we saw on the other men."

"And look."  Rinoa pointed at a group of people.  There were three of them, watching TV, generally enjoying themselves, what most people would identify as a family.  Mom, dad, and young child.  "They're opfers."

I continued looking at the family, trying to see if these people were also wearing greasepaint.  It was when I was straining to study the family when I heard the click.  "Put your hands up and turn around."  Rinoa and I looked at each other before we turned around.  The look of total fear on Rinoa's face was more distressing to me than what I saw when I turned around.

There they were.  Three men.  The three men we saw at Gin's plane.  The three men we were trying to evade.  Three men in uniforms holding assault rifles pointed at us.  Three men, faced covered in rainwater, with clear evenly dark complexions.

There are certain situations that wise that cause you to say things that you would never say otherwise.  A part of me hopes that doesn't explain what Rinoa said to me as she stared at the three men.  "Hato, I'm sorry about what I said.  I didn't really mean to call you a weird slightly obsessed guy.  I was just upset."

Hearing Rinoa's confession made me want to confess something.  I wish what I had to say was more significant than it was.  "Rinoa, I'm sorry but I had no idea where we were going.  We were running around the forest like a chicken with its head cut off."

The uniformed man in the center began addressing us.  "Keep your hands up!"  We did.  The uniformed man addressing us lowered his gun and started walking toward me.  As he did so, the uniformed man started looking at my face oddly.  He looked at it left to right, up and down, then through one eye followed by the other.  Then the uniformed man stuck his hand out and pressed his fingers against my forehead.  He placed two fingers in the middle of my forehead, ran them left and right along my eyebrows, then down the center of my face to the tip of my nose.  The uniformed man then looked at his fingers and started rubbing them with his thumb.  The uniformed man then did the same thing to Rinoa.  She didn't look like she enjoyed the strange man putting his fingers on her face, and who could blame her.  After he was done, the uniformed man stepped back to where the other two uniformed men were standing and asked, "Are you opfers?"

I hesitated a moment before responding.  "Are you?"

"You doubt me?"  The man addressing us was not happy to hear my question.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Your uniform.  You are wearing the same uniform the police in Moenia Prima wear.  Those police would regularly put on greasepaint and harass opfers.  Many of those police officers killed my parents and many opfers in Moenia Prima."

A knowing look came over the face of the man addressing us.  "Ah, I see."  The man addressing us then motioned to the other uniformed men who put down their weapons.  "I've heard similar reports about uniformed verbrecher men wearing grease paint.  I wouldn't trust us either under those circumstances.  In fact, that thing I did where I rubbed your faces was me checking to see if you were wearing grease paint."  All three of the uniformed man got a laugh out of that.  I didn't feel like laughing and clearly neither did Rinoa.  The man addressing us stepped forward again, extended his hand to us, and said, "Brother, my name is Captain Ushtar Alie.  Behind me on the left is Private Billy Mik, and on the right is Major Robert Dost.  We are members of the Vierdestad Opfer Military, protectors of all those that live in the great city of Vierdestad."

A look of hope came over Rinoa's face.  "Vierdestad!  Where is it?  How far away are we from it?"

Ushtar lifted his arm, pointed, and said, "It's right there behind that fence."  Looking back on it, that was rather funny.

Rinoa continued in her jubilance.  "Is there a hospital where Hato and I can get checked out?"  Rinoa says weird things when she's jubilant.

Ushtar shouldered his rifle and said, "Yes.  If you'll follow me, I'll take you right there," after which Ushtar started marching off with Rinoa following shortly behind him.  I was a bit more hesitant to follow Captain Alie, but Rinoa grabbing me by the arm more or less compelled me to do so.  It's odd staring at the butt of an attractive woman while two men carrying assault rifles are walking behind you.

Rinoa and I are at a medical facility run by the Vierdestad Opfer Military right now.  They checked me out first and diagnosed me as having suffered a concussion in addition to the headwound , which they used twelve stitches to close.  They're checking out Rinoa now as I patiently wait in the waiting room.  I hope she's fine.  I have no reason to believe she isn't, but I hope it nonetheless.

I've never spent a lot of time in a hospital.  I don't like it much.  Not just because of the general feeling of sickness here.  It's also because of the many strong muscular opfer men wearing uniforms I've only seen on verbrechers who had a problem with me.  There's a weird mix of pride and anxiety going through my body right now.  I'd like to leave this place so that feeling could go away.

Later.

Hato Shurtleff