Adele Dawn

To talk of many things:
Of shoes — and ships — and sealing-wax —
Of cabbages — and kings —
And why the sea is boiling hot —
And whether pigs have wings.’

- Lewis Carroll, The Walrus and the Carpenter

(This entry is cross-posted to tumblr as well.)

I’m a bit down right now.

Its really hard for me to make friends, acquaintances and such like. (I’m not even sure what it means anymore, really.) I find people who like things I like, and I want to share the shiny things I treasure and … I can’t. Well, I do, then I end up feeling like I shouldn’t be there. So I end up standing on the outside looking in the window.

Whatever I’ve got, whatever treasure I hold in my hands, whatever flower of inspiration I grow - it’s not enough. Pretty enough, or right enough, or it’s not lore compliant or drawn accurately enough and I just end up watching it wither and die.

I want to just hold out this thing and have someone be as happy for my enthusiasm as I am for theirs but it always comes with a, “Well, actually…” or a “I don’t like that ship” or “But have you seen this artist do this thing” or even a “You spelled that wrong”.

I’m not dumping on anyone else’s fun, everyone do their own thing, you know?

I’ve also had the feeling this last little while of being “too much” in the places I’ve been, possibly overstepping myself. I don’t want that, I don’t want to make people uncomfortable, I don’t want people to feel like I’ve been feeling - so I think it’s time for a hiatus for a bit. Just from all the things.

It seems we've hit the end of the expansion doldrums. The last of the main storyline quests have dropped, Hildibrand is finished, there's nothing left to do but finish leveling things and endgame gear alternate jobs, so people have pretty much tapered off playing. Which is fine for some things (there's that group of people you'd rather not pay to put up with and they are taking the time off right now) and not so fine for other things (the other people who are taking time off but they were in your static/raid night group and now you're short at least two people any given time you try to run anything).

I think I'm going back to messing about and seeing if I can get Heaven on High cleared before the expansion drops and they change out job/class skills again. I'm going to get that title for beating HoH solo *clenches fist*.

Relearning the same job every expansion is a little tedious - but the changes to bard were amazing this last time. I enjoyed bard more this expansion than any other. (pls don't mess it up, pls don't mess it up) Hopefully, machinist will see the same quality of upgrade that bard did from Heavensward to Stormblood. I wanted to like that job so much and it just...failed.

I am a little concerned about the main tank/off tank comments made so far, because paladin has been a sidelined tank (off-tank) for all of Stormblood and it makes playing it a rather miserable experience. I have all these mitigation tools and instead I'm standing off to the side - whack, whack, whack, thru the dps rotation then chain cast til I'm out of mana and back to whack, whack, whack again. Sure, there's an occasional intervention/cover tossed out but I'd like to learn the fights as the mt every once in a while.

If they decided to make it an off-tank officially, I'd probably stop playing it. It'd probably require a major reworking of the job, no less, considering all their mitigation tools. Paladins are the tankiest tanks, that's their whole function. To turn them into all the time OT's where they already have the lowest dps and most of their skills are wasted seems sketchy to me, but we could always be pleasantly surprised.

(Yes, I know, the META. Look, the Meta can go die in a fire because it's bad. Min/maxing in this game is bad because we're talking such small amounts. If people need that nth of a % to beat a savage? Maybe they'd already have it if they could play the classes they are actually good at instead of the META. Yes, I have strong feelings about people being forced to play the entire game like they are end-game raiders even if they are just running in a four man dungeon.)

Let the warriors OT and do all the dps while the pld MT's and mitigates all the dmg. I have no idea about what gunbreaker is going to entail and I don't play drk so I'm not touching that one - they can fight amongst themselves :D I just want my paladin to be able to be a tank and not be a bad red mage. Lemme stab my enemies with the pointy sword instead of chain casting the one spell I have.

Sorry about all that, I think I just needed to get it off my brain. It's not even a rant to me, just a small worry. *spots soapbox* Well, except the meta stuff. That was a rant.

All in all, I'm optimistic about things going forward because you know? Even when things go wrong, the devs have been really good about fixing things. About listening to the community. I really appreciate that. So, to end this whole ramble, have a picture of Khala doing the Manderville Mambo.

Family coming home for the weekend and just...I think I'm done with people today. I don't wanna talk anymore, or listen to someone complain about their mom for the umpteenth time, or anything else. I just want to hibernate but unfortunately, I have to be "on" all weekend.

The thought makes me tired already. Monday can't come soon enough.

Just managed to finally wander into Pyros. Where I thought there'd be more fire, honestly. Currently, it's not really set up for single player content. You've got to have a leveled buddy willing to freight you around the map, which eh, no. So I'm off to go do the challenge log to work at leveling up and call it good, unless I wander in and run the bunny fate a few dozen times when I'm bored.

The logos and whatevers are neat, kinda, and from what I hear, really useful in cheesing the Arsenal in Hydratos but they aren't impressing me that much. I might actually get my Good Samaritan title though, rezzing people as a bard. :D Think it's time to grind some dungeons for minions or something.

I'm so tired lately. Not sure if I'm not getting enough sunshine or sleep or just whats going on but bleh, it sucks. So much to do and so little energy and time to do it in. *falls asleep*

New year - time to clean out the things I don't need or want in my life.

Currently I'm working on my electronic life - email, who I follow on twitch, discord channels, internet tabs I have open, all that sort of thing, lol. All of it has become bloated and unwieldy so it's time to let some things go. Dealing with people who don't want or need my company, my input, or that make me feel bad for being me - done with that. I don't have time for that. I deserve better.

I had a bad morning with some community things that are supposed to be for fun and with another where I realized that I was expending an emotional effort that was not appreciated. It made me realize I needed to do this. I'm not a mod, a mom, or someone who even really means anything to these people so *shrugs*. Time to move on to things that bring me joy and people I enjoy spending time with.

It's hard, because the empathy kicks in and I'm afraid of letting down people I don't even know. And that's just dumb. They don't care, they don't know me, I don't know them. Anxiety makes it hard to do things that I should, sometimes, so instead of canceling a subscription I just let it run even though I'm not using it or staying in a discord that I don't even read. And I needed to change that. I had one more thing I was on the fence about, but writing this out made me realize that I needed to let it go as well.

It feels good to get out from underneath some of that.

I think I'm going to work at having Thursday nights be an art night, whether it's drawing a thing or writing a thing. (Or both.) I've work earlier on Fridays and if I play games, I'm up way too late and lose track of time (Although I do that pretty well when I'm in the zone drawing as well, so I don't know how well THAT'S going to work XD .) And it motivates me to do something creative on a more regular basis.

I drew a Free Company friends' Dragoon character as a semi-chibi. It seems to be the art style I'm rotating into being most comfortable with experimenting without judging myself too harshly. It's still taking me way too long in turn-around time, I feel. For a semi sketchy looking drawing I spent something like 4 hours on it. Just rough lines, no colors. Everyone says faster will come with time, and considering what I drew tonight I couldn't have done last year, I get it. But it's so frustrating! *laughs at myself* I want it NOW!

Everything's been quiet on the internet friends front. Family as well. The significant other has been dragging me around doing house-buying stuff all weekend and I'm exhausted. I love them but it's a holiday weekend, omg. Pls. We've been working towards this for two years and I'm very excited but also nervous. It hasn't actually HAPPENED yet so the constant state of anticipation is just draining.

Hopefully, we'll know more in a few weeks.

I've been trying to catch everyone's details (from the people I follow) and I hope I've bookmarked them all. I don't have a pillowfort account so bookmark folder for those for the time being.

I'm sad to see everyone leaving, but I understand why they are. Most weren't even given a choice.

There are some people that this will end their art business for the foreseeable future, some who just won't produce art anymore because what's the point?, stories that will get lost and just... it's sad.

Working on Byakko with the CWL group and we've gotten most everyone doggos now after tonight's runs. \o/ We all dressed up in some sort of holiday appropriate costume so we had a vast assortment of goofy looks. It was pretty fun. Hopefully next week we finish off tiger man and can begin one of the other stormblood primals. (Not that I'm looking forward to Shinryu but I'll deal :P)