Late Night Ramblin's Vol10 - The Friend Crisis

 So it's currently the 20th October, it's late, and I am wide awake. Something is bothering me..... I did have a mini rant on my closed friend Instagram stories and the rant was basically about one of my friends and how it feels like he is neglecting his true friends and how no matter his down-and-out state he never seems to listen to advice or take any help and continues to just thrive around in his muddy mind. 

Read the next few images to get what was on my mind and how I have been feeling lately....if my friend is reading this just know this is just out of love and care and frustration, I want what is best for you, and obviously I don't want to feel like i have been replaced or discarded, and I don't want excuses from you, I want the truth and just want to help you. I may regret saying all this or posting this, and I am sorry just, i needed to get this off my chest and mind because it was suffocating me. 

So yeah, am I right in what I say and been feeling? Or am I just going insane and being delusional or jealous or whatever else. I think it's just my caring nature and wanting better for my friend. I have seen him through these situations many times, but this time seems to be the worst of them all. Anyway, It's been a crappy week for me just some stuff going on, I'll be fine soon, and I got Electric Callboy LIVE soon, so I am hyper hyper for that haha. 

In my dreams (original poem,lyrics)

In my dreams, I see you sailing away, I'm holding onto hope that the pain will leave me someday, our love is a moment lost to time, heartbreak should be a crime, in my dreams we are sailing away, 

Listen to the echos of forgotten dreams, we had the world at the palm of our hands or so it seemed, we thought were the champions of all, just like Icarus our love flew too close to the sun and we started to fall,

I fell and broke into pieces, I couldn't arrange them and make them fit anymore, I didn't balance life well and I've lost who I am, blinded by pain sorrow and regrets, I drink now to forget,

Every time I fall asleep I see you there, laughing and smiling with your eyes gleaming, I lay awake at night staring at the ceiling, memories come streaming to my mind, I'm surprised my hearts still beating, 

How much longer will this take, the pain and the heartbreak, I ache and i ache, I have never experienced such pain, In my dreams i find you there.  

Mood Today (original poem, lyrics, story) by Sjones

I'm writing these words just to say,
About how I am doing and my mood today,
Quiet and fine,
Inside my mind,
It's not so silent,

Violent,
My anger and frustrations,
Surviving is a riot,
There's not many that know, all who go,
Chasing dreams over a colourful rainbow,

This too goes to show,
My mind is singing, while the exterior is quiet,
Everyone's asking, are you okay?, how are you today?,
I smile and sit in silence,

I'm okay or at least I say,
I'm not really sure what to say, of how I am really doing on this day,
Numbness and sadness underneath my clouds,
It hasn't rained in days, this sight's profound,

Take your time and focus on yourself,
They all say, little do they know,
That can't quite be,
Done,

I'm having fun,
Living my life distracting myself,
My emotions I cast aside and set up on a shelf,
As I'm living and breathing trying to forget someone else,

Memories are nice but bring pain,
Of a heart break that feels like yesterday,
It's been a while now and I still feel empty and drained,
Missing a part of me even though I am not in pieces,
Physically,

My body is exhausted
Mentally maimed,

I'm losing sleep, sleeping less on the daily,
My heart is locked away underwater in a locker titled,
Davey,
Which will give up first I often wonder,
Heart, soul or mind which will be the first to go under,

Life is something I always ponder,
What came before, what comes after,
Ok I say,

As I'm holding back laughter,

We've heard quite enough,
I feel like I'm dying, Is there any wonder,
Why?,
With all these words in my head,
I'm overflowing with all this existential dread.

Random Ramblin 41 - Worst Year Ever & An Apology

Without any shadow of doubts this year has been the worst ever for myself.

A lot has happened and lockdown has made things so much worse and harder than ever before and its having such a heavy toll. 

I feel like my anger has just been so blinding this year same with my sadness. 

Grief has had a big ugly card at play in a lot of this and the fallout created and spawned from said grief is so traumatic that its very complicated and problematic.

Back to anger and it's been so overbearing and so quick to rise up from many factors of the world of course. I probably am suffering from some depression too I've you know said to people i want to see a dr for meds and I've said to others that it's a real struggle to keep going on every day. 

You know, it's bloody hard it really is. Not to toot horns but this one has been specially tough for me. Going into lockdown i lost my nan and damn this still hurts and makes me cry now even as i type this here, i did not expect that. Before going into lockdown another loss was had at the start of the year and fights were had and so life was tough and sad and painful and times got tough and anger and depression and grief were all there present. 

It was just a month ago i was giving the downlo on the intel i had for you from me or the lockdown. 

Times still tough and still going through a lot of shit.

All i have ever wanted is peace, love and happiness. I apologise to those reading this who i have hurt or offended in anyway. 

I am a human being and i make mistakes and i fuck a lot up unintentionally too. 

I never mean to ever hurt anyone, i truly am a gentleman and a good soul and i don't say this if i did not mean it. 

I have pushed many good people away because of my problems i know this and to them i am sorry. I never mean to be the problematic one or to shoe off all my sorrows onto anyone else so they could carry the weight or anything i just wanted to be listened to and to have had a push of help in the right direction. 

I struggle to fully cope well with the pressure of my emotions i know this and some are stronger and more powerful than others inside me. 

I got a lot of work ahead of me and yes it is a bit scary and overwhelming but the path to redemption is often rocky and uncomfortable. 

Just let's all be safe and keep well and start shining.

Stay Shiny!

Emotional Videogame Impact (E.V.I.)

***SPOILERS ARE HERE FOR LIFE IS STRANGE AND TELLTALES THE WALKING DEAD BEWARE!!!!***

I forget sometimes on how much of an impact video games can make on us. 

Especially the interactive story games. I have recently completed Life Is Strange: Before The Storm and during the process I've teared up and had my emotions go all over the place. From smiling one minute at how happy the characters are to mistrusting and being suspicious to people to missing them to annoyance to tears of sadness to gobsmacked-ness (if it aint a word auto correct well it is now!).

I originally completed the first LIS (Life Is Strange) on Xbox 360 when it first came out back in 2015, and i originally found Chloe to be such an annoying character who was only using Max.

However after before the storm i understand so much more and i feel for her, i feel so sorry for her, its crazy, god it sounds so stupid out loud as we all know and you know she aint real at all, just a piece of writing pieced together with code, cgi and a voice actor. I feel so sorry for Chloe and I just want to hug her but alas i cannot.

It's truly amazing how some games can take you out of all that and make you feel as if the characters are real because that's damn good writing! Sorry it seems like i grew too attached to these characters but this is only the beginning of this blog post lol. Now let's get spoiling and opening up more. 

As my post indicates I grew quite attached to the game series Life Is Strange. I've finished all of them and even though I did Before The Storm last, there was apart of me that felt like I could do it, I can actually save Rachel from dying! I was happy at the end of Before The Storm to see Rachel and Chloe messing around being so happy BUT It's only when after the credits roll you realise that's not the case, you can not save her! 

She was doomed to die from the start. It's so sad, just tragic, depressing even. It's crazy that this girl whom you never really meet in the first Life Is Strange made so much of an impact in that game because all you really know about Rachel is her name and the fact she was this perfect student who has up and vanished one day. 

I will say she makes a hell of an impact in Before The Storm and on every character that ever came in contact with her. This girl who was full of life, so well known yet she is taken so young. This girl whom I made happy playing as Chloe and who made Chloe happy there's no saving her, you couldn't. 

God damn this series is so bleak, even its soundtrack is bleak but it's quite beautiful, poetically speaking.

I can only hope that as a writer I can create characters which can give people the same effect as these characters have made on me. If any of the Life Is Strange writers do read this I want to say THANK YOU SO MUCH! 

I talked about the tragedy of Life Is Strange and how beautiful it is even in it's bleakest of moments but now to talk about a game and a man from another interactive episodic game series. 

Now it's time to talk about Telltales The Walking Dead with Lee Everett!

Season 1 of Walking Dead by Telltale games featured a man named Lee. Now we don't know a whole lot about Lee besides he was on his way to prison when all of a sudden his life got flipped upside down and boom, it's the apocalypse! The other thing we know about Lee is he has a family who runs a pharmacy. Mostly we are Lee, the player is Lee and so we choose what he does and says.

So you go through this episodic first season looking after a little girl you meet named Clementine who is the sweetest girl in all of gaming let's be honest. 

She's helped us the player out at times aswell during the game. 

Now one thing happens in episode 4 which leads you to get bitten (it happens no matter what sadly). So your then infected and on your way to become a zombie. After losing some friends and encountering massive odd of bandits and zombies of course Sweet Pea gets kidnapped by some psycho and we have to get her back. 

We fight through the hordes of zombies to get to Clem even though we suffer great blood loss and the fact we are losing our time to live and we save her BUT then as we try to escape together our time is up together. 

Here we lay unable to move as our body gives out and we are faced with a decision and the first one we ever make with Clem. 

Kill Lee or let him turn into a monster? 

It's tough because we want a different way Clem does. She is so upset she does not want to lose this man who's been like a dad to her but we have no choice.

I personally shed a tear and shot Lee. 

I didn't want him to turn into a monster and Lee end up killing her. I raised Clem to not let the monsters get to her and she's a tough badass woman now.

After shooting Lee the credits song rang and I'll never forget that. The song still makes me sad now when I hear it. 

The brilliant tense adventure of Lee and Clem has come to an end.

Now flash forward years later Telltale has their final season of Walking Dead coming and I have a sinking feeling this will be it for Clem she won't be surviving the end of the season but who knows for sure.

As for Life Is Strange well a sequel is coming so who know's what will happen and how much more heartbreak we gamers will suffer with that!

That's all I have for you another slice of emotional gaming memories. If you did read this, thank you! I got a lot of this on my mind right now, along with the sad thoughts and songs that followed each sad scene of the games. I've grown so attached to these characters and games it's crazy I know. 

Share yours below!

#EmotionalVideogameImpact

Written by Scott Jones

2017: What Have I Learned?

So that's 2017 wrapped up. Another lap around the sun complete, another number added to us.

There's been good and bad, like any other year really. We've lost stars and we've lost a lot of good people last year too. . We've all had new starts too and even if you say nothings changed, something has.

MY LIFE IN 2017

For me, I started the year low being let go from my job in a game shop. It was sad indeed and I still miss working with the wonderful people there. I knew it was coming however and then I moved on. For a short while it was back to the dole be forced to do all that crap with them again for 30 odd hours a week until I landed my job with a local cinema chain. "A dream job for you" people told me. It was a good fit I won't lie and it's funny how few years ago I applied for a role there and I failed but this time I was successful. I'm so happy i got this role!

We all have our good and bad days, sometimes the bad days are brought on from others while other days it's just our own troubles. You know The Miz was voted wrestler of the year and I feel like I'm The Miz of my work. No matter what, I always put my blood,sweat and tears into everything I do, I'm not a throwaway, I work my hardest for what I want and I always try to improve upon myself. I also want to thank all my family and friends for putting up with me as ever, you make my day's, months, years go great, much love and respect for all of you!

Highlights?

Star letter in gamesmaster mag.

Game review published in gm as reader review.

New job.

New friends.

New ebooks released.
Held a Bearded Dragon.

Went to London for a lovely day out with work and went to madame tousauds and planet hollywood.

Went to Birmingham for work sports day and got to semi finals.

OVER 50K Blog views!

So what have I learned? 

I have learned that I'm quite the juggler, juggling life, work, YouTube, writing and social life altogether it's been hard but I've done a decent job. I have learned I am a bit harsh on myself and I've got a bit of a short temper and that I can and I will keep improving myself.

What's Next?

It's took me a couple of days to compose this post but I will say the past 8 days I have cut down what I eat and with work I'm always on the move almost every day so being active and eating less should do the trick of weight loss for me, i am keeping an eye on what i eat and how frequently and cutting down the junk so fingers crossed this works out and i come out of 2018 much lighter. This year i want to write more and bring you more ebooks and just enjoy life. I'm off to the gym with James soon, so i got to wrap it up here but everyone thanks for the love and support as ever!

I wish you all the best year ever, have a nice day and stay tuned for more wicked blogs from yours truly!

Emotions are running strong....like a river free falling down...a waterfall.....a waterfall.