A small confession…

I really do plan to blog volumes about my lifelong geeky nature (and some of the amazing adventures [and misfortunes] it has taken me on), but I’m not in a big rush to do so. After all, I’ve been working on this a long time. I mean – A LONG TIME. I’ve been putting little bits of content online since before most people even heard of ‘online’. In that bleak era I call ”BTI” (Before The Internet) using the 1980’s BBS technology.

Now for that small confession: The specific reason that this “DrewDabble” blog exists (at this specific moment) is not to fulfill dreams of unleashing my inner Earl Hamner or to become some sort of Digital Sage sharing my journey towards enlightenment. It’s simply because I’ve become blissfully addicted to one of those newfangled freemium games… EA Mobile’s “The Simpsons: Tapped Out” (TSTO). As the advertisement says, it is LIFE RUININGLY FUN. Soon after getting hooked on TSTO (late February 2013); I found the TSTO Tips blog – which (as I’ve commented there many times) is an indispensable companion to the game.

Having your own WordPress (WP) blog facilitates commenting on other WP blogs like TSTO Tips. However, I did not want to have an ‘empty shell’ of a blog, so I went ahead and made a couple of small (but sincere) posts. I’ll be making many more as time permits. I’ll try to do a new Geeky DrewBabble post in the next few days. However EA has just graced us with yet more new content (Level 32) and that’s bound to set me back a good day or two. 😉

Meanwhile, if you are a dedicated Simpsons Tapped Out player (Tapper) please check out my latest screenshots from the game on my Flickr account. I’m actually trying a little experiment there right now. Until the controversial Level 30, I had pretty much blown through all the game dialog (or dialogue). If you are a word-geek like me, this is quality content that’s as enjoyable as actual game play. Starting with Level 31 (again, time permitting) I will be posting complete composite paste-up images of all the game’s dialog pop-ups in (what I guess you’d call) pictorial walkthroughs. The best way to access these walkthroughs is go to my Flickr ‘Sets’ page and click/tap the Set with the level you want to see. This will present images in the correct order level by level.

BTW: Flickr (IMO) has leapfrogged to the front of the pack in the photo sharing realm. It brilliantly handles full resolution images in an ultra-easy to manage UI. I’m a very visual person and foresee a beautiful relationship with Flickr. So much so, I’ll be doing a full post talking-up Flickr soon!

What are geeks and what do they have to do with icy couches?

Please note (as if anybody besides me will ever read this)…  At least until I’ve explored this topic to my satisfaction, everything I write in this blog is (more or less) striving towards a deeper understanding of this “icy couch” notion that I’ve been trying to get my head around for over a decade, thanks in large part to insightful books by Hubert Benoit and CJ Beck.

What is a geek? Over the past couple of decades, it’s a word that’s become generically associated with people that are good at working with computers (aka information technology). Actually that’s the best possible connotation of the word. Other meanings (depending on one’s point of view) are somewhat less flattering.

A quick Google search yields two definitions for “geek”:

1. An unfashionable or socially inept person.
2. A person with an eccentric devotion to a particular interest: “a computer geek”.

Big surprise, I work in information technology. When my clients call me “their computer geek”, I wear it like a badge of pride. This is not resting on the icy couch. Most things involving positive feelings of pride are warm and fuzzy… the very opposite of icy couch.

Here comes some icy couch… I’m so socially “awkward” (“inept” is a bit of an overstatement in my particular case) it’s amazing I even have any clients. It seems the very thing that makes me good at my profession also turns out to be a fairly serious character flaw. Yeah, how’s this for a professional tagline: “If you can tolerate being around me, I can most definitely help you with your IT needs”.  Not a warm and fuzzy thought to have about one’s self.  In fact, it’s cold and hard like (drumroll please) an icy couch.

Icy couch is not morbid or fatalistic. It’s not grim or negative, at all. It is simply accepting that the human mind generates an endless stream of both comfortable and unconformable thoughts (emotions, feelings, whatever you call them). Most contemporary western mindsets try to minimize (if not, completely eliminate) the unconformable aspect. Maybe it’s just human nature. I, personally, have spent several insight-less decades trying my best to ignore anything that takes me outside of my psychological comfort-zone.

I consider it most fortunate to have become aware of the benefits of being able to restfully “stay with” thoughts that would otherwise leave my mind very agitated and upset.

This is a good place to stop. Maybe in the next post I’ll pick up with what I mean by “stay with”.

UPDATE – 8/12/2013: The third post on blog this was going to be about the notion of  ‘stay with’. In the mean time The Simpsons Tapped Out game blissfully ruined my life. I will be posting a lot more on what I call ‘Geek/Zen’.

Welcome

An icy couch? Sounds pretty uncomfortable, but with some practice, it can become the most restful place you’ve ever known. I seek knowledge, whatever that means. Dabbling is my primary method of knowledge acquisition. I’m a geek.

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