Infinity Dreams Award

It’s official: Something By Chrisi now has its first award!

Thank you so much to my friend Grace for nominating me for the Infinity Dreams Award.  If you haven’t already, you should definitely check out her blog: https://gracetfirefly.wordpress.com/.  She does some amazing writing, and is one of the sweetest people I know.

Acceptance Rules:

Thank and link to the nominator (see above).  List 11 facts about yourself, answer the nominator’s 11 questions, and nominate someone else with another 11 questions.  This award’s definitely got a thing for the number 11.

So, first off, 11 facts about myself!

1.  I’m a Missionary Kid (MKs Unite!)

2.  I love East Asian cultures and always want to learn more about them.

3.  I’m currently learning Korean, but I also really want to learn Chinese (though not without the help of a native speaker because I really, really don’t want to learn the tones incorrectly).

4.  I’ll be a Super Senior next year but will graduate from college while I’m still 21.

5.  I want to get my Masters in TEFL so I can teach English at an international school or university in East Asia.  Right now I’m really leaning towards China, South Korea, or Japan, but I’m definitely open to wherever God leads.

6.  My favorite color is black, followed closely by red.

7.  My taste in music is all over the place: from Asian pop, steampunk, Christian rock, and video game scores to opera, film soundtracks, worship music, and epic music.  The only genres that I really don’t like are hip hop, most rap, and American pop.

8.  I could literally live my whole life on egg rolls, sushi, wontons, and ramen.

9.  God’s been working on me quite a lot this semester, a lot more than the past twenty years combined (or so it seems).  It’s very difficult sometimes, but I keep being reminded to slow down and just enjoy living life with Him.  I’m excited for what the day holds for me now.

10.  I’m a theatre junkie.

11.  I talk during movies unless I’ve been asked not to.  The only time I don’t talk through a movie is when I’m in a theatre, and if anybody does talk in the movie theatre I get kind of ticked off.

Now for Grace’s questions:

1. What is one of your favorite/craziest/worst dreams you’ve ever had? (You can answer as many as you want and/or as apply.)

I don’t usually dream, and when I do they’re usually nightmares of some sort.  The only one I actually remember involved running through a world that looked like red and black static.  I was with a human-sized, psychotic, black mouse who would not stop laughing, and we were being chased by a skeleton who always had his mouth open.  The only time that this mouse and I managed to get even farther ahead of the skeleton was whenever we passed through a big square door frame that suddenly appeared.  I had that dream twice when I was about 14 or 15, so that’s the only reason why I remember it.

2. Have you ever met any well-known people (even if this is just well-known in your general area)?

Ummmmm… I know I got a football player’s autograph once, but that was a long time and he wasn’t very well known.

3. What is your middle name (no I’m not stealing it! I’m just borrowing it, you might say)?

Kaylee (but it’s a secret, shhhhhhh… ;P)

4. Would you rather be able to go into any picture and walk around in that world, or go into any fictional world at a time where the characters you know of are either dead or not born yet?

I’d rather go into the fictional world.

5. Who’s your favorite Avenger? Or, if you don’t do Marvel, your favorite superhero. Or your favorite, um, superpower. Or all of the above, I’m being generous today. =)

Favorite Avenger is Captain America.  If we’re being technical, then Deadpool is my favorite super hero (followed by the Winter Soldier).  But if you still consider them to be “bad guys,” then I’d have to say Nightcrawler.  And my favorite super power is regenerative healing, like what Wolverine, Deadpool, Agent Zero, and Sabretooth have.

6. Do you watch Studio C and/or Blimey Cow?

Both.

7. What’s your favorite YouTube channel (aside from those in #6)?

Uhhhh… I don’t usually do much of anything on YouTube.  But I’d have to say Toonboxstudio (he does drawing tablet tutorials) and sometimes Markiplier (who does… a lot of stuff, honestly).

8. What song most often gets stuck in your head?

Depends on the genre, honestly.  “The Stand” comes to mind often, as does “MAMA” by EXO-M (the Chinese branch of EXO), “Fantastic Baby” by BIGBANG, and “Riot” by Tedashii

9. Would you rather meet a movie star or a writer?

Probably a writer, just because I’d then be able to ask him about any problems I may have with my own writing.

10. Referencing your answer to #9, who would you meet?

Tolkien, if I could, but he’s kinda dead right now so that probably won’t work this side of Heaven.  ;P  Otherwise, I’d have to say Lemony Snicket.  He’s a brilliant author, and I’d love to get some tips or encouragement from him.

11. Star Wars or Lord of the Rings? 0=D

Lord of the Rings, hands down (though I do love Star Wars quite a bit).

And now it’s NOMINATION TIIIIIIIIIME!!

I nominate my friend Jacob Cullum at 3rd Rule Productions.  And here are my questions for you, good sir:

1.  You have the option to see Skillet or RED in concert, but you can only go to one.  Which one do you choose?

2.  Favorite TV show?

3.  What did you think of Guardians of the Galaxy?

4.  What’s your most favorite designing program?

5.  Justice League or the Avengers?

6.  What are your college plans (or your plans for afterwards, if you’re already a college student)?

7.  What project are you the most proud of?

8.  How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

9.  PC or Mac?

10.  Favorite story/memory about a family member?

11.  Favorite Bible verse?

Thanks again for the nomination, Grace!  It was quite fun getting to answer your questions.  =D

Until next time, God bless you guys!

 

– Chrisi –

Merry Christmas!

I’m praying that you all have a wonderful rest of the year, that God would fill your lives with His comfort and His peace, and that you would grow more and more into the likeness of Christ.

Merry Christmas, everyone, and may God bless you today, tomorrow, and forever more!

– The Chrisinator –

Projects

Popping on to mention that I made a new page with links to different projects.  I’m currently having a slight tech problem with the portfolio viewing properly, but you can still view all of my different art pieces by clicking on the links there.  I’ll be updating it with new images as I make them and, hopefully (fingers crossed) I get the portfolio view to behave.

Enjoy, and God bless you guys!

– The Chrisinator –

It’s Coming!!!

GUYS!

The new Hobbit trailer is out!

I cannot keep calm!

*SCREAMING*

asdfghjklqwertyuioasdfghjkl!!!!

I can’t even anymore!

GAH!

God bless us all!

– The Chisinator –

From the Healers

Yeah, that’s a good part of it.

As most of you probably know, I’m a gamer.

For those of you who didn’t, well now you do.

My genre of choice is MMOs (or online games), and I always roll the healer class.

Always.

The reasoning is pretty simple. Before I started playing MMOs, I did some research into the four standard roles (Tank, Damage, Rogue, and Healer) to find out which one best fit me and my preferred play style. There are a lot of great pros (and cons) to all of these roles, but the two main things that stuck out to me were the lack of Healers and the even greater lack of good Healers.

It makes sense, right? Given the choice of beating the bad guy’s brains out with a sword twice your size or standing back and babysitting your group’s health bars, the average gamer would choose the first. Even so, there isn’t a raid team alive who doesn’t spend at least ten minutes begging the Gen Chat for a Healer – any Healer – to please, please help them get through the next Flashpoint or Instance.

So that’s why I became a Healer. I wanted to help fill the void, to challenge myself (because healing is the exact opposite of easy), and to push myself to be the best Healer in the history of ever (though the odds of that are pretty long, indeed).

Unfortunately, Healers have a bad wrap for being nay-sayers, fun-killers, and even for being incompetent. This post is basically an open letter to other gamers on behalf of myself and my fellow Healers, explaining our point of view and why we do what we do. I hope you find it interesting and maybe even a little amusing.

………………………

No, You Can’t Jump Off of Every Random Cliff You See.

You don’t want to see this lady? Then don’t do stupid things… not without asking me first, anyway. =P

Tanks, I’m talking to you. Yes, we know you can take a crazy amount of damage. Yes, we know that you can go barreling into a horde of enemies with just a massive sword and a really loud war cry. Yes, we know we’d all be dead if it weren’t for you acting as the resident meat shield. And we’re super grateful, honest.

But that doesn’t mean you can/should just go jumping off of every cliff you see or into every acid pit just to see how long you can last.

Look at it from our perspective as Healers. Our whole lives revolve around making sure you don’t die a horrible, flaming death of burning ouch-ness. And it’s really hard (not to mention frustrating) when the Tank suddenly screams into the chat:

“GUYS! IT’S A CLIFF WITH AN ACID PIT! IMMA JUMP IT!!”

Seriously, we die on the inside every time that happens. We even go out of our way to try to distract you if we see a cliff or something like that nearby in the desperate hope that you won’t see it.

It’s not that we don’t want you to have fun. I mean, really? We’re all playing a game. If we didn’t want fun, wouldn’t we be somewhere else doing something else? Healers like fun, too. But when you’re seriously considering if you can jump your speeder across that chasm of lava, ask yourself these questions:

1. If I don’t make it, can I get out and/or can my Healer’s spells reach me?
Our abilities have a max distance, too. If you’re too far down/too far out, we can’t heal you and you could end up staring in horror and regret at your health bar as you slowly burn to death. And unless you’ve got some awesome earplugs, you’ll also hear your Healer screaming and banging her keyboard like a possessed maniac. That’s not something you wanna hear, trust me.

2. If I don’t make it, can my Healer get close enough to me to rez me?
Remember, we usually can’t take as much damage as you can. So we probably can’t make it across the piranha-infested river fast enough to revive you.

3. If I don’t make it and my Healer can’t get to me, do I have enough rezzes or will I have to go to a respawn point and walk all the way back?
Nobody likes waiting for a teammate to walk back from a respawn point, ok? Don’t be that person.

If the answer to any/all of those questions is “no,” then you should probably be the responsible leader for now and save the fun for that big Boss at the end of the raid. Your Healer (and other teammates) will appreciate it and, besides, whacking a Boss is a lot more fun and satisfying in the long run anyway.

I Can’t Heal Everyone All the Time

Somebody’s gotta stare at those health bars and make sure they ALL stay 80% or higher.

“But that’s your job, right? I’m supposed to jump into a horde of bad guys without a care because you’ve got my health bar.”

Yours, and everyone else’s on the team.

See, most of my heals only work on one person at a time. Very few are AoE ones that can heal everyone at once, and those aren’t usually very powerful. That means I have to cycle through every team member to give them individual heals and use the AoE heals when I absolutely need to.

You know about the Hierarchy of Needs? Ask any Healer. We have one, too.

The Main Tank takes precedence simply because he’s the team leader, he can take the most damage, and he’s 99.9999999% of the time the most powerful team member. If he goes down, we all go down, ok? That’s just a fact of life. He gets the most heals more often.

If there’s an Off-Tank, he’s the second most important because he keeps the extra NPCs off of the Main. Next is the highest level Ranged Damage dealer. And from there it just goes down in terms of each member’s power (which, honestly, depends a lot on what level you’re at).

In a pinch, if I have the choice between healing a level 35 Ranged Damage and you as a level 30 Melee Damage, you’re gonna have to wait a couple seconds longer. It’s not because I have anything against you. You’re a wonderful person who’s doing an awesome job. But Mr. Level 35 is just a tad bit more powerful than you, probably a little more experienced, and as a Ranged Damage his abilities tend to take out multiple enemies at a time while your abilities tend to only effect one NPC at a time. That’s the reasoning in a nutshell.

Sure, that formula applies the best in situations where there are NPCs coming in droves or when you’re in team PvP. Each Healer also puts her own spin on the Hierarchy of Heals, and the list can even change depending on which game you’re playing or what level you’re at. The point, though, is that there’s usually only one Healer on a team (maybe two if you’re lucky), and we can only do our best.

Sometimes our best means focusing on the Tank and the best damage dealer at the expense of everyone else just so we can revive you after the enemy has been defeated. I’m sure you’d rather us do that than let everybody die because we’re too busy trying to give everyone an equal amount of heals. Long-term goal in mind. Remember that.

You have no idea about the struggle until you roll Healer…

If Everyone Dies, I’m Gonna Run.

I know you’re getting ready to yell “COWARD!” in the chat, but hear me out. The Healer can only do her job if two requirements are met:

1. She’s alive.

2. Everyone else is alive.

In that order.

So if, for some reason, the team is dropping like flies (either because we took on an enemy that was too powerful or – hopefully not – I didn’t do my job right), I’m bolting. Not because I’m a coward but because if anybody needs to live at all costs, it’s me.

It sounds really self-centered, I know, but that’s how it is. Tanks can’t heal. Very few damage dealers can heal, and those that can can’t do it for very long or as well as an actual Healer. Plus Healers have unlimited, cooldown-less reviving abilities. Everyone else can only use theirs once – maybe twice – before having to wait another ten or fifteen minutes to use it again (depending on the game). We Healers don’t have that problem.

So when everyone’s dead (or 2% away from being dead), a good Healer won’t try to be the hero and take on the rest of the enemy by herself. She can’t take that kind of damage, and then everybody would be dead.

Instead, she’ll turn tail and run like crazy until the NPCs stop chasing her. Then she’ll sneak back, analyze the situation, and start rezzing and spam healing like a crazed maniac (the Main Tank is always first, unless there’s no way to get to him without entering combat again). Then the newly rezzed team can figure out what to do and where to go from that point.

Returning to the respawn point and walking all the way back? Ain’t nobody got time for that.

That long-term goal’s back in action again.

Everything I Do is On Purpose, Even Not Healing You.

Well, I’d personally wait until all but one of my teammates was dead before running, but this is still how it is.

I remember a time I was playing The Old Republic with a friend and another random person I didn’t know. Somehow the conversation turned to me being a girl (’cause that’s such an interesting topic, apparently) and the guy I didn’t know started wolf-whistling and asking if I was “hot.”

We had a good conversation about not treating girls as sex objects and he even sincerely apologized, which was awesome. I really respect him for being willing and mature enough to fess up to his mistake. But in the moment I was more than a little ticked off, so I did something I never ever do…

…I let his health bar drop to 50% in the next fight.

I don’t know why. I guess I thought it would make me feel better. Instead it just made me feel guilty, so I made sure to heal him like usual from then on out.

But it’s a valid point nonetheless. If you treat me like an object or yell at me because I didn’t do whatever you wanted me to, I’m going to feel a lot less inclined to heal you like I should. Most people are like that, honestly. Is it right? Not always. But does it happen in the heat of the moment? Yeah.

We Healers get a lot of flak because, apparently, it’s only our fault when the team fails. It’s easy to blame the girl babysitting your health bars, I guess. And I’m not saying this as a threat, but we really are less likely to heal you and are more likely to drop out of the group if we see that we aren’t being appreciated and/or being treated right. Anyone would feel that way.

True, there are some Healers out there who honestly don’t know what they’re doing. There are others who are damage dealers who are mad because they had to respec to Healer because the team lead couldn’t find an “actual” Healer. Sometimes the Healer is just distracted by whatever’s going on in their “real world.” There are a lot of reasons why the Healer may not be as good or as focused as you’d like. But that doesn’t mean you should blame her for everything or push her around. Not only are you taking away from the fun of the game, but you could also really be missing out on the opportunity to make a really great friend. Think about it.

Tanks are for serious my best friends.

You’ve Got a Friend in Me.

We Healers are helpful people, otherwise we wouldn’t have rolled this class. Helping out in any way we can is our forte, but we also appreciate it when someone helps us out.

You try your best to be our friend? You take the time to learn about our abilities and give us helpful pointers and suggestions? You listen to us and our suggestions? You stand up for us when someone is yelling about how “incompetent” we are? You actively invite us into your raids?

I can’t think of a single person who wouldn’t want to be friends with a person like that.

We’re here to help you, to have fun hanging out with you, and to yell at you when you decide that jumping into the Sarlacc Pit is so definitely worth it.

So let’s take on the world together, ok? It’s always more fun when there’s at least two!

Besties For LIFE!

God bless!

– The Chrisinator –

Ideas Are Hard

It’s officially harder to figure out what to write on a personal blog than on one that’s about a particular topic (or two).

My old blog (HNED) was all about any and every piece of video game, film, and Star Wars news I could get my hands on.  Sure, there was the occasional day when I just couldn’t find anything that exactly pertained to what my Followers were interested in, but the game and film industries are always pumping stuff out so it’s pretty easy to just check back later and find exactly what you’re looking for.

Personal blogs don’t exactly work that way, per se.  I guess you could say that I’m at a tad bit of a loss of what to write about.  One could argue that I should just write about every little detail that happens in my life.  Kinda like a public diary of sorts.

At the same time, though, who honestly wants to read my diary?  Maybe a lot more people than I’m currently estimating, but I’m a random person you probably didn’t even know existed until 30-ish seconds ago.  I don’t read random people’s diaries (actually I don’t read anybody’s diary, but let’s get back on topic), so I’m thinking that most other people in the world work the same way.

So what I’m asking is: what would you guys like to read about here?

Blogs are for the writer because it can be used in a therapeutic, steam-letting-off way.  But blogs are also for the followers.  If the followers aren’t interested then there’s ultimately not much of a reason for the blog to continue (unless, y’know, you like ranting to nobody, which I do sometimes).

Anyway, bring on the suggestions!  I’ve got a few ideas that I’m working on fleshing out more, but I’m always open to hearing about what you guys would like to read here.  Bring ’em on!

Oh, and in other news, I just got an Instagram, if you feel like following me on there.  It’s private so I’ll have to approve your follow request, but I don’t plan on denying anyone unless I have a very good reason (which I will work on coming up with at a later date).

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand that’s all I’ve got today.  How are you guys doing?  Been up to anything fun or interesting?  Anything I can pray for?

God bless!

– The Chrisinator –

So I Had a Butter Popcorn-flavored Jellybean Today…

And they looked so tasty, too! Lies.

What.  In.  The.  What.

Who in the world thought that was a good idea??!

I mean, the taste is fine.  It really does taste like movie theater popcorn, which is the best stuff in the history of ever.

But then you remember that you’re eating a jellybean.

Ok, maybe I’m “old-fashioned” or whatever, but jellybeans are supposed to taste like fruit.  Strawberry, lemon, peach, even blue raspberry.  That’s what jellybeans are supposed to taste like.

So when you bite into a popcorn one, it’s super awesome…at least until you realize what you’re eating.

It’s like eating vanilla pudding out of a clearly labelled mayo jar, ok?  It’s irrevocably weird and impossible to get over.

I’m sorry if the popcorn-flavored jellybeans are your favorite.  I’m sure they’re great if you grew up on them.  But for someone like me who lived just over 20 years before eating her first one–

I CALL SHENANIGANS, OK??!!!  ALL THE SHENANIGANS!!!

…………………..

In other news:

– It’s crunch time for finishing my presentation for the Safe Families Gala next week, so I’m minor-ly freaking out over here.

– The charlie horse-like thing in my Achilles Heel just will not leave.

– One of my little sisters (I’m the oldest of four kids) just became an adult.  Wut.

– I got to Skype with my college roommate and my bestie yesterday, which was super fun and encouraging.

– I also got to wake up early this morning to Skype with another college friend of mine who’s currently teaching English at an International Christian school in South Korea.  She answered a lot of my questions, opened my eyes to the reality of being an American teacher in a foreign country, and has encouraged me to keep pushing forward in my dream of becoming a TEFL/Theater teacher in South Korea.

– God also seems to be calling me to not only trust Him more with my future, but also that I can boldly pray for things I want (like being a teacher) and actively keep moving forward.  In this case (as far as I can currently tell), “moving forward” involves starting to crack down on learning Korean and doing research into both places to get my Masters in Education and schools to apply for afterwards.

So, yeah, a lot of cool stuff is happening.  I’m sure that there are hurdles that I have yet to encounter farther down the track, but God will get me over those when the time is right.  I also have to remember to keep my eyes, heart, and spirit open to wherever He leads, even if it means not going to Korea.  I hope that won’t be the case, but God puts people in the best place and shattering hopes and dreams is not in His job description.  That’s hard to remember sometimes, but it’s something I’m gonna strive to remember more actively.

Anything fun or interesting happen to you guys this week?  Anything I can pray for or try to encourage you in?

God bless you all!

– The Chrisinator –

Assassin Cats

If this doesn’t make you smile, then you may have to rethink your priorities.  😉

God bless you guys!

– The Chrisinator –