IRL – Secret Thoughts

Breaking Bad

Breaking Bad is one of the most well-constructed TV series I’ve ever seen. It follows Walter White on his rise from over-qualified high school chemistry teacher to methamphetamine drug lord. If you haven’t seen it, I recommend getting on Netflix and watching it before proceeding.

The series features many well-developed characters, but Skyler, Walter’s wife, in particular caught my interest. A fellow Breaking Bad fan, and the person who introduced me to the series almost a decade after its final episode aired, however, told me this was an odd choice. The wife of the shady protagonist in crime dramas like Breaking Bad (e.g. The Sopranos) tends to receive a lot of hate from viewers. They’re either submissive to whatever their criminal significant other wants them to do, making them seem weak or unrealistic to the audience, or they are antagonistic, making it natural for the audience to dislike them for getting in the “hero’s” way.

As Walter White’s wife, Skyler is no exception to the rule of being a commonly disliked character. She begins the series oblivious to Walter’s criminal activities. After she discovers them, she transitions between reluctantly or unwillingly supporting them, trying to separate herself and/or her kids from them, and finding herself hopelessly ensnared by them. Walter reasons that his actions are for the good of his family. He wants to provide them with wealth and safety for after he dies prematurely from terminal lung cancer. Skyler similarly reasons that her actions are for the good of her family. She hides Walter’s criminal activities partly to protect her son, who would be devastated to discover the father he admires is a criminal, and partly to protect her brother-in-law DEA agent Hank Shrader, who would be devastated to discover a criminal mastermind in his midst.

While Walter is willing to sell drugs and commit murder to provide for his family, Skyler is willing to go to equal extremes to protect them. She concocts a clever explanation for Walter’s wealth for her sister and brother-in-law. With her former career in accounting, she insists on overseeing Walter’s money-laundering operation to ensure no one discovers it. She pays most of Walter’s accumulated fortune to her former employer when she discovers he is at risk of being investigated for tax evasion. Fearing her household and money laundering business will also fall under this investigation, Skyler insists he use the money she forces on him to pay his bills and shutter his business, even sending goons to scare him into doing so. Unfortunately, she does this at a time when Walter needs his accumulated wealth most, unwittingly creating a seemingly insurmountable obstacle for him.

Admittedly, after watching the series a second time, Skyler is most interesting during this period of reluctant acceptance, which peaks in Season 4. Her prior period of revenge sex with her former boss in order to punish Walt for hiding his criminal activity and post period of deep depression and antagonism after she discovers Walt is not only a drug dealer but a murderer is less interesting. Perhaps this is because in both cases she reaches the contradictory conclusion that she must split her family apart for the good of the family.

Still, she was the character I didn’t know existed and yet needed for inspiration. I’d never watched a crime drama before and was unfamiliar with her archetype. It turns out I’ve been writing a novel with a loose crime drama sub-plot for over a decade, and the “crime boss’s” wife was my weakest character. Unknowingly following the trend of crime dramas, I’d never had a good idea of what to do with her to make her likeable or even interesting. Skyler made me wonder, “How far would this supporting character go to protect her family?” While I can’t say I’ve solved the problem of the “crime boss’s wife” archetype, finding an answer to this question resulted in a much more interesting character.

The Year of Magical Thinking

Near the beginning of The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion promises that you will experience what she did in your lifetime. Specifically, she was referring to the feeling of disbelief following the death of someone dear. For example, following the sudden death of her husband, she described feeling that as long as she thought certain ways or didn’t acknowledge certain things, her husband would come back. She knew he was dead today but wondered, “What about tomorrow?” She saved her husband’s shoes with the thought that he would need them when he came back.

I can believe her promise and relate to her sentiment. Even five years later, it doesn’t seem real that I’ll never see my mom again. My cat Jiji passed away in June this year. I held on to a box of food I bought for her for months. I still have a baggy of her medications in a closet. These things are “special” in some way, a part of her, and can’t merely be thrown away.

A rant about smut and experimental writing

A friend recently recommended that I read stories from the Human Domestication Guide (HDG). This collection of stories takes place in a universe where Earth has been taken over by technologically advanced invaders. These invaders, however, have an imperative to reduce suffering, even if that means imprisoning a miserable person in order to take care of all their physical and mental needs. The stories are technically smut but 90% of their content examines disability, mental health, and gender expression.

It interests me partly because I like researching topics in mental health and gender expression. Additionally, at least some stories are written from the perspective of characters who desire to give someone else total control of their life. This ideology is the exact opposite of my own: everyone should have as much freedom to act as individuals as possible. A government-less society is the ideal… which is about as realistic as the society of post-scarcity, boundless resources, and total control depicted in the HDG. It interests me because I want to understand a perspective so different from my own.

I’m no stranger to picking through smut for other aspects of a story that interest me, but I’ve gotten rather annoyed with having to do so as evidenced by the following rant I gave my friend:

In regard to the Human Domestication Guide, is my fascination with experimental writing showing when I say I’m more interested in the methods the creators use to attempt to maintain coherence across thousands of stories and dozens of writers than I am in the stories themselves? At first I thought the Wiki (which I found first) was the HDG, but then, I found the collection of stories that actually compose it. If it had been the Wiki, that would have blown my mind. Non-linear writing is neat.

I’ve been slowly writing/adding to this “non-linear saga outline,” “digital garden,” thing: https://the-net-digital-garden.vercel.app/. Eventually, it will basically be a collection of my notes, backstories, character profiles, and other things that are too detailed or too irrelevant to put into any book I plan to write. They’re things I needed to flesh out to make the stories and characters that these notes support appear coherent (hopefully) though. At first I thought HDG was something similar that already existed.

I’ve imagined that some writer out there could find my notes and be inspired to write their own story within my universe. I don’t plan to flesh out six planets worth of things after all, just the parts that I need. There’s plenty of room for someone else to write within it… And then I think, “Someone is just going to use all these ideas as a backdrop for smut, aren’t they? I’ve certainly given them enough fuel to do that. -_-”

Smut has it’s place I suppose if it’s allowed HDG to grow as large as it has. It’s just annoying. HDG’s ideas sound interesting enough on their own without pandering to the reptile brain. It’s a plague within experimental writing, too. Even House of Leaves, a book objectively unique and interesting to look at without even reading it, has straight up porn in the middle of it.

I reread Vurt by Jeff Noon a few years ago and realized that it represents everything I dislike reading and everything I dislike about experimental writing. It’s a book about drugs and incest (and robo-dog-cop-vurt-human-shadow hybrids) and written from the perspective of a guy writing a book (that’s a different rant). Yet, I still loved the basic story, the characters, and the subtle experimentation with perspectives, which is what I remember most and remember liking a lot back in high school. I realized I’ve kind of spent the past twenty years trying to recreate what I liked so much about Jeff Noon’s writing but without all the smut.

Mr. Black and Night

Night and Mr. Black merging into one.
The first names I thought of when considering what to name my black cats was Mr. Black and Night. “People are going to think I’m boring,” I thought. Ultimately, I decided I didn’t care and proceeded to take them to their first vet appointment where my veterinarian struggled to keep their names straight. Perhaps I named them Black and Night to annoy people. How do I even keep them straight?

There’s a reason for my madness though. I’ve been obsessed with the music artist mind.in.a.box since 2017. With the exception of R.E.T.R.O., each of mind.in.a.box’s seven albums are a chapter in a science fiction story. My obsession has been particularly intense this year. Prior to adopting my new cats, I spent several months studying mind.in.a.box lyrics. Mr. Black and Night are reoccurring characters and seemed like perfect names for a short-haired, black male cat and a long-haired, black female cat.

If you happen to have any interest in an electronica/futurepop musical without the stage play, I highly recommend it. For those wanting the TLDR version just so you can keep my cats straight, however, “Travel Guide” suffices:

And just because I can’t resist sharing two of my favorites featuring my cats’ namesakes…

Mr. Black

Night

UnagiLogic Shout Out

UnagiLogic gave this blog and other things I’ve written a shout out on Patreon, so I’m returning a shout out. UnagiLogic is building a VRChat game called Tap-ioca Tavern and sharing game development learnings and other aspects of the journey along the way. They will also be hosting regular Micro Jams and are open to collaboration for those wanting to build their programming skills or widen their community.

If you’re interested in game design or game development, you can find UnagiLogic’s Patreon here.

August AniMeals Adoption Follow Up

In August, I adopted a bonded pair of cats from AniMeals. Adopting from AniMeals was interesting in that they require adopters to sign a contract where if adopters can no longer care for the cat in the future, they must return the cat to AniMeals. It also takes a couple days for AniMeals to respond to adoption applications because they will do a background check, including calling personal references provided to them. I didn’t expect the friends I listed as references to actually receive phone calls, but they did! I don’t think even personal references I’ve listed on a job applications actually received phone calls, but AniMeals is thorough.

Anyway, since AniMeals is more involved in the lives of their adopted cats than the typical shelter is, they sent me an email to ask if I’d share an update about how the cats have adjusted. Below is the questionnaire I filled out for them, and a few of the pictures I sent.

1. Did you rename your kitty?

I adopted Stella and Bodie, now known as Night and Mr. Black.

2. How did your kitty adjust to your home?

It took some time for them to adjust to the house, my other cat Luna, and me. They stayed in their safe room and didn’t like leaving it for about three weeks. Night can still be skittish outside her safe spaces, but she is slowly getting more comfortable with me and the house. Her latest favorite place is lounging on my desk while I’m working. Mr. Black, who has settled in with much greater ease, gives her confidence when she’s feeling shy. Both of them like pets, watching birds out the windows, and playing with toys. Black will throw himself on the floor to ask for full body pets. Night likes playing with cat wands, and Mr. Black can often be heard playing with stuffed mice and toy balls late into the night. They’ve always been polite to and tolerant of Luna, who is slowly accepting them into her house. While they aren’t friends yet, the three of them frequently lounge in their favorite spots on the couch together.

Luna, Mr. Black, and Night lounging on the couch.

3. Have any behavior issues arisen since adopting?

No major behavior issues have arisen since adopting them. Mr. Black occasionally picks a fight with Night and has swatted at Luna, particularly around meal time, but nothing too concerning.

4. Is your kitty eating & using the litter box, okay?

Both of them eat and use their litter boxes fine. Mr. Black had some diarrhea initially that resulted in messes at the entrance to the litter box, but I’ve since identified that as a sensitivity to fish.

5. Have you been to the vet since adopting, and if so, did anything arise from the visit?

I’ve taken them to the vet and had bloodwork done for both of them. Night’s bloodwork was perfect, but Mr. Black had some abnormal kidney values. I’ve since put them both on an all-wet food diet (except for a few crunchy treats they enjoy). Mr. Black will have his kidney values tested again in a couple months.

6. Would you adopt from us again in the future?

I would definitely adopt from AniMeals again!