It's seems that I'm about the only one posting these days.

Maybe it's the summer time slowdown. Everyone is busy
outside.

Over here in South Korea, this is the one "escape" back
to the real world via the forum, however, it looks like
I'm talking to myself lately!

Come on people, were are you?

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Serious Soldier

Doing calculus, and writing 20 pages articles

Tell me about it, well if anything try and bring some people over, we need it.

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ActiveTuning - Partner & Director Of Sales & Marketing

Well....I'm in the midst of finals here. Then its back to work for me. I gotta earn more cash before school starts again!

Actually, from my experience, it's usually quite the opposite. Summer time and Xmas vacation are peak times of activities on the various forums out there.

Here's my theory why, nothing new, and if you feel offended, then it's not my problem

< Total generalisation, feel free to FLAME me to hell and back, I'll check in eventually >

Most people that visit tech forums are GEEKS or NERDS ... however much they try to hide it, they are. They don't feel like they fit into the world, don't socialise much, etc. So, they try to do what every human does, associate with their peers, people who will understand them. Since they tend to be shy, online is a great place to be with people, they can be SOMEONE.

Now, you still need time to visit the forums, which work can steal from you. School, on the other hand, offers a variety of time off, some scheduled, some not. SO, you see an abundance of people, especially newbies, during those long time off. They get bored, they need something to do.

< End flame causing speach >

< Begin life story >
As for me, I'm a victim of The Real World [tm]. You see, over the years, I realised that being alone sucked. I also realised that many people were WAY geekier than me, and that they didn't seem to have much fun. I thought to myself "Hrm, life is supposed to be about having fun and being happy, isn't it ?", so I tried to have fun. My geekier fellow had strange ways to have fun, ways that didn't appeal to me at all (playing dungeons seriously, being seriously into video games and such). Such things can be fun, once in a while.

But lets face it, there comes a time when you need to grow up. If you don't do it on your own terms, society will force you into a place you may not like ( go society =| )

After such a brilliant realisation ( oh yeah, I'm special ) I decided that I, too, wanted some fun. Drugs and alcohol ain't my boat, just ain't fun for me. Parties are nice though. I shut off my brain ( quite enjoyable ) and set my sights on having fun. That was a little over a year ago.

I was having fun, dyed my hair, got in troubles with the wrong crowds COMPLETELY disappeared from the forums out there, etc. That was a fun semester.

Then came summer, dreadful summer of 2000. I was having fun, partying here and there, spending time with friends, all was good. Then my dog got sick, like REALLY sick. And ended up dying of generalised cancer in my hands [ thank you Mr Vet for not noticing generalised cancer, more than 3 weeks of warning would have so hurt my poor feelings ]. I was down, heartbroken. I came back to the forums not to have to face my friends again, the pain was too much. Got seriously addicted to an online game ( www.planetarion.com ) and came back to the world of the web ! ( my hair was still fire red though )

Surviving through the summer till school was hell, I just wandered around aimlessly for a while. Then school started, giving me something to do again, something else to think about. September rolls along. I get to school one morning only to see a girl I haven't seen in 2 years run up to me with a serious look on her face. The message was short, but meaningful "<edited> commited suicide last week".

Oh yeah, I hear ya, what a nice summer and start of school year. Being totally in shock for a few days was interesting. I realised that people could die at my age ( close to 19 back then ). For some reason, I didn't feel like "wasting my life" on parties and such anymore. Fun is good, responsible fun is better

By then, I was halfway active on the net, dropping by to see friends I had made and whatnot. Then I got to meet my current groups of friends, both in real life and online. 2 great groups, fun people to be around. I was back to having a life, a new one.

Of course, my life couldn't just be bland and boring now, could it ?

In my online group, there was this woman, there was something about her, something that I liked, but couldn't quite say what. Now, as usual, when you like a girl, what's the prob ? Exactly, she has a boyfriend and he's a jerk !

I thought "that's ok, as long as she's happy. I'll only be a good friend". Which would have been fun enough, left my life in a state of normality that I had forgotten about. But of course, why the heck should my life be stable, right ? Life is about change

Dude comes to me to tell me he doesn't love her anymore. Being utterly confused, I just told him to let her go easily, don't make her feel too bad about it. I got the extreme honor of having both of them talk to me during their breakup. Being in the middle is not somewhere you want to be people !

So, she's free, she's nice, what now, you ask ? Nothing, exactly nothing. You see, I had heard about how awful it was to be a rebound date, and since I truly cared about that woman, I did not want that [ plus, I was a chicken, a little ]. So I waited a while. March 5th comes along, my life changed, I told her how I felt and she replied in kind. We talked through the night, both freaking out at the similarities [ way worse for me, I was NOT expecting it ]

By then I'm floating, the web ? whut's that ?!? hehe. Of course, the long distance side of it is hurtful, but in no way permanent I completely lose every markers I had till then, school is even more boring than usual, forums don't appeal to me, the work. I sincerely have no clue what happened since then, cept I visited her and I know my feelings for her are true and very powerful.

I've grown a lot in the last year or so, through some good and some bad. But for some reason, all of those things seemed to draw me away from the forums. I drop by once in a while, but rarely reply anymore.

There you have it, why I'm WAY inactive compared to the past, of course, you do not care at all about my life so ...

< End life story >

hrrr, right, back to the topic ...

In short, summer and xmas vacation are the busiest times of the year, I have NO clue why there's almost no one this summer ...

PS : I have no clue why I shared ... maybe some will enjoy the read or something

PPS : I love you Chrissy

EDIT : Why isn't this post #100, that would have so ruled dammit !!!

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Heh...I used to be the second-biggest poster here, but I'm working full-time right now, and putting a fair amount of time into content for the site, so I don't have too much opportunity to sit and chat on the boards, I'm afraid!

I'm still around, though, so feel free to start discussions, and if something interests me, I'll pop in.

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"And knowing is half the battle!"

Good post Master Kel.....

I read your whole story and found it quite interesting.

I've always been a good listener. However, one point,
not everyone is a geek or nerd that hangs out in forums
or spends half their day surfing the web.
Some of us have jobs that are "web" based and require us
to use the web daily, 10-12 hours a day.
Checking on a forum is sorta like a 10 minute smoke break
from work. It's what I call the enjoyable part of work.

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Serious Soldier

I said 'most' didn't I ?

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I work IT support fulltime right now, and I basically sit at a networked computer for 8 to 9 hours a day handling support calls whenever they come in.
Needless to say, I get a lot of internet time. That's a good thing right now, because it's giving me more time to work on the site. I also have two computers in here (Plus a third, which is my personal Linux machine). I only have to use one for work, and the other is my test machine, so I've got the XP beta on the second (P3-450, which is the machine I do all my posting and stuff on). There are a couple of minor beefs I have with it, but they're mostly beta beefs. This is a really solid Windows. I've only had to reboot it once, and that was because the 3D screen saver caused a pretty bad memory leak. It even plays Worms Armageddon, which neither NT nor Win2K would do!

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"And knowing is half the battle!"

Hey, Master Kel...you got your hundred post!

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Serious Soldier

Master Kel:

What a lovely post . Something similar happened to me on March 5th as well . I found the greatest gift of my life. I discovered true love. All I know is that it is terrific and it grows daily. I have never felt to special and so loved. Thank you sweetheart. I love you too

That isn't all he got, apparently...
Congrats, Kel. Now I shall leave this thread before it gets out of hand...

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"And knowing is half the battle!"

Me to!! I'm outta here!

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Serious Soldier

LOL !!

ps : I'm probably nearing 1k posts now ... if you count previous versions of the boards

And yes, I got way more than post on a BBS, I found love

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There's no doubt about that.

Good luck!

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Serious Soldier