Life Updates 2015





Things have been pretty crazy since my last general blog post.

Griever
The most devastating thing that happened recently was that my cat, and best friend which I rescued from campus as a kitten passed away due to cancer. He was only five and a half years old, and had a very aggressive form of cancer called a sarcoma, that was possibly vaccine related. It happened so fast. In December he was fine, and by March I had to put him down.  He was my first real pet that I had, he was my best friend and I had to put him down since he was beginning to suffer from the cancer that was attacking his body.

In December we went out of town for something and when we got back we noticed he was limping. I took him to the vet and they said that he possibly just tore a muscle and should be fine. A few weeks later he was limping more and had a small bump on his shoulder. We took him back, got new meds and he seemed to get a bit better. Then a week or two later he was limping again. Back to the vet and they did a needle biopsy. Showed nothing. Next week he was limping even more and was tired all the time. They did a full biopsy and a week later they found that it was cancer. Very aggressive and the lump on his shoulder was the size of a small tennis ball now. Nothing could be done. I had spent almost $2,000 at this point and the cancer was so advanced that even amputation would not save him. I would have spent every dollar that I had if it would have saved him. That was the hardest part was knowing that nothing could be done and that I would have to choose to put him down. We made his last week as great as we could and then we had the vet come to the house and put him to sleep. He was nervous at first but he laid down and I held his head as the vet put the needle in. He looked at me one last time, exhaled and was gone. It happened so fast. It took less than five seconds, and he looked so peaceful. I have never lost anyone this close to me before.

I'm glad that he is at peace now, but my life just feels so empty. He sat on my lap every day for five years. He slept at the foot of my bed every night. He would sit on my desk or my Hafler amp on the floor when I was working. He was part Siamese and he would meow or make cute & unique sounds all the time. Everything just seems so quiet now. Everything just seems so empty. I think about him every day. My friend Kat said that I should get a photo of him to put above my desk, so I had one printed up. Now he can still watch me and hang out every day. We are going to spread his ashes back at the pond at Tech where I found him. I think he would like to rest there.

VJ / Club
I have somehow become the resident VJ at Effex's Industrial / EBM / Goth night  Phenox that I also help run. Its fun, but a lot of work; Trying to make new VJ material, flyers, run social media, and other management stuffs. Its a distraction though from home, and thats what I need right now.

Work
Work keeps me busy. I rather enjoy being a Security Analyst / Researcher / Noob Pentester. Lots of stuff in the works for my independent research will be coming soon.

PAX
PAX South has come and gone and it was a ton of fun. Had a different feel than PAX Prime, much smaller, but it was great to see Issac, Hillary, Ryan, Lyz and Mar again. Got to meet some great new folks as well. I live for this stuff now. PAX Prime 2015 here I come.

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