It was a magical time when you could still find a cellphone that wasn’t ginormous, it was still ludicrous to think that Trump could be a presidential candidate, gay marriage became legal in most US states, the disease people were afraid of was Ebola, Porpentine was still entering the IFComp, and this place finally got past squabbling over whether choice-based games were ruining everything. Then again, Ferguson, Gamergate, massive violence and killing in Iraq.
Positive thing: for the first time since my divorce, all my books are now shelved.
It’s cold and everyone pretty much is holed up. I have cancelled all my standing plans and am enjoying time alone for both days of the weekend which I didn’t realize is so rare for me lately.
I’m not diagnosed, but I certainly go by the “spoons” metaphor for regaining energy to handle things and leaving the house takes several. So I’m restocking and hanging out with the cats, doing little projects and cleaning as it occurs to me.
Having two unscheduled days and not having to think of where I need to go next in several hours is mind-blowing and I’m thoroughly indulging in it.
KITTEH MISCHIEF CURTAILED
I’ve already managed one major project - my cats hide under my couch and tear things up and cause havoc - older boy with weak stomach and bladder, so I’ve been trying to keep them out with hastily taped tin foil and cardboard and styrofoam barricades. The styrofoam worked the best, but my darling marshmallow girl has been working on excavating her way back under there and I’ve been routinely sweeping and vacuuming a blizzard of styrofoam crumbs frequently.
I cleared the couch, vacuumed everything thoroughly, tipped it and removed the legs. Now it sits flush on the floor and it’s a bit low but they can’t get under there and shred the underside of the upholstery anymore!
I got the cats a donut tunnel, and I’m trying to get my fluffy-clawed angel to drag herself all the way through it as recompense for not shredding the couch.
Seltani saved the day and allowed Pinkunz to communicate with forum members when other forms of communication were blocked on the hospital wifi. I’m glad Pinkunz thought to try it.
Had one of the worst flight (so turbulent, so sick) then scarry news on landing. But we got to check in and I got home all fine.
Time for crashing.
Tomorrow will be a new day. A good day.
And games will distract the rest.
Nothing positive has happened today, considering the events. But at least it seems to be getting better for Pinkunz and his wife. That’s really good, and I’m super glad, and that’s what I’m posting for! But it’s still really bad in comparison to these events not happening in the first place. But I don’t think that’s a good thing to say, since it’s already happened.
Nice. I feel like that’s getting close to “I can barely click that fast” territory. Maybe I should use a real mouse instead of the touchpad on my laptop.
Interesting. Do you find that your speed is about the same with or without misses? For me it tends to take longer if I miss because it’s harder for me to see other possibilities for those letters. So I try to be pretty careful before adding words.
Faster with misses. It’s equivalent of checking chess positions while moving chess pieces. Usually, I’m not sure whether there’s an S at the end, so if I skip that, and there’s a lone S at the end, I’d know where to put it.
Grandma was released from the hospital after being stuck in isolation since New Year. We didn’t know what was wrong with her for a long time, but it was a deficiency in B12 that beat her immune system to a pulp.
She’s gonna have to take pills daily now (at almost 90, she never had to before) and to change doctor (the hospital thinks she’d been deficient for a few months already, and her doctor didn’t catch it in her recent blood test).
Don’t forget to get yourselves a blood check once in a while! deficiencies are no joke!
Signed into ifMUD for the first time earlier. Still getting the ropes!
Glad everything is getting better with Pinkunz, even though I wish I could do more, and good luck to those who have been having issues right now. The best you can do is forge through them and emerge victorious
It is COLD. 15F. Everything is frosted white, although thankfully just a little, so no breaking trees yet. Our flora and fauna are not adapted to this kind of cold. We filled Tom’s dozens of bird feeders to capacity last night and they’re already half empty as all the birds try to pack on some fat. And we put several big bowls of water underneath heat lamps on the porch railings, and the birds are coming in groups to sit under the lamps for a minute, get a drink, and get warm. Poor little guys. Last year I found so many little frozen bodies on the ground after the ice storm and this year we are prepared to help as much as we can to avoid that heartbreak.
Our budgies’ large cage is right by a window to the back porch where we put a heat lamp, and so the wild birds are amassing just on the other side of the glass from them, and it enrages them. They are shouting angrily at the encroachment onto their territory. Guy Peep seems to think that screaming his spaceship noise at them on repeat will scare them away, but that’s not working, so he just keeps increasing the volume.
Edit: After a full hour of Guy’s record being stuck on the spaceship noise, I threw a sock at him. He hates socks, so now he’s just grumbling. He occasionally opens his wings in the direction of the wild birds and gets really tall, which I suspect is an intimidation technique that, again, is not working.
My laptop completely kicked the bucket before the first hour of classes on the first day of the semester. That’s uh, a raw ass deal, but I have made arrangements to pick up a new one this evening, (fingers crossed) and I had backed up my files last night in anticipation of this specific terror happening.
And I mean, it’s kind of the best point in the semester for it to happen if it was going to. That, and I am a stationery fiend, so I have a notebook and pens to write notes with for today, even if I did forget to pack my bluetooth keyboard for my phone. And even if the laptop thing falls through tonight, (unlikely), the keyboard and phone combo should be fine until I get one combined with camping out in the library like a stray cat.
Ugh. Well, pink ink is nice. And I didn’t lose any important files. Yippee.
Had to go into the printshop to pick up my lab book and the printshop man gave me a dollar discount “for your lovely manners, dear” which was really nice of him.
Yes, you read that correctly. I have never played the game I made. I wrote the entire thing with the guidance of game design theory and number crunching and only heard back from testers. All the testing I did myself was just on basic, isolated mechanics and logic.
It’s literally based on my recurring nightmare; can you hardly blame me?
But I played it last night and beat it on hard mode without UNDO. (It helps when you know deeply how the game works; glad I added higher difficulties for others who could say the same).
This game is… actually quite fun(?). Also terrifying, but it’s super targeted for me, specifically, so… obviously it’s gonna make me tremble at the keyboard.
Found a bug or two (was playing the same version everyone else had; 0.9.6) but I’m pretty sure those have been fixed or are already known.
Had a few genuinely scary moments with the antagonist. Got too excited about searching for a final suit part and let a door close on its own. Also turned the corner and ran right into him on my way out of the facility, and had to think of an alternative route during a chase sequence.
But yeah. I’m glad the hallway bug will be fixed in 1.0, and I just wanted to log in with my tail between my legs and admit this was my first time. When I tried playing it during testing, I found myself too paralyzed at my keyboard, so I had to pass playtesting onto others lol.
Hopefully I don’t get razzed too much for this. Just got excited about my victory lol.
Play time with our youngest girl cat. We split time between two locations and she comes with us to the coast. She’s been down the last day or two since her main human (my wife) has been away at a volleyball tournament for her daughter.
Agadore is an awkward player but always cute and apprecitates attention.
Think I’ve finally set up my new laptop with all my usual apps. This thing is like seeing in shrimp colours, (it feels like when I’ve gotten new glasses in the past, which is mildly confusing.) Hello, Scrivener, old friend! They sure do make the retrieval process for your license easy, which is really nice. Customized most things too.
Wishing him a swift recovery!
