Interesting article about Wingspan, which I’m posting mostly because it’s such a different perception of the game from mine. Though I’m also posting it because it includes interesting stuff about Elizabeth Hargrave and her process of developing the game, and how her success is helping to open the door to more diversity among game designers. […]
Status update for my first week of being on leave from day job: Feeling a little more relaxed already. Getting more sleep than usual, though that may be related to going to sleep earlier than usual. I made a list of things to do every day—some of them are ongoing long-term open-ended things, like piano […]
Learning Piano: Have made significant progress recently. Pleasing. Continuing to get noticeably better. Currently doing the “Slash chords” course in Simply Piano, which is less scary than it sounded. Duolingo: 43 consecutive days (except for one day that I missed but they gave me a streak freeze). Getting noticeably better there too. Who knew that […]
I’m continuing to read/skim Fernand Braudel’s 1980(ish) The Structures of Everyday Life: The Limits of the Possible (volume 1 of his three-volume work Civilization and Capitalism, 15th–18th Century). I continue to find it a mix of fascinating and annoying—there’s a wealth of information here about what Braudel calls “material life” around the world during that […]
This is a long rambly post about microphones and mic quality and my dissatisfaction with perfectly good audio tools. (I should note, for my own future reference, that this post is not entirely in chronological order.) Back when Mary Anne and Ben first invited me to be a guest on an episode of their podcast, […]
Two things about work: 1. I have now gotten approval to work from home permanently. I’ll still go in to the office now and then to see colleagues, as appropriate, but most of the time, I can stay home. I know that lots of people hate working from home, and y’all have my sympathies. (As […]
When I see numbers in fiction that are in some kind of mathematical relationship with each other, I reflexively check the math. (Well, for basic math/arithmetic, anyway.) Like, if a story says “They traveled at 500 mph from California to Japan, arriving in 45 minutes,” then I think, Hmm, it’s 5,000+ miles from California to […]
I finally got around to creating a Shortcut on my iPad to automatically set various settings when I want to launch a particular app, and it was pretty easy and straightforward, so I thought I would post about it. Background: When I launch the Simply Piano app, I’ve been doing a couple of things manually: […]
Interesting situation with a recent crowdfunded anthology: The editors had sent out the ebook version of the anthology and were preparing to print the printed version, when a reader let them know that one of the stories in the book was a close copy of something published on Tumblr in 2017, specifically the first part […]
Content warning for discussion of the Canadian residential schools and other horrific anti-Indigenous behavior by governments. Background: For over 100 years, the Canadian government funded boarding schools that it forced 150,000 Indigenous children to go to. The schools were administered by various Christian churches. At least 2%, and possibly as many as 20%, of those […]
Every so often, I get it into my head that I desperately need a tiny printing press. At which point I go through a mental process (and series of web searches) that goes something like this: I could buy a Speedball Press or other small art press. Art, ink, paper, squeeze them together—boom! printing! …But […]
This year’s Hugo ballot has a (one-year-only) Best Video Game category. I had heard of (but not played) most of the nominated games, but was curious about one in particular that I had never heard of: Blaseball. Turns out that it’s a free, web-based “absurdist […] take on fantasy baseball,” in which you bet imaginary […]