Update + Possible Dream Series

Hello,

I should be posting about the game I created over the course of three weeks in June, but that’s not what this is about. The game is working & complete-sh (to me its just a proof of concept demo, it doesn’t have everything I wanted to do), I just haven’t bothered to do anything with it since finishing last semester. Maybe I’ll post about this later.

Evidence of game.

I’ve just returned to polytechnic after a three week break of doing nothing… initially.

I can’t remember how this started but, over a week ago I emailed a dream to my flatmates. I kinda treated it as a creative writing exercise. They seemed to really like it so I sent them another one. Then another one. I think the first couple dreams I shared was added to a zine.

The same guy mentioned there might be an audience for this & I realized – I have about seven years worth of material, with more to come in the future. Maybe I could turn this into a series of some kind.

Random Art: Yeti + Fanfic

Hello

Whilst watching a flatmate play Spelunky, I spontaneously decided to spend 5 minutes writing a mini fanfic about the yetis in the game, followed by a bit of fan art.

Yeti (I have a scanner now, no more shadowy sketches!)

Actually, I’m not sure if I can regard this as ‘fan’ anything since I barely play the game. I can see the appeal of Spelunky & can see myself enjoying it, but it is a skill-based game & I haven’t felt much drive to get good at it (I rarely play side-scrollers). Besides, I already have my own games that serve a similar role (Diablo 1 for randomization & classic Doom for skill-based mastery) & I’ve seen so much of this game that there’s little to discover.

Doesn’t stop me from liking the yeti’s though.

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I’ve been returning to the idea of doing fiction writing, going so far as installing Twine so I can create my own interactive fiction. As expected, my old writing problems resurfaced, thoughts like “how do I make this good/epic/high quality writing?”, “what is my plan for the plot/story/themes?”, “what are my characters like & how would they interact?”, “I’ve never been a competent/experienced fiction writer”, “is there much point in doing this?”, & more that just leave me paralyzed & retreating to Youtube.

A different flatmate suggested I try free associative writing just to get myself writing anything. Forget structure, grammar, or plot, just write literally anything that comes to mind. I must say its kinda worked. It’s made me care less about what I’m writing & has allowed me to find amusement in the writing process, seeing the random crap I belt out.

As an example of what this lead to, read below:

Overdue Update – Still Alive

Hello again blog (& people who still check in), sorry I forgot about you for a while.

Part of the reason for my absence is because I got sick of just writing life update posts yet I couldn’t think of anything else I wanted to write, nor did I feel the motivation to write at all. I-um… hmm… well, this next bit is going to be weird.

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I had a moment when writing this where I formed the sentence below & actually looked at the posts I linked:

I’ve also been feeling bad about… things I’ve already written about before: unemployment woes, social issues, worries about my future, blah blah recurring personal issues; so I felt no need to repeat myself.

Let me just toot my own horn for a bit – I think I just realized the value of my own posts (well, except for ones like ‘unemployment woes’, that’s just me complaining). Reading the later two has brought an earlier, better, mindset back. They reminded me of some important points for myself & may have re-centred me a bit. Now that I think about it, I’m actually kinda proud of those posts since they feel like the clearest version of my own thoughts.

Except now we have a problem – this segment has completely derailed this post… Try to bare in mind the rest of this short post was written before this part.

Awkward meta self indulgent segment aside.

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Since my last update in February:

• March = despair resembling a post from mid 2015. Only thing worth noting is I received my first contract payment – yay!
• April – getting better (I think), though still feeling troubled. For some reason the only points I can remember are:
  • I’ve actually been getting some solid weeks of work doing ‘business intelligence reporting’.
  • On the last week of April I had a flatmate attempt suicide. He’s fine now & doesn’t seem to be considering it again any time soon though the experience left me uneasy, particularly with how nonchalant everyone involved has been.
  • Whilst I have no intention of committing suicide (I think), I have been wondering – what am I living for?

Yeah, I’ve been thinking about death & existence a lot lately. I’ve been writing pieces of another post about this topic as I wrote this one, so there may be a post about that soon… whenever that is. I feel like I need to get back into writing.

Anyway, this is just me saying I’m still alive but I’m not sure why.

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😐

What’s happening with this post?

This may be the weirdest thing I’ve ever written.

February Life Update – New Adventures

Hello, this month has been a bit of an emotional roller-coaster. More than once I’ve just had to stop because I wanted to cry, but there have also been some unusually fun times. I guess you’d call it cathartic.

Also, side note, why has an old post of mine been getting views from a lot of random people this weekend? Not complaining, I just find it kinda weird that people are suddenly interested in a post from late 2014 (wow, this blog has been going for that long?).

Anyway, the main things this month:

• I’ve been getting myself setup as a freelance IT Sole-Trader, & thinking about how to make it viable has left me feeling a bit overwhelmed.

• I went on an impromptu road trip with some friends to Twizel overnight. It was nice to see central Canterbury & help a friend move some stuff back home.

• Been looking at the writing/lore aspect of my storytelling game prototype Sojourn.

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If you’re wondering what a Sole-Trader is, it’s essentially a one person business. If you’re wondering what I’m offering here’s my draft business card:

Yes, I’m intending on this being my business card (I wish I could say this was an original idea). I tried to do this in C# but I could see several problems with this approach.

Fortunately there isn’t much I need to legally do before I can begin work (I think I’ve got everything setup with my accountant now), but I’ve found myself having to wait regardless.

September Life Update – Game Time

Hello, I thought I’d end up writing about the uncertainty of my job as my contract ended yesterday, but now I have good news. For those who haven’t kept up with my work situation, or forgot, I’d advise reading July & August before reading the next part.

My boss has presented his case about the future & value of my team (& my own role) to his own boss &, from what I can tell, he has no problem with me going part-time. Now we’re just waiting for those above him to approve. This could take a while since apparently there’s a backlog of matters they must see to first.

In the meantime, he has given me a 3 month extension on a part-time basis. I haven’t received any actual paperwork for this yet, but it’s agreed between us that my standard days for the rest of this year starting next week are Tuesday, Wednesday, & Thursday; with days changing to suit the needs of the team as they arise.

So yep, it’s kinda official now – I’m no longer working full-time. Yeays!!

August Life Update – Not Quite Yet?

Hello, I actually wrote this out in a single afternoon.

This month I’ve become more weary of working full-time & was looking forward to a change in situation, but this last week has been kinda weird for me in an oddly ironic way.

My contract was set to end this coming week & it occurred to me that I hadn’t taken any leave since April. I’d asked about the leave I’d accumulated & was advised to simply sit on it for now. The policy is I’d be paid out for any annual leave I haven’t taken, but this wasn’t the case for sick leave. I’d been advised to simply use it since I hadn’t actually taken any sick days. My plan was to use it to make this current weekend extra long & go visit my parents + dogs in Te Anau again.

Well, this past week my body decided now was the time of the year to be sick.

Ugh, what am I writing?

Hi, I’ll just start by saying that I don’t have a project update for this week. Instead I was going to upload a post about the people who inspire me to go for my aspirations. I’d been writing it for most of yesterday, but when I returned to it today… I just wasn’t happy with it. It isn’t what I normally write about, it felt like a mess, & it felt like an excuse post just to fill in a week.

I still wanted to make it good though. I wanted to keep it short & too the point, but I also didn’t want to exclude anyone. It was getting really long so I considered who I should cut out. I considered the ‘obvious’ sources (my family & friends) but I just felt terrible for doing that.

I also didn’t want to cut out my more obscure sources. While I can give names, in simple terms its creative people in general. This ranges from game developers, people on Youtube, musicians, other bloggers, etc.This is mainly because they’re average people like myself who, despite having to juggle work & whatever else they have to put with on a regular basis, are taking what time they can to do what they really want to do.

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Anyway that’s my wee personal spiel. I felt it was better to be honest about what’s going on in my head than to just post something I felt was bad. I’m probably taking this way more seriously than it is but, I feel that I need to show more respect to those who help keep my dreams alive & to those willing to take the time to read what I write.

Thank you & farewell.

1 Year Ago

“Craft stories, forge worlds”, I haven’t thought about those words in a while.

According to WordPress, this blog has been active for a year now. I remember in June last year I decided to try out blogging & spent the entire month drafting a long ass post introducing myself & what I intended to do with this blog. A year later & this post was done in less than a week. I’ve come back to this first post & I’ve been wondering how have things changed & have I kept to my aspirations.

First Lucid Dream of 2015 – Yeays!

I’ve lucid dreamed again a few nights ago, & this one was markedly different for several reasons:

• Unlike my previous lucid dreams, I didn’t feel a sudden rush of excitement. I was able to stay calm in my awareness & I stayed in my dream for an extra few minutes.
• I tried to teleport to a different setting (Dive To The Heart from Kingdom Hearts, I really want to experience my own version of that) but failed.
• I realized I’ve been in the city I dreamt of before. Not in real life (although I do see elements of Dunedin in it) but I feel I’ve dreamed of the city on many separate nights.
• I tried to stop myself from waking up by spinning (in the dream I recalled it as a way to stabilize dreams. It isn’t until now that I realize it can also be used to teleport I think; damn!). However, it was more like I observed myself spinning, rather than experienced the spinning for myself, so it didn’t work.

Anyway, I felt the need to write it out in story form. I’ve added it to my dreams section, but you can simply go here to read it.

First Lucid Dream

Finally got on to finishing my first written story in like six years. Yay! I had most of this story done for the past few weeks but it was only until recently that I bothered to finish it off. I’ve added the story as a new page within a new section called Dreams.