Break

So first the power failed, then our government failed, and then my health failed. I haven’t written here in a while. I went from an American existential crisis directly into a pretty hefty covid infection. I made it 2 and a half years without getting sick, but, unfortunately, the streak is broken. I’m not going to write anything more direct about the Supreme Court here. I’m not going to write further about my time with covid either. I think my experiences of both of these things are very similar to those of many others. I don’t really have anything useful to add.

One thing I did learn in my absence is how hard it is to return to a habit once the chain has been broken. I was really enjoying writing here every week, but I just couldn’t bring myself to write during recovery. I’m going to continue to try not to make any promises about writing here, but I do feel better when I’ve written.

3D Printing Failure

After the covid brain fog really set in, I decided to print the battery and back covers for my polaroid camera mod. So I set them up to print and then walked away and completely forgot about it.

For incredibly short prints, these failed quite spectacularly. The hotend is shot. The print separated from the build plate and attached to the hotend and it just kind of kept running. I was honestly too out of it to be too upset.

So I’ve purchased a new Ender hotend. I had previously printed an adapter as a backup in case of exactly this. Super happy I didn’t put this off when I found it. I’ve been waiting for complete recovery to set this up and give it a try.

Gaming

Destiny 2

The Season of the Haunted is wrapping up and I find myself much closer to finishing the season seal than I had expected. So I’m actually going to go for it. My best friend and I did a lot of the hard parts this weekend. All that is left for me is some collectible pickups and some grinding.

Every time I return to this game I’m still impressed by how good it feels.

Battlefield V

I’ve been feeling a void that could only be filled by a big pointless battle game. I was thinking of Star Wars Battlefront 2 (the new one rather than the old). I remember hating that game. So I don’t know why I find myself wanting to play it now.

Many of the Battlefield games are on Gamepass. So, instead of returning to a game I know I hate, I picked the most popular version of Battlefield (using Steam numbers) - Battlefield V. My best friend also has a copy. So I was able to rope him into reinstalling and playing with me.

So far the experience has been wonderfully mediocre! Exactly what I was hoping for. It was a nice temporary shift before I returned to Destiny. It really scratched that itch I had that I still can’t explain.

Reading

Library Books

I picked up 3 books from the library the week after the power outage. I outlined these in my last post. Of those I’ve finished one and started on the second.

Unfortunately, when I got sick, I missed out on another book I had on hold at the library. I’m not sure when I will return to it. It kind of feels like the opportunity passed me by. The book was Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals which was recommended by Jay Springett. Perhaps, when I’m fully recovered, I will re-request it.

Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore

I finished Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore pretty quickly. I felt engaged. I also felt the tinge of anxiety I last described when reading Becky Chamber’s The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet. I think Sloan is courting that a bit more here than maybe Chambers is, although The Long Way has tension building scenes as well.

I had not realized, when picking it up, that this book was written in 2012. This explains what I can only describe as dissonant levels of optimism regarding Google’s effect on the world. This probably also didn’t help my anxiety levels. I kept expecting something bad to come from the megacorp’s involvement, but this just isn’t that kind of story.

Despite the anxiety, I did enjoy it quite a lot. I felt like the overall message was positive, and the prose flowed well.

Creative Quest

I’m only a bit of the way into Creative Quest but I’m already feeling impacted. I might have to read this one twice and do some exercises the second time through. A couple of things I definitely want to explore more:

• What am I not?
• Who are my influences?

Other Stuff

With my covid quarantine ongoing I haven’t been able to go to the comic store in quite a while, which has kind of sucked.

I purchased Wanderhome and it came more quickly than expected. I had expected the typical delay of a print on demand service. I’m quite suprised by the quality of the physical book itself. I haven’t had much of a chance to look at it yet, but I’m hopeful that it will fit into my continued focus on Iyashikei.

The Journey Continues

“Do the thing you actually want to do, not the thing that’s easiest.” is becoming my North Star. It’s an easy measure of whether a day went well or not: Did I do what I really wanted to do? Success in this requires a surprising amount of mindfulness especially with the world in my pocket. I hope that you are able to do what you truly want to do as well.

Stay chill and enjoy