Reflections

I've rewritten this a couple of times now and each time it just sounds pretentious. I don't know if it's a fault of the kind of piece I'm writing, if reflections by their nature are at heart a bit pretentious, and then I realise it's happened again. Pretentiousness for everyone!

Hopefully that's it out of my system. On to the point: I've been re-examining myself over the past year, partially because it's coming up to a new year and partially because of one of my Christmas present. I had asked for, and was given, a scrapbook to fill. Thankfully I managed to get out of the house and do things so I have a couple of pages that I can fill with stuff, but there's a lot of empty pages too. Already I know of future events that can fill these, but it doesn't feel like it's enough. I don't feel like enough to be worth recording.

So, the question is what will I do to fix that?

Before I spill all my faults out to the internet and world at large, which I've probably covered in past posts regardless, I'll just say now that I'll figure all this out properly in my own time and space. I'm just going to put the things here that I'm happy sharing, so don't worry you won't be getting a 40 page epic on changes of diet and exercise that'd I'd never keep to anyway.

One thing that I will put here is that I want to do more. I want to travel more, I want to spend more time with friends and I want to talk to people more. I have a real difficultly talking to people and it's something that I can only work on by going ahead and doing it regardless of how nervous or anxious it makes me, and I'm not saying that I suffer from social anxiety issues- I've known plenty people that do, I'm just a whinger in comparison. In the past year I've done so much more than I usually do, and it's still a pathetic amount of nothing. I want to, and will do everything I can to change this, but it's up to me to do that.

Another thing that kind of ties in with the above post as it is part of the doing more campaign is that I want to get into the habit of writing regularly. I was given an amazing leather bound notebook and I have access to various writing programs on my laptop and now my new phone so I don't have the excuse of not having anywhere to write. I have ideas too, so that's not really an issue, it's just laziness, a bad habit. So my writing goal is a minimum of 250 words a week, per week. If I go over one week that's great, but they do not carry on to the next week. If I write 250 words a week by the end of a year I would've written 130,000 words minimum. It's a low target sure, but that's not the point, the point is to make it a habit that I'm comfortable with, so that when it comes to writing something with real purpose it's not a total uphill climb. It might be that my 250 words end up in this blog or that they go into a story, either way, as long as they're being written.

In closing, whatever your reflections on the past year bring you I hope you have many happy memories in there and I hope that the oncoming year brings you many more.
Yndi Halda!

Eleven11

Hi folks, got a few things to chat about so I'm just going to dive right in.

First up, the makers of Abe's Odyssey have released a new Oddworld game called 'New n Tasty' on the PS4. I am desperately awaiting news on the pc port and as I don't really follow console news I completely missed this when it was released in July. Not that I would have been able to do much about it back then other than be completely jealous of everyone with a PS4. The game graphics so far look pretty damned good and gameplay on the PS4 seems to be pretty good. I've not seen anyone complaining about it at least. I'm currently following @OddworldInc for updates.

Blizzcon was only a few days ago and like many people I'm sure my twitter was swamped with messages about the event. However one game seemed to overshadow all others, and with Blizzard's announcement of Overwatch, the internet seemed to collectively lose it's shit. I mostly saw a lot of positive tweets about the game, the choice of characters available to play and the range of weaponry but I did also see some folk just try to pass it off as a cheap TF2 knock off. Curious, I had a wee look at their site (here) and I gotta say, this game looks pretty darn amazing. Playing in groups of 6, you can fight for control of a map or do a kind of courier mission where you have to get a payload from point A on the map to point B and so on. Doesn't sound like too much at the moment but there is plenty of room for expansion and knowing that Blizzard likes to make the most out of their ip's I'm expecting there to be lots of expansions in the future. I'm going to dust off my old Battlenet account and sign up for the beta as soon as I have the chance.

In music news: Gajin-rock band Area 11 have released their new EP Underline, which they are claiming is their best work to date. The 3 track download is currently available through  iTunes,  Amazon and  Musicglue. I only have one issue with this and it's the fact that they're calling this an EP- to me EP's are a 4 track minimum, anything less than that is a single, but that is just me being really pedantic. The guys are currently on tour promoting the release. They are playing Carlisle Brickyard tonight, Glasgow Classic Grand tomorrow and Edinburgh Cabaret Voltaire on the 13th November, then they take a short break before picking up the rest of the tour on the 16th. Full tour dates are here. I thought today was a great day to bring it to your attention as it is 11/11!

Kickstarter update for Evan Dahm's Wonderful Wizard of Oz illustrated book- the project not only reached it's kickstarter goal, it smashed it. The goal was made on the 11th October and since then enthusiasm for the project just seemed to snowball with the final amount raised being 4 times what was asked for. I am really looking forward to owning a copy of this book, and may yet still buy further copies for friends and family that have little ones to share.

Speaking of books I am pulling out of this year's NaNoWriMo. Other circumstances have cropped up and I just can't dedicate the time that is required to the project at the moment and I'm already behind so catching up is just out of the question. Also, I've been having a constant headache for the past four days and daily nosebleeds (which has been interesting- I've not had a nosebleed in years), so my concentration's been all out of whack. I'm still writing when I can but it's just wee drabbles here and there. I do plan on finishing the story that I had planned out for NaNo, but I'll be doing so at a much slower pace.

Actually now that I think about it I have still more to ramble on about but I think this is a good place to stop and I'll post something else in a few days time with the other nonsense that's banding around my brain at the moment. Until then, take care.

NaNoWriMo 2014

Well, I did sign up for NaNoWriMo, and I am terrible at it.

I kept delaying signing up because the last three months of the year are usually really busy for me. Not only do I have a ton of birthdays from friends and family, but I like to do things for Halloween and I do usually try to do something for my birthday which is right in the middle of all this nonsense.

What ended up happening was that Halloween was a mess of doing responsible things like having appointments with my bank and cooking, and doing fun things like hand making Halloween decorations and carving pumpkins. All of this took all day. I was surprised and most of it was spent cooking. And the amount of trick-or-treaters we got was ridiculously small. We had three. Only three.

So we started the first of November with a hell of a lot of halloween candy left over, and I got the chance to catch up with some of my friends that were up for the weekend. We all had different halloween parties to go to in the evening so we made the most of our day catching up. The evening I spent throwing together a very cheap, very last minute costume and went out to the party and drank a bottle of rum to myself. This caused the following day to be spent in a hungover agony that was self inflicted and very stupid.

Day 3 of NaNo I had work and then went round to a friends house to play board games, watch Gotham and eat birthday cake. They got me a Batman cake, I have awesome friends.
Sidenote: I got mostly booze and chocolate for my birthday. I repeat- I have awesome friends.
Unfortunatly I got in at about midnight and needed to be up for work in 5 hours time.

Day 4 of NaNo, I finally get a chance to start writing. And I write something around 100-200 words.

Today (Day 5) I'm up to 830. 830 words. I should be in the region of 8300 plus. I am 7500 words behind.

I can't do this. I don't think I can do this. But I'm going to try. Just after I'm done bitching about my inability to do this on the internets. And when I'm done watching stupid youtube videos.

(Update 1 of NaNoWriMo.)

Update on me

Hi folks, for a personal blog I tend to talk about a lot of nonsense. So I figured I'd spend a wee bit of time to talk to you about what's going on with myself at the moment.

We're coming so close to my favourite time of year (Halloween) and even though I still don't have a costume decided on I am really looking forward to watching as many Halloween flavoured films as I can stomach and carving me a pumpkin.

I'm still an employed member of society! It's been a year and a half since I threw off the shackles of unemployment and chained myself to a life of servitude in exchange for legal tender. All in all my job's still going well too, there's up days and down days and days that just happen. It's an experience of sorts. Fingers crossed I'll still be here this time next year.

I'm still humming and hawing over signing up for NaNoWriMo, mostly because it is a massive time sink, but the story I'm planning out for it may just be too good to pass up on the chance of writing it. Because if I don't have the push of a deadline I know what will happen. I'll start it an never finish. I'm going to make my decision on Sunday, and I'll hopefully be able to update you with more information on that on Monday. In the meantime I am happily planning all this out and ignoring my other projects. Typical.

I've also gained a sort-of second job. It's not a job that I get paid for, and being very honest it's not really a job I've done anything for yet except send off a couple of emails. If you've been reading this blog for a while or even with some amount of regularity (or if you know me in real time- hello!) then you'll have heard me mention Mack and possible the game he's been making: Carbon
Well, Carbon is live. [Insert "It's Aliiiiiive" joke here]
Now I'll probably get kicked for this but, it's barely a game. However it is there and it's free to play. It is currently a sandbox shooter- but it will grow into something magical and if I need to break somebodies shins to get it there I will. Because, damnit, I'm excited for this game. I'm excited to see what it's going to grow into, I'm excited to see what communities will form and what factions will rise and fall. I'm excited to join my first MMO.
Yes, at the moment it's the very bare bones of a game, the graphics aren't even finalised yet I'm afraid, but Cabon has the potential for this to be a fantastic game. And I really want it to be one.

If you do sign up for Carbon, I'm on there as Idge. I need to talk to Mack and get updates on what he's been working on for the game but if you have any suggestions for things to add in, leave a wee notice on the website, tweet myself or @SootEverywhere the company Carbon is being released under. I'll put more links up to Soot related stuff once there's some content up on there.
In the meantime, take care, have fun.

A little something to check out

Normally I'm not really a fan of the Kickstarter service, for a couple of different reasons too. But this time I couldn't resist backing this wonderful project.

The book 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz' has been illustrated by one of my favourite artists, Evan Dahm. Dahm has started this Kickstarter to raise funds to take the book to the publishers, everything else- the illustrations, the design- is complete, the money being raised is purely to go towards getting the book published. The best thing about this- there's already a publisher in place and the project is already backed!

I'm telling you about this even though it's already backed because this is probably the cheapest you'll be able to order the book at, and the push goals that he's put into place now that the book is funded will only enhance the book. He's got options for wholesalers who might want to purchase the book at lower rates which is a really cool idea, not really something I've seen before.

His illustrations and progress has been regularly updated on the tumblr BaumbyDahm and one of his most recent posts has looked a little into past illustrated copies of the Wonder Wizard of Oz story. The story itself has been around for over a century and is a wonderful tale that almost everyone knows- either through the film or the book itself.

There are currently 14 days left on this Kickstarter from when I'm writing this, and there's not long to go until the first push goal, so if you like some really beautiful artwork, or are just a fan of this classic story, you should really check this out!

Hello again!

So, wee while since my last post but I've not abandoned this yet! And I've come with news and shiny things to show you.

First up is this short but very sweet text based game: Hulk<3Fabio
Made by Nina Freeman and Teddy Diefenbach, you write the love story between Fabio and Hulk Hogan -with a little help from the Hoff- who have fallen into a rocky patch of their relationship. Although completely fictitious it is a cute story that I'll admit, did have me flailing and excitedly squeaking at points. And if that wasn't enough to get you interested in checking it out, I'd suggest just playing it once to hear Big Giant Circles' cover of 'Hooked on a Feeling' (a cover of the Hasselhoff cover by the by), just don't rush through the text, as that can cut the track off. Although the song does loop but it's pretty easy to tell when the loop comes in so you're not going to spend an hour waiting on the one page for the track to finish. I just spent an hour on the page cause I liked the cover.

Secondly, I'm going to direct your attention to this bandcamp page: Proleter
Proleter does some amazing electro-swing tunes, the first one I'd heard being April Showers, off of the Curses from Past Times Ep , in a youtube video. Thankfully, Proleter was linked in the description and I spent the rest of my afternoon consuming whatever I could get away with sneaking in during my work day, which was actually quite a lot. It's something that's a little different to listen to. And as a bonus, most of the downloads on the page seem to be under a pay what you want costing bracket, meaning that if you really wanted to, you could download these for free. Madness.

Lastly, I want to talk about next month as I'm kicking about the idea of trying out for NaNoWriMo this year. NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month, it's been going for a good couple of years now, and it's aim is to get people writing lots. And by lots I mean 50,000 words in a month. Their belief is quantity over quality, with the idea that you can always edit later. It's an interesting theory to me, as I never really have trouble coming up with ideas or getting started- it's actually finishing a project that I have trouble with. However, like a surprising amount of people, I tend to do my best work under pressure, so having the goal of writing 50,000 words in a month is something that I may be able to actually accomplish. Whether or not it makes any coherent sense is a totally different story, but that's not what NaNoWriMo is asking for, and- if by the end of that month I'm not totally sick of my own story- I could totally edit it later. I have an idea and I'm using this time to research and plot the story, but it's still fairly early in October, I might chicken out of the idea.
It won't be a love story between Hulk Hogan and Fabio. That requires proper attention.

Maybe next year.

Let me know if you think I should go in for NaNo, let me know if you like the Proleter tunes, or let me know if you tried the Hulk<3Fabio game- and whether or not you hate me or love me for showing you it! I'm on Twitter as always, now also on Facebook periodically (not enough to be bothered trying to link it), on Steam even less these days, I've actually been playing the 3DS a lot this past month. Well, that and watching a metric shit-ton of Hat Films to the point where I think I may actually have a problem. But that's an issue for another post. Good day.

A wild post appears!

I've not looked at this thing in forever, and I'll start off by being honest- I don't know when the next time I'll look at this will be.
I stopped posting because, basically, I became more and more of a boring ol' sod. And I still am. And yet people still read this. So, I will update when I can with what I can and maybe someone, somewhere, will be happy I'm posting again. (you werido! :p )

Some changes have been happening in my life- although my silence on here is mostly laziness. I've finally found a stable and enjoyable job that's reasonable hours and a good commuting distance. I've been working there for almost a year and a half and I'm really enjoying it. Most of the time at least, but I don't think there's any job that doesn't have off days, or weeks...

Because of this I don't have the amount of spare time that I used to, so while I do still draw, engrave etc, it's not as often as it used to be. A hobby that I've been spending a bit more time on lately has been writing however, my focus being on very short stories. I've tried writing longer stuff but I never finish it.

I mentioned on a previous post (so about 2 years ago) that I had somewhat fallen out of love of listening to music. Hopefully not jumping the gun, but that might be changing. Beatsteaks just released a self-titled album that I'm currently loving, Big Giant Circle and Disasterpeace continue of just be amazing in all their chiptune glories, I've been listening to Yndi Halda a lot lately, I've been craving some Reuben and Maximalism's adventure music has been the soundtrack to my commute most days, but I'm feeling a need to look into stuff I've not heard before. However I'm not sure where to start.

Another thing that's changed is that I've been going out and doing things. Whether it's trips out with friends or holidays where I'm travelling a wee bit, it's better (I'm told) than staying in an playing Dungeons of Dremor until my fingers are worn down to nubs. The main push for this was that my work closed for two weeks during the most expensive time of year to travel and I thought fuck it, if I spend the two weeks in the house I'll go mad. So I went outside!
I got sunburned, twice!
Worth it. I'll probably post tales of my adventures on here once I stop watching Youtube long enough to sit down and type something- kind of like now. So while I'm organising that, question time:

i.    any of you glad I'm back?
ii.   got any music suggestions? I'm looking for anything.
iii.  is there a particular type of blog post you enjoy? (drawings, ramblings, review based, etc?)
iv. would any of you be interested in reading any of my short stories?

Thanks for reading.


[Edit: Forgot to mention, I still have twitter and now a facebook! I'm on there as Erin Idge and my picture not of me, I couldn't find my diggle pic :c ]