Time, swelling, Cameras, and doubt.

 There was a time when I might have been bothered by not posting on time on an arbitrary schedule. I don't think I'm like that any more, which i guess is an improvement. To explain, I was doing this on Wednesdays to keep myself doing it, but to be honest this week I just wasn't up to it. You see I've got an infected tooth and most of the week I was either worried about the swelling in my face or tired from fighting the infection with the aid of some antibiotics. Long story short, brush your teeth and when your mouth hurts make a dental appointment, otherwise you lose a tooth.

I've made a little bit of progress is thinking about the visual novel i'd like to write. I've never made one before but i know that there are some engines out there that will allow me to create what i want without having to learn too much programming or starting completely from scratch. I think in the end it may be more of a kinetic novel rather than a true VN because with the story i think i want to tell there isn't much leeway for choices to be made. It will be a fictionalized story, rather than a fictional one, if that makes any sense. I don't want to give too much about it away just in case i end up actually making it. Ruining the story's ending before i actually write it would be sort of a lame start. 

My technical projects haven't really gone anywhere, but with the projects I've completed that's not really that bad. There are a couple of machines I need to fix and a tablet that needs a new micro usb port so I can extract some pictures for my grandpa, but other than that I really don't have very many things i'm currently working on. The only other project I have going on is on hold due to funding. 

I've been digitizing the pictures my mother has at home in albums and things and uploading them to google photos and sharing them back out so they have digital copies of their old pictures. That part is mostly done so I can sell the scanner i bought for the project, except for the sketchbook i used to have in high school that I'm still working on getting scanned in. The next part is digitizing the old camcorder tapes my dad shot when we were little. He's passed away now and has been for a long time, so seeing him and hearing him again has been a little difficult. He wasn't a bad person, he was a wonderful father, but having not seen nor heard him in 20 years or so affects a person. Anyway the only way i can digitize the camcorder tapes is to buy a camera that can read them. We had a couple of VHS tapes that were easy enough, but the Hi-8 analog tapes can only be played by a camera. Or a 500 dollar Hi-8 player. The cameras on ebay are all a little out my current price range, so I'm just saving to be able to do that. Camcorder plus Composite to HDMI adapter to avermedia capture card makes the process pretty easy, the only hard part is buying the camera i need. 

I've thought about streaming. I want to stream playing games and talking, but I'm not very good at just talking. I spend most of my work day talking, but it's in a different light, and on the phone. Other than this space there isn't anywhere for me to just talk, so i generally dont. I dont think what i have to say means anything, or is interesting enough to attract people to watch and listen. I certainly dont think that anything i have to say would teach anyone anything about what i'm doing at all, i mean who am i to try and tell someone tips and tricks? 

There has been some thought to using this blog to sort of document some of my projects. I worry a lot that if that's what i ed up doing it would just come off as conceited I think that there is something sort of conceited about trying to tel someone else how to do something, even though i certainly know i'm no expert. But at the same time maybe i do something in a certain way that could help someone else. I know i've bounced around the internet long enough and read enough other blogs to know that i definitely have learned things from people's blogs, especially ones that help me with processes at work. I guess its just more of that feeling that there isn't anything of value that i can contribute that hasnt already been posted somewhere else. That feeling like i'm just not able to share anything special. Same reason i haven't started streaming yet, even though I have a pretty good setup for it now. 

Thats all for now I think, hopefully there is some kind of progress to report on the next one on any of the topics above. Good night, and good luck.

Checking in

 I've been debating with myself over whether or not to publish personal details. I've been thinking about it and it would actually be kind of nice to avoid that, but at the same time there are quite a few things I'd like to write about that would entail those details being written out as well. Time will tell I guess. 

Since it's been about a week I figure it makes sense to try and keep these things on a schedule. Even if there isn't much to write about or talk about really. I've been watching the anime this season, quite a bit of it. A lot of the series that are new starting out this year are pretty great, and the ones that are continuing from last year have also been fun. Except Vinland Saga, I haven't watched any of that just yet because I think I wanna save that to the end of the season and then binge watch all of it. Really I think I'm just waiting for a friend of mine to finish the first season so we can watch it together. 

Work has been work. Been a bit busier lately as my boss is out of the country and he is generally the only one helping me keep the queue trimmed back. At least the rest of the week should go quickly, as i've noticed happens when you spend every day super busy. Thats also about the time I make more mistakes though, so I've really been trying to focus on not freaking out, keeping calm, and just working on ticket at a time. The queue can get kinda hairy sometimes and I'm so used to getting hollared at (well, we all do, it's never directed only at me) when things start piling up.Enough about work. 

I've been thinking of writing out my technobabble whining here too, and if thats the case then be prepared for a post every day. On top of my job I also tend to work on little projects around the house, sometimes for everyone, sometimes just for me. There aren't very many of the latter to be honest, but sometimes I find something interesting that would be helpful or fun for me to work on that literally no one else would use or cares about at all. Sometimes it's just nice to have a place to get all the stuff out of your head that would normally just bore everyone around me to tears until they just stop listening. Which is something that definitely happens every time something breaks or i upgrade something or i start working on a new project for something neat to use at home.

There has been a new development in the ol' home life though. In december one of our cats had to go to the vet, which was costly, and now requires special food, which is also costly. We were running out so before we were totally out I called up the vet for a refill, and they ddnt have any. Neither did their recommended site, or it's main competitor. So I called the vendor, who directed me to a new supplier, who did have the food, but need the prescription from my vet before they could send it out to me. So I called the vet, they havent refilled the prescription yet. Super. So I've just been trying to get the cat to eat all the wet food I can stuff into him and I havent replaced the dry food. Thats the special kind only, not buying any more of the normal stuff at all. Mr Kitty is doing just fine for now, but I dont want him to return to feeling and acting the way he was a moth ago. 

Already I almost feel like this thing is getting a little more structured. Or at least I'm trying to keep thoughts together rathr than just rambling until I'm done with it. One of the things I'm working on, or trying to work on, is to be able to return to writing cohesive ideas out. Most of the time I get distracted or run out of steam, then completely abandon a project. I've not had many projects like that because i tend to give up before i start now, knowing that it'll just be another half finished pile left on my front lawn. 

Watching tv in the evening

 There was something I wanted out of blogging. A friend of mine said something the other day that made me think. No one puts things on the internet just for themselves. They do it for the attention that comes along with it, the comments, the rating, the views, whatever. This came up when we were talking about my old blog from high school, or the fact that my live journal is still out there. I think there is something to that. Maybe that is what made me want to blog back in the day, someone would read it. They'd understand, maybe even just a little bit, what was going on in my head. And you know what? Re-reading them has been fairly enlightening. 

Before you ask, I wont be posting my old blogs. I wont link you to them or anything like that. If you find them, send it to me, I'll tell you if you found the right one. 

On to the future, or the present. I decided to return to writing for one thing only, I need to practice getting thoughts out of my head. I have things I want to write, but just can't get them out right. Nothing ever comes out the way that it's intended. There is definitely a lack of words, some vocabulary that feel out of my head along the way. 

One of these days I'll write some of those ideas down here. Lets work up to that part shall we? There isn't much there but an outline, not even an ending, just ideas floating around in my brain. The idea here is to just let things comes out of my head however they want to. 

The TV has been on, playing a documentary. It's been rather inspiring and really interesting learning things about him that I'd never known. You can always learn something new about a person, famous or not. Listening is such an important thing and I've gotten rather good at it. It's the talking part, the expression part, that's the part that I just can't seem to get working again.And on the off chance that happens, it comes out wrong. Things get said that aren't meant. 

Not only writing, I also want to get into streaming again. There is a desire to do something like that in me that I don't understand. I've never understood it. Maybe it's the same thing that makes me want to write, to blog, to tweet. There is no interest in instagram or facebook or anything stupid like that. And yes I do feel like those are rather stupid. There have been attempts at those things, they didn't last long. Maybe streaming wont either. Previously i quit because of the way my setup was situated. My computer and desk (including of course my camera and microphone) was in the living room. How my personal computer ended up being located there may or may not come up and be explained, but the point was there was no way to stream normally with everything going on int he background. It was never about people not watching, it was about finding a good time to be uninterrupted. 

I know that this is mostly insane sounding and may not have made much sense to anyone, but thats not the point. The point here is that I just need to write something. I do feel that urge, the need to make something, to tell a story, no matter how dumb or inane. 

We'll work on this together right? Maybe screaming into the void is my way of not feeling alone in this attempt at creation.

 Lets make a test!~

This is a test post, don't expect much.