110 lines
6 KiB
Markdown
110 lines
6 KiB
Markdown
---
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tabtitle: "Life in Progress: January, 2025"
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title: "Life in Progress: January, 2025"
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topics: [life]
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pub: 2025-01-03
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short_desc: "A retrospective of 2024, up to the beginning of 2025"
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---
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# Life in Progress: January, 2025
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My [now page](/now) is growing too verbose. Instead, I'll leave that page as a
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summary of what this/these page(s) will explore. I'll start with a retrospective
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of 2024, up to now, the beginning of 2025. Maybe a bit of ambitions too.
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## 2024 Retrospective
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2024 was a significant year. The most notable change being that I was laid off
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in April. The remaining 8 months were quite nice. Before April, the year doesn't
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feel much different or significant. From what I remember, I was stressed,
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unhappy, and overall dissatisfied with my situation. I was in the process of
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saving money to leave, when I was laid off and paid a generous (enough)
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severance. It's nice when the universe solves problems.
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Much of April and May was time spent decompressing. A bit too much drinking,
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from what I recall. I began receiving unemployment payments, and looking for
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jobs, though only half-heartedly. I was already decided I would start my own
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business. I also started my playthrough of **Fallout 3**.
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At the end of May, I entered into a game jam, and made my first video game,
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[L4-N-DER Training Simulator](https://vagabondazulien.itch.io/lander). One thing
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I do remember from the beginning of the year was speaking with some friends
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about trying to publish a video game on Itch. I made the game using
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[Fennel](https://fennel-lang.org/) and the [LÖVE 2D game
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engine](https://www.love2d.org/). It was incredibly rewarding, and a great
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learning experience. This game would be the first of 5 that I published on my
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Itch page this year.
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Much of the summer was spent procrastinating starting my own business, and
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golfing. At the beginning of summer, in June, my grandmother passed away. She
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was about 2 weeks from her birthday, and so we round up and say she lived to 98.
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I spent some time helping to clean and clear up her house too. In the beginning
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of July I traveled to New York City to see Rezz. I also started properly
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exploring WordPress, and working to understand better the business I was still
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going to start. Around August, I began playing **Morrowind** for the first time.
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In the fall is when I "got serious" about my business. I signed up for the New
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York State Self-Employment Assistance Program (SEAP), and through them signed up
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with SCORE to speak with a mentor and begin some small business training. I made
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my first WordPress site, for a relative (and for free). I also entered into 3
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more game jams during this period, publishing
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[TICSweeper](https://vagabondazulien.itch.io/ticsweeper) (a Minesweeper clone
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mde with the TIC-80); [RUNR](https://vagabondazulien.itch.io/runr) (another
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TIC-80 game); and [Escape The
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Crash](https://vagabondazulien.itch.io/escape-the-crash). _Escape_ was based on
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some work of mine over the summer to better understand and implement ray-casting
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in the TIC-80, which I then translated for use in Fennel and LÖVE. At the end of
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fall, my remaining grandmother severely injured herself, placing her in town
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through the end of the year. For the second year in a row, much of the holidays
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would be spent visiting a rehabilitation center (the same one as my first
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grandmother's). Since the pandemic, I don't think I've had a "normal" holiday
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season.
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At the end of the year, I formally started my business, [Niblock Technology
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Solutions](https://www.niblock.tech), and began working on websites for two
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additional clients. Exploring this new world has been exciting, and there are a
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lot of new challenges. I love working with others to solve problems, and I'm
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looking forward to it. I'm also beginning work on a second business idea for a
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game shop. I want to build a community space for people to play games, enjoy
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company, and relax. Rounding the year out was my first playthrough of **Deus
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Ex**.
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## Now: January, 2025
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Now. Plenty of plans and ambitions.
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Easiest: I started a playthrough of **Oblivion**. Similar to **Fallout 3** and
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**Morrowind**, my goal is to complete the main story and all DLC's. This time
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around, I explored a new modding setup, using [Lutris](https://lutris.net/) to
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install and manage the game (from GOG), and all the modding tools. For all three
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of these games I want to write up a brief retrospective about my experiences and
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any of the setup required for playing them on Linux. I already have two articles
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for Oblivion ([Part 1](/2021/11/20/oblivion-linux.html), [Part
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2](/2021/12/09/oblivion-linux-2.html)) detailing using Steam and Proton. I think
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the Lutris approach is a bit nicer.
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_Escape The Crash_ was fun to make, but it's not done yet. I want to add in a
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floor, sound effects, a skybox, and objectives. And an actual ending condition.
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Game-making in general I want to continue. I've started looking into the
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[DragonRuby game engine](https://dragonruby.org/). I also want to learn (more)
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Godot. I have no shortage of ideas, only my regular struggles with motivation
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and focus.
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I've fallen into a few bad habits, and my health is worse for them. Its absurdly
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easy for me to put on weight, and equally as difficult to lose it again. At my
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heaviest I was over 320 pounds, and I'm now at a much better 240. I want to
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bring that number down to 200, but I also want to remove as much significance
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from that number as I can. It should be a metric, not a grade.
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I've also set for myself several music goals. I want to get better at
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sight-reading, and so I have a goal to read a new piece of music each week. I
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also want to explore music production, and try making my own 45-60 minute mix.
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There are the business goals. I need to have an income that supports my
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lifestyle, which means more clients and (hopefully) more businesses!
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Finally, I want to write more. I think about writing, but rarely follow-through.
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As all my other ambitions develop, sharing them with the world will help me
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formally catalog my successes. Plus, if I have something useful and helpful to
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share, then I want to!
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