What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

I feel like I both have a lot going and not that much. I guess it is that the stuff I'm working on is mostly not things that I check off on my To Do list. Today, I worked on the solo roleplaying game again and got my first character made. I came up with a really dramatic background that is a good start to the game. The book that I am using for the solo game is okay but a bit confusing as the instructions aren't super clear about when I should be referring to the standard rule book for this game. That is made worse by the standard rule book that I'm using being a later edition (I assume) than the version that the author of the solo book was expecting, since character creation is handled really differently. I've figured it out enough, though, to get started. I will end up writing up a more organized version of the rules once I figure everything out. I can say that I am thinking about it much more like a story than a regular roleplaying game, in that I am thinking about "failures" as being elements that build dramatic tension rather than things that make you more likely to die.

Today, I also worked a bit on the website for organizing my garden and went out and worked with Joel on weeding (I've seen that gardening is considered exercise, so I'm doing it instead of walking on days when I don't have to walk someplace, since there is so much work to be done in the garden). Anyway, I'm still pleased with my day.

I went out on another walk today. Amazingly, I walked up this _huge_ hill with no real trouble. I was pretty shocked. The poles help, but I think that the exercises I have been doing (treadmill sometimes, walking sometimes, squats sometimes) may also be helping. I am so pleased! I also got to listen to a chapter of each of the books that I cannot finish. Yay!! I was also significantly less exhausted than yesterday. I walked twice as much today. However, I didn't have a Portuguese lesson today, so maybe that is why.

I also finally fixed one of the problems that I've been having with the webpage for my podcast forever. A long time ago, I wrote some of the page to read the content of the RSS feed for the podcast and fill in the info on the podcast episodes based on that. It works well. However, not if there is an ampersand in the name of the band. I finally figured out a solution to that. It also freaks out if there is a period in the name of the band. It is pretty rare for this to happen, though, because how many band names contain a period. The answer is "a few", which means that there are times that it causes problems. Now, in the years since I wrote those webpages, I set up a database backend for the podcast to manage all the permission and contacts. The database also generates the files that are used to make the RSS feed. That's nice. However, I am still having the problem with the period in band names, and this time there is no easy way around it. Finally, I realized that instead of having this complicated setup (which originally saved me time editing webpages), I could just have the database generate the webpages along with the files that are used to make the RSS feed (and a couple of other pages). So, tonight, I spent a couple of hours fixing that. The website looks more or less the same, except that now, the most recent episode has a band name that has a period in it. Phew!

I've gotten some positive feedback on the chapter I just posted of the story I write with Joel, which is nice. This evening, we worked on the next chapter, which features combat with a dire weasel (like a weasel that is 12 feet long with spikes). Joel did the prep and did the actual combat, while I recorded video. We always play out the combat, which makes the whole thing a bit more like real Dungeons and Dragons. Next, I'll probably take the video and write down a description of what happens on each character's turn. At least, that was what I had to do last time, as it was just so overwhelming otherwise. Then, I'll write the chapter based on that. Luckily, I remembered what I had trouble with last time (does the weapon get deflected by the armor or does the attack just miss?), so I was able to get enough information so that I don't have to try to figure it out while I'm writing.

In other news, we got one of our boxes last nice (the ones from Sasha in Russia!) and paid the customs fees on the other one. So, it turns out that the fees weren't as low as we had thought. However, that is fine. I now have twice as many summer pants. Sasha isn't answering my messages, but as soon as he does, I'm going to try and get him to send out a bunch more stuff. Probably that is why he isn't answering me.

Oh, and my computer upgraded itself to Windows 11. It was like "would you like to upgrade?", and since I haven't heard anything bad about Windows 11 (and since I'm running Windows 10 on a Windows 7 license and don't want to get stuck paying for a new license), I decided to just go ahead and try it out. Unlike the upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10, so far it has been painless.

For some reason, I've also been feeling more like getting stuff in order. After the upgrade to Windows 11, I noticed that the desktop on my computer was a bit messy, so I put some of the files and folders into more appropriate places. Then, I thought that the piles of fabric all over the living room were messy, so I used the box from Sasha and put a bunch of fabric that is left over from other projects into that, so that I could put it in a cabinet out of the way. I then reorganized the fabric box. When we get the box from Sasha that just cleared customs, we should get a bunch of patterns, so I can make t-shirts. I have a few t-shirts that are really falling apart, so I need to make replacement shirts and move the designs over. After all the fabric reorganizing, I also went through my email and got my inbox cleaned out. Phew! I'm guessing that this means that I am feeling a bit better.

I was so fussy today. Geez! I just could not get myself to go out. Instead, I stayed in, did a little cleaning, and relaxed, which seemed to help a lot. I did a bit of work on some websites, so that's good. Also, I finished playing Subnautica: Below Zero, which is mostly set under water. I really like it, because the resolution is all about the power of friendship. That sounds silly, but it is a good game. Since I wasn't done eating my lunch at the point, I started playing Endless Sky, which is like a remake of the Escape Velocity games. Joel sat next to me and gave me advice on ships and trading. It was a lovely time.

Happily, we are back at home. The peace lily had wilted quite a bit, but I watered it. Now, it is nearly back to normal. Everything else is good. It is just excellent to be here. I am reminded, though, how much I need to work on my Portuguese language skills. The taxi driver was listening to news on the radio, and it was slow and clear (although I still didn't really understand it). They have podcasts, so I'm going to see how they are. I could also try translating one story a day. Now that we are back, I can get to work again on the things that I left off thinking about because of the trip. I'm pretty sure we can go to get all the checkups that we need now (there is a 3 month waiting period before you can use your medical insurance here). At the moment, I'm not thrilled about that. However, I'll deal with it. I know that seeing one doctor a week is way too much. I may go for one a month until I feel like I'm ready for more. I would like to finish up the work on the hutch too. The next step with that is finishing the artwork on the drawers and putting the pulls and stops on the cabinet doors. I got jasper pendants at the gem and mineral show to use as pulls to open to the cabinets, which I'm super happy about. After that, I have to get to work painting the closet boxes, since we went to Goodwill in the US, and now I have a lot more clothing and not enough storage for it.

Speaking of clothing, I need to contact Sasha to see if he can meet us someplace and bring some of our stuff. You can guess that this means that he still hasn't sent it.

The other day, I worked on getting all the events in my calendar/to do list database in iCal format. I also imported one event into my Google calendar to see the result. The notification on my phone was not all I had hoped. However, the calendar app gave me the option in the general settings of having a sound and vibration, so I should (hopefully) be able to get it to do that.

I've slacked off on writing because of all the travelling, so it is time to fix that. Tomorrow, I'll go to just the writers group (it is 1:30am now, so there is no way with this jet lag that I'm going to be up and feeling well for tai chi in the morning), so hopefully that will get me started.

Now, though, bed.

Today, I went on a nice walk. I finished most of what I wanted to get done on the website that I've been working on. I also made progress on emailing bands for permission to use their songs for the podcast and on my top 100 songs for 2021 list. Since all of these things involve websites and all my websites are still puking up errors from the upgrade to php8, almost all of this involved cleaning up old code. Mostly, it was no problem. At least once, I found old errors.

The other thing that I've been working on is my Perseus story, which I shouldn't be working on yet, as I haven't quite finished the Horizon: Zero Dawn story. However, new things are more exciting, especially since my favorite part of writing is developing the story at the beginning. After that, it is mostly just filling in the blanks, although every once in a while, there is a surprise. I wonder if it will be a bit different with interactive fiction, since you don't really see the final product until you play it. Also, I plan on adding some random elements (characters who don't always show up, random encounters). Now that I think about it, I tend to lose interest in the shorter stories much more quickly than I do in my longer stories. I wonder if that is because I build up the characters and the plot more in a longer work and enjoy reading about that.

I've started a list of what needs to be done before we leave and what we need to pack. I cut out the bras and a few pairs of compression socks. I'm not thrilled with this spandex, but I think it will work well enough to get me through the trip. I also need to take in the waist of one of my pairs of pants just a bit (probably due to old elastic). I'm planning on making new winter pants once we get back here and getting some better spandex for compression socks, so all this stuff just needs to make it through the two weeks in the US.

Ears: I went to the doctor, and she said that it is just inflammation. She gave me a prescription for ear drops that I'll get tomorrow. Hopefully, that will be enough to get me to the point where I can travel.

Roof: According to the workers, the roof is done. We moved our bed back into our bedroom, and suddenly the apartment is much easier to navigate. I am so incredibly happy to have things back the way we had them set up previously.

Programming: I'm pretty sure that I got the calendar program working. Right now, there are no holidays, so nothing is showing up, but it should work when there are. There are still a couple of things that need to be fixed/added, but I can do that tomorrow/later. I also fixed the big problem I was having in the travel database and cleaned up a bunch of smaller problems, including some that were caused by my own sloppiness and not by the php 8 upgrade.

Hutch: I started working on putting gesso on the drawers today. I will probably focus on all the other artwork for the hutch except the sphinx painting, since many of those little paintings will be pretty quick. Right now, my plan is to paint the front and inside of the drawers. I'm hesitant to paint the sides, because I think that will make them more likely to stick. I'll think about it. If I decide to paint the outside of the drawers (or glue fabric to them or whatever), I can always do it later. I would really like to get the hutch to the point where I can use it as soon as possible.

Holidays: I made the gingerbread dough. Yay! It needs to sit overnight now. I'll bake it tomorrow. In the future, I would like to get a bit more creative with my gingerbread, like a little gingerbread campsite with gingerbread tents or a gingerbread Greek temple with lots of columns. This really depends on how well the powdered royal icing that I got works. If it works well, then I will be able to use it in the future. If it is as much of a pain in the butt as other royal icing recipes I've used, then maybe not.

I think maybe the weather is changing, because my ears were pretty sore today. Thankfully, a hot compress helped. I can't wait until this is over.

The guys working on the roof came again today. They got much but not all of the roof painted with sealant. They'll be back soon to do more. I look forward to being able to have a bedroom again.

I made a lot of progress today with the calendar file processing program. The caching functions worked well. For some reason, the program screwed up the date comparison and so was showing events that also happened yesterday (instead of just today and in the future), but I'm guessing it has to do with times and time zones. I think I should be able to get it working soon, which is good because I'd really like to get my writing website working. Even if it just does the basics for now, I would really like to use it. I'm becoming less happy with the other writing program I use.

Good progress was made with my sphinx painting. Joel had some good suggestions, as the rocks behind the sphinxes aren't as detailed as the sphinxes, which looks kind of weird. So I'll work on that and the sand in the foreground. After that, I think I just need to cover up everything but the sky and then finish that up. I know that the sphinxes have a kind of golden glow in the movie, but I'm not really into adding a golden glow to them. Joel suggested maybe adding some golden glow to the rocks (reflecting of the sphinxes). I might. I'll see how it works out.

So, over the summer, I started working on a program to show what a braided rug would look like, based on what colors you started with. The goal was to help me and Joel choose how we wanted to make our rug: did we want some kind of organized color scheme or did we want it to be random within the colors we chose? Eventually, we left the US, and I got busy with other things. However, recently, I read something about handmaking rugs, and this morning, I remembered that I still hadn't answered the question of how we were going to make the rug. When I don't feel well, I often take on projects that are more tedious (I guess) than I am usually interested in doing. Today, when I sat down with my bowl of pea soup, ear stuffed up, exhausted from a poor night's sleep, I was totally ready to complete some tedious task. So, I set to work on the braided rug visualizer. I love "'perfect' is the enemy of 'done'", so I made some changes to simplify my goals for the visualizer. Then, I stole some code from my palette program and got to the point where I could make a single braid (already working) in something like the colors we chose for our rug in both an organized scheme (all the dark colors together, all the middle-luminosity colors together, all the light colors together) and a more random one.

Joel has said all along that he wanted a more random color scheme (dark and light luminosity mixed, so a strand of dark red braided with medium green and light blue, then medium red with light green and dark blue). However, when he looked at the mock-up, he thought that he liked the more organized color scheme better. He wasn't positive, though, so I needed to make more than a single braid. Before I got into anything insanely complicated like making the braid into a spiraling oval, I decided to generate a bunch of vertical strips. I wasn't positive about how to do that. Luckily, though, when I made the braid program, it generated each piece of the braid based on a single point, so I just needed to get the program to move that point to the right after generating a strip of braid and then make another strip. I had hoped to be really accurate and do it all with math, but in fact, I just guessed approximately how far I was going to need to move it, and after a few tries came up with the right amount.

From there, Joel was definitely able to say that he preferred the more organized version over the random one. (Note: the colors are a rough approximation of what we would use. I am too lazy to find perfect matches.)

But wait! I changed how many times each color was used, so that there was more of a pattern in each. When I did that, we both agreed that the more random one was better than the organized one. What we're going to have to do is mark each change of color, so that we can splice in the new strands at the appropriate time. Normally (if I recall correctly), you don't make the rug as you are braiding it. That, I think, would be like knitting a sweater as you are spinning the wool. However, if we want the colors to be just so - and it seems that we do - then we are going to have to do it as we go. The benefit is that if we screw up the braiding or if something doesn't quite work as we have done it, we will only need to unbraid a few feet rather than a huge long mess.

Today, we took a lovely walk toward to the center of town to try to put some more money on my transit card. We couldn't get the machines to work, and I was having a ton of trouble walking. I finally ended up having to take the bus home. However, in better news, I used the automatic button hole feature on the sewing machine for the first time, and it worked really well. Joel sewed all the buttons on, so now we have on cushion that is completely done. I'm hoping to be able to sew the button holes for one cushion per day. It would be _fantastic_ to get those done. I think I'll make socks after that, as I have few pairs of good compression socks. I also thought I would do a bit of painting on the computer hutch but ended up mixing up a ton of paint and thus painted most of it. It looks pretty good, although this is just the first coat. I'll put a second, lighter coat on it to give it a more sandstone-like texture. Also Joel thinks it needs some little specks of other colors, and there is nothing I love more when it comes to painting than flicking paint at something and making a giant mess. So, that's the plan. However, I think I need to make the drawers and doors before I go too far with the painting, since I don't want them to be different colors. I also ended up spending a lot of time on my RSS reader, as there was a section that was broken, and I wanted to get that working (and did).