Der Feuervogel aufersteht.

I've begun to feel a bit unmoored from, idk, life, in a way that I recognize is from a lack of general structure. When I was in grad school, I had classes, teaching, homework, grading, and other parts of my life to keep track of and make sure I had time for and keep generally organized. When I had a job, I had a place to be from 8:30-5 five days a week, and then I had friends and stuff to do things with.

Now, with the only structure to my day or week being what I impose on it, I don't know what's going on, and if asked what I did any given day, the answer is, "uhhh..." Everything feels vague, and I don't like that. So I want to start writing things down (like I said in my previous post).

I've been managing my planning with a regular spiral notebook that I write daily tasks on, but Leuchtturm has a BOGO promo on their planners and calendars right now, so I ordered a daily calendar (with hourly slots) in A5 and a weekly calendar in A6. I'm hoping to use the weekly one to do menu planning and keep track of what food I have, because twice a week I have to get groceries, and I hate figuring out what to cook. I'm getting 2 of each because of the promo, so I've offered the extras to roller derby people. I ordered them today, so I won't have them until the middle of next week.

Thus far in 2024, I have written another 800 or so words in my nonfiction book (which somehow has almost 30000 words in it, but I don't understand how that's possible), started 3 microfiction stories for an anthology call that opens the 15th, done a lot of laundry, and played a lot of video games. I've decided which of the 3 pieces I want to work on to make submittable; one of the rejected ones might go to my newsletter subscribers for fun.

I also signed a contract for a part-time freelance copyediting job that I got via a writing friend, and the money I earn from that will cover my rent and insurance, at least, so that will stop the massive drain on my savings. Will it be enough to get my visa renewed in November? I sure hope so. I also hope, once I finish my book, that people buy it off Amazon or wherever, and I get income from that occasionally.

Strange Horticulture was a fun puzzle game, and I've played it 3 or 4 times already. After the first run, once you know the answers to the puzzles, it goes a lot faster. I want to get all the endings (there are 8, I think), and I only have 1 achievement left on steam. You play as the proprietor of a plant shop who collects new and unusual plants. Your neighbors come in and ask for particular plants for various reasons (mostly relating to medicine, but also magic). There's a monster on the loose, and you have to stop it. (Or you don't stop it, if you want to get those endings.)

Bear and Breakfast is like Stardew Valley but more stressful in some ways and less stressful in others. It also has a lot more story/background than SV: there was some sort of authoritarian government? and there was a big fire in the valley, and people stopped visiting. You play as a young bear, Hank, and you befriend other woodland creatures who help you out. A raccoon operates the decoration store, and you pay them with "valuables" (trash); a beaver renovates the derelict cabins that you rebuild into your hotels.

More stress: you're not just managing your farm; you have 5 resorts to manage and match guests to rooms that meet their requirements (which include hygiene, food, and heat). You can get staff (eventually) to manage these things for you, but they cost money per day, and it's sometimes more than you earn from your properties. Less stress: there's no combat. All your crafting items are gatherable in the world, so you don't have to go fight vampires in the mines to get your minerals to craft with.

I requested exam 2 in the teaching German course to start Friday, so I've been doing that for 2-3 hours every day since, about as much as I can manage before my brain leaks out my ears.

This time I'm asking a million questions about the test questions, because last time I did so poorly (barely passed), and I want to do better. You only get 3 exam retakes, see, and there are 8 modules.

I haven't written anything in about a week, but that's OK. After I've wrangled this shit in German, my brain is done.

I'm reading through this year's Hugo nominees so I can vote. I'm putting my opinions here. Right now I'm reading Throne of the Crescent Moon, and I have to say I'm not impressed. It's generic epic fantasy set in a pseudo-Muslim culture. I'm about halfway through, though I considered giving up around chapter 3, because I was just that bored. I decided to keep going so I could have a fully informed opinion. It's still not urging me to run out any buy the rest, I have to say.

Dude I know from COUP who worships Bill Gates thinks my criticisms of the XBox One are completely irrational and unfounded. Riiight. This is the guy who liked this fucking show so much that he bought a Midori hand puppet. So I'm going to go with "he's a fucking dumbshit who doesn't know what he's talking about" on this one. Also because every time I respond with actual evidence that MS is doing seriously shitty stuff, he stops responding.

I just realized that pretty much all I've been posting lately is word counts. But I've been spending most of my days either farting around on facebook games or writing and evenings reading while Ben plays video games.

I finally made it through my re-read of the Foreigner series and first read of the 4th trilogy in that (book 12 is finally out in paperback). That's 4500+ pages. Then I read Devil's Cub by Georgette Heyer, and I'm working on Among Others by Jo Walton, which was a birthday present. I've also read the Hunger Games trilogy (on my e-reader).

The Foreigner series is very dense politics, with aliens who resemble humans but have very different psychology. The fourth trilogy spends some POV time with young Cajeiri, not just Bren. That lets you get a little more insight into atevi psychology than Bren has. There's a fifth trilogy in the works; I wonder if that'll be the last. I also wonder if DAW will ever authorize ebook versions. Fifteen books take up a lot of shelf space!

Devil's Cub is a Heyer Regency. The male lead is a rake with a violent temper (but he adores his mother, who also has a bit of a temper). The female lead is a no-nonsense woman. I was disinclined to like the male lead from the beginning, but he got a little better. Even if the horrid gender norms of the early 1800s are horrid. It's apparently normal for men to discipline their wives with spankings as if they're children! Gag.

I think I'd enjoy Among Others better if I understood more than three or four of the references the narrator makes to books she's read. Of the books/authors name-dropped, I've read Tolkien and LeGuin. No Heinlein, Delany, etc. Example sentence (paraphrased): "Now I understand what Smith meant when he told Jones what he did." That means NOTHING to me. Aside from the gratuitous NERD CHILDHOOD NOSTALGIA (which I don't have, not having had a Proper Nerd Childhood myself), it's a good story.

Final Fantasy XIII-2 is sheer and utter nonsense. Like, completely illogical nonsense with a fresh coat of nonsense on top. It's very pretty, and the battle system is almost the same as in XIII, but good god DAMN the plot makes no sense. "If you change the future, you change the past." NO. That's not how time travel works.

I can't wait to see Legend of Korra. Holy shit. I am all over that show. I watched the preview of the first two episodes online yesterday, and I was impressed. It looks like there's going to be a good amount of depth again. A:TLA was a show for 11-year-olds about genocide and imperialism. Korra looks like it's going to be a show for 16-year-olds about classism and privilege. I'm looking forward to it!

I find console-based RPGs unspeakably dull and tedious, with the grinding and talking to people and the item optimization and stuff. But give me a fighting game that has taken all the story bits out of arcade mode and dumped them into scenario mode, wherein you take your fighter and an assistant and beat up hordes of enemies, and I'll put in 20 hours in 3 days, grinding and getting items.

(Yeah, I have Tekken 6 now. I've mostly finished scenario mode, except 2 hidden areas - the ones that unlock Mokujin (HARD! OMG!) and Devil Jin (HOLYSHIT this is HARD as FUCK.) I found an item that gives Lee Chaolan an extra 300 life, and that's the only way I made it to the bottom of the level full of ninjas to get Yoshimitsu unlocked.)

In other news, I had a party last night, and it was fun. It was the latest I've had a party over in ages -- there were still half a dozen people here until almost 2 am. Of course, I'm wiped today, because I still woke up after 5-6 hours of sleep at the time my body said "Hey it's wakey time, get up now!"

Improvised garlic knots were OK; I still need to experiment with those. Meringue ghosts were win. Two growlers of Shotgun Betty were enough; 1 would have been too little. I still had a pint left in the second, so I finished it off with lunch.

Pepper Dog Salsa, from Apex, NC, is tasty, but revise your selection down. The medium was too spicy for me to enjoy thoroughly. It was good, but very hot.

I'm supposed to be rewriting the first chapter of this damn novel, but I'm mired in worldbuilding still. Some of it isn't highly important at this stage, so I can do both.

I'd like to take a nap, really. Or go grind some more levels with Lee. I played with Hwoarang a lot already.