Words, Art & Science by Anthony Francis
It’s what happens when we’re not working or playing or thinking or doing. That thing we do that doesn’t fit into all the other categories.
Sometimes we call it living.
Friday was slow, but Saturday was a pretty damn good day at Clockwork Alchemy. I have wordcount on Camp Nano and a late night event to attend, so I'll give a fuller update tomorrow.
-the Centaur
Pictured: the "Louie", a very nice variant of an Old Fashioned unique to the San Mateo Marriott "Craft / Code" bar, which is going out of business next week as the hotel is closing.
Hey folks! I've got just a quick post for you now, because I need to go heads down on Jeremiah Willstone #2, CITADEL OF GLASS, for Camp Nanowrimo. Prepping to be Guest of Honor at Clockwork Alchemy next week - and creating the Kickstarter campaign for The Neurodiversiverse, which we want to go live before CA - has put me behind on my word count for the month ... so I need to make a few changes.
In "normal" circumstances, I have a pretty simple day: take care of food, cats and laundry, work for several hours on the project of the day, and then break - on Mondays and Wednesdays, a late break for dinner where I catch up on reading, on Tuesdays and and some Thursdays, an early dinner break before writing group and the church board meeting, and on Fridays and Saturdays, an early break for coffee and drawing / writing before a late dinner and more reading (with date nites with my wife thrown in). This structure makes sure I'm both making progress on life and work projects during the day, and creative projects at night.
But you can't do that during Camp Nanowrimo or regular National Novel Writing Month - at least, not if you get behind, because if you do, you will fall farther and farther behind. Writing in Nanowrimo actually makes it easier to write more in Nanowrimo - generally, you can raise more questions for yourself than you can answer in a writing session, creating the fuel for future sessions. But once behind, that can jam up - stuck in "writer's block" where you haven't raised enough interesting questions for creative mind to answer, or not thought through the answers enough when you get to the point of writing the outcome of a confrontation.
When I'm behind on Nano, I have to drop my normal "read and eat" strategy in favor of "crack open the laptop at every available opportunity". And I won't limit myself to "write and eat" during meals and "laptop in the coffeehouse" sessions: at the very end of the day I'll set up the laptop in the kitchen , sitting down to bang out the day's wordcount before I let myself crash for the night, where both I and the laptop recharge.
"Autistic inertia" is the way many autistic people describe their inability to start or stop tasks, and some feel it is one of the most disabling aspects of autism. I don't have a formal diagnosis of autism, but informal tests put me on the spectrum - and being aware of your own neurodivergence and the experiences that other people have with the same neurodivergence can help you find strategies that work for you to cope.
For me, I can work on tasks for hours and hours on end - but if I don't have a long enough block to do a task, I tend not to start a task. Now that I understand that I may be struggling with autistic inertia, that helps me understand what may be going on. The feeling that I won't be able to get anything done if I don't have time to get everything done is just that, a feeling. In reality, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step towards it ... and the journey towards 50,000 words in a month begins with one word on the page.
-the Centaur
Pictured: Normally, there should be an open book or sketchbook next to those delicious fish tacos.
DON'T FORGET: Please sign up for our Kickstarter at neurodiversiverse.com - my understanding is that the more people who sign up to be notified when it goes live, the better the campaign will go on launch day! And if you're in the Bay Area, please come see me at Clockwork Alchemy where I'm the Author GOH!
Okay, it wasn't a fluke: Loki sought me out, meowed for attention, climbed up into my lap ... then moved to the nearby table and deliberately turned his back to me.
Now, it is true that he wanted more scritches, but just a little, and it was just as clear that he wanted his large primate to be near enough to protect him, but without a lot of interaction.
He is a weird little cat. He often meows that he wants something, but can't seem to walk in the direction of what he wants, and you need to trial-guess it by walking in several different directions until he follows.
He clearly wants something though ... he just can't make it clear.
What, you expected my behavior to make sense?
-the Centaur
Pictured: that guy, yes, that guy, rocking the golden hour.
Loki has asked me to pass on this public service announcement for cat partners everywhere: "Please, sit close enough that we may ignore you. We can't very well ignore you if you aren't there, now can we?" I suppose this is a security blanket thing, though later in the day he changed tactics on maintaining proximity of his human and went for "doing cute things, please pay attention to me."
I picked him up recently for one of the back-stretches he enjoys, and I swear he yawned when he did it.
-the Centaur
Pictured: Loki, trying to ignore me, but from a comfortably close distance, then attracting attention.
So I saw two make turkeys posturing outside, and carefully stepped to the French doors to take a picture. But what I assume was the female they had been courting had been on the other side of those doors, and decided to book it. Yet, even though their audience was gone, the two males didn't stop posturing.
I feel this make some subtle point about continuing the fight after the prize is gone, but it eludes me.
-the Centaur
Buc-ee's (hyphenated like Spider-Man) is the largest gas station I've ever seen, outside and in:
Which is apropos, I guess, because the largest gas-station in the world is a Buc-ee's. Actually, reading the article, it appears that several of the largest are all Buc-ee's.
When stopping, my buddy commented "it was a gas station as if done by Pixar." After seeing it, I said "It's like Pixar had done a theme park for their movie entitled 'Murica'."
His response? "They already did that movie. It's called WALL-E."
Truly this is a disturbing timeline.
-the Centaur
There's a lot to do on that boat. And, despite expectations, it looks worse once transferred, because while I had crossed off some items, the act of writing them down reminded me of more things to do ...
Clockwork Alchemy is just a notch over two weeks away (actually, a notch less, by the time this scheduled post goes up) and may I say AAAAAAH!
But we'll get there.
-the Centaur
Technically, everything is everywhere, but, nevertheless, cats can turn their backs on anything, even existence.
-the Centaur
Pictured: Loki, pretending to ignore the universe he came outside to see.
So today, I found out that Uncle Paul back there is the same age my dad would have been, were he living - forty years older than me. But Dad died almost twenty-five years ago, and Uncle Paul looks younger than my dad did when he died. Which is amazing, because Uncle Paul is about to turn ninety-five. And he's still clear, active, getting around - and even driving. As my Uncle Bill put it once as we were leaving a Thanksgiving dinner, "Wait up. You're ninety, and I'm seventy, and I can't keep up with you? This is bullshit."
Here's to family.
-the Centaur
Pictured: Me and Uncle Paul at Easter lunch.
So! You take one of those double-row brushes (see detail below) ...
... and apply it to one of these fuzzy creatures in shedding season (see detail below) ...
... and, violin, you get a tribble:
As far as I can tell, these artisan, hand-crafted tribbles are, unlike Dr. McCoy's version, not born pregnant.
If only most problems we face in this world could be solved as easily as "stop feeding the invasive species without natural predators." And, in fact, like not feeding the trolls, many of them can.
However, cat fuzz is not one of those problems. For decades, I put up with my pets getting horrible tangles and mats during shedding season, great lumpy wads which had to be cut or picked off - almost like tribbles.
But, when my wife and I got those double-pronged brushes and began brushing the cat every day, the mats went away. Though we do have now a tribble proliferation problem, we don't have unhappy cats.
Solving some problems requires disengaging the behavior that creates it (like passing on chips, margaritas and dessert for your problem waistline); others require active maintenance to prevent them from happening (like brushing for the problem of keeping your teeth).
What problem are you facing that would go away if you stop feeding it - or start brushing it?
-the Centaur
... your contributions to my productivity are invaluable.
I do not know how I could remember to get everything done without you.
-the Centaur
Pictured: my whiteboard desk, after Loki sat on it; and while I didn't catch him in the act this time, I have caught him doing it previously, and there we are.
... he's just going to survey it from the safety of the inside.
Lots of work on Embodied AI #5 and Clockwork Alchemy and the Neurodiversiverse, more tomorrow. Until then, please enjoy the above pictures of a cat.
-the Centaur
Pictured: Loki, who for some reason wants to look out the window on the opposite side of the room - perhaps because there's more activity out in the trees than in the little courtyard behind him. Also behind him, a sofa modified by my wife Sandi, and one of her paintings.
Apparently this wonderful phenomenon springs upon us, then is gone, almost entirely in the period when I am normally at GDC ... a transient frosting of beauty, dispersed by the wind almost as soon as it falls, like snow dissolved by rain ... but, for whatever reason, this year I got to see it. Cherry blossoms, I presume?
Even the cat stares in wonder.
-the Centaur
yeah, this was today, around 9am. so i've been up since six-thirtyish am if you count the end of my redeye flight, and it's two-thirty am, and i can't even do the math on that, twenty hours ish? and i've been going all day thanks to meetings and such.
going to bed now. or after i post my drawing.
-the Centaur
Spent a day with my wife; enjoy this picture of a beach.
-the Centaur
SO! I have no topical image for you, nor a real blogpost either, because I had a "coatastrophe" today. Suffice it to say that I'll be packing the coat I was wearing for a thorough dry cleaning (or two) when I get home, and I will be wearing the new coat my wife and I found on a Macy's clearance rack. But that replacement coat adventure chewed up the time we had this afternoon, turning what was supposed to be a two hour amble into a compressed forty-five minute power walk to make our reservation at Green's restaurant for dinner.
Well worth it, for this great vegetarian restaurant now has many vegan items; but it's late and I'm tired, and I still have to post my drawing for the day before I collapse.
Blogging every dayyszzzzz....
-the Centaur
Pictured: Green's lovely dining room, from two angles.
I really like this shot, and reserve the right to re-use it for a longer post later, yneh. But it captures the mood at the near-end of my trip to the Game Developers Conference: San Francisco, both vibrant and alive, and somehow at the same time a vaporous ghost of its former self.
Here's hoping she comes back, we miss her.
-the Centaur
Thanks, mold, for making me suspicious of every new pummelo, no matter how fresh and delicious. When I have actually gotten sick off a food, sometimes I develop a lifelong aversion to it - like chili burgers, lemon bars, and pump-flavored sodas, the three things I remember eating before my worst episode of food poisoning. However, apparently finding something rotten just as you eat it is a close second.
Sigh. Here's hoping this fades.
-the Centaur
Pictured: a tasty and delicious pummelo, but even so, I can't look at them the same. Is there an evil demon face embedded in that, thanks to pareidolia?
Hey, man. Back off. I did not consent to be photographed. Geez, Louise.
As it turns out, a pair of male turkeys gobbling at each other on your front doorstep sounds a lot like two small barking dogs yapping at each other, at least when heard through the glass.
-the Centaur
Pictured: Two formerly gobbling turkeys, having noticed me trying to take a picture, hightailing it.
Cats supposedly have brains the size of a large walnut, and are not supposed to be intelligent according to traditional anthropofallicists. But there's something weird about how Loki remains perfectly still ... right up until the point where you want to take a picture, at which point he'll roll over. Or how he'll pester you, right until you're done with a task, but when you are done and can attend to him, he'll walk away.
Almost like there's something devious going on in that aloof,yet needy little brain, some thought process like, I want you to pay attention to me, but I don't want you to think that I need it.
-the Centaur
Pictured: Loki, who looked just like a sphinx, until I pulled out my camera and he immediately rolled over.
