Re: the Newbery TARDIS console dimensions being all wrong (17 jun)- I later examined the model and now think I was panicking over nothing. But now I've examined it again and discovered that I made a completely different mistake: I did not bother to research actual metric plywood thicknesses or study the plans I was using closely enough to realize that the pieces should generally be 12mm thick. Instead I seem to have gone with 10mm or 15mm in different places based on i dunno, vibes? The overall dimensions are fine but this messed up a lot of the fine detail. Anyway it's still going to be a while before I fix that. I have a new harebrained plan that may or may not end up touching the website to focus on for now.
Started watching Supernatural with my partner a few weeks back and now I totally understand why there's a "Super" in "SuperWhoLock". (I was always confused specifically about it being an American show grouped with two British ones sharing prominent writers.) It seems pretty good so far. What can I say, angsty protagonists work too well on me... probably a big reason why, rewatching Doctor Who (2005) with some friends, I've been much more fond of Ten's era than them...
Also there's a new feature in the minesweeper: incorrectly flagged empty cells will now be indicated as such when you lose the game. This will likely function to rub salt in the wound if you mess up while chording. Thank you to my friend Jason at generatingwittyurl.neocities.org for the suggestion!
Unless I've missed something, the last site update checked off the final item on the list of ideas mentioned in this log. It's a really weird feeling... I believed I owed it to my starry-eyed past self to do everything he set out for me, and that belief might have been the main thing keeping me going. But what now? I'll still be adding onto the TARDIS and Scratch game pages for years, sure, but I think I still owe it to him to dream of new things. I can only hope I'm not too burnt out to actually chase new dreams. Here are some:
Someday the current contents of the "Doodles" page will get moved to another one called "juvenilia" or somethin. In their place will be a gallery of "possibly interesting" images made primarily in Sketchup (probably). Maybe Blender if I can learn it but I dunno, I kind of like the primitive architecture-firm look Sketchup gives you. I don't exactly know where I'm going with this idea but if I can get myself into a flow state like once a month it'll go somewhere...
I'm also going to really tick my future self off and publicly commit right now to releasing music (let's say, oh, at the very least a 6-track EP) by the end of 2026. Do I have any of it written now? Nope. Can I actually play any instruments? Nope. But I can sing in tune ok and make noises on the computer and that's something. I know from goofy unreleased collaborative stuff that if I focus I'm perfectly capable of working fast enough. Maybe putting a goal in writing will get me to focus? If not, maybe someone reading this and yelling at me to focus will? Hope so!
The music will: have either fully sequenced instrumentals or heavily fudged midi keyboard, probably use goofy synth patches, possibly have vocals that will lie somewhere between "crooner" and "sad indie" because I can't train for more power without annoying the neighbors, possibly not have vocals because I have never written lyrics worth shit, rely heavily on the kind of chord changes that personally tickle my ears, and likely have a certain level of schmaltz as a result. That is all I know. Goodbye.
Ok it's all done now. Not much to note beyond what I already said, except that there is an easter egg (small and silly) hiding somewhere in the album collection... Speaking of the album collection, I automated much of the compilation work needed for it, but there was still plenty (like identifying the exact releases and putting in discogs links) that I could not. This has confirmed for me that I would not only tolerate but actively enjoy the kind of mindless data entry jobs that are probably being actively automated away right now. Oh well.
Yesterday I spilled some chickpeas and thought, "that sucks," but then the cat came over and started sniffing them all one by one. Sometimes life is good
I will be updating the site again soon. There'll be some new bug pictures and a new page with a bunch of rambles on increasingly trivial topics in lieu of an "about me". Finally making a section for my album collection, too (without any reviews or other comments as of yet, because despite the occasional music commentary in this log I've found I usually struggle with much beyond "waow this sounds nice")
Really need to get in the habit of putting stuff here.
Uh
Here's a thought that's been on my mind: thank you to archivists and librarians everywhere, both those preserving physical artifacts and digital copies. Especially those of you digitizing, though. I really hope that the internet and IT architecture in general swings back to collecting human culture to be accessible to all instead of bulldozing over human material in favor of various flavors of LLM slop, and that civilization doesn't screw up so that anything saved now can stay saved for an unfathomably long time.
Also there is a new set of TARDIS console renders! Took a very long time to get the final details satisfactory, and they're still fudged a bit. In the process of poking around my reference material I noticed that the control positioning for the last one I did, the Newbery console, could use some work. Then I noticed that the whole thing's dimensions don't even check out perfectly. Gonna wait a bit to make my attempt at correcting them; I'm finally tired of this work for the time being.
Random SketchUp (circa version 8) tip for anyone like me who can't figure out how to use the damn Photo Match tool: go into the "Styles" menu and import the photo you'd like to match as a watermark. Set the watermark as a foreground overlay with whatever opacity works for your eyes, then line the model up with the image using the regular view tools (note you'll probably have to play around with the field of view, too)
The minesweeper now has flagging on mobile. It doesn't use long presses because for some reason once my phone detects a long press it seems to cancel the regular mouseup and doesn't trigger any events I could find in doing so. Hopefully the alternate solution I've come up with isn't too horrible and works on all devices!
Hard for everything not to feel futile between global, national, and personal events, but sitting around is even more futile. Other stuff will continue appearing on here, probably first the next TARDIS console on the Dr Who page in a few months. I've made a whole bunch of tweaks to the earlier models too, having had plenty of time to notice mistakes.