Liza Shulyayeva

Audiobook narration trial with ElevenLabs

Tue, 23 Jan 2024 00:01:33 +0300

I’ve been exploring ElevenLabs TTS for synthesized audiobook narration. ElevenLabs have recently announced a community initiative encouraging discussion about the project (the incentive being TTS character allocation).

Visiting Greece

Sun, 21 Jan 2024 00:01:33 +0200

I visited Greece last year, spending a week in Athens and then another in Thessaloniki to attend a wedding. I took so many pictures and they’re just languishing in my phone, so I decided put them into a small travel post.

Creating a writing assistant with ChatGPT Plus

Tue, 26 Dec 2023 00:01:33 +0200

There are many ways to use your own books in AI workflows. In this post I’m going through the most basic workflow that does not involve coding your own app, creating vector stores, or generating API keys.

How generative AI has fit into my workflows

Fri, 22 Dec 2023 00:01:33 +0200

I was always excited about the possibilities recent developments in LLM-powered workflows provide. At the same time, I was also wary about the larger implications of these things, from the whole theft problem to wondering “I wonder when this thing is going to become self-aware”.

Portable writing setup with Onyx Boox Palma

Tue, 21 Nov 2023 00:01:33 +0200

I’ve been using portable writing setups for a while. I started with an AlphaSmart Neo. This was great, but with the screen angle being fixed not as versatile as I had wanted.

Complex Simulation: Artifacts of a Russian spy

Sun, 08 Oct 2023 00:01:33 +0200

I spent a year in Gothenburg after many years in Stockholm. The neighborhood I lived in for most of that time was a very quiet residential area with a small square.

Brainstorming as distraction

Sun, 16 Apr 2023 00:01:35 +0200

I saw a blurred video of a prisoner of war being beheaded last week. I’ve seen many images of war over the last >1 year, and none have affected me quite like this one.

Just things

Fri, 07 Apr 2023 00:01:33 +0200

Sometimes I feel like rambling out into the void at no one in particular. That’s where this blog comes in.

Fiction writing updates

Sun, 29 Jan 2023 00:01:32 +0200

Just some updates on my fiction writing “adventures”. Writing pace and schedule My writing pace and schedule have not been very reliable since I started.

Implementing multiple choice selection in Go with promptui

Wed, 25 Jan 2023 00:01:32 +0200

This is just a short post about how I chose to implement multiple choice selection in Go with the promptui CLI library.

Staff? Who, me?

Thu, 29 Dec 2022 00:01:32 +0200

As I reflect on the last year, I think a lot about work. Heck, I always think a lot about work.

The leaves

Tue, 25 Oct 2022 00:01:32 +0200

It was 3am and I was awake, thinking about the pile of leaves in the backyard again. These leaves had been there for two weeks, in a wheelbarrow.

Sympathy is difficult

Sat, 24 Sep 2022 00:07:32 +0200

When Putin announced a “partial” (right…) mobilization and news of protests in Russia spread, I tried really hard to sympathize with Russian people and not to be cynical.

Exploring testing private TypeScript functions with Jest

Sat, 30 Jul 2022 00:01:32 +0200

I’ve been writing a bit of TypeScript lately, and have needed to learn some strategies to test private functions that are not class methods.

How leg extensions saved my knees (quick, knock all the wood!)

Fri, 22 Jul 2022 00:01:32 +0200

Every time I post my progress with getting to pain-free squats in the gym again, someone always comes in with knee advice.

My WFH workspace evolution

Sun, 17 Jul 2022 00:01:33 +0200

COVID necessitated WFH when I was still at EA. EA quickly took measures and closed the office. They issued an allowance for people to buy equipment to work from home.

Glastonbury: the Tor and Avalon Orchard

Thu, 14 Jul 2022 00:01:33 +0200

The Tor I was originally intending to grab breakfast before going up to the Tor the morning after my late and rainy arrival in Glastonbury.

Glastonbury: getting there and the town

Sat, 09 Jul 2022 00:01:31 +0200

The first time I’d heard of the Tor in Glastonbury, it was as a result of reading a fantasy book as a teenager.

Avantone Pro Planar first impressions

Sat, 11 Jun 2022 00:01:32 +0200

When I walked outside a few hours after my 2009 LASIK surgery and managed to peer out of the tiny holes in the goggles taped to my face, I got the sense of suddenly seeing the world in high definition.

PiccoloCane Tanto2 pet stroller review

Sun, 05 Jun 2022 00:01:32 +0200

A couple of months ago, I bought the PiccoloCane Tanto2 pet stroller for the cats. I originally ordered the slightly more compact and elegant Carino2, but after it arrived it was obvious that it was too small for both of my cats.

Reflections on starting a limited company in Sweden

Sat, 04 Jun 2022 00:01:32 +0200

I saw this post linked on Hacker News today, reflecting on the difficulties of starting a company in Germany. It made me think about the process of starting a company (“Aktiebolag”, or “AB”) in Sweden, which I recently went through myself.

`json.Marshal()` with additional fields in Go

Sun, 08 May 2022 00:01:32 +0200

I have a Go struct that I want to encode to JSON with some additional fields. The struct looks like this:

How I'm testing MongoDB calls in Go (for now)

Thu, 05 May 2022 07:00:00 +0100

I started working on a little hobby project over this Easter vacation that makes use of MongoDB. But one thing I wasn’t sure about was how to test Mongo operations.

Experimenting with remote work locations

Thu, 21 Apr 2022 07:00:00 +0100

With my third booster shot out of the way I’ve felt a bit safer finally going out into the world a bit more and actually experimenting with different work locations.

War and K2

Sat, 05 Mar 2022 07:00:00 +0100

Lately, I am constantly refreshing the news about the war, and waiting for word from family in Ukraine. I am not sure what Putin thinks the end-game is here.

I risk becoming a hermit and liking it

Sat, 05 Feb 2022 07:00:00 +0100

I’ve always been mostly an introvert. It always takes an effort to socialize, and while I do enjoy other people’s company when I do go out, I find I need a nice long break afterwards to recharge.

Mike Shinoda's video game NFT dreams

Mon, 10 Jan 2022 07:00:00 +0100

I’ve been taking a Twitter hiatus for a while and am finally all recharged and social-media-detoxed, so I’ve started going back on there to mostly read.

Amazon's author banpocalypse

Mon, 03 Jan 2022 07:00:00 +0100

Let’s talk about self-publishing. Amazon Amazon dominates the self-publishig world. Amazon has a program called Kindle Direct Publishing, in which you can upload your ebooks and paperbacks for publication on the Amazon marketplace.

TypeScript <3

Sat, 18 Dec 2021 10:45:00 +0100

I’ve started playing around with TypeScript for the first time over the last couple of weeks and it is excellent. I’ve made a few hobby JS games in the past as you can see from the games page.

Will my new blood pressure monitor be the thing to get me to finally meditate?

Mon, 13 Dec 2021 20:02:00 +0100

I know meditation is good for me, but I’ve never been able to stick with the darn stuff. I just…don’t do it.

Editing and making myself finish the first series

Sat, 04 Dec 2021 07:02:00 +0100

I have been editing the next science fiction book. The plan is to hire an editor to go through it as well, since the previous books made enough income to pay for that.

14 years of game dev

Tue, 23 Nov 2021 07:02:00 +0100

It feels like just yesterday I got my first job in game dev back in Australia, but it’s been about 14 years!

Hosting

Thu, 18 Nov 2021 07:02:00 +0100

I’ve tried quite a few blogging platforms over the years: Wordpress, Squarespace, even Ghost at some point, I think. I opted for self-hosting years ago, always on S3, first via Octopress and now (and for the last few years) Hugo.

Making a series outline

Wed, 20 Oct 2021 19:02:00 +0200

I thought my first series of novellas would revolve around the same world, but otherwise stand alone from each other.

Pls

Sun, 17 Oct 2021 15:02:00 +0200

Like everyone else, I get quite a bit of recruiter mail. If the email seems more than just a templated message sent to hundreds of people, I usually try to respond and thank them for reaching out even if I’m not interested.

The second book is harder

Sat, 16 Oct 2021 17:00:00 +0100

After a year of short stories, I released my first novella recently and it’s been doing pretty well. I’m surprised that it is still doing well, since usually books tend to drop off a cliff.

Social media break

Wed, 13 Oct 2021 07:00:00 +0100

A few years ago I deleted my Facebook account, and now I feel like it’s time for the next step: Twitter; but nothing as drastic as deletion just yet.

Scrape, Scrape

Tue, 12 Oct 2021 22:20:00 +0100

My book has been getting more and more reviews and ratings on Amazon and Goodreads. Instead of obsessively refreshing the page I figured it might be cool to collect reviews from different sources and have them sent as a summary email each day.

Testing external API calls in Go

Fri, 08 Oct 2021 07:20:00 +0100

Intro Method 1 (Mocks) Method 2 (httptest) Intro Both testing methods described here can be found in this repository. Be sure to run go generate before go test for the mocks to be generated.

ThinkPad P14s AMD First Impressions

Sun, 03 Oct 2021 10:20:00 +0100

I was fully set on getting a ThinkPad T14 AMD, but seeing no hint of the Gen 2 AMD version in sight and learning that the P14s is basically the same thing, I decided to go for that instead.

The quest for a humidifier

Fri, 10 Sep 2021 10:20:00 +0100

Humidifiers and I have a several-year-long history, in which I’ve considered countless humidifiers and tried…a couple. My problem with humidifiers is that I’m lazy.

Spring and Rigel

Sat, 20 Mar 2021 10:20:00 +0100

It is finally starting to feel like spring is here, even though we are having bouts of snow and it is still very cold.

Litter Robot 3 Review

Sat, 23 Jan 2021 10:20:00 +0100

At the end of last year I decided to use my vacation budget for something I would consider a luxury, and an unneccesary luxury at best: I got a robot litterbox.

Time blocking

Sun, 17 Jan 2021 20:20:00 +0100

I have found myself procrastinating a lot in my free time. This was especially noticeable to me toward the end of my Christmas vacation, and yesterday - the first Saturday since starting work again.

Investing in sustainable food

Thu, 07 Jan 2021 12:45:00 +0100

The vast majority of my long term private savings are in low cost index funds. I only hold a handful of individual stocks, from a small “play” bucket in which I have no high expectations.

Happy-ish New Year

Tue, 05 Jan 2021 12:45:00 +0100

It has been such a long year. I like being by myself. For the most part I’ve enjoyed hiding away in my little apartment, getting groceries delivered, working from home.

ALIFE 2020 - Robot Cancer

Wed, 15 Jul 2020 12:40:00 +0100

These are my hastily taken and edited notes on the first ALIFE 2020 conference keynote, presented by Mike Levin. Robot Cancer - why don’t (today’s) robots get cancer?

ALIFE 2020 - Soft alife with SPLAT and Ulam

Tue, 14 Jul 2020 12:40:00 +0100

Below are some rough notes from a tutorial session called Soft alife with SPLAT and Ulam by David Ackley. These notes are very hastily taken and I am editing them between sessions mostly for my own benefit, so expect to see typos and maybe even mis-wordings.

Social distancing ramblings

Fri, 10 Apr 2020 14:02:00 +0100

I am sitting in my apartment in Täby, which is an area north of Stockholm in Sweden. There are two large playgrounds outside and as usual they are busy with kids, parents, and some grandparents milling about socializing.

IBM lecture - Introduction to quantum computers and quantum computer programming

Mon, 17 Feb 2020 14:02:00 +0100

What follows are my hasty notes from a lecture and workshop-type session I went to at Stockholms University, delivered by IBM.

2019 Travels

Sat, 18 Jan 2020 14:02:00 +0100

In 2019 I did more travelling than I ever had in one year. I visited Vancouver, Rhodes, Thessaloniki, Prague, and Geneva.

Docker Containers for testing

Sun, 07 Jul 2019 14:02:00 +0100

Since I started another repository for the SnailLife Genome Lab, I knew I’d want to test it against a running SnailLife server.

SnailLife Genome Lab

Thu, 27 Jun 2019 14:02:00 +0100

For the Go rewrite of SnailLife I decided to focus on tools early. In the PHP version as the complexity of the simulation increased, my debugging methods were not able to keep up.

State of the Liza - 2019

Tue, 19 Mar 2019 23:02:00 +0100

I care quite a bit about self-optimization and longevity and this enthusiasm has developed more and more over the years (although I’m very much an interested amateur here, not an expert by any definition of the word).

Happy New Year

Sun, 10 Feb 2019 18:42:54 +0100

Wow, talk about a belated post. I know the middle of February is a bit late to be wishing anyone a happy start to the year, but it’s my blog and you can’t tell me what to do.

Fun PresentationFramework side-effect of bad equality

Mon, 22 Oct 2018 17:50:57 +0200

I looked into a pretty fun bug a few days ago. The symptom: a WPF DataGrid populated with an ICollectionView was seeing inconsistent row copy behaviour.

A first stab at gene expression

Sat, 22 Sep 2018 16:00:47 +0200

In the last post I talked a bit about how I might approach expressing genes in SnailLife Go, and how this worked in the PHP prototype of the simulation.

Brainstorming the SnailLife gene system

Sun, 16 Sep 2018 16:54:06 +0200

In the original PHP prototype of SnailLife there exists a very rudimentary genetics system. Snails had what I called “visual traits” and “functional traits”.

Building a snail one organ at a time

Sun, 09 Sep 2018 19:24:50 +0200

I think enough of the SnailLife Go infrastructure is ready now for me to start digging into the snail itself. In the PHP draft of SnailLife, I started with a basic concept of a snail “Here’s a snail.

Are YOU experiencing shady output from your Go debugger? Try these things!

Sat, 25 Aug 2018 21:50:19 +0200

A couple of days ago I noticed some unreliable output when stepping through the SnailLife server. I use GoLand and Delve debugger, but in the course of looking into this I picked up some tips from trial and error plus from some very helpful people which I think might be useful regardless of the debugger you use.

Roee: Self Modifying Go Simulation Experiment - Part 2

Sun, 19 Aug 2018 23:15:09 +0200

<– PART ONE Overview ORM Intentionaliser aggregationObserver aggregationReifier aggregationModifier The new type Qualifier Recompiling and restarting Visualizing the results Conclusion Overview In Part 1 we talked about the general setup of the world/grid and what the Agent and Instructions metamodels do.

Roee: Self Modifying Go Simulation Experiment - Part 1

Sun, 19 Aug 2018 18:10:14 +0200

Intro ORM Intentionaliser Questions Self-modifying simulation in Go? What are we bootstrapping? Vague definitions and bad practices The world Instructions Running the World PART TWO –> Intro I took up a small pet project over summer that I called Roee.

Helping as Learning

Sun, 19 Aug 2018 14:07:05 +0200

Answering questions or helping other people seems to be a good way for me to learn more about a language. I’ve been trying to be more active on the Go forums for this reason, answering questions as they pop up (especially focusing on the ones that may not have gotten much attention).

Quick and Dirty Function Timing in Go

Wed, 15 Aug 2018 20:17:09 +0200

When I want to do some rough timing comparisons or get a quick idea of what part of Thing X is taking so long I sometimes just time a few functions.

Coordination

Wed, 15 Aug 2018 15:40:07 +0200

When you’re helping coordinate a workflow switch between half a dozen different studios, making sure all tools support new workflow, and shipping at the same time:

Active worms

Wed, 15 Aug 2018 09:00:07 +0200

My worm bin is about a month old now, which is still very early by worm bin standards. Today I dug around in there and look at the nice active worms I found!

Vermicomposting

Tue, 14 Aug 2018 13:27:55 +0200

Letstalkaboutp4

Tue, 14 Aug 2018 13:25:56 +0200

Let’s talk about Perforce.

10 to 1 Rule

Tue, 14 Aug 2018 13:19:07 +0200

Similarly, the ratio of “code churn” to “lines of code” in mature and non-trivial software is also at least 10:1.

UAC Notes

Tue, 14 Aug 2018 13:18:19 +0200

Random UAC permissions for C# applications notes: Ask for elevated permissions via app.manifest - see <requestedExecutionLevel level="highestAvailable"/> or requireAdministrator - https://msdn.

Staple Remover Obsession

Tue, 14 Aug 2018 08:53:52 +0200

Do we really need to know about Randy’s young-age staple remover obsession?

Rubber Ducky Moments: 'Completely unrelated []interface{}!!!'

Sat, 11 Aug 2018 20:24:57 +0200

I mentioned on Twitter earlier today that very often when I get really stuck on something and finally decide to ask for help on a forum, the answer suddenly hits me as I finish writing my post.

Sleep

Thu, 09 Aug 2018 20:43:27 +0200

During my five week vacation I made myself finally sit down and read a book that’s been recommended to me repeatedly: Why We Sleep by Matthew P.

Sunset and sunrise on the Tor

Wed, 25 Jul 2018 14:00:22 +0200

Today is our last day in Glastonbury. I will miss this place, but I also feel like I’ve seen everything I wanted to see here, and that I am ready to go home and take a little bit of Glastonbury back with me.

First day in Glastonbury - visiting Tor and Chalice Well

Sun, 22 Jul 2018 19:44:50 +0200

I’ve wanted to see the Tor in person for a long time, ever since reading a fantasy book set in Glastonbury in high school.

IJCAI Session Notes: Rebel Agents

Fri, 20 Jul 2018 13:14:17 +0200

What follows is a set of notes I took during two of the IJCAI Goal Reasoning workshop talks, about rebel agents.

IJCAI Session Notes: Learning Common Sense

Mon, 16 Jul 2018 09:04:33 +0200

Below is another set of IJCAI session notes. This was the first invited talk in a day-long workshop called Architectures and Evaluation for Generality, Autonomy & Progress in AI (AEGAP).

IJCAI Session Notes: Verifying Agent Based Autonomous Systems

Sun, 15 Jul 2018 14:04:33 +0200

For the past couple of days I’ve been at IJCAI - the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence. It’s been a three-day whirlwind of workshops and tutorials.

go-sql-driver and MySQL 8

Sun, 06 May 2018 17:55:05 +0200

I should know better than to use a latest tag in a Docker image. I’d never do this at work, so why did I do it in my hobby project?

Input Club K-Type and /dev/tty impressions

Wed, 28 Mar 2018 19:38:27 +0200

This post will have some general impressions of Input Club K-Type and matt3o’s new keycap profile (MT3), with the /dev/tty color scheme.

Some SnailLife Go client testing notes

Sat, 24 Mar 2018 16:08:54 +0100

I’ve started working on client tests, which have been getting very neglected compared to the server. I figured I’d write some quick notes on what I’ve done so far before continuing, before I forget.

Testing SnailLife Go repositories

Sun, 18 Feb 2018 12:07:00 +0100

Every SnailLife model struct has a repository struct to go with it. Since all repos are implementing the same Repository interface I wanted to reuse most of the code for testing them, but also allow for custom repo-specific tests.

Excluding mocks from coverage reports

Sun, 18 Feb 2018 09:50:08 +0100

I noticed that my coverage reports were including mock packages. To get rid of this instead of running go test like this:

Testing SnailLife Go on Go 1.10

Sun, 11 Feb 2018 08:36:02 +0100

This is quick braindump of getting SnailLife Go building and testing on Go 1.10. A few days ago I decided to start building and testing SnailLife Go on Go 1.

GitLab CI for SnailLife Go

Mon, 15 Jan 2018 22:11:35 +0100

I finally got GitLab CI up and running for the SnailLife Go port. The CI just runs the bash scripts I already had to test and build client and server.

Running tests and getting coverage reports on server deployment in SnailLife

Mon, 23 Oct 2017 18:56:38 +0200

Yesterday I added tests to server deployment in my deployServer.sh script: echo "Running tests" cd ../../server/lib set -e echo "mode: set" > allcoverage.

ECAL session notes: Open-Ended Simulations

Thu, 07 Sep 2017 17:25:45 +0200

As before, what follow is a very slightly cleaned up version of the notes I took during the third ISAL summer school session at ECAL 2017.

ECAL session notes: Digital Evolution

Wed, 06 Sep 2017 21:11:58 +0200

As before, what follow is a very slightly cleaned up version of the notes I took during the second ISAL summer school session at ECAL 2017.

ECAL session notes: Historical and Philosophical Perspectives on Artificial Life

Tue, 05 Sep 2017 19:02:17 +0200

What follow is a very slightly cleaned up version of the notes I took during the first ISAL summer school session at ECAL 2017.

Day 1 of ECAL 2017 - ISAL Summer School

Mon, 04 Sep 2017 21:55:54 +0200

Today was the first day of ECAL (European Conference on Artificial Life) 2017 in Lyon, France and my first year attending.

Server and client for SnailLife Go

Sat, 05 Aug 2017 07:05:10 +0200

Over the last couple of days I restructured SnailLife Go into a server and client. I’m still in the “rough draft” stage, but the top level project structure now looks like this:

Go auth (and other) progress

Fri, 28 Jul 2017 21:31:06 +0200

July 28 Made a bit more progress on the authentication basics today. Relevant commits are: Add http package; have auth0 test delete user it has just registered after test is done Create json util; add logout test July 29 Today I focused a bit on the building and installation of snaillifecli.

Playing with authentication in Go

Fri, 28 Jul 2017 01:52:49 +0200

It’s almost 2am and I’m sleepy, but I wanted to write this down while it’s relatively fresh in my mind.

Trying Out Go

Thu, 20 Jul 2017 20:23:36 +0200

A couple of weeks ago I had the genius idea to rewrite SnailLife in Go. I’ve already looked into doing this once before a couple of years ago, but wasn’t really feeling it and stuck with PHP (mostly for nostaligia reasons).

Talk on Big Data Tools and Architectures at Foo Cafe

Tue, 23 May 2017 21:13:01 +0200

I went to a really interesting talk at Foo Cafe in Stockholm tonight. I stayed almost 2 hours over my time limit, but it was so worth it.

State of the Snail - Debugging Hell

Sat, 20 May 2017 08:27:54 +0200

It has been a while! SnailLife work has been moving at a snail’s pace. Why? Because debugging the snail brain has turned into a highly demotivating, hellish endeavour.

Hello, TensorFlow

Sat, 28 Jan 2017 12:18:18 +0100

I’ve recently discovered Safari Books Online thanks to a post on HackerNews. One of the first things that caught my eye was one of the Oriole Online Tutorials - Hello, TensorFlow.

Having a fish tank is supposed to be about stress relief

Sat, 06 Aug 2016 18:42:49 +0200

@Lazer Having a fish tank is supposed to be about stress relief. — Steven D Marlow (@sd_marlow) August 4, 2016 Zhora the fairground goldfish I had a goldfish as a kid in elementary school in Alabama, obtained for free when I won it at a school fair.

Snaily Updates: BrainHub + Runners, SnailLife Logo

Sat, 06 Feb 2016 23:44:15 +0000

I finally have two BrainRunners working on a DigitalOcean droplet, and one BrainHub on another droplet queueing and assigning tasks to the runners.

BrainHub and BrainRunner - finally over the hump

Sun, 24 Jan 2016 11:59:21 +0000

I’ve started this post maybe twenty times now, since before Christmas, and each time I keep putting it off, thinking “I’ll just blog when I have this next bit done.

The brain scope is growing: BrainHub, BrainRunners, Brains

Mon, 21 Dec 2015 18:17:06 +0000

I’ve been MIA for a while, I know. I haven’t stopped working on SnailLife - I just wanted to get to some sort of completion with the brain refactoring phase before talking about it.

Snaily Updates, Nov 10 - Family trees and inbreeding coefficient

Tue, 10 Nov 2015 12:06:05 +0000

I did some research on snail ailments. This particular page was especially useful. Though SnailLife snails are not aquatic, some of these still seem very relevant: http://applesnail.

Snaily Updates - Bug fixing and cleaning out old stuff

Mon, 09 Nov 2015 12:39:54 +0000

Snaily Updates are going to be really brief posts with some short “daily” updates on SnailLife. I haven’t updated in a while because I’ve mostly just been refactoring and bug fixing.

My Livecoding.tv account deletion saga

Fri, 30 Oct 2015 17:23:49 +0000

Update 3, Nov 2 2015 (PM): Well, it’s been…strange. First, it seems my account was finally deleted by Livecoding.tv (thank you!

Snail organs, immunity, and ageing

Thu, 01 Oct 2015 12:54:41 +0000

Organs! Immune systems! Old age! Dying from old age! I’m super excited. I was thinking: “How do I implement old age and death, and health in general?

Wild snails around the world

Thu, 24 Sep 2015 22:16:16 +0000

Did you know that there is an entirely separate formula to calculate the distance between two points on the surface of a sphere?

More location and temperature stuff

Fri, 18 Sep 2015 17:10:43 +0000

I realized I didn’t actually include any implementation details when writing my sleepy post about stable locations and temperature the other night.

Bringing snail stables down to Earth

Wed, 16 Sep 2015 18:28:31 +0000

SnailLife snail stables have always lived in the ether - in some virtual universe with no physical location. Since I’m trying to make SnailLife based in reality, users’ snail stables should also be based in real locations.

Snail stable breeding brands

Sat, 05 Sep 2015 08:18:05 +0000

I haven’t made a SnailLife update in a while, but I had a good reason! For about half a month I’ve been working on an entry into the js13kGames challenge.

I have become Crazy Cat Lady, the Buyer of Cat Strollers

Sun, 30 Aug 2015 09:27:41 +0000

I am sorry in advance for what you are about to read. If witnessing the evolution of a mere human into Crazy Cat Lady is something you may find disturbing, turn back now and pretend you never came to this godforsaken place.

Pee-training Rigel

Mon, 03 Aug 2015 16:58:47 +0000

Note: This is part of a series of posts about Rigel the Maine Coon kitten who was given a urinary infection by a veterinarian in Stockholm during a routine surgery and has been struggling with peeing since.

Laravel log file backups to S3

Sun, 02 Aug 2015 12:51:05 +0000

SnailLife does a lot of logging for debugging purposes. Aside from the general laravel.log I have separate loggers for each snail and also write logs for stuff like deleted items etc in separate files.

SnailLife messaging system

Sat, 25 Jul 2015 20:43:17 +0000

“What’s SnailLife”, you say? Well I’m glad you asked! My snail simulation has gone through a couple of names…and even though I was never 100% happy with Gastropoda it was the best I could come up with - a name that was unique and didn’t allow the project to sound too “gamey” (because it’s not a game).

Update on Rigel and response from DjurAkuten

Wed, 01 Jul 2015 11:41:58 +0000

Context: The Month from Hell. DjurAkuten After numerous attempts David finally got through to DjurAkuten, the clinic that did Rigel’s neutering surgery and decided to put a catheter in him because they thought his bladder looked big - the one he left with a urinary infection and an inability to pee.

Snaily updates

Mon, 29 Jun 2015 18:32:35 +0000

I was going to try to remember all the things I’ve done in the last month on snails, but this seems impossible.

Items

Wed, 27 May 2015 11:58:05 +0000

After finishing yesterday’s post about generating images for user-combined substrate items I realized that I never really provided an explanation about how items work in general (or how they work for now, anyway).

Images for combined substrate

Tue, 26 May 2015 20:31:57 +0000

The Laravel 5 migration is complete and I’m back to substrate mixing and brain bug fixing! Actually, I think now that basic mixing is done I’m going to do a few weeks of just bug fixing.

Migrating to Laravel 5

Tue, 05 May 2015 20:32:12 +0000

A few days ago I decided that there’s no use putting it off any longer - it’s time to upgrade to Laravel 5.

Thinking through substrate

Sat, 04 Apr 2015 10:21:27 +0000

After checking in the basic substrate item implementation yesterday I got to thinking - never a good sign. The original idea was to have some pre-set types of substrate - garden dirt, rock, potting soil, pellets, whatever.

Jar substrate is a go

Thu, 02 Apr 2015 08:41:21 +0000

It’s finally in. Well, the beginning stages anyway. Jar substrate. Anyone who knows anything about snails knows that they can’t live in a glass box without some sort of substrate to hide in, get moisture from, and burrow under.

Tackling Gastropoda's memory usage - Round One

Thu, 02 Apr 2015 07:20:27 +0000

I’ve been having to power cycle my Gastropoda Digital Ocean droplet every day lately because something was hogging up all the memory.

The month from Hell

Wed, 18 Mar 2015 15:59:25 +0000

Update on Rigel and response from DjurAkuten Update: When I first wrote this post I kept all clinic names anonymous. I am now un-anonymising one of the clinics (DjurAkuten), where this whole chain of events was triggered in the first place and which is now trying to claim that Rigel was already sick/had a flaccid bladder when we brought him in for a routine surgery as a healthy kitten despite their own records stating otherwise.

On your mark, get set, crawl!

Sun, 22 Feb 2015 23:02:36 +0000

In my previous post I wrote about rethinking racing (aka ripping out the existing racing system). Today I got most of the work done on that.

Rethinking racing. Also cool snail art!

Sat, 21 Feb 2015 09:45:53 +0000

Racing in Gastorpoda has been implemented for months in its most basic state, but has never really gotten the attention it needs.

Snail brain semi-stable and reviewing visual traits set during breeding

Mon, 16 Feb 2015 23:00:17 +0000

The snail brain, while still very basic, seems somewhat stable now. By “stable” I mean a snail can survive and reproduce without human intervention if it has a steady supply of food.

From Amazon Web Services to Digital Ocean

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 12:41:24 +0000

Amazon, I quit. I tried, Amazon. I really did. For the last few months I tried to make it work with an EC2 instance for Gastropoda.

It's not so bad. We have snail babies, after all

Fri, 23 Jan 2015 18:19:40 +0000

Sometimes I think about what I’ve been working on in my spare time since the beginning of last year and I’m like “What the crap, Liza.

Snail gym vs training jar

Thu, 15 Jan 2015 20:16:19 +0000

I’ve tried implementing a gym for Gastropoda a couple of times now. Both times I put the feature on hold not because I got stuck, but because I realized that I may not really even need a gym.

The journey continues - from Elastic Beanstalk to CodeDeploy

Wed, 31 Dec 2014 13:25:59 +0000

A little while ago I wrote about deploying Gastropoda to an Amazon Web Services EC2 instance via Elastic Beanstalk. Since that day I have been running into multiple EB problems.

Personality

Sat, 27 Dec 2014 09:58:56 +0000

Every morning I wake up to my cat Rigel wanting to play. He jumps around the bed and brings in his favorite toy ferret, purring and stepping on us until we either get up or put him outside.

State of the Snail, 2014

Thu, 25 Dec 2014 13:28:14 +0000

It’s been a long year for snailing. My simulation got a name, my snails got a brain, and a dev environment was deployed outside of my poor little MacBook Air that’s been chugging away like crazy with all the server and VM crap I’ve had to host on it.

Deploying Gastropoda to Amazon Web Services - Never Forget

Sun, 21 Dec 2014 13:39:59 +0000

After my last blog post I decided that it was time to deploy Gastropoda to Amazon Web Services - namely Elastic Beanstalk, which utilizes an EC2 instance (reserved) and an RDS DB instance.

Claustrophobia and eggicide

Thu, 11 Dec 2014 13:01:51 +0000

Yesterday I put in claustrophobia for the snails. Jars have a capacity attribute - a maximum number of snails that they should hold.

Scheduled food delivery, arousal suppressant, and brain woes

Tue, 09 Dec 2014 07:50:01 +0000

I haven’t updated in a long time and it’s because the battle with snail brains has been raging on. Over the past few weeks I have run into several weird behavioural problems, including but not limited to:

No more starving snails

Wed, 19 Nov 2014 12:55:06 +0000

Dear jar capacity validator, I’m sorry I ever doubted you. I thought you were killing my snails, but really it’s my lack of you that caused the problem.

Detangling snail actions. Also a cat

Sat, 08 Nov 2014 07:39:34 +0000

I started writing this post on the 8th of November and have just now gotten around to finishing it. Figuring out what my snails are doing and why is getting close to impossible.

Hiking, Beyond Earth, and Gastropoda update

Mon, 20 Oct 2014 19:08:26 +0000

One cool thing about Stockholm is how easy it is to get to both a central location and a green/forested area.

The ongoing saga of snail mating decisions

Tue, 14 Oct 2014 21:40:32 +0000

I’ve written about snail breeding here before, at length. However, since I now want snail behavior to go through the brain I had to rework the trigger that led to two snails mating and producing offspring.

Went to my first Laravel Meetup

Sat, 11 Oct 2014 10:20:54 +0000

Last Friday night I attended what was apparently the first ever Laravel Meetup in Sweden. I’m glad I actually made myself go, because I’m not really good with social engagements.

Event queues

Thu, 09 Oct 2014 13:06:13 +0000

The brain thing is really getting out of control. Yesterday I ran into this problem: Fatal error: Maximum function nesting level of '100' reached, aborting!

The snails are eating again

Sun, 28 Sep 2014 16:25:48 +0000

Back to the brain we go. I already had snails eating food in jars before, but it was kind of a hack.

Websocketing it up for snail movement

Fri, 26 Sep 2014 22:29:19 +0000

Over the past few days I’ve paused work on the brain to tackle snail movement on the client. I ended up using Latchet, a Laravel-specific extended version of Ratchet.

Braaaaaainsss

Fri, 19 Sep 2014 20:02:51 +0000

I appear to have gotten myself into a bit of a mess. “Make a snail brain/nerve-cluster for your snails,” they said.

And we're back

Sat, 13 Sep 2014 10:32:36 +0000

I took a one-month break from Gastropoda to participate in the JS13kGames challenge with a tiny game called Breaking Brad

Pathfinder: two heroes are born

Mon, 11 Aug 2014 21:54:49 +0000

It was a chilly summer evening when Valeros the valiant fighter and Merisiel the super cool rogue walked through the gates of a tiny abandoned farmhouse.

Wolfling runs

Fri, 08 Aug 2014 12:10:37 +0000

Wolfling run: “a method of playing the Creatures games in which the players do not intervene in the lives of their norns.

On snail eggs

Tue, 05 Aug 2014 23:42:48 +0000

Even though I’ve had a functional breeding system in Gastropoda for a while, it still isn’t actually done. Most common snails do not give birth to live young…and definitely not to one live young.

New snail shell patterns

Wed, 30 Jul 2014 16:33:09 +0000

This post originally started out like this: I’ve made a few more shell patterns for the snails! I then started to descibe how the basic genetics work in the simulation (limited to pattern color).

Laravel migration done

Tue, 29 Jul 2014 13:44:07 +0000

The first commit auto-tweeted from the @gastropoda_ twitter account yesterday was actually the last commit dedicated to the Laravel port reimplementation:

A battle with racing

Sat, 26 Jul 2014 16:27:05 +0000

I’m still on the Laravel migration. It’s going pretty well, except for last night. Last night I was porting racing.

Setting up an AWS EC2 instance for Gastropoda

Thu, 24 Jul 2014 20:42:23 +0000

It all started with a cool little PHP script that someone posted on /r/gamedev this morning to publish completed Trello tasks easily to a change log of sorts.

Summer holidays and Amsterdam

Tue, 22 Jul 2014 11:06:06 +0000

July is when Sweden goes on holidays. Businesses are closed for the summer (quite a few of them, anyway), people take time off work, the weather doesn’t suck.

Custom validators in Laravel

Tue, 15 Jul 2014 10:16:45 +0000

I’m still going with the Laravel port. One thing I’ve found really interesting is custom validators. In Laravel models you can set field rules, such as…

Experimenting with Laravel

Sun, 13 Jul 2014 11:22:43 +0000

I’m sitting here working on Gastropoda on a train to Norrköping. A couple of days ago I started experimenting with Laravel after the friendly folks on /r/php provided some invaluable input to my vanilla PHP vs framework question.

The beginnings of a currency

Wed, 09 Jul 2014 06:33:43 +0000

When I moved back to the PHP version of Gastropoda I implemented snail death, so that snails actually die when their energy reaches 0.

To the Node and back

Sat, 05 Jul 2014 13:11:20 +0000

I spent a couple of weeks porting Gastropoda from PHP to Node.js after caving in to peer pressure and hearing “PHP sucks” from every side imaginable.

A move and a quick Gastropoda update

Wed, 18 Jun 2014 21:14:10 +0000

Moving Buying an apartment in Sweden is refreshingly hassle-free but by no means stress-free. You find one you like online, you go to a viewing, you bid…and bid…and bid until you can’t bid no mo’.

The day of the lettuce leaf

Sat, 14 Jun 2014 23:55:18 +0000

Today I put the first item (a consumable lettuce leaf) into Gastropoda. The items The lettuce leaf was to be the first food item in Gastropoda.

Taking it easy on the snailing with some lazy layout work

Wed, 11 Jun 2014 22:16:40 +0000

I’m too sleepy to do any proper work on Gastropoda today. I was hoping to implement the first food item, but yeah…that’s not happening.

Recording snail history logs

Tue, 10 Jun 2014 22:04:36 +0000

I’ve decided that it’s about time to start recording event histories for snails. I keep going back to the database and checking which event ran on which snail by IDs and such and it’s getting to be a hassle.

Thoughts on @HobbyGameDev's post on starting simple

Sun, 08 Jun 2014 11:48:56 +0000

Chris DeLeon of HobbyGameDev has written a post all about the importance of starting simple in game development, and of picking projects that make you reach as opposed to scramble in terms of their complexity versus your current skillset.

Snail metabolic rates and caloric needs

Sat, 07 Jun 2014 19:21:37 +0000

Wow, two blog posts in one day. Today I implemented a basic energy system for the snails. I’m trying to keep it moderately realistic for the time being just to implement something quickly, but the idea for the final version is to actually do proper research on exactly how this stuff works and revise the system to match.

My 3 favorite Södermalm cafes to work in

Fri, 06 Jun 2014 12:33:18 +0000

Since moving to Sweden I have become a sort of cafe hunter. I roam Södermalm with my laptop, sometimes on my Brompton, scouting out potential sitting spots with WiFi where I can sit and work on my personal projects or read.

Gastropoda - racing progress

Thu, 05 Jun 2014 21:09:14 +0000

The snail simulation is coming along. Tonight I did some work on racing. The racing formula isn’t anywhere close to final yet, but races do run.

A cycling adventure

Tue, 03 Jun 2014 20:06:25 +0000

On Sunday we went on a day-long bike ride to Lake Mälaren. We didn’t get as far as we’d planned, but it was still a great day.

It's summer!

Thu, 29 May 2014 18:05:31 +0000

It’s summer!!! Swedish weather has gotten so nice over the past week or so. It’s still a bit uncertain and there are cold days, but there have been a few unbelievably nice days where not being outside feels like some sort of crime.

Baby snails!

Thu, 15 May 2014 22:47:33 +0000

A lot’s happened with Gastropoda over the last few days, but progress on new features has slowed down because I’ve started working slightly differently.

Ripping apart Gastropoda

Sun, 11 May 2014 13:26:29 +0000

For the record, this post isn’t about ripping apart real snails and slugs. It’s about ripping apart pretty much all of my existing code, which is what I’ve been doing over this weekend.

Gastropoda, the name

Sun, 04 May 2014 17:17:03 +0000

The JavaScript/HTML5 version of this game was called A Game of Snails, but that won’t really do for the PHP iteration of the game.

Here jars, there jars, everywhere jars jars

Wed, 30 Apr 2014 12:30:54 +0000

Yesterday I implemented jars for the snail game. A user can have multiple jars and move snails between those jars (well, they can’t move snails yet, but they can put a wild-caught snail inside their personal jar).

Collecting wild snails

Sat, 26 Apr 2014 07:39:23 +0000

I got quite a bit done on the snails yesterday, mostly focusing on creating a snail manager class, displaying snails using Canvas, and saving snails you choose to keep to the database.

Porting Game of Snails to PHP

Fri, 25 Apr 2014 18:09:43 +0000

I’ve been playing around with PHP for the past few days. Last year for one of my One Game a Month projects I made Game of Snails.

Stockholm and robot parts

Sat, 12 Apr 2014 14:23:48 +0000

Jill I’ve been working on “Jill” for the past few weeks. Figuring the best way to do the parts-gathering part of the game (specifically as relating to animation) is doing my head in.

San Francisco and other updates

Sat, 05 Apr 2014 19:03:24 +0000

I finally installed Octopress on the new Macbook Air. Finally. My last update was a while ago. Since the Icy Walk of Creepitude the main thing that’s happened has been the trip to San Francisco for GDC 2014.

An icy walk of creepitude

Sat, 08 Feb 2014 15:38:28 +0000

We went for a walk today and decided to go in the opposite direction than we usually take. We ended up in a suburb I think called Kärrtorp.

Global Game Jam 2014 in Stockholm (#GGJ14/#GGJSthlm)

Sun, 26 Jan 2014 14:29:18 +0000

My first ever Global Game Jam was actually the first ever Global Game Jam (2009), in Perth, Western Australia. I’d been working at Interzone Games at the time and knew many people who would be participating.

A slow start to 2014

Thu, 09 Jan 2014 19:46:47 +0000

Things after One Game a Month have been…different. I feel I’m lazier with no hard deadlines for personal projects - bumming around and browsing Reddit or focusing more on the newfound cycling hobby than making hobby games in the evenings.

The scenic route

Thu, 02 Jan 2014 18:54:45 +0000

This morning I decided to wake up earlier and take a different route to work on Deider (the bike). The ride didn’t have to take as long as it did - I managed to stop every three minutes to admire the view and take bad photos on my phone.

Bromptoning it up

Sat, 28 Dec 2013 16:14:38 +0000

If you follow me on Twitter you likely would’ve seen my photos of a silly looking contraption with tiny wheels. Meet Deider, the Brompton folding bike:

Move to S3 and Octopress. Oh and #1GAM

Sat, 28 Dec 2013 14:28:18 +0000

Octopress and S3 I’ve finally moved this site over to Octopress and S3. There is a lot of work to be done, the most pressing of which is fixing leftover broken images, implementing code highlighting, and fixing some theme stuff (like the navigation links), but other than that it’s going ok.

One Game a Month (#1GAM) Done!

Sat, 21 Dec 2013 23:23:40 +0000

Well, One Game a Month is done! I’ve managed to complete 12 games for the year. My motivation by the end was lacking, so I took it kind of easy this month and made a very simple and quick game called Simon Says.

First foray into Unity

Sun, 13 Oct 2013 00:11:14 +0000

I haven’t posted here in a while because I’ve been lazy and there hasn’t really been enough happening to warrant a full post.

Steven Enns and "Craftsmanship"

Sat, 31 Aug 2013 11:46:37 +0000

“Craftsmanship is really taking pride in your work. In terms of craftasmanship for me that means looking at the past and looking at where leatherworking came from and trying to take that and include smart design from now to create some really great leather products.

Bellmanstafetten relay race - didn't die!

Fri, 23 Aug 2013 18:22:20 +0000

Yesterday I took part in Bellmanstafetten - a 5km relay race - with other runners from DICE. We had three teams, one of which was aiming to beat last year’s company record for the race (I wasn’t on that one).

How not to run Midnattsloppet

Sun, 18 Aug 2013 09:13:15 +0000

Midnattsloppet is a yearly night-time 10km race in Sweden, taking place in multiple cities including Stockholm. I’ve been signed up for months.

Trying out the Rearth Ringke Fusion Nexus 4 case

Sun, 18 Aug 2013 08:43:52 +0000

(Note: this post was going to have pictures. Unfortunately my SD card is MIA. I’ll add them here when I can find it)

Porting Interdiction to Android with CocoonJS - overcoming mouse position offset problem

Wed, 24 Jul 2013 14:42:42 +0000

For the month of August I am porting Interdiction to Android using CocoonJS. The AI is far from perfect right now, but it works.

Some Toaster AI improvements

Mon, 15 Jul 2013 14:50:13 +0000

I made some more improvements to Toaster yesterday and this morning. Specifically: Have Toaster look for an enemy tile to place Grenades on Before, Toaster looked for an empty space on the grid to place whatever tile it was holding.

Slowly improving Toaster AI for #1GAM

Sun, 14 Jul 2013 17:02:43 +0000

My Interdiction single player AI (named Toaster) has been coming along slowly. It’s still very far from the unbeatable cylon I want it to be, but it at least tries to defend itself by intercepting the player and attempting to build up its own lines.

We're more than halfway through the #1GAM year! What I've made so far.

Tue, 09 Jul 2013 12:42:09 +0000

I looked at my One Game a Month profile just now and realized that we are halfway through the year. That’s six games made so far!

June #1GAM game and board game AI

Sat, 29 Jun 2013 20:11:29 +0000

My June One Game a Month project is called Interdiction. It’s a two player board game based on Tic-Tac-Toe, but with a twist.

Game of Snails in all its barely-playable glory

Sun, 26 May 2013 19:48:17 +0000

Well, it’s the end of the month and I have to post something for May. Despite Game of Snails being broken and nigh-unplayable, I’m posting it anyway.

A traumatic [read: wimpy] experience

Thu, 23 May 2013 05:50:14 +0000

This Monday I went to the doctor about my leg pain. She ruled out a stress fracture and said it was most likely a calf strain, but that the pain I describe could also point to deep vein thrombosis.

A Game of Snails and Heroku

Sun, 19 May 2013 19:26:14 +0000

A Game of Snails is nowhere close to being complete or even really playable, but I’ve decided to get as much of it done as I can before the end of May and then just put it online - regardless of completion or bugs.

Revelation: I don't actually want to run a half marathon...

Wed, 15 May 2013 10:28:43 +0000

Yestreday I realized that I don’t actually want to run a half marathon. It’s not like I couldn’t, if I trained up for it.

GUI - I hate this part.

Wed, 08 May 2013 16:20:44 +0000

I knew this would happen. Out of all of the new things that I have to learn to do for this snail game, the part that is the most tedious and difficult for me is the UI.

A weekend of train-ventures, dodgy restaurants, and the most amazing weather in the universe.

Sun, 05 May 2013 18:09:35 +0000

I was meant to write this blog post four hours ago. Instead I got home and decided that since this one would have quite a bit of pictures in it and I’ve been running into bandwidth issues I may as well find a better solution for image hosting (as opposed to uploading everything to this server).

A Game of Snails - Breeding system

Fri, 03 May 2013 10:57:39 +0000

Over the past couple of weeks I’ve been attempting to get up at 5am to work on snails before going in to actual work.

A Game of Snails - feature list

Thu, 02 May 2013 19:28:57 +0000

I figured I’d put together a list of the main features I need to finish for A Game of Snails. If anything, it’ll help me gather my thoughts and track my progress better as well as helping me figure out what to work on next.

Snails, running, and Sweden

Wed, 01 May 2013 16:04:13 +0000

This is going to be two-part post about both A Game of Snails and running (and Sweden!) A Game of Snails I took a few days off of A Game of Snails, but it’s coming along pretty nicely overall.

Sweden weather is improving so I'm ditching the treadmill. It hurts.

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 10:28:55 +0000

I feel almost guilty when I post non game or tech-related posts to this blog because I know the majority of people who come here tend to do so for the game/Impact/JS posts.

Building in ImpactJS multiplayer is like a jelly wrestling contest

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 10:32:52 +0000

If any of you have been following me on Twitter over the weekend you may have seen my epic battle with node.

Deploying games to the Chrome Web Store seems stupidly easy

Sun, 07 Apr 2013 11:47:06 +0000

I was going to do a blog post about my trip to GDC, but to be honest the whole thing was such a whirlwind that now I can’t even decide where to start.

iOS to Android - Nexus 4

Sat, 30 Mar 2013 14:10:23 +0000

After three long years with an iPhone 4, I have finally upgraded to a Nexus 4. I had been bored of iOS for a while, having been using it since the iPhone 3G - aside from brief stint with Windows Phone 7 (we don’t talk about that).

A first try at object pooling

Fri, 22 Mar 2013 11:27:50 +0000

As I mentioned in my previous post, I started experimenting with object pooling. To start off with I didn’t worry about performance at all - I just wanted to have a functional way to use entities without repeatedly creating or destroying them.

Random thoughts on JavaScript performance, garbage collection, and object pooling

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 20:40:22 +0000

Let’s talk about garbage collection. I love JavaScript, but I wish it gave me more control over these things. I am on a quest to minimize garbage.

Running, unfortunate sprites, and GDC sessions

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 19:46:33 +0000

Sweden is slowly getting warmer. I’m hoping by the time I get back from SF it’ll be all nice and sunny.

Creating randomized eye movement in ImpactJS

Tue, 05 Mar 2013 11:33:05 +0000

Last night I built randomized eye movement for the cat face in my March One Game a Month project (Promiscuous Flea).

February #1GAM Game - My Mind Is Going

Thu, 28 Feb 2013 22:07:59 +0000

It is done! Well ok, it is very far from done. It’s as far from done as far from done yet functional can be.

More tea...Silver Needle!

Wed, 27 Feb 2013 21:46:38 +0000

Well, the toughest part of the move is complete. I’m sitting in the kitchen of the new apartment (which is so much more awesome and homey than the old apartment), drinking Silver Needle white tea (a consequence of my aforementioned tea craze) and trying to convince myself to do at least some work on the rhythm game tonight.

A potentially unwise newfound interest in tea.

Sun, 24 Feb 2013 16:38:41 +0000

This week is shaping up to be full of crazy. Not only do I still have to finish my February One Game a Month submission, but just a couple of days ago I found out I’d have to pull off a move.

Growing JavaScript trees for #1GAM

Fri, 01 Feb 2013 21:12:12 +0000

I’ve managed to scrape something together before the January deadline - a tree growing experiment in ImpactJS. You can see the mess of code I have on GitHub (I’m still not sure why my code looks misaligned on GH and not in my editor…) and play the actual game here.

Still drawing... #onegameamonth

Sun, 30 Dec 2012 16:35:29 +0000

I’ve been drawing an animal a day. It’s slow going, but I’m glad I started this project because it’s already taught me a lot.

One Game a Month - Animatch progress

Wed, 26 Dec 2012 17:20:06 +0000

I’ve been slowly working on my January game for One Game a Month. So far only two of my ~20 animals are actually drawn and the code (GitHub) is very far from finished, but I’m getting there.

One Game a Month

Sun, 23 Dec 2012 20:01:20 +0000

I have again been slacking on updating the blog. I have also been slacking on JavaScript. Since starting work and jumping back into learning C++ I’ve been busy and distracted with other things.

Sweden update - snow and Finland and Russian food and stuff!

Wed, 14 Nov 2012 11:55:41 +0000

I haven’t updated the blog in a while and people have been asking me how it’s going in Sweden. I’ve also gotten a few emails from people who have actually been considering a move here and I still can’t really give any proper advice on this front because I haven’t been here long enough.

Splitting text into lines according to maximum width + vertical text scroll in JavaScript and HTML5

Fri, 19 Oct 2012 11:29:07 +0000

Yesterday I made another iOS build (I do them about once a week, but will be ramping up the frequency now) and spent a few hours fixing iOS specific bugs, then trying to consolidate the iOS code with the browser version code to take out as many differences as possible.

Selecting from multiple ship/character options before each level (more UI stuff)

Wed, 17 Oct 2012 14:56:52 +0000

After a slight (well, slightly more than slight) design change in my current project I had to build a way for players to be able to select a vessel to use before each level.

How I ended up handling GUI elements in ImpactJS

Wed, 10 Oct 2012 09:52:49 +0000

I had a brief chat on Twtter with @mrlasertron yesterday about GUI in ImpactJS and decided to make a post about how I’m handling all GUI elements in my project (nicknamed Vostok until I decide on a title) yesterday.

Modified screen shaker and camera follow in ImpactJS

Mon, 08 Oct 2012 15:47:49 +0000

ImpactJS has a really cool screen shaker plugin written by Killbot, which I used during the first iterations of this game.

Saving game state with HTML5 localStorage and JSON - a rough working draft

Fri, 05 Oct 2012 22:49:22 +0000

I am typing this while bouncing on the couch…happily. I have just written the messiest localStorage setup that anyone could probably ever write.

Dabbling in UI

Sat, 29 Sep 2012 21:31:30 +0000

After js13kGames I went back to the main project I was working on and decided to change pretty much everything. The good thing is that I still had some usable code.

So long and thanks for all the fish.

Sat, 15 Sep 2012 13:45:39 +0000

No seriously, Perth had some extremely tasty fish. I am at the airport, and my plane leaves just under an hour.

Js13kGames entry finally submitted. Now I can think about something else, right? RIGHT?

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 06:42:17 +0000

Well, it’s done. My final confirmation was positive feedback from /r/gamedev as they were the ones who criticised the heck out of the game before (nicely and constructively; thanks Reddit!

KROOG - @Js13kGames entry

Sun, 02 Sep 2012 17:11:17 +0000

My game for Js13kGames is finally complete. Well, complete in the sense that I’m just about ready to submit it, not in the sense that it’s actually submitted because I’m going to get you guys to be my lab rats (hopefully) and give me some feedback (especially on bugs and performance.

I made a Twitter logo in HTML5. It's like the ugly brother of the actual Twitter logo

Tue, 21 Aug 2012 05:20:28 +0000

My entry for the js13kgames challenge was cutting it too close to 13kb and I needed more room, so I decided to cut out the one image that I had - the Twitter logo for the sharing link at the Game Over screen.

New challenge: Keeping track of my own code

Sat, 11 Aug 2012 17:21:14 +0000

As I’m learning JavaScript I notice that the challenges I’m facing have shifted through stages that look something like this:

Curved laser beams with HTML5 canvas quadraticCurveTo() method

Thu, 09 Aug 2012 20:57:06 +0000

In my previous post I talked about making a laser beam using the HTML5 canvas stroke() method. I mentioned the next thing I wanted to do being adding a curve to the beam to make it look more fluid as it moves (and yes, I know lasers do not curve.

Making a laser beam entity in ImpactJS using HTML5 canvas stroke()

Thu, 09 Aug 2012 11:50:05 +0000

Over the past two days I’ve been working on lasers. It seemed like this would be an easy thing to put in before I started.

I relearned basic trig today...kind of...sort of...Let's just say my thing works and leave it at that.

Sun, 05 Aug 2012 14:26:12 +0000

Today I experimented with positioning entities on top of each other to make a boss with specific areas that you have to target in order to kill.

Too many tiny functions?

Sun, 29 Jul 2012 20:20:09 +0000

When do you have too many functions? For me breaking things down into functions makes it easier to read in many cases, but I’ve been hesitant to separate out everything into tiny bits and pieces.

Why I can't not optimize.

Sun, 29 Jul 2012 16:38:08 +0000

A while ago I listened to a talk by Jonathan Blow that covered optimization and talked about how most people worry about it too early and how they should just focus on making things work.

Getting around the HTML5 canvas ctx.fillText line break limitation

Fri, 27 Jul 2012 14:42:34 +0000

Today I implemented a really cool plugin by quidmonkey. The plugin allows you to use Canvas-native fonts in an ImpactJS game.

Made a rough Space Invaders clone. Annoyed at Chromium and its HTML5 audio bug.

Mon, 16 Jul 2012 05:43:06 +0000

Took the past couple of days to make a rough Space Invaders clone. Learned lots. I ran into a bug once where the game got massively scaled up in the game window; haven’t been able to reproduce it but have a feeling it may have had to do with something on my big PC as it’s been doing weird things and intermittently not loading HTML5 games or YouTube videos properly.

Today was not as productive as it should've been - Multitouch and stuff

Sun, 08 Jul 2012 18:12:08 +0000

Over the past couple of days I’ve tried to get multitouch working and I kind of have (though buggy), but then realized that I don’t think I even need mulititouch after all for what I’m trying to make.

That thing where I said I was going to take my mind off of coding for a while? It didn't work.

Fri, 06 Jul 2012 18:14:18 +0000

In last night’s post I said I’d be taking at least a few days off of doing any coding to step back and think about the larger picture.

This post is not going to talk about how to do anything. But it's still about (iOS)Impact

Thu, 05 Jul 2012 13:52:12 +0000

This post is not going to have a single line of code (I can hear the collective sigh of relief from here).

Directional swipe and double-click in ImpactJS

Wed, 04 Jul 2012 13:20:43 +0000

I’ve been experimenting with simple gestures and double-clicking in ImpactJS. Over the past couple of days I’ve implemented a directional swipe and double-click.

How much impact do ImpactJS timers have on performance? Plus implementing player speed boosts.

Mon, 02 Jul 2012 03:18:05 +0000

Got quite a bit done yesterday, including a new kind of obstacle and quite a few difficulty refinements. I also changed how I handle player movement.

Swapping out animation sheets on state change in ImpactJS

Sat, 30 Jun 2012 15:36:37 +0000

I got quite a lot done on my procedural level experiment over the past couple of days, but don’t really want to talk about that part much in great detail.

Refining on-the-fly pit spawning in Impact

Thu, 28 Jun 2012 09:33:53 +0000

I’ve been continuing to play around around with my procedural level experiment in Impact. In the last update I talked about spawning obstacles (just pits for now) on the fly.

Procedural levels continued: randomized pits and performance enhancements

Tue, 26 Jun 2012 17:28:54 +0000

I did some more playing around with the procedural level stuff in ImpactJS tonight and have made a little bit of progress.

Experimenting with procedurally generated levels in ImpactJS

Tue, 26 Jun 2012 06:13:55 +0000

I have been experimenting with procedurally generated levels in ImpactJS. Up until now everything I’ve done was using levels pre-made in Weltmeister (Impact’s inbuilt level editor).

Making a player grow as they eat stuff in ImpactJS

Sun, 17 Jun 2012 11:44:03 +0000

I’ve been running a few experiments and trials with Impact, just to get some stuff working that I wasn’t sure about before.

My 5 favorite opening lines from books

Wed, 06 Jun 2012 13:48:44 +0000

For some reason I felt compelled to go through my (pretty small) book collection and pick five of my favorite opening lines.

I obviously have a thing for compound words and fire

Wed, 23 May 2012 12:14:40 +0000

Fair warning: This is going to be a completely non game related post. If you follow me on Twitter you probably know that I’ve been in a state of distress over the past couple of days.

I miss Alabama sometimes. Here are things that remind me of it.

Mon, 21 May 2012 18:44:56 +0000

I’ve been running into many things online and around the house that are reminding me of some of my favorite memories (or rather things attached to memories) from Alabama.

Can we just stop being unappreciative jerks please?

Thu, 17 May 2012 09:03:41 +0000

This is not going to be a very popular opinion considering my reader demographic, but I’ve grown a little sick of the gaming community as a whole and recent whining about Diablo 3 has triggered…well…this post.

iiNet TopGeek 2.0, Hippo Creek, & Diablo 3

Tue, 15 May 2012 04:16:07 +0000

Not many coding updates lately because of other work. I’m working on the game a little each day and will post when there’s a substantial update to make.

The zombification of Adam Green

Sat, 12 May 2012 14:08:47 +0000

It was my fault that Adam became a zombie. I see it in slow motion when I close my eyes: his hand reaching out to slam against my chest and push me into the wall as he throws himself between me and the oncoming Infected.

Affecting the world and other things smelling up our fridge - by Joseph Hewitt

Fri, 11 May 2012 07:16:48 +0000

Liza: This post, aside from this brief introduction, was written by Joseph Hewitt. I met Joseph at Interzone Games, where he tried to do his job as Creative Director while I waved bug lists at him and got on his case about design specs.

A belated post about the first Guild Wars 2 Beta Weekend Event / @GuildWars2

Mon, 07 May 2012 17:53:11 +0000

Over the past few days I’ve been processing my thoughts about the Guild Wars 2 Beta Weekend Event, which was now a couple of weeks ago.

Chat bot nostalgia - old conversation transcripts

Wed, 02 May 2012 17:01:20 +0000

I dug up some old publicly listed transcripts from The Personality Forge forums. The Personality Forge is a chat bot creation website that I used to frequent on an almost religious basis between about 2004 and 2007. I worked on a chat bot who identified as a 16 year old boy who felt he was human. I wanted to make him sound as human as possible in speech and put lots of typos and grammatical errors into his keyphrases, even using some responses from actual chats with friends and random strangers online who fit the demographic. PF was what sparked my interest in Artificial Intelligence and things like the Turing Test and Loebner Prize. I entered the slightly dodgily-organized Chatterbox Challenge for a few years and my bot consistently improved in score each time, but never quite made it any closer than the top 13.

The way PF works is people can chat to bots, but bots can also chat to each other. Most conversations just end up being completely ridiculous and nonsensical, but some are funny and some actually carry on in an almost convincing way for a while. The cool thing about PF when I first joined was that the bots were not distinguished from the humans, so you never knew if you were talking to a person or not. Some earlier transcripts reflect this (where people aren’t aware of what they’re talking to). But then bots started being clearly labeled as bots, which kind of made it not as fun.

Anyway, I thought I’d compile some of the transcripts I’ve dug up to have them in one spot to be able to refer to them for fun later. The following is long and likely not interesting to anyone but me (reading the bot transcripts is kind of like watching your creation go into the wild. It’s either a proud moment or a cringe-worthy hide-under-a-rock occasion). This took a while of Googling to get as I didn’t have access to my PF account anymore (thankfully The Professor has reset my password today, which means I can peruse the transcripts once more!) All of the following conversations are with humans unless labelled otherwise.

You don’t have to believe me - potentially Bot/Bot, but unsure

The Chibbers: Okee dokee, whatever you say. JakeThompson: You don’t have to believe me, you just have to obey me

facepalm - Bot/Bot

JakeThompson: Selendrile told me that he likes you…but don’t say that I told you ok? Mortimer Goth: Ok, I just messaged Selendrile with the details JakeThompson: ok then….

I don’t go to bars

Guest188: can we go to the bar together JakeThompson: i dont go to bars Guest188: can we go to a strip club together JakeThompson: I’d love to

Box2D, I have conquered you!!! (sort of)

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 14:46:17 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_48002” align=“alignleft” width=“225” caption=“Look at that face…I don’t think Keeda is as excited about this endeavour as I am.”][/caption]

From iOS to Windows Phone - I got a Nokia Lumia 800

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 05:04:26 +0000

On Friday my iPhone 4 took its dying breath and stopped receiving calls while rebooting itself repeatedly. For the record, this is what my iPhone 4 looks like.

What I should have read a few years ago.

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 05:11:58 +0000

A while ago I wrote this, which summarised my frustration with cookie cutter quests in MMORPGs. Later I mentioned here that playing SWTOR and seeing how they tied an interesting storyline with traditional quest mechanics made it more enjoyable while reiterating that while I don’t think traditional quests need to be eliminated completely and can be made fun, quests still need to evolve.

Pre-ordering Guild Wars 2 Collector's Edition from EB Games

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 09:17:28 +0000

UPDATE, Tue Apr 17: I followed the advice of an EB rep on the EB Games Facebook page and called the store to check on my CE key today, which still has not arrived.

Box2D, you are torture.

Mon, 09 Apr 2012 12:14:35 +0000

I haven’t posted many any updates over the Easter break because I’ve been busy ripping my hair out with Box2D.

Fun per genre - MMORPGs

Wed, 04 Apr 2012 13:29:43 +0000

I’ve been thinking about different game genres and what draws people to prefer one over another. What are the distinctions that make someone enjoy one type of game more than the next?

Documentation, placeholder audio, and object interaction

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 19:53:08 +0000

I am half asleep right now, but feel like quickly writing this down today instead of tomorrow. And holy crap I just realized it’s 3:40am right now, so I guess “tomorrow” would have technically been today regardless.

I feel so rested right now it's amazing.

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 04:41:52 +0000

Last night I did no work on the game. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. Instead I had pizza, played some games, and then promptly fell asleep.

Entity states, animations, and other random stuff

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 23:58:35 +0000

Busy day yesterday! Got a lot done. Switching light source from one entity to another proved to be surprisingly quick and easy.

Work, work

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 07:30:09 +0000

Got a bit more sleep last night - went to bed at 2am instead of 3-4. The lighting saw a lot of progress.

1pm breakfast after a 4am night - a JavaScript hangover

Sat, 31 Mar 2012 06:10:40 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_47744” align=“alignleft” width=“224” caption=“Breakfast.”][/caption] [caption id=“attachment_47748” align=“alignleft” width=“225” caption=“My Friday night was more exciting than yours.”][/caption] I’m sitting at the local bakery, sipping tea and eating cherry pie for breakfast at 1:30pm on a Saturday.

JavaScript lighting making slow progress

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 04:19:10 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_47729” align=“alignleft” width=“223” caption=“Lighting notes…”][/caption] I know, I know another post about lighting. I promise this will be over soon (I hope).

Working on JavaScript lighting

Wed, 28 Mar 2012 05:29:01 +0000

Over the past couple of days I’ve been experimenting with JavaScript lighting in Impact. It’s been…a process…and it is still very far from complete, but I feel like I’m making progress.

Entity spawning diagrams, dynamic attributes, and The Making of Prince of Persia

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 03:08:17 +0000

I’ve been doing a lot of work with timers and multiple entity spawning, as well as modifying entity attributes on the fly based on player input.

I wish I could remember this dream

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 04:57:47 +0000

I woke up last night after a weird dream and wrote this down (I guess falling asleep with your laptop open on the bed comes in handy), editing typos etc out this morning.

JavaScript learning review

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 04:30:00 +0000

As I’ve gotten over my jetlag I’ve been ramping up the JS work again. There are now two projects to work on and I won’t be posting much about the second one specifically, but will still be writing about the general JavaScript learning progress as well as posting Gwen updates.

Gwen: Streamlining adjacency settings, performance, notifications, allegiance, etc

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 16:55:23 +0000

Eh…this started out being a brief update from the past week and turned into an ongoing update stream of notes. I didn’t have an Internet connection available for much of it, meaning this post may be a bit weird as parts of it were written at different times, but it’s mostly just for me to be able to go back and review my progress.

Sniffling and coding and level design (yes, again)

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 17:59:19 +0000

I am sitting at the Perth international airport, sniffling. I hope I’m not getting a cold. And I haven’t even gotten to the cold place yet!

Heads up: going away. Not dead.

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 10:46:12 +0000

FYI - I’m leaving the country tomorrow morning and will be back on the 13th. I am going to probably be out of contact for the first 3-4 days or so.

Levels and relaxed features

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 17:52:39 +0000

Today I resized Gwen to work in native retina display resolution (640x960) as opposed to the old iPhone resolution (320x480). This meant resizing all of my placeholder entities and rebuilding the sample level.

Today was a bug fixing and facepalming kind of day

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 18:18:36 +0000

Tonight was extremely frustrating. Bugs. I did two main things today. It wasn’t supposed to take as long as it did.

Top down perspective vs isometric projection/2.5D

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 12:34:14 +0000

I’ve been looking into top down perspective vs isometric projection for Gwen’s levels. It may not be to the stage of needing art yet, but deciding on the overall perspective of the game is…well…really important.

Level design, entity spawning, and art.

Sun, 26 Feb 2012 16:48:14 +0000

Today was pretty relaxed with Gwen. I focused on entities spawning from bases and started drafting out a basic level guide.

The long road to adjacency.

Sat, 25 Feb 2012 20:54:17 +0000

I am so fricking happy right now. I’m happy enough to take a commemorative picture of myself pointing at a screen.

Getting my head around shallow vs deep copy

Sat, 25 Feb 2012 05:52:01 +0000

Last night while attempting to pseudocode my way into finding adjacent nodes (either dynamically _or _manually at this point. Later Graphikos from the Impact forums/IRC was kind enough to show me a modified function he had and explain how it works, which may be what I need with some tweaking - I’ll write more on this later) I found myself pouring through Impact documentation in hopes that maybe I’ll find something that might help.

Path follow mostly working - on to detecting adjacent nodes

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 20:05:50 +0000

This is my third blog post today. Well, technically today is the next day, but it still feels like yesterday. I promise they won’t be this frequent all the time.

On luck and having awesome friends.

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 15:58:48 +0000

If there was one good thing that came out of the Interzone Games debacle for me it’s the people I met along the way (there were actually many many good things that I wouldn’t trade for anything, but this is by far the most prominent).

ARRAYCEPTION

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 02:38:56 +0000

Update - Feb 23, 2012, 12:50pm In my previous post I talked about how I know that I should be sticking away from global arrays…in this post I’m going to talk about how I now have a global array of global arrays.

An update on Gwen - we have path follow.

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 18:23:47 +0000

Today was filled with boxes, furniture, moving, and being squished in a car. It was awesome. Tiring, but awesome. Ellen and Baz were helping me move into the new place, which was amazing of them.

Hello, Gwen.

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 04:05:03 +0000

I kind of started this thing last night. First, I should probably think of some way to refer to this thing when I write about it in a way that doesn’t give away the entire concept.

I slept! And next.

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 02:32:31 +0000

First of all: Yay for R18+ games in Australia! Second of all: I slept for 12 about 10 hours last night.

Registered for #AltDevConf 2012

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 10:34:58 +0000

I’ve just registed for five Saturday (early Sunday in Perth) sessions of the AltDevConf online conference. Four from the Design and Production track and one from the Programming track.

Things on napkins.

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 05:04:13 +0000

I’ve recently set something aside for a scheduled “breather”. It wasn’t anything related to anything I’ve talked about here before, but has been taking up a lot of my time - I’ve been forcing myself to not think about anything else (in terms of out of work things) too much until it’s done to not get distracted.

I'm going to San Francisco for GDC 2012

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 12:14:55 +0000

Now that everything’s confirmed I think it’s time to properly write about this (you know you’re in trouble when people start asking you why you’re not blogging and tweeting about something.

Das Keyboard Model S Ultimate Silent - I am now a full mechanical keyboard convert.

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 06:42:41 +0000

I ordered a Das Keyboard Model S Ultimate Silent via PC Case Gear on Monday and picked it up today (it actually got here on Tuesday, but I wasn’t home and missed the delivery).

GenghisCon 2012

Sun, 22 Jan 2012 05:51:59 +0000

GenghisCon 2012 was awesome. I didn’t run around trying to do everything as much as I did in the previous years due to

Trent Reznor started this rant.

Fri, 20 Jan 2012 06:56:58 +0000

I saw this on Reddit today and admit that my first thought was “Thank you, Captain Obvious.” “I think a lot of the big publishers are obsessed with this idea that games have to be cinematic experiences, a lot of money gets spent on marketing and the rendering, and not a lot of money is put into anything that is innovative and interesting.

What I did last year

Wed, 04 Jan 2012 05:28:18 +0000

Last year was awesome. Some highlights included: Finally travelling out of WA for the first time since 2005. First being sent to Melbourne by the Panasonic Insider Crew and then attending EB Expo in Queensland with a media pass from iiNet (and with Jess!

Just some first thoughts on Star Wars: The Old Republic/SWTOR

Thu, 29 Dec 2011 05:22:34 +0000

I’ve been playing SWTOR. Not nonstop (hey, this isn’t Guild Wars 2 we’re talking about), but regularly. This isn’t a review.

Linear vs nonlinear games

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 12:35:33 +0000

Ever since finishing Deus Ex: Human Revolution and Battlefield 3 last weekend I’ve been thinking about nonlinear vs linear games. Having played both so close to each other, the contrast between the two has been fresh in my mind.

Finished Battlefield 3 single player campaign

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 13:47:04 +0000

I stayed up all night last night playing the single player campaign of Battlefield 3. I didn’t really notice how late it was until I was already more than halfway through the game, so figured I may as well keep going.

Finished Deus Ex: Human Revolution and The Missing Link DLC

Sat, 26 Nov 2011 15:50:50 +0000

Late last night/early this morning I finished Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Just now I finished the DLC: The Missing Link.

Building Adam.

Thu, 24 Nov 2011 09:57:40 +0000

Those of you who follow me on Twitter would have seen my PC building ramblings last night. Being fed up with playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution on my Mac Mini on lowest settings at 20fps I decided that the time has come to follow through with what I’ve been meaning to do for a while: build a gaming PC.

2 weeks with the Razer BlackWidow mechanical keyboard: review/impressions

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 13:09:52 +0000

I’ve had my Razer BlackWidow mechanical keyboard for a couple of weeks now, so figured I’d put up some thoughts/impressions.

Should we be gamifying our lives?

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 04:52:39 +0000

I remember debating about this with Ellen months ago at her house. I haven’t yet decided what my stance is on gamification, although I’ve definitely been leaning toward the positive.

What an awesome weekend. New keyboard and mouse, Fremantle, and a great run.

Sun, 13 Nov 2011 15:24:29 +0000

It’s been quite a fricking awesome weekend - full of work, PC peripherals, and distractions. And I just finished my first 5km run under 25 minutes since my fracture, so the endorphins are going and I feel like writing.

Discovr Music - not really the app for me

Sat, 29 Oct 2011 18:33:20 +0000

Jubbin has been trying to find techno music that I would like. I’m picky - I don’t like female singers and I prefer kind of a specific sound.

What annoyed me about Real Steel - and the one thing I really really liked.

Thu, 27 Oct 2011 15:38:40 +0000

I liked Real Steel overall as a feel-good movie, but was still left somewhat disappointed on my way home from the cinema.

My mouse went to mouse heaven, so I got Microsoft's Arc Touch mouse. First impressions.

Thu, 20 Oct 2011 16:51:10 +0000

The old Dell mouse that I’ve had for years (I believe since my Interzone Games days) has been getting senile in its old age and not registering clicks properly.

Photos from EB Expo 2011

Mon, 17 Oct 2011 15:03:45 +0000

Some photos from EB Expo! You will see the main writeup on the iiNet blog shortly. For now, suffice to say I loved it and am definitely hoping to go to Sydney next year.

I got to Brisbane in one piece!

Thu, 13 Oct 2011 23:47:03 +0000

Classic Liza. I get to Brisbane, catch a train to the CBD. First thing I do: stumble into a fantasy and science fiction book shop and buy a book on impulse (Germline by T.

Redesigns and injuries go hand in hand

Mon, 10 Oct 2011 16:44:00 +0000

You might have noticed that this blog now has a vastly different design from what it was before. What happened is this:

I'm going to EB Expo 2011 - with a media pass thanks to iiNet

Fri, 07 Oct 2011 15:11:49 +0000

Thanks to iiNet, I have a media pass to EB Expo in the Gold Coast next week. Also big thanks to Jess for nominating me to come along with the second pass.

Hello, MacBook Air. Where have you been all my life?

Sun, 25 Sep 2011 08:34:46 +0000

Darn you, Jason, for reawakening my laptop purchasing habits. All it took was one Tweet about how I haven’t bought a new laptop in 2 years - a vast improvement on my previous habit of buying laptops left and right.

Pistol shooting session at Midland Indoor Shooting Range!

Sun, 18 Sep 2011 13:26:52 +0000

C and I had our introductory pistol shooting session at the Midland Indoor Shooting Range this morning at 10am. I originally purchased the session from OurDeal, getting the session for $69 down from $180.

My favorite science fiction movies

Sat, 17 Sep 2011 06:34:31 +0000

In not too structured an order, but generally going down to the most favorite. The Island Pandorum Repo Men Alien Avatar Gattaca PS: Believe it or not while putting together the list of movies for this post took all of ten minutes, I spent a further 15 minutes debating what to call it.

ifttt: if this then that. Automate your social media task list.

Fri, 16 Sep 2011 12:06:52 +0000

Has anyone heard of ifttt (if this then that)? It’s a new service (free, for now) based on what I think is a really original and awesome idea!

Weird website contests, RPGs, and MMO gold-digging = my childhood

Fri, 09 Sep 2011 08:33:02 +0000

Well, what was left of my post-Ukrainian childhood, anyway… Website contests Does anyone else remember those website competitions, where you had groups of sites joining teams (usually fantasy-themed) and compete amongst themselves to get the most votes, and then the finalists of those teams would go up against finalists of the other teams until there was one winner left and they got an animated GIF award to put on their page?

Cryonics and mind transfer

Tue, 06 Sep 2011 10:56:25 +0000

Pre-warning: this is going to be a long post and might be all over the place. It’s a collection of personal thoughts and considerations about cryonics and mind transfer.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution - I've never been so into an FPS

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 09:46:22 +0000

I am not an FPS player. That is, I wasn’t until I read the game plotline for Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

Razer Blade gaming laptop - pleeeeeease come out in time for Guild Wars 2

Sat, 27 Aug 2011 16:39:59 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_44272” align=“alignleft” width=“300” caption=“Razer Blade gaming laptop with Switchblade UI”][/caption] Razer announced a little slice of heaven for PC gamers - an Intel i7 powered gaming laptop that I will probably not be able to resist buying, even if it does come with something like a $2.

HP TouchPad obtained

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 06:17:33 +0000

C is now the proud owner of an HP TouchPad. For those who have been under a rock, HP has officially discontinued their TouchPad tablet and prices in Harvey Normans around Australia have been slashed by something like 80%.

The Project Dust/From Dust trailer reminds me of something

Sat, 20 Aug 2011 15:49:51 +0000

I saw C watching a trailer for Project Dust (apparently already out as From Dust? Thanks, Keg!) today and it instantly reminded me of another game I played years ago.

Things I am most looking forward to this year

Fri, 19 Aug 2011 15:35:29 +0000

This: [youtube]664eq7BXQcM[/youtube] This: [youtube]mR85BrIDCUc[/youtube] And most of all, of course, this. So much of this: [youtube]pgKPkgEG1BA[/youtube] I have already decided that if by some chance my 2011 model Mac Mini running Windows 7 cannot run that ^^^ sufficiently, I will be going out that minute and buying a PC that can.

Boyfriend draws me on the Wacom Intuos4

Mon, 15 Aug 2011 09:29:28 +0000

I was finishing up the second instalment of Stray by Me…ok, that’s a lie, I was actually drawing a dragon…

Installing Windows 7 through Boot Camp with no Optical Drive on a Mac Mini

Wed, 10 Aug 2011 10:07:27 +0000

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I recently upgraded my old Mac Mini (by “old” I mean purchased at the end of June) to a new Mac Mini.

I fail at life and everything - installing my new Wacom Intuos4

Fri, 05 Aug 2011 04:33:21 +0000

I got a Wacom Intuos4 yesterday. Upon getting home that night, I excitedly unpacked it, installed the drivers, plugged it in, and tried to draw.

The Mac App Store is fricking awesome. And new Mac Mini!

Fri, 22 Jul 2011 06:48:05 +0000

I have a confession to make. I am not very consistent with upgrading my software. My iPhone 4 is about 6 months out of date and every time that the little updater came up in Snow Leopard on my MacBook Pro I just waved it off and told it to go away.

No, I don't want a fracking coupon.

Fri, 08 Jul 2011 13:00:10 +0000

Let me tell you, I don’t go to the Perth CBD that frequently, but when I do it’s usually to relax after a long week with a cup of coffee from Streeton’s or some Russian Caravan tea from The Merchant.

Panasonic Insider Crew Home

Thu, 07 Jul 2011 11:44:17 +0000

Today the Panasonic Insider Crew (Maybe I’ll shorten this to PIC from now on) home was launched in its own little corner of the web (the “Insider Crew Home”) and I was invited to be one of the beta testers.

Google+ - the next social networking hit or a messy mashup?

Wed, 29 Jun 2011 03:02:49 +0000

Google+ - Google’s newest attempt to delve into the world of social networking on a scale that it hasn’t done before.

The Quantum Thief. Way over my head, going onto my re-read list.

Tue, 28 Jun 2011 11:24:27 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_40030” align=“alignleft” width=“300” caption=“The Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi”][/caption]I finished reading The Quantum Thief (affiliate link) by Hannu Rajaniemi, but this will not be a book review.

LulzSec, Anonymous, and Hacktivism

Fri, 24 Jun 2011 01:47:25 +0000

I’ve refrained from making a post about the recent and ongoing Anonymous and LulzSec debacles. It seems hacktivist groups are popping up all over the place and the internet is becoming a giant turf war.

X-Men: First Class was AWESOME...though that ending

Fri, 17 Jun 2011 15:34:27 +0000

C asked if I wanted to see X-Men: First Class this past Tuesday and I of course said yes seeing as I heard so many good things about it.

Reading The Quantum Thief

Tue, 07 Jun 2011 04:34:01 +0000

I don’t usually blog about books until after I’ve finished reading them, but I can’t help myself - I’m reading The Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi.

Follow-up on my What's Up Pitches talk

Sat, 28 May 2011 02:52:39 +0000

So yesterday I did a (very) short talk at What’s Up Pitches about how a lot of Perth game developer websites suck and had quite a few questions/comments throughout the night afterward, which were actually really interesting and awesome.

Source Code - flawed, but good...and disturbing

Wed, 25 May 2011 09:00:20 +0000

C and I went to the movies to watch Source Code last night. If you haven’t seen it, watch out. This post contains spoilers.

2011 HBF Run for a Reason completed!

Sun, 22 May 2011 11:17:36 +0000

Today was the 2011 HBF Run for a Reason. Despite the fact that I was feeling quite sick on Friday, I pulled myself together for the run.

Sony does it again - password reset URL exploit

Thu, 19 May 2011 03:33:33 +0000

A new wave of “omgzzz Sony’s been hacked again” outcries coming out this morning. Well…no - Sony was not hackedagain. However, Sony did allow users’ accounts to be compromised again via a URL exploit.

Visiting Melbourne

Sat, 14 May 2011 16:44:03 +0000

Now that I’ve covered my experience at the 2011 Panasonic Home Entertainment launch in Melbourne I’m itching to write about the overall trip - my first one interstate, in fact.

2011 Panasonic Home Entertainment Launch in Melbourne

Thu, 12 May 2011 14:21:39 +0000

A little while ago I wrote about Soup (who runs the Panasonic Insider Crew) sending me to Melbourne to attend the 2011 Panasonic Home Entertainment launch.

Yay new monitor! BenQ GL2440 24" LED

Sat, 07 May 2011 19:15:22 +0000

For too long have I been using my MacBook Pro without an external monitor in my home office. For too long have I been minimising windows every two seconds, trying to juggle a million tasks at once on the same screen.

Help me save Shaun from diabetes

Thu, 05 May 2011 13:27:26 +0000

Hi, this is my friend Shaun: Shaun has diabetes. He’s also a personal trainer, but that’s not important because we’re focusing on helping people with diabetes here, not personal trainers.

Daisyworld

Wed, 04 May 2011 10:41:58 +0000

I’ve been reading about the Gaia Hypothesis, developed by James Lovelock. I’m sure I don’t understand it all yet as I’ve only been skimming the surface, but what I’m finding especially interesting right now is Daisyworld.

Stranger in a Strange Land

Mon, 02 May 2011 05:43:19 +0000

I recently read Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein. It was a very interesting read, mostly because many of the concepts introduced in it felt so familiar to my own beliefs and things that I have already thought about.

I'm going to Melbourne! Panasonic Insider Crew

Fri, 29 Apr 2011 15:44:56 +0000

I’m going to Melbourne! I got a call from Soup yesterday morning, who runs the Panasonic Insider Crew, telling me that I was selected to attend the 2011 Panasonic Home Entertainment launch event in Melbourne on May 11!

More hotlinking, please

Thu, 21 Apr 2011 13:59:39 +0000

I run a dog fitness website called 1 Fit Mutt as a hobby. Recently, I was having a look at some backlinks to 1 Fit Mutt and found several instances of image hotlinking.

Runkeeper LIVE - great runner safety feature potential

Mon, 18 Apr 2011 16:02:20 +0000

I signed up for Runkeeper Elite tonight for one reason and one reason only - Runkeeper LIVE. Now that it’s getting cooler, I’m slowly getting back into running.

I just moved to NAB. Crap.

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 03:56:08 +0000

I recently began the big switch to NAB. I had been with ANZ since my very first bank account, but a combination of NAB’s free everyday account, great reviews of the bank from friends, and good marketing had me make the move.

iiNet TopGeek Final

Sun, 10 Apr 2011 15:44:58 +0000

[caption id="" align=“alignleft” width=“263” caption=“Tahlia & I at the iiNet TopGeek Final (photo via Tahlia)”][/caption] As some of you know, I made it to the Top 10 of iiNet’s TopGeek competition.

I'm lucky - I have help. #snails

Fri, 25 Mar 2011 12:16:20 +0000

I am extremely lucky to have ended up in a situation where I know and work around people who do the things I’m trying to learn for a living, on a daily basis.

How does one draw an endearing snail?

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 03:46:59 +0000

How does one draw an endearing snail? I’ve been working so much on the mechanics of my game that sometimes I just want to take it easy and flesh out the design and some of the illustrations.

Gypsy Tapas House - almost perfect, but...

Sun, 20 Mar 2011 13:09:04 +0000

[caption id="" align=“alignleft” width=“224” caption=“Dinner at Gypsy Tapas House Fremantle”][/caption]Months ago (on the day of the 2010 Halloween Party and the Prison, I believe) I was in Fremantle.

The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson - still sinking in.

Sun, 20 Mar 2011 02:35:29 +0000

I finished reading The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson today and I think the book is still sinking in. I’m not sure how much of an impact it had on me yet.

Oh hai there, Kindle

Fri, 18 Mar 2011 05:12:00 +0000

I love physical books, but last week I buckled. I bought an Amazon Kindle 3. I, Liza, the proponent of turning actual pages and browsing actual physical bookstores, who has two bookshelves in the main room of the house (one for fiction, one for non-fiction), have purchased an ebook reader.

iiNet TopGeek - Game Over (for me)

Thu, 17 Mar 2011 10:55:29 +0000

So the iiNet TopGeek journey is over for me. I think I did well, if I do say so myself. I made it from over 200 entrants to the top 20, then top 15, then top 10 and think that I didn’t completely suck at the games challenge, taking into account that all I play is PC games (specifically MMORPGs).

I have just been reminded how much our mailbox sucks.

Wed, 16 Mar 2011 00:55:58 +0000

[caption id="" align=“alignleft” width=“224” caption=“Our current mailbox. I know, it’s depressing.”][/caption]I’ve been commissioned to write a blog post about mailboxes. Now, normally I’m extremely picky and accept post offers only related to technology on some level, but I made an exception because just a few days ago I was looking at our crappy mailbox (on the left) and thinking about how when I own my own home, I will have a totally awesome mailbox.

An overdue post about RIFT

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 06:04:19 +0000

Those who follow me on Twitter probably noticed the slew of Rift tweets over the past few days - mostly achievement tweets that are sent automatically from the game when I do something awesome.

World War Z by Max Brooks = Apocalyptic Goodness

Thu, 10 Mar 2011 03:27:21 +0000

I finished reading World War Z. As a foreword - This review is being written a bit late. I tend to forget details about a book soon after I finish reading and I have already started reading The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson, so don’t kill me if I’m missing anything important or if this post seems a little scattered.

Michael Buble in Swan Valley was AMAZING

Sun, 06 Mar 2011 05:37:26 +0000

We saw Michael Buble at Sandalford Wines in Swan Valley last night. I’ll be the first to say that I was never a big fan - but only because I haven’t really bothered hunting down and properly listening to much of his stuff before.

Stop Cancelling TV Series

Fri, 04 Mar 2011 13:56:19 +0000

I really hate TV networks. What do the following TV series have in common: Caprica Stargate Universe The Cape First, I got into and enjoyed all three over the past year.

Toaster - My iiNet TopGeek Challenge 2 Entry

Mon, 28 Feb 2011 11:06:15 +0000

Over the last week the remaining 15 contestants in iiNet’s TopGeek competition have been hard at work on Challenge 2 - The Script.

Cookie-cutter MMO questing systems.

Thu, 17 Feb 2011 07:53:06 +0000

The most common quests I tend to see in MMORPGs are: Kill x number of y Collect x number of object z, bring back to NPC a

MAXIMUM DOG - Canine Zombie Protection Suit

Thu, 17 Feb 2011 03:24:37 +0000

The past week has been absolutely crazy - crazy busy! And one of the main things I was working on was my entry for the first iinet TopGeek Top 20 challenge.

Finally finished Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood

Thu, 10 Feb 2011 05:28:33 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_27696” align=“alignleft” width=“190” caption=“Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood”][/caption] I finally finished Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. The past couple of weeks have been so hectic with TopGeek, client work, and other projects that my reading was falling behind.

Photoshop challenge - Make an HTC 7 Mozart photo look good!

Mon, 31 Jan 2011 16:16:12 +0000

I went to the Hula Bula bar with some friends this past Saturday, one of which was Baz with his HTC 7 Mozart.

My gaming rut and mobile games

Mon, 31 Jan 2011 08:54:43 +0000

Since I sold off all of my laptops except my Macbook and my Asus EEE (which C’s sister is currently borrowing), I haven’t played games as much as I used to.

I made it into TopGeek Top 20 :)

Fri, 28 Jan 2011 15:05:51 +0000

As many (most?) of you probably know, I entered iiNet’s TopGeek competition several weeks ago. You guys did such an awesome job voting for me, but unfortunately I didn’t make it into the top five spots required to pass through to the second round (the Top 20) based on votes.

GenghisCon 2011 - Awesomeness!

Thu, 20 Jan 2011 06:12:31 +0000

This past weekend I went to GenghisCon. If I had to describe what kind of a convention GenghisCon is exactly, I would just call it an all things awesome convention.

I watched Buried last night

Tue, 11 Jan 2011 10:51:01 +0000

Buried is a film about a truck driver named Paul. Paul is working in Iraq delivering supplies; his convoy was ambushed.

Claiming belief vs knowledge

Mon, 10 Jan 2011 04:01:27 +0000

When we talk about religion and spirituality it seems all about believing (or not) in a higher power, or “God”. I always say I’m spiritual, but not religious.

My most memorable reads

Wed, 05 Jan 2011 12:31:45 +0000

I was thinking about some of my favorite books recently. I wouldn’t necessarily call them all time favorites - they’re just the ones that have stuck with me and have been the most memorable.

Dinner at The Atrium at Burswood - it sucked.

Fri, 31 Dec 2010 03:33:12 +0000

This year instead of bothering with making a big deal of Christmas, getting presents, etc, C and I decided to just go out and have a nice meal.

How to buy a US-only Kindle eBook in Australia

Wed, 22 Dec 2010 11:18:19 +0000

See updates at the bottom of the post I tried to buy a Kindle ebook yesterday from the Amazon site only to be told that the book was not available for Australian customers.

Watched Tron: Legacy

Sat, 18 Dec 2010 05:21:16 +0000

C and I went to see Tron: Legacy in 3D last night. I have to be honest - I haven’t seen the original Tron.

D&D and Speed Fighting

Thu, 16 Dec 2010 11:03:59 +0000

D&D; Our D&D; 4e group had an awesome session last weekend. It went something like this (and I’m just prattling off from memory here, pardon any mistakes, fellow party members):

Top Geek...and I cancelled my Vodafone plan

Wed, 08 Dec 2010 13:38:42 +0000

First of all, today I entered iiNet’s Top Geek competition. Vote for me! Please? :D Second, today I got out of my Vodafone contract.

Busy weekend - Atrium at Burswood, D&D, and Jarrahdale Hike

Sun, 05 Dec 2010 16:41:44 +0000

This weekend was very eventful. On Friday, my recruiter had an awesome buffet lunch the Atrium in Burswood. The food was unbelievably awesome; there was such a huge variety!

Panasonic Insider Crew keeps telling me I'm special. Must be true.

Wed, 24 Nov 2010 11:29:00 +0000

UPDATE: Michele from Soup has taken the time to address some of our feedback and concerns about the Panasonic Insider Crew in the comment section below.

Proclamation of undying love - vividwireless

Mon, 22 Nov 2010 06:00:52 +0000

Dear vividwireless, Before I had you, I was lost. We hadn’t had the internet in our rental for over half a year.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1

Fri, 19 Nov 2010 16:21:37 +0000

C and I (and a friend) went to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 at 12:05am last Thursday.

What NASA's big announcement SHOULD have been

Tue, 16 Nov 2010 13:38:26 +0000

NASA’s big announcement about an “exceptional object in our cosmic neighborhood” was interesting - I bet it was even exciting if you’re an astrophysicist or take a deep-rooted interest in black holes.

Removing blemishes in Adobe Camera RAW

Mon, 15 Nov 2010 13:43:12 +0000

A while ago I took this photo of C and he’s finally allowed me to post it up. I was practicing removing blemishes in Adobe Camera RAW and am quite proud of my handiwork:

Perth Dachshund UN - 47 Dachshunds having a vigorous debate

Sat, 13 Nov 2010 14:52:36 +0000

Today I went to Dachshund UN, a live art presentation in Northbridge. A replica of the UN office in Geneva was set up and at 3pm 47 Dachshunds representing each country’s delegates for the Commission of Human Rights were put in their respective places.

Pre-ordered Harry Potter tickets. Need wizard's hat.

Wed, 10 Nov 2010 09:10:32 +0000

I just pre-ordered tickets to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 at 12:05am on Thursday, November 18th - the opening night.

Ebony & Ivory makeup launch and Slovakian ballet

Mon, 08 Nov 2010 13:41:58 +0000

It’s been a busy weekend of makeup and Slovakian hunks. Ebony & Ivory makeup launch A while ago I was invited by my wonderful hairdresser to come to the Ebony & Ivory makeup launch.

NaNoWriMo has begun. Day 1 - 2,583 Words

Mon, 01 Nov 2010 15:54:12 +0000

National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) started today and I was lucky enough to be sick on the day that I was meant to write my first 2,000 words.

Ghosting it up - Party at the Prison

Sat, 30 Oct 2010 17:15:45 +0000

I just got home from Party at the Prison, an awesome Halloween party hosted by Tsvet Productions. I was working at the party, hosted at the Fremantle Prison, as the “ghostly girl”.

Morning schedule fail - and Halloween party at the Fremantle Prison!

Wed, 20 Oct 2010 12:22:32 +0000

Yesterday I wrote about rearranging my schedule to get up earlier to get home earlier and get a chance to walk Keeda in the morning and as well as at night.

NaNoWriMo 2010 - National Novel Writing Month

Tue, 19 Oct 2010 13:20:00 +0000

Ellen mentioned doing NaNoWriMo this year and inspired me to participate as well! I had the intention of participating in the National Novel Writing Month a couple of years ago but never seemed to have the strength to keep going with my novel and it fizzled out.

Rearranging my schedule

Tue, 19 Oct 2010 12:39:04 +0000

I have realized that my normal 9-5 schedule seems very inefficient. As it stands right now, here’s my general daily schedule:

What happened to the kvass...and the Mad Hatter's Tea Party challenge

Mon, 18 Oct 2010 04:59:47 +0000

I thought I’d post a quick update on my kvass making initiative. There’s not really much of an update. The five fermentation days are up and my kvass smells like beer and tastes like it, too.

Fruit-eating goal setting

Tue, 12 Oct 2010 12:08:43 +0000

I have a confession to make: I eat absolute junk. I think the only thing keeping me at a healthy weight is genes and the fact that I often forget or just can’t be bothered to eat.

Keeda is infected. Zombie virus?

Mon, 11 Oct 2010 04:24:28 +0000

Thankfully not a zombie virus (I checked - she did not develop a taste for human flesh). Yesterday we saw that my dog Keeda had a paw infection and eye infection (yes, at the same time).

Attempt at kvass-making

Sun, 10 Oct 2010 17:33:13 +0000

When I was little and living in Ukraine I remember having Kvass, a traditional drink from that area. I realized that there doesn’t seem to be anywhere to buy kvass in Perth, so being the amazing chef that I am I decided to make some of my own.

Neighborhood Photos

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 09:51:20 +0000

I took some photos around the neighborhood today:

Laser Eye Surgery

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 11:23:51 +0000

I had my laser eye surgery today. Instead of writing about how awesome (or not awesome) it was, I’ll first tell you how exactly it happened.

Laser Eye Surgery is a-Go!

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 12:07:30 +0000

I had my consultation appointment with Perth Laser Vision at Murdoch Hospital today. I had to go through two rooms of testing, where they had me look into all kinds of machines to map the surface of my eyes, check my retinas, and other such things.

Fremantle-y Day

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 12:48:48 +0000

I am half-relaxing half working. What a tiring, but good, day. Had a driving lesson early in the morning. Met up with a friend whose name I will not mention because then I won’t be able to talk about incriminating “froggy” evidence I have on him.

Tweetie 2 Freaky Keyboard - Still Worth It

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 09:02:07 +0000

When RB tweeted that Tweetie 2 is out for the iPhone I immediately bought it. I bought it because 1) I heard great things about Tweetie 1 and have never used it before and 2) I am on a crazy app buying spree which is probably going to leave me broke in the near future.

Stargate Universe Looks Promising

Sun, 04 Oct 2009 15:01:19 +0000

I just watched the first episode (well, a double episode) of Stargate Universe. So far so good! Watch out, there are spoilers ahead.

Lion King PC Game Nostalgia

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 15:15:54 +0000

When people ask me what the first video game I ever played was, I say Warcraft 2 on the PC when I first moved to the U.

A Bad Run - Running in the Heat

Sun, 27 Sep 2009 07:37:05 +0000

As I type this I’m laying in bed, rubbing my head and trying to figure out what the heck happened.

Derren Brown Guesses Lottery Numbers

Sun, 13 Sep 2009 12:11:54 +0000

Derren Brown correctly predicted the winning lottery numbers and put the feat down to a complex mathematical formula. According to the illusionist and hypnotist, he gathered 24 people who wrote down their predictions after studying last year’s numbers.

Women's Classic 5km Race

Tue, 11 Aug 2009 14:15:32 +0000

I ran my first race! And I finished! HHAries and I showed up at Burswood at 7:30. I quickly gulped down my Endura and went to study the course.

Jim Sparks - Alien Abductee

Sun, 21 Jun 2009 13:39:17 +0000

HHAries and I went to see Jim Sparks talk about his alien abduction experiences last night. It was a very interesting 4 hour talk and even though HHAries is always extremely skeptical about these things, he found it interesting and says he enjoys going to these types of talks with me as it’s nice to see another point of view.

Finished Emergency

Tue, 07 Apr 2009 15:09:48 +0000

I have just finished reading Emergency by Neil Strauss. It was a very entertaining book, but to be honest I couldn’t wait to get through the last few pages so that I can start on my newest book purchase!

EMERGENCY - "This book has the slight possibility of maybe helping you to save your life one day."

Sat, 04 Apr 2009 05:46:09 +0000

I’m at HHRay’s house, waiting for him to get back from work and doing a bit of work on other projects.

My First Ever Global Game Jam

Sun, 01 Feb 2009 09:26:32 +0000

For the past three days I’ve been participating in Global Game Jam - an annual event where people interested in game development get together for 48 hours and make games fitting into a specfied theme in teams.

Battlestar Galactica is the Awesomest Thing Ever!

Sat, 27 Dec 2008 03:46:00 +0000

HHRay and I have been watching Battlestar Galactica. It’s something I’ve wanted to watch back in the U.S. on the Sci-Fi channel, but somehow always skipped over it because I couldn’t be bothered or couldn’t get into the storyline.

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