D. Paul Harrison - 1 - Life, exploration, and movement.
Hello!
Got off my schedule, but will be back on it from now on. Going with a slightly different format for the title, as well, which might help the situation. From now on, I will go twice a week - likely Mondays and Thursdays, and that may help me through whatever writer’s blocks that I possess.
Not much has changed since my last update, which is mainly the reason I haven’t been typing more. I am very much in a place where I am trying to decide what to even do - every day is a crossroads, and it becomes tiring, and then I drink a bottle of wine. The guilt I put on myself greatly exceeds any external forces, and I need to give myself a break. Probably need to give myself a vacation as well, but that seems unlikely.
I’m trying to walk more, and re-engage with the world, but to some degree it doesn’t seem worth the anxiety attacks, even if I know it is. It is funny, I feel completely comfortable not having a plan for the next few years, or necessarily know what I want to do professionally, but I deeply plan every time I leave the house.
What I’m writing
NYC Midnight Microfiction Contest (100 words)
Got into the second round of this, submitted my second story yesterday. I feel good about it. The 100 words is hard, and fun, and the first prompts I got led me to essentially, just writing a joke.
Voices (1000+ words)
Going to rewrite this completely over the next couple days, looking forward to doing so, now. The external deadlines for other things have been helping, and I need to get something in someone else’s hands.
What I’m reading
Zero Sum Game by SL Huang
A nice little techo-thriller sci-fi book that does a magic trick that seems a little too difficult: writing in first-person about someone with superpowers, without a point of view character. The characters are enjoyably unlikeable - and the conflict is interesting, and I’m definitely invested in continuing this series.
I’ve been casting around a bit for more light near-future stuff, and this fills that niche relatively well, for me.
What I’m playing
Sea of Thieves
Still a fun multiplayer experience. It’s interesting to compare it to the game below.
No Man’s Sky
I got a new ultrawide monitor recently, so decided to give this a shot. It is hard for me to define why I find it unsatisfying - technically, it combines some of my favorite things, such as Freelancer and EV Nova, with the narrative adventure game such as Outer Wilds or Subnautica, but the survival elements and its combination of grinding along with the narrative makes me not want to play it.
In Subnautica, I built a base for A) survival and B) because it was neat, I felt like I was actually under threat in a hostile world, and I’ve carved a space out, for myself. Maybe if NMS started its base building with more things that were cosmetic - tables, chairs, et al, - it would be different, but as it stands, it feels like I am building a base because I need to, and I can’t customize it to a point that makes me feel like it’s a home. I traditionally do not like games that are based solely on survival, and this isn’t one, but the missions and benefits of exploration are not enough to keep me engaged.
Goodbye
That’s it for me today!