I messed up the order on Oct 20 & 21, and fixed them around, I think. And that's where my notes are relatively understandable.
Also, I admit Saturday's update was late because I did not have it written in the morning. The memoir is in a bit of a dull spot at the moment, stuff hasn't really hit the fan yet.
Sunday, April 21, 2013
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Ugh
Revising story.
Finding out I'm linked from TDWTF.
Staying up late reading comments and looking at readership impact.
Getting up early to print story if necessary.
And buy tutoring supplies.
Story still not done.
Class wanted to know blog address.
Tutoring postponed.
Fell asleep at Leonardo's Basement.
Still tired.
Still need to finish story.
Still need to write new story for Monday.
Still need to write this Winnipeg library piece to keep new blog visitors coming back.
How to do this?
Dunno.
Sleep.
Finding out I'm linked from TDWTF.
Staying up late reading comments and looking at readership impact.
Getting up early to print story if necessary.
And buy tutoring supplies.
Story still not done.
Class wanted to know blog address.
Tutoring postponed.
Fell asleep at Leonardo's Basement.
Still tired.
Still need to finish story.
Still need to write new story for Monday.
Still need to write this Winnipeg library piece to keep new blog visitors coming back.
How to do this?
Dunno.
Sleep.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Call me a pessimist...
...but the prospect of an economic breakdown in China triggers my "major global disaster" sense. Many people have noted that in many ways China, as the world's foremost manufacturer, occupies a spot analogous to the US in the 1920s. Add to that the trillion dollars of US debt held by China, and today's economy could look like paradise compared to that in two or three years.
Fortunately, my track record on these kinds of worries is not particularly good, but if you do have a spare minute and some plans for weathering this Great Recession, they may be worth reviewing.
As for me, I don't know what I would do anyway. If I had a house I would start collecting cardboard, bits of string, and scrap pieces of metal and other things that you might be tempted to throw out, but since I don't even have that I guess I will just need to learn how to fish the Mississippi River.
Fortunately, my track record on these kinds of worries is not particularly good, but if you do have a spare minute and some plans for weathering this Great Recession, they may be worth reviewing.
As for me, I don't know what I would do anyway. If I had a house I would start collecting cardboard, bits of string, and scrap pieces of metal and other things that you might be tempted to throw out, but since I don't even have that I guess I will just need to learn how to fish the Mississippi River.
How to get 100,000 players
[This is the original e-mail I sent to Calvin after the the infamous interview just featured in the Daily WTF. John, for one, thought this version of the story much more humorous than the one I eventually submitted to the Daily WTF, so I will preserve it here for posterity.]
Calvin,
I interviewed this afternoon for a programming position with a game development company.
By game development company, I mean a man who has played some video games before.
He is designing a massively multiplayer online game that will have both steam locomotives and sail-driven ships.
By designing, I mean he has some ideas.
Some of them are even written down.
This man claimed to have an idea every day. Can you imagine how it must feel for him to walk among the rest of us?
Oh, actually.
He doesn't. Walk among us, I mean. He never leaves his apartment.
He told me that.
He will charge $15/month, but the income will not stop there. He will also have in-game advertising. For a fee players and businesses can put up banners in the game and even send each other messages.
The game is going to be so popular Google will advertise in it.
I showed him Venture the Void and mentioned that as an example of how long it can take to develop a game.
And how few people might sign up.
He is outsourcing most of the development to the Philippines and India. He found programmers there who said they would work for royalties only.
The game would take three to six months to finish. I would be the go-between. And also work for royalties only.
Not paltry pay. $75,000 a month when they start pouring in. That's 2% of his expected income.
Did you know, you can easily get 100,000 players by posting your game to mmorpg.com?
You might try that.
Please send me 2% of the proceeds if you do.
Because for some reason,
I decided not to take the job.
Kevin
Calvin,
I interviewed this afternoon for a programming position with a game development company.
By game development company, I mean a man who has played some video games before.
He is designing a massively multiplayer online game that will have both steam locomotives and sail-driven ships.
By designing, I mean he has some ideas.
Some of them are even written down.
This man claimed to have an idea every day. Can you imagine how it must feel for him to walk among the rest of us?
Oh, actually.
He doesn't. Walk among us, I mean. He never leaves his apartment.
He told me that.
He will charge $15/month, but the income will not stop there. He will also have in-game advertising. For a fee players and businesses can put up banners in the game and even send each other messages.
The game is going to be so popular Google will advertise in it.
I showed him Venture the Void and mentioned that as an example of how long it can take to develop a game.
And how few people might sign up.
He is outsourcing most of the development to the Philippines and India. He found programmers there who said they would work for royalties only.
The game would take three to six months to finish. I would be the go-between. And also work for royalties only.
Not paltry pay. $75,000 a month when they start pouring in. That's 2% of his expected income.
Did you know, you can easily get 100,000 players by posting your game to mmorpg.com?
You might try that.
Please send me 2% of the proceeds if you do.
Because for some reason,
I decided not to take the job.
Kevin
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Sacrifice
I wrote up about 24K of text today, which is the longest piece of fiction I've ever done. I will probably spend most of tomorrow revising it, which is probably not enough time given its current state, but I guess this is a workshop after all.
At some point I need to check how long this is. It only needs to be under 30 pages, and I'm pretty sure it's shorter than that, although it probably is longer than the other pieces that have been reviewed.
Ending still stinks too.
Anyway, I did get a lot of writing done today even if it doesn't show here.
At some point I need to check how long this is. It only needs to be under 30 pages, and I'm pretty sure it's shorter than that, although it probably is longer than the other pieces that have been reviewed.
Ending still stinks too.
Anyway, I did get a lot of writing done today even if it doesn't show here.
Monday, March 2, 2009
Sometimes
Sometimes I cannot tell the difference between Christ and Quixote:
The Legend of Master Legend
Even if you've read this article before, it's worth re-reading. Here, I'll post another link:
The Legend of Master Legend
It's a Rolling Stone article about real-life superheroes.
The Legend of Master Legend
Even if you've read this article before, it's worth re-reading. Here, I'll post another link:
The Legend of Master Legend
It's a Rolling Stone article about real-life superheroes.
Social Skills
So there is this ad going around on the tubes with the text:
My first thought was how few social skills one would need to have to say something like "I'm popular. You're not." Then I thought that someone who had poor social skills might think this is a good thing to say, so the ad is actually extremely well targetted. I am flummoxed.
I'm reminded of a sign on the door of SCUM -- the Society for Collegiate Undergraduate Mathematics -- at the University of Calgary. When I first arrived, the sign read
I liked the blatant nerdiness on display there, but the next year I noticed a change:
That was somehow disappointing, but another year later it changed again:
The only undergraduate mathematician I ever knew well was Robert. His opinions, in fact, were rarely a mystery. I asked him one day about the sign, and he told me. I cannot quote Robert on a blog read by my family, nor even paraphrase him because his speech is essentially a long string of vulgarities punctuated by descriptions of obscene acts. I survived middle school and high school but Robert showed me that it was still possible for language to shock me. So really the best I can do is give a paraphrase of a translation from Robert-speak to normal-person-speak.
In short, Robert admitted that both changes to the sign were his fault.
The first time he had managed to say, or do, something so awful it shattered the limits of SCUM's tolerance. He was banned and the sign was changed from "No social skills" to "SOME social skills", that word SOME in uppercase and underlined multiple times. After meeting other members of SCUM it horrifies me to imagine what this could possibly have been. Robert would not tell me.
The second change occurred when Robert was elected president of SCUM and had the sign changed to "Few social skills" as a rational compromise.
I had a class with Robert my last semester there as he was trying to finish school. He spent most of the semester in a drug-induced haze, skipping classes and dressing as a pirate, until he realized that he needed to pass all his classes in order to graduate. In an astonishing period of a month he was able to finish his backlog of homework and tests, complete his final projects, and, also astonishingly, beg and plead the professors he had been verbally insulting for mercy.
I left school to live on the river, and Robert left Calgary to work on a doctorate at the University of Toronto. He said his real calling was to become an evangelical missionary, and a PhD would lend authority to his claims that science does not disprove the existence of God.
He is one of many Calgarians I miss dearly.
I'm popular. You're not.
#1 Guide to Social Skills.
My first thought was how few social skills one would need to have to say something like "I'm popular. You're not." Then I thought that someone who had poor social skills might think this is a good thing to say, so the ad is actually extremely well targetted. I am flummoxed.
I'm reminded of a sign on the door of SCUM -- the Society for Collegiate Undergraduate Mathematics -- at the University of Calgary. When I first arrived, the sign read
Welcome to SCUM!
No social skills required.
I liked the blatant nerdiness on display there, but the next year I noticed a change:
Welcome to SCUM!
SOME social skills required.
That was somehow disappointing, but another year later it changed again:
Welcome to SCUM!
Few social skills required.
The only undergraduate mathematician I ever knew well was Robert. His opinions, in fact, were rarely a mystery. I asked him one day about the sign, and he told me. I cannot quote Robert on a blog read by my family, nor even paraphrase him because his speech is essentially a long string of vulgarities punctuated by descriptions of obscene acts. I survived middle school and high school but Robert showed me that it was still possible for language to shock me. So really the best I can do is give a paraphrase of a translation from Robert-speak to normal-person-speak.
In short, Robert admitted that both changes to the sign were his fault.
The first time he had managed to say, or do, something so awful it shattered the limits of SCUM's tolerance. He was banned and the sign was changed from "No social skills" to "SOME social skills", that word SOME in uppercase and underlined multiple times. After meeting other members of SCUM it horrifies me to imagine what this could possibly have been. Robert would not tell me.
The second change occurred when Robert was elected president of SCUM and had the sign changed to "Few social skills" as a rational compromise.
I had a class with Robert my last semester there as he was trying to finish school. He spent most of the semester in a drug-induced haze, skipping classes and dressing as a pirate, until he realized that he needed to pass all his classes in order to graduate. In an astonishing period of a month he was able to finish his backlog of homework and tests, complete his final projects, and, also astonishingly, beg and plead the professors he had been verbally insulting for mercy.
I left school to live on the river, and Robert left Calgary to work on a doctorate at the University of Toronto. He said his real calling was to become an evangelical missionary, and a PhD would lend authority to his claims that science does not disprove the existence of God.
He is one of many Calgarians I miss dearly.
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