Dear Diary

Shrink Day

I'm seeing my shrink today to see if I still have a brain in my fluffy little noggin. I'm guessing yes.

I'm gonna bring along the iPad because I actually committed some art between visits and there's a chance I might get struck with inspiration during the natter.

My priority list for the HAM when I can fit it in are:

The publically viewable stories
Patreon Tuesday
500 words
Editing the last of the Oh My Mods footage so I can put that program away

Of course I'm going to tell my shrink about HAM. It's like the mental processes version of 20:10 for distractable arseholes like myself.

20:10 is environmental unfucking for spoonies. Twenty minutes sorting your shit out, ten minutes having a breather. It really works when you lack energy for the all-out purge.

HAM is like that for mental tasks. Writing a thing, working on a different thing, learning processes. It's easy to get burned out and disappointed when you're just doing the one thing and/or failing a lot. HAM means you move on in short burst to other things.

Speaking of other things... I should get rattling on my HAMs.

Back into the rhythm

It is the last full week before Back To School. My little darlings have their shit sorted apart from lunchboxes, I think. Should still be able to get those long about Wednesday if they want them.

Because...

Today is cleaning day
Tomorrow is shrink visit

And thusly, the Wednesday is the only actual day I have guaranteed free so far. I will be asking the darlings whether or not they want a fresh lunchbox and I'm willing to bet Mayhem will answer

I'm much better today

A good dose of sleep has helped me recover my energies, and the digestive upset seems to be over for the interim. Huzzah.

This means I can return to prioritising my HAM for the day.

So, in rough order of priority:

Today's Instant
Today's TAZ ficlet
Second attempt at RPG maker
Further education in Java
Initiate education in idle game-making

I'm taking a half-hour between my working half-hours for my personal entertainment. Sanity HAM if you will. I'll see if it works

The morning after the night before

Here's the thing about RPG night...

I have a lot of fun
I also stay up to past midnight
I generally eat too much
I'm paying the price this morning

I tried to stay on Keto but I still ate too much and gained a firkin kilo. Too many nuts have given me digestive upsets.

I'm'a be napping a lot today for sure.

Frankly, I think it's kind of amazing that I managed to get my writing for everything done in the

Game Nite!

Our regular DM is out for life reasons and will be back eventually, so tonight the gang and I are planning a horror one-shot IN SPACE. I get the feeling this is a playtest of a system under construction, but I don't care.

I rolled up a scientist and plan on having zero social skills for the in-character portion of the game. As well as baffling them with technobabble.

It's a one-shot. There's zero investment and maximum potential for fun.

I also

I Failed HAM

I blame slow load times. Some program or another or many of them just decided to drag their metaphorical feet [I had too many of them going at once, doy] so I ended up swapping between tasks and getting distracted and losing time to assorted sinks.

I literally can't do that, today.

At ten, I'm taking myself to the optometrist because I'm having trouble with my glasses. I might have to get new frames because my detachable sunnies are delaminating [and I

I'm Failing Fine

The good news is that I got 2018's Year of Instants out into the world. Advertising soon. I also made a start on futzing around with RPG Maker.

Not so much of a success. I can build maps just fine, it's just that nothing I've made so far works. I'm consulting with the nerd who put me onto it and I may have to do some immense jiggery-pokery to make it do what I want it to do.

I have a thirty-day

Things to Do

I have a lot of HAM on my plate, today. Which includes a break of unspecified length to go get my car fixed up from the minor accident I had in Tullagawoopwoop.

That's happening at ten AM.

Since I have no idea how long it will take to repair, I'm planning on breaking HAM so I can work on novels-in-progress if it actually takes that long. Nevertheless, I am taking the lappy.

For today, HAM happens until 10, and then after ten.

HAM works!

When you have a lot to do, going HAM helps. Yes, the Half-hour Action Model is a good tactic to get several things done at once when you're as prone to scatterbrain syndrome as I am.

Yes, I know it's the ADHD portion of my ASD comorbs, I just like alliteration. So ner.

Today's agenda of goals includes:

Increment Java education
Increment RPG Maker education
Today's Instant
Today's TAZ ficlet
500 words in B'Nar
100 more chapters unfucked
CLEANING

The last on

Going H.A.M.

I may have coined a new acronym. HAM - short for Half-hour Action Model. You spend half an hour on a thing, then go do something else for a bit. Or a different half-hour on another thing.

It allows scatterbrains like me to get an assortment of projects nibbled away without feeling guilty about leaving anything behind.

So far yesterday, I have:

cleared up to chapter 100 in 2018's Year of Instants
furthered my education in Java
made the cover for 2018's

Achievement Unlocked?

Things done so far:

[X] Supplies acquired

[X] New version of my Windoze simulator

[X] Unfucked the translation macro that turns a single *.md file into several other files

[X] Begun fixing the actual file

There's three hundred and sixty-five stories, each of which has to be put on a new page, have the title separated from the content, scoured for footnotes, bookmarked and linked if there are.

I'm doing ten at a time and that does NOT make progress any faster.

Getting Re-organised

I've probably caught up with everything. I have this last year's worth of Instants collated into the anthology and all I have to do yet is adjust the cover and transform it into the right kind of document and then link all the footnotes.

Which means upgrading some important software so that I can actually do the footnotes without having to transport my document to another computer and fart around there.

"All". Yeah. Things get complicated when I set out to do

Anthology Pending

I have immense trouble with sequential numbering. Anyone with the right amount of search chops plus my archives will be able to tell you that.

So of course I'm going through the latest Year of Instants to be absolutely, positively certain that I have all my ducks in a row.

Alarming discovery #1 - I somehow have three hundred and sixty-eight chapters when I should have three hundred and sixty-five.

Alarming discovery #2 - I somehow missed putting in an entire story

Half an hour per diem

If I can focus (stop laughing) I can spend half an hour a day learning both Java and RPG Maker each. According to a friend on the interwebs, all I need is a few video tutorials to start with and I should be able to muddle through the rest of it on my only.

We'll see. I can be a thoroughgoing dill sometimes.

For those of you anxious about Garbageman... the only news I have is bad. Capt S. changed her mind

Merry Roadtrip!

I'm off again into the mountainous, twisting, animal-corpse-scattered roads of Australia on a day-long trip all the way from Tullagawoopwoop to my home sweet home.

Just like before, I'm taking breaks when safe, every two hours or so. Driving carefully at all occasions and staying below the speed limit at all times.

Unlike before, I have a part of my car that is currently held in place with packing tape and a prayer. If it even looks like it's coming loose at

Menu

A 1123-post collection

Shrink Day

Back into the rhythm

I'm much better today

The morning after the night before

Game Nite!

I Failed HAM

I'm Failing Fine

Things to Do

HAM works!

Going H.A.M.

Achievement Unlocked?

Getting Re-organised

Anthology Pending

Half an hour per diem

Merry Roadtrip!