As a rule of thumb, no one owes anyone anything, short of what is promised within the confines of a contract, either explicit or implicit.
In terms of an explicit contract, I am referring to stuff that is usually backed by legal means, or at least, backed with enough ``force'' behind it that everyone agrees with when the construct and content of the contract is being explicitly delineated.
In terms of an implicit contract, I am referring to the more wooly concepts of ``social contracts'', or the use of a legal term to explain the kinds of implied expectations that people have when they exist within the society.
Most of the time, the explicit contracts are ``easy'' to define, and fairly straightforward to enforce---just follow the terms that have been spelt out within the body of the contract itself.
It is the implicit contracts that make things rather... divisive at times.
See, because the contracts are implicit, there is never an artefact that properly spells out all the rights, privileges, mores, and norms that are expected. Instead, these implicit contracts rely on a sufficiently vocal majority to educate, and to enforce.
There are four terms there that need explanation.
``Sufficiently vocal'' means that the people who follow the implicit contract must be willing to stand their ground and hold the righteousness of the implicit contract in a manner that makes their stance unambiguous and understandable.
``Majority'' refers to a large enough number of people that fulfil the level of a quorum, i.e. they are representative of the intent of the implicit contract through numbers alone.
``Educate'' refers to the promulgation and teaching of the intent of the implicit contract to those who are unfamiliar with it, either because of a lack of experience due to age, or a lack of experience due to being a transplant from a different cultural norm.
``Enforce'' refers to the actions that need to be taken to demonstrate the consequences of a violation of the terms of the implicit contract. Enforcement differs from education in that it refers purely to the demonstration of the consequences of violation---to properly rehabilitate the offender, education of the intent of the implicit contract to which the offender has violated needs to be made.
Part of the reason why people these days start having that entitled behaviour with respect to the implicit contract (and therefore coming to the conclusion that society somehow ``owes'' them various things) is due to the violation of one or more of the four terms set out.
The lack of the ``sufficiently vocal'' has resulted in the intent of the implicit contract being increasingly wooly and subjected to unjustifiable interpretations, not all of them necessarily following the proper intent.
The lack of the ``majority'' has resulted in smaller numbers of people dictating the terms of the implicit contract over the quiet voices of the larger quorum, with the additional side effect of acting as though these minority are indeed the majority, which further increases the fuzziness of the boundaries of the implicit contract.
The lack of ``education'' means that there is no consensus on what the intent of the implicit contract, which again feeds back into each person deciding to interpret things their own way regardless of the original intent.
The lack of ``enforcement'' further emboldens the offenders to continue on their path of heresy, further destabilising the social fabric that was based on the implicit contract.
Combine these with the increased isolation that many are practising from living in an increasingly urbanised landscape with more interesting broadcast-level virtual connections than a highly localised and personal connection just increases the level of entitlement to the level of angst of ``the world owes me!''.
``MT, what's the point here?''
Since when did my rants ever have a point? 🤷♂️
Till the next update.
Sunday, April 07, 2024
Saturday, March 30, 2024
Marching On...
Urgh. This is probably the fourth time I opened up Q10 with the intention of writing a blog post. The first three times, I wrote like three paragraphs, before closing the editor in frustration.
I just couldn't put together what it was that I wanted to say without sounding like a twat.
So instead, let's try to talk about something else.
My Eddington Number was recently raised to E16. This means that I had at least 16 days where I cycled at least 16 mi. My usual North-East Riverine Loop averaged to nearly 12 mi, so I just did the obvious-but-dumb-thing of just cycling in both directions, leading to a nice 24 mi, with some sketchy actions to actually bring it up to the 24 mi. I had to do it twice just so that I could reach E16, and it was all done over the past week.
In short, I destroyed my legs in a fun way cycling about 79+ km just to reach a new milestone. Of course, the real secret is that I am just one ride away from reaching E17, but I won't be doing that soon because my left calf is already showing signs of being overworked---it was starting to cramp up during my return leg of ride number two today.
In other news, I have started on the LEGO Bugatti Chiron. I know that the web-site says ``Retired Product'', but they can still be found in the LEGO shops in SIN city. I am also well aware that there are Amazon.com versions that are cheaper than the retail price of nearly SGD600, some by nearly SGD150+. But there's always something magical about holding the box in one's hand as directly purchased from the brick-and-mortar shop, and considering my recent trauma from a lost Amazon.sg parcel (allegedly ``delivered'' by Ninjavan), I was not about to tempt fate again, especially with something this pricey.
I had known of the Bugatti Veyron for years---it was always that wonderful feat of German engineering that just made me go ``oooo''. The Top Gear episode was also the first time that I saw the Veyron go vroom:
And James May's response from his experience just sealed the idea that the Veyron was the best car in my book.
``But MT, the Chiron isn't the Veyron?''
Yes, and no. It's a refresh of the Veyron, but for the purposes of the LEGO model, it's basically the same. The LEGO Bugatti Chiron is a large build, probably the largest in the LEGO Technic series (but not necessarily the largest physical build). I have no idea where to put the finished assembly, but that will be a problem for future MT to handle. I am definitely taking my time to put it together, partly because in any LEGO assembly, the journey is usually more fun than the outcome. Moreover, I had to go slower---all these stupid heat is making it hard to exist, let alone think or manipulate all these tiny LEGO.
------
Minecraft. I had been spending time after work in my solo world digging out the strip-mines that I had started way back in 1.17+, just as a way to decompress.
Then a thought came to me. How about ``Digging Straight Down''? The idea was to find some interesting location off my hill-top base, figure out the chunk boundaries, and dig out the entire column, while encasing the dug out chunk with glass. I knew from my early recce for a deep ocean biome to build my mob farm that there was a nice patch of ocean off the main desert that I had not explored before. So I went out that way via my overland minecart line, and promptly found what I was looking for.
And then I felt that one chunk was kinda small, so I expanded it to a 3×3 chunk grid in the middle of the ocean. I had some sponges that I had bought from some wandering traveller from long ago, and coupled that with the ``gravity blocks'' strategy of creating dikes to form the ```Dig Straight Down'' polder. Now I'm in the process of doing the actual digging, and replacing the walls with glass just for containment.
------
I think that's about all I want to write about for now. Looks like I managed to avoid talking about anything involving pain, discomfort of being vulnerable with another, the realisation that people are just generally terrible, and other stuff that made me rage-close the Q10 editor three times before.
Till the next update, I suppose.
I just couldn't put together what it was that I wanted to say without sounding like a twat.
So instead, let's try to talk about something else.
My Eddington Number was recently raised to E16. This means that I had at least 16 days where I cycled at least 16 mi. My usual North-East Riverine Loop averaged to nearly 12 mi, so I just did the obvious-but-dumb-thing of just cycling in both directions, leading to a nice 24 mi, with some sketchy actions to actually bring it up to the 24 mi. I had to do it twice just so that I could reach E16, and it was all done over the past week.
In short, I destroyed my legs in a fun way cycling about 79+ km just to reach a new milestone. Of course, the real secret is that I am just one ride away from reaching E17, but I won't be doing that soon because my left calf is already showing signs of being overworked---it was starting to cramp up during my return leg of ride number two today.
In other news, I have started on the LEGO Bugatti Chiron. I know that the web-site says ``Retired Product'', but they can still be found in the LEGO shops in SIN city. I am also well aware that there are Amazon.com versions that are cheaper than the retail price of nearly SGD600, some by nearly SGD150+. But there's always something magical about holding the box in one's hand as directly purchased from the brick-and-mortar shop, and considering my recent trauma from a lost Amazon.sg parcel (allegedly ``delivered'' by Ninjavan), I was not about to tempt fate again, especially with something this pricey.
I had known of the Bugatti Veyron for years---it was always that wonderful feat of German engineering that just made me go ``oooo''. The Top Gear episode was also the first time that I saw the Veyron go vroom:
And James May's response from his experience just sealed the idea that the Veyron was the best car in my book.
``But MT, the Chiron isn't the Veyron?''
Yes, and no. It's a refresh of the Veyron, but for the purposes of the LEGO model, it's basically the same. The LEGO Bugatti Chiron is a large build, probably the largest in the LEGO Technic series (but not necessarily the largest physical build). I have no idea where to put the finished assembly, but that will be a problem for future MT to handle. I am definitely taking my time to put it together, partly because in any LEGO assembly, the journey is usually more fun than the outcome. Moreover, I had to go slower---all these stupid heat is making it hard to exist, let alone think or manipulate all these tiny LEGO.
------
Minecraft. I had been spending time after work in my solo world digging out the strip-mines that I had started way back in 1.17+, just as a way to decompress.
Then a thought came to me. How about ``Digging Straight Down''? The idea was to find some interesting location off my hill-top base, figure out the chunk boundaries, and dig out the entire column, while encasing the dug out chunk with glass. I knew from my early recce for a deep ocean biome to build my mob farm that there was a nice patch of ocean off the main desert that I had not explored before. So I went out that way via my overland minecart line, and promptly found what I was looking for.
And then I felt that one chunk was kinda small, so I expanded it to a 3×3 chunk grid in the middle of the ocean. I had some sponges that I had bought from some wandering traveller from long ago, and coupled that with the ``gravity blocks'' strategy of creating dikes to form the ```Dig Straight Down'' polder. Now I'm in the process of doing the actual digging, and replacing the walls with glass just for containment.
------
I think that's about all I want to write about for now. Looks like I managed to avoid talking about anything involving pain, discomfort of being vulnerable with another, the realisation that people are just generally terrible, and other stuff that made me rage-close the Q10 editor three times before.
Till the next update, I suppose.
Sunday, March 17, 2024
Never Reach Your [Hobby] Goals
Never reach your goals, especially if they are for your hobbies.
Before you go thinking that I'm nuts, hear me out. Goals are often things that we set out to achieve, and they serve as the inspiration to keep on striving through the path that we had set towards getting to them. With a goal in mind, one has the beacon to walk towards, a thing to focus on.
Now, what if you've reached your goal? What happens next?
In a work/career setting, the answer is usually quite straightforward---go lateral. Put in a different way, it means branching out into a related domain, or develop ``soft skills'' into the so-called T-shaped person. As a career option, it makes sense, since there really isn't a peak with respect to the means of making a living---having more tools in one's arsenal is almost always an asset with respect to the work environment, though there is usually a hidden cost of having too many useful tools; but that's a problem for a different day.
Most people will not have any issues about developing laterally once they have reached their goals at work, especially if they have run out of ``vertical'' goals to achieve. At some point, the challenge will be too great, and one will eventually revert to a level where one is more comfortable and competent, while still earning enough to pay the bills and power any other side stuff.
Hobbies are things that we do ``for fun''. It's what we do to pass the time when we aren't doing things to enhance survival and/or reproduction. If the hobby is no longer ``fun'', it becomes highly likely that we drop it in favour of something else.
Since hobbies are ``for fun'', we tend to not take it as ``seriously'' the way we do for what we do for work (I'm discounting anyone who uses their hobbies as a ``side hustle''---I think of that as going semi-professional). So, when one reaches the goals of one's hobbies, especially the ultimate-type of goal, what happens next?
Going lateral means that we are taking the hobbies seriously, which defeats the whole idea of a hobby. Not going lateral and leaving it goalless is akin to acknowledging that there is no longer anything else that one wants to achieve within the hobby, which can lead to stagnation and eventual disinterest.
Hence, it probably is better to never reach one's goals, especially if they are for one's hobbies, particularly if one wants to keep doing the hobby for a very long time without killing off the fun.
Instead of interpreting what I'm saying as The Truth, think of it as a cautionary tale from personal experience. I love Geocaching; I've been doing it from way back in 2009(?) when Jason first introduced me to my first geocache in Singapore, as well as my first trackable.
Fast forward to today, in 2024. I've not gone out to find a geocache in years, with much of the momentum killed after I've taken part in a Mega-Event, visited Geocaching headquarters in Seattle, and completed a D5/T5 geocache. These were ``ultimate''-type goals, and once they were met, my interest in the hobby of Geocaching just started dying out.
On a more scary note, my dizi playing. I recently completed my set of all 27 possible dizi, and having played a Grade 9 piece (《山村迎亲人》) in concert, I find myself staring out into the void going ``What's next?''. I have been expanding myself laterally with trying to do composition, and even playing in the Music Ministry on the concert flute, but at times some of these things just feel like I'm really taking things too seriously. I still derive fun, but the marginal amount of fun per effort is seemingly getting smaller. My first love here is still the dizi, and I'm at the level where unless I go semi-professional, I think I'm dooming myself to some kind of stagnation, which scares me.
``MT, you could like, go fusion music, or jazz?''
Sure, true. But that's going lateral, see? And it involves me making the decision of actually wanting to go down that path, which I have already asserted as ``being serious''. I do wonder though... part of me probably knows that it'll be something that I must do (or give up dizi playing), but how to do this is something that I will need to come to grips with.
After all, we only evolve as effectively as the environment allows us to. If the environment is stagnating, then there is no incentive to evolve; conversely, if the environment is too competitive, then one needs to be sufficiently serious in order to evolve fast enough to not die. In either case, ``fun'' seems to be reduced.
Tough calls for me for now.
As a side project, I am working on shakuhachi now. I've the Bell Shakuhachi from Jon Krypos (he renamed himself to Josen), and recently got some Kinko-ryu study material (the most obvious is the use of ロツレチリ for the notation of the notes DFGAC). It's a much tougher instrument than even the 洞箫 because of the way the embouchure cut is made---the angle required is very precise, and there is very little lipping involved as compared to the other edge-blown flutes. Only time will tell what will become of this.
Anyway, this is starting to get a bit long, so I'll stop here. Till the next update then.
Before you go thinking that I'm nuts, hear me out. Goals are often things that we set out to achieve, and they serve as the inspiration to keep on striving through the path that we had set towards getting to them. With a goal in mind, one has the beacon to walk towards, a thing to focus on.
Now, what if you've reached your goal? What happens next?
In a work/career setting, the answer is usually quite straightforward---go lateral. Put in a different way, it means branching out into a related domain, or develop ``soft skills'' into the so-called T-shaped person. As a career option, it makes sense, since there really isn't a peak with respect to the means of making a living---having more tools in one's arsenal is almost always an asset with respect to the work environment, though there is usually a hidden cost of having too many useful tools; but that's a problem for a different day.
Most people will not have any issues about developing laterally once they have reached their goals at work, especially if they have run out of ``vertical'' goals to achieve. At some point, the challenge will be too great, and one will eventually revert to a level where one is more comfortable and competent, while still earning enough to pay the bills and power any other side stuff.
Hobbies are things that we do ``for fun''. It's what we do to pass the time when we aren't doing things to enhance survival and/or reproduction. If the hobby is no longer ``fun'', it becomes highly likely that we drop it in favour of something else.
Since hobbies are ``for fun'', we tend to not take it as ``seriously'' the way we do for what we do for work (I'm discounting anyone who uses their hobbies as a ``side hustle''---I think of that as going semi-professional). So, when one reaches the goals of one's hobbies, especially the ultimate-type of goal, what happens next?
Going lateral means that we are taking the hobbies seriously, which defeats the whole idea of a hobby. Not going lateral and leaving it goalless is akin to acknowledging that there is no longer anything else that one wants to achieve within the hobby, which can lead to stagnation and eventual disinterest.
Hence, it probably is better to never reach one's goals, especially if they are for one's hobbies, particularly if one wants to keep doing the hobby for a very long time without killing off the fun.
Instead of interpreting what I'm saying as The Truth, think of it as a cautionary tale from personal experience. I love Geocaching; I've been doing it from way back in 2009(?) when Jason first introduced me to my first geocache in Singapore, as well as my first trackable.
Fast forward to today, in 2024. I've not gone out to find a geocache in years, with much of the momentum killed after I've taken part in a Mega-Event, visited Geocaching headquarters in Seattle, and completed a D5/T5 geocache. These were ``ultimate''-type goals, and once they were met, my interest in the hobby of Geocaching just started dying out.
On a more scary note, my dizi playing. I recently completed my set of all 27 possible dizi, and having played a Grade 9 piece (《山村迎亲人》) in concert, I find myself staring out into the void going ``What's next?''. I have been expanding myself laterally with trying to do composition, and even playing in the Music Ministry on the concert flute, but at times some of these things just feel like I'm really taking things too seriously. I still derive fun, but the marginal amount of fun per effort is seemingly getting smaller. My first love here is still the dizi, and I'm at the level where unless I go semi-professional, I think I'm dooming myself to some kind of stagnation, which scares me.
``MT, you could like, go fusion music, or jazz?''
Sure, true. But that's going lateral, see? And it involves me making the decision of actually wanting to go down that path, which I have already asserted as ``being serious''. I do wonder though... part of me probably knows that it'll be something that I must do (or give up dizi playing), but how to do this is something that I will need to come to grips with.
After all, we only evolve as effectively as the environment allows us to. If the environment is stagnating, then there is no incentive to evolve; conversely, if the environment is too competitive, then one needs to be sufficiently serious in order to evolve fast enough to not die. In either case, ``fun'' seems to be reduced.
Tough calls for me for now.
As a side project, I am working on shakuhachi now. I've the Bell Shakuhachi from Jon Krypos (he renamed himself to Josen), and recently got some Kinko-ryu study material (the most obvious is the use of ロツレチリ for the notation of the notes DFGAC). It's a much tougher instrument than even the 洞箫 because of the way the embouchure cut is made---the angle required is very precise, and there is very little lipping involved as compared to the other edge-blown flutes. Only time will tell what will become of this.
Anyway, this is starting to get a bit long, so I'll stop here. Till the next update then.
Tuesday, March 05, 2024
I Have Nothing Left to Give
I have nothing left to give in a relationship. I think I should really accept this reality. It's not even about sour grapes or anything like that... it's just the realisation that I've lost whatever it was that made me look forward to being with someone exclusively.
It died the day she dumped me like a sack of Hell-going crap.
And it took me a few more years to learn that I am really a husk of who I was before.
I have no zest for life, I have little faith of the future, I have no interest in knowing anyone else deeper, and I am actually looking forward to just dying.
That is all.
It died the day she dumped me like a sack of Hell-going crap.
And it took me a few more years to learn that I am really a husk of who I was before.
I have no zest for life, I have little faith of the future, I have no interest in knowing anyone else deeper, and I am actually looking forward to just dying.
That is all.
Sunday, February 25, 2024
Maintenance...?
And so, this weekend is about to end.
It's the weekend of maintenance. Aurelia, Stella, and Picc are off to Windworks for COA; my bicycle went to B-Spokes for maintenance, and one of my longest run geocache needed some maintenance [from me] as well.
In theory, things would have been peachy by Saturday, but there was something innately wrong with the rear-shifter for my bicycle that necessitated my bringing it back today for rectification, which resulted in me having to skip out on church today.
``But MT, why must it be today? Couldn't it wait?''
No, not really. It was just after a major maintenance---had I waited for longer, it would have been a bigger mess than it really is now.
Sadly though, a new line of dead pixels have started showing up on Eirian-V. Why and how that happened, I have no idea. But as at now, it isn't completely annoying just yet, so I might just live with it; sort of like my Brother laser printer showing random low-toner density (I think the drum is kaput, but haven't had enough wherewithal to pull up the money to buy a replacement to test the hypothesis).
I also took the chance to use my air-blower to clear out the dust on Eileen-III, as well as my work laptop, something that I had been neglecting to do for about five months now.
Then of course, there is some self-maintenance. I finally chopped my hair down to the right length [of stupid short] with the hair clippers, and am relying on occlusive treatment to force the weepy and inflamed skin on my fingers and palms to calm down. I also replaced my toothbrush, which was at least two months overdue.
Mentally though... I think I might not have done well there. Feeling a little overwhelmed with the barrage of new ``fun'' that came in from the work side. It's not bad, it's just... a lot to take in at once. Not to mention the whole set of loss of spoons from being involved in two large gatherings of people.
I probably should just turn in earlier tonight, after re-packing my backpack to set it up for work, as opposed to errand-running mode.
Sorry this is a short entry---till the next time.
It's the weekend of maintenance. Aurelia, Stella, and Picc are off to Windworks for COA; my bicycle went to B-Spokes for maintenance, and one of my longest run geocache needed some maintenance [from me] as well.
In theory, things would have been peachy by Saturday, but there was something innately wrong with the rear-shifter for my bicycle that necessitated my bringing it back today for rectification, which resulted in me having to skip out on church today.
``But MT, why must it be today? Couldn't it wait?''
No, not really. It was just after a major maintenance---had I waited for longer, it would have been a bigger mess than it really is now.
Sadly though, a new line of dead pixels have started showing up on Eirian-V. Why and how that happened, I have no idea. But as at now, it isn't completely annoying just yet, so I might just live with it; sort of like my Brother laser printer showing random low-toner density (I think the drum is kaput, but haven't had enough wherewithal to pull up the money to buy a replacement to test the hypothesis).
I also took the chance to use my air-blower to clear out the dust on Eileen-III, as well as my work laptop, something that I had been neglecting to do for about five months now.
Then of course, there is some self-maintenance. I finally chopped my hair down to the right length [of stupid short] with the hair clippers, and am relying on occlusive treatment to force the weepy and inflamed skin on my fingers and palms to calm down. I also replaced my toothbrush, which was at least two months overdue.
Mentally though... I think I might not have done well there. Feeling a little overwhelmed with the barrage of new ``fun'' that came in from the work side. It's not bad, it's just... a lot to take in at once. Not to mention the whole set of loss of spoons from being involved in two large gatherings of people.
I probably should just turn in earlier tonight, after re-packing my backpack to set it up for work, as opposed to errand-running mode.
Sorry this is a short entry---till the next time.
Monday, February 12, 2024
Slept for 12 Hours...
Ah Monday. Public holiday in lieu of the second Chinese New Year public holiday falling on a Sunday.
A break day. A possibly ``true'' break day.
The special item that was presented yesterday at both the Chinese worship session in the early morning and the English worship session in the late morning was a hit. I listened through the playback for both renditions, and it does sound much better than I thought it would. The G 梆笛 soared without sounding like a dick, and I honestly cannot tell if it's because of my skill (what skill?), or the fact that I'm using some top-grade 笛膜 that keeps the sound clean. Feedback has been pretty positive to me, from those who actually knew me in church, and apparently even those who didn't know me had positive things to say to the music coordinator, who played with me in the item on the piano.
A win perhaps. Glory to God.
Now that that is done and dusted, I'll need to listen carefully to the various recordings to write it down. I'll probably publish it at my compositions page.
One item down, another two or three more to go. 😬
------
Special item aside, I just crashed out for twelve hours straight once eight o'clock came, waking up every three hours just to use the toilet. Woke up at around eight o'clock this morning, give or take an hour, and just chilled out for a bit, pondering about nothing even as I am catching up on stuff on YouTube that I have missed out from the past week.
I discovered a new tool: KLOGG. It's a log explorer, designed apparently to load and search through extremely large files the way computer logs tend to be. I've not really deployed it anywhere yet, but it is definitely something to try. My only complaint is that it runs a GUI, and there's no TUI for it, but that's really minor, considering that I use Beyond Compare from Scooter Software, which is also GUI-centric with no TUI.
I have tried my best to make
Apart from that, I've been roaming about from one game to another on Steam, switching between Boltgun, trying out the Turbo Overkill demo, a bit of Vampire Survivors, and The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles.
I'm also half-tempted to finish up the last bits of math to complete the really really simple LED-1 remake in PICO-8. But... urgh... math when I'm trying to chill the fuck out. Eww... (hahaha)
Aaaaaaaaanyway, I suppose that's all for today. I'll go... do something... I think. Maybe game more...
Till the next update.
A break day. A possibly ``true'' break day.
The special item that was presented yesterday at both the Chinese worship session in the early morning and the English worship session in the late morning was a hit. I listened through the playback for both renditions, and it does sound much better than I thought it would. The G 梆笛 soared without sounding like a dick, and I honestly cannot tell if it's because of my skill (what skill?), or the fact that I'm using some top-grade 笛膜 that keeps the sound clean. Feedback has been pretty positive to me, from those who actually knew me in church, and apparently even those who didn't know me had positive things to say to the music coordinator, who played with me in the item on the piano.
A win perhaps. Glory to God.
Now that that is done and dusted, I'll need to listen carefully to the various recordings to write it down. I'll probably publish it at my compositions page.
One item down, another two or three more to go. 😬
------
Special item aside, I just crashed out for twelve hours straight once eight o'clock came, waking up every three hours just to use the toilet. Woke up at around eight o'clock this morning, give or take an hour, and just chilled out for a bit, pondering about nothing even as I am catching up on stuff on YouTube that I have missed out from the past week.
I discovered a new tool: KLOGG. It's a log explorer, designed apparently to load and search through extremely large files the way computer logs tend to be. I've not really deployed it anywhere yet, but it is definitely something to try. My only complaint is that it runs a GUI, and there's no TUI for it, but that's really minor, considering that I use Beyond Compare from Scooter Software, which is also GUI-centric with no TUI.
I have tried my best to make
vim play nice with extremely large files, but it's still a crapshoot after all these years. There are other tricks that allow one to work with extremely large files, but they often involve messing around with less, grep, tail, and head.Apart from that, I've been roaming about from one game to another on Steam, switching between Boltgun, trying out the Turbo Overkill demo, a bit of Vampire Survivors, and The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles.
I'm also half-tempted to finish up the last bits of math to complete the really really simple LED-1 remake in PICO-8. But... urgh... math when I'm trying to chill the fuck out. Eww... (hahaha)
Aaaaaaaaanyway, I suppose that's all for today. I'll go... do something... I think. Maybe game more...
Till the next update.
Friday, February 09, 2024
T's The Eve of The Lunar New Year
Okay, this is take three.
I had wanted to write an entry today, but the start always revolved around the sentient of ``yeah yeah it's the lunar new year, which supposedly represents some kind of togetherness, but that's the last thing I feel''.
Naturally I couldn't continue the entries, because it was just too negative, even by my ``standards''.
So in this take, after finishing one can of Sapporo, and well in my second one, after having some Suntory Whisky, I shall avoid all that depression-talk crap, but do bear in mind the unspoken background of that.
I finally finished watching the final AGDQ'2024 speedrun of Final Fantasy V, and the part when Garulf died hit me in ways I did not quite understand. I played Final Fantasy V before, and it is probably the only Final Fantasy game I actually completed. So Garulf's death was not unknown to me, but I was surprised to be affected enough to just cry for a little when I was watching the speedrun.
A side news that was hitting up the VTuber world was the termination of Selen Tatsuki from Nijisanji, the other large corpo-VTuber agency that is not Hololive (actual company is ANYCOLOR, kind of how COVER Corp is the company for Hololive Productions). It was a fustercluck, with implied bullying, gaslighting, suicide attempts, and the associated consequences that are still unfolding now.
I don't really follow much of Nijisanji, and even less of Selen. I only know of her from the genesis of the name TSB (Team Snakebite). But to be terminated like that, and under those circumstances, it's bad.
I'm no corpo-sympathiser. I'm no liberal leftist anarchist either. I'm more of a pragmatist---if a corporation is meant to be a money-making machine, then it is important for the corporation to invest in their money-making methods well. In the case of an entertainment company then, it is their talents that they should be investing/supporting well, since the talents' labour are what helps to bring in the initial revenue and generate the kind of intangible accounting ``goodwill'' that generates powerful virtuous cycles for recurring income and what-not.
Dropping the ball like that on their own talent like that is not just uncool, it probably is bad for business as well, no matter how much denial they put up.
And that's about all I want to say about that.
------
The past week was rough for the team and I. Thanks to red tape, our access to the production-like environment was delayed for about a month, and we were just cramming as much as we could done to reach the deadline in as functional a way as possible. It's a pretty public system meant for an international audience, so we are naturally striving to do a good enough job.
I think we pulled through despite the nonsense, but it's hard to tell till the upcoming Tuesday after the long weekend. But even before that, I just feel very drained. I took leave for today, refusing even to work the usual half-day that I would normally do. Part of the reason was also because a policy change that was revealed in month three of my first year where I am at now stipulated that one only needed to use a half-day leave for certain eves of public holidays instead of the more traditional whole day.
And thus I ended up taking today off, just to sleep in, and upon waking up, just chill about with booze and in a ``head empty; no thoughts'' sort of way.
I suppose that's all I want to write for now---I probably cannot practice the set list for this Sunday's worship service tomorrow, so I probably should do that now. This is, of course, in addition to checking up on my special item that I'm presenting with the music coordinator for both the early morning Chinese worship service, and the regular English one later on.
Till the next time then.
I had wanted to write an entry today, but the start always revolved around the sentient of ``yeah yeah it's the lunar new year, which supposedly represents some kind of togetherness, but that's the last thing I feel''.
Naturally I couldn't continue the entries, because it was just too negative, even by my ``standards''.
So in this take, after finishing one can of Sapporo, and well in my second one, after having some Suntory Whisky, I shall avoid all that depression-talk crap, but do bear in mind the unspoken background of that.
I finally finished watching the final AGDQ'2024 speedrun of Final Fantasy V, and the part when Garulf died hit me in ways I did not quite understand. I played Final Fantasy V before, and it is probably the only Final Fantasy game I actually completed. So Garulf's death was not unknown to me, but I was surprised to be affected enough to just cry for a little when I was watching the speedrun.
A side news that was hitting up the VTuber world was the termination of Selen Tatsuki from Nijisanji, the other large corpo-VTuber agency that is not Hololive (actual company is ANYCOLOR, kind of how COVER Corp is the company for Hololive Productions). It was a fustercluck, with implied bullying, gaslighting, suicide attempts, and the associated consequences that are still unfolding now.
I don't really follow much of Nijisanji, and even less of Selen. I only know of her from the genesis of the name TSB (Team Snakebite). But to be terminated like that, and under those circumstances, it's bad.
I'm no corpo-sympathiser. I'm no liberal leftist anarchist either. I'm more of a pragmatist---if a corporation is meant to be a money-making machine, then it is important for the corporation to invest in their money-making methods well. In the case of an entertainment company then, it is their talents that they should be investing/supporting well, since the talents' labour are what helps to bring in the initial revenue and generate the kind of intangible accounting ``goodwill'' that generates powerful virtuous cycles for recurring income and what-not.
Dropping the ball like that on their own talent like that is not just uncool, it probably is bad for business as well, no matter how much denial they put up.
And that's about all I want to say about that.
------
The past week was rough for the team and I. Thanks to red tape, our access to the production-like environment was delayed for about a month, and we were just cramming as much as we could done to reach the deadline in as functional a way as possible. It's a pretty public system meant for an international audience, so we are naturally striving to do a good enough job.
I think we pulled through despite the nonsense, but it's hard to tell till the upcoming Tuesday after the long weekend. But even before that, I just feel very drained. I took leave for today, refusing even to work the usual half-day that I would normally do. Part of the reason was also because a policy change that was revealed in month three of my first year where I am at now stipulated that one only needed to use a half-day leave for certain eves of public holidays instead of the more traditional whole day.
And thus I ended up taking today off, just to sleep in, and upon waking up, just chill about with booze and in a ``head empty; no thoughts'' sort of way.
I suppose that's all I want to write for now---I probably cannot practice the set list for this Sunday's worship service tomorrow, so I probably should do that now. This is, of course, in addition to checking up on my special item that I'm presenting with the music coordinator for both the early morning Chinese worship service, and the regular English one later on.
Till the next time then.
Sunday, February 04, 2024
It's February Now!
Oh hey, would you look at that? It's February now!
What a mess this month is going to be... so many major milestones coming up for work, TGCO, and even for music ministry in PPCC. If we do pull it off, it will be quite satisfying.
On the subject of music, I realise that after playing in the music ministry for nearly a year, I've improved upon my ability to read the grand staff, but my ability to read the ``regular'' flute upper ledger lines is getting iffy---I can handle up to high-F, but the ledger lines start to merge when we reach the high-G all the way to the C.
It's literally a skill issue, and it will take me some time to sort it out. I'd love to get that fixed, just so that I can do the Marcel Moyse Exercises Journaliers, which unironically has very good interval patterns to properly master and raise my flute technical handling to a higher level.
In other news, I've started on the throne room for my castle build in Minecraft, though the more I think I about it, the more it should be thought of as the keep within the castle build (the castle includes the surrounding wall, while the keep is the inner building). The main building material is diorite and polished diorite, with the use of iron blocks for accents. The throne itself is made of cherry planks, and now I'm building the second floor.
I think that I'm building at least four storeys for the throne room. The ground floor is the throne room proper, the second floor is the conference room, the third floor is probably the armoury (with enchanting?), then the bed room.
Next to the throne room, I'll build a red brick tavern/inn combo.
And... I think that's about it for now. Sorry for the short entry---it's been a hell of a week.
Till the next update.
What a mess this month is going to be... so many major milestones coming up for work, TGCO, and even for music ministry in PPCC. If we do pull it off, it will be quite satisfying.
On the subject of music, I realise that after playing in the music ministry for nearly a year, I've improved upon my ability to read the grand staff, but my ability to read the ``regular'' flute upper ledger lines is getting iffy---I can handle up to high-F, but the ledger lines start to merge when we reach the high-G all the way to the C.
It's literally a skill issue, and it will take me some time to sort it out. I'd love to get that fixed, just so that I can do the Marcel Moyse Exercises Journaliers, which unironically has very good interval patterns to properly master and raise my flute technical handling to a higher level.
In other news, I've started on the throne room for my castle build in Minecraft, though the more I think I about it, the more it should be thought of as the keep within the castle build (the castle includes the surrounding wall, while the keep is the inner building). The main building material is diorite and polished diorite, with the use of iron blocks for accents. The throne itself is made of cherry planks, and now I'm building the second floor.
I think that I'm building at least four storeys for the throne room. The ground floor is the throne room proper, the second floor is the conference room, the third floor is probably the armoury (with enchanting?), then the bed room.
Next to the throne room, I'll build a red brick tavern/inn combo.
And... I think that's about it for now. Sorry for the short entry---it's been a hell of a week.
Till the next update.
Tuesday, January 23, 2024
What I Did Yesterday-ish
Today marks the last day of the leave that I took to celebrate my birthday. I spent a large part of yesterday (birthday proper) just... walking about under air-conditioned settings. I had a wonderful lunch of fancy sushi at my favourite place, before heading down to Plaza Singapura to check out the Yamaha there (ended up buying a super long flute swab), before walking about Plaza Singapura itself where I found GameMartz which sold the Steam Deck (I didn't buy because I really don't play games on the move---I tend to read a hell lot more, hence the Eirian series, with the latest being Eirian-V).
I made my way to Esplanade after that, wondering on a whim to see if Kelvin was there in The Band World (he wasn't---Liyan was there, and I just went in and kaypoh-ed around the merchandise). I had tea-time Guinness with nachos out at Harry's@Esplanade Mall. The old library@esplanade was completely boarded off (as expected) due to its closure; near it was 《印映》, a visual arts exhibition by Hong Shu-ying that reflected upon 阿炳, the blind erhu player whose most famous piece was 《二泉映月》. Apparently he was also among the earliest to introduce 简谱 notation for writing down Chinese music, but this part is a little sketchy to me.
Before I started heading home, I caught Night Drives with ANNÉ running through their sound checks. The lead singer was Nicole ``Nikki'' Ann Chan, and while her stage dress was definitely eye-catching (white body-con Bardot-style with a really low back and high hemline, matched with white ankle boots), it was her voice that was the more captivating. Her lows had that smokey feel that is always wonderful to hear, and when she was singing high to the rapper (not a fan of, but that guy was decent for sure!), it was clear.
Very lovely. Too bad I didn't actually want to stay for their set at 1900hrs---I wanted to get my ass home before the home-going crowd started to flood the public transport.
------
SimplyGo---a name that will forever be tainted with the infamy that came from a forced adoption that got hastily retracted roughly two weeks after it was first pushed through as the only way forward for public transport.
I won't go into the details of the whole debacle, except to raise the obvious question: what is the end-game here? Will EZ-link cards be phased out after all, but in a much quieter fashion by stopping any new supply and force-converting each and every expired EZ-link card over to SimplyGo? Will SimplyGo be updated to not suck (actually show the balance on the fare card with a similar performance profile as EZ-link)?
The announcement is bereft of all that, which makes me wonder deeply about the possibilities...
------
In other news, I've finally made my way up the Altus Plateau, and have fought my way up to Mt. Gelmir in Elden Ring. It's definitely a much different feel from Limgrave, and damn the Death Blight status effect is horrible; the Scarlet Rot is nothing in comparison. Urgh.
Back in Minecraft, I finally added the top layer of the four round towers that are on the perimeter of my castle-build. I've also added the ``rammed earth walls'' to connect these towers. Soon I will start working on the habitable parts of the castle or something.
And I think that's about it for today. Till the next update.
I made my way to Esplanade after that, wondering on a whim to see if Kelvin was there in The Band World (he wasn't---Liyan was there, and I just went in and kaypoh-ed around the merchandise). I had tea-time Guinness with nachos out at Harry's@Esplanade Mall. The old library@esplanade was completely boarded off (as expected) due to its closure; near it was 《印映》, a visual arts exhibition by Hong Shu-ying that reflected upon 阿炳, the blind erhu player whose most famous piece was 《二泉映月》. Apparently he was also among the earliest to introduce 简谱 notation for writing down Chinese music, but this part is a little sketchy to me.
Before I started heading home, I caught Night Drives with ANNÉ running through their sound checks. The lead singer was Nicole ``Nikki'' Ann Chan, and while her stage dress was definitely eye-catching (white body-con Bardot-style with a really low back and high hemline, matched with white ankle boots), it was her voice that was the more captivating. Her lows had that smokey feel that is always wonderful to hear, and when she was singing high to the rapper (not a fan of, but that guy was decent for sure!), it was clear.
Very lovely. Too bad I didn't actually want to stay for their set at 1900hrs---I wanted to get my ass home before the home-going crowd started to flood the public transport.
------
SimplyGo---a name that will forever be tainted with the infamy that came from a forced adoption that got hastily retracted roughly two weeks after it was first pushed through as the only way forward for public transport.
I won't go into the details of the whole debacle, except to raise the obvious question: what is the end-game here? Will EZ-link cards be phased out after all, but in a much quieter fashion by stopping any new supply and force-converting each and every expired EZ-link card over to SimplyGo? Will SimplyGo be updated to not suck (actually show the balance on the fare card with a similar performance profile as EZ-link)?
The announcement is bereft of all that, which makes me wonder deeply about the possibilities...
------
In other news, I've finally made my way up the Altus Plateau, and have fought my way up to Mt. Gelmir in Elden Ring. It's definitely a much different feel from Limgrave, and damn the Death Blight status effect is horrible; the Scarlet Rot is nothing in comparison. Urgh.
Back in Minecraft, I finally added the top layer of the four round towers that are on the perimeter of my castle-build. I've also added the ``rammed earth walls'' to connect these towers. Soon I will start working on the habitable parts of the castle or something.
And I think that's about it for today. Till the next update.
Monday, January 22, 2024
Another Trip Round Ol'Sol
Woah, stupid o'clock! Also, damn I'm officially yet another year older! Frankly, apart from having some fancy sushi for lunch, I don't really have any other things planned for the rest of the day. The old standby is, of course, to find some bar/pub to sit at, and read some book.
Maybe I'd just put on a face mask and go for a walk out on Orchard Road. But thanks to the fifth COVID-19 vaccination (Spikevax this time), I'm on a strict ``no physical exertion for two weeks'' edict, which probably includes this walk as part of the prohibition.
I suppose an explanation is [sort of] in order. I had planned to take leave from 2024-01-19 till 2024-01-23 (inclusive) just to chill out and do whatever the hell I wanted as part of my birthday thingamajig. Then MOH was like ``dude, you're due for your fifth vaccination''. I don't know about you, but there has been some spikes of COVID-19 cases here and there over the past few months, and the last time I was hit with COVID-19 was back in September, which was more than three months away from well today. So I was definitely interested in taking the booster shot just as an insurance for both me and my two aged parents, especially since it was ``free''. The only problem was, when?
A long story made short meant that 2024-01-19 was the best available time. I'd do earlier, but there were no free slots on Saturdays (not taking any more ``unnecessary'' leave if I can help it), and doing it later will run into some seriously hard-to-deal with issues (special item in church, Chinese New Year proper, and quite a few work-related events that need my presence).
And so, my Friday morning was burnt.
My Friday afternoon went away as well when the music coordinator in church had to reschedule a work-together session for the special item that was supposed to happen on 2024-01-14. Again, Friday was the only free time, and so went the rest of the day. To be fair, not all of the afternoon was spent on working out the special item---due to the big rain, I ended up staying for another few more hours to chat.
Come Saturday, I was starting to nurse the usual lethargy from the booster jab, while having to consume brain power doing transcription of the recording of the work-together session that happened the previous day. Then there was rehearsals for TGCO in the evening.
Sunday, I was just dead. I had taken paracetamol for Friday and Saturday to sort of control the side effects, and I had been running on pure spite (a.k.a. ``too angry to be sick'') for the two days' worth of events. That led to the crash with me feeling both feverish and too drained of willpower to drag my carcass to do anything. I slept for nearly twelve hours, and felt much better after that.
And that's three out of my five days of break that was spent just pulling through the side effects of the vaccination, while still doing my best to keep up with the obligations and responsibilities. What a fucking mess...
------
Previously, I talked about how I fixed up the tables in my personal website to have ``sticky'' headers. I also mentioned about how I had to sacrifice the borders for the header due to rendering bugs in the browsers (I'm too lazy to find and link to it: I hereby invoke ``trust me bro'').
Well, one of my subordinates found a workable solution for this (we needed to do something similar for a work item). The gist of the solution was to eschew the automatic border rendering and
It worked, in a way. It created the new caveat of not allowing any other
In my case, I had to change the orientation, drawing only the right and bottom borders instead.
``MT, why so contrary?''
Because my tables have togglable hidden columns. This means that the detection algorithm for the right most column (i.e. the
And so, now the tables in my personal website have the full border treatment, be it the header cells, or the regular body cells.
Huzzah!
------
AGDQ 2024 came and went. I watched nothing live, but that is to be expected. The VOD list on Reddit was always cool, and with it was a great way to catch up on the coolest speedruns that made it to the Big Stage.
------
Anyway, it's late. I'm going to crash out. Till the next update.
Maybe I'd just put on a face mask and go for a walk out on Orchard Road. But thanks to the fifth COVID-19 vaccination (Spikevax this time), I'm on a strict ``no physical exertion for two weeks'' edict, which probably includes this walk as part of the prohibition.
I suppose an explanation is [sort of] in order. I had planned to take leave from 2024-01-19 till 2024-01-23 (inclusive) just to chill out and do whatever the hell I wanted as part of my birthday thingamajig. Then MOH was like ``dude, you're due for your fifth vaccination''. I don't know about you, but there has been some spikes of COVID-19 cases here and there over the past few months, and the last time I was hit with COVID-19 was back in September, which was more than three months away from well today. So I was definitely interested in taking the booster shot just as an insurance for both me and my two aged parents, especially since it was ``free''. The only problem was, when?
A long story made short meant that 2024-01-19 was the best available time. I'd do earlier, but there were no free slots on Saturdays (not taking any more ``unnecessary'' leave if I can help it), and doing it later will run into some seriously hard-to-deal with issues (special item in church, Chinese New Year proper, and quite a few work-related events that need my presence).
And so, my Friday morning was burnt.
My Friday afternoon went away as well when the music coordinator in church had to reschedule a work-together session for the special item that was supposed to happen on 2024-01-14. Again, Friday was the only free time, and so went the rest of the day. To be fair, not all of the afternoon was spent on working out the special item---due to the big rain, I ended up staying for another few more hours to chat.
Come Saturday, I was starting to nurse the usual lethargy from the booster jab, while having to consume brain power doing transcription of the recording of the work-together session that happened the previous day. Then there was rehearsals for TGCO in the evening.
Sunday, I was just dead. I had taken paracetamol for Friday and Saturday to sort of control the side effects, and I had been running on pure spite (a.k.a. ``too angry to be sick'') for the two days' worth of events. That led to the crash with me feeling both feverish and too drained of willpower to drag my carcass to do anything. I slept for nearly twelve hours, and felt much better after that.
And that's three out of my five days of break that was spent just pulling through the side effects of the vaccination, while still doing my best to keep up with the obligations and responsibilities. What a fucking mess...
------
Previously, I talked about how I fixed up the tables in my personal website to have ``sticky'' headers. I also mentioned about how I had to sacrifice the borders for the header due to rendering bugs in the browsers (I'm too lazy to find and link to it: I hereby invoke ``trust me bro'').
Well, one of my subordinates found a workable solution for this (we needed to do something similar for a work item). The gist of the solution was to eschew the automatic border rendering and
border-collapse: collapse;, and to manually handle the borders, specially drawing only the left and top borders for all cells, except for the bottom-most and the right-most, where they will also draw the bottom border and the right borders respectively.It worked, in a way. It created the new caveat of not allowing any other
border-related CSS styling for tables, to avoid fucking up the manually designated set up.In my case, I had to change the orientation, drawing only the right and bottom borders instead.
``MT, why so contrary?''
Because my tables have togglable hidden columns. This means that the detection algorithm for the right most column (i.e. the
last-child of the <tr> tag) will fail should that column be hidden. I had tried to use some other types of CSS-selectors to pick the last visible column through class exclusion and what-not, but nothing beat the simplicity of just changing the orientation.And so, now the tables in my personal website have the full border treatment, be it the header cells, or the regular body cells.
Huzzah!
------
AGDQ 2024 came and went. I watched nothing live, but that is to be expected. The VOD list on Reddit was always cool, and with it was a great way to catch up on the coolest speedruns that made it to the Big Stage.
------
Anyway, it's late. I'm going to crash out. Till the next update.
Sunday, January 14, 2024
Soreness
Ah man... played the tenor part at my first church service with Davie, and I am absolutely sore. The soreness isn't from having to lug Davie and the bass clarinet stand that doubles up as my bass flute stand from home to church with a busted up left forearm while still carrying my usual gig backpack of Aurelia and Stella, as well as my own music stand.
The soreness is from the unfamiliarity of reading the bass clef for the tenor part and translating it to playing on Davie.
Let's face it. As a whole flutes are an entitled bunch the way saxophonists are---no matter how high or how low an instrument we are playing, we expect it to be transposed so that we can play it a la ``instrument key''. This means that notes that would really be in the bass clef when considered in concert pitch will be rewritten into the treble clef just so that it can be read and performed. This is true even in consort playing.
This is unlike the poor recorder player (and the !@#$% nonsense picked up by those who wanted write dizi music in staff notation) who is doomed to stare at the parts in concert pitch, and figure out how to play. This isn't too bad for the gang of `C'-recorders (Garklein, Soprano, Tenor, Great Bass, and Sub-great Bass), but is absolutely horrid for the `F'-recorders (Sopranino, Alto, Bass, Contrabass, and Sub-contrabass).
For the hymns, I could transcribe it off hand in LilyPond, but apart from the the obvious effort, I just think that I should develop the ability to transpose from any commonly seen clef right there in my head.
And thus came today's little experiment. I don't know why, but I picked a day where two thirds of the hymns had four to five flats in their key signature (A♭=major, and D♭-major), with only on that has a single sharp (G-major). That probably added to the soreness.
Well, that's that.
I don't really have much else I want to talk about for now, so till the next update.
The soreness is from the unfamiliarity of reading the bass clef for the tenor part and translating it to playing on Davie.
Let's face it. As a whole flutes are an entitled bunch the way saxophonists are---no matter how high or how low an instrument we are playing, we expect it to be transposed so that we can play it a la ``instrument key''. This means that notes that would really be in the bass clef when considered in concert pitch will be rewritten into the treble clef just so that it can be read and performed. This is true even in consort playing.
This is unlike the poor recorder player (and the !@#$% nonsense picked up by those who wanted write dizi music in staff notation) who is doomed to stare at the parts in concert pitch, and figure out how to play. This isn't too bad for the gang of `C'-recorders (Garklein, Soprano, Tenor, Great Bass, and Sub-great Bass), but is absolutely horrid for the `F'-recorders (Sopranino, Alto, Bass, Contrabass, and Sub-contrabass).
For the hymns, I could transcribe it off hand in LilyPond, but apart from the the obvious effort, I just think that I should develop the ability to transpose from any commonly seen clef right there in my head.
And thus came today's little experiment. I don't know why, but I picked a day where two thirds of the hymns had four to five flats in their key signature (A♭=major, and D♭-major), with only on that has a single sharp (G-major). That probably added to the soreness.
Well, that's that.
I don't really have much else I want to talk about for now, so till the next update.
Tuesday, January 02, 2024
First Grab Bag of 2024
(No, I did not write this at the time that this was published. I deliberately delayed the publication to ensure that the quick summary stood alone.)
So the first thing that was on my mind was the realisation and general thankfulness that space is as big as it was. I know that there's a common Internet saying that goes something like:
Until I actually took the time to sit down and contemplate about the underlying reality.
Space is stupendously large. It's stupendously large to the point that the fastest known object, the photon, still takes a fucking long-ass time to get places. Space is also expanding.
But space has some terrifying as fuck objects that can, as best as we can understand it, obliterate us in as instant as it gets. The only way in which we are safe enough to observe these objects, let alone have the time and wherewithal contemplate about them, is from the sole fact that we are also magnificently far away from them.
Yeah, I'll just be thankful that space is stupid big, and that we don't have a good way of travelling all that distance within a life-time. Considering the amount of stupidity that the average person has given access to technology (see the car, the aeroplane, the computer, the Internet, and the peace engineered from strong international collaboration to actually preserving said peace), I shudder to think what will happen should we ever have such a capability.
------
In other news, Elden Ring was as frustrating as I thought it was, but paradoxically, it was also fairly fun. I suppose the ability to run through most dangers just to do sight-seeing is one of the plus points.
That, and the mindless grinding that one can do to farm enough runes other standard upgrade materials to ensure overwhelming power when going for boss fights. It's a FromSoftware game---I feel no guilt in being over-levelled to take on various big mobs and boss mobs. The world is gorgeous even though it is often quite twisted---there's that sense of forlorness without invoking the weird biomechanical style that is the speciality of H.R. Giger.
I think I have sunk quite a few hours in Elden Ring at this point, and I may switch over to something else just for variety. Maybe a bit of the new DLC for Vampire Survivors, which is still a damn fun game even after so long. HoloCure might be the best in breed, but that is technically a twin-stick auto-shooter, while Vampire Survivors is a single-stick auto-shooter, which means a different kind of fun.
------
I binged-watch the second season of SPY×FAMILY. I liked it. Unlike in the first season, this time the focus is more on Yor's alter-ego than that of Loid's. There was little to no emphasis on Anya's antics in school, which is fine from a pacing perspective. I wonder how the third season (should it come, but let's be real---SPY×FAMILY is too popular to not have a third season, especially when the source materials isn't exhausted yet) will go, and more importantly, I wonder if SPY×FAMILY has an actual ending instead of going on f-o-r-e-v-e-r the way One Piece or DragonBall does.
On another tangent, after delaying for so long, I finally started on Parks and Recreation. I'm still somewhere in the middle of season 2, and while Amy Poehler's character of Leslie Knope can be quite cringeworthy at times, the series sort of started to grow on me. No idea why.
------
In yet another tangent, I spent a couple of hours during stupid o'clock a couple of days ago updating all my Lilypond composition source files to 2.24.3. The astute would realise that Lilypond 2.24.3 has been out since 2023-11-19, so the natural question would be, why the delay?
Well, because the Cygwin version was only available rather recently. While the actual conversion was ``just'' an exercise of loading the relevant files into Frescobaldi and then running the conversion there, I needed the Cygwin version to make it scalable.
It's just much faster to go
Besides, I also have another Python script that allows me to auto-rebuild the output PDF just so that I can update the files available at my compositions page.
------
And I think I'm done with what I want to say for now. Till the next update, and oh, have a happy and blessed 2024.
So the first thing that was on my mind was the realisation and general thankfulness that space is as big as it was. I know that there's a common Internet saying that goes something like:
Born too late for the age of discovery; born too early for the age of space travel.And to be fair, I used to think like that as well.
Until I actually took the time to sit down and contemplate about the underlying reality.
Space is stupendously large. It's stupendously large to the point that the fastest known object, the photon, still takes a fucking long-ass time to get places. Space is also expanding.
But space has some terrifying as fuck objects that can, as best as we can understand it, obliterate us in as instant as it gets. The only way in which we are safe enough to observe these objects, let alone have the time and wherewithal contemplate about them, is from the sole fact that we are also magnificently far away from them.
Yeah, I'll just be thankful that space is stupid big, and that we don't have a good way of travelling all that distance within a life-time. Considering the amount of stupidity that the average person has given access to technology (see the car, the aeroplane, the computer, the Internet, and the peace engineered from strong international collaboration to actually preserving said peace), I shudder to think what will happen should we ever have such a capability.
------
In other news, Elden Ring was as frustrating as I thought it was, but paradoxically, it was also fairly fun. I suppose the ability to run through most dangers just to do sight-seeing is one of the plus points.
That, and the mindless grinding that one can do to farm enough runes other standard upgrade materials to ensure overwhelming power when going for boss fights. It's a FromSoftware game---I feel no guilt in being over-levelled to take on various big mobs and boss mobs. The world is gorgeous even though it is often quite twisted---there's that sense of forlorness without invoking the weird biomechanical style that is the speciality of H.R. Giger.
I think I have sunk quite a few hours in Elden Ring at this point, and I may switch over to something else just for variety. Maybe a bit of the new DLC for Vampire Survivors, which is still a damn fun game even after so long. HoloCure might be the best in breed, but that is technically a twin-stick auto-shooter, while Vampire Survivors is a single-stick auto-shooter, which means a different kind of fun.
------
I binged-watch the second season of SPY×FAMILY. I liked it. Unlike in the first season, this time the focus is more on Yor's alter-ego than that of Loid's. There was little to no emphasis on Anya's antics in school, which is fine from a pacing perspective. I wonder how the third season (should it come, but let's be real---SPY×FAMILY is too popular to not have a third season, especially when the source materials isn't exhausted yet) will go, and more importantly, I wonder if SPY×FAMILY has an actual ending instead of going on f-o-r-e-v-e-r the way One Piece or DragonBall does.
On another tangent, after delaying for so long, I finally started on Parks and Recreation. I'm still somewhere in the middle of season 2, and while Amy Poehler's character of Leslie Knope can be quite cringeworthy at times, the series sort of started to grow on me. No idea why.
------
In yet another tangent, I spent a couple of hours during stupid o'clock a couple of days ago updating all my Lilypond composition source files to 2.24.3. The astute would realise that Lilypond 2.24.3 has been out since 2023-11-19, so the natural question would be, why the delay?
Well, because the Cygwin version was only available rather recently. While the actual conversion was ``just'' an exercise of loading the relevant files into Frescobaldi and then running the conversion there, I needed the Cygwin version to make it scalable.
It's just much faster to go
find -type f -iname '*.ly' -print0 | xargs -0 convert-ly -efollowed by any manual adjustments needed (like fixing the
format function to have #f as the second parameter) than to manually traverse the entire compositions directory and load each file by hand. It is also less error-prone.Besides, I also have another Python script that allows me to auto-rebuild the output PDF just so that I can update the files available at my compositions page.
------
And I think I'm done with what I want to say for now. Till the next update, and oh, have a happy and blessed 2024.
Monday, January 01, 2024
Quick Summary
So, a quick summary of what I had written in 2023:
That's an average of 0.151 pieces of writing a day, compared to 0.211 last year.
2023 was a weird year. I lost a team member, gained a whole section's worth of subordinates, got a new team member, transited from solely being an engineer to a leader/manager-engineer (running appraisals and all the other crazy things asssociated with the managerial-class work), caught/recovered from COVID-19, completed my set of dizi, pulled the trigger to get Stella before the price increase (and before the master maker passed on due to age), started serving in the music ministry of PPCC with Aurelia/Stella, performed with the TGCO in a couple of performances with quite a few newbies, and a whole bunch of other things that I cannot remember precisely.
What else is there to say about 2023 in retrospect? Nothing much, surprisingly. I think I'm fast reaching the age/period of life where I just don't bother looking back any more, not because I'm some kind of visionary (I'm not), but more that the past is starting to become something that is just not worth looking back one. I mean, when we look back at the past, it is usually to reminisce about something that was from back then that made one feel all nice and fuzzy about.
But for me, I don't have much to look back into the past any more. The ``good times'' are long gone, and no thanks to the great time separation that has been humourously called ``before COVID'' and ``after COVID'', the ``good times'' feel even deeper in an era that bears almost not resemblence to who I am now.
The running theme that seems to be with me is that of isolation. Yes, I may be serving in the church, I may have a care group to work with, and yes I have may have made a couple of newer close friends as compared to before, but somehow I was always alone. Okay, Jesus is with me, but He doesn't talk back the way regular people do. It's kinda okay though; while I may be alone, but I'm never truly lonely, if you can understand the difference.
For those who cannot understand, I'm afraid that I have no other means of explaining it. It's like the crude but effective metaphor of ``I can teach you to take a dump, but in the end, you'll need to do it yourself to figure it out'' (a similar concept works for gaining enlightenment, no matter your predilection for beliefs).
``MT, are you then resigned to your fate of not having a significant other?''
Yeah, I suppose so, though I have not completely killed off the possibility by taking what I would call ``irreversible changes'', like reallocation of my budget that were originally set aside for prosaic things like the wedding ceremony, the joint spousal account and the like. Call me a hopeless romantic, but maybe a miracle may happen, though like all people who sort of understand miracles, I cannot see how one might occur if all I do during times when I'm not working, or at rehearsals, or serving in the music ministry, is to stay the hell at home and do whatever I want without leaving my room.
🤷♂️
Anyway, that's as much retrospection that I'm willing to allow myself for now. The year 2024 is upon us, and there is a lot to be done. Work-wise, we are starting to see some of the stuff that we need to deliver, and so there's that. Music-wise, we need to ramp up [a little] on our performances just so that we can rebuild the much decimated TGCO due to COVID and other life priorities of the members that got in the way.
As for my personal life side, may the Lord be merciful.
Amen.
- 1 poem posted here
- 52 essays/rants posted here
- 0 prose/stories posted here
- 1 NaNoWriMo winning entry available here
- 1 pieces of compositions/rearrangements posted here
That's an average of 0.151 pieces of writing a day, compared to 0.211 last year.
2023 was a weird year. I lost a team member, gained a whole section's worth of subordinates, got a new team member, transited from solely being an engineer to a leader/manager-engineer (running appraisals and all the other crazy things asssociated with the managerial-class work), caught/recovered from COVID-19, completed my set of dizi, pulled the trigger to get Stella before the price increase (and before the master maker passed on due to age), started serving in the music ministry of PPCC with Aurelia/Stella, performed with the TGCO in a couple of performances with quite a few newbies, and a whole bunch of other things that I cannot remember precisely.
What else is there to say about 2023 in retrospect? Nothing much, surprisingly. I think I'm fast reaching the age/period of life where I just don't bother looking back any more, not because I'm some kind of visionary (I'm not), but more that the past is starting to become something that is just not worth looking back one. I mean, when we look back at the past, it is usually to reminisce about something that was from back then that made one feel all nice and fuzzy about.
But for me, I don't have much to look back into the past any more. The ``good times'' are long gone, and no thanks to the great time separation that has been humourously called ``before COVID'' and ``after COVID'', the ``good times'' feel even deeper in an era that bears almost not resemblence to who I am now.
The running theme that seems to be with me is that of isolation. Yes, I may be serving in the church, I may have a care group to work with, and yes I have may have made a couple of newer close friends as compared to before, but somehow I was always alone. Okay, Jesus is with me, but He doesn't talk back the way regular people do. It's kinda okay though; while I may be alone, but I'm never truly lonely, if you can understand the difference.
For those who cannot understand, I'm afraid that I have no other means of explaining it. It's like the crude but effective metaphor of ``I can teach you to take a dump, but in the end, you'll need to do it yourself to figure it out'' (a similar concept works for gaining enlightenment, no matter your predilection for beliefs).
``MT, are you then resigned to your fate of not having a significant other?''
Yeah, I suppose so, though I have not completely killed off the possibility by taking what I would call ``irreversible changes'', like reallocation of my budget that were originally set aside for prosaic things like the wedding ceremony, the joint spousal account and the like. Call me a hopeless romantic, but maybe a miracle may happen, though like all people who sort of understand miracles, I cannot see how one might occur if all I do during times when I'm not working, or at rehearsals, or serving in the music ministry, is to stay the hell at home and do whatever I want without leaving my room.
🤷♂️
Anyway, that's as much retrospection that I'm willing to allow myself for now. The year 2024 is upon us, and there is a lot to be done. Work-wise, we are starting to see some of the stuff that we need to deliver, and so there's that. Music-wise, we need to ramp up [a little] on our performances just so that we can rebuild the much decimated TGCO due to COVID and other life priorities of the members that got in the way.
As for my personal life side, may the Lord be merciful.
Amen.
Monday, December 25, 2023
Getting High in Church, and Elden Ring
Whew... that was something.
So let's start from the beginning. Back in April this year, I got Stella. There were some logistic issues and what-not in getting her, but those were eventually settled. In that same entry, I talked about serving in the Music Ministry. I played a simple hymn in a quick audition on Aurelia, and had a quick chat with the music coordinator, her husband, and the deacon in charge of the music ministry. It was a very casual chat, and they were just trying to see how I could fit in with the current structure of the ensemble, seeing that I was bringing in a flute to a piano-[electric-]organ-violin ensemble. I started playing every other week, then building up towards playing every week. I came in earlier to rehearse with music coordinator to get a better sense of the play style and the repertoire of the hymnals, and that was before we had the usual rehearsal with the playing group before the service itself.
I built up confidence over time with the ``feel'' of the hymns, and got used to the keys that I had not played much of since my Kiltie Band days (hi A♭-major, E♭-major, and D♭-major) on Aurelia. My goal was to play good enough to blend in with the ensemble---the music works with the congregational singing to praise the Lord, and therefore it was not necessary to stand out in any way.
That changed for these couple of days, namely for the Christmas eve service and the Christmas service. I pulled out Stella, and for the carols, just went high as needed, going 15ma as opposed to the usual 8va that I would play with Aurelia (hymns tend to stick within the grand staff, with the main melody staying completely within the treble clef, but largely having middle-C and lower, making it impractical for the concert flute to play as is without the 8va).
Stella was wonderful. I didn't play everything at 15ma---much of the carols were played at the usual 8va, but since Stella is 8va higher than Aurelia, it means playing in the first register. This is where Stella's access to B4 was amazing. I would sneakily play Stella at how I would play Aurelia, before bursting into full technicolour 15ma for that added sparkle and sweetness.
The feedback for the two days' playing this way was positive; the congregation apparently loved it, and had fedback to the music coordinator about it. Even Paul, who is self-declared not musically-inclined, finally made a comment of hearing me play and liking the lilting sparkle that Stella imparted.
Was it vindication? Vindication of what though... that I could control myself and sound sweet at 2 kHz range? That the MINI (not really a piccolo, but I just called it that to avoid a looooooooong discussion point) is the perfect instrument for this range?
Nah... I mean, my personal bar for myself is kinda high. While I have about 12 years of piccolo experience (damn it has been 12 years?!), it is the 31 years of 笛子 playing that is pulling much of the weight. I go ridiculously high all the time with my dizi playing, and I think it has conditioned me to handle the 2 kHz range with greater control than I would normally have without having done that.
But, at the risk of being smug, it is nice to be appreciated.
------
In tangential news, the bag that holds my special music stand finally ripped the seams beyond the 50% mark. I spent part of yesterday afternoon sewing that stitch back, before using fabric glue and some spare fabric salvaged from an old T-shirt to strengthen the seam more. It held out well today, but only time will tell.
Part of the reason why the bag gets ripped at the seam was the way that I'm carrying it. Previously, I would sling it on my right shoulder like normal, but I didn't like it. With the backpack gig-bag, it was always in the way whenever I had to switch the backpack to the front before sitting down at a seat on public transport. So I started to cross sling the music stand bag in the front, with the left shoulder being the higher holding part. And this is where additional stress from the poke-y bits of the folded up stand act on the seam on the bag, which is already supporting the entire mass of the stand (it's heavy) due to the position and design.
Having the bag slung in front allows me to just quickly switch my backpack between the front and back.
------
Aaaaaanyway, I talked about waiting to see if Elden Ring was on sale.
It was.
It had a 40% price drop, which was pretty large. I took the opportunity to get the Deluxe edition just so that I would have the soundtrack as well.
And since I was already buying something, I bought a few more other games from the Steam sale. But you probably don't care about this.
Elden Ring. Oh yes, fucker's hard... but it is actually still fun. There's just so much to see and do, and each fight is like a timed puzzle.
Don't get me wrong, this fucking game is hard, and there were some bullshit moments [when fighting the Tree Sentinel in the beginning area] that I thought was unfair (got trapped in the scenery, for crying out loud). Runes are used for everything, and dying does make one drop it all. Hollow Knight does that as well, but what Elden Ring made better was to allow that dropped runes be persistent between gaming sessions until either one picks up their dropped runes, or when one dies again.
The routing to the Boss that one died to in Elden Ring also tends to be straightforward, allowing resets to happen faster and not overly punishing the player to redo the entire dungeon to get back there.
The levelling up system is slow as molasses, but then I realised that it would be exactly like how I would want to create a game that tried its best to mimic reality while keeping the fantasy moments. The action RPG nature of Elden Ring means that apart from just the numbers, there is still that meta-game of actually being skilled at the mechanics.
And I like it. It scratches the kind of itch that rogue-likes have, but without the perma-death that can frustrate one who is a little more time-sensitive. The use of the numbers to replace the skill meta-game is interesting without taking the fun of mastering a gamme completely, and I like it.
A lot.
And anyway, that's enough for now. Till the next update.
So let's start from the beginning. Back in April this year, I got Stella. There were some logistic issues and what-not in getting her, but those were eventually settled. In that same entry, I talked about serving in the Music Ministry. I played a simple hymn in a quick audition on Aurelia, and had a quick chat with the music coordinator, her husband, and the deacon in charge of the music ministry. It was a very casual chat, and they were just trying to see how I could fit in with the current structure of the ensemble, seeing that I was bringing in a flute to a piano-[electric-]organ-violin ensemble. I started playing every other week, then building up towards playing every week. I came in earlier to rehearse with music coordinator to get a better sense of the play style and the repertoire of the hymnals, and that was before we had the usual rehearsal with the playing group before the service itself.
I built up confidence over time with the ``feel'' of the hymns, and got used to the keys that I had not played much of since my Kiltie Band days (hi A♭-major, E♭-major, and D♭-major) on Aurelia. My goal was to play good enough to blend in with the ensemble---the music works with the congregational singing to praise the Lord, and therefore it was not necessary to stand out in any way.
That changed for these couple of days, namely for the Christmas eve service and the Christmas service. I pulled out Stella, and for the carols, just went high as needed, going 15ma as opposed to the usual 8va that I would play with Aurelia (hymns tend to stick within the grand staff, with the main melody staying completely within the treble clef, but largely having middle-C and lower, making it impractical for the concert flute to play as is without the 8va).
Stella was wonderful. I didn't play everything at 15ma---much of the carols were played at the usual 8va, but since Stella is 8va higher than Aurelia, it means playing in the first register. This is where Stella's access to B4 was amazing. I would sneakily play Stella at how I would play Aurelia, before bursting into full technicolour 15ma for that added sparkle and sweetness.
The feedback for the two days' playing this way was positive; the congregation apparently loved it, and had fedback to the music coordinator about it. Even Paul, who is self-declared not musically-inclined, finally made a comment of hearing me play and liking the lilting sparkle that Stella imparted.
Was it vindication? Vindication of what though... that I could control myself and sound sweet at 2 kHz range? That the MINI (not really a piccolo, but I just called it that to avoid a looooooooong discussion point) is the perfect instrument for this range?
Nah... I mean, my personal bar for myself is kinda high. While I have about 12 years of piccolo experience (damn it has been 12 years?!), it is the 31 years of 笛子 playing that is pulling much of the weight. I go ridiculously high all the time with my dizi playing, and I think it has conditioned me to handle the 2 kHz range with greater control than I would normally have without having done that.
But, at the risk of being smug, it is nice to be appreciated.
------
In tangential news, the bag that holds my special music stand finally ripped the seams beyond the 50% mark. I spent part of yesterday afternoon sewing that stitch back, before using fabric glue and some spare fabric salvaged from an old T-shirt to strengthen the seam more. It held out well today, but only time will tell.
Part of the reason why the bag gets ripped at the seam was the way that I'm carrying it. Previously, I would sling it on my right shoulder like normal, but I didn't like it. With the backpack gig-bag, it was always in the way whenever I had to switch the backpack to the front before sitting down at a seat on public transport. So I started to cross sling the music stand bag in the front, with the left shoulder being the higher holding part. And this is where additional stress from the poke-y bits of the folded up stand act on the seam on the bag, which is already supporting the entire mass of the stand (it's heavy) due to the position and design.
Having the bag slung in front allows me to just quickly switch my backpack between the front and back.
------
Aaaaaanyway, I talked about waiting to see if Elden Ring was on sale.
It was.
It had a 40% price drop, which was pretty large. I took the opportunity to get the Deluxe edition just so that I would have the soundtrack as well.
And since I was already buying something, I bought a few more other games from the Steam sale. But you probably don't care about this.
Elden Ring. Oh yes, fucker's hard... but it is actually still fun. There's just so much to see and do, and each fight is like a timed puzzle.
Don't get me wrong, this fucking game is hard, and there were some bullshit moments [when fighting the Tree Sentinel in the beginning area] that I thought was unfair (got trapped in the scenery, for crying out loud). Runes are used for everything, and dying does make one drop it all. Hollow Knight does that as well, but what Elden Ring made better was to allow that dropped runes be persistent between gaming sessions until either one picks up their dropped runes, or when one dies again.
The routing to the Boss that one died to in Elden Ring also tends to be straightforward, allowing resets to happen faster and not overly punishing the player to redo the entire dungeon to get back there.
The levelling up system is slow as molasses, but then I realised that it would be exactly like how I would want to create a game that tried its best to mimic reality while keeping the fantasy moments. The action RPG nature of Elden Ring means that apart from just the numbers, there is still that meta-game of actually being skilled at the mechanics.
And I like it. It scratches the kind of itch that rogue-likes have, but without the perma-death that can frustrate one who is a little more time-sensitive. The use of the numbers to replace the skill meta-game is interesting without taking the fun of mastering a gamme completely, and I like it.
A lot.
And anyway, that's enough for now. Till the next update.
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