The end of the second week and start of the third weeks the a doldrums of a month-long challenge. Engagement falls off as people slam into reality. That’s why I did it all in September.
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blunder
I started by cribbing Arthur Baker’s brush script. I have a hard time with the verticals of his b (skinny at the bottom to wide on top) but that’s gonna take focused practice.
It will likely take a month of pure brushwork to drill into my hand and brain that the flat brush can make different shapes depending on how hard I press (unlike a steel nib).
Ultimately I decided to give it another go after getting a big fat hake brush (which also inspired my retake on “sting”). I’m a lot happier with this one than the original blunder.
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Ornate
Three versions of Ornate, the top two different surfaces of the Handwritmic ruling pen, the last one the Dreaming Dogs Aldus ruling pen with a curved edge.
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DEAL
One of the pieces that went from straight from brain to paper. It still took several tries to get good enough, and of course I still have my quibbles, but I got my fun out of this one.
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ARCTIC
There are three types of color inversion in GIMP. This one was the “value invert” where colors keep their main characteristics. After that, I nudged the curves to highlight the overlaps to better define the letters.
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rivals
I had a rough time with this one. Words are inherently cooperative things. The letters patiently stand in line, more or less in teh right order.
At first, I tried something competitive within the word that just didn’t work. So I settled on gothic, harkening to sports team logos. But that was boring.
A few days later, I thought of going upside down. The capital R is so distinctive that it still reads upside down, and the flourish on the l makes it read both ways. The upside v is forgiven cause it’s in the middle, plus it resonates in the graph as an apparent capital a.
So again, third time was the charm.
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Blast
I clearly have a blast with ruling pen cursive. But this time, print letters felt right.
Then again, the as lives on the cusp of cursive. With calligraphy, I have finally started understanding the weird cursive conventions that was drilled in 2nd grade (such as the weird-s shape).
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Button
More cursive, with a circle.
With any concept, there are still so many little choices in the execution. A medium-small buttOn felt right.
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FIREfly
More cursive+block text. Even though I try to let each word speak on its own, the line of thought from piece to piece becomes obvious in retrospect.
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In August, we visited Springs Preserves and my dad let the grandkids play with his SLR.
I then spent September celebrating an unplanned liver party at UMC.
I finally took the photos off his camera, which reminded me to dig up my old camera.
While looking the Nikon D40, the boy asked “so you’re looking for a real camera, like without a phone?“
Cya next time!
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PS—Magic: The Gathering Arena
Twenty-three years ago I joined my first poker night. It was also my last poker night. It was so fun that I quit on the spot.
Two decades later, I came across MTGA, getting all the gambling kicks without spending real money.
Like any online game, there are plenty of ways that Hasbro can steal your cash, but you don’t have to give it away.
Having been an adult through the rise of social media and freemium mobile game evolution, I see exactly what’s going on with multiple currencies, regular rewards, multimedia stimuli, and daily prompts. Like any sucker, I can see all the warning signs, but it’s so fun.
It teaches compassion towards the victims of con-men. Many of these marks must know they are onto some bad stuff, but do it anyways.
We’ll see if this kick holds up after a few months. It’s mega fun, but it’s not building towards anything bigger in life.
Is the time worth it? I know it’s not. Maybe it’s my subconscious rebelling against the pandemic.
—September 2021
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PPS—Ominous Roost
I’ve been playing so much MTGA that I need to go cold turkey.
But first, I brewed my own deck—a case study of why the game is so alluring in an online environment.
In this game, I love having lots of creatures and things that make them for free. So this card is perfect, since it is all about creating free creatures.
At first, I started with what I had in my digital collection and added all the relevant cards.
After playing it a couple times, I realized the concept was workable so I used a couple precious “wildcard” tokens to buy a few extra copies. Then I pushed the deck wide, using a copy of all the cards with the special ability “Disturb” to explore how they interacted together.
Once I sensed how the individual pieces worked together, I culled the deck to the to the bare essence. In constructed Magic, there are many great cards, but only 60 slots. Once the goal of the deck is decided, it has to be refined.
This deck tried to build lots of flying creatures to kill the opponent before they killed me. The engine was a couple of card draw / discard spells that would simultaneously create more creatures and build up defenses. For interaction I had a couple surprises to mess with the creatures in play.
Thus arises the central paradox in deck building. One is limited in engine cards because the engine requires fuel. This deck relied heavily discarding “spirit” cards, but all my engine makers and surprise cards are not spirits.
This is where the online part of MTGA kicks in. It’s fascinating to slowly refine this deck. The entire library of Magic is at your fingertips so you can tinker endlessly and your opponents won’t get bored because it’s a new player each time.
With each test, the wicked question comes up. Did my most recent changes improve the deck or was it a lucky card draw?
I’m not sure. Let’s play again!
—October 2021, I quit MTGA a few weeks later. It was too obsessive! Four years later, I remember nothing from this deck except what’s written here.
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PPPPS—Sid Meier’s Civilization, 1991
Every decade or so, I get sucked into this game for a couple nights of mindless clicking.
Of course I played quite a bit when it first came out. And then in Berkeley, Houston, and now Las Vegas.
This time on an online DOSbox emulator on the Internet Archive (a legit site, I’ve donated to them in the past). But I must be getting old—I got a bad headache and I’m still hungover the morning after.
Like much of my entertainment, I stick with what I know, so I’ve only played the original version. It’s just the right balance of challenging but actually pretty easy.
I always focus on a high infrastructure strategy, going heavy on research, connecting all my cities by (rail)roads. Once I have an edge, I defend with strong military unit and buy off cities with an army of Diplomats, strangling the other civilizations.
You’d think it gets boring, but a little randomness keeps it fun, just like Hollywood recycling the same formulas to entrance the world for a century.
Coda: I got sucked in for a second night. Fun enough, but not the best use of February 18-20, 2022. Now I need to avoid this program till 2032. Maybe I’ll finally try out Civ II (1996).
—February 2022
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PPPPS—Practice
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