I’m going to try a little experiment. I’m going to attempt to “learn” something every day of December. By learn something I’m going for doing some type of training, reading, or other lessons related to programming, Flash or other software topics. I’m kinda pissed at myself because AGAIN, I’ve been unable to commit. And AGAIN, my problem is that I just get swayed by so much new shiny stuff coming down the pipe.
Example: I downloaded a copy of the Unreal Development Kit. Why? Because the sample game looked cool. UDK uses a scripting language (or so it appears at first glance) with a rendering engine and bloom effects. It looks very cool. I have absolutely no idea why I’m futzing around with it aside from the fact that it looks cool.
Whizzle, a sample game produced with the Unreal Development Kit
Aside from being just generally distracted, I keep finding job ads that are looking for skills that I just don’t currently have. Rather than bemoan that fact I’m trying to improve my situation. I don’t know whether web dev is for me but I figure I can make some ActionScript 3 skills out of my knowledge and work in that direction. I just need to keep focused. To that end I’m going to try and limit my other “recreation” time and really knuckle up and start working.
Thanksgiving was rather low key this year. Often we hit both sides of the family but this year we only had to do one. I hit my parents place where my aunt was using an iPad as a recipe lookup device. It again cemented where the iPad’s market is for me: lightweight web browsing, appliance, utility, lightweight PDF reading, and games. Using the device is a lot of fun– I know there’s rumor of the revised one coming out soon after January which sucks for the Holiday shoppers, but is probably the best thing for the folk waiting for the 2nd gen like me. I’ve drawn some parallels to the Star Trek Tricorder in the past and I still think it is an early precursor to some future device like that.
Lastly, my time has lately been taken up with a new addition to our household: a Japanese Bob kitty named Suki. She’s pretty badass;
Suki!
playful, excited, active, and pretty chill when she wants to be. I’d forgotten what it was like to have a cat, much less any living animal in the house. She’s totally a part of the family now and reminds me that someone wants to hang out and watch while I attempt to code all day.
