Hello, I’m back!

Actually, I’ve been back for a few days, but getting up to speed on work has been exhausting. The story went something like this:

So, I was writing some kind of software project, wasn’t I? Oh yes, that was it. Creating virtual life. It was a bit complicated, if I remember right. Lots of science. And programming. Lots and lots of programming. Where had I got to when I left? Avatar animations were next, according to my notes. But I can’t remember how to do Unity animations any more. I did buy some fancy software to help me with that, but jeez – this alone is a full-time career! How the hell do I do blend trees, again? Okay, so now things are just randomly disappearing from the screen. Where’s the notebook gone? Why did that happen? What have I done wrong this time??? Aargh!!!!! Deep breath… Can I just go back to my tent and live out my last remaining days on a mountainside? Please???

We had a really nice time, though. I went camping in Colorado, with my dear friend and lifesaver, Kimberly. Both of us seriously needed a break from reality for a while.

For the first few days, we camped up in the mountains above Denver, and let ourselves in gently with some civilized, ‘old-people-friendly’ activities – a day at the Botanical Gardens, a visit to a lovely mineral museum at the Colorado School of Mines, dinner al fresco at a restaurant, etc. It rained quite a bit, but since I currently live in a hot, dry desert, I really enjoyed that. There are few things more soothing than the sound of rain pattering on a tent and the smell of wet pine trees.

Then we moved camp up to Rocky Mountain National Park. Stunning mountain vistas, altitudes ranging from 9,000 to 12,000 feet (2700 to 3700m), and animals; lots and lots of animals! Groups of elk would just wander around our fairly isolated tent as if it wasn’t even there. Chipmunks constantly tried to outwit us and steal our food. One evening stroll around a pretty lake brought a family of moose, wading in the shallow water. I think we’re going to need some moose-like creatures in the game. They have this wonderful “Yes, I know I look really silly, but given that I’m five times your size, what are you gonna do about it?” expression on their faces. We also had a brief encounter with a rather upset black bear, but luckily there were a couple of wildlife photographers nearby, who knew what they were doing. Which is probably just as well, because although I had my bear spray with me, it was right at the bottom of my backpack, rather than conveniently strapped to my belt, where it should have been. Bears generally avoid humans, but the last bear I encountered stalked me determinedly for an hour up a very narrow canyon with no way out, so they make me nervous.

The last few days, we moved to a pretty state park, where I camped the last time I was in Colorado. On our final day, I dragged poor Kimberly 1600 vertical feet (500m) up to the top of a high mountain, to see the dinosaur tracks that I think I mentioned once on our previous project site. It was a much tougher hike than I’d remembered! And it was dark well before we got back down again too, so it was quite an adventure. But heck – dinosaur tracks! The longest continuous trackway in the world. No signs, no fences, just a free opportunity to walk in the footsteps of a dinosaur. They looked almost exactly the same as they did the day they were made. It was well worth the climb. After all those elk, moose and bears, it wouldn’t have surprised me at all to see a four-footed creature the size of a truck come lumbering out of the forest.

Anyway, now it’s back to work. I don’t exactly know how long it will take to get the next build out. When I left, I felt like I was really close, but now I’ve kind of lost the momentum and need to catch up again. I need to redo these animations – not only were they very rough in the last build, so that they got a weak reception and caused me to lose my self-confidence, but I’ve made some changes to how tools work, which opens up some new possibilities for the future, now that we actually have arms. After that it’s mostly just small stuff.

The one really big thing is that we still need a new 3D world, to go with the fact that we have a real, wild population of creatures, rather than just needing somewhere to keep our own. It’s a significant conceptual change. I’ve bought some new tools to help me with it, but I’m going to try to sit on my hands and get a build out using the old world first. Probably, anyway. I hate going off half-cock, because people can only ever judge what they see, not what’s in my mind. If I had my way, I would never put out a build at all until it’s at least close to finished. But I’m going to starve long before that point comes, unless I keep demonstrating some progress, so I’ll try to restrain myself and cut a build soon.

Talking of needing support, a couple of people spontaneously sent me some money lately, in part to help me take a break. I really appreciate that. Thank you. I’d like to call out @finnius and @midnight for their support. And of course, dear Kimberly, for so many years of making sure that I can pay my rent.

Also a shout-out to @foggygoofball, for largely keeping our forum going while I’ve been away, and posting things he’s learned about how the simulation works under the hood. There’s so much that needs to be known, but I never get any time to tell you about it, so it’s great that someone is obsessively deconstructing it, like an archeologist digging among the ruins.

Once you start thanking people it becomes hard to stop, but where would I be without @mabus, who is the number one poster on this site? Keep it up, my friend! And thank you in general to all our paying members. This is an enormously challenging project, and sometimes I feel like I did when I was being chased by a bear up a narrowing canyon with no way out. I just want to give up, lie down and wait for it to eat me. But with your support and enthusiasm, I’ll keep trying.

Ok, back to work. I was going to talk about something slightly troubling that Microsoft’s Copilot did to me today, but I’ll do it another time – I’ve droned on long enough.