Blog

I don't care if noone reads this, but part of the reason I rarely update my website is because I still like it how it is. Much like my interest with Touhou and vocal synths, some things just last a long time for me. For example, since I first made this site, I've become an even bigger fan of the colour red, and I really consider it my favourite now.

But aside from that: over the past months, I've gotten really deep into QGIS, specifically mapping out the world of After the End, a mod for Crusader Kings 3. So far I've digitized about 2500 provinces (the smallest division of land) which is about 60% of North America, so that's like maybe 25% complete overall. I've thought about showing it online, but I couldn't help myself from fixing mistakes from the original map, so while I can't say it's my own work (I'm primarily just copying after all), it also isn't a faithful recreation of the game map.

I've also gotten back into Terraria after 5 years, and started a new Rimworld colony, so that's cool too.

I'm 22 now, and I figure if I'm gonna update that little number on my site, I may as well update other stuff on it too! I've been busy with a bazillion things always catching my interest, and I can't be on top of all of them, so maybe quarterly or bi-yearly updates will just be how my site works, IDK.

You know how I just explained that my interests shift around a lot? Well, this Touhou obsession of mine is different, it's been a rock solid constant in my life for more than a year now. I discovered ZUN's music albums since I last updated my site, and long story short my SECOND pair of Renko & Merry keychains are currently being shipped. I've lost count of the artists I follow on pixiv just for these two characters, and when one of them released keychains I couldn't stop myself from ordering them, despite already having a different artist's keychains of these exact characters.

But aside from that, I've started posting to my YT channel! So far I have an Uta Utane cover of Jerma's teacher noise, and a showcase of a 3D node web I made of the board game Diplomacy's map. I mean, if either of those extremely niche things sound interesting, then there you go. I dunno, maybe if I didn't need an excuse to update my site I would have more to say, but that's pretty much it for now.

Ok yeah, I didn't end up being more active here. BUT, I gotta talk about the new minecraft update! Bundles are here, and they are awesome. Ever since I started playing minecraft, my biggest problem was with how the inventory works. I love going on long mining trips, but my inventory would always immediately get clogged with stuff and I'd have no choice but to throw stuff away or go back. For years, andesite/granite/diorite have been the bane of my existence; I would avoid mining them because if I took ANY, I would be kissing goodbye to 3 inventory slots. And with all the crap they've been adding over the past few years, the problem only got worse.

A few months ago, I tried to start a new world with the experimental bundle pack, and I literally spent hours searching for rabbits to make bundles and never found ANY AT ALL. But now, bundles are not only fully in the base game, but also cheap to make!! Using them feels so good. Like, yes please I will take some calcite, thank you very much, I have space for it! In my new world, I've been playing for nearly 200 in-game days and everything I have can easily fit in 3 double chests, and that's with me being able to collect everything I want to collect. And on top of that, inventory management feels like a fun minigame now. When I fill up on iron and gold and redstone and lapis, I just gotta tetris it into my bundles and boom, more space unlocked!

But anyway, speaking about this new world, my hyperfixation on Touhou has only gotten stronger, and I've decided to build Gensokyo. Here's what I have so far (very WIP):

Here's the Scarlet Devil Mansion:

(And with a local map):

Here's Hakurei Shrine:

The beginnings of the Bamboo Forest of the Lost:

And an overall map of the whole region:

The thing marked as "Youkai Mountain" is currently just a ring of really tall hills surrounding a valley with a lake, like a huge bowl. My plan is to use it as a base to build my own mountain on top of so I can achieve the required height.

I TOLD y'all in my about me that I work on sporadic bursts of interest! So it should be no surprise that I'm back after nearly 2 months. I'm back in school now, but contrary to the usual expectations, it might actually make me more active here starting this semester. I've been spending months working on organizing my thoughts in this markdown-and-wikilinks-based notetaking app I use. I got this plugin for it called Dataview that lets you turn your notes into a queriable database, and I'm beginning to figure out how to use a fraction of its power to make the process of taking notes in class (and then REVIEWING them) inspire less agonizing cognitive dissonance in me. At least some of the brainpower I was wasting on trying to power through my executive dysfunction is now free to waste on neocities!

Also, I figured out how to use CSS snippets to make Obsidian look amazing. I was previously using another plugin called Style Settings for that, but doing the code myself is super powerful and satisfying. Every time I go look at my to-do lists, my notes, my braindumps, etc., I admire how sharp and rectangular everything is, and think about how I was the one who figured out how to remove the UI rounding on every element.

Yesterday I watched Night Mind's video about Shipwrecked 64. I know I can't handle the spook, so I won't be playing it myself, but Nick has convinced me I need to experience it in some capacity. Livestreaming is cool for a lot of reasons, but when it comes to puzzle games, and especially spooky puzzle games, live audience input is more a disadvantage than a benefit. Watching someone struggle on a problem when you know the answer or miss a secret you already found can be deeply unsatisfying, but watching other audience members interfere and give hints is way worse. I tried watching someone's day 1 release stream of Shipwrecked, but chatters had already learned what actions made things progress and were completely unable to resist the urge to rush the streamer with hints, so I shut it off. What I need is a proper old-fashioned Let's Play.

One of the only true let's players still around that I know of is Welonz, and a certain Vincent van Sauce regularly does "prerecorded streams" (as he calls them), but finding actual let's plays by searching up games is practically impossible nowadays. The best I can do is find a small channel's stream VOD with <1k views, but even then I look in the comments before watching and see multiple people complaining about backseating.

This past week, I got my wisdom teeth extracted. I had been kinda worried and dreading the eventuality of it for years, but it really wasn't so bad after all. Probably the biggest thing for me was a fear of "going under" (I was on IV sedation). The idea of altered mental states or not being in control is a little terrifying to me, but ultimately it ended up being pretty much exactly like going to bed. While the standby paramedic and oral surgeon were hooking me up to the IV, a blood pressure monitor, 2 sticky electrode thingies, and a heartrate monitor that went on my finger, I was actually able to stay calm by making small talk about how anything to do with needles or blood generally gives me a psychosomatic feeling of faintness. Like, I was opening up about an embarassing moment I had at the pharmacy once after I got a covid booster, when I thought too hard about the needle and probably gave them a scare by nearly losing my balance. Next thing I know, I'm all done and they're helping me into a wheelchair, taking me to my mom's car for the drive home. Point is, I guess small talk can actually be useful in very specific circumstances.

I have a whole bunch of site buttons now! I would notify people, but that's a lot of messages to send and I don't even have my own button yet. I started making my own button, but then I remembered I haven't made pixel art in like 3 years and I don't know how art works. How do??? I feel like I need to go, y'know, actually follow a tutorial and practice before I can make something presentable enough to show. I also want to make an automated blog at some point, but that's another complicated thing to figure out.