DZP Update: Jan-Feb

Earlier this month, I wrote about the goals I have for this year. I have further divided those goals by month. My plan is to have a monthly update on where my goals for that month and the next stand. Although some of these goals don't appear on my DZP list, they are still important. Also, I couldn't think of any topical photos to include in this post, so I'm gonna break up the wall of text with photos of places I wish I could be right now.



January goals I completed:

- Buy a car: While this hasn't happened yet, I did test drive a car last week. It was good enough, so I'm try to negotiate with the dealer now.

- Revive my dying plant: When I moved to Muncie a year and a half ago, Makenna and I each bought a houseplant. Mine had been going strong for quite a while. Unfortunately, I think I combination of the cold weather and my pot's drainage getting clogged were killing her. While the original plant is now truly dead, I did cut off a couple clippings to propagate her. One of those died, but the other is still going strong a few weeks later. So this may be a success? Too early to tell.



- Make YouTube videos: I posted the first one yesterday. My goal was to have 3-4 by the end of the month. I currently have two that are finished and two that are started. Mission partially accomplished.

- Block schedule my week: I talked about this earlier. I did this and it's been helping me stay on track, though it's not perfect and I'm not always the best at keeping it. But the fact that I'm writing this is evidence of some success there.

- Custom MtG set: Finish first draft of uncommons. I'm mostly happy with where they sit, and I've moved back to the commons. It's coming along. I hope to have this finished by June.

- Plan the year for Day Zero Project: Duh. What does it look like I'm doing?



- Get antidepressants: I started therapy, but it wasn't quite enough. I've been taking Lexapro for a couple weeks now. I should start seeing results in a couple more. Hopefully I will. I gave up drinking for this (lol jk I barely drink anyway).

- Begin exercising regularly: One of my coworkers is a personal trainer. I got him to set me up with a workout plan and help me get comfortable with the gym. It's been going okay. Though I have missed several days, I am doing a lot more than I ever have in the past and that's a success.

- Clean out my phone so it stops being so slow: Well, I cleaned it out. The slow part is still up in the air.

- Print photos of my friends to decorate with: Well, I'm not pleased with the quality of the photos Snapfish sent me, but I do have enough decent ones to decorate. Probably gonna do that sometime this weekend.

- List important birthdays/anniversaries so that dates stop sneaking up on me: Did it! I even got a couple of birthday presents in time for friends' birthdays. It's helping already.




January goals I didn't complete (these will become February goals):

- Make a schedule to keep in touch with people:  The problem is I'm not sure where to start or if my free time will coincide with the people I'm trying to talk to. Still

- Open a savings account:  Just something I totally forgot to schedule,

- Get a bike: Kelsey literally has one in her garage she wants to give me. I just have to go pick it up, but I haven't yet.

- Read Gardens of the Moon: I even scheduled reading time at night. However, that's the part of the schedule I'm not great at keeping up with.



New February goals:

- Get a new wallet:  I almost bought one, then I was like "I can find a cheaper good one online." But nope, I haven't been able to.

- Make MyHeritage give back the money they stole: I cancelled my free subscription in time and they still gave me a full year one. They are the worst.

- Get rid of 100 things: My apartment is a mess, in part because I have too much stuff.

- Visit Kelly: Already planned for the 22nd!

- Practice blind-solving Rubik's cube: Not gonna try to get down to 10 minutes just yet, but I need to practice my memorization a LOT more.


There will probably be more goals added during the month. You will see them when I write next month's update. Thanks for checking in. Stay fresh.

Tourist Destination: Marim

The world of Marim was created when the Great Mirror shattered, scattering fragments of reality across the universe. Or so the philosopher Kriffus wrote, several hundred years ago. He said that each world, each plane is a different piece of the original, harmonious reality, of which now only shadows can be seen. These shadows are the gods, vestiges of perfection in a broken world, who shape it in ways only glimpsed by mortal eyes.

Far to the north, off the coast of the mainland lies an island permeated by mystery. Garos has long been regarded as a cursed place, and to be sent there is a worse punishment than death.

Naturally, I had my party start out on a prison ship bound for Garos. This is the intro to the world I created for my D&D campaign.

The players:

- Katie Miller as Orma, a half-orc barbarian whose drive to rescue her father is equaled only by her desire to kill the wizard who took him and slaughtered her village.

- Chris Miller as Tihgomma, a wealthy dragonborn paladin whose family became destitute in the search for his father, dispatched by political rivals. (Chris and Katie, is your dad okay?)

- Jamie Trost as Saiorse, an elf rogue who like, killed a lot of people.

- Kelsey Witt as Vaerfina, the halfing ranger with no known past.

- Matthew Becker as Ruvin, the dwarf cleric who keeps them all from dying.

As they neared Garos, a sudden storm swept upon their ship and destroyed it. They and the ship's captain, Aslar, were the only survivors, rescued by a group of other prisoners. They discovered that though the island is dangerous, there are many who have survived by banding together into clans. In order to assess their abilities, the clans had our heroes fight against each other.

They impressed three of the clan. They chose to accept Echidna's offer to join the spider clan, who have remained safe from the island's horrors by building the treetop village of Loften.



On the way to Loften, two night wolves (think a wolf the size of a small house) attacked the spider clan. They were defeated, but the spider clan lost Caris, one of its strongest warriors. Before moving on, Saiorse found a pale pink crystal on Caris's body and retrieved it.

The rest of the trip to Loften passed without incident. The party rested there for the night. In the morning, however, after being equipped from Loften's armory, they heard a commotion outside. A crazed woman covered in spiked armor was standing over Echidna, now unconscious. The rest of the spider clan was gathered around. The woman entreated the spider clan to join Rophidian, saying that he had already taken the Cradle of Souls -- a revered place on the island where the souls of the dead are sent to rest peacefully.

The woman left as quickly as she had come, and the spider clan was left to make a decision. Should they travel to the cradle to confirm the woman's words? Or should they fight the forest fires to the north or the giants to the the east, both of whom were threatening to press in closer to Loften? With Echidna down, leadership fell to the second strongest in the clan -- now Orma.



She decided to organize an expedition to the Cradle. She took her fellow survivors (minus Aslar), an intellectual named Clyde, and some redshirts. It was to be a three-day journey.

As they neared the edge of the treetop platforms, the expedition was ambushed by a group of paint-faced warriors: natives of the island of whom little is known. After a drawn-out battle, the natives retreated. The fallen natives also carried pale pink crystals, which the party took. Clyde explained that these crystals are how souls are stored. After a week with a corpse, the soul leaks into the crystal, which is then sent to the Cradle. Without a crystal, the soul will dissipate forever. Saiorse also found a hammer-pendant necklace adorned with two chunks of crystal, one on each face of the hammer.

The expedition pressed on. Three times they came across a huntress named Della in the woods, who invited them to share her meal. Three times they refused. She gave them an uneasy feeling. They thought they may be going in circles, but Clyde the guide confirmed that they were still moving forward.



Along the way, he mentioned they could take a brief detour to a tree that answered any question asked of it. They decided to go.

Upon being asked what they should do about the Cradle of Souls, the tree whispered in words of wind: "you must release what has been bound".

Orma asked where her father was, and received the response "you are where you need to be".

After this, they continued onward, and finally reached the end of the forest. As the trees gave way to rolling yellow fields, the expedition was attacked once more, this time swooped down on by Aarakocra -- bird people.



The party prevailed once more with minimal injury. This is where they remain, until next we meet to continue the story.

StrataGames

As I may have mentioned previously, my family loves games.

My younger brothers and I used to have a Christmas tradition, which was that we would play board games in the morning before we were allowed to wake up my parents. We also used to make escape the room games out of legos. We made our own Star Trek CCG cards, and later on Magic cards.

We've been interested in game design for a while, without really knowing it. But now we're trying to turn it into a real thing. Starting today, we'll be releasing videos on YouTube (1-2 every week) about gaming.



Matthew and Jason are working on Simple Strategies -- a series where you can learn how to play games better. The first one, Five Tribes, is up now at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHOGcgF3Mkk.

Then on Thursdays I will be releasing videos on Magic design. This can be useful for learning how to create your own cards, or just how to understand better how the game works.

Eventually, Jack will join in with some fantasy football.

We hope to build up a following that loves games, so that when we eventually release our own board games, we'll have people interested in our product. If you like us or just think we're funny, please subscribe and watch all our videos (we're keeping them pretty short).

We're very excited about this. Thank you everyone who supports us, and we look forward to building up our brand in 2020.

Andrew's Guide to Love and Murder

Actually, just love. I'm being told the second one is not something I should talk about publicly. But hit me up if you want my thoughts on it. Joking! But seriously though. You know where to find me.

As an awkward, sheltered, homeschool kid, it may surprise you to know that I had quite the array of female admirers in high school (I went to a public school for the last two years). As an awkward, sheltered, homeschool kid, it may not surprise you to know that I was completely oblivious to that fact.

Once I discovered this (one of my friends literally had to point out the signs to me), I didn't know what to do with the information. Which was actually kind of nice. Most of these girls, I wasn't interested in, and as it turns out, a whopping 0% of them had the guts to ask me out. So eventually they just faded away.

I didn't want to date someone unless I was certain they would be worth the time and energy. However, after years of having failed to find anyone who fit that criteria, I got frustrated watching many of my friends going out and having dates for prom and everything else.

So the next time there was someone I was even a little interested in, I asked her out. She was attractive, and nice enough, but deep down I knew that my interest was superficial and wouldn't last.

Sure enough, once I graduated and we were no longer together, I realized I didn't want to put in the energy to date her long distance. I broke up with her by phone and that was that.

Although she hadn't been perfect either, I blamed myself. I knew I shouldn't have dated her in the first place. I had been depressed and hated myself, and was looking for some kind of meaning and support in a romantic relationship.

Fun fact: that's not how it works.

Our society places such importance on having the perfect boyfriend or girlfriend that we miss the beauty in just living a healthy life. Spending time with friends, hobbies, working to improve our skills. Instead we fear that if we don't have someone, we are missing out.

And romantic relationships are great and they are important. I'm not saying that dating for the fun of it is bad. But it should not be so important that you should waylay your life for it.

After many long years of waiting, I do have someone that is worth rebuilding my life for. Someone who meets my basic needs. She is supportive, and adventurous, and open-minded, which are some of the most important things to me. But I was only able to find her and make a relationship work after I dealt with my self-esteem issues.

My point is: stop relying on relationships to fix you. Stop dating people you don't even like just so that you won't be alone. It won't make you happy in the long run. If you're scared of being alone, determine why and deal with that problem. Everyone is different and you're not missing out just because you aren't in a relationship. You're missing out if you allow bad relationships to replace who you are.

Strategy Games

Anyone who knows me knows that I love games. A lot. In 2009, I played a game with some high school friends that would change the course of my life. I played Catan. I lost twice. But I enjoyed it, and it was a different kind of board game from the ones I had spent my whole life playing. Two of my brothers and I all had gift cards to Barnes & Noble, so when we saw Catan there, I suggested we all go in on it.

That was our gateway game.

Ten years later, my family is has shelves and shelves of strategy games, and we host multiple large game days every year. My dad has taken to buying, selling, and trading on BoardGameGeek.com, and gets lots of stuff on the cheap.

Today I'm going to give you my top ten board and card games.







1. Magic: the Gathering

The original trading card game, this game pioneered a new type of game while staying rooted in something simple and resonant: a medieval world filled with magic. The game has strategy, lore, and is incredibly customizable. You can play however you want to play. There's a reason why ten years after I started, I'm still playing and still heavily invested in this game.

2. Android: Netrunner

I'm not gonna lie: I have a weakness for collectible things. A:NR is at least an LCG (Living Card Game), which means that the cards you buy aren't random. If you buy a set, you get 3 of each card, which is as many as you can use in one deck.

What's great about A:NR is the asymmetric strategy. Both players have different goals: one is a megacorporation trying to do (allegedly) evil things, and the other is a hacker trying to steal their data for (allegedly) good purposes. Despite only running for six years, this card game has enormous depth of play and is a lot of fun. Unfortunately, I only have one friend willing to play it with me. (It's pretty complex)





3. Terraforming Mars

The first actual board game on my list. Terraforming Mars is another game with megacorporations. The difference here is that EVERY player is a megacorp, and each is looking to terraform the red planet in its own unique way.

The best part of this game is how huge it is. There are so many corporation options, and so many cards in the deck, that you can play dozens of times and still find new strategies. The best part of this is that even when I lose, I don't mind because I had a lot of fun accomplishing the things I did. My family has been obsessed with this game for probably a year now, and we're still enjoying it.




4. Dominion

Surprise, surprise. More deckbuilding. But this one has you build the deck during the game, and the replayability is incredibly high thanks to the fact that you only use ten out of twenty-five sets of cards whenever you play. This means there are 3 million ways to play in just the base set alone. Once you add an expansion, things get out of control quickly.

However, the game can start to feel stale if you just stick to the suggested sets of ten on the backs rulebook. That said, it's still one of my favorites. Pro tip: try to trash all your starting cards.




5. Castles of Burgundy

Castles of Burgundy is one of those games that offers you more to do than you can actually accomplish in a single game. This is both a blessing and a curse. It's frustrating that I can't fill my entire board, but it's good gameplay to make players pick and choose what will be the most beneficial game plan in the long term.


6. 7 Wonders

My family latched onto 7 Wonders hard because it's one of the only games that can play almost all of us. It's a drafting game (which I love), which is where you get a hand of cards, you get to pick one, and then you pass the rest to another player. Rinse and repeat until the cards are gone. Once you know what you're doing, games only take half an hour.





7. Concordia

Welcome to ancient Europe, where you will be buying and selling goods to build cities in various provinces. The cool part of this game is that the cards you play to determine your action each turn are also worth points in various ways, so you have to buy them both based on what they will do for you and how many points they give you. Pro tip: buy as many cards as you can.




8. Five Tribes

Like Castles of Burgundy, Five Tribes offers you more to do than you actually can. This is made more severe by the fact that all of your options affect (and are affected by) the options that other players take. You'll be playing the game, working on your strategy, and suddenly realize there are only two moves left in the game. The meeples dry up quickly out in the desert.

That said, the quick end leaves you wanting more. This is a great strategy game for when time is limited.





9. Scythe

The only war game that my family plays. Like most war games, it takes a long time to play. However, the game mechanic of moving your token to a different location on your board each turn, each with its own actions, is brilliant. It limits what you can do each turn in an interesting way and challenges you to find the most efficient combinations of effects.





10. Love Letter

This is an incredibly fast game. Rounds can take as little as a minute, though most probably run closer to three. Each player has a secret role and is trying to figure out who everyone else is while simultaneously switching out their role for a more powerful one.

It's an airtight social deduction game that, despite its simplicity, can entertain for hours (though it serves better as an in-between activity).




There you have it. Andrew's top ten games (as of now). Don't pay too much attention to the specific ranking (I didn't). Just know that these are all great games for people who like strategy. If you don't....I dunno, play Candyland.

2019

As the new year approaches, it is tradition on social media to look back at the old year and say:

"**** you, 2019."

Add this to the long list of things of things I don't care for. Every year brings with it some bad and some good. Certainly, some years are worse than others. 2016 was a very difficult year for me, but it was also the year that I took a major step in conquering my self-esteem issues and learned how to start living as though I like myself.

It's important to appreciate what things a year brought you, both good and bad. So today I'm going to look back on 2019 and talk about important things I remember from it.

January 1: Overwatch Legos release

I have always loved legos, and around October 2018 I realized I now have enough money to start buying them for myself. That's both a blessing and a curse. I also like Overwatch (though I don't have much time to play anymore) and it was cool to get some minifigures of McCree and the gang.



February-March: ?

Gonna be honest, I don't remember much about these months. I know I had my birthday, and spring break. Makenna and I saw Gypsy at Ball State with some friends. It was...fine. I even had started journaling again, but most of my notes are about work stuff. It was a busy time for work, but personal stuff? Not sure what was going on. Probably a lot of stress and avoidance.

Oh yeah, on Feb 26, my sister had a baby. I was planning to visit my sister over spring break, but the baby kind of took priority. Which is fair.

April 24: Academy slideshow

This was my big work project for the spring semester, and some poor planning earlier in the year left me scrambling to complete it in time. I burnt myself out a bit, working on it in all my work free time and some of my personal free time. But I liked the result, so that was something.

June-July: Summer

I had a lot of lofty goals for the summer. I was going to buy a car, teach Makenna to drive, read The Stand, prepare all my programs for the upcoming school year...and more. A lot more. I ended up cleaning m room, cleaning out my computer, went to the zoo and water park with Makenna, visited Jack and TJ, and finished a song parody. In a two-month span, that fell a lot short of everything I wanted to accomplish. I got a bit depressed after two months of long days at home doing not too much. Although I did spend a lot of time out thinking and game designing on my parents' new deck, which was very nice.

August 10: Jason & Leann's wedding reception

My brother got married back in December '18, but it was a small ceremony with no reception. We made up for that. I had to take time off work and drive six hours in a day, but it was worth it to have all my family and many of our friends all together in one place. This was a truly good day, which is rare.



September 1: Game design contests

Starting in September, Buttonshy Games began a monthly game design contest. The best entry would be offered a chance at publication. Although I was very excited about this, it didn't go so well. Each month, I would have an idea for their constraints, but would get stuck and be unsure how to proceed. In October, I actually got a playtest in, but it didn't go well and just revealed that the game needed a complete overhaul, which I did not have time to complete. They have not posted anything for January. Hopefully, they do more contests now that I have scheduled time for game design.

September 4-9: Canada

I and my friends Jack, Kristina, Kelsey, and Rachel spent a weekend at the Stratford Theatre Festival, something I had not been able to do when I was a student at the Academy. It was both the first time I've been out of the country since 2012, and an incredibly fun trip that I already miss. One of the highlights of the year.



September 19: Day Zero Project

This was the day I stopped waffling and started working toward my goals. I wanted to wait until I felt ready, and now I'm sort of getting to the point that I'm ready, but I'm not sure I would be at this point if I hadn't started.

October 5-6: Skydiving

Probably 8 years ago, my dad and I agreed to go skydiving whenever he got below the weight limit. Well, after a lot of hard work, he got there, and after getting rained out once, we were able to take the plunge.

This is not my dad.

October 15: Doughnuts and Dragons

This was the day that my high school classmate Blake Dollive opened a beer and board games store in Indy. I have thus far tried to make a trip over there once, but it has failed. That needs to go on the bucket list, I think. Okay, it's on there now.

November 7: Kelly!

Kelly came to visit me in Muncie! It was nice.




December 22-23: Family Christmas

My whole family was together for the third time this year (the first one I had to miss for work :'( ) We played a whole lotta board games.



Overall, this year was not bad. My depression came back, but I have started to deal with it in some new ways. I spent some good time with family and friends that I won't soon forget. I have taken a lot of concrete steps toward completing my goals, which is a huge change from where I was last year at this time (or even back in the summer, if you read that segment.)

Obviously, there was a lot more that happened. It's hard to gauge what should go in and what shouldn't. I could make this post two or three times as long if I thought hard enough. The 2020 recap probably will be a lot longer.

Skipping Stones

Brother, it's strange 

How you will change 

Portion by portion, 

Grain by grain

Until, surprised, you see one day 

Every contradicting way 

That motions, emotions 

Have rearranged 

The intervening time erased 

From memory, now but faintly traced 

Current endurance 

Of sapient brain 

Provokes alteration 

Of orientation 

For better, whenever 

You next lose sense of 

Nice day, isn't it?

Heroes

I don't believe in celebrity.

That's not to say I don't believe in fame. I think that being recognized for the work you have done and who you are (good or bad) is a good thing. I'd like to be known someday as a great game designer, and hopefully that reputation will help me sell more games.

But I don't like the idea of turning famous people into gods -- consuming the lifestyles of people we barely know, glorifying them as exemplars when (most of the time) their morality is worse than our own. That's why tabloids and celebrity gossip has always made me uneasy.

Let's take Weird Al.



 I like Weird Al's music a lot. He is one of the world's greatest parodists, and his original work is funny too. Everything I've ever heard says he's a pretty nice guy, a respectable guy. It's good to hear he's a good guy, at least. But I don't know him. Even if I meet him, I won't ever know him. he could be a despicable person. His music brightens my day, but that's the extent of it. So I don't consider Weird Al to be my hero, or anyone other celebrity, for that matter.

My heroes are the people I've met who have impacted my life in profoundly positive ways. My mom, who has homeschooled eight children and put up with all the fighting and bad attitudes all day for thirty-some years now. She always puts her family first and doesn't always receive the recognition she deserves.



My dad, whose dedication is apparent in everything he does. When he sets a goal, his discipline and hard work consistently allow him to reach that goal. He, too, has given up a lot for his family.

My high school geometry teacher, Scott Hinkley, who was one of the first people to believe in me. To tell me I had talent. Who could always tell when I was down on myself and would try to change my perspective.

These are the people I look up to.

But despite that, they are still people. They say to never meet your heroes, because you may not like what you see. But it's important to remember that everyone is disappointing. Everyone you know and love has probably done something recently that would disappoint you if you knew.

So while I consider these people my heroes, I have to remember that they are not perfect. I take what inspiration I can from them and I move on using what I've learned. And eventually maybe I can become a person that I would want to have as a hero.

I don't know what the point of this post is. I don't have some great message. I'm just writing my thoughts.

Day 114 Project

Back in September, I posted about DayZeroProject.com, a website that is useful for setting and tracking your goals. Although I haven't posted much about it lately, I have still been doing it. I thought I'd give a brief update. You can follow along with my list at https://dayzeroproject.com/user/beckeram/list/155774.

Goals I completed in 2019:

• Go to a haunted house
• I started writing a blog post about this. I'll probably get around to posting it at some point, though it won't be topical anymore.
• Go to a renaissance fair
• Ditto
• Go skydiving
• I did write a blog post about this, so I won't go into detail here.
• Build a blanket fort
• This one was fun. Makenna and I went back to our childhood by making a fort and stocking it with books, games, legos, and a TV. 

It's kinda hard to see, because it took up most of the room. But it was sweet.

• Start a blog
• Well, here it is.
• Buy a new suit
• It was...expensive. But now at least I don't have to go to weddings in my old, worn dress clothes.

Here I am in what's left of my suit.

• Create and maintain a budget
• Well, I created it. The maintaining has been a bit difficult to do, but now I have data from four months on what I spent money on, so I can adjust my budget to better reflect that.
• Talk to a therapist
• I took the plunge, and it wasn't as bad as I had feared. My guy's name is Taylor and he plays Magic more than I do, so we've connected on that point. Although it has been helping, I haven't felt like it's enough, so now I have an appointment to see a doctor about getting antidepressants.
• Learn to DM and run a campaign
• This is something I tried to do years ago with a Mistborn RPG and I had no idea what I was doing. It was rough and we only played once because I was too timid to figure out where we were going. Now I've run three sessions of a D&D campaign in a world I designed and I'm very happy with the story and world. Although our schedules changed a bit, hopefully we can continue meeting this semester.

The DM screen Kelsey got me for Christmas

At this point, I have completed nine of my goals in four months. That's a little low. Mathematically, I need to complete one every ten days (or three per month) to finish on time. However, I have also started the process of completing many others goals, so I'm really not as behind as it might seem.

I sat down and planned out which goals I would like to complete this year. There are 32 of them. Between these, the ongoing ones that I will continue working on, and whatever goal I decide to do on a given day because I have the time, this should be a good number to stay on track. Here are the 32:

• Publish a game
• This is one of my loftier ones. My goal is to have a workable game by June, then spend the summer months marketing it. My brothers and I might be headed toward making a game company, so self-published on Kickstarter is also an option. This is eventually the career I want to go into, so setting these goals is important.
• Write a song for Makenna
• While I haven't written a song in a while, it has long been a goal of mine to write one for Makenna. Something both classy and sweet.
• Create family tree
• Last semester Makenna and I attended a genealogy seminar. This is something we have both been interested in for a while. And though I have made a family tree that goes back several generations, I want to fill it out more and prove the family relationships using firsthand data.
• Record family history
• Going along with the family tree. My late Grandma Rinehart was very into genealogy and had lots of information and documents that she left to my Uncle Rick, who is also interested. My goal is to both help Rick sort the multitude of documents and also interview family members to get some fun family stories.
• Create a conlang
• A conlang (short for constructed language) is any language created intentionally over a short period of time, as opposed to a naturally-developed language. Think klingon or esperanto. It's a fun hobby.

Something I've been working on.

• Blind solve a Rubik's cube in 10 minutes
• I have actually done a blind solve before, but it took so long as to not be very showy or impressive. I'd like to speed that up. The hard part is remembering the location of each piece.
• Finish my custom MTG set
• Another game design goal, not something I can monetize but something fun that I've been working on for like seven years. And it can at least go in my design portfolio.
• Make a comprehensive list of music I like
• This one is a bit of a trap. I don't think it's even possible to remember every song I like, but the idea is that when I do think of one, I add it to the list. Once I make a concerted effort to go through all my music and organize the list better, I'll probably check this one off.
• Explore an abandoned building
• There's a ghost town in Indiana, just a short drive north of where I live. I've been trying to go for a while, but it just hasn't been a good time. Soon, though.
• Watch a meteor shower
• For all my interest in space, I have never actually seen a meteor shower. They happen all throughout the year, though, so with planning, it should be simple enough.
• Keep in touch with friends and family
• This one is hard for me. I probably need to make a schedule of who I'm gonna contact when.
• Make a list of birthdays and anniversaries
• Important days tend to sneak up on me. I'd like to be at least on top of things enough to say happy birthday.
• Surprise Makenna with dinner
• I like to cook, but first you have to decide what you're cooking, then you have to go grocery shopping, then you can finally cook, but then there are dishes after. It's an ordeal.
• Take my parents out to dinner
• Just to spend some quality time with them. I took my dad to lunch a couple months ago, but I still need to get my mom.
• Change my signature
• Just enough to make it something I like. I've got a good start, but I need to tighten it down more.

• Decorate with photos of friends
• I love good pictures of me with people I love. I keep meaning to print out a bunch and hang them around my room, but I haven't done so yet.
• Find a new band
• Just to keep branching out.
• Find a new hobby
• I like to try new things.
• Get a bike
• Biking is both exercise and a good stress reliever for me. It also helps me think. I have a friend who has a bike for me, but I need to go pick it up.
• Get a new wallet

Enough said

• Learn fingerstyle
• That is, playing guitar prettier than I know how to play.
• Learn to create karaoke tracks
• So that I can make song parodies, my seventh favorite pastime.
• Learn to invest
• The sooner I do this, the more money my money will be making me. I just need to take the time to figure out how to do it smart.
• Learn to whistle
• I've never been able to whistle, but I'm sure I can learn in time. I've been working on this whenever I'm driving or walking around. I've made some real progress. My goal is to be able to whistle tunes.
• Buy a car
• Mine has never been the same since a deer jumped in front of me. It's time to move on.
• Revamp my wardrobe
• I have way too many shirts and way too few pants that fit. Among other problems.
• Exercise regularly
• I did this a couple times last semester. On Wednesday, I got my membership so I will be working out three times per week starting on Monday.
• Get rid of 100 things
• I've got too much stuff, man.
• Make a comprehensive schedule
• I talked about this in my post from Monday this week. I am almost done.
• Open a savings account
• Like investing, I should have done this years ago.
• Visit Kelly
• I have never gone to visit my sister in Ohio, in the six years she's been living there. She doesn't live that far. Come on, Andrew.
• Visit New York City
• I love to travel, but it's the hardest thing on my list to accomplish. Between my responsibilities here and the barrier of having never made my own travel plans (for anything bigger than a weekend trip), it's difficult to actually go. But I need to start somewhere. New York's not that far, so it should be a good place to start.

I know that was quite the mouthful. Props if you read the whole post. These are my goals for this year. It's a lot, but I believe it is attainable. And even if I don't complete something, there's always next year.

Updates as I check these off the list.

Movie Review: The Rise of Skywalker

Note: There will be major spoilers for Star Wars IX in this post.

I went to see the new Star Wars movie on New Year's Eve. Although part of me wanted to let go of critiquing and just try to enjoy the movie, a larger part of me wants to get better at critiquing stories in general, which I think will come in useful. So here are my thoughts on the movie -- at least the ones I remember at this point.

Let's start with the good.

The main thing I wanted out of this movie (other than for it to be good) was some explanation of why Rey is so incredibly strong. In the Force Awakens, she is able to beat Kylo, a master force-user, in a duel her first time using a lighstaber. She is also able to mind trick a stormtrooper on her second attempt. This is an advanced jedi technique that should take incredible amounts of training to pull off. In short, she is much stronger than she should be.

And the movie delivered on explaining this, to an extent. Rey is revealed to be the Emperor's granddaughter, and has inherited his vast force sensitivity. This is about as good of an explanation as they could have given, though I do think Rey's raw power should still have been no match for Kylo's trained power (especially considering his grandfather was also an extremely strong force user).

I also like how they juxtaposed the two families, with Kylo from the "good guy" family on the dark side, and Rey from the "bad guy" family on the light side. And at the end, when Rey is once again asked her family name, she says Skywalker, representing her ability to choose her own path.

I was also relatively happy with Kylo's story arc. As expected, he turned to the light side at the end. I thought the death of his mother in trying to reach him might not have been the strongest motive for a change of heart, since he already, you know, murdered his father in order to become more darkside anyhow. But still, I liked how he replayed the Han murder seen in his head with new context to the conversation.

And as always, the visuals and cinematography were very aesthetic. Going to the ruins of the second death star was cool.

Now, the bad.

There are some small things I can gloss over. Like why does Kylo's lightsaber keep pushing people instead of cutting through them? Why do stormtroopers wear all that armor, which doesn't even deflect blasters, literally the most common weapon they face? Why, after Poe was shot, did Finn rush into the corridor junction that was absolutely proven to be unsafe, didn't look around to clear any stormtroopers, and yet was fine?

The healing thing Rey and Kylo were doing was interesting. I'm not sure how I felt. It's probably fine. Though...what exactly did Rey die of at the end? Her life force being drained? But she was still able to fight after. Long enough to beat Palpatine, anyway. Just seems like a case of the Padmes.

 Them teleporting things using the force was interesting. At first I was put off, but it was kinda cool when Vader's helmet fell to the planet below, alerting Kylo to Rey's presence on his ship. That said, it was kinda fourth wall-breaking when Luke gave Rey a second lightsaber to take to Exegol. The audience knew she would need to give it to Kylo, but Rey did not.

Moving on to bigger issues.

I rarely, if ever, enjoy the resurrection of a dead character. It removes all the stakes (more on this below). Palpatine's return was both frustrating and confusing. It just brings up more questions than answers. Is this the original Palpatine or a clone? Because Exegol was clearly doing some cloning of Snoke. But Palpatine had those extremely damaged hands, so that's probably the result of when Vader turned his lightning back on him. But then how in the galaxy did he survive the explosion of a small moon that he had just been thrown into the reactor of? But could you even clone a sith and replicate their force sensitivity? That seems like it would cause some major problems. Like why wouldn't they have made a clone army of force users back in episode II?

And where did this fleet of star destroyer/planet destroyers come from? Have they been building it on Exegol for the last 20 years? I guess so. So do they have a legion of builders to do that work? But there'd be so many people they'd have to have a whole society down there. But it seems like a pretty inhospitable planet; how do they grow food? Maybe they import it? But wouldn't that compromise the secrecy of Exegol in the first place? Also, how do they staff these hundreds or maybe thousands of star destroyers in a day's time? Is that what the child recruitment in the earlier part of the movie was about? But how do you train kids to run these things in such a short amount of time? And once again, wouldn't bringing them all to Exegol compromise its secrecy? People are going to notice if a large number of ships are heading into a nebula and vanishing. And what exactly was Palpatine planning to be emperor of once he destroys all the inhabited worlds in the galaxy?

None of it makes sense to me. It seems contrived in order to make the final battle as big as possible.

Imagine if, instead of Palpatine being alive, he returned as a force ghost. He could return specifically to torment Rey and try to make her claim her inheritance as empress. She can't shake him for the whole movie, until the very end when she refuses the throne. Or what if she had taken the throne, ostensibly as a force for good? That could have been so much more intriguing character-wise.

But the biggest disappointment in this entire movie was the moment that Rey thought her poor force control had killed Chewbacca. Actually, that part itself could have been great. Being responsible for the death of a friend could have served as an incredible character moment for Rey, and might have actually made me believe for a second that she might turn to the dark side.

However, because I knew there was no way they would kill off Chewie in that manner, I didn't believe any of it. I would have liked to be proven wrong. It would have given consequence to Rey's actions, instead of everything magically getting fixed for her.

Of course, Chewie wasn't dead, and the manner in which they kept him alive didn't even make sense! So...he wasn't on the transport that Rey destroyed. He was on a different one. So there were two transports leaving at the same time. Despite the fact that those transports were specifically chasing down Rey and her crew. One of them decided to leave without accomplishing anything. Just so that Rey could have a character moment that didn't mean anything in the end.

And it's not just Chewie. Take C-3PO. They have to destroy his memory banks just to find the location of the second Sith wayfinder. He makes this big deal about how he's taking one last look at his friends. Again, this could have been a great character moment. Except I knew that he would be good as new by the end of the film. And he was.

Oh no, new characters Zorii and Babu Frik refused to leave their planet, which was destroyed shortly after? Well, they both survived somehow, despite having given their best shot at leaving to Poe.

I can't care about the characters if I know that everything will be fine in the end. There needs to be uncertainty. There need to be stakes. I didn't expect more, but I wanted more.

Don't take this as me beating up on the franchise. I still enjoyed the movie. I still love Star Wars, and it's because I love Star Wars that I care about these problems. I just wish that a multi-billion dollar franchise would put more effort into its story and less into making an action movie that's actiony for action's sake.

New Year, Old Me

Well, I haven't written in a while. That isn't due to a lack of events to write about -- more due to a lack of motivation to write it. I actually have a couple of drafts of things that are no longer relevant, like a very fall weekend Makenna and I had a couple months ago. I just never got around to finishing it.

And that's the main theme of my life.

I've tried to change on numerous occasions. To be more dedicated, to be more intentional. I inevitably just lose motivation and stop trying. That's why I don't believe in New Year's resolutions. There's more to changing than just saying "I want to change." More than a desire for betterment, you need to set yourself up for success.

For example, I know that one of my biggest problems is wasting time. I just let a little time go, and then a little more, and soon I haven't done anything I planned for the day, and everything feels hopeless and why am I even trying and now my dreams are shot before I even gave them a fair chance.

To combat that, right now I'm setting up a calendar on my phone that will alert me every time a new item pops up on my schedule. Shower? Alert. Lunch? Alert. Go to the gym? Alert. This is something new, so who knows how well it will work for me. But it's worth a try. And it's better than resigning myself to missing out on all I want out of life.

Blogging is on that schedule, so hopefully there will be more from me soon.