Kinda Sorta Making Games

September 01, 2021 by Adam in Adam's Projects

I sometimes miss making games and telling stories.  For about a year now I'll occasionally break out a little web-based game project and tinker with it.  I had a little time over my beach vacation to play around with it.  I got to the point where I could make a grid of walls and floors and put a little robot on it that would jump from square to square, pathfinding as expected.  I'm never sure if it'll turn into a functioning final product, but it's been fun to play around with things.

A Comfy Loft

August 10, 2021 by Adam in Adam's Projects

Joanna and I went out to the cabin again today to move the loft down 4 1/2".  It sounds silly, but the difference ended up being fairly dramatic in the end.  It's no longer a claustrophobic nightmare and instead a cozy bed looking out into the forest.

The work itself was fairly straightforward.  We put up reinforced rails to rest it on, pried it away from the wall where the last nails were hanging on, bent the nails, and then lowered it down to new rails with a ladder and car jack.  There was some mild cursing here and there, but we reattached the loft with screws and tossed up the mattress to give it a try.  There's a bit more work to make sure it's solid, but the end result turned out well.

Balcony Sanctuary

June 16, 2021 by Adam in Adam's Projects

Joanna's been working hard on turning our balcony into a cozy little spot to hang out.  I've helped a bit - hauling dirt, attaching hardware, and holding umbrella pulls to be cut shorter.  The end result is phenominal.  Today I snuck out and just sat under the shade, warming my legs in the sun.  It was lovely.

Hole Digging Vacation

March 24, 2021 by Adam in Adam's Projects

I've had the last three days off, the last two of which I've spent digging a big hole for the foundation for Joanna's little cabin at the farm.  It's back breaking work, with thick, clay soil.  Last night I came home exhausted, then weirdly woke up early and headed out for more until noon today.  I have the bulk of the digging done, along with axing roots and generally clearing things up.  I think we'll have to frame it as it's at a pretty significant slope, but we're closer than we were.  Tomorrow I leave my hole digging vacation behind me and return to work and relax.

Ben got contacts today and is very excited.  It reminded me of getting glasses when I was little and noticing contrails in the sky for the first time.  Emma's trying to figure out what she's going to do with her free time now that she's going down to a single class.  Duncan hung out with a friend last night to sit around the fire and roast marshmallows.

Life is still bumpy from time to time, but a couple days of hard labor was strangely uplifting.

Garden Beds

January 12, 2021 by Adam in Adam's Projects

Last weekend, Joanna put in a bunch of work getting the garden beds in.  We hauled dirt, spread sand from the old sandbox, and generally got things ready for planting again.  It was satisfying, one of those small victories in an otherwise hard year.  The beds have a gap of a foot or so of air between the beds and the ground, hopefully preventing roots from getting in and choking out the vegetables.  Here's hoping for the best.

RetroPie

January 08, 2021 by Adam in Adam's Projects

I asked for a Raspberry Pi for Christmas, which is a low-cost tiny computer that runs Linux and is used for all sorts of interesting projects, from weather stations to garden watering systems.  One thing people do with it is run old video games using emulators, and there's a well-known community to support it.  After mulling over options, I also bought a lift-top coffee table.  It took the duration of Monty Python's Holy Grail to assemble the thing, but it worked pretty well and nicely fit the old monitor and speakers I had laying around.

Yesterday I finally drilled holes for cables and finished putting it together.  Ben was my beta tester, playing old Atari games and a little Sonic before we had to stop and make dinner.