Where do thoughts and feelings go, if there is no one to receive them?  Does there really exist a place where there are no longer any ungranted wishes?  Will anyone ever return to the place, the time from whence they came?  All of those memories shimmering behind us in the sea.  I wish I could dive in and embrace them forever...but I must stay here.  For I am no longer alone.

No longer am I trembling with quickly beating heart, waiting for someone to wrap her wings gently around me.  But it was neither an angel nor a bird that lifted me from the steam, but a cat that found me and showed me that the water was not so deep, that if I turned around the sun would still be shining for me after I finished crying, and that there was a place we could return to.  Together.

Today:

- Wrote Christmas letter #24 out of 31
- Started and finished my ballot for voting
- Put out another minor update for our Ludum Dare game
- Rated 5 more Ludum Dare games for a total of 40
- Put ~2 more hours into my song for the Carole & Tuesday project (very nearly finished)
- Did the laundry...

Tomorrow:

- Christmas letter #25
- More Ludum Dare rating
- Final version of the song
- October "Monthlies" pixel art album cover...(?)
- Take apart second DDR pad...

"don't you forget that I love you", you said.

But you've already forgotten, haven't you?

Way overdue for one of these...it's a little presumptuous of me to apologize, as that would probably be overestimating the impact of my writing on others.  But I'd apologize anyways.

Ludum Dare happened!  (Ludum Dare is a 48/72hr game jam that happens twice a year)  We made a game!  There is still a lot of work to do be done on our game before we are really satisfied with it, so we aren't really sharing our game around a lot at this moment.  But it is up, if you would like to try it.

The after-LD fallout was =real= this time...I spent a good two weeks feeling pretty tired/drained, or just in general just feeling overwhelmed by stuff to do.  It really doesn't help that LD coincides with xmas letter writing month, as that just adds to the list of stuff to do.  Nor does it help that the Carole and Tuesday project deadline was also in October and due to factors outside of my control I was not able to complete that ahead of time.  The Vote Forward mailout day was also in October and I did my part in contributing 85 letters.

Anyways, LD work is still ongoing, and there's roughly a week left in the rating/voting period.  I don't expect to place super highly this time around, but I mean, it's LD and the voting is pretty random at times, so you never really know (and should not really care...).

Progress is steady (of course) on the xmas letters -- I have completed 19 so far, with 12 left remaining for the rest of the month.  Already almost 2/3rds of the way there!  I have been able to really get a feel for my new pens through this writing process.  I should maybe do a megapost where I review all of my different pens...

I have not played an alttpr seed for the entire month!  I keep meaning to get back onto the train, but have not =(  I guess that is just how October works... there's just been a bunch of games in general that I've been wanting to play, but keep on not getting around to =(.  On the other hand...

I'm on chapter 7 now of Ikenfell -- a new and highly praised indie RPG -- and it has been great so far!  Lots of people lauding it for not only its characters, gameplay, story, design, and art, but also its content warning and accessibility features, and also its lgbtq+ representation, which is...refreshing, to say the least.  I can perhaps do a full writeup on Ikenfell later.  But for now I have to say that SIDEGRADES are so, so, so good in RPGs.  I love customizability and the ability to weigh different tradeoffs (some of which may depend on your strategy) in general is just.....fun!  It's what made me love tactics ogre so much and Ikenfell has a little of that too.  Maybe not in spades, but there's enough to keep things interesting, at the very least.  I'm hard-pressed to find anything bad to say about Ikenfell, honestly.  It's just been enjoyable all around.

Falling off of the BBS train at this point, basically.  The Falcon's Eye game is not super interesting and I gave up after mistakenly passing the month with the wrong set of labor employments and losing a bunch of people/land as a result (twice) -- and just started attacking the smaller county, just to at least go out with a bang/make things interesting.  In LORD I actually killed the red dragon, which felt great, I've never actually beaten that before.  Unfortunately I didn't actually end up finishing Ultimate Universe yet.  I got to the point where I just accumulated masses of credits and resources, but to finish the game you have to find the Takkian artifacts and do something with them and I haven't been able to pin them down or anything.  Maybe someday?  But probably not this month, for sure, lol xP

We've gotten a few MtG games in remotely, over Spelltable, which has been nice!  Another thing that I'd be doing more of if not for trying to catch up on other stuff.  We have been doing our Theros: Beyond Death sealed pools, and I had kind of a tricky pool to build, and I had to try a few obvious combinations (which I think were traps) before I ended up settling on what I think is the "correct" build -- a UG constellation deck, featuring Setessian Champion, a bunch of enchantments, and a very minor spells-on-opponent's-turn theme in blue.

Last week I had my first go at making real, legit, boil-the-pork-bones-for-hours, tonkotsu ramen!  It turned out =great=, despite some extra stress and anxiety around putting the bowl all together (I need to find a better way to deal with the noodles).  Very savory, very tasty -- I can really only describe it as "unctuous" in the good way.  Also featuring pork belly that I cooked via sous vide and then blowtorched, and a simple shoyu tare that I made the night before.

I still have another portion of the broth frozen, so when I am feeling up to it I will probably put it to use by trying to make a miso tare and using the broth for some nice bowls of miso ramen.  That will probably turn out well, too.

For now though I am attempting (and failing) to take a break from cooking, as I think I just need a break from some things in general (if the first two weeks of October were any indication).

I've been online knife shopping and I think I found what I hope is "the one" for me: this super nice santoku blade from Hiroshi Kato: https://www.chefknivestogo.com/kavgdawa17.html

It's super thin, very light, got a Japanese handle, and a pretty striking damascus steel finish.  After getting the carbon steel nakiri I decided that A) a nakiri was cool but in the end I really just want a santoku, and B) carbon steel feels great to sharpen but I think I really just want a stain-resistant non-reactive metal for my blade since I am always doing other things in the kitchen and it's nice to not have to dry your knife carefully after every use.

So yeah, pretty excited for this one, and pretty certain that I'll like it based on the other knives that I own.  Maybe I'll even get a display stand for it...or maybe that's going a bit too far.

There's probably other stuff too, but that's probably enough of an update for now.

The only reason I pay it forward is because I cannot pay it back.