The blog has been out of action for about 10 months or so, give or take a post or two. Competing in IFComp 2010 took an enormous amount of effort, and I burned out hard after the competition was over. I let pretty much all of my creative activities drop, and am just starting to put the pieces back together. This blog was the last piece of creative expression to go and will be the first to come back, but I’m going to pace myself this time. I’ll start with a post a week, and if I can sustain that I’ll try to move back to two or more posts if I have sufficient content and time to write.
It’s not that I lack for material — far from it! A lot of things have happened in the intervening time. We’ve had wild and wooly changes with Katherine’s autism — most notably, she now has diagnoses for autism and Tourette’s Syndrome, and is on medication to help with the severe tics she has as well as the anxiety those tics create.
I’ve read tons of good books, seen a lot of good (and bad) movies, and have played some of the most cinematic, richly-produced, narratively advanced PC and console games I’ve ever seen, all of which I’d like to discuss and review at more length as the weeks go by.
On the personal front, I injured my knee (again) and recovered, got back playing racquetball regularly, and started lifting weights, which puts me in probably the best overall physical shape I’ve been in for years. The kids continue to grow and develop. Thomas continues doing well in school and competing in various sports (flag football is the newest addition). Jonathan has developed into a little charmer, talking constantly and grinning at you with his winning smile — at least when he’s not throwing a full-bore terrible twos tantrum. Robin continues to do the impossible on a daily basis, keeping the kids and Katherine’s staff organized and productive. When Jonathan goes to school and she’s ready to work, she should be able to step right into a CEO or COO position without blinking an eye.
And, of course, when October rolls around, it’s going to be IFComp season once again. I don’t have a game in the Comp this year, but that means I can write reviews while it’s in progress, and I’m planning to cover every entry this year. I can’t wait to see what returning veterans and new authors alike have for us this year!
Finally, I’ve also linked the blog to Facebook, to provide folks that prefer social networking an easier portal to see content here. I hope it works properly — let me know if something seems messed up. So watch this space in the coming weeks for more updates. We’ve got a lot of catching up to do!
