January 2024
I'm grateful for my friends. Reconnecting with them over the holidays has recharged my creative batteries, and I ended up working on Overworld and grains for the most part of the month.
Overworld is my adaptation of AirXonix for Playdate. An early version of the game is already playable but I have to do my homework on code optimisation before it becomes fun to play. All of the game progress is documented in the devlog and I've been collecting my learnings about the SDK on the Playdate dev page. This little console has been an endless source of inspiration and fun, can't recommend it enough.
In an urge to play the original on an authentic Windows device, I lusted over old IBM ThinkPads on eBay for quite some time, deciding between T60 and T43. Alex came to the rescue and kindly lent me his trusty Lenovo. We learned the guitar cover of Hurt by Johnny Cash when he came over, but couldn't help singing the original Nine Inch Nails lyrics.
I’ve published grains online at the beginning of January and have been updating it regularly, I’m happy with how it turned out. I often find myself pulling up grains instead of a search engine when I need to look up or explain some topic. It was nice to see that the idea of a personal wiki resonated with others, now I secretly hope to inspire more friends to run their own.
I completed 20 out of 30 Days of Yoga this month. It was not a new year's resolution thing but rather an attempt to keep my body in shape without much social commitment. Around the same time our water heating broke, so I was forced to experiment with cold showers for extra health benefits. Two observations: squeezing in a video before breakfast helps with consistency; bouldering sessions became more fun. I am yet to find out how long the 30 days challenge actually lasts.
At times this sabbatical felt like a self-inflicted lockdown, so breaking isolation became important. I started tracking days on which I left home, and my bar got low very fast: going out for groceries counts.
One such venture outside was the CTM festival. I stayed up late to see Skrillex and EPROM on two separate nights at Berghain, and both of them felt special. Osmium threw a hypnotic performance at Silent Green, an event space in the basement of a former crematorium. Unfortunately, I left after a few minutes, as my chest and ears couldn’t handle the loudness.
Two minutes away from Silent Green we discovered migas, a bar where you can enjoy a fizzy drink (my favorite was the Vagabund Brauerei Hopwater) and a quiet conversation while the owner spins records from his vinyl collection. I’d like to explore more places like that. Inspired by the listening bar tradition from Japan they all look somewhat similar but feel so much better than your regular bar in almost every way.
L. and I. came to town for the weekend, so we took them to AVJam on one night and had an unplanned sighting of DJ Omlet in the wild the day after. Unfortunately, he ran out of vegan omelettes too soon this time.
I took another DJ’ing lesson and it became clear that I don’t spend enough time testing tracks on the laptop before moving on to the decks. This was an aha moment but it also threw me off for a while, so I barely made any progress in the last few weeks, apart from finding some great new music on Bandcamp. To have less friction in the process I moved back to using a Pioneer controller and Rekordbox, and it's been a bit of a distraction.
I finished reading “Унеси ты моё горе” and “The Creative Gene”. While the latter isn't strictly a biographical book, Kojima reflects on deeply personal topics of loneliness, social anxiety and suicidality through movies, books and art.
But eventually this lonesome latchkey kid got smarter. I learned how to improvise a pretend family gathering. As soon as I got home, I turned on every light in every room and switched on the TV at high volume-not to watch anything, but to distract from the loneliness. Even in my adulthood, I continue the habit.
The chapter about Taxi Driver
My college years were a particularly dark time in my life. I wasn't able to let go of my dream of making movies, but neither could I find my break. The days went by with nothing but languor and anguish. My college life was so lacking in vitality I might have been dead. I had no one to go to for advice, and not even anyone to just talk to. That was when I met Ian of Joy Division, and Etsuko Takano, the writer of Nijussai no Genten (my starting point at age twenty). Neither were alive. Both had taken their own lives while still young. Rather than the hopeless loneliness I felt inside crowds of the living, I chose to converse with the dead, whom I could never reach.
The chapter on Joy Division
I dedicated a full day to book shopping and visited Babbel Books, Dussman and Modern Graphics, and scored “Спрингфилд”, which I finished in two sittings. It depicts growing up a dreamer and a queer in modern Russia with a touching and devastating realism.
Летний «Кошелев», он же самарский микрорайон «Крутые ключи» — это русский Спрингфилд из трёхэтажек за чертой города и железнодорожного полотна, с современными баскетбольными площадками и доступным жильём, танком, фонтаном и днём ВДВ. До поэтов, инженеров и гопников на самарской земле жили древние венгры. Они были кочевниками, и от них остались стоянки. Одна из них была найдена в Кошелеве. Экскаваторы выгребли венгров и построили доступное жильё для новых кочевников — молодых бедных, как мы. Мы поживём тут, подкопим вещей из IKEA и поедем дальше прерывать довременье.
From the 1st chapter published for free by Freedom Letters
Having tried most of Ottolenghi’s recipes from the Jerusalem book, we switched to Flavour and tested it on our friends. Not to pat ourselves on the back but the food turned out great and I can only say good things about the book so far.
