writing:

progress: covering slashdot for rolling stone.

goals: finish my homework. further interview stephen perkins for Mindjack magazine. persue game spot as a better site for my game reviews. harass giant robot until they accept my amended Sword of the Samurai review.

gardening:

progress: purchased and installed three additional flowering vines. yellow flowering passion vine, white star jasmine, and an orange thing that's just brilliant. I rigged up a few lengths of bamboo behind the thriving pink flowering passion vine to give it room to grow upwards, showcasing the vibrant vine and affording us additional visual shielding from the iron gated condos next door.

goals: sweep up the sticks and debris in the corner by the fence. remove the plastic pots and things from near the other fence. fix the leaky hose and consider irrigation for mo' better watering.

palmpilot painting:

progress: purchased a palm III from ebay and have it ready to spray paint. purchased "colour pack" for palm pilots, extra covers to paint.

goals: visit a hardware store with extensive selection of spray paints and varnishes. experiment with different clear coatings. attempt to mix metallic red with a still wet chrome.

consulting:

progress: don pearman is ramping up again, and we've started to interlink articles and photographs on his truly astonishing site. talking to a river rafting guy about his company web site, perhaps in exchange for a northern california rafting trip. ramping up web 99 with artists and presenters and deadlines and schedules and madness that feels like good training because it's testing my patience and my abilities.

goals: help make web 99 online lounge kick butt. provide outdated expertise at top dollar to forgiving and quirky clients who feed me nice dinners.

gaming:

progress: played Caesar III even after my review, at least to finish my "Quaestor" level city. Ditched that for continuing Half-Life exploration - I'm at the Blast Pit and somehow the game won't let me open doors or shoot some opponents. damn high technology bugs.

i'm abolsutely psyched to have discovered an old game i forgot the name of - daughter of the serpent, where you get to play an egyptologist. thank you home of the underdogs!

goals: track down a working copy of syndicate wars. download quarantine finally. write up sea rogue with screenshots. download terminator 1 and terminator 2. find the synergistic "excalibur" king-arthur strategy games from virgin.

I recently read a throwaway biography of John Maynard Keynes (the financial mind behind state sponsored economic stability in a capitalist system)

it said that:

"the civil service proved deadly dull, and he soon left. He lectured at Cambridge, edited an influential journal, socialized with his Bloomsbury friends, surrounded himself with artists and writers and led an altogether dilettantish life until [World War I propelled him into a career in the Treasury]."

so i think about all the different things i'm doing with my life and today i was feeling maybe i'm a dilettant, but that's not something to worry about for very long. as long as i'm doing things and following through, i feel like a good person. it's a struggle, definitely. having healthy plants helps.

13 june
june 4