With the beautiful days ticking away as I’m stuck inside on my computer and a recent signup at Wakoopa, I’ve been more conscious of how I’m spending my time. It’s not that I’m completely wasting it but it certainly feels that way as I hear kids run around at recess outside or watch the clouds pass in front of bright blue skies. I’m always doing stuff in front of screens. You’d think I worshipped these guys, staring endlessly into their sputtering radiance. But no more!

Every single day, I’m going to do at least one thing that doesn’t involve a screen of any kind. What constitutes a screen? Anything with pixels. No pixels! Not here, not anywhere. What constitutes a “thing”? Whatever it is, it can’t be routine.

crowd

Hey, but what about my iPhone! I can’t live without 3G internet, what if someone emails me and I can’t see the sports score or the twitters news day…

No! Step away. If you can’t leave your cell phone in airplane mode for an hour or keep yourself from checking your email for 5 seconds you should seriously consider why that’s really so important in the first place? What’s the pay out on being constantly connected 24 hours a day? For me i can handle 22 hours a day just fine and the pay out of those 1-2 hours of disconnection is incredible.

crowd

But what about showering? Nobody showers with a screen… Or, or cooking! Yea. Got you there, don’t we?! Your reign of screen-hate is over.

Doesn’t count. If it’s a chore, task, errand or whatever it’s not really adding something new to your life. Because that’s the whole point! On Wednesday I went outside and drew pictures for an hour. Yesterday I went running in my new Vibrams! [I don't usually run]. Today I’m going to shoot some hoops. Work doesn’t count, even if you don’t work in front of a screen all day.

Social things count too. Tonight I’m going out to VEISHA with some friends, and while there may be a guerilla screen or two there [DROID] it will still be an activity that is more spontaneous than it is routine. I’ve tried a bunch of stuff to focus on things outside of work in my life and it always seems to end up being too complicated. This is simple. Once a day, get away from the digital world, however and whenever you can. Even if it’s just for a half hour or ten minutes!

It seems simple and easy, but you’ll have to get pretty creative after just a few days of doing it. Oh yea, that’s the last rule. You can’t do the same thing twice in a row. And if you alternate between two activities you’re missing the whole point again! :)

I’ve posted this little manifesto on the TIGForums, so if you join up post something cool you did with your No Screen time.

Edmund’s points are all very sound, but like any list, it’s easy to pick apart. But really what came out was a discussion about how each of us as developers approaches things from what sometimes is a vastly different angle. Stephen Lavelle [increpare] mentions how he takes issue with most of the points, and with good reason. Stephen makes games for very different reasons than Edmund. It got me thinking again about something I’ve been thinking about a lot since I was talked to Ben about creativity. We were chatting about his ongoing sideproject: Aztez and we got talking about collaborations and he mentioned how he sees most developers as one of two different types of creative people: Artists or Entertainers. That stuck with me and forced me to take it on and ask myself…
Me

Am I an Artist or an Entertainer?

Now there are a lot of problems with grouping someone in such a broad category. Certainly there is a vast spectrum there between those two values and the words Artist and Entertainer are insufficient especially in lieu of the “games as art” dead horse. Perhaps a better divide would be Artists who want to Express an Idea v. Artists who want to Express Emotion? I dunno…

Labeling things like that will only upset people but if you can get past it and ask yourself “which am I?” I think it provides an interesting insight into the “why” of creative expression. If nothing else, it’s a good starting point. So let me start…

Raymond Arnold

If you don’t care about quality and you don’t care about money or recognition, by what metric do you measure yourself at all?

Rob Fearon

Whilst I obviously can’t answer for Stephen, I can answer this for myself. Getting the idea out of my head and onto the screen is far more important a factor for me than anything else. If it turns out to be an idea with some merit (however one might choose to define that on a personal level), then ace. If it isn’t, at least it’s out of my head.

But crucially, I don’t measure myself on the body of my work and wouldn’t care to either. It doesn’t define me. There are far more important things in life to worry about, y’know?

Rob’s feelings on the question of “why” are pretty close to what I feel about making games. Or anything for that matter. Right now I have an idea for a visual poem I want to do. A comic strip that I want to start. An iPhone game that refuses to find a home. These are all things that fester inside me and I desperately want to expel them. Not that they’re demons of any shape, but it’s this compulsion to create that drives me. Showing it to other people is a nice side effect, it’s always nice to hear someone got something out of something I did, but it’s not the why. The why is much more selfish.

Raymond Arnold

the people who are most successful (both in terms of quality and recognition for that quality) tend to do most of [Edmund's] things.

Stephen Lavelle

Screw quality, screw recognition, screw success.

I understand what Stephen is saying here and I think his heart is in the right place and I definitely feel the frustration of forcing a “focus on success” type of attitude. Too often do we assume that everyone else in the world wants tons of money and fame. Though I do take issue with the bit about quality. If I have an idea for something and I can’t execute it like I see it in my head then it’s never as satisfying as creating something that I feel is 100% realized how I envisioned. Now, that doesn’t really exist, just like no circle is perfect, but there are things that I’ve done that I’m still proud of today and then there are many that I am not. I am highly critical of myself and if I weren’t I probably would have gotten bored of this a long time ago. It’s that unreachable goal of perfectly capturing and conveying an idea and transferring it from my head to the screen/page/canvas that also drives me [mad].

Exactly why I do what I do

I want to get more specific though, because this is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. For me, the real reason I make video games boils down to a very specific, very discernible moment.

It’s “seeing it live”. It’s a feeling I clued in to over a decade ago doing Final Fantasy VII fan sites in PageMaker. I would type in some code, save the file and then load it up in the browser. I’d see the changes and it would work! It felt awesome and I was hooked. I had this thing [webpage] that I could endlessly modify and watch it work and show to others. It had this whole hairy underbelly that only I knew about and I would be pulling the levers and setting it up just right. Games are a lot like that. Animation; 3D modeling; they all have elements of alchemy that let you surprise yourself. There’s something very abstract about the process, much like Pollock probably experienced when he was playing with gravity and paint on a canvas. The work would surprise him and he’d respond and refine and respond and refine…

That’s why I make games, or why I do anything creative. I’m addicted to that. I enjoy drawing, but when I draw I usually find a way to play with my subconscious by laying down a doodle and then responding to it, or venturing into watercolor or inkwash and letting the water do its thing with the paper. In my early college years at Iowa I did a lot of symmetrical abstract work in Photoshop using the Liquify filter and hundreds of blend layers horizontally flipped to create something incredibly unexpected, yet recognizable. The moment just before turning on the blend mode to see what it would look like was that nugget of crack that I craved out of the whole process.

So in the end, it’s completely selfish. There was a time that I thought what I was doing would somehow make a difference in the world, or help people understand each other a bit better so that maybe the world would be a better place, but the last few years of my life have taken that view out of the idyllic and into the realistic. It’s impossible to save something that doesn’t want to be saved even if it needs it. I don’t think what I’m doing is bad, and I still do believe in what I’m doing is for the good, but it’s clear now that it’s much more for myself than it is for others. If others get something out of it, then that’s the icing.

When I transferred from the University of Iowa to Iowa State University to pursue a degree in graphic design something switched on inside of me. The challenges that the rigorous ISU design program posed brought out the best in me. I arrived on campus at the beginning of the spring semester with little choice but to complete the year-long curriculum within half the time recommended [1 semester]. Since you can [and probably should] spend all your free time polishing your projects to make sure you have the best shot at being accepted when you hand in that all important portfolio at the end of the year, spending a full year instead of 1 semester will help your chances.

That’s what I did. I spent 95% of my waking life working. When summer came around I took a much needed break, but after a couple months I received my acceptance letter and then it all started again. Only a few days later I sat down to think about designing a game. I’d always loved games, but I never thought it was possible. After accomplishing what often seemed like an impossible task [acceptance into the graphic design program] and seeing that ISU offered an experimental game development workshop, I thought maybe it wasn’t so impossible after all. So that was the end of “breaks” for me. I chose to tackle one of the most time consuming majors at ISU while simultaneously home-brewing some kind of game development education in my off-time.

In the back of my head I knew I’d never get a break between the two, but that was ok with me. In the cocoon of college it made sense. Everyone around me had their heads down with me and we banded together to get through it. It was great! I had a like-minded support group that enjoyed the same things I did. Working creatively is extremely fulfilling and often fun. So that’s what I did for the next 4 years.

The first 2 years were jammed with graphic design. What was previously 2 classes full of projects and endless polish, was now 3 and a half classes. It was certainly tough, but nothing my workaholic attitude couldn’t handle. After awhile though, classes got easier which made more room for game development. My first two semesters in game dev were mainly about research and design documentation. The stuff that isn’t game development, but I had to get that out of my system. It was still all-consuming though and it took up most of my nights and weekends. I took a couple jobs, mostly 20/week during the school year doing web-dev which carried on into the summer. I worked 5 jobs my junior summer. Some of it was freelance, others were part-time wage work. All of them were design related and consuming. As an incoming senior I found a spot at the Virtual Reality Applications Center [VRAC] which marked the shift from mostly graphic design to mostly game development. Now it was time to start the real work.

I was scheduled for 40hrs/week but I spent way more there. I met people at VRAC that I’d been looking for for years at ISU. Capable people who wanted to make games, not just talk about making them. It was an infectious environment and like everything else, I binged. It went so well that it spawned our first game, Dinowaurs. In the early morning twilight of VRAC we fashioned our pitch to Adult Swim and Kongregate. A few months later we would founded intuition and I would spend my last semester at ISU as a part-time student and a more-than-full time game developer.

After graduation, Dinowaurs continued at break-neck speed. What I didn’t have time to realize then was that I was working at the same pace, if not harder, but my support group was dwindling. What once was dozens of peers was now 3 or 4 and they were all decidedly male. Instead of working inside a lively and social community, I was working within a mostly “incestuous” family. That’s not giving the situation enough credit, but it’s a good way to get across the idea that it wasn’t healthy.

We released Dinowaurs, marched on and released a bunch of smaller games. That was a lot of fun but it didn’t exactly help the situation. In some ways it hurt us. The success of Effing Hail and acclaim for Gray washed over the fact that we had no friends or social life other than on the internet. The worst part about this whole thing though was that we were oblivious. Sure we knew we had no friends and we made cracks about it in a self-deprecating way, because we really do have friends. Great friends that may be few, but they are close and awesome. But we never hung out with them, we were too involved in the projects for a number of reasons but I think for me it was mostly about escaping the reality that life had changed drastically and I didn’t want to face that.

Just recently I came home from IndieCade. It was the most fun I’ve had since I went to Rome for a semester. The level of camaraderie and love that permeated the place was incredible and I wish I could have bottled it somehow so I would never run out. But that was really the issue when I got back. Returning to my gray Iowa world with no indie-love, no lively social life, and no avocado-tomato-on-everything restaurants really gave me the perspective I needed to realize just how gray and awful my life had become.

After I got back I felt like never making a game again. I hated the idea of making games. I didn’t want to work on anything. I opened up Illustrator to see about a new idea I had and I couldn’t even use the pen tool without getting disgusted. I’d never felt so miserable and I had no idea why. On top of it all I was sick. It wasn’t until I took a few days to think about my life and put everything in perspective that I realized why I was so miserable. I mean, the whole time I was thinking “man, I’m making games, that’s awesome!” It is awesome, but that doesn’t make us super-human. Just because I enjoy my work a great deal doesn’t mean it’s not destructive to constantly be working. In fact it makes it more dangerous since there’s no rational justification for stopping something you like doing.

So, after realizing all of this, I made some new rules.

1. Leave my laptop at work.
2. Never turn down an opportunity to hang out with friends.
3. Always take weekends off. Always.
4. Wake up with the Sun.
5. Exercise.

I’m not sure if this will help, but I think half the battle here was realizing that you can’t just work and work and work and work. Eventually you’ll go to an IndieCade and realize your life sucks and have to change it.

Mikengreg just returned safely from IndieCade to the gray plains of Iowa and we couldn’t be happier. It’s Mike’s birthday [wish him well on twitter] today and we’re both charged full of IndieCade. Countless memories, so many new-old friends, it was an unbelievable gathering of intimate and heartfelt personalities that we will never forget. We love you all.

Mike was so happy he dusted off his stripping skills for you all.

While I was considering on writing more of a reflective post on how this has transformed my life, I think right now there’s simply too much to talk about and the message would get lost. For now, here are some videos that capture a little bit of the tone of our experience.

Also check out my flickr set for all of the [crappy] pictures I took during the festival.

IndieCade Videos

Cactus makes for great couch play. ;) Here’s part 2 [much longer at 9+ min.]

Zach and Steph battle it out. Check out Unify

She doesn’t just write adventure games, she lives them!

Not to brag or anything but we slept together. :P

In a lapse of judgement Daniel gives up his trade secret: brain damage.

This kept going on with MarioKart and glitch art. Very cool.

Browsing the Newgrounds forums.

Noticing, without anticipation, I just made the 222nd post here.

Apparently tinyurl is just as much of a headcase as I am…

Let’s fire it up!

Geocities & MS Frontpage 1998-2002

I will never be able to remember the address for all this madness, but during this time I spent a lot of time making FFVII fan sites. I’d rip walkthroughs off of GameFAQs or something and make webpages with the most unholy of WYSIWYG editors: Microsoft Frontpage. I learned HTML and all sorts of dirty hackery like hotspots, frames and other now-bad practices. Though, it’s what eventually led to my ability to be a game developer.

wu.sw0bes.com 2002-2005

I refuse to read any of the text on these pages. Just know that I was young, idealist and trying to “find myself.” We’ve all been there and if you haven’t been, you will be someday. During this time I was trying a lot of stuff out. I made animated music videos in Flash, [even Windows Movie Maker] tons of digital art, took loads of pictures outside, documented just about every dream I ever had, wrote a bunch of poetry, non-fiction stuff, short stories, and drew a bunch of crazy intricate doodles while redesigning my website just about every 6 months. For the most part it was fun, and somewhat fulfilling, albeit aimless. It’s too bad the images didn’t cache [though I don't blame the archive] so you can’t see all of my past madness. But maybe that’s for the best…

maroonedmoon.com 2004-2005

Ah, my first domain. Since I’ve probably purchased a few dozen, but this one was just another creative outlet. I’d post anything I thought worthy of going up there, mostly photography and digital art stuff. During this time I was really into image manipulation, symmetry and nature photography, all of which were of amateur quality. I also was obsessed with the moon, specifically lunar eclipses. After this phase of my life, I realized I wasn’t happy with my artistic abilities and started to ask myself: “What makes something look better than others?” It’s a tough question, but it’s why I decided to head to an honest design school. I knew certain designs/websites/paintings looked better than others, and I knew why some of the time, but otherwise I was lost on where to begin.

gregwohlwend.com 2005-2009

Apparently 2005 is too recent for the Wayback Machine, but gregwohlwend.com has probably gone through about 4 total redesigns, maybe more. Gregwohlwend.com more or less marks the beginning of my trying to be a designer in earnest. I tabled my more wild artistic dementia in favor of stuff that would actually get me a job. It did during college, but by the time I was out, I didn’t want a job anymore. Nor was I interested in the wild-artistic-dementia mentioned earlier.

mile222.com 2007-2009

As for mile222, that’s probably gone through 2 total redesigns, starting out as a portfolio experiment which eventually turned into what you see today. So here’s to the Wayback Machine! Continuing on its valiant quest to archive the internet, as impossible as it may sound…

EDIT: BTW, this was the 222 post published on mile222.com! :)

Per usual, I’ve extrapolated them out into a series of half-baked metaphors. Here are those things in numerated list form!

1. Would you get married to someone without knowing them first?

If you said yes, well then definitely don’t start a business. You’re probably in it for the romance of the thing and business [like marriage] isn’t romantic. If you’re like most people, and you prefer to acquire a fair understanding of the individual before signing binding documents committing what might be half of your total self to them, then take heed. Starting a business is not much different. Know your potential partner first. Work with them. For a long time.

It wasn’t until about a year after starting intuition that Mike and I had enough fights that we could be completely comfortable working with one another. It’s not enough to just know the person, or be friends with them. They may end up being totally different people to work with. Moreover, working with someone day-in and day-out on something you are both passionate about [a baby] brings up a lot of healthy, and sometimes unhealthy, conflict. Sometimes it’s too much, sometimes there aren’t fights at all and that’s the problem. Whatever it is depends on the people involved, it needs to come to the surface and that takes time and energy. Make sure to expend enough of both before you “elope.”

2. Are you a polygamist?

This is a bit of a misnomer, because getting into an equal business partnership with more than 1 person is worse than polygamy. At least in a traditional polyamorous relationship [Mormon-wise] there’s often some sort of male-dominant chauvinistic hierarchy. In an equally shared business partnership between more than two people you are basically amplifying the potential for disaster because there’s really no “order of operations.”

When we started intuition, we did this exact thing. 4 of us were excited about working together, finally finding competent and passionate people that could potentially get something off the ground. If we hadn’t done it, I know I would be worse off today. But if I were to do it all over again I wouldn’t have started a business per say, or at least one that would have a life outside of the project we were working on. I would have opted for a per-project type of organization that would provide for much less restriction. In fact, I’d argue we didn’t really need the operating agreement or any of that. Legalese replaces trust and we all trusted each other at least to the point that none of us would betray the other. We would have made Dinowaurs and have been done with it. That comes off as harsh at first glance and a little unnecessary, but it would have changed things immensely. With each of us armed with the knowledge that we would have to figure something out after Dinowaurs we would have approached the entire situation much differently.

3. How well do you know yourself?

This is probably the toughest one because it’s a catch-22. You’ve got to go through it first in order to investigate your own personality deep enough to be conscious of what’s important. Not explicitly though, maybe you’ve got a penchant for understanding these potential relationships, or you’ve been through a nasty divorce or two enough to know what the real hard work is. Nonetheless here’s the short list of stuff you should know.

• How you want to work.
• Who you want to work with.
• What kind of work you want to do.
• Where you want to be as a result of this endeavor.
• Why you are doing it. With 100% Honesty.

Each of these are tough questions, and not a single one should be breezed over until you’re as sure as you can be about the answer. Even then this doesn’t cover the gamut. The main takeaway: you should know what you want to do [the easiest part], why you want to do it [the hard part], how you want to do it [the harder part], and who you want to do it with [the hardest part]. Some of the difficulty varies wildly from person to person. Someone may know exactly what kind of people they work with but remain clueless on what they want their work to mean to them.

I’ve been in a few serious romantic relationships and even after those I’m still not sure what I’m looking for in another woman. People are a complex mess of behavior and emotion and getting two to live together on an exceptional level [happily] for an extended period of time [ever after] is an incredible unlikelihood [doesn't exist?]. Finding a business partner is not much different. Granted there’s not much fighting about the minutiae usually found in a stereotypical martial spat, the stakes are somewhat elevated because many times decisions relay directly into paying the bills and livelihood. Don’t take it lightly. Don’t be naive. You wouldn’t take marriage lightly would you? It will become your life. Choose wisely.

4. How well do you know your prospective partner(s)?

Ask them the same 5 questions above. Ask them in a serious and private setting and make sure everyone thinks long and hard about the answers. It’s not in anyone’s best interest to be anything but 100% honest.

We only recently did this, which prompted the splitting up of intuition into a collective. I like to think we’re all much happier for it, even if it was painful to do the actual splitting. It’s just more evidence that being honest and openly communicating with people is paramount when dealing with any kind of trust/partnership. For us, there was some branching on the questions of “Why are you doing it?” and “What kind of work do you want to do?”, which are not easy questions to answer for a lot of reasons. There’s a lot of gray area in these as well which can lead to temporary confusion. If someone in the partnership “doesn’t mind” doing a certain task, or taking a certain project while the other is thinking it’s the only thing they ever wanted to work on, that can lead to a relative disparity between the two. It might not be immediately evident and in a lot of ways this can lead to a worsened scenario due to how time tends to exacerbate the growing chasm. It’s the whole “rip off the band-aid” thing.

More to the point though, there’s a lot to be said for people doing exactly what they want to do. Partners, employees, wives and so forth. If someone in the team is working on something they’re not honestly passionate about, it’s a waste. This may seem blue-sky and all that, but with a small team [2-4 people] I don’t think it’s that lofty. Sure, at some point we all have to do things we don’t want to even when it’s a project we’re really passionate about, but that’s just reality. I’m talking about working on something that you think will “make you a buck”, “serve a market” or “get you cred” that’s outside of what actually interests you about the work. If it doesn’t serve your own interests, then why would it be interesting to anyone else? Be courageous. Dare to do it.

5. Do you really want to start a business?

Maybe you just want to work with someone on a project and split the profits 50/50. Maybe you just want to make something and can’t find enough people to do so. Sometimes “starting a business” gets people excited. Their eyes get larger and you both embark on this adventure into the unknown. I admit, it’s exciting. It still excites me. But know that if you really want to start a business, then go ahead and do it. You’ll learn a great deal, and maybe the next go-round you’ll get it right.

Regardless of blue-sky solutions to the ever-present problem of an unbalanced pantry, starting fresh allowed me the opportunity to evaluate how to get the most out of a trip to the grocery store. The list below is actually what I purchased tonight. More importantly though are the categories I separated them into. From that, it’s a bit easier to see how buying things that are more modular/generic can actually provide more variety. Of course, you’ve gotta have some spices/oils and know-how lying around as well…

Protein

1. 18 Large Eggs
2. Baked Beans [2 large cans]
3. Chicken Drumstricks [3 lbs.]
4. Pork Chops [1.5 lbs.]

Vegetables

1. Frozen Vegetables [2 pkgs.]
2. Hashbrowns [1 pkg.]
3. Potatoes [3 lbs.]
4. White Onions [1.5 lbs.]
5. Peeled Tomatoes [2 large cans]
6. Tomato Sauce [2 small cans]

Starch

1. Pasta [3 pkgs.]
2. Short Grain Brown Rice [2 lbs.]
3. Wasa Multigrain Crackers [2 pkgs.]
4. Wheat Bread [1 loaf]

Total Price

1. $46.23

I left out a few things, like the bananas I bought and the 18-pack of microwave popcorn. I don’t buy a lot of fruit, probably because I don’t dig on sweets much, but also because they tend to spoil pretty quickly. The vegetables I bought keep for awhile in the fridge and the others are frozen, so I’m pretty well off in that respect. Nonetheless, there’s a pretty even smattering from the three key food groups in my life. The pasta could be a side with a stir fry of the vegetables, or I could use the peeled tomatoes for marinara. The rice can go with just about any of the vegetables/protein combos either as a side or as fried-rice + eggs and so on…

I’m pretty excited about this venture. I’m guessing these groceries should feed me lunch and dinner for about 2 weeks, maybe longer. As for breakfast, that’s what the bananas are for. When those run out I’ll probably pick up some yogurt or just skip breakfast all together. I never have much of an appetite right after I wake up anyway. The take-away here is that eating cheaply doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice nutrition, stock your cheeks full of additives/preservatives and synthetic food-stuffs, or sell your soul to Ronald McDonald. Try to focus on all the different ways you can work with a single, versatile ingredient like the potato. Once you have all those under your belt, cross-breed them into masterpieces!

But why 222? I see that number everywhere. It’s been my address, friend’s addresses, when I look at the clock it reads 2:22. I see coupons for 2 burgers for $2.22… o_O Some might say this kind of synchronicity is a sign, or perhaps some other force trying to guide me through life. Maybe they’re right, I certainly don’t rule that out. But I think, more likely that it’s a reminder that we tend to recognize what we want to recognize. If I’m looking for 222 all the time, I’m going to see it and remember it. I see a digital clock probably hundreds of times a day but I only truly remember looking at it when it reads 2:22 because it means something more to me since I’ve allowed that number to be more than just a number to me.

I use 222 whenever I can. 222 pixels of Gaussian blur. 222 frames of flash animation inside a movie clip. I also like 42, well, because of geeky Hitchhiker’s Guide reasons. It’s more of a personal joke to myself to use those numbers when they are called for, and somehow that imbues that piece of work with something beyond a simple alpha value… Instead, it is the Omega answer to the great universal question of: “What should I set this alpha to?” as opposed to just some number. I used to be obsessed with using the Fibionacci sequence wherever I could, in animation, design and etc. I still use it occasionally because that type of “sacred geometry” is useful as a designer/artist.

Sacred geometry is very much the same thing as my 222 synchronicity complex but on a much broader scale. By perpetuating those ideas of sacred geometry over the centuries it becomes much more basic than just an idea. It’s intrinsic. And with some cases, it becomes Common Knowledge. I guess if you reward the broken-record for long enough people start seeing meaning in things that are logically meaningless. And it doesn’t end. With enough years, an entire people can create complete, air-tight paradigms around once meaningless figures, shapes and symbols. But really, I think it’s a pretty cool thing, and certainly a testament to the vibrant imagination of the human mind.

So, yea. That’s where this site gets its name. I plan on posting pictures of 222 stuff more often, I don’t make a habit of doing that nowadays, but I’ll try to do more of that to break up the “tl;dr” posts that seem to be coming out of my brain more and more these days.