Progress Report
How have things been going since my failed attempt at a Soul Day? =)
Friday night:
Ended up playing a couple of trials of Adventure Games off of Big Fish Games. Had an “a-ha!” moment. I’ve been toying around with the idea of making my own adventure game for a while, and now I have a more concrete goal which is to develop one and sell it through Big Fish =) Seems to be a very accessible route, and there are some games on there that I know I can top!
Saturday:
I don’t really remember what I did for most of the day… But by evening, I felt extremely convicted to get my copy of Riven working on some computer in my house. I had bought the Myst 10th Anniversary DVD pack last summer, but couldn’t get the games to run properly on my computer or Nick’s. I played Riven way back in Jr. High I think, and thought it was amazing, though I was a little too young to really appreciate it and figure things out on my own. Now that I’ve got Mystery House thoughts running through my head, I really wanted to be able to experience Riven again.
I finally got it running on my old PC which runs Windows XP, and besides a few freezes here, an error message there, the game runs pretty smoothly! I ended up playing til about 1 am that night =)
Sunday:
Um..kind of played Riven, like..all day. It was pretty fantastic. I ate white cheddar popcorn and drank soda and played a video game all day. THIS was my successful Soul Day! After I got tired of playing for the day (read: after it got dark outside and I stopped playing so I wouldn’t be too scared to go to sleep later), I read some Ender’s Shadow. Still conflicted over enjoying Card’s writing while being disgusted by his views about homosexuality (well, not so much his views, he’s allowed to have whatever views he wants, but the discriminatory actions he thinks should be taken against gay people in general). Still enjoying the book again regardless and looking forward to re-reading the rest of the series.
Monday:
ANT ATTACK! Who knows what Monday could have been if it weren’t for the ants! Nick spotted them crawling all over a plate of cake crumbs I had left out over night, and then promptly left for work, haha. He may or may not have had a bit of a traumatic ant experience as a child… I traced their path down the table, across the carpet, and into a little cranny where the fireplace/wall/carpet meet. I deduced that they were originally attracted by some of the white cheddar popcorn that had fallen on the floor. So for the rest of the morning I proceeded to Windex and vacuum the ants into oblivion, and then set up four ant traps around their source, with a cinnamon barrier to keep them from exploring further. Did you know ants hate cinnamon? They walk right up to it, get freaked out, and turn around. It’s magical! And you can just sprinkle it around on the floor and carpet without really worrying about getting anything dirty because, well, it’s cinnamon! Hooray! Anyway, a side effect of the ant attack was that I cleaned most of the living room and dining room to avoid another infestation. Neither of these were areas I meant to clean over the weekend, but it was nice having some part of the house clean anyway.
Most of the rest of the day was spent playing Riven and getting totally exhausted with it. This game is tough! I don’t know how anybody beat it when it first came out and there were no walkthroughs. I was pretty proud of myself for getting as far as I did without any help though. It had a nice level of toughness in the beginning, where I would get totally stuck, but about five minutes later I would figure out what I needed to do next. It was strange, because for a lot of the times I was stuck, there were entire islands and sections and puzzles that were totally available to me, I just hadn’t figured out how to access them yet. I had overlooked whatever button or lever would take me to them. And when I got the most frustrated was when I had a handful of puzzles with no hint at the clues/solutions needed to solve them. Or a handful of clues with no puzzle to apply them to. Eventually I found help online and discovered all the corresponding hints/puzzles were within those accessible but undiscovered places. Very interesting but frustrating.
So Monday was pretty much ANTS, Riven, dinner, reading, and then doing some preliminary planning for our anniversary in September. We (I) want to do something fun and relaxing where we don’t really have to do anything to make it happen. Our honeymoon was a lot of figuring things out as we went along, walking around the city, etc., which was fun! But also exhausting. I want relaxing this time =D I want there to be a place to go to eat dinner that is always open and is possibly included in the price of our trip. I think we’ve narrowed it down between a Disney cruise or a straight up Disney World trip, but I would say we’re leaning towards the cruise. Really, whichever one I’m looking at at the time is the one that appeals to me more, haha. Neither of us has been on a cruise though, and Nick did a lot of Disney trips for band and such when he was growing up in Florida, so I don’t think he’s as excited about that idea as I am (I only went once as a little kid).
Today:
Today has been awesome! I don’t know how it happened, but I ended up finishing up all the dishes, and getting all of the new kitchen items that my parents brought us put away in places that made sense. Actually, I also rearranged some of the things we already had and put them in more sensible places depending on how much we used them, how heavy they are, etc. Then I cleaned some of the other parts of the house that I had planned on cleaning! And then I talked Nick out of the chicken dinner I had promised him and we got pizza instead! Overall it’s been a pretty sweet day so far! I think I’m ready to go sit in the quiet bedroom and go back through The Renaissance Soul and see how it pertains to my life post-quittingmyjob.
It’s weird, because I feel kind of this pressure now that I quit my job. I feel like I have all these expectations, from myself, from my family, from my friends, from my old co-workers, from Nick. Is it OK to kind of take it slow at first until I get ready to really begin? Nick answered that for me, without me even asking anything. He said “I don’t want to hear any complaining about you not getting things done. Maybe if like.. it’s been two weeks and you haven’t done anything, then maybe you can complain a little bit. But otherwise, I don’t wanna hear it. I don’t care. So, yeah.” He’s used to me making lofty productivity goals for myself that I cannot possibly meet, and then hearing me whine and complain when I inevitably fail to meet them. He’s made it very clear that my choice to quit my job does not mean any new pressure from him to do anything at all. He really, truly, just wants me to be happy doing whatever it is that makes me happy. He doesn’t want me to think he has all these expectations for me as a stay-at-home, work-from-home wife. What a wonderful and amazing husband I have <3.
So I’m taking it slow. Getting ready. Relaxing a bit and cleaning things up. Having a little bit of fun. And now I’m ready to go start seriously thinking about what the future holds for me. How exciting! =D
