I am once again assuring you I'm alive

Heyo puffins,

This isn’t a preemptive request to charge you or anything like that, just thought I’d check in.

So. Firstly, sorry I haven’t posted on here a while. I don’t have much of an excuse beyond going into a bit of a hole really. I’ll just get the depressing shit out of the way first.

The blues got me fairly good for a time, that’s the bones of it. (Hardly a unique experience in 2020, I won’t labour the point.) I’m fine, just somewhat fell into writing fatigue, if that’s a thing. I have some new Catastrotivity scripts in the works (if you know what I’m going on about), but uploading rants along the lines of hEy GuYs HeReS hOw YoU dEaL wItH wRiTeRs BlOcK, while simultaneously being burned out seems fairly fucking hypocritical. All’s well in any case, I'll resume the series shortly.

The new book is done, the draft anyway, but little did I know that was just the beginning of the fun. Lots of plot points make no sense, lots of stuff still needs to be tidied. I was hoping to get it out for Christmas, and developed a regime of covering my living room in notes and sleeping on the sofa so I didn’t have anything else around as distraction. A friend noticed this approach while visiting and suggested I might be losing my mind, and maybe should stop forcing the thing. I agreed.

It’s done, it’s just not polished yet, and I’d like it to be as close to what it’s supposed to be as possible. It will make it to the outside world soon, promise.

Cool, that’s the depresso-espresso over. Onto the jokey jokes.

Well. I was lucky enough to contract the you-know-what flu last month, even after being relatively careful. It was a 3.6 roentgen experience, not great, not terrible. Really I got insanely lucky – the peak was basically a few weeks of moderate flu; lots of sitting around trying not to google signs of pneumonia, etc. The upside of living alone and losing your sense of smell is not having to shower for 5 days. The downside of not showering for 5 days is you sure as hell notice when your sense of smell comes back.

In all seriousness, this seems to be a very mixed bag with how symptoms turn out. I know several folks who have been asymptomatic, and several others who have had a really, really horrible time with it. It won’t be that surprising if we find out in a few years that there was a strong genetic component to all this.

Still. I finally tested negative a few days back and going outside was just…I’ve never had such a deep appreciation for pavements, and trees, and dumpsters even. Outside is great, I really can’t recommend it enough after 3 weeks indoors . Staying inside is a fun luxury when it’s on your own terms, I’ve always found. With quarantine though you start having thoughts like, “I really should go and buy more milk….and potentially risk killing my neighbours. Yeah, maybe just black coffee today, huh.”

It was a very strange experience catching something that had been so psychologically ‘distant’ just a few months ago, localised mostly to China, then spreading across Europe, then perhaps a few acquaintances, then suddenly it’s right there in your own biology. You start developing a kind of weird hyper-sensitivity to every tiny thing your body does. WHY ARE MY EYES A BIT LEAKY TODAY? IS THAT A SIGN THIS IS GETTING WORSE? DOES BLUE USUALLY LOOK THAT INTENSE? I SHOULD PHONE THE SURGEON GENERAL AT ONCE, etc etc.

I’m not trying to scare you, or to diminish the thing either. I had a middle-of-the-road experience and contracted it even after taking almost every precaution I could. Please, please, please just be careful is all I’m saying. If you’re going through it currently, I hope you’re keeping in good spirits, and you have someone to kindly go and fetch stuff from the outside world. I’m sure you’re going to be absolutely fine, and lots of early festive wishes to you.

I will bet my cat that we’re now at the beginning of the end with this thing. Not only are vaccines getting rolled out, but at least two of them seem to be remarkably effective. The fact that researchers even managed this so quickly is a testament to how, when we have to, we can get our arses in gear and actually come together on world-changing, world-saving projects. I hope we don’t forget we have the potential for that when needed. All I’m saying is: we might be about to turn a corner with this one, and 2021 may begin to look like normality again thanks to very, very clever men and women. It’ll take a little while, but we will recover.

Anyhoo. As always I have a few gaming and whatever else suggestions that I think you might like, especially with having had 3 weeks of sitting around in my pajamas.

The first won’t be new to you, but: Fallout New Vegas. I played it a bit back in the day, but for some reason wasn’t drawn in. This time around it’s kept me up until sunrise on several occasions. Just all the warring factions, the powerplay inside the factions; the wasteland feels genuinely alive, and your decisions actually have serious consequences. If you haven’t played any of the recent Fallout games, this is the place to start in my humble opinion. You really won’t regret it. (It’s also quite modestly priced on Steam at the moment.)

The second is a highly addictive game called Noita. I won’t spoil it, but you play as a pixelated wizard, raiding the land and picking up various powerful wands to end baddies with. Every single pixel on the screen is subject to your wrath, you can blow just about anything up. It’s absolutely fantastic and hard as shit. I still haven’t beaten it, even with quarantine time.

The third, again, won’t be news to you but: The Queen’s Gambit, a show on Netflix about a chess genius. The main actress (actor?) is brilliant, Anya Taylor-Joy. Alcohol, debauchery, and chess. What’s not to love about this one.

Finally, this is a bit specific, but maybe you know of Louis Theroux. He’s a documentary filmmaker from the UK, usually covering cults or just out there people. I’ve been a huge fan of his for years. I can’t recommend his book Gotta Get Theroux This enough, it’s fantastic – chronicling how he rose from a slightly nerdy graduate, to a living legend. (That’s my appraisal of him, not his.) The audiobook is absolutely great, and got me through the more unpleasant days of covid. I hope you dig it too.

Anyway. I hope you liked today’s video. These days they seem to take about a month to make and the process was driving me nuts. This one was just under two weeks from idea to finish; I think I’ll go back to that kind of shorter format. I have a little Christmas video plan I also hope you enjoy, if I can make the script work. Then I’ll do my damndest to return to something resembling a regular upload schedule. Promise.

As ever, thank you so, so much for sticking by me on here, apologies if I've been tardy with replying to messages; I'll spend tomorrow (post-upload day is always a treat) going through anything I missed, and getting back to you. I hope you’re doing well, and keeping in a good place.

Big love as ever, and speak soon,

Ex.

(P.S. Did you think I would forget the obligatory feline photos? She has been the goodest of cats of late, keeping me amply company. Please find evidence of such attached.)