Semi-regular burgers and drinks

With these weeknotes I track and archive whatever it is I spend my time on. They’re public so you can keep me in check.

Last week was autumn break for my daughters; the first half was all about spending extra time with them and doing less work, and the second half was all about them being at their grandparents and me going to the movies a lot (I saw The Martian, Sicario and Irrational Man, all of which I liked, but Denis Villeneuve’s Sicario was clearly the best).

All the while I tried to get out of the rut caused by Geometry Girl being dropped from the Renew the Book contest. It’s not a disaster by any means, but applying required a kind of focus that’s now become useless… so I have to switch to another kind of focus. I haven’t really succeeded at that yet, but I trust that I’ll be able to soon. I did have a 40-minute phonecall with the contest’s program director, which was constructive and even inspiring.

What else? Among other things, I…

• Worked on Two Tribes’ RIVE a lot, integrating my writing, figuring out how to do more complex stuff in the game editor, coming up with alternative names for game modes and weapons, and preparing the marketing site. I visited the team on Friday too, just in time to join them for their semi-regular burgers and drinks with ex-employees.
• Edited a strategy text for the Dutch Games Association, which was quite a bit of work, but useful for them I think.
• Did a tiny bit of writing on Free Birds, the kids’ museum game by Hubbub, which is nearing completion.
• Gave another writing class to Games & Interaction students at the Utrecht School of the Arts, and prepared for a one-off lecture about nearly the same topic at the Delft University of Technology this week.
• Met up with a creative writing student from ArtEZ to discuss her graduation project, which I’ll help her out with as a coach. The student is working on interactive fiction, which is interesting, and she has a wonderful concept, so I look forward to seeing the process unfold and learning from it myself too.

Average step count per day: 10.532
Average staircase count per day: 14
Average sleep per night: 7:32
Average weight: 88,7 kg