Things...

 Ok, so to update... I did fall victim to the temptation and preordered the Quest 2... in fact, I must admit, I ordered 2 of them (the intention is that one of them I will keep and the other will either be flipped on eBay or saved to give out as a Christmas gift.) I do envision that come Holiday Season this will be a hard to get item, so might as well bank on that.

Anyway... I just couldn't help myself, after the Facebook Connect announcement, all of the leaks were detemined true, including the price leak... this will be the absolute best value in VR and some of the most impressive technology as well. I will have to sell a bit of my soul with the new Facebook login requirements, but I don't do much on my Facebook anyway, so hopefully it won't be as big an issue as I worry about. Hopefully.

With that said, I am super excited to get my hands on it, which should be in about 2 weeks, a nice, late birthday present to myself. 

Speaking of VR, Sydney is getting better and better at playing, which is mostly Beat Saber and the song, Thunder by Imagine Dragons, which she plays over and over and over, but it is so cute to see her immersed in the world and chopping block after block. I also got her into this big coloring book app, which immerses you into the pages of a coloring book and lets you paint your surroundings. I want to check and see if there's any other good, kid friendly apps I can have her toy around with since she's definitely interested.

In other news... we are 1 day away from October, which means Halloween! Last weekend Jen and the kids went camping, and so while home alone I decided to decorate the house for Halloween... did a pretty good job too, and now I'm definitely feeling in the mood. I have been playing (in VR as well) the Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners, and also re-watching the whole Walking Dead series, so I am getting in the spirit, indeed. Am also planning on picking out some good Halloween/Horror movies, and re-checking my Halloween movie list, will have to update some Family Halloween movies so we can have some spooky movie nights through the month!

That's a good summary of things, I could go deeper, I could go shallower... but I'll just stick with what I put down and leave things at that... peace out ya'll!

Fuck Facebook...

 Ok, after my last post about Facebook and my desire to boycott their products of the future, they have just made my decision very hard.

So, the new 'Facebook' Connect conference is in 2 days, and apparently the big reveal was just leaked this morning... it is indeed the Quest 2, but the features and specs and (potential) price is far more optimistic than most people thought would be coming. 

At it's heart, it will still be a Quest... a wireless, stand-alone VR unit, but the feature set has it coming in at 50% higher clarity lenses (close to 2k per eye) as well as a 2GB boost in RAM, going from 4 GB to 6 GB, along with a Snapdragon XR2 processor, which apparently doubles or triples speeds all around, plus it is supposed to be up to 20% lighter, features new straps, new controllers (albeit similar to the current controller) and will offer a 256GB version... although it is white, or grey or something, which is kinda, eh... but the biggest thing would be the price... 

Now this wasn't part of the official leak, so not sure if it's legit or not, but a couple leaks from Walmart.com and Target.com price the two versions at $299 and $399, which is $100 less than the current version (which is being delisted at more and more stores everyday.) So if this is true, it not only gives us a generational leap in terms of specs and experience, but it gives us the absolute cheapest full fledge VR on the market. period. 

If that price is true, Facebook is going to be taking HUGE loses on each unit, but I don't think that matters much to The Zuck, which would make me lean towards this being true. It will be easier for Facebook to make money off of your data if they have an easier way to invade your privacy and get your data in the first place. Which, unfortunately, is the scary truth about what they are doing and why the ToS are being updated and Facebook is taking more control over the brand.

What's even scarier than that? The fact that someone like myself, who realizes this and despises Facebook...may not be able to resist the temptation. Everything in my mind is screaming, "Fuck Facebook!" but I am such a fan of VR, and even focus on VR a lot for my podcast, so just dismissing it is absolutely tough to do... with the specs mentioned, I would have probably still been having a difficult decision if the units were coming in at $599 and $699, but if those prices are true, it's going to be hard to NOT get one... truly.

Attack of the Facebook

 Ok, so in an announcement made last week, Facebook is apparently dissolving the thin line that held back the full force of Facebook Inc from dominating over the Oculus division. It seems that any new Oculus setup will require a Facebook ID integration, and for those that are "grandfathered in" with strictly an Oculus ID, we are being given only until 2023 before we also will require a Facebook ID to use Oculus (or at least to use it without numerous 'restrictions'.)

To many customers (and developers) this is a big blow, one that they were holding out hope was NOT going to happen, but in retrospect it was probably inevitable. The data-mining, anti-privacy, sell your secrets, Facebook, now aims to steal as much of your VR data as they can to further increase their capital and control over the industry. It is sad... but there is hope. The people I've seen complaining and articles written since this announcement proves that people are not happy at all with this decision, and although the leash Facebook currently holds over VR, many are seemingly going to break free.

It may be true that Oculus is the best bang for your buck in terms of VR and that they are way ahead of the game with the Quest being a standalone wireless unit... but I imagine the other VR companies can absolutely use this news to their advantage, hopefully push forward the competition and (hopefully) have a viable, alternative option available by the time Oculus forces users to be a slave to their Facebook user agreements. C'mon VALVE!!

This whole thing certainly pains me a great deal, as The Rift CV1 was my first forray into VR, so that will always be a great memory. As stated, Oculus was able to put out high quality VR for affordable prices since they were able to make-up that money on the back end in so many ways, and I was happy being an Oculus loyalist, even though in the back of my mind the distaste of Facebook was definitely there... this announcement has forced my hand, and I will absolutely look into alternate options as my next headset. It's true I was in love with the Quest, being the wireless, standalone that it is, so I really hope another company can compete, even if it's a higher price, I'll do it... and if not, I may have to figure out how to do a fake facebook id... is that even possible? I guess I could have a fan page facebook for my music...? Things to consider indeed... oh 2020, what a year! What's next....?

VR Socializin'

 With some recent VR news that Oculus Venues (which is an exclusive Oculus app that allows users to view various entertainment with or without friends,) has been updated, or at least in beta, to include larger and more social spaces, settings, and the inclusion of new avatars... which many are leading to believe this is the beginning of Facebook Horizon getting itself ready to release and attempt to dominate the VR Social space.

 For those unaware, Facebook Horizons was announced late last year and it is Facebook's attempt to dominate the Social VR space currently occupied by apps such as VR Chat and Altspace VR. They certainly have the financial backing to put a lot of resources in this, and judging by the initial preview of this service, they have high hopes to make this your Facebook in VR, and to give users the ability to not only socialize but to create experiences, worlds and games. Very ambitious indeed.

 Lately, I have been pulled back into some of the Social VR experiences my self, doing a bit more in VR Chat for fun, and then I got pulled back into Altspace because it is more structured and... well mature I guess. Was actually just going in there because they had a new update which vastly expanded on a lot of things, mostly more personalized and better visualized avatars, and then looking for things to do I found myself in a Covid-19 discussion and thought some of the thoughts and opinions of those in the room were interesting. It really made me reevaluate the benefits of these VR social spaces, so I kept frequenting the Altspace event board looking for more events that would captivate me.

 There were a few very interesting Altspace events that drew me in, and just the other day someone actually had a Trump 2020 room/live watch party of one of his speeches. At the time, there were only about 7 people in attendance, but this is something I never even expected to see in VR, especially knowing the general audience, so I consider that a huge win. The room itself was like a stadium and on the big screen in the front was a video of the most recent rally/event that Pence and Trump were speaking at. The room was also decorated with tons of Trump posters and memes and I found it absolutely fascinating and inspiring. I will continue to be on the lookout for this room to pop up again!

 All in all, especially in these times with social distancing and people afraid to set foot outside, these VR spaces are very welcome and a lot of fun. 

VR Educatin'

 With school being on the forefront of many discussions lately, including within my own household as we are dealing with a fakedemic and a 5 year old who was supposed to be going into Kindergarten this year... I've been seeing stories popping up about VR Education... this was something I thought about a long while back that I just wanted to revisit... well, because i'm bored.

First I read a story about some teachers using Half Life: Alyx to teach students... although I don't know why, since there are plenty of dedicated VR classroom type experiences that aren't a Single Player game... (I didn't read the whole article) but still the concept fascinates me...

The basics of the VR Education concept, in my opinion anyway, is that it is a great way to replace learning from books... I still believe an actual teacher is still necessary to guide students on the path as to answer questions and make the knowledge digestable... but many subjects could benefits immensely from VR.

The biggest one that jumps out at me, and already has a good number of apps/experiences out there, would be History! Followed along by Science, Geography, and Social Studies... imaging that instead of reading about a historical event and trying to follow along paragraph after paragraph, you instead are AT that historical event... with the possibility of freezing time to explain details, answer questions, etc... it would be much more memorable than just reading through a book. 

Science and Geography as well, since these are largely visual and/or experimental subjects... have a VR lab with simulated chemicals, or take the class through outer space to take a closer look at the milky way... on the way back down to earth, fly over the continents and identify each of them.

The possibilities are truly endless... most, if not all subjects could benefit from VR... I just really like the History aspect and get kind of interested in thinking that students can actually travel with the pilgrims on the Mayflower, or watch the signing of The Constitution, or be in the crowd watching Martin Luther King Jr's "I Have a Dream" Speech... again, this is stuff that would be truly memorable. 

The technology still has to catch up a bit... although The Quest is taking things in the right direction, since it is wireless and a bit easier to use and set-up than PCVR. The units will still need to get more powerful, lighter and cheaper... and those things aren't a matter of how, just a matter of when. I will say within a few years...10 at the most, VR headsets will be a part of the classroom... or they will BE the classroom... 

As It Continues...

 Ah, back to reality after a nice week at the beach. We haven't been to Rehoboth in 2 years, because we went to Disney last year, so it was great to return... although hampered a bit by all this covid bullshit... and yes, it's bullshit... when a pandemic virus has a survival rate of 99.96%... it's NOT a fuckin' pandemic... it's an election year virus, and a last ditch effort by the remaining liberal "powers that be" to push this crap on the public... and frighteningly enough, it's sort of working... Thankfully there were still a lot of people at the beach who I saw did not wear their mandatory muzzles, but there were still a lot of sheep who were... ugh... disgusting...

Anyway... back to work... at work... which sucks since our 'infrastructure' supports working from home, it should be our fuckin' choice if we want to come in the office or work from home, especially if we can get the same amount of shit done... of course bosses want to be bosses and have us within arms reach to belittle us for not performing at 100% efficiency. Oh well, whatever...

anything else I'm pissed at?? yes. yes there is.

Anyway... other things are going good, the podcast, the family... Jen's birthday is coming up this weekend, so gotta figure out something to do there... and trying my best to get into Big Brother since the new season (22) just started up. 

WTF Happened?!

Man, I just so happen to neglect posting anything for the last 4 months, which have probably been the most significant, crazy, frantic, upsetting, and weird 4 months in history, and I think it literally kicked off only a day or 2 after my last post back in March. Suspicious Much?!

But seriously... to put it briefly... the whole world went into a Covid Panic, shut down pretty much EVERYTHING, ordered lock downs, closed businesses, ordered 'mask mandates'... basically a bunch of Bullshit... we're being lied to left and right about how bad the "virus" is, the case numbers, the death numbers... a lot of governors (democratic governors) in some state including our own commie Tom Wolf and Mr. Levine actually went against orders and flooded nursing homes with covid infected patients, which accounts for a large percentage of the deaths thus far... the whole thing has been a Shamdemic and we're being royally screwed by orders, rules, mandates, etc... that are slowly chipping away at our freedoms.

Many of us feel this is a last ditch effort to not only start conditioning and ushering in some NWO shit, but coincidentally enough this all is happening during an election year, of one of the most polarizing and attacked Presidents in history... I don't think it's a coincident at...all...

So that's been happening... which has already been fuckin' up what would have been a good summer...

Other than that though, we are doing great at the new house, still getting some things set up and done, but all in all, the move was a success, and we couldn't be happier to be where we're at! Oh also due to this plandemic bullshit, there was a couple months I was working from home, which was phenomenal... one of the only good things to come out of this virus scare, but alas, they have asked me to come back into the office... for now... so that's happening. Ugh, oh well...

Also... still doing good with the podcast... we're up to episode 22 now, we've had all three hosts come on and be guests, as well as the host of the Horrible Gamers podcast, and a bunch of other people... good times, good shit, we're getting the hang of it more and more with each episode!

So that stuff is going good... speaking of gaming, have been jumping back into the VR a bit more again lately, there are rumors of Oculus ramping up production on a new headset, but no new details as of yet... speculation says it might be an upgraded Quest... a Quest-S or something... I'll probably get it...lol.

I don't think there's too much more beyond all that, this virus thing is really just messing up life right now, and it's all bullshit and there's too many sheep who just go along with everything with no questions asked... it's very sad, but I believe a secret war is still ongoing and my fingers are crossed that righteousness will still conquer all. We shall see...

Thursty Thirsday

Things are progressing... the move is 'mostly' completed, and we are still working on the unpacking, organizing, and small touches here and there, but it's coming along.

I finally got Syd's bed all completed and her room is set up and cleaned, we still have to work a bit on our room, and a couple annoyances we're discovering, like the outlets in the bathrooms don't seem to be working... hmm... but in general we're getting things down and getting a nice routine going. Smooth sailing from here on... I hope.

Started watching this Wu-Tang show that came out last year, and it got me a little hooked... since Wu-Tang is what really got me deep into hip hop, it's been fun watching their come-up... even if it is a bit fictionalized... still good shit, really liking it and already anticipating Season 2!

Oh, did I mention internet finally got set up at the house too... so finally, finally, finally we are connected! it's been a relief and a half.

Other than all that, I'll be back on the podcast this Saturday night, so I do have some early prep done, will have to relisten to the eps again as well as do some audio chopping... great VGO quote of the week this week... and also wanted to try to finish up the 'Drop the Canadian Loser' song as well as maybe work on some new music for the outros... My well is running a bit dry with old instrumental tracks to use and no one thus far has submitted any alternative music to use or suggestions. Should be a lot of fun though.

I think that's all I got for now...

I Felt Moved

Ouch... don't move that... oww... my leg is...YOWWI....oh no.... uggghhh.... Ok... that's about how my body feels today.

It is Monday, I have survived the past 5 days of moving into our new house (with still tons more to do) but at least all of the heavy items have been moved, we also completely cleared out our storage unit, which was another pain in the muscles... and yes, I am indeed still sore, but we are moved in, and for that, I am relieved!

From Wednesday night to Saturday night, it was practically nonstop lifting heavy items, Sunday was a little more chill, but still involved moving around things and trying to set up the new house... (plus we did a huge Costco run, which involved... lifting heavy items lol,) It's now Monday...I'm tired, I'm sore, I'm ready to sleep a whole day to refresh, but alas, won't be able to do that yet :P There is still a lot to do.

For the most part, things are set-up, but the little things need to be organized now, and all the finishing touches need applied, which is going to take a long time... even when we think things are all set up I'm sure we'll keep making changes.

Either way, I'm happy we're in a place of our own and now can do things our own way... it also seems like it'll be good weather this week, which will help out our mood all around.

Unfortunately our little Syd is sick right now too, so my parents are taking her to the doctor today to get checked out. Crossing my fingers she's ok, of course.

Other than that, nothing too noteworthy... oh yea, they are finally installing our internet tomorrow, so that'll be a huge relief as well, because it's been tricky not having the internet... (especially with the Saturday night podcast thing... which I'll get into in a minute)... also having internet is (now obviously) necessary to distract the younglings. It felt like being in the middle-ages trying to keep them entertained and at the same time trying to set up the new house. Help us internet... you're our only hope!

Ok so the podcast... this week I wasn't actually on the podcast, but being the technial guy I am, I am still going to be editing it, so that was my task on Saturday... first off, one of the hosts wasn't able to host, so they were scrambling at the last minute trying to fill the spot and luckily Avi was able to fill in with short notice... so I headed over to my parents (since my computer is still there, with glorious internet still available) and of course, the podcast got off to a late start... then they did the podcast until almost 2:00 a.m. so as soon as they completed, I threw it in my DAW and went to work, figured I'd power through it nonstop to complete it... which I did, but that took until around 4:00 a.m. at which I shot it off to Michelle and went back home to sleep. The baby woke me up at 6:30 a.m. so suffice to say, I was a little tired on Sunday. With the internet finally being set up tomorrow, at least I will be able to do this from home from here on, which will help out extremely.

Ok that brings you up to speed...

Conglaturation !!!

So phase one, purchase and acquisition of the house, has been completed...

Phase two was briefly started last night, deep cleaning of said house.

We went over last evening after work, took a trailer full of boxes and started cleaning up just a little. Jen got most of the kitchen cleaned up, which is good because a big portion of boxes we took over yesterday were kitchen items. Should have that all set up tonight... potentially.

Speaking of today/tonight... I'm taking off work tomorrow and Friday to get a lot of the moving completed, so woo hoo, today is my Friday! Thank God!

Tomorrow we rent the U-Haul truck so we can move the big shit... the Bed, the other Bed, the Table, the dressers, the grill, and anything else we can cram into a very literal truck. Friday we will probably still be moving stuff over... but we also have a lot of deliveries coming for like, the couch and i think something else. Busy Busy Busy. This weekend should hopefully be spent unpacking and setting things up... although it seems like Saturday I will have to go to my parents house late-night in order to edit the podcast. Then I can pack up the computer and take it over I guess... although still no internet going to be setup until Tuesday, which blows monkey balls...

I just want to get through this work day as quick as possible (time IS relative after-all) and get back to the new house... might need to get the gates tonight so I can set those up for Kenzie... (plus I think we'll need one more (bottom of main stairs, top of main stairs... & bottom of basement stairs) at least that way we can keep her and Syd in a certain area while we get busy with house stuff and I won't have to worry about her running up or jumping down or falling down the stairs. These things will be worked out.

Overall though, very exciting times and I'm very excited. Let's do this!

Habbening

Welp, we did it... the papers are signed, the keys are acquired, the House... is ours!!

As of TODAY, February 25th, 2020, we are the proud owners of BlahBlah Blahblah Boulevard! It was a pretty painless process to sign all our paperwork and get all of that in order, and we were subsequently given our keys, and even though I had to get back to work, we were too excited so we stopped by the house after settlement, finally free from Realtor chaperones, and breathed in the fresh air of our new domicile!

It will be a lot of work to get everything moved over, which we are doing later in the week, and then start setting everything up, but the end result will be fantastic... The only crappy part is that I had to wait to set up our internet because for whatever stupid reason they have to do a credit report, and we weren't supposed to do any credit reports until after settlement, so by the time I finally set it up (today) the first available appointment to get it installed is NEXT Tuesday... ughhh.... so as far as editing the Podcast this weekend, I have to figure something else out.

Speaking of the Podcast (how'd you like that seque!) We already got episode 2 in the can, and we did come up with new schedules and structures... out of the 4 "OG" Hosts, 2 at a time will 'host' per week, and will have either 1 or 2 "Guests" from the discord. I think that works great... and gives me next week off (for moving... although I am still in charge of editing the show... so like I said, I gotta figure that out.) But it seems to be going well, and it's been so much fun to do.

I can't say enough how awesome it is to actually be contributing somewhat to this show that I've been listening to for 14 years! That kind of thing doesn't always happen to people, and I know that it's a fairly obscure show with a niche audience, but I have so many memories of listening to this show, it's all just kind of surreal... even if they cancel our show tomorrow, to have been doing 2 episodes of our podcast will be another great memory.

That is all... Ajay.... OuuuuTtt...

Podcast Power Moves

Well, it seems that I have absolutely gone in over my head with the RPM Challenge this year and I am regretfully bowing out... the desire was there and despite jumping in late and being busy with moving preparations, it wasn't either of those issues that sealed the deal and caused me to give up, something else that was unexpected took over and derailed me a bit...

Last week, very spur of the moment, one of my favorite podcasts of all time, (as you can see from my March 4, 2019 post - http://rawcoffee.blogspot.com/2019/03/my-top-3-podcasts-of-all-time-and-few.html ) the Video Game Outsiders, were chatting in the VGO discord and talk began of starting a 'Community Show' with fans of VGO. It started coming together very rapidly but before I knew it, I was one of the hosts! Ohhh snap!

For the inevitable historians who end up curious about this monumental genesis of the podcast, it pretty much went down like this: Michelle was on Discord talking about perhaps having fans be on, or do a PS4 podcast which eventually turned into a more inclusive Community Podcast idea. A few of us chimed in that we would love to participate and before you knew it, we were 4 deep as hosts of the show and were already talking about a schedule to record. DowBeast, AviTheNeet, TheSL33P3R, and myself were set to take the reigns and embark on the maiden voyage of the U.S.S. VGO-Community Show Podcast.

A plan grew to record on Saturday night, and throughout the last days of the week we were getting things together like a show structure, some show ideas, artwork and a theme song. Figuring how last-minute everything was, it is kind of amazing we managed to get all of this together in time... less than a week of prep, that's how we roll!

When recording time came, I think we were all thrown off a bit because John and Michelle themselves wanted to come on as "Special Guests" which was kind of a geek-out moment for me figuring I've been listening to this podcast for 14 years! Luckily they were both cool as shit and were a great help to get the show off the ground. End of the day, it was a really fun experience, and I'm hoping we can keep this thing going.

I am extremely proud to say that I also ended up making the theme song, which even if it is only used on the first episode, was a thrill to do. If it goes on with the show, whether I stay on or not, would also be fine with me. We'll see how this goes! I also edited down the show a bit, and threw one of my instrumental tracks on the end of the show before it got published on their app (search for VGO on Android and iOS, and for fuck's sake, hit the PREMIUM button to get even more exclusive podcasts throughout the week... it's only $2 ya cheap muthas!!)

Ok, so that was the most exciting part of my last week... in other news, we're still making headway on packing and preparing for the big Move, and shit, it's next week! 8 days until the house is OURS!! Muahahaha! I hope that doesn't conflict with my new VGO_CS schedule, but I can def. carve an hour away to record the show no matter what's going on... also feel pretty obligated now to play some more games and get some news ones to talk about during the show.

Either way, no matter what seems to be going on, I'm extremely busy for the next few, whatevers... but am excited... good times and good things happening... New House, New Podcast, New... shirt.... very exciting.

The RPM Challenge

Ok, after posting my last post, and thinking about it further, I think I will attempt to do the RPM Challenge this year, because, well... why not!?

The goal for The RPM Challenge is to come up with a full album (which is 10 songs (or 35 minutes) of newly created material,) strictly in the month of February... Here is my breakdown of all of this mess:

RPM Challenge

- 29 Days to make a complete album... 10 songs or 35 minutes of new, previously unreleased material

Tools:

- iPhone, iPad, MPC Live, Turntable, PC... and whatever else makes a noise

Thoughts:

- no thoughts, just go make an album, fool!... start working out some song stems, see what sounds good and fits together and build on it from there. Might be a good idea to start 10-20 stems right off the bat, and filter out the good from the bad and keep watering them with ideas until they grow. By February 29th... finishing touches and BOOM... done.

Themes:

- could do a Meta theme, all about working within the boundaries of the Challenge and how it's done... sort of a behind-the-scenes album, about making the album itself... hmm... interesting.

- could be a random, sportatic, free-flowing thought kind of album that relates to nothing... eh...

- could potentially do an album about moving, or about my move or something similar... maybe a Life-Changes kind of album... hmm...

- could do the MCU album I've been keeping under my hat... but I think I won't have the time to comb through all the movies again given the time restraints.

- could do the Halloween/Horror album I've always meant to do... but similar time restraints will probably keep this from becoming a reality... for now at least.

- could do a Family album... stressing the importance of Family and Love and gay shit like that... lol

- could do a selfish album... stressing ME and how great I am, and how I am the god of the universe and all must bow down before me... umm... no....

- maybe do a political album... I've seen both sides of this spectrum, one half could be a liberal mindset and the other a conservative one... could go back and forth with the ridiculousness of both parties.

- in the same vein... perhaps an ultra-conservative, conspiracy theory filled venture that dives as deep into ufos as it does with Epstein and Pizzagate and JFK, etc, etc... X-Files style!

- more than likely, I will just come up with what I come up with... I've never been great, either with music or with writing, at strictly following a predetermined 'theme'... I take tangents and like to expound off of ideas and see where they'll go. So in all reality, if I do complete this album, it will likely be a mix of all kinds of themes and ideas and thoughts and rambling... just like my brain.

Let's do this!!

The Move and The February Groove

We are ramping up on the moving prep... on Saturday we rented a truck, moved all of my parents stuff out of storage unit, and we picked up our new Dining Room Table, Rug and Sydney's new Bunk Bed from Wolf's Furniture and moved that INTO the storage unit... ugh, Saturday was fun... lol, actually it wasn't as bad as it could have been, we got everything moved around fairly quickly. I am still dreading the actual big move, where everything has to come out of the storage unit as well as everything we'll have to get out of my parent's house.

The next steps are to start packing... we are just at 22 days left, so if we can get everything packed up and ready to just pick up and take to the new house, it'll be huge!

I am proposing now, to myself and to the nobody that reads this, that the next three weekends (and any other time we can squeeze in) we need to organize and pack everything in the storage unit (as well as put some stuff away that we can get rid of... I know there's definitely some stuff I'd love to get rid of!) and also do the same for my parent's house... although it's not like we're getting evicted from there, so even if that's a slower roll-out, we have time and it's literally so close that moving stuff from there to our new house will be painless... plus they have the trailer for any over-sized items that will be leftover to move.

Gotta say, I am getting very excited! Saturday evening we asked our realtor if we could get into the new house to get a couple of measurements and luckily they agreed, so we got in and took down some crucial measurements, and just getting back in there got us more hype than ever to finally get this move over and done with.

Speaking of, I finally got the measurements for my "Daddy's Den" and am starting to plan that out... really would love a corner/L shaped desk to put in there, but honestly, that can wait. Luckily it affords me pretty close to the same area of space that I have now in my parent's basement for all my stuff (which I plan on reducing as well, so should all fit even easier.)

22 days, 22 days... Oh... speaking of February (sort of) I know that there is TONS to do this month and it's quite possibly the worse time to even consider it with all that's going on, but I think I want to enter the RPM challenge again... For those unawares, the RPM challenge is a musical venture wherein you are tasked with creating a full album strictly in February. I joined it and had a blast doing it probably 5 years ago or so, and ever since have just been busy, or haven't been in music moods at the time, or a whole litney of other excuses, but this year I kind of wanted to do it, accept the challenge (which is extra challenging with the move coming,) and seeing what I can do. I am already 3 days behind, but in a weird artistic way, I kind of like the pressures of doing it knowing I have so much other stuff happening. I'll see what tonight brings, if I only get motivated enough to put on Youtube videos and play Minecraft (which was most of my weekend, despite wanting to do VR,) then so be it, but maybe I'll push myself... maybe.

Afterdinner Mints Part 2

As suspected, I didn't do any of the things I had been inspired to do the last two nights. Well, Tuesday night I had forgotten that my favorite podcast (Video Game Outsiders) was broadcasting, so I tuned into that instead and by the time is was over, I was pretty sleepy, so that day was a wash. Last night, we went to the grocery store and then by the time we got home and unpacked the groceries and put the kids to bed, it was already later than normal. I ended up (no surprise) watching youtube videos and playing both Minecraft and Portal, which I've been getting back into (I already did beat Portal 1 and Portal 2 ages ago but they are fun puzzle games that are satisfying to go back in and play.)

Tonight I really, really, really need to get a couple things done... for one, my credit card expires tomorrow so I have to activate my new one and go through all the websites and such and change my cc info for each one... ugh. Also need to do my taxes, Monday was the day they started processing them, and hell my parents already got their money back, so I'm slacking there and right now the extra money will help, so I better get to it! Also need to cut my hair and there's a couple other things I really SHOULD be doing, but if I can maintain my focus and at least do those three things, I might still be able to fit in some VR time. Still kinda fiending to do some VRChat or Altspace at least... something. I also keep hearing more and more positive reviews for the Walking Dead VR game, which I'm anxious to try out!

I guess we'll have to see what the evening brings!

Afterdinner Mints

The conclusion is this... all day long I work, and although I do my work well enough when I'm at work, my mind constantly races to what I'll do that evening when I get home... I always feel immensely inspired to either make music, or play certain games or watch certain things, or clean, or do laundry, or start packing up... but at the end of the day (literally) I get home, do all my Daddy duties, get my free-time and what do I do... nothing.
Seriously it's usually just go to my computer, put some Youtube videos on and play minecraft. That's my standard go-to...which is very fun in it's own right, but it comes to 11pm and I look around... I didn't make any music, I didn't play any VR, I didn't work on cleaning, or laundry, or packing, and my night of free-time is done.

Well, today I would love to change that, I would love to say I will finally do...something, but alas I probably won't... but if I don't do nothing, I am currently in the mood for some social VR.

VRChat is always fun, interesting, and you don't know what you'll find. AltSpace Vr is awesome as well, more organized and structured, albeit more rudimentary, there's usually some events going on that are fun to participate in. Sansar is one I'm still trying to get into, I tried it a little the other night, but didn't know what I was doing so I quit. RecRoom? Nah, although novel in concept and if with a fun group this sounds intriguing, but it seems too juvenile at the same time.

There are a couple other Social VR apps/games that may also fit the bill, including The Under (semi-social), Star Trek (awesome, I'm just nervous that I'm not that well trained yet), Pokerstars VR (poker), and Wave (there are others too) but reading a reddit post about Wave is what got me thinking about jumping into Social VR again.

If things go as usual and I don't end up jumping into VR tonight, I still have the other stuff that I probably won't do, but acknowledging a problem is the first step, I'm told! Let's get it on!

FRIDADAY

Ok so a week in and I'm on episode 3 season 1 of Star Trek: TNG. I don't have much time during the week mind you, so will probably knock a couple more episodes out tonight since it's Friday! Thank God it's Friday, foreal!

I have also still been consistently listening to VGO, and am currently on episode 78, only about 500 more to go before I'm up to date! Almost there! lol.

Also, kinda pissed off at Akai... they quietly released the MPC One, which is just a slightly dumbed down version of the MPC Live... but not dumbed down a lot at all, and it's $300 cheaper... am considering selling my Live and grabbing this one instead... will have to weigh the pros and cons... although actually I'll probably just stick with the Live since I already have it and it does more and has the battery option and some other nice features. Oh well.

Hearing about the new MPC slightly has me wanting to do some music tonight, but I am still obsessed and really looking forward to jumping into some VR. I want to play a bunch more Boneworks, Star Trek and a couple other titles. I will more than likely get home, won't do music or VR at all, and probably play Minecraft while watching Youtube videos... that's always a decent option as well and the one I usually resort to.

Nothing much else to speak of, started taking vitamins... being a little more cautious on my dietary intake, but not as far gone as Jen is, plus trying to work out a bit... usually it's a VR workout.

Ok, that's all.

Udpate

Started watching Star Trek:TNG from the beginning last night - got maybe half-way through the first episode before I fell asleep, but definitely starting to feel the Trekkie vibes taking over. This show was so good. Will continue tonight and at least watch the second half of the first episode... may try my hand at some Bridge Crew as well.

Also, wifey is on a diet, so I'm a diet as well. I am not being forced into it or anything, but I wanted to start cutting down on some weight anyway, so the timing works. Last night was grilled chicken and saute'd spinach...was pretty good actually.

Also, we are pretty much all set for the move, haven't heard anything recently from Greg (our real-estate guy) but as far as I know, things are all in place, just waiting for the owners to fix a couple of things that were in need of repair and then wait until settlement date, which is just a tad over a month away. HURRY UP!!!

Also, still listening through old VGO episodes, I'm up to episode 72, which was from March 2007. Man so much has changed since then, that seems a whole lifetime ago.

Also, can't figure out what I want to do, I would say my current obsessions are still VR/Video Games and Star Trek, but also interested and want to read some books (got to get back to Ready Player One,) and write something as well. I dunno, want to get back into making some new music too. Ugh, too much to do, too little time.

Also, it's cold af lately... I can't stand winter. Yesterday I believe, was the coldest day so far this winter, and today is only a tad warmer. C'mon summer, let's hurry it up!

Also, umm... also... also also alsoalsoaslo... that's all.

Space... The Final Frontier... These are the Voyages of... ME!!

For whatever reason, I've been watching some youtube vids of a fellow named Scotchbox (well, Alex is his name actually,) and the majority of his videos are of him playing Star Trek: Bridge Crew in VR. They are hilarious, and have got me very interested in going back in and playing some Bridge Crew myself. Now, I am quite the socially awkward butterfly, so I haven't (as of yet) played an actual on-line game yet, but have been going through "Starfleet Academy" to learn the ins & outs before I proceed, but I truly do intend to get online, hopefully find a decent group of chaps and... engage!

This game is 2 years old at this point, and apparently it's not as active online as one would hope (although it was just recently released on the Quest, so hopefully that surges the fanbase a bit) but since it's still a great game, and missions are supposedly procedurally rendered, it has a lot of life in it, and Star Trek fans are dedicated, I expect some good times going forward... as soon as I am comfortable with each station, that is.

This is somewhat rekindling my Star Trek love all around... as a kid I watched TNG all the time, new episodes...reruns... all of it. I've also watched all the original episodes over and over. The movies? of course! I've watched a couple of the spin-off series as well, but none of them ever captured my attention like TNG. Really liked Enterprise, saw some of DS9 and Voyager throughout, but eh, and judging by how much fans panned it, I don't think I'll even bother with Discovery.

Anyway, I think I am going to go back and start watching Trek again all around, maybe catch up on some DS9 and Voyager, maybe watch through all the movies again... Might even have to see if I can get a new Engineering Uniform and a new pin... this game brought me back to being a Trekker, or Trekkie or whatever it is! Yay! I'm a nerd again! lol.

In House Hunting News:

We actually got the Home Inspection done today on the place that we got our offer accepted, and they did find a few small things that needed attention, doesn't seem like anything major (we will get the full report in 3 days or less,) so it seems we'll be moving to the next step. Depending on the repairs, we may either require they get fixed up or else we might be able to negotiate on the rate a bit. Either way, we're on our way to move-in day!

I think I said it before, but if things go smooth, settlement/move-in day will be on Tuesday, February 25th. We are super excited, including Sydney, who went with Jen today for the home inspection, and she thinks the house is "the coolest house she's ever seen"... lol. God I love her!

We got some measurements, and some thoughts on decorating, and are probably going to be obsessively pondering and getting things ready for the next two months until it's finally time to haul around box after box after box after box... I don't look forward to the hauling, but the unpacking and decorating will be worth it!

I already started getting some lists together for things I need to get to help in the move, and I'm sure I'll come up with a lot more lists, a lot more items, and a lot more thoughts on everything, how to set it up, where to do what and all that! yep.

I'm becoming nonsensical, so I better get going, but we're all getting super-excited the closer and closer we get to finalizing the deal and moving in! Cheers!

More VR Babbling

Finally got the Half-Life VR Mod working and I gotta say, all the new games are absolutely amazing, but there is something extremely special playing an older game like this in VR and entering into the game world... something magical almost about looking around and looking at the characters, walking the hallways, shooting face-grabbers....even if the graphics are far from photorealistic. It's a blast, and I feel more engaged in the game than I ever have before.

I would be ecstatic if they could figure some way to put old adventure games like Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, or the classic Sierra games into VR somehow (may be hard though since they were 2D though) or Day of the Tentacle, hell I am getting nostalgic thinking of the possibilities! Would still really love them to figure out GTA 3, Vice City and San Andreas and be able to transport inside of those games as well... soooo many good options, I think I either need to pray that developers start working these angles or else I need to figure out how to program... something I probably should've done ages ago.

Really loving all that VR is doing lately, with the Quest it is starting to change the desire for VR all around, and just as I predicted, popularity is growing and growing... I believe that device was definitely the catalyst for VR to break-through... once Half Life: Alyx releases it will jump another plateau and I imagine next year they will probably release a new Quest with enhanced visuals...wait wait wait...

PREDICTION TIME:

Figured I should separate 'predictions' a bit so I can look back at these in the future and see if I was right... or not, so here we go.

I predict Half Life: Alyx will uptick the fascination, popularity and adoption of VR for many people and keep the momentum going strong.

I predict that next year, 2021, Oculus will release a new Quest which will feature enhanced visuals, a bigger FOV, Faster processing, better battery and be a bit more lightweight (maybe) but that will start pushing VR through the roof.

Other companies are definitely going to be following suit, the wireless nature of the Quest is the way of the future... sure there will always be the PCVR headsets because you can't argue that the best experiences & most demanding graphic games that push the VR boundaries will still be on PC's... but the fact the Quest is an all-in-one, wireless and still very powerful device that works well makes it a game-changer.

I constantly choose my Quest over my Rift-S just because of the wireless factor alone. The fact I can easily just throw on the headset, jump into a game and can move and spin around without worrying about getting wrapped in the cord, is huge, even if I can't get every game I want or have to deal with slightly 'lesser' graphics.  It doesn't matter.

Oh, anyway (almost forgot about predictions)... so as VR gains more and more fans, I predict more and more studios will start leaning toward VR game development, and we're talking the BIG studios. It won't be long before we actually are getting GTA 6 or Call of Duty, or Madden in VR versions.

OK done with predictions... but also forgot to mention that the next iteration of Pixel Ripped was released today: Pixel Ripped 1995. This game once again has the player battling for screen-time avoiding parents and teachers, but instead of just playing a gameboy-like system, we are jumping to the 16 and 32 bit eras. The first game was amazing, although too short, but the concept of it is brillaint and I can't wait to give it a go... might have to get it tonight!

**UPDATE 1/8/2020**
I was lied to! I read some article that Pixel Ripped 1995 was supposed to be out, but when I went to check it says 'releases Spring 2020' so I guess I'll have to wait for this one a bit longer... shame! shame! shame!

Moving?

Get this shit!... remember a couple posts back I was talking about how we are house hunting, and remember I said about liking a house but it was a bit out of our range for the down payment and stuff, and remember I said something else after that? Well, we decided to put in an offer regardless and they accepted! So folks, as of now, we are under contract for the house we loved!

Still a couple hoops to jump through, like the Home Inspection and such, but pending that, it's a done deal, and we'll be moving in around February 25th... it's still about 2 months away, but that's better than 2 years away, so We'll take it!

Moving out of my parent's house is going to be a blessing... not to say that it wasn't a blessing with them letting us stay there, but you know, you get to a point and you just need your privacy and own set of rules and freedoms ect, ect... So I'm super excited and just pray that the home-inspection goes swimmingly with no issues. Seems promising at least thus far.

This also brings to mind a couple other things, like, having to actually, you know... move again... ugh, it is something I hate so much. But... I do like starting fresh and getting things started and set-up and decorating my area and things of this nature... but "moving" in and of itself is a pain I wish I could avoid... we also plan on taking EVERYTHING out of the storage unit and taking to my parent's and our stuff, obviously to our house... so that sounds to me like 2 times the work... Fuck!

Nonetheless, the suffering of 'moving' will be worth it, we will have everything set up and can finally settle again, get our routines and rules in place and raise our little sweethearts the way we want to raise them with limited outside interference! yay!

Also to note, although this is another townhouse, which I wasn't super excited about, it is an end unit (one of my conditions) it has a fenced in backyard and it is still in West Hanover, which is a fantastic location, minutes away from Sydney's (and eventually Kenzie's) Elementary School, as well as everything else that is just a hop skip and a jump away (it's literally 2 or 3 minutes from my parent's house, so everything we had near us is still near us.)

2020 continues

The New Year has arrived, we are two days deep at this point, and here I am, back at work. Wednesday is the worse for Holidays, so instead of relaxing I have to be at work today and tomorrow and THEN it is the weekend, so I guess that's cool, but still....

Speaking of, this year is pretty sweet as far as Holidays go, since it's a leap year! That jumps Holidays like Christmas and New Years to Friday... sweet! 4th of July is on a Saturday... sweet! Groundhogs Day is on a Sunday... eh (don't care about that one really.) Valentine's Day is on a Friday! My Birthday is on a Friday! Halloween is on a Saturday PLUS it's apparently a full moon PLUS it's the night we change the clocks... SPOOPY! Our Wedding Anniversary is also on a Friday the 13th this year too! Noice!

In other, other news... VR!! haha, I had to do it. Nothing too new, I just last night downloaded "The Under Presents..." which was made by the people who made 'Virtual Virtual Reality' which was an amazing concept of a game and bended the rules of VR nicely, this one is supposed to be really cool and has unique puzzles as well as live performances of some sort. I dunno, but sounds interesting, and people have been raving about it. Sounds like it's worth a shot.

Well that's about all I got for today. 2020!