I recently borrowed Austin Kleon's audiobook trilogy from Libby. I listened to Steal Like An Artist and Show Your Work, but I didn't make it to Keep Going before the loan expired, which is pretty on-theme for me (RIP so many hopes and dreams). Those books are marvelous; straight to the point and crammed full of wisdom. They're also responsible for the birth of this little corner of the internet. Kleon is like the ultimate blog salesman. He could convince a grizzly bear to start blogging.
Hilariously, once upon a time, I had a blog. I was in the tail-end of elementary school back in the 2000s. My dad corralled my sister and me into it. We were living in Hawaii at the time, which made for some interesting content, and I loved writing stories. It seemed like a great idea. I made it less than 10 posts deep. I don't feel the need to go into the details of why that didn't work out, but man, Joe from Modern Family in S9 E11 is a little more relatable than I'd like.
I'm working on a bunch of random stuff that I think is cool, and I want to keep a little log of it. Also, having a place for all my random thoughts and ideas to go other than at my husband's face would be nice for him I think. Here's the short list of cool stuff I'm into right now:
Programming
I studied programming in school and I like building things, so I built this blog and have plans to experiment on and add to it in the future. I followed this crazy long Youtube tutorial by JavaScript Mastery to start it. The video is an amazing tutorial. If you have 3 hours, go watch it.
This blog is built on React + Typescript with Next.js, Tailwind CSS for styling, HyGraph for the headless CMS, and Vercel for deployment. It's still bare-bones, and some links dead end, but in the immortal words of Sam Cooke, Rome wasn't built in a day.
Blogging
Long ago I liked to write. The writer in me has been dead for years though, so this blog isn't a journey of re-discovery, just plain old self-discovery. I super resonate with what Kleon said in Show Your Work. "You can't find your voice if you don't use it." So here I am, tryinna using it.
Indie Game Development
Game dev is an intersection of a lot of things I love like storytelling, art, programming, and puzzles. I'm still in the infancy stage of game development, so I'm trying to focus on just building my knowledge base. Unfortunately, I am super easily distracted by details, so I participate in as many game jams as I can stomach to force-feed myself the important skills. I've produced a handful of silly games for those jams, some I am proud of, most I am not. I have several stand-alone game ideas, and maybe it's just hopeful thinking, but I think I'm ready to build one of them.
Surfing
I recently-ish moved to Oahu with my guy and finally gave surfing the chance I've always wanted to give it. It's just as fun and awesome as I always thought it was. I started surfing 10 months ago and own two boards; a Chuck Andrus 9'0 performance longboard with a dragonfly Island Fin Design fin, and a 5'5 Morgan 74 fish with a friend's Rasta keel Futures fins. Shortboarding is a beast to learn, but I am all here for it. I don't know why I love getting beat up by the ocean so much. I occasionally cameo on my husband's Instagram account @jaredwattsphotography. He's a super talented surf photographer and he has a beautiful feed.
Videography
Kinna mainstream of a cool thing, but I'm a fan. I like posting short videos of life, the ocean, and drone footage on my account @jaz.thefish.