Still Working On Extra Bits For That Links Page. Here's A Tumblr One Where The Tumblr Logo Turns Into

still working on extra bits for that links page. here's a tumblr one where the tumblr logo turns into a reblog.

could i do this with a gif? yeah, sure. did i do this with pure css? you bet i did.

Update Time! (Summer 2022)

it's been a while since i've written a proper update post here! let's talk about some stuff i've been up to lately. lots of it is good news ✨

Where I've been

i came out of the gate swinging in 2022, both restarting my antidepressant (more on that later) and streaming twice within two weeks – it's been a long time since i've pulled that off!

unfortunately, in late february, i got hit with some pretty rough stomach problems. doctors and tests have confirmed it's nothing serious, but the worst of the issues lasted about three months. i've spent most of that time resting and recovering – and while i'm happy to say that i seem to be past the worst of it, i'm still sometimes hit with intermittent cramps and constipation that get in the way of both work and play... the big difference is, now they only knock me out for a day instead of a week!

as of now, i only know what it *isn't* – it's not a blockage, bacterial infection, or internal bleeding. but next month i'll be seeing a gastrointestinal specialist, so we can narrow down what it is, and hopefully do something about it.

in the meantime, with symptoms starting to abate, i'm much more active and busy again! speaking of...

New video tomorrow!

today i'm putting the finishing touches on a new video for my main channel: a highlight reel of my monkey ball streams! if you've never made it to my streams, this is a nice bite-sized introduction to my streaming style and sense of humor. i had lots of fun putting it together, and i hope it's just as fun to watch~

it's been nearly five years since my last highlights video – five years since i've had the energy to think about videos, five years since i've streamed anywhere near consistently enough to have highlights, five years of unfulfilled hopes and dreams. so this is a big moment for me!!

the video releases tomorrow at 5pm central time. i would appreciate if you give it a watch 💙

What's next?

in the midst of my stomach problems i was working on something else: my old Mari0 mappack, Retrush! yes, i'm still working on that old thing. in fact, a demo is nearly done – i just have a little bit of polish left to do! ...but i haven't touched it in two or three months. it's so close though! i'm gonna work on knocking that out next.

after that, who knows? i would love to keep up the streaming momentum – i still can't commit to a schedule, but i feel more confident about tackling bigger games now! i've had a lot of stream games pile on to the list over the years... it'll be nice to start clearing through that pile again.

In conclusion

my partner introduced me to the concept of "creative constipation": ideas and dreams that have been stuck in your system for too long and just need to be released already. pretty much everything i'm working on here has been a dream of mine since college! but for so many reasons over the years, i've been struggling to get them out – whether it's homework, actual work, family issues, or mental health issues.

go figure that the latest reason is actual constipation.

but with that subsiding, and some real support in my life, i'm hoping i can finally – finally! – start fulfilling those dreams. the future is looking bright 💖

New look, same old blog!

welcome to a wholly improved skysometric.co! after years of dreams, sketches, redesigns, code, and slamming my head against the wall, i've finally fulfilled my dream of having a blog that matches my design language. i'm so excited to put it to good use as the front page for my creativity and journaling 💖

the blog's still based on tumblr, using a new custom theme. in truth, it's just a heavy edit of the default theme... and quite a mess of one, at that! but hey, it looks and works great, and isn't that all that counts in the end?

(speaking of which, are you reading this on the tumblr app? come check out the new site!)

About the redesign

on the left menu are links to my main sites, and core tumblr links like the askbox and archive. there's also a theme toggle for light and dark mode – i'm especially proud of how the dark theme turned out! the light theme needs a little work, but i think it's a good start to improve on in the future. oh and btw, these animations for the menus opening and closing? they're pure css, even on mobile~

the right menu has featured tags to browse stuff i've made and written, as well as a search box for anything not featured. tags are a core part of the updated site, serving as collections of art and writing – so they have extra prominence both in the menu and at the bottom of each post. all my most important tags have icons that are loaded dynamically based on their name! and any tags that don't have an icon use the default hashtag. i'm really proud of all the design work that went into it, and i'll show off the icons on their own pretty soon ✨

posts themselves can be blue, purple, or pink, matching my main color palette. the color is based on the post id! so each post's color is always the same, whether you're viewing it on the front page, tag pages, or the post itself.

Design history

this updated blog has been four years in the making, surviving both my name change and multiple iterations of my design language – yet somehow, it still looks just like my years old sketches. i'm impressed at how much i was able to rework and carry forward with me, especially with how many of these ideas felt like dead ends at the time!

that early screenshot at the top is from waayyy back when i was considering moving away from tumblr. it was very tempting to self-host and "own my data" as they say... but i would miss out on all the social features like reblogs. plus, on tumblr people can follow me and see all my posts in the app, as well as on my site – what's not to love? so even though the site's time may be past, i'm sticking with tumblr until they literally nuke it out of orbit~

Cleaning up, carrying forward

i've had this blog for nearly ten years now, and the way i've used it has changed tremendously over that time. what started as my first foray into social media turned into a space for sharing things i found that made me happy, sharing my philosophies and outlook on life, sharing my struggles through college and burnout, and now sharing my journey discovering my voice as a person and a creator. so now that i'm a new person with a new voice, i should probably clear out all those crusty old cobwebs and start fresh, right?

not a chance!

if anything, i went back and made sure my old posts look just as good as my new ones, cleaning up tags and backporting my new code to work with old tumblr post layouts. i want to carry my history forward with me! for all these years this blog has been my journal, and even though my journaling changed with time, that core purpose hasn't. honestly, after all the cleaning, i'm inspired to return to those old methods of journaling – share more of myself, share more of what makes me happy, be more free and open and wild ✨

(that said, some of those early posts were especially raw! those have been archived for now. maybe i'll remake the sentiment behind them someday...)

My promise to myself

in the wake of college i realized i was posting less here on the blog; this redesign was an attempt to give it more importance, so that i would use it more. but what i didn't realize was that i was posting less due to burnout... and i stalled out on the redesign, also due to burnout. a double whammy! so i used my blog less than ever, and it languished for years.

on top of that, giving my blog more importance made it more of a Serious Website™ in my head, a place where i had to put my best foot forward at all times. that made me want to post here even less, only when i finished some big or important project! but my blog was never intended for this – i've been posting random nonsense since the beginning.

so what started as a promise that i would use my blog more, became a promise that i would make my blog A Big Deal. and that's not healthy for me! so i stepped back and re-evaluated. first, i started consciously calling this place my journal, to make it a sketchy and rough place with intent. second, i ultimately decided to redesign it anyway, with a new promise: to make it somewhere i'm proud of posting more often, no matter what those posts look like.

and with that promise fulfilled, i'm ready to get back to journaling 💙

new stream archive, in which we run another marathon! this one has more bananas... and more salty tears.

The Story So Far

if i had five minutes to tell my life’s story, what would that look like? what are the common themes and threads? what details are most important, most effective? this was just supposed to be a thought exercise, but i find it makes for a nice blog post! it functions as a tidy summary of all of my life updates both here and on twitter. most of it is focused on the last ten years or so, but in truth, that’s where the most growth lies... as well as some stuff that i’ve kept mostly private until now, which is equally pivotal to my growth. so, without further ado: the story of my life so far.

i had a rather sheltered childhood. i was homeschooled, so i rarely made any friends; the few i did make lived far enough away that i rarely saw them, and i never got too attached since we moved roughly every three years. the only constant people in my life were my family - my dad, my mom, and my brother - who all struggled with their own issues. so, over time, i built a shell: when i was around others, i did what they wanted to do, because their happiness made me happy too. then when i was alone, i recharged with my own solitary interests, like drawing and video games. and for a while... it worked, and i found my own happiness.

then i left home for gifted school at 16 years old. it was essentially college level work with high school level socializing! of course, i was not ready. the course load and social load both shattered the fragile balance i had found as a child, leaving me with frequent panic attacks and low grades. but it wasn’t all bad; it also helped me chip away at my shell. i made more friends than i ever had before, and i went online for the first time - where i started this blog and found spaces to be more myself. ultimately, gifted school was two years of highly accelerated growth, both painful and rewarding.

i barely graduated gifted school, but still somehow went to college with a full scholarship. by comparison, college slowed to a crawl - it was both less social and less work. i fell behind in classes as i wasn’t sufficiently challenged, and did more online as my socializing fluctuated... causing me to procrastinate even further. as my grades dropped i lost my full scholarship, and had to go on student loans plus a state-funded scholarship. then the state cut its scholarship funding during my senior year, and i could not justify taking out more loans to keep going. in truth, i only went because i thought i had to; i didn’t really know why i was there!

...but i figured out why the moment i got home: while i was away, my family was falling apart. my brother left and we didn’t know where he was, my mom was sleeping in the garage and having her own frequent panic attacks, and my dad had exactly two emotions left - raging mad, or dead tired. within a few months my dad divorced and disappeared, shattering my family for good... leaving just me and my mom. she was highly unstable, but i still had a strong conviction to care for her. she’s my mom! she’s the only family i have left!

with the divorce hanging over us, neither i nor my mom had a place to go. so i took the first job i could find and the first place i could find, hoping to take care of her. instead... she took advantage of me, by vandalizing the house i was renting. she flipped breakers and water mains on a whim, DIYed the wiring of outlets and light switches, unplugged the fridge overnight - spoiling all of our food! - and nearly got us both kicked out of my lease. all while complaining that i should be doing more for her! then the pandemic struck, and i felt bad about the idea of kicking her out... but i needed an escape. i was still doing what she wanted so that she wouldn’t hurt me; i was fawning to survive.

all the while, i was still extremely online - and it paid off in spades. one day, i realized one of my mutuals lived in the same city! so i drove somewhere that i didn’t “have to” go for the very first time, and met the person who would soon become my partner: Melody. her love and genuine kindness cracked a hole in my shell, leading me to come out as genderfluid and rethink my life choices. i realized that the fawning i was doing for my mom has always been my shell; that i primarily did what others wanted or expected of me, and made few choices of my own. all for little crumbs of love and acceptance that Melody gave so comparatively freely!

i told Melody about the situation with my mom; i had barely scratched the surface before Melody broke down crying. i realized she was the first person i had told about it, that i had kept it bottled up all this time. so with Melody’s help and support, i finally took steps to combat my mom’s behavior. i locked the breaker box and limited what my mom was doing around the house as she continued to escalate her rampage. finally, i gave her a date to move out by; she didn’t pack or find another place, but only left when i threatened to call the police. she left behind her cats, most of her stuff... and a lot of the “DIY” work she did on the house.

finally, we reach the present day: Melody moved in with me, and we work together daily to build each other up (in stark contrast to my mom). my dad reached out, and we’re working on repairing our relationship; i learned that he divorced because mom did all the same things to him, from the moment i left home for school. i still live in the same “first place i could get” working the same “first job i could get” - which is both a blessing and a curse, as mom’s memories still live on within. and i am actively seeking therapy and medication to heal from the last ten years... and to take more of my shell off.

in the end, i always knew taking my shell off would be my lifelong journey. but i never knew what that shell looked like... much less how much it was hurting me. now that i know, i can truly embrace my journey: to relinquish the naïve comfort of following someone else’s choices, and fearlessly lead myself on my own path.

last night i finished twilight princess for the first time and i have a LOT to say about it...

i didn't grow up with twilight princess like i grew up with the other zelda games. i don't remember why i didn't pick it up back in the day – some combination of tone and timing, i guess? – but i played every other zelda i could get my hands on, 2d and 3d alike.

it wasn't until college that i picked up a gamecube copy, stopped right after twilight kakariko village, and never returned to it. the pace of the game's opening areas is GLACIAL, and despite me actually liking the twilight areas, i didn't really gel with much else.

so i didn't have strong expectations when i returned to the game a couple weeks ago. i knew the game's tone was extremely 2006, i knew i'd have to be patient with the game's pacing, i'd heard the memes about it being Ocarina But More, and not much else.

now that i'm finished, i'm happy to report that i'm utterly FASCINATED by both the game's strengths and by its flaws. every good thing that the game does is accompanied by a major setback, usually due to sticking too hard to the zelda series's roots in the process.

like how the game's coolest ideas are punctuated by pacing issues – for example, the second dungeon's magnetic floors make for such incredible dungeon design! but they require the iron boots, and walking around the entire ceiling of a room in iron boots is SO FREAKING SLOW

or how hyrule field is scaled up for horseback travel, which in turn makes traversing on foot slow and monotonous... so they added warps, which you can only use as a wolf, which you can't switch to around people, which makes getting around needlessly complicated???

i was really surprised at how much i like the game's tone. i do love majora, it's my favorite 3d zelda, but twilight princess always seemed like it'd be 2006 gritty grimdark to me. far from it; the tone is tasteful and never takes itself too seriously.

but the biggest surprise to me personally is this: every other 3d zelda game is pretty unique in terms of structure, tone, and added mechanics.

by comparison, twilight princess sits almost exactly halfway between oot and botw. it's the missing link i never knew existed!!

so much of what twilight princess iterated or added beyond oot was then iterated further in botw. big things like the expanded overworld emphasizing horses and warps, but also little things like bomb arrows, bug collecting – even snowboarding, which led to shield surfing!

it blows my mind how much these games share dna beyond the obvious zelda tropes; it gave me more appreciation for the development history of the series, how everything led to what we have now. honestly, twilight princess has me more hyped to play botw2 than botw1 itself ever did!

twilight princess also gave me more appreciation for what oot did right that didn't really make it to the other 3d zeldas, things i'd forgotten since it's been so long since i last played – or maybe things that twilight princess leaned too much into that oot did more tastefully.

it may seem like i'm ragging on twilight princess at this point – i'm not, i promise! the game does a lot right, like having some of the best dungeons in the series, some fascinating (if underutilized) new items, and, uh, pretty much everything relating to Wolf Link and Midna

but like light casting shadows, the game's strengths betray its own weaknesses – and in the broader context of the series, it creates a fascinating contrast that shines new light on why i love these games in the first place. a 10/10 experience, even if the game itself isn't.