All's well here at The Dispatch. For Easter, the snails wanted to do an easter egg hunt. But they wanted to be the eggs and they wanted us to find them. So we spent an afternoon dying their shells different colors and then we let them go off and hide. We still haven't found the majority of them, and it's been a few days now. We'd be more worried but the snails we have found are telling us that they packed enough provisions to survive for weeks.

Game Boy 👾

• Loop Hero
  • Cool indie rogue-like game where you change the environment and the character moves and fights automatically
  • Not sure how deep it goes, but what I have played is grindy, but fun
• Finished playing Ori and the Will of the Wisps
  • The storyline ended basically right when it should have
  • The power creep for the character's abilities also curved up at the right moments, so at the end of the game you are doing crazy things you couldn't do at the start, but only for a short while until the final boss
  • The story was actually pretty poignant and sweet
  • Overall had a great experience with it playing on Xbox game pass

Coding Corner 👨🏻‍💻

• ChatGPT
  • I've started going to ChatGPT first over Google or StackOverflow to help get a first stab at a solution to coding problems I have
  • It's so helpful for stuff that is specific scenarios where I can describe the context
  • And I'm able to correct/clarify incorrect assumptions or add additional details and it can remember the context
  • Starting to think about paying for the pro version so I can play with it in other contexts or extensions using an API key
• Work stuff
  • Had a lot of uninterrupted time for coding this week, and was very productive
  • Was another reminder of how valuable deep thinking is, and how hard it is to fit into busy schedules

Albums 🎧

• "The Record" by boygenius
  • Listened to this a few more times this week; there's already a familiar shape forming in my head now; was making me want to add context and listen to their other albums
• "boygenius" by boygenius
  • Right off of listening to "The Record"; feels like the potential energy and the full album is kinetic
• "Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You" by Big Thief
  • Can hook into this and feel mellow and content while working; also is longer, so feels like I'm settling into something
• "God Save the Animals" by Alex G
  • Making a space in my head with "Big Time", probably because they're both on my self-hosted audio service; "I did good, I stuck to the mission", "forgive yesterday, I choose today"
• "Big Time" by Angel Olsen
  • Connected to the concert now; I feel like I have concrete emotions/feeling tied up in some of these
• "Punisher" by Phoebe Bridgers
  • Production is incredible at setting the mood and her voice enchanting
• "Sylvan Esso" by Sylvan Esso
  • Band is from Durham, but I don't know if I'd listened to them since moving here; But good work music, listened to in a coffee shop; Makes me at once remember the stress and freedom of leaving my job in Wisconsin
• "Crack-Up" by Fleet Foxes
  • Like an intricately illustrated story or collection of poems; breezy misty wispy
• "Woman King" by Iron & Wine
  • A short and sweet EP; classic Iron & Wine sound
• "Rat Saw God" by Wednesday
  • Cool lead singer vocals, all over the map sound; maybe midwestern americana; will need to listen again
• "Home Video" by Lucy Dacus
  • Virginia tacit Christian culture; gay angsty vibes; also beautiful vocals

Podcasts 🎙

• Dungeons and Daddies
  • Caught up to the most recent episode and feel like it's going to be hard to wait two weeks for new episodes
• Not Another D&D Podcast
  • Started right back up listening to new episodes of this though
  • Trinyvale X Bahumia three episode mini-arc was good, the first episode was the best/funniest
  • Once they get into combat I start to zone out, and I wish it was all just them goofing off