The Professional Gamer - March 21, 2020

Day 5 of quarantine here, and I’m starting to go a bit stir crazy. I suppose I should clarify. I’m not actually under quarantine, but am voluntarily isolating due to potential exposure to COVID-19. A family member of another worker in my office building testing positive and the worker was showing symptoms on Monday (I’m hoping that the worker was at home). So, I was told to pack up my desk and head home immediately. From that day forward, I’ve been working from home. I’ve teleworked a lot in the past: I’m allowed to do so one day every other week, and I usually do it. But working remotely for several days in the row has been a trip. I’m having to make extra effort to get outside at least once a day. Also, being in a office building where the kitchenette is about 500 feet away, is a lot different than having a kitchen 10 steps away. I used to get about 4,000 steps per day minimum just from walking from my car to my desk and around the office. Now, I have to make a significant effort just to get 2,000 steps in a day.

Anyways, lets talk about the more fun stuff that I’ve been doing outside of the work day. First up, I finished Iruma-kun. And it was a lot of fun. If you need a good comedy in these dark times, I recommend it. I’m a little annoyed about how the season ended, since it was obvious bait for a new season (which is going to happen). But, I feel like its a bit presumptious to end a season on a weird cliffhanger when you don’t have a second season contracted. Anyways, good series and a lot of fun.

Next, I caught up on Eizoken. This series is so delightful. We were watching an episode with the characters walking around town, and I was blown away by the detail that when into placing posters in the windows of a convenience store. It sounds a little strange, but someone had to think about the fact that there should be a poster in the window, and then design it and paint it into the background for the animation. And this was just for a passing shot. It was probably only on screen for 20 seconds. That is really one of the amazing things about animation. The things that appear in the feature (typically) do not exist in the real world. Even if they do, you have to intentionally draw them and add them to the animation. Unlike film, where a setting or a prop is something that can be found, everything in animation has to be created. And the small scale world building in Eizoken is amazing. I love their weird town with things that have been built on top of each other repeatedly for many years.

I have read about one-third of the BuJo book, and I think I’m starting to understand things a little better now. I’m still not sure how I’m going to apply things for myself, but at least I’m making process to learn about it.

I’ve been very thankful for Discord this past week. It’s helped me keep in touch with friends. Especially having some voice chats, and playing some RPG’s together. Even when I can’t be in meat-space with people, it’s good to hear their voices.

That’s all for this week. I hope everyone stays safe and healthy. Have a great week, and game on!