gewgaw

At Googlism, in addition to being stuffed with deep-fried turkey and the best stuffiing-alternative west of the Mississippi…

Chris Hecker is always entertaining and a bit frenetic

Jennifer Pahlka is director of Gama Network

Eric Faurot is the general manager of Comdex

Charles Martin is of course the only true and worthwhile candidate for the Presidency in 2016

Doug Church is looking into those numbers

Alan Yu is telling some truth

Jane Pinckard is a slacker and a gamer

and Robin Hunicke is still stuck in academia.

Tiny, of course, is too cool for us oldsters and our geekery.

Thanks for and love to all my holiday companions, friends and family who make each day worthwhile. Special shout out to Smart Girl NYC, for her special delivery and supersweet note. Girl, you almost made me cry!!

Thanks also to those who’ve written and said hi in the last few weeks re: this blog. Your encouragements are deeply appreciated. Be well!

Revolution, evolution, stagnation, failure. Which will it be? Games and AI feel perilously close to one end of the spectrum, as I sit and mull over my “contribution”, my “future work” and “my story”, as Justin calls it.

I am impatient. I want to know. Now. Is that so terribly uncommon or shocking?

At the bottom of all this anxiety and despair – the fear of working so hard to climb up the hill, only to get up there and realize I’m on the wrong side of the valley. Wasted effort, dust in the wind.

I want confirmation of my value, my ability to enact positive change – the radius of my sphere of influence. More importantly, can (should) I communicate outside of a small, familiar circle of contemporaries to the fresh young ears of potential artists, programmers, activists, revolutionaries? If so, how?

At a time when I most need to focus on the immediate, I feel a thirst for roadmaps, perscriptions, advice. Tell me how I will matter. Even casual conversations bend to this shape. Friends, I apologize. Really, I swear it will pass.

No great mystery, living in the moment. Enjoying the feeling of now, the impact of a well made point (or meal). Letting the value be revealed, in time, as it is done. Why does this drag on me so?

I told myself for a long time that my enthusiasm and interest in pushing pushing pushing was a good thing. The further along I get, the less this feels like a truth. More an excuse, a way of justifying my internal foot-tapping, head banging, heart pounding frustration at the slowness of it all.

People smile and say “If it’s so obvious to you, then go do it. If not, stop complaining and make at least some small effort to learn.” After years learning, thinking, and yes – doing – I feel slower than ever. Despair at the thought of more time not knowing.

Learning to write a new story that tells me in a new way. The me that doesn’t know but is OK with that. Feeling positive about future events without having to control exact outcomes. And no way to say the dog ate my homework. Uncle!!!

Lauren. Articulate, passionate, cunning, dexterous. Revealer, healer, 18-wheeler of compassion and critical inquiry riding up the tailpipe of your complaint. Sometimes while she is talking I think to myself: Christ! How did she *get it* so fast? And she gives good complication.

I did a 2.5 hour interview today with a sociologist who is studying the CS department in an attempt to understand how “intelligence” is defined and represented and evaluated in the AI community here. We talked for so long that I felt my tongue was out of batteries. And I can talk a lot.

Plus, I was so sad and beat last night that I couldn’t sleep. I got about 4 hours, went to therapy, then did the interview, worked on an article/paper idea with Rob, stopping at 7 to review a game-studies program proposal for Depaul. By 9, dinner seemed like a stretch. Could I really be present enough to justify her trip up from Hyde Park?

Yes! Again! More! Advice and laughter and good food… energy from somewhere inside me just minutes after we embraced. So comforting, comfortable, easy, young, old, familiar, new.

Smiling and playing with her ruby sparkely ring (black pants, black sweater, black hair with just a few wires of gray) “I”m really happy that you could take time away from your sadness and tiredness to come out with me and have pleasure.”

And I did. Thank you, Lauren, for so much hand-holding, instruction, care and depth. I have been sad for too long, and it is time to grow again.

I’m typing at my desktop computer, ears plugged into my new tiny flash mp3 player. QOTSA rocking me into oblivion, or nearly so. The new “extended life” battery is charging up in my laptop – transforming it into a plane-able companion for the first time in probably 2 years.

I’m pretty bad with routine maintenance.

I just had dinner with Matt. I’d had an exhausting day and was feeling like crap, so instead of going out, I cooked. It’s been months since I cooked for anyone, let alone myself.

We drank wine and traded stories about our brokenness, and then recovered from the seriousness of it all with some Prince of Persia and Top Spin. I miss doing that – just coming home, talking to him, and then playing games. It was a nice two years.

When things first started to go wrong between us, I wasn’t sure what to do. I knew we were growing apart, feared that somewhere down the line it would slowly grind to a halt. The creaking joints needed oil, or tears, but I couldn’t supply them. Too busy trying to figure out my own malfunction. Self-absorbed? Selfish?

I some way, I figured it was me, my bad, something I should avoid mentioning. Why be critical? Why pick a fight? Now I wonder: what would a little communication and a few new parts have spared? For want of a nail…

I crave connection. Want to feel close to people and be there too, smiling and hugging and laughing out loud. As friends and colleagues move on to new places, and I prepare for my own eventual flight, I feel this so acutely. It hurts.

And I disagree with Jane here. Text is a poor substitute.

But it isn’t fair to hoard and scrimp as I have been doing, stacking up more intimacy chips than I can possibly cart home. No good for the karma. Was I denied as a child? Kicked too much? Did I get the lonely gene in spades?

Whatever the cause, I’m trying to loosen my grip a little.
Bear with me.

I did it again – stared so intently at my monitor that my eyes gave out on me. When this happens, I develop a swirly pattern of dots at the center of my vision. Eventually, it becomes so busy and blurry that I can no longer see what I type. I have to adjust my gaze so that I’m always looking just slightly to the right of the cursor… like it’s a miniature sun.

How long had I been sitting there? It doesn’t seem like that long. I went to the gym at about 9 pm and was home by 11 – only 4 hours of screentime? OK make that 5.

I’m working too hard. I’m not working smart. I make progress – but at what cost? I fear that like others in my circle, it’s time to re-evaluate a few things, change some habits, close some windows and doors. Learning to budget your time is a lot harder than it seems. Sleeping less and skipping meals doesn’t make up for confused priorities.

I’ve been traveling a lot lately – often to spend time with dear friends. Yet when I get home it feels like I’ve hardly seen anyone. Christmas is just around the corner but all I want to do is hole up and stare at my screen, my books, my notebooks.

My poor eyes.

Will it take blinders to keep me focused on finishing? Is this really what it will be like for the next six months? Do I have to let everything go and become a complete hermit?

Every PhD I have asked seemed to think so.

It was raining when I left work tonight. Sprinkling, so I figured I would brave it. By the time I got off the train, it was teeming. Walking home in the downpour, sans umbrella, I suddenly felt a stab of panic. I was carrying all my notebooks with me. What if they got wet?

I have these notebooks. I write in them. I write all manner of things about my thesis, my interests, random systems that might work as games or be interesting to build or study. I write these things down and then forget them. Promptly. It’s as if I keep these notebooks so I can feel good about having had great thoughts, without actually doing anything about the contents.

What does it mean to be a computer scientist and keep all your notes on paper?

A couple of years ago, my cat knocked a piss-soaked houseplant onto a carefully organized array of notebooks, thesis docs and readings. Furious but resigned, I dutifully wiped off the grime and stacked the sodden and stinking materials neatly, so they would dry flat. I still have them.

It’s gotten to the point now where I can’t think unless I have a white board or paper in front of me. I’m a luddite when it comes to brainstorming, organizing, outlining.

I think best out loud. For whatever reason, when I’m conversing, the cruel editor that lives inside me takes a siesta. An hour later, sitting at the keyboard, I get self-conscious and knotted up around simple ideas. The writing becomes a nest of unruly ramblings, and I’m lost.

No more tangles! No more tears. I need some help and so I’m turning back to this machine. I’m writing these things down to make them disappear. Thesis blog. Games blog. Anxiety confused overworked missing people blog. You know who you are.

For the next little while, this is going to be a notebook for me. We’ll see how it goes.

No comments, tho, because I won’t have time to write back.

gewgaw (G(Y)OO-gaw), noun:
A showy trifle; a toy; a splendid plaything; a pretty but worthless bauble.

“A heavy gewgaw, called a crown, that spread about his temples.” –Dryden

“All the trash and trifles, the bubbles, bawbles, and gewgaws of this life.” –Fielding

“If, in the storm-portending times in which we live, the gewgaws of art or literature are worth a thought…” –J. W. Croker

“Her accomplishments were not the mere gewgaws which accomplishments so frequently are.”

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*from a helpful reader:

Etymology: c. 1225, possibly a reduplication connected with Old French ‘gogue’, meaning “joke” or “game”; or from ‘jou-jou’, “toy” – baby-talk word, from ‘jouer’, “to play”, from Latin ‘jocare’.

Dictionary.com