Direction
January 31, 2006
We’ve my recent attempts with Accelerated C++ going not as well as expected(but still ok mind you). I’ve been rethinking about the future. I’m really not uncertain. Its more like anticipating for the future. I want to know if an option will be hit or miss. So that I can focus on the hits and ignore the misses. Learning C++ is a very difficult task, I’ve spent more than a year doing so and I feel as though I haven’t gotten very far. I’ve gone thru a fair chunk of a difficult book, done a series of online tutorials and quite a bit thru Accelerated yet I still feel below the bar. I could have tried much harder beforehand and have done what I have achieved in this past year in 2-3 months. Perhaps. Although when I do try again I get stuck and try to fix it, only to find that my progression has been somewhat flawed despite it being the reasoning that I battle on. I could throw myself in a deep end and try to move but that would be worse. It certainly takes time. Perhaps its not in my blood or comes naturally. If it did I guess I would be somewhat of a miracle child. 
I have started early which is great, but then again, you always think that you could have started earlier, or even started something else earlier. I don’t know if I regret not getting into another field earlier. Its intersting when you see someone young on say deviantART creating such brilliance. There’s no doubt in my mind that the same applies for all fields. Most notably programming. So I could have been something and obsessed about it earlier and now be a professional. That reminds me of the new NRX staffers, the artists. They have a wide variety and are extremely talented for their age, to me they seem to have filled their potential and are destined to enjoy their work, their life in the art that they make.
So then what does this make me? A wannabe programmer who is probably a better artist but compared to some 14yr old kids is no where near as good? In saying that though I have had plenty of all around experience. I’m also sure that if I wanted to I could become as good as those kids in a years time if I strongly dedicated the time. I’d love to hit that passion and just spend all day working on it, honing my skills. I’ve had experience with general programming, flash, C++, Fireworks and Photoshop, general good computer usage. I’m great at doing the loose jobs. The kinda small adminy type of work.
The verdict then? What am I to do? Well I’ve given it a bit of thought. I firstly want to expand my career choices a bit. Especially since the only game studio in SA has closed down(not that they were great anyways). There are plenty of other options in other states but I wouldn’t be as keen. I’d love to join the ever growing Australian games industry. God that would be such a joy to me. I’ve decided that I should extend from my 2 prefered choices which were either a games programmer and a Chinese translator in which translator wasn’t a big idea. To a more stronger lean on translator, perhaps an engineer, general computer job(admin or something???) , maybe even a professional sales assistant as I enjoy selling stuff @ work and talking to people about that kind of thing.
One of the big changes with my focus on chinese is all to do with the upcoming China trip which happens in about 10 weeks, which isn’t actually too far away. If I enjoy China enough on the trip then I am thinking that after yr12 I head off to China and live therefor a year. In which time I prepare to be a translator and then work for the Beijing 08 Olympics(as was recommended by my chinese teacher). After that, who knows? I’d love to do something like that. I’d choose that choice right away, theres only one thing stopping me though. That is I haven’t been there yet and I might not like it. So this option is on hold until the trip. If China turns out to be bad then I’d prolly go for the computer science course after yr12 and then continue on with some kind of sales job in the mean time until I do something with my programming. I have also thought about going for a spot at BAE systems or DSTO as I might be bale to make it there as an engineer or coder. If I go well at maths I was thinking that I could go for a pure maths course and get a very well paid job as a mathematician. 
What I would love to happen is the following. I go to China and enjoy it, live there for a while after yr12 and get some kind of decent job. Hopefully if our site is good enough still be working on that from China 
. Stay in China for quite a while, hopefully somewhere modern. Then come back to SA and continue programming(past years having on/off programming, gaining skills) hopefully for a game studio, maybe spend sometime making small fry games and then get a job. Do that job for a while and from then on, I don’t really care, go back and forth to China would be cool. Working for a Chinese game studio would be even cooler.
Have to wait and see for now. NRX 4 will be up today for staff and should be great. Holidays are almost over but new senior school building sounds great.
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So, it starts
January 19, 2006
This holiday really bites. Stupid kitchen and knob job builder. So many plans, destroyed Obliterated. Talk about a series of unfortunate events. Kitchen= ruined, adsl=can’t get, emails won’t come in, WMP isn’t messing up my music. Argh I hate this bull shit. Bloody C++ is so damn hard to learn. Ggggggggrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!
Downloading OGRE as I type. So that means that I’ll have everything that I need to work magic. Just gotta do a toss load of learning.
Holidays will be over in 2 weeks. Still haven’t done 10hrs of service at the library and got my Ls. Just wonderful really. I spose I should be anticipating the return of school. Most of my classes will have my friends in which is nice. This dumb streak should be over and everything should fall into place.
All I need to do now is to prepare. I have my resources gathered. Now it starts.
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Reinvention
January 6, 2006
It feels as though things are finally clicking back into gear which is really great. Kitchen won’t be finished until we go back to school which is really terrible. Other than that things have been good. Christmas was great, Chris and I got loads of games, I think that it as 9 n total which is so abstract from all of the other Christmas’. Bu then who said that I was complaining.:) Also got the first 2 Mario Bros cartoons which I’ve been watching recently they are suprisingly good and I strangly feel compelled to continue watching one more episode. I’ve eaten all of my lollies already but that was bound to happen sooner or later.
Christmas day was one of our best yet imo. Everyone got along really well and the day ran quite smoothly. I’m fortunate to have such a kind family.
NRX 4.0 has seen quite a bit of progress. I managed to finish the overall template the other day and it turned out really well. Since its mostly finished I am happy with what we’ve done on it. I am annoyed at the RPG system as I plain out don’t like RPG systems on forums. I’m also disappointed that Chris didn’t opt for the phpBB blog hacks as they were excellent. Very similar to blogger which I would have liked. The current blog system looks annoying, has sub standard skins and less options in comparison to the phpbb ones imo.I think that it had to do with Chris wanting some the mod on the forum and that the phpbb blog clashed with it. The good thing about the RPG and blog system is that with the blog system at least I will be able to share with other forum members.And the RPG system will probably keep people busy for a while and generate some kind of buzz.
The story of the week is not of anything that I have mentioned yet. After 2 months of hard earned saving I have finally purchased my laptop. Infact I am writing this very entry up on my laptop. The day has finally come,i it was last Friday and I tell you it didn’t run that smoothly. I wasn’t given my free laptop bag when I picked it up and I was sold a PS/2 mouse and not a USB mouse. So I am getting the bag and also my mouse swapped over. I can’t wait as this ruddy touch screen is nowhere near as good as a mouse. Oh and the other slight problem is that it came with a AMD Sempron sticker and not a Turion sticker. Not sure why though 
I’ve spent the last 2 days setting it up. Got all of my files across today. I’ve installed all of the regulars and have tried not to install too much. Since our other computer is bogged down thanks to Chris using too much at once and installing too much garbage. Which is why I am only installing what I need and I’ve also specifically bought laptop with 1gig of ram. I’m very proud of it.
No real diference from my normal set up. Same OS skin, same Winamp skin, same tool bar configuration. The main difference is that I’m using Openoffice instead of MS office. Since its free. I still need to add stuff to my Winamp library. I’m not touching anything until I get to use my free 200hrs of internet or when we get adsl in a few days. So that WMP can update all of the songs and so it won’t all be moved around and hence destroying the locations of my Winamp songs in my media library.
The real reason on why I should be so happy about picking up my laptop is a shift in focus. This laptop for me represents me moving into a more programming based environment and to leave the other stuff behind. I’m sick of wasting time not getting anywhere, I’m setting myself some big goals that I can with the aid of the laptop complete. Lets hope that I can complete them. I don’t plan on telling anyone about what they are, well not until I have completed that goal in my set time.
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For your consideration, a blog about video games as written by myself:
