May Roundup. It’s Still May, Right?

As much as I don’t beat myself up for not writing in this as much as I used to, I do still want to at least have something here each month. It’s harder when I have Twitter, Discord, Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram and my Twitch channels where I’m also still producing writing and photos and streamed content. There are debates out there whether blogging is making a comeback or is still relevant in 2024, but I just like having this space that is mostly under my control. And it’s nice to peck out a couple hundred words about what’s been happening or on my mind.

Philadelphia

I guess the biggest thing from May was spending a week in Philadelphia, working remotely from an Airbnb. I stayed there with a friend as both a test of “can we travel together” and also “can we live together” as we’ve been mulling over a future roommate situation for both savings and possibly a more interesting place to live. I love apartments, but when you get into 2-bedroom places, they aren’t really designed to be 50/50 equal vs. Master Bedroom and Other Bedroom.

So it was really a “working vacation” but it was nice to be someplace else and still be able to manage my day job. My partner lives in Philadelphia and they usually visit me in DC, so it was also nice to be in their neck of the woods for a change and not have PAX Unplugged going on at the same time. Outside of remaining somewhat tethered to my work laptop the whole time, I was still able to get in morning walks, explorations for coffee and nibbles and revisit a city that I hadn’t spent much time in socially, for decades. Or since last century. Both words were thrown around and made me feel every bit of my age.

It was eye-opening though. Because of the pandemic, I’ve sort of taken “working remotely” to mean working from home, but it really does mean work from anywhere. So long as I have an internet connection, my VPN is happy and I didn’t have any issues keeping up with my tasks. It’s not terribly cost-effective to decide to jet-set around to various places while working, but it’s possible. Though I confess that lugging multiple laptops along with me wasn’t the most fun. But again, it’s a proof of concept for being able to be “someplace else” while still managing the working responsibilities.

Work stuff aside, we had a great time! One particular weekend day was glorious weather and we walked down to City Hall, the museums, the riverfront, back through neighborhoods for drinks and nibbles. But every day we were there, we tried new places to eat and drink, saw different sights, I confirmed my favorite places to stop for coffee, we visited a speakeasy, we made a new friend at happy hour and geeked out over tech and sci-fi. It was that fine line between being tourist and local which I feel is a better experience of a city than just doing sightseeing.

And while I’ve never really been an Airbnb person, I’m considering them for my December trip, if they have a place near enough to the Convention Center. It was less expensive than a hotel, and having a fully-furnished apartment while there would be nice. I don’t mind giving up daily housekeeping for having a fridge and a stove. So I’ll have to look into it since PAX is just 6 months away!

Tech & TTRPG

An odd segue into both of these topics since the one thing I don’t plan to do while on the road is stream. Since I’ve never thought of myself as an on-the-go worker (I don’t even like working in coffee shops), I haven’t had the right tech or machine to do so until recently. My day job has “employee points” which can be redeemed for gift cards, company merch and actual products. I’d already used them to get an Apple Watch, but a work anniversary netted me enough to buy a new MacBook, and it’s robust enough to stream! (Ok, that’s underselling it, it’s the most powerful Apple laptop I’ve ever owned and I should try to use it more.)

So while I had scheduled a charity one-shot before planning the trip, I decided to keep it and test out the streaming/meeting rig on the road. MacBook, camera, mic, earbuds and nothing more. And for the most part, it worked. The Airbnb didn’t have the best desk-like area for sitting, but I was able to get a window with plenty of light, and the bedroom was so modern and generic that it could have been a virtual background.

Aside from having un- and re-plug in the USB cables once or twice to get the peripherals recognized, it wasn’t too bad. (There was a lot of, “Ok, can you hear me now?” until I figured that out.) Definitely not like my home streaming set up, and I did have to kinda get over myself that without bringing an entire other suitcase of gear, it would never be like that, I am pleased with how well it all worked. I’m not a big traveler and don’t have tons of travel plans on deck, but it’s nice to know that I might not have to bow out of an opportunity just because I’m not at home. Or that I could do a quick stream while I’m away for the weekend!

While there, we did watch the Google I/O presentation and I’ll admit that while my thoughts on “AI” aren’t charitable, Google did at least show some use cases of Gemini that seem somewhat helpful and would use the information you consent to giving it instead of just going online and grabbing freely available nonsense. However, they are also suffering from their experimental search results doing exactly that, so… we have a ways to go before we’re at AGI.

Streaming

Back to streaming for a bit because even though I did bring a stream-capable machine with me to Philadelphia, I gave myself a break and decided not to stream from there. Partly because I was sharing the space with another person, but also because I confess that streaming has not been easy for me lately. Finding games to connect with has been rough, I worry that my streams aren’t interesting or entertaining, and frankly what used to be a decent side-hustle of income has seen a lot of opportunities dry up.

Streaming and TTRPGs are in a weird place where everyone involved is expected to be a professional freelancer and treat everything seriously, while at the same time we have no structure or organization in place, no real standards or guidelines, nothing akin to a union or HR. So while the popular TTRPG shows and famous streamers get the money, accolades and opportunities, there are tons of other streamers and performers all passing the same $20 around to each other.

It’s been harder for me to want to stream, decide what to stream, and again feel like I’m entertaining enough. I don’t stream that many days during the week and my stream times probably put me more in “background noise” or “morning coffee” levels of engagement, so I shouldn’t feel bad about it. And it does make me happy to stream and perform, that’s the most important thing.

But not being a full-time streamer, I do look at it often, compared to my day job like, “Does this matter? Should I keep doing this?” And I confess that I don’t have a “streaming end goal” because at no point has streaming to me seemed like a viable career. It’s a way to showcase my talent and creativity, it’s a great way to make time to play games, sometimes it lets me live my best “cooking show” life, but overall… some days it’s really hard to click that “Start Streaming” button.

Everything Else

For the most part, life is good. I’m in moderately good health, Earth hasn’t evicted the human race (yet), June is right around the corner which means Pride month–and my calendar getting busy, and I may travel to visit the family as it’s been a while. But yeah, heading into Summer with things being ok, for the most part. I’m getting out for a walk every day, enjoying leisure time with friends when I can, and hopping into TTRPG things when my schedule allows.

I could use an actual vacation, so we’ll see what happens when my birthday rolls around in a few months, but for now… yeah, it’s all right. 💖