5 months since the last post, I’ve clearly got out of the habbit of writing.

I’ve been doing a lot of miniature painitng and that’s kind of scratching my “express yourself on the internet” itch via my instagram account.

I’ve read a bunch of books but haven’t had the urge to make any notes about them.

I have, unfortunately fallen back in to the Hearthstone habbit though just the Battlegrounds (auto chess-ish) mode which is a bit more managable.

I’ve been investgating the game engine Godot in my other spare time. Game engines these days are not what they were in my youth. Where they used to be a kind of abstraction layer over the top of graphics APIs/ low level stuff nowadays they’re like a whole IDE & all sorts of other tools & they encapsulate all sorts of other common patterns. It’s interesting, it feels like lrearnign Flash all those years ago. I don’t have a clear idea of what I want to make but gettign a penguin to move around the screen with a GameCube controller was pretty rewarding. Those GameCube controllers are SOOOO good. They’re hamstrung slightly by their oddness – they’re not generic enough, too opinionated – but they’re so comfortable and intuitive and just generally solid feeling.

Why Chronicling Nature Can Make Us (Especially Kids) Better, Smarter Humans

1) “There’s a personal value,” says Tan. “It brings me great happiness and sharpens my sense of observation. It also deepens my appreciation for nature and hence, inspires my conservation efforts. Whether or not it benefits the birds, I’m not really sure. [At my house] they certainly have enough food when nesting, and that may contribute to the number of baby birds being born. Because the fewer times the parent birds have to go out to get food, the more attentive they can be. They don’t have to be away so long, which leaves the nest open to fewer predators.”

2) Nature journaling is something that can actually increase intelligence. “Some of it has to do with attention span, and maybe it also has to do with the development of certain brain matter that is linked to observation and drawing. It’s especially good for kids to get involved.”

3) “It’s an outdoor activity. You can do it looking out the window as well.”

4) “It makes kids curious and ask questions. It makes them find answers as their own little scientists, looking for answers.”

5) “It develops memory. Children remember better what they write down and draw, and they develop better memory skills. And they can apply those memory skills to other areas of life.”

6) “Kids will be the generation that are the stewards of our natural world. The more understanding they have of nature, the more likely they will become conservationists in the future.”