RJ Rambles about the release and stress

Hey everybody! Man, last week felt looooooooong. This weekend felt like it went on forever. I can barely remember things that happened.

Okay, so on Monday, we watched the eclipse. That was pretty cool. Was able to just sit out in our back yard and see it. Clouds cleared, we had our glasses, world got dark for a bit, animals were going nuts. Was pretty neat! I'd seen eclipses before, but it might have been my first full total eclipse.

The middle of the week was mostly just preparing for the Update 17 release. I chilled out and played some games in the evening. We also put together our home gym (some foam flooring with a squat rack, bench, barbell, and weights), because we're not planning on renewing our gym membership, just to save some time and money and to be able to work out comfortably from home. I worry a little bit about the mental side of it - having a gym membership makes you feel like you should be working out - but I think I'm past that point now and I am motivated just on my own.

Thursday, Mango and I went out on a date, which was really nice. We started doing this on the night before release as sort of a celebration. After release, I'm usually busy with bug fixes and promotion stuff and answering questions and everything. Then I came home from the date and got on the internet and saw that my beta release had leaked on pirating websites... which was frustrating. So now the pirating websites have a broken version of the game (which they complain about) and some of my patrons who actually pay for the game were asking if they could just get the release a day early, since it's already leaked. I get that, because it's fucking annoying when pirates get to play the game before people who actually paid for it. But I can't just press a button and release everything. I have to do a lot of setup and promotion and stuff when the release happens, plus be there in case something goes wrong and it messes up. Release is like an all day thing. If I released at 7pm, I would not be able to relax and sleep that night.

Anyways, thank you all for actually supporting the game. I don't want to spend too much time thinking about pirates, but it always frustrates me.

So, then the release happened on Friday. And it went really smoothly. There were some unforeseen bugs, but I got those fixed pretty quickly. The feedback on the release has been really positive and that makes me feel amazing. I've started working on Update 18 now and have been enjoying that process as well. Update 18 is huge. But I'll talk more about that on Friday.

This morning, I did my first workout in my home gym. It was really nice to not have to get dressed, fix my hair, and drive to the gym. And I don't have to worry about somebody else using the equipment I want, or just being around people, being stared at, or judged. Felt really good.

Lastly, next week there will likely not be a Ramblings on Monday. We are planning a short camping trip. We've been wanting to go for a while, but have been waiting for a good time when I'm not too busy and when my Mom can look after the dogs. So we'll be gone from Monday through Wednesday, two nights, at a park that we've never been to before. Should be fun - really looking forward to the hikes. I'll share pics when we get back.

That's it! Thanks for reading my nonsense and supporting my game. Hope y'all have an amazing week! Love ya!