Friday Thoughts 12
Last night I had some free time, so I fired up PCSX2 on my Macbook and played a round of MVP Baseball 2005, Blue Jays vs. Brewers. My goodness, I hate those 2000s Brewers jerseys. I have to earn a lot of points to unlock classic jerseys (I miss my PS2 copy so much).
It's still a very fun game to play; ignoring the dated graphics, the game mechanics function very similarly to modern baseball games. In fact, I changed my control scheme in MLB The Show 2026 to mirror MVP as closely as possible.
I recorded my gameplay and clipped a few fun plays from the game. I'm going to edit a video to upload to my YouTube channel.
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Today is Bandcamp Friday! I posted on Mastodon and got a couple recommendations. I think I'm going to buy Blowin' Up from Kiwi Jr., whom I've heard on SiriusXM's Alt Nation.
I'm still listening to find a few other purchase options.
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Speaking of Bandcamp Friday, an artist reached out to me to share this tool he made:
Limnetic Maps - Bandcamp Musicians V1.85 by limneticvillains
I tested it out and it's neat! If you want a comprehensive listing of artists by country, you'll enjoy this tool.
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I'm slowly listening to my catalog in Apple Music and rating songs as I hear them. Mostly I'm listening by album, but I also use my Random Music playlist to find different tracks.
I want to play around with smart playlists and I think having ratings on my songs will lead to some interesting options.
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I posted about starting fresh this week, and neglected to mention this also includes flossing & brushing at night. I've gotten very lazy with this, so I'm being diligent about it again. It's such an easy thing to do, there's no good reason NOT to.
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Do you judge how busy you are at work based on how fast you drink your coffee? Or if you have time to get a second coffee before lunch? Just me?
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We'll be back home for the next week after a few weeks. It'll be nice to be in our own house, but more importantly we'll be able to clean the areas we weren't able to last time we were there and do some more baby room prep.
The sad part is it's because of a situational change that we weren't anticipating when we first made our plan to transfer my wife's 3rd trimester care to be closer to her in-laws: my father-in-law had his leg amputated, so our need to be here is not as important; he's going to be moving to a nursing home by the end of the month so is not returning home. My mother-in-law is also more independent as she continues to recover from an impact fracture to her shoulder, so she doesn't need our help as much.
I guess there's good and bad to all of this. It's hard to navigate the emotions of it all.
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As a result of some of our freed up time, my wife and I are finally looking at baby gear like car seats and strollers. We have our eye on one in particular that combines a car seat with an adjustable stroller. The underlying meaning is that we have time to think about ourselves, instead of focusing on her parents all the time.
With a baby coming in just over a month and a half, this is important.
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Some second impressions from my new phone: battery life is fantastic. I checked my battery usage a few minutes ago, and I have approximately 20 hours remaining before 0% (I'm charging to 80%, for battery protection). I don't think I ever had as good a battery as this when my S21+ was brand new1.
I've become slightly accustomed to the S Pen. It's still awkward to hold because it's so thin, but I like how you can take it out of the slot and start writing a note immediately. It looks like you're writing in those chalk markers and I like the way it looks. It's a little thing, but I like little things.
The S Pen in general is useful for editing videos (see PCSX2 note above). Instead of relying on my fat fingers I can use the pen for precise editing. On that note, Samsung's built-in video editor is not great. I was trying to avoid downloading VN just because it's a freemium app; VN works very well on mobile, but I thought maybe Samsung offered something a more robust. Unfortunately the most that their editor offers is their proprietary "Galaxy AI" features2.
I haven't explored the camera much yet, but I have my eye on a mode called "Expert Raw" that looks powerful for a mobile camera. The photo blog is going to get some fun content in the near future.