Some Random Thoughts#
It seems that after returning from the National Day holiday, I have interrupted my writing habit. It's true that any system that relies on manual maintenance is difficult to sustain. Ideas continue to emerge, but there is a lack of a process to implement them. I still enjoy this random thought process.
I didn't return home until October 1st during the National Day holiday, as it was difficult to get a high-speed train ticket. I usually arrive at the train station more than an hour in advance for an 11 am train. It seems that I have developed a habit of preparing early before every trip, worrying about unexpected accidents the next day. I used to have trouble sleeping at night because I was constantly worried. However, as the number of trips increased, my mindset gradually improved. I always tell myself that I only need to bring my ID card and phone for domestic travel, and passport, visa, etc. for international travel.
The short trip (although it lasted a day) went smoothly without any surprises. I chose a window seat on the high-speed train. When I sat down and looked up, I saw a few people in front of me who seemed to be dressed like college students. One of them took out a box of the game "Three Kingdoms Kill" and started shuffling the cards. It brought back memories of high school when I used to stay up late playing "Three Kingdoms Kill" after lights out. "Three Kingdoms Kill" has been with me since elementary school, but I haven't mastered many card-playing skills.
The most significant change after the National Day holiday is that I started to gradually adjust myself, slow down, and learn to focus without getting distracted by other things.
The most obvious change is that I concentrated on completing "Phantom Trick" last week. Although I relied on other people's strategies for many levels, I still felt a sense of accomplishment when I finally completed it.
Getting stuck is inevitable. The character development in "Phantom Trick" is excellent, but there is only one solution to complete the game. The most memorable time I got stuck was when I forgot to control an object after possessing a ghost, which caused me to be unable to complete my subsequent actions within the expected time. I tried 5 or 6 times before realizing this after carefully watching a strategy video. It also reflects that in my daily life, I often overlook key details due to the jumpiness of my thinking.
I no longer switch to another game immediately when I encounter a difficult level like I used to. By constantly changing games to stimulate dopamine, I gradually lost the joy of playing games.
During the weekend, I focused on playing "Star Ocean." Although many people criticize the slow pace and lack of innovation in the combat system, the game still captivates me with its music and visual transitions. I also played the newly released "Forza Horizon 8," but I uninstalled it after playing for more than two hours. The game is not well optimized, and it crashed several times. It is also not friendly to the Quick Resume feature. When I tried to switch back to the game in the afternoon, I couldn't enter it normally. I can only wait for future updates of the game and continue playing "Forza Horizon 5."
Unexpectedly, after returning home, the crown button on my Apple Watch broke. It can only rotate, but pressing it doesn't have any response. I thought it was a system problem, so I updated both my iPhone and watch to the latest system, but the problem still exists. It's frustrating, but I have to accept it as long as the other functions are still working. However, I was pleasantly surprised by the updated UI design of the Health app. I prefer the style of pure color cards.
I didn't pay much attention to other updates, but I was surprised by the landscape display of the charging widget for the iPhone. Although I knew about it early on, I thought it was not very useful at the time. However, when I actually used it, I have to admit that Apple understands its users. It may be based on some backend data analysis that many users have this usage behavior.
After setting goals, I started asking myself what I want to achieve each day when I brush my teeth and wash my face in the morning. At the same time, I deleted a bunch of books on my WeChat Read shelf that I wanted to read but hadn't flipped through. I also deleted TV shows on streaming platforms that I wanted to watch but hadn't watched yet.
I had a realization when I saw a sentence that said to pay attention to the balance between information input and output. I realized that when I'm tired, even though I keep reminding myself to rest, I still can't help but watch recommended videos on Bilibili. In reality, I don't even finish watching videos that I'm interested in. I just skim through them and move on to the next one. It's essentially the same as watching short videos. I call it the short video approach to long videos.
🎮 Games#
During the National Day holiday, I didn't do much coding or reading, but I focused on playing two games: "Slay the Spire" and "Tears of Themis."
I had played "Slay the Spire" on and off before, but I couldn't progress past Ascension 1 because I was too bad at it. So, I watched a few strategy videos to learn the gameplay and correct some misconceptions about certain cards. After several attempts, I finally managed to beat Ascension 1 at midnight.
I had been wanting to play "Tears of Themis" for a long time, even though I didn't finish the previous game in the series. But that didn't stop me from loving "Tears of Themis." I watched several reviews and finally started playing. However, I was so bad at it that I struggled in the beginner's village for a long time. The two most memorable moments were when I tried to use the Left Nau device to cross the river because my route was the opposite, and I didn't know how to use the fan, so I attached it to my weapon, thinking that swinging the weapon would generate enough wind to cross the river. The other moment was when I couldn't find the third shrine in the beginner's village, which is on the snowy mountain. I had to watch a strategy video to find it. How can I find these easily missed points? It's hard to summarize because each game has its own design philosophy. Sometimes it's like reading comprehension, where you have to guess the intentions of the game designer to progress. For example, in Assassin's Creed Valhalla, finding the key to enter a door may not always involve finding an actual key. It could be climbing up to the roof and shooting the door latch or entering through a specific window. If you can't find it, then it's probably part of the storyline. In Tunic, you have to stick to every path closely to find hidden chests.
📚 Reading & Book Club#
Recently, my reading has mainly focused on current events, with occasional revisits to "The Chronicles of the Ming Dynasty." I am currently reading "Jerusalem: The Biography."
I actually want to restrain myself and finish reading the books that genuinely interest me first, but I can't seem to stay away from some current events or popular books on Douban. After all, I still crave some social currency to have topics to talk about with people.
The book shared in this issue of the book club is "Flowers for Algernon."
I quickly finished reading it for the first time and started rereading it. I strongly recommend reading this book at least twice. At first, you might laugh at poor Charlie, with his constant misspellings and cautiousness. But during the second reading, between the lines and in every self-doubt of Charlie, you can feel a helpless sadness.
Supplement: I really admire translators. I can imagine that there must be a lot of spelling mistakes in the original English text, but the translator can accurately translate them into corresponding Chinese characters.
The teacher said if the operation works good and maybe someday ill be smart. I dint care. Im glad I got my operashun. Miss Kinnian says maybe they can make me smart. I want to be smart. My name is going to be in the books going to be a famus scientest. I dint care so much about beeing famus. I just want to be smart like other people so I can have lots of frends.
When you read this passage for the second time, you can't help but feel like crying. This "pleaser personality" seems to be something I had before, but no matter how hard you try, there will always be people who dislike you.
Charlie was too worried about the details, and when Gimpy said, "Okay, you try it," he couldn't move at all.
I remembered when I had a physical examination in elementary school, and they measured lung capacity. Because I didn't know that the mouthpiece needed to be changed (later I learned that it should be done by the doctor), the doctor gave me an impatient look and shouted at me. I thought I needed to wash the mouthpiece, so I tried to wash it with my hands, and he shouted at me again. In the end, I didn't know how to complete the test. This incident left a heavy shadow on me, to the point that I'm still afraid of doing lung capacity tests.
📮 Newsletter#
From now on, all my records will be automatically synced to my personal channel, https://t.me/RayeJourney.
But I will also excerpt some of them on my blog:
- Flask SSTI CTF Record - lca I didn't expect to find someone on xlog who is also interested in security.
- The "Filming" of Tencent Headquarters! Because of Them Technology for the good! I didn't know that the lights in buildings could also affect bird flight. It's an interesting piece of knowledge.
- Ruined by Simplified Chinese Translation (Jerusalem: The Biography) Book Review Simplified Chinese translation really ruins it. The same passage could have been translated better.
- Start Learning Knitting Even though winter in Shenzhen is practically non-existent, it still ignites my love for knitting. I have always enjoyed doing handicrafts like this since I was a child.
- A Whirlwind Tutorial on Creating Really Teensy ELF Executables for Linux How to write the smallest "hello world" program. It's clear that you still need assembly at the lowest level. I have gained some understanding of the principles of compilation and linking.
- Shi Ke Ren: My Father Owes 30 Million, Went to Jail, and Has an Illegitimate Child, But I Don't Think He's That Bad I unexpectedly saw my junior schoolmate on Bilibili. It turns out that everyone is carrying their own burdens.
- A Discussion on "Peanuts": Thirty Years of Glory and Decline of Nokia, I Collected Over 50 Classic Old Phones Peanuts' videos are of high quality. When you stretch the timeline, you can see the changes over time.
- Before Turning 24 I realized that I'm almost 24, so it's time to prepare something.
- The Chinese Version of "Octopath Traveler," Will It Be the Best Wuxia Game of 2023? Since playing Octopath Traveler, I've become more and more addicted to JRPGs with pixel art and turn-based combat.