Well, despite some serious health issues and other setbacks, I made it.
One notable and extremely sucky event occurred Monday of Week III: we had to put down the dog. His health issued had reached the point where keeping him alive was only prolonging his suffering, and there was no getting better at that point. We took him in to get him looked at and the vet said there was nothing that she could do because in addition to his ongoing concerns – he was essentially terminal for the last three years – he had probably had a stroke or two pretty recently. So that sucked. Hard. I still miss the little guy, and I probably won’t ever not miss him.
Another notable and extremely sucky event occurred toward the end of Week IV: my stroke reared its ugly head. Friday afternoon I started to lose the ability to write. And I was right in the middle of labeling wires by hand. Problem. It took me nearly an hour to relax enough to get my brain to cooperate. It was absolutely infuriating – there is no feeling that can compare to having your own brain tell you what to go do with yourself. So the quality suffered late in that week, but I did manage to complete Week IV and V.
Lessons learned:
I need to set and keep to a better sleep schedule. This is part of my post-stroke lifestyle. When I don’t get enough sleep, I get tired faster. As an effect of the stroke, any strenuous activity involving the thinky bits is going to wear me out a lot faster than it should. Part of this is because I’m still rewiring my brain, and part of it is the simple fact that part of my brain didn’t survive the stroke. This was by far the most serious difficulty in this year’s attempt.
I’ve definitely gotten better at curved models that aren’t just a slightly-modified primitive mesh. I didn’t do more with it this Create29 because I just didn’t have time.
I’ve also gotten better at using the modifiers in Blender.
So despite the decrease in quality toward the end, I’m good with calling it a success. Maybe next year my brain will be in better shape and I’ll have more practice time to get better quality.