If you've not seen Sunday to Saturday, it was a daily vlog put in a weekly format that I did. You can find the entire set here.
I started the series because I thought my main reason for not getting videos out was a lack of footage. We'll get to this later, but at the time this was a pretty reasonable thought as I wasn't recording much.
This was after I hurt myself with the arcade cabinet, so a weekly editing set would be much easier than a daily one. It was a great idea, and if I felt good for a certain week I could make more videos.
I had also been watching a solid amount of StephenVlog (great channel) and TomSka's Last Month (also great), so there was definitely some inspiration/style theft/etc built in, but I've never claimed to be purely original.
I had to remember how this stuff works. Filming a vlog is odd and weird and kinda sucks but you get used to it quickly enough. I hadn't done it in a while and I was still burnt by season 3 of Cublex Uploads Daily, but it's something you get used to.
It very very quickly was indeed a great look into my life, and I am glad I made it for that reason specifically. Rewatching the series now, here's some commentary for a few moments in the 10 episode run.
Starting off, that really bad laptop. I had ideas for that thing, and I kind of still do, but it'd be a personal thing that probably wouldn't end up doing much beyond existing. Still annoyed I never got Windows 7 on it.
I also forgot that my current arm straps to help my hand pain were discounted by $20. Thanks Target clearance! Genuinely appreciate it.
Oh god, the game site. If you go to the main page on THIS website as of this article's release, you'll notice that that project is "semi-shelved", which means that I want to get back to it eventually but I'm not doing anything super active with it right now. If you'd like to know what the end result might be like, check out the now abandoned TFGD.
For episode 5, I decided to start making thumbnails in paint.net again. At this point in time, all of my thumbnails were made right within Vegas, my editing software, so they were pretty simple. Doing them in actual photo editing software adds a lot of work, but it also allows you to make way better thumbnails. This ended up being my favorite part of the series - the thumbnails for episodes 5, 8, and 9 are still absolutely fantastic. I love em. Making silly thumbnails is the best part of the job and I still do it.
Oh right, the Xperia Play version of Lumines! And the two feature phone games that were phone model specific! I completely forgot I found out about those during this time.
And speaking of, the Lumines archive was supposed to be a segmented thing with separate links for everything. I do not have the organizational skills for doing that, but it is something I'll be doing in one form.
Pikmin Bloom was really fun for the time I played it, but oh my god it's way too much time out of my day now that I have a full work schedule. Genuinely disappointed, it's really good. And it did get me to walk the dogs with my parents every so often, so it was absolutely worth the few weeks of stress over a mobile game. (I'm currently going through this with Pokemon Sleep as of writing, which I will also probably abandon eventually.)
I do still go to Sheetz, although my current go-to is usually a bacon wrap nowadays. It's pretty good, although I always want more mayonnaise, even when I request extra. Sheetz is my replacement nowadays for the late night burger that popped up in episode 1.
I also still do physical therapy, although I'm currently working on finding a more medicinal approach to fixing my hands. The current plan is a medicine that gets applied to pads, which push said medicine into my skin. The pads are put wherever I'm having pain. If it works, I do a single set of doses and then I'm done. If it doesn't work, it won't ever work, so I'm good to stop doing it. God I hope it works.
Episode 7 has the best end card gag I've ever done. I forgot about the plum. I'll never forget about it again.
Oh, the snack box. What a time. Most items in the mystery box part didn't end up getting eaten, but I do use the mystery box itself to store snacks. (There's lemon drops and some chewy candies in there.) A lot of the chips were just ok. None of them beat out the love of my life (regular kettle chips) including the actually really good mushroom ones. I'd like to highlight the Millions, those were really good. I'll have to get more of those at some point.
Oh yeah, cleaning my room out in episode 9! That was genuinely really good for me. I'm very glad it happened. FOr the most part, I've been keeping up with this, which makes me feel very good about my current responsibilities.
Man, I was so excited for Pump It Up Phoenix, and then they got rid of a million gimmicks in charts they didn't need to and the score balancing doesn't work with the way holds are calculated. And I never even got Intermediate 8!
I never did make it that far through Breath of the Wild. I also stopped playing Humanity, which you can hear about in a different article.
I did eventually get the sconces in the basement replaced, and I also found why the lighting was weird - as it turned out, there was a dimmer switch that was stopping the lights from working properly! We replaced the dimmer switch with a regular switch and now it works perfectly.
That's all I have to discuss as for topics in the series itself.
My main reasons for ending the series was generally just unenjoyment. I didn't want to edit the series anymore, and recording it stopped being fun as well. It wasn't fun, and I wanted to use my time for things that were fun. And nowadays, I realize that recording is the easiest part of making videos. I don't need to make a series that makes the footage easy, the editing is the part I need to focus on.
I also wanted time to make videos of many other things, and while most of those plans ended up falling through, it was great to do them and I had a good time moving on to other projects.
But honestly, another thing that soiled it is more personal than that, which is why nowadays I'm citing the ending of the series to a generally negatively turbulent life.
A lot happening during a time when you're vlogging can be good. Vacations, events, generally cool stuff, those make for great video topics. Unfortunately, the death and funeral of your grandmother does not make for a great video topic.
I've never mentioned this publicly until now. Some of my friends know what happened, and I did have a vague "hey guys, something happened" in the video and throughout other places, but I've not really opened up about it.
I thought I'd be able to handle it well, but it was timed absolutely terribly. I was just starting to pick up steam on a new project while my parents were out of the country on vacation, and I didn't have anyone to really lean on for about a week.
I was originally told that she was in the hospital via a phone call from my mom earlier in the day, then that evening two of my uncles drove up at the time to give me the news of her death in person and figure out funeral processions.
It was nice to see them, it had been a while, but I do wish it was in much better conditions. It was kinda surreal, there wasn't much to really say but we were all saying it anyway. It just didn't quite feel real. Thinking back on it, the bit of conversation we had was incredibly comforting at the time, but it was brief, and they had left before I woke up the next day.
That all happened on the Sunday of episode 5. You'll notice Monday got completely skipped. The funeral was early on the Wednesday of episode 6 - I drove out with my mom after the urology appointment the day before. It was again very nice to go out and see everyone, but of course the reason for doing so was not a good one.
I did want to continue after all this had settled, but there were two issues. First, it never really truly settled. Writing this now, I can feel the emotion coming back. Second, I am very momentum based, and this killed that momentum immediately. I tried to push it. Don't push it on personal projects. Bad plan. I did not enjoy those editing sessions.
This is also what killed Outrun 2006 - I was in the middle of recording when my uncle knocked on my door to give me the news. Completely ruined the ability to want to make a video about the game.
There will probably never be a second season. I'll absolutely do vlogs again, but not Sunday to Saturday. It's what it is. A bit of a postmark, but nothing legacy creating.