I'm really starting to like the new Linkin Park. :) They don't forget, but they keep on going, and just seem to keep on getting better, too...

The cruise was cool! Good groove. And tomorrow, I'm flying off again...

5:40 AM sharp. See y'all in a week and a walk in the park.

Man I'm tired.

My back issues haveth returned. As they do.

I wake up early again - sun shining bleakly through the curtain, birds chirping... it's possible they would've woken me regardless, but I blame my back more so. And it takes a while before it calms down as I sit here, clacking keys and getting a move on with business.

Funny business? No funny business. Money business? No money business. So you may wonder as you sit and listen: what kind of business is this? It's just an intermission. In life.

Fortunately when I'm a little tired creativity flows.

I used to think it only did so at night, but it seems applicable in the morning too. I'm starting to appreciate morning writing more and more. That's what's up! Good morning Norm.

But I'm headed off on a cruise this afternoon, and so would have liked to be a bit more rested instead.

The door swings open, and then it closes in my room, as if ghosts are on the loom... the wind blows slowly outside. Will it blow into a typhoon? When we leave this hold, will we go boating on the moon?

I'm looking forward to the cruise, anywho. Morning buffet tomorrow. Light dinner tonight.

In an idyllic French canyon, there lies a geological masterpiece few have ever seen... that's the tagline (partially translated and paraphrased) that went along with this image, in this article, that showed up in my newsfeed the other day.

Cirque de Navacelles... truly seems like a utopian place! I wondered how I had never heard of it before - I probably did at least subconsciously question if it was real or no, cause I turned to Google...

But I'm not sure I actually questioned the image, more so the Cirque.

The real Cirque de Navacelles (it is real)? It looks like this...

Read on...

Grief is only love that has nowhere to go.

Jamie Anderson may have said it first though, possibly... and slightly differently. But what a quote... picked it up via a recent TPW pod.

Just gotta share my latest collab y'all! It's a good one.

You can find it on NG and on CDB so far - and I hope to do more with @CasualBreather in the future! We've been chatting it up both before and after the track, and it turns out we actually have surprisingly much in common... whoda knew? Suddenly I have a friend in France too...

The playlists were down here on CDB for a few days this week - which doesn't affect individual tracks like this, but if anyone's been trying to listen to full albums... that's fixed now.

The problem had something to do with the CSP I added earlier. Which seemed simple to use in theory, but in reality... ugh. Why would it block even internal scripts? Isn't the point to block only external ones? How does it work? What did I do wrong? I have no idea! I've opted for a plugin instead, since I apparently have no idea how to properly configure this myself. Check the security headers score now. Not bad eh. :)

What do those checks mean though? I have no idea either.

I mean I have a general idea, but browser security is not my field of expertise. I barely knew about security headers at all until I by-chance stumbled upon some tips on what headers to implement while looking for ways to speed up my site, which is since the recent server move still not consistently performing ideally in the performance department...

I don't even know if I'm maxing out on resource use or no, the control panel shows nothing. The server seems a bit misconfigured, and support non-responsive, so I'm currently testing a move to yet another host, which seems both more stable and more capable; hopefully I'll soon know if the ongoing issues are in fact server-related or no...

All this troubleshooting's taught me a fair share about server configuration though, and I've done quite a bit of optimization. No bad thing without some good to it.

Regarding the server misconfiguration on my current host: it seems to also have the unintended side-effect of bypassing the server account quotas entirely, and not measuring how much data I have on my account, so that's pretty cool... in the world of shared truly unlimited is pretty rare.

I just hope I'm not sharing this apparent misconfiguration and lack of limitations with everyone else on that account. Oh well. Backups.

In other news? I just revised three reviews, and felt like I'd been efficient enough to take a break and write a bit instead, so I'm writing this. There is much to be done yet on the revision front, I'm working through it...

Those first impressions of Eschalon: Book 1 are up now too, and second impressions are ongoing! I'm really liking this game... even though I've played through it already when I write this. It's one of those worlds where you feel there's more to explore even when you've been through it all. You can play it in different ways, as different characters, with different stats and abilities, and I wondered how it'd be with a different one, so I'm trying one now... though maybe it's more so that the game's a bit short, and so even when you finish it you don't want to give it up just quite yet.

It's not that short though - I'm 50+ hours in at this point, and on my second run. It's going better than the first one. I'm taking care not to sell off equipment I want to keep, and to be more strategic about skill points, and the optimal order of character evolution... like for example you can train yourself in certain skills in-game, and thus save a lot of extra points on not learning those skills at all beforehand, and certain skills are more helpful to hone earlier in the game than others are, like cartography... though then again you don't need cartography to complete the game at all, you could focus entirely on honing your combat. It's just helpful.

I think I'm getting a cartography addiction. I just want to map the world. I run into enemies without realizing it sometimes, while just following the edge of the forest and trying to map out the groves between the trees...

Anyway I can't wait to play the second book later on. But I'm taking my time with this one. And after this one I'm taking a break! Movies, next...

Reviews, and revisions, and the ongoing site stuff... that's the gest.