It’s Ada Lovelace Day!
Ada Lovelace Day is a day for celebrating women in “STEM” – that is, in sciences, technology, engineering, and math. There’s all the details you can stand at: http://www.findingada.com
I’m struggling under a giant mass of Things Which Must Be Done, so this year about the best I can do is to refer to my post from last year: The Programmer Wore Satin.
I blame my mother
Once upon a time, my mother related to me a terrible joke about computer programmers that starts like this:
Why can’t computer programmers tell the difference between Christmas and Halloween?
The punchline was sufficiently nerdy and terribly punny that it’s stuck in my head for years. Being sure I’m not the only one who would think so, I made holiday cards:
Yes, that’s ASCII art.
You can get them on CafePress or on Zazzle.
Obviously, I like it when people buy stuff from those links, because the royalties keep me in bubble gum, but I care more about sharing my quirky humor on this one. Soooo … comment if you want me to make a printable PDF of this (including the inside bit).
You’re welcome to blame me, too
Oh, the punchline?
Because OCT 31 is the same as DEC 25.
I’m thinking of starting up a holiday on NOV 27 to complete the set.
Thursday Tree
Some of my trees are starting to become a bit … odd.
A first attempt at some minimalist trees
I’m not quite sure what was going on with these ones. They’re like trees, but kind of creepy.
I am a bad data point
When I was in my teens, I got my hands on one of the simplified Myers-Briggs tests. You may know the ones – they sort you out into things like ISFP and ESFJ and INTP and so on, by forcing you to chose between two different statements (80 times or so). Each question is focused on one of the four pairs: Introvert/Extrovert, Sensing/iNtuition, Feeling/Thinking, Perceiving/Judging. If you pick the Introvert statements more often than the Extrovert statements, well, you’re an Introvert, and so on for the other pairs.
The first time I took this, my result was: XNXX.
X, if it’s not obvious, means “too close to tell”.
If ambidextrous means I use both hands equally well …
Over the years, I’ve shifted a bit in my temperment type, but I’m still pretty solidly straddling that line between Extrovert and Introvert. Some days, I love social contacts and strike up conversations on a bus or in a grocery store or want to hit parties. Other days, I just want some time alone, doing my personal thing. Having a foot on both sides of the line, I’ve learned how to pull on those sides of myself when I need to – becoming a sort of “ambivert”.
When I don’t have to pull on one side or the other, it still would be really handy to easily let people know which side of the line I’m on for any given day. I suspect I’m not the only one, so I made a sign and some buttons and stuff: 
For the buttons and stuff, check it out on CafePress: http://www.cafepress.com/ambiverts.
We’ve come a long way, pen tool
Me and the pen tool, well … we haven’t gotten along so well in the past. I think we’ve come a long way since then …. using it no longer makes me want to stab myself in the hand with a spork. These days it’s more like “[tweaktweak] [squint] [tweak] Yeah! Like that!” and I move on to the next set of curves. It definitely helps that I’m starting to get a solid handle on handles (as it were), and on fill vs. stroke, and on making my own brushes and all that.
This is good, because now I can get to where I’m practicing the techniques of the art, not of the tool. And goodness, do I need some practice with that. I’m starting to feel that I’m not just so much doodling anymore as rummaging around in the various styles to see which ones I like and want to make my own.
It’s almost like I’m trying to become an artist or something.
But enough about me …
I know you’re here for the trees. :) So, here, have a tree!
An tree made entirely from vectors, with some yummy curves
When your only tool is a spiral …
I sketched this one out as a followup to my two trees growing together.
I may have had spirals on the brain at the time.
I went a bit spiraltastic on this one.
This is one of those ones where I love the overall aesthetic, but I wish I could tinker with just a few of the lines. Given my progress so far on digitizing the two trees growing together, I suspect this one won’t ever make it to that point.
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