I've been on a sort of Eve break for the past two months. And I mean as far as logging into the game for the purpose of PvP and Pirate Lord duties. In fact, right now, Rixx is locked into the Jita station prepping mods and ship fits for the Alliance Tournament. This "break", if you want to call it that, was started by a combination of events that conspired against me - the return of the Alliance Tournament and a new job out here in the real world.
Which is all great news. I love my new job and I'm putting everything I can into making it work. But it is a demanding and time-consuming thing. Much like the prep for the AT. Combine those two things and it has left precious little time for anything else. Which is why I've also made the decision to stop accepting commission work. I have a few more projects I need to finish up, but essentially I'm not going to be doing anymore commissions until sometime down the road. Except for special projects like the recent "Community Beat" project with CCP. I still can't say no to those.
There are only so many hours in a day. Even for me. I'm still writing in these pages, still active on Discord, on Tweetfleet, and everything else. But things have gotten squeezed and I've had to make some choices. I know my Stay Frosty and ABA pilots miss me in-game, but I'll be back to regular log-ins here shortly, once the AT has been decided for us. I hope we manage to go far into the tournament this year, but either way I'll be back to a more regular schedule afterwards. At least that is the plan.
I learned a long time ago that breaks are important. You don't play a video game like Eve for 13 years without coming to some understanding about time management. Not without burning out. So this is just another one of those times.
The AT starts in earnest the first Saturday in November. Our first match is coming up soon. We have our last practices this week and then it is crunch time, final comp changes and revisions, ship prep, and planning. Three months of Saturday and Sunday practice sessions plus everything else that happens or has to happen during the week has eaten up a lot of time and energy. After 21 AT matches so far, this is the first time that I really started wondering if it was worth it. Just wondering. So far wondering hasn't turned into anything else. But it sure does take dedication and time away from other things.
Anyway, those are my updates. More later.