We recorded our first weekend of development for the sake of history. Enjoy.

My life has taken a turn into the broad unknown and my heart, in feeling it, is filled with wonder, even joy. My thoughts, my dreams, my passions, my goals, my friends, my life; everything is seasoned with something new, something yet untasted.

In the past month, as I have pressed through the daily grind of what you might call a relatively average American life (incredible blessing in and of itself), I have had the feeling of a new light of hope just over the next hill. A green pasture that I won’t want to leave, a lofty field of dreams, if you can find it in yourself to endure the phrase.

Vague though it may be, this is an image of my heart, and the only one I think I can paint right now.

I have a new sense of direction, and new motivations to drive me.

I don’t really have much more to say, other than to share my excitement of this nameless joy that has come into my life, and strong though these words may be, I feel confident in their digital declaration, and more if you’re around me in the coming days.

I am continually amazed that at the end of pain, or challenge, life more sweet can be seen to grow. I love learning from my mistakes, and though I surely wish I had never made many of them, I would not trade the knowledge that comes with them for a lifetime of peace.

I’ll try to keep the updates frequent as the new sights come into view.

“For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.”
Romans 11:36

Garland wasn’t really all that bad, it just didn’t feel like home. The only solid things it had going for it were proximity to friends I don’t get to see so often (leave it to Miss Claire to move to Hawaii just when I move 10 feet from her house, and to move back right when I bail. I wonder if she’s trying to tell me something…), a shorter drive to my old place of work, and a Lifetime Fitness (the kingdom of physical activity) directly across the street.

Aside from those things, it wasn’t worth much. The people (that I didn’t already know) were relatively unfriendly, the environment felt generally messy, and we -did- have our door kicked in by a curious local.

I suppose I should take a moment to admit that I didn’t quite take advantage of the friendly proximity that I mentioned above. While I did find some new cronies at Lifetime, I didn’t hang out with Will (hero), as much as I would have liked, and Shelby was a bit closer too (though only relatively). There should have been more crashings and creative all-nighters. iLament.

At any rate, I’m back, I have friendly neighbors, I can see Caleb and Ryan’s apartment from mine (oh the havoc that will be wreaked), Charles is less than 5 minutes away, and a whole host of my other friends are within 5 minutes from my door. Add that to the sand volleyball pit below my balcony and a new-found love for home-making, and you’ll find me pretty pumped.

I went out and bought a bunch of stuff for my balcony, some chairs, tables and a little fountain, and though they’re nothing special, they’ve put a fire in me to make my new apt a place people want to be. I’m all about fellowship, random chillaxin’ and an overall open-door policy. I want my peoples to come in whenever they want, eat what they want and rob me completely blind on a whim. That last bit is a bit of a stretch, but you get the idea. Other than the balcony, my room and bathroom are the only other places that I would call “finished,” (pictures following) but the rest will come soon. I’m rooming with my brother Josh, and we have some plans to make the place sexy.

I’m hoping as the coming months progress, that I can actually settle in a bit. I know it’s only an apartment, but at least for the next year, it’s where I call home. I’ll keep the updates coming. Look for more pictures as further apartment sexiness occurs.

The object of the game is to keep the creeps from crossing the board. If you let too many of them through, it becomes obvious that you are worthless on the Creep battlefield, and your term as a weapon tower general is ended. I may have added a bit to that last part, but you get the idea.

Beneath the game you will find some helpful commands and tips to help you stave off your enemies of doom. Read them.

The Goal	Creeps enter from the top and from the left. You must stop them from reaching the other side or you will lose lives. You start with 20 lives, and when they are gone the game is over.
The Pieces	Towers are used to attack creeps and also to block their path. You buy a Tower by clicking on its image and then clicking somewhere on the map. There are 6 different towers to choose from, each with different abilities. Towers can be improved by buying upgrades.
The Money	Gold is earned by killing creeps, especially the boss creeps which come every 7 levels. You spend Gold on buying Towers and upgrading them.
The Levels	Each level, or ‘wave’, contains 20 creeps (10 on easy) and they arrive every 25 or so seconds. They cannot be stopped. Your only defense is to purchase Towers to attack them. Some waves have special abilities like FAST or FLYING. Also, after every 7th wave is a BOSS wave that is especially hard to kill.
More Help	If you have never played a Tower Defense before try the Quick Start Tutorial.
Keys	1-6 selects a Tower & 0 deselects. U upgrades the selected Tower. S sells the selected Tower. Holding down Shift allows you to place multiple Towers one after the other. Space to toggle pause.
Sell Timer	It now takes a certain amount of time to sell a tower, the time goes up the more times you sell towers.

Keep in mind that a highly upgraded tower does a lot more damage than many level 1 towers. Anti-air does what it says on the box, when flying enemies pass your normal towers by and you weep, don’t come running to me. You can earn a higher score by sending waves early, but be careful not to swamp your maze. ‘N’ sends the next level early.

I’ve been a wannabe entrepreneur for as long as I can remember, with Table Racers in elementary school, which were basically inverted airplanes that you blew gently on to race (25 cents apiece), a locker candy shop in middle school (yeah I was that guy), and randomly assorted businesses and ventures that usually involved Charles in some way or another. Side note here @Charles: You rock my face d00d. Smart. Sexy. Designer. Sexy Designer. Keep on rockin’. :)

Side note here @Charles: You rock my face d00d. Smart. Sexy. Designer. Sexy Designer. Keep on rockin’. :)

All that said, I strayed from my entrepreneurial ways for a stint as a Barista at Starbucks, an IT Manager at a TV show called Designing Texas (where I was also wrangled into an ad designer/video editor position from time to time), a web designer for LearnVisualStudio.NET, and most recently as a documented Ninjaneer at Pursuant.

I have been blessed by so many amazing mentors and teachers in my life, and would be nowhere without the support of my friends. My passion for the web really sprang into life when I was but 13 years of age. My best buddy Cabeeb came over and showed me the wonders of web development courtesy of Geocities and Notepad. Sweet mother of all that is good and pure I love that man. Look out Caleb. Major man-crush.

: ahem :

All that man-loving goodness aside, that was a glorious day. I wish I still knew the URL to my Geocities page. I go on a hunt for it roughly once a quarter.

From there, I’ve been mentored over the years by my own desire to learn, and by absolute ninjas like Daniel Mall*, who suffered through so many “Do you mind looking at this code, and after crying for an hour, telling me what’s wrong with it?” conversations he should get a medal for.

Development ninjas coupled with mentors in business like my broseph Donnie, and Pursuant founder and CEO Matt, have made my education extremely varied, and I’m looking forward to the future with about as much explosive excitement as this kid:

Note: That little guy needs a tranquilizer to the neck.

I hope for many things to come, but most of all, I hope that I can pass on some of the impact that my mentors and friends have had on me in my life. I want to not only be a success, but to help those around me be successful as well. My thanks to those that have given their time and love and patience to me over the years, and my special thanks to the people at Pursuant, and especially to Matt (twice linked!), Ross (start a blog d00d.) and Jason for their incredibly selfless encouragement to me in the pursuit of Fuor.

A special shout out to one Michael Manes, for being on the Dart rail late that Friday night. My life wouldn’t be the same without our mutual mockery of that would-be drunk d00d, and for the job that you got me soon after. Love you man. I’d better see some published pages soon, or you’re gonna get your ass kicked. I’ve been practicing since we last threw down.

At any rate, I’m sure I’ll post more on the adventures to come. Fuor looks to have a bright future, and I’m sure we’ll grow and be stretched as we step out on our own and learn the ways of the Fuorce.

*I think I’ve officially reached the “unhealthy obsession” number of links to the DMallosaurus. Sorry buddy.