Crump Bingo 2024ℹ️

Instead of making a New Year's resolution, I'm making a bingo card of things I want to do in 2024. Some of these goals are lofty, some are silly or "trivial", and some just aren't fully in my control.

A successful result 🎉 for me is that I can look back at the end of the year and celebrate the things I did do, but not feel guilty about the things that didn't happen.

🔎 Something fun to note about this page: there is zero javascript! The bingo card is made with CSS grid, and the modal card takes advantage of the :target CSS pseudo-class. This also means that you can link directly to this info card or to a specific square on the bingo card, like this!

Go skiing or snowboarding for the first time ever! It's not a long drive to the mountains from here and I hear there are some great places to go.

Make a video game, even if it's a small one! I've helped out with a few game jams before, but I've never made a game from scratch on my own.

This past year, I've designed a handful of silly shirts, shoes, and even a jacket. I want to do more of that, completing at least five new designs in 2024.

We moved to Somerville, MA in February 2023, and we're loving it! We're currently renting, but we'd like to buy a house in the area and make it our own. We're definitely happy to wait until the right place comes along, but we're also excited to start looking!

(I'm itching to get all of my home automation projects going again!)

✅ Jul 15 - We did it! We bought a house in East Somerville, even after some false starts and some patience-testing exercises. We're all moved in, loving the new place, and quickly made it our home. I did indeed get Home Assistant set back up, with some old and new integrations and also have plans for some fun decoration LED projects. Nala's been enjoying the space too!

Back in Huntsville, one of our favorite haunts was a place downtown called "Jack Browns". They had probably the best burgers I've ever had, a rotating tap of craft beers, and a "notch club" where you'd get your own embroidered shirt. We knew all the staff and always had a good time. I want to find a place like that here in Boston!

I've finally spun up a personal website again, after not using tylercrumpton.com for anything in a while. I want to post at least one thing to it this year, even if it's just a silly blog post or putting up an Eat Fruits pin for sale.

Skeeball is kinda big in Boston! I feel like rolling a 600 is doable, but it'll take some work!

✅ Jan 24 - Not only doable, this happened pretty early on! We went to Lucky Strike in Assembly Row and I rolled a 630! We also scored a huge handful of lucky ducks that I've been keeping at my desk at work 🐤❤️!

We've been in Massachusetts for almost a year now, but we haven't really explored any of the surrounding states. I want to take some time to see what the Northeast has to offer! I'd call this a success if we check out the sights in Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, or maybe even Canada!

✅ Dec 14 - Took the Amtrak Downeaster for a weekend trip out to Brunswick, Maine and had a great time! Lots of awesome food, beautiful sights, and score our first couple of letterbox finds!

I've been wanting to do another large-scale art installation. Something interactive, maybe with LEDs, maybe with sound, maybe with lasers, maybe with all of the above! I want to make something that people can interact with and enjoy.

I've fallen in love with many games over the last few years, but I'm always looking for something new! I want to find a new favorite game this year to add to my all-time faves list:

• Outer Wilds
• Super Mario World
• Hades
• Subnautica
• The Witness
• ... and others!

I've participated in Hackathons, and even helped organize and run a handful! I love the fun and energy that goes into hacking on fun stuff and want to do it again!

✅ Oct 23 - While not the type of Hackathon I was expecting, I still got to participate in a week-long hackathon at work where my team put together a highly anticipated feature, and cranked out some cool demos to go along with it! We had a lot of fun, and I learned a ton about WebAssembly in the process, which has already come in handy!

I've designed all sorts of PCBs, and even one PCB badge for PhreakNIC 2023. I have learned a lot and want to design a new badge for a conference or event this year!

✅ Aug 18 - Surprising (and annoying) my friends at our yearly get-together with a custom PCB badge based on such.press was a ton of fun, learning, and I even got to try out a new technique for modular circuit design! The badge was built off of the Raspberry Pi Pico W, and would play sounds when the capacitive touch pads were tapped. It was programmed in CircuitPython, so people got to easily hack on them over the week, too!

This one is a bit of a freebie, since this space will be completed as long as I made this bingo board 😅

✅ Jan 3 - Did it (and maybe over-did it)! I put together this silly page to update throughout the year when things get checked off my bingo list!

It's been too long since I've added a bunch of RGB LEDs to something. I want to zhuzh something up with some blinky lights!

✅ Mar 17 - I spiced up my bike with some RGB LEDs, a WLED controller, and a USB battery pack for a friend's birthday. He asked for a non-traditional gift: "Engage in a Random Act of Play". The world truly is our playground, and I took that opportunity to just go for it and light up the world a bit! They're not waterproof LEDs strips, so I'll have to replace them soon, but I've already had a handful of people get excited about the bike in public, even without the LEDs turned on!

I've spoken at PhreakNIC a few times, and I've given a few small talks at local events, and I plan on keeping that up! I'd like to speak at at least one conference or event this year.

✅ Nov 9 - Once again, I had the pleasure of speaking at PhreakNIC in Murfreesboro, TN! This year, I gave a talk about building apps for the Flipper Zero using the JavaScript API that was added earlier this year. I was really proud of my presentation, and got a lot of people interested in trying it out; some even finally bought a Flipper after holding out for a while!

I've been on the news discussing the COVID-19 vaccines, 3D-printed guns, and more! Maybe Matt Shearer will pick up something about a silly project of mine or something!

I love living in a city with real public transit! I want to ride the MBTA "T" to all of the end-of-the-line stops, and take a ride on the ferries!

I've had so many project and gift ideas involving cutting a custom vinyl record, but I've never actually done it! I want to make a vinyl record this year, even if it's just a silly one!

Open source software has always been a big part of my life, and I want to continue to contribute to it! I want to ship at least one "real" PR to an open source project like CircuitPython, KiCad, or Home Assistant.

The total solar eclipse in 2024 will be visible from the Northeast US! I gotta catch the totality!

✅ Apr 8 - We had pretty bad luck when it came to the weather, but we still had an amazing time out in Rochester, NY! We had a blast at the various museums and events, got to chat with the organizer of Roc The Eclipse, listened to so many sun- and moon-themed songs, and still got to experience the pure nighttime of the total solar eclipse. Don't regret the trip in the slightest, and we're already looking at options for the total eclipses in Spain and Australia! 🌒🌓🌔🌕🌖🌗🌘

Bug Hunter and the Narcissist Cookbook are two artists that have made a huge impact on my life. I want to make something for them, some little piece of art or something to show my appreciation for all they've done for me.

✅ Aug 17 - We saw an absolutely amazing show for the Bug Hunter + Narcissist Cookbook tour in NYC! I built a custom PCB for each of them that played various clips from their songs and the boards were shaped like Bug Hunter's "Caterbug", and tNC's "strange creature" logo. It was so cool to see them again and to share some of my art with them.

This is probably this silliest one on the list, but I've never lived anywhere that really got snow before! I'm sure it'll get old fast, but it'll be something new to clear off the driveway and sidewalk, maybe even have to dig out the car!

✅ Jan 16 - This was the second snow of the season! I learned during the first snow that landlords in MA are legally obligated to clear snow for access paths and sidewalks for their properties. I definitely can't complain about having it taken care of for me! We needed the car this time though, so I dug it out and cleared off the driveway.

I've not taught a class in a while, and I miss it. Whether it's something more structured like a specific project workshop, or more general like "Intro to PCB design with KiCad", I'd like to teach something this year!

I thrive on the excitement that others get when they have a cool project that they want to do, and I want to inspire someone to start or finish something, or if I can help out with it in some way, even better!

✅ Sep 22 - While there are a handful of cases I could probably point at to call this one done, my favorite this year was chatting with a friend at a birthday party and getting them excited about trying out CircuitPython on the Raspberry Pi Pico! They had been wanting to get back into some embedded programming, and I had an extra Pico on hand, so I've been enjoying seeing them work on something that should end up being really fun and cool!

One of my weaknesses is that I have a lot of ideas, half-started projects, and things that I want to do, but I don't always finish them. I might try to launch a Kickstarter for one of my projects this year, even if it's as simple as an enamel pin. Gotta experience the process for myself!