I wanted to make some modifications to the little aliens on my other site, and wouldn’t you know it, I can’t open the damn Flash source file.
“Unexpected file format.”
Lovely.
Naturally, I searched for help. Then I tried some things, none of which worked. I imported the SWF, since that at least should give me access to the symbols. Nope. That didn’t work. A very unsatisfying nothing.
Frustrating.
So now I’m rebuilding it, and man O man I have not worked with Flash in a while. I spent about 30 minutes just looking at the blank Actions window wondering where to start. Every other minute I thought how nice it would be to have the code I used to create the first version. Of course, this was futile.
I finally got over my slump and starting writing some code. I hadn’t forgotten everything, but it’s still slow going. And I keep thinking there’s a better way to do what I’m doing—and that I probably had already thought of the better way before.
This little episode is causing me to wonder, if there is a limit to the amount of knowledge I can cram into my brain. The answer seems to be, without a doubt, yes.
Then I wondered if I should drop a few things, like Flash, and continue to specialize in other areas, like CSS and information architecture. Am I spreading myself too thin? Could I be CSS super guru of the world? Would I want to be?
I don’t think so. And the job is already filled.
Sometimes I wish I could focus on one thing. But that doesn’t seem to suit my natural tendencies. So instead I will continue to pull myself in all directions, and hope I don’t come apart.
Now back to re-learning Flash…