Daughter, I hope you love Role-Playing Games

Someday, when you're older, I'm thinking ten or twelve, but maybe as young as eight depending on how mature I think you are, I'm going to sit down with you and help you create a Dungeons and Dragons character. It'll be about ten years from now, so we'll probably be using the brand new 5th edition system, but I'm thinking... Elf Fighter. Maybe a mage. Definitely Elf though.

So we'll create a character, talking about who she is, where she's from. What her dreams and aspirations are. I can already see that dreamy far away look in your eye as you describe her parents (king and queen of a far away land, of course) that your teachers have described to me. You put it on as you stare dreamily out of the classroom window when you should be learning about... whatever you should be learning about in the fourth grade. I don't remember exactly because I was too busy staring dreamily out the window when I should have been paying attention.

Then I'll give you the brand new dice I bought you in your favorite colors. Maybe purple, like your mother, or deep red with white numbers. Will you make sure that all your dice match? Will you prefer pips or digits on your d6s? I prefer that all my dice conform to "Ugly, old, and mismatched". Maybe you will too.

You'll know all the jargon, of course. d4s, d6s, d20s, etc. To Hit, Damage, and what kind of bonuses are power, feat, armor, or the almighty untyped. You've been the unofficial table mascot since you barely had hair. I'm afraid that you'll someday view all men against the benchmark that your father and his gamer friends have set. A benchmark that shows how focused, charismatic, successful and crushingly boring non-gamer men are.

So we'll begin and I'll describe the court of your parents. Maybe your Elf Fighter/Mage (that is, one or the other as multi-classing is a coward's game) feels out of place in the airy intrigue of the Great Game, or maybe you'll be bold and daring and give her an excellent CHA and begin to play your parent's enemies against each other. Maybe your mother will play with us. I can see her as the cautious and resolute Human Paladin envoy. I can see it now: She is to guide and protect you as you deliver a peace accord to the human lands, but the Goblin Emperor cannot afford peace between the Elf and Human kingdoms and has vowed to stop you.

It will be epic.

And maybe as you get older you won't have time for your Dad's adventure games, and that's ok. I'll send a copy of the Core Three (PHB, DMG, and MM) with you when you head off to college and there will always be a spot for you at the table, which I have moved to your room, which is now my room, while you're away at college.

I hope you love Role-Playing Games because I do and I love you.

I'm a little airplane nyow...

I remember a time when the songs that got stuck in my head weren't intended for toddlers and preschoolers. I can't say that I don't mind it. Sesame Street is my new Buddha.

Things are looking up!

So, the past three months have been very difficult financially. With only one income, my wife and I have felt the weight of our monthly bills and due to late payments, our credit is taking some damage. However, because of our apparent difficulty, two of our creditors have offered solutions to help us out.

Chase bank, who owns my credit card debt, has offered a plan, which reduced my interest rate significantly and sets up a schedule to have my balance paid off in 5 years. Now, we're talking a reduction from a 30% interest rate to 2%. Yeah. And our payments will drop almost $150 a month.

The other is EdFinancial, who own my student loans. They have turned me onto a Unemployment Deference, which will defer my loan payments for 1 year, and the federal government will pay my interest. All I have to do is register with the Unemployment Commission, and fax them a letter of intent. So guess who's registered with the Virginia Unemployment Commission, and guess what I'll be doing tomorrow.

So once all the paperwork is done, our monthly bills will drop almost $350. That is so huge. We're also going to look at other monthly expenditures, and see what else we can dump.

The Target job fell through, which is upsetting because big box retail should be a slam dunk for someone like me, and I'm just not sure what's going wrong. Someone suggested Wal-Mart, but I feel like that's a step towards a bad end. The idea makes me feel dirty.

I'm heading back to the Friday night gaming table for the first time since October. I'm going to be super far behind as far as the story and everything that's been going on with D&D as a game, but I'm excited to be gaming twice a week again. We're starting Shadowrun up again Monday, and I'm excited about that too.

Does anyone want to buy a old style PSP, a few games, and several accessories for a reasonable price?

Ok, so once a week is more realistic...

So, I've got an interview at Target in about an hour and a half. I thought I did well at the Best Buy interview, but that fizzled out as if it never happened. I'm trying to stay optimistic, but constant dissapointment (in the world and in myself) is a tough storm to weather.

On the up-side, we've got a new gamer at the table. I'll have to wait to see what she names her character so I'll know what to call her here. We played Cleopatra and the Society of Architects, which I haven't played in some time and it went fairly well. Sven was fed to the crocodiles, and I eeked out a victory over Mal. She-who-has-not-yet-been-named didn't do well, but it was her first game out the standard Milton Bradley fare and she was just playing a little too safe.

Afterwords we talked about Shadowrun and I gave her my book to look at. We'll probably sit down before the next week and get her character made. Which is exciting. There's nothing like making a character with someone who's almost never gamed before.

As promised

So Calidax (I'm going to be using D&D character names for my friends instead of their real names when applicable) is in Illinois again this week. I remember him saying that he would be gone for only three weeks, but now I'm believing he said five. As it's been three weeks and he won't be back for another two. So there's no role-playing until he gets back because we're going to be getting back into Shadowrun.

So for the past three weeks we've been playing board games, which I am super-excited about as denoted here. The first week we played Arkham Horror, which is a very large game, but can feel simply overwhelming before coming to a anti-climactic end. For the past two weeks, we've been playing Puerto Rico, which is much lighter in size but still has plenty of strategy to keep everyone's attention.

My weekend went well and while I showered and such Saturday, I just let myself go entirely on Sunday. Didn't shower till today, and have imbibed nothing but Dr. Thunder since Friday. I watched movies and spent hours playing video games without a care in the world. I did miss my wife and daughter, but the weekend was a nice palette cleanser.

Still jobless. I'm having trouble securing even the menial of positions, so if anyone has an inside track on a position... any position... I'd like to hear from you.

The Eve

Wifey and Daughter are leaving with Father in Law tomorrow morning around 8am. That should get them to where they're going by mid afternoon. My plans for tomorrow are as follows: 1) Turn off baby monitor (although the white noise that's been pumping into my ear for the last 6 months may make it hard to sleep without it); 2) Get out of bed whenever; 3) Clean the carpets in the living room and the baby's room; 4) Clean bathroom; 5) NOTHING ELSE!

That is, of course, besides grinding out level after awesome level in City of Heroes. I'd be playing right now, but they took down the servers for maintenance reasons. It's unfortunate that the first evening of a double XP weekend they have to take down the servers.

Pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps, redux

So I've always been enamored with having a Blog and exerting my thoughts on the world at large, et al, etc.

That being said, I haven't posted in two months so I've decided that the best thing for everyone is for me to call "do-over" on the whole thing and so, with a fresh coat of paint and a new name, I begin again.

The changes you will see are two fold. The first is anecdotes and insights on the gaming I get done Monday nights and the other gaming I do throughout the week in addition to anecdotes and insights into being a largely unemployed father and husband. "But Chuk," you say. "There are a maxillian other Blogs about gaming, what makes yours so special?" Well, I'll tell you: Besides the fact that those other Blogs aren't written by me, nothing. "Oh," you reply, clearly uncomfortable. "OK." The second dealy is that I'm going to try to keep myself on a schedule. Monday nights after the game, Thursday, and Saturday.

So, Wifey and Father-in-law are taking Bug on a trip to see extended family in West Virginia. This is the longest period that I've been on my own in a year and a half. It is also a Double XP weekend for City of Heroes/Villains (CoX) so I intend to have a superpowered weekend full of superpowers.

It's not just you...

As some of you may know through the social osmosis that is Twitter and MySpace/Facebook, I lost the job I had at Fulton Bank. It was a temporary position sure, but I was comfortable there and got along fairly well with my coworkers and did the best I could at it. According to my agent at AppleOne I was let go to be replaced by a college student. So it's been a week since I've worked and my mood has been up and down. I've been trying to find solace in the idea that it's hard all over and that many people are in a similar situation. It doesn't really help, but I keep trying.

Bahie let me borrow Lost Odyssey and I'm digging it so far (although for a bunch of immortals they seem fairly predisposed to crumpling over and dying).

I really, really want to be reading more. So far I'm 3/4 of the way through Bonehunters and 18 pages into Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell.

Beyond

Ok, yes. It has been nearly two months since my last post and for the ones and ones of you that read this blog, I apologize. Of course, since so much time has past it's going to be impossible for me to relate everything that's happened over that time.

So instead, I'll talk about a few things that have been going on recently:
Today, I'm sick. Maybe. I've been feeling off all day, and since both Miranda and my mother in law have had fevers, I assume the headaches and "swimminess" in my head are due to the on set of some sickness. Chance of it being the swine flu? Minimal.

So yes: Miranda has been sick. I came home Friday night looking forward to a fast and loose evening of not doing much and ended up spending a few hours of it at Patient First where I paid a $30 copay for them to take a few possibilities off the table (i.e. It's not strep or flu). So at the end of the weekend I had convinced myself and Amanda that it was side-effects of new teeth coming in. Then mom in law and myself come down with something, and now it's all weird. Miranda, on the other hand, was zooming around all morning without a care in the world. So at least she's feeling better.

As some of you may know, I host a Monday night gaming group where we've been enjoying a rousing Shadowrun campaign run by my buddy Nate. In it I play a Troll mafioso by the name of Slabber (as in, he puts people on slabs) who acts in most situations as either a negotiating liability or a meat turrett (he's terrifying with an assault rifle). Starting last week I shifted gears a bit at the table and started running a Feng Shui game. I had to cancel tonight's game as I am sick. However, I'm excited to be behind the GM Screen again and telling tales. I really enjoy running games because you can start off with a story in mind and have it shifting week to week as the players say and do things you'd never be able to prepare for.

I'm going to try to update again later this week and then keep it to an update a week after that. I also want to keep my community involved, so if there's a subject you'd like me to comment on, let me know.

You can't take the sky from me...

I want to start off by apologizing for the last blog post, which was apparently penned by none other than Mopey McMoperson, a whiny Irishman of some renown.

So I've been sitting on every episode of LOST from this season; I've just been waiting. Can't really sure why, just have been. So yesterday I figured it was time to get back on the horse. Now, up until now, my relationship with LOST has had similar symptoms to that of an abusive relationship. At the beginning it was fun. We were learning new things about each other and the mystery was exciting. OOOooo... what's so special about Walt? Who are the Others? That kind of thing. But as the relationship goes on, you realize you aren't getting any answers. Maybe you Google their name. What you find doesn't just raise more questions, but you're weirded out by what others are saying about this new influence in your life. You start to demand answers and are punished for it. Eventually you just learn to keep your mouth shut.

I missed the entirety of season 3, and part of me is proud of that. I come back in season 4 and they're doing flash forwards... holy shit. Now we're getting somewhere. Not only is the narrative structure unique, especially for television, but there's a pin-prick of understanding. The edge pieces of the puzzle are starting to reveal themselves (FYI, I've switched metaphors). Now in season 5, it seems they've finished off the edges for us. Time travel. Thank GAWD! This is a notion I can deal with, and use to make sense of what's been going on. The island moves in space and time. OK. Sounds great. The characters are interesting again, too.

Also, I watched the Firefly pilot again for the first time in about two years. What a fucking good show.

Half Jack

If there's anything I've gotten good at, it's shouldering the weight of my own history. Memory is so imperfect. I know things weren't as great as I remember them, but I remember them being amazing and it hurts me to know that little boy in the black make up sitting in Margary's room listening to Marilyn Manson is gone. He's like a guy I used to know who had a strong influence on me. A best friend whom I lost touch with after a time. Am I making sense? There's a sense of loss associated with my memories of myself.

Perhaps it's the simplicity of those times. Floating through classes during the week, then going to Rocky and the West End Friday, and maybe Saturday nights. Type O Negative and Sisters of Mercy provided the soundtrack. Most of my memories are pegged on whoever I was dating at the time and I recall the time frame of them in relation to a girl's name. I think that's a little odd, but it is what it is.

I wish I could give young me some of the esteem that I have now. Just a bit. Just so he would have smiled more and taken more chances. Had more friends. None of my friends from high school are close to me any more. I still have channels to a surprising number, but I don't see any of them. Jeremiah was it and I just got tired of his self-centeredness.

Come to mention it, Miranda's birth shifted things just as the end of High School did. Two of my friends who I thought I was pretty tight with have barely made an appearance in the past 14 months.

I know this is the common lament of everyone who realizes that their youth is behind them. Miranda is my youth now, I guess. If it wasn't for her I think I'd be having a harder time with my current situation that I am.

Brought to you today by the letter "C"...

So I was thinking about the third letter of the alphabet today. It's a subject I've put some thought into in the past and today I made a desision. I'm going to stop using the letter "C" as much as I possibly can. "But J.R.", you, my dear reader, my say, "You just used it while spelling 'much'". Indeed I did and I'll defend that slip in a moment.

Now, the letter "C" as we all know is pronounced as an "S" sound as in "century" or a "k" sound as in "counter". It is the only letter that does not make a unique sound in its own right, but rather mimiks the sounds of two other letters. There is no reason, beyond tradition and konvention, that we should keep the letter. It would drop the number of letters to a more aesthetically pleasing 25, for one thing, and bring a more logikal and phoenetik spelling to many of the words in the English language. There is one konsession I'm willing to make, and that is the "ch" dipthong. Here the letter "C" would take its rightful plase as a grammatikal and alphabetikal oddity. A generation from now, children will ask their parents: "Mommy/Daddy what's that weird letter that isn't in the alphabet?" To which the parents will shrug. "Better not to speak of it," they would say.

So, dear reader, I urge you to join me in my quest to rid the English language of this parasite letter. This unnessesary and konfusing blight to our dear alphabet. Strike it from your korespondenses and defend your right and, indeed, duty in doing so.

Let my love...

Well, it's been a few weeks since I've updated. I wish, of course, that I had a good reason why that is. I don't. Have one that is. A reason... er.

My job is going along, and it's coming to a close in the next week. So I've updated my resume on Monster.com and such. Hopefully something else will come up. I'm so tired of doing this dance. On the upside, since it's the end of the season at the ole' United Way, I've gotten some paid time off. I was off all day Thursday, then got off at 11am Friday. THEN there's a chance I'll get at least some of Monday off. All paid. It's pretty great, but terribly short lived.

I've watched a few movies in the past several days: Babylon A.D.; Find me Guilty; and Dan in Real Life. Yes, that's two Vin Diesel movies. Babylon A.D. was standard Vin fare. He was essentially playing Riddick again. Which is fine. I had no problem with his performance. The issue I had with the movie was that there was too much emphasis on what was happening and not why it was happening. So two hours in you have Vin Diesel with a cyber-hand and multi-ethnic children living in a cabin. Sure, I can connect the dots, but there was no incentive to connect those dots.

Find Me Guilty, on the other hand, was a pleasantly surprising film and I was happy to see Vin doing something different.

Am I a Vin Deisel fan? Yep. Jason Statham and Vin Diesel are taking the place of the last generation action actors.

More soon I think.

Adam is a canvas...

Yeah, so the permanent position at United Way fell through. I talk too much and am too honest about my shortcomings and I didn't have enough experience to make those two things easy to overlook.

We received our tax return and did some spending. New HDTV, which I'll probably have to exchange due to a minor display problem. Minor problem, yes, but if I spent several hundred dollars on it, I want it to be immaculate out of the box. Amanda bought some new clothes. She needed some jeans and shirts that fit her better than what she had. I told her the price was worth it if they fit. Easy thing to say when you have a nice cushion in the bank. Hurray for us. I think we deserve it.

I've been trying to get a hold of Bahie, who's been sick. Hopefully it's not a zombie-making virus. But I'd put a machete in his head if it came to that. Real friends don't let friends be zombies.

Miranda is starting to learn to use a spoon. On par with a chimp. I'm so proud.

So easy, so peasy

I should be in bed, like for serious. I haven't been up this late without any particular reason in, well, about a year. Amanda's asleep on the couch. I have no idea what time she has to work tomorrow so I'll have to try to wake her up and get her into the bedroom. If I knew it wasn't till later in the day, then I'd just leave her on the couch. It's easier for everyone.

I split today pretty evenly between cleaning, playing Phantasy Star Universe, and playing with Miranda. I got the kitchen relatively cleaned (mopped, which is a small miracle) and picked up the living room. Hurricane Miranda can literally make half of the room unnegotiable in about 15 minutes. But cleaning is cleaning and everyone does it at some point or another, like experiment with homosexuality, just some more than others and some other's choose to make it a lifestyle.

Or get paid for it.

I have a theory about homosexuality. I think everyone is born able to be homosexual. It's just a matter of what turns you on. I have a thing for large breasted women. Could I get aroused by a small breasted woman? Yep. Could I get aroused by a man? Sure, given the right circumstances. I seek out to be aroused by large breasted women, or woman. Married, you see. Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is the ability to be sexually aroused is inherent in us as a species.

Wait, I think I was going to say that we all have a preference for a particular type of person and we then choose to be... whatever, I think my theory was that sexual preference exists, which it does. I'll work on it some more. I'd like to argue that it is both nature and choice. I'll work on it.

I've been splitting my XBox time between Oblivion and Phantasy Star Universe (PSU). Oblivion is great, as many famous historians have said. On the other hand, I like PSU in spite of myself. I'm six hours in and the story is drab at best, non existent at worse and I don't like/sympathize/understand/giveashit the main character whatsoever. I'm not sure what it is about JRPGs and the fact that every main character in them makes you want to punch them in the throat. Seriously, I haven't liked a main character in one of these games since Squall. Now, Squall was an asshole and a douche, but at least he created a responce in the player.

Maybe they make the mains unassuming so the player can more easily put themselves in thier place? I don't know. If so, that's fucking stupid. I don't want to be Tidus, I want to be told a story. And while it's been 11 years since FF7 came out (yeah, 11 years, holy shit and also: let the game just die) I remember what Cloud was all about. I remember him trying to figure out his identity and holding Aerith and all that. I don't remember one fucking thing that Tidus ever did.

Ever.

But back to PSU: it breaks the mold a bit in two ways, battles are in real time. Let's say Kingdom Hearts style, more on that in a bit and the main character wears clothes that make sense. He does, however, show a hint of his mid-drift, although he's wearing a space hoodie. I'm not happy about it, but it's better than what who-the-fuck was wearing in FF12. But it owes a lot to KH in that enemies suddenly spawn in and you hit the attack button until they go away. The computer controls any other party members.

And they're fucking useless. Occasionally they'll set off a special attack. They'll swing their laser swords once in a while. I'll tell you what, it would be a lot better if it had "Pull your fat from the fire" Donald and "Doom-Bringer" Goofy in it. Goddamn, but Goofy could beat down some MFs. So yeah, and on top of the moronic AI, retarded plot and repetitive combat, you have sterile environments and nonsensical design choices (such as a string of giant metal doors in the middle of the wilderness).

But I've been enjoying it so far. Will I finish it? Not unless it shows me something fancy in the next few chapters. Ah, yes: the game is split up into chapters each of which is put together like a TV show episode, including an opening and "Next Episode" segments. Not really sure how I feel about that yet.

Miranda is doing excellent. I mean, I'm beginning to see her personality develop and I do like her. Quiet and analytical, but open to bouts of loud silliness. She likes what she likes and ignores the rest with little complaint. She loves to eat and has enjoyed or tolerated everything we've fed to her. I love spending time with her. I followed her as she wandered around Home Depot. She stopped and looked at everyone, smiled at people, but didn't get in anyone's way and only touched things she wanted to see more of. Some kids just touch to touch. She's playing in a much more rational way now. The design of a toy is much more important to her and she has preferences.

Jeremy (B-in-L) is going to start coming to Monday night gaming and I couldn't be happier.

A month in the life

Whew! It's been quite a month. I moved from the temp position at Amerigroup to one at United Way. It pays less, and the job is terribly boring, but a paycheck is a paycheck. I've just been going and doing it and then I go home. It's steady work until April, so whatever.

There was a job opening there for a full time position as an administrative assistant. I put in my resume, but haven't heard anything yet. More on that as it develops.

In case you haven't noticed, we've gotten a new president, and while the first 2+ weeks haven't been sterling, I've been very impressed with the guy I voted for.

• Guantanamo Bay? Yeah, it's a legal limbo and an abortion of justice. Let's shut that place down, see who's actually there and do something good and fair with them.
• Speaking of which, America does not torture. No we fucking don't.
• If you've gotten a bunch of money from the American people, you're going to have to make sacrifices.
  

There have been some hiccups with some of his prospective appointees (for fuck's sake, pay your fucking taxes), but it'll work out, and he's taken responsibility for his mistakes. Good for him.

I'm so unused to my president living in the same reality I do, that I don't know what to do when I hear about what's happening. Government spending on... weatherizing homes? I... think that's a great idea. Come weatherize my home!

Eric Young is the most underrated pro-wrestler working today.

I don't believe that Jesus was the son of God. I'm not doubting his goodness, nor his ideals, just his divinity. Which is a fair thing to doubt for everyone else. I've scrutinized his claims and I just can't get behind the idea. I also don't think that the Bible is more than a book. I'm also skeptical about the rest of the organizations.

Miranda's birthday was on the 31st, and for the most part, the party went very well. She got some fun stuff. One of the well-wishers made a bad decision and we're all paying for that.

Also, we're getting a few Gs from our tax returns. I'm THRILLED!

By the James

Yes, I'm stealing Andy's blog title but since the very fact that I have a blog is due to some sort of hero worship I don't feel bad about it. Imitation is both flattery and plagiarism.

He was going on about Justin Timberlake, as he is wont to do and while I'm sure the only thing I can be as enamored with as he to Justin is my daughter, I still read everything he says about the man with wide-eyed Ich werde gänzlich beeindruckt. Then he began talking about Dungeons and Dragons and I say to myself: "HOHO! Here's something I can work with!" Flattery and plagiarism, you know.

Now I started with the D&D thing well before Mr. Skeleton... it's hard to say how much longer as the only proof I have about his age is certain life events he has struck. These watermarks put him in his early 20s. He is physically unreadable. My now brother-in-law who was then a very good friend said that we were going to play Dungeons and Dragons. Now, the only thing I knew about D&D at the time was that it may have been Satan Worship, which I was OK with actually. The whole Christianity thing had well fallen apart for me by then (the fact driven home the summer before when the girl I was seeing asked me if I was going to go to Heaven, and I physically and verbally shrugged. Turned out I just didn't care) so I was interested in looking at new avenues.

Turns out, obviously, that if we had met with Satan during the course of our adventures we would have attacked him. To my recollection, Jeremy (the b-i-l) was running it and Jeff and Mike were with me. They handed me a sheet of paper with Jeremy's never to change handwriting all over it and they told me I was playing a Cleric. Now, I was 13 and I had no idea what a Cleric was. They told me it was like a Wizard or Mage (I knew what a Mage was... thanks Final Fantasy). Now, let's be fair: Clerics are very much like those things. Or at least they were in 2nd Edition. They got more Clericy in 3rd edition and then much less like Wizards and more like we all thought Clerics were, but actually weren't, in 4th.

The actual events of the night are blurred by time but I do remember lots of Lil' Hugs and a King and a cave. Using... entangle on a Goblin? I don't know. But thereafter the hobby began to permiate my life and now there is probably a polyhedral die in every room in the house. I have played with a multi-tude of people, several I don't know the names of any longer, or if ever. I also skipped out on a game because everyone wanted me to play a Half-Dragon but I wanted to play a Human Sorceror who would prestige class into... that Dragony Prestige Class. I don't remember.

The RPG as an industry is falling apart. While I want to lay the blame at the feet of the d20 system and the OGL, it was really people's disinterest in Vampires and the burgeoning MMO scene that did the most damage. Vampires? Yeah, White Wolf was a steamroller, a cultural phenomena in the 90s. Goth kids who didn't know anything about D&D were picking up Vampire: The Masquerade because they had to. Then, as they grew out of the Angst, they were looking at other systems because they enjoyed the game. Sadly, I played very little during this time, though I continued to study. I started probably a dozen Werewolf games in the last 15 years, but none got anywhere. I attribute it to me knowing too damn much about the game. I am the only one who likes it enough to run it, and then it just gets bogged down as I try to infuse the contents of dozens of books on a nightly basis. I would really, really like to play. That will probably never happen.

Amanda asked today about playing Diablo. My heart leaps with joy. More on that as it develops.