Game Night!

With the advent of the baby came the death of playing role playing games. But we still get in a night or two of board gaming each month. We're playing again Friday, and I'm hoping to get in a round of Duel of Ages II. Just bought it last week, haven't even pressed out the cardboard pieces yet, but I've read the rule book and numerous reviews and it looks like fun.

A Year Has Past Since I Wrote My Note

Hurm..... Just plagiarized Sting... and the Watchmen comic. I don't talk much. In real life or in my blog. This is owing to the fact that I don't believe anyone would be terribly interested in what I have to say. I know in the past I wasn't a terrible writer. I won prizes in college for the things I wrote (never more than $150), got published in minor things, wrote a story and submitted it to the New Yorker and got rejected. Last thing I ever submitted anywhere. Pretty ridiculous to think one can go from college wrting contests to the New Yorker in one step, but that's me in my youth for you. Now I'm older and rambling and not sure where I'm going with this post. Just started writing again recently. Decided my goal was just to write at this point rather than to write to try get published. Better to be a failed writer writing than a failed nothing sitting on his butt. Writing was my New Years resolution, of which I only started a few weeks ago. Let's add 'lazy' to the list of faults, along with self-deprecation and unreasonable ego. What the hay, I'm glad I'm attempting to write again, although it's very difficult to get interested in any of the ideas I've had of late. One of them was a story about a race of Aliens who can spread viruses through the air that are deadly to humans. I was going to call the story 'The Immune' until I saw that a story with the same name was published a few years ago. Wish I had a punchline here. So I'm writing even though I have little faith in being read, and I'm talking here with little faith of being heard. This is best, as amatuerish material should be ignored.

He is risen

Nuff said.

Here’s something I can’t recall hearing very often on the OSR blogs:  that would be Shame.  Specifically, shame in one’s own chosen hobby, that of RPG’s.  Granted, it’s been a long time since my high school days and the times I was actually bona fide mocked for playing DnD were actually pretty few and far between, but they left a lasting impression on me.  I loved playing the games, but there was a small part of me that couldn’t shake the thought that I was spending my energy in the wrong direction.  I mean, we’re playing an expensive game of make-believe, right?  Don’t little kids do the same thing all the time without all the props – dice, books, pencils, miniatures, what-have-you….  I couldn’t escape the thought that dogged me every now and then – I’m getting too old for this sh!^.  I thought this even in high school.  Mind you, it didn’t stop me from playing.  No, I loved the idea of the game too much to stop, loved buying the accoutrements that came with it. 

            Lately I have very little time to actually play or work on my campaign worlds.  I am most definitely too old for this sh!^ now, and that’s a fact.  If I play once every month or two I’m lucky.  I don't feel silly or juvenile any more, because the people I play with are also ‘grown ups’ who seem (to me, DnD geek that I am) to be relatively well adjusted.  They have jobs, families of their own, which adds to the complications of actually trying to get a game together.  No, now when I try to work on a campaign I think, I should be sanding and painting the porch, or I really should be doing the baby’s laundry right now and taxes haven’t been done yet.  Still, the feeling is familiar in an odd way.

            Any one else have this experience?  Come on, all two people who ever read this blog, tell me what you think.

I slightly changed the title of my last post

Since I'm pretty sure it was getting hits for people looking for a review of Star Wars Episode IV.  This is false advertising at its worst, since the post is about being bummed about winter, not about Luke, Leia and Han.

New Hope

February is nearly over.  Temps here have been in the 40's off and on for the last week.  I can make it home now before it gets pitch black out and I can actually see my keys as I'm trying to open the door.

Take heart, fellow Seasonal Affective Disorder sufferers, the long winter shall end soon.  Or in another month or so, at least.  At least it won't be February soon.  February is the worst of all months.  January has New Year's, and it's proximity to Christmas.  November's not so bad.  Heck, snow is pretty the first couple snowfalls of the year.  But February, what does February have to recommend it?  March may tease you will warm spells followed by a blizzard, but Febrary is a stone cold bitch of a month.

And in three days, it'll be done for another year.

I played Space Alert and I liked it

            Once a year a group of my wife’s closest high school friends gather from both ends of the county (from Hollywood to D.C.) to play… board games.  This year the gathering was on our home turf of Wisconsin at a renovated farm house with rooms and beds enough to put us all up for 4 days and 3 nights.  During the festivities we were visited by a chicken that escaped from a nearby coop.  Joining us this year for the first time was Lily, our 9 month old.

This practice is incomprehensible to a number of my wife’s coworkers, who think we play Monopoly and Scrabble for 96 hours straight.  Actually, prior to meeting my wife, the thought of a weekend of board games would have been pretty foreign to me as well.  I hadn’t yet encountered Munchkin, or Cosmic Encounter, or the Buffy the Vampire Slayer board game, or my new favorite, Space Alert.

This is not a new game, I know, but for anyone not familiar it is a real time game with a  soundtrack telling you in a monotone computer voice what threats (aliens) are appearing and when they will be draining your shields, blasting your ship, and eating your crew.  The first mission we played we were annihilated.  The second and third were much better.  I think we avoided getting hit at all on the third.  I’m looking forward to playing it again whenever I can wrangle the time and three other players together.

It’s been a long absence from this blog.  Been busy at work.  Planning another Pathfinder session soon.