Dark Times

Like Water

Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:05:02 GMT

I was reflecting last night about people in general are like water. Amorphous entities, that endlessly morph and shape themselves to their container and environment. It even adapts itself so much that it can flavor, mix and take on an entirely different composition like soda or beer, and be consumed. Slowly becoming part of another human until it's excreted and then jumps back into the entire water cycle all over again.

Among my close, local friends (and yes, I have to distinguish locations) there's a standing rule that exists between all of us. "Don't be XXX".

In one of the Red Dwarf episodes (Thanks for the Memory) in which Rimmer is asking Lister about why he ultimately ended up with no friends. Lister's response is short and sweet, and I think is one of the oft ignored, underlying facets of human relationships: You never had time for people.

Lately, I feel that I've been slipping toward XXX more and more. Not having time for people, because I've got whatever else going on. I'm going to try and rectify that. I'm not entirely sure how just yet, but I'll find a way that doesn't involve sacrificing any of the delicate juggle of projects I'm currently working on right now.

In a surprising note, Chad finally gave as close to an apology to Melcrest as I think he's going to, so we're back to being fine, or rather, I'm back to being fine with him. Which I was actually impressed to hear. Kudos.

Recent Bitch

Wed, 22 Jul 2009 14:23:29 GMT

So, my wife brought it to my attention that this LJ is used primarily for bitching. So, if that turns you off, don't read.

On reflection, what I posted just brings me to Chad and Dan's level. If ever this cycle of random internet sniping should cease, one side is going to have to grow up.

I'll do that now.

Weekend Update

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 14:26:58 GMT

This weekend was actually pretty entertaining.

We went to a dinner party on Friday for my wife's firm. I'm always nervous at those events, with good reason. Since she's still an intern, I don't want to do or say anything that's going to get her canned (though, since they've offered her a job and she's accepted, I don't think that's going to happen). Usually my move at those parties is to be quiet, listen and play the role of a good husband. I can make smalltalk if I have to, but generally I avoid doing starting any conversations or anything like that. I avoid important people.

At one point during the evening, I was talking to two of the senior, senior, senior partners, like the two of 5 people that ran the firm. A big firm. That's pretty awesome. Professionally, I deal with mid-size companies. These guys talked about deals, cases, and whatever with dollar amounts in the billions. At another point, I was talking to someone who, for you local people, is largely responsible for the owning and development of the Loop. Wow.

Saturday we did nothing. I played Dawn of Discovery all day. It was great.

Sunday was Dawn of Discovery, gaming and then True Blood and Hung. Hung is alright, but not great. I'll give it some more time because the concept is hilarious. I don't like True Blood.

Longy Update

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:56:55 GMT

Just a couple things on the docket today.

1.) I've finished my longer short story submission for the next anthology, Built for Speed. I don't think I've ever been as excited about something I've written or something I've produced as I have about this. So that's a big yay for me.

2.) We've almost completely framed the basement. Whooo! The Basement Construction team has been awesome, and so far, the only major snag we've hit is that in extreme rain, the basement leaks slightly. We're going to try building up a slant of dirt away from the house and packing it in nice and tight to see if that does it for us, which it probably will. Soon. Soon.

3.) Project MG, Luke's game-in-development is to the point where we need to get the external guys to playtest the shit out of it. This makes me really happy and slightly nervous. Once external playtesting is done, it's a matter of finalizing the layouts, etc. Right now, I don't have much to do. When we get to that point, however, I'm going to have a boatload to do.

4.) Gencon is coming up. I'm not ready with my game for it, but I've got a month and a half. I smell a playtest of the second game, Project DK, coming on shortly. With all the stuff planned at Gencon, it might fall the way of Archon in recent years past: the fun is overwhelmed by the business. Hopefully, that's not the case.

5.) I was on Kicked in the Dicebags recently. It's super explicit, so if you're bothered by that kind of thing, don't listen. Otherwise, it's pretty candid and no topic is off-limits. Go listen and see if I get myself in trouble. ;P

Long ass roundup

Mon, 15 Jun 2009 14:28:10 GMT

So, my birthday weekend was pretty awesome. Rob, Mike and Art from the Bear Swarm podcast came up to visit and hit v3 with us. Friday night, we hit up DD's. It was a little rocky at first, but once everyone got hammered, it was probably the most fun we've ever had up there. There may have been a little "Carry On Wayward Son"/Kasas action.

We had v3 at Diecon this year. It was alright. There was a bunch of people, we played a bunch of games, but it wasn't anything that we couldn't do in my basement, so I think from now on, if Game On is closed, we'll just be doing it at my place. Once we finish the basement, see below, that'll be more feasible.

The basement is almost framed! If we hadn't run out of lumber on Saturday, we could have finished framing the walls out, which would have been cool. As it is now, about 75% of the basement is framed, and some electrical has been run. We're probably going to get the rest of the lumber and finish framing/electrical this weekend so that we can just panel after that and be done with it. The ceiling isn't going to be easy, but one thing at a time I suppose.

After the ceiling, then we move on to carpeting and then I get my pool table! So. Stoked.

As for projects, I'm currently working on three big ones. Luke's Project MG is humming along. We've gotten some artwork from the artists I've contracted and it looks pretty nice, and I've got a layout guy waiting in the wings. Hopefully, we'll have something to show by Gencon.

The other two, Built for Speed and the game Jenn and I are designing for Gencon, I have some initial things worked up on, but not really enough to talk about. I need to get a hold of some people about some things etc.

Oddly enough, I'm more excited about my Built for Speed submission, The Fire Race, than I have been about anything else I've ever written. It just feels good.

I was busy every day last week, and I'll likely be busy every this coming week as well. Battletech, podcasting, BBQs, Interviews, Construction and gaming are some serious time sinks, even if they are all worth it.

Oh well. I'm going to try and update more often, though I promise nothing.

The Road So Far

Fri, 05 Jun 2009 16:43:16 GMT

I use my birthday as a better milestone for me than New Year's. So, here's the big year-in-review; what happened, what I learned, what-ever.

So What Happened?
Last summer was relatively busy time for me. We (Joe, Matt, Luke and I) started The Podge Cast, though the first episode didn't drop until July something. At the same time, Luke and I geared up and started Spooky Outhouse Productions, the business wing of our empire. So we were cropping up new endeavors left and right, but still had the existing ones going:

Back Seat Producers was still recording once a week. Movie reviews are carthartic. All the prep you have to do is watching the movie, and that's entertaining prep. In addition to the movies, we had also received a bunch of submissions for The Storm Cloud (which you can purchase a copy of at the link :) ) and were discussing, editing and the like of it.

On the entertainment front, we had just gotten into Burning Wheel, which really jazzed me up about role-playing again. Luke ran Kingdom: The Next Generation, which was one of the top 3 games I've ever played in, if not the most fun.

Time passes as per normal. Summer ends, and the convention season begins. We ended up hitting three of them this year: The New Media Expo in Vegas, Dragon*Con, and Archon. All three were a blast, though we'll be skipping NME for Gencon this year.

The Outhouse grows. At present we have 18 different sources of material, spanning a huge number of people. Most of them are really active. Most of the people in the group I have a great working relationship with, Rob, John Kelley, Tim White, etc, etc, etc. So it's really cool that not only is it a networking tool for potential content producers, it's also a 'old boys club' of sorts. Which I find pretty awesome, even with the tedium of having to do tech support.

There were certain goals I wanted to accomplish on FtB that I never could. Minus the benefit of advertising my new location on the show, it's been a slow build back to the audience numbers we once had. This is something I expected when we started, though the goal is more accomplished than TPC's stats would lead you to believe. While the numbers are lower than what I remember of FtB's (though, the disparity is somewhat lessened as their numbers have dropped, I suspect), my access to those numbers is pretty much the same so, having realized that, it was time to start jumping on the projects I always wanted to do, but couldn't because I was busy actively maintaining a podcast, something my co-hosts will now help me out with.

The Outhouse Wall and v3 are both things we talked about doing forever. Basically, the former is a print, gaming newsletter and the latter is a grassroots "Get out and game" day. Both have been pretty successful so far, and we've got people as far away as Canada participating! Whoo! We're international!

Other than those three events, three newsletters, I've also put out almost 100 podcasts in the last year. And published a book. And started working on the release of a gaming system. /flex

What Did I Learn?
Nothing really.

I learned that my wife is pretty awesome. And there's lots of other chicks who frankly pale in comparison, and that I don't often tell her how awesome she is.

I learned that some times people just aren't worth it. Even if you bend over backwards and apologize and try, that their insecurities will usually get the best of them. I learned that through a baseless harassment suit threat. I also learned, somewhat from my wife, somewhat from common sense, that if you have a lot of money, dishonest lawyers will tell you you can win anything to suck fees out of you. I find this hilarious.

I learned that a lot of people who talk about their "big plans" are assholes, myself included. "I'm going" is a wiener phrase. "I did" is a much better conversation topic.

I learned that I know a lot of awesome people. We had a lot of great times this year. Huzzah.

I learned that I can accomplish a life goal. And that I'm probably going to do it again next year. Bonus.

Whatever
I don't even know what to write here.

GO ME.

I'm still tired but hey...

Tue, 26 May 2009 15:01:52 GMT

So, my vivid dreams are continuing. Last night, I was part of a group (TMC - The Mechanical Crew) who understood how to sidestep between worlds. Apparently, someone on the team betrayed us, and told the world about it. So we were gunning for them. It turns out, this person was part of a larger corporation and it was some global, corporate conspiracy to crack open the dimension jumping for tourist trade.

Down south, about two hours out of St. Louis, a thick mist began to envelope the area. We drove down there to check it out, and the mist was actually a safe 'tunnel' to the other side. But, there was a very bizarre issue with the sides of the highway dropping off into nothingness. We then ended up in a grocery store to buy supplies. The level of detail on these people, lifers from a grocery store, was pretty intense.

I came to the decision, shortly through the night, that I can only dream technical details if I'm laying on my left side, and I can only dream the narrativist details when I"m laying on my right side. The way our sleeping arrangement is, if I lay on my left side, then Melina can't sleep because I'm snoring right into her ear. I toss and turn pretty frequently, and I can vaguely remember saying "Damn science." as I was turning over to get what I assumed was the other half to my story.

This weekend was really busy, actually. Saturday, Scott came over and we constructed our new shed. It took us 4 hours, which is slightly longer than I thought it would take, but wasn't bad at all. The rain they had projected never showed, so that was a blessing. Next weekend we move on to the next stage in the basement construction process, which is tearing out the garage door, building the outside wall and tearing down the drywall and storage closets. If we get far enough into it, we might even start framing afterwards. Woohoo!

Sunday I was drunk all day. My company had our annual baseball outing. We got tickets to the Best Buy suite, with a whole bunch of televisions, free food and beer. Yum. Although I said I was going to, I got real drunk, as I oft do. We then jetted out of there and I went home and ran Seasons. Afterwards, we had Mexican. It was actually a pretty good day.

Yesterday I played Rome: Total War all day. Nothing to report there.

However, Storm Cloud, the anthology I was a contributor to and editor of, went on sale. So, if you're interested in picking up a copy, and I'd encourage you to since all of the stories are pretty good, hit that link up and follow the instructions.

If that's not enough, Project MG, Luke's big publishing project is having it's first administrative meeting later today. The Dr has finished all the game design and is gearing up to be ready for some serious, hard-core playtesting, both internally and externally. This means a significant amount of work on the back end, since publishing a game isn't easy. We'll have to see how this meeting goes before any decisions are made.

Wheee! Busy time.

Sleeping and Technology

Mon, 04 May 2009 14:54:06 GMT

I've made no shortage of stories on the fact that I have had a headache for over a year now. Straight. When I wake up, my head hurts. When I talk, my head hurts. When I go to sleep, my head hurts. It ebbs and flows, gets more and less painful, but it's one of the few constants in my life. I get the occasionally reprieve if I get drunk enough, but obviously, this isn't a realistic enough solution to be considered 'long-term' by any stretch of the imagination.

My head hurts.

In the beginning, I went to the doctors, had the tests and tried to determine what's wrong. They gave me varying drugs with varying side-effects ranging from a slight inconvenience to full-blown crazy. I stopped taking them, and just dealt with it. I learned quickly that if I didn't mention it casually, then my wife would forget about it and then we wouldn't argue about going back to the doctor for the 'fix'.

So, I've dealt with that forever. Now, something has come along that is really fucking with me. Sleep deprivation.

I think it's been about a month since I've had a solid night of sleep. Conditions in the house are ideal. But, every 5-10 minutes of sleep has me waking up in a cold sweat because of a dream. I won't go so far as to say nightmare, since they're rarely terrifying, but they're just so vivid that I wake up and I can't really tell the difference between reality and the dream.

This happens every night. I toss and turn, walk around the house, get water. I can't fall back asleep, and when morning comes, I don't feel rested at all. This is much worse than the headaches.

Switching topics...

A few weeks ago, I was complaining that I didn't know that the NEXT BIG THING was going to be. I think I misdiagnosed my problem. I have no idea what the NBT is going to be, but because of all of the survey stuff, and episode prep, and all that stuff I've been doing to try and determine what the NBT is, I came upon a startling revelation that really lined it out for me.

It was one of those kick you in the ass "Why didn't you see this before?" type of things, and it all fell into line.

I think, with something I've got cooking in the background, that I can address this revelation. And it will be hot.

Alright, enough rambling.

Editing

Tue, 21 Apr 2009 14:06:53 GMT

I realized last night how much I truly hate editing things. I spent about 4 hours editing XXXXXXX and at the end I was crabby, frustrated and annoyed. On the other hand, the work in progress is already pretty amazing. The work is for a private third-party, but I promised the people who kicked in for Master the Met a special prize, so I may do a private screening of it for them.

As much as I've created the situation myself, and don't regret it mind you, I am spread way too thin. I have a couple policies that exacerbate that situation needlessly.

The first is that I try not to push any e-mail off for more than a day. I know a few people who just let e-mails sit and ignore them for weeks, and I vowed to never be that guy.

The second is my philosophy on networking. I do an incredible amount of technical work gratis. I don't particularly mind this. However, I try and make myself available to all of the Spooky Outhouse shows, all of my friends, and all of my friends' shows. Once upon a time that wasn't a lot of people; now, that's a pretty big area to cover.

The third is that I truly do have a lot of projects that take up my time, and I have problems divvying up the work. I may be a control freak, I may just not trust anyone else to do it. Call it what you will.

Negative

Fri, 17 Apr 2009 14:18:28 GMT

I don't know what is going on, but stuff has been so negative on the internet these last two weeks! Holy crap!

We finished shopping for basement finishing materials last night. Hauling things sucked, but I'm glad we've got everything. In a few short months, we'll be shooting pool in my carpeted basement. Can't. Fricken. Wait.

Other than that, my podcasting vacation this week has been great. I enjoy what I do, but doing two episodes a week for the last year has been draining to say the least.

I guess I really don't have anything to say.

Easter

Mon, 13 Apr 2009 13:42:47 GMT

This may have been one of the best holidays ever.

I went to my parent's house, as I oft do for holidays, and after a fantastic dinner, my dad, brother and I played 7 rounds of Yahtzee. Goddam I love Yahtzee. We then moved on to play a full game of Cities and Knights, Settlers of Catan. Delicious.

Today marks the start of my podcasting vacation. TPC and BSP are both not recording this week (though we have back content so we don't miss delivery dates). Yay. This frees up my Tuesday and Wednesday nights this week, which is a fantastic bonus considering Melina just got into Avatar and I'm re-watching it with her.

Other than that, life is pretty good. If you follow any of my podcasts, and haven't submitted the RPG Listener Survey, head on out to http://spookyouthouse.com/survey and do so.

I think I've found the outlet for my creative itch, but, it's one of those situations where I'm not entirely sure how easily it's going to be to actualize. It's a great idea, and would be received really well in the RPG-o-sphere, but it's a pretty big task for a mediocre programmer.

So, I keep plunking away at it in my spare time, but it's slow going. Whine, whine, whine. If Melina were out of school right now, I'd take out a small business loan and pay one of my buddies to make it happen for me. But she isn't, and I can't. /pout

Oh well.

The Industry Beneath the Industry

Fri, 03 Apr 2009 19:54:21 GMT

For many people who are fans of podcasts, blogs or the gaming industry's cheaper, more desperate younger brother, keeping an eye on shows and what's going down is merely part of the experience. I've podcasted in what I call "The Industry Beneath the Industry" (TIBI) for several years now. While I'm a far cry from the first, or even close to that group of the first, I've been around awhile to objectively watch where the TIBI has trended to since I started.

If you're interested in some of my musings, keep reading. If you're content with simply consuming your gaming content and don't give a flop about the meta-commentary that goes along with it, feel free to skip this.

In the interest of a frame of reference for the things I'm about to say, I started RPG podcasting in the late spring of 2006. At the time, there were a dozen, maybe more shows. If you asked me for listenership of the other shows then, I couldn't give it to you. I can say that our show was among the biggest, if not the biggest, at the time.

Like the era of blogging several years before, podcasting was still very much in its infancy. Bear in mind that what you're reading is a slight history/analysis of someone who worked in the industry. I'm not omniscient, nor for the first few years of my residence here, really even took a passive interest in the community.

If you asked me which shows were running at the time, I couldn't name any of them. That isn't a statement of quality about the other shows, that's a statement about how I perceived the community at the time.

It would take the second trip to Gencon, after our failed meetup with other RPG podcasters the first time, to finally understand about the community. I'd dealt with a few of them through our forums, but didn't really have a strong relationship with any of them.

Historical musing aside, I suppose my point with that anecdote was that I always got the impression that, like the blogs before, there were a few points of light in an otherwise dark sky. Let's fast forward.

Time has passed, hosts have been shuffled to new homes and new blood has entered the arena and now, instead of the dozen off shows, there are around 150 shows (at the time of this writing, of course) listed on RPGPodcasters.com. Those are individual shows, not groups.

An interesting phenomenon that has started in the last year or so is the banding of those disparate individual shows into groups of shows, organizations. Watching it happen over time, I almost missed an amusing parallel: it's almost like watching the evolution of society. We were all individuals to begin with, then over time, when we saw the mutually beneficial advantages of pooling our resources we began to move closer and closer together.

So now, not only are we individuals, but we've got our collective 'communities' behind us. So, watching this evolution happen has been fascinating, but prompts the question: what's next for us who dwell in the in-between. We're not gaming companies (well, most of us anyway), and we're more than just a fan (or at least I tell myself that to justify the hours I put in each week). What is the next step for us?

I've been mulling this over as of late. I don't want to say that I'm getting burned out, but as each new gaming podcast comes online I can feel the collective value of every podcast being diluted, which is a natural evolution of the business, I suppose, if we follow the trend of blogging before it.

A couple months ago I would have said that live casting or video was the next step, but now I'm not so sure. The evolution of blogging became podcasting with the availability and relative ease in which you can record audio content and syndicate it. While I suppose that video has the same properties, there is an extra layer of editing that goes along with it that makes it difficult to obfuscate the lack of "professional" training, which causes me to believe that that isn't the next step. It's an impractical jump.

Perhaps then, the next revolution in podcasting is not going to come in the form of a technical one, but one of content. With the P.O.D. services like Lulu.com and the stuff that HP is allegedly getting into, are all of the podcasters going to start producing long-lasting, original paper product? Once again, I'd have to say I can't see the industry falling into that line easily. For starters, anyone can type of a document and make it a PDF. P.O.D. doesn't do anything beyond that but make it pretty in binding and handle the money for you. Secondly, it's a lot of work to produce your own print material on top of producing regular syndicated content.

How about some sort of recognition in the industry? Picked up by one of the big professionals, awarded contracts, etc. I don't know about that. I've been offered a job by White Wolf/CCP. I was against taking it. Largely because of how it would have perverted the existing content we had.

So, I guess my answer is that I don't know. I derive a significant portion of my own motivation from this abstract, intangible concept of VALUE. I derive VALUE from accomplishments. I can't point to a recent accomplishment that I derive a lot of value from and I suppose lately, though I feel I've been working really hard, I don't feel like I've been getting the same amount out of it, which is kinda how this whole thing started.

Because this blog....

Wed, 25 Mar 2009 13:57:16 GMT

is only about me, I can back my story up to a point where I think it'll make the most entertaining story.

Monday night we had to go to El Scorcho to get the debit card I drunkenly left there the night before. As a side note, Sunday night was easily one of the most relaxing nights I've had in a long time. It was just Paul, Luke and I drinking margaritas and chilling out.

We ate at El Scorcho. I'm experimenting with all of the food that they have there, because while everything I've had so far has been great, I haven't found THAT ONE DISH that I'll order every time I go there. I ordered the Mexican Pizza. While the food was still excellent, it's situation in my stomach was not.

I went to bed not feeling well. Let's leave the story there and chase another rabbit for a moment.

I have/had acid reflux pretty bad. If you know me, then you know that I am very anti-drug. I hate medicating. Untreated, the excess acid in your stomach will eat away at the sphincter at the base of your esophogas and spill acid into your throat (typically when you're laying down). Over time, as the sphincter is eaten more and more away, it becomes easier and easier for this process to occur. Yay.

So, what this means is, essentially, after enough time it's very easy for a larger amount of acid/stomach goo to make it's way down your throat while you sleep. There have been times when I've woken up, panicked because there's a crapload of burning fluid in my throat and been really freaked out.

After I started medicating my heartburn issues, this went away.

Monday night, Melina was sleeping on the couch. 3:15, I woke up. The stomach goo had progressed to my mouth (really fucking gross), and in my panicked sit up and reaction, I inhaled sharply - forcing some of the goo into my lungs. Wonderful.

So now, I'm desperately trying to breathe and cough the vomit out of my lungs. Over the course of the remainder of the evening, the rest of the Mexican is expelled from my body. I crawl back into bed at some point, and before I go to sleep my final thought is: "Gee, I wonder if something bad is going to happen. That lung/vomit/choking thing doesn't happen to me anymore."

Cue the next day. I don't go to work because I'm tired and still gross feeling.

About 3:30 or 4 in the afternoon I get a call. Apparently, someone I know has tried to kill themselves by hanging, and luckily, failed. She's currently in the ICU in one of the local hospitals.

What a shitty day.

Watchmen, etc.

Tue, 17 Mar 2009 13:55:42 GMT

Yep, I'm going to go ahead and do something I know is wrong, and I don't care.

Watchmen is great; if you didn't enjoy it you didn't understand it. This is hands down the best adaptation of any text to film, and I'd go further to say that it is the best Watchmen film that could have possibly been made.

The book is pretty fucking epic, and if you haven't read it, you're doing yourself a great disservice. That is all the Watchmen wanking I'm going to do.

It's just a penis, get over it. I've been hearing a lot of general unease with the increase of junk in mainstream media. Seriously, get over it.

I'm still sleeping badly.

What a bizarre ass post. I had all this deep philosophy bullshit to talk about that seemed to leak out of my mind as soon as I sat down to write this. Huh.

Strange Dreams

Tue, 10 Mar 2009 14:01:42 GMT

The last couple days I've been having strange ass intricate dreams again. I hate when this happens because I feel like I wake up every 15 minutes disturbed from the dream and then have to fall back asleep, in which the dream continues. The next morning, I don't feel very rested at all.

I've been thinking about the projects I do, and how I need one that I get a more specific amount of personal development satisfaction from, so I think I've decided to take guitar lessons, since I know I'll never pick it up on my own.

Big Update - it's been awhile

Mon, 09 Mar 2009 16:04:24 GMT

So the last two weeks have been nightmarish in terms of busy-ness. I"ll start with a few weeks ago.

The Outhouse Wall, despite the fact that Francis does all the layout work, is a bit of a nightmare to coordinate among a large group of people. All-in-all, we've got about 15-20 people who are involved with some or all of the steps to its completion. Wrangling, reading, approving, editing, layouts, and all that jazz take a massive amount of time.

Don't get me wrong, I love the thing dearly, but it's a big time sink. I think this time around, since Francis isn't doing the layouts, we're going to try and shake things up a bit and see if we can streamline the process a bit more. Despite his requests otherwise, we still only got it out last minute, with little breathing room.

Kinkos, for some reason, has decided that even though I pay them for all of the copies, they still double charge the people picking them up. Kinkos, you suck. Hard.

v3 St. Louis isn't that hard to organize. Really, we get together and have a few GMs that are out and about and willing to run stuff, and then we bring The Gift as a backup so no one sits around who wants to play. v3 in other locations however, is more work than our "at-home" effort. Advertising, talking with gaming store owners, getting some pretty sweet ad stuff from fans, setting up the online stuff - none of this is hard, mind you, but all time consuming.

One of the joys, though, is talking with the people organizing the events. It's actually refreshing to talk to people who are jazzed about something that helps us all out. I know I'm starting to sound like that hippy broken record, but it's true. It's awesome to be involved with, as Matt put it, a "grassroots" endeavor like that. Looking at some people who are interested for the next one, I think we're looking at doubling the amount of locations that we had this time. Wow.

Meg was in town two weekends ago. We hung for a bit, but she mostly hung with Phil. She came out for a special Back Seat Producers episode: my 1 year anniversary! If you missed it, I'm probably going to cut the beginning audio out and post it elsewhere while the time isn't that far passed. I toast Tony Mast and give him a big thanks.

A year ago-ish, I wasn't sure I wanted to do anything. When he invited me out to Fanboy Smackdown and we did the Harry Potter movies, I had so much fun that it really jump started my lack of motivation. I know last summer, when Luke was on hiatus from Fear the Boot, that Tony showed him how fun podcast could be again. So, again, here's me tipping my hat to Tony Mast.

Last week, Rob and I were in the SOP chat room and he cooked up an idea that I thought was brilliant. So, after a little more brainstorming, I starting laying the foundation. The last week, amid a cold and all that stuff, I stayed up til 2 or so each morning programming and working out some of the finer details of an authentication system for it. I think what I've got is solid, but needs a lot more testing on my end.

As a side result of that, I started feeling really badly during the middle of the week. I even skipped the BSP episode, which ticks me off since the movie was Milk, my pick for the Best Picture from last year. One of the locals, Darrell, was around during the entire events of the movie, which I won't spoil for Melina. I tuned in to the live ep and heard a lot of the discussion, but it's frustrating being on the receiving end of those broadcasts. ;)

I took Friday off to read the rest of Watchmen before Melina and I set out to see the movie. I wasn't going to finish the graphic novel since I got bored quickly with it, and I was glad Melina made me. The movie was great, and I'll not go into specifics, since I'm sure BSP and TPC will both do an episode on it.

After Watchmen, I introduced Melina to a Catholic fish fry. I love fried fish. I love fish frys. It was a good evening all around, really. We then settled in to watch some BSG and suffer through some Dollhouse.

Saturday Phil and I did Master the Met. A 42 story stair climb for the American Lung Association. I want to lie and say that we both made it up in record time. That's not even close to being true. We dragged our asses up to floor 21 and called it quits. Since then, my lungs have been killing me.

Saturday night, Grungydan, Aron Head and a crew of his from Texas showed up for a little get together at my crib. Tony and Luke were on hand, and we had an awesome relaxing evening over scotch, ouzo and beer, capped with some White Castle. Great, great evening.

Sunday Dan and Joy, who'd stayed with us while they were in town for Fear the Con, left and I had a couple hours to myself. I played Tales of Vesperia while Melina napped, and then I ran the final session of Keep on the Shadowfell. It was long, but I think we all generally had fun. Chris still has the worst rolls I have ever seen in my life.

Tonight, I pick up and put together the elliptical machine so Melina and I can get some workouts in to aid in our weight loss. She's down like 20 pounds, go Melina!

Wow. If I spent this much time writing fiction, my novel with Sarah would be done! And jeez, we haven't even started yet!

I'll be glad when...

Wed, 25 Feb 2009 14:48:25 GMT

these next two weeks are over.

With v3, Meg coming in town, the Bear Swarm guy(s) coming in town, recording 3 podcasts a week, Master the Met, Grungydan+1 coming in town, and the big get together party next Saturday, I'm pretty fried.

Especially where there's a few projects that are really calling to me right now.

Damn.

It's been awhile

Mon, 16 Feb 2009 16:00:02 GMT

It has been awhile. I've been busier than shit these last few weeks.

I took the majority of this weekend off and just chillaxed. We went to the symphony on Friday night, and I picked up the first of the R.A. Salvatore books. I read through the performance, and I'm about a third of the way through. It's dreadful.

We saw Dawn, and it's nice to know that I still feel sorry for her. The sushi we had was excellent, and that makes twice this week on that. Most excellent. I can't wait until Melina starts making a shitload of money and we have sushi once a week.

Saturday was pretty uneventful. I jumped on Skype with some other podcasters and bullshitted for awhile. Before that I had played 360 most of the day. Afterwards, Melina and I took my dad to see Taken, since it was his birthday. We stopped by my parents house and shmoozed with my mom, and then left for Gamestop and home. I picked up Deadspace and Melina watched me play that for an hour, and then I wasted the rest of the night playing Spectral Force 3.

Sunday, Phil and Paul came over early and we Mancasted before the 4e game. I modified some of the encounters, and Deez Nuts, Inc, still thwomped me with little difficulty. Oh well. Looking through the rest of the campaign, we're actually almost done.

I've got another full week. Joy.

Long, tired and angry

Wed, 11 Feb 2009 00:28:12 GMT

So, I've had a mountain of work to do over the last two weeks ALMOST SOLID. None of it is for me. Work, friends, co-workers, acquaintances and Spooky Outhouse stuff. TOW is looming, and I can't get time to edit it, since I have other things going on during the week.

And, I've got a hard cap on this stupid website I'm designing for work. I dont' have a problem with the date. What I have a problem with is: "Our website is broken, please fix it." So, not only is it fucking broken, but it doesn't display in A browser. Not a specific one, any of them.

So, I get it to a point where it works, and I'm like... "Yeah... this doesn't work. You can't design a website like this. Let's fix this."

So, instead of listening to what I have to say about the UTTER FUCKING USELESSNESS OF YOUR WEBSITE, I suppose it's a better idea to tell me that what I've got isn't right, and then to change the ORIGINAL WEBSITE. You know, it's not like I'VE DONE THIS BEFORE OR ANYTHING.

I was ecstatic when I got my emails back down to 20 or so this week. But, I can feel them creeping behind that other tab. This vexes me.

I seriously need to destress.

Throw on top of that this stupid MSCRM test I just cannot seem to fucking pass, and I want to fucking break something.

Gah!

Dilemma

Mon, 26 Jan 2009 17:43:50 GMT

This weekend was good. Saturday was nice and chock full of games and movies and other non-stress work stuff. Whee.

On Sunday, we moved Melina's piano into the house. For all the trouble it was to move it (although it was pretty easy), she'd better play the hell out of that damn thing. Afterwards, we hit up 4e. We're going to be recording a recap - if we can tear ourselves away from an encounter long enough, unlike last night - so I don't want to go to deep into it here.

As for the dilemma I'm facing right now, I have to speak in abstracts, though, if you know me, you should be pretty quick to understand what I'm talking about.

Over the last few months, I've changed my thinking on a lot of things. Ideologically, I agree with something pretty whole hog. But, there are aspects of it that I just can't reconcile.

I don't think I've actually had to sit down and think about how I feel about something in a long ass time. And it bothers me that this issue isn't as cut and dry as I think it should be. I suppose this is getting older - finally understanding some of the nuances of life that make issues more complicated than they originally appear.

How troublesome.

Obama Inspired Philosophy

Thu, 22 Jan 2009 15:21:50 GMT

So, I've been thinking about morality and what's right recently. Specifically, I've been hearing a crapload about Gitmo, and this morning Obama signed the exec order to close it by the end of the year. We'll see if that actually happens.

Politics aside, the philosophical quandry is this: I'm tired of the dual nature of things.

The double-edged sword of everything is seriously a concept I'm tired of dealing with. There are two opposing viewpoints here; do you ultimately, unflinchingly do what's right or do you do what's necessary?

I love this as a theme, and character's choices along these lines make for some of the greatest stories. In Angel/Buffy, these characters are the Watchers. Giles and Wesley fucking rock the scenes where they have to make these choices.

So, that's fun to think about.

Politics and a movie meme

Tue, 20 Jan 2009 15:09:01 GMT

I can't wait until Obama is inaugurated. Just so people will shut the fuck up about this stupid election.

I'm a liberal. Yes.

Do I think Obama is Jesus? No.

Am I excited about his inauguration? Sure. I can't wait to see what he does in office. Though, to be honest, I was this excited when GWB took office 8 years ago. You can't help be excited when there's this much change. Is the level of ... fanaticism a bit higher? Sure. There's a pretty radical changing of the guard, and you can see it clearly from the campaign.

Let me break down the election for you, in simple terms.

McCAIN: Elect me, OR ELSE.
OBAMA: We can make things better.

One of those messages was a message, and one of them was a fear-mongering threat. It's no surprise to me that after 8 years of it, people are excited about the change.

I suppose I can understand the ire of conservatives, having lived through the same twice in the last 8 years, but Jesus I can't wait until he takes office and people can just accept it and move on with their lives.

( ) Rocky Horror Picture Show
(x) Grease
(x) Pirates of the Caribbean
(x) Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man's Chest
(x) Boondock Saints
(x) Fight Club
( ) Starsky and Hutch
(x) Neverending Story
(x) Blazing Saddles
(x) Airplane
Total: 8

(x) The Princess Bride
( ) AnchorMan
(x) Napoleon Dynamite
( ) Labyrinth
( ) Saw
( ) Saw II
( ) White Noise
( ) White Oleander
( ) Anger Management
(x) 50 First Dates
( ) The Princess Diaries
( ) The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement
Total so far: 11

(x) Scream
(x) Scream 2
(x) Scream 3
(x) Scary Movie
(x) Scary Movie 2
(x) Scary Movie 3
(x) Scary Movie 4
(x) American Pie
(x) American Pie 2
(x) American Wedding
(x) American Pie Band Camp
Total so far: 22

(x) Harry Potter 1
(x) Harry Potter 2
(x) Harry Potter 3
(x) Harry Potter 4
(x) Harry Potter 5
(x) Resident Evil 1
(x) Resident Evil 2
(x) The Wedding Singer
( ) Little Black Book
( ) The Village
( ) Lilo & Stitch
Total so far: 30

(x) Finding Nemo
(x) Finding Neverland
(x) Signs
( ) The Grinch
( ) Texas Chainsaw Massacre
( ) Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning
( ) White Chicks
(x) Butterfly Effect
(x) 13 Going on 30
(x) I, Robot
( ) Robots
Total so far: 36

( ) Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story
(x) Universal Soldier
(x) Lemony Snicket: A Series Of Unfortunate Events
(x) Along Came Polly
(x) Deep Impact
(x) KingPin
(x) Never Been Kissed
(x) Meet The Parents
(x) Meet the Fockers
( ) Eight Crazy Nights
( ) Joe Dirt
(x) KING KONG [Orriginal only]
Total so far: 45
( ) A Cinderella Story
(x) The Terminal
( ) The Lizzie McGuire Movie
( ) Passport to Paris
(x) Dumb & Dumber
(x) Dumber & Dumberer
(x) Final Destination
(x) Final Destination 2
(x) Final Destination 3
() Halloween
(x) The Ring
( ) The Ring 2
( ) Surviving X-MAS
(x) Flubber
Total so far: 53

(x) Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle/get the munchies
(x) Practical Magic
( ) Chicago
( ) Ghost Ship
(x) From Hell
(x) Hellboy
(x) Secret Window
( ) I Am Sam
(x) The Whole Nine Yards
(x) The Whole Ten Yards
Total so far: 60

(x) The Day After Tomorrow
(x) Child's Play
( ) Seed of Chucky
( ) Bride of Chucky
(x) Ten Things I Hate About You
( ) Just Married
( ) Gothika
(x) Nightmare on Elm Street
( ) Sixteen Candles
( ) Remember the Titans
( ) Coach Carter
(x) The Grudge
( ) The Grudge 2
(x) The Mask
( ) Son Of The Mask
Total so far: 66

(x) Bad Boys
(x) Bad Boys 2
( ) Joy Ride
(x) Lucky Number Slevin (The Wrong Man)
(x) Ocean's Eleven
(x) Ocean's Twelve
(x) Bourne Identity
(x) Bourne Supremacy
(x) Bourne Ultimatum
( ) Lone Star
(x) Bedazzled
(x) Predator I
(x) Predator II
(x) The Fog
() Ice Age
() Ice Age 2: The Meltdown
( ) Curious George
Total so far: 78

(x) Independence Day
(x) Cujo
( ) A Bronx Tale
( ) Darkness Falls
(x) Christine
(x) ET
(x) Children of the Corn
( ) My Bosses Daughter
(x) Maid in Manhattan
(x) War of the Worlds
(x) Rush Hour
(x) Rush Hour 2
Total so far: 87

( ) Best Bet
( ) How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days
(x) She's All That
( ) Calendar Girls
( ) Sideways
(x) Mars Attacks
(x) Event Horizon
(x) Ever After
(x) Wizard of Oz
(x) Forrest Gump
(x) Big Trouble in Little China
(x) The Terminator
(x) The Terminator 2
(x) The Terminator 3
Total so far: 97

(x) X-Men
(x) X-2
(x) X-3
(x) Spider-Man
(x) Spider-Man 2
( ) Sky High
(x) Jeepers Creepers
( ) Jeepers Creepers 2
(x) Catch Me If You Can
(x) The Little Mermaid
(x) Freaky Friday
(x) Reign of Fire
(x) The Skulls
(x) Cruel Intentions
(x) Cruel Intentions 2
(x) The Hot Chick
(x) Shrek
(x) Shrek 2
Total so far: 113

( ) Swimfan
(x) Miracle on 34th street
(x) Old School
(x) The Notebook
(x) K-Pax
( ) Krippendorf's Tribe
( ) A Walk to Remember
( ) Ice Castles
( ) Boogeyman
(x) The 40-year-old Virgin
Total so far: 118

(x) Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring
(x) Lord of the Rings The Two Towers
(x) Lord of the Rings Return Of the King
(x) Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark
(x) Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
(x) Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Total so far: 124

(x) Baseketball
(x) Hostel
( ) Waiting for Guffman
(x) House of 1000 Corpses
( ) Devils Rejects
(x) Elf
(x) Highlander
(x) Mothman Prophecies
(x) American History X
( ) Three
Total so Far: 131

() The Jacket
(x) Kung Fu Hustle
(x) Shaolin Soccer
(x) Night Watch
(x) Monsters Inc.
total so far: 135

(x) Titanic
(x) Monty Python and the Holy Grail
( ) Shaun Of the Dead
( ) Willard
Total so far: 137

( ) High Tension
( ) Club Dread
(x) Hulk
(x) Dawn Of the Dead
(x) Hook
(x) Chronicles Of Narnia The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe
(x) 28 days later
(x) Orgazmo
(x) Phantasm
(x) Waterworld
Total so far: 145

(x) Kill Bill vol 1
(x) Kill Bill vol 2
(x) Mortal Kombat
( ) Wolf Creek
(x) Kingdom of Heaven
(x) The Hills Have Eyes
( ) I Spit on Your Grave aka the Day of the Woman
( ) The Last House on the Left
() Re-Animator
(x) Army of Darkness
Total so far: 151

(x) Star Wars Ep.I The Phantom Menace
(x) Star Wars Ep.II Attack of the Clones
(x) Star Wars Ep.III Revenge of the Sith
(x) Star Wars Ep.IV A New Hope
(x) Star Wars Ep.V The Empire Strikes Back
(x) Star Wars Ep.VI Return of the Jedi
(x) Ewoks Caravan Of Courage
(x) Ewoks The Battle For Endor
Total so far: 160

(x) The Matrix
(x) The Matrix Reloaded
(x) The Matrix Revolutions
(x) Animatrix
(x) Evil Dead
(x) Evil Dead 2
(x) Team America: World Police
(x) Red Dragon
(x) Silence of the Lambs
(x) Hannibal
Total so far: 170.

You beat me by 5, weeble_man, I got 170.

Smooth and Well

Mon, 19 Jan 2009 20:18:29 GMT

Things have been good recently. I'll recap.

BSP - I'm still having a blast. We've got another reviewer, and things are kicking ass. We're also running a new contest for a whole bunch of Coraline schwag. Go check it out here.

TPC - Things are going great with the Podge. We're much more popular than I thought we would be 6 months in, and I think we've got a good flow. The listener numbers keep steadily climbing, and we've got some cool ideas and interviews lined up for the future.

SOP - Spooky Outhouse has picked up a lot of great shows. I'm pretty confident that the content producer community we've got is really solid, and covers a large swath of people.

Given some of the collaboration I've seen from some of the shows, I'm pretty pleased and would call it a success.

TSC - Assuming everything goes well with Tony today, I foresee us pushing this to layouts and printing pretty soon. Honestly, that's really exciting for me.

TOW - Issue #2, 2/29/2009. Whoo.

I've notice I'm less chatty on this blog than I was before. This might be due to the 2008 malaise having gone away. I've grown up, moved on and my life is better for it. Maybe that's why I don't post as often.

Avoidance

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 21:15:35 GMT

It's not just a trait pets can learn to take 25% less damage from Area of Effect attacks!

I've been avoiding writing anything in my journal for awhile. I don't have a good reason, really, so I thought I'd tie myself down for twenty minutes or so and just get it over with.

Recording stuff is going really well. I'm being interviewed on Thursday and doing a big collaborative project tonight. The current crew we're associating with online is hilarious and supportive and awesome. Luke and I had a long talk about recording, SOP, and stuff in general the other day, so I'm excited to start that stuff up.

In like 3 months we'll have watched all of Buff/Angel. Overall, it was pretty good. Though really, really cheesy. I'm probably a better person for having watched it.

Soon, Sarah and I are going to start on a collaborative writing project. I need to get some big piles o' shit off my plate first. Namely, v3-2, TOW setup, and some work projects.

Oh, and I just bought an xbox360. Let see if I suffer the same productivity hit that everyone else I know who got one suffered. ;)

Uneventful

Thu, 08 Jan 2009 14:53:57 GMT

Things are good. Things are uneventful.

Yay?