Central Texas is due for freezing rain and below-zero (Celsius) temperatures for the next couple days. Thus I need to be prepared for Southerners who can’t drive under these conditions and probably toilet paper hoarding.
Found out they’re getting their overreactions going. AISD cancelled school in advance. Fingers crossed we have a delayed start for work tomorrow!
Caught the news about her passing this morning pretty early thanks to having Duran Duran in my FaceBook feed. Makes sense this would be a part of their updates, the Cranberries were Duran Duran’s opening act during their 1993 “Wedding Album” tour.
What I didn’t know is that the band was still together this whole time. I guess I wasn’t looking hard enough but I do have two of Dolores’ solo albums, they’re pretty good. I figured the band went the way many did after the popularity of “Alternative Rock” faded with the advent of Metallica being played without irony on 101X.
Since it’s the 25th anniversary of my 1993 mix of greatest hits (Tapestry), I’m even more inspired to listen to the Cranberries’ debut album all the way through because I am tired of hearing “Dreams” to this day.
Thanks for all the great work Dolores and expanding upon the body of work made by real Irish citizens.
Practically every gaming group has that guy in the group. The one who always plays the wizard/sorcerer so he can unleash a some serious damage via magic: fireballs, lightning bolts, magic missile, etc. Well, now, thanks to Cosmo Joe, you can get them via his Web Store here.
Above are all the key offensive spells with their desired results replacing the number six: a fireball, a snowflake (for freezing), musical notes (for enchantment, usually bards), a lightning bolt, a skull for sneak attacks, a skull for the ever useful “20” with poop countering the frustrating “1,” and lastly, four-siders with their numbers adjusted for the game’s trademarked magic missile.
I like them and I made sure I had spares to give to a friend who is the consummate spell-caster. John is often a good playtester to help the rest of us on what is effective when trying to take out a small horde by arcane means.
Zorl the Silverhanded levitating 30 feet over three dwarves
This week I will be participating again in what my old D&D group established as Gamer’s Weekend, a mini-Convention of friends/acquaintances where it’s non-stop games in a house on a summer camp Jeremy’s mom owns. You could say it has the seeds to germinate into another ChupacabraCon or when I’m old and gray…GenCon!
So in honor of attending for the second time (Gamer’s Weekend VI!), I’m going to throw in some gaming-related posts until I head out. Heads up, the camp doesn’t have any real reliable Web access, meaning I will be mostly incommunicado from Thursday afternoons until I come home next Sunday.
Above is this really cool, clear-plastic miniatures’ aid called a Combat Tier™. What it helps with is showing where flying/levitating characters/monsters are during the game, usually in combat. It comes with bases nicely parsed out into one-inch squares representing five feet along the X and Y axes. It didn’t cost much neither, $40 to provide a better, more accurate representation.
The short version…it’s a modern, R-rated take on The Creature From The Black Lagoon. I loved how del Toro made the creature more credible and stuck with practical effects on him. The creature is a him as you’ll see in the story.
The long version. Shape follows the dreary, routine life of Elisa who is a third-shift janitor at an American Black Ops site circa the early Sixties. She’s a mute with no family (raised in an orphanage) beyond her neighbor, Giles, a elderly gay commercial artist and Zelda, a fellow janitor who is very protective. At least both understand ASL so they can interpret for and understand Elisa.
One day, a really cruel Mr. Strickland (a government agent) brings in something he found in the Amazon for study. Their introduction is gross because the creature cuts off two of Strickland’s fingers; Zelda and Elisa get 20 minutes to wipe up the blood.
Sensing the creature is intelligent and gentle, Elisa teaches him ASL, shares her lunches and plays records to strike up their relationship. When she learns Strickland plans to have the creature dissected (allegedly to help NASA make better spacesuits); Elisa, Giles, Zelda and Dr. Hoffstetler conspire to rescue the creature.
I’ll leave it at that. There’s many details before and after you’ll have to see. Much may surprise you. I don’t recommend this movie for Trump voters, “Christians” or the over sensitive. Horror fans will be disappointed too. Much like Star Wars these days, Shape is the story of rejected Americans: Gay, Black, Mute, Intelligent and Fish-esque; fighting back at the WASP establishment.
For me, Shape shines in finally seeing Michael Shannon have a decent villain role. He was wasted in Man of Steel as Snyder tried to make General Zod a sympathetic character. As Mr. Strickland, he’s a ruthless, sexist bastard that used to be called a patriot in the early Sixties.
Alamo Extras: Trailers for The Beach Girls and the Monster, The Creature from the Haunted Sea, Black Narcissus, All That Heaven Allows (Rock Hudson movie) and Revenge of the Creature (the lesser-known sequel to the 1955 original); the trade-show ad for The Creature from the Black Lagoon pinball machine (it’s a great game, I’ve played it many times); video for the Revillos song “She’s Fallen in Love with a Monster Man,”; scenes from some weird Spanish-speaking movie with the Creature, Frankenstein’s monster and a gorilla; commercial for monster-toy-based soap dispensers; del Toro starring in a Mexican Alka-Seltzer commercial; and a history the Creature as he or it appeared in three feature films, The Munsters, The Colgate Comedy Hour (Abbott and Costello); Monster Party, Mad Mad Mad Monsters, Jonny Quest, The Venture Brothers and Phantom from 10,000 Leagues.
To celebrate Seth MacFarlane’s American Dad beta achieving 300 episodes, Fox put together a a little Web app to make yourself a character in the style of the rarely funny Family Guy. This is the best I could do given the pieces they offer. I look like a brunette version of Judd Apatow.
Hard to believe Family Guy has made it to this milestone. Then again, after 300 generations, humanity’s latest accomplishment is singing poop.
Well, on the upside, Seth’s mediocre show and gravitas has given birth to better entertainment thanks to his help: American Dad (now on TBS), Robot Chicken, Cosmos with Dr. Neil deGrasse-Tyson (hard to believe Fox backed anything based in facts), letting Patrick Stewart demonstrate his funny side, his sister Rachel having a career (she’s a very good voice actress in her own right, watch Kids Next Door) and being a factor in proving that [adult swim] would be a viable network. The jury is still out on The Orville.
A couple podcasts I like to listen to have had episodes about the future of food. How much protein we can get from crickets (blech!) and as always, how much meat we chunky Americans need to scale back on. Darn it! I live in Central Texas, BBQ and burgers are done so well here! Meanwhile, I have to acknowledge we all have to change as the American way of life just isn’t tenable in the long run, especially if the Chinese fully emulate us. Their palette prefers other proteins but they do outnumber us.
It’s also a new year which means resolutions! After I recovered from my illness last year, food began to taste way better and I admit to overcompensating for the months preceding in which I couldn’t get anything down without the jitters, puking or both.
Now my weight rivals Homer Simpson, the one fictional character I always thought I could beat! Somara had a banner 2017 in her weight loss. I can’t quite follow the same path. I love going to the gym yet I keep cancelling out that progress with a cheeseburger.
For 2018, I’m tripling my efforts on both fronts while investigating a couple “food” alternatives.
Opti-Meal often gets all the entry-way shelf space at HEB around this time of year. As I mentioned earlier, this is their take on the heavily advertised Slim Fast. One of these is supposed to take the place of a whole meal like breakfast (I rarely eat in the morning) and/or lunch. Then you have a sensible dinner. Translation: don’t go crazy for the last meal, you’ll wipe out the progress this gunk provides.
One bottle allegedly provides 180 calories with all the other key elements you need to get through the day. Not sure why they call it a “shake,” the stuff lacks the consistency of one, it’s really just fat-free milk that tastes like liquid chalk covered in vanilla flavoring as a diversion. Much like how weed smokers think patchouli disguises their body odor and hobby from us squares.
This isn’t something I could stay with and I only bought a small case (eight bottles) for a starting point and as a stop-gap measure until the other two candidates arrive.
TED talks tend to be something I take with a grain of salt. You hear some good ides but my complaint is that these “talks” are often Silicon Valley oligarchs lecturing other Silicon Valley oligarchs. Ergo, their “solutions” will flop in the real world because Democracy and civil liberties are pesky obstacles to their brand of progress.
I had never heard of Ethan Gilsdorf until I read his essay here. I agree, D&D had a positive influence in my life regardless of my parents’ and brother’s shit talking; those three are what my Japanese friend calls “mainstream,” I’ll let the connotation speak for itself.
The little game from Lake Geneva, WI continues to brighten my days as it did 35 years ago. There was no Internet, video games weren’t very sophisticated or immersive and most computers cost as much as a second-hand car. If you just had the key books, some dice and paper, the possibilities were endless. It helped me make new friends throughout high school be it Houston or “the sticks.” D&D got me through those boring stretches of high school, namely my days in North Dakota where binge drinking and weed smoking were the pinnacle for most residents…and teen pregnancies.
Dungeons & Dragons is more than a game though. It helps with thinking on the fly, creative solutions, theoretical exercises (morality) and interactions. It might have io9.com that published an article about (former) DMs being more mental agile in running a meeting.
Need to put his book on my wishlist. He’s only a year or so older which means certain releases or developments in the game happened around the same age. He also seems to be a pretty nice person.
Makes me worry what they call our “regular” flavor and is there an “uncool” American flavor like “Ugly American”…it’s loud, boorish and smells like Fake News!
Christmas 1981, my parents bought me the boxed set sequel to the Basic Game…Expert! They didn’t know D&D was divided into two different “brands.” I was more into the Advanced, hardback books and needed the Dungeonmaster’s Guide, but I really didn’t care. I cobbled Basic, Expert and Advanced rules into one giant pool of fun. My friends didn’t care. We were putting the hurt on monsters and this came with the unfairly, unloved Isle of Dread module. I loved Isle, for it was a huge setting that could be used continuously because there was more to the exotic island than just finding a black pearl the size of a basketball.
TSR continued with Erol Otus for the cover and I dig how he shows the set’s continuity; a wizard in the Expert level range spying on our previous heroes from Basic. Ergo, this box’s contents aren’t a separate game, it’s an addition or expansion. Much like The Empire Strikes Back makes little sense until you see Star Wars or how the Harry Potter books are in a set order.
Saving this for Gamer’s Weekend to wear should the weather work out.
If you got to the original Vimeo page, Nick explains which hardware he used to make this possible along with the music. I’m also getting friends who are very experienced film makers/video people to give me some notes to pass on. Don’t get me wrong, this movie kicks ass but he is in college where he’s learning more. Plus, I am confident my friends as critics may pick up stuff from Nick in return.
Caught these two sitting together which is pretty uncommon since Isis will only lie on the bed if we’re gone or unconscious. Sadly, I think Kuroneko is only “sharing” Isis’ favorite chair to assert her alpha status. Note, they’re not cuddling, it’s more like a bully trying to crowd out the smaller, weaker creature. Still cute looking.
It’s great to be up and about after spending a few days in bad and/or cooped up at home. Seems I had an upper respiratory thing, not exactly the flu, which I got a shot for. I imagine it could’ve been worse if I didn’t.
Somara is enduring the earlier stages. I hope she recovers before the weekend because I wouldn’t want her to lose out on any plans.
Maybe it’s something in the air? One of our three cats also has been sneezing continuously and pets are pretty often invincible.
Anyway, I’m back and I’ll be catching up on stories, exercise and some other things I like to do. Plus, I’m going to Gamers’ Weekend, gotta’ prep for the fun.
Now to work on my fattiness at the gym and fight the sore throat the freezing weather is giving me.
I received a couple pictures of my niece Anna rocking out in the garage. She’s showing off the electric guitar Somara and I bought her for Christmas/Birthday. It’s a good starter, a Squier which I think is Fender’s entry-level brand like Buick was for General Motors. Thanks to all the musicians I work with at my job, I was pointed to Sweetwater to get it over Guitar Center.
My brother told me Anna has utilized her years of violin practice and playing to learn the essentials of piano (what we used to play as kids), guitar and bass. She’s still in high school so I’m hoping that she’ll at least have the experience of being in her first band. Yes, yes, Uncle Steve is living out his inner rock star vicariously through Anna because I only know how to play iTunes. Seriously though, I made a deal with my niece. Play the hell out of this guitar and in time, if this is something she wants to continue doing, then we’ll discuss getting a Fender or Gibson, which start around two grand.
Next up, I’m going to listen to Father John Misty, the only music I heard of Anna is into. Being an old fart, every name I listed of women who lead/play guitar drew a blank. No wait, Anna did know who Annie Clack (aka, St. Vincent) was. In time, I’ll see if I can get her to draw inspiration from other heroines of mine: Aimee Mann, Kate Bush, Johnette Napolitano (Concrete Blonde) and Ladyhawke (aka Pip Brown). Who knows. Maybe one day soon, Anna will be crashing out my house to perform at SXSW! It would be nice to have a rock star in our family.
