Tuesday, March 24, 2015

Anger Management through HALO

I have a pretty bad temper.  I get red-in-the-face angry at some of the dumbest shit.  It really doesn’t take much to set me off.  Fortunately, my reaction to that anger is usually just brooding and simmering until I can get a handle on it.  But, sometimes it bursts out, and I raise my voice when I probably shouldn’t.  This happens mostly with my kids.  I find I have to apologize for yelling a lot (that being said, I get accused of “yelling” when I’m actually not, so I think they have a hand in this).

Anyways, my son gets me mad a lot.  He’s 6, and at the stage in childhood where he has no filter, and no “survival instinct” as my wife puts it.  So, he’ll respond to something I tell him with something infuriating, and I usually end up yelling at him for it.  It’s annoying because, first of all, I hate losing control.  But more importantly, I know what kind of damage that can do in the long run, and I am always worried that I’m not a good parent anyways.  So, yeah, stress levels rise.  It’s really a vicious cycle.

My son loves video games.  And he loves to play them HIS way, regardless of who he is playing with.  In Minecraft, he’ll get all bossy, and indignant of you do something against what he wants you to do, for example.

Lately we’ve been playing HALO Reach (got it for free through Xbox-Live a while back).  But he likes to play it on Firefight, where player 2 is defaulted as a lone Spartan, and player 1 can either join the Spartan side, so there’s two, or he can join the Covenant.  The scenario is basically a Last Stand, where the Spartan side has to fend off wave after wave of increasingly difficult enemies.  He likes to be the Covenant.

Last night, I felt the anger boiling, since he kept camping me.  And since his temper is equal to mine, he kept getting angry when I would kill him (usually with a shotgun to the face).  But, instead of yelling, I decided to just make jokes about it, and compliment him on his kills.  And suddenly, it was fun.  And when I shot him, he would initially have the “gamer rage” reaction of insisting that he got me first (when clearly he hadn’t, since he was the dead one).  But then we would laugh, and he’d come back and come after me again.

It was a very succinct reminder that my kids learn from the behavior I model.  It’s common sense, and every parent knows this already.  But, sometimes I need a little refresher.  So, I’m trying to wrangle my temper with humor and compassion.  Just like every “expert” says to do.  It seems to work with my son.

Now, if I could get the 12-year old girl to drop her attitude…I think I’ll leave that one to mom.

Friday, March 6, 2015

Opening soon?

I was perusing my bookshelves yesterday, and I think I came to the conclusion that I just need to pare down my collection.  Anyone who knows me knows that this is a major deal.  I am somewhat of a collector, and borderline hoarder.  I kind of always have been. 

When we came back from Desert Storm, I had stuffed my duffel bag with paperbacks that people had tossed in a barrel to be burned in preparation for the beginning of the ground war.  Nowadays, I hit up the local Half-Priced Books about twice a month, and the first place I go is the "Bargain" section.  These are books that, if not sold, will just be tossed into the dumpster in the middle of the night.  The thought just horrifies me, so I often "rescue" books that interest me from this fate.

Hey, it's cheaper and cleaner than saving animals from the shelter.

Be that as it may, I find that I have a lot of paperbacks that I have read, and that I know I will never read again.  I also have several paperbacks of Robert E. Howard's works that are duplicates of what I have in the Del Rey collection (only missing like two volumes from those).  And then there's a whole plethora of books that, chances are, I probably will never read, and have no idea why I bought them in the first place.

So, my idea is to create a new page here (see the tabs at the top), and list all of the ones I want to sell, with a reasonable price.  Anyone who wants any of them can let me know, and we can work out a direct sale deal.  Payment would probably be through PayPal, and I would mail everything Media Mail, since that's the cheapest.  Unlike Amazon, I wouldn't add a standard mail rate to each book.  Rates would be based on the weight of the package and nothing more.

I figure this has a good chance of getting books into the hands of people who will appreciate them, and we can bypass the middle man.  I did this in the past with RPG books and materials, and it worked out pretty nicely.

I'm going to start sorting and creating a list this weekend, probably.  So, keep an eye out.  I'll most likely just do a quick post when I have new items listed.

On a side note, I would probably also entertain the idea of book trades.

Tuesday, March 3, 2015

In the wrong line of writing?

I know the conventional wisdom is “don’t chase the market.”  We are advised by successful writers to write what we like, write what we know, write what grabs us by the passion-hairs, etc.  But, what if those things aren’t what we SHOULD be writing?  This is the question my fragile ego has been asking me lately.

Although fantasy and science fiction have always been my favorite genres to read, and to date, they are what I most often write, I am starting to wonder if maybe I should try other genres, just to see if something grabs my writer-attention.

As a holder of a History degree, there is the natural instinct to write historical fiction.  And within that, there is a lot of room.  Scott Oden has managed to take his love of fantasy and apply it to his passion for history.  Could I do the same?  On a related note, what if I slipped sideways from the standard “adventure” stories I tend to want to write, and try something like mystery?

This idea kind of took hold yesterday, and I gave some thought to the possibilities.  Interestingly enough, the premise for a series of mystery novels set in Constantinople during the Byzantine Empire sprang into my mind in moments.  I even had ideas for characters; a constable (possibly a Greek mercenary), and a Varangian Guardsman.  I’m mulling the ideas around, and I definitely see some room for further exploration.

Then there’s the Agesilaus pseudo-biography (“pseudo” because there is little to nothing known about his actual upbringing, so everything before his becoming one of the Kings of Sparta is conjecture).  I had made some progress on that one, with a bare-bones plot, some scene ideas, and a cast of characters.  But, alas my son decided that the flash drive sticking out of my tower would make a good footrest.  I try not to dwell on the damage done, and the writing lost.

I’ve also long had ideas for modern techno-thrillers and military thrillers (ala Tom Clancy, but less verbose).  I’d still love to do one or some of those.  The problem is that those kinds of books become very dated very quickly, so you have to really concentrate to make things as relevant as you can for as long as possible.  Either that, or you have to write really fast.  Yeah, that'll work..

In the end, I think I want to try to stay within the realm of “reality” as much as possible.  So, no magic, no futuristic science, no supernatural elements.  I’m not sure how that would go for me.  And I have a feeling I might just slip back into my fantastic worlds eventually.  Which is fine.  I’m comfortable there.  I just want to be sure that that’s where I belong.