Random Monday Musings

Since my brain is feeling a bit cloudy today, I thought I would try to rev it up with some writing here.

Last night we watched The Grey with Liam Neeson. I have mixed feelings about it. On the one hand, it was pretty intense, and though you could see shit coming from a mile away, everything that happened still managed to startle me when it was supposed to. I thought the characters were well-done, and over all, it was a well crafted film. Except the ending. All of that build up, and then…cut to black. I felt robbed. Although, if you stayed until the end of the closing credits, there was a quick shot that alluded to an earlier scene. This kind of gave you resolution. But not enough. I give it a 7 out of 10.

In other news, based in part on Keith’s comment on my last post, an idea that has been lingering for a while came forward with some clarity. Look for a new eBook to come soon. On a related note, I have re-priced two of my longer stories. I figure if publications base their pay on your word-count, then it wouldn’t be a bad idea for me to do the same with my self-publishing. And finally, after reading an article about non-fiction seeming to sell well on Kindle, I threw a couple of my academic history papers together and published them. They’re listed on my shiny new Amazon Author page, linked above. I also have a Goodreads author page, but I can’t link to it right now, as my work internet can’t translate that site very well (it’s a long story, involving an out of date version of IE that I can’t upgrade).

Now that the weather is starting to actually look like Spring (though the weather reports keep mentioning “chance for snow”), I am looking at getting outside more and being more active. Related to that, my friend gave me a punching bag that his kids had, but almost never used. It’s a good, heavy one. I need to drag it down to the basement, so I can hang it up and start taking out some aggression. Also, since it’s so heavy, I can wrap old belts around it, and make handles for lifting. Some good strength-training right there. My goal is to be in good enough shape that I can actually look like a superhero, should I choose to dress up for Wizard World Chicago in August.

Speaking of Cosplay, my wife is now an official “D20 Girl.” This is a group who organizes women cosplayers for pop culture conventions. But, rather than hired model “Booth Babes” who don’t actually know much about what they are promoting, these girls are authentic gamers and geeks. So, she will get free tickets to (relatively) local conventions, and will be required to wear costumes. She’s already planning on several options. This is way cool!

 

(By the way, this is not my wife.  Just a girl explaining what they do.)

Super Conception

Once upon a time, in the vast, fertile fields of my imagination (at least, that's how I imagine it), there were two Role Playing Games. One was an old, worn out, somewhat dated game, who, despite his age and mechanical problems, still held a lot of charm and character for me. His name was Marvel Super Heroes. The other was a bit younger, but still no spring chicken. Yet she held a slick beauty that made her very "flexible" and able to handle many situations. Her name was Storyteller.

One day, these two systems met, and it was a match made in...well, in my imagination. And the rest, as they don't say (but should) is the future.

What does all that mean? It means I am going to re-invent the old Marvel Super Heroes RPG from TSR, by merging some concepts from White Wolf's Storyteller System. Basically, instead of rolling percentage dice on a chart, you will be rolling handfuls of d10's and looking for successes (ie.: 7 or better).

I think I will call it "Marvelous Stories."

Why bother? Because I like the concept of FASERIP. I like the idea of stats being denoted, not just with a bland number, but with a description word that has some zing to it. I like the look and feel of the old MSH game, and would like to see it updated with something that is easier to grasp. Plus, I'm bored.

I also don't have the money or the gaming group to go out and buy the next big Supers RPG. And besides, I have always liked screwing around with what other people invent, as far as RPG's go. And this effort costs me nothing but spare time, and I can ditch it whenever I want. Because that's what I do.

In other news...

Vacation this week! Woohoo! Road trip with the wife.

Speak Out With Your Geek Out – Day 5

So, here we are, the final day of my blog series for the Speak Out With Your Geek Out event. I’ve tried to bring some new ideas to my blog, and avoid the tired subjects that have been staples of mine for going on three years now. So, what should I talk about today?

Honestly, I have no idea. I guess I’ll just ramble in a geeky way.

Last night I was thinking that maybe I would talk about the old animated series Gargoyles. There was a time when that was my absolute favorite show. It was during my first year of college, less than a year out of the Army. I was taking Summer classes in 1996, and I would leave class each day around noon or 1:00, pick up my daughter from daycare, and go home to watch an episode of M*A*S*H and then Gargoyles. It was a ritual. Later that year I was introduced to the World of Darkness games, with a Vampire campaign run by my new friend, Chris Blanchard. Interestingly, I could not wrap my head around vampires being the “good guys” in a story, so my first character was a Mack Bolan/Frank Castle-type who hated vampires almost as much as he hated being one. I was the combat monster in the group. It was pretty fun, for the most part.

Anyways, back to Gargoyles. Sometime in 1997 I had the brilliant idea of adapting them for the WoD setting. So, I set about doing just that. The final product was pretty good, considering it was my first attempt to write anything RPG-related beyond a D&D adventure. Gargoyles: the Awakening borrowed a lot from Werewolf, actually, but it was compatible with all of the 2nd Edition WoD stuff. I recently discovered that the whole thing is still available online here (my crappy old website).

Interestingly, if you want to see what kind of stupid shit I used to get into, that website is kind of embarrassing. I should probably just delete the whole thing. But, there’s stuff I want to keep there. Like the Gargoyles game supplement.

Also, you can see the website I built for our long-running Stargate RPG campaign. I loved that game. Chris really outdid himself, and I have often pondered writing some fan-fiction based on those events. But, because I’m a stickler for technical accuracy, I have a hard time coming up with ways to make it fit seamlessly into the show. This idea has been on my mind lately, and I am considering trying to figure out a way to adapt it to an original setting, without referencing the show or Stargate in general. We’ll see.

Well, there you go. A relatively short end cap to the week. I enjoyed this, but I doubt I could sustain this momentum for long. As evidenced by this post.

Live long and prosper.

New Directions

Today I have no specific topic to blog about. But, in keeping with my desire to be a prolific and regular blogger, I will talk about various ideas that have been rolling around inside my brain (of course, you have to read that last part using the voice of Madagascar's King Julien to really get the proper effect).

First of all, my orc story of Mahak the Vengeful has stalled. I've kind of hit a creative wall, and the story has stopped making any sense. I'm sure this is temporary, and I will go back and finish, edit and revise it before long. In the meantime, my tastes in writing have been all over the place. I am going through one of those periods where I just don't know what I want to write. As I have stated in previous posts, this all comes back to my lack of focus, and my wide variety of literary tastes.

One thing that has recently caught my attention again is Erotica. Yeah, I know, I'm a perv. So? Anyways, several years ago I had written a couple of short vignettes about a northern barbarian having some erotic escapades. But, being me, I couldn't just let it go at that. I mean the vignettes were well-done (at least all who read them thought they were), tasteful, and decidedly NOT in the Penthouse Forum vein. But, I wanted to link them all together in a cohesive narrative with an actual story, of which the sex was only a small (but somewhat important) part. Well, the narrative died because I couldn't decide where exactly it needed to go. Unfortunately, those vignettes disappeared. So, yesterday I began trying to re-create them. I have the first one done, with plans for two more parts. However, the overall narrative will be much shorter, less involved, and easily handled in less than 10,000 words. I think I can do this. And I even did some research and found a couple of possible markets. So, we'll see how that goes.

Thanks to an article I read today about Raiders of the Lost Ark, I now also have this desire to write some plain old pulp adventure. I have a character in my head (and some of him on paper) that is a direct homage to characters like Doc Savage and Indiana Jones, named Jack Redstone. He was first developed as a character for White-Wolf's Adventure! RPG. Though I never got to play him, I wrote an extensive background for him, and even had a couple of stories plotted out and started. Unfortunately, both of those efforts were lost when my last flash drive mysteriously disappeared. Still, I think I have it in me to start over, and do something cool with the character.

Related to that, a friend of mine told me I need to start a Pulp Revival. There are ups and downs to that. First of all, how cool would it be to have a source for new stories in the Pulp Adventure vein? The downside would be that the audience would be relatively small, as many people don't really have any interest in that era (beyond an occasional movie), and, in the case of younger readers, don't even know about the existence of such literature (see my last blog entry about this). I did have an idea of how to do it, though. Basically, I would set up an eZine, and each story that was published would have a link to a virtual "tip jar" that would link to a PayPal account for the author. That way, people could read the stories for free, and if they liked them, and felt compelled, they could drop a bit of change in the author's account to let them know. I dunno. We'll see how that goes.

Speaking of Indiana Jones, I'm kind of eager to get started on studying ancient cultures. Though, for some reason, I know it's not going to be as fun as I'd like. But still, it will motivate me to read about actual history. I love ancient cultures and hearing about them. I just hate reading that much academic stuff, and usually only do so when forced to. I'm lazy, I know.

I've also been thinking of trying my hand at screenwriting. Mainly because other writers I am friends with keep talking about it. And after the fiasco that was Conan, I wonder how hard it would be to adapt an actual Robert E. Howard story for the screen. Again, we'll see how that goes.

So, there you go. I managed an entire blog post off the top of my head. I know, I astound myself as well, sometimes.

Random thoughts and ideas

So, I figured I’d take a bit of my downtime here at my new job and update my blog.

Speaking of my new job, things are going good. For those who may not have heard, I started last week at the Wisconsin Department of Children and Families. Yes, I am a government employee. But I feel like this department actually does some good, as it takes care of children in need and their families. Oddly enough, the department would probably be where I would try to get hired once I finish my Masters in Counseling Studies (or whatever program I switch to). So, when the time comes, I already have an inside track on becoming a social worker/counselor for the State. It’s like there was this grand plan or something…

School is going ok. Had a bit of a hiccup last week involving deadlines for posting discussions. Apparently my new school sets mid-week deadlines for posting new discussion topics. This is fine, and pretty common. But in my past experience, it’s been more of a guideline in order to allow others time enough to respond. However, this school enforces it by not allowing new posts after Thursday. From then on, you can only respond to other people’s posts. So, my grade for last week will suffer, as I didn’t get to it until Saturday. Stupid rule, considering it’s an online school. But, meh. I’ll deal with it.

So, Sunday was my wife's first 5k. She had started running to lose the baby-weight, and found she really liked it. She looks awesome these days, and I often have a hard time keeping my hands off of her (not that it's really ever been different). But, anyways, she decided as a goal to runa 5k. Well, she did it. And faster than she expected. And now she's looking at marathons, triathlons and an Iron Man. I say more power to her! She amazes me with how much personal motivation she has sometimes. I am very proud of my honeys.

I’ve been editing my Ryvor stories based on some feedback. I like the edited versions better. So, I may try to submit them for publication soon. Speaking of writing, with a new full-time job and going to grad school, writing will be taking a back seat for a while. I’m not giving up on it. It’s just that supporting my family and stabilizing my life is more important right now. That being said, I am constantly barraged with new ideas. I need to carry a notebook around to jot stuff down in.

Yesterday I was reading a couple of articles by a friend of mine. Phil Elmore is a writer who runs a website called The Martialist. There he reviews and discusses all things pertaining to combat and fighting. Martial arts, knives, guns, etc… He also likes to expose frauds in the martial arts community, and one of his favorite targets is Ashida Kim. Without going into detail, the things I’ve learned about this supposed “ninja master” from the 80’s has me in stitches. The guy is a certifiable loon. The funny thing is, people buy his BS whole-heartedly. So last night I had this idea of creating my own martial art on paper, a persona to sell with it, and market it to unsuspecting saps looking for a fantasy. It would be a hoot, I think.

Other than that life is going as it goes. I got permission to take the last week of October off for my court appearance in Fresno. If all goes well, Faith will be coming home to where she belongs in Wisconsin sometime in December.

Generally speaking, life is pretty good.

Oh, and congrats to my Dark Master, Scott Oden, and his beautiful new bride, Shannon. They tied the knot on Saturday, and they looked great!