Natterings

First:  Really?  My father used to have a thing about never patronizing a business that deliberately misspelled its title.  I get that.  I feel the same way about names that all run together using lowercase letters, as if that makes everything more profound.

Anyway.  To sum up:  About 70 years ago, the whole population of a tiny New Hampshire town left home and walked a trail that led to the death and/or disappearance of just about everyone.  Now, a couple of photographers/writers, along with support staff and a local, attempt to recreate that walk to find out more about the townsfolk’s … Continue Reading

What a great movie. Gareth Edwards put together this science-fiction-travel-romance-tragedy on a relatively small budget, but the cash went to all the right places.

Creature effects are rare, but captivating — and eerily beautiful, in a few pivotal scenes.  The plot involves an initially antagonistic North American man and woman who are attempting to get out of alien-infected Mexico and back to the United States.  As is pretty much the case with any film based on getting from point A to point B, their plans to make it home in comfort and safety go out the window almost immediately.  Parallels … Continue Reading

A few impressions from having too much time on my hands:

I am really looking forward to the Winter is Coming series on HBO.  The previews have been fantastic, and even though Sean Bean is a good 15 years older than the role he portrays…it’s Sean Bean.  If you want noble + troubled in fantasy, he is a go-to guy.  The rest of the cast as seen in the previews seems fine, if a little too clean and pretty for the grimdarkgrim world George R.R. Martin created.

Having now seen both The Adjustment Bureau and Source Code, I am reminded that the … Continue Reading

Rest in peace, babe.  Wish you were here.

I could write so much more, but I can’t right now.  I just can’t.  I miss you.

Friends and I were talking on Facebook recently about the types of characters we tend to play, and I can sum it up very easily (at least in 4th Ed. D&D):

Leaders.

Not “hey guys follow me come here do this!” but the very specific healer/buffer role in a party. My goal is to have one of every leader class, but oy. I only have so much time. Here are my current incarnations, both in LFR (Living Forgotten Realms) and a home game:

Faral – lvl 16 Valorous half-elf bard. Roleplay-wise, she desperately wants to be a trophy … Continue Reading

So, I wrote this in May and never published it:

My Awesome Therapist asked me this on Tuesday:

“What would the world look like if you didn’t think you were personally responsible for everyone else’s survival and happiness?”

Uh, I dunno.  It’s a good question.  Before my husband died, I would probably have said something breezy and glib about how I would have a lot more time on my hands.  These days, I honestly don’t know.  The last person who stayed over at our apartment (one of our gamer friends who decided he … Continue Reading

Farewell, Frank Frazetta!  One of the coolest things I helped curate at the museum where I used to work was your Conan redrawn on the side of a B-52 (among many other excellent examples of post-World War II aircraft nose art).  I loved your art when I was young.

I know everything I come up with has been done a thousand times. Maybe that’s one of the joys of having gamed for about 4 years, instead of all my life: every plot seems fresh TO ME.

That overly defensive caveat aside:

4th Edition D&D, Eberron setting. The whole point of the campaign is a race sponsored by House Orien (the Dragonmark house concerned with transportation), though their actual motives for running the race might be (gasp) different than their stated motives of publicity and entertainment. The participants can use any form of magical or nonmagical transportation, as … Continue Reading

As an aside, my favorite spam comment so far is:  “This article is very recreative!”

As for gaming, I continue to enjoy Living Forgotten Realms a ton.  It isn’t the most creative roleplaying I’ve ever done:  the modules follow a pretty basic formula, and while that’s comfortable like a bowling league or a movie night is comfortable, I let myself sink into the basic structure of the games too much.

I play LFR in three separate settings:

1. In & around Baltimore with my LFR peeps.  It’s a neat mix of folks, and I’ve been lucky enough to stumble into a group that … Continue Reading

Carl & Ellie’s Married Life

This is why I couldn’t see Up. That clip right there.  Bryant told me about it when he came home from seeing the movie alone, and I remember being so grateful that I hadn’t gone with him.  I saw the clip today in a random blog, and watched, and now I can’t stop crying.

There are so many different kinds of tears.  Hurt tears, angry tears, betrayal tears, frustration tears.  I’m a weeper, and always have been.  But grief tears never show up alone.  They’re always accompanied by my pounding heart and throbbing headache and fears … Continue Reading