I've begun and erased this post five times. I don't know what to say or do anymore that really, really would make a lasting difference. Therapy? Drugs? Psychologists? I don't have the money, little insurance (in fact one of the people at work is fighting over medical insurance).

To stay here in California is purgatory of the worst sort, a cruel joke, the shards of my greatest dream and hope dashed into pieces. Why did I ever believe for a minute that things could have worked between Bonnie and me?

If I had been pessimistic and did not move to California, I would be unhappy and possibly still at home. That is the one and only good thing of this. But I am lonely, alone, and dying inside. I rise and fall, yes, but the falls are growing more common, and deeper. Ever deeper. I thought I would be safe if I made it through the winter holidays.

It wouldn't be the first mistake I've made in this life. Stronger people than me would take this opportunity that I've been given and make the most of it. Stronger people would be having fun, exploring this west coast world and saying to hell with everything else. Stronger people would be seeing what happened as a good thing in a way, since its clear Bonnie and I are not suited for each other. Stronger people would be looking for that right person.

I am weak. I am not skilled socially, but all of you who have read this Blog and know me personally know I operate on the principle of introduced friends, I do best when people I know introduce me to people they know, expanding across social networks. There is a comfort level to that. I can't go into a room cold and make friends, not usually. Too much low self esteem.

And so, here alone, I am adrift, and lost. I have a "deal" to move somewhere else...right after the con, but right now, I only can think that I will be causing more problems than I can possibly solve.

It's not worth it anymore.

I don't know why I got to extremes
Too high or too low there ain't no in-betweens
And if I stand or I fall
It's all or nothing at all
I don't know why I got to extremes

Sometimes I'm tired, sometimes I'm shot
Sometimes I don't know how much more I've got
Maybe I'm headed over the hill
Maybe I've set myself up for the kill
Tell me how much do you think you can take
Until the heart in you is starting to break?
Sometimes it feels like it will

I don't know why I go to extremes
Too high or too low there ain't no in-betweens
You can be sure when I'm gone
I won't be out there too long
I don't know why I got to extremes

Out of the darkness, into the light
Leaving the scene of the crime
Either I'm wrong or I'm perfectly right every time
Sometimes I lie awake, night after night
Coming apart at the seams
Eager to please, ready to fight
Why do I go to extremes?

And if I stand or I fall
It's all or nothing at all

I don't know why I go to extremes
Too high or too low there ain't no in-betweens
And if I stand of I fall
It's all or nothing at all
I don't know why I go to extremes

Arref's alt.wish.33

alt.wish.33 :: Perfect Element
If you had a genre element of a rpg system that was perfect; for example a mechanic that worked so well that it was transparent to the Players, what would you pick? What would you really, really want that element to be? Why that element? What game comes close? What experience tells you it will never be perfect?

A fair question, requiring some thought. Of course this goes back to a comment made about the necessity of different systems, to address different issues, to introduce different mechanics.

My idea is similar to Ginger's, but its a slightly different focus although it might be considered under the same umbrella.

I call it the 110% rule.

The idea is that, every so often, a character can exceed his limitations, break the boundaries of her or his stats, go beyond what they think is capable of themselves. It might be tied into experience points, as a prelude to an increase in their abilities, but it could work in game, too. It's nothing that happens often (so a dice pool or a few points in a bank might be worthwhile), the character has to really want it for it to happen. Miracle points in Nobilis are a bit what I am talking about, the extension of the character's domain beyond their normal boundaries....and Adventure! has a mechanic, too. It's a fine line, though, if you limit it too much, the players hoard the points and never use them. On the other hand, too generous with such a system, and this "exceeding" becomes commonplace and ordinary, and not at all what I, the GM or player want to have happen. It should be uncommon, but not once-in-a-lifetime or every day. Just like real life.

One option might be that the player could use said points either for one-shots, or, if there is an accumulation system, a chance to convert them to actual experience points and lasting changes. But there, again, I wouldn't want a system where the players felt compelled to "only" save them, or "only" expend them. I'd want it to be a fair choice, and dependent on the player's taste, rather than the logistics of the game.

The weather has been awful by just about any standard...rain, lots of it, even by the standards of a New Yorker. (Maybe not by the standards of someone from Florida). 2 and a half inches yesterday...maybe an inch the day before that, showers today and tomorrow too. Yes, about 4 inches of rain all told...much more up against the mountains (Pasadena got 7 inches yesterday alone, and mudslides closed down the main I-5 pass called the grapevine)

It's not helped my black spiral dance (with apologies to WW).

No, I haven't bought duct tape.

If terrorists did want to launch an attack on Anaheim, well, it would suck to be me. It's not *that* far fetched, we do have Disneyland here, lots of civilians for a fanatic to kill.

And some people might consider the destruction of the "Its a small world" ride a blessing.

I've wandered around with nothing more than time on my hands
I was lost in the night with no sight of you
And at times it was so blue and lonely
Heading for the light

Been close to the edge, hanging by my fingernails
I've rolled and I've tumbled through the roses and the thorns
And I couldn't see the sign that warned me, I'm
Heading for the light

Ooh - I didn't see that big black cloud hanging over me
And when the rain came down I was nearly drowned
I didn't know the mess I was in

From "Heading for the Light" by the Traveling Wilburys

ACUS games are up.

I didn't have the enthusiasm to actually go and pick games, and still don't as of yet.

But you can see that I am running 3 slots solo, and a fourth as a collaborative effort.

Slot 1: Its a Mad Mad Mad Chaos, with Felicia Olson (no webpage up, yet anyway)
Slot 2: Ad Amber per Astra II
Slot 5: Ghosts of the Past
Slot 6: The Wizard in the Attic

So, let's say theoretically (and I DO mean theoretically) that you, gentle reader actually want to play in one of my games. (I would be intimidated if someone actually wanted to play in all of them.)

Which game should you choose if you've never been a player in my games before?

If you want comedy, and probably less of my hand on the tiller, go ahead and choose It's a Mad Mad...
If you want to join an existing game, and try and unravel the mystery of Finndo and his siblings, then go ahead
and sign up for AAPA II
If the sudden appearance of a river in Amber that everyone except people like the Royal family takes for granted as always having been there peaks your interest, then you might like Ghosts of the Past
And if you want to play in a slightly alternate Amber, where Brand is slightly off-center, but still, a nice guy, and it was Fiona who was the true villain, and Deirdre is alive and well, then go ahead and meet the Wizard in the Attic.

Any takers?

Portrait of the Universe as an Infant.

A very cool "map" of the early universe, thanks to the new Microwave Anisotropy Probe.

Highlights:

The Universe according to this findings has been pegged to being 13.7 +/- 0.2 Billion years old.

The first stars apparently ignited only 200 million years after the Universe began, earlier than cosmologists expected.

The composition of the universe is:

4% regular matter, from the cores of stars to our bones
23% "dark matter", still in debate just what this really is.
73% "dark energy", which makes dark matter positively well known.

So, we still have a lot to learn, but we've gotten a nice chunk of information today.

One unhappy cat, thanks to the similarity of the words lion and line in some dialects of English.

The picture says everything, the story explains how it happened.

Poor kitty.

On the flipside, I found myself wondering on the way to work today just how much a "social tragedy curse" would be worth in GURPS as a disadvantage. Plenty of ways to implement it...for every month in a relationship, the character must roll versus his charisma, a failure indicates that their significant other now views them as if they had 20 points in negative social traits...

Really just bookmarking this for myself...since it has occurred to me that just about everyone I know
who reads this Blog is in a long-term relationship. Everyone save the author of course.
Is it difficult for men to meet women?

Le Ton Beau De Marot, where are you?

One of his lesser known works, Le Ton Beau is Hofstadter (the guy who did Godel Escher Bach) tackling the problems of language, and more specifically, the art of translation.

With these competing versions of the translation of the Osama Bin Laden tape, I'd love to have my copy of LTBDM and read on what he had to say on the subject.

World Net Daily version of transcript

An Australian translation

Here is something to make me smile a bit. Li likes my idea of a "Martian Ellipse" (see the comments)as a down-the-road
sequel to her Grand Ellipse game.

And I intend to join her Lunar Ellipse (which IS the next one she is doing), too.

Okay, I feel like a teacher now. Here's the next thing down the pike for you to read, Who's behind the attack on the Liberal Professors, by Dave Johnson, a fellow at the Commonweal Institute.

Remember the famous line from All the King's Men? : "Follow the Money"?

Mr. Johnson does exactly that...and whether or not you agree with the views of the Professors under attack (and I am sure that some of you most certainly do not), it is the attempted stifling of free speech which concerns me, rather than the content of that speech.

If the politics were reversed 180 degrees, I'd still want this out in the open.

Dense and not "soundbiteable", when you have the opportunity to really do so, read Gary Hart's
speech Principled Engagement: America's Role in the 21st-Century World

I myself am going to have to wait until I get home to really digest it.

I don't have the heart to respond myself right now, but check out Arref's alt.wish.33 and his very good answer to the Roll the Bones #6: roleplaying sex.

"...I am everything you want. I am everything you need. I am everything inside of you that you wish you could be. I say all the right things at exactly the right time, but I mean nothing to you, and I don't know why...and I don't know why...why...."

Vertical Horizon

4 more days until what is just about the unhappiest day of the year for me.

Valentine's Day.

I've never done well with the holiday, even in those years when I am attached. Its truly a day of bad feelings for me, a day of broken dreams, of tragedies returning to the surface of my mind. The what-if's, the if-only's, the why did she have to be taken from this world. The what could I have done?

The loneliest day of the year. Friends, near or otherwise really can't help, but this is not about friends, not really. I know I am narrowing the focus of Valentine's Day, but, what the hell, most of the holiday's persona is geared to that, its inescapable.

I shouldn't complain or get overly depressed about it. Friends in the Blogosphere are dealing with family illnesses, layoffs and other problems. I should be happy that I am alive, and employed and all of that...

But its not enough. To survive is not enough, I want to thrive. I'm not. I'm isolated, I'm alone, and every attempt I have ever made to change that has blown up in my face. Tragedy strikes. My own social inadequacy dooms relationships. I move 3000 miles away to make a real full relationship out of one conducted in the ether, and it falls apart almost immediately. God, the devil, Big Wuju, the Cosmic Luck are all slapping me in the face and laughing every time I try, and every different thing I try. I admit it, I am not one of those people who are a hermit. I may not be overly social in what an astrologically inclined person might consider a "Libran way" but I need friends...and I need someone to love.

It seems I can't have the latter and I am a failure as the former. And as Valentine's Day approaches, it hurts more and more. I always thought, in the worst depressions I've faced, that the day most likely, most appropriate, most symbolic if I ever were to take that fatal step, would be February 14. A symbol of broken dreams, smashed promises, and most of all, my own pathetic failures.

I hurt, gentle readers, I hurt.

Bete Noire is back

Thanks to Arref for the catch. Urp, I don't have my BN login information here at work...no way to post there until tonight.

Interesting article in the NY Times today by James Gleick on Spam.
The email kind, not the lunch meat.

In the Gene Wolfe novels, and Jim Groves has made use of the concept in his character descriptions, there is a color which is somehow "darker" than black, called fuligin.

Check out this article, where a few scientists have actually created something which is blacker than known materials.

I can't seem to see why the entry on Enterprise won't blind properly. I've done it before, but I have no clue what's different now. I can't seem to see any stray tags that would explain it. It might be implied Break tags from Blogger. Grrr.

Role Call #4

If we can agree that all roleplaying is really about telling a story, then how does system figure into it? Explain.

The system of a game, in the best circumstances, helps enhance the experience and make the story come alive, in terms of the genre and setting of the game as well as what "role" the players have in that universe vis a vis each other, and the GM.

Not all systems are created equal, which is why there are so many of them.

Nobilis, for example, of what I have seen, is very suited to "greater than mortal" adventures, I've heard variants on the game have been used for superhero games, even. Such a system, with its 0-5 scale on stats, would not, for instance, be very useful in a straight D20 fantasy game. Conversely, if you tried to "D20" Nobilis, you might get some odd results, and stats that probably would run into the 30s and 40s.

Science fiction RPGS, which we discussed a while ago, tend to need games that can handle hardware, technical terms, and the like. Possibly its the inability to come up with a really good system to handle all of this that explains the relative unpopularity of SFRPGs versus FRPGs.

I've mentioned D20 before, and I am aware that there are hundreds of supplements out for it, its becoming almost like a second GURPS in that respect. And these supplements run the gamut from Traveller T20 to the Epic Level Handbook. I do not feel, however, that D20 is the perfect universal system. For games which are modeled on a probabilistic outcome, it works. I would be curious, although likely not play, a D20 version of Amber. I have noticed, though, that some game systems are folding themselves up, and re-presenting themselves as D20 universes. 7th Sea and Fading Suns are two examples of this trend. GURPS itself has already done versions of several games in like manner, like Castle Falkenstein.

In an ideal world, system wouldn't really be necessary to tell stories, and such imaginative exploits are something some of us did with our fellows, as children. However, as we grow, system provides a useful framework, a mold with which to cast our role playing adventures. The sheer variety of those adventures and the chimera of a truly universal system is why there are many games out there, of all stripes and systems.