The Emerson Papers

Happy Birthday, America!

Always a work in progress, yet always my pride and true home. Our great experiment continues, for good or bad, and long may it last!

Well, I'm off to catch the bus and head to my first day of Summer Term. I've only one class today, which is Statistics and I'm excited for it. My other class this term is Speech, I had a class about Day Hiking (just for the heck of it), but it didn't get enough people and they canceled it.

But, seven credits is enough...it allows me to get my extra loan money, which should help pay for things while I hunt for a job. If I can find an okay job that works around my schooling, then life shall be fine. If not...well, we'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

Laters!

Once, long ago, I use to love assembling and painting models, it was something that my step-dad did as a boy and that his father (my grampa Emerson) really liked, too. So, I glommed into the idea of doing it rather deeply, but then came the Summer of '85, when I returned from Camp Meriwether to find my parents had packed my room up and that we were moving from Gresham back to Portland.

Fun, huh?

In addition to losing all of my elementary school friends, whom I was about to join in Middle School, I also lost my fondness for models. I really enjoyed them, but I also really enjoyed impressing my step-dad with them, too.

Anyhow, over the past few years I kept thinking about how I'd like to get into miniatures, but just never did it. But, at PaizoCon this weekend, I saw a lot of cool miniatures and to cap it all off, my last played game was Sean's "Into the Scarlett Monastery," which had an awesome array of painted, metal miniatures...and my inspiration grew leaps and bounds.

More so thanks to the kewl mini that I got to keep, too. Seriously, SKR is an awesome miniatures painter.

Thus, I figured I'd ask for some advice from you kind folk here on what would be a good way to introduce myself to painting minis, good starting supplies, and so forth.

Thanks!

While PaizoCon was one of the most enjoyable and interesting gamer moments of my life, the drive to and from the con was anything but...in fact, they were my two most frustrating and disheartening driving moments of my life.

See, I enjoy driving, especially long drives, since it is a form of active/reactive meditation, sort of like lawn mowing. You're able to get into a rhythm and glide from beginning to end and all is well.

Except for this past week.

On the way to PaizoCon my car started to act up, inspired by this jerk of a long-haul drive who had passed me a couple minutes before, only to be almost stopped on the other end of a tunnel, which caused me to decelerate and stall out. After coasting about six miles down the road, thankful for the steep incline, I rested on the side of the road until my car would start.

Up until this moment, I was on-pace for a 7 and a half hour trip in the nine hours it could have taken, which didn't last.

Start at about Eugene, once I switched over to the Oregon portion of I-5, my car was stalling out, which was worse once I crossed into Washington, as it took me three hours to cover the expanse of I-5 between Kalama and Kelso/Longview area. But, after that, things went smooth, save for a Microsoft catering van cutting me off (I think it could sense my iPhone or something). It took me about thirteen hours to get to the con.

Insert the enjoyable Con experience here and then back to the road...bad idea.

The return trip took a projected nine hour timetable and turned it almost thirty hours on the road, which included me sleeping in the car on the side of 197, just south of The Dalles, a town which I was stuck around for roughly fifteen hours and no one ever stopped to check on things.

It's okay, mind you, but the only person I saw during the whole trip, aside from the nice lady at Denny's who didn't charge me for my soda, was a State Trooper Sergeant just south of Madras who did the check up on me after about the forth time he passed me in his unmarked car.

Nice friendly guy who just did a well-being check, sans asking for ID and such, as I moved on my way.

While the drive sucked there were some cool moments on it, such as seeing a half-moon rising over the Oregon wilderness, a curious coyote who decided to look at me through my driver side window, and a beautiful buck with velvet horns (five-point; we only count one side out this way, folks), and some wonderful open country.

But, while I'm gonna go to every PaizoCon that I can manage...I will never drive myself there again. I'll take a train, fly, or carpool with others, but I ain't the sole driver, anymore.

Hell, I'd sooner rent a car and solo drive to GenCon, but I think the drive from Klamath Falls to Seattle has scared me for life and beat my ass down. Sure, in the end, I beat it and drove the whole way myself, but turning roughly eighteen total hours of driving into nearly thirty-three was insane, defeating, and soul-crushing on some weird level.

It's not the worse thing in life, nowhere even near it, and I know there are worse events out there, right now, but that drive has crushed me, for now and I've no issue with admitting it. *laughs*

That is all. More later.

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

I'm about fifteen minutes west of the Dalles and all is well. 251 in, but I added a few miles by using 84 instead of I-5...pretty miles though.

Half way home.

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

So far, so good.

116 out of 454 down and I'm feeling okay about things, especially since I'm adding in rest stop breaks and not feeling rushed.

PaizoCon was such a blast, next year I'm so gonna take a train or plane, maybe carpool, so I can focus more on the experience. Everyone was cool and fun, reminded me more if Scouting events or DeMolay Convocations, as there was this nice esprite de corps to it all.

Anyhow, thanks for the kind words and wellwuahes, very appreciated.

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Evocative City Sites: The Rogue's Gallery

So I edited Rite Publishing's Evocative City Sites: The Rogue's Gallery and it's quite the cool project. It's a systemless project, so it's all flavor text, artwork, and a killer map. Also, the price point is rather cool, too.

For $1.75 you get about 13 pages that has some adventure hooks, a pair of interesting NPCs, a rather unique location that is gleamed from an interesting trope of fantasy, and I enjoyed tightening up some of the text and working with the author (as well as publisher) Steve "Qwilion) Russell.

Anyhow, I figured I'd add some extra work and income to my life, while expanding upon my eclectic industry credits. *grins*

Laters!

...mainly because I'm tired of offering ad hominem folk an easy first strike.

Seriously, moderate does not equate to a flip flopper, a fence rider, or a half dozen, or more, other comments that are supposedly witty and are used when you cannot defend your position, at least with any intelligence.

I do not go where the wind blows me, in fact I am rather firmly entrenched with all of my civil rights, not just the ones that the various parties seem to like to put next to bullet points on some list. They are all fairly nice rights and I want them all, even if I do not plan on using them, since, last time I checked, I am part of this "We The People..." thing.

*grins*

Sure, I do not have a political party, mainly because they all seem happy to trade my civil rights back and forth like they are some sort of commodity or something. Plus, it means I get to vote for whom I wanna vote for, not for who I am told to vote for...of course, that means my vote is a lot more my fault, I guess. Hopefully voting for Clinton and Obama makes up for the times I voted for Bush...but, I make no apologies for my Perot vote, as I liked the nutty bastard.

Anyhow, there is nothing wrong with not having a political party, voting for who you want, and wanting freedom of speech for the same reasons you want the right to bear arms, as they are both nice things.

Being an independent is cool, I think, especially a dyed in the wool one, so...yeah, independent. I would use libertine or freethinker, but the former usually brings up images of a pervert frenchie and the later can be insulting to the asshats that are bugging me...but, so is asshat. ;)

...that, for whatever reason, having a high pain threshold somehow makes the small pains worse, especially the nagging ones.

I've a nasty headache today, it's right behind my right eye, although earlier it was behind both eyes, and it was painful enough that I was quite sure my eyes themselves were hurting. It's a pressure pain, though, as closing my eyes really tight can intensify the pain until I relax them and it subsides for awhile.

My glasses seem fine, prescription wise, and it is not a constant thing, as it only happens now and then, but damn it sucks. Ranks right up there with the nagging pain of busting, or damn near busting, a pinky toe.

Now the reason that it's odd is that I've a very high pain threshold, with respect to most things; I've sliced open a fish hook wound to get the hook out myself, pour some hooch in it and then used super glue to close it and I was just fine. We won't even go into the stories of my big toe issues when I was a teen, as it makes some folks ill and I get lectures about it. *chuckles*

Yet, little pain, sniggling ones, those bug me as if it was my nethers bathed in molten rock...WTF?!?!

Well, varianor wished me, first, so I figured I'd return the favor. It's interesting, as I've now met two folk who have the same Birthday as me, neither of whom have the same birthyear.

Thus begins the army. ;)

http://ecoworldly.com/2009/03/11/giant-stingray-could-be-worlds-largest/

Seriously, that's a big damn ray....plus, it gives my a physical representation of why something like a cloaker, dropping from the ceiling, would scare the holy shit out of someone.

*chuckles*

Off to academia.

...but I've finished my last class for my Associates of Arts in Criminal Justice, once the grade for it drops I'll apply for my degree and complete my first college degree and it only took me sixteen years, or so.

*laughs*

Seriously, though, I'm enrolled at the Oregon Institute of Technology, now, starting at the end of the month, which is Spring Term '09, in the Applied Psychology program and, if I keep on task and discipline, I should graduate with my Bachelors of Science in Applied Psychology in June of 2010. Once that is done I'm giving some serious consideration to working toward a Master's, maybe even a Doctorate. But, that's down the line a bit, so we'll see how things go once I finish the next step.

However, they really should give the associate's degree a cool title, I mean if I had a master's degree, I could call myself magister. ;)

Laters!

...than a whole people have in their collective bodies.

Oddly enough, that ain't a spoiler, because it's pretty much been true for a damn long time, too.

Period.

In effort to form a review for my gaming blog, Emerson's Bookshelf, as well as give my opinion on the work to the author, I purchased Agents of Artifice last week and have been reading it, enjoyably so. Now this is not a review, that will come later, but this is more of a first blush feeling and statement about the book.

Now I have not played Magic the Gathering since the mid-90s, although I use to love it and owned an okay collect that I sold for close to a thousand dollars a few years after I quite, but I do not think you need to be a current fan of the game to enjoy this launch to the Planeswalker series. In fact, I would not be surprised if this book has the potential to draw some folk back to the game or tempt some new players in purely because of its flavor. As with most the novels in the Magic the Gathering line, the thematic elements of the game are dominant, while the card aspect of the game is no where, as this is Magic the Gathering and not the cartoon-tied games of other CCGs.

Overall I feel that the novel is a good read, with interesting elements and characters, and I think it would be a nice buy for those who like wizardly types as the main characters, especially in the high magic and summoner vein that MtG is ripe with. While I am not finished with the book yet, thus not ready to give Ari Marmell my full thoughts on the book, I do feel comfortable telling folk who read my LJ, you poor sad souls (*grins*), that you could do a lot worse in life than buying this book and giving it a read.

Talk to you later.

A conversation tonight with lemuriapress got me to thinking about my life and music, there is this large gap in my life where music wasn't as big of a part of my life as it was prior to this point or since it passed.

If you were to observe me on a daily basis, although goodness knows why anyone would (waves at the NSA, sorry folks), you'd notice that I listen to a lot of music when I go shopping, go for drives, or when I'm not watching television. In fact, even though I am in this dreaded period of being single and living alone, pretty much for the first time in close to a decade, there is almost always voices in my ears, be it from the movies, television, or music.

But, just a short while ago, a couple of years ago, there wasn't any music, as I hated carrying CDs and M3 players, prior to iPods, felt cheap to me. I'm not saying they were cheap, just that I didn't like them, yet that changed with my first iPod Nano, which I got through a offer with Key bank. Afterwards I switched from my iPod Nano to my iPhone, podcasts and videos joined my queues, although I don't watch the videos when I drive or shop. ;)

Prior to the period of silence, I use to listen to the radio and CDs all the time, be it when I was around the house, on the way to school or work, or when I was going to sleep. My tastes were eclectic then, still are in fact, however The Who have been a steady constant since my early childhood, which is odd since no one in my immediate family listened to them or own their records. It's like I heard them one time, as a boy, and made sure momma knew I wanted that music.

However, for the life of me, I cannot figure out why I had this drought of music, I wish I could though as it's made me overly curious.

Seriously, that's all I've got to say as I've only just seen the opening scene to this weeks episode and I had to share that feeling.

Pax.

...more so than I miss most the games I've played over the past few years, with the exception of Arcana Evolved, which is a damn fine game, too. But, this is my lamenting over Star Wars Saga Edition and my desire to play it.

See, back before I left Boise, we were playing Star Wars Saga Edition every Saturday, from Noon to Midnight, where I would run my pre-Clone Wars campaign (set right before Episode I) and my friend Michael would run his Rise of the Empire campaign (set post Episode III). It was cool to run for a few weeks and then switch out, so as to avoid GM burnout, since Michael and I both like playing in games, as well as running them. Hands down, even with certain issues with some folks at the table, it was still one of the best gaming times, easily top five, in my life.

I loved how easy it was to switch back and forth between starship scale and character scale, as well as how enjoyably awesome it was to play with miniatures. SWSE rocks miniature play, plus buying the various boxes of miniatures was awesome, too.

It is not an exaggeration when I say that if I could only pick one science fiction RPG to play, for the rest of my days, I'd pick Star Wars Saga Edition without breaking a sweat. I enjoy it that much, it's one of the few of my RPGs that actually was packed with me when I moved. Everything else is in storage, sadly, back in Boise.

It's bad enough that it's hard for me to find a solid gaming group to play with, but finding one that wants to play Star Wars Saga Edition seems even more of an ass pain. Hell, I can't even find an open play by post game, as they usually open up and fill up when I'm sleeping; seriously, I think it's a global plot that I've got to be in deep REM before someone offers up a game.

If it wasn't for the fact that moving is out of the question, since I couldn't afford to do it right now if I had to move, I'd figure out a place that was dense in SWSE gaming and move there (hopefully it'd be somewhere gamer cool like Seattle, as I'd love the climate, but I'd do Austin or Atlanta, too), but that's a pipe dream.

It's all good, though, I'll just keep buying the latest books, keep updated on the game, and loving it because , sooner or later, I'll get to play it again. *grins* Of course, if anyone sees a play by post game of it open up, let me know, :D, please?!?!

....it's just the nature of things, we develop various words, be it slang or idioms where the once rare becomes mundane, and I've been struck by the curious thought of what talk of space flight and travel will be like when it becomes mundane. I mean, look at the talk of aircraft back in the early days, be it planes or lighter than air craft, and look at it now. Or automotive travel. Or rail. Or sea.

I mean, the evolution of language is cool, but it also has some oddities in it, when something becomes common place, and I wonder how it's going to be when a hop from Earth to Mars is like saying you're going to the Bahamas. One thing I've always enjoyed about a solid piece of science fiction is how, when done right, the language just flows effortllessly.

Hmmm, damn I miss good science fiction, I've been so into fantasy, lately, that I've grown a hunger for some space fantasy. *grins*

...I'm so glad that Life on Mars is back, as it's a damn good show that makes me laugh out loud, tear up, or sometimes both.

It is a damn interesting premise, but a lot of British imports seem to be, and the cast is just downright awesome. But, as some folk notice over time, I love solid ensemble casts, as it adds a depth of feeling to a show. Plus, let's be honest, Gretchen Mol has been a lighting flame of my lascivious and lustful torch and ran a few miles with it. I swear, one of these days I should put a series of pictures up, of the various ladies who on a simple, physical level inspire these feelings and try to figure out what the "it" factor is for me...but, with respect to my baser nature, I ain't prone to worry it that much.

Anyhow, Life on Mars is a good show, with good plots, good cast, and it makes me feel good, in general. I really like to laugh, even if I don't do it often enough, and Life on Mars takes me through a lot of range of thought and emotion, but there is always solid laughs in the show. Plus, I get a weekly does of Harvey Keitel and that ain't half bad.

I swear, if something I wrote one day was somehow optioned for a movie, I would negotiate away a piece of my profit to make sure, if there was a role in it that fit him, that Keitel had a part in it, because I think he is just that awesome.

Now, in honor of the man, Mr. Keitel, I'm gonna down some twelve year-old single malt, as Glenfiddich is some nice hooch. *grins*