Slow-Down on 480 Due to Sun Glare

Yes, the Sun is so rarely seen in Cleveland that it causes traffic jams when it comes out.  "You mean you can use that overhead mirror/CD holder for shade?  Wow!  Maybe some day they'll even invent some sort of lenses you can put over your eyes to cut the glare."

Dino-aliens

Rocketmen vs Saucers

Game in progress...

Caed and Yoggy

AKA Paul and the other Robin, at Rock Bottom

Hitting Rock Bottom

at the Rock Bottom Brewing Company... or Alcatraz, or the Ram. I'm not sure. Tom took this while I was elsewhere.

banners

Also around one.

Arrival

Actually taken around 1 pm

Gentlemen, Behold!

More corn!

All Aboard for Gen Con

Tom helps Caed load up for the ride to Indy.

On the Porch

just testing the phoneblog

hurryhurryhurry!

It's coming today!  My draft copy!  I finally get to see what it looks like!  Boy, is this gonna be a long morning!

Jessica's Art

I hate to refer people to MySpace, but I just had to say something about my friend whose art is finally starting to sell. Check out her stuff at:
http://www.myspace.com/whodidyousayyouwere

RCL

Found out at work today that nuclear engineers use my initials for "Reactor Coolant Leak."

Vans of the Pit

So I was driving home from work today. Traffic was fairly heavy because it's construction season in Cleveland. Then this whole row of white vans, emergency lights flashing in unison even though they're going as fast as anybody else, pulls up and starts hovering alongside me. There are no windows except in the very front, just flat white metal, and they all have blank license plates. Now here's the creepy part: after a couple of miles, I look over to the on-ramp on my right, and TWO MORE blind cave vans accelerate into traffic, turn on their emergency lights, and merge into the line. I keep thinking, if only I had looked over there sooner, I would have seen the ray that transformed two ordinary cars into drone servants of the Van God. I suppose I should just be glad I got away unscathed. If they knew I was onto them...

Upgrade Request

I was almost there! I finally finished all the real writing tasks for Peryton RPG and I'm ready to put everything together in the book format. And now my hand has to go all screwy and keep me from typing or using a mouse for more than a few minutes at a time! I'm pushing it just doing my part time job but I really can't afford to stop that too, and so far it's getting better as long as I rest it at home, take asprin, and keep the wrist immobilized.

But hey, there's good news too. It really is almost done, and it's totally gonna rock. So there's that anyway. Guess I can use this time to pull back and look over my printouts so far. Make sure it's all gonna fit together when this carpal tunnel thing settles down.

I keep toying with adding this one new class but I still haven't made my mind up. Sort of an ascetic healer/transcendentalist type. It would have some abilities in common with the D&D monk class but would not be as focused on combat and funky weapons and Oriental culture. More of a healer type, but (hopefully) with enough tricks to make it still fun to play.

So maybe I can work out the details of that while I'm sitting around re-playing the Doctor Who episodes I recorded and cursing the frailty of flesh.

The Greatest Generation?

I'm getting really sick of hearing about how everyone who's too young to have fought in World War II is a spoiled brat who'll never be anywhere near as wonderful as the least among the "greatest generation."

There's nothing all that great about that generation, anyway. They fought in a big war. They went with the tide of history. They did what anybody else would have done in their situation. There's nothing heroic about that. It's just life. And they bred like rats, too. Thanks a lot for that population nudge, greatniks. Thanks for the boom that led to urban sprawl, toxic wastelands, and global warming. I am so humbled before your greatness.

There's no such thing as a great generation. The only thing we get from glorifying the past is the inability to grow out of it.

Puritan Pain

I've got a headache so bad that it's actually upsetting my stomach as well.  I just wanna go home and lay in the dark for the rest of the day, but noooo, I had to have this stinking "work ethic," so here I am, squinting at these crabby little correction notes and updating engineering specs instead.  Yet another reason to curse the black souls of my Calvinist ancestors.

Merchandising and the Modern Nomad

I was listening to this news item on NPR this morning about the troubles of the nomads in Mongolia.  Apparently they used to be taken care of by the communists and even had some sort of health insurance.  Then the reporters talked to this organization that was trying to help them out.  One of the things they were trying to do was teach them to "diversify their business."  I couldn't stop laughing all the way to work.  I just had this image of John Cleese wandering around on the steppe with a pack of brochures under his arm, trying to explain the benefits of multiple product lines to a bunch of grimy nomads herding... whatever they herd in Mongolia.

Ow

Note to self: head not to be bashed into hard wooden posts.  That is just not cool at all.  Happened last night and it now it's giving me a whole different kind of headache.  I wonder if I bruised my brain.

Also, I got no work at all done this weekend, unless putzing around with the cover layout counts.  So maybe I cracked myself on the head because deep down, I knew I deserved it.  Damn, I'm mean.

I Got No Idea What's Goin' On

It can't be healthy taking two different antihistamines... one at double dose... It really can't. But that's what it took before I finally stopped sneezing. That's gotta be good for something. Hello? Well, I guess I better go slip into that coma now. Seeya later.

And I Feel So Much Safer Now

Rough Summer Is On the Way for Air Travel
By JEFF BAILEY, May 21, 2006

CHICAGO, May 20 — Brace yourself for a summer of miserable air travel.

Planes are expected to be packed fuller than at anytime since World War II, when the airlines helped transport troops. Fares are rising. Service frills are disappearing.

Logjams at airport security checkpoints loom as the federal government strains to keep screener jobs filled. The usual violent summer storms are expected to send the air traffic control system into chaos at times, with flight delays and cancellations cascading across the country...

http://www.nytimes.com/...etc.

Well, that's just great. The one summer I have to fly because a car trip to my brother's wedding in San Francisco would be even more expensive, and shit like this is happening.

Futurist

"I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past."

Kind of a neat quote, huh?  It popped up on my random quote of the day thingie just after I emailed that last post in.  And isn't it cool, btw, that I can just email my blog posts in (with a password) and they get posted automatically?  That's one of the reasons I jumped to this site.  Anyway, you know whose quote that was?  John Lennon?  Jules Verne?  Think farther back.  It was actually my favorite "founding father," Thomas Jefferson.

History's interesting too, of course.  No denying that.

Tigers, Lambs, and Volcanoes

So I was looking at this picture.  It shows a big troupe of mostly African animals all walking along the savanna together.  I think it was meant to be sort of an idyllic scene, but there are really all kinds of animals - tigers, giraffes, lions, gazelles, etc. - just walking together, not eating each other or anything.  Every time I look at it, despite the pleasant-looking scene, I think of some horrible catastrophe.  Why would all those animals be moving in one herd unless they're running away from a volcano or a fire or something?

Squirrels!

We were at the park today and I saw something I've never seen before: a black squirrel. It was cool. Turned out there were actually a bunch of them there. Of course, I'm hardly a squirrel expert. I hadn't seen red squirrels either until I moved to Cleveland. They're all red in the neighborhood where I live now. Before that, I thought they were all gray.

Okay, really. Future posts will be more interesting than this. Probably better written too, although I make no promises. It is a blog, after all.

Welcome

Yeah, I'm trying out yet another blog site. This one looks like the best yet... but I suppose the others did too. This is the first one so far that's not based on the "corrosive" theme from my home page, though. I figured after three "Corrosive Strangeness" blogs, that theme was getting a little tired. Look, this one's not even green! Maybe I'll actually stick around this time.