Redwolf's Journal (continued)

I didn't really believe it last night. Sure, the sky had its orange "snowing or will soon" glow to it (due to the city lights), but I didn't expect to be scraping snow and ice off my truck before going to work in the morning. It's not a bad thing, just a bit odd this late. And it was t-shirt weather a couple days ago. Go figure. The oddity of the morning came as I was almost awake about twenty minutes before my alarm went off. I was half-dreaming about the child of a character of mine who doesn't - and may never - "exist." An anthro, winged, gray-furred, feline/vulpine hybrid. That's quite a mouthful.

I must learn to pace myself again. It's been a while since I picked up a novel and started reading (at least, without being on vacation and not caring what time it was). I forgot just how engaging they can be. Really, there was no reason for me to finish it last night. It would have been there today. I certainly didn't need to dive back into it after logging off for the night. "I'll just finish this chapter." "Just one more page, and I'll turn in." Yeah, right. I don't even mind the giddy, light-headed feeling of waking up and knowing full well the four and a half hours of sleep was not enough. Going to work that way takes the fun out of it, though. And the worst, for me, is knowing I've probably put myself in a sleep deficit that I won't recover from until next weekend. All that said, I don't actually feel too bad at the moment.

So, there have been a few products I've wondered about recently, such as: WotC "Mature" Product Line. I bought the Book of Vile Darkness. I can't say I found it to be objectionable, but I can understand how some people may take offense at the contents. It's a book of evil, nasty stuff for DMs, so that's fine. Now they're putting out a Book of Exalted Deeds (October-ish, if I recall). And this is a "mature" title too. Huh? I'm really wondering how/why a book of good-based stuff requires that disclaimer. Are they going to talk about crusades and inquisitions? Surely that can't be so bad, if such things are discussed in history books. About the only reason I can come up with is the book might detail some of the upper planes, thereby offending some people on a religious basis. Even that seems far-fetched, though. Help me out here? "Matrix Reloaded" PowerAde. Huh? This stuff I just saw this morning. The display caught my eye

Returning to work from break: "Hey, Scott." "Hey." "Oh, thanks for fixing my e-mail." "Sure. No problem." Actually... Minor problem. I have NO idea who that was.

This would be for , but the few who read here may have additional comments. Also, by voicing it here I may get a message across that didn't seem to take by e-mail. Kit, you need to seriously and honestly answer, if only to yourself: What do you want for Fool's Moon? When we last had this conversation (in a very limited fashion), you seemed to imply you wanted the game published professionally. Yet here we are, the progress being limited entirely to your writing whims. Still. That's the way to treat a hobby - a personal project that may someday be published if all the stars are in alignment and everything just happens to come together. I wish I could say all this as a published author or somesuch. You might listen more closely then. Instead, I'm just a friend with a different perspective than yours who cares about you and your dreams. If you really want the game published, you need a far more business-like approach. You can't rely on friends to complete secti

I should have more to say, but I don't. The redesign of the paper has gone reasonably well - better than I would have expected. The last couple days have seen us through the biggest problems. Now it's just a matter of tweaking to solve minor issues as they come up. And I didn't even have to put in much overtime. And... that's about it. Ciao.

Okay, now that I've gotten a post about my virtual existence out of the way, it's time for some reality. The newspaper I work at is about to make some changes. In an effort to offset some of the increase in newsprint costs, we're about to start printing on narrower paper. Many papers are already doing that, so we're not exactly trend setters here. While we're at it, most of the type styles will change too. People will notice, and that's okay. When I saw the product of a test run, it struck me as "cute" somehow, but I had to look at it for a bit before really seeing the difference in size. What most people won't realize is the sheer amount of work involved in something like that. Then again, end users in any sense rarely understand how much trouble a seemingly minor change can be to those who have to implement it. In our case, every single template we use to produce the paper has to be resized and restyled. Databases must be changed for the ne

Last night, I ended up signing my character on for a fairly major plot line on FF:DA. I was almost immediately reminded of everything I dislike about roleplaying in large groups on a MU*. In all fairness, just about every TP I get into makes me thinks of such things. The timing is annoying, sure. Between technological lag, typing speed and RL, there are always great delays in the action and every extra person means more difficulty in getting "enough" people together to play. That, however, isn't what gets me the most. Rather it's my own behavior... As more people are in the same place on a MU*, I find my screen filling up more rapidly with idle chatter and OOC comments. In turn, I find myself less inclined to participate in such things, hoping instead that we get to what's important to the plot line. I end up posing less and getting lost in the crowd. In real life, it's only a little different. The quantity of people is less a factor than is how well I k

I want to say "I feel like Hell," but it's not quite true. I've felt worse. Last night, I ended up crawling into bed at about 7:00 and passing out. I was up a little more than an hour later just long enough to get online and realize I still had an overwhelming desire to sleep. Instead of being refreshed this morning, I'm still tired, and a little stuffy-headed. Mrrf. I've gone through the last couple days feeling as though suffering from mild allergies, but maybe I'm really coming down with something. And to top it all off, I get to sit here and have people walk up to tell me about their computer problems while I'm feeling borderline-miserable myself. As Mika would say: Feh.

Heh. I just plain forgot. So there I was, scanning RPG-related news on EN World (http://enworld.cyberstreet.com/news/) and I reach the description of the new D&D "3.5" edition ranger before it dawns on me... Yep, it's April Fools Day. Thanks to Morrus and anyone else involved in their annual humor entries for reminding me to take everything on the Web with an extra grain of salt today.