This week’s Trifecta Writing Challenge is simple. For the site’s 99th Trifextra Challenge, we were asked to provide our New Year’s Resolution in three words. Tempting though it was to take the Chuck Wendig route and say that mine would be “Art harder, motherfucker,” I decided to be a little more original. Here it is. Three simple things I plan to do more of in 2014.
Read. Write. Love.
Happy New Year, everyone. See you in 2014.
2013 has been a pretty amazing year. I got to continue to work at two jobs that I love. I got to meet Neil DeGrasse Tyson, William Shatner, and Neil Gaiman. I saw RUSH in concert for the first (and hopefully not last) time. I made a lot of awesome new friends at the Colorado Renaissance Festival, and got to spend time with a lot of my old ones. I got to take my cosplaying in bold new directions. I celebrated the birth of my first nephew.
Looking back over my preview for the year, I’m seeing a lot of great things that I got through. I read Halo: Silentium (and played through Halo 4 with my good friend Hugh), and Dr. Sleep. I caught Pacific Rim, Iron Man 3, and Star Trek: Into Darkness in the theatre, and caught up on a lot of other films once they hit DVD. I powered through the new season of Arrested Development and devoured the first season and a half (thus far) of American Horror Story, plus wrapped up the final season of Futurama.
There have been some rough patches this year. I’m not going to pretend that, as Vonnegut so wonderfully said, “Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt.” It’s not true. I lost one of my oldest friends a few months ago. Lots of people are moving on to do other things with their lives, and I have felt at many times that I am being left behind. I didn’t do a great number of the things that I set out to do at the beginning of this year. However, despite all of these things, I’ve found that the good manages to once again outweigh the bad. I can honestly say now that I believe that 2014 will be even better. I’ll keep you posted. Thanks as always for reading.
Required reading. It’s a phrase that strikes fear in the hearts of lesser men and women. Despite the delays that my undergraduate career caused for my reading list, I encountered some of my favorite works of literature during those years. I had numerous lists of required material for my classes in college, and I can honestly say that my tastes have changed for the better because of it.
Some of my favorite pieces of required reading from my college courses are listed here.
Beowulf (translated by Seamus Heaney). My medieval literature professor had us read this one. I knew the story prior to taking the course, but I’d never read Heaney’s translation. Heaney maintains the verse form of the original text, but makes the legendary tale accessible to modern readers. Follow the adventures of Beowulf, mighty warrior, as he does battle with monsters and becomes a king. Side note: kennings are awesome.
Fun Home by Alison Bechdel. Bechdel’s art recreates memories of her childhood in the family-run funeral home. Along the way, she reflects on her coming out as a lesbian and explores her recently-deceased father’s reasons for hiding his own homosexuality from his family. This graphic novel and its follow-up, Are You My Mother? are fantastic. Solid writing, honest prose, and intricate drawing make Bechdel’s works must-reads. My many thanks to my American Literature professor for introducing me to her writing.
The Giver by Lois Lowry. This was one I’d read a couple of times since first encountering it in audio book format on a family camping trip as a kid. When I learned that it was on the list for a sociology class I was taking, I wanted to thank the professor for picking something that so beautifully described a small, isolated community. Jonas’ selection as his village’s new Receiver of Memory is the first step in his realization that life in his home is not as ideal as he believes.
That’s it for now, folks, but I may make another post or two along these lines. Remember, literacy is our friend, even if it’s forced on us.
Tomorrow, my older sister will receive her Master’s Degree. I’m very proud of her, and thrilled that she’s accomplished so much. It’s great inspiration to me, since I’m planning to start my own Master’s program in the next year.
My apologies for not writing more of late. It’s one of those nasty side-effects of working in a retail job during the holiday season. I swear there are stories in progress.
I remember kneeling on the couch, arms resting on the back, staring out the picture window at the frozen landscape. I remember wishing we had a fireplace like my grandparents, so that I wouldn’t have to bundle up under blankets in the middle of a day like this. I would shiver and go to the room that my little sister and I shared, climb up to the top bunk, and shut off the overhead light. A small bedside lamp was all the illumination I would need to lose myself in one of my books, a favorite pulled from one of my many shelves.
After an hour or so, my little sister would inevitably come in and ask me to play outside. I’d reluctantly agree, because I knew it meant getting cold and spending time with her when I could be reading or drawing, but I would agree nonetheless. No matter how much I might have protested, I really did enjoy spending the time with her. I still do. We would get dressed in layers of clothes, including snow pants if we still had a pair that fit us.
We’d finish getting bundled up and wander out into the snow and ice, hoping that the snow was wet enough that it would be packable, allowing us to make snowballs at the very least. Snow angels would be made, should the snowfall be deep enough. If it were a really legendary Colorado blizzard, we’d have enough snow to make forts up against the base of the pine trees in the park. After a few freezing hours, we’d trudge back to the house. Mom would be there, and she’d help us make a couple of mugs of homemade hot chocolate, with marshmallows if we had them.
After that, it would be time for a movie or a game, depending on how tired we were. We would spend the rest of the evening in the living room until it was time to help get dinner ready. All too soon, our day of freedom would come to an end, and it would be time to eat and get things cleaned up before bed. Finally exhausted by our day, we allow sleep to overtake us and dream of the adventures yet to come.
I’ve passed 12,000 views on the blog! Thank you, dear readers. You’ve been amazing.
My friends and I are nearing the end of our latest Dungeons and Dragons campaign, and so we’re turning our thoughts to the future of our gaming sessions. Since it’s been a while since the last time I ran a game, I decided that I would take it upon myself to serve as the Dungeon Master for our follow-up game (we take turns so that nobody gets completely burned out by running a campaign every week).
Now I’ve been a fan of pirates for a long time.
In case you hadn’t guessed…
And the Pirates of the Caribbean movies and the One Piece manga and anime have served to inspire further ideas. So when it came time to come up with something new for our D&D group, there was really only one logical decision. Pirate campaign it is!
We tried to do one of these before, and it was fun, but the group got too big and unstable. This is going to be an invitation-only thing, because with what I have planned, there’s going to be enough going on with all of the NPCs I’ll be running. Right now, it’s in the development and research phase. I’ve attempted to learn from the mistakes of our last attempt, and so I’m putting as much forethought into it as I can.
Influences: As I’ve mentioned, the two big influences are going to be the Pirates of the Caribbean series and One Piece, with maybe a scattering of Terry and the Pirates and Treasure Island (and as much real history as can possibly be crammed down my players’ throats).
Setting: The primary setting is going to be Faerûn, though I’m open to expanding out from there (namely because I love Warforged, so there will be at least some connection to Eberron), probably via Planescape (because I’ve already toyed with the idea of setting at least one session in the city of Sigil). Most of the shipboard action will take place on the Trackless Sea, and it gives me a lot of room to add some details of my own.
Rules: We’ll be running a hybrid rules system, utilizing our favorite aspects from Dungeons & Dragons 3.0 and 3.5 rules and Paizo’s Pathfinder Roleplaying Game. We’re accustomed to a certain level of character power, so I’m having everyone roll a gestalt character as per Unearthed Arcana.
Additional House Rules: All characters get max HP at each level. Spellcasters DC’s for spells are determined by their remaining highest spell slot/prepared spell (this way a 20th level wizard’s fireball spell is far harder to dodge than an 8th level wizard’s). We tend to waive racial requirements for prestige classes as well.
So yeah. I’m going to be spending a lot of free time building NPC pirates and related characters for a while. Goal is to go some time in January. In the meantime, I’m open to any suggestions.
The Swords of the Ancients 