Blackmoor Vituperative

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

I am still working my way through our DVD collection. I recently started with the “D”s. There are some truly great films that start with “D”. For example, last night I watched “Darby O’Gill and the Little People”, which is likely my all-time favorite Disney movie. It wasn’t until this morning that I realized that today is St. Patrick’s Day. “Darby O’Gill” features Albert Sharpe, Sean Connery, and Janet Munro. Janet Munro also starred in The Crawling Eye, which I saw just a few days ago (it was the second-to-last of our “C” DVDs), and which is also one of my favorite movies.

The mechanical effects in “Darby O’Gill and the Little People” are simply amazing. If you get the chance, watch the DVD special feature “Little People, Big Effects”. I am still astonished by what can be achieved with forced perspective and matte paintings.

Another beautiful Richmond day. The weather was cool and nice, and the dogwoods are blooming in pink and white. Several birds, including a bright red cardinal, were at our bird feeder today. I love living here.

“It is not written that you must detest everyone who disagrees with you.”

— Chocolate Pickle

Five or six years ago, I tossed out shelves and shelves of role-playing games and sourcebooks. Many were games that I had never played: all were games that I never intended to play again. All of my 2nd edition D&D books, nearly all of my indie RPG books, all of my Hero System/Champions books — all went. I saved books for games I still played, or still wanted to play, but this was a very small pile compared to what I got rid of. I also saved a few books that, for one reason or another, were special to me.

Nobilis was one of those games. I had a first edition copy of Nobilis, and I will have it as long as I own any books at all. You see, I was there when Nobilis was written. Oh, I didn’t contribute to it. Not directly. But I was there while the author played with ideas — strange, magical ideas. And in my small, probably insignificant way, I encouraged her. And when the book was published, I bought it.

Well, Nobilis is in its third edition now. Go buy it. Even if you never play it (as I likely never shall), it is worth it. It is strange and magical, much like its author.

P.S. A special, limited-edition autographed copy is available for a limited time. I am tempted. Sorely tempted.

The US director of national intelligence, a retired Air Force general with 47 years in the intelligence business, with access to the $80-billion American spying bureaucracy, made more than a few politicians upset today. What did he do? He answered their questions, and didn’t tell them what they wanted to hear.

Watching the video of the exchange gave me flashbacks. I am glad that I no longer work in the government arena. I may not have as much responsibility, but what I do now is a lot less stressful, and a hell of a lot more honest.

There are a lot of people asking about this, and a great many sites which tell you how to set it up. They all entail copying DLL files and registering them, etc. Sadly, these methods do not work on 64-bit Windows Vista/Windows 7 or Windows 8. Here is what works:

• FastPictureViewer Codec Pack

It costs money ($10, as of this moment, but it’s usually $15).

Anyone who has taken an English class in the last fifty years knows how ridiculous the rules are for capitalizing titles in English. First word, sure. Proper nouns, sure. Pronouns? Why would a pronoun be capitalized? “In” when it is functioning as an adverb, but not when it is functioning as a preposition. Uh… yeah. Prepositions aren’t capitalized, but sometimes they are if they are longer than four letters, depending on whom you ask. And it gets worse; this is just the tip of the iceberg.

So here is my rule for capitalizing titles:

A title is capitalized as though it were a sentence.

Either capitalize every word in a title, or capitalize it as though it were a sentence… whichever you think looks better.

That’s the best I can do.

Charlie Sheen is my new favorite person. He is so unapologetically, enthusiastically demented. I can only wish I had the balls (and the money) that the Sheen has. Banging seven-gram rocks and “models” half my age in rapid succession. Tossing out brilliantly insane bon mots like they are confetti.

Confetti at a parade for my awesomeness.

“I’m a grandiose life, and I’m embracing it.”

Stay gold, Charlieboy… Stay gold.

This is not urban fantasy

We are home, safe and sound, from MystiCon 2011. We had a good time, and we are glad we went. Here are some thoughts in no particular order.

I liked Brinke Stevens. I can’t recall (offhand) ever enjoying a guest of honor as much at a con. I wish her luck with her writing.

It annoys me that “horror” is apparently no longer a genre, and that all of these vampire romance novels are called “urban fantasy”. WTF. I have an easy test for anyone wondering if a book is “urban fantasy”: if the protagonist or antagonist in your novel is one of the Universal Studios classic movie monsters, it’s not fantasy, much less “urban fantasy”. Storm Front is urban fantasy. Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter is not. War For The Oaks is urban fantasy. Dead Until Dark is not. This is not rocket science.

We really enjoyed hanging out with Carla and Brian. Fun folks. I hope they come to RavenCon some day (although they won’t this year). We met several other fun people, as well, but I am terrible with names, so I can’t tell you theirs.

The character sheet for Greg Porter’s new Verne game is simply amazing. Also, CORPS has been replaced with EABA… as of eight years or so ago, which shows you how out of touch I am.

The podcast thing worked out pretty well, I think, but I have learned something in the process: I am painfully tedious. There are some people who are so tedious that I can barely stand to be in the same room with them when they are talking. I am one of those people. I don’t know how anyone else stands me. Aside from my annoying nasal voice, I combine the worst aspects of someone who can’t string together two coherent thoughts and someone who appears convinced of their own brilliance. If I was in the audience for a panel I was on, I would probably just leave. No accounting for taste, I guess.

I need to find a way to tether my phone to my laptop, so that I won’t be dependent on a malfunctioning hotel internet connection. I know that there are Android tethering apps; I am just not sure if my phone can do it.

I would like to play in a superhero LARP some time. We were too busy for me to participate in one this time.

Having pizza in the con suite Friday night was awesome. Having a hotel room across the hall and one door down from the con suite was doubly awesome.

In general, I am glad we went.

My final “podcast” from MystiCon 2011: myself, John Meagher, and Travis Surber on the Creating A Unique Magic System panel at MystiCon 2011, 2011-02-27 @ 11:00. Technically, John and I were the panelists, and Travis and his wife were the audience, but in practice the three of us just chatted for 45 minutes.

Creating A Unique Magic System podcast (mp3, 42 MB)

I still really hate my voice.

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