FourthWallah

4thwall @ 2006-01-01T21:24:00

2006-01-02T02:24:22Z

Stolen from anongrrl and jengagne

2005-12-13T03:51:22Z

Dear Santa...

Dear Santa,

This year I've been busy!

Last month I gave nyxie a wet willie, then I took it back (-5 points). Last week I ruled Iran as a kind and benevolent dictator (700 points). In July I bought porn for lilmissnever (10 points). Last Wednesday I put gum in thatseasongirl's hair (-12 points). Last Sunday I turned ooshiegordon in for farting in church (3 points).

Overall, I've been nice (696 points). For Christmas I deserve a shiny red ball!

Sincerely,
4thwall

4thwall @ 2005-12-08T11:17:00

2005-12-08T16:17:15Z

If you read this, if your eyes are passing over this right now,
(even if we don't speak often) please post a comment with a COMPLETELY
MADE UP AND FICTIONAL memory of you and me. It can be anything you want
- good or bad - BUT IT HAS TO BE FAKE.

When you're finished,
post this little paragraph on your LJ and be surprised (or mortified)
about what people DON'T ACTUALLY remember about you.

Ripped from madwriter, seen on many others.

Will you, won't you...

2005-11-30T19:37:59Z

I’ve always dreamt of being a writer, but I’ve never actually put much to paper. Oh, there’s been the occasional story, the quickly dashed poem, but how much time am I really willing to invest in my craft? The bottom line is that I’ve got plenty of time to work on things like this right now, but I simply am not.

The issue isn’t a lack of ideas. I’ve always had a dozen or more concepts that, when explained to others, immediately inspire intrigue. No, it’s a lack of execution, an inability to bring things to closure. I think that this may be a general tendency in my life; how much have I really done without exterior prodding, or /with/ exterior prodding? How many projects have I really completed rather than letting them die on the vine?

The answer is “some”. I’ve always done decently well at my job, ultimately producing what I’m asked to produce, usually with little wasted effort. In fact, I’m a very efficient worker, more efficient than it’s convenient to reveal to my boss at times since my job requires me to bill at an hourly rate…But that’s another story altogether. Suffice to say, I’m capable of focusing when I have to on my programming, and I do ultimately produce good code.

Yet, when it comes to my personal projects, I have a harder time. Recently, I’ve attempted to start work on yet another MUSH and, like the others, despite an initial surge of inspiration, I haven’t really produced much. I think that it all comes down to this issue: while I am an acceptably talented writer, the real joy of producing stories comes from the creation of the plot or the world, not the execution. Oh, I may enjoy the occasional turn of phrase, but typically the “right” way to put things comes almost too easily, without much thought, so there’s no real joy in finding that perfect paragraph for me. The craft isn’t the thing. I can enjoy others’, but not my own.

The issue, then, is how to fix this in myself; I have stories I want to tell, some more formed than others, but I burn all the energy conceiving them without penning them. My brain will always be faster than my hands…

Is there a way to produce a coherent novel without really knowing its full span before you reach the end? How can I keep my own sense of engagement with the process alive past the point at which I know all the characters, their backgrounds, and what becomes of them, both internally and externally?

I think that what I really need is an audience. I enjoy personal storytelling, feeding off the energy of others as I spin one of the many tales derived from my youth…It doesn’t matter to me that these stories have been told a thousand times already—the new audience gives them new life, and I can honestly say that I’ve never told them the same way twice. Sean’s struggles with the FBI, accidentally breaking into the back halls of Congress…These stories are still alive for me in the telling.

If I could capture that feeling of engagement with my audience, I think that I would fiend to write at all times. “Imagine your audience” is something that, in one way or another, is something that anyone who’s taken a creative writing class has heard many, many times. I think, though, that this isn’t sufficient for me…My audience can’t just be imagined. I need something tangible, something that I can feed off of…Something that I’m speaking to, that helps me choose this way of telling over that in a way that’s not arbitrary, that gets me excited about those dips and ducks.

Art, for me, is not about producing something to be studied from afar with a critical eye…It’s about producing something that engages the senses and the emotions, something that can be felt. I want my art to be muddied with finger prints, dog-eared, yellowed, and falling out of the spine. I want it to feel that way, not pristine, as I’m producing it, rather than post-facto. I want it to be lived in.

Now I just need to figure out how to make that happen.

Movie block!

2005-11-16T17:01:47Z

I counter colubra's horrid movie link with Sheer Genius!

When Art Shows Attack!

2005-10-19T04:07:45Z

"They're doing it where?" I asked, arching a brow in all too appropriate skepticism.

"The alley. It's just the pre-show part...A teaser to get you in the door. It's going to be some sort of ritual thing involving candles..."

"Uh-huh," I said, gripping my wife's hand in anticipation.

A friend's ex had made him promise to come and see her belly dance as a part of this "massive, multimedia art show", and we were in for moral support-- this promised to be just the sort of awful that we enjoy from time to time. Alley Katz is a well known local venue which has its main entrance in the all-too-typically grimy alley because it's /cool/. The thing is, I'd never heard of anyone doing anything in the alley itself. Usually, even the most horrible acts manage to find their way inside before spewing forth viscously.

This choice was Bad Sign #1.

You could tell that something unusual was going on almost immediately by the heady smell of pot and BO that formed a palpable wall at the entrance to the alley. A crowd had already gathered, at least half of which was comprised of hippies. I have nothing against well meaning lovers of the earth and peace, but these were of the sort that'd gone so far down the road to drugs and hedonism that their bodies had achieved something akin to an early stage of decay. For all their stonedly cow-like lassitude, they looked excited.

This was Bad Sign #2.

Sure that I wouldn't going in, I almost immediately recognized someone in the crowd, at least partly because he was not smeared with grime-- my most pretentious professor from college, a self-styled "poet-gentleman". I actually like him a great deal in most circumstances, but his presence here...Well...

That was Bad Sign #3.

Music cued up, something anonymous and sprightly. A man in a flamingly orange suit pranced out, followed almost immediately by a man in a black suit with a cane and top hat. The guy with the orange suit produces a microphone from what appears to be his navel, then says, "You all know who THIS is, right?" Gestures to the guy with the cane. Like three people, the dirtiest of the lot, shout out "Puck".

This fellow's name is Bad Sign #4.

So "Puck" lit his cane on fire, and proceeded to sort of half assedly twirl said cane around the index finger of his right hand, his side-to-side skittering resembling nothing more than the mating rituals of the common fiddler crab. Some of my immediate misgivings about this displaywere quelled when I realized that we've inadvertently placed ourselves directly behind the fire control crew...So, I figured, /AT LEAST WE WON'T BURN AND DIE/.

Very ceremoniously, the mating dance ended as "Puck" brought the flaming point of his cane down into this sort of bowl thing they've placed at the other side of the alley, but this abrupt creative impulse was for naught-- nothing happened at all. Visibly shocked, he lifted the cane, peered at the bowl, then thrust the fiery point home again. Nothing happened. This dry cycle repeated three more times before, finally, the world's tiniest ceremonial fire appeared, lighting the alley with all the power of a pair of candles.

The signal flare was lit, the music dying into a sort of throbbing chant. Two shirtless men in leather pants emerged, dragging a limp figure between them, its sexless form clad in a violet druid's robe. Solemnly, they march towards the flame, veering off at the last moment. Dead druids, apparently, belong a little to the right.

At this point, events had progressed from "Bad Signs" I observed to the "Oh Shit" that I actually say. Moreover, I've realized that we've made a tactical error. This was going to be painful, and, despite the safety of being behind the fire crew, we're completely cut off from escape in any direction.

We'd have to stay for the whole thing.

Oh God.

"FEAR NOT, FOR THE LORD IS AMONG US" boomed a voice, a man dressed almost entirely as a preacher striding from the main club door, his incongruous combat boots wobbling dangerously on the uneven cobbles of the alley as he made his noisy way to the fire. There, he proceeded to demonstrate his impressive ability to shout incoherent biblical references above the ambient-and-swelling noise of the alley.

Summoned by the preacher's boom, a clump of very dirty and very intentionally "freaky" people wandered out. They formed a very polite single-file line to burn offerings of paper in the wee flame, failing entirely to make it larger. As each broke away from the line, they added their own little bit of random chaos to the morass. The shirtless leather men proved to be fire eaters, occasionally gouting flames erratically. A man hammered a nail into his nose and extracted it less than a foot from us, his jaw slack enough to make me wonder if he'd accidentally struck brain. Women dressed as pixies, not content to merely burn paper, lit candles and gave them to those in the crowd.

Naturally, one was given to my friend, making it yet less likely that we'd be able to leave subtly. The torch of shame was passed.

Then something landed in my eye, briefly giving me a blissful, if simultaneously painful, respite from the spectacle. Purple glitter rained from above, obscuring everything but for the occasional flash of fire and constant noise.

Glitter, it seems, is a balm for the dead, for the dead druid thing sprang to its feet, whipping back its hood, revealing what might have been a woman, if a particularly skeletal one. Reaching beneath her robe, she produced a rope which, presumably intentionally, was set aflame as she whirled it through the tiny altar. A wide circle formed around her as she began to weave the infinity into the air with her fire-cord for what seemed like an infinitely prolonged period of time. For a moment, I thought that this was merely a natural reaction to the spinning flame. Then I noticed the instruments.

A drum and chant circle congealed around her. Perhaps mercifully, the chanting/poetry/ranting of the circle leader was entirely drowned out by the still all-too-enthusiastic roaring of the preacher.

The tiny pixie people were, apparently, not through with their unwelcome distributions, hopping about the crowd and very seriously delivering to us kidney-shaped objects, rather like mutant plastic easter eggs. Rather than finding sweet, sweet candy within, however, they contained philosophical quotes that, in addition to being tritely forgettable, were rife with both spelling errors and grammatical mistakes. I decided to save mine for later "amusement", so I put it in my pocket.

Suddenly, a troupe of women belly danced into sight, led by the ex-gf(who I know). I noted that they actually /could/ belly dance, unlike the guy prancing about them with the devil sticks, whose proficiency was somewhat less obvious.
The belly dancing ended after about 30 seconds, while the rest of the chaos was sustained for at least 15 minutes. We'd been pinned in our corner by both the gouts of fire and the orange suited announcer, who apparently has decided that our corner could use more color.

Finally, though, and perhaps signaled by the guttering of the altar flame, the horror ended. The druid-lady put her hood back up. The preacher slammed closed his bible. The drummers' broken rhymths finally stilled.

With obvious confidence, the orange-haired announcer stepped forward, beckoning us to join them for "more inside."

At this point, the wife's and my charity has been wholly used up. We decided to bail-- my friend couldn't, as he'd promised belly dancer girl that he'd see the actual show. As we made our way through the crowd, it occurred to me what was really most awful about the whole thing...The fact that they were taking it so /seriously/. I mean, here you have fire eaters and people playing drums...This could be a carnival atmosphere, if not a very /good/ carnival-- but it isn't, because it's "art".

This inflated sense of seriousness, apparently, only got worse. Inside, we later learn, they proceded to screen a 15 minute documentary about the /last/ 5 renditions of this show, followed immediately by a 10 minute speech about the role of art in society telling them how they were going to change the world /then/, /that night/, with their horrible stand up comedy and poetry readings.

We, however, escaped the fray, retreating to the very classy Cafe Guttenberg. Sitting at the table and drinking snooty beverages, I remembered-- I still had my kidney-egg in my pocket. Tugging it from my pocket, I eagerly opened it, to discover the following quote on a piece of purple paper:

"Some have no brains in their heads at all." --Eeyore

Perfect. Just perfect.

The Doctor is Out

2005-02-22T03:14:15Z

Spring is heavy in the air tonight. That sort of negativity is infectious, the kind of cancer that makes all good smokers mouth breathers before they die. Slow rot in soft tissue. Still, sucking in life for a later explosion. It's a frightening time, machine-gun rain exploding all over my roof.

I've been shopping for a car lately. The key to a getting a good car is a slow walk up to the track, lazy, measuring the distance accurately before you plunge headlong down it towards and over the salesman at the other end. Gouge his heart out with your fingers, that's the way. I'm inclined to be practical for once. Something sleek and Japanese. My heart, though, aches for some great boat, one with fins that eats gas like a lion with a roar to match. This, I think to myself, is the car for marriage, a car to hurtle cross country in, hell bent for some desert chapel.

It's a thing you should do right if you're going to do it at all.

It's a war zone out there now. Two men gunned down in a crowd in broad daylight, no witnesses, some massive coverup. The police tape is three bands thick around a whole block, their cruisers flashing blue blue blue into the void.

What gets me, though, is how we never hear the shots. 200 yards away, gas station, 3000 miles away, Colorado, is there any difference? Violent death is wrong when it's so silent, when it creeps in like a thief and leaves brains splattered, spleens ripped, lives taken. That's all we ever seem to know of it in this America, where the ghoul reporters circle to feed at the corpse of one of their own, suckling to the teet of misery, paint faced and teary. This tragic loss of hope, expectation, talent, future glorified by cowards and miscreants. This is our media now that its heart is gone.

No, friends, we must not let it be a sad day. Do not feed these vultures. Open your windows and your doors. Breath deep of the coming change in the wind. Exhale. Let the first, long note come deep from the pit of your stomach, gaining strength as it burns through your chest, throat, explosive as it tears from your lips.

Sing with me.

---

Mahalo, Doc. It's been weird.

AHAHAHAHAHAHA.

2004-10-22T05:09:30Z

My eyes, my precious eyes!

Totally worksafe. There might be other reasons to censor it though.

Books Queue, 10/14/04

2004-10-14T00:58:53Z

Read:

Jonathan Strange & Mister Norrell, Sussanna Clarke

Really entertaining read, highly recommended.

The Amulet of Samarkand, Jonathan Stroud

Decent young adult fantasy. Not as rich as Harry Potter, but a more grayscale hero.

The Queue:

The Eyre Affair, Jasper Fford

Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said

Others. Will update next week.

A politician says what?

2004-10-14T00:48:58Z

It was entirely by accident.

My hand shifted too hard against the control, depressing the channel button. The TV went into a spasm of flickering images then settled abruptly on a face I knew, one that was staring intensely at the screen, gesticulating wildly and spewing vitriol about the stem cell discards from fertility clinics that found no womb-home and were, instead, being recycled as a sort of jelly rather than used for harmless stem cell research. "Jelly...For the rich!", she shrieked behind the hipster glasses which were doing their best to substitute for her beret, "Wanton destruction of the worst kind!"

It was a fair point, but this did not quell my disquiet. She'd had this show back when we'd dated, yet somehow I'd managed to miss it every time it'd been on. Now, here she was, explaining our parliamentary system to some miscreant call-in, somehow managing to catch my attention despite the stunning white of her compatriot's clothing. Why?

Aha, I thought, it's an election year, those direst of times, a natural environment for ghosts. Soon, far too few of us would waddle out into the fall-cooled streets, fighting our way through mad hordes of pigeons that we might do our part in selecting the evil of two lessers. One only has to listen to the debates to recognize how muted the platforms of these candidates have become. They are, in short, the same person, some weird hydra of politics, one head brain, the other brawn, both drooling forth savage opinions, pausing only to bow respectfully for some aged media figure to mumble the next dodgable question.

O, some might say, you are unfair to these brave men who would lead us! Possibly, but this election has me particularly rabid frame of mind. Most of my peers cry lustily, "Anyone but Bush!" Fine, but isn't it possible that we could do better than "anyone"? Where is my strong-backed liberal to take this country on his shoulders and carry us forward into the coming century? Why must we be faced with a steady stream of board-like, long-faced cretins? War hero or no, Kerry does not invest enough in his opinions to convince me of anything beyond his own inherent cowardice and, by extension, the cowardice of his party.

In short, the Democrats have lost their voice, their distinctiveness. They forged their own cage when they pushed us into this new age of political correctness, muting all public opinion to the point that there was nothing but a bland, squishy paste to be found instead of the previously chewy left-wing filling. I imagine it to be something like the cherry in a Hostess Fruit Pie in its more ideal state.

Will I vote for this milky white platform? Likely. But don't mistake me for being happy about it.

Mir-- if you still read this journal, good to see that you're alive. Hope all is well that way. If you replied to my replies to your emails, they were eaten by a spam filter somewhere(or the replies were). ;)

4thwall @ 2004-10-08T14:45:00

2004-10-08T18:45:46Z

"Yeah, dead ants all over. She didn't notice 'til she'd had two swallows. It was the crunch that caught her attention, she said."

The Collaborator winced, though his attention was largely elsewhere-- his latte had arrived at last, so we could leave this dismal line once my own drink was in hand. He'd developed a nasty addiction, all that insistance that he'd never drink anything brewed from beans having fallen aside at his first sip of the Freak Star Maid's Venti Cafe Mocha. "Balls, man, what'd she do?"

"Got another glass, I expect."

He nodded at me, the tension leaving his face at last as the comfortable rush of a caffeine high began to take hold. "Horrible about the ants. My soulmate was recently ravaged by a wild dog. They saved the arm, but she's trapped in the mountains of Pennsylvania for the duration."

The counter girl squirted pumpkin and ginger into what would be my cup. "No Chincoteague tryst then," I observed, collecting the terrible seasonal cafe confection that was my latest vice.

It was a dreadful shame, since it almost certainly would've ended my friend's years of celibacy. Being largely homebound by his mother's help and recently amputated toes, he had turned into a sort of caged animal, stalking out into the cool night and snarling at the moon before we settled beneath a shading umbrella to consume our beverages.

Fall had crept in this week, its sudden arrival stirring confusion amongst those who, caught out unawares in shorts, were left with little idea of why they were threatening to collapse into frozen heaps with each step. Better prepared, I was swaddled in flannel.

The weird gray plastic thing standing behind my seat proved to be some sort of recepticle for cigarettes, and, as my stirring had evidently angered it, it presently began to exude a foul odor of stale tobacco and urine. We pitched the great phallic thing away before it could further intrude on conversation. That done, it seemed time to get down to the hard stuff.

"I'm in love..." I began.

"Again?" My companion's lack of interest was disturbing.

"Yes, again, only no-- this time it's probably fatal. We're talking about houses and ancient religious rites of binding, and yet there's been no urge to retreat to a safer position."

This earned an arched brow. "Wow."

I nodded, tilting my chair back. "A year with the same woman and no end in sight-- it's so normal that it's almost perverse."

Following the lead of the leaves, we were deep in the season of settling.

Muhaha.

2004-08-09T15:37:28Z

Really, really bad joke within. Made it up. On a dare. You have been warned!

So, Don Marquez, the great man of Madrid, sat in his villa, staring in disgust at the lone bare wall in his house. His decor seeemed nearly perfect, but this wall defied him-- for all his searching, he had failed to find anything that would adequately fill its void. This is how he came to the idea of a mural, and so he summoned to him his brother, Diego.

"Diego," Don Marquez said, waving towards the wall, "I wish you to make a mural to make my villa whole, one that captures the very essence of m beloved Madrid." Diego, flattered, agreed.

For three days and three nights, Diego worked on the wall. Finally, on the fourth day, he called Don Marquez to him.

Don Marquez was impressed-- this was better work than any he had seen from Diego, for all his evident skill. Indeed, here was Madrid, in all its splendor, only...

"Diego...Why are there zebras in my mural?" And indeed, a herd of zebras was making its way through the streets of Madrid, fine coats catching the sun, manes tossed in the breeze.

Diego, wide eyed, replied, "Why, brother, they symbolize the freedom of our city! See how they run, their heads high, with no cares...Surely, they make this truly our Madrid."

Don Marquez, who did not hold family ties particularly close, frowned. "Diego, this is all wrong...You must fix it! I cannot have zebras on my wall!" So Diego, dejected, agreed.

For three days and three nights, Diego laboured at the wall.

On the fourth day, he called Don Marquez to him.

There, on the wall, was an even more detailed painting than before-- Don Marquez caught his breath, for even in this distant view, a small cafe in the background was visible in exquisite detail. Indeed, one could almost hear the small talk between the lofty women seated there as they sipped their wines.

About to express his enthusiasm, DOn Marquez paused, his mouth open, and pointed towards the legs of the women in the cafe. "Diego...Why are there /flamingos/ in my painting?" And indeed, there they were, the vibrant pink birds nestled amidst the forest of legs beneath the tables.

"Their colors, they aid in the illusion of depth, bringing those women to /life/," Diego replied, his eyes and hands both wide and animated. "Surely, you must see why we must have flamingos!"

Don Marquez took a long, patient breath. "Diego, I wish only the /real/ Madrid. In it, I have no use for flamingos. You must fix it." So Diego, heart-broken, agreed.

For three days and three nights, Diego slaved over the wall. On the fourth day, he stopped in amazement at his own work. "This," he said to himself, "This is my masterpiece. I shall never paint a greater painting than this in my life!" And so he summoned Don Marquez to him.

Don Marquez gaped in amazement at the painting upon his wall-- such life! One expected the people on the streets to spring to life and get about daily business at any moment.

Even as he was ready to give his praise to his brother, he noticed something with his too-keen eyes, a tiny detail just peeking from an exposed alleyway-- a minute, if clear, tawny tail. "Diego," he said with something approaching dread and stabbing a finger that way, "what is /that/?"

Diego cleared his throat, his smile as wide as his eyes. "Why, brother..."

"You have to draw the lion somewhere."

Ich bin ein Shirer!

2004-06-26T01:31:49Z

If you've never seen this, strap yourself in.

AHAHAHA.

2004-06-24T23:21:41Z

Credit colubra with THIS.

He blames boingboing.net.

I remain skeptical.

How to Move in Seven Days

2004-06-04T02:07:54Z

Imagine, if you will, that you are preparing to move. Maybe you're moving in with a girl. Maybe you're even in love.

You're not lazy. More than a month in advance, you begin your apartment search. You pick through the classifieds carefully, looking for that perfect, cute little place that suits both you /and/ your budget.

Finally, you find it-- a little two bedroom in a charming neighborhood in an extremely well kept building on a tree lined street. You negotiate with the landlady, of course, and get the price you want for it. You sign on the line, call your friends, and arrange for the great change of scenery with the utility gods.

Maybe you take your girl out for a walk on the Saturday before your move-- you're not worried about it. You're experienced with this sort of thing, so you started packing two weeks ago, just a bit at a time as it felt convenient. It's a good walk-- you buy pastries at a cute little shop and coffee to grind when you get home. It's a bright, warm day full of Spring.

You come home to voice mail and a promptly ringing phone. In a whirl of information, you learn that your new building is being purchased and converted to condos. While your lease is good, the new owner wishes to buy it out. You call your to-be-landlady and find that it is true, that she's in the best of spirits about the whole thing.

The money is very, very good.

The next days, therefore, are madness. You frantically rush around that weekend, seeing every apartment in your new price range(for your wealth is expanding) that is available for showing. You make lists. You compare amenities and costs. You work budgets. You negotiate, knowing that it is the last week of the month and that a failure to sign you means a month with no tenant for the landlord, so you know their number.

You are a shark, always swimming.

The phone calls to utilities are endless-- it will take you three calls each to get them straight since the new apartment had outstanding balances on each and every one. Hours flake away.

The move itself comes all too soon, mashed tight to the wall of arrangements and negotiations. It is a whirlwind, so many helpful friends, so little parking.

Eventually, though, they leave, and it's magical-- you are in a new place, one you'd never even considered as a viable option due to its expense, on that you are effectively paying /less/ for due to your diligence in negotiations both with the old building's new owner and the new building's old owner, one that has everything you could want.

You are very very lucky.

I suspect that I was doomed by the 'wall' in my name...

2004-04-28T13:48:15Z

Which Eddie Izzard "Dressed to Kill" line are you? by Saphyne
Username
Eddie Izzard quote:	"The stones are 50 foot high, 30 foot long, 20 foot deep, and other measurements as well."

Created with the ORIGINAL MemeGen!

4thwall @ 2004-04-13T12:37:00

2004-04-13T16:37:18Z

How much time have you wasted answering stupid survey questions this year? Don't think before answering!

Answer now!

Answer now or I eat this kitten!

Seriously, I've got the pot boiling and everything!

For serious! This is LIFE OR DEATH here, people!

Update:

I hope the humor of how my mocking of demanding polls by having a demanding poll isn't lost on anyone. :)

People, people vex me.

2004-02-08T15:53:32Z

Denver's Vampire Sphere is abruptly closing its doors.

It's not entirely a surprise--I've been hearing rumblings from friends on the staff that were ominous, but they were neither specific and were always in that 'I can't talk about it' vein. That, I think, is the biggest problem. We didn't get to talk about it. Honestly, what they said wasn't inclined /this/ way, which implies to me that this is a decision that was made by those who didn't even have a hand in the Sphere.

Not just me, the players. There're a lot of people who had an interest in the game, none of which were involved in this discussion. Well, maybe lilmissnever-- you can ask her if you want. The point is, there was never a single 'let's sit the players down and talk' type meeting. No open forum. No warning at all for the majority of the people who actually make up the heart of the game.

Is it just me or does this in itself explain quite nicely /why/ they're closing the Vampire Sphere? Rather than working with their players, who are factually who define their game in most meaningful ways, they're having backroom discussions to steer the course of the game. Decisions, in essence, are being made without any real indicators about what players want. Is it any wonder, then, that you have a hard time getting and keeping players when they feel alienated from the real workings of the game? Staff changes, player departures-- all of these can be managed if the communication is good and if people remain committed to the game.

And there were people committed to the game. There were people applying that were excited about their concepts. There were new players who were both active and intrigued by what they were seeing IC. There was a core of older players, myself included, who weren't going anywhere, who were actively working on plots and recruiting to try to keep things lively.

As a member of that last group, I feel like I've wasted a lot of energy, and it's just disappointing. There's an arrogance in all of this, and ignorance as well.

Fuckers.

4thwall @ 2004-01-21T09:45:00

2004-01-21T14:45:24Z

So today is my birthday!

Happy birthday to me!

Whyyyyyyyy?

2004-01-20T16:51:53Z

No, Johnny, no!

Where are you going, where have you been...

2004-01-06T19:40:14Z

It's been ages since I've written to this journal. Fortunately, it's for pleasant reasons. I'm going to forgo my usual wit for the moment and just give an update...I do intend to revisit this, though, for reasons I'll enumerate below.

#1) I have a new girlfriend and we're serious-- her name's Ashley, she's brilliant and she's occupying a lot of my time...This is a Halloweenish event. The current plan is to move in together in May when my lease expires...Amazing. It's lurb.

#2) A group of my friends and I are forming a writing club. They insist that we need to actually have meetings despite my insistance that the most amusing thing we could do would be to form a faux club, encourage people to give us submissions, then establish a club review paper without any /real/ club. They've at least agreed that we can have a web site, but those bastards insist that I should work...Imagine.

#3) Work has gone utterly mad. I've been working like a fiend, and it's only going to get more dramatic-- rather than actually keeping up with the details of the projects that're in the works, I've just been iterating a number that represents projects that will require a tenfold(or more) staff increase to pull off. That number's at 10. 10. I'm not kidding, and I think that we'll probably actually realize 2-3 of these, so we're only talking about a company of 100 by sometime around June...

...

So basically, things're really quite well. They're just busy-busy. I'm still farting around with silly internet games while I work, but honestly, my recreational time is sort of directed at the moment. That said, I will be writing for said club, and those works'll probably friendslisted here as they emerge. Expect more soon.

Whee!

2003-11-10T17:24:01Z

Met a girl on Friday through a mutual friend...We're 'dating'. She's very smart, intensely weird, funny, and named after Ashley from Gone with the Wind.

Yes, I'm really, really sure she's a girl.

Tonight: movies, pizza, and beer(beer for her, anyway).

To all the bitter Matrix fans out there...

2003-11-09T02:32:31Z

Here guys. I'm going to make this easy and save you a lot of time spent bitching. I have the perfect phrase for you. Ready?

"Only try to realize the truth-- there IS no sequel."

There. Perfect. Done. I said it first. Remember me, Horatio, or something.

To the Windy City-O

2003-11-07T03:56:57Z

What can I say about Chicago-- I didn't hate it.

It's surprisingly clean. I felt safe there in a way that I don't in New York or Philidelphia. It's massive enough that there's always something happening there, an almost overwhelming quantity of places to go and things to see.

Seeing Heidi was really nice. Absolutely no weirdness, just a solid friend thing. I liked her friends Jeanette and Vince as well-- extremely nice people. We went to a rather lame Halloween party and met their rather less lame friend Maggie(who is a wee bit of a nutter but charming naytheless). I was, indeed, the Son of the Last American Horse Thief..My father would've been proud.

We honestly didn't do but so much else, but that was really OK-- just had a nice, relaxing trip, caught up on old times. Saw Bubba Ho-Tep(sooo amusing). She seems really happy out there and I'm glad for her.

The plane ride back was a bit of an adventure-- my 1:20 flight became a 5:30 flight due to various weather delays(two of which were in-air). I'd finished reading my book before we took off. Just...Yeah. Not so fun, that. Still, I had a nice chat with the girl next to me...Never a bad thing, really.

All in all, a good trip.

Halloween Tales...

2003-10-30T03:16:21Z

Halloween was my favorite holiday as a kid. Oh, Christmas was great-- don't get me wrong, I used to sit there and meticulously create a list of goodies that I expected from Santa, itemized and with complete catalogue references for his convenience. Why I thought Santa ordered from Sears I couldn't explain to you.

But Halloween was better because it was the holiday that both of my parents loved. My mother was the worker bee-- she'd go all out on costumes, sewing weeks in advance to create things like the most amazing Batman costume I've seen /ever/. Every little piece of a Batman-comic outfit replicated in felt. A Star Trek uniform(soon to be smeared with blood-- I always wanted to be one of those dead Security guards).

My dad would get all into planning our candy route with us, leading us through the dim streets of middle class suburbia in a pattern designed to give us the best shot at the best treats before people started running out, forgoing the 'bad' houses("No no, not Ms. Hinkle, she gave you prunes last year.") He was always so giddy, grinning goofily as he held my little sister's hand, my friends and I a few steps ahead iust within his bobbing flashlight beam.

The coolest thing, though, was the school Halloween party for which they'd both dress up, if with decidedly different styles.

My mother was all about the details, her costumes always very recognizable but very, very good. The one I remember best was her witch...She never went for the 'ugly old hag' witch, but instead preferred to be the young, cute witch, that little pale Irish face beneath a black hat just about perfect for the 'Bannisters and Broomsticks' look. The best bit, though, was her dress, this fantastic patchwork affair, all oranges and earth tones against a black backdrop. And, despite being the 'nice' witch, she could /cackle/ with this amazing, throaty voice that would turn heads. I think my favorite image of my mother as a young woman will always be that one, with her cackling, her arms spread, the magical queen of her domain.

My father, on the other hand, was the king of the subtle concept costume. One year, for instance, he put a small but very black dot in the middle of his forehead, going as the infamous "Dead Guy." 'What're you, Mike?" -- "Oh, I've just tragically passed on." -- "You mean you're a ghost?" -- "No no, just a dead guy."

His favorite, and one that recurred, was on its surface a lumberjack. Jeans, a plaid shirt, a woolen cap, sometimes even an axe handle. Yet, if you watched him, he'd be casting subversive looks about, looking comically shifty. No indeed-- no plain lumberjack, my father. He was the Last Great American Horse Thief, hiding out from the authorities in Canada. "Shh," he'd whisper to the children he 'confided' in, "Don't tell anyone." To adults, though? Just a lumberjack. Except, of course, for that witch that was onto him...

So, this year, I've been invited to what's unexpectedly a costume party. Clearly, I don't have nearly enough time to get together anything elaborate...So it occured to me-- what if the 'lumberjack', on some lonely Candian night, caught the eye of a lovely witch?

Hide your herds, people. The Son of The Last Great American Horse Thief is coming to town.