You know the drill... who's playing, what server, etc. This is my mid-semester present to myself. Probably foolish but evilhat got me wound up about it.

I have started off the week on the wrong foot, what with waking up at 5am from a dream where I slept in til 3pm and missed all my meetings and got chewed out. It felt very real and I was in a mild panic for a few minutes... but fortunately was able to go back to sleep.

Last Thursday we assembled a ragtag crew for a crab leg night; Captain Jerry's is under new management (although we can't remember if it was last time we went) but the crab legs taste as sweet. Service there is always spotty but you can always get a table, so I am not complaining. eedge and her family just moved back north and I am glad we could do a little socializin'. I also found another cheap beer to add to my list of beloved cheap beers; bud light lime. It's definitely the kind of beer I can put a 6-pack of in anyone's fridge and expect it to still be there when I return.

meercat and I managed another tennis date on Friday, and this one was a doozy. We were out there for 1.5 hours, with a little break, but my wrist didn't hurt much afterwards and I maintained energy! Her intrepid coworker who can actually *play* tennis came out for a bit and hit the ball at us, doling out many compliments! I wonder, are any of you guys out there in internet-land also interested in playing tennis? I would like to play more, or there might be times when Jen can't go and it might be nice to still play! I am kind of doubting I could talk Jack into it.

Saturday my big plans were to see the batman movie and maybe level up one or another of my WoW characters. Done and done: ( batman stuff behind cut ) After the flick I dragged Jack through the LLBean and the rest of the mall. Didn't buy much since the birthday is coming up and you never know. We polished off the evening with Sushi King and then herded our slowpoke mains to level 69. We may have level 70s before they raise the stupid cap again!

Harvest Moon DS makes me feel like a moron, by the way. Tiny children can play this game, and I'm still wondering if my turnips will ever grow and where I can get more seeds. And then I read online that you have to like, raise the entire town's friendship factors? This game is too open-ended for me. But, see, I promised Jack I would stop playing Jewel Quest because he thinks it is rotting my brain.

drivingblind re-kick-started his tabletop game, from which we have had a 3 month break, in medias res. It never ceases to amaze me the wit and wisdom of rob_donoghue who, frankly, is the brains of any operation. Do you have an operation? Does it need brains? Talk to that man. We cracked wise a bunch, but by the end of the session Things Got Serious. We will have to wait a month to find out what happens! I proved that no matter what kind of game mechanic you give me, I will fail to understand it in some critical way. This week it was XP spending.

When I got home I forced myself to hunker down and finish off the last of my rote crap work for my class. Now it's just the final exam & rewriting my paper. The prof hasn't given me her comments so that last part will be a challenge. Grr.

As a reward for that (I did not deserve a reward for that, it is just what I needed to do!) I bought myself a new domain name, which I may or may not turn into an independent blog, inspired by my good friend Genie. I also may have screwed up by getting the username on LJ when I probably should have just renamed this one. I am a little hesitant to let go of snidegrrl, is all. I did fix it so that snidegrrl.com and .org forward here, at least.

Remember when I was in shock that it was last monday? Well wash, rinse, repeat. We're halfway through 2008 and I feel like I'm still not finished contemplating the impact of 2007.

tzel and I went to the Ram's Head Live last week to see Pat Benatar. Beforehand, however, we had dinner at Mex next door. On a weekend, I probably wouldn't want to set foot in the place, but early on a Tuesday it was lovely inside. We had excellent service and apart from their unfortunate problem of being out of avocados, the food was good. It was not blowing us away - the cheese dip needed more spice for instance - but worth it, as it was on the cheap side for dinner. The show itself was good - her voice was clear and beautiful. Her band rocked. The crowd was mostly women our age and up, although the wonderful guys standing behind us who were clearly big Pat fans were great; since I couldn't see real well I just enjoyed the big gay dance party.

I never talk about work here because I largely can't talk about specifics and sometimes generalities. I do kind of mostly paddle along right now with a great deal of fear because my main support person is completely consumed in another project. I am on my own and very confused most of the time. It's not my favorite but fortunately my boss continues to be great.

Finally went to see the Sex & the City movie with my classmates from A&P. I take it back, my one classmate and Jack, because everyone else bailed. Mostly I realized that for a half-hour show I can take and leave what I like and hate, but for a two hour movie, it just left me angry for myriad reasons. But hey, Chris Noth on the big screen, that's a plus.

The next few weeks of my summer class-taking will consist of mainly project stuff. The group project (groan) & the paper. My plan of attack is to take the book (for the paper) which I just finished reading and make a bunch of notes of things I could possibly talk about and then like dough, allow it to rise through insertion of extra words. For the group project - that will require more research. I sent my group a list of tasks last night. I am desperately hoping they respond by Wednesday. I just want this done and over with at this point.

For a totally unplanned weekend, I did a mess of stuff: lunch at Abol with omphaloskepsis and tzel, after which we scoured the Crafty Bastards fair for things that were not twee, irreverent t-shirts and adorable stuffed monsters. (I bought handmade soap. I have enough for three years now.) And then took a timeout af the Piratz Tavern, where we got crumby service and no ice. The vegetarian platter at Abol was really good though. I could do that every weekend! I wish I knew how to count the points though.

After I dropped my ladyfriends off, I chilled at home long enough to cool off and then headed to the 9:30 to catch chiba's band The Hypersonic Secret. They were pretty darn good.

Got home and pretty much was in for the rest of the weekend trying to read chapters in the text & playing diablo ii, after the great news from blizzard inspired us. Hey, with the latest patch you don't have to keep the CD in. LAN party anyone?

Top Chef: I thought I might have a crush on Tom Colicchio, but after reading this I am completely sure. (Spoilers at link!)

SYTYCD: I have been watching this only when I work out on my mini-trampoline. After randomly catching 15 minutes of a previous season's rerun, falling in love with Pasha times ten, and then finding out that it's GREAT for encouraging me to work out, I started recording the new season. I realized that I never got hooked on the show before because I hated the auditions. They keep turning people down that I think are good dancers. But I will persevere and hope for another hot russian.

Speaking of dance and working out, inspired by motorharp I was thinking it would be fun (and because clearly I don't have enough hobbies) to take an adult ballet class. A cursory googling tells me that finding one nearby is going to be nigh unto impossible. Anyone know of any ballet classes for random ungraceful adults?

Summer season of softball is in full swing and I still stink and now I have to play 3rd base much of the time and it would be nice if I could stop a ball, like, ever. There were several in last night's game that I was sure I was on top of and went right through my legs or over my foot. GOD.

I spent the weekend traipsing around all over the place. Philly in one day (worked out well! should have left about an hour earlier for maximum wakefulness) including my first ever fish tacos which were tasty and delightful. Pictures if I ever get them off my camera. I also went to Baltimore to play some canasta with the cards crew. Band practice got cancelled... oh well. we waited 6 months, what's another week. We *might* have a new bassist. She knows who she is.

Return to Weight Watchers is going great and a big part of it is being able to talk food with tzel on a near-daily basis. Apart from the wedding fumbles it's going great.

People responded to my post about wanting to play D&D with responses that made it sound like they thought I was way more knowledgeable about games than I actually am. The sad fact is that apart from one or two isolated incidents that were so forgettable that I mostly forgot them, I have never been asked to play in a D&D game. When I was in elementary/jr high school I knew that some of the boys played D&D and I remember wanting to play really badly, but always being told to buzz off because girls don't/can't play that. Obviously once I got to college I found many gaming compatriots and ventured off into GURPS and then LARP but nobody ever said, "Kim, come play D&D with us". So I guess I have sad emo geek scars over that. Also it means I don't give a flying patoot what version it is or anything because I won't know the difference. Also I might hate it. Who knows.

I have been thinking and reading a bunch about photography lately and it is starting to creep over me that I want, really want, a DSLR. I know hardly anyone but a few friends look at my flickr stuff but I spend a stupid amount of time on it and get all happy when a shot comes out and think about composition a bunch and how to eke out the best pictures from my (very surprisingly able) little P&S. So I wonder if I have an eye for composition and I wonder if I could do more interesting things with a single lens reflex. So I guess I may be asking people who want to get me a birthday or christmas present to put some money in the piggy bank, as it were. I keep saying I won't have time to really learn how to use it, but I also can't stop thinking about it and do spend a certain amount of time with my little powershot. Here's a photo I took that I really love that only 2 people have ever seen:



I have one last question for everyone: Who out there is using del.icio.us and I don't know it? The new Firefox addon has an awesome little widget that tells me when people have added bookmarks and I enjoy seeing what people tagged. My bookmarks can be found here so add me to your network!

Playing the new edition of D&D sounds like fun.

edit: I really mean that subject in case it's not clear - I am not trying to guilt anyone, and I know lots of gaming types. :)

My weekend was great, although my brain is still mush. This despite class having been canceled for no good reason on Friday! I caught up on Project Runway instead on Friday and read some. I've been making more time to read and it feels great, largely due to finding a book worth curling up with. Saturday morning went as normal except that I was really tired due to being up half the night with stomach complaints. That is what I get for eating Popeye's, frankly. Had my drum lesson, shamefacedly admitted to not really practicing enough, and the main takeaway was that I need to even out my rolls (I should put that in quotes since I play them so slowly they can hardly be called rolls) - hope to accomplish this with accenting trick.

Then we had game! I have learned that at the table, and this should be no news to me, I need a good 45 minutes of warm-up before I can get really into character or anything. This is interesting given drivingblind's style being very geared toward shock-to-the-system sort of in medias res openings. If I think back to the old days of LARPing, I was the same way then - I had to be around people already being fluidly in character to make the context switch. (Also, as relates to work, I think I may strike the next person who utters the phrase "context switch", even if it is me.) I have learned that I have a role in the party: it is Unintended Sardonic One-Liner Delivery. Oh, and take many blows, although thankfully and miraculously that did not come into play in this session. I'll shut up now - because I know no one likes it when you talk about your character. :) ( beyond are blatherings about mechanics )

Post game I went to REI to pick up some shoes I had ordered online, and had one of those moments where I had to question whether the world was aligning for me or if carefully crafted retail experiences were happening to me. Their music mix that day sounded just like they had pulled it out of my ipod when I walked in the store. They played Peter Gabriel and Split Enz and several other things I love - do they just know their demographic and I happen to be it or what? They have piles of exactly the kind of clothes, bags, and shoes (not really the outdoor gear, but the kind of stuff that outdoorsy people wear when forced to be indoors) that I want to buy. My shoes were too small but I walked out with (thanks to incredibly helpful salespeople!!) a $125 running jacket marked down to $20 and a $30 sports bra marked down to $10. Oh, and a freaking membership, because they put shopping rohipnol in the vents.

Then I went home and made Jack start up yet more new WoW characters because I wanted to see the Dranei content.

Sunday I got more coloration on the sleeve done! So it looks real now!!! EEEE!!!
( pics )

TV highlights from the weekend:
- SNL - Annuale Commercial - DO NOT MISS
- And on The Soup, we were SLAIN by the clip from the Dutch Oven camp cooking show. SLAIN. So watch The Soup anytime before friday for that one.
- Project Runway: Hate Christian with a burning passion. How on earth he won viewer's whatever I do not know. All his outfits look the same: high collars and poufy sleeves. YAWN.

Antiquers! This weekend is the next DC Big Flea! I plan to meet up with my parents there saturday and browse.

OK, let's try that again. I welcome Tuesday with open arms.

So only two of you many fine friends can imagine coming up with enough country songs to fill a mix cd? I know I have more country fans, surreptitious or proud, on my flist than that!

This review of the Matrix Energy drink cracked me up.

This weekend was busy, and great! Well, with a setback here or there. ( dissection, chili, philly, and RP )

Yet another idea in the long list of ideas that I might get around to acting on:

Who wants me to have a Talisman night?

Haven't updated in a week. What can I say? Not much going on.

After many years of being a snotty bitch about gaming, I dipped my toes back into tabletop with the all-girl Arcana game. This weekend I enjoyed the first session of a new fantasy game run by drivingblind which was a sprawling 6 hour world-building exercise with a little character creation tossed in at the end (or that's how it felt) and it was good. This game has several things going for it: experienced players (except for me), like-mindedness about play style (to some useful extent), and a design which allows the players to contribute to the world-building. This is quite terrific; it avoids the lecturey part of getting started and everyone is able to be more on the same page. Since it won't be a weekly event, I won't feel so pressured about it. Although if I could build a new world every week, that would be OK, since that was super fun. In fact, if you were an aspiring genre writer, the recorded session would be like gold. :)

After that, though, I got a searing headache which followed me through much of the holiday weekend. Combine that with my natural tendency to laziness and the most useful thing I did this weekend was laundry. Jack and I did go to lunch yesterday and discuss a bunch of things we should do around the house... and then sort of stared at everything in the Lowe's for a while. I stared at Corian countertops. Alot. I confess I'd like to modernize our range/oven and dishwasher although the ones we have work just fine. NONE of this activity got the house any cleaner, which is really what it needs.

When I got tired of Lowe's and Jack was still searching for things, I walked over to Staples. Oh, office/school supplies!! My stated goal was to find a notebook for class which starts in just over a week. I neatly filled a 1-subject college-ruled notebook for BIO 101, and was hoping to find another compact sturdy notebook for this. Since notebooks are all about fashion or economy, this was actually kind of a pain. But apart from my needed notebook, I managed to snag several pens prompted by my post the other day. Due to everyone's fervent adoration of the Pilot Precise v5, I purchased a whole rainbow of those, which I will mail to someone if I hate them. I re-discovered the Varsity disposable fountain pen, and picked up some Parker gel refills for my Jotter. Now I just need some momentous writing tasks. :)

Last night we had the peril_book_club meeting. We all loved the book, which made it less a book discussion and more a social call, but that's OK. Next up... well if you want to know you're probably already in the community!

The only thing on my list of life goals for 2008 I'm doing a good job with is the drumming. Which is the number one thing, so fine!

Hello Flist gamers: My friend belladonnalin works in a homeless shelter with street-dependent and homeless teenagers. She posted the following and I am just passing it along to see if any of you can help:

I have a handful of kids there who are gamers. Unfortunately, when they had to move out of their respective homes, they lost all their gaming stuff.

I know that there are some people on my friendslist who used to be D&D gamers (or still are) and I'm wondering - if you have your old gear that you're not using, would you mind sending it to me for these kids?

They're trying, you know? They're trying to stay out of gangs and away from the drugs and in general to maintain relatively normal lives. I'd buy the stuff for them, but that's not appropriate for me to do.

So, if you have any of the following, used and in any condition? I'd love it. More importantly, they would.

Need:
Any extra character sheets you can spare (or direct me to a decent downloadable one?)
Player’s Handbook
Dungeon Master’s Guide
Monster Manuel I
Player set of dice (1 D4, 4 D6, percentiles, 1 D20)

Would Like:
Complete Warrior Handbook
Player’s Handbook II
Dungeons and Dragons Miniatures
Feind Folio
Monsters Manuel 2-4
Complete Arcane
Complete Divine
Complete Scoundrel
Complete Adventurer

Some of her friends posted that you can download and print some of this stuff - if you guys know anything about that let me know.

I seem to be feeling that itch again.

What addons are you using nowadays? What are their merits?

Immediately frustrated with fooling around with my druid, I rolled up a new blood elf paladin. Named Wajejeah. Jack made a 'lock. Named Penolus. Because we're 12.

Well, I really didn't know what I'd been missing all these years. Now, I'm sure I had what could be considered an optimal lawn-concert experience in a venue that has a capacity of 25,000. There were several good points about Tweeter Center not the least of which was the gorgeous view of Philly.

But enough about that. Let's talk about Rush. I've never been your huge Rush fan. In fact I am sure I have been a little anti at times. But if there was any question about my devotion before seeing them live, it is totally gone. The main thing I was concerned about is that their studio material is so clean and and well-produced (for my own scale of well-produced) that I was having a hard time imagining how the material would come across live, if it would be too perfect or have that energy. I shouldn't have doubted. Even from way, way back on the lawn the energy was great. The setlist included most of the favorites, and I was up and out of my "seat" as soon as I heard the opening to Subdivisions. At some point early on I was like "why am I the only jackass moving around?" (I don't know if you'd call it dancing) but as the giant novelty glasses of beer flowed there was more air instrumentalism and general enthusiastic pointing and horns-throwing. At some point the following amusing dialogue occurred:

snidegrrl: Did you think you would see monkeys fucking tonight?
angela_la_la: No, that had not occurred to me.

Some other highlights: the South Park intro to Tom Sawyer, Geddy filming the audience making a group greeting to Canada, obviously the drum solo, and the completely random and inexplicable chicken rotisserie machines set up on the stage. At points I was like, "is it worth it to be so far away?" but considering the non-egregious ticket price and relatively painless crowd experience, I think it totally was.

My weekend didn't stop there, though. After the concert we had to go get cheesesteaks (it's official: I don't really care that much for cheesesteaks) where some kid who probably wasn't even at the show complimented me on my Porcupine Tree shirt. We tooled around Philly a bit saturday and had the incomparable cheese fries at Chickie & Pete's. We zoomed home so I could meet up with femjays for sleepover, vegan cupcakes, and general silliness. Pictures of makeovers may exist, but I'm not telling! And when I got up sunday morning, I joined tzel for a trip to Linganore winery for tour & tasting! PHEW. Technically I think I still haven't caught up on sleep.

Which is probably why last night I dreamed that salami_salome and I were part of a RPG where you had to use real objects you actually own to represent powers in game and there was a real person who was an enforcer of sorts who came to reclaim your things who just happened to be T.R. Knight, not that I've been watching too much Grey's Anatomy. But then I woke up and had a light bulb moment about a game mechanic I thought would be really awesome and will now have to look up the Fudge rules and see if my nocturnal game design dovetails.

Yesterday was very much a monday. Work kind of stinks. I rolled up a blood elf paladin on Uther and fooled around with that most of the night. And that is as detailed I can be abuot anything due to time.

Poll #1017686
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 23

I still play World of Warcraft and I'm on the server:

( details behind the cut )

Which leaves me with some questions that came out of the weekend and a conversation with the Other Viking. Do you wish you could find a new tabletop game? Do you have a tabletop game idea you've been wishing you could unleash on unwitting innocents? Drop me an email or a comment, as I think there may be a plan afoot.

Dragged Jack out tonight to test drive the Mustang, finally. I think he may have come away from the experience more excited than I was. My excitement was tempered a little, but that's like saying Tom jumped up and down on Oprah's couch one less time. I am happy that the visibility isn't too bad out the back, and trepidatious about the stiffness of the clutch pedal. The first time I got into any traffic, I'd literally cry from the pain in my left leg.

After we got back to the lot and had the proverbial cigarette, I drove the RSX. I believe this was a poor choice of order of operations. Like I said to Jack, it's like going to the gun range and firing the 50 caliber Desert Eagle first. Everything else just sort of pales. I also took a closer look at, but did not drive, the Honda Element (the sales guy just wanted to show it to me so badly!) and the Subaru Forester. Dirty little secret: I love the Forester. If I had dogs, I'd git me an Element, btw. Designed to be hosed down!

Then we went to Tampico, ate fajitas, and did Mustang impressions. Or Muppet impressions. It's a fine line. ("GUnhhnghaBRrrrruuuugggg" "burrrrburrrburrrr") He's so sweet to even begin to even think about considering this as a remote possibility for our little family unit.

Next up: Honda Fit, Mazda 3, things they don't have on the Carmax lot.

Earlier this week I participated in a one-shot tabletop game of Mortal Coil run by Rob D. It was actually quite fun. I haven't played a tabletop game since either Ash ran his game or since Chris ran 7th Sea? If I am forgetting someone's TT I've been in in the past 6 years, I apologize. Gene's zombie game! I knew I was forgetting something. I didn't perform real well in that one, as I wasn't taking it too seriously. Anyways, I typically snark about roleplaying and get all snobby about it but I'm actually a total freaking n00b who has no idea how she'd react if she was really challenged. I got really into it! I mean, I thought I couldn't really "act" anymore. But I think I was kind of chomping at the bit to do that. I suprise myself constantly. To round out this post, I will just note that this is my favorite of those RPG motivational posters that are going around.

A friend of mine started a discussion in his blog about video games. I had my own personal answers, but I realized when I wrote this...

Playing games for me is different than it is for many real gamers. I play games like someone would play a slot machine. You pull the lever, things line up, maybe some treasure falls out. It's kind of mind numbing and for me it relieves stress. I don't like games to be at all challenging, I just like them to let me zone out for a while.

...that my experience is probably not representative of many other people who like video games. I was remarking that I know people who take on video games as more of a full time hobby or a main hobby, and they feel like they get all kinds of other stuff out of it that maybe isn't part of my experience. So video gamers: How does gaming fit into your life? What benefits do you feel you get out of it? What are the negatives, if any?

Wow. Why, again, is the reproductive system designed to cause me this much pain on a regular basis? I would have called out today except we have this massive company meeting. Mostly I would have stayed home because I'm worried that my office is going to suddenly become the elevator scene in the Shining.

Last night's PvP was mighty eventful. I did in fact make Senior Sergeant. I spent time in WSG, AV, *and* AB. As a result I got to bed an hour late - hey but maybe I can push for 1st Sargeant, right? Whee. I've gotten better at quickly changing forms and better at going bear and stunning, although Paladins apparently can get out of that handily. Cheaters. Rogues can stop me from being in control of my character in 1,001 simple ways, but I can stun and root and those never work? Meh. AB still my favorite.

I would say I'm kind of crankypants, but actually mostly I am still a ray of sunshine. I am in fact wearing new pants which may or may not have embroidery and sequins on them.