Random Thoughts

1:55PM - In the news

As seen on the Pentagon Channel!

Click "Around the Services" on the left menu bar and then cue up the July 21 episode. The teaser for our robot is at 0:34 and the news article is at 14:45 or so.

9:08AM - Quote of the Day

"Unique Habitat Found Inside Earth"

- Space.com reporter Aaron Gronstal breaks this story; other news outlets apparently skeptical of claims of tropical climate, dinosaurs.

2:49PM - Surely someone has done this before...

So our rotating Sunday game is approaching another turn of the wheel; curiousangel's Traveler game is nearing its end and then Ruthie will run d6 Star Wars. And then it's back to me. Old-school AD&D has been proposed, but I also found myself thinking fondly of Adventure!

Chatting with the Dear Spouse, I had an idea for an experimental-style game. Each player generates two characters: a higher-powered villain and a starting-character hero. Then they pick some other player's character to be their nemesis.

I hand the villains some Grand Master Scheme, which will have to consist of three or so subgoals (e.g., steal the gold, kidnap the scientist, distract the heroes and then UNLEASH THE DOOM RAY). They'll need to be able to get to the end pretty much no matter what, because the campaign needs a boss fight no matter what. But if they succeed in their intermediate goals, the boss fight will be harder for the heroes.

So: If they fail to steal the gold, they can use regular copper wire for the Doom Ray, but it will take longer to charge its cathodes. That means more time on the countdown clock for the heroes to foil them.

The villains will have villainous resources: lair, henchmen, gizmos. They can deploy these to accomplish their subgoals, and indeed, my main task as GM will probably be to RP henchmen trying to carry out the villains' plans.

Of course, no matter how well the villains plan, the heroes will either discover or stumble upon their nefarious scheme. Because that's the way the genre works. The focus for the hero characters will not be detective work - the players already know what's going on, and the characters will be handed an intro to the adventure on a plate. The focus is on being cool and stylish as you try to foil your nemesis's plans.

If any villains have elected to be personally involved in a heist or kidnapping, they'll only confront, and be confronted by, their nemesis. Because, again, that's the genre. It's something the captain has to work out for himself. So two PCs square off for the encounter and the GM throws henchmen at the rest of them.

Players would have to agree what style of villains they want to face, and they have very fine-grained control over it now. Do they want maniacal laughter, ridiculous death traps, and monologuing? They can RP themselves that way. There's no worrying that the GM will take advantage of your noble hero with a totally pragmatic villain.

There is a worry that your fellow players will perhaps elect to take their characters in a different style, and Captain Courageous will find himself knocked unconscious and his throat slit open. But if the players have explicitly negotiated a joint style for the group of villains, I think that's less likely.

I think it would either be awesome or totally lame. I'm not sure which.

9:23AM - Office decor

I've made some very small changes to my office, per my last post about that. I bought some brass upholstery tacks (about $3 worth) to use as pushpins, and they actually work well and add something. Brass paperclips ($2) have replaced the old tin ones; I don't use them that often, but now they sit in their little jar right by my monitor and give me something shiny to look at. I've covered my Government Ugly metal bookshelves (with drop-down doors) with printouts of Phil Foglio's clank sketches, done on cream-colored paper (< $1). There's a color photo of our real robot arm right in the middle of all the sketches. :)

But the biggest changes have all been free. Since I spend most of the day on my computer, I've been collecting Mac icons that fit my theme. My Xterm is now a wooden library drawer with an "X" on it (it's really "for" Mac OSX but who cares?) MS Office is three bubbling beakers in blue (Word), green (Excel), and yellow (PowerPoint). Mail is a retro radar box, Terminal is Futurama's "What If" machine, and Preview is a pinhole camera. TextEdit has a fountain pen. Firefox is a little clank, more scifi than steampunk but only if you look too closely. I have a black steamer trunk for my backup drive and the cushy red chair from the Matrix for my computer. I've changed the desktop background to a Cordovan leather red.

It ain't as cool as this stuff but it's something. :)

3:04PM - Why was I not informed?

DC has a flea market?

The Washington Valley Flea Market was our regular Sunday amusement, growing up. I love flea markets! Eastern Market looks to be, regrettably, not quite the easy 10-minute drive the old one was. That's a 30-45 min drive plus parking headache, or else a 45-60 min car-to-Metro odyssey. Not exactly weekly tradition material, there.

8:40AM - Quote of the Day

"Wow, lady, you are really up to your ass in alligators."

- Dear Margo, offering an uncharacteristically profane assessment of someone's situation.

2:50PM - Musings

I write a lot.

On a given day, I may write any or all of: gaming material, early music research notes, personal musings, RPG-related stories, and/or RPG play-by-posts (which are sort of collaborative fiction). If I don't write something for a few days, I get twitchy.

But I've never identified with the whole "muse" thing. Heck, I've never liked the idea, although it's very romantic.

Then, I don't see myself as much of a poet, either. I mean, I can arrange words in a moderately pleasing order, adhering to whatever conventions you like. I like to think that I see and appreciate the beauty, terror and irony around me at least as well as the next guy. But I don't have that inspired "way of seeing differently" that marks out a real poet. I can dress up fairly pedestrian sentiments in end-rhymed iambs, but I don't often have much new to say about it.

I have projects, which solve problems. I'm an engineer. I see a hole or a need, and I plan a project to fill it. From there, it's just doing the work to get it done. That often involves creativity, which I like to think I have in good measure. But the catalyst, the thing that starts the creative process in me, isn't usually inspiration. It's analysis.

And do you know, I'm actually much more taken with the idea of Hephaestus as a patron. I'm more of a crafts(wo)man than an artist. Besides, dude built kickass robots.

7:31PM - And in other news...

His Royal Majesty, Sinclair Hawkins, saw fit yesterday to induct me into his Order of the Coral Branch, on account of the harping, teaching, etc. Yay!

His Majesty is actually pretty darn cool, and it's too bad we haven't been able to get him (and Her Royal Majesty, who I am sure is equally cool) up here more often. He was funny, well-spoken, and very thoughtful; his words showed consideration, in all senses. He was also, Moe found later, a filk fan and very fond of Leslie Fish.

7:22PM - I'm mellllltiiiiiing......

We have been sans air conditioning for a week. The 28-year old unit just died.

I grew up without AC. Know what? It sucked then, and it sucks now. It especially sucks when it's this hot and humid. curiousangel and rivka, I don't know how you do it. I have had to remember all our old tricks about wetting down nightgowns and elsewise staying cool. The Spud has handled it by eating less and sleeping more - not a bad strategy.

We are coughing up the cash for a new unit. They are supposed to come tomorrow. They are also predicting rain tomorrow. Can you install an electrically-powered AC unit in the rain?

5:29PM - Quote of the Day

"...really need to talk budget with [Outgoing Program Manager] and [Incoming Program Manager], so it's in everyone's best interests that we finish the presentations early. So talk fast - contractor."

- Our team lead to our infamously verbose systems engineer, whose continued contract depends on the team lead talking budget with folks.

3:29PM - Quote of the Day

"HAIL SATIN"

- A would-be Satanist fails.

2:02PM - Newflash: Che Guevera T-shirts good for something after all

They were worn by some of the Columbian military personnel in this week's hostage rescue to aid the illusion that they were really FARC rebels.

If you haven't read a good account of this operation, by all means do so. This is the kind of thing that, if it happened during an RPG, would have the GM wondering what she did wrong. I mean, no combat at all? Not even dramatic shots at the 'copter as it's taking off? No fights by the open helicopter doors, with people clinging to the landing rails or hostages held at gunpoint?

Nope (thank goodness). They got this one 100% right, it seems.

10:25AM - Quote of the Day

"I’m not worried about my inability to muster the customary excitement over celebrating the birth of the nation that has brought us inventions that add so much to my daily life (Diet Coke, The Federalist Papers, The Colt Single Action Revolver with custom mother-of-pearl inlay and scrollwork.)"

- Plumcake at Manolo for the Big Girl, mediating on July 4th. (Plumcake is, as you may already suspect, from Texas.)

2:04PM - Office decor

One of the guys a few doors down has some Tibetan style goin' on in his office - a rug as a wall hanging, a battered box as a monitor support. Another guy has a "sleek geek" thing, with professionally-framed blueprints for (I think) lightsabers complementing his certificate of thanks from NASA for his part in a recent launch. The computer graphics sim guy is a Pixar nut, Star Wars fan, and pinball aficionado, and posters of these things decorate his office. My immediate boss seems to go for "clean and uncluttered" (something of a novelty hereabouts, myself not excepted) with his kids' artwork featured on the walls.

I have, in no particular order, a plant, pictures of the Dear Spouse and Spud, a small tableau of three plaster gargoyles, a model triplane, a poster of a serene forest glen, and an "Evil Geniuses for a Better Tomorrow" bumper sticker. You could call it "eclectic" or you could call it "random stuff," overlaid on Standard Issue Government Ugly office furniture.

I'm thinking... I'm thinking a slow incorporation of steampunk elements. Like... let me get rid of the plastic cup with the colorful plastic thumbtacks and replace it a small, interesting glass full of brass furniture tacks. That would be a very modest start.

11:14AM - Sweet yogurt dressing

Yesterday, I tried putting yogurt on my fruit salad as a dressing. It was too thick and (since it was plain yogurt) less sweet than I expected. Undaunted, I tried it again today, but with about a teaspoon (or so) of sugar and as much of milk to the blob (1/3 c?) of yogurt. It thinned out and was nicely sweet, and went very well with a salad of mixed greens, kiwi fruit, and blueberries.

I think with some cinnamon or other sweet spice in it, it would be awesome with strawberries, actually, or peaches.

8:11AM - Visitors at work today

We are hosting Arun Seraphin and Church Hutton.

Who put a Windy in charge of the Role maintenance database?

7:24AM - SCRA

Can we make this happen? Pretty please?

My last attempt at Victorian garb was really awful, though.

9:26AM - I was silly

And I bought a sticker book.

Sticker technology has vastly improved since I was eight. We had "sticker albums" which were supposed to let you unpeel and stick stickers (so you could trade them) but half the time, the stickers ripped the glossy coating and the underpaper right off. These new books appear to actually let you easily remove and re-stick the stickers, and they look almost like normal paper.

Of course I tested it with one of the lame scarab stickers, not one of the good ones. It's something of a shame that I was still chewing crayons* in 1981, because Harrison Ford was hot then. I never did the movie star/pop singer poster-on-the-wall thing, but might have been tempted to if I had been 14 when Raiders came out.

*Mom had to explain to me that "non-toxic" did not mean "edible."

8:35AM - Quote of the Day

"[The Ampbot] has a real presence in the home by allowing interaction with the owner. The owner can also enjoy being chased around the house by the robot."

- Osamu Takeuchi of Sega Toys introducing the dancing, music-playing Ampbot, pitching his product to the tech/horror market.

2:16PM - Quote of the Day

"Get them!"

- Would-be supervillain Reptile Master (secret identity Victor Rodriguez) commanding an albino python minion to attack police officers. Police were there because he'd been threatening his girlfriend with the snake. Happily, the snake appeared disinterested in a career in minioning, and Reptile Master's career appears to be over before it began.