Icebreaker Contests
Posted in Games, Personal January 31st, 2009 by joedelta

When I was in college, we’d occasionally go out to dance clubs and mingle.

As a nerdy virgin who couldn’t dance, I found these pretty terrifying. Fear of rejection threatened to plant me as a wallflower.

My friend Steve had a novel solution:  We had a contest to see who could get turned down by more women.  Now we have an excellent excuse to go up and ask the prettiest girl to dance.  Most of the time we’d get turned down, but instead of letting it get us down, it’d be an occasion for a high five — scored a point!  Worst case, you waste five minutes dancing with a pretty girl.

Years later we upped the stakes, to see who could get slapped more often.  (Drink thrown in the face counted for two points.)  My favorite line, virtually guaranteed to result in a moist or stinging face:

“Nice shoes!”

“Thank you.”

“They’d look great on my shoulders.”

Pow!

Life in the Abnormal, Chapter Two
Posted in Books, Personal January 29th, 2009 by joedelta

Chapter 2
Difficulties

Our Snore prepared for a hard journey. However, he was lucky, and met only minor troubles on his way to the Isle of Snores. He feasted on broccoli in barbecue sauce and wore pink socks with green polka dots. He thought that since it had been such an easy trip there it would also be an easy journey back to the U.S.A. Sadly, he was wrong. Why? To answer that question,we must look at the world from yet another point of view.

Mr. Periwinkle Peliggall (Peli for short) was a pelican who lived on the coast of the Pacific Ocean. He was very ill-tempered and despised everyone but himself. He was obsessed with food of every kind, but there was one dish that he preferred above all.
Fresh, tasty snores.

And now we must go back to what our Snore is doing. After completing the stationary  Snore ritual, he was ready to complete his journey. He packed an emergency kit with things such as a handkerchief, a bubble gun and a can of extingui-fly spray. However, he did not think the trip would be rough and, after saying his good-byes, set out to find a home.

Shortly after leaving, the Snore saw a flock of seagulls flying towards him. Like any good Snore, he was afraid of being preyed upon by seagulls and the like. The Snore made himself transparent, and even after the flock had passed, he continued to look over his shoulder for any signs of hostility. Only when they had disappeared from sight did he look before himself only to realize that he was face to face with a giant pelican.

Mira’s Story — Life in the Abnormal
Posted in Books, Personal January 18th, 2009 by joedelta

In our world, we live normally. We act normally. Life is as normal as can be. But I must ask you…
What is normal? Think. If you were looking from some people’s point of view, you would see that things were not normal.
This story is about those people.

Chapter I

As I before mentioned, some people live in our world but see it in a different way. They know the extraordinary and have seen things that you and I could hardly imagine. Let us begin with the tale of one of these people. Her name is Coral Mithendril.

Early one morning, Coral was in the car on the way to school with her friend Myrtle Willowflew. Coral had not slept well that night and was on the point of falling asleep. She was so tired that at a certain point she let out a huge yawn, but he stayed inside her head and thought he would come out later. He was called Brother Yawn.

Now, in our world, most think Yawns and such are not alive and cannot talk or be named or save lives or win Olympic medals or anything that people can do. But they are wrong.

Yawns in particular are very slow and boring creatures, unless they are angry. They usually float up into the sky and take the appearance of clouds. When they open their mouths, water pours out. However, don’t be afraid to go outside in the rain because you don’t want Yawn saliva on you, as it is really pure water. When there is pollution, they cry, and that is what bad rain is. When Yawns get angry, they all band together and moan and fly around, and thus create hurricanes and the like.
But back to the story.

Coral was  able to stay awake for only a little while longer, and finally fell asleep. Once asleep, she let out one good sized snore, which escaped out her ear and flew out the window. This snore is to become a main character in this story. But now I shall tell you about a certain ritual all Snores go through.

Once Snores are made, they always fly over the nearest ocean(avoiding hungry predators)in order to get to the Isle of Snores. They then feast upon broccoli in barbecue sauce and wear pink sacks with green polka dots. Once satisfied, they travel around in order to find a place to live. This Snore was destined to find not a place to live in, but a person to travel with. But  first, our snore (who had at that point no name) must complete a task that he may not survive involving one word.
Pelican.

Clan Lord
Posted in Games, Macintosh, Technology January 17th, 2009 by joedelta

Clan Lord is our online role-playing game that’s been running for, oh, maybe 12 years. We started about the same time as the original Ultima Online.  It peaked years ago, and has been sliding slowly into the abyss, with fewer and fewer players on.

So we’re giving it a good kick, making several big changes.  First, we’re switching over to free play.  We’re no longer charging a monthly fee to play, except for supporters who want to be charged.  For now, we’re still charging $14.95 to set up a new account, but that’s mostly to keep people from creating hundreds of accounts for no good reason.

Any of my friends who want a free account, of course, can always get one — just email me.  Get one for your friends and your kids.  And your kids’ friends.  I want to see the average player account ten times higher than it is right now, so spread the word.

Green
Posted in Books, Games, Personal January 12th, 2009 by joedelta

“What?” Her eyes opened wide as she smiled.  “What do you mean?”

“They’re green.”

“What does that have to do with electric?”

I swallowed and squeezed my eyes tight.  Took a deep breath.  Shrugged.

“You are so gone.” Her voice was musical. I could tell she laughed easily.  I knew she could sit on a park bench and happily watch people. I was gone. My chest felt empty, vacated. Every heartbeat caused a pang of hunger. “How do you feel?”

I tilted my head happily. How did this happen? “How long has it been?”

I could hear her checking her watch.  “Uh, about five minutes.”

Five minutes.  I’ll never make it. Actually it was a lot easier since I had closed my eyes.  I could see the green patterns of her eyes, refusing to hold still in my head, but at least I could pay attention to other things.

“Well?” She wanted an answer.  I thought I could pay attention, but I had missed her question again.

“Just about.”  I laughed. Sometimes that’s an appropriate response, right?

“Like that phrase, don’t you?” God, she’s quick. I loved her. “Especially when you don’t hear something.”  Very quick.

Great. I meet a beautiful, intelligent, wonderful girl, and I can’t form a complete sentence.  She’ll think I’m a druggie. Lord knows enough of Reed’s friends are.

2009 Resolutions
Posted in Games, Personal January 5th, 2009 by joedelta

In no particular order:

  1. Family dinners whenever possible
  2. More social activities
  3. 14% Body fat
  4. Grow Clan Lord or kill it trying
  5. File all my back taxes
  6. Meet some of my online friends in person
  7. Get a little more heating and cooling in the house
  8. Delight my partner more often
  9. Make my websites suck less
  10. Support President Obama

Anybody else got anything?

2008 Pictures
Posted in Personal January 4th, 2009 by joedelta

I uploaded most of my pictures from 2008 in one big messy post.  There have been embarrassing photos I failed to censor in every previous year, and I’m sure this is no exception.

Best Movies of 2008
Posted in Movies January 3rd, 2009 by joedelta

I haven’t been going to theaters as much this year as in previous years, mostly watching DVDs and downloads.  This trend is what made me short movie theater stocks, the only profitable financial decision I made in 2008.

Among my favorites in 2008 were two non-movies:  Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog and Presto, the short by Pixar that showed (I think) before Wall-E.

My favorite movie of the year was The Dark Knight.  It’s kinda long, essentially two movies in one — but both were great, and I didn’t get bored. I think Heath Ledger deserves an Oscar for playing the scariest Joker ever.

Other faves, in no particular order:

  • Wall-E — Another Pixar winner, perhaps not up to the impossibly high standards of some previous productions
  • Iron Man — brilliant casting with Robert Downey, Jr.
  • Definitely, Maybe — I probably have a special connection to this as a dad of a precocious 11 year old daughter.
  • Burn After Reading — Much more satisfying than last year’s Coen Brothers success, No Country for Old Men.
  • Hancock — I don’t know why this comic book movie didn’t get more attention.  Worked for me.