I had a thought over the weekend. Even though I'm tattooed myself, and ought to know that it didn't change me at all beyond making my arm slightly more interesting to look at, I still find myself pre-judging people with facial tattoos. Not that I ever really meet anyone with them, but it's something I should do less of. For those of you following me on Twitter, that was my thought that was too big for a tweet.
It was driven from my head over the weekend by an annoyance: one of my tyres picked up a screw. This was distinctly unhappy-making, since it could have proven expensive. Those tyres only have about 6500 miles on them. Fortunately, I'd sprung for the road hazard coverage, but that would merely have reduced the cost. I got lucky, though; it was a short screw, and didn't penetrate the tyre. However, having noticed it yesterday, my reaction was to give the LA a chance to observe as I swapped the wheel for the spare. Fortunately, I use a full-sized spare, rather than a donut spare, so I had no qualms about doing the swap. I was reminded while doing so that my car's passenger-side jacking points are what's technically known as "bollocksed", insofar as the provided jack can't latch onto them as it should. The LA noted my frustration, and when I explained that I could procure a 4000lb-capacity floor jack for the price of the big fuck-off set of mole grips and the unmolested jack that the alternative plan of un-bending the bent parts required, and for significantly less hassle than going to a pick-and-pull and finding the replacement jack, she approved the purchase. So, now I have a floor jack and a couple of chocks (since they're nicer to the garage floor than the bricks I had been using to chock the wheels) and, since I'd already had to perform step 1 of a tyre rotation (swap a random wheel with the spare), I decided to continue with the rest of the steps once I'd had the tyre repaired. As previously noted, that turned out unnecessary, but I pressed on with the rotation anyway. The right rear tyre I'd removed went over to the right front, the right front it replaced went to the left rear, which moved to left front, and so on until all four tyres were in their new spots, my torque wrench had been given its longest workout yet of torquing 20 nuts to 65 foot pounds each, and I was positively yearning for an impact wrench to break the blasted nuts and spin them off. As it was, I was using a spider-type wheelbrace, which had just enough leverage to take the nuts off. An impact wrench would have been quicker, but there's no doubt whatsoever that the greatest contribution to the ease of doing the job (and it was MUCH easier this time than it had been swapping to the alloy wheels in the first place) was the ability to use a good jack. Yes, I technically did have all the tools I needed last time around, but having the tools you WANT makes a heck of a difference.
I should start maintaining a "tools wishlist". Right now, an impact wrench of some description is at the top of the list, along with suitable sockets and a set of torque sticks. I made this job easier by getting a set of 1/2" drive extensions, which are impact-rated since that's what Harbor Fright had on special. Moving the torque wrench outboard by roughly 3 inches meant it was no longer fouling the bodywork, so I could get a clean reading on it. I got the beam type since that's a low-maintenance tool; so long as I store it correctly, in the original packaging, it's not got anything to go out of adjustment. The click-type torque wrenches are a lot more finicky, and I just don't want the hassle.
Of course, this does mean that I'm now feeling the hurt, since I spent the morning doing physical labour, but it's still an honest job that I can be proud of.
Monday, October 24, 2011
Monday, October 10, 2011
How to boost confidence
Or, what I did over Columbus Day Weekend. As I mentioned last time, I was at a convention from Friday through Sunday, and a very enjoyable convention it was too. The organiser is a guy I know, and he works hard to make things go well. This convention, his first full-blown convention as organiser, was no exception, and he did very well. Frankly, I think he got more right than people who've been doing it for years.
Among the things he got right: game sign-ups. There was a good long submission period, and then a good long period of waiting while everyone got to look at who was running what and when, which let people plan. Then, and this is the important part, the sign-ups were opened in a first-come-first-served format. The general pattern in the Bay Area is for games to be done as a shuffler, wherein you make your selections and you might get into a game or not. This leads to stress, and uncertainty, which make things less fun. Knowing what you're playing in before the con is a LOT easier to deal with. Then, there was a lot of communication, which meant lots of promotion of pickup games (and that was a popular option), and reminders of interesting events such as what passed for a seminar track this year. Normally, there are seminars at conventions, and they cover many subjects. I tend to be a seminar person at shuffled cons, because they don't require signups and the associated stress, which means I enjoy myself more. As an added bonus, I learn things from luminaries such as Kenneth Hite, Ryan Macklin, Leonard Balsera, and others. At Big Bad Con, the seminar track was a late-night thing involving sitting in the bar, in a tight group of geeks, and getting Ryan Macklin and Lenny Balsera (two of the mouthiest men in the games industry) started on game design. People kept them lubricated, asked them pertinent questions, and one person wound up somewhat of a focus because she pitched her concept, and had her gameplay torn to pieces. On the other hand, she got a huge amount of good advice, suggestions for media to look into, and I suspect we'll see a very good game come out of it. I certainly hope so; her core concept is interesting enough that there were several people in the group wanting to play the game. I'm pretty sure Ryan Macklin was one of them. The whole atmosphere of the con was friendly; it being tiny compared to the "major" cons helped with that, but everyone there was determined to make it good. One of my room-mates for the con was volunteering; when he was bumped from that at one point, he was disappointed.
And, of course, I ran my game. That was Saturday afternoon, and, well, I wound up a net two players short (which was OK) after three of the signups didn't show, and one person crashed, and then character choices led to my one planned challenge having to go by the board before we even started. This meant I was improvising from minute one, and I had a four hour slot. I also had my silly principle of "I will run this game standing up" to contend with, since I didn't want to be hopping up and down constantly, nor did I want to be hidden by my "screen" of a couple pages of notes and the character sheets for the characters chosen (since I'd gotten organised and actually printed out two copies of each character I'd made...), and so I was distinctly glad I'd elected to wear hiking boots. I managed, despite running blind and for complete strangers, to create a reasonably well put-together storyline, and the players gave me enough material and ideas for another two games in the same series. This is looking likely to become a long runner; at every con I attend, I can be reasonably certain of having a couple of these games I can run, and getting enough new material for some more of them. When I asked my players to be gentle with their feedback forms after the game, they were astounded that I'd just finished running my first ever con game. Heck, my third time ever running ANY game, although I didn't tell them that.
Unfortunately, there were some niggles with the con. Food was... well, it was decent enough, but I'm not sure it was worth the price being asked. Next year, I'll see if I can't get hold of something MRE-like to cut costs. I didn't really have a good way to let people know that I had two open seats, since there wasn't really a way to drop games. And despite the excellent communication, many people were somewhat out of touch because there was no wifi in the con building and many of us were unable to get cellular data inside. I found that a mere three feet from the door, I was getting full speed HSPA (what my phone calls 4G, although really it's 3.5 at best), whereas inside, where I got signal at all it was a degraded EDGE signal. Voice was fine, as was SMS, but data was reliably absent. The one location I could get data signal, I didn't need or want it, as I was busy running a game!
Overall, though, this was one of the best convention experiences I've had, and has made me very excited for next year's Big Bad Con 2. Even though Ryan Macklin is moving to Seattle and Lenny Balsera is reportedly moving to Texas, so the seminar track will probably be quieter, more sober, and considerably less foul-mouthed.
Among the things he got right: game sign-ups. There was a good long submission period, and then a good long period of waiting while everyone got to look at who was running what and when, which let people plan. Then, and this is the important part, the sign-ups were opened in a first-come-first-served format. The general pattern in the Bay Area is for games to be done as a shuffler, wherein you make your selections and you might get into a game or not. This leads to stress, and uncertainty, which make things less fun. Knowing what you're playing in before the con is a LOT easier to deal with. Then, there was a lot of communication, which meant lots of promotion of pickup games (and that was a popular option), and reminders of interesting events such as what passed for a seminar track this year. Normally, there are seminars at conventions, and they cover many subjects. I tend to be a seminar person at shuffled cons, because they don't require signups and the associated stress, which means I enjoy myself more. As an added bonus, I learn things from luminaries such as Kenneth Hite, Ryan Macklin, Leonard Balsera, and others. At Big Bad Con, the seminar track was a late-night thing involving sitting in the bar, in a tight group of geeks, and getting Ryan Macklin and Lenny Balsera (two of the mouthiest men in the games industry) started on game design. People kept them lubricated, asked them pertinent questions, and one person wound up somewhat of a focus because she pitched her concept, and had her gameplay torn to pieces. On the other hand, she got a huge amount of good advice, suggestions for media to look into, and I suspect we'll see a very good game come out of it. I certainly hope so; her core concept is interesting enough that there were several people in the group wanting to play the game. I'm pretty sure Ryan Macklin was one of them. The whole atmosphere of the con was friendly; it being tiny compared to the "major" cons helped with that, but everyone there was determined to make it good. One of my room-mates for the con was volunteering; when he was bumped from that at one point, he was disappointed.
And, of course, I ran my game. That was Saturday afternoon, and, well, I wound up a net two players short (which was OK) after three of the signups didn't show, and one person crashed, and then character choices led to my one planned challenge having to go by the board before we even started. This meant I was improvising from minute one, and I had a four hour slot. I also had my silly principle of "I will run this game standing up" to contend with, since I didn't want to be hopping up and down constantly, nor did I want to be hidden by my "screen" of a couple pages of notes and the character sheets for the characters chosen (since I'd gotten organised and actually printed out two copies of each character I'd made...), and so I was distinctly glad I'd elected to wear hiking boots. I managed, despite running blind and for complete strangers, to create a reasonably well put-together storyline, and the players gave me enough material and ideas for another two games in the same series. This is looking likely to become a long runner; at every con I attend, I can be reasonably certain of having a couple of these games I can run, and getting enough new material for some more of them. When I asked my players to be gentle with their feedback forms after the game, they were astounded that I'd just finished running my first ever con game. Heck, my third time ever running ANY game, although I didn't tell them that.
Unfortunately, there were some niggles with the con. Food was... well, it was decent enough, but I'm not sure it was worth the price being asked. Next year, I'll see if I can't get hold of something MRE-like to cut costs. I didn't really have a good way to let people know that I had two open seats, since there wasn't really a way to drop games. And despite the excellent communication, many people were somewhat out of touch because there was no wifi in the con building and many of us were unable to get cellular data inside. I found that a mere three feet from the door, I was getting full speed HSPA (what my phone calls 4G, although really it's 3.5 at best), whereas inside, where I got signal at all it was a degraded EDGE signal. Voice was fine, as was SMS, but data was reliably absent. The one location I could get data signal, I didn't need or want it, as I was busy running a game!
Overall, though, this was one of the best convention experiences I've had, and has made me very excited for next year's Big Bad Con 2. Even though Ryan Macklin is moving to Seattle and Lenny Balsera is reportedly moving to Texas, so the seminar track will probably be quieter, more sober, and considerably less foul-mouthed.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
I ride!
Not on a motorcycle, or even a bicycle. Not even a stationary one. But I'm eating better, as a result of making sure the LA eats better (it being far simpler to do two portions of good food), and this morning I weighed myself.
I'm down a stone from my peak weight. I'm aiming to get rid of another stone, which will likely take a while. (For the Americans in the audience, that's 28lb overall, from a peak of about 195. I want to try to stabilise around 165, at which point my doctors should hopefully nag me less.) I am, however, on the right track, and the LA is also on a downward trend for weight.
In other news, this weekend I'm running my first convention game, and we're also waiting to hear the outcome of our house-buying efforts. We've an offer in on a place which, frankly, is just about perfect. Slightly smaller than the current house, but better laid out, and in better shape overall. However, there are competing offers, and so it's a nervous time. If it works out, though, well, it's a large point in my favour on certain things which I'm not quite ready to discuss here. Suffice it to say that October's shaping up busy.
I'm down a stone from my peak weight. I'm aiming to get rid of another stone, which will likely take a while. (For the Americans in the audience, that's 28lb overall, from a peak of about 195. I want to try to stabilise around 165, at which point my doctors should hopefully nag me less.) I am, however, on the right track, and the LA is also on a downward trend for weight.
In other news, this weekend I'm running my first convention game, and we're also waiting to hear the outcome of our house-buying efforts. We've an offer in on a place which, frankly, is just about perfect. Slightly smaller than the current house, but better laid out, and in better shape overall. However, there are competing offers, and so it's a nervous time. If it works out, though, well, it's a large point in my favour on certain things which I'm not quite ready to discuss here. Suffice it to say that October's shaping up busy.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Smarter than it appears
You may have heard of Ben & Jerry's ice cream. Much of it is good. Recently, they've been in the news for having decided to introduce a new flavour, inspired by a skit on Saturday Night Live. It should come as no surprise to anyone that the name is a pun, in poor taste.
One of the multifarious "everyone else has no morals" pressure groups with which the USA is sadly infested was surprised, and has taken it upon themselves to demand a boycott of the company. Naturally, this is helping the "Schweddy Balls" flavour gain huge publicity, making the pressure group a figure of fun, and generally giving Ben & Jerry's and Saturday Night Live a huge boost. It's also distracting said pressure group from screeching about more important things. The pressure group is opposed to such things as reproductive health, civil rights for all, informed consent, bodily autonomy, and human love, but right now they're screaming about how fancy ice cream will destroy America, which makes them look foolish and pulls resources away from their efforts to deny the humanity of more than 50% of the population.
One begins to wonder if Ben & Jerry's isn't doing this entirely deliberately, perhaps even with the aim of destroying what little shreds of credibility such pressure groups may have had. After all, just because the founders were hippies doesn't mean they weren't smart.
One of the multifarious "everyone else has no morals" pressure groups with which the USA is sadly infested was surprised, and has taken it upon themselves to demand a boycott of the company. Naturally, this is helping the "Schweddy Balls" flavour gain huge publicity, making the pressure group a figure of fun, and generally giving Ben & Jerry's and Saturday Night Live a huge boost. It's also distracting said pressure group from screeching about more important things. The pressure group is opposed to such things as reproductive health, civil rights for all, informed consent, bodily autonomy, and human love, but right now they're screaming about how fancy ice cream will destroy America, which makes them look foolish and pulls resources away from their efforts to deny the humanity of more than 50% of the population.
One begins to wonder if Ben & Jerry's isn't doing this entirely deliberately, perhaps even with the aim of destroying what little shreds of credibility such pressure groups may have had. After all, just because the founders were hippies doesn't mean they weren't smart.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
I really am turning Californian now.
It appears there's been an earthquake, centred in Virginia. Latest reports have it as a 5.9, and the Eastern seaboard is busy saying things like "Ohnoes!" and "Wait, was that it?" because they mostly have no experience of earthquakes.
Meanwhile, my instinctive response is to say things along the lines of "Now do you get why I really don't care? Because seriously, that WAS it. I'd far rather have maybe one of those in five years or so, or maybe not ever, than be pretty much certain I'll have to deal with a hurricane most years."
Meanwhile, my instinctive response is to say things along the lines of "Now do you get why I really don't care? Because seriously, that WAS it. I'd far rather have maybe one of those in five years or so, or maybe not ever, than be pretty much certain I'll have to deal with a hurricane most years."
Monday, August 15, 2011
Coat tails
As my mother will no doubt confirm, I have a tendency towards running to fat. The lack of activity in my daily life (due to a combination of lack of need to exercise in doing things and an ever-increasing collection of mobility-impairing health problems) doesn't help at all. The LA, having an office job, also struggles with keeping weight to an acceptable level; so much so, in fact, that she's begun (with some friends) attending meetings at Weight Watchers. Their points system is nicely generous, with the majority of vegetables counting as freebies, and her attention to it is also providing fringe benefits for me; since I cook for both of us, it's simplest to cook something that's good for her, and eat my portion of it happily. It's not impossible that I'll be able to lose some weight as well, which will make my doctor happy; he's been on at me to lose about a stone and a half. For the same reason, I'm working (when I have tuits and suitable weather available) on a frame to raise my desk by roughly 15 inches, so that I can stand at it instead of sitting.
Perhaps I ought to try posting regular updates here. Allow my readers to help keep me accountable.
In other news, my car has lost a feature it had until very recently; the powered antenna ceased to work reliably, and my efforts to troubleshoot resulted in finding that the $200 motor is up the Swanee, which is far more than I'm willing to invest in what is, frankly, a luxury on what I consider to be utilitarian transport. And so, I reassembled the thing with a shortened pigtail (having removed the mast while troubleshooting, and been unable to re-thread the pigtail) and a permanently erect mast, and then disconnected the control and power lines to the motor. I can no longer take my car through an automatic car wash, but then again I hadn't done that in over a year anyway. I wash the dust off it occasionally, and keep the important glass scrupulously clean; beyond that, it's getting on for 18 years old and is always going to look it., so as long as the paint remains sufficiently intact to prevent rust, I honestly don't really care.
Perhaps I ought to try posting regular updates here. Allow my readers to help keep me accountable.
In other news, my car has lost a feature it had until very recently; the powered antenna ceased to work reliably, and my efforts to troubleshoot resulted in finding that the $200 motor is up the Swanee, which is far more than I'm willing to invest in what is, frankly, a luxury on what I consider to be utilitarian transport. And so, I reassembled the thing with a shortened pigtail (having removed the mast while troubleshooting, and been unable to re-thread the pigtail) and a permanently erect mast, and then disconnected the control and power lines to the motor. I can no longer take my car through an automatic car wash, but then again I hadn't done that in over a year anyway. I wash the dust off it occasionally, and keep the important glass scrupulously clean; beyond that, it's getting on for 18 years old and is always going to look it., so as long as the paint remains sufficiently intact to prevent rust, I honestly don't really care.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
I just wish you could smell this...
I had a busy day lined up, and limited tuits, so I decided to front-load the complex part of dinner. So, I made something approximating quiche. It'll be nice cold, today and tomorrow, and all of it is from the larder. This one has about 5 ounces of ground turkey, mushrooms, aged goat cheese, and a shallot in it. I'm not sure if that's four or six portions, but it's more than if I'd cooked the turkey and served it straight!
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