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by M. J. Young

That Was Unnecessarily Frustrating

March 31, 2008 in Blogs

I’m very late today because of a cyberdetour of sorts.

In my ordinary travels, as I do my e-mail, I pick up a few articles here and there that I read.  As I mention in one of the old Game Ideas Unlimited articles which I will link in a few weeks, learning about everything is part of my job.  In this particular case, though, there was a note indicating that a column I sometimes read is seeking a new writer–a part time gig writing for an Internet publication.  It seems right up my alley, and I decided it was worth a bit of time to drop a note inquiring about whether I might be considered.

That bit of the note, though, turned into something of a major project.  The person handling the hiring wanted all applicants to include in their letter a list of ten topics related to recent or current news items.  That sent me pouring over recent and current news posts, looking for those which would make interesting topics for the rather eclectic column.  After several hours, I had written up and linked seven.  Then I did something stupid:  I attempted to print a page from a Microsoft site using a Netscape browser.

I am persuaded that Microsoft intentionally codes its pages to cause Netscape browers to freeze when certain ordinary actions are taken, most notably trying to print the page.  It does not matter whether you route it through your own browser printer button or click the “Print” link on the page, either way it will freeze the browser–and the associated e-mail program.  I lost all the work I had done, and there was no way to get it back.

Mercifully, after rebooting, I was able to track down the seven stories I had already linked, and reproduce the letter I had written.  I might wind up once more being paid to write articles for someone else’s web site.  That would be a good move for a part time job.

I can report a little more than that.  I did a bit more updating in the Gaming Outpost article archives, and made some progress on my readthrough edit of the Game Ideas Unlimited book.  I could wish I’d done a lot more, but I might have wound up doing a lot less.  I did have to take my mother-in-law to both the store and the bank today, after all, and that put a spanner in the works.

Before I fall asleep at the keys, let me get to the forums.  Tomorrow is looking worse than today, but maybe I can get something done.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

A Few Hours Here or There

March 30, 2008 in Blogs

Some are no doubt wondering what became of me on Friday.  On Thursday evening I was asked whether I might pick up the girlfriend of a certain son Friday night, and although I recognized that this would mean at least five to six hours on the road, I also recognized that there is value in making the lives of my sons a bit brighter.  Then late Thursday night I mentioned this to my wife, his mother, by way of discussing vehicle arrangements–and she cut the discussion short by saying no, I was not to make the trip.  Her reasons are not relevant here, really; I passed them to the boy the next afternoon when I saw him, and he did what he ought to have done initially, which was discuss it with her.

The joke of it, really, is that they came to an agreement that I would pick her up, but neither of them mentioned it to me until late in the afternoon when mother called home and was surprised that I answered the phone.  I would have been there anyway, since pickup was not to be until between eleven and twelve, after the girl got home from work but before her parents would be disturbed by people arriving (even people who sit at the curb and never see them); I left shortly after church.

Along the way, I got a call from the other son who often calls upon us for transportation.  It seems he was chatting with his brother’s girlfriend, and she discovered that he had a stretch of days off from work (which he had created so that he could weekend with some friends), and insisted that he call us and arrange for us to grab him on the way home.  It’s not far out of the way, although what with getting off the highway and stopping and all it probably adds half an hour to the trip.  His plan was to change his transportation arrangements such that the person taking him to the weekend gathering Saturday would pick him up at home instead of at his work address.  So that was added.

Returning home around two, I knew that I could not address the work awaiting, so I did the posting to the Corinthians list and went to bed, so as to get at least a few hours of sleep before church in the morning.

I was fairly tired by late afternoon Saturday, but someone offered to make supper so that I could finish the unfinished Friday work, and my wife asked if I would make a quick run to Wal-mart with her to see whether they accepted a certain insurance coverage for eye exams and glasses.  They did not, but as long as we were there she thought it would be good to spend a lot of money on some things she felt we needed (in fairness, perhaps five to ten percent of the expenditures were for car care products I thought we needed–motor oil and brake fluid).  Between three and four hours later we returned home to discover that dinner had not been made, and it was too late for me to undertake making it, so I spent the next hour or so obtaining and serving Kentucky Fried Chicken (a task extended by the fact that they neglected to include two of the items in the bag, so I had to drive back for these).

At the end of that time, I was entirely exhausted.  I went to my bed, put on that movie I promised to watch, The Last Mimzy, and after getting a very vague feel for what was happening at the beginning, fell completely asleep.

I’m up now.  I can’t really catch up on what I missed–there were too many “extra” things I should have done.  However, I will do today’s work and see where it gets me.  Already the week ahead is looking overbooked, but we’ll manage.  I’ve got to be in North Jersey again on Tuesday, to return said girlfriend and to visit my parents, who have something for me and something for my son, and for whom I also have something.  That’s going to be difficult, because we have a shortage of help on Tuesday, but we’ll manage.

I did get a bit done on a read-through edit of the new Game Ideas Unlimited book; I’ve also been pressuring a few people for feedback on the cover, but without result.

That reminds me:  I was supposed to post on Friday to call your attention to the second article in the archived series, Game Ideas Unlimited:  An Amusing Dungeon.  It describes the juxtapostion of two unrelated ideas into a fascinating adventure.  As always, comments in the forum are invited.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

Another Friendly Interruption

March 27, 2008 in Blogs

I had finished the regular work last night, and was working on proofreading the Faith and Gaming collection (which I finished earlier this afternoon), when a call came from a young lady, a dear friend of one of our sons who has found herself living in our living room (odd that it should fall to that purpose) before.  She had been evicted from her apartment, an hour away in Philadelphia, and needed to move herself and her things immediately.

I agreed to get her.  I called my wife, who was finishing up at work, to let her know my intentions, and she said to wait until she called me back.

Oddly, while I was awaiting that call, I came upon the old article, Faith and Gaming:  Friends.  I say it is odd, because the piece recounts another night, years ago, when it was my wife who was taking the truck to go help a friend in need in the middle of the night, and I who was accommodating her.  The article speaks of unbalanced ledgers, and how it is not the point of friendship to look for balance, that what we gain does not always equal what we pay.  It was an interesting and indeed timely reminder.

My wife insisted I take the boy along who is most closely her friend, and he agreed that he should go despite the fact that this would mean being crowded in the unheated cab of the truck.  We at the time did not know how crowded, nor how complicated, this would be, as in addition to the girl we also picked up a cat in a carrier and a ferret on a leash, and there was no place to park along Tenth Street south of Mifflin in Philadelphia even at one thirty in the morning when we arrived, so I was sitting by a fire hydrant with the back end of the vehicle extending into an intersection for most of an hour while they first carried boxes and packages to the truck and then attempted to coax a ferret out from under a neighbor’s balcony so he would not be left behind.  We also had to feed the young lady on the ride home, at almost three in the morning when all we could find was a McDonald’s Drive-thru, even in so busy a place as the Deptford Mall area.

I neglected to mention that our eldest and his wife, who missed Easter with us because of his work, managed finally to make it down, arriving minutes before the phone call which took me away.  They were still here when I returned; in fact, it was after four when I finally got to bed, and they were still here when I awoke shortly after five to get boys to buses.  Thus I did not see much of them, but my wife did, and that’s a reversal of the usual circumstance, so that’s good.

I probably did not get eight hours of sleep before I was folding laundry (another thing I tucked into that time) and trying to start my day, but I’m not slowing down yet.  I have a Collision rehearsal tonight, and it happens to be Baxter’s birthday, so I’ve asked our resident cook if he could make a cake just in case Baxter makes it.  Meanwhile, I’m hoping to get everything else out of the way sooner rather than later, so I’ve got time to do some other stuff at some point.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

I’m Here

March 26, 2008 in Blogs

I’m here.

I’m not at all certain what I should be writing here tonight.  I did a few important errands, but otherwise all I can remember that I’ve done since yesterday’s blog is more editing the Faith and Gaming book.  I’ve not done much of that, either, just a quick breeze through one or two of the fifty articles while getting dressed.

But I’m on schedule for today, even if there are a dozen things I wish I’d done, so let me try to stay that way.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

Looks Like I Made It

March 25, 2008 in Blogs

If you were with me yesterday, you know that I was very concerned as to whether I was going to finish everything yesterday and still be able to deal with today.  It seems that the e-mail, while not exactly light, was not so heavy as I had anticipated, and I managed to get everything finished before I was completely exhausted.  I got the one kid who had school today awake in time to be there, and got a bit more sleep before dealing with my morning and my mother-in-law, and retrieving the son from his work address to return home for a few days.  It’s not even really all that late, but I’ve a fair amount still on my plate, including dinner (although my dinner plate seems to be in use somewhere, so I’m waiting for it to become available before I eat).  We’ll see how the day goes.

In addition to what I anticipated doing today, I got a bit of editing done on the Romans notes, which I am eager to finish but not quite three quarters through yet.

I also had a few people offer to help with cover art for the Faith and Gaming book, and so I’ve asked them to tell me their thoughts.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

Sort of Backwards

March 24, 2008 in Blogs

I am still recovering from Easter; I am not certain when I actually got to bed last night, but I did not budge until the afternoon alarm, which awakens those on the three to eleven shift.  From there, I stumbled around a bit, trying to find my voice (I am battling an upper respiratory infection, and with the aid of the marvelous tropical fruit flavored Cold-Eze™ zinc and C drops I seem to be winning, but please don’t ask me to sing tonight).  Before I’d really figured out what I was doing, I was informed that I had to take a truckload of empty boxes to a frequently helpful friend half an hour away who is moving.

Thus it was after seven before I was actually on the road to take my mother-in-law shopping and deliver my son to his brother’s house for work tomorrow.  It seems both of them need me again tomorrow–she because she has run out of checks and did not realize it today until it was too late to get to the bank, he because he is working tomorrow morning and then off again for several days.  I’ll lose a few hours to that, but it will be good to have him home.

Home is where I finally found myself at one in the morning.  I immediately did the last thing I do each night, posting to the Corinthians list, so that I would not have to do it when I finished whatever I managed to do.  I then came here.  I have not yet done the e-mail, and possibly I won’t; given my condition, I might not finish the forum–but I have already opened it, so I will at least start it.  We’ll see how far the second wind in my sails carries me.

I did a bit of editing on the Faith and Gaming book.  I had expected merely to read a few of the articles while getting dressed and eating lunch, but in reading I found places where I needed to add footnotes, delete extra line breaks, and make a minor correction or two.  So today is not completely without progress.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

Getting to Know Anew

March 23, 2008 in Blogs

Happy Easter to all for whom this is a welcome greeting; He is risen indeed.

I find that the front page of Gaming Outpost has been redone, as part I presume of a thematic update. There are things to like about it, and I do like them; there are also some glitches and concerns, but I’ll manage.  I’ll discuss these in the appropriate forum, I think, when I get there.

I have been proofreading my the text of the proposed Faith and Gaming book, the collected Faith and Gaming articles.  Mostly I’m adding footnotes to things that were easily linked or discovered when it was part of the Christian Gamers Guild site.  I’ve not yet reached the point of pricing this, which will be the longest book I have yet published independently.  I’ve not heard about the cover for the Game Ideas Unlimited series, but then, I don’t check my e-mail until tomorrow, and I am beat enough tonight that I’m not going to add anything to the list.

Actually, I’ve had a thought on that which I am going to have to send to Jim–O.K., I’ve sent it.  I’d like to list on the back cover, with a brief blurb, maybe half a dozen titles from the book which are particularly good, or at least particularly enticing.  To that end, I think I’ll offer at the end of this article the titles of the twenty-six that will be included, and if you recognize any of these as something you remember (or if the blurb entices you to read it), let me know which ones you would list.

Now I really must get through today’s work so I can get some sleep tonight.  I’m starting to get very run down, to the point that my wife is thinking I may need a medical exam, and I want to get a good night’s sleep to forestall any such problem.

Actually, rather than listing and linking all of them, I can take advantage of some of the work I did with the original series and again more recently. The first dozen are linked from the thirteenth, Game Ideas Unlimited:  Over My Shoulder which originally appeared on August 24, 2001, and marked the completion of the first quarter of a year of the series.  used that milestone as an opportunity to look back over what preceded, and forward toward what was to come.  The copy at Gaming Outpost has blurbs about all twelve, including as mentioned links to go read them.  I did the same thing every quarter, but I haven’t fixed all fifteen quarterly articles yet.  I have fixed the one for the second quarter, Game Ideas Unlimited:  The Process which also suggested that the way to learn creative process was by watching how others did it.  It still appears at Gaming Outpost.

I do hope this won’t disrupt my efforts to get people reading and discussing these one per week on the forum.  I’m just hoping that I can get some input from those who remember these articles as to which ones would be best to blurb on the cover, either because people who read them before would want to read them again, or because people who heard the idea mentioned would be fascinated enough to want to read more.

Thanks.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

A New Book, The Easy Way

March 21, 2008 in Blogs

I stayed up too late last night; but this being Good Friday, all is good.  I managed to get through six months of Game Ideas Unlimited articles, fixing all the links and copying the text into the draft of the new first volume of the book.  It’s very nearly one hundred pages, and I’ve printed a copy for our president and e-mailed a copy to our art director.  My expectation is that someone will create a cover for it fairly quickly, and I’ll have a few of them at Ubercon, depending on the budget.

I also did something I always wished I could do:  at the end of each of the articles there is now a link to the next, so you can follow them in series forward.  I’ve not yet done the cleanup work on the twenty-seventh article, but it’s still there and you can read it.  I made only two changes to any texts.  In one it was apparent that I’d left out a word, which I inserted.  Another, the twenty-sixth article, had mentioned that all the links had gone sour in the thirteenth (because of a major site overhaul at that time), but having finally had opportunity to repair those links I added a marked edit that that had been done.

I’ll continue to post pointers to the articles week by week, and hopefully I’ll find another chunk of time in the foreseeable future to get through the next six months.  I’m also thinking of doing the Faith and Gaming series, but Valdron is not so interested in that so I’ll probably publish it myself.  That might be easier, but I’m not certain yet.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

New Project Started

March 20, 2008 in Blogs

I probably could have gotten to bed earlier last night; however, I have been meaning to start work on a project for a while, and at the last directors meeting this was given some impetus, and I recently saw that it was not going to be so difficult as it would have been a few months back.  I am organizing the Game Ideas Unlimited articles into a book, or more likely a collection of books, which will be available over the Internet and at conventions.

As part of this effort, I am going through the old articles on this site, connecting those to authors as I am able (not just my own), and repairing links in my old ones.  This is more work than necessary merely for releasing the book, but I have long wanted to fix some of those links (in fact, the links in the thirteenth installment in August 2001 were all bad by November 2001 due to a site restructuring, and I’ve wanted to fix them since then) and it is easier to do it all at once.  I’ve lost my own copies of many of these articles due to system crashes at my end, and this rebuilding will make the book possible finally.

Also as part of that, another thing that I have been meaning to do for much less time than either of those is reintroduce the old articles for the new audience.  I hope to keep on top of cleaning up the articles, and reposting these here, not as new posts but by means of mentioning them here and in threads on the forum, one at a time over the next four years.  That’s a substantial commitment, but I think I can stay alive that long, and it requires only that I take a few minutes to fix old links (it doesn’t even really require that–the articles themselves are quite readable).  I intend to do this on Fridays, the traditional day on which the articles were originally published, but as long as I’m talking about it let me point all of you to where the series began, Game Ideas Unlimited:  Introduction.  That’s in some ways a very brief one, and in some ways a very long one, because by way of introduction it links to several of my articles elsewhere, all of which I still reference from time to time, and well worth reading.

Also, I have finally repaired the problem with the Dandy mailbox, the one connected to my Internet service provider.  The big deal was a capitalization error in my password, now resolved.  Perhaps it is because while I was typing this I was also downloading three hundred forty-seven e-mails, three hundred two of which I have already deleted as Spam and a substantial number of those which remain either probably Spam or notices from the mail server that it has captured suspected Spam for my review (it’s usually right, and doesn’t catch enough of the stuff), but the connection to Gaming Outpost has gone quiet.  It appears to be just this site, but it’s been inaccessible for long enough now that I’m inclined to save this on my drive and reboot to see whether that clears the problem.

Whether or not that was the problem, it seems to have been fixed.  I’ve a bit more work to do on articles, it appears, but I’m on it.

–M. J. Young

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Paging a Post

March 19, 2008 in Blogs

I am looking at the upgraded version of the software that runs this site, and being the sort of person who does not always react favorably to change (particularly when it is not readily apparent what advantage it has), I find myself hunting for the features I already use, which have been moved, and trying to identify those features which are apparently new. It tells me that I am in Visual mode, but it’s not letting me switch to HTML mode, which is the mode in which I usually type these, so it’s probably going to be pretty messy, and I’m going to wind up spending some time trying to get it cleaned up. I will, however, adapt. I had to log in afresh, but my password organizer recognized the login screen and took care of the information for me.

I am not at all certain what the difference is between a post and a page, but I’ve decided that what I want to write is a post. It took a bit of effort to find the categories so I could mark this as a blog, but they’re in the Tags section once you expand it. It looks like tagging articles has become a tad more difficult, but I haven’t gotten that far yet so I could be mistaken–if I’m seeing correctly, I’ll have to add tags individually, instead of in strings as in the past.

That’s all right. Today has run reasonably smoothly. There was not that much e-mail, since I checked it all yesterday; I did get to my mother-in-law with postage stamps, but not as early as I’d planned since my wife is ill today and needed some extra help. I got a bit of Romans editing done while on one errand. There is not that much left to do, so I might even get to bed early tonight.

–M. J. Young

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