I was late to the director’s meeting today, because we had an errand to run on the way which ran a bit late; but the meeting went reasonably well once I got there.

I did not accomplish much on my off day, other than taking some time to go over parts with Collision bass guitar player Adam, on one of the toughest songs we’ll be doing.  He’s getting it, which is good.

I’ve become aware of my own need to practice more; there are a number of songs ahead for which I am not really ready.  However, time allows only so much.  If I get through today’s work early enough, I might tackle some of the parts that are giving me trouble.  We’ll see how it goes.

I want to extend my thanks to those who have encouraged and assisted us in this recent difficulty.  You make it possible for us to keep going.

–M. J. Young

I have just come from the directors meeting, where it was agreed to release Game Ideas Unlimited Volume 1 at the price of $18.95.  You can view and purchase it at the new CafePress storefront created specifically to host these books.  The plan is to have some in hand at Ubercon, although of course with the time getting close there’s no guarantee that we will.  I should mention that this joins our two other CafePress storefronts.  The one we have promoted to some degree is known as the Valdron store, which sports T-shirts, mugs, and other paraphernalia including the dice poster.  The other is the NagaWorld store, which features the nerf-like creatures of NagaWorld but also has the poster based on the cover of the novel.

So the book is available for those who wish to have the first two months of the series in a convenient portable format.

–M. J. Young

You probably have to be a geek to laugh at the title of this blog entry; that’s all right, because I had to be a geek to think it was clever.

As of last night, the PDF (Portable Document Format) files for the new books, Game Ideas Unlimited Volume 1 and Faith and Gaming, were completed and uploaded to their respective printers.  That means that the first of those is complete, but that we the directors, meeting this weekend, will have to agree on the price.  As to the latter, I’ve agreed on the price, but do not yet have the cover art; this has been promised for early next week, so I might just have these ready for Ubercon, as hoped.

On another front, the Collision concert has been postponed a week.  This was a decision made by the organizers, who apparently had overlooked a conflict with a local high school play.  Fortunately, we’re all good with that date, and pleased to have the extra rehearsal time–we might even be able to do three songs instead of just two.

I’ve much to do tonight, so I’d better move to doing it.

–M. J. Young

I awoke relatively early today, but while I was still awakening I was abruptly reminded of two things I knew two days ago and had completely forgotten.

I had an untouched cup of coffee next to me, and I had even decided in a rare move to get some breakfast, so I had an untouched bowl of cereal next to that. Then my cell phone rang.

I don’t carry my cell phone on me. There was a time when I never had it in the house. It does not get good reception in the house, and for some reason the chargers made for this model that run on house current do not work right with this particular phone. I use a car charger for it, and I use to leave it in the Caravan all the time–until the Caravan died. Since now I do not really have one vehicle that is “mine” in the sense that I have exclusive use of it, I keep my car things in a bag very kindly given me by the Ubercon people. Thus I was staring at my computer screen, my clock was striking twelve, and mixed with the music of the clock there was another sound which my mind sorted out as the ring of my cell phone, somewhere in the bag across the room.

I managed to find it before it stopped ringing. I disabled the voice mail some time ago, because it was just annoying and I did not want to pay for people to leave me messages I wouldn’t get for days. But it was director and artist Jim Denaxas asking me if I remembered two things, neither of which I had remembered.

The first of those was that this being the second Sunday of the month (and it not being May, the month in which the second Sunday is rather busy at restaurants) we had a directors meeting at one o’clock. I remembered that the moment I saw his name on the caller ID; I was not yet dressed, and had no notes, but it only takes half an hour to drive there so I could pull something together.

The other reminder was that last night we came off Daylight Savings Time, moving all the clocks ahead. Since the federal government decided to change the date on which this happens after decades of it being reliably at the same time, none of the clocks designed to do this automatically do it on the correct day, and although I had known it was coming I completely forgot and changed none of them. I still have a few clocks to track down and correct. However, that meant that when the clock struck noon it was already one, and we were late. We scrambled to get out of the house, and made the meeting, but we’re a bit behind for the day because of it.

The meeting constitutes some progress, and we talked about how to get some of these projects finished, so we’re moving forward.

–M. J. Young

There was a Valdron directors meeting today. A fair amount was accomplished, and some positive decisions were made, but at the moment I’m too tired and busy to try to sort out what should be reported. I’m sure you’ll hear of it as it comes to pass.

Some who came for the meeting spent last night at my house, and so there was a live game. Details will probably hit the forum soon, so I won’t put them here.

–M. J. Young

Most of what I wrote on Friday has followup news today, but there’s not much that’s new. I have been running pretty solidly since Friday, and was late to more than one engagement, but everything that needed to be done was done–some of it a bit less than smoothly.

The person I brought here Friday night for today’s meeting has tentatively decided to stay the night and return tomorrow, which saves me some driving since I have to make half the journey anyway, to get my mother-in-law to the store yet again. That complicates tomorrow’s work, but it simplifies tonight immensely.

Tonight I have to launch the new study in I Corinthians, but otherwise I’m in the winding down phase of the day.

On a subject that has not been mentioned for a while, I’ve suddenly got a stack of stuff for the Temporal Anomalies site. I have been struggling with Primer–a movie that I have thus far found very nearly unwatchable for how slowly it moves, although this might in part be because I’m always starting it sometime around midnight. I also have a copy of Lakehouse, provided at the same time by the same reader. Today I was handed two more films, Next with Nicholas Cage and Premonition with Sandra Bullock. I’m not certain whether either actually is a time travel movie, but one way or another I’ll watch them and reach some conclusion.

Speaking of conclusions, I’m hoping to reach one early tonight–that is, of my work for the day. I’ve a long drive tomorrow on top of a lot of work that normally hits on Monday, so I’d like an early night and an early start in the morning. Maybe I can get that.

–M. J. Young

I’m running very late tonight, and still have running to do.

That trip to take my mother-in-law to the bank yesterday had to be done today, and then got extended with an extra hour north (and that through traffic) to pick up someone who did not realize he had to be here for the director’s meeting this weekend. The return trip put me back looking at e-mail about two hours ago, and now I have finished that and am here. However, a son came home several days ago and must go back tonight, and I do not yet know whether his mother is going to come home from work to take him or work through the night and need a ride in the morning. I should know by now, but no one was answering the phone there an hour or so ago, and since then my phone has wandered away (cordless phones do that) so I’ve not been able to try again.

So I’m trying to get as much done as I can before it gets too late to think–or drive.

I have been meaning to mention, all week, that that Romans teaching list I occasionally mention has come to the end of Romans, and starting Sunday night will become a I Corinthians teaching list, using the notes I sometimes mention from my morning study. Anyone interested in catching this study from the beginning can join by sending an e-mail to the Yahoo group subscription address cgg_review-subscribe@yahoogroups.com and confirming when you get the confirmation request. We will go through the book one verse a day, five days a week, with something different on Friday.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I think I’d better find a phone.

–M. J. Young