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by M. J. Young

One Foot In Front of the Other

June 20, 2011 in Blogs

First, congratulations to Mr. and Mrs. Kyler Young, celebrating their honeymoon in Atlantic City, and it was good of them to make the extra hour trip to see us while they were somewhat more than usual in the neighborhood.  We did not discuss when he will return to the games, but I did give him a Multiverser coffee mug obtained from our merchandise at Cafe Press.  He was supposed to receive it for Christmas, but things have been just that crazy.

Speaking of crazy–well, we’ll get back to that.  First, let me mention the publication in the Examiner’s temporal anomalies series of A Sound of Thunder part 7:  missteps, which tackles more problems with the notion of history changing in waves.

Now back to the crazy.  I was unable to do much typing yesterday because one of the cats bit me rather severely when I attempted to prevent it from escaping out a window I had taped shut but someone else had opened.  When I overused the hand it would start bleeding again, so everything was kept to a minimum.  I have a much too early appointment tomorrow to get a tetanus booster, so I’ll have to curtail my work tonight so I can be up at an indecent hour.  Meanwhile, and before that, the brand new gas tank we had installed in the car started leaking Friday night, and we had to limp it through the weekend and the distant wedding and take it to the shop this morning–where they said of course they will replace it free, but unfortunately the parts supplier won’t have one until tomorrow so I’m dependent on others for transportation for a day, and of course a day on which I have to get somewhere early.  I am the more apologetic, because I have had several people respond to the routine letters I send when someone applies for Gaming Outpost membership, and am certain that there is a spate of new posts awaiting my attention that are not going to get it as quickly as I would have liked, but hopefully someone will let them know that I’m not really ignoring them and will get to them as soon as the smoke clears and the dust settles.

I also want to make a point of reading Eric Ashley’s articles, so often filled with interesting ideas, but I think tonight all I can do is call attention to them, Practise Bits:  Ship and Practise Bits:  Knife, and remind myself to read them when I have a moment.  At least I caught up the e-mail.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

Another One Bites the Dust

October 25, 2007 in Blogs

Today seems mostly to have been about cars. I had to borrow one from one of our houseguests, who got an alternate ride to work and left me his keys. I used this to make arrangements to move the truck to our mechanic, who says he can probably fix it tomorrow afternoon–which would be a very good thing. Then I finally got up there, paid him the towing charge I owed and cleaned out my beloved Caravan, including retrieving all my cassettes, and taking the spare tire–the car I still hope to get happens to be a Voyager, so it probably uses the same rims and tires, and this was a perfectly new unused full tire, not one of those stupid donuts.

There were other errands, and Kyler was fretting about his girlfriend, who was fretting that he was unable to come see her (two hours away), so the houseguest whose car we were using agreed to drive him there. (Agreed with him–I had no input in the matter.) He, the houseguest, in turn decided to pick up his girlfriend for the ride–and that was as far as he got, as his car quit when he got there. On of our other houseguests had to rescue them. Kyler was only slightly daunted–he found a friend who would run him up there for a bit more than gas and toll money. Since the only car still on the road belongs to the houseguest who has to go to the hospital tomorrow, and I have a dental appointment in the morning (has it been that long?), we will probably have to rent a car to get through the day, and hope sincerely that the truck will be back on the road before the shop closes so we don’t have to rent the car through the weekend.

In good news, my mother has tracked down an unused car in the family; actually, it’s unused because it broke down, but she is going to get it fixed and pass it to us, because we need it. It’s not exactly what I want or need, but my wife thinks it will suit her work transportation needs admirably, so we are grateful. It’s out on Long Island, though, so I’m not certain how I’m going to get it, or whether I’ll have it, or anything else for that matter, before Ubercon.

So let me ride–er, walk–out of here.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

A Very Dickensian Day

October 24, 2007 in Blogs

I managed, with a bit of help from the printer’s technical support staff, to upload the corrected file for the book About the Fruit. That was a positive thing, but I was up until five finishing it, and up again at six, struggling to keep myself awake and to awaken the schoolboy. I was not the only one fighting this battle–the houseguest son of one of our houseguests missed his bus this morning, apparently due to a failure of the alarm clock. I am so very grateful that my son made it, and I was back in bed by seven.

I was up again around eleven, because Kyler needed me. He had an important appointment at four, almost an hour from here, and so I already had accepted that I would be driving him there immediately after dropping his mother at work. However, he was also concerned that he needed to get an important errand done, half an hour in the opposite direction, and so felt it important to do before the afternoon pressure hit. I might have managed to drag myself to the truck in under an hour, and we managed to get back in time for everything else.

The appointment was the sort where you must be there on time but should anticipate waiting forever. I took my Romans notes along, and made some progress while waiting. I also brought along and read a printout of a very favorable review of the newest game from my friend Seth Ben-Ezra, of Legends of Alyria fame, Dirty Little Secrets. I’m going to have to break down and buy a copy, it’s that good. The system design generates a Noir Mystery Genre feeling, even if you have no idea what that is. That’s good design.

However, in case it did not strike you, this appointment took several hours. Kyler did very well at it, probably one of the most encouraging points of the day. I, however, was already concerned about how to get home in time to feed people as we left.

That concern increased greatly immediately after I stopped for gas, four miles from home, and then could not start the vehicle again. The starter had complained a bit here and there before, but tonight it did not function properly at all. Kyler and I, and our papers and gear, had to be picked up and brought home; the truck will have to be picked up and taken to a shop tomorrow.

Mercifully, two of our houseguests are equipped with their own cars, and are pitching in to help us deal with transportation. This is especially important, since the other son has to return to Delaware tonight so he will be at work tomorrow.

Coming home to find that the counter where I was planning to make the waffles for dinner was covered in unwashed cups, I realized I had little hope after nine at night to feed anyone before ten. Chinese delivery became the order of the evening, and I turned my attention to my morning study, along with my first, and probably last, cup of coffee, both interrupted multiple times in major ways.

I am now working my way through today, and the light at the end of the tunnel is dimly visible.

In other news, our company president decided, posting on our private company forum, to create a cooperative effort on the new website by having development (me) and public relations work together with art on the total site, rather than having each of us working in his own section. Because I’ve got all the access codes and am the company contact with the hosting service, I’ve been given the task of chairing this. As usual, I’ve taken a significant part of that upon myself–the best way I can see to start is to do a bit of recoding on the old pages (which I still have), and then upload these and make changes as we go. That hopefully means that we will have a website in the next two and a half weeks–in time for the directors meeting, where he wants a report from development on the progress. What’s Gandalf’s phrase? And I was already tired. Hopefully some of the others are ready to pitch in and help make it work.

On one last point, it appears that there might be yet another chance of getting a car, but it’s a long story, and I’m going to leave it for another time.

It was the best of days, it was the worst of days.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

Ahead of Ahead of, and Behind, Schedule

October 23, 2007 in Blogs

Kyler is home tonight. There is much rejoicing.

When he left, we all expected that he would be gone into early November, and would miss Ubercon for it; however, he did so well that they announced a while back that he would be finished tomorrow–and then decided this morning that he could leave today. I was supremely pleased to be able to bring him home, and proud that he did so well.

Unfortunately, that, plus a few other problems, put me well behind on today’s work–it is, after all, Tuesday, my heavy day. One of those other problems had me sitting in a parking lot for most of an hour when I should have been starting dinner–but at least I remembered to take my Romans notes for editing.

Speaking of editing, I got flagged by the printer of About the Fruit because I had not properly placed the ISBN on the copyright page (mea culpa, I did not pay enough attention to the directions, and was worried about how I was supposed to add the barcode to the back, so when I saw that they had done that I didn’t look further). I have made the correction to my copy, but still have to upload it to them; at the same time, I will adjust the price to the regular price, but that means also changing the Specials page on my site to remove the sale announcement. So that’s more work, probably more than I can accomplish tonight. Tomorrow already has its own scheduled disruptions, but hopefully I’ll be able to squeeze a bit extra into the day.

In other good news, the gout is subsiding rapidly, and I’ve started leaving the walking stick behind.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

Some Gout About It

October 21, 2007 in Blogs

It is a very strange thing, really. Every once in a great while I am afflicted with rather severe and seemingly inexplicable pain in my foot–my left foot, although I cannot swear that it has always been my left foot. I mentioned having it in the end of this past June, but that was quite unusual. The thing that is odd about this pain, which my doctor diagnoses as gout, is that I seem to get it usually–but by no means consistently–in October.

I realized it at Ubercon–probably Ubercon VI, if I’m tracking back aright. What struck me most about it, as I hobbled about with my cane, was that the previous time–and the time the problem was diagnosed–was just in time for Ubercon IV. However, if memory serves, I did not have any pain last year at or around Ubercon VIII–although I probably took the walking stick to be safe.

As of yesterday, the pain had returned, perhaps not with so much of a vengeance as I described in June, but fiercely enough that it was painful even lying down. I had to struggle with it during the afternoon and early evening, as there was much I had to do, including our own grocery shopping; by the end of the night I was using a walking stick, which I continued to use today. All I have taken for it is four hundred milligrams of Ibuprofen (that’s two tablets, but twice the recommended dose), but the pain has started to fade. I hope to attend Ubercon gout-free.

Today’s tasks included, foremost, visiting Kyler. He finishes this phase on Wednesday, and will be home for at least a few hours (assuming I can get him here). After that, the next step is uncertain.

I could tell you several things that did not advance significantly, but there’s not much point to that, so instead I’ll turn my attention to advancing something.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

Schedule?  What Schedule?

October 11, 2007 in Blogs

It was actually quarter after five this morning when I shut down the lights and went to sleep for forty-five minutes before rousting myself to launch the boy onto the bus–and he had more trouble awakening than I, I think. Of course, I went back to bed for a few periodically disrupted hours, and started my real day closer to two.

I would love to blabber some excuse about how I used all that time to catch up on the work I missed when the computer failed on Monday, but it’s a much more mundane explanation: I spent some of that time (not all of it–there still was work to finish) with my wife.

Today, however, has not been kind. It is a mercy that it is Thursday, a light day. However, Kyler needed a few things, and I had to buy some of them and bring all of them to his location; also, one of our houseguests had surgery yesterday and needed to be brought home today. In the midst of this, my poor mother-in-law called. She is worried that her social security check is not yet in the bank. I told her that there was no way I could get everywhere I needed to be and get her to the bank on time, and she was very upset; then I refigured everything, called her back and told her I could do it, but it would be tight; then I got held up with the part about buying things, and had to call her back to say no, I would have to attempt to do it tomorrow. I think that was more upsetting than just having said no the first time, but there was nothing I could do about it.

Thus I’m very near both the beginning and the end of my day–that is, I’m just getting started on today’s work, but I’ll be leaving to retrieve my wife from work before I’ve gotten much farther along. I’ve had to add things to tomorrow, and to Saturday, and am looking at quite a crunch, but at least I’m dealing with today today.

Also, I managed to pull together a draft of the notes for the directors meeting this Sunday. October is the month in which we normally elect officers and decide on our meeting schedule for the coming year, so it’s a big meeting; having that out of the way is good, particularly as there are so many things still in the way.

–M. J. Young

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by M. J. Young

Errand Pinball

October 5, 2007 in Blogs

It is going to sound like a strange story; well, it is a strange story, and there’s not much I can do about that.

You will recall, perhaps, that yesterday we were to celebrate a birthday, and that I was planning to mail some review copies of the new book. I did the latter today, but the former I will be doing today despite plans to have done it yesterday. Yesterday exploded in a strange way.

Some will know that Kyler has wanted to get into a particular program for a while, and has been on a waiting list. While he has been on that waiting list, he has been waiting largely in the company of his girlfriend, who is at school with his brother, two hours away. Late yesterday afternoon he got word that there might be an unexpected opening, but that they would have to let him know when they knew, and he would have to get there as quickly as possible to claim it.

At six eighteen yesterday evening we got word that the answer was yes, and we started scrambling to get him from the school to the program. This was complicated by the fact that we had only a vague idea where the program facilities were, other than that they were down our direction somewhere. It was also complicated by the fact that we had been planning to eat at the birthday dinner, so we had not eaten. He was told that the admissions director would be leaving at ten, but it was evident before we were on the road that we could never make that deadline; however, he could be received if he got there before midnight, and they would run the admissions materials in the morning.

We made it. Shortly after eleven last night, we pulled into the parking lot and were met by someone ready to process him and get him situated. I’m not sure how long that took, but it was near midnight, maybe after, that we were headed home.

We didn’t make it. At least, we did not make it right away. Blame the fact that I was trailblazing more by direction sense than by knowledge of where I was. Blame the fact that I recognized road names or numbers that did not go where I thought they went. Blame Providence, perhaps. I probably went a few miles out of the way (which is not bad for what is actually a fifty minute drive by the most direct country road route) and hit a familiar spot which took me home through an intersection I had expected to avoid, a traffic light in the middle of nowhere between an elementary school and a convenience store, when some complete stranger in the parking lot of the closed store at one in the morning flags us down to beg telephone money. It seems she had been partying with friends, had a fight with one when they stopped here, went inside to buy something, and came out to find everyone had left her there. Not the sort of people to leave someone somewhere, we helped her attempt to reach someone by phone, and then drove her home–back where we’d just been half an hour or so before when we were trying to find our way home. She had trouble staying awake to tell us where we were going, and there was a traffic light with a broken sensor that kept changing but never greenlighting us, but we got her home and returned here shortly after two, I think.

That’s when I finished my forum work. I had trouble getting up with the boy this morning, but he managed to catch the bus; I got the books mailed this afternoon, as mentioned.

That’s not the end of the story, though. Kyler had packed clothes, toiletries, the usual thneeds (a thneed is something that everyone needs), but no pens, papers, envelopes–he needed stationary supplies. I was notified around five thirty that I had to get these and take them to him, which I did (I included a box of paper clips, which those in the know will know is going to make him laugh when he gets them). I was late to church, but not too badly.

I will be going out to dinner in about an hour. Hopefully I can get most of the rest of the work done before then, but if not (as seems likely), family has been informed that I will have to finish when I return. I’m the one who suffers for that, of course, because I’m the one who will be rising early for church in the morning, but hopefully I can catch up with my sleep at some point.

–M. J. Young

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