Why don’t you just tell everyone that you don’t have time to post because you have to get ready for Ubercon?

The question would have been less ironic, I suppose, were it not that the one asking it had called me around one in the morning, when I was trying to make good use of the time my laundry was running by washing some of the dishes which must be under control by the time I leave tomorrow–a phone call that lasted over an hour and took me away from the things I needed to do to look at one of the very forum posts he was suggesting I not answer until Monday.  Yet irony or no, it was a good question.  I could decline to attend today’s game, and let it all slide into Monday.  I would be a lot less pressured in terms of convention preparations were I to do so.

It is not so simple as that, however.  To my mind, the question is not whether I will post today, but whether I will attempt to post tomorrow before I leave.  My inclination at the moment is that I will not, but it is a hesitant inclination.  I believe that I have always posted on Friday before departing for any convention, probably all the way back to Apartment Con years ago.  However, I have also gotten caught in traffic, or fallen behind schedule, or otherwise wound up reaching the first event late, or breathless, or both.  I would like this time to get to my hotel first, leave my suitcase there (since I will be traveling in the pickup this time around, and I do not wish to leave my suitcase in the bed of a pickup in a hotel parking lot in the middle of a New Jersey Turnpike interchange while I spend four to six hours in the convention).  That means I’m looking to leave earlier than I usually get out of bed, and hoping to have accomplished at least a few things before that (although I will probably pack most of the stuff into the truck tonight).  So I already feel a bit guilty about the fact that I am nixing tomorrow’s visit, and to add today to it would be too much.

On top of that, as I pointed out to my caller, the work does not stop stacking up simply because I stop doing it.  Come Monday I will have all that I usually do on Monday, plus whatever I did not do in the interim.  Frequently I have managed to pop in and post upon my return Sunday night–but last Ubercon the last session was packed, and this Ubercon promises to be even more insane, so there’s no hope of an early departure (and really, I do not hope that there will be no interest in the last session).  I will be late getting home, and probably will not be able to do the bare minimum of Sunday’s work.  Thus Monday promises to be nightmarishly overloaded, and adding Thursday to it would be completely foolish.

So here I am; but I make no promises that I will return again before Monday.

–M. J. Young

It was late when I hit the mattress, but not much later than usual.  On the other hand, I’ve been dragging a bit today, and don’t really have time to drag.  I should already have our youngest guest at his doctor’s appointment, but that he is not yet home; I have loaded the trash on the truck to go to the dump (”convenience center” is the term they prefer), but don’t have time to get there and back, so I have to hope to get there after the doctor visit.

And as quick as that, it has all happened.  My essential preparations remaining for today really come down to laundry, and starting to organize all that needs to be packed for the trip to Ubercon.  I also intend to defrost the freezer, because it is iced over but approaching empty, and my mother will undoubtedly stock up my meat supply when I visit her on Sunday evening, so I want to have storage space ready.

For the moment, though, I feel that I may be on top of things.

–M. J. Young

Already I am two hours behind my original unreasonably optimistic schedule for today; I should long ago have left to take my mother-in-law shopping, and in fact be preparing for the next leg of that journey, to return a certain young lady to her northern home.  I’ve planned to have dessert and coffee with a friend while up that way, who is interested in seeing the new books.

Speaking of the new books, the Faith and Gaming copies arrived today.  I didn’t order many, but we’ll see how they sell.  I’ve already promised one to the church library, and mentioned to a young high school senior at the church that I would give it to him to peruse before it gets that far, and it’s possible I could sell out on these quickly if things go well–but that’s partly because I did not put much money into stocking copies for myself.

I also managed to make my hotel reservation for Ubercon.  I’m at a nice comfortable inexpensive motel six in the next town; I stayed there last time, and it’s probably less than ten minutes’ drive (I kept finding shorter ways to make the trip, but it will take a couple tries to get it all back in my head).  I’ll be paying a bit less for two nights than convention guests at the select hotels will pay for each night, but I won’t have a shuttle so I’ll have to drive myself between the two points.

I’ve also received an updated analysis of The Last Mimzy, and sent a cursory response; it will require more attention from me, but that probably won’t happen this week, if I can avoid it.

Things are piling up, so I’d better unpile them.

–M. J. Young

The Collision concert went reasonably well last night.  Baxter brought his new amp, which looks really good, but because we’d not worked with it I suggested we use the old one for this concert.  Adam got crossed communication wires and went to the wrong coffeehouse location, and since Brittany had to be out early we got a short delay and then did the first song without him, tuned up the bass while Brittany introduced the second, and finished our two songs to audience approval.  I got some compliments on Adam’s playing, but he ducked out early.  Baxter and I did an encore near the end of the night, which also went well, although not as well as the opening songs.

Meanwhile, I’m starting to get nervous about the week ahead.  I’ve got Ubercon on Friday, and Kyler has indicated that he will not be going this time, and I’m not certain what John’s situation is.  I can probably handle it alone–but there are still many preparations to make, including getting my hotel reservation (I don’t know anyone close enough to Edison to stay with them, despite having attended elementary school within half an hour of there).  I have to do inventory of everything that has to go with me, probably printing copies of forms used, and make sure that I have everything packed.  Complicating this, my Monday Workload has been increased because when I take my mother-in-law shopping I will also have to go about ninety minutes further to return a certain young lady to her home.  Then my overbooked Tuesday has been further overbooked by the need to help an old friend move.  I’ve also realized that our youngest guest’s medicine will run out next weekend, and that his doctor cannot refill it without seeing him, so I’m going to have to twist arms to get him an appointment midweek on top of everything else.

It’s not looking good; and I have been alerted that there is a substantial amount of work awaiting me in the form of an analysis of The Last Mimzy that will add a significant chunk of time to Monday’s work.

Conventions always mean crazy weeks; unfortunately, crazy weeks don’t always wait until they are convenient.

–M. J. Young

Sometimes it feels to me as if I have not accomplished much–particularly when I wind up collapsing early, then going on late-night errands, then sleeping well into the next afternoon only to commit to long errands on behalf of others.  However, review of the facts suggests otherwise.

At some time within the last twenty-four hours I finished reading a book I have promised to review.  It was an allegorical science fantasy illustrated novel by a writer I know somewhat personally (never met but have corresponded), whose work I have reviewed before.  I’m not certain when I’ll get to the review, as I’ve a lot on my plate at the moment, but I will get to it.

I also returned my attention to the Multiverser Triple Play:  Horror supplement.  What I did was copy all the notes from the development forum to a document on my hard drive.  I was fighting a headache yesterday which is attributable to the fact that the disruptions of the day prevented me ever from getting a cup of coffee, and so I did not feel up to making all the checks as to what still had to be done with those notes.  However, it’s a step in the right direction, and as things appear now sometime after Ubercon I may be able to make progress on it.

I also provided an extensive response to questions about a developing temporal anomalies analysis of The Last Mimzy, which took probably an hour or so from today’s precious time but will mean a new page on the Temporal Anomalies site which might garner some traffic and interest in turn in the Multiverser books.

I’ve agreed to pick up the girlfriend of one of my sons tonight; he has agreed to help keep the dishes under control all weekend.  If he hasn’t got them under control before nine I guess I’m not going, and I’ll have more time to work, but I am hoping that he is sufficiently motivated by the desire to have her visit that he will get to them in time.

I’m also committed to a Collision concert tomorrow night, sans drums or major amplifiers, at the church coffeehouse.  They do this once or twice a year.  Brittany has a school assignment that requires her to be at another location fairly early, so we’re going to have to ask to be at the beginning of the night, but I think they’ll accommodate us.  Last night’s rehearsal went quite well, thank you, and I’m comfortable with our ability to do these two songs at a performance quality level.

I’m not as confident in my ability to finish everything else that must be done, however, so I’d better get to it.

–M. J. Young

I stare at the screen wondering what to type.  It is very like writer’s block; I do not know what to say.

Of course, it isn’t really writer’s block.  The reason I don’t know what to type is that I was here late last night and am back again early this afternoon, and nothing has happened in the interim.  Of course, it’s not true that nothing has happened.  I got a phone call last night telling me that the Game Ideas Unlimited Volume 1 books would be arriving today (according to tracking information)–and lo, as I am typing the crunch of truck breaks out front alerts me to the arrival. I have now seen copies, and they look good, so assuming I make it, they should be with me at Ubercon.

While I’m on the subject of Game Ideas Unlimited, let me call attention to the next in the series, Screen Wrap.

I did not actually get to bed early–I did, but not early enough–and so I am already tired from a somewhat early start intended to manage anticipated disruptions which have already occurred.  Let me press forward, in the hope that I can finish before I am again too tired.

–M. J. Young

At the end of last week I received word that someone about two hours away needed a ride here by midweek, and it was agreed that I would pick him up on Monday, that is, today, after taking care of my mother-in-law’s shopping trip.  To some degree I scrambled my day, so that I could make sure people were fed and get a fair amount of the work done before making what was to be a six hour errand.  It did not all work exactly according to plan, but I had finished the first half of it and was about to make the last jump when I got word that there had been a change at his end, that complications had arisen and he was not certain he could make it and would make other arrangements.

I’ll confess that I was disappointed but also relieved.  He is a big help when he is here, but I was already tired and knew I had much to do still–particularly since the final front cover for the Faith and Gaming book had arrived in the e-mail, and I was going to have to deal with formatting and uploading files to finish that book.

That book is now available.  It is in a sort of pre-release form–only because the next formal step is to set up a distribution package, which means adding an ISBN, which means editing that onto the title page of the book and uploading the edited text and losing a few days of availability while everything is put in place–a few days I cannot afford if I am to have copies for Ubercon.  So I am ordering my copies for that (not too many, but enough to have available), and when I get a chance to clear my head I’ll take the next step.

That means copies ordered now will be different from those ordered in a couple weeks, as they won’t have the International Standard Book Number or barcode on them.  I know some people like having those unusual copies.  Of course, it also means I’ve not seen them and don’t know how they actually look, but that’s part of the charm.

Much to do.  Let me get to it.

–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 have gotten a bit closer to the goal of releasing Game Ideas Unlimited in time for Ubercon X.  This afternoon in a few stolen minutes I managed to work through a few more of the hoops in the software interaction between the two programs.  I am not yet there, but if tonight’s game does not run late I might be able to get the rest done–and if it does, I might have to cancel a game session or something to finish it.

That’s because tomorrow is looking rather crowded; but I’ll talk about tomorrow then.

Thanks go to one of our lurkers for his assistance in this.

–M. J. Young

I was actually so far along as to be backing out of the drive last night, on my way to bring home a son when my wife rushed outside and relieved me of that task.  Thus I was granted a bit of extra time, during which I put some into the proofreading of the new Game Ideas Unlimited:  Volume I and some into updating the Gaming Outpost archives, which I consider to be in part precursor to working on the next volume in the series, although I am admittedly doing much more than I need to do for that.  (After all, Aaron and company have always done much more than they needed to do for us, and it’s good to be able to return the favor, even though friendships are not about balance sheets.)

We are all working frantically toward the completion of this book.  I’ve asked four people for input on the cover design (quite apart from having asked everyone here), and three of them have answered, but I’m thinking that the fourth will help settle matters to a significant degree.  We have a directors meeting Sunday, and we hope to know what the cost per copy to us will be by that time, so that we can have copies in hand at Ubercon X at the end of the month–the last weekend of the month, for anyone who is in the area and hadn’t caught the dates.

Thus it is promising that I’ve gotten a bit of an early start, as I might just get a chunk of stuff completed before the day ends.

It comes to mind that last Thursday I delayed pointing to the next article in the old series because I’d promised to do that on Friday, and then everything fell apart bouncing it into a very tight Sunday.  To avoid such a complication this week, I’m going to point to the next article in the series now, Game Ideas Unlimited:  Transmats, and set up a thread in the forum for comments and thoughts on it.  I’ll see you there.

–M. J. Young