23 Hours

The fourth book in David Wellington’s vampire series, 23 Hours, continues the story of Laura Caxton and her pursuit of the blood drinking monsters.  This time, due to the events of the last book, Caxton is in prison and the world’s last vampire comes to play.

I’m a huge fan of Wellington’s work, read and loved them all.  So it is no surprise that I liked this one too.  After seeing so many books using vampires as romantic objects, it is nice to return to this world where they are more like sharks, mouths full of teeth, death on two legs.  Anyway, I hope I’m not spoiling too much when I say I’ll be eagerly awaiting book five.

Dragon*Con 2008: Day Four

The last day of Con is always the worst.  First, because it comes after the last night of Con, which is usually filled with too much drinking and staying up way too late.  Then there is the packing in order to check out before getting dinged for another day stay.  And as bad as you feel, any panelists feel worse, because not only do they have the same issues you do, but they also have to be on panels.  The last day of Con is always the slowest.

After getting the car packed and heading back in, I made another trip through the dealer and exhibitor rooms.  After a few days of saying there was nothing worth seeing you might wonder why I would go back… well, being the last day, many sellers weigh the expense of hauling back product versus cutting the price.  So, its no surprise on Monday at Dragon*Con to see 20%… 50%… or higher signs.  See, if you buy early, you pay more, but you will get your item.  If you wait, you might pay less, or you might be too late.  I found a stall selling RPG materials, all items $2, so I picked up random curiosities, like the Starship Troopers pen and paper game.  I wouldn’t pay the normal price, but for $2?  Hells yeah!

Then it was off to the panels… Free MMOs was up first.  There are lots, most of them look like crap (to me, anything anime is crap, I hate that style, all asian MMOs, free or not free, are boring soulless garbage), but some don’t.

And the pen and paper game Aftermath! has been licensed for an MMO.  I heart the apocalypse, so I hope they succeed.

With those last panels out of the way, it was time to head home and sleep…

Dragon*Con 2008: Day One

One of the things I enjoy most about Con are the panels.  Yeah, the costumes and parties are cool and all that, but I also come for the panels.  In a good, well run panel, you can actually learn quite a bit, participate in discussions and meet people with similar interests.  In a poorly run panel, the only thing you learn is that there is a reason for having a moderator who actually cares about the subject at hand.

I’m not going to point any fingers and name names, but many of the panels I went to today were not well run at all.  People asking stupid questions, panelist meandering through unrelated subjects, entire topics being misunderstood and abandoned…  Not a good day at the con at all.

But then came the drinking and the people watching, which is always fun.

To cap off the night, the wife and I decided to duck into a concert.  99% of live performances by bands are not intended for people who like lyrics and don’t already know the songs by heart.  The music is cranked so loud that the only thing you know for sure about the words is that the song does have lyrics, and sometimes you can make out the tones, but actual phrases are lost beneath the thrumming beat and the wailing guitars.

Oh well… there’s always drinking and people watching…

28 June 1998

Well, I missed a few days… but I have an excuse… My dog ate my employment application.
Actually, I now have a job… Seagull Software. I start that on July 6th, so next weekend is my last “free” weekend. Not that I’ll be working weekends, but it’ll be the last weekend that isn’t followed by getting up on Monday morning.
Now that job hunting is over, what am I gonna do now… I already decided that all my free time from here on out will be focusing on projects for North 5. First and foremost being the web page. Then I’ll start working on other things…
I’m not usually one to quote myself, but I said something that was actually pretty nifty the other night… while out drinking on Friday at the Ugly Mug Pub, I just casually said to a couple of fellow gamers from DoS, “You know that you have been spending too much time playing on-line games when you refer to being drunk as lag.” Friday night I didn’t get drunk… but on Saturday, hehe… I went to a party / pool tournament, what follows is a chronicle of the games last night:
First off, I playing some practice games against Frank.. nice guy, decent pool player, but he doesn’t play his shots with the next one in mind, meaning he doesn’t line up shots too well.. Anyhow, first game went to him when I scratched while trying to sink the 8, and the second game he still had 5 balls on the table when I dropped the 8 for the win. After that Derek and I started a game that was going pretty evenly, but we never finished because the tourney began.
I was told in the beginning of the evening that the man to beat was Austin, of the 5 tourneys they had held, he had won 3. So of course when we drew numbers for the games, he was in my bracket. Not my first game, but in my bracket. My first game was against Robby, and I almost lost. He was up with only the 14 left on the table and I had 5 balls out there. He missed a shot and I got lucky as hell by ending my turn everytime leaving him no shot on the 14. Slowly I worked down the table, and his last shot of the game, he left me set up to drop my last ball and then the 8. After almost losing it, I pulled back and won. I decided it was time to start drinking.
My next game, as luck would have it was against Pete, ForceTen of Clan DoS, and we were fighting out to see who would play Austin in the semi-final round. The game was going easy enough with Pete and I both sinking a ball or two, but I hadn’t drunk nearly enough to be good yet, so I was nervous. Then Pete dropped the 8 in by accident and took himself out of the game. At this point I think the last 3 or 4 games had ended that way.
Now was the semi-finals, me versus the legendary Austin, and I was on my 7th or 8th drink and fading fast, time to get nasty. = ) The game was normal enough, I took the break and we both traded off getting balls down, but then he took a lead and got about 3 balls ahead of me. With only the 6 on the table, he started chasing it around never quite getting it to drop in a pocket. In the end, he missed a shot on the 6 and set me up perfect for my last couple shots. The king is dead, long live the king. hehe. I’ll admit, I got lucky here. I really didn’t think I had a chance, but with the cops hangin’ around outside deciding whether or not to come in looking for minors drinking (of which their were none) and the hosts flipping out because I think they suspected a person or two to be holding (if you don’t know, don’t ask), I would guess that Austin was a little off his game. Besides, I have always been of the opinion that even when you know you can win, you should lose every now and then to keep the odds up. = )
For the finals, I was playing Scott. The game was going evenly when out of my drunken haze I had a moment of clarity and dropped 3 balls in a row and took the lead. We played back and forth a little but finally I whittled down the table and dropped my last ball. I had a nice setup on the 8, but it’s one of those shots where if you sink the 8, it’s great, but if you go a couple degrees off the mark, you scratch.
I got $43 for second place.
I must give out kudos to Kelly and Sean… they throw a kick-ass shindig.. I’m just a little upset that I missed the female, naked body-shots because I was playing pool. Next time I’ll know better and lose in the first round like Eric (D’oh!! hehehe).
I am also very glad that I am one of those people that just don’t get hang-overs…
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Today’s Song: Hey Man Nice Shot by Filter for all the obvious reasons.. this song really needed to get played during the tourney.
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Today’s Movie: The Outsiders. This was on TV during the party… I love this movie. See it.