Good News!

I meant to post this Monday and then meant to do it Tuesday, but here it is at last. I've got to stop ignoring my online communities for so many days at a time...

It's been about a week since I last stopped in here and longer since I last wrote. It's been one of those periods when lots of stuff happens, good and bad without leaving many events that stand out in my mind. I've spent a lot of time feeling busy without seeming to get much done. A lot of little things made me think that I'd mention them in an entry. The way the crocuses by the YMCA looked when I walked past, the yellow reminding me of Brach's butterscotch candies but richer in the way that only flower petals can be. The whooshing sound of the wind in the trees just before I felt it push against me. My stepfather's comments on his first experience of Mardi Gras.

My cough has eased a bit. I haven't been able to get to the doctor yet. The resurgence seems very definitely to be linked to the cold air I got when I helped Scott shovel snow. I still have trouble when I do a lot of talking (running game sessions is less fun under the circumstances). As long as I stay warm and well hydrated, I don't have much trouble. I just have to remember to take my scarf with me every time I go out, even when I think it's warm enough that I won't need it. Our weather's been varying quite a bit in terms of temperature, so it's impossible to guess what things will be like even a few hours in the future.

The big news came last Friday about 3:30 or 4:00 (just before Scott got home from work). I got a call from Bonnie Martilla from the Long Term Disability Office at the U. She told me that they'd reviewed my claim again and decided that I am, after all, disabled. She didn't have any numbers for me then, and I haven't heard from her today, but-- The important thing is that I'll be getting benefits. I was so happy I started shaking; I could barely even talk to her.

As soon as I got off the phone with Bonnie Martilla, I called my mother. She was home, studying for the bar exam (which she should be taking right now). She was very pleased by the news. She and I agreed that probably Uncle Frank had filed the papers to sue; the timing was about right. Back in January, he drafted a letter saying he'd file in 30 days, and the timing's about right. I tried to call him but only got his voice mail. I left a message thanking him; I'll have to try calling him again later.

While I was talking to my mother, I heard the garage door lift. I said a hasty goodby and went to greet Scott. I went out on the back porch in my stocking feet. Naturally, he sat in the car for a few minutes gathering his stuff and so on. That made me a little grumpy since I wanted to tell him as soon as possible. I didn't want to scream the news for the whole neighborhood to hear, and yelling was the only way he'd have heard me from inside the garage.

After that, we called Scott's parents to let them know, and I sent out an e-mail to let most of our local friends know (a lot of them are on a single mailing list). I also sent an e-mail to my father's current girlfriend (How strange it seems to use any word containing "girl" in reference to a woman who has a five year old grandson!). She and Papa are about to move, and I knew the e-mail wouldn't change even though the phone number was likely to.

Other News

Last week, I spent time with Jenn and Amy, off and on, and went on with my normal activities. I finally got my COBRA papers, and Amy took me out to Wolverine Towers to deliver them. She needed to visit Human Resources herself to see what jobs were posted, so she needed to go over there anyway. I suppose there's a certain irony that I got the COBRA stuff fully taken care of just before the LTD got approved. Sadly, I don't entirely appreciate it.

Monday was my step-father's birthday. I gave him a call in the evening, and we talked for a while. He's enjoying teaching graduate students, finding it more interesting than the undergraduate instruction he did before. He mentioned that he's got a grant for research for next year and is looking forward to it. He seems a little frustrated by Mom's preparations for the bar exam and the stress they're causing her, nothing major, more a sense that he's having to do things without her for a while.

We also got the paperwork out for our application to refinance our house. Scott had forgotten a few things when he sent the first batch in, so he had to deliver the rest of it last Tuesday. I was supposed to see my psychotherapist that afternoon, and he couldn't do both. I took advantage of needing to take the bus to my appointment to get myself to the public library. (That's when I saw the crocuses. The Y's by the bus station and library.) The weather was a little warmer than is normal for February, so I enjoyed my time outside. I picked up a few new books then headed out for my appointment. I got off the bus there with about 45 minutes to kill, so I went to Denny's to stay warm (Warmer than normal is still not warm, at least not in February). I indulged in a hamburger (garlic mushroom Swiss) after counting servings and figuring out that the only category it was likely to push me over in was fats.

It was a rather intense session in terms of discussion. I was trying to find words to make her fully understand the level of anxiety that I live with all the time. I've tried before, and it's pretty difficult. I suspect that it's rather analogous to trying to explain music to someone who's deaf. The theory's clear enough, but without the actual experience comprehension remains incomplete. She asked me again as she does from time to time whether or not I was ever sexually abused. I answered the question as I always do by saying that I have no recollection of such a thing or indication that anything of the sort happened. I think my therapist forgets that she's asked before rather than that she thinks the answer will change.

I suppose it's understandable. That sort of abuse is the most common explanation for symptoms of the sort I have, and she'd be negligent not to ask. Every therapist I've ever seen has asked. Answering the question becomes kind of irritating after a while, kind of like the frustration of trying to explain to different doctors that my worst headaches are combinations of sinus, tension and migraine and need medication for all three. I know the truth, but I also know that the person I'm talking to has no way of knowing and possibly no reason for believing what I say.

Wednesday, I ran the Amber game. It went pretty well. I was able to juggle a few things so that events within the story fell into place together. Everybody felt like they got to do something, and the plot progressed in the direction I'd intended without the players feeling like I was dictating anything. Jenn sat in.

Thursday, I took Jenn and Amy out for dessert. I'd planned to splurge and break my diet with a dessert once during Jenn's visit to town, and that's how it worked out. As it turned out the timing was just what I needed. It had been a bad day up till that point. I discovered that Scott had taped the wrong thing when he tried to tape Buffy for me on Tuesday (I went out with Amy and Jenn; he stayed home and watched the episode). He keeps forgetting that the show has moved to a different channel. At any rate, I didn't discover the problem until I put the tape in Thursday morning, intending to watch it while I did some other work.

As it turned out, the stuff I was working on, preparing for the LARP I ran on Sunday, was fairly messed up. I ended up spending 2-3 hours cleaning up some stuff that shouldn't have been a problem. I got fairly stressed out over it and didn't actually eat anything until we went out for dessert. After we went out, we all came back here so that the other ladies could check their e-mail. I played a few songs for Amy since she'd been wondering about the "theme songs" I'd selected for some of the Amber npcs at Laura's prompting.

Scott brought me a single red rose. He'd stopped on the way home to get it for me. It's still blooming in a vase on top of one of our bookshelves. I was very pleased to get it; I love roses.
Scott even managed to get his shower in before Cheryl, the woman who helped us out with running the LARP, showed up for her pre-game briefing. I'd wanted her to have a chance to talk to Scott since we were asking her to do some of what Scott and I usually handle. We got that done in about an hour so that she could get home to her husband and daughter.

I was doing fairly well until later that evening. Wednesday, I'd put a tape in the VCR to catch that evening's episode of The Pretender which was one of the few I lack. I forgot to take the tape out after it was done but figured that it didn't matter because the episode on Thursday was the same that I had in the second hour of the tape. What I didn't know was that Scott had watched the tape the night before, rewound it and left it in the VCR.

I lost my temper. I still don't understand how he could do that. He was the one who programmed the VCR and set it up to tape from 7-8pm every night, so he should have remembered that that was what it would do. If I'd done it, I'd have set it for just the specific nights that I needed to tape, but Scott told me that since we had five episodes to get (I lost the tape with the 4 previous episodes on it and wanted to retape them) it was better to set up one program.

Basically, all of the day's frustrations came out. It was hard because there was nothing to be done to fix what had happened. Scott was so contrite that being angry at him felt pointless. That sort of thing leaves me feeling especially helpless. I want to fix the problem, force whoever or whatever's responsible to make it right. Scott doesn't help because he just shuts down under those circumstances. He goes away just when I need him. I've tried explaining that that disengagement makes the pain worse for me, and he's responded that he assumes that anything active he does will make the situation worse. I don't know if we'll ever work that problem out.

Naturally, the fact that I hadn't eaten much (apart from dessert) all day didn't help. I eventually got Scott to hold me while I cried. Then he pulled an Uno's sea delico pizza out of the freezer and baked it for me. It wasn't really on the diet, but I badly needed the calories. I had two pieces and put the rest away for later. Pizza doesn't really fit the diet since I don't have much in the way of dairy allocations due to my allergies. I'm still losing weight, however, so I'm not too worried.

We'd been planning the LARP for quite some time. I hadn't put much work into it because I trusted that Laura would do the recruiting. I suddenly realized on the 7th or 8th that I didn't yet have enough confirmed players to be able to run the game, known as Family Plot, is larger than most with 40 possible characters, so I need at least 25 to run it. As of the morning of the 8th, I had 10. I told Laura that I needed to be sure of at least 20 by the evening of the 10th in order to commit to running. She started putting the word out to her people, and I started beating the bushes to see who I could find.

I sent out a few e-mails and got a few responses. Laura had more luck than I. By Monday, we had 32 players signed up. At that point, I asked Matt Q. to print the characters. I hadn't wanted to ask him to do it until I was sure we'd use them. Several of the people who'd sent in surveys earlier recruited friends to play.

I spent Thursday evening (before the blow up and after the crying) assigning characters. It's a difficult process because all I have to go on in most cases is a few sentences in answer to some questions and, if I'm very lucky, a vague memory of encountering the person at other games. The people I know personally are easier to cast, but I don't want to always give them the best characters, particularly when they're not the ones who sign up first. Some of the characters that I design would bore me to tears or frustrate me dreadfully; there are players, however, for whom those characters are lots of fun. I just have to guess what matches up.

This time out, everybody seems to have had fun. I'd signed up 34 players by game time on Sunday. We had two walk-ins and three no-shows (Two because they were a couple one of whom had a flare up of serious back pain that day and one for no reason that I've been able to discover). Scott, Cheryl and I managed to keep the game running fairly smoothly, and I have the impression that most, if not all, of the players had a good time. At any rate, nobody left early or seemed to feel that they'd wasted seven hours. I think part of the success of the scenario rests on having a couple of things going on that are guaranteed to catch anyone who's not doing something else (and some who are).

Now I have to clean up a few details from this game so that it's properly put together to run again the next time I need it (I expect it'll be a few years) and then start work on updating the game I'm supposed to run in April. I'm quite hopeful that that one will fill entirely. It can only handle 20 players, so it's entirely possible I'll have more players than I can cast. Laura wants me to run it on April 7th. The other option is April 21st which would give me two more weeks, but that's much closer to finals. Many of our players aren't students, but many are. I can understand why those who are wouldn't want to lose several hours of prime studying time.

Fading Roses

The rose Scott gave me on the 14th has more or less given up the ghost. It lasted almost a week, which is pretty good given the amount of attention I'm likely to remember to give such things. I always feel a bit of regret when a flower fades and dies; I feel somehow responsible and as if I ought to apologize. It's not enough to make me not want cut flowers just a bit of bittersweetness.

I've just spent a couple of hours preparing some things for Laura. She's asked if I'll let her run the short Amber scenario I designed for her gaming group, and I don't have any problem with that. I just needed to put the documents into a format she can read and print and write up a summary of all the things I carry in my head with relation to the scenario. Hopefully, I'll have given her all that she needs to get the story going. I did find that I had a hard time writing some of it down because it's so situation dependent. I did several lists of ways that she might approach various parts of the story. For example, the characters need to get out of a besieged castle early on but may not want to leave. If they don't want to leave, there are a couple of npcs that might give them a shove in that direction. If they do, one character has an ability that might get them out or they might have to wander through a labyrinth of caves or... You get the idea.

Scott ran TechTool on our hard drive last night in an effort to figure out why OS X doesn't like our CD-ROM drive. Sadly the major result of that seems to be that I've lost a chunk of e-mail again. Everything I received after about noon on Friday is gone as is everything I sent out after about noon on Saturday. I think the only really important loss is a message my father sent me, but it's still annoying.

The University has sent me another set of COBRA papers. Don't ask me why. I already filled out the first set and turned them in with payment. Sigh.

And I've got to make sure I don't skip my online reading for too long again. It's taken me three days to get caught up, and I limited myself to skimming in many cases. There are also a couple of OD+ diaries that I couldn't open at all (Mel and Christina Elizabeth, if you have any ideas why I can't get into your diaries, please let me know!). I think it's a question of graphics and the like in one case as I've had sporadic trouble there before but am not at all sure about the other.

Amy's supposed to stop by this afternoon to give me the notes for last week's Amber session. I want to get them edited and sent to Laura as soon as possible. I was pleased to be told over the weekend that Justin's been following the game through the website. If Jenn does so as well (and she said she intends to), that'll give us an audience of at least two. I think that's a motivation to keep things up to date.

I find this interest fairly flattering, and I expect that the players will too. I'll have to ask Laura to add a link so that people can e-mail me if they have questions or guesses about what's really going on or suggestions for new plot twists. I'd been meaning to ask her to provide a link back to my own website anyway.