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Aug. 12th, 2015 09:59 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_rckI slept middling well last night but woke up feeling groggy and generally bleh. For some reason, my left breast (the one that gets biopsied tomorrow) hurts. The right one is fine, so I can't figure it out.
Scott discovered yesterday that the car rental was costing a lot more than he thought it was. He thought it was $33 a day, but it was actually $77. He looked at the rental agreement and couldn't find the actual price specified anywhere on it.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
evalerie is going to loan us a car from this evening forward, but we've racked up a considerable bill.
Scott's definitely leaning toward another Subaru Forester. He's just not quite ready to commit to it. Also, his parents have friends whose son works for Subaru and might be willing/able to get us a deal on a car. The dealership is only willing to give us $500 as a trade-in on our old car. That's not terribly surprising, given the repairs it needs, but it is disappointing.
Scott and I both want to run something at UCon. I don't think a LARP is on the table for us this year. I suppose I might be able to do it if everything turns out to be fine with the biopsy, but I'm feeling sort of fried, and a LARP is a lot of work, even one I've run before. Scott's thinking to run XCom, and he thought I should run Sentinels of the Multiverse. I think he likes the idea of board/card games because there's not nearly as much preparation work involved. I'd really love to run a small role playing scenario, but I'm not sure that I'm up to the work involved. I also haven't GMed anything in about thirteen years and don't know any of the systems people seem to commonly run at conventions these days.
Of course, buying a car and everything might have an impact on whether or not we can afford to go to UCon.
My SIL and niece are going to come down early so that all four of us can go to lunch before my appointment. I need to be at my appointment at 1:00, so we're aiming for 11:00 for lunch. I still miss Cafe Marie, but at least, Panera's not terrible.
A couple of active parents of students in Cordelia's class are trying to organize a bunch of activities between now and the beginning of school. Unfortunately, I don't see us being able to do most of them, not with Scott's work schedule. I'm debating emailing the list to see if someone is willing to drive Cordelia to and from the laser tag session, but she'll only want to go if someone she likes is going, too, and I'm pretty sure that none of her friends will be going. We could probably go to the picnic that's supposed to be on the school playground (construction permitting), but it would take a huge bite out of our Sunday, and that's the only day we can be sure that Scott will be home most weeks.
Scott looked up the terms of Cordelia's phone contract last night because she's been getting massive numbers of texts recently (mostly Google hangouts as that's where kids she knows gather). She has unlimited texting, fortunately, but her data allowance is measured in MB. As Scott said, no wonder she's constantly running out.
I finished my link finding last night. Pinterest wouldn't let me go back as far as I wanted to, but I probably didn't miss anything. The links there are usually to posts that are years old or are things that get linked four or five times over the course of a few days. I only lost a day or two. It's my week to post, and I'll probably end up posting on Friday. The other link finder doesn't have her stuff in yet and may very well have gone to bed already. I really, really don't see myself being together enough to post tomorrow.
I've stepped my Wellbutrin down again so that I'm taking 100 mg twice a day. I really hope that that means the end of the dry mouth problems I've been having since we went up to 150 mg twice a day back in January or February.
I've been listening to a variety of things on YouTube. Amazon is recommending a lot of music to me, and most of it is artists I've never heard of. Of course, judging by what I've tried so far, there's a reason for that. What on earth makes Amazon's algorithm think that I'm interested in some of this? I've wishlisted and/or bought folk, bluegrass, 1980s top 40, and some Beatles. So far, I've tried and disliked Deep Purple, Nightwish, Rainbow, Within Temptation, and Epica. I didn't out and out dislike Kamelot, but I'm not at all sure I liked them.
Scott discovered yesterday that the car rental was costing a lot more than he thought it was. He thought it was $33 a day, but it was actually $77. He looked at the rental agreement and couldn't find the actual price specified anywhere on it.
evalerie is going to loan us a car from this evening forward, but we've racked up a considerable bill.Scott's definitely leaning toward another Subaru Forester. He's just not quite ready to commit to it. Also, his parents have friends whose son works for Subaru and might be willing/able to get us a deal on a car. The dealership is only willing to give us $500 as a trade-in on our old car. That's not terribly surprising, given the repairs it needs, but it is disappointing.
Scott and I both want to run something at UCon. I don't think a LARP is on the table for us this year. I suppose I might be able to do it if everything turns out to be fine with the biopsy, but I'm feeling sort of fried, and a LARP is a lot of work, even one I've run before. Scott's thinking to run XCom, and he thought I should run Sentinels of the Multiverse. I think he likes the idea of board/card games because there's not nearly as much preparation work involved. I'd really love to run a small role playing scenario, but I'm not sure that I'm up to the work involved. I also haven't GMed anything in about thirteen years and don't know any of the systems people seem to commonly run at conventions these days.
Of course, buying a car and everything might have an impact on whether or not we can afford to go to UCon.
My SIL and niece are going to come down early so that all four of us can go to lunch before my appointment. I need to be at my appointment at 1:00, so we're aiming for 11:00 for lunch. I still miss Cafe Marie, but at least, Panera's not terrible.
A couple of active parents of students in Cordelia's class are trying to organize a bunch of activities between now and the beginning of school. Unfortunately, I don't see us being able to do most of them, not with Scott's work schedule. I'm debating emailing the list to see if someone is willing to drive Cordelia to and from the laser tag session, but she'll only want to go if someone she likes is going, too, and I'm pretty sure that none of her friends will be going. We could probably go to the picnic that's supposed to be on the school playground (construction permitting), but it would take a huge bite out of our Sunday, and that's the only day we can be sure that Scott will be home most weeks.
Scott looked up the terms of Cordelia's phone contract last night because she's been getting massive numbers of texts recently (mostly Google hangouts as that's where kids she knows gather). She has unlimited texting, fortunately, but her data allowance is measured in MB. As Scott said, no wonder she's constantly running out.
I finished my link finding last night. Pinterest wouldn't let me go back as far as I wanted to, but I probably didn't miss anything. The links there are usually to posts that are years old or are things that get linked four or five times over the course of a few days. I only lost a day or two. It's my week to post, and I'll probably end up posting on Friday. The other link finder doesn't have her stuff in yet and may very well have gone to bed already. I really, really don't see myself being together enough to post tomorrow.
I've stepped my Wellbutrin down again so that I'm taking 100 mg twice a day. I really hope that that means the end of the dry mouth problems I've been having since we went up to 150 mg twice a day back in January or February.
I've been listening to a variety of things on YouTube. Amazon is recommending a lot of music to me, and most of it is artists I've never heard of. Of course, judging by what I've tried so far, there's a reason for that. What on earth makes Amazon's algorithm think that I'm interested in some of this? I've wishlisted and/or bought folk, bluegrass, 1980s top 40, and some Beatles. So far, I've tried and disliked Deep Purple, Nightwish, Rainbow, Within Temptation, and Epica. I didn't out and out dislike Kamelot, but I'm not at all sure I liked them.
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no subject
Date: 2015-08-12 02:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-08-14 02:33 pm (UTC)I tend to play fast and loose with the rules no matter what system I'm running. For campaigns, I'm always up front about that and only take on players who're okay with that. For a convention game, I think expectations are harder to manage.
I'm also a lot better at planning a scenario and creating characters than I am at actually running a short game. My GMing style tends toward plot digressions and complications that I hadn't planned but that seem like a good idea at the time. When I run a campaign, I'm good at tying all of that stuff together so that the players think I planned it all in detail. A four hour game, however, doesn't give me any room to improvise in the ways I like to.
The last time I tried to run a short, simple scenario, I advertised it as such and still got several people who'd played my LARPs and were expecting something like that, something complicated and surprising. I want to learn to run short table top games as well as LARPs and table top campaigns, but I need time to start at the beginning with something straightforward. Maybe it is a pity I have no idea how to run a D20 dungeon crawl...
no subject
Date: 2015-08-13 12:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-08-14 02:20 pm (UTC)It seems to have gone pretty well. Now, I just have to cultivate patience...
on Amazon recommendations
Date: 2015-08-13 06:54 pm (UTC)Ritchie Blackmore was a guitarist in Deep Purple when I was a sprout ("Smoke on the Water!!! Yeaaaah!!!!!") and, in the 1990s, in Rainbow.
Amazon's not going to care about the changes in style between Blackmore's projects; I think he ties them all together in their system. Alternatively, a lot of hard rock/metal fans follow Blackmore over to the "medieval folk" Blackmore's Night project. (Candice Night is Mrs. Blackmore.)
I meant to push the Abigail Washburn and Bela Fleck married-banjo album at you; had you heard that?
This week I'm marinating in CDs picked up at the Great Lakes Folk Festival, last weekend in East Lansing. Mostly Hot Club of Cowtown (western swing, with a Django Reinhardt gypsy jazz influence) and Genticorum (Quebec); also some blues and old-time music from Jerron Paxton, though he was better live than on CD. The festival had a very hot bluegrass band called Newtown, but I haven't gotten to that CD yet.
Getting Pushy department:
Here's a Newtown video for "Frank and Jesse James", which was a song I liked from the festival:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0Z-RbcTbz8
Here's a Hot Club of Cowtown video for "Ida Red", which has been one of their hits for years:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xv-03ISRAGE
PBS feature on Abigail Washburn & Bela Fleck:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Y0bXvq6VRM
Music, from moi
Date: 2015-08-13 08:17 pm (UTC)About Nightwish -- there have been three female singers to date -- Tarja (the first one), Anette Olzon (the second one), and the current one, Floor Jansen, who I have not yet heard sing. Tarja is the most operatic/dramatic (overblown) of the two I've heard, while Anette is more lyrical. I really like Anette's tenure with the band, although my daughter and other rabid fans miss Tarja a LOT. If you want to try an Anette song, look up ``Amaranth''. While the band's sound is always ``symphonic metal'', it can vary a lot depending on the singer/frontwoman. I get to listen to a lot of Nightwish because Rhiannon plays it in the car while she's driving.
Actually, I also get to listen to a lot of Within Temptation, too. Originally, Gareth was a big fan, so I got "The Heart of Everything" back in 2007, which satisfied my Within Temptation needs (though the earlier song ``Ice Queen'' has an amazingly kick-ass video, as I recall). Rhiannon still loves them, so I get them on car rotation too. Again, it's ``symphonic metal'' or ``goth metal'', according to the metal classifications out there now.
I have no idea why Amazon would try to hook you up with those two bands, unless it listed Blackmore's Night as ``symphonic metal'' too. I never get any band recommendations from Amazon -- mostly because my buying habits are too way off the charted path for them to get a good algorithm on me. Today, I'm buying classic American folk (The Everly Brothers); tomorrow, it might be the latest k-pop sensation; the day after, a Bollywood soundtrack -- they can't get a fix on me. Bwah-hah-hah!