Category Archives: Journal

This is me rambling about me, mostly. Current stuff: home, family, my head’s on fire… that kind of thing. This also includes everything imported from LiveJournal.

Journal

At Best, Inappropriately Expressed Enthusiasm

59 Comments

I blogged about the final round of the easily-spoofed Washington Post poll, and I made a mistake. I mentioned that it was easily spoofed.

This was not meant as encouragement to spoof, but apparently it was taken as such. For this I am sorry.

You see, when I blogged at 9:15pm local time, Schlock Mercenary had around 120 votes. Three hours later Schlock had 211,000. That, for those who are interested in this sort of thing, is more unique IP addresses than hit my own website in the course of an entire month. I don’t for one minute believe that more than 1,000 of those votes are legitimate. And by curious coincidence, during the one minute for which I’m not believing, about another 1,000 votes arrived.

I’m embarrassed and saddened. It’s much more fun to mock an easy-to-rig popularity contest when it’s not one of your own fans doing the rigging. You see, now if tens of thousands of Penny Arcade fans visit the poll (and they will) they will associate “Schlock Mercenary” with dishonesty.

Whoever you are, mister or missus Inappropriate Expressor of Enthusiasm, you are damaging my name with your antics. Worse still, you are making all of the smart, discerning, tastefully dressed, and bewitchingly attractive Schlock Mercenary fans look dingy and disreputable.

Shame on you.

Food, Journal

Eating to live

8 Comments

So… This last thursday Cafe Zupas had a sign up saying that all proceeds that day were going to the Red Cross to help out in Haiti. I had been planning to use a free meal coupon, but decided to save it and spend money instead.

Then I decided to get a dessert, because hey, it’s for a good cause. Then I added a soda, and then a soup.

As I was eating, and filling up long before my comestibles were consumed, it occurred to me that I was overeating so that others might not starve. The irony was so thick I could spread it on that delicious bread I got. So I did.

If charity through excess is wrong, I want seconds. Of that custard, please…

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Journal

Moving Past the Tavern

14 Comments

Last night’s RPG session was a one-shot adventure with completely fresh characters. Instead of having us start the game in a tavern, Bob had us wake up in jail.

Apparently, three days ago the dwarf took us to a dwarven bar, vouched for us, and we ended up on a bender whose details were lost in an alcoholic haze. The dialog with our jailer was memorable:

Paraphrased…

Jailer (played by Bob): You set fire to an outhouse.
Mika the Cleric (played by me): I… I think I remember that.
Jailer: It was a very nice outhouse. It had running water.
Mika: Yeah, it’s coming back to me now. That water can’t be safe. Not in an outhouse.
Jailer: The owner is very upset.
Mika: We were doing him a favor.
Jailer: You burned his outhouse to the ground.
Mika: The outhouse had it coming.
Jailer: “had it coming?”
Mika: Look, if “Lance of Faith” sets a building on fire, the building is obviously an unholy abomination.

All of this was just a prelude to us getting recruited to clear out the kobolds in exchange for some charges being dropped. Which meant, of course, that most of the rest of the dialog in the game was nowhere near as interesting. Well, maybe except for the part where I related the legend of the Gnomish village of Riverton that had dwarven ale delivered for their big celebration. Three days later the village was in the next county over and all the buildings were upside down.

Journal

Relapse of Mono

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The Physician’s Assistant, Whitney, called me to talk about the blood work we took a week ago. Short version: Epstein-Barr, which is pretty common but usually latent. Mine acted up, and I had what amounts to a relapse of mononucleosis, or “mono.”

As I said on the Twitter feed, the diagnosis may have been mono, but it felt more like Dolby Surround Sound 5.1.

[rimshot]

Anyway, I’m fine now. As an added bonus, I’m not crazy. I really WAS sick. Also, I have yet another reason to eat nutritiously. A strong immune system is the best defense against another relapse. Okay, okay, fine. I’ll have another salad.