2014: A Month in Review

So far this month I've:

• ...completed a two-year project at my hospital that streamlines our electronic medical record system.
• ...presented said project to our hospital council and earned a promotion.
• ...had two game developers contact me to review their games.
• ...been asked to assist on a new RPG development project.
• ...was recommended to a new video game company for help with their character development.
• ...been hired for and completed an editing/development project for Rogue Genius Games.
• ...picked up three new freelance RPG development projects.

I couldn't be happier.

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Addendum, 1/31/14: I just finished the first meeting about a new RPG and I must say the system impressed me. It's midway through development so I can't elaborate, but the mechanics are sound, unique, and potentially far reaching; making it a Gateway Game for RPGs. What gamer doesn't want that?!?

Happy Birthday Dungeons & Dragons

January 26th, 1974.

I've already written about some of my earliest experiences with the game that changed the world. I still run into people who don't even know that roleplaying games exist, much less understand how they could influence a life as passionately as they have mine. It's been 40 years since the hobby was invented, and 36 years since I experienced it for myself. There is little success I can't attribute to my time around the table. As I say on my About page:

"It teased my curiosity about the world, then pressured me to meet new people and share experiences with them. It fed my addiction to storytelling, compelled me to draw out people's emotions, gently manipulate them, then put them back in a way they would tell their friends about for years. It forced me to read about culture, and history, and mythology, and science, and religion, and forensics, and linguistics. It relentlessly bullied me into becoming a better writer and then pressured me to introduce it to other people. One game is even directly responsible for my ability to do math."

There will be scores of posts today about D&D and the positive influence it's had on the lives of those who've played. I'm honestly not sure I can add much more. RPGs are my life, personally and professionally. They form the foundation for my closest friendships and will be the tool I use to bond with and inspire my children and their friends (at least until they find their own outlets). If you want to know more about why I love games, and RPGs specifically, check out the Popular Posts on almost any of my blogs. I write about them all the time.

So all I can say today is, thank you Gary and Dave, for the incredible life I've lived. Happy Birthday, D&D.

Afterlife

Yesterday I spent a few hours rearranging my office. A few hours won't be nearly enough, but it started the inertia on a Honey Do I've been wanting to finish for the last year. There's a lot to do, but the physical work isn't what takes up all the time, it's revisiting bits and pieces of your past while deciding which to keep, which to pack, and which to throw away. I have a lot of memorabilia; I'm a geek, it's what we do.

One of the more difficult decisions I made was to pack away things I inherited from my friend Matt--a small box of knick-knacks from his house, souvenirs from games long past, and file folders of characters and stories. While digging through his old writing, I came across a collection of typed poems I'd never seen before. I grabbed a random one from the stack and read it.

My Life, Part 2

Up to age 40, my life has been pretty amazing; not that I've always recognized that.

I've had my battles with depression, particularly in high school and university. I've had more relationship ups and downs than I care to talk about. Most of us have. Still, there's no doubt that when I look back on my life, the friends I've made, the family I've kept, the places I've seen and the geeky things I've experienced would make 10-year-old Rich very proud. What I didn't expect was that my life would get a reboot halfway through.

An Annual Sadness (I Had a Dream)

April 15th, 2007, my blood-brother and best friend of 20 years, Matt Welty, died of an unexpected and massive heart attack. He was 45 years old. October 18th is his birthday.

It's not uncommon for me to feel down around these days and I often don't realize why until I look at a calendar. Matt was one of the first people I met when I moved from small-town Kentucky to big-city Orange County. Matt was my backup. My safety net. He was one of the few people who witnessed my transformation from naive country boy to...well, naive and educated world traveler. I have a few friends I've known longer, one in particular is very dear to me, but none of them watched me struggle to figure out the world outside of the romantic fairy tales I'd built around myself.

Finally! The Arrival of Daddy's Little Dryad!

It's official, my wife and I are the parents of one stunning baby Rowan! It was a 48+ hour event that we'll share sometime in the future. In short, everything went mostly as planned (natural birth), but I have to say that this week confirms that I have in my life two of the strongest women I've ever known.

We can't thank everyone enough for the overwhelming love and support we've received. She can't wait to meet everyone!

At least after we get a lot of rest.

Born: 1510, August 26th, 2013
7 lbs, 10.4 oz
21.5" long

A few pictures can be found here.

Click here for more information on rowan tree mythology.

What If, indeed. Episode II

A couple of years ago, Belated Media posted a re-imagining of Star Wars: Episode I. Re-imagining actually gives Episode I too much credit--the guy tore it apart and molded it into what it should have been. Finally, his vision of Episode II is out and now I know why it took a while.

With Phantom Menace, he could cut together scenes from the film to give us a general idea of what he was thinking; he could also put big red slashes over Jar Jar's face. So much of the first film had been changed (and the second one was so terrible) there was almost nothing for him to use. That means storyboards. The result is not only breathtaking, it is a lesson in story editing.

What If Episode I Had Been Good?

What If Episode II Had Been Good?