I’m so almost there it hurts.

New Beginnings is almost done. Tomorrow and another weekend I reckon and all the text will be done, and then off to friendly nit pickers for comments. Amendments the weekend after that (touch wood) and finally off to the publisher in the first couple of weeks of December. Scary thing is mentally I’m begining to get into this. Already have the next couple of writing projects lined up (thankfully the next codenamed the Xmas Project is much shorter).

The Molad website is almost done. The framework of the site is in place, all I have to do is knock up a quick template and fill in the basic introductory content. I’ve also pleasantly found that I’ve got alot of articles hanging around, so the site will be quite content rich to start with. Then I sit back, get the nitpickers to do a quick review and release it into the wild. I’ve got ideas so I can update it at least once a month, but I’ve made the absolute commitment that in no whay am I going to get emotionally attached to this site, like I have with others in the past. No this is the age of wham-bang-thank-you-mam website design…

House, pretty clean. Just need to tidy away the orphaned books and cds in the middle bedroom then way its done (as far as these things are ever done).

Work…screaming to the end of a three projects, with at least two of the project’s customers screaming for the products. Lets hope I can deliever otherwise deadlines will have to be reneogiated yet again….

Which is just as well since today wins the dullest day of the year award.

Fed up of feeling run down so started eating healthy and exercising again with a spot of Taichi/Dao Jin (Taoist breathing exercises) this morning. Back to the gym later this week when the last of the leg nastyness has finally cleared up (antibotics doing the work but leaving me with a jippy stomach).

Work going great guns with serveral deadlines looming and yet looking very acheviable…hoorah!!!

Final push on molad.org this week, hoping to have it up and going this weekend for user testing (ok nit picking from interested mates!). Decided on CMS Made Simple instead of Drupal as the CMS of choice, because it is much easier to work with and adapt. Don’t get me wrong Drupal is very good, and if I wanted to set up a self regulating community were every one is an content author of some sort, with its own rather simple forum, blog system and book creation section I would use it . However I’ve had to make to many comprimises to my set of requirements with Drupal, after a very promising start, so I’m dropping it. The crunch is that im using CMS Simple at work, I understand it theres a very active community that support it, and it actually does what it says out of the box. My only qibble is that I wasn’t so up on my php/css and Smarty (which I’ve had to learn for this) it would be a tad confusing to extend it. But the out of the box is good and there are scads of extensions, so this is only a very minor quibble.

Off home to do some writing on New Beginnings as Rach (aka PregZilla) is at work till 9.

Yesterday was less “Yessssssss” more “Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr” than Saturday. 

Despite feeling tired and grouchy cracked on with what I had to get done. Carried on writing, but wasn’t flowing as quickly as Saturday so when i hit my frustration point with it headed out into the garden and hacked back more of the jungle. I’ve really fallen behind in keeping up with the garden, so all I can do now is a tidy up, hope not too much dies, and start afresh in Spring. Then fed the Rach, who has discovered brightly coloured shareware puzzle games again and suddenly can’t leave the computer FOR 3 HOURS STRAIGHT!!! While she interacted with the computer in a way that made it make ‘ping’ and ‘tinkle’ noises every 10s, I tidied more of the middle bedroom. All I can say on this one is that I can now see floor and appart from a few lonesome piles of books everything is tidied away with free space in the cupboards. Can’t quite cross that one off  my TO DO list yet but getting close.

Today I’ve realised why I was a bit low yesterday. I seem to be coming down with a cold. Time to eat sensibly and drink lots of water. Blah.

Is what I had yesterday. Exactly what the psychiatrist ordered.

Rather than piddle around with writing for Unknown Armies or MRQ like I planned (both effectively new projects) I stuck my head down and did a couple of hours on New Beginnings. This is the current working title of the book of HeroQuest scenarios I’m working on for narrators new to the game and Glorantha. As well as the scenarios, which have been run over the years at various cons as demos, each of the published HQ settings (Sartar, Lunar Empire and Sea) has a simple community that can be used as a starting community for new heroes. I’ve got the Lunar one done, which was easy since I love that setting. Yesterday I worked on the Sartar community (The Silverwind Tula), which I’m not as familiar with. As I fleshed it out I sat with a large pile of source books, cross referencing details. Overall I had a fun time, which is what needs to happen to keep me going at this. I also had a break through moment with my writing. For the first time I didn’t feel like I was writing blind, i.e. I’m writing a gamebook but I’m not 100% sure what its structure should be, and I was very happy with the result. Even at this stage I look at it and think, ‘yes this is what I want to see on the page, you could 100% use this in a game”. Admitly I’ve still got to get the thing peer reviewed before I send it of to the publisher, but it was a real leap forward confidence wise. Yesterday in hindsight was a real acid test of whether or not I carry on this games designer/writing lark with any degree of seriousness in the light of spawning, and I got a really good ‘yes you should’ feeling deep inside. Now I need to press on with more discipline (and less Rome Total War/Call of Duty 2).

Massive headway was also made on the Middle bedroom aka the office aka the new cluttered attic. Managed to throw out a huge bage of rubbish, mainly paper, and put things back in boxes. Now all thats left is to sort out a big pile of CDs/Magazines and other junk and then the room will be tidy. Then onwards to pulling out fitted wardrobes and replacing them with bookcases. This in turn leads to the realisation of the dream that I have had for the last ten years, of finally getting my books out of storage boxes on onto shelves!!!!

Feeling much better now. Leg is beginning to return to normal size and I’m on a short course of antibiotics to clear it up 🙂

A quiet weekend of pootling round the house, and writing up rpg nonsense. Going to type up the notes I made about my upcoming MRQ game. Also my mind has turned to Unknown Armies and my Division X game, Le Carre meets UK political/social Satire with players being uk tv cops/characters like Reagan and Jonathan Creek. As well as converting an old (talking 99 here) scenario to the series I’ve also come up with an idea for a new game. I’m going to start putting these together with the aim of bunging them up on my website when I’m done.

Talking of websites all the the research I’ve been doing lately on opensource content management system for work is really beginning to pay off. 

The big winner is CMS Made Simple,  which does what it says on the tin, quickly and simply sets up a manageable site and is easy to extend if with user created modules and tags (since it uses the Smarty templating system). I’m already using this for my home site and for a project at work.

For the new Masters of Luck and Death (HeroQuest demo group I’m involved with) website I’m going to be using Drupal, another opensource cms, which much better for a  community website were registered users can add content. It has inbuilt blogs, story submissions, as well as page management. Although it does have its own inbuilt forum, I’ll be using Simple Machines Forum (a php bulletin board which blows phpBB out of the water imho) which is linked by a bridge to the mainsite (a piece of code which means user accounts are shared by both SMF and Drupal).

Looking forward to a nice productive weekend (must avoid playing Rome: Total War like the plague though)

Oh yes happy days are here again 😀

Well this meme was more fun than I expected

You are The Devil

Materiality. Material Force. Material temptation; sometimes obsession

The Devil is often a great card for business success; hard work and ambition.

Perhaps the most misunderstood of all the major arcana, the Devil is not really “Satan” at all, but Pan the half-goat nature god and/or Dionysius. These are gods of pleasure and abandon, of wild behavior and unbridled desires. This is a card about ambitions; it is also synonymous with temptation and addiction. On the flip side, however, the card can be a warning to someone who is too restrained, someone who never allows themselves to get passionate or messy or wild – or ambitious. This, too, is a form of enslavement. As a person, the Devil can stand for a man of money or erotic power, aggressive, controlling, or just persuasive. This is not to say a bad man, but certainly a powerful man who is hard to resist. The important thing is to remember that any chain is freely worn. In most cases, you are enslaved only because you allow it.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

I’m sick of being sick, its official. Ok so I’ve far less to whinge about than people I know who have/had life threatening illnesses and the Good Lady Rachel who is currently sick everyday from carrying the Newtlet, but after ten days of cellutis a skin infection which has caused my left leg to swell up like an angry red balloon and makes me feel permanently nauseous I think I deserve a small outburst. Off to see the doctor in a hours time, and will probably be rewarded with another batch of antibiotics. Brilliant.

In other news I have caught up with all things Rome on my outstanding list. Ancient Rome the Rise and Fall (the recent BBC series) which is ok but a bit filmed in LSD vision for my liking, Rome (BBC/HBO) which I got for my birthday and was cracking as ever (Titus Pullo still rules) and Rome Total War the pc game which sucks my life away in the most immersive way. Also started watching I Claudius again which still rocks. “Faster than you can boil asparagus!”

Still loving RuneQuest, currently planing the big-silly-rq campaign in Northern Dara Happa to end them all. Full of crunchy combat, intrigue, duels, trading, assasination, courting etc etc. Its nice to sit  there with a notepad and sketch out ideas for fun, rather than working against a deadline for a con game. This be said I best get back into my HeroQuest book writing this weekend, since I’ve set myself the deadline of the end of the month to get it done.