…here, ducky ducky
Gadzooks! The weekend was pretty fuckin’ brutal to Uncle Doc, kiddies. Mystery shops out the wazoo (along with their corresponding reports) kicked my ass. I was up until 2:00 AM doing reports on Saturday and up until 12:30 last night. Only had time to bathe one dog (Winker(, so Lucy will get cleansed tonight. Hopefully, I’ll be able to do some writing tonight, too.
…it’s a big seller in Canada
So far, my Saturday has been all about walking and waiting. drive car to dealers for a brake job/check up…walk the mile home…wait a couple hours for bank to open…walk the 1/2 mile to bus stop…get to bank, deposit check, then wait while they try to figure out why our online bill pay is acting goofy…wait for bus…walk another 1/2 mile home…wait for dealer to call telling me car is ready, then I’ll have to walk the mile to the dealer again.
Curse this exciting, fast paced life I lead!
…man, did that birthday party suck
It’s supposed to hit 105 today and it’s gotta be 100 or better out right now. Normally, this would not stop me from doing yard work and other outside stuff (except for dog walking, because The Girls feel the heat and do their business as fast as possible so as to get back into the air conditioned house), but today, there is something in the air that is seriously fucking with my allergies. After maybe 10 minutes out (this morning, when it was barely 80) I had a motherfucker of a sinus headache that took a fistful of aspirin and an hour indoors to get rid of.
Stupid allergies!
In other news, starting Monday I’ll be applying for jobs I’d really rather not do, but am now too poor and overcome by cabin fever to turn down. Should I get one of them, expect me to turn into a miserable son of a bitch after about the first month. By the end of the second month, I’ll be stomping Tokyo into a smoldering ruin. After that, look for me with a gun on a high tower near you.
Ok, enough bitching. I’m off to surf the net for information on the high paying world of running ones own religion. Or maybe robbing from the rich and keeping it. Or selling ones soul…wait, did that one back in 1972. Shit.
…if, ya know, you don’t want to be one
The Big GenCon Wrap Up
So, GenCon was fun. Seeing my friends is what the whole going to GenCon thing is about for me and I certainly got to see them. Some more than others, true, but still there was the visiting and the going out to eat and the playing of games and the goofing off. It was all good.
But, as I mentioned earlier, there was a pretty pronounced feeling of disconnection from the actual con itself. It was kinda like I had broken my GenCon going stride…which I had. Let’s see how that happened…
2002: I go to the last GenCon in Milwaukee and, as in the previous decades worth of GenCons, I had a blast.
2003: No GenCon trip due to no money
2004: I go to GenCon, but due to a leg infection I miss 99% of the con. Also, Indianapolis, with it’s foul smelling air and swampy tasting water, fails to impress me.
2005: No GenCon trip because I’m still feeling crappy about the previous trip, Indy and the gaming scene in general. Also, we are flat broke.
2006: No GenCon trip, despite having the money, because I had sworn not to go until 2007
So, as you can see, I basically missed 5 years of GenCon. thus was my stride broken. But wait, there’s more. Part of the disconnect had to do with the con itself.
See, GenCon has gotten humongous. Enormously, giganticly, con that ate Indy humongous. It has filled the convention center (which is pretty friggin’ huge) and spilled out into about 6 hotels. Hell, it’s Indy’s third largest convention…and Indy hosts a bunch of conventions.
And there’s the deal. In 5 years, GenCon has morphed into a con I didn’t really recognize. True, alot of the con (card games, wargames, computer games, RPGA, LARPs) has never held much appeal to me, but now there’s more of everything and it’s all bigger then ever. Shit, it took 2 days for me to really see all of the Dealer’s Room.
Plus there is the fact that I’m scarcely a year out of nearly 5 years of gaming malaise and still not easily excited by most RPG products.
And going there without Grace…and not having my pal Spike there for the first time ever…and staying alone in a hotel for the first time at a con…all added to things.
Anyway, it all just sort of blindsided me this time around. In some ways, it was like losing my big con virginity all over again.
So, you ask after reading this whinefest, will it be better next year? Well, I doubt it, because barring a lottery win, I doubt I’ll be going next year. 2009 should be a go, but in 2008 I’ll most likely be reading your con reports about it.
And that was my GenCon 2007.
Next con: DunDraCon in February, where I’ll run my 19th annual TOON game.
NOTE FROM THE FUTURE: So yeah, a big lack of money, plus other things, added up to me not hitting GenCon until 2019, and even then, it was mostly on somebody else’s nickle. Pretty much everything I said above, plus allergies and a fucked up tooth extraction, made 2019 my second suckiest GenCon. On the other hand, I still oves me some DunDraCon.
…by the plant world
Well, my planned day of outdoor fun was well and truly buggered. Allergies have reduced me to a sneezing runny nosed blob of blahness. We managed a short trip to the dog park and I got Herb Garden F-32/B planted, but by the time I finished, I was out for the count. Dr. Grace has me taking assorted pills and resting and if I can stay awake I might try writing. Or not.
If I feel better tomorrow, I’ll go out and attack the landscape again. If not, I’ll lay around the house feeling miserable and whining until Grace throttles me.
I fucking HATE being sick.
