Roadside Picnic

Can't Hardly Wait

2020-02-02T20:16:10Z

The Niece and I got together Thursday and saw Knives Out. For some reason, I had gotten into my head that this was a comedy, and I was wrong, but who cares because it's one of the best movies I've seen in quite a while. A stellar cast giving superb performances and working with a great story and director - this is the good stuff.

Had a heck of a good night playing X-Wing Friday. Got in a team Epic match, and it was a proper Empire versus Rebellion throwdown. I fielded a Gozanti as our capital ship, and the opponents had a CR90, and we both had the obligatory mix of fighters. Without really meaning to, I built my Gozanti to be a brutal close-range combatant, and it combined with a couple of TIE Bombers and a Star Wing to make short work of a couple of bold Y-Wings. My teammate's gaggle of TIEs got the best of the other Rebel escorts - though not without losses - and we were able to focus everything we had left on the CR90. It's a tough ship, but three rounds of fire from all quarters did it in.

Looking at dropping one of the streaming subscriptions, probably Disney+. I'm hitting the same state I was in when I dropped cable way back when - I'm just not watching enough to justify the expense. Netflix and Amazon Prime have more than enough for me, and I got a year of Apple TV+ with my new iPad, and I'm just not watching very much on the Mouse now that The Mandalorian is over for a while.

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Reach Out

2019-12-05T19:08:51Z

I left the farm early Friday afternoon. A game shop in Lexington announced the obligatory Black Friday sale, and poor impulse control convinced me to detour that way instead of heading straight back to Louisville. The visit reminded me of why I quit going to that store when I lived there. Headed on to Louisville, got to Heroes and got in a couple games of Outer Rim.

Bought a copy of Goodman Games' gigantic D&D 5th version of the old Expedition to the Barrier Peaks module - I've resisted the previous tomes, but D&D characters exploring a crashed spaceship is what I want right now.

So, I guess I'm going to run some goddamned D&D soon. My GM burnout seems to have been setting-based, not role-based, because I am pretty darned excited for this.

SpaceX got another Falcon 9/Dragon stack up this afternoon. Successful first-stage recovery, and the Dragon looks to be working just fine and should dock with the ISS in a couple of days. Next big milestone is Boeing's unmanned CST-100 test in two weeks, barring another delay.

We're halfway through the first season of The Mandalorian, and it has not disappointed. Before the launch, I was more excited for it than Rise of the Skywalker, and I'm still there. Everything about the show is working for me, and among the highest points is the music. It's flawless, going right down the line between Williams and Morricone.

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On and On

2019-04-24T04:11:23Z

Got a painful lesson reminder of why I shouldn't trust Microsoft products a couple of nights ago. I've gotten into the habit of taking my iPad with me when I'm working at PNC in the evenings or on weekends, and using the ample downtime to keep some writing going. So, Sunday evening, I'm feeling pretty good about things and cranking out some good stuff, and figure, what the hell, lets put Word on the iPad and see how it works on that platform. It works pretty darn well ... unless you're using iCloud for online storage. Word refuses to recognize that option, and when I tried to use Google Drive, Word threw a fit and lost a big chunk of what I'd written. Not at all how I wanted things to go.

I'm just fickle as hell about my tools, I guess. I sent the Macbook Air dock back to Amazon last night, and returned the monitor to Walmart yesterday morning. I agonized a little bit about keeping them, with the logic of "Hey, I might have a need for them sometime," and then I thought about the garage and barn at the Farm, and realized whoa, dragon, that's where that line of thinking leads. So, no fuss, it's done. And now I'm looking at newer iPads, either a 6th generation 9.7" model or a 10.5" one. My existing Air is still working as well as the day I bought it, but it only has 16GB of storage, and the OS takes up nearly half of that, if not more.

Okay. I'm going to embrace the workflow and do all of the writing in Pages. It exports to .docx, and LibreOffice will work for any final edits before I dive into Scribus for any self-published gaming products. Admitted, I've made these noises countless times over the years, so there's every likelihood that none of it will come to pass, but I'm remembering how good writing feels when I fucking DO IT, and that mental and emotional energy seems to be flowing again, so I'd best make the most of it. Paring down the number of active (relatively speaking) projects has helped out. I feel like I'm going to really have something together before long.

Started watching Netflix's Chilling Adventures of Sabrina tonight. First episode isn't bad. Appropriately spooky, wasn't expecting naked witch-girl stepping out of the tub, and I think I'm going to stick with it.

Some Star Wars stuff - Jon Favreau cited spaghetti Westerns and Kurosawa samurai movies as strong influences on his The Mandalorian for Disney+, the Cassian Andor series is promising me some espionage stories, and I'm more interested in these TV projects than I am in the end of the Skywalker saga.

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Oedipus Tyrannus Overture

2017-12-01T00:18:44Z

The cold is not going away. I cancelled tomorrow night's RPG session - a) I don't think I'll be rid of this by then and b) I don't want to spread this to my friends. I'm sticking with the traditional treatment routine - keeping fed, resting as much as possible, and medicine to suppress symptoms. This is most unpleasant.

The CW DC series' crossover event was telecast this week. Earth-X's Nazis invaded Earth-1, and the heroes of all four shows came together to repel the invasion. It was darn good superhero adventure, better than both Batman V. Superman and Suicide Squad. These shows are, for me, the vanguard of television's crop of supers shows. I love their Supergirl - Melissa Benoist is pretty without being supermodel beautiful, Kara is consistently hopeful and cheerful, and the writers let her be angry, and that's a rarity in writing. Arrow may have run its course, but it still gets in some good storytelling and I'll always love it for for putting Mr. Terrific on my screen. The Flash is the most variable in terms of quality and enjoyment, but when it's on, it's just fantastic. After a shaky and too-serious start, Legends of Tomorrow has gone all-in on fun, maybe over-the-top comic-book stories with a cast that seems to be having a great time in their roles.

The morning after the Crisis on Earth-X, Marvel released the first trailer for Avengers: Infinity War, and holy cow. This is going to tie all of the MCU characters together, including the cosmic side. Giant cast, the heroes coming together to fight off Thanos. Infinity War releases on May 4, 2018 - a couple of days after the tenth anniversary of Iron Man, which was the gamble that started this juggernaut.

Here at stately Bourbon Manor, we've talked about this era of SF/fantasy/superhero adaptations. Not so long ago, we watched geek media, no matter the quality, because it's all we had. Now, there's enough out there that a given work has to be good, or it won't get an audience.

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