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Showing posts from April, 2013

World-Building Exercise: Cosmology of the Western Isles

This is a continuation of last week’s world-building exercise , which started as a discussion of how Hasbro could potentially market D&D with specific characters in the same way that it markets soldier-based toys via G.I. Joe. Every fantasy realm needs a Cosmology .  To keep this one simple, I decided to use Roman mythology as my base, simplifying and abstracting as necessary.  What follows may seem ludicrously over-complicated, but in reality, it’s but a fraction of what the Romans’ true religion actually contained.  I’ve tried to cut this down without changing its essential nature—as I understand it—more than was absolutely necessary.

Triathlon Training Diary: 4/22 to 4/28

This was one of those weeks where I kept trying to get one more thing done, but I never quite got there.  Which isn’t to say that it was bad or anything like that, but it wasn’t the kind of great training week that I had last week.

Sunday Comics: Bronx Angel--Politics By Another Method (Page 29)

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Bronx Angel: Politics By Another Method , page 29. Click here to see the page at full size . Wow.  There's an egregious typo on this page.

Friday Mad Science: They Call Me the Working Man

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Before we start today, let me own up to the fact that I got  Sally  a subscription to the  New York Times   Weekend Edition , and it came with an all-access pass to their internet content.  So if it seems like all of these articles come out of the Times, well, that’s kind of what’s happened.   What can I say?  I’ve been reading the Times a lot lately.

Friday Hair Metal: Under Pressure

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What a show this must have been!

Sally said:

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"This is what our puppy, Faith, would look like... if she was a bear."
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World-Building Exercise: A Brief History of the Legion of the Red Lord

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I posted something last week about  how I thought  Hasbro  ought to market and monetize  D&D  in a way that was similar to what they’ve done with  G.I. Joe .  I noted in passing that D&D has miniatures in much the same way that G.I. Joe has little green Army men, and that I thought that D&D could therefore have named character personalities for marketing in the same way that G.I. Joe has done in order to make some of the typical “green Army dude” archetypes more marketable as individual characters. I’ve wanted to expand on that idea ever since, but time being what it is, I haven’t been able to until today.

The Surprising Red She-Hulk

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I picked up a couple of issues of Red She-Hulk for my daughter Emma a couple of weeks ago, issues 63 & 64.  Emma is way into comics, but being a girl, she likes girl-power comics, and there aren't so many of those. So I figured, why not try Red She-Hulk ? Red She-Hulk #63 , from Marvel Comics. Yes, that is a version of Machine Man in the car with her. Who knew that it was gonna be terrific?   I only got around the reading the issues myself this afternoon, and I gotta say that they were super-entertaining.  Smart and trippy and not at all what I expected. Why is Red She-Hulk covered in poop?  Gentle readers, there's only one way to find out. Needless to say, Emma will be back for more.  And she'll be bringing me with her.  Ha!

Close Call

Dude turned right in front of me today, leaving me less than a foot of space between my front wheel and the hood of his car! Honestly, I can't believe I survived and didn't wind up as street pizza. Yesterday was close, but this was absurd. It's twenty minutes later, and I'm still shaking. Think I need to say a little prayer tonight.

Triathlon Training Diary: 4/15 - 4/21

Last week was Week 1, the start of a new 4-week training cycle and the week after my first multi-sport race of the season.  I took it easy early in the week, but by Wednesday, it was business as usual  Actually, this past week turned out to be the heaviest training week of the year so far, at least in terms of the number of aerobic points I put in.

Sunday Comics: Bronx Angel--Politics By Another Method (Page 28)

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Bronx Angel: Politics By Another Method , page 28

Winter Seasonal Sale

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I'm trying to decide if the savings here is worth the social faux pas of buying beer out of season.
Swam 2500 yards on Wednesday. Ran five miles Thursday. Swam 4000 yards yesterday. Ran eight mile just this morning. Now I feel like I need a beer.

Friday Mad Science: Living in a Geek's Paradise

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It's been a crazy week, and mostly not in a good way.  This week, we're just gonna have to fight back as best we can. From G.I. Joe Classics, Volume 2 .

Friday Hair Metal: Now She's Gone

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I don't love Steelheart or anything, but it's a dreary, overcast day here in Connecticut, and this song kind of fits my mood.

Muddy Puppy

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G.I. Joe Classics, Volume 2

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I'd expected my little G.I. Joe obsession to last about a week, but I've gotta admit that I'm digging the comics a bunch.  As was advertised, the G.I. Joe: Cobra mini-series was excellent. But as much as I've loved that, I've also loved the G.I. Joe Classics comics from the '80s.  I finished volume one on my Nexus yesterday, and damn if I didn't go right back to Comixology and buy volume 2.  I loved this cover by J. Scott Campbell : G.I. Joe Classics, Volume 2. I loved this cover so much that I had to share it. Actually, it was a terrific week for comics all the way around.   Superior Spider-Man #7 was good, Hypernaturals # 10 was really good, and Cutter #1 from IDW was also really good.   Of course, the best comic of the week was, without doubt, Saga #12 , but at this point, that almost goes without saying.  Seriously... holy shit!  Saga is amazing.

New Capcom D&D Video Game

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Wizards   put this up on their Daily D&D site the other day, and now I can't decide whether to be excited that there's a new D&D game coming or insulted that it looks like they only spent  about ten minutes putting it together using an old arcade engine from the late 1980s.
I just cannot understand why anyone would attack a marathon.  The act itself accomplishes nothing, says nothing, makes no statement that rational people can understand.  It is a blip on the radar.  A vain and useless gesture that was doomed to failure before it even occurred. The bombing is tragedy for a few handfuls of families, and my heart and my prayers go out to them.  I run races, I was in New York on September 11th...  I know well the truth that there, but for the grace of God, go I. But like New York before it, Boston is still the great city that it was yesterday, and no single instant--no matter how terrifying--can change that.  This moment will not stop that city, will not even slow it down. That's the truth, and no handful of lunatics can change it.

Triathlon Diary: Brian's Beachside Boogie 2013 Race Report

After four working weeks in a row, last week was a Rest Week.  That was convenient for two reasons.  First, I had to go to Albany for work, and it’s always tough to train when you’re on the road, and second, I had my first multi-sport race of the season yesterday.

Thought Experiment: When Is Hasbro Going to Realize That It Owns D&D?

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"When Is Hasbro Going to Realize That It Owns D&D?" This was the question posed by the Comic Dorks Podcast last week, and it kind of caught my imagination, especially since I've been on something of a G.I. Joe kick this past week.  The reasons for that kind of vary, but for now, we'll blame it on a lack of exercise and a lack of female companionship during my week away from home.

Friday Mad Science: Scraping the Bottom of the Barrel

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Happy Friday, everybody. *** From issue #5 of G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero . *** P. Diddy says he is not banging Kate Upton .  So I guess we can all breathe a sigh of relief? Eh.  The Internet seemed shocked by this story-- shocked , I tell you!--especially because of the age difference.  But I personally didn't care... until I saw the link on TMZ to their retrospective of Upton's Sexy Twitter feed . As it happens, that is worth your time.

Friday Hair Metal: Goin' Home Tonight!

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This was always one of my favorite White Lion songs.  Unfortunately, it seems like I'm one of the very few folks out there who likes this song, however, because I couldn't even find any decent concert footage.  So we're stuck with just the studio cut and a shot of the album's over. On the bright side, you can listen to this while you do something else, which is probably what you ought to be doing anyway. We're playing today's song in honor of the fact that my trip is coming to an end, that I'll be headed home in just a couple of hours.  Hooray!

The Baroness

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It occurred to me yesterday that what we were missing on the blog was one of those ridiculously hot pics of the Baroness that IDW   always runs on their GI Joe comic covers. So there's an itch that's scratched. If you need more, there is a whole Tumblr devoted to these , some of which involve cosplay.  Just sayin...

Stray Voltage: April 10th, 2013

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I'm in Albany on business this week.  Yesterday, we discussed a bit about the Free Market, with a mechanic's eye to the possibility of bolting on a steering wheel and stick shift, so that we could drive the market in whatever direction we wanted. No, not really. What we really talked about was gas/electric coordination and reliability and the reality of the fact that the whole country--but New York and New England in particular--are becoming increasingly dependent on natural gas for power generation.  Which in turn makes the electric business increasingly dependent on natural gas pipelines.  That's not exactly a problem, per se, but pipeline capacity is a limited resource, and while we can address it at some level with fuel diversity, reality again is that gas is much cleaner than the alternatives--and usually cheaper, too. *** In case you missed it, the Washington Times today has a story on North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un , who apparently studied in the West as

Movie Review--G.I. Joe: Retaliation

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Tri Training Diary: 4/1 to 4/7 (Week 4)

This was kind of an unusual week.  I normally train on a four-week cycle--three working weeks and then one rest week.  But that didn’t work out last week, both because of my race schedule and because I’m traveling for work later this week.  So instead of resting last week, I wound up using it as a fourth working week with the caveat that I wanted to be careful not to either overwork or exaserbate the little injury I’ve been struggling with in my left knee.

My Dad and Me

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This is me and my dad running in my first road race, a 5k somewhere in San Diego.

Sunday Comics: Bronx Angel--Politics By Another Method (Page 27)

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Bronx Angel: Politics By Another Method , page 27. Click here to see this page at full size . I don't know that there's a lot to say about this page.  However, if you're one of this story's new readers, I do want you to know that I appreciate you coming by.  If you'd like to get caught up on the story and see what's going on, the easiest way to do that is with the tags at the bottom of the post. Use the Sunday Comics tag to read Bronx Angel from the beginning, including the Born Leader ashcan that was this story's original #0 issue.  Most everyone likes Born Leader . Or use the PBAM tag to just start at the beginning of Politics By Another Method .

A Beginner's Guide To Triathlon Training

My editor put up the first two pieces from a series of articles I wrote last month that I collectively called  "A Beginner's Guide to Triathlon Training."   I mention that only because Chris , my editor, decided not to use that title.  But I liked it, so there you go. Anyway, the articles that went up were: Building Aerobic Fitness Developing Your Training Plan

Friday Mad Science: Learning What's In It For You!

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This week in Friday Mad Science , we: Discuss the art of "What's In It For Me?" and how you can a voice, both here and elsewhere. Talk about the shit with North Korea and why it might have repercussions for you! Learn about "The Star Wars" and how it's different from plain old "Star Wars". More after the jump!

Friday Hair Metal: Tool!

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Comic Preview: Cutter from IDW

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IDW and Wizards of the Coast released a preview of the new R.A. and Geno Salvatore comic mini series Cutter yesterday, and I gotta say, it looks pretty good. Click here to download the preview . The D&D comics have been a mixed bag, especially in terms of their art, but I do believe I'll be picking this one up.

Punisher MAX and the New Hickman/Opeña Avengers

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I read the first trade of the  Garth Ennis  Punisher MAX  series yesterday, and while I'm not gonna say that the book was bad or that I didn't like it, I will say that the book was deeply anti-social.  A lot of comic writers envision the Punisher as a kind of Chaotic Good character; he becomes a guy who is a mean-ass vigilante, yes, but a mean-ass vigilante who is ultimately trying to bring justice to the world.  That is the take on the character that we saw in the first Punisher movie, and I think that’s the take that we generally see in most all-ages comics.  Punisher loses his family and goes on a rampage, but he also at least attempts to connect with an informal community of weirdos in whatever storybook universe he’s involved in.  He's a mean and violent guy but not a complete bastard.  He's still human. That is  not  the Punisher that Ennis has going in the MAX series.  Instead, Ennis gets back to the character’s roots.  Punisher started as a villain for 

D&D Next Homebrew: Shadar-Kai

I’m still working on the concept for the adventure I discussed here a few days ago, the one that starts in the Shadowfell and then works its way into the City of Brass .  It was slow going at first because I'd been struggling to come up with a hook to get the thing going, but then I decided to just hew a little closer to what I have in my current game, and things kind of fell into place.  In story terms, that basically means using Bane instead of Lloth as the evil church du jour, meaning that this is going to be the story of the Church of Bane vs. the Church of Shar--which is exactly what I have in my actual campaign,  The Sellswords of Luskan .   So anyway, now I feel like I have a plan, but I need time to start slicing it together.  Time, however, has been in short supply lately.   In the meantime, the actual Sellswords have broken into the Fire Cultists’ citadel in the Shadowfell, and as a result, I needed some shadow-based fire cultist soldiers for them to fight.  So

Triathlon Training Diary: 3/25 - 3/31 (Week 3)

It wasn't a bad week of training this week, especially considering that I hurt my knee last week but still managed to put in some decent work this week without re-injuring it.  But it was a little frustrating, both because I feel like I've reached the limit of my wife's patience with this whole triathlon thing and because I kept feeling like I needed to hold back to avoid re-tweaking the injury. Bottom line, this was kind of a big biking week, and it was a huge week for aerobic training, rather than the kind of harder, more uptempo interval work that I prefer.  Still, if it keeps me in the race, I guess that's all I can ask for.