The "Golden Age of TV" Lasted a Season

 The bad writing in the TV and Hollywood movies that we are seeing these days are due to producer decisions not a culture trying to represent its various ethnic segments in stories that sell to those various ethnic segments of any given population basis. Likewise, the bad writing in the TV and Hollywood movies that we are seeing these days are directly addressing social injustices are decisions made by producers wanting to make profits but not investing in creating culture. If you, drinking and smart analyzer of popular media, cringe when you see a child, a woman, or a man of color come up in the Brand Name TV show that you enjoyed as a child of not being born when it was released, it's not your fault.  And as well, if you as a social advocate view narrative fiction TV consumption as education, you are missing out on really informative stuff provided from else where. But truth be told, you're probably just perpetrating a fraud.

As for the white, racial purist on topics like the Marvel Comic take on Thor while not knowing exactly what to do with Captain America. Can you not find anything interesting to read?  There are about 1,700 authors of fantastic fiction that gets more than million sales upon any release. BUT you are fans of trademarks from the late 50s throughout the 80s. The world is meant to be yours, because you like did a web search back in 1997 or were born on the same day as well and have a white-minded penis. You read three comics on reprint and are now the shield maidens of Catholicism or something or another. And we both know, I am spinning.

Sales are marginal.

What WE not you and me? Notice how there is no separation between our demographics any more? So when you harp on about how media has disenfranchised your take on Captain Marvel because of your inherent manhood and genetic Catholicism you get Bree Marie as Kree-Purse One. That because, what is being viewed on your stream is provided by what I will call a box-lunch provider. You get the best and the "We" forget the rest. The rest might be really good, and you were out voted. You get what you get. The numbers decided that you wanted bullshit, and it worked at least in acceptable outcomes figured out.

I would go on about creative artists versus brand names, but it's hopeless right now. The creatives I am finding are all about stealing and/or selling out.

Should've Been Written By Manatees.

I just watched a movie totally cobbled together by an algorithm though three people are credited with typing it out after they read what a machine told them to. The process must’ve been:
“So like what do 30-50 y/o male comic book buyers like? According to sales of 40K per release Batman and Justice League. Then the whole supernatural caboodle with freshens things up for the younger crowd and hippies about 30K an issue in sales. Hey Nightwing, err Teen Titans pulls in the soccer moms and gays, they sometimes spend up to 20$ a pop. I hear the Frank Miller militia likes apocalypse, that’s another $2.11 for all ten million of their internet sock puppets. Stuff by Jack Kirby goes over big with the drunks, they spend 13k a year before their credit cards are declined. “Dark” sells and Matt Ryan is TV rates. Well there’s Justice League Dark and Darkseid. Two “darks” yeah. Let’s do this.
Don’t forget Harlequin because... Millennials.”

That’s what you get with Justice League DARK Vs DARKseid. Also called Justice League Dark: Apocalypse War which isn't any better.
So like Superman wants to defensively launch a preemptive strike on Apocalypse because Darkseid is bad and is coming for Earth one day. Just like the Netherlands did when they knew Nazi Germany was going invade as much of Europe as it could in late 30s, wait a second... . So despite coherent arguments to not do so, everybody sides with Superman. John Constantine known for his Justice League-ness these days, because supernatural comic books don’t sell over 20k an issue with their own names, is on the bus to Apocalypse. And the rest of the movie is a post-apocalyptic drama, see what the writers did there, where everybody gets what they want.

Superman being a self-entitled douche. Constantine being a douche canoe. 14 y/o’s saying “fuck” and dealing with parents. Kirby’s Fourth World gets mentioned as part of Darkseid’s milieu. The Suicide Squad does suicide with Louis Lane. Oh yeah Oa gets destroyed because why not?

A strength to the movie, if there is one, is the depth of characterization in the personas that weren't Superman, Darkseid, and the Swamp Thing. But that is not a hard thing when the task is write the closing act to a tale of doom and desolation. The movie should have been more interesting in the starting acts and then piece would've not been worthy of doing laundry while watching it. That would've taken humans thinking about how the characters should be presented at the start of it instead of doing coloring book plot exposition.

A definite Robomonster of a flick. I wish it had been written by manatees. Where was Jimmy Olsen and his Newspaper Boys?

NoGenCon Hoot 2020: When Cometh the Moth?

So with GenCon being cancelled this year, our gaming clique, the serious ones at least, got serious about doing the Mothman trip that we've been planning since like 'o7. Peryton and I started out a day earlier than everybody planning on attending. So on Wednesday afternoon we pulled off I-77 in New Philadelphia, Ohio for lunch.
"Hey look the Towpath Tavern." Robin noticed. "But we don't have time for that."
"We are headed to a Quality Inn along the Ohio River coal-burning Valley," I replied. "A day earlier than anybody."
"I wonder if they have decent onion rings, let's find out." She answered.
When we got moving again we decided to listen John Keel's The Mothman Prophesies to get into the right mood.

We made it around 5pm and did a driving reconnoiter of the Point Pleasant, WV/Gallipolis, OH before just settling on finding the named motel. Waiting for Caed and Ravish(Rodney, Caed's husband) to show up in the evening left us with some time to kill. It would soon be raining, so we had the excuse to sit around the room and read game books and nap all day. I still did a little walking and found where I think the original collapsed bridge was.

Getting text messages on my phone, I realized that it was already 6pm and that Robin and Rodney (Caed and Ravish) were there. We met in the lounge of the hotel, I stand corrected from my earlier assessment of Quality Inn, in our usual trickle in fashion. The men first, then the women; my wife of course being the last.
The Old Home Week Evening was awesome, as it usually is. If we all hadn't been practicing in front of mirrors for an entire month, there was some serious note taking and stage details worked out before hand. The storytelling with only four of us there was worthy of a Tony Award at least. Well, at least mine was. I mean who else would I be listening to hear my own beautiful and rich voice?

Rod the Ravisher being apprehended by Museum Security

The next day, everyone was a little hungover but I was able to wrestle everyone from their nap spots and out the door to do the shopping part of the trip done while we waited for new Tom and Saharrah (Tom Too and Sahar) to show up. We texted them and told them to meet us in town. When they arrived, after Pery had spent 200$, and treated my fake niece and her betrothed to admission to the world famous Mothman Museum.

After the pleasant afternoon in the hot sun and fresh air in a quaint smaller city's downtown area, it was time for big dinner with the whole gang assembled. Then it was time, after a quick nap, it was time for the important stuff. It rhymes with GAMING.

Everyone wanted to some serious D&Ding so I acquiesced and even played. Still Pery would not let me play an one-eyed half-ork general because her long session was set in Middle Earth. Hey I saw the movies, there were orks in them. She's was just being Character Class Racist. I need to get a Twitter account to rake up some fake controversy.  I mean somebody got to play an elf girl with no hit points to speak of.
The game ran from 9pm Friday and into the late afternoon of the next day. There was some sleep time and a big breakfast so we all could bug our latest favorite waitress, Lezza (just call her awesome). I believe this is what "true gamers" hope for. So unlike my three to four hour quippy sessions that I run at GenCon and online for the rest of the year. I had fun, but I couldn't help but feel like I was clocking in when restarted.

After that game, our gang deigned to allow me to run some Crawlspace. Came up with a session called The Funeral using a couple of seeds from some scenarios knocking around in my head already. Around midnight, we cleaned up our mess and everyone could get some real sleep. The last session at the Hoot is always a test of endurance.

The next day, everyone slept in. Caed and Ravish slipped out so Tom Too had to pay the bill on their shared room. I bought us all some brunch, so Pery and I dragged "the kids" out to the TNT Bunkers so central to the folklore of the Mothman cycles of Kultura Americana.

The bunkers are a nice low-level nature walk. Almost a mile and pretty well maintained, probably by the Department of Parks and Recreation. The bunkers are still temples of adolescent partydom, which sticks to fairly interesting graffiti. Our particular hike was just great. A storm system had rained just enough the night before to cool down the 90s into the high 70s. The scorching sun was mostly behind clouds (LOOK HOW MUCH SUNBURN I AM NOT!), and it's a real bog. The water was only mildly lawn fertilizer polluted, so while slime covered, it still looked like water not pea soup when big frogs would jump in. 

So we took our time getting home after hugging Sahar and Tom goodbye. We drove up to Pomeroy and up to Zanesville before finding the Mighty Road, I-77, to make our way home. We got to enjoy the lovely country air filled with smog from fracking facilities. Have to admit I was a little glad to get back to Cleveland where I get some fresh air.

Peryton Moth-Wenching it up Saturday night.

The Comic Book Movie of the Decade

In case you haven’t noticed over the past decades since 1997 when I first came on-line, I am a Batman fan. Any of the comic book scholars that I debate with nearly weekly, know that I believe that comic books are supposed to express something other than pornography and nihilism without being self-righteous and an organ of any would-be State Propaganda Department. Okay the pornography is Frank Miller and the Propaganda is everyone cowering to anyone not liking movies made for audiences not over 14 years old. I do not mind when the movie in front of me is not written by Proust. I also am not sitting around watching a movie because I need distraction between diaper-changes for my 32 y/o children. I also don’t mind when a movie wants me to like it.

Okay, the movie Birds of Prey is not total Feminism 210. It’s more a comic book take on girl power set in GOTHAM CITY . It has no world-ending plot device and it is GANGSTA BATMAN. It’s also not afraid to get corny, because none of the Bat-Man franchise ever would go corn ever. Up front, this movie has a lot of pretension without the precociousness that we are used to after being lectured by Disney Corp. It staples down on the semi-successful scripting of the Suicide Squad and falls back the story. This is not a CGI and canned music puppet show of needing something to say. Everyone viewing this is just simply watching a movie, not an advocate towards the testament of a mythological cycle.

It comes down to wanting Iain Glen to play Batman for the next seven years. While ignoring how much the DC Universe series Titans sucks, it doesn’t always require the end of the world for someone to put on silly costumes. It does require some hard circumstances to need a silly costume and not just be absurd. So when the costumed heroes come out, it’s worth it.

The stages for the last part of movie combined the Tim Burton stages with the Chris Nolan feel for things This made the movie much better than the downward spiral of all the Avenger DC story rip-offs. It did not need to be written by 30 background-checked temp employees trying to equal Shakespeare or Marlon Brando. It need to be fun movie to watch without worrying about doomsday, it needed to be about people wearing costumes.

As to any criticism as to how “woke” the film is, remember seated friends that you’re watching a movie for 9-16 year old females.

The Justice League Movie 2017

Well the film that every DC fan has been both waiting for and kind of dreading has come out. Luckily it wasn't that hard to both like it and think of defenses for the predictable onslaught of bad reviews as its predecessors (Batman Versus Superman, Man of Steel, and Suicide Squad) had. My celebratory mood moved from "At least they didn't step on their dicks this time" to "Well, that was a good superhero movie."

To be fair, Justice League has a lot of things not going for it even if you don't include the past movie efforts for the DC Franchise that wasn't done by Christopher Nolan. There's the whole Zach Snyder who hasn't read any comic books not written by Frank Miller, needing Joss Whedon to be forced into his crew to have a few one-liners and a smile here and there worked in. The whole Marvel franchise which can put out video games as movies as long as Spider-Man stays young and receive great reviews. Then there is the DC universe(s) which is needing to be crammed into one film. This last bit was what helped this flick out more so in my opinion than any of the action sequences and breezy character interactions, but more on that in a bit.

The characters worked for me. Batfleck, a beat-up 50 year-old man, moving from fighting master criminals to cosmic super-villains works-- I really do enjoy this rendition of Bruce Wayne. Wonder Woman fighting the forces of regression in her intro, might be staid, but it reinforced the icon. Newcomer to the JLA, in my 80s-form view, Cyborg was given a sense of uniqueness with his struggle with his machine part that I don't remember reading about in the pages of the Teen Titans the only place I ever familiarized myself with him. The Flash being a self aware, funny-ish 20-something, with a nod to his actor probably being related to one of the films producers, was not a bad touch. Aquaman, the Water-Dude, and Atlantis were the weakest parts, but Jason Mamoa got to take off his shirt a lot and his backstory gets some grit which makes up for too much LotR not-floating imagery. The villain Steppenwolf, Darkseid's uncle, was an obscure pick, but seeing his Asgardian-like butt get kicked by Superman was awesome. Really it spoke to my inner DC-Versus-Marvel self. Superman finally got be the stud muffin that needs his women to tell him when to put his pants on that every married man should be. And the supporting characters got some time and a little color as well, except for Joe Morton (Cyborg's dad) maybe. He could've used a bit more to do.

What especially worked for me is how the story-telling is showing the strengths and the weaknesses of our superheroes while defining the levels of power in the DC universe. Batman and an accomplished Amazon, can handle dozens of thugs but only handfuls of elite forces, like parademons. The Flash has to use his brains to not kill himself doing anything super. Aquaman is as strong as a tank, but Wonder Woman is Hercules. And Superman is a Kryptonian. Jack Kirby created the "wonder worlds" of New Genesis and Apokolips to delve into worlds with plenty of Super-Men already.

Complete with allusions to the (Old Gods) Olympians, Green Lanterns, and the aberrant aliens the Dominators, the antagonist is almost disappointing. Steppenwolf, for this uninspired, Thor-like cardboard cut-out, should have come riding in on a giant wolf, with a bunch of the Hunger Dogs riding in behind him, for accuracy. He should've only had parademons as scouts and special squads. The Deep Six, should've been ransacking Atlantis for the Mother Box kept there. The boss villain should've been sending reports back to Desaad and arrogantly dismissing more help. Unbeknownst to most viewers, Steppenwolf is a third-string New God from Apokolips. But the story wasn't about the villain, it was about the league of justice-minded heroes coming together to defeat him. Getting newer film viewers introduced to the mildest Jack Kirby's Fourth World while bringing back (um from the Dead, folks) Earth's greatest defender, Superman, epic enough.

The DC fan in me wants to call the flick a Godzilla, but the older movie critic in me will call it a King Kong. I am getting a bit tired of hearing the names Zach Snyder and Josh Whedon though. Can't they go write Danny Devito a Napoleon trilogy of films or something?

And into Halloween Season

So this Halloween isn't going to be about dedicating myself to watching a list of movies this year. I can't think of any right now because I have been watching a slough of horror flix from various release dates throughout the year already. I have been reading and writing a lot over the Summer months, so maybe I'll celebrate in that mode.

I hope to publish the now six year-old scenario "The Horrible Fate of the Haunted House Hunters" this month in time for a release date around the week before Halloween. It was originally a CoC session, but long since evolved into a Crawlspace event. Since it won't be on sale or "Pay What You Will" (or "Take it please I only only want hits") at Drive Thru RPG, I doubt that the timing will boost initial sales, but hey I will feel great at doing for the season.

Reading something new horror from a known contemporary author, like say Ben Sperduto or Dan Mills or Richard Lee Byers, is one way of keeping it real. I also have the original run, 1983 or 1984, of House of Mystery's I, Vampire in a TPB somewhere around the library. I think I'll finish it. Maybe, I'll look into some of Marvel horror characters as well.

Over the weekend just before Halloween, I am running two Crawlspace events at Beckett's new game store Weird Realms. They were supposed to be a part of grand opening festival, but things have been pushed back, so now the sessions will be private parties, over Friday and Saturday evening. The planned scenarios are "Detroit Death Metal Audition Apocalypse" for Friday's giving, and then "Ghost Story." G-Story is the actual sequel to The Horrible Fate. Though it isn't a Hoot, I intend on doing some serious party gaming here. Since we don't have to worry about customers, I am sure the other attendees will be in the mood as well.

Hopefully JerryTel shows up for some Zombie Action

Luckily I am off on the 31st of October, hmm maybe I should re-read that Zelanzy novella, so my porch of spookiness will be up and running. I am already buying candies, all of which have to be produced in the USA for this most American holiday, and have some props from previous years ready. I just might put a bit more effort than usual into the night's festivities though.

Suicide Squad

A couple of days ago I was able to remove my FacetuBe photo of an outtake of the Joker and Harlequin from the Suicide Squad movie. I had put it up when I first heard about the movie from supernatural comic book aficionado Ben Lathrop over a year ago. I promised myself I wouldn't take the shot down until after I had seen the movie. Considering I have been wanting some "street level Batman" since the  mega-apocalyptic installment of the Nolan Dark Knight trilogy. Frankly this looked like one of the few chances, I'd get for it back then. So while, I've always been more "meh" about the title featured than anything else, having both the Batman and Joker (the two "mythic level" icons of the DC streets) appear in it as only side characters meant that the DC comic book "street level" universe was going to be explored. Going to see it last Monday was the perfect finale for my vacation which had centered around GenCon.

I loved the movie . I am going to go see it probably two more times in theater and then buy the DVD and then watch it again. Then I'll watch the Blue Ray version available only online for me because those machines just suck.

The strongest point was the characters. With more main characters than Sergey Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkim, the story-telling still works. While Will Smith still eclipses the sun in this movie, the cast around him are allowed at least one shot each along side him. Guess what, Will Smith's Deadshot is a devoted parent with an unseen spouse off some where else in the world. Each of the characters do show some personality, will the direction and writing showing their individuality.

Especially nice is the fact that the audience is encouraged to find the hidden aspect to each of the protagonist villains as well as look for what makes the good guys interesting. Killer Croc is the scary Black Man that we all have to learn that he is indeed human. Diablo is the reformed esse that just can't ever go back. Enchantress is the cutting, goth girl that cleans up nice enough to bring home to mom. Captain Boomerang lives up being as big an ass, yet real enough guy, as anybody that would use the word "boomerang" in his nom de guerre. Amanda Waller is that manager down at the Unemployment Office that doesn't give a damn about your paperwork emergency. Harlequin is the liberated woman that is still daddy's little girl enough to be reminded that she is a victim of Stockholm syndrome whenever a villain needs to be self-righteous. Flagg is the capable hero that is just a little too self-indulgent to do much good for most around him. Slipnot is the gullible kid that we should all try not to be when we're 14.

Meanwhile Batman and the Joker never get too much depth. That works for me because I want more of them later and not from a whizz-bang production like this flik. Jared Leto has a pretty full vision of who his Joker is, though I suspect that the film's makers willfully decided to not let us see much more than some teaser material.

The action and the formula gets a little plodding and mechanical. I guess the editors and writer took a bit too much of the criticism of BatsVSupes too heart. The main characters, all 2,000 of them, are introduced in about 45 minutes of trailer material. The rest of the plot unfolds in "A to B to C" fashion and the twist leads to the final face off with two, not just one, boss monsters. I guess Ayer, the writer figured the over-used flashbacks would provide the magic required for the silver-screen to have emotion bamboozling to make it a truly memorable film. He should've just had the flashbacks be the action for the first 45 to 75 minutes, turned Enchantress and Flagg into a real love story, and then let Waller take over the world. The climax sequence, could then be the wonderful Ghost Busters homage that it was meant to be without feeling guilty.

Still the product good enough for Hollywood intellectuals to feel clever enough, with the revenue to prove it. Though I rate this movie a Bigfoot, on the Smurf to Godzilla scale, it'd be nice if film writers would write just a bit more than the comic book writers that they are getting their "inspiration" from.

Batman Versus Superman: Dawn of Justice

I have been dreading the arrival of this movie since I first heard about it. Zach Snyder did 300 which I hear is done frame by frame like the comic book by Frank Miller. As a movie, despite all the Homeric-eroticism, it is just a pathetic film. The trailers that I watched did not inspire me with confidence. Dudes in riot gear were bowing down to Superman and Batman was sneering at him through a rubber mask permanently set in a sneer saying a stupid line ("Do you bleed... You will). All I saw was more bad Frank Miller script, which I take to mean "bad storytelling with incomprehensible reasoning." The early reviews I read on the movie were awful. Words like "incomprehensible," "illogical," and "constipated" were being used in even the nicer ones.

Still on the day of its release, which was Thursday March 21st, despite its advertised March 22nd, I bought a ticket. Not just any ticket, but a "select" reserved seat which was available for $21 dollars. Like the worst of any William Castle movies from the 50s, the presentation was in 3-D, and the seats buckled and leaned back and forth with the action going on the screen in front of the ticket-holder. Luckily a friend gave me a "coupon" code, which bought me the ticket for $7 because I was a "true Batman fan." I had had a few beers and shot of Ardbeg (whiskey so bad it's green) before showing up. Seeing how awful the last Star Wars flik was, and the need for movie factories to use Trademarked franchises to sell train wrecks of motion pictures, I wanted to be pretty numb.

About ten minutes into the movie, I dialed back my seat controls to as low as it would allow-- it wouldn't let me just shut it off so I had to deal with a machine kicking my seat every few minutes or so. Around the time that Laurence Fishburne cracked his character's second joke, which I laughed at easily, I started letting my guard down about the movie. By the second action scene, I was in love. A little over two hours later, I was still in love and starting to respect Zach Snyder as not only a capable director, but a fan of Superman. From one over-aged adolescent to another, the man gets comic book and has done DC justice.

Batfleck is Bruce Wayne not just the Batman

Sure Superman is young and fresh. He always should be, but the Bat-Man is where every 35-plus fan of comic books is, at the height of their powers, but, to paraphrase Jeremy Iron's Alfred, not dead yet, despite at least two decades of trying. We get to see posh a cocktail party given by multi-billionaire then work in James Bond style espionage and hot chicks complete with fabulous shoulder blades and an accent. We also get to see him beat up that spare tire that men of a certain age carry around their waistline most of the time. A bit more seriously, the role of Bruce Wayne for all of its orphan porn, is probably better written than any other take on the character to date. This makes up for the 90s toy and booklet favorite, the "power-armor" tribute of the last part of the movie.

The Wonder Woman movie just might be as exciting as Wonder Woman

Both the smooth world-building and the later rock-em, sock-em part of the movie featured a Wonder Woman that was almost as interesting as the the history of the now seventy-something year-old character created by William Moulton Marston. The directing influences of this take of the princess of power have decided that since she is immortal that perhaps World War Two is a bit quaint for her introduction. Her pictured super-friends from 1918 was almost as exciting as Hans Zimmer's Led Zeppelin/Beethoven-inspired soundtrack around her.

Girlfriends around the world might disagree

This is the best superhero live-action flik ever. Call me a fanboy, which is rather rich considering my penchant for being disagreeable with much of recent comic book-based media production history (since 1988). I have a pretty specific criteria for what makes a good superhero flik. So far the professional reviews will not decrease my love of this motion picture.

What is my criteria for a good motion superhero flik?

1.) The viewer should understanding why a superhero is needed quickly
   BatsVSupes is at a disadvantage. It's been three years since Man of Steel came out introducing Amy Adam's Lois Lane to the world and that's like yet another four Marvel Comic's movies introducing female about 1,600 characters that mimicked the DC heroine. BUT this movie is a part of an on-going saga, and potential threats to Earth from outer space has been established.
   The movie re-capped and added detail to this threat as seen in Zach Snyder's first handling of Superman. It also introduces why a street-level superhero like the "bat-man" is paying attention to our planet's first extraterrestrial immigrant within fifteen minutes. To help you along, in case you're not a big MoS fan, there are plenty of sequences showing the superheroes and their place in the world around them.

2.) The action scenes should be understandable
   Since about Transformers: The Over-Budgeted Movie, Part One, there has been a tendency to make things so action-packed that no one in audience knows what is going, except for what the soundtrack is inferring. I've watched blurred information occur again and again from the Avengers and Star Wars VII, and most movies in-between.
   In this movie I watched: Superman save Lois Lane from Al-Shahbaab, Batman witnesses 9-11, Superman and Batman meet for the first time, and things get really more complicated. At no time did I have to ask myself 'what just happened?' This is not the film-makers' pretense to leave out mere-human comprehension for better understanding because of sound effects and music.
   
3.) Characterization is not a substitute for plot.
   If the superhero movies keep retelling the origin of a superhero while introducing a new cast along with the film-makers' current favorite villain (usually with more CGI than the last one), the franchise is about ripping off the audience's love of older, and probably better, movies.
   Okay Batman gets his story re-told here, but in the fictitious, and factitious, "Superman True Fans Club," he is a new character in this saga. If anything, a scene where he is defeating an established villain of the DC universe(s) should have been included.

And... ?

There about two hundred comic book titles that I would like to see made into live-action movies with just enough CGI to have them not suck. At the same time, I like film. What is a CGI-epic and CGI-driven franchises does not always fall into what a major motion picture should be. What I like about this movie is that it covered a lot of character history, in a single flik and without relying too much on noise and flash.
Dawn of Justice makes the movie that came before it a somewhat better tale to watch. I have to wait for the next one to get a fuller perspective of the cycle being presented. All that said, I have enjoyed this movie.

About the bad press

Someone must be paying for it.

Star Wars: the Force Awakens

Well I saw it. The cultural phenomenon known as Star Wars: the Force Awakens, which the build-up to over the last couple of years has been a lot fun. Everybody I know has been waiting for it. George Lucas got to go see it first and be passively-aggressive and everyone got to be snarky right back at him. Folks I know have missed work to go see it on the midnight of the day that it publicly aired. Last Saturday I even heard the movie, with pretty bad sound quality, wafting from a cracked window in project housing. Seems to me everybody is getting in on the festivities. As late as Tuesday, the mega-cinemas around my neck of the woods were doing pretty brisk business. The last bit was a nice night out for sure.

It only me took a few minutes of watching TFW before I realized that I didn't have to be spellbound. Lucas Sound sound effects creeping into my left ear, but not my right ear, reminded me of that-- the "immersion" just went away. After a while, it wasn't just J.J. Abram's blurry action scenes and grating sound mattes that was giving me headaches. By the middle of the picture, I realized that it was production decisions by the movie-makers that were bugging me even more so.

Why was Max Von Sydow in the movie? More over why couldn't he have real role? He is an actor of that stature, especially in the "genre" films. You know like the rather well-known Alec Guinness, Christopher Lee, and Peter Cushing in the originals and the prequels? Von Sydow is cardboard cut into some scenes to grant to franchise some big name credibility to the new film's opening, and then lost to formulaic scripting and production decisions that he'd cost too much later.

The writing wasn't bad though the plot was a bit confusing at times. Plenty of Nazi fetishism for the cryptofacsists while having both girls and boys play strong roles to placate the Outrage Brigade and their auxiliary of helicopter parents. The character development made me feel clever as I was able to figure what everybody's response to this or that dramatic decision seconds before it happened, though in truth I learned this from watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes irregularly. So in short, Disney knows how to make movies that a lot of people will want to see.

Like Hamill, Ford, and Fisher the young cast members are all wonderfully talented actors and actresses, complete with some appearances in various Law and Order franchises. This is rather like the "unknowns" of the first Star Wars flik, where all three of the main characters had been working on TV and the Silver Screen for ten years at least and not really that unknown. I am sure that they are all going to go on and become more fully developed characters, at least for the good guys.

For the bad guys, I am worried. Do you member how you knew to be scared of Darth Vader when the skin and bones Moff Tarkin strode up next to him? Well, imagine two young men in their twenties, one is Aryan-ish and the other lion of Zion-ish, and despite WWI Central Powers' uniforms both look a little soft around the edges. They both kneel down to Smeagol who is playing the Wizard of Oz. Even the lacky bad guys are poorly presented. Interaction among our "heavies" is more like Mean Girls-meets-Teletubies than say the Force Ten from Navarone.

Visual-wise the sci-fi is kind of Star Wars-y but more CGI stock footage than much else. Locales were well-known vacation spots in Ireland, CGI, and a backlot filled with sand. The "rathtar" aboard Han Solo and Chewie's big space junker, J.J. Abram's proudest contribution to the movie I'm sure, have been in about every weird horror flik since before TSR wrote up the Phaerrim. The ships, the ones that we could actually see, there were many blurry suggestions of ships, were either from earlier films, or boxes.

Overall the film is something of a Big Foot, on a scale of Godzilla to Smurf. Will I go see the next release? Well, yeah. What else do I have to watch that is space fantasy with a decent budget? I would to see some old fashion competition among the film studios though that would provide subsequent styled films, but aren't the same franchise.

Dystopian Omlette: Chris Kelso's Slave Stories: Scenes From the Slave State

One of my more intimate local friends Beckett Warren told me that he had been published in Chris Kelso's Slave Stories: Scenes from the Slave State so I picked it up a couple of months ago. As you already know I have been delving into dystopian-visioned works for a few decades already, so it wasn't a stretch for me to get into and this collection of short stories has many authors tied to Cleveland and its surrounding parts. Heck, the day I finished up the book, I brought it to read over breakfast in a nearby diner and noticed that one of the windows was being replaced after being shattered that very morning-- Do you want to talk about the feeling of synchronicity?

It seems that Kelso had created a setting and then asked various authors to help him fill out the streets, back alleys, and by-ways. There is the big city Wire City, its inner suburbs of Ersatz and Spittle, and the surrounding backwoods of Shell County. Off to a far edge of my imaginary map is the fill-in-the-blank city of Moosejaw. Almost thirty authors jumped in to help along with four artists. Like a punk rock album the reader gets a lot of economy out of the product.

Also like a punk rock album, one has to be prepared for what lies within the jacket. The authors draw the contradictions of everyday life and blend allegory with surrealism to make some tales that would have Absurdists like Beckett (Sam not Warren) and Ionesco feeling comfortable. Others might feel a bit less comfortable, especially those where sexually explicit language and situations are concerned. While the overall effect isn't too shocking, come on folks listen to high-schoolers walking home already, it can be a bit jarring. Then there is the strangeness that the reader has to deal with.

To name a few of the works:
I enjoyed Mary A. Turzillo's "Crime Against Nature". Here she delves into transhumanism, a term that would baffle me if not for folks in life. Her language as a virus pun is awesome.
Clive Tern's "Shell County Vodou" is a fun romp into employee politics.  My favorite story in the collection.
Be prepared for Preston's Grassman's "Interstate" sordidness. It depicts injection drug use but with a twist.
 "The Coin-operated Man" by Gregory L. Norris, is about the most traditional work in the collection for the casual sci-fi reader. It is very well placed in the setting but is a take on the hard-nosed S-F adventure fiction of the 30s through the 50s. Mind you, don't get too comfortable.
Beckett and Tony Yanick, also a local friend, writes "Tribes of Neurot". I hope the reader is comfortable with his body, and its own flora and fauna.

The collection doesn't get boring, especially with the wide range of writing styles from the twenty-nine authors included. The subject mater tried to be new and different for the reader. I suspect that is more for removing its audience away from their comfort zone than novelty. Some might be easily shocked by this, but readers of authors like Kathy Acker and Samuel Delaney, heck even Bruce Sterling or Pierre Boulle, are going to be a little dissatisfied. I suppose what I find lacking is that once one gets over the fear of being in the slave state presented, no one digs into the factors behind it. We only the fact that nobody likes to go work, sometimes it even shows us why, but not often enough. The work is still refreshing and interesting enough to be a "Bigfoot" of a read.

T.J. Bass

As a kid of the seventies, I caught many of the best parts of over-population and ecological disaster and their warped futures science fiction ever. Whether we're talking the rather gritty and practical Soylet Green, to the rather stylish and fantastic Logan's Run. I actually read the novels years before I ever saw their movie presentation. Oddly enough, I saw Walking Tall, the Exorcist, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Jaws before I was 18, err or 17, or whatever age it takes before kids can get into 'R'-rated movies, but rugged Charlseton Heston and glam Farah Fawcett were too much for my family. So as it was that I'd be in my 30 before I saw Michael York as a sandman, it'd be in my late 40s, damn-near 50, that I'd find out about the novels by Thomas J Bassler MD or TJ Bass. I thank Ben Assaf for the lead from over at Good Reads.

The population boom is not so much a failure as it is an absolute success. Thousands of years in the future, humans as we know them are being replaced by the nebish.  Millions of billions, possibly a trillion or two, inhabit the planet. Every square inch of the surface that isn't a mountain or tar pit is relegated to being dedicated to agriculture. The humanoids, and their entourage of vermin and parasites, are pretty much the only complex organism alive living in vast underground cities. The population centers of the world comprise the Hive.

Much as we view bears, mountain lions, and neanderthals the nebish view their contemporary human neighbors. Unlike the bears and lions, the humans tend to really be dangerous. The battling between the two makes quite a fulfilling sport for combatants on both sides. The most successful nebish hunters even tend to defect to the outside world and become "cow-eyes" (one needs big eyes to be above ground) themselves.

The dystopic future presented by TJ Bass is undated, and keenly not easily outdated as a lot of science fiction ends to be. The author was a physician and his understanding of biological science shows, but he keeps it fairly understandable to non-scientist reader, like me. His technical world is functional without belaboring too many engineering processes and he avoids over specifying the technology itself-- unlike the petroleum, fusion, and telephone-driven futures of 1945-1995. His societal evil is quietly competent and many a corporate employee reading this will get it right away. She maybe even agree with the Hive.

It was Bassler's take on artificial intelligence that I liked the best. While the humans, yes even the nebish are human, have complete story-arcs, the reader gets to know the AI working around the characters. I find this last bit the most interesting aspect about these two books. In a time where sci-fi writing is dominated by evil electronic-minds overtaking humanity, it is nice to see how a non-robotic engineer can understand how AI will most likely become helpful and therefore actually used by humanity. The works taken together rather reminded me of how HG Well's works, especially The War of the Worlds or The Time Machine, not only read well but are still relevant as speculative fiction. Definitely a couple of King Kongs here of S-F literature.

Halloween-y!!! 2015

Let us never forget that September 15, Nine-One-Five-Whatever, is a good time to start getting ready to make the year's Halloween season awesome. Since Friday evening, that was 9-11 folks, my partner got me into the mood for this year's celebration of phantasmagorical horror and supernatural flights of fancy. You see, we were bringing a patient out of our vehicle into the hospital. It was raining, so I put a white towel on the patient's head. She promptly covered her whole head with the towel. When walking into the ER, my patient raised her arms and said, "BOO!"

The ER staff loved it, especially after the Charge Nurse heard that I wasn't the one that covered up the patient's face, as well as the cop pulling OT as security at the ambulance door. Even when transferring the patient the staff kept speaking like Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi My partner couldn't stop talking about Halloween for the rest of shift-- her son's three now, so she can start doing some of the festivities again. With this little piece of guerrilla theater, I am totally in the mood for Halloween again.

Others start earlier than I do, Ben Lathrop, that's Hepcat,  is concentrating on vampires this year.  Charrl's, Charlie Fleming, Screamzine channel is horror 24-7-365 and is available on ROKU. I am especially digging the "Gravebit" series on the Screamzine channel. 

But what I am doing for Halloween? Well, I've decided to publish a couple more Crawlspace scenarios. Since I am off on Halloween night, I plan on doing a porch production complete with American-made chocolates, like Boyer's (I really do like butterscotch and peanut butter cups) and B&W movies for the hordes of uncultured kids these days. A bit more privately, I intend on indulging in some movies just for Peryton and me, maybe Caed or Batman when they stop in over the next few weeks. Here's the selection I am thinking of for this year done in countdown fashion for drama:

10. Blackula ('72)- moving from Hammer Horror films that I did last year into the exploitive 70s.
9. Frankenstein 1970 ('58 actually) - don't let anybody fool you, the 70s have no exclusive deal on exploitative horror flix.
8.  Alien (1979)- Would you believe that I've only read the book?
7. Cat People ('42)- Haven't seen it yet.
6. Cat People ('82)- Only heard the song.
5. Creature from the Black Lagoon ('54)- Gotta get a bit of classic onto this list
4. Prince of Darkness ('85)- Peryton's choice
3. Hellraiser II ('88)- Peryton's choice
2. Blade the TV Series ('o6)- I'm in love with the receptionist.
1. Hellraiser ('87)- A movie that set the tone for those that followed it.

Pasty, Fat Fuck that I am

Yesterday I head that if I "Want to improve (my) game mastering? Get up off the chair." This struck a cord with me. I was reminded of days when I was spry and had so much energy that I couldn't sit down while running a game. I felt young again. But I also know now that while I was a good GM back then, but as I am not good as I am now. Game-mastering that has the GM feel good and connected with even complete strangers is not a mysterious ritual . Further more, game-mastering should not be about the only time a person bothers to exercise.

Quick disclaimer: Werdna (Scott Malthouse) is a person that is comparatively younger than me. He is also one of deeper, better thought table-top gamers that I will ever meet. His articles provide me with perspectives that I would never think of on my own. The debate going on here is a discussion among colleagues not an derisive argument between unfeeling agents of imaginary factions inside of some great schism in a hobby meant to be for fun that often isn't. Also, there is a good chance that any participants in this discussion will not come to a conclusive uniform outcome as to how things should be.

Let it be said, that as a GM I got rid of GM-screens in 1991. I would put scraps of paper in front of me, and when someone needed to see if I was making things up, I'd pull out a manila folder with the written-out scenario in it from my very book-bag. In these days (20o4-present) of electronic readers, video players, and complete stereo systems in single large-pocket sizes, this habit of mine has only gotten worse. Lordsheads, that book-bag is sooooo damn heavy. Apparently, I am a radical.

While the mixture of bad decision-making in dietary matters and ever-growing food industry in modern non-manufacture-driven economy, have helped me put on pounds since I was 14, my tabletop gaming passion has never required me to carry around a lot of stuff. Though the providers of current "adventure gaming" would have you think otherwise, "gaming" does not need to be burdensome nor preformed by sedentary people. If indeed folks seem to think that showing up to a "role-playing" game requires fifty pounds of equipment and being out of shape signifies a person's inner deepness, they are welcome, but it really should not dictate the reality of the hobby.

At the same time, we should not be so concerned about looks, and our personal smell (GAYMERS), that we cannot share those sparks of intelligence that show how imaginative we are. Cosplay might be paid for by the electronic gaming industry, but those game designers do not have as much fun as we have for 1/15th the money that they spend. Table-toppers get the lookers for virtually free because of our fantastic thoughts.

A little about GMing a RPG session.

Table-top should resist the urge to be a performance artist. Indeed, a good GM is of course one, but folks should not see it "for free." If you get this, sit down already. I mean it. Folks at the table aren't here to see your passion. More than likely they're here to see how a game should work or at least want to sample the game mechanics. Your passion helps, don't get me wrong, but folks want to see an activity formed by a prcess developed by you. They will apply to possible situations well away from the table that you are sharing with them much later.

Actually your passion about any game system that you are working is not indicated by whatever position you happen to be in while being observed by others. The desire comes through in the knowledge of the game system. The drive to be entertaining comes from the technique of presenting players with the options that they have. Most often, what is indicated by your standing or sitting is how much control that you as GM want to have.

You, yourself, get a whole lot out of this interaction. Besides being clever, you get to organize things. You get to shift from being omnipotent as the GM, to slovenly ignorant as a dim-witted NPC. Best yet, you make the patterns as you roll dice. Hopefully you don't fudge roles too often, sometimes you need to, most time you don't. Using the success or fail of dice/card/whatever determination provides the GM with as much entertainment as the scenario set out in front the players. Your own heart beats faster, you are quicker than usual mentally, _and_ the opposite (as well as the same sex) thinks you are sexy.

Now about standing up and sitting down.

Okay, hopefully you walk, or wheelchair around in fresh air, enough to get some a sense of well-being to not be expecting too much from the players sitting in front of you. It is now that you should know, that everything is up to you. Good or bad, it's your fault. There isn't a set of rules written that is going to preserve you from any criticism from the folks that have come to the table between you and them. Here is playing field. He is where you prove yourself.

Sitting while having players define their Characters, tells people that they are in charge of their characters. You are, hopefully, actually distracted with important details of the upcoming scenario. Familiar players should act as coaches to new players with designing their PCs.  Try to listen to the conversations going on, this helps you get notes on how to make the upcoming adventure great in everyone's eyes.

What your posture during the start of any narrative can be anything. That position is actually going to define the rest of the session. This subject will be covered in later blog posts, or not.

Stand-up when you're not in charge. You are now, in fact, floating, above each and every individual Character. You're looking at the PCs. They are in charge, you're just showing how special that they are. Take notes if you're any sort of author. These moments ae gold and should be cherished.

Especially in argumentative situations, you sit down when you need to tell everyone that you are really in control. This bit might be counter intuitive, but it shows that you are a being of finite energy and patience. You can even pull out a reference material at this time. Feel free to stand back up again as you read where your GM decision is legitimized by the rule-set. If it isn't, you made a mistake, but guess what, you're the GM, do not admit to being wrong about the rules. Anybody pressing it is being an ass, let him play himself out. He, or she, just looks confused in the end.

It's Zak S Pundit's or Hillamena's Hobby, We just Live in It

A couple of you might've noticed already, but last Tuesday (Aug 4, 2015) I received a note from a dude, a Daniel Bently, commenting on a year-old blog entry ( July 31, 2014) of mine. I was sipping coffee as I read his vaguely put point that his blogs were being filled up with "he-said/she-said bullshit" (paraphrased for clarity) and mine should include "citations." It took me a couple seconds before I stopped reaching for my College English Composition textbook from 1986, which is luckily upstairs, to comply with his request. I realized that he was up to something, so I replied " From all 30 reads of this blog post since July 5th (2015)? Really?" Over the course of  the day, I could mostly find out what Bentley didn't actually say. It was all very passive-aggressive.

On the second morning, after I stated that Mr Bentley had an agenda for his reviving of the old blog post, Peryton informed me that Zak S's A Red and Pleasant Land did extremely well at GenCon's Ennie awards. Things clicked in my head. This explained to me why I was the asshole that made him search for my blog and post there, hence cluttering up his feed. Whether he had an agenda or is naturally a jerk ( IE someone who raises a hand to tell everyone that he doesn't know something), I don't really know.

So at this point in time, to balance the unbalance of the universe going on I suppose I should just mention David Hill and Filamena Young, or "Hillamena" as Peryton puts it. As Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have the equal mixture of looks as well as talent to be great artists, these two have the mixture of writing skill and connections to be the bell-ringers for what I am going to call "the Gamer Outrage Brigade." There that is done.

Just as I know that the Kurds as antagonistic towards the nation of Turkey as much as they are oppressed, I also know that the oppressed of the tabletop gaming industry are just as oppressive of other gamers. While many people still don't like homosexuals and still have very simplistic views of cultures not their own, there are just as many folk loudly trying to shame others for hygiene standards and the way that they speak. Big secret folks, role-playing in fantastic scenarios helps us overcome the need to be the oppressor or the bully.

Now John Tarnowski would turn this sort of rant into an awesome 25 page-long treatise. Zak S would disappear for six months to come out with rocking rebuttals towards the easily offended. I am frankly done here. Be nice or not, just let the shaming of people that disagree with you go though. It doesn't work, it only makes you look petty.

Citations listed herein

GenCon 15: Holed-Up Lotta Something

A friend of mine described my time at GenCon as "... holed up running games all weekend." 

As you might have read elsewhere, Pery and I weren't doing the exhibitor's booth this year, instead focusing the PeryPubbers on running events. While I didn't run the most events that I ever have at GENCON, I did nine events. It was some work, but it didn't cut anything out of the great experiences that the convention is for me.

The road to GenCon
The passive-aggressive stance of the LLC members towards the anti-homosexual legislation in Indiana annoyed me. Really why did they say anything if they were not going to be going anywhere for five years, if then? Oh yeah, to stir up media mentions of GENCON. I didn't want to go, but Peryton reminded me that we had already paid for our room with JerryTel by then. Having six new scenarios about 3/4s finished at the time of the announcement didn't hurt either.

Over the spring, many of the new GM PeryPubbers and we met up for hoots to basically playtest ourselves. GENCON is just too much of an occasion to walk into without getting some practice in before hand. In June, I actually played the Arkham Horror for the first time in like 20 years to make sure that Caed was familiar with the board, its pieces, and game mechanics.

Still about four days out from the trip, I decided to play CIVIII instead of doing pre-generated Characters for the games. Other, real life things, had my dork factor at a particular low ebb.

I was mopping the floors when the house-sitter showed up Wednesday AM. Peryton decided that her mix of 80s Moody Blues would be the best road trip music ever on the way down. Frankly, I was wondering if I was going to have any fun at all this event.

Old Home Eve, our Wednesday night party was a success though. Beckett, Cram, Jedi and Jessi, Caed, Kal, Batman, JerryTel and the Boy, Sligo, LinZ and Joe, Darrenn E. Canton, a couple dudes by the names of Chuck (I have the business card) and "D," then finally WEB showed up-- If I missed anybody, please let me know. Though Bill, WEB, lectured me on the expensive drinks, at the Park Plaza lounge, I loved the place. I'd talk Beckett and Cram into "second location"ing it to stalk WEB down at his fourth or fifth location. Still finally saw the hotel room that I would be living in for the next five days around 1:15 am. I wasn't staggering too much.

A monolith from 2001? I _was_ holding a bone.

Happiness, at last
The J.W. Marriott is not only very far away from most of GenCon, it is actually a very, very big complex in and of itself. It was far from the hivemind of the majority of gamer dorks (BOARDGAMES), and it is here where the indy role-player ghetto was. The farthest room at the 400 meter long north hallway was where the PeryPubber clique dominated things (the exotic location Room 209). But the room had four tables, and most of the other GMs in there were truly independent gamers. The Pubbers took up three out of the four tables for a couple of time slots, quite a proud moment for me.

After the first fifteen minutes of running the first game, "Big Foot Hunting" for JerryTel's Stay Alive, I was in my element. Now the great group with me didn't hurt. But even by the last game on Sunday, "The Easter Bunny, the Holy Day Horror" for my on Crawlspace, I was really enjoying myself.  Even the extremely large groups players for my midnight games and the lack of air conditioning after 11pm, couldn't ruin any session. By the way, thanks to a player complaint, thank you Matt and Leslie, a manager has promised me, or other folks, fans for next year-- it was verified at 91 F degrees in the corner I did my last night game in at 2:13am.

The convention around me

Even evil has to wait in line.

 Wednesday afternoon, I noticed GenCon has finally put up large maps of its Exhibitors Hall outside the exit. Since I wasn't running a booth, I only walked into it twice. Once on Friday AM-ish, to see how big the crowds looked (a very good time to do so BTW, without the clusters, clumps, and clueless of Saturday) on the way to a game. Sunday afternoon, I found where I wanted to go on one of those maps, Palladium Publishing, walked in the closest entrance, got there, bought my stuff, and left. The clusters, clumps, and clueless were just rocking out still. Sorry to a couple folk about that.

I noticed a lot more prettier younger folks running around this year, more so than other years. I actually watched a "Hard Gay" cosplayer techno-dance down a hallway with a boom box on his shoulder. I wanted to see if he had any disco on the CD then he'd learn how to really dance, but I had a game to get to. Turn it up to 11, I say. To be clear, the man's music wasn't loud at all.

Speaking of loud though, one of my midnight games was almost crashed by a group of idiots basically looking for a room to squat in for a party for kids too cheap or too broke to have their own party spot. The group I was running didn't mind the silliness, nor the squatting, but they started coming over and interrupting us with drunk cleverness. This ticked off a couple players, and I was jealous, so I chased them out of the room. One got officious with me asking "What is your event number?" I threw a program at him and told him to look up the RPGs running after 11pm that night and then narrow it down. For another hour, he and his friends would hide around the corner in the hallway, sneak up to peek into the room, and take pictures of me. They got sleepy and went to their nap-nooks within 40 minutes.
I bring up this tale, not to bitch about the partying, amateurs, but a detail about GENCON operations. While I am checked throughout the day by volunteers, in the middle of my events, to make sure that everyone has their badges and that they have given me tickets; those same volunteers were gone by about 8:30pm every night from the desk they were working at. This sort of 9-5 attitude makes strict policies about what table GMs can and cannot do somewhat hypocritical. Either be in control or get off my back when you're not tired dudes.

Some personage- personal times
 

After my afternoon T&T game, "Yetis, Yet Again," I grabbed David from Toronto for a get together. I actually had enough time to meet and have dinner with Brad McDermitt at High Velocity, the sports bar at the JW Marriot. That establishment has some awesome house-made corned beef for reubens. LinZ and Joe found Batman and me hanging out at Loughmiller's Pub about 90 minutes later. It was Saturday and I was on the downhill part of my scenario running. I had a break between 5-11pm that evening. Heck, I was even able to spend an hour or two with my beloved Peryton and the Boy. JerryTel was running the auction this year, so he was actually busier than I was for our comparative vacations.

It wasn't until Sunday, that JerryTel, Batman, Cramm, Peryton, the Boy and I could spend some real time together. Nicely the Bourbon Street Cafe had room for three of us. Sadly the Sci-Fi channel had only sucky movies on for the rest of the night. I think there is a show called American Ninja and Pirates or something these days. If there isn't, there should be.

The Weekend Cleveland Didn't Burn

I noticed the trial of Cleveland police officer Michael Brelo was ending when a friend who works at the Old Angle bar up W.25th Street from me posted an innocuous statement to the effect that Cleveland doesn't like to be ugly . I had been hearing updates everyday I listened to the news for three weeks already, so it just wasn't exciting news to me. I first heard about the verdict of Brelo from my sister calling me from Florida to find out "how bad things were." I was having minor liver failure or something, so I wasn't at work getting news from elsewhere like the local radio stations or gossip texts from coworkers. I suddenly became very worried. I told my sibling that, "the folks across the street are remarkably quiet." at which point, we spoke of magnesium citrate. Later, I'd scan the web and read about the seventy something folks that got arrested stepping over the bonds while practicing their right to protest. Still the neighbors were remarkably quiet for a Saturday night-- dudes have a burnt-out car without a roof parked in their driveway, to tell you just how they usually like to relax.

On Sunday, I was still enjoying discovering how magnesium affects the body. Thanks to FacetuBe's algorithms (I forgot to hit "most recent" button the day before),  I read a portion of the infractions that had gotten the dozens of protestors arrested from various bar tenders and a couple owners from places that I like. Apparently, the protestors were at what I'd call "Playground Cleveland." Rechecking the official news sources, not much else to tell. The most exciting thing that happened all day, besides a fever, was that night when putting out my two American-made American flags for Memorial Day that night, a john and hooker were scared off of a shadowy, deserted porch next door. So I was in my bathrobe, I don't know where they get their wardrobe from, but, sheesh, talk about judgmental.

The next day while at work, The local NPR radio station was proclaiming how peaceful things had been. I heard about a rash of fires being called in along St Clair Avenue, a notorious northeastern street, within minutes after the verdict was read. "The Eastside burnt itself to the ground" said one person who had clairvoyance or something because he was not there. Later, my partner and I drove up to area to check things out during some down time that we were experiencing on the national holiday. Either the calls were a bunch of crank calls or perhaps somebody was presenting information that was not wholly based in fact.

The most exciting bit of vandalism that I could find is when, even later in the shift, we pulled up to a favorite park of mine (Down BY THE RIVER! ref. the Clash) to chill out. A couple of Cavalier fans according to their expensive jerseys wearing baseball caps, camouflage pants, in a big pickup with plates out of Medina county, Ohio (according to my partner) saw the vehicle and had to leave in a hurry. I had to chuckle as well as be pissed off as to why they had to. Here's the pictures below.

Best spot in all of Cleveland. Come find it.

This is the reason why deer hunters can't have nice things, like major sport franchises.

Officer Michael Brelo was the only law enforcement officer charged with a crime in a policing incident where a whole bunch of police cars, from more than one city, followed a couple of folks who were probably drunken driving and had some cocaine on their persons as well. Somewhere in East Cleveland, the folks were corralled where police cars were anywhere the drivers could escape. Shots were fired, less than two hundred, and towards the end of things, this was the one who charged the bunker, so to speak, jumping onto the hood of suspects' car and delivered a full clip through the windshield. Okay, I get it. Someone has to make sure his comrades at arms don't get hurt, you storm the bunker. The problem is, no one in the car was armed. Is he guilty of a crime? No. Should he be a police officer in Cleveland, Ohio. No. He storms bunkers, while anybody who lives around here knows the bomb of poverty was dropped here a long, long time ago, nobody that lives around here think that drunken drivers are the real armed enemy. If so, then there is an unspoken war between disparate populations that claim Cleveland as their own. Sadly the ones with the badges don't even have to live in the city limits.
  

Hoot on Top of the Holler

Since about 2006, Peryton and I have been driving past a certain spot on I-71 (going from Cleveland to Columbus) and seeing the Travel Lodge Inn sign at the crest of a ridge of hills and thinking that the spot would make a great place for a Hoot. So nine years later, we finally have one of the get-togethers there. The specific spot is right at the I-71/SR 13 intersection, which seems to an area that has a lot to do with Mannsfield, Ohio without actually having to visist that city.

JerryTel sounded interested when I mentioned this particular gathering, but then remembered a previous date in Germany or Tibet, or somewhere. My younger sister Caed, tried her best to come up with excuses to avoid coming, but even her first grandchild was born earlier than was expected so the woman finally just submitted and agreed to show up. Drew, from Spacers, and Beckett also were coming as well without half as much hassle. There were a couple of folks that mumbled something about let me ahead of time, but I have my own scheduling to keep track of, let alone theirs, so I just called them a wash months ago. But on April 24th around 3pm, I was picking up Peryton from her workplace and we en rout to Exit 69 on I-71, or the Mansfield exit commercial district come hell or high water.

The afternoon/evening went beautifully. Caed started texting me that she was Ashland, just as we drove past that city, picking cheese from Grandpa's Cheese Barn and would be a little late. When we checked in, Pery and I realized that we weren't actually at the top of the hill, but in the lower complex of the motel. Still, we had arrived, and there was a Mexican food restaurant right on the premise. There my sister would meet us and help Pery finish a pitcher of margarita. Around 8-9pm, Beckett and Drew, from Spacers, would show up as well and the festivities were underway.

Friday and Saturday were spent with role-playing and lots of jokes, and bit of napping between the two. We didn't see much else of the town around us, except other local dining establishments, but I was on top of world. Or at least I was on top of hill finally. I think I might just make the spot my preferred place for future hoots dedicated to playtesting my scenarios. It really was a good time.