The next Open Design Podcast is out, and it's a winner! Tony DiTerlizzi of Planescape, Monstrous Manual, and Spiderwick Chronicles fame talks about how to improve your art and art direction, and he sketched up a prize for us as well. Yes, you could win a Tony DiTerlizzi drawing, just by subscribing to the Open Design Podcast RSS feed.

If that's not enough, Mike Mearls of Wizards of the Coast talked with us about design, collaboration, and his favorite adventures. And told us just a little about an upcoming boardgame project as well.

The free podcast awaits; let me know what you think.

• RT @matt_james_FR: Have you check out the Loremaster Interview section lately? There are some new answers. tinyurl.com/mad635 #dnd #

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So, yes...it has been over 4 months since I made an entry here.

I've been busy.

Turns out that owning a house is a LOT of work!

We closed on the house on the first week in August. That was followed by taking out nearly ALL the original carpet, and putting down new carpets and laminate flooring. That was essentially our $8000 tax rebate.

While we spent time packing (interrupted by my youngest son's biopsy and subsequent hospital stay due to pneumonia), my father-in-law moved into the house and started working on it. By the time we moved in near the end of August, he'd painted and repaired much of the issues.

So, then moving day came. The night before the move....I sprain my ankle. Lovely. Luckily, we had great friends who lent us a hand. Whew!

So, in the time since, we've slowly settled in. I've taken to tackling a lot of the yard work....pruning our trees and shrubs, planting new ones (like the 6 huckleberry bushes I bought!), thinning the bamboo grove back to a respectable size, creating planting beds, etc. etc. etc. I really do love gardening, it seems.

And that's about it. Homeowning is a busy, busy endeavor, but one that is totally worth it. Oh, and that other house we tried to buy? It was foreclosed, as we thought it would. Records show that the real estate group that bought it paid $360,000 for it, only $5000 less than we had offered. Funny though....they are selling it for $349,950. Guess they didn't see the inside before they bought it! It gives me a warm fuzzy feeling inside, knowing that I wasn't the one who got screwed over on that house, after all.

Originally published at Highmoon's Ponderings. You can comment here or there.

I’ve been avoiding dealing with Mom’s memory in any conscious capacity for more than a month now, trying to get back to a normal rhythm of life. I’ve even felt guilty at times because I have actively avoided anything that would make me think too much of Mom, especially all the papers and photos I brought back from Puerto Rico. I’ve relegated her to the wallpaper on my cellphone and iPod Touch, and the picture of her I keep in my journal marking the next blank page where I’ll write.

Not today. I know this will come up at dinner, so I rather work through it now than at the table. I’m talking of course of the “What are you thankful for?” question at every Thanksgiving dinner. Well, I’m thankful for my mom, Wanda I. Robles Ortiz. And this is my eulogy for her.

The easiest way I can find to describe Mom is by way of Psalm 15:

A Psalm of David. Lord, who may have a resting-place in your tent, a living-place on your holy hill? He who goes on his way uprightly, doing righteousness, and saying what is true in his heart; whose tongue is not false, who does no evil to his friend, and does not take away the good name of his neighbour; who gives honour to those who have the fear of the Lord, turning away from him who has not the Lord’s approval. He who takes an oath against himself, and makes no change. He who does not put out his money at interest, or for payment give false decisions against men who have done no wrong. He who does these things will never be moved.

Now, Mom wasn’t perfect and I have no interest in making her into a saint after her death. My mom was a human being, fallible, with quirks all her own who nevertheless strove every day to be the best she could be, accepting each night that she had failed in some things, and knowing that, with G-d’s help, tomorrow would be another day for her to try again. If there is one great lesson I learned from her it probably is, “Lo mejor que hizo Dios fue un dia despues del otro,” (the best thing G-d made was one day after the other) for in that phrase is encompassed the way in which she lived her life and how she taught us to live ours: know that whatever you do today, good or bad, tomorrow is another day; you’ll either have a chance to see the results of the good deeds done and be inspired to do more, or see–and deal with–the consequences of your not-so-good actions done and have a chance to learn from them and perhaps make amends. I don’t know that it was this well codified in her mind, but I don’ t think I’m too far off the mark either.

Mom led by example. Through ups and downs, through the thousand-and-one juggling acts she performed raising three kids as a single mother, it was always her actions that taught the big lessons, and yes, at points the lesson was ‘don’t do what I did here.’ More often, however, it was more a guide on how to behave properly for us then to apply according to our own way of life. I learned to be patient from my mom, as well as easy-going, accepting, honest and diligent. I learned to treat people with respect, as well as a few choice curse words for when your respect was answered with rudeness. I learned to laugh at everything I could, to be happy and thankful with the most trivial gift, to be loving and caring and affectionate. Some people say I’m touchy-feely and clingy, and you can thank Mom for that.

Living apart from Mom was always a bit difficult for both of us, though we managed by always being in touch by phone (she even tried email a couple of times over the years just for me) and she would visit as often as she could. When she fell ill the first time in 2007, I went to PR to be with her for some of her hospital visits. And when she fell ill again at the start of this year, I dropped everything to spend what eventually would turn into four months at her side in Puerto Rico. How could I not? It wasn’t easy, both because my life has changed in the past few years and the realities of spending long stretches of time in a place without a large Jewish community and all that entails made things difficult for me, but mostly because it was torture seeing Mom decline as she’d go through the stages of her illness. This was also when I saw the awesome strength of will she had inside.

It was also during this time that I realized the magnitude of something I already knew. My mom had been a teacher for 19 years, most of them at the same elementary school in a low-income government project (”caserio,” in Puerto Rican), a place that most people avoid like the plague. There, Mom taught wave after wave of young kids, earning their affection for years after they’d gone out of school. Even though many of her kids were tough to deal with, she did not give up on any of them, going to lengths I didn’t even know to help them out (I’m talking facing off with drug traffickers and the like). She was my mom, our mom, but she wasn’t ours, and she wasn’t her own; she belonged to others, to her students, fellow teachers, friends, family, and pretty much any and every one that needed her in any slight way.

So today I am thankful for my mother, for the time I did get to have her, for all that she gave me and taught me, for all the love she bestowed upon me from even before I was born. I am thankful that I was able to give back to her a tiny fraction of what I owed her. And I am thankful for the legacy she left behind in me, my sisters, and my nephews (and any that may later come). I miss her with every ounce of life in me, and that will never change.

Lastly, I am thankful that I have this video of her, the only recording of her that I own. This is a message she recorded for the school graduation, which was dedicated to her and which she could not attend because she was in the hospital. It isn’t a video I can watch often yet, but I have it and I treasure it.

Farewell, Mom. I love you.

The most horrifying thing about this article is that I can't be entirely sure if it is tongue-in-cheek or genuine, full-bore stupidity. Either way, it's an amusing read, particularly for my techie friends.

EDIT: Okay, yeah, it looks like it's a hoax. Part of me is relieved by this. The other part is somewhat disappointed.

• Gah, account may have been hacked. Apologies to anyone who may have gotten DM spam. #
• God I hate spammers. #
• @Tonyrunes I'm sure you IQ is extraordinary. I, however, feel like a dummy. I have no idea how the hack happened. #
• Huh, I got DM spam from @katie_berger, @d20monkey, @scimon, @mrlich, @robosnake, @swordwraith, @teknohippy, @mana_junkie A pretty big hack. #

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Photos of the week

We're so delighted with the immense talent of our growing, global lj_photophile community that we've decided to introduce a poll. Each week, we'll choose a half-dozen photos (based on user comments and staff feedback) and ask you to select a photo of the week. The winning photo will be announced in the next newsletter. If possible, please limit photo size to 350x350 to ensure that images display properly on friends pages. We want to thank you again (and again!) for sharing your passion.

Check out this week's photo poll and more fantastic user content after the jump!

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Curtains

Thanks for joining us. To our American friends, have a fantastic Thanksgiving. To all of our international neighbors, we'll eat a little extra for you!

I went through and did a little bit of friend's list maintenance today, deleting all the people I haven't talked to in years or people who haven't updated since like... 2006.

I frowned a bit when I came across mcingan in the list because, sadly, Josh is no longer with us.

*pours a 40 for his homey*

• RT @KoboldQuarterly: Who will reign as King of the Monsters? bit.ly/8sTatc #

Visit the Monkey King at KoboldQuarterly.com.

This morning as I'm getting Roary her breakfast yogurt, she tells me "I say you woman, get me a spoon."

Oy vey.

I finally got my assignment from the RPG company guy that wanted me to do the editing work for him. He sent me a 70-page document filled with prestige classes and a couple of alternate rules to look over. I was given the instructions to "look them over and edit for grammar, spelling and mechanics issues, like balance. Feedback on the general 'cool factor' for them would also be appreciated."

He wants it done by mid-January, though I anticipate being finished before Christmas. The pay? $150. Not too shabby for something that will likely amount to less than 10 hours worth of work. And really, I'm tweaking and editing PFRPG prestige classes. Can it really be called work? No, I didn't think so.

Since I'm going to be attending classes for my CCNA and from there delving further into the tech field, I happened across this picture that made me LOL.

• Perfect feats for cowardly player characters. www.koboldquarterly.com/k/article2886.php #
• Fishing for tuna from a kayak. This guys is nuts. Awesome, but nuts. bit.ly/6G7GCu #

Visit the Monkey King at KoboldQuarterly.com.

My "ulcer" has been acting up again lately. Frequently. 3 of the last 5 days I have woken up much earlier than I intended due to intense abdominal pain. I say "ulcer" in quotes because, when this issue first manifested itself in February, I went to the ER (yes, the pain was THAT BAD, I thought I had appendicitis or something) and the sonogram they performed on me revealed no evidence of such. In fact, the doctors as a whole could not fathom what had caused the pain but suggested that it may be a "proto-ulcer," i.e. one that was developing but not yet detectable.

They prescribed me some vicodin for the pain and some additional medicines that were not covered by my insurance to help treat it. Naturally, since it wasn't covered by insurance, I was unable to acquire those medicines, but at least I got the vicodin. Now the problem rears its ugly head again. Fortunately, I did not use all of the vicodin I was originally prescribed and now have some on hand to deal with the present issue. Painkillers are not a cure, however, merely a crutch through which to ease my suffering. It seemed to go away on its own before, after a few days. Hopefully it will not become a more frequent irritation. Maybe when I have a job and real money again, I'll return to the doctor and get a second opinion... and perhaps actually purchase the medicines I needed to begin with.

I have my job training orientation in two hours. Hopefully, my lack of sleep combined with the potent narcotic in my system will not render me unconscious in the middle of it. Given my present level of mental alertness, I think I should be able to tough it out.

EDIT: Started vomiting around 8am. Had to call and reschedule the orientation. It won't affect my start date at all, thankfully, but it's a shame I had to miss this one.

I thought it would be fun to take some of my fantasy minis and paint them up as if they were fantasy versions of the Watchmen. This is a work in progress. So far I have Rorshach, the Comedian, and Silk Spectre II.

public Facebook album link

What: Werner Hodel's 1997 riverboat navigation game Mississippi Queen, published in German by Goldsieber and in English by Rio Grande Games.

Why: This category is something of a contradiction. The classic definition of a strategy game is a game which contains no chance and no concealed information, such as go and checkers. The classic definition of a tile game is one where players place pieces on a surface, such as mah jongg or Scrabble. Hybridizing the two concepts led to a boom of brilliant games in the 1990s, where players built the "board" with tiles to play wildly different games each time. The gold standard is Kosmos's The Settlers of Catan, but for my Deutschmarks, the most enjoyable is Mississippi Queen. Each player helms a paddlewheeler down the Mighty Mississip, picking up Southern belles for delivery to the delta. A boat contains two six-faceted paddlewheels, one controlling speed and the other coal. You start out moving speed 1, and can rotate the speed wheel up or down 1 each turn. If that's not good enough for you, you can burn off coal to accelerate or decelerate some more. The problems you face are twofold: First, turning such a large boat is difficult, and second, you have no idea where you're going. When a player crosses a line on a tile, that player places the subsequent river tile in whichever direction he or she wants. Run out of river and you're gator bait. Glory be.

Impact: Mississippi Queen won the prestigious 1997 Spiel des Jahres, the German game of the year. Shortly thereafter, the game was expanded by The Black Rose, which added watery deathtraps and a black boat that the rearmost player could use to disrupt the plans of the leaders. Sadly, both games are out of print now, but copies often become available on sites like BoardGameGeek. If you're the kind of person who likes fun, seek it out.

Personal Connection: At some point, my longtime friend Jay Tummelson became the smartest man in American gaming. At Mayfair Games in the early 1990s, he spotted the tremor running through Germany and snatched up games like Manhattan, Modern Art, and of course Settlers. Then he founded Rio Grande and pounded out Mississippi Queen, Bohnanza, Puerto Rico, and hundreds of others, becoming the king of the American Eurogames industry. (I should note that he also published our game Gloria Mundi, so I may be a touch biased.)

Other Contenders: Mexican Train, a dominoes game so good I kept an entire trial jury occupied with it for a week; Acquire, Sid Sackson's property-building masterpiece; Cathedral, a tile game where the tiles are 3D medieval buildings; Carcassonne, Klaus-Jürgen Wrede's festive jaunt through a medieval countryside; Agora, James Ernest's game of haphazardly building a Greek marketplace; Blokus, which is the game you would make if Tetris pieces fell on your head; two light games that are literally poles apart, Hey! That's My Fish! and Ice Flow.

Since Ali did one, I suppose I will, not that I'm expecting presents from anyone.

• Assassin's Creed (video game, PS3)


• Assassin's Creed 2 (substantially more expensive than the original, also PS3)


• More Warhammer 40K fiction!


• 2 car payments to get me current. (Hey, it is a wish list.)


• A working copy of MS Office 2007. (I don't care for Open Office, though it will suffice for now.)


• One of these for upgrading my PS3. I'd take a bigger one, of course, but the price is good on this one.

How bad is the American economy right now?

Yeah, it's like that, unfortunately.

65redroses
Eva is a vibrant young woman with Cystic Fibrosis who survived a double lung transplant. Read about her difficult recovery and personal triumphs over pain, isolation, and fear. Back in school, Eva now works part-time in a children's center and enjoys running and cross-country skiing. A documentary on her story, entitled 65 Red Roses, won three awards at the Vancouver International Film Festival.

meet_other_moms
A warm and welcoming "Add me" community for moms of all ages and backgrounds from around the world. If you're a mom, just post a little about yourself and start connecting with other mothers based on similar hobbies, musical interests, book/TV/movie preferences, or taste in humor! A great way for busy moms to socialize online.

kitchenfaq
Want to share a fabulous home recipe for coconut bread? Suddenly run out of confectioner's sugar with company on the way and need to find out a quick in-house substitute? Searching for tips on what to charge for a custom-designed wedding cake? Whether you're a professional chef, an aspiring culinary wizard, or a happy home-baker, you'll get delicious guidance from fellow and sister foodies.

Monsterpocalypse has two that aren't quite brains-with-tentacles but they're still pretty neat:



Snatcher and Snatcher Elite

• Hey, KQ made the RPG Countdown AGAIN. rpgcountdown.com/2009-11-20 #
• Word of the Day: Anterograde. #

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I ordered some miniatures from Impact! Miniatures - they told me it could take up to four weeks. It took exactly six weeks.

I ordered some books from Indie Press Revolution, and had them send the books via media mail. They warned this could add several weeks to my shipment. I received them two or three days after ordering them.

The Day After Ragnarok was officially released at, as I recall, Origins this year. July. My FLGS has had it back-ordered since then, and I still have not seen it in the store.

The Longmont Store (more local, equally friendly, not my store of first resort nevertheless) had The Radical's Handbook for the Dark Heresy game line in yesterday or the day before; I don't expect to see the book at my Karliquin's until Wednesday.

I wonder, sometimes.