Year End Reflections

The Clock is Ticking

Seasons greetings once again!  Now that Christmas has passed, we are in that in between time where we are recovering from the merry-making of the holiday season yet waiting for yet more merry-making on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.  More specifically, I find myself having written nothing of the eighth chapter of my book, and instead having written 5 more pages to my seventh chapter.  While I do not consider that a failure, I wish I had been satisfied with my seventh chapter as I left it at the end of November.  

The trouble I had with moving on to the next chapter was that several aspects of a village where the chapter takes place was left undefined because, at the time, I didn't see a need to elaborate on them.  That changed immediately when I sat down to write chapter eight and I realized I had none of the foundation set for what I wanted to happen (specifically where it would happen) and so, back to the drawing board (of chapter seven).  And that is where I stand at the end of December.  Writing more of a chapter I thought I finished.

Apart from the problems of authorship, life has been enjoyable.  I always enjoy time with my family, even if the amount of time is sometimes viewed as 'too much time' in the moment.  Anyone with a large family will know what I mean, especially as you get older and drama inevitably develops.  Regardless, I saw many people that I loved, including dear friends, and that's really the best part of this time of year, religious or not.

Apart from that, this past year has been an adventure for sure.  I proposed to my (then) girlfriend last Christmas, and we've been slowly planning our wedding all year.  It's going to have a mash-up theme revolving around Ren Faires/Christmas/Nerd-dum and we're going to get custom outfits made.  I'm gonna have a cape.  You know, because the Rule of Cool.  I've written a few chapters of my novel.  Got artwork for said novel created (which I discuss in my various World Building posts on this blog).  And I saw Star Wars: The Force Awakens, twice.  Next year promises to be awesome.  So until then, stay safe and best wishes.

Season's Greetings!

Merry Christmas!

And a Happy one of the other 17(?) Holidays between Thanksgiving and New Years!

Hope every is having a safe and happy holiday of choice!  I know it's a day late for Christmas but it's also like two weeks late for Hanukkah.  Best wishes to everyone and I look forward to taking this back up in earnest once life calms back down after the New Year begins.  Stay safe!

The Force Awakens

There has been an awakening...

Have you felt it?

On Friday, December 18th, at around 9 o'clock in the morning, I found myself sitting in one of the most comfortable seats I've ever seen in a movie theatre.  I'm talking about lounge chairs that recline and have leg rests built in, and they're set up for couples!  So there is an arm rest in between the pairs of seats that can be folded up and out of the way.  So I had a great, comfortable seat for the showing, which of course was in 3-D.  (The movie doesn't have any 3-D gimmicks but it makes the movie much better).  So after a half an hour of previews for Captain America: Civil War and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and (the incredibly white washed) Gods of Egypt, the following came on screen:

I was so excited!  I was about to see a new Star Wars movie!  After Revenge of the Sith was released, the whole world thought that it had seen all the Star Wars it was ever going to see on the big screen.  We might get more video games, more books, more TV shows, but not movies.  It wasn't until 2012, when Disney bought Lucasfilms, that we all learned that, yes, there would be more Star Wars.  And not just any Star Wars, the original (Legacy) cast members Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford, Tony Daniels, and Peter Mayhew, alongside a new cast featuring Daisy Ridley and John Boyega.  And now that three year wait was about to be over!  And in the few seconds I had to consider all of this, those magical words: "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far way..." came and went, before John Williams epic score kicked in and those hollow yellow letters came on screen to spell out. . .

It was here.  I was watching it (with my lovely fiancee) and for the next 2 hours, life was good.  Space ships, monsters, lightsabers, aliens, good vs evil.  Star Wars was back and it was great!

Me (R2-D2) and my Fiancee (Yoda)

I will write a review after New Year's Day so people have a chance to see it without getting the spoilers.  I want to discuss all the aspects of the movie.  But for my non-spoiler review?  "It was good!  Go see it if you liked the original trilogy!"  There you go.  Short and sweet.

A Long Time Ago. . .

In a galaxy far, far away...

7 Days from the exact moment this hits the blogosphere, I will see "Star Wars - Episode VII: The Force Awakens," and I'm not sure if I should be excited or terrified.  With so much at stake with the original cast members being involved and George Lucas selling Star Wars to Disney, not to mention the last attempt at Star Wars movies being very divisive (and even destructive) among the fanbase, the possibility for disappointment is immense.  And yet, I will go and see it with baited breath and possibly a Lightsaber.

That being said, I have been playing "Star Wars: The Old Republic" frantically to feed my Star Wars fix before the movie comes out, and before I drive my fiancee crazy humming the Star Wars themes.  The game has been out for a while, but in October, Bioware, the makers of SWTOR, released what is literally the best expansion for the game since launch, and quite literally it is better than the original story (which was pretty damn good.)  Called KoFE by fans, Knights of the Fallen Empire turns the MMO into a Single Player Campaign, focusing a story around your character and how he affects the events of the plot completely independant of other players, allowing you to simultaneously play with your friends, while making all the important choices yourself (while your friends are making their own choices in their own continuity).  I have not played the expansions new content myself yet, but several of the game play mechanics have changed with the release.  I like all of them.  SWTOR has been a game that I put on the shelf, waiting for something good to come of it for a while, and I'm glad to be back into it.  The original content remains for players new and old to enjoy, while promising a reportedly amazing experience once you reach the newest content.  And what makes it even better is that Bioware is continuing to add to the expansions story, so there is even more to look forward to.  Bioware, who makes games like Mass Effect and Dragon Age, has always made story telling the best aspect of their games, and they (finally) delivered an expansion that lives up to their past successes.

So, if you want to find me on SWTOR, leave a comment with a character name and I'll instead come find you!  That is, if you're on the Jedi Covenant server.  Otherwise, well...  Too bad.  

May the Force be with you.

The End of NaNoWriMo

The End of an Era (of frantically trying to write)

So the end has come to National Novel Writing Month a few days ago, and I am happy to say that I wrote 4241 words, a mere 8% of the goal of 50,000 words.  That said, I finished off Chapter 6 and wrote the entirety of Chapter 7.  So I'm happy with myself.  Considering this was my first attempt, I'm not ashamed of not writing more.  NaNoWriMo is meant for authors to try and write a new 50,000 word novel.  I've been using it as motivation to write my existing novel which currently sits at 28,023 words across seven chapters.  Given I've been working on this draft for about two years, I'm happy with my slow but steady progress.  This month's goal is to write Chapter 8, if not more, before the New Year.  Then, it's a chapter a month for 2016 and by then I should be done!  Wish me luck!

I'm gonna need it.

Why I love Thanksgiving!

And I'm back!  With NaNoWriMo and Thanksgiving Weekend over, I'm going to try and get back to posting regularly.  But for now, why I love Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving (in the USA at least) is a time of the year marked by a bipolar nature.  It has become a time where most families spend time together, sharing a meal, and (supposedly) being thankful for the good things in their lives, while at the same time, many corporations are trying to get a jump start on "Black Friday" by opening on Thanksgiving Day so people can buy more stuff during the madness that ensues.

I have (almost) always been lucky to be able to spend the entire weekend with my extended family.  While some things have changed over the course of my life, my mother's family has spent every Thanksgiving up in Oneonta, New York to stay at a cabin my grandfather built for longer than I've been alive.  It has given me the chance to make a lot of good memories with my family, especially since the cabin sits on over 300 acres of forest.  We've been able to play flash light tag and capture the flag together.  We've had target practice using rifles and bow and arrow together.  We've built 'forts' out of sticks and logs together.  We've found spotted newts and toads and frogs and snakes together.  We've ridden trike-bikes together.  We've made pumpkin doughnuts and cookies together.  We've built snowmen together.

These are the things that always made Thanksgiving fun.  Every year I look forward to seeing my family and spending time with them.  Now that most of my cousins are adults, we have started cooking a meal for our aunts and uncles.  We light off fireworks and built bonfires and play complex board and card games.  We see movies and talk about books and even dote upon our baby second cousin.  And I hope that I get to do these things for many more years to come.