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Comment to this post and I will give you 5 subjects/things I associate with you. Then post this in your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given. Questions courtesy of ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
tfbretz.
Shadowrun: Shadowrun is frankly one of those crazy things that shouldn't work (and if you're too much of a purist, it doesn't) and yet does, at least in part because it knows exactly how crazy it all is, and then acts as though it all makes sense anyway. I really do adore this game. I never get to play it any more, sadly... it's been a long time since I knew a group that was interested in such a thing. But it's still an awesome game.
I came to SR on the heels of 1st edition in all its Larry Elmore goodness. I stayed with it through second and into third, and that's when I somehow managed to find my way from tech support hell into a job as an editor with FASA Corp, up on the fifth floor of that damned old piano factory in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago. But more on that later. I stayed with it through third, but this time on the inside, working to help create it, with a group of people whom even now make me smile by just thinking of them. I helped write 4th edition... and I'm damned proud of it, too. It's good and it's lost some of its more schizophrenic mechanical bits, which I can't help but think is a good thing.
I never did manage to make a character that really resonated with me, oddly enough, but I remember those games. I remember the attempts we made to teach our youngest group member why compound interest was a bad thing (through the tender mercies of his own greed, a DocWagon contract, and "Uncle Tony," aka Don Antonio of the local Mafia contingent). I remember Screamer, the unfortunately named character from my roommate in college who somehow missed why all the guys giggled at her flirtatious but "hard ass" character (or just faked ignorance very well). I remember Night-SMOOOOOTH-Shadow, the elf ex-spy/assassin/special forces/whatever it was from Tir Na Nog, who was plagued by bad dice and a chaotic streak that made Loki look staid and overly conservative. He chose the nom de plume "Nightshadow," which meant that the team then had to give him shit whenever he was particular non-nightshadowy. We first dubbed him "smooth," and then that became part of his name, with the number of o's in "smoooooth" varying depending on exactly how smooth he had failed to be of late. It was great. :)
Shadowrun will always be very special to me for all of the above reasons, but not the least of which because it gave me a career and people for whom I will always be grateful. For that alone, I owe it a huge debt. So ka, omae.
Special-Needs Parenting: My oldest son, Alisdair, has been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome. That means everything and nothing, really, especially since he came to his diagnosis late. We didn't have him evaluated until he was 9, far later than many autism spectrum disorder kids. Part of that was his age, part of that was where we lived (Chicago with very little in the way of insurance and only for a year and a half, and then rural Oklahoma), and part of it was that he's high functioning and we were fairly isolated. The symptoms were just Alisdair. There were no benchmarks to compare him to, no other kids with similar issues.
All the same, I worried about him from the time he was little. My brother and my dad both had learning disabilities, you see, and I was concerned he might follow suit. My family thought I was making problems where there weren't any. My ex felt similarly... then again, he was away for a long time and sort of wrapped up in his own issues during most of that period. As it is, I would really have liked to have been wrong -- not because what he has or who he is was bad, but because you never want to be right about something like that.
Because things went undiagnosed until after he'd been in school for a while, and because I was on my own with him either figuratively or literally while he was little, I learned a lot about special-needs parenting without realizing I was doing it. I became his champion and his therapist and his taskmaster, guardian, and jailer. I made him do things he didn't want to do, and learned to find ways to communicate with him when he couldn't communicate with us. I did it the hard way because I didn't know any better, and I didn't get help when I should have because I didn't know how.
Compared to some people who have serious health challenges and struggles with their children, I have it easy. Alisdair is smart and capable and has made stunning amounts of progress between therapy and medication. He can tell me he loves me, now, and he'll come to me for hugs. There are parents who will never in their life have that from their children. Odds are good that Al will be able to have a job and live a full adult life. Again, there are parents who will never even see their child graduate high school. I am thoroughly grateful for what I have, but I know that on the scale of things, my experience is so minor as a special-needs parent that it's barely a blip. We are greatly fortunate, and I will never forget that.
Knitting: I really like knitting. I know it's sort of a granny kind of thing, but I don't care. I've always been into crafts and such. Unlike, say, counted cross-stitch (something I did for YEARS -- my joke used to be that I had samplers in lieu of a social life), I can finish even a big project in a few months if I keep working on it, and a small one in a number of hours. Knitted stuff can be awesome and comfy and even sexy, if the pattern's right and the fit is good. Unlike sewing, which can also have a quick turn-around, it doesn't mess up my entire living room for a week plus in order to make a project, either. The initial buy-in can be cheap or as pricey as I can afford, depending on what I'm making. And most of the items are actually useful, which is something most crafts can't actually claim. It's good stuff, man.
WoTC: Wow. Um... Wizards was an amazing chapter in my life. A terrible, fuzzy-grained, back lit, stumbling through haze chapter, but amazing nonetheless. I learned a lot during my time there. I wish I could say I had fit in there, but I didn't really. I can't say whether that was because I was still the walking wounded while I was there or whether it was something else, but whatever it was, it was undeniable, at least in retrospect. I had health issues (finally got my tonsils out there and realized I'd had sleep apnea and a general lack of oxygen for ages because of them), I was grieving for my marriage, my ex didn't want me but would not leave my tiny house, and I was actively trying to kill every spark of love I felt for the man lest it kill me first. Small wonder I couldn't focus. I'd taken a shot to the heart -- it wasn't mortal, but it was damn close, and it was starting to hurt something awful. And naturally, the worst of it was that I thought I was okay. :)
That said, I had a pretty good time there. I worked on some great books, I got to see how the sausage was made first hand, I met some fantastic people, I played in the best damn Firefly game EVAR, and I got to play with toys for a living. It's really hard to beat that. I'm sorry I wasn't there for more of 4th edition. It would have been good to see how it grew and what the process was. I'm better off, though, for having moved on when I did. Sometimes you just can't go back.
Chicago: When I got the job at FASA, I naturally had to move to Chicago. I'd never been in a city that big before and I was worried I'd hate it, but... well, maybe someone can hate Chicago. I couldn't. I lived in Humboldt Park (or rather two blocks west thereof) right on the edge of gentrification, between Little Poland and Little Puerto Rico, on the second story of a beautiful refurbished greystone apartment building owned by a very nice Polish guy named Marek. If I'd been single with no kids and a bit of money, it would have been absolutely fabulous. As it was, it was still pretty darn good. :)
The worst of it was that I was working in Pilsen, which is on the lower west side of the Loop, and David got a job in Skokie at the JCC, which is a northern suburb. We had one car between us and we lived hell and gone from any of the L stations. If I'd thought about it and not been a total bus-phobic person, I probably could have taken the bus to the L and then gone to work from there. I remember thinking I couldn't, though, that I couldn't get a reasonable bus route, and so he'd have to drop me at the L or else drive me to work. Given how much he actively hated traffic, this was probably a contributing factor to the ex just not being happy there. Oops.
Despite it all, though... I loved Chicago. I really did. It wasn't really a place to raise kids, certainly not to send them to school, and it cost a pretty penny if you wanted to live there and do anything. If I got an offer to move back there, though, once my kids are grown... even as much as I love Seattle, it'd be awfully tempting. There's just something about it.
tfbretz. Shadowrun: Shadowrun is frankly one of those crazy things that shouldn't work (and if you're too much of a purist, it doesn't) and yet does, at least in part because it knows exactly how crazy it all is, and then acts as though it all makes sense anyway. I really do adore this game. I never get to play it any more, sadly... it's been a long time since I knew a group that was interested in such a thing. But it's still an awesome game.
I came to SR on the heels of 1st edition in all its Larry Elmore goodness. I stayed with it through second and into third, and that's when I somehow managed to find my way from tech support hell into a job as an editor with FASA Corp, up on the fifth floor of that damned old piano factory in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago. But more on that later. I stayed with it through third, but this time on the inside, working to help create it, with a group of people whom even now make me smile by just thinking of them. I helped write 4th edition... and I'm damned proud of it, too. It's good and it's lost some of its more schizophrenic mechanical bits, which I can't help but think is a good thing.
I never did manage to make a character that really resonated with me, oddly enough, but I remember those games. I remember the attempts we made to teach our youngest group member why compound interest was a bad thing (through the tender mercies of his own greed, a DocWagon contract, and "Uncle Tony," aka Don Antonio of the local Mafia contingent). I remember Screamer, the unfortunately named character from my roommate in college who somehow missed why all the guys giggled at her flirtatious but "hard ass" character (or just faked ignorance very well). I remember Night-SMOOOOOTH-Shadow, the elf ex-spy/assassin/special forces/whatever it was from Tir Na Nog, who was plagued by bad dice and a chaotic streak that made Loki look staid and overly conservative. He chose the nom de plume "Nightshadow," which meant that the team then had to give him shit whenever he was particular non-nightshadowy. We first dubbed him "smooth," and then that became part of his name, with the number of o's in "smoooooth" varying depending on exactly how smooth he had failed to be of late. It was great. :)
Shadowrun will always be very special to me for all of the above reasons, but not the least of which because it gave me a career and people for whom I will always be grateful. For that alone, I owe it a huge debt. So ka, omae.
Special-Needs Parenting: My oldest son, Alisdair, has been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome. That means everything and nothing, really, especially since he came to his diagnosis late. We didn't have him evaluated until he was 9, far later than many autism spectrum disorder kids. Part of that was his age, part of that was where we lived (Chicago with very little in the way of insurance and only for a year and a half, and then rural Oklahoma), and part of it was that he's high functioning and we were fairly isolated. The symptoms were just Alisdair. There were no benchmarks to compare him to, no other kids with similar issues.
All the same, I worried about him from the time he was little. My brother and my dad both had learning disabilities, you see, and I was concerned he might follow suit. My family thought I was making problems where there weren't any. My ex felt similarly... then again, he was away for a long time and sort of wrapped up in his own issues during most of that period. As it is, I would really have liked to have been wrong -- not because what he has or who he is was bad, but because you never want to be right about something like that.
Because things went undiagnosed until after he'd been in school for a while, and because I was on my own with him either figuratively or literally while he was little, I learned a lot about special-needs parenting without realizing I was doing it. I became his champion and his therapist and his taskmaster, guardian, and jailer. I made him do things he didn't want to do, and learned to find ways to communicate with him when he couldn't communicate with us. I did it the hard way because I didn't know any better, and I didn't get help when I should have because I didn't know how.
Compared to some people who have serious health challenges and struggles with their children, I have it easy. Alisdair is smart and capable and has made stunning amounts of progress between therapy and medication. He can tell me he loves me, now, and he'll come to me for hugs. There are parents who will never in their life have that from their children. Odds are good that Al will be able to have a job and live a full adult life. Again, there are parents who will never even see their child graduate high school. I am thoroughly grateful for what I have, but I know that on the scale of things, my experience is so minor as a special-needs parent that it's barely a blip. We are greatly fortunate, and I will never forget that.
Knitting: I really like knitting. I know it's sort of a granny kind of thing, but I don't care. I've always been into crafts and such. Unlike, say, counted cross-stitch (something I did for YEARS -- my joke used to be that I had samplers in lieu of a social life), I can finish even a big project in a few months if I keep working on it, and a small one in a number of hours. Knitted stuff can be awesome and comfy and even sexy, if the pattern's right and the fit is good. Unlike sewing, which can also have a quick turn-around, it doesn't mess up my entire living room for a week plus in order to make a project, either. The initial buy-in can be cheap or as pricey as I can afford, depending on what I'm making. And most of the items are actually useful, which is something most crafts can't actually claim. It's good stuff, man.
WoTC: Wow. Um... Wizards was an amazing chapter in my life. A terrible, fuzzy-grained, back lit, stumbling through haze chapter, but amazing nonetheless. I learned a lot during my time there. I wish I could say I had fit in there, but I didn't really. I can't say whether that was because I was still the walking wounded while I was there or whether it was something else, but whatever it was, it was undeniable, at least in retrospect. I had health issues (finally got my tonsils out there and realized I'd had sleep apnea and a general lack of oxygen for ages because of them), I was grieving for my marriage, my ex didn't want me but would not leave my tiny house, and I was actively trying to kill every spark of love I felt for the man lest it kill me first. Small wonder I couldn't focus. I'd taken a shot to the heart -- it wasn't mortal, but it was damn close, and it was starting to hurt something awful. And naturally, the worst of it was that I thought I was okay. :)
That said, I had a pretty good time there. I worked on some great books, I got to see how the sausage was made first hand, I met some fantastic people, I played in the best damn Firefly game EVAR, and I got to play with toys for a living. It's really hard to beat that. I'm sorry I wasn't there for more of 4th edition. It would have been good to see how it grew and what the process was. I'm better off, though, for having moved on when I did. Sometimes you just can't go back.
Chicago: When I got the job at FASA, I naturally had to move to Chicago. I'd never been in a city that big before and I was worried I'd hate it, but... well, maybe someone can hate Chicago. I couldn't. I lived in Humboldt Park (or rather two blocks west thereof) right on the edge of gentrification, between Little Poland and Little Puerto Rico, on the second story of a beautiful refurbished greystone apartment building owned by a very nice Polish guy named Marek. If I'd been single with no kids and a bit of money, it would have been absolutely fabulous. As it was, it was still pretty darn good. :)
The worst of it was that I was working in Pilsen, which is on the lower west side of the Loop, and David got a job in Skokie at the JCC, which is a northern suburb. We had one car between us and we lived hell and gone from any of the L stations. If I'd thought about it and not been a total bus-phobic person, I probably could have taken the bus to the L and then gone to work from there. I remember thinking I couldn't, though, that I couldn't get a reasonable bus route, and so he'd have to drop me at the L or else drive me to work. Given how much he actively hated traffic, this was probably a contributing factor to the ex just not being happy there. Oops.
Despite it all, though... I loved Chicago. I really did. It wasn't really a place to raise kids, certainly not to send them to school, and it cost a pretty penny if you wanted to live there and do anything. If I got an offer to move back there, though, once my kids are grown... even as much as I love Seattle, it'd be awfully tempting. There's just something about it.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 07:25 am (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:17 pm (UTC)From:Start-ups, driving on road trips, unions, marriage, and trucks.
And thank you. I'm glad to know I'm at least entertaining someone out there. :)
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 02:44 pm (UTC)From:Would it be presumptive of me to say "Thanks"?
::grin::
JD
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:18 pm (UTC)From:And for topics, I choose the following:
Firefly, California, marriage, D20, and "the industry." Have fun with those. :)
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:23 pm (UTC)From:You're obviously unaware of my record of avoiding Internet memes.
And, as for "the industry": You're obviously unaware of the volumes of material already posted on my own LJ ... ::grin:: (I'm serious, though: I've had to cut people from my friends list, we had such uncivil disagreements ...)
JD
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:29 pm (UTC)From:And you obviously assume that I am not entertained by your views on the industry. If I ask someone for something like that, it's for a reason. Like that I'm occasionally a troublemaker. But that's all right. *grin*
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:32 pm (UTC)From:But if there's one thing you should know, it's that I like to rant ...
JD
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:34 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 02:49 pm (UTC)From:G'wan, throw me some questions.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:26 pm (UTC)From:Um... LARP, Lancaster, gamemastering, beer, and livejournal.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 03:09 pm (UTC)From:Nobody else seems to GET parenting a special needs child EXCEPT another parent with a special needs kid.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:30 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:44 pm (UTC)From:People have a terrible time imagining things they haven't been exposed to before... we just do. We have no frame of reference for it.
Very true.
I think it's hard to tell sometimes that a child has difficulties when they're not blatantly obvious. Just talking to him, you might suspect James has a speech delay but it's not glaringly obvious. He talks a LOT and responds to questions, etc well. He is just a little difficult to understand sometimes.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 04:36 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:31 pm (UTC)From:Costuming, foodies, wine, vampires, and Seattle. :)
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 04:52 pm (UTC)From:I played Shadowrun ... A sun allergic Troll with zinc oxide on her head codenamed: Malibu Barbie. They made me play the "barbie" song in the car. Evil.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:33 pm (UTC)From:Hmm, what to ask you....
Zombies, prop making, Disneyland, Halloween, and Microsoft. :)
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:06 pm (UTC)From:Don't worry. I can hate it enough for both of us.
-E
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:34 pm (UTC)From:You want topics? They're yours if you do, but I know your workload at the moment.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:36 pm (UTC)From:No. No meme. No.
Thank you. No.
;)
[Edit]
I recant. Go ahead. It looks painless.
-E
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 06:47 pm (UTC)From:Chicago, Stately Trautmann Manor, Comics, Crimson Skies, your favorite firearm. :)
Who loves you, baby? *grin*
no subject
Date: 2009-03-03 10:21 pm (UTC)From: