No, my name isn't on milk cartons......yet, Part 01

I've learned some things over the past few days. First of all: *NEVER* post saying you're going to post, or you never will. I technically intended to update that night, however, when I woke up (around midnight), I found myself playing some PSX games, and chatting with Adam, who is a night owl. By 3am, I was already sleepy again. Too late for an LJ update then.

I woke up on Saturday morning, and saw a post by my friend jartravian, who needed a technical question about LJ answered (he wanted to change the text in the comment fields). I typed up a nice, professional* tutorial, and commented. By that time, though, I realized exactly how much more I could tweak my LJ layout. I spent the next 3 hours editing and customizing my LJ. I only quit because I said that I was going to go to some video game shops, and see what they had for the Playstation.

Aron, Adam, and I all went. The first stop was Replays, only because I knew they had used games. I saw some games there that I'd like (Gundam Assault 2), but the prices were not friendly. I did pick up Ridge Racer 4 there for $13. I like me some racing games. :) After that, we went to FuncoLand. It's like Replays, but they specialize in video games. Heck, they had a section for the SEGA MASTER SYSTEM!!! I snagged Medievil for $10, and decided that I had a good day. I went home, and tried out R4. I suck at it. Oh well, at least I can have fun racing, or something, right? :)

It was during a break that I read a review of Arcana Unearthed. One thing immediately came to mind: The classes they are describing in this review are awesome, and fit my idea for my next game better than the standard ones. I checked out Amazon (still in pre-order), ENworld's RPGShop (available, but shipping was expensive), and Talon Comics (no dice either). So, I tried local stores. Comics N Collectibles didn't have it (I'd driven up there). Kevin's Attic had it, (Yes!) but were sold out already, and wouldn't get any more in until Tuesday (D'oh!). On a lark, I decided to call Comic Cellar (my usual store) to see if they had it.

They did.

So, I dashed up there, bought it, and came home, $30 poorer, but happier. I paged through the classes and races. Wow. These are excellent. I wish I could play in a game, so I could play either a Giant Champion of Light, a Verrik Akashic/Mage Blade, or a human magister. There are so many possiblilites. This tome reminds me why I love gaming in the first place.

I went to bed WAY later than I meant to, and had to make my rest count, since I had to be at work on Sunday morning at 5am.

No, my name isn't on milk cartons......yet, Part 02

Sunday began bright and early. I hated it. I was running late to work, and when I walked in the door at 511am, who should I see but my manager and the night checker, standing there, watching me. I walk slowly over to him, to see what's going on. He says only one thing. "The store's been robbed."

It appears that someone walked into the store around 3am, carrying a gun. He put the gun in the night checker's face, and demanded that she open her till. When she finally got it open, he grabbed the whole till, and ran out the door. She opened another till when the manager got there, and I had to count it down, to determine how much had been taken. I came up with almost $400 at first, but because I forgot that we were missing a till, I counted incorrectly in the office, and thought I had found some of the money that I thought had been stolen. I later learned that wasn't the case, but only after I had opened her pan up, and applied the money to it. In any case, I feel that I made a royal mess of things in accounting that morning, IMHO,* And I did.

I made good progress doing my Sunday payroll stuff, and was downstairs on time, and even remembered everything that I was supposed to do. I ran UScan, since the girl who was supposed to be working at it was a No-Call, No-Show. She wasn't answering at her house, either. I worked on UScan until 115p. I was supposed to leave at 1pm, and I *NEVER* leave without doing a count.

Earlier, Joyce had done a count when she got in, to double check my figures. She got $250 less than I had. I started my count, and found a counterfeit $100 bill in the back. That means that someone with access to accounting took the bill. I finished my count around 145pm, and I was NOT short, as Joyce had been, but considerably over. I started checking things that had been done, and everything was checking out. In the meantime, Joyce came back there, and we got to discussing how the till thing worked on the night checker. She felt I took too much money off the checker. Whenever I tried to explain to her, she didn't seem to grasp it. She said that I should only have counted one pan, since one was stolen. That made absolutely no sense to me, and still doesn't. However, corporate has told her to do it the way she thought, so I'm not going to argue. If it's wrong, it's not my fault. I did another count, and didn't get to leave until 230pm. This is the time I normally head over to Brad's for the Sunday game, and I was farther away than normal! :(

I sped over to Alex's, picked him up, and made it to Brad's shortly after 3pm. I was still upset about the money issues at work, though, and quickly fell into a black mood. It was complicated by the fantastic job Brad did on two miniatures (he got the drybrushing done just right, IMO). Also, I thought I had my character ready for 3.5. I was called on to make a Spot check, and what did I see? NOTHING! I had forgotten to write down my skills when I was copying over to a new sheet for Revised. To make matters worse, I didn't have the paper that I upgraded him with, so I had to do it all over.

Meanwhile, I told them to continue without me. I heard them doing the game, and it made me surlier. Irrationally, I felt that they didn't even need me. Brad did something in-character AGAIN that blew Stephen's mind, and that brought to mind my feelings that.. how do I put it?... I felt that, on some small scale, I was competing with Brad, and that I'm falling behind because I cannot get my paladin to do things impressive enough to warrant bonus XPs. It's not about levelling. It's a mindset that I tend to get in everything, and I'm normally pretty good at ignoring it. Because of how shitty my day at work was, though, I dwelt on it.

Finally, I realized that my mood was NOT conducive to playing a game and having fun. I knew that the best thing for me was to go home, and skip out on this week. (You should never game if you're in a bad mood.) However, I wanted to play. I mean, this is the very thing that I look forward to each week. I settled for walking outside, and talking to Scott. I almost asked him for a cigarette, but settled for a single drag. (Those who know me understand how on edge I had to have been to actually WANT to smoke a cigarette again.) Scott and I talked about anything except the game, and I calmed down. Slowly, everyone else came outside. My job was mentioned, and I borrowed a [paraphrased] line from Office Space: "I don't really want to talk about my job." We laughed about that, and nothing more was said about work. I came back inside, feeling better, and had a great session. I even managed to piss off an evil god of Death and Magic personally.** :)

I came home, and had some hot, fresh Nestle Tollhouse Chocolate Chip cookies. MMMmm. I went to bed happy, and planned on doing some small maintenance on my car Monday morning, if I woke in time.

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* - She had been given two tills. Her first one was the one that was taken. The second one was the one she was working on when I got there. Each till starts with money in it already. The store's accounting software doesn't recognize this money, since we keep it in the tills. My reasoning was that since she had been given two tills, regardless of what happened to them, I was supposed to take the till's starting amount out twice. (It'd be the same if you were given two tills, one with $100 in it, and another with $150 in it. If both tills were yours, then YOU are accountable for $250, plus whatever sales you took in. Am I right, or what?)

** - I am playing a paladin. The deity that I chose, when my character was still in the Forgotten Realms (where we started) was Ilmater. Ilmater opposes human suffering, among other aspects. Followers of Ilmater take the pain of others into themselves, and consider it noble. Well, I had already learned that wanderers in the desert we were currently below were captured, and either released close to the city we hailed from, or used as sacrifices. Immediately, that bothered me. Well, later, I saw one of the altars. Inscribed upon its surface were the ritual steps for sacrificing a person. To borrow a line from Jason, I don't suffer human sacrifices, because that is pain brought on someone without their consent. So, I broke the altar. The deity noticed. :)

No, my name isn't on milk cartons......yet, Part 03

...so we're now up to Monday. First things first about Monday:

I would like to welcome two new people to my LJ: lilithraevyn and rafaela. They both added me, and for no immediately apparent reason. Yay! It's nice to be interesting enough to be added by strangers. (Though, I guess lilith found me when I made a comment in the dungeon_masters community.) Rafaela knows xenoweeno and starchild78. (Though I've never seen those two people together. I know them from two completely different sections of my life. Cool, huh?)

At any rate, thanks for adding me. I hope I don't bore you guys too much. :)

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Back to the recap, though. I woke up on Monday at 10am. I knew I wouldn't have time to get the maintenance done before I had to go to Brad's for our Monday get-together that is usually a game. We're between games right now, though, and just playing home-brewed board games. We hung out for about an hour, and then it was time to go get Mike from the U of M campus. I volunteered to go, since he and I are working on a campaign idea that would have both of us as DMs. I left, and went to the spot where I was to pick him up. He wasn't there. I drove past the spot 7 times in thirty minutes, once after I had given up and gotten almost all the way back to Brad's. Finally, an hour and a half after I went to pick him up, I got back. I was hot, my car was acting funny, and I had wasted a lot of gas for nothing.

It turns out that, since Mike hadn't heard anything about the game, he assumed something was going on, and it was cancelled. By the time we got in touch with him, he was already working on something else for school, and couldn't get away. We just sat and talked about BS until around 7pm, when Monk came on USA. That is a great show. After it ended, Aron, Alex, and I left. I made some more Nestle cookies, and went to bed after reading about the Witch core class in Arcana Unearthed. I slept well, even if I had to get up this morning at 5am.

Today was a normal day all-around. The one notable thing is that I got our tax-exemption file organized and straightened up. It LOOKS neat now, in addition to being in an order that we can find what we're looking for. The office count went okay when I got off, and I came straight home. I've got notes about the last several sessions that I haven't written down in Word yet, so I might do that. I will be reading more of Arcana Unearthed, and thinking of how this will fit in a seafaring Kiingdoms of Kalamar campaign based primarily in Renaaria Bay.

Wipeout!!

I just got a chance to play the game that Jason got me at EBX: Wipeout 3. This game is fun on a level that's only approached by F-Zero. Thanks, man! This one will see some gameplay!

Aric Seles, Stahl Campaign, Session #03, 07/06/03

That language seems to be on everything, so it’ll probably come in handy…

( Aric Seles's story for week 3 )

After that episode, I need to find a temple. I am in need of silent communion with my deity. I feel that I have done something wrong, and I must take action to atone for what I’ve done.