Author: Chris S.

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Race Day 2018

While I know the first race I ever watched from start to finish was the 1997 Daytona 500, I honestly can’t recall what was the first race I ever watched, period.

But I figure it must have been the Indianapolis 500.  Somewhere along the line I was a fan of A.J. Foyt, and knew names like Al Unser and Rick Mears.

There was a time that I knew I’d miss watching the race because we’d go camping over Memorial Day Weekend.  I’d hear about who won after we got home from the camp site.

This is the last time that ABC will be broadcasting the Indy 500, handing the reins over to NBC in 2019.  I’m hopeful that they’ll do as good a job, they’ve come a long way since that terrible coverage of their first ever NASCAR race, where they had interviews and spotlight segments DURING THE RACE, and didn’t even show what was going on during those segments.

We’re a few minutes away from the command to start engines.  I have my favorite drivers, like Danica, Helio, and TK, but unlike NASCAR, there’s not a single driver in this series who I don’t like.

I’m hoping one of my favorites win.  Or maybe one of the NorCal drivers, Kyle Kaiser or J.R. Hildebrand.

Drivers, Start Your Engines!

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Solo: A Star Wars Story

It’s getting to a point where I like these newer non-Skywalker saga Star Wars films  better than the saga films.  As an avid role-playing gamer, the original Star Wars RPG from West End Games was more than just a game, it allowed us, the players, to make our own mark in George Lucas’ sandbox.  To me, that meant more than the EU books/stories did, as much as I liked a number of those.

And to be honest, I think it’s one reason why I myself am so forgiving of the newer films, while toxic fandom continues to ruin what should be a golden age of genre films.  Sure, I have an idea of how Episodes VII and VIII should have told the story, but they didn’t, and I’m okay with that.  It’s not my story to tell, or I’d have my name in the credits under ‘Written by’ or ‘Directed by’.

Heck, I was actually picturing what my old characters (a bounty hunter and an Ewok) would be doing during The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi.  Those are stories that I CAN tell.

But I digress.

Solo: A Star Wars Story is a fun movie.  My initial ranking among the other films puts it between The Empire Strikes Back and The Force Awakens on my list, which makes it 5th in the top ten.

There were Easter eggs to other Expanded Universe material.  There was a jaw dropping moment, equal to the one that was as much a surprise to me in Infinity War.  Totally unexpected.  But made sense, if you watched a certain animated series called Rebels.

One of the Easter Eggs almost made me yelp in excitement.  Another one made me smile.  Another, well, let’s just say that I need to re-read the Lando books.

And there were plenty of moments where I just had a huge grin on my face and tears forming in my eyes.

Was it the movie I’ve waited 40-odd years to see?  Yes.

It was a movie that focused on Han Solo and Chewbacca and the Millennium Falcon.

And that’s all my 10-12 year old self wanted, after seeing Star Wars and reading the Brian Daley books.

The only things missing were Bollux and Blue Max, and Gallandro.

Recommended.  Go see it!  Two thumbs up!  3 out of 4 stars!

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Coping? Mitigating?

Today I decided to tackle a kitchen cabinet.

There was so many expired goods, I refilled the just-emptied garbage can downstairs.

Some were over 10 years old.  Heck, one expired in 1990.

Kept me busy, at least.

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Catharsis

20 minutes ago:

Brain: Do it.
Heart: No, Chris, it’s too painful!
Brain: He must.  It will help him.
Heart: You’re right, dammit.

I went to youtube.com and played the ending to Field of Dreams.

It hurt.  I ugly cried for a good while.  3 minutes?  5?  Lost track of time.

I love you, Dad.  I miss you.

I’m probably not going to watch this movie again for a while.

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Loss

Losing a parent is tough.  I learned that 14 years ago when Mom passed away.

It doesn’t get any easier the second time.

We lost Dad yesterday.

Details will follow, regarding services.

For now, your thoughts and prayers for my siblings, and his, are appreciated.

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Cowboy Bebop

Last night I get an random alert on my iPad from the Amazon app that ‘an item you may be interested in is on sale’.

Sure enough, Cowboy Bebop 4-disc blu-ray set is on sale for $29.99.

I have never watched it, so I put it in my cart.  And then I got distracted and went to sleep.

This morning I saw that it was still in my cart at Amazon, with delivery on Friday.

I then checked Best Buy to see if they had it in stock at the same price, which they did, and I could pick it up today.

I added it to my cart, and checked to see if I had any reward certificates.  I had three.

$20, $10, and $5.

Since the item was $29.99, I knew it wouldn’t let me use the $20 and the $10 together, so I’m picking this set up after work for a little over $5 and change.

It also appears that I bought the last one at this Best Buy location.

Go me.

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Games Day 05.05.2018

Gloomhaven

Betrayal at House on the Hill

Second game, my character trapped in the basement until Glenn arrived in a magic elevator

Victory!

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Solo

Except for a couple of days with friends every month, I am a solitaire gamer.

Or solo gamer.

I miss the days when my friends and I would play games almost every weekend, mostly role-playing games like Star Trek or Top Secret.  Nowadays we do RPGs once a month.

Because of this we’re limited to sticking with a given game world or system for a few months, like D&D or Hyperlanes or some superhero-based system.  Meanwhile, other systems stay on the shelves, collecting dust.

Imagine my surprise when I went to drivethruRPG.com and discovered this:

The Cepheus Engine is another name for the classic Traveller RPG system, and this product allows one to play without a referee/game master in any of the existing versions of Traveller.

Like the one that I have at home from Mongoose Publishing.

At 150+ pages, this looks to be a good way for me to play Traveller… Solo.

We’ll see.

*dust off Traveller core rule book*