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The marvelous Weird Fiction Review website has now posted a conversation that Eric Schaller and I had about our books, our magazine The Revelator, the weirdness of New Hampshire, and other topics.

Along with this, WFR has posted Eric's story "Voices Carry" (originally in Shadows & Tall Trees) and my story "The Lake" (originally in Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet).

So if you're curious about us or our writings (or just utterly bored), Weird Fiction Review is a great place to start.

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Inspired by Kenn Nesbitt’s, “My Brother’s not a Werewolf”. Hope you enjoy.   Tale of the WeirdoWolfBy Donna Earnhardt He transformed in the daytimeavoiding moonlit nightsHe cringed at his own shadow,fear brought him no delight He was a vegetarian.He loved to draw and paint.And when he howled,No one was cowed*,Except for him… He’d faint.  …

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Cute, cartoony bird / chick toy character design, available as a 3D print.

(Sevensheaven.nl)

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Este bichito nació de un ejercicio que estoy haciendo. Dibujé todas la letras del alfabeto y a partir de sus formas básicas ilustré personajes. Este es el primero y está basado en la letra A. Eventualmente tendré una familia completa de bichitos raros.

This creature was born from an exercise that I´m doing. I drew all the letters in the alphabet and from their basic forms illustrated characters. This one is the first and it´s based on the letter A. Eventually I´ll have a complete family of weird creatures.

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A not-strictly-new new piece of mine has just been posted at Weird Fiction Review, "Stories in the Key of Strange: A Collage of Encounters".

It's not-strictly-new because the collage is built from excerpts from things I've written over the past few years: blog posts, interviews, book reviews, Strange Horizons columns, stray essays. When the good folks at WFR asked me to contribute, I was up to my neck in grading student papers, etc., and though I wanted to contribute, I didn't have a spare brain cell to spend on something new. I thought putting together a collage would be an interesting exercise and easier than writing a new piece. It was definitely the former, but not the latter — I forgot how much I've written over the years... (Plenty of it is best left forgotten.)

Trying to organize it all in some vaguely coherent and resonant way was a fun challenge, although I'm too close to it all to know if it's at all effective. At the very least, it provides a kind of overview of the major themes to a lot of my nonfiction.

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My previous post about The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction noted that it is in beta-text mode and so quite obviously incomplete. Among the lacks are entries on either Jeff or Ann VanderMeer. I am not a contributor to the encyclopedia nor am I in any way affiliated with it, but I do have a great interest in all things VanderMeer.

Earlier this year, I wrote a biography of Jeff for Fogcon, where he and Ann were honored guests. (Eric Schaller wrote the biography of Ann, which I hope he will allow me to reprint here, but he's not returning my calls or email at the moment, probably because I suggested that for Halloween he should dress his dog as a character from Twilight.)

I hope the information provided below will prove useful to the encyclopedists and any future scholars. My only goal in life is to be helpful. Jeff VanderMeer will, I expect, deny the accuracy of some of it, but I believe such denials only confirm the truths I am here able to provide to the world...

By late adolescence, VanderMeer was living in Florida, primarily on a houseboat off the coast of St. Petersburg, the fourth-largest city in the state and the second largest city in the Tampa Bay area. VanderMeer's actual activities during this time are unknown, though he has variously claimed that he was working as a merchant of dried squid, an icthyologist, and a decoy for the Witness Protection Program. Whatever he was doing, we know that he was writing, because it wasn't long before his first book, a monograph on herpetology titled The Book of Frog, was

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My latest column has been posted at Strange Horizons: "Old, Weird". I probably should have included links to some songs and materials discussed in it, so here are a few to get you started...

• Some of Greil Marcus's The Old, Weird America can be read at Google Books.
• The Wikipedia page on The Anthology of American Folk Music has some good info and links.
• At the Folkways site, you can hear clips from each track of Harry Smith's Anthology and also download the marvelous liner notes as a PDF.
• You can read some parts of When We Were Good: The Folk Revival on Google Books.
• I wrote a bit about Todd Haynes's I'm Not There when it first came out.
• Tim Lucas posted some interesting quotes about Dylan's song "I'm Not There (1956)" at Video Watchblog (the link to an mp3 of the song still works, at least as of this minute).
• You can hear Henry Thomas's sublime "Honey, Won't You Allow Me One More Chance" on YouTube.
• Some of Charley Patton's recordings are available at The Internet Archive.
• Finally, an interview I did with Brian Francis Slattery just before Liberation was released.

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Halloween is all about the scary and sometimes freaky, but you won't find anything this October 31'st that will compare to the strange, weird and oh so true stories and events in the latest Ripley's Believe It or Not.

This book is 254 pages packed full of the most astonishing and unbelievable things you could ever imagine.  Like the "Head Shrinkers" on page 23, or the "Elephant Face Girl" on page 103.  What about the world's biggest hairball found in the stomach of an 18 year old girl - it weighed 10 pounds!

Here's more of what you can expect among the pages of Ripley's Believe It or Not;

• Strange But True
• Weird World
• Animal Antics
• Extreme Sports
• Body Oddity
• Travel Tales
• Incredible Feats
• Bizarre Mysteries
• Fantastic Food
• Artistic License
• Amazing Science
• Beyond Belief

If you want to learn more about this weird, wacky world around us, grab the latest copy of Ripley's Believe It or Not, available wherever books are sold. 

Ripley's also has a web site; http://www.ripleys.com/ Check it out!

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Rarely does a photograph inspire me as much as the jaw-dropper above does. I found it at the Huffington Post, which in turn snatched it from what I assume is Trent Reznor’s Polaroid collection. Actually, I don’t have a clue where it ultimately originated, nor do I want to know. Because the primary source can’t possibly live up to my imagination.

I like to think that the photo was found some years ago in a dented metal lunch box, on the backseat of an ivy-hugged T-Bird, which was parked alongside an abandoned hunting cabin in the north woods of Quebec. I like to think that there was a journal enclosed in that lunch box as well. I like to think that the journal starts out innocently enough, with tales of teenage optimism and lumberjacking aspirations. I like to think that a man named Pierre Beaumont enters the story at a certain point and he has the laugh of a magpie and he carries a jack-in-the-box that he’s always cranking, though the thing never opens, and when the young author asks him if it’s broken, Pierre simply puts a finger to his lips and says “the trees will drink our secrets.” And I like to think that on a night of sleet and whiskey, the author boards a canoe with Pierre and the two go in search “The Norwegian,” a notorious hermit who is said to possess a radio which is perpetually tuned to the sounds of woman washing their feet, but they lose their way when they flip the canoe, then decide to follow an albino fox through a dark hollow, at which point they come upon the fore-mentioned hunting cabin. Then I like to think that the journal changes, and mutates into a series of sketches and scrawls, of riddles and limericks, which appear to make no sense at first, until paired with the photograph above, and then a foggy portrait of an endless evening emerges, of a burlap sack full of masks, of a victrola, of a boy sewing his own eyelids shut and clapping on one and three, of a meal of mutton and Tang, of a game of William Tell, of a moonlit tango which makes the men blush with jealousy, of a hissing teapot, of third-degree burns, of a monkey with a shaved head and  lobotomy scar, of a old man who speaks through a hole in his throat and says, “when I was just a boy my father took me to the fish market and we bought the largest fish they had, a five hundred pound marlin, and when we returned home, my father burned my bed and all my linens, then he sliced the marlin lengthwise with a letter opener  and he told me that I was to sleep inside of its belly, and so I did, for fifteen years, just me and the marlin and the moonlight, and I was okay with this because I was boy and boys don’t know what life is supposed to give them next, and what life gave me next was a bear, a snarling, drooling, furry beast who stole the marlin and me and took us to a cave and in the cave there was a bucket and in the bucket there were marshmallows, and as the bear ate the marlin, I ate the marsmallows, until my stomach expanded and rounded me out, causing my body to roll down into the caverns and onto dark underground river, in which I floated for a while, both afraid and delighted, until I reached an opening and poured out into the Rainforest Cafe, where they were serving Rumble in the Jungle Turkey Wraps, and I ordered one of those and a nice cold sarsaparilla, and I waited to the judgement, but the judgement didn’t come, no, the judgement never comes, and I learned that the hard way, just as we’re all learning tha

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Hey there guys, Master Jedi Zack here. Recently I've come across a few really cool books about some really weird stuff.

First we have The Glitch in Sleep. This is the first book in a series called The Seems, so once you find this awesome book too awesome to put down, you have two more to read. The story follows a 12 year old named Becker Drane who has a pretty cool job. Becker's job is to fix things that break down in a world called The Seems, which is the place that shapes everything about The World (where you and I spend our lives). The Glitch in Sleep tells us all about The Seems while we watch Becker try and fix a "Glitch" that is keeping everyone in our world from being able to sleep.

Second is Only You Can Save Mankind by Terry Pratchett. This book was brought to me by another guybrarian out there who is in the know. So if you are ever visit the North County Branch of the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library be sure to stop in and say hey to Ian, he is good people (and not an evil Sith like some people around here). This book is about Johnny Maxwell is finds that the aliens in his video game would rather surrender to him than be blown up. Now Johnny has to figure out what to do with all of these aliens from his game.

Last, but certainly not least is the graphic novel version of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Now I know what you are thinking, but this is not the same girlie girl Wizard of Oz you have heard about this is some serious Boys Rule! Boys Read! stuff here. In this version you can see some good ol' fashioned ax work by the Tin Man, one seriously scary wicked witch (but she does like silly straws) and more monsters than you can shake a Cowardly Lion at!

So there you have it, three new books about weird worlds (and even more than that if you read the rest of The Seems series). Read on!

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Nature has ways of providing us with sick entertainment. Everyone who has had a garden has at one time or another dug up a uniquely formed carrot or potato. We find these abnormal growths entertaining and interesting, abnormally formed animals and humans draw our eyes even more so.

The most famous deformities are Siamese Twins. Most do not survive.  Undoubtedly without medical aid none could be born naturally and the mother too, would die.  For more information (and freaky pictures) on Siamese twins click here!

Another deformity can be caused later in life, as the result of the polio virus.  The virus travels through the bloodstream and into the brain.  Although it has been halted in many areas thanks to vaccinations, it should be noted that the below photo was taken as recently as 1995.  It primarily strikes young people and can leave them paralyzed. 

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Polio_sequelle.jpg

Hypertelorism is a genetic deformity that causes body parts to be placed farther apart.  Most often the eyes are abnormally wide set, as we see in the seven year old girl below.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypertelorism

Another famous freak is the freak accident, as when a skier crashes into a tree.  Particularly funny to witness, not too funny to be involved in.  A free accident is typically one that nobody could  have predicted, or something that happens very rarely, and should have been easily avoided. 

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Freak_accident_-_entire_photo.JPG

Freak storms are an other freak event we just love to watch, over and over.  As long at it is not happening to us.  Below we see a tsunami that hit Thailand in 2004.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2004-tsunami.jpg

Some people are noted for being freaks.  For some this is a good thing, while others are bullied or teased, shunned by society for having the guts to be different and live their life the way they would want.  Obviously some people are freaks because of natural physical deformities, as mentioned above, but these are the people who have the stigma of being freaks only because their behavior is different than what is the cultural norm.  Below we see a man who even calls himself a freak, this is John the freak at Hempfest in Seattle.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Seattle_Hempfest_2007_-_John_the_Freak_01A.jpg

Because it is today considered socially unacceptable to put freaks on display, the once common “Freak Show” in circuses and fairs is getting harder and harder to find.  While some freaks in the past were probably real, others may have been faked.  If today we saw this picture (below) we would question if the remainder of the person was simply hidden under the sand.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:FreaksPoster2.jpg

None the less there is something in the human psyche that longs to look at freaks for one reason or another.  We need to watch train wrecks, disasters, and to look at deformities.  This is nothing new, we can look back to older renderings showing freaks, sometimes in tasteful ways.  Below we see Lazarus and Joannes Baptista.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lazarus_and_Joannes_Baptista_Colloredo.jpg

Finally I leave you with Jo-Jo the dog faced boy.  Not a very nice name for this lad who served in side shows due to his abmornal hair growth on his face.  The problem is actually known as Hypertrichosis.  In minor forms it causes single abnormal hair growth on people even so that a person may have one abnormally long hair on their arm or leg, or a patch of long hairs. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Jeftichew-14.jpg

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Richard Hughes's first and most famous book, A High Wind in Jamaica, is one of the strangest novels I've ever read, which is really saying something. It's both delightful and disturbing in the way it presents -- in an unfailingly light tone -- children as amoral aliens. The novel is rich with irony, and it's not a satire so much as a relentless attack on sentimental notions of childhood. The possible interpretations of the novel are likely endless, but in many ways the book itself is about interpretation -- about the futility of trying to interpret a child's experiences and thoughts through adult eyes. (It's also worth noting that the novel was first published in the U.S. under the title The Innocent Voyage, which I'm rather more fond of than its better-known title. It was also once illustrated by Lynd Ward.)

I was surprised this morning to discover an essay by British teacher Victoria de Rijke in a 1995 issue of Children's Literature in Education, "Reading the Child Invention", in which de Rijke explores the very concept of "children's literature" by having children read A High Wind in Jamaica. The majority of the essay consists of transcripts of a conversations de Rijke had with an 11-year-old who read the novel, Ayeshea Zacharkiw. It's possible that Zacharkiw was extremely precocious, but de Rijke writes of many other children who read and appreciated the book, too. Toward the end of the discussion, she asks Zacharkiw if she thinks Hughes's novel is a book for children or for grown-ups, and Zacharkiw says she thinks it depends on reading ability, and a child's willingness to use a dictionary.

AZ: ...It’s an old book as well, so it’s got all these old expressions, but I think anyone could read it whether they’re children or grown-ups. Yeah. It might take the children longer than older people, but cut at two year olds, cos you have to be sensible about ages.
VdR: Right. I agree. And do you think there’s anything in it that adults now wouldn’t like children to read?
AZ: I don’t know why it’s been republished for adults. There are words in it I suppose, rude words (laughs) and piracy, but you can get horror books especially for children, but adults read them. Well, anyone can read any book. It’s just what level you are at reading, whether you like that particular type of book, and if you don’t like it, you can always put the book down.
VdR: Mmm, absolutely. You’re free to do that, aren’t you? It’s not in control of you! (laughs)
AZ: (laughs) No, course not. Once you’ve bought it. It doesn’t matter who you publish it for. Anyone can buy it and read it, or get it out of the library.
VdR: So what kind of particular type of book do you think this is?
AZ: Well, it’s about life. It’s about life on the schooner, and about children, as they’re the man characters, and about the difference between grown-ups and children, who’s in control.

De Rijke draws some interesting conclusions from this exchange:

Children’s observations are often valued by grown-ups for their blunt honesty and wisdom, for cutting through the adult flannel and exposing simple truths, most often because adults are already uncomfortable about hypocrisies which they are concealing. Ayeshea reminded me that there are a number of basic requirements for effective reading: a level of basic literacy, information retrieval and developmental skills ("cut at two year olds, cos you have to be sensible about ages"). What a terrifically blunt reminder of the low expectations teachers and adults have of reading potential! ... The act of reading cannot be controlled by publishers’ reading-age targeting, or price, given access to the library and a free choice of genre. In conversation, Ayeshea and I also emphasized, by the repetitive use we made of the word control the significance the book places on power relations, in terms of its subject. The term subject could be applied to both reader and plot.

It's a fine reminder not to underestimate readers.

For another view of the book, Francine Prose's introduction (PDF) to the NYRB edition is a good overview of some of its strange wonders and terrors. And I'm entirely in agreement with Mr. Waggish: "The sheer oddness of this book really defies summary."

In place of summary or analysis, I'll leave you with a direct quote from the middle of A High Wind in Jamaica:

In short, babies have minds which work in terms and categories of their own which cannot be translated into the terms and categories of the human mind.

It is true they look human -- but not so human, to be quite fair, as many monkeys.

Subconsciously, too, everyone recognizes they are animals -- why else do people always laugh when a baby does some action resembling the human, as they would at a Praying Mantis? If the baby was only a less-developed man, there would be nothing funny in it, surely.

Possibly a case might be made out that children are not human either: but I should not accept it. Agreed that their minds are not just more ignorant and stupider than ours, but differ in kind of thinking (are mad in fact): but one can, by an effort of will and imagination, think like a child at least in a partial degree -- and even if one's success is infinitesimal it invalidates the case: while one can no more think like a baby, in the smallest respect, than one can think like a bee.

How then can one begin to describe the inside of Laura, where the child-mind lived in the midst of the familiar relics of the baby-mind, like a Fascist in Rome?

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If you’re like most people, you’ve had many different hobbies in your life. Some of them were athletic, some were intellectual, and others are probably best left unsaid. But if you’re like me, you’ve probably come to notice that nearly any hobby you might choose suffers from one critical weakness:

The presence of other people always screws them up. 

It doesn’t matter if you are hiking, rock climbing, playing Axis and Allies, or what.  If it involves other people, there is always at least one idiot who won’t take it seriously, or always has to ‘win’, or for some reason or other makes you want to kick their head in. In relationships this is true as well, but that’s another article.

So anyway, it’s 2009, and the problem of finding good entertainment is worse than ever. We’re in a depression, and can’t afford anything fun. Doing things outside is dicey, since a lot of us live in areas where the weather is terrible most of the time, and even when the weather is good, people on the street will beat you senseless and rob you. Not because those people need the money, but because it’s like saying hello – at least here in Wilmington, and where you live probably isn’t too much different. 

It’s hell. So under circumstances like this, what do you do to entertain yourself that is safe, cheap, and involves as little human interaction as possible?

Why, there’s only one thing you can do… go back to your roots, acquire a really old version of Dungeons and Dragons, and play it by yourself!

Why is this Hobby Awesome?

1. Every guy with even the slightest bit of imagination, deep inside, loves the concept of Dungeons and Dragons. Even if you don’t like fantasy, you get to kill things, take their crap, and face no consequences. Even most women would like the experience if they really gave it a try. Well, probably not. Screw them.

2. Rolling dice, writing stuff down, and having some interest in doing so will take you back in time if you’re over 30. You’ll feel like you’re 11 again. If you’re under 30 and have spent some time being broke, it might do the same.

3. You’ll get to use your imagination, which does not get exercised at all by computer games (except for roguelikes which you also need to play, if you haven’t already). With a pen and paper experience, you can picture the damp, dark hallways and imagine the groups confusion when surprised by some giant, nasty beastie. If you want to get all nerdy about it, you can even maintain a history of what your individual characters accomplish, so that they get some depth over time and take on some life.

4. It’s free and you can do it anywhere as long as you have a flat surface and your materials. You don’t even need electricity. As long as you have light, you can do it in a basement while drinking tea, for chrissake. Any hobby which can be performed in a basement with a cup of tea next to you is Win.

Why wouldn’t I want to tell anyone that I do this?

1. It’s Dungeons and Dragons, and you’re probably a reasonably functioning adult. You not only will get laughed at, you will also become re-acquainted with another activity that you indulged in as a kid – getting your ass kicked by people who are bigger than you are. And that’s just the men… all that is nothing compared to how girls will treat you.

2. It’s an activity which is designed for more than one person, and you’re doing it by yourself. Something like that never looks good. Does having a tea party by yourself look good? Does playing football by yourself look good? No, it doesn’t. So stay quiet.

3. You’re going to be playing a version of Dungeons and Dragons which went out of print about 20 years ago (I’ll get into why later). It means that even game nerds, who are on the absolute bottom of the social totem pole, will spit on you because they will not consider you to be relevant.

Wow! Playing a really old version of Dungeons and Dragons by myself sounds Awesome as long as I don’t tell anyone! How do I do it?

You need the following materials:

First Edition D&D Players Handbook, Dungeon Masters Guide, and Monster Manual (All available on E-Bay for about $40 total)

Dice which have the following number of sides: (4, 6 (get 3 of them), 8, 10 (get 2 of these), 12, and 20). They should be available at your local gaming store for about $5 total. Yes, they still have gaming stores if you look. They’re like peep shows… the people who have that need, know where to go to fulfill it. And just like peep shows, you’ll see a lot of awkward, pasty looking men scuttling out of the front door with brown paper bags under their arms. Don’t look anyone in the eye.

A table, a pencil, some paper, and a room where you can be sure that no one will walk in on you. Wherever you go to look at porn is probably the ideal place for something like this, too.

Some randomly generated dungeons which can be found at http://donjon.bin.sh/d20/dungeon/. The resulting dungeons are created for a rule set which is much newer than yours will be, but it’s easy enough to create house rules on any monsters/experience points which are not covered specifically in the dungeon descriptions. Commercial dungeons made for solo adventures are also OK, but there aren’t many of them and a disproportionate amount of them suck.

A critical hit table which can be found here:http://www.angelfire.com/dragon3/vinifera/critical_hit_table_2e.pdf . What that will do is, if an attack against a monster (or against you) is really, really successful, it can result in an arm being sliced off or something – which adds to the flavor big time.

Then play away, Dungeon Master! Don’t read the room descriptions, just move around the map and read each description as you enter. If a room contains a secret door or hidden treasure, roll a 6 sided die for every party member – if you roll a one, the door or treasure is detected. Create groups of at least 8 characters, because with bad luck and critical hits, the mortality rate will be high.

Warnings

Dungeons and Dragons has a lame reputation for a reason. If there is anything you take from all this, read the following and be sure to remember it well!

First of all, I am not talking about playing D&D in a group. Do not finish this article then run out and join the first pack of neckbeards that you can find. You will suffer, and everyone around you will suffer, and the most tragic aspect of it all will be that it could have been avoided.

Let me explain:

D&D was originally based on miniature war gaming. When it was first conceived of, play was 99% built around the idea that you go into some dark hole, indiscriminately kill monsters who are all ugly and all bad, become more skilled, then crawl into another dark hole to apply what you learned in the last one. Simple, right? It’s more than simple, it’s Awesome. In fact, everything should work like that. Life would be much shorter, but it would be interesting and have some sort of meaning.

However, over time, the group game evolved away from that idea. Nowadays, the average D&D player is even more poorly adjusted to society than I am. They don’t like fighting monsters unless the odds overwhelmingly favor them. They throw fits if their characters die, and worst of all, they enjoy going into imaginary towns and posturing in front of imaginary villagers. This causes conversations that are so lame, so ridiculous, that they defy description. For example, once in a while you’ll get some guy who wants his character to get laid, so he sits in a tavern and tries and get with some buxom tavern wench who is, of course, being played by a another neckbeard who is sitting on the other side of the table behind a cardboard screen. Neither the person playing the male character or the one playing the buxom wench has any experience with women and dating. The banter at the table goes like this:

Keith: “OK Seth, so you go into a tavern and sit down. This girl comes over to you and she’s got really big boobs and long black hair… ummm… and she stands close to you and she’s like, ‘Hey’.”

Seth: “What’s her comeliness?”

The crackling sound of rolling dice issues from behind the cardboard screen. I am seated at the middle of the table between the two neckbeards and look down at my hands with a grim expression, since I know how this story will end. I set my lips into a tight line and begin using the dice in front of me to build little towers, in an effort to ignore the conversation.

Keith: “15. No, she’s hotter than that, like 16, 17.”

Seth (blushing): “Dayummmmmm! Hehehehe. OK, so I say ‘hey’.”

Keith (as Buxom Wench): “Hey… ummm… you’re really hot. What’s your name?”

Seth (in his deepest voice): “I am Lord Comforter, prince of Down and hero of Qwertyuiop, and I am at your service!

Seth again: “Hey Keith, I like, lean over and press up against her boob to let her know I like her.”

Keith (giggling and blushing): “OK. So she presses back and leans over so you can see down her dress and then she’s like, ermm… That’s a big sword you have there. Do you have any other.. ummmmmmmmmm…. weapons?”

Seth (flustered): “Well, I have this bow and erm, a magical war hammer, and ermmmmm… ”

Keith (blushing so hard that he can barely talk): “No, Seth, she didn’t mean it like that. She meant it like…”

The conversation is broken by the sound of breaking glass. I have just smashed a bottle on the edge of the table, and am waving the jagged end at the other players with a wild gleam in my eye. Again.

Me: “For the love of God… that’s enough. Stop. OK? You need to stop. I will kill you both!”

10% of group Dungeons and Dragons is enjoyable. The rest consists of interactions just like that and you will end them just like I do, by threatening to kill people and being 100% serious about it. Where I’m going with all this is that while playing on your own is awesome, playing in a group is not the same experience.

Second, I am not talking about playing a new version of Dungeons and Dragons. Yes, I know you’re by yourself, but show some self-respect and play like a man. You want an old as hell version, with rudimentary character classes, rules that are simple and written by guys who would have done so for free, and no character motivation other than a desire to clean out random dungeons, kill stuff, and get more powerful. It’s that, or it’s nothing at all. Role playing and using exotic characters smacks of having a tea party with dolls, and you will have none of it if you want to have a Socially Frowned Upon hobby that is Awesome and not one that sucks.

So that’s it. You are now ready to play a really old version of Dungeons and Dragons in the most Awesome way possible – one that involves no kind of interaction at all with other people. Now get out there, cover a table with weird looking dice, homemade character sheets, and some crude rulebooks that are at least 25 years old, and get to it! 

And don’t tell anyone.

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If you’re like most people, you’ve had many different hobbies in your life. Some of them were athletic, some were intellectual, and others are probably best left unsaid. But if you’re like me, you’ve probably come to notice that nearly any hobby you might choose suffers from one critical weakness:

The presence of other people always screws them up. 

It doesn’t matter if you are hiking, rock climbing, playing Axis and Allies, or what.  If it involves other people, there is always at least one idiot who won’t take it seriously, or always has to ‘win’, or for some reason or other makes you want to kick their head in. In relationships this is true as well, but that’s another article.

So anyway, it’s 2009, and the problem of finding good entertainment is worse than ever. We’re in a depression, and can’t afford anything fun. Doing things outside is dicey, since a lot of us live in areas where the weather is terrible most of the time, and even when the weather is good, people on the street will beat you senseless and rob you. Not because those people need the money, but because it’s like saying hello – at least here in Wilmington, and where you live probably isn’t too much different. 

It’s hell. So under circumstances like this, what do you do to entertain yourself that is safe, cheap, and involves as little human interaction as possible?

Why, there’s only one thing you can do… go back to your roots, acquire a really old version of Dungeons and Dragons, and play it by yourself!

Why is this Hobby Awesome?

1. Every guy with even the slightest bit of imagination, deep inside, loves the concept of Dungeons and Dragons. Even if you don’t like fantasy, you get to kill things, take their crap, and face no consequences. Even most women would like the experience if they really gave it a try. Well, probably not. Screw them.

2. Rolling dice, writing stuff down, and having some interest in doing so will take you back in time if you’re over 30. You’ll feel like you’re 11 again. If you’re under 30 and have spent some time being broke, it might do the same.

3. You’ll get to use your imagination, which does not get exercised at all by computer games (except for roguelikes which you also need to play, if you haven’t already). With a pen and paper experience, you can picture the damp, dark hallways and imagine the groups confusion when surprised by some giant, nasty beastie. If you want to get all nerdy about it, you can even maintain a history of what your individual characters accomplish, so that they get some depth over time and take on some life.

4. It’s free and you can do it anywhere as long as you have a flat surface and your materials. You don’t even need electricity. As long as you have light, you can do it in a basement while drinking tea, for chrissake. Any hobby which can be performed in a basement with a cup of tea next to you is Win.

Why wouldn’t I want to tell anyone that I do this?

1. It’s Dungeons and Dragons, and you’re probably a reasonably functioning adult. You not only will get laughed at, you will also become re-acquainted with another activity that you indulged in as a kid – getting your ass kicked by people who are bigger than you are. And that’s just the men… all that is nothing compared to how girls will treat you.

2. It’s an activity which is designed for more than one person, and you’re doing it by yourself. Something like that never looks good. Does having a tea party by yourself look good? Does playing football by yourself look good? No, it doesn’t. So stay quiet.

3. You’re going to be playing a version of Dungeons and Dragons which went out of print about 20 years ago (I’ll get into why later). It means that even game nerds, who are on the absolute bottom of the social totem pole, will spit on you because they will not consider you to be relevant.

Wow! Playing a really old version of Dungeons and Dragons by myself sounds Awesome as long as I don’t tell anyone! How do I do it?

You need the following materials:

First Edition D&D Players Handbook, Dungeon Masters Guide, and Monster Manual (All available on E-Bay for about $40 total)

Dice which have the following number of sides: (4, 6 (get 3 of them), 8, 10 (get 2 of these), 12, and 20). They should be available at your local gaming store for about $5 total. Yes, they still have gaming stores if you look. They’re like peep shows… the people who have that need, know where to go to fulfill it. And just like peep shows, you’ll see a lot of awkward, pasty looking men scuttling out of the front door with brown paper bags under their arms. Don’t look anyone in the eye.

A table, a pencil, some paper, and a room where you can be sure that no one will walk in on you. Wherever you go to look at porn is probably the ideal place for something like this, too.

Some randomly generated dungeons which can be found at http://donjon.bin.sh/d20/dungeon/. The resulting dungeons are created for a rule set which is much newer than yours will be, but it’s easy enough to create house rules on any monsters/experience points which are not covered specifically in the dungeon descriptions. Commercial dungeons made for solo adventures are also OK, but there aren’t many of them and a disproportionate amount of them suck.

A critical hit table which can be found here:http://www.angelfire.com/dragon3/vinifera/critical_hit_table_2e.pdf . What that will do is, if an attack against a monster (or against you) is really, really successful, it can result in an arm being sliced off or something – which adds to the flavor big time.

Then play away, Dungeon Master! Don’t read the room descriptions, just move around the map and read each description as you enter. If a room contains a secret door or hidden treasure, roll a 6 sided die for every party member – if you roll a one, the door or treasure is detected. Create groups of at least 8 characters, because with bad luck and critical hits, the mortality rate will be high.

Warnings

Dungeons and Dragons has a lame reputation for a reason. If there is anything you take from all this, read the following and be sure to remember it well!

First of all, I am not talking about playing D&D in a group. Do not finish this article then run out and join the first pack of neckbeards that you can find. You will suffer, and everyone around you will suffer, and the most tragic aspect of it all will be that it could have been avoided.

Let me explain:

D&D was originally based on miniature war gaming. When it was first conceived of, play was 99% built around the idea that you go into some dark hole, indiscriminately kill monsters who are all ugly and all bad, become more skilled, then crawl into another dark hole to apply what you learned in the last one. Simple, right? It’s more than simple, it’s Awesome. In fact, everything should work like that. Life would be much shorter, but it would be interesting and have some sort of meaning.

However, over time, the group game evolved away from that idea. Nowadays, the average D&D player is even more poorly adjusted to society than I am. They don’t like fighting monsters unless the odds overwhelmingly favor them. They throw fits if their characters die, and worst of all, they enjoy going into imaginary towns and posturing in front of imaginary villagers. This causes conversations that are so lame, so ridiculous, that they defy description. For example, once in a while you’ll get some guy who wants his character to get laid, so he sits in a tavern and tries and get with some buxom tavern wench who is, of course, being played by a another neckbeard who is sitting on the other side of the table behind a cardboard screen. Neither the person playing the male character or the one playing the buxom wench has any experience with women and dating. The banter at the table goes like this:

Keith: “OK Seth, so you go into a tavern and sit down. This girl comes over to you and she’s got really big boobs and long black hair… ummm… and she stands close to you and she’s like, ‘Hey’.”

Seth: “What’s her comeliness?”

The crackling sound of rolling dice issues from behind the cardboard screen. I am seated at the middle of the table between the two neckbeards and look down at my hands with a grim expression, since I know how this story will end. I set my lips into a tight line and begin using the dice in front of me to build little towers, in an effort to ignore the conversation.

Keith: “15. No, she’s hotter than that, like 16, 17.”

Seth (blushing): “Dayummmmmm! Hehehehe. OK, so I say ‘hey’.”

Keith (as Buxom Wench): “Hey… ummm… you’re really hot. What’s your name?”

Seth (in his deepest voice): “I am Lord Comforter, prince of Down and hero of Qwertyuiop, and I am at your service!

Seth again: “Hey Keith, I like, lean over and press up against her boob to let her know I like her.”

Keith (giggling and blushing): “OK. So she presses back and leans over so you can see down her dress and then she’s like, ermm… That’s a big sword you have there. Do you have any other.. ummmmmmmmmm…. weapons?”

Seth (flustered): “Well, I have this bow and erm, a magical war hammer, and ermmmmm… ”

Keith (blushing so hard that he can barely talk): “No, Seth, she didn’t mean it like that. She meant it like…”

The conversation is broken by the sound of breaking glass. I have just smashed a bottle on the edge of the table, and am waving the jagged end at the other players with a wild gleam in my eye. Again.

Me: “For the love of God… that’s enough. Stop. OK? You need to stop. I will kill you both!”

10% of group Dungeons and Dragons is enjoyable. The rest consists of interactions just like that and you will end them just like I do, by threatening to kill people and being 100% serious about it. Where I’m going with all this is that while playing on your own is awesome, playing in a group is not the same experience.

Second, I am not talking about playing a new version of Dungeons and Dragons. Yes, I know you’re by yourself, but show some self-respect and play like a man. You want an old as hell version, with rudimentary character classes, rules that are simple and written by guys who would have done so for free, and no character motivation other than a desire to clean out random dungeons, kill stuff, and get more powerful. It’s that, or it’s nothing at all. Role playing and using exotic characters smacks of having a tea party with dolls, and you will have none of it if you want to have a Socially Frowned Upon hobby that is Awesome and not one that sucks.

So that’s it. You are now ready to play a really old version of Dungeons and Dragons in the most Awesome way possible – one that involves no kind of interaction at all with other people. Now get out there, cover a table with weird looking dice, homemade character sheets, and some crude rulebooks that are at least 25 years old, and get to it! 

And don’t tell anyone.

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The first story today that caught my eye came from the Daily Telegraph, the main reason being that it’s in my neck of the woods – East Anglia (UK).

A local councillor, Pat McCloud at Forest Heath District Council in Suffolk attended a committee meeting and was making his point when Councillor Lisa Chambers interrupted him mid flow.  Councillor McCloud, who obviously had got his knickers in a knot, then proceeded to send an email to some of his co-councillors commenting on the interruption and stating that Councillor Chambers couldn’t possibly have known in advance what he was going to say and went on to say that they used to burn witches at the stake for such skills!  This obviously touched a raw nerve and ended up going before the District Council’s standards committee where poor Councillor McCloud was found guilty of accusing Councillor Chambers of witchcraft.  The decision was overturned on appeal but it ended up costing the Council more than £3,000 to investigate and ultimately, of course, this will be added to next year’s tax bills for the general public to pay off next year.

Councillor McCloud, strangely enough, seems to have found allies in the local Pagans who were disappointed that Lisa Chambers and the committee members who found Mr McCloud guilty obviously felt it was a bad thing to be a witch.  As they quite rightly pointed out, not all witchcraft is bad – there are obviously black witches but there are white witches too who do good rather than evil.  I just hope that the witches there in Suffolk can conjure up a bit more cash for the council tax payers in their district to cover the wasted costs in this futile case and let’s face it, if this is how our money is spent in local government it’s no wonder the local taxes go up drastically year on year!

The second article from the Telegraph related to the above Golden Delicious apple.  No, it’s not been painted red – the apple has grown naturally that way!  It’s a ‘random genetic mutation’ apparently and the odds of finding one of these growing on your apple trees at home are 1 million to 1!  As you can imagine it’s causing quite a stir in the village where it grew – Colaton Raleigh in Devon.  The grower, Mr Morrish a retired painter and decorator, said he’d been picking apples to take to his sister-in-law and spotted this little beauty.  He’d been growing apples for 45 years and had never come across anything like it before.  Even the experts at the Royal Horticultural Society and British Independent Fruit Growers Association can’t find any rhyme or reason for it.  Just don’t tell the local council, Mr Morrish, or you may find yourself under close scrutiny by the Witch Finder General of Devon!!!

My third article was spotted in The Times.  It seems that the darker witches have been waving their wands in London!  A series of speed humps has been put on public walkways in London in order to prevent speeding cyclists.  Obviously the cyclists have got the hump but many pedestrians, particularly the elderly, have said that something needed to be done to combat the two-wheeled terrors.

Unfortunately these humps haven’t gone down well (or should I say up and down) with all pedestrians however.  Young mums with pushchairs and prams say they’re not that easy to negotiate and they’re not particularly wheelchair friendly; and of course the blind or more frail pensioners run the risk of tripping.  Somehow I can’t really see these catching on too quickly around the country.  Here in Norwich we tend to have a series of cycleways and footpaths combined which work quite well.  Half the footpath – the outer part is for cyclists and the inner part is for pedestrians.  There’s a white line down the centre so ne’er the twain shall meet – well, in theory anyway; although my experience is that all too often the twain do meet but thankfully, as far as I know, we’ve had very few fatalities although I think we’ve ended up with the odd bruise or scratch (or wonky wheel … and I’m talking about the bikes here, not the pedestrians or cyclists!).

Now to my final article which I found in The Guardian.  The Food Standards Agency is going to fund investigations into whether, after years of telling us we should be cutting back on sugar and using artificial sweeteners, aspartame can be damaging to the health and has side effects.

Aspartame is around 200 times sweeter than sugar and can be found in more than 4,000 products in the UK including diet sodas, ready meals, yogurt, cereal bars and candy.  It’s been considered safe for more than 25 years but now it seems the populace are finding that after consuming products with aspartame in them, they seem to be prone to headaches, dizziiness, diarrhoea and tiredness.

The research is apparently going to take the form of using 50 human guinea pigs who are susceptible to side effects and feeding them with cereal bars.  Some of the bars will contain aspartame and others will be aspartame free.  The results should be available some time next year and, if there is reason to believe aspartame could be damaging to the health, then further research will be carried out.

Now this is where my witchcraft comes into force!  For years (without the aid of a crystal ball) I’ve foreseen that all this cutting back on fat, salt and sugar and opting for artificial versions is bad for the health.  People for centuries have been eating the natural versions and don’t seem to have come to too much harm.  Provided you have a good range of all the natural minerals and vitamins and have a reasonable amount of exercise you shouldn’t need all these artificial things and now it seems my premonition has borne fruit – even if it’s not a genetically mutated fruit. 

Come on Witch Finder General – seek me out and burn me at the stake if you will!!!!

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The first story today that caught my eye came from the Daily Telegraph, the main reason being that it’s in my neck of the woods – East Anglia (UK).

A local councillor, Pat McCloud at Forest Heath District Council in Suffolk attended a committee meeting and was making his point when Councillor Lisa Chambers interrupted him mid flow.  Councillor McCloud, who obviously had got his knickers in a knot, then proceeded to send an email to some of his co-councillors commenting on the interruption and stating that Councillor Chambers couldn’t possibly have known in advance what he was going to say and went on to say that they used to burn witches at the stake for such skills!  This obviously touched a raw nerve and ended up going before the District Council’s standards committee where poor Councillor McCloud was found guilty of accusing Councillor Chambers of witchcraft.  The decision was overturned on appeal but it ended up costing the Council more than £3,000 to investigate and ultimately, of course, this will be added to next year’s tax bills for the general public to pay off next year.

Councillor McCloud, strangely enough, seems to have found allies in the local Pagans who were disappointed that Lisa Chambers and the committee members who found Mr McCloud guilty obviously felt it was a bad thing to be a witch.  As they quite rightly pointed out, not all witchcraft is bad – there are obviously black witches but there are white witches too who do good rather than evil.  I just hope that the witches there in Suffolk can conjure up a bit more cash for the council tax payers in their district to cover the wasted costs in this futile case and let’s face it, if this is how our money is spent in local government it’s no wonder the local taxes go up drastically year on year!

The second article from the Telegraph related to the above Golden Delicious apple.  No, it’s not been painted red – the apple has grown naturally that way!  It’s a ‘random genetic mutation’ apparently and the odds of finding one of these growing on your apple trees at home are 1 million to 1!  As you can imagine it’s causing quite a stir in the village where it grew – Colaton Raleigh in Devon.  The grower, Mr Morrish a retired painter and decorator, said he’d been picking apples to take to his sister-in-law and spotted this little beauty.  He’d been growing apples for 45 years and had never come across anything like it before.  Even the experts at the Royal Horticultural Society and British Independent Fruit Growers Association can’t find any rhyme or reason for it.  Just don’t tell the local council, Mr Morrish, or you may find yourself under close scrutiny by the Witch Finder General of Devon!!!

My third article was spotted in The Times.  It seems that the darker witches have been waving their wands in London!  A series of speed humps has been put on public walkways in London in order to prevent speeding cyclists.  Obviously the cyclists have got the hump but many pedestrians, particularly the elderly, have said that something needed to be done to combat the two-wheeled terrors.

Unfortunately these humps haven’t gone down well (or should I say up and down) with all pedestrians however.  Young mums with pushchairs and prams say they’re not that easy to negotiate and they’re not particularly wheelchair friendly; and of course the blind or more frail pensioners run the risk of tripping.  Somehow I can’t really see these catching on too quickly around the country.  Here in Norwich we tend to have a series of cycleways and footpaths combined which work quite well.  Half the footpath – the outer part is for cyclists and the inner part is for pedestrians.  There’s a white line down the centre so ne’er the twain shall meet – well, in theory anyway; although my experience is that all too often the twain do meet but thankfully, as far as I know, we’ve had very few fatalities although I think we’ve ended up with the odd bruise or scratch (or wonky wheel … and I’m talking about the bikes here, not the pedestrians or cyclists!).

Now to my final article which I found in The Guardian.  The Food Standards Agency is going to fund investigations into whether, after years of telling us we should be cutting back on sugar and using artificial sweeteners, aspartame can be damaging to the health and has side effects.

Aspartame is around 200 times sweeter than sugar and can be found in more than 4,000 products in the UK including diet sodas, ready meals, yogurt, cereal bars and candy.  It’s been considered safe for more than 25 years but now it seems the populace are finding that after consuming products with aspartame in them, they seem to be prone to headaches, dizziiness, diarrhoea and tiredness.

The research is apparently going to take the form of using 50 human guinea pigs who are susceptible to side effects and feeding them with cereal bars.  Some of the bars will contain aspartame and others will be aspartame free.  The results should be available some time next year and, if there is reason to believe aspartame could be damaging to the health, then further research will be carried out.

Now this is where my witchcraft comes into force!  For years (without the aid of a crystal ball) I’ve foreseen that all this cutting back on fat, salt and sugar and opting for artificial versions is bad for the health.  People for centuries have been eating the natural versions and don’t seem to have come to too much harm.  Provided you have a good range of all the natural minerals and vitamins and have a reasonable amount of exercise you shouldn’t need all these artificial things and now it seems my premonition has borne fruit – even if it’s not a genetically mutated fruit. 

Come on Witch Finder General – seek me out and burn me at the stake if you will!!!!

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I’ve recently been going through the UK’s daily papers and finding one or two weird news items and giving you links to them but I’m now finding myself in a position where I can’t keep up with the weird and wonderful so I’m trying a change of tack and just give you a brief rundown of what I found intriguing or amusing!

Here’s my top four for today.

Image by Jim Linwood via Flickr

I was checking out the Daily Telegraph and came across something particularly odd.  It seems that, in order to try and keep swine ‘flu at bay in H M Prison The Verne in Dorset, the governor sanctioned the purchase of a goodly supply of anti-bacterial hand gel.  As soon as it was distributed amongst the prisoners apparently one of the inmates decided it’d be a good idea to drink it rather than shove it on his hands.  I’m not sure how much the prisoner actually drank but he became a tad tiddly and started a fight.  Before anyone knew it, there was a full blown behind bars brawl.  Oddly enough, the staff at the prison took away what remained of the hand gel, presumably considering it would be easier to deal with a swine ‘flu epidemic than an alcohol poison one!

It just begs the question, who was the prisoner who actually tried the hand gel in the first place?  I’m just wondering what I’ve got under the kitchen sink that I could try?  How about a Mr Muscle Margarita for starters?

The second news item that interested me was again from the Daily Telegraph.  It gave details of some of the strangest items that had been taken from hotel rooms.  Amongst those that caught my eye were a marble fireplace; a whole room – the contents were completely stripped; a mounted boar’s head; a hotel owner’s dog; a grand piano and a selection of sex toys. 

Once again, my brain went into overdrive, particularly when it came to the sex toys.  I can’t  imagine even using sex toys provided by a hotel let alone stealing them – you don’t know where they’ve been!!

Image via Wikipedia

My next story which was reported in several papers, relates to a tortoise that was found walking along the M25 motorway (freeway).  Thankfully, for once, most of the drivers were obviously keeping their eyes on the road and the tortoise was rescued by a tortoise loving driver who, having taken a little detour to the supermarket to pick up some lettuce and tomatoes for the traumatised turtle and then took him for a check up at the local vet where it was discovered that he was chipped so hopefully owners and family pet will soon be reunited.

Quite what the tortoise was doing on the M25 I have no idea.  Maybe, like many travellers before him, he couldn’t find the right junction off the circular motorway to reach home or another alternative could be that he’d been visiting The Verne Prison and had a drop too much of anti-bacterial hand gel!!!

And finally, what would you expect a badger to eat?  I’d always considered they spent their evenings rummaging around the woodlands looking out grubs, insects, worms and the odd mouse or two but it seems it’s now been discovered that the latest badger delicacy is hedgehog.  How can a badger who normally eats small and relatively ’smooth’ food cope with the prickles?  What motivates a badger to even consider tackling a hedgehog.  Maybe their lives are so mundane that they decided they wanted more of a challenge.  It’s a mystery to me but I’m sure that some night wildlife watcher will come up with a bit of video footage to enlighten me!

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