All posts by jcjosAdmin

Libraries rock !

They do they do indeed.
Tis not just the books you know.
They are pretty wonderful, ah the earliest form escapism, better then drugs,
No hangovers, socially acceptable; infact encouraged.
Lost of books that you can get a lend of and curl up and read and disappear into another world, into someone else’s head and see things differently for a while.
Trust me it works, go try read Clive Baker or Poppy Z Brite for a shock to your senses.

Growing up the eldest of 5 kids the library a mere 15 mins walk away become a sanctuary. It was quiet there. There were no screaming, squabbling, crying kids.
ESP if you got your book and snuck to sit at the table just inside the door to the adult library which was always closed and kept out the noise.

I could sit quietly and not be disturbed to mind anyone or force out to ‘play’.
This tactic never really interrupted my reading. I always had more then one book and
If eviction from the sitting room was pending there was already another book placed behind the curtain of the sitting room out of sight but with in reach from the outside of the sitting room window.

Ah yes libraries. The Blanchardstown library is a lot bigger then the on in finglas; where I grew up, yes part of me feel like I spent enough time there to consider it one of the places I grew up in. Lots and lots and lots of books and comfy seats and even more books. There are also computers.

The children’s section has many parts.

There is the nice desk where the lady sits and she has tubs of crayons and cool picture to be coloured in and if you ask she will let you pick a jigsaw but you can’t have it unless you promise to count the piece with her when you give it back.

There are nice kids sized table and chairs that grown up look silly in when they try to sit with you. Designed so that every Mammy’s bum look big when they sit on them
( even the castleknock unislim gold members Mammys 😛 )

There is a big notice board where you can stick up your picture if you don’t want to take it home as the fridge in the kitchen is utterly camouflaged or you want your glorious statement that the bear in the big blue house who is usually orange not blue can be purple like the otters Pip and Pop for a change.

There is the story circle where stories get read at appointed times or if a Mammy (or daddy or who ever is so foolish or brave) starts to read aloud they get an audience of little listening ears. This is also the sing a long circle but again only at appointed times.
Just because the last time you were there you got to do ‘If you are happy and you know it’ at the top of you little lungs does not mean you race to do a repeat performance every time you enter the library.

There are lots of funny wooden boxes painted different colours with large wooden animals on them, and they are created for holding all those kids stories books that are
Too tall, too wide, too floppy or strange to stay on a plain old book shelf.
An ordinary bookshelf could not constrain or restrain such books.
Each a treasure in it’s own right to be discovered and explored.

There is the Lego and stickle brick corner but really that is only for babies and little boys that have been fed too much sugar and both types end up only throwing the blocks and bricks.

Then there is ‘older’ section of the children’s library where are plain old book shelves but they are lower down hen the grown ups books; and the grown ups books are not as colorful. Here are books that are so good that even grow ups sometimes come to read them. This is the quieter part of the children’s library there are still games but at least
For the most part the chess pieces don’t get flung about the place.

There are chess lessons too, on Monday’s for an hour.

This my two off spring discovered having become bored of all the other delights
And came, running back to report what they had found among the big shelves and imploring to be allowed stay and play. Stay they did for an hour while a kindly gentleman
Explained the pieces and the rules. They sat and took it in and hardly fidgeted at all.
At seven you can sit and not fidget, harder when you are five and have learn the art of the theatrical wink and hand wriggles. I have informed they ‘have’ to go back next Monday.

It was great to see them happy there and it gave me a chance to have a look at what I guess it the kids self help section. There are lots of book on everything from a pet dying, moving house, a new baby to ‘What is splitting up? ‘ . Nice to know that those type of
books are there for parent to read with their kids and work through issues and get the parent to see things from a child’s point of view and let the child know it is not their fault
And that this has happened to other kids.

I also got to have a look at the notice board while the serious seven year old was explaining to the frivolous five year old that you don’t have to make a horse noise while moving your knight on the board, which causes her to pick up the piece and wonder if the knight fell off. Funny how time still flies when your in a library, where did those
Two hours go to. I reckon all libraries are magical even ones with out librarians that look like orange primates.
Ok one of them apparently is hairy enough to be a bear but that just ment we got to have another chat about personal remarks on the way home in-between playing I spy and wondering if they had books about volcanoes and why we don’t have any.

Brave or stupid?

Ok so the last few entries have been filler I admit but fun filler.
I have been pretty busy writing.
Deadlines for essays to be handed in and the terror of Gealcon looms.

After being central compiling hub for the ‘Spectres: Ancient Hordes’ pulling all the
Different parts together and writing the bulk of the descriptive text for it and then
Gming 3 games of it in a row as Warpcon last January; I got it into my silly little head
That maybe I could infact write stuff that may run at Gealcon…..

Brave or stupid?

Guess I won’t have the answer to that until the 1st of November.

I have always written what I term as ‘stuff’,
Hell I still have the copy book which I fill with tales and story ideas when I was 15.
Moving into writing stuff for RPG session was as easy as breathing for me.
Running games on the fly or fleshing out prewritten scenarios a joy.
Being able to take bits from several campaigns and work them into a world story arc
Containing the histories and continuing sagas of the chars in my group was enough
To keep me utterly engaged.

But there is a difference between tailoring a game for your own group of friends /fiends,
And writing one that will run cold at a con. When you choose a table at a con and take a seat you are agreeing to take part in a gaming session. I did learn running the same game
3 times in a row with 3 very different groups as Warpcon how different each game became due to the participation of the players and the direction they took the game.

So with the writing part of what I am doing for Gealcon done I am trying to find the
Balance between telling a story and making it a real game and covering a lot of angles and offering choices for the players. I guess I am used to writing sprawling sagas,
And to my group how could spend 4 hours getting from one town to another one week
And then deciding the following week sod that lets cast Owls wisdom on the
Doodad and have him wind walk the party and the horses in two groups the rest of the way which should have been 4 days travel with encounters which had been painstakingly prepared.

I just hope that I don’t end up with any dice junkies at the table. GM means God Mode and an rpg session is an interaction / reaction interfacing as far as I am concerned.
Honestly anyone starts a trait bidding war and I will go rock paper scissors* on their asses.
I guess we all get protective about our creative endeavours and anyone who tries to ruin a game at a con is not brave.
Not that I have never well not even played out of the box, hell I have been known to trash smash and burn the box leaving
a trail of ashes in my wake ( as some poor gms , usually Salburi can attest to) but it has been in the context of the game
and working with the elements in it and never screwing up other peoples fun.

Yes I would be great to tell the tales in what I have written but I guess it will also be fun to see it morph and change hopefully
into something even more werid and wonderfull on the morning they are run.

from that film with that dyke

Artist: Joey Lauren Adams Lyrics
Song: ALIVE Lyrics

I’m feeling nothing
But all alone
Just missing someone
I don’t even know
But until I find them
I’ll wait patiently
Just feeling nothing
Inside of me

And where are you baby
Where can you be
Why aren’t you here
Loving me
‘Cause I won’t to kiss you
And make you feel right
I want to lay with you
all through the night

And I want to feel passion
I want to feel pain
I want to weep at the sound of your name
Come make me laugh
Come make me cry
Just make me feel
Alive

And so I wait
For that glorious day
When the one I dream of
Comes my way
But until I find them
I’ll wait patiently
Just feeling nothing
Inside of me

And where are you baby
Where can you be
Why aren’t you here
Loving me
‘Cause I want to kiss you
and make you feel right
I want to lay with you
All through the night

And I want to feel passion
I want to feel pain
I want to weep at the sound of your name
Come make me laugh
Come make me cry
Just make me feel
Alive

mad Madam Mim!

I took the most accurate villain personality test
created by:
The Arch Villainess Gracie

Mim: With only a touch, I have the power
zim zaba rim bim, to wither a flower
I find delight in the gruesome and grim
‘Cause I’m the magnificent, marvelous, mad Madam Mim

I can be huge, fill a whole house
I can be tiny, small as a mouse
black sorcery is my dish of tea
(spoken) it comes easy to me
’cause I’m the magnificent, marvelous, mad Madam Mim!

I can be beautiful, lovely and fair
Silvery voice, long purple hair
la la la la, la la la la la la
la la la la la, la la la la la la
but it’s only skin deep
for zim zaberim zim
I’m an ugly old creep
The magnificent, marvelous, mad, mad, mad, mad Madam Mim!

oh my

dear, you are Bookish, aren’t you? You are a
highly intelligent and witty bluestocking,
whose beauty is hidden behind spectacles. Your
dress sense is eccentric and a little
unfashionable, and you consider yourself plain.
You have very little use for men, who find your
knowledge of Shakespeare, interest in politics
and forthright speech formidable. You are
undoubtedly well-off. The only reason for your
presence in a novel of this kind (which, I
might add, you would not dream of reading,
although you have occasionally enjoyed the
works of Miss Austen), is your mother, who is
absolutely determined that you will make a good
marriage. Rather than defying her directly,
you are quietly subversive, dancing with anyone
who asks you, but making no attempt to hide
your intellectual interests. The only person
who can get past your facade is the man who is
witty enough to spar with you, and be amused at
your blatant attempts to scare your suitors
away. While you will, no doubt, subject him to
a gruelling cross-examination to find out
whether his respect for your intelligence is
real or mere flattery, you may be sure that he
is your match, and that you, he AND your mother
will all live happily ever after

The Regency Romance Quiz: What kind of Romance Heroine are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

The wedding that was.

The wedding that was.
6 days ago was my sisters wedding.
I survived it.

First wedding in the imdediate family, yes I am the eldest, yes I am the only one with kids, no I am not married.
Or ever likely to be in this life time and if I do it will not be the extravagasa that was the wedding with a pink trim.
I was the only sibling not in the wedding party, my two other sisters being bridesmaids and our only brother being a grooms man.
Not all that bad, ment I sure as hell was not wearing a pink dress on the day, and not being a christian anymore
it ment they could not try and placate me with a reading of some sort.
Funny being at your sisters wedding and feeling that really your only there cos
due to the formalities you should be there and the fact that she wanted her only neice and nephew as flower girl and pageboy.

Couldn’t bring myslef to write about at the time,
I was too upset at the time.
but guess wht I have flu and I am utterly pissed off atm.

It was a horrid day tbh, but you do it cos it has to be done family and duty and all that jazz.
I am not they type of person who can’t but thier own grievences aside so not to upset
family and extended family for the likes of a wedding.
As the eldest of the 5 of us, me not being there would have been hughly noticible,
and lead to many awkward questions and converstaions and it would not have been fair to have done that to my family.

Ok well really as revenge for the shit storm of stuff and thier sticking thier noses in in my life and my affairs
it would not have even rated at being fitting for 1/4 of the tears and grief they caused.
Ohhh but everything they did was cos they were concerned.
Concered MY ARSE.
They didnt know what was going on, they didnt want to know, and then they jumped to all sorts of conculsions.
I was the one who suffered because of it.
You want to know what is going in with me and my life come talk to me.
If you can’t handle me or my life then don’t fucking ask, and don’t dare fucking judge me
by what you would or would not do or how you live your life.
You go live your life, I will live mine.

Sounds harsh, more like stuff you would say to strangers then family,
but then again you expect family not to always approve of your life
but you do not expect them to stab you in the back when you are strugging either.

Will I get over all of this, sure you bet.
I need to, I have two kids I love and a new life to create for me and them.
Part of that means figuring out and making sure that thier Dad my now ex-parter
is still a part of thier lives no matter what he choses to do with his life
and if and when he moves out of the family home.

As the wedding proves I can be gracious and not hold a grudge;
but forgiving and forgetting will never happen.
Esp when you get the feeling you are barely being tolerated and that is cos they want to see my kids.
No that is not the situation with all of my family,
but realy if I am to be the black sheep of the family I may as well use the privilage of telling them
a few uncomfortible home truths, and letting secrets out of the bag.
But you what I can’t, for no matter what they think of me I am not the bad person they supose.
Why re enforce that ?
Just because you can does not mean you should.

Fuck them.

Those that know me, trully know me know better.
The only person I have anything to prove anything to are me and my Gods.
If I am not breaking any laws, then the only persons who can judge me are me and my Gods.

Being Sick sucks.

I have flu, I feel utterly wretched.

What was a temp yesterday and a slight scratch in my troath
last night became restlessness and utter wooly headiness.
Currently after being up with my son vomiting last night things have gotten worse.
Not quiet oh gods I want to be dead, that only comes along after the brain numbing
I can’t read , focus , watch stuff, can’t function headache.

Being Sick sucks.
I it is worse when you have kids.
Thankfully they are now 5 and 7 and even if they are sick too, they understand that mammy is sick.
Really I recall the joys of changing a very dirty nappy and vomiting both before and after;
so this time arround won’t be that bad.

Besides if the comment my son was making at 3:35am about the accustics in the toilet room
had us both laughing, then maybe there is hope for all of us.