Life is short. Lard it up.

You've not seen anything until you've seen the Trinity "Larding it up."

There's nothing quite like a good "Power of Lard" to beat the blues. I've got it on a MP3, but somehow, it just isn't the same without the Trinity of New Paltz going crazy to the beat.

We're getting older, but someone's got to babysit the babysitters. That is the Power of Lard.

BTJM

-AM

Does this mean they have Godcatchers?

"Ray. The next time someone asks if you're a God, you show them your license!"

I'm reading James Frazer's The Golden Bough right now. It's been lurking on my nightstand for a couple of years. In an attempt to catch up on my reading, I try to consume a chapter or two a night.

This evening, the topic was on incarnate gods. And I quote:

"A register of all the incarnate gods in the Chinese empire is kept in the Li fan yaun or Colonial Office at Peking. The number of gods who have taken out a license (emphasis mine) is one hundred and sixty...The Chinese government, with a paternal solicitude for the welfare of its subjects, forbids the gods on the register to be reborn anywhere but in Tibet...But besides these public or licensed gods there are a great many little private gods, or unlicensed practitioners of divinity, who work miracles and bless their people in holes and corners; and of late years the Chinese government has winked at the rebirth of these pettifogging deities outside of Tibet. However, once they are born, the government keeps its eye on them as well as on the regular practitioners, and if any of them misbehaves he is promptly degrade, banished to a distant monastery, and strictly forbidden ever to be born again in the flesh."

And I thought the DMV was bad!

BTJM

-AM

I've got four stories left

Because of my latest desire to finally finish the stack of books left next to my bed, I realize that despite 20+ years of role-playing, I've only got four stories left in me. Maybe stories isn't the correct term. Let's say "settings".

The first, and the Granddaddy of them all, is of course, the Fantasy D&D setting. I've got a world that goes back to the "Red Box". It's weathered 3.5 editions. I sometimes dream about the places there.

The second is my "creepy game." When I was in college, I discovered "Vampire:The Masquerade" and I Vampired the Hell out of it!. The basics I learned in those years carried over to numerous White Wolf settings. They taught me that characters trump dungeons. Write up enough enduring individuals and you can not only have three successful World of Darkness games that you run, but also drag the experience into other Storyteller games and Mind's Eye Theatre events. If I have a dollar for every minute I spent on LARPs...

In the meantime, I've managed to build on my "creepy game" with some Call of Cthulhu, and most recently, White Wolf's plan to publish new "World of Darkness" books. I don't really care a lick for the genre stuff (Vampire, Werewolf, and Mage), but the direct World of Darkness stuff is actually very useful.

The third is a variation of "the creepy game." That's "Wraith:The Oblivion." I can never explain my attraction to this setting. It's complex as a Hell you'd find on the Far Shores, but I love it none the less.

The four and final setting is, of course, "Gamma World." Much like "W:tO," Gamma World was never quite was understood by the masses. It's been through more editions than D&D, so somewhere, somebody knows that this whole role-playing game hobby is about having fun. Sometimes you just have to spend four hours as a mutant jellyfish with a raygun...

BTJM

AM