Thankful Thursday - Coffee

 

For many, many years, I could not stand coffee.   My mom and dad both drank cups of it in the morning, but I never had any desire to join them.  I jokingly blamed it on all the coffee ice cream my mom ate while she was pregnant.  It didn't get any more palatable to me when I was in high school, working the breakfast shift at McDonald's.  I made so many urns of coffee, handed out so many cups, and refilled so many more that if I never had to touch another drop, I'd be happy.

I can't even say when, exactly, I started drinking it.  I know that I didn't even by my first coffeemaker until Rich and I had moved to Nashville 16 years ago.  And even then, there were months that went by without us using it.  But an occasional pot was made here and there, especially when either my or Rich's family were in town.  I also know that it wasn't until flavored coffee and flavored creamers became the norm.  Because I still don't like the flavor of coffee.

Ever since March of last year, though, coffee has become a ritual almost every morning.  It helps that Rich has been working from home more often than he has been working from the office.  He would usually have a cup when he got to work, so he's started making pots in the morning so we both can have some.  We're usually buying new bottles of flavored creamer once or twice a week (not because we drink that much coffee but because we put a LOT of creamer in our coffee).  It's become a regular start to my morning, sipping on it while working on various things on the computer.  

So why did I choose to talk about coffee for this week's Thankful Thursday?  Because today starts a virtual gaming convention.  It's based out of Ireland, which means the times of the game slots are not completely set to US times.  For three nights, I will be up until after midnight, having a great time.  Then I'll be back up the next morning to get some things finished (Tax Free Weekend, baby!) before starting another game at 1.  And coffee is going to be a big part of my diet to keep me ready for whatever vagaries this con throws at me.

Yeah, today I'm really thankful for coffee and it's ability to keep me from falling asleep on my computer.

G is for... Gaming

I still remember my first time.  I was in the Student Center, sitting with two friends.  Eric, the one that was experienced in this sort of thing, was talking us through what we needed to do.  He led us down the path, helping us craft just what we needed.  And while my friend Alison was able to walk away, I knew I was hooked for life.  I'd become a gamer.

For the longest time, I had to hide it.  My step-mom had very negative views of gaming.  She was convinced that it was a tool of the devil and that I'd lose myself to insanity if I played.  So I never looked for a group when I was home.  It was something I just did when I was in college.  We had a regular group that got together - Eric, Jake, Jay, Jim... I was the only girl in the group.  But that didn't matter.  I was there to have fun, and fun I had.  I played a psionic based on myself.  I played a wizard (which was actually one of my worse characters - I had a tendency to do things that broke the game when I played her) in a fantasy setting. I played GURPS (Generic Universal Role-Playing System).  I played Champions.  I lost myself in whatever my GM (usually Eric) wanted to throw my way.  And I wished I could play when I got home too.

I suffered a drought in my gaming for several years.  Even though I had my own GURPS books (carefully hidden from my step-mom), I didn't know anyone to play with, didn't know how to find a gaming group.  So I created characters in the dead of night, hoping that someday, I'd be able to use them.

It wasn't until I was immersed in the online community that I started gaming again.  First the occasional game with some friends after I moved to NY.  Then with my future husband (since that fact that I was a Gamer Girl was one of the things that drew me to him.)  I learned that there was more to the world than just GURPS and Champions.  I was (finally) introduced to D&D.  I learned that you didn't need dice to play, and that you could play as easily by writing e-mails online as you could playing face to face.  In fact, for a long time, all I was able to do was play online in a few Amber Diceless Role-Playing games.  (Based on Roger Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber.)  My world was expanding.

While Rich and I lived in Philly, I had my first regular gaming group since college.  At first, we met at a local bar/restaurant every Tuesday.  But when that started getting pricey, we moved the game to our apartment.  One of the saddest times was when we moved from Philly to Nashville - no more regular gaming with our friends.

It took us awhile to find a new group to game with.  At first, it was just not really knowing anyone.  Then there was the added challenge of having young kids.  But we were lucky enough to find not one, but two groups that had kids the same age as ours to play with.  The first family moved away from Nashville and our group dissolved.  The second is just another family and us - and we're still getting together, semi-regularly, to play.   And when we don't have time to get together because of life hitting us hard, Rich and I will sometimes run one-on-one games.  We've also had Teddy and Pete wanting to join in.  (Pete more to roll the dice, Teddy to actually have fun playing.)  It's family fun, and I couldn't ask for anything better.

In gaming, I get something that I haven't found elsewhere.  I get to use my creativity in creating stories.  I get to create something with others.  I get to have memorable moments and stories to share with like-minded individuals.  I get to be a part of something.  And, for a little while, I get to set my life and my problems to the side and be someone different than who I am.  I can lose myself in a fantasy where I am a superior thief.  A master archer.  A swordswoman who will fight to the death to protect her friends.  A superhero with the ability to turn insubstantial.  Anything I can dream, I can be.  And I can set her world aside for awhile whenever I need to go back to real life, knowing that she'll be there waiting for me to take her on her next adventure whenever I feel the need.

Running our boys through their first D&D session

   If you happen to be a gamer as well, feel free to share your favorite gaming story in comments.  I love hearing what other characters have faced!

Wordless Wednesday

Gaming with Teddy - Happy Birthday, Robot!

We're big geeks.  It should come as no surprise to any of the regular readers of this blog.  One of our biggest geeks, and one that we really want to pass along to our children, is role-playing games.  And tonight, we tried one of our first non-Pokemon related games. We played a round of the incredibly kid-friendly Happy Birthday, Robot! by Daniel Solis (who is, in my not so humble opinion, one of the best indie writers out there).

Happy Birthday, Robot! is primarily a story-telling game, with dice to help determine who gets to add what to the story.  It's a fantastic gateway drug for some of the more advanced games because it introduces the younger or new players to collaborative story-telling.  The rules are incredibly simple to follow - including rolling three dice at a time to find out how many words can be added to a sentence and how many your "neighbors" (the two players on your left and right) can add.  There are freebie words (Robot, Robot's, And, But), tokens to loan to your fellow players and to add bring a close to the game and an epilogue section to pull things together at the end. The story comes together one sentence at a time and can sometimes go pretty far afield of what the first player to utter words thinks it will.

Tonight, it was just Rich, Teddy and I playing.  As enthusiastic as Pete was about wanting to play, he just doesn't have the counting or reasoning skills for it quite yet (though his story-telling ability is top notch).  It took us about an hour to play and the time went quickly.  This time around, Rich and I did the writing because, while Teddy's writing is getting better, we figured this might be a bit much the first time around.  But I am hoping to use it as writing exercises in the future.

The first phase is dice rolling and the dice are split based on what the storyteller rolls.  Any ones and twos stay with the storyteller.  Any threes and fours go to the person on their right. And any fives and sixes go to the person on their left.  Dice are rolled three at a time and the storyteller can keep rolling sets of three dice until either they don't want to roll anymore or one of their neighbors has four dice in front of them.  The number of dice each person has in front of them is how many words they can add to the sentence, along with their individual free words (the storyteller gets the free word Robot or Robot's, the person on their right gets the free word And, and the person on the left gets the free word But).  The storyteller writes their part of the sentence first, followed by the And person and then the But person.  The three need to come up with one sentence.  When they are finished with the sentence, the storyteller gets tokens (placed heads up) equal to the number of dice they had for the sentence.  Then it moves to the next person, with them becoming the storyteller and the person on either side of them becoming the neighbors.  After the first roll, the storyteller can borrow tokens from other players to add words to their sentence, placing borrowed tokens tails side up.  The last round happens when one player has ten tokens, allowing any remaining players to have one last chance at being storyteller.  The final portion of the game is the epilogue, where each person gets to write a complete sentence by themselves.  It starts with the person who has the most tokens, then going around based on the decreasing number of tokens. When it's your turn, you can write a sentence with as many words as you have tokens and using the free words Robot, Robot's, And, and But.  Then sit back and enjoy the story that you created together.

Teddy really enjoyed rolling the dice and coming up with his parts of the sentence.  Being the youngest, he was the first to roll and come up with the beginning of the first sentence.  By the end of rolling, Teddy had four words that he could use (with the free word Robot), I had four (with the free word And) and Rich had three.  It took about a round, seeing each of us take our turn at storyteller, for Teddy to really understand what he was doing.  And we did help with suggestions as we played.  Teddy has the tendency to use a lot of words where a few would do, so we would help him still get the idea across but fit within the number of words he was allowed to use. I think we crafted a pretty good story, all told. And Teddy said he wants to play again.

I do think, though, that we'll stick with three people playing for awhile.  As we were getting closer to the end, Teddy's attention started to waver a bit and he was ready to end the story.  But he did finish up with us, coming up with some great sentences at the end.  I'm hoping that this will become a regular weekend game for us.  And maybe in a few months, as Teddy gets more into it, we'll check with our friends' to see if they and their six year old daughter would like to join us.

And now, without further ado, here is the story that we created tonight by playing Happy Birthday, Robot!




Happy birthday, Robot!

"You are two today, Robot, and we're gonna have fun!" said his Mommy.

"Can we go swimming and then to the park to swing and slide?" asked Robot.

Robot danced while Mommy thought about going there.  Robot stopped dancing and came to Mommy but she wasn't ready yet.

"Ok, Robot, if you are good."

Robot sighed, "Ok, Mommy. I promise I'll be good for you."

They went to the pool and had lots of fun, but Robot rusted! Robott's Mommy took out his special oil and he could move better now.

"Mommy, let's go home now," said Robot sadly, "But I want to rest."

Then Birthday Robot slept until morning and felt so much better but was kinda sad.  Then Robot's Mommy came in and brought him a cake!  Robot smiled at his Mommy, "Oil cake with cookie icing! My favorite!"

"The cake was really yummy and now I'd like some milk," said Robot.

"Ok," said Mommy, giving him a hug.  It was the best day ever.

Before I had game controllers, I had imagination

I had this idea for a shirt the other day.  A picture of a game controller with the words, "Before I had this" above it and the words, "I had imagination" followed by several dice (d20s, d10s, d4s... non-sixers, basically).  Because that's the way I feel about gaming.

My mind usually takes a tortuously weird route to get to places.  For this one, it all started with seeing a castle-like store front and remembering one of my local game stores, The Game Keep. And that had me remember a conversation I had with the owner after he hung up from an incoming call.  The caller wanted to know if they carried X-Box games.  And he had to  explain to them that no, that's not the kind of gaming this store is about.  He told me there are regularly calls or visitors seeing the word "Game" and thinking that meant computer/console/portable games.  Role-playing and board games were foreign concepts to them.

And it saddens me to realize how true it is for so many people.  When I look up "gamer" on various social websites, I find people dedicated to playing X-Box or PC or DS or any other electronic game out there.  Dice and character sheets are never mentioned.  If I don't realize that those are the kinds of games they are talking about and ask which system people prefer, I hear debates on X-Box vs PS3 vs Wii rather than the merits of D&D 4th ed over GURPS instead.  Independent games?  What are those?

Don't get me wrong.  I love my computer games as much as the next person.  I'm currently heavily embroiled in a game of Puzzle Quest Gallactrix on my DS, have far too many Facebook games for my limited amount of time and am looking forward to kicking my nephews butt in Smash Bros Melee on the Gamecube over the next week.  Computer games are a great way for me to wind down and relax.  But they don't get my imagination running.  They have a set story line or a specific purpose for the game and you can't throw a monkey wrench into the game designers plans.  You can't bring your characters in directions that surprise you and everyone around you.  You wait, breath drawn in, for the clatter of dice to stop rolling on the table to see if you were successful in your attempt to steal the crown jewels or not.  You can't use your imagination.

I didn't start role-playing until college, when one of my friends introduced me to GURPS. I played a psi character based on me.  And I loved her.  She was rough... very rough.  I didn't know as much about creating a character in those days.  But she was also a lot of fun, sending out a mental broadcast to all Supers in the area to come to the recruiter for the government Supers (played by my friend Jake) so I could get away from him and ending up having a three day building party.  (I rolled pretty good on that one.)  We played a fantasy game where I was a mage that loved the death touch spell a little too much.  We played a Bureau 13 game.  In short, we played anything and everything, letting only our imagination limit us.

With the advent of the internet, most of my gaming is online now.  I've played on message boards and played through e-mail.  I've made friends with people halfway around the world.  I've practiced my writing and stretched my imagination.  Because I never know what will be thrown at me next - or how I may change because of the other people I'm playing with.  My character on the now-defunct Tazlure started out as a worshiper of the god, Pan.  She wanted to follow his path of joy - which often involved sex - to become a Rose (think Companion from Firefly and you're somewhat close).  Not long before I started my character, though, the Red Rose Guild closed.  So Sevti, my character, wanted to try to reopen it.  But life had other plans - war came to her isle, she met a man that she fell in love with, and then thought she lost that man forever.  We even touched on the future through the dream world, where she found her lover again.  By the time the game closed it's doors, she was no longer trying to follow the path of joy, but trying to follow the combination of all three paths - joy, art and blood.  She was going to be a priestess of Pan.

In electronic games, you can't get that kind of growth and change.  Or if you do, it's predetermined.  Sevti could have easily left the isle after her parents were found and traveled to restart the Red Rose Guild.  Or sworn her heart away from Pan when she thought her lover had been killed.  There were so many possibilities that she could have taken. And for each one, she would have ended up a different character.

Gaming fuels my imagination.  It opens my soul to new possibilities.  It challenges me to accept change and roll with the punches.  Because I become invested in my characters, as much as any writer does when they are penning a novel.  My characters are a part of me and a part of my soul that those created by a computer programmer can never be.  Because they aren't completely mine.

I'm teaching my kids to use their imaginations.  For all that Teddy loves his GBA and my DS (and he's learned quite a lot from the games he's played there), he's excited to start playing his first RPG with us - Happy Birthday, Robot!.  He's always loved rolling the dice for us when we would get together with friends for the (increasingly) rare times we would game face to face.  And he's got such an active imagination anyway - this, the boy who will gladly play a Pokemon battle with imaginary Pokemon. I think he'll do well at it.  And Pete... well, Pete follows in his brother's footsteps.  So if Teddy's doing it, there's no doubt in my mind that Pete will be doing so soon as well.

I love imagination. I love the ability to stretch it.  I love having that creative outlet that gaming brings.  And I wish more of the world felt the same way.

Recent Geekery

Between today's Free Comic Book Day fun at Rick's Comic City and a bunch of the geek stuff I've found online lately, I've been in Geek Heaven.  It's making my little geek heart soar!

First, I'll share the goodies I picked up at FCBD today.  For any of my readers that got their own goodies at a local Comic Shop, please feel free to share what you got.  I'm curious to see what else people picked up and what they think of said goodies.  At Rick's, they had a bunch of long boxes filled with comics they were selling for 50 cents.  So along with my freebies and the few new titles that I wanted to pick up (Doctor Who, anyone?  And DAY-UM, I want to talk about the Doctor vs Jack the Ripper with someone!), we also found several goodies among those boxes.  So here are the list of goodies that we came home with:

Free Comics
Sonic the Hedgehog
Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse
The Intrepid EscapeGoat: The Princess and the Pyramid/The Stuff of Legend
Chip 'n' Dale, Rescue Rangers/Darkwing Duck
Pep Comics: Featuring Betty & Veronica
Young Justice/Batman: The Brave and the Bold Super Sampler
Geronimo Stilton, plus a complete story starring the Smurfs
X-Men: Curse of the Mutants Saga
Marvel Sneak Peeks
Son of Marvel Reading Chronology
Walter Koenig's Things to Come/The Mis-Adventures of Adam West
Green Lantern: Special Edition
The Darkness II: Confession

New Purchases
Green Arrow: Brightest Day, Issue 9 (My Mother's Day gift from my boys, who wanted to get me something GA)
Doctor Who, Issue #3 & #4
Doctor Who: A Fairytale Life

50 Cent Comics
Batman: The Blue, The Grey and the Bat
Batman: The Book of Shadows
Green Arrow #1-3 (the 1988 new format)
The Green Arrow: TPB by Jack Kirby - classics from the 1950's GA
Superman #464 & #469 (The boys picked out these)
Sonic The Hedgehog #216 & #217

I've read through the Doctor Who comics and a couple of the freebies, but I still have lots of reading to do tomorrow.  I'm really looking forward to it!

I've watched "The Impossible Astronaut" and "Day of the Moon", the first two episodes of Doctor Who, season 6.  I'm jonesing for someone to talk about it with.  I'm just really leery about putting my thoughts out here yet because I don't want to spoil it for someone who may not have had a chance to watch them yet.  Tomorrow, I'll be watching "Curse of the Black Spot".  And I've got some Sarah Jane Adventures that I want to watch as well.  I'm firmly in Whomania right now.

I'm going to start a new channel on YouTube for all the Geekery that I love there.  (Ok, I've actually started the channel now - small though it is to start - and you can find it here if you want to share in the awesome geekiness that I'm finding on YouTube.)  For the last several days, we've been having the video below playing pretty constantly in our house.  And it's making me want a regular gaming group again so badly I can taste it!



We had it playing before I left to visit with Dad tonight, and I actually turned to Teddy before I left and said, "This WILL be you one day.  You WILL be up until dawn rolling dice.  You don't have any choice."  I'm only mostly joking.  It is something I'd like to see him do.  Hell, it's something I'd love to do with him, Rich, and Pete when they boys are a bit older.

It brings back a lot of good memories though, particularly back in college.  Of course, we didn't play D&D in college.  We played GURPS (which fits so much better with rolling a d6 than D&D). But still... I was played a mage (during our fantasy fames) and I had one hell of an evil GM that I loved dearly (and would love to game with again if I could).  I kinda miss those days sometimes.

Rich had never seen this next video, so I had to introduce him to it.  Which is another one that gets me chair dancing.  And reminds me that I really need to check out The Guild far more often because I'm missing so much goodness.



And then Rich showed me "Game On", which I hadn't caught before.  Bollywood geekery rocks!



Gods, I better stop this for now.  Because otherwise I will be up until dawn finding Lovely Geekery.  And if you have some geekery on YouTube that you think I'd enjoy, PLEASE send it my way.  Because Geekery needs to be shared!

Once again, back in the saddle

The last several weeks have been insane.  Between Teddy's birthday weekend and an unexpected trip to Philly/NJ for a funeral, I have barely had a chance to breath let alone get anything done.  While there is still a lot of chaos around me, I'm trying to feel revitalized enough to get everything done.  I'm still trying to come up with a plan of attack... I have some ideas, but I really need to sit down and write them out.  I need to come up with something to keep everything in as well.  I'm getting ready to head out for several errands, including running to Wal-Mart, so I may be able to find something that will help me out.  And tonight, Rich is taking the boys out to go shopping for my birthday (am I seriously going to be 37 on Friday?  Gah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), so I might be able to get some of my organization done then.

I'm still staying about the same in the weight department.  I think I need to revamp my goals again, but that shouldn't be too difficult.  I'm still determined that I'm going to make the changes that I need to to be healthy.  The weather has been nicer, so I might be able to get out and walk more.  I bought another new pedometer - the one that I got with the DS program had the hook break off so it won't stay on my hip/shoe/whatever, and it doesn't do well in my pocket.  But the new one doesn't seem to be working right either.  I'll figure something out.  When I'm out at the store today, I'm going to pick up some more fruit so I have some healthier options for snacking.

I'm pretty behind in Swap-Bot again, in large part because of the trip to the NE.  I think tomorrow is going to be a Focus on Swap-Bot day.  Kids should be in PDO, so that should give me some time for taking care of things without the boys driving me insane.  I'm hoping to have everything back to normal on that end by the weekend.  We'll see how it goes, though.

I still have a lot of backlog with writing book reviews as well.  I'm going to write that up on a list as well, for the various things that I need to do.  That crosses over into Swap-Bot, since one of the swaps I'm in is a book log for the first quarter of 2011.  It shouldn't be too difficult, though, since most of the books I've read are graphic novels.  I did, however, listen to a couple of audio books on the trip, so those will count as well.

I have a grand plan for cleaning.  Rather than focus on a room at a time, I'm going to focus on a section of a room at a time.  The rest of the house might be a mess, but that isn't to worry about right now.  Instead, I'm going to start at one corner of the apartment - specifically, the far left corner in the kitchen.  I'm going to clean and organize from that point forward until I feel finished for the day, then I'm going to quit.  The next day, I can pick up from that point.  While I go, I'm also going to decorate - pictures on walls, things like that.  I won't have to be stressed because I don't have a specific amount that needs to be done daily, but I'll still be able to see progress.

There's fun worked in here as well.  Yesterday, before we got home, we stopped by GameStop to pick up our reserved copies of Pokemon: Black and Pokemon: White.  It's pretty cool because everything is brand new - new area, completely new pokemon, and I've been avoiding spoiling myself so I don't know what will be coming up.  Along with Pokemon, I'm finally downloading WoW to the new computer (which came in right before the trip to the NE).  So I'm going to make some time for that as well.  After all, I'm paying for it, I might as well use it.

I'm getting back into a few other things as well.  I finally got the 1st disc of Season 4 of Dexter, so I'm catching up on that.  I'm hoping that disc 2 will be in soon.  I'm also getting ready to start season 5 of Teen Titans.  I just have to send the latest disc back to Netflix.  We listened to Book 5 of The 39 Clues on the trip back and have decided that we really want to get back into those, so I have the first several of those on hold at the library.  Rather than spending a lot of TV time, we're planning on spending a lot of Audio Book time in the evenings.  It'll be nice, I think.  Plus, I need to make a trip back to Rick's Comic City to pick up a few new comics.  I haven't gotten a box yet, but I'm still thinking about it.  I could use more Green Arrow.

Speaking of which, Barnes & Noble is doing an online promotion of buy 3 get the 4th free on their graphic novels.  I'm debating picking up some.  I have a $20 gift card for B&N anyway, so it would be a good thing to buy.  I just have to decide what I want to get.

Re: the trip to Philly... for all that we saw family for a sad reason (my husband's grandmother's funeral), it was actually a pretty good visit.  We got to spend time with family and got to have fun with the boys.  I got quite a few cute pics of the boys and various members of the family, and I'm hoping to get those up on Picasa and/or Facebook next week.  I've got a few things that I'm hoping to put into the scrapbook as well.  That's another thing that needs to go onto my To Do list.

We'll be making another trip north this summer.  My in-laws have rented a house on the Jersey shore and we'll be there for a week.  We're hoping to go up to NY to spend time with my family as well.  I'm also hoping that we might be able to include a few days of visiting in Philly with friends and maybe making an extra stop or two at places in VA that we've been wanting to check out (including a super huge book sale that goes on 6 or 7 times a year).

It definitely looks like things are going to be keeping busy.  And that's good.  I need to keep busy.  Especially because Teddy will be starting Kindergarten in the fall.  And if I'm busy, I won't have to think about my little boy becoming a big one! :D

Now I'd better get going and run some errands.  Just too much going on and we all have to start somewhere!  :)

Have a great Fat Tuesday, all!

Quote Memories

One of the swaps I signed up for recently is one in which we share some of our favorite quotes.  As I was searching for quotes that I knew I would enjoy, I looked for some quotes by me.  And in doing so, I came across quotes that I took from TBR in 2004.  As I was reading over them, I kept laughing at the hilarity of some of them.  As such, I want to share them again.  So here is a blast from the past.  For those that were there, I hope your memories get tickled the same as mine did.

In Her Shoes
GM: Amber & Rich DiTullio

Paul Weimer as Hadrian
J.P. Brannan as Fletcher
Will Wagner as Talen
Mark W. as Kalman
Jeff McDonald as Kennard
BriAnne Searles as Kennan
Amber DiTullio as Maya (Only NPC Cousin)

Fletcher: I’ll make sure she (Maya) has water so she doesn’t get dehydrated.
Kennard: I’ll make sure THEY have water. (The three guards that Maya is supposed to be fighting and, quite possibly, will destroy.)

Amber: She’s Gerard’s daughter, what do you expect? (Re: her strength)
Kennan: Ummm…. (Raises hand)
Amber: But he’s Gerard’s SON!

BriAnne: I have an icicle?
Paul: It’s his sword. It’s just called Icicle.
BriAnne: Then you need to capitalize, Amber.
Amber: I did. That’s my capital I.
BriAnne: Capital I’s aren’t supposed to be dotted.

Random: What the hell is going on?
Kennard: I’m not sure Your Majesty. But we have your body here.

Fletcher (in Talen’s Body) after the acid: I did it, everyone saw me do it.
Talen: Then Dad’ll be pissed at ME!!!!

Maya to Keenan: I’m trying not to touch you.
Keenan: This is just wrong. My body is hitting on me!

Fletcher to Kalman: Think wet thoughts.
Keenan: Maya already is.

Kalman: It’s beginning to sound a lot like Brand.
Fletcher: No, if it were Brand, there’d be lots of Bwahahas.

Fletcher: I will take out my sword and try to cut through the bunting. At the very least, I’ll try to save the cute servants.

GM to Talen: You have boots. They didn’t have laces but they do now.
Kennard: Just for the record, that wasn’t one of my items.

Fletcher (talking about the “appreciation” he’s getting from one of the servants): In the Unicorn Paladins, they teach you to be pure of word and thought and deed.
Amber: That’s why you failed, isn’t it?

Hadrian: If wishes were horses.
Jeff: No! No horses! No horses! Wishes are a bad thing.

(After Mirelle says that she’s going to make Caine’s children “no more” because they’re icky.)
Hadrian: Do I no longer exist?
Jeff: No, you no longer have parents.

(Hadrian, showing up in the Trump Room of the castle after Mirelle tried to make him go away.)
Guard: Highness, I didn’t realize you’d left.
Hadrian: It was… an experiment.

Hadrian (upon getting first blood on Riktik, the demon): Score!
Fletcher: No, that’s what I was trying to do.

GM: You have julianned Riktik.
Kalman: Wait. Julian is Riktik?!!!

They burn the demon parts. Fletcher asks if there is a broom around.
GM: That’s what the servants are for.
Amber: Then Random comes in (in the servant Jennifer’s body) and starts sweeping up the powder.

(Talking about Mirelle being in either the throne room or Random’s quarters and someone commenting that it’s where they should start.)
Talen: Unless Random took Jennifer up there.
Amber: That’s just wrong. On so many levels.

Keenan (to Mirelle): This is your fault.
Mirelle: No, it’s not!
Keenan: Yes it is. You did magic and now we’re here with a little kid!

Quotes courtesy of Amber DiTullio and BriAnne Searles

Wizard in the Attic
GM: Paul Weimer

Amber DiTullio as Chenoa
JP Brannan as Fletcher
Brian Caldwell as Victor
Jennifer Woelke as Aegean
Jeff Trumitch as Bronner
Mark Stafford as Shawn

GM (to Fletcher): It’s 7 in the morning. What are you doing?
Amber: Which servant are you with this time?

Victor: Can I tell where it’s from? Is it from…
GM: Yes, it’s from that place. The unhappy place.
Mark: Go to your happy place.

(Re: the animated suit of armor that Fletcher just exploded.)
Bronner: I’m trying to figure out what animated it.
Fletcher: I have a theory.
Bronner: And what’s that.
Fletcher: Magic.

Bronner: I haven’t seen armor in well over 500 years.
Fletcher: Well, there’s probably not much collector’s value left.

Jeff to Victor: How did you get out of your room, anyway?
…
JP: There are new changes under the Amberite Disabilities Act.

Aegean: I’m waiting to see what happens from her challenge.
Amber: (Meep)
Aegean: That was not what I was expecting.

(After Shawn flicks off ichor from her blade)
Aegean: Wonderful, cousin. Wonderful.
Shawn: I’m not here to win friends and influence people.

GM (to Fletcher): You’re going to try to counter-spell Brand’s spell?!
Amber & Jenn, simultaneously: This is gonna be fun!

Shawn: Why don’t you go bug her for awhile?
Aegean: Him.
Shawn: Him.
Jenn: Why don’t you go bugger him for awhile?

Scipio to Aegean: Perhaps, cousin, we should discuss over breakfast why our cousin is so amiss?
Shawn: So what?
JP: A tool!

Brand: It was an experiment that failed.
Fletcher: An experiment in what?
Brand: Transportation.
Fletcher: Yeah, I think being bound in once place would be considered a failure.

GM: He blinks his eyes twice.
Bronner: And that would be… no?
Victor: Yes, I think two would be no in universal blinky code.

Aegean: Why are you going to hit this with a shovel?
Shawn: Because that’s what I do when I don’t know what to do. I hit it with a shovel.
(beat… beat)
Think how many things would have been better if you’d hit them with a shovel.

GM: It’s at the Fellbane, the plaza at the end of the world.
Mark: Is there a restaurant there?
GM: No, no restaurant.
Jeff: No, but there’s a Starbucks.

Shawn: Hit it with a shovel.
Random: That’s enough out of you.
Shawn: Hit it with a shovel.
GM: Random takes the jewel and…
JP: … sticks the jewel in your mouth.
Shawn: That’s not a shovel.

(When the shovel jokes are continuing)
JP: Let’s explain the Chaos Lord’s method of binding someone. First, you hit it with a shovel.

GM: He takes you into the demon laboratory. You see a variety of demons bound…
JP: And an assortment of shovels.

Shawn: I’d rather give my back to Fletcher than him (Bronner)
Fletcher: I have a way with the ladies.

Bronner: Well that’s good, because I’m not my father.
Fletcher: Well, that would be quite the paradox.

GM: They are adapting quickly.
Jeff: We are the Brand. You will be assimilated.

GM: You are drawn to the far side of the track.
Mark: We keep jumping from cheek to cheek.

Quotes Courtesy of Amber DiTullio

Dreams Made Flesh
GM: Paul Weimer

Amber DiTullio as Maya
Deb Atwood as Jenny
Tara Kunkel as Michaeline
Mark W as Raymond
Jeff McDonald as Connla
Will Wagner as John
JP Brannan as Clio

Jenny: Are Fiona and Bleys missing?
GM: Yes.
Jenny: That makes her happy.

GM: And the little thing (the demon) steps back and looks at you.
Jenny: I step back a little and look at IT!

NPC Woman in Michaeline’s bed: Darling, you never cease to amaze me.
Michealine: Well, I’m amazing.

Random: Where are you?
Jenny: Not in the place I went to bed!!!!

GM: There are no romance novels about Corwin and Dara yet.
Amber: It’s being ghostwritten.
Will: By Ghostwheel?

NPC Woman in Michaeline’s bed: She (Dara) always wants something.
Michaeline: She wants me at my earliest convenience. Right now it’s not convenient.

Tara: The unflappable Michaeline almost flapped.

Jenny: He told us to go someplace safe. As long as he doesn’t pace, he’s fine.
Amber: Random not pace?!!!

Random: Who is she?
Will: Just tell him you’re a secret agent for Queen Dara.

Jenny: We should go back and get them.
Michaeline: Except for John. We can leave him behind. We won’t miss him.

GM: The watching goes away because you have… insurance.
Amber: We have watching insurance?!

Jenny: Can you get Random a message for me? I’ve been kinda giving him a headache by accident.

(After John bounces off of a boundary around the patterny goodness.)
JP: You know, it might be on the second assault they set the deflection shield on random particle distribution.

Random (after he drinks the beer that Jenny gives him): That better not be poisoned.

GM to Clio: Are you following Maya’s path of doom?

Random: If you’re spies for Dara, you’re the best spies I’ve ever seen.
Amber & Deb: Or the worst!

(After a night of innuendo flying everywhere)
Clio to Dara: I think Random has something John needs.

Jenny: What’d you do to yourself?
Connla: Ow. Fire. Boom. Bad.

Jenny: Where’s Clio?
Connla: Ow. Ow. Bad. Fire.

Jenny: We have redheads on our ass, let’s move.

(After the numerous times this game has gone PC to PC conflict…)
GM: But JP’s gonna give me a note which is gonna give me angina.

(The GM is asked to give a description of where everyone is in the pattern room after the first bout of mayhem, including Random’s incineration.)
GM: Going closest to the door we have…
Mark: Ash…

Tara: We killed Fiona, we killed Bleys…
Tara & Amber: We killed Random.
Jeff: But that was just a side effect.

Michaeline: Well, when I cut off your head, I wanted to make sure it wasn’t really you.
Bleys (in a very small voice): Cut off my head.

Deb: It’s always fun to wake up with the husband you didn’t know you had.

Maya (to the man in her bed): This is going to sound strange but who the hell are you?

GM: This wasn’t meant to be a smut game. This is just meant to be the entre’.
Amber: If this is the entrée, then where’s dessert.
(Later, when reading this quote: The dessert was PC vs. PC fighting)

John: But everything else is changed but…
Maya: You too?
John: I’VE not changed?

Quotes courtesy of Amber DiTullio and Deb Atwood

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
GM: Deb Atwood, Paul Weimer, Amber DiTullio

Deb Atwood as Lydia
Amber DiTullio as Tamara
Liz Trumitch as Random
Jeff Trumitch as Martin
Brenda McCartney as Colin
Tara Kunkel as Sofia
BriAnne Searles as Zenobia

Deb: You’re not the banana.
Amber: I’m not the banana. I eat the banana.
Brenda: Eat the banana gently.

(Talking about Paul’s games not going where he expects them to.)
Deb: You don’t have Amber and I playing. You have us co-direct.
Paul: Thankfully.
Deb: No no no. That’s why.

Liz: Coffee soaked cookies good for king.

Deb: Brats seem to be too much work.
Paul: It’s grilling. It’s cooking. It’s man food.

Deb: No cross-shadow blow jobs!

Deb: How long does it take you to get a two room carriage?

Amber (about Tamara): She’s very happy to be there, though she can’t keep her eyes off of Colin.
Deb: Or her hands.
Amber: Or anything else.

Liz: Why would you want to sabotage it?
Zenobia (Bri in character, but not really in game): Because I don’t want to spend the rest of my life throwing up.
Liz: He’ll just go out and get another one.
Zenobia: Why do you think all the others failed?

(Talking about the doors between Tamara’s room and Lydia’s)
Colin: Do the double doors lock from one side?
Random: If you were serious, you could go a week without fucking her.

Random: No penile implants, no drive in the skull.
Martin: You didn’t ask about penile implants.

Deb: Maybe she just has the one true mouth of which all others are but Shadow.

Zenobia: You take care of your fiancée, I’ll take care of your fiancée’s mom.
Lydia: How will you take care of me?
Zenobia: In any way you want.

(Talking about Martin’s mohawk)
Paul: Unless you use gel or something.
Amber: Yeah, you need something to keep it up.

Liz: He was drilling him pretty good.
Amber: Was he now?
Liz: He was squirming under it.

Random: I’m going to see what the mother-in-law can do on the piano.

Vialle: Oh Randy my dear?
Random: What is it Allie?

(While Random is getting it on with Lydia)
Martin: Dad, something’s come up. I need to talk to you.

Merlin: What is she doing?
Zenobia: Me

GM: Brought down by accessories.
Tara: It was an accessory in crime.

Random to Tamara: There’s this thing in the basement you need to walk.
Tamara: Is it like a tightrope?

Random: Do I know you’re a lesbian?
Zenobia: I’m not a lesbian. I’m an opportunist.

Quotes courtesy of Amber DiTullio and BriAnne Searles

Any misspellings, misattributions or any other mistakes are purely mine.