Quick Year End Update

Well, where to begin?  Lots of good things happening here but nothing that comes to a quick and tidy conclusion, which makes documenting them a messy chore.  I love to type into the blog to give a sense of permanence to fleeting events and thoughts but when they are ongoing affiairs they don't lend themselves to the format without a little work. 
First off, we had a house catch fire in the neighborhood.  This is the house which is behind the house I'm living in and it went up around midnight.  I was in bed reading a very good book and heard what I took to be the sound of plastic garbage can lids being slammed.  Since this is a good neighborhood with some sketchy elements I didn't think anything of the sound.  I figured it was someone going up and down the street getting cans before they could be recycled.  True, they were going about the activity in a more obnixious way than usual, but still it wasn't enough to insite my interest.  Still, the sound went on for about 10 minutes and I could tell there was something bad going on.  It turns out the bangs were the sounds of the neighbor's windows being blown out by the heat from the fire.
Now of course there isn't enough information to make sure one way or the other what started the fire.  No one was hurt, thankfully, and everyone got out of the house safely including the family dog.  The house is still standing right now, but blackened on one side and looking miserable in the winter chill.  I don't blame it in the slightest.
In a few days I'll be going to Ontario for the Episcopal Church convention, and I'll be going as a vendor. I've got the Squaresoft register device adapted to the phone so I'll be able to take sales for the game St. Benedict RULEZ!  Yes, I'm being realistic about the chances of sales.  I doubt we will make enough to retire on, but it would be nice if we could fill the coffers of the Benedictine Study group a bit.  They have gone out of their way to make sure I have everything I need to design and create the game, and it would be wonderful if we could make some sales to justify their faith in the project.
Caiaphas Cain is a wonderful series of books to get into, the Lucha VaVoom cards are still an ongoing project, getting an online-only bank account set up and Scrat is still 90% feral despite having spent 90% of her life indoors with people.  And now the roundup of events is complete!

Media Observations

Once I found out that YouTube is a mine of commercial free content, I had to check out some of the shows that I'd always been meaning to get around to watching but never found the time for.  This week it is "All Creatures Great and Small", which appears to have run far more seasons than I had originally given it credit for.   Consensus?  Great series and excellent acting which outshines anything seen today.

Small Screen

Let me be the first to say that blogging from a phone is not the most fluid of data entry choices.  It works, but that is about all that can be said for it.  The main reason to do it at all is to have the treasured iPhone descriptor.  For example: Sent from Ted's iPhone.  I don't think it is worth it.  Still, it is better than nothing.  I finished printing off the church songbook covers and will see about assembling them tomorrow.   Jesus is on the cover in front of a pentacal.  We will see if anyone notices.  It wasn't intentional, but couldn't be helped.  The design needed it.

Swimming in Tech

I am having good success in bringing broken tablets back to life.  This is being written from a Galaxy Tab 3!

Doc Savage and Guys and Dolls

Not one.  Not a single deck of cards.  I knew it!
When I created the Guys and Dolls deck of cards for the Snowline Players production of the play I knew the key to selling them was to have them available for purchase right from the start and right in the lobby.  But because of events surrounding decision making (read: not my fault) the decision as to whether to place an order for the decks didn't come until much to late.  Typically, I'll be lucky if an order gets shipped within two weeks of being placed.  Considering all that is involved in the manufacturing of these things, that doesn't surprise me.  If anything, I'm happy that they can complete the order in the time frame specified anyway.
But I knew that if I told people during the play that if they wanted a deck they could order it online and then wait two weeks for it to arrive, that proposition would be a nonstarter.   I mean, the whole point of a souvenier deck of cards is that it's bought the way you normally buy impulse items.  You buy them right then and there without any planning.
So while lots of people did come to the play and expressed interest in ordering a deck for themselves, no one actually did it.  And that's ok.  But it is still a missed opportunity that makes me feel bad.  We could have raised additional funds for the little production company.  Guess I'll have to hope I can get them onboard more quickly next time.
Doc Savage on the other hand is something that I don't have to go through anyone's approval process.  This is something that I'm doing for my own enjoyment and that's the sort of project that I love the most.  If you haven't had a chance to read any Doc Savage before, I encourage you to do so.  They are great, if brief, stories of high adventure and daring.  However, the author really needed to have a good editor go over the work before publishing.  Yes, the author was under constant demands from a grueling publication schedule but the stories would have been greatly improved with a little more polish.  I'm going to apply the polish to a few random stories over the next few days, and I'll post the results here.

Blog App

It turns out that there is a ready made Blogger app which I can use to update the site right from my phone.  It sounds a bit gimmicky when I say it like that, but there you are.  Ill give it a shot while I procrastinate on painting today.

House Cleaning

Borderlands Vending Machine Logo

Borderlands Logo Background Android Wallpaper

This is going to be a generalized housekeeping post.  I've really been letting this blog slide for the past few months, which puts me in the company of about 80 percent of humanity.  Writing a blog is fun and rewarding, but on of the catches is that you get to set your own goals and deadlines for posts.  This keeps the writing from feeling any pressure about keeping up with posts, but also results in lots of times where the writer imagines what they're going to upload, without going to the actual effort of uploading.
So I've got a ton of great ideas for things to put here, but when it came time to do the hard work of typing the stuff down, I always put it off until later.  That is how we came here.
But let's work past the blame and start working on getting better.  So here are a pair of images that are formatted to be used as smartphone backgrounds.  They are taken from Borderlands and altered/modified/etc to look awesome.  And awesome they are!  The first one is perfect for the screen-lock image which greets the user when they first wake up the phone from sleep mode.  The second is a nice, clear background for the app tiles.

While these images sit here and do the function they are given to do, I'll give you a little fill in for the past few days.  I've been working on a songbook for St. Hilary's Church.  We have the typical hymnal which is a huge and heavy tome which every good Episcopalian knows by heart, but the church always likes to sing a few more modern (relatively speaking) contemporary songs.  For this purpose the church has a couple dozen hand made booklets with the words (sans sheet music) so that the congegration can follow along.  It's not the most elegant solution but it works just fine so no one has wanted to modify it in the past 25 years. 
But time waits for no man and no church. And I'm volunteering my computer layout skills to make a new booklet that is going to run about 50 pages and includes a batch of new(er) songs for the church.  It's been a great project but I'll admit it's taken longer than I'd expected.  When the project was proposed I thought I'd be able to crank it out in a day or two but this has been a weeks worth of work.  The thing which makes it a positive experience is that the results also look better than I'd imagined, so it's a pleasant surprise for everyone involved including me.

Guys and Dolls Poker Deck, Published!

Snowline Players Guys and Dolls poker deck!

This deck of cards was created for the Snowline Players 2014 production of Guys and Dolls!  My original idea was to publish about 30 decks of cards so that I could give them out as gifts for the show.  But something cropped up that I just couldn't get around.  Cost.  Printing these cards doesn't cost a fortune, but 30 decks add up quickly.  So I scaled back the idea and just made 3 decks.  One for our director (of course.  I want to be in future Snowline plays after all), one for my babe and one to use as gift tags for my other idea...
The Big Jule Dice Bag.

 

Big Jule's "Lucky" Dice

Now I'm not going to be modest here.  The dice bag idea worked out fantastically and I thought the idea was pretty awesome.  Blank dice!  I mean, that's hard to top!  But still, it would have been so cool to have been able to give full card decks to the crew.  Especially when they worked so hard.  With that in mind, I've gone ahead and flagged the deck for sale at the Game Crafter.  This means that if you would like to purchase a deck of cards for yourself, you can visit this page and get as many as you want.  I will donate all profits to the Snowline Players because I want to be sure they make more plays in the future as well!
One tip.  I recommend that if there is any chance at all that you will want more than one deck that you buy them all at once.  For example, if you think that you might want to give out three decks for family members, than buy them all at once.  I've noticed that shipping takes a bite, but only for the first deck.  If you buy multiple decks then you save a lot on shipping charges.
When did shipping costs suddenly go through the roof?  OK, I'll save that complaining for another post.

Guys and Dolls tech week

This is going to be a very busy weekend!

First things first.  Guys and Dolls is getting ready to hit the stage.  When I say get ready, I mean it is about 99% of the way there.  All we're waiting for at the moment is the keys to the auditorium an directions to the green room.  The singing, dancing, blocking and costumes are all in place and now we just need an audience.  Of course there are many details that go into a produciton, and some of them just can't be done until the last minute.  Stagecraft and lighting are two critical things that come to mind.  We know who is playing what role, and the story is something that we can recite in our sleep.  But the stage director still needs to know where we're standing on their stage, and decide how to light us.
So in about two minutes, I'm jumping in the car and heading over to put on the costume and go through the ritual which is known as "Tech Week".  This is going to be a concensed version of that activity in that it is only comprising 3 days before opening night.
Yeah.  This production has been a bit more interesting than most.  The leading man quit three weeks before opening night, we've gone through three people for one of the named roles before settling on a nice woman who is doing to do it in drag, and other assorted dramas.  Still, it's a great adventure and I enjoy it immensely!

St. Hilary has a New Look

Whew!  This was one of those days where I sat down at the computer and didn't move for a dozen hours.  However, there is something worth showing for all this effort.  The church has a new website and it's up and working!  I found out that most of the work is just getting the links arranged and working, and trashing all the visual clutter from everything else.  The result is highly satisfactory.  It is clean and helpful.
I turned off the controls which reformatted the page for mobile viewers.  If you have a cell phone, you're going to have to get out the magnifying glass and prepare to read tiny print.  It came down to a choice of the mobile version looking broken or illegible.  I hate a broken look, especially after all that I went through to make sure it WASN'T broken.
The new site can be found here.

Guys and Dolls in the High Desert

     I'd heard awhile back that Cheryl was going to be putting on a production of Guys and Dolls for the Snowline Players, and so was semi-prepared when the auditions were announced.  I'm specifically saying that I was semi-prepared because as has been happening, I'm auditioning for plays that I'd never heard of before.  I'm really beginning to realize what an advantage people have when trying out for roles they're familiar with.  It just makes sense.  If you are the sort of person who really enjoys theater and musicals there's a good chance that you'll have grown up in their influence.  When a play comes along, chances are you've already got the soundtrack on your iPod and have posters of the Broadway production tacked to your wall at home.
     Not the case with me.  Not by a long shot.  Sure, I'm mostly familiar with the NAMES of the plays that we're doing, but that's about as far as it goes.  As for actually knowing the plot and storyline, that's another thing altogether.  Recognizing the major characters?  No.  Hasn't happened once.  Sure, Pirates of Penzance was something that I could have done in my sleep.  But that's going to be the exception for me I'm afraid.  Unless there is a sudden great call for Shakespeare to be performed in the High Desert, I'm going to have to content myself with doing research online with YouTube to fill in the gaps of my knowledge.
    Not a great solution, but so far it's been working pretty well.
     Getting back to Guys and Dolls, I saw the movie online and was ready to go.  Yeah, I'd known the showstopping number "Luck Be A Lady", but only enough to hate it.  It knew it was Sinatra, which alone should have banished it to the depths of musak.  Sinatra doesn't do it for me.  Ever.  Happily, it appears that Sinatra's rendition of the song came out after the Broadway production so his insipid voice isn't singing the song.  I suddenly got more interested in the play than I'd planned.
     Lots of singing and dancing later, and I landed the role of Harry the Horse.  Hey, I'm happy.  This means that I get some stage time and will probably be back stage moving set pieces around during the numbers.  It keeps me busy, and that's what I like most of all.

Guys and Dolls Deck of Cards

Guys and Dolls Playing Cards

9 of Clubs

King of Clubs

Eight of Diamonds

Ace of Diamonds

Seven of Hearts

Joker for Guys and Dolls deck

Ten of Spades

Jack of Spades

Bob Shaw Quote

"I can make neutrons dance to a new tune, but I shrink from telling a human tick to fasten onto someone else." -Bob Shaw; 'Ground Zero Man'

Bitchy Post

Yeah, another typing exercise.  Take it for what it's worth.
For anyone in the future who is wondering what its like to interact with people in 2014, let me give you a mental picture.  Something that will make the whole experience come into perspective.  Put your head into a blender of soul-boring trivia and personal blanditude, and press "whirl".  Yeah, it's not a pretty experience, and one that I'd spare you from if I could.  But you're from the future, so your chance of actually interacting face-to-face with someone from the past is probably pretty small.  So time has come in handy in this one interest at least.  But if you ever start thinking that you're missing out on an experience of some entertainment, let me remove the scales from your eyes, as it were.  Talking with people in my time isn't that great.  It's just dull.
You see, for one thing, most media seems to think that when two people talk to each other they are sharing information which leaves the two affected parties improved in some way.  They are talking about experiences which are shared, or not.  They are discussing ideas or values which they both hold, or which are presented to each other in ways that make them more clearly understood.  All well and good, right?  I mean, afterall this is the purpose of communication in the first place.  And if that was actually what was transpiring at least 50 percent of the time, then communication would be a rewarding hobby.
But here's the scoop.  99.95% of what is discussed when two people get together in my time is not illuminating.  It's boring. 
I should mention right now that as I'm typing this, Kirstie is watching a YouTube rehash of an old nicolodeon show which was cancelled about 10 years ago for lack of popularity.  It's Garcia-something-or-other.  Yeah, it's bad.  But still not as bad as talking with my neighbors.

A Record of the Times

This post is going to ramble a bit, and there is a good reason for that.  This is a typing exercise more than anything else.  I've been jumping between projects for the past few months, and so haven't had the time I'd like to post as much as previous weeks.  This is giving large gaps in this narrative, but that can't be helped.  Projects pay the bills, which allow me internet access, and therefore requre me to give them preference no matter what the soul prefers.  That's it in a nutshell.
I've noticed that one of the things I really regret about not blogging is that somewhere in the mix I might be forgetting or omitting information which later would be interesting to readers.  When I'm reading any historical accounts, it's always a kick to see what the author put in the record unintentionally.  Those are the details that really make a history come alive.  When author so-and-so writes about how this governor or that leader enacted a law, it bores me to tears.  But when they also mention that the leader ate raw fish as was customary at every session of parlament, suddenly the account gets juicy.
And this is merely a way to say that when I'm writing about the day to day life of 2014, there might be something that people in the future would find fascinating and should be recorded, but was ultimately denied because I had to do laundry, or wash a car, or pick up someone at the airport.  I guess there isn't much of a way around this.  These things are eternal to some extent.  For every perception altering detail, there is someone who wants to tell me about the cool thing their cousin can do with his toes, or the daughter of their boss who holds a record for fastest potato peeler in the SouthWest.

ATalentForRaw Website... Gone!

Well, the website is gone from the web right now.  It will be back, but not after I do a fresh Joomla reinstall.  I came across a template that I liked much better than the previous incarnation, but getting it to be recognized on bluehost was becoming a problem.  I finally just wiped the whole thing out thinking that it would be easier to start from scratch than have to force the database to be recognized.
So it's gone, but I'm going to put it back as quick as I can!

Lucha Cheesecake

I'm wrapping up the Queen of Spades, and am thrilled with the results.  The Ace and Jack were definite beefcake images, which is all well and good, but needed a generous helping of cheesecake for balance.  Now to post the image and test the waters of the Facebook photo submission policy. 

Waiting for RENT

I'm backstage right now waiting for the opening night's performance of RENT to draw to a close. I've got a few moments to spare so I'm giving a quick update here.  OK.  You know the truth of the story.  I've got LOTS of time to spare because RENT is a play that takes forever to end.  So I'm free to make this a lengthy update without worrying about missing the final number.
Wow, this play goes on for longer than 525,600 minutes.
I finished my painting for the lobby.  VVC did a call for art which specifically requested pieces to be inspired by RENT in some fashion.  I couldn't resist this call.  After thinking it over for a bit, an image occurred to me which captured my particular take on the production.  A fresh canvas and some brush strokes later, and I was done.
I'll post a picture of it here, if I haven't already.  It features two cartoonishly middle-class audience members clapping in ecstasy while watching an actor draped in a Gay Pride flag.  The actor is performing a song from the musical while standing in a garbage can.  The title of this piece is "Refuse Mediocrity".  I'm very proud of this piece.
If you are one of the lucky few dozen people who have had no experience with RENT, the setting centers around the antics of a group of New York 'bohemians' complain about how their dysfunctional relationships aren't working out.  The play is the epitome of surface-deep emotion.  A parade of the mundane.  The songs are hastily written dialog purposely mistimed to any attempt of melody.  A more capable playwright would have been able to match dialog to music, but failing that was only able to swear that the end result was intentional.  I'm not blaming him.  We all have to pay our bills somehow.  Everyone except the cardboard characters on the stage.
There is a cast party right after tonight's performance, so at least that will be a highlight for this crew's hard work and dedication.  But I'm leaving the moment someone launches into a song from the production.

Lucha Libre Cards Update

I've been able to use a format which allows each "pip" on the card to be clearly seen and not run into the other objects on the card.  This is just a technical way of saying that I found a way to put everything on the card so that it will fit.  Using logic, I started off by designing the two of clubs.  Of course, what looks good on a two doesn't necessarily look good on a ten.  Two masked faces on the two look clean and tidy.  10 masked faces on the 10 can look cluttered and messy.  I avoided this by keeping the color ranges to a minimum so the eye doesn't become confused when looking at the card.  In addition to this, I made sure that the faces were organized on the card and not placed randomly in a chaotic pattern.  Finally, nothing is occluding the numbers and suits in the corners.
The results are positive, and the next step is moving on to the face cards.  Wow, this project really took off quickly!

Just a little taste of the magic to come

There is no kind way to say this, but posting multiple images on this website is possible, but not easy.  It's more awkward than hard, but just awkward enough to make me want to dump a bunch of photos here and then come back to tidy them up later.
Yeah.  That sounds like a good plan.  Enjoy!

2 of Diamonds

Lucha Libre Deck, what does it mean?

A Lucha Libre deck is past due.  Far past due.
Before embarking on project I check the Internet to see if it's been done before.  As my Loteria deck, it's surprising that it hasn't been created before now.  Lucha Libre lends itself to a deck in multiple ways and the more I thought about it, the more natural it becomes.  Now comes the hard part...  the art.
This deck is a little easer than the other ones I've designed because the format that I'm using came together nicely from the start.  Usually I spend a lot of time tweaking and modifying a layout to use that is visible on a small card but still with a unique flair.  This design I've decided on fulfills those criteria nicely and looks amazing.  I've already completed cards 2-9 for clubs and will be starting on the other suits tonight.
The real heavy-lifting of this project will be the face cards.  I want to have something that has a Mexican flavor but is specifically targeted to Lucha VaVoom.  THAT is going to require some skill!

Lucha VaVoom Deck of Cards!

Prototype Card Back

Palm Springs International Film Fest 2014

Boy, it's always a mixed bag at PSIFF.  The last full film festival I attended was terrific.  I thought that I'd found the solution for singling out good films from the dozens of marginal works.  I don't think I'd seen a bad film at all last year.  So it was will full confidence and an overwhelming sense of capability that I approached the selection this time.  I wasn't prepared at all.  Wow.  What a festival.
There were a few in the pack which could be classified as automatically good and worth watching.  Now that seems a little smug, because every film is worth watching to some degree or other.  On of the greatest pleasures I get out of attending the event is seeing films from countries or cultures that are new to me, so there is always something to be enjoyed no matter what the genera or budget of the film.
But I'm not going to lie to you.  Some of the films can be hard to get though.  I don't mind the violence or gore.  Amateurish camera work and wooden dialog are fine as well.  No, the real thing which can be a problem is pacing, or more specifically, a lack of pacing.  A movie which just sits on the screen for over an hour can make any film lover wince and twich in their seat.  I got both barrels this year.
The first one was "Rabbit Woman", which was billed as being an adventure story about genetically modified bunnies which crave flesh, presented in a manga style.  It wasn't.  It was just long.
Then there was Madera.  I'm not sure if that is the correct way to spell the title of the film, but I'm not going to take the time to double check.  It's not worth it.  It is a film about adultery in a small town.  But an honest viewer would say its a small town spread over 90 minutes.  No small town is worth that sort of attention.  Ever.
Longwave was better and funny in parts, and Patch Town was the best of the fest as far as I'm concerned.  The automatic winners I'd given a pass to because I figured it would be easy enough to get them on Netflix or Amazon later this year.  Now I'm thinking about changing my approach to the films.  Yes, there is something to be said about finding a film you'll never see anywhere else.  But some films just don't have to be seen all the way through to be experienced.  They can be completely appreciated in a small dose while passing by in the theater hallway.
We'll see how long I'll stick to this resolution.  There is a good chance that some South American documentary about Nordic tattoos will catch my eye next time, and I'll plunk down the price of a ticket when the festival rolls around again.

Wheels in motion

I'm typing this up at the local Starbucks while I wait for Kirstie to finish her class.  I'm determined to keep hammering away at this blog and catch up on my email as part of a New Year's resolution.
New Years has been a little different than what I'd first pictured.  For example, I got sick on Jan 2nd. 
Not too surprising, right?  I mean, who can say they've ever felt in top form on the second of January.  But this wasn't related to drinking or partying all night. This was the standard cold which decided to grab me by the throat and only now is letting up.  So I do feel a little justified in not being 100% diligent on my resolutions at the point.  I mean, how can one person prove they are out to better themselves while they are shoving a box of Kleenex up their nose?
It's not easy.
But, I'm still making the effort.  And now that my lungs aren't making interesting crinkling sounds when I breathe, I'm using the time to catch up on the blog and other aspects of my life.  Guitar is going well, a new painting is planned and I haven't been thrown out of any nice establishments.  Yet.