Video Games I'm Currently Playing

• Digital Devil 2 *****

Video Games 2008-2009

• Halo ODST ***
• Digital Devil ****
• Persona 4 *****
• Persona 3 *****
• Dragon Quest VIII ****
• Final Fantasy X ****
• Halo 2 ****
• Halo ****
• Lego Star Wars ***
• Stranger's Wrath *****
• Kingdom Hearts ***
• Kingdom Hearts 2 **
• Fable ****

RPGs I'm Currently Playing

• Mage
• Iron Kingdoms
• D&D 4E Dawn of Worlds Setting

RPGs 2008-2009

• Zombie Apocalypse
• Call of Cthulhu WoD Conversion
• WoD Second Sight
• Orpheus

For those who aren't aware, children's book editor Stacy Whitman is working on starting a small press to focus on multicultural fantasy and science fiction. There's been a lot of awareness over the last year about this gap in the genre, and Stacy's press, Tu Publishing, would be a good push toward closing it. Here's Tu Publishing's mission statement. I'm really excited about Stacy's project, and hope she's able to get it off the ground.

But a publishing company needs money to pay authors and do print runs and so forth. In that interest, Tu is raising money through Kickstarter, a website that allows projects to connect with donors who pledge. If the project reaches its goal, the money is donated, and if not it's refunded to the donors. Tu Publishing is at 30% of its goal, and the deadline is December 14th.

Some of the awesome people on livejournal have started an auction, to which anyone can donate items. Anyone can then bid on those items, and if they win, the amount bid is pledged to Tu's Kickstarter page in exchange for the donated item.

We're working on getting together some stuff to donate to the cause. I'll post again when we're ready. In the meantime, if you can help, try to spread the word. Even if you can't donate items or money, tell someone about the project. The more people know, the more likely Tu Publishing is to meet its goal.

Today the only place I want to be is Redbutte Gardens in May. I'd even be happy to work on my revisions, if only I could do it there.

Well, I'm back at work.

Meaning after a nearly three month break, I'm writing again. And by writing I mean jumping into a massive revision. (It's amazing how massive a revision can be when you're not actually changing the plot/characters really at all. Just augmenting what's there. And augmenting and augmenting and augmenting. Because "more can be done here.")

But I've discoved that the business tasks and housework and errands don't actually go away just because I have writing to do. So I'm settling into a rhythm--business stuff and housework in the morning, jumping into writing in the afternoon.

This works well for me, because I get itchy if I sit down to write with too many things on my To Do list. The trick, then, is to keep my daily To Do lists short enough that I can finish everything in a couple of hours and feel like I have the rest of the day clear to write. So far it's working.

So this morning I finished dishes and printed invoices and did some PR work. And in a half hour it's off to the Keep to bury myself in revisions.

It's nice to have a more concrete routine, but most of me just feels like I've come back from a very nice vacation--one I wish was much, much longer.

Sigh. Back to work.

Over the weekend I attended World Fantasy.  I was actually dreading this convention.  I have a hard time with large groups of people I don't know.  I don't like that about myself, so I'm trying to change it.  In the month before, I'd been practicing starting and maintaining conversations with strangers, but I knew my skills weren't where I wanted them to be, and the whole thing made me extremely anxious. 

On Thursday night we went to the con for a couple of hours.  I had a couple of very brief conversations, but was very, very tired.  When I went to bed that night I made a list of all the things I'd rather do than have to talk to strangers for two days straight.  Tooth drilling and pelvic exams were both on the list. 

And then on Friday something magical happened.  I arrived at the con.  I started talking to the people who were talking to people I knew.  I got to know them.  Then I walked around with some of them and met other people they knew.  My group of con friends spiralled out and out until there were a large number of people I was comfortable talking with.  Even the strangers didn't seem so scary anymore.  

At dinner on Saturday night I discovered that my agency is full of people who remind me (hilariously) of the guys at the Keep, both in temperament and interests.  I fell into a familiar rhythm of joking and geekery.  By the time we were ready to go home on Sunday morning I was exhausted, but still wished I could spend a couple more days--of all things--talking to strangers, and the awesome people I had met.   

Now I want to do it again, which is not something I ever thought I'd say about a con.  I don't expect it'll be super easy for me next time, but this success gives me confidence.  And that's  good thing. <input ... ></input><input ... >

A longer post is coming later, but I've been waiting forever to announce that I've signed with a new agent.  I have a personal policy about not announcing things on the internet until ink is dry, but it is now.  I'm working with Eddie Schneider at JABberwocky.  So yay! 

I'm leaving town tomorrow to go to World Fantasy in San Jose.  It's actually at the same hotel as my high school winter ball.  Good times. 

I wish I'd had half a second to think about the convention and prepare for it...but I've been running around like crazy all month, with this week speeding up into a crescendo of busyness.  I have no idea what's going on at the con, besides the dinner I'm going to on Saturday night.  I'm not going to have time to find out tonight, as I'm running off to shoot aliens with friends.  This is necessary, as I badly need to wind down before I wind all back up again for the weekend.

We have one Schlock left for sale.  After that, we'll have a reorder coming in a couple of weeks.  We didn't even do any of the advertising stuff we usually do for this mini.  By the time I was ready to make web banners and forum banners and write a product pitch, our inbox was already full of orders.  There just wasn't time.  I'll get it all up for the next run, though.  We're ordering quite a lot of them, in hopes of being able to keep them in stock for several months at least.

This weekend is going to be crazy.  My list of Things To Do for next week is already a mile long.  I am tired and frazzled and the end of the busy is afar off.  But I'm busy doing things I love (and things that I don't like but are related to things I love) and so I'm happy.  It's good to be happy underneath the incredible frazzle of busy. 

It is snowing.

Also I am running around like a crazy person trying to get a million things done.

This is due, in part, to our release of the Schlock mini yesterday. Schlock was sculpted by Melissa Mayhew, and is (obviously) inspired by Schlock Mercenary by Howard Tayler. We sold 2/3 of our inventory in the first 24 hours. Good thing we already have a reorder coming.

Sometimes I wish other people would just do their jobs and do them right.

That is all.

I have spent most of the last two months working on projects for Garden Ninja. I finished the accounting project earlier this week (thank goodness). I've been working on painting better so that I can pitch in when Drew has too much business to handle alone. I've just finished all the minis I had lined up to paint. I wanted to be done by the end of October, so I finished a week early. That's good, because at the beginning of November I'll be headed back to writing again. (Can't say I've missed it. The break's been very nice.)

Anyway, here are some of the projects I've been working on. (A couple of the minis in the group shots are Drew's, but most of them are mine.


( Many minis here. )

Last night Drew and I watched Silence of the Lambs and then The Shining.  Loved them both. 

#

Silence of the Lambs was shot more artistically than I expected it to be.  Through most of the dialogue, the characters' faces are framed up close, looking straight at the camera.  Constantly staring into Hannibal Lector's eyes is frightening all by itself.  The performances were every bit as good as people said they were. 

Also, I was very surprised by the plot.  Apparently I hadn't had it as spoiled for me as I thought I had. 

#

I'd seen The Shining years ago, and it was every bit as scary as I remembered.  Maybe more so.  

I remembered it being a pretty straightforward horror flick.  But I'd forgotten what makes it so scary.  There are supernatural elements, but the crux of the scary is that the female protagonist is locked in a hotel with her abusive and homicidal husband.  And it isn't just the supernatural elements that make him that way.  Their relationship shows patterns of abuser and enabler from the very start. 

Stephen King understands not just how to scare people, but what actually makes people scared.  The Shining is scary not because of the ghosts, but because there are real women whose husbands talk to them that way, yell at them that way, isolate them that way, threaten them that way.  Because some husbands really do kill their wives.  And even if they aren't literally isolated in a snowbound hotel, abusers are good at making their victims feel like they are.  Yes, the supernatural elements are scary.  But scarier by far are the pieces of the film that are real. 

Also, Jack Nicholson is the scariest person imaginable.  Not even Anthony Hopkins' Hannibal can compare.

That is all. 

Dear Janci Patterson of  August 2007,

I regret to inform you that in two years, you, hater of all things mathematical, will have the unfortunate experience of becoming, among other things, a business accountant. 

It is tempting to believe that the decisions that lead you to this predicament are those you've just made--becoming engaged and deciding to start a business.  But that isn't true.  You put yourself on this path many years ago.  Let's review.

In your first year of college you decided to become a writer.  (This is not the decision that causes you to become an accountant.  Hang with me.)  For many years, people responded to this news by asking you what you were *really* going to do with your life.  This lasted until right about the time you finished your third novel.  And it was good.  You were a senior at BYU.  You'd been doing this writing thing for four years, and you weren't quitting.  Good for you.

It was during these years at BYU that you discovered that some of the reason people stopped asking you what you were really going to do with your life had nothing to do with the quality or quantity of your writing.  It had to do with your gender.  Roommates, teachers and church leaders all spouted the general counsel that it was a man's job to provide for his family.  It was also good for women to educate themselves, but it was a woman's responsibility not to prepare to make money, but to find a man to marry who was prepared to support her and her children.

Here it is, Janci.  Your first step onto this path.  Do you remember what you said?

You told them all that you couldn't bring yourself to hold some guy to a standard you didn't adopt for yourself.  You knew being a writer meant you'd probably never make much money.  But you loved it.  And if whoever you were going to marry loved something that didn't make much money, then so be it.  It wasn't fair to ask more of him than you asked of yourself.  You'd figure out how to make it work together.

And there it is.  Your choice for your life, made years before you even met Drew.  (And yes, you're really going to marry him.)

The decision you've just made to support him in his goals to paint minis for a living was just a follow-up to the decisions you've already made.  And so you're going to figure out how to register a business, how to bring in revenue, how to juggle the myriad tasks of business ownership, and *gasp* how to be your own business accountant.

You're not scared yet, but you will be.  Once you get past the stress and business of being engaged, once you open up that business account, once you graduate and lose the safety of the teaching job, you're going to feel the fear.  You'll be scared that this task is bigger than you.  That it requires skills you don't have.  That you'll fail. 

Business ownership is a big elephant, but you're going to eat it one spoonful at a time.  Every month there will be a new task to learn.  You'll make mistakes.  Then you'll fix them.  You'll pick up one piece at a time until the whole thing is running like a well oiled machine.  And money will come in.  And you who hate math, who majored in English, who can't imagine why people go into Finance--you'll do the accounting.

And it won't be that bad.  Because the business is something you and Drew own, you'll love every piece of it.  Even the accounting.  It'll be all yours, and you'll be responsible for it, and you'll love to watch it grow.

I'd love to tell you it all turns out okay.  That the business continues to grow.  That you're able to actually meet all your goals.  That you won't fail.   But I'm not far enough ahead of you to be able to see it yet.

When I get there, I'll let you know.

Janci Olds
Garden Ninja Studios

I have been up to my ears in Quick Books all day.  I am sort-of-not-really-almost done with 2008.  The good news is I'm getting faster at making the program work.  The bad news is 2009 is 2-3 times bigger than 2008, and I've fried my brain into a wad of goo.  Seriously, the only other thing that fries my brain like this is writing. 

I think I'm done for today.  I'll start again tomorrow. 

I talk a lot about writing process.  Writing fiction (or most things, for that matter) is a very difficult task with many parts and many stages.  In order to do it efficiently and effectively (with the goal of being a professional who can actually turn a profit on the effort), it's helpful to know what processes works for you.  I used to tell my writing students that the goal of trying out different processes was to help them work smarter, so in the end they spend less effort for greater output.  They really liked the less effort part.  In truth, so do I.

The problem is, finding and creating an effective process takes a lot of hard, hard work.  I spend many years weeping and wailing and gnashing my teeth over my writing.  Tasks that take me a few hours now took weeks or months then.  But as I persisted, the process became easier.  I developed a groove, discovered discipline, fine tuned the steps, and strengthened my mental muscles.  Because of the processes I have developed, writing is much, much easier and faster for me now than it used to be.

This is true of other things, too.  Communication and mediation between two people requires practice and process.  When we first got married, Drew and I spent a lot of time hammering out disagreements.  At times it was frustrating.  At times I was impatient.  The effort it took to make (sometimes simple) decisions was exhausting.  But I took comfort in the knowledge that the difficultly wasn't caused by the decision at hand.  It was caused by our lack of communication process.  We didn't know how we went about disagreeing or making decisions together.  And so we had to have a long conversation where we figured it out, and then another long conversation on its tail where we talked about what went wrong in the process of the argument, and how we could do it better next time.  We don't have those conversations very much anymore, because we've developed a rhythm.  Like with writing, the energy to maintain that rhythm is insignificant compared to the energy it took to create the process. 

I'm currently learning a new process for business accounting.  Sandra kindly came over and talked me through the capabilities of my new Quickbooks program.  At first I was confused, but as I've poked at it, I realize that I now understand the basic functions of the program.  I've begun entering 21 months of backlog, which is giving me practice at making the program go.  I can see how it's better than my old process; it connects the dots automatically that I have previously been connecting all by hand.  I've made a process list for what I anticipate I'll have to do each month to keep the accounting going.

Unless I'm very far off, I predict it's only going to take me one hour per month to maintain the system.  But in order to set up the system I'm estimating 40-80 hours of work.  It's not just that I have to type in all the backlog.  It's that I don't understand the process yet, so for each step I have to search for the right functions, make errors, erase the errors, search some more, find the function, troubleshoot the function, and then identify the next step.  

I'm frustrated and I'm scared.  I don't want to take on such a huge burden.  It feels like I'm going to be struggling with it forever.  But I've felt that way about things in the past that are now easy for me.  And right now I have the space in my life for creation of process.  Right now the process I was using before is still sufficient, but it isn't scalable for the kind of business growth we're hoping to see.  If I wait until the very hour we need a more complicated process, I'll end up having to learn it in a rush, adding time-crunch stress to my already stressful learning.  Better to adapt early and avoid future conflict. 

Because eventually energy used to create this process will become enery used to maintain it.  And then the excess energy will spill out and be sucked up by other tasks.  What is now hard will one day be easy.  I just have to develop the process, and learn the rhythm. 

Since last weekend’s General Conference at my church (of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), I’ve been thinking a lot about testimony. Two of the things that have made me think about this are Jeffrey R. Holland’s talk (which is less of a talk and more of a testimony), this blog entry, and an article from this month’s Ensign about religion on the internet. 

In my church, we throw around the word testimony a lot. Like a testimony in a court hearing, bearing your spiritual testimony means to bear witness of things that you know. In this sense, it’s bearing witness of things which often cannot be heard or seen or measured. It’s a witness of things felt spiritually. It’s a statement of what one believes about God and religious truth.

I don’t talk about religion a lot on the internet, mostly because I feel safer talking about it in contexts where I can look at the people I’m talking to. Where I can gauge reactions. Where I know other people believe as I do. Because knowledge of a spiritual thing is not something I can hand over. It’s not something I can prove. But when one has had a spiritual experience, it cannot be denied. A testimony is a statement of those things which one has felt with one's spiritual senses. The things which one knows because of spiritual experience to the extent that one would not be any more convinced if one did see it with ones physical eyes.

I admire bloggers like NieNie and Cjane, who regularly talk about their faith on the internet.  It takes courage to say things that are so central to one's heart in such an unpredictable forum. 

Like a great many others before me,  I have a testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This means, among other things, that I believe that Jesus Christ came to earth and died so that we might be forgiven of our sins.

When I was in high school, I first came into contact with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I read the Book of Mormon. I prayed, and felt real responses to my prayers--every bit as real and distinguishable as if they were sounds in my ears. Because of these responses--and many others over the years--I believe that both the Book of Mormon and the Bible are inspired words, containing the Gospel of Jesus Christ, or guidance for how to live in this life and in the next.

It doesn’t mean that I’m particularly good at following the guidance. Just because one knows a thing does not make it easy to live those principles. I’m still working on it. But on days when I remember the things that I know, I feel strength which allows me to push forward, try harder, be patient and believe.

I have many friends who don’t share my beliefs. This is okay. My sister has pointed out that believing the things that I do and believing that other people should choose their own ways to believe represents a conflict of interest. And maybe it does. But as I want other people to allow me the right to believe what I believe, and to know what I know, I need to extend that same privilege to them. And I hope that I do. If you believe differently that me, that is okay. But it doesn’t change the things that I know.

I know that God lives. He is real, and he is our father, and has been since before we were born on this earth. He loves us, loves us so much that he sent his son to die so that we might be able to return to live with him. As in biblical times, he now listens to our prayers, and provides personal communication with those who earnestly seek him and who strive to live according to their knowledge of what is good and right. Because it requires practice to understand these spiritual communications, he has provided us with other tools to guide us back to him--among them modern prophets, the Book of Mormon, and the Bible.

Above all, I know that God loves each of us individually, regardless of our actions, our cultural background, our nationality, or our beliefs. He is real, and he is available to those who seek to find him. I know this. Even though I don’t always know how to communicate it.

It’s not easy to hold on to that knowledge every second of every day. It’s not easy to always act like I know what I know. Faith takes practice, and sometimes it gets lost in the shuffle. But other times I cannot deny the hand of God in my life.

Like when I feel in my soul like I need to stop looking for opportunities to send out my work, stop pushing my writing and just let opportunities come to me, and it kills me to do it, but I put it all down, and then opportunities fly at me so fast I’m not sure how to respond to them all.

Like when business increases in the very month that we run out of personal savings have to start pulling on business equity to pay our bills—increases so much that if it would just continue at this rate, we could pay those bills indefinitely…plus meet our long term goals.

Like when I leave school without a job, and don’t even apply for one, and haven’t needed one since.

Like when, four months ago, Drew leaves school and goes full time with the business, and overnight there’s full time work for him to do.

Like when our bishop asks us to donate money to the mission fund, and promises if we do our income will increase, and we do, and it does.

These things don’t make me believe in God anymore than I already did. But they are constant reminders of what I already knew but so often take for granted--that we do have a father in heaven, and that he loves us, and that all things are possible with him. Even scary things. Even hard things. Even impossible things.

These things I know to be true.  I know them to be true because I have felt them and seen them and lived them.  I still have a long way to go, but I also feel hope, that the hands I feel guiding me will still be there in the future.  And as I go forward, I hope for more moments when I remember the things that I know, and fewer moments when I falter and forget.  

My computer decided not to be able to reinstall windows even after I formatted it, because it's just that jacked up.

So I trucked it down to Best Buy to use up the last of my warranty. And the nice service representative was friendly and helpful, took down the information and shipped it off to the service center.

And I. don't. have. to. think. about. it. anymore.

Best Buy's customer service stuff makes me so happy I could cry. Sure I'm without my computer, but I can use Drew's.

Happy, happy day.

The last week has contained the hacking of our site (fixed), the dying of our wireless network (fixed), and the acquisition of a horrible virus that poses as antivirus software (not yet fixed).

I just want the world to go away.

I have been a ball of stress lately.  I am supposed to be calmly investing in the projects we have going.  Instead I am constantly trying to distract myself from stress.  Granted, the things I've been doing to distract myself are mostly productive.  The house is clean.  We have a new mini case all put together and organized.  (Looks much better than it did!)  But the painting has not been happening because painting allows me too much time to think about how stressed I am. 

There are a few events that should lessen my stress.  One should happen today.  A few others should happen this week.  I really hope they all come down in the next three days, so that next week I won't be so tense anymore. 

*sigh*

This was supposed to be notes, not complaints.  Whoops.

Yesterday we went to IKEA to buy the mini case.  I just love furniture stores, especially the kind where they have everything set up like rooms.  I have since I was a little kid, for some reason.  They make me all happy.

It's raining today, and the rain also makes me happy.  It feels like Bay Area winter, which is so much better than Utah winter, which I am dreading.

September has been a slow month, which is only a small part of the stress.  We've got an avalanche of business coming down on us (probably starting today), so I'm not really worried about the lack of money coming in.  I'm more stressed about how crazy October and November are going to be, mostly because we cannot yet do anything about any of the projects.  *sigh*

Tomorrow is October 1st.  I've been counting down to it for several reasons.  I have a feeling October is going to be different from August and September.  I really hope I'm right.  If nothing else it's the beginning of several events that will keep me busy and not thinking about the stress.

My dreams all have the same theme lately.  Trying to get somewhere, and my legs are stuck, and no matter how hard I try, I can't seem to move very far.  Walking up a hill, and the hill keeps tilting so the grade gets steeper and steeper, until it's fully vertical and there are no handholds and I can't pull myself the rest of the way up.  Looking for something, but my eyes are blinded and I can't see to find it. 

I think I must be feeling powerless.

I have started reading Gravity's Rainbow.  I've wanted to read this book since my American Lit professor said that it was the quintessential work of Postmodern Literature and then assigned us Pynchon's short story, Entropy, instead.  I loved Entropy.  I loved Entropy even though I didn't remember enough high school physics to fully understand it until years later. 

I've had a copy of Gravity's Rainbow since I pointed it out on Drew's parents' bookshelves and said I'd always meant to read it (but was intimidated because, hello, Postmodern Lit is freaking dense and takes a lot of work to understand) and Drew snagged the copy and took it home. 

He said this was probably okay, because it probably belonged to his older brother Ben.  We have many books that once belonged to Ben.  They're mostly vandalized.  Gravity's Rainbow is not vandalized, but it is rather worn, and fits with the other Ben books we now own.  Ben's choice in books and the way that he chose to vandalize them is one more piece of evidence that makes me believe I would have liked him, and he would have liked me, and the three of us would have had endless interesting conversations--the kind Drew and I have around the rest of his family that makes them all look at us like we're aliens from outer space, and carefully don't have around anyone else that we know.  (Sigh.  Have a pity party about not getting to meet Ben until I get to Heaven.  Move on.)

It took me another year to start reading Gravity's Rainbow because, hello, it's 700 pages of Postmodern Literature.  I hate Modern Lit, because those moderns liked to make a game of looking up obscure texts and then referring to them so only the very elite could understand their works.  They were purposely exclusionary, and in being so created the elitism we now find in English departments (not that I have any strong feelings on the subject) and caused the death of poetry.  (You know people used to actually read that stuff before the moderns, right?  And it's not that people changed.  It's the poets who changed.  And I resent them for it still.)  It seems the Postmoderns responded to that elitist allusion by referring not just to elitist texts, but to every possible thing under the sun, from literature to pop culture to science to entertainment to politics.  Instead of creating works where only the few can understand, they created works where everyone has equal chance to misunderstand.  Equal opportunity confusion.  Thanks, Postmoderns.  Love you too.

Yet Postmodernism resonates with me in ways that Modernism doesn't.  I picked up Gravity's Rainbow to start the other day and read the first chapter.  It was as dense and difficult as I expected it to be, and also fascinating.  My kind of challenge, to begin with at least.

I pulled out my American Lit anthology to rediscover Entropy.  And in the introduction to Pynchon, I found this description:

"Pynchon's longest and most daring and exhaustive effort came with the publication, in 1973, of Gravity's Rainbow.  This encyclopedic fantasy operates through brilliant improvisations, tall tales, obscene parables, and burlesque stage routines, all of which work together into a story of supersonic capabilities and annihilative retributions.  A huge cast of characters, each with a crazy name and a plot to unravel, is located all over the map, but mainly in World War II London and in postwar Germany.  As the four main and the countless subsidiary plots take shape, characters--and the reader as well--attempt to "read" the messages flickering, the dumb intent to communicate, in the most casual as well as the most portentious sign.  Pynchon's knowingness and fascination with popular culture are overwhelmingly evident in Gravity's Rainbow as is his preoccupation with the lore of theoretical science, of obscure historical tales, and of contemporary comic books.  No one denies the formidably encyclopedic nature of this astonishing effort; the question is, as Warner Berthoff has asked it, whether that effort may not also be 'encyclopedically monotonous and static.'  More readers begin Gravity's Rainbow than finish it."

I have never read Les Miserables, or Gone with the Wind, or War and Peace.  I like to finish things too much to start books so long and dense as those.  I give up on all books that don't light me on fire in the first two pages, so I don't know how much chance I stand of finishing this one.  Then again, maybe Gravity's Rainbow has set me on fire.  I an driven to keep reading by the question that often plagues me when I face Postmodern Lit: just what the hell is this book about?

I'll let you know if I figure it out.