All Eyes on Me

Dinner with rigel and bleemoo was lovely last night; they were excellent company and wonderful dinner guests. I shall have to have them over to cook for more often. The apple cider chicken came out well; it's basically a sauteed chicken dish in a thick, coarsely pureed sauce made of carrots, onions, cider, heavy cream, and apple vinegar, topped with a garnish of a sauteed apple slice in butter. I thought all the vegetable flavors worked well together. Having made it once I think I can do it without the cream, but it would take away from the richness of the puree. Rigel suggested trying almond milk, which might be a non-dairy way of keeping it creamy. I like that idea; I've never had almond milk before, but I've always wanted to try it.

Joe is coming to visit today for the rest of the week, along with his girlfriend and another friend of theirs. I'm excited to see him. He's going to be filling in as Riker in the Burn Notice session I'll be running this weekend. That promises to be interesting; I'm really looking forward to seeing what he'll do with the character. At the moment there are two storylines active in the campaign-- one a job for a friend of Donovan's mother that involves busting up an underground boxing ring, the other about Gwen's brother and ex-fiancee coming from Ireland to warn her that someone's trying to frame her --so I've got to sort out how those two will interact in this session. I guess I could put one on hold for the other, just so one has a chance of getting resolved sooner rather than later, or I could just let them follow whichever thread they prefer at the moment. That probably will require even more planning on my part-- I like an extremely well-planned out campaign --so I'm going to have to buckle down.

Feeling much better today. The lack of sliding on the road on the way to work this morning helped. Last night Jared and I were going to cook, but he also wanted to talk to his fellows involved in Matt's four-color supers game about his character, so we decided we'd have the GM and the other players over for dinner. I was in the mood to make a lot, so I did the Rachael Ray apricot and cippolini braised chicken, my mom's complicated wild rice dish, steamed broccoli, and a yellow cake, graciously frosted by Matt. Other than the cake being a bit dry-- I had one fewer egg than I needed, and I think I left it in the oven a bit long --it came out very nicely. The wild rice is pretty much the only rice dish my family makes (we're not really rice eaters) and I like it's because it's complex and sophisticated, but I'm always afraid that all the different flavors make it tough to gauge whether it will suit someone's tastes or not. There's mint, orange, scallion, toasted pecan, golden raisin-- I think it all goes very well together, giving it a nice fresh taste, but there's no accounting for what people like. Jared, for example, tends to be hot and cold on it, depending on how it goes with what it's being served with. Fortunately it went over pretty well last night, and I will have the leftovers for lunch today.

Talk over dinner ran very hard to GURPS in general and this game in particular, as it was designed to, which meant I didn't have much to add. But actually I was pleased by that; it was pleasant to let the conversation of my guests wash over me while I made myself comfortable and enjoyed my food and let my mind wander. For some reason I didn't have it in me to be terribly engaging or engaged, so just being present without having to be anything in particular was nice. I enjoyed the company, and being able to kind of be alone while in it. I know Jared definately was happy to spend the evening with friends and get to talk out what he was thinking for his character. And I like to think Bernie, after being trapped in his last for two or three days straight, appreciated the dinner and the chance to hang out with friends.

Finally got myself a Gmail account-- breakinglight11 like the name of the banner under which I run my larps --in preparation for the time when my Brandeis account finally expires. It probably won't anytime in the very near future, but it's good to be ready. Otherwise it doesn't really matter which of my addresses you use, I have them all sent to the same place.

I think I would like to write up a record of what goes on in my Burn Notice game, an episode guide, if you will.  I know when Kindness was running the saga of the Fairview Five, Matt would recap each session in his LiveJournal as a way of preserving the story. I always liked this idea, as it is a way of holding on to a story that you wrote that is told in a medium as ephemeral as the roleplaying game. As I'm trying to make it feel as much like a TV show as possible, I'm considering the story in the units of "episodes"-- not necessarily sessions, but the complete self-contained story that a single episode of a show would contain. In the four sessions we've had so far, there have been three episodes, begun if not completed. The pilot to our "show" was the two-parter getting Donovan knocked out of the field and stumbling back to Miami as a burned spy, combining the attempt on his life signaling the burn, his awkward return to his hometown and all the baggage he left behind, and the first job he would go on as part of Bruce's investigation team. Now we're onto the second episode, with another job and introducing some of the ongoing elements of the story. When I write them up, I'll also give them titles like real episodes. Now that I think about it, if I recall correctly the Buffy system is designed to function like seasons of a TV show-- is there any tangible effect of that on the way the game is run, or is it just flavor? Regardless, I like it, and want something similar for my game.

Mmkay, after that long emo post, I'll try and focus on more positive things.

I got a part in Romeo and Juliet! I am playing Paris, county and cousin to the Prince of Verona, with whom I am well pleased because I get a fight scene as well as whenever I'm not around all the other characters praise me effusively. I can get behind that. :-) The show is going up during Parents' Weekend this year, which means a short rehearsal period, but also that we get a built-in audience with all those families around that need something to do.

Also, my brother just got around to telling me about the nice thing he did for me. He was in LA all this past summer being a PA on television productions, and a friend of his, his roommate, did the same thing in Florida. His friend worked on Burn Notice, and Casey got him to bring me back a copy of a director's script and one of the actors' scripts, he couldn't remember which one. Isn't that cool? Casey can be really cool when he wants to be. Speaking of Burn Notice, I'm hoping the get my tabletop game running again this coming Sunday. I have a really cool session in mind, so I'm pretty excited.

Tried a new pumpkin pie recipe this past weekend. Made in conjunction with my famous apple and berry pie recipes, it was more complicated than my typical one, involving pre-baking cooking and freshly ground spices that gave it quite a kick. I really liked it, though, it's very flavorful, if perhaps a bit strong. I had so much of the supplies left over that I made four little mini-pies as well in my darling red ramekins. Figuring out baking time was a bit of a challenge-- they're four-inch vessels but they're much deeper than the typical pie pan --so I basically just threw them in and checked them every five minutes until they were done. I think it took about a half an hour in total. Still, they came out tasty, and I had the pleasure of looking at lovely little mini-pies. I do so love tiny food.

Yes, I am not doing fantastically lately. But I'm trying to get past it.

Today was a day for Phoebe to be alone. I needed to take care of a few things, but I also just needed some space and quiet so I could just think.

Tomorrow lots of things are happening. A game of Twilight Imperium will be going on at Elsinore. I have rehearsal all the way in Duxbury starting at noon, so unfortunately I won't be able to be there for the first part of the game. It's a shame, not because I have any interest in playing, but because there's a chance that the awesome Mr. Mike Hyde may be attending, and it would be cool to get a chance to hang out with him. I should be back before the end, though. And then, the second session of Burn Notice goes on. I think I'm ready, though I should probably go over things one more time, just to be safe.

I baked three pies for the company, two pumpkin and one apple. I enjoyed it, but it was more work than I expected it to be; the whole process, including the massive amour of cleanup that always follows pie-baking, took three solid hours of work. I've never made that many pies without help before, and it was particularly challenging to roll out and lay on all the crusts without a second set of hands. I'm actually kind of exhausted. But there are now three beautiful pies cooling on he stove for everyone coming tomorrow, so enjoy the fruits of my labors.

I look down and my feet are covered with flour. I look behind me and see little powdery white footprints. I see I have more cleaning to do.

I should go take a shower. Or clean more. But my flour-feet are tired.

Today Phoebe buckles down to work. I have the first session of my new Burn Notice campaign tomorrow evening, and I promised to have the Oz sheets out by the weekend, so that means I have to nail things down for real. I learned from the most recent run of Alice that it is not a good idea to shoot sheets out without thoroughly checking them over first, which can create a problem with you have them saved in multiple locations that aren't all necessarily up to date. So I'm going over the Oz sheets with a fine-toothed comb, making sure they're set and that I've integrated the new plotline in properly. They just went out an hour ago, and I am very pleased.

I also want to write out my plan for how Burn Notice is going to go. I'm not certain which is more pressing, the sheets or the session, since the one needs to be ready for tomorrow and the other needs to be out with enough notice for people to read beforehand. I pretty much know what's going to happen, but I work best when I have it all laid out in front of me. My brain is a little melty after working most of the day already, but after a break I'm going to jump right in on this. I really want this to go well, so I'm trying to spare no effort.

Been watching a lot of Burn Notice recently. It's a really damn good show. I love the premise of a guy who used to be an international covert operative who's suddenly blacklisted, and forced to make his way doing private operations while trying to figure out who burned him. Makes me want to run a Spycraft campaign with that setup-- a small campaign, like three people, maybe even a solo one, where you have the superspy cababilities but with the most localized setting and challenges, all the while unraveling the larger mystery of who put you out a job. I'd either have one player for the Michael, Sam, and Fiona characters, or I'd just have the Michael and everyone else be NPCs.

The upside of doing better on not biting my nails is that they look a hell of a lot better grown out so nicely. The downside is that they make it a lot harder to type on the keyboard.