Author: Jennifer Kuntz

I need a new back up character idea. I’m playing in a D&D game that has gotten the PC’s up into the high teens (16-18) and the risk with playing at that level is that it becomes increasingly easier to die horribly and be unable to be raised. Right now I’m playing a human barbarian and while I really enjoy this character, I’m unlikely to make another barbarian should I die. Hence the need for a back up. Here are the caveats.

1. We are in a HUGE group. If everyone shows up there are 11 people playing. This is a lot of people for D&D, so a character that fills a vital role in the group would be better than a repeat of what someone is already doing.

2. We have a lot of spellcasters. We’re up in the levels where rangers and specialty classes get their spellcasting abilities, so we’re pretty well covered on the magic front.

3. I don’t like to do the same idea twice (at least not within a short amount of time), this means that book standard paladin, barbarian, cleric and bard are out as those have been my most recent characters.

4. We’re playing in the Forgotten Realms.

5. I’m especially looking to avoid the following ideas as these are well represented in the group already: sneaky thief type, spellcaster with a lot of skills and knowledges, monster disguised as a regular PC race, archer, agile monk type, armored melee fighter.

Any suggestions?

Well my eclectic taste and desire for audiobooks have led me to a steamy little treasure. I’ll begin this mini-review by saying that this series has elements that appeal to me (quick pacing, snappy dialogue, refreshing lack of emo-ness considering the subject matter, and steamy sex). The series is a collection of vampire romances by MaryJanice Davidson, featuring Betsy Taylor, Queen of the Vampires. The style is very post Bridget Jones with a considerable amount of sarcastic dialogue and quite blue language. Betsy is a designer shoe loving, 30 year old “super secretary” who has the worst birthday ever; she gets fired, her party is cancelled and then she dies. However, she doesn’t stay dead long and rises the next night with an unnnatural thirst. The first book is called “Undead and Unwed”, and the series all have an “Undead and…” title. There is a certain amount of “Mary Sue” here, despite the author’s avowed desire to avoid that particular aspect. But it’s mostly in the “plot support” area (ie. incredibly wealthy best friend supports our heroine, vampire rules don’t apply to Queen Betsy, vampire powers too conveniently used to resolve plot points) but the issues are at least addressed, if not completely dealt with to my satisfaction. The best features of the books are the characterizations (I like Dr. Marc, Tina the vampire, George the fiend and especially Eric Sinclair, vampire king), the dialogue and MJD’s use of the romantic formula. The series failings come in the area of plot, often too disjointed, with unsatisfactory resolutions of the action sections of the story and narrative voice, she’s perfected Betsy’s POV to the point where the other characters often wind up speaking in her idiom. This is especially jarring in the depiction of the elder vampires who start out well, sly and stately, and too often wind up chattering away like valley girls. However, these are minor points of contention.

On a personal note, I have to credit this series with re-invigorating my erotic imagination of late. (Poor Tiernen I don’t think he knows what hit him.) It’s been nice to have some enthusiasm and ideas to bring into the bedroom (and don’t worry, nobody’s biting anyone else).

See Order of the Stick

http://www.giantitp.com

for provenance of the above.

Well, it looks like our transition at work may be finally official. I have a meeting today with the new department chief and we’re going to discuss our budget and planning for the coming fiscal year. Hooray! I have pretty much decided to focus on collection development and new initiatives for the library and to leave the status quo stuff to my territorial paraprofessional. People here aren’t using the library because they aren’t informed about what we can do for them. So, that’s my main goal. To instruct and inform people, to bring them in the door and have them use our services. As the demand for services increases, there will be more of an opportunity for me to become involved in the day-to-day stuff without overshadowing or crowding out the person currently doing it.

I like having a plan.

I will admit readily that I am a Fantasy/Sci Fi snob and a girly snob at that. I particular dislike the crunchy hard stuff with the very manly men, like Conan or Gor and the whiny misanthropic stuff, like Thomas Covenant. And to be fair I do TRY to read something before I give it a pass. I’m not opposed to Mary Sue as such. I don’t think you can read or write fantasy without having a certain amount of guilty Mary Sue-esque pleasure in it. But the majority of my taste is for funny stuff, like Discworld or really juvenile and girly things like the Dragonriders of Pern (well, the early books at least). However, I love and heartily recommend the Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser books by Fritz Leiber. They are pretty standard sword and sorcery, but the characters and writing style are so much fun that you just have to enjoy them. Read these books and then go back and read any later fantasy and I’m sure at least one of Leiber’s ideas will show up in them. It’s a lot like H. P. Lovecraft (whether or not you enjoy him). I had the books sitting around and decided to re-read them and I’m really glad I did.

I didn’t realize how lost I feel when I don’t have an appointment calendar with space for the next three months or so until the 2007 one from OCLC arrived and I instantly put in all of my upcoming events. Without the calendar it’s like there’s a vague temporal blur ahead with activites swimming in and out of focus, but nothing is fixed and things could be missed completely. When they’re written down they go into the memory in some kind of formal sense and I can then start planning. Weird, I know.

Ok.
Happy Holiday of your choice to all!
We’re out for Pittsburgh (Greensburg, really) for X-mas with the Kuntz family. Also, seeing the groovy PA friends. We will be collecting Tiernen’s motorcycle and bringing it back, so I think with that I am caught up on all the wife promises for now.
Our friends Ian and Lauren had a solstice baby, Nell Aurora Trindle (gotta love those hippy kids) is doing well after a home birth in PA. We will (hopefully) be meeing Ian (Lemonjello Cannedcorn etc.) Shively this weekend. Babies all around, hooray!

Next week, we’ll be cleaning up the house, no, really as the ‘rents are coming for New Years.

Wish us luck. And love and seasonal festive greetings to all.

Which Historical Lunatic Are You?
From the fecund loins of Rum and Monkey.

Had my first briefing with actual doctor (well, in this case, dentist) students today. It went pretty well, although we had some equipment issues and they had to leave about an hour earlier than we had originally planned on. I am coming to realize that even smart and well educated people can’t know everything and a lot of people are very intimidated by online searching. This is a surprise to me because it seems so natural, but I have to go back and remember that I have been learning about and doing this pretty much consistently for the last ten years or so. Some people, even people in school, have been learning about other things. I hope to have more opportunities to do this in the future. There’s so much good information out there and it’s becoming increasingly easier to find.

RULES: Each player of this game starts off with 10 weird things/habits/little known facts about yourself. People who get tagged need to write a blog of their own 10 weird habits/things/little known facts as well as state this rule clearly. At the end you need to choose 10 people to be tagged and list their names.

1) I’m really getting bothered by the recent trend to make every moderately popular children’s fantasy novel and/or series into a film, although I’m probably also going to go out and see most of them, so I guess I’m a hypocrite.
2) When I was 12 I wanted to marry Optimus Prime.
3) I have a six inch plate in my ankle from a bowling accident.
4) I once played Brad (Brenda) Majors in a Girl Scout camp production of the Rocky Horror Picture Show.
5) I sincerely want to reduce the things I own by 1/2, I just don’t know which half to get rid of.
6) My great grandparents and great grand-aunts and uncles on my dad’s side were a pair of brothers and a pair of sisters.  They met because my great grandfather and his brother delivered beer to the resturant of my great grandmother and her sister’s father.
7) I’m better at getting things done if I have a deadline promised to someone else.  Therefore, if I don’t want to do something, I leave the terms purposely vague.  
8) I like to debate people about politics, philosophy and social issues. 
9) I won’t eat fat on my meat, or raw tomatoes, bananas or peaches (happy now?).
10)  I think library fines are stupid, but I favor court action against people who are negligent with library materials (damaging, stealing, refusing to replace).

Tagging:
Whoever wants to carry this on, I’m not very good at tagging

So I’ve been on and off with various cold-like things for about a month or so now.  I did go and see the Dr. and we got the coughing under control, but I was out from work again yesterday with sneezing and upper respiratory stuff.  It seems to have calmed down today, but honestly, I’m just tired of the whole thing.  I don’t like taking this much time off of work and I don’t like feeling unwell and tired from being sick (or maybe sick from being tired).  I wish I knew what was causing it.  I hate the idea that I’m just generally unwell.  Bleah.