much to do

There's a lot going on around town and at my house. We're gearing up for my daughter graduating high school. The battle of flowers is coming up this Friday with Fiesta next week. I'm gathering material for a weekend full of projects / things to fix. Travelers Road is now on Amazon as a paperback. Yippee!

A BBC article noting the 40th anniversary of Dungeons and Dragons floated across my desk this morning before I left for work, now I can't find it. I almost made myself late this morning because I was skimming the article. In the piece they were talking about religious groups taking offense and denouncing it as evil and the devil's work. An old friend of mine nailed it right on the head many years ago. "Those people who try to act as if it's real, aren't wrapped too tightly in the first place."

Thanks Charlie, that sums it up very nicely. As we make our way in the world, I notice things aren't neatly divided into good and evil, black and white.The more I think about it, people aren't truly evil. No one wakes up in the morning and says; 'Let's strangle puppies today.' We do things with varying degrees of self centeredness. The more selfish you are, the bigger an asshole you can be to others. When people find out I role play, the reactions are a mixed bag. From, 'Oh really?', on to crying out 'Die Spawn of Satan!'

Listen up people: it's a mind exercise. It is pretend. Cops and Robbers, Cowboys and Indians, but with a heck of a lot of extras. Pen, paper and imagination. But most of all, it's harmless. People fear what they don't understand and some do everything they can to close their mind to imagination. The most depressing thing about the article? They suggest D&D is going mainstream. The horror... the shock. Dare I say trendy?
Yeah, those Hobbit movies and Avengers fighting across the screen? We nerds had that all those years ago and you're just realizing it now? Noobs...
Now if they will just come out with a Dragonriders of Pern movie, I'll be happy.