Five Points From Gryffindor
Dec. 13th, 2022 01:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jakebe
I didn't mean to leave this fallow for five whole days, but it happened anyway. Usually this means that something's happening in the morning that leaves me no time to write and for some reason I don't do journal after 9 AM. But it's good practice to find the time to do it, and so I will. Like today, where I'm writing this after work.
It's been hard to wake up in the mornings. We're in winter now, so the temperature is around 30-35 in the mornings and maybe 55-60 in the afternoons if we're lucky. We're getting a lot of rain, which is great, but it makes everything extra-wet, cold, and dark. Even though it's 4:15 PM right now, we're entering civil twilight. It'll be dark before 5 PM.
Honestly I love this time of year. It's a great excuse to be cozy indoors, wear comfortable, warm clothing, drink hot tea and such. But it's not great for holding yourself to a schedule or forcing yourself to go outdoors to do things you'd rather not be doing. So waking up on time to meditate and write before work, or making sure you get out the door to do some running, is a lot harder. I'm committed to trying, though -- I just know that I'm in for a lot of failure before the habit begins to stick.
I'm on a team that's mostly based in Egypt, so team meetings are scheduled for their convenience...mostly. They've made concessions for me and the other international colleagues (one in PA, another in India), but it still means that I'm logging in to work at 7 AM almost every day. And because I tend to take a fairly long break at mid-day, I end up logging out at 4 or 5 PM. Since I'm hourly, it's nice to get regular overtime, but it does squeeze other activities into a smaller window. Especially on busy weeks like this one!
Yesterday night we played in L's Advanced 5th Edition game. It's a pretty neat system that puts some crunch back into 5E through non-combat systems. The idea is that there are three pillars to role-playing: combat, exploration, and interpersonal. A complete system should have ways for your character to contribute in all three areas, so your adventuring class might offer some fun exploration/travel benefits at the cost of a few combat-oriented features. There are...five aspects of character design for the system: Heritage (Race in D&D5E), Culture (which determines where your character grew up and what proficiencies they're likely to have), Background (which in addition to giving you bonds, etc, also gives you an Ability Score bump), Destiny (which imagines what your character is striving for and what bonuses you get for doing so), and Class. It makes creation a lot more nuanced, and by the end of the process it feels like your character is pretty well-layered.
I've built a satyr barbarian named Keogolas. He's on the Metamorphosis Destiny, which will hopefully see him become more and more fey over time. Right now, he's a boisterous puppy, ready to throw an arm around your shoulder and share a drink. Desecrating nature or beautiful things are the quickest way to throw him into a rage, though.
We're playing with a couple folks we've never shared a table with before, and it's been fun feeling each other out. We're only a few sessions in, but I think everyone is settling into their characters (and roles) nicely.
Tonight we're driving up to San Francisco to see Beetlejuice! the Musical. I've listened to the soundtrack/cast recording before, and it sounds like a pretty fun time! Our season tickets are for Tuesday evening performances, so we end up seeing a LOT of opening nights as it turns out. I'm generally not sorry to have seen a show, but it is an admitted hassle to drive an hour-plus towards the city during the last bit of rush hour, sit for a three-hour show, and then make the hour-long drive back home. We typically end up getting to bed late and feeling kind of groggy the next day. So there's that to look forward to.
Tomorrow night, another D&D game -- this time, Descent Into Avernus as run by my huzzlesnep, R. It's been an interesting campaign but I think he's ready to end it already. It's been hard to present the party with a proper challenge, partly because we're fairly large (six characters) and partly because we have two folks who are VERY good at maximizing the system for their benefit. But also, since we're playing online, it can be pretty hard for every character to get their due. Three of the players are in the same place, and they're our most boisterous, so frequently there'll be long stretches of time we're trying to get a word in edgewise while they're going all out. I've learned to accept being a bit more of a background PC, picking my moments and providing comic relief every now and again. But it IS draining.
And on Thursday, there's Avatar: The Way of Water. I'm pretty sure we'll be seeing it in IMAX 3D, and that it's a three-hour movie or so -- so that's another late night back and a potentially-groggy Friday morning. Which honestly sucks a little bit, since I'm hosting a live event at work for one of our scholarship programs. I think I can fake it until I make it, though.
I've been wanting to have deeper, quieter conversations with folks, but time and focus conspire against me. There are more than a few friends who could use a constant and steady presence, but I'm not in the best shape to provide that.
At least there's nothing planned for the weekend. After the live event on Friday, the work week is pretty much over so I can catch up on rest, decompress a little, and start moving into next year's Bullet Journal. I'm almost certain that R is going to be playing a LOT of God of War: Ragnarok. :)
It's been hard to wake up in the mornings. We're in winter now, so the temperature is around 30-35 in the mornings and maybe 55-60 in the afternoons if we're lucky. We're getting a lot of rain, which is great, but it makes everything extra-wet, cold, and dark. Even though it's 4:15 PM right now, we're entering civil twilight. It'll be dark before 5 PM.
Honestly I love this time of year. It's a great excuse to be cozy indoors, wear comfortable, warm clothing, drink hot tea and such. But it's not great for holding yourself to a schedule or forcing yourself to go outdoors to do things you'd rather not be doing. So waking up on time to meditate and write before work, or making sure you get out the door to do some running, is a lot harder. I'm committed to trying, though -- I just know that I'm in for a lot of failure before the habit begins to stick.
I'm on a team that's mostly based in Egypt, so team meetings are scheduled for their convenience...mostly. They've made concessions for me and the other international colleagues (one in PA, another in India), but it still means that I'm logging in to work at 7 AM almost every day. And because I tend to take a fairly long break at mid-day, I end up logging out at 4 or 5 PM. Since I'm hourly, it's nice to get regular overtime, but it does squeeze other activities into a smaller window. Especially on busy weeks like this one!
Yesterday night we played in L's Advanced 5th Edition game. It's a pretty neat system that puts some crunch back into 5E through non-combat systems. The idea is that there are three pillars to role-playing: combat, exploration, and interpersonal. A complete system should have ways for your character to contribute in all three areas, so your adventuring class might offer some fun exploration/travel benefits at the cost of a few combat-oriented features. There are...five aspects of character design for the system: Heritage (Race in D&D5E), Culture (which determines where your character grew up and what proficiencies they're likely to have), Background (which in addition to giving you bonds, etc, also gives you an Ability Score bump), Destiny (which imagines what your character is striving for and what bonuses you get for doing so), and Class. It makes creation a lot more nuanced, and by the end of the process it feels like your character is pretty well-layered.
I've built a satyr barbarian named Keogolas. He's on the Metamorphosis Destiny, which will hopefully see him become more and more fey over time. Right now, he's a boisterous puppy, ready to throw an arm around your shoulder and share a drink. Desecrating nature or beautiful things are the quickest way to throw him into a rage, though.
We're playing with a couple folks we've never shared a table with before, and it's been fun feeling each other out. We're only a few sessions in, but I think everyone is settling into their characters (and roles) nicely.
Tonight we're driving up to San Francisco to see Beetlejuice! the Musical. I've listened to the soundtrack/cast recording before, and it sounds like a pretty fun time! Our season tickets are for Tuesday evening performances, so we end up seeing a LOT of opening nights as it turns out. I'm generally not sorry to have seen a show, but it is an admitted hassle to drive an hour-plus towards the city during the last bit of rush hour, sit for a three-hour show, and then make the hour-long drive back home. We typically end up getting to bed late and feeling kind of groggy the next day. So there's that to look forward to.
Tomorrow night, another D&D game -- this time, Descent Into Avernus as run by my huzzlesnep, R. It's been an interesting campaign but I think he's ready to end it already. It's been hard to present the party with a proper challenge, partly because we're fairly large (six characters) and partly because we have two folks who are VERY good at maximizing the system for their benefit. But also, since we're playing online, it can be pretty hard for every character to get their due. Three of the players are in the same place, and they're our most boisterous, so frequently there'll be long stretches of time we're trying to get a word in edgewise while they're going all out. I've learned to accept being a bit more of a background PC, picking my moments and providing comic relief every now and again. But it IS draining.
And on Thursday, there's Avatar: The Way of Water. I'm pretty sure we'll be seeing it in IMAX 3D, and that it's a three-hour movie or so -- so that's another late night back and a potentially-groggy Friday morning. Which honestly sucks a little bit, since I'm hosting a live event at work for one of our scholarship programs. I think I can fake it until I make it, though.
I've been wanting to have deeper, quieter conversations with folks, but time and focus conspire against me. There are more than a few friends who could use a constant and steady presence, but I'm not in the best shape to provide that.
At least there's nothing planned for the weekend. After the live event on Friday, the work week is pretty much over so I can catch up on rest, decompress a little, and start moving into next year's Bullet Journal. I'm almost certain that R is going to be playing a LOT of God of War: Ragnarok. :)
