Aberro Specus

But let me tell you why!

The group I play D&D with have quickly become good friends to Crista and I, and we’ve started playing two nights a week. It’s good times, usually with some amusing antics. On one of the two nights we play, I am DMing a game, and I’ve been spending a lot of time working on that game. I’m calling it “Darker Tombs” and so far they’ve been fighting a decent amount of undead, and had some interesting puzzles to figure out. I have a few tricks up my sleeve to throw at them this week, so it should be fun. Once they finish the first adventure I will probably post a summary of it on here.

I’ve also been working on becoming employed, which is not as easy as it sounds, but I’ll save that whole story till I get the details ironed out (which should be tomorrow *crosses fingers*).

In addition to both of these things, the school season here has started (today in fact), which means the new Caesar Rodney Thespian Societies season is beginning, which means I’m back to work building sets. My next post will be more in detail about this, so I wont babble much about it, but let’s just say I have my work cut out for me. All I’ll say is that the plays this seasons are Peter Pan and The Sound of Vomit Music. While I rather dislike The Sound of Music it’s one of my father’s favorites, and it will be a great show… and I love Peter Pan, so… woo!

So that’s what’s been keeping my busy these days, and will be keeping me busy for the next few months, but I’ll be posting more, promise.

~Ian

This weekend is likely to be a busy one, and let me tell you why.

Members of the blogenning (which we now affectionately and spitefully refer to the blogging agreement as) Brandon and Jaco are traveling down from Boston and Philly (respectively) to visit and spend the weekend in Dover visiting me. In about 24 hours Brandon will arrive here (Jaco is arriving earlier in the day, mid-afternoon), and we shall have an entertaining weekend.

The highlight of the weekend is Sunday, when we will be going to Kings Dominion for the day. I haven’t been there in a few years and it is my favorite amusement park, plus I’ll be going with Crista, my best friend Brandon, Jaco, and my parents. It should be awesome.

Besides that there will be much hanging out, guitar playing, some drinking, and general goofing around. I haven’t seen Brandon in about a year, so it will be nice to see him, and haven’t seen Jaco since the same time even though he lives closer, so it’s all-around exciting.

Look for tales of (mis)adventures and insanity after the weekend, and don’t expect much posting from any of us till Monday (more than likely, you never know with us).

~Ian

Brandon has given me a wonderful excuse to post something actually worth reading finally (which I have about 5 minutes to type because I have to head out the door for play rehearsal shortly, I’m directing a terrible adaptation of The Tell-Tale Heart, it’s fun).  He and I have started a new blog. It’s a fictional blog covering the story of a group of survivors of the zombie apocalypse from the point of view of two of the members of that group, Brandon and myself. The idea spawns originally from a d20 Modern rpg we played a while back about the Zombie Apocalypse and how we would survive in our current living situation (at the time). This game also spawned a series of short stories I’m working on, which will not run parallel with the blog, but in a very different direction.

For those of you who care about what I write here (I’m sure there are few of you ), writing in this new blog will not replace this one, and I know I’ve been slacking lately but Crista moved in with me so I haven’t had much time to write lately. I’m going to picking back up on it soon, I promise. For now though, I have to head out the door. Head over to http://bostonzedheads.blogspot.com to see the new blog and read Brandons excellent first posts. Till next time…

~Ian

Jaco and Brandon have both posted on things that each of them have slacked on lately in their life.  Jaco wrote about how he hasn’t been drawing lately and Brandon wrote a list of things that he wants to pick back up, as well as why they have “fallen by the wayside” so to speak. In the spirit of things, I too am going to post a list, similar to Brandons. So without further ado… and in no particular order…

• Piano. Following suit with Brandon, I need to pick up the piano again. Differently from Brandon however… I haven’t really played in over 7 years. This is a problem, because I am basically going to need to reteach myself how to play. I can still play the intro to Fur Elise… I think… eesh. We’ll see. I really need to get back into this though, for a variety of reasons. It seemed to drop off in High School, when I was trying to involve myself in far too many hobbies at once… and this trend continued in college. So I’m going to see if I can fix this…
• Photoshop. I used to be really good with Photoshop. I mean really good. And now I get confused when trying to edit color balance in a photo I took…  I need to brush up on the new versions, relearn some of the basics, and maybe look for some filters to play around with. Mostly I want to get good at basic photo manipulation again so I can brush up some I took.
• Exercise. Hey this one’s on my list too! Due to circumstances most everyone who reads this already knows about, I gained around 35 pounds in my last couple years of college. 165 - 200lbs. Ouch. I want to try to drop down to at least 175, maybe even 170, and have that weight be almost entirely muscle. This, however, is looking to be very likely to happen in the near future, because of certain things going on (pardon my vagueness, there are reasons for it that will be disclosed at a later date).
• Write! I need to write more. Not a little more here and there, not a bit more during the day. A lot. Fucking. More. I have two novels started, a graphic novel started, a movie script, a song, and philosophical work; all of which needs to be picked up again. My goal is to have the movie script and graphic novel finished by this summer, as well as the song. The rest I will then work on at a resumed steady pace, hopefully completing all of it by the end of the year. This is my lofty goal… prepare to watch me fail. Also, I plan on completing NaNoWriMo this time around (Yay November…), so add another novel in there.
• Grad School. This might seem like an odd one for this list, but I really need to study for and take my GRE and start applying to Grad Schools soon. I’d like to enroll for either Fall 2009 or Spring 2010… but we’ll see what happens.
• Work. I need a job. I got discouraged after looking for on all summer and fall, and having only slight luck, gave up. I need to start looking for one again, or get my ass in gear with writing and sell something…
• Philosophy. I need to start reading more philosophy, regularly, and writing about it. I kind of took a break after this summer, and would like to continue my studies on my own until Grad School… it just seems like a good idea to me.
• Leave the house. I need to get out of the house more, I spend all my time on the computer… yeah I know it’s sad… I’m working on it…

And that’s about it. If I think of anything else I’ll add it to my mental list. If you can think of something else, feel free to leave a comment on this post :). Now at this point, I need to eat some food before I starve… till next time.

~Ian

Looks like someone finally woke up and wrote something on his damn blog. Welcome back Ian! Now I can go back to the booze and whores that have been waiting for me while I kept your blog from slipping in to a full coma.

Or you know, just keep writing here.

Ciao,

- B

In Ian’s unending absence I will again temporarily take up my position as contributor and try to put some things here from time to time. Today, some quote-inspired musings:

“The best restaurants in any town are the ones that are open 24 hours. It doesn’t matter if the restaurant is clean or attractive, if the food is good or even edible. What makes 24-hour places special is that whatever is going on inside them at any moment–eating, crashing from a night high and wild, a secret lovers’ rendezvous, a drug deal, a traveler getting her bearings in a new town– will continue to go on there until the place burns down or goes out of business.

These places sell time, not food. All 24-hour restaurants are social neutral zones, outside the normal boundaries of time and space, which exist for most of us in neatly packaged eight-hour segments: one for sleep, one for work and one for life. These diners are the alien bases in our midst. Area 51 with curly fries and a Coke. “

-  Richard Kadrey

“For my part I know nothing with any certainty, but the sight of the stars makes me dream.”

- Van Gogh

5 years ago I wouldn’t have even begun to understand either of those sentiments. 5 years ago I would have thought Van Gogh a fool to be dismissed  for not being an intellectual.

Me 5 years ago, having met the me of today on the street, would have thought the me of today to be a fool.

I am pleased.

- B

Dear Ian,

You never write in me anymore. I am so lonely here. Please give me some content so that I might thrive again.

Do it or I will tear out your innards and wear them as a hat.

Love,

- Aberro Specus

2005:

Richard Pryor
Rosa Parks
Pope John Paul II
Hunter S. Thompson
Arthur Miller

2006:

Syd Barrett
Billy Preston
James Brown
Ahmet Ertegün

2007:

Kurt Vonnegut
Luciano Pavarotti

2008:

George Carlin
Bo Diddley
Harvey Korman
Sir Arthur C. Clarke
Thomas M. Disch
Heath Ledger

RIP all y’all. What a sad 4 years.

- B

P.S: Yes, I know Charlton Heston and Mitch Hedberg aren’t on the list, but Heath Ledger is. I’m currently caught up in The Dark Knight buzz, and frankly I think Heath Ledger was a batter actor than Charlton Heston could ever hope to be. Add on to that the NRA stuff, etc. I’m also not a stoner, so I don’t “get” the huge frenzy around Mitch Hedberg. He was a funny guy who made me laugh for a bit. I thank him for that, but he doesn’t get on the list. Also, some will probably notice I left off Robert Jordan. I hear he’s fantastic, but until I read some of his stuff, he doesn’t get on my list either. (Ian you can feel free to add him if you want).

So, there was more gardening yesterday. I however wasn’t feeling well all day, so decided to put off posted about it until today. So now for the update!

We went back to Wal-Mart, as well as one of the local garden shops and got some more vegetables for the garden, as well as some flowers that Mom wanted to plant along the path from the driveway to the front door.

… We also bought a new grill and some patio furniture (table and chairs set).

The new grill was mostly for me, as I’m the one who loves grilling. It’s a favorite past-time for me, I like standing there, flipping burgers, drinking a beer, etc.  Even if it’s just for me I’ll grill food instead of cooking it on a stove. Just love doing it…

So after we went and bought all of that stuff we put it all together, then did some planting. For photo’s and what not click through the cut. There will also be some more post after that…

Continue reading

So, I watched possibly the most terribly awesome movie tonight. Bug. Came out in 2006, Ashley Judd, touted as a Horror flick.

It sucked.

Until the last 20 minutes.

And then it made the entire movie awesome.  If you like really fucked up movies about weird shit… watch it. Don’t buy it, rent it. I don’t think many people would appreciate it’s brilliance. It definitely helps if you know that it’s based off of a play, because it feels like one. It starts off very slow, like an artsy play.  I think it would work a lot better on stage. If anyone hears about it being done somewhere on the East Coast let me know… I’d drive to go see that.

Watched 30 Days of Night again too. Definitely works better on the big screen, but was very good the second time around nonetheless.  I need to go buy it…
That’s about all for now. I’ve been working a lot and trying to get some stuff sorted out. Playing guitar has replaced writing for the past couple days, I’ll write more soon though.

Till later.

~Ian

P.S. OH DEAR GOD THE BUGS THEY ARE EVERYWHERE GET THEM OFF! Hehe.