DreyNet 3.0

by Drey on May 29, 2011 in Artwork, House of Whack, The Stork with No comments

At least I think it is the third iteration. Maybe it is the fourth. In any case, I have updated the gateway to my small network of web sites. Let’s take a quick tour.

The home page is a rotating gateway to each site. The sites can also be accessed from the main menu. You will also note a link called “The Latest”. That’s where I will display my most recently completed projects (stories, games, videos, etc.). Social media hooks are in full effect with the tweetbox on the right and a “Follow Me” tab displaying numerous online destinations to satisfy your cyber-stalking pleasure.

On to the individual sites:

First Time Flowing – My blog. No doubt you are familiar with this one.

DreamPunk Productions – This is my “game and story-shaped design” studio, home of The Stork and House of Whack. Speaking of which, those each have their own site.

In Between – This is a wiki I made to keep track of all the worlds and characters I have created over the years. Managing several universes is a challenging task.

There is another somewhat hidden site, which can be discovered by the person looking for me.

And there we are, back at the start!

Judgement Day

by Drey on May 21, 2011 in Life with No comments

I decided to make a sandwich while I was waiting for you. I know, I could have just bought one from one of the vendors lining the street. I’ve sampled their wares in the past and can attest to their tastiness. But I like to watch my hands build things. I like to choose the order in which to stack the various components. Now, I could have simply purchased the sandwich fixings at the supermarket and gotten on with my day. I had already been waiting a long time and I didn’t know when you’d be back. But still, I had been in so many arguments with people in the store about which bread is best that I thought I should bake my own. Yes, it took a long time, especially planting and harvesting the wheat. The dairy farm passed through several stages of disaster before it became viable. The tomatoes were easy. Always had good luck with tomatoes. I cannot fully describe the pleasure of seeing all those sandwich components spread out on the table around the blank plate. Maybe the sun gets a similar thrill, an intake of breath just before it crests the horizon, painting the world anew. I stacked that sandwich layer by layer, a secret combination to condense satisfaction into the smallest possible space. I know that were I to show the sandwich to the man on the street, he would nod in recognition at some layers, shrug at others, and wrinkle his face in disapproval at certain culinary choices. He’d never want a bite of it and he’d never hungered for it like I had.

They are still murmuring out there, checking their watches, comparing schedules. Thanks for taking your time. This sandwich is the best I’ll ever have.

Strangers on a Bus

by Drey on May 19, 2011 in The Stork with No comments

I bring you the first documented account of someone delivering a package to a stranger! I must commend the bravery and generosity of this person. Really great stuff! Read their tale below.

—

Firstly, I received the package and was excited to open it up. After reading through the well illustrated pages I began to feel nervous. I’m generally a pretty easy going guy but the thought of trying to give a stranger a nondescript package and walk away was interesting. I wanted it to be a stranger – I feel as though that passes the message on better, has more impact and it truly is about just paying it forward and knowing nothing is coming back your way (maybe a thank you and some good karma).

As opposed from going about my normal day and driving to uni I thought I’d jump on the bus.. better chance to interact with someone. I picked a woman, about 35 years old and talking on the phone. After she got off her mobile I asked her if I could borrow her phone to make a quick call as my phone had just died (that was a lie). I suppose I was attempting to qualify her and know the stork would be passed on, even if only once more. I wouldn’t have walked away if she said no, I wanted to gauge though how she would react. Without hesitating she offered me her phone. I said “thank you”, and after a moment said “actually can you hold that for a second while I grab something”. It all became just a little more weird from here.

People around us started to look as I did my best to explain to this woman why I was trying to give her a mysterious object, in a box, with something rigid inside wrapped in an envelope. Very apprehensively she says “is this a bomb?”. Deviating for a moment I think some design aspects could be modified. Was a little confusing and can give away a surprise if you write what you gave them in the ledger – a lot to type so if ever you had a chance for to Skype would be great to talk.

After the initial awkward moments of my poor explanations and her puzzled questions (like, “is this stolen?”, “are you sure it’s not stolen”, “ok but what if it’s stolen, why would you give me this if it were yours”) she was smiling with her new (second hand but in near new condition) iPod touch as well as some foreign currency and a little note. The iPod was used rarely since I bought my phone. Was an upgrade from the tattered mp3 player she had clipped on her shirt.

My stop arrived and I just told her to have a great day and to pay it forward.

A nice lady that left me with a smile all day. I still think about who the stork is and what’s happening out there. Would love to hear the stories.

Venture Forth

by Drey on May 14, 2011 in Board Games with No comments

Here is a video I put together to help promote my friend Dan Manfredini’s board game Venture Forth. I wrote the script, had Marc Majcher record the voice over and then I composited original artwork from the game. I think it turned out pretty well for something turned around within several hours.

Help fund the game at Kickstarter

Someone Should Be With Me Here

by Drey on May 8, 2011 in Avatar with 2 Comments

Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night with a crippling muscle cramp chewing into my leg. I think, “I wish someone was here to help me. I wish someone could massage the pain out.” Or, pain aside, I want to reach out and find someone next to me in the darkness and not care about anything else that may have happened to the world while we slept.

Sometimes I cough so hard that it triggers my gag reflex and I throw up a little bit, but I wasn’t expecting it, so it sprays out over my hand in a dripping mess. I think “I’m glad there is no one else here to see this. Who would want to witness this horrible display? No one.” No one would tolerate how I choose to do my laundry or re-use my dishes or not shower until later.

Hunter S. Thompson spoke of knowing the “dead-end loneliness of a man who makes his own rules.” I’ve been alone for going on seven years now. In that time I have honed the skills needed to be on my own. Certain habits and practices are deeply ingrained. I know myself and what I want better than I ever have. It is like I started out as a simple puzzle piece with rounded edges, with many potential compatibilities. But then I found myself with years of introspection to while away and antsy hands that set themselves to whittling complex patterns along the edges of the piece.

Now no one fits. Or maybe only one fits. Or the ones that might fit aren’t interested in fitting.

I fall in love with rounded edges, my heart forgetting that I myself haven’t had them in quite some time.

Set My Mind in Motion

by Drey on April 30, 2011 in Board Games, Life with No comments

The main board disc is essentially complete. Since I had graphics for all of the board spaces, it was a no brainer to put together the Spice Deck. The original version has the region completely isolated. I decided to highlight the space where the spice blow occurs and desaturating the spaces around it, so you could see where it was contextually.

I still need to come up with a good sandworm image. I’m looking for a good 3D model, but I might end up trying to draw one. Maybe I can have Nick draw one.

My mind has just been a flood of ideas lately, all potential projects. I’m trying to give everything the nurturing it requires at its current state while still focusing on things in active development, like the Dune board.

Speaking of nurturing, I finally got around to buying some potting soil to fill up the planter I built from an old cabinet and some bricks. I went to the local nursery, ready to pick out tomato and pepper plants only to find out there had been a rush on tomatoes as it had become hot much earlier this year. Now it was no use trying to plant tomatoes or green peppers until the fall. I did come away with a basil plant and a chocolate mint plant (yes, that is a real thing).

I also set up a timed sprinkler in the front yard to begin resuscitating the lawn. It feels really good to go outside and putter about, surveying the land, making plans.

42 Again

by Drey on April 23, 2011 in Life with 3 Comments

Description=Richard Dawkins Photograph: Jeremy Young 05-12-2006

I had always considered Richard Dawkins to be kind of an adversary, someone who came along to take all the fun out of everything. But I was watching a documentary a few weeks ago and Dawkins appeared and said something that changed my mind. It wasn’t what he said or that it was Richard Dawkins. It was a catalyst that made me go “Oh, wait” and then everything snapped into place.

There’s a scene in one of the Hitchhiker’s books where a young woman suddenly has an idea for world peace that just might work, but the Vogons destroy Earth before she can tell anyone. That’s how I felt. In this case, the Vogons were represented by the realization that I had my answer, not The Answer. Again, language is the problem. Whatever I try to explain will just become your interpretation and not my answer. It only means something to me. It is useless to anyone else.

I realized that the questions I had been asking weren’t the wrong questions. But the real question was “Why am I asking this?” And that’s not really the most accurate way to put it. Perhaps I should say “What mechanism must exist to make it possible that I can formulate this idea?” My questions were already biased because they were American questions, human questions. What if I asked inhuman questions? What if I tried to peer through a crack at the edge of my vision? What I saw was so simple that it sounds ridiculous to even say. But it was also horrific to my sensibilities, leading to statements that I know I cannot utter in this society.

These insights haven’t made anything “better” for me. I feel a weird peace about certain things, but I don’t feel settled. I don’t think I am meant to.

Scattershot

by Drey on April 23, 2011 in Board Games, Dreams with No comments

Claudia Black Debuted to 90210 Season 3 as Guru Sona

Come with me on a wander through some items related only by the virtue that they sprang from my head.

I awoke from a dream in which I was in a relationship with Claudia Black. Or maybe it was her character Vala Mal Doran. I don’t have a Claudia Black thing going on, but I had been watching the last season of Stargate SG-1 recently. It was one of those dreams with compressed time and a lot of ground was covered. In the end things didn’t work out and we were both unhappy. I woke up feeling genuinely down about the whole thing. I tried to find a message in it. Maybe she reminds me of someone.

—

I think I have too many apps on my iPad. Like over 150. I had this feeling the other day like I was at a bar staring down a trail of shot glasses that ended at my hand, like I might have a problem. If something I might like is 99 cents, I buy it without question, archiving it for later. With physical objects and media, I keep it spartan, but with the digital I am a pack rat. If there were a show called CyberHoarders, I would be on it. I have a little black box with a million worlds on it.

—

Since I don’t track the passage of time well, I have a suite of reminders on my phone and computer which tell me when to do things. Routines can be good right? But sometimes they seem like fences or mile markers. Hedges around my life or notches measuring the remainder of it.

Here is what I can’t forget to do:
1. Clean out the litter box (every 3 days)
2. Administer nasal sprays (twice a day, 1 dose followed by another 30 minutes later)
3. Clean out the Roomba (twice a week)
4. Take a 1 minute exercise break (every hour)
5. Go to Boards ‘n Brews (every Tuesday night)
6. Write a blog post (every Saturday)

I guess that isn’t too bad. I wish it also said 7. Make-out session (every…week?)

—

As I was doing some prep work for the components for the Dune game, I realized something that could be designed differently. The original game has a disc for each of the characters. Why a disc? So it can fit in the disc-shaped slot in the combat wheel. But why do it that way? Why not just put them on a card instead? You can put your card face down to keep it secret. And why do you even need this huge combat wheel? Why not a card-sized wheel like the life counters in Magic? So now you can just hold a hand of cards: your leader, your Treachery cards, and your combat wheel card. There is something neat about the discs and putting them in that slot, but when you take a step back it is really a bit convoluted and unnecessary.

The Genesis Effect

by Drey on April 16, 2011 in Board Games, Creations, Something Real with 2 Comments

Perhaps my analog to having children is creating projects. The most satisfying projects are the ones that become larger than myself, things with a life of their own. I’m not entirely sure why that is. Maybe I like being able to diffuse the success of something over a group of people because accepting it myself is too overwhelming.

It’s like that with Boards ‘N Brews, a weekly board game meetup I started two years ago. My original thought was to play some of the games I owned that never seemed to make it to the table. I figured I could find four or five other people who might want to meet twice a month and play games. Fast forward to today where there are now 40-50 regular members, several other organizers, and several games scheduled every week at a packed venue. Sometimes I walk in to the Rockin’ Tomato and see all those people and think that I am somehow responsible for what is happening. But I try not to think about it too much. I’m just happy that it exists.

I like to bring ideas to life, set things in motion and then let them go. While I like to provide creative direction, I don’t really like being “in charge” of anything or anyone. A lot of the time nothing will happen unless someone decides to take action and sometimes that someone is me. But that is different from wanting to control everything for control’s sake. I’d rather have an idea and then find all the right people to make it happen and have someone else manage it.

In an ideal world, I’d be a facilitator for dreams, mine and other people’s. I’d nurture the most promising ideas and help cultivate an environment for them to grow in. And then I’d let them be what they are going to be. If you see any job postings like that on Craig’s List, be sure to let me know.

Voldemort Does Not Have These Problems

by Drey on April 16, 2011 in Life with 1 Comment

I bet having an almost nonexistent snake nose has its advantages. Probably not as many sinus issues.

I finally went in to an allergist the other day to say if I might have a food or environment allergy. After describing my symptoms, he said that although the $750 allergy test might reveal some sensitivities, he didn’t think my problem was allergy related. He described an affliction called non-allergic rhinitis and it fit pretty much with what I was experiencing. It is a mysterious ailment with allergy-like symptoms but unknown causes. Unfortunately, there is no cure. There is a treatment, however.

He prescribed some inexpensive nasal sprays to try for a few months. I already feel the difference, though they have some side effects like a bad taste in my mouth and dryness. One of the sprays smells like flowers. The doctor said I would probably need to use the sprays forever. I’ve also started using a neti pot, which helps.

In attempting to ease my suffering, some other issues have come to light. Now that my nasal passages are more clear, I’ve realized that the feeling of congestion is caused by my deviated septum. At some point I will probably get septoplasty and have that corrected so I can breathe through both nostrils more easily.

I’ve also been getting tonsil stones which are these bits of white calcified junk stuck to the back of my throat. The drainage in my throat was probably contributing to the tonsil stones, but so has caffeine, dairy products and bread. Hopefully the combination of the nasal sprays, neti pot and making some dietary adjustments will make the stones go away. It is either that or have my tonsils removed.

First Time Flowing

Scattered pages from an apocryphal diary