HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Well, another year almost done. I don't think any of you
old timers from Cams or the Wolfpack are going to make it
online, and I might be in bed before you do afterward.

So Happy New Year, everyone!

HOMES PT1

This is the house I lived in for most of my teenager years
here in Abington. Of course, back then, the house was brown and
there was an apple tree in the front yard. That hydroganea
bush might be one my dad planted. That smaller section on
the right used to be a open porch until Dad closed it in. I wonder
if the sliding glass door is still there on the back side of it?

Hard to believe it's nearly 40 years since I lived there.

BRRRRRRRRRR!

What a way to end the old year and start the new!

About 10 inches of snow, 9 degrees F and a windchill below
zero. The apartment thermostat is set at 70 but the
temperature inside reads 65. Feels colder than that, and
I'm in what I used to tell Di is my unibomber mode: I'm
sitting here typing with the hoodie on and the hood up!

Yikes!

SNOW MORE SNOW!

Damn. Going to snow again tomorrow/today. When I was
younger I didn't sweat it, but now that I'm older
I really really HATE snow.

Just the thought of it makes me sleepy. Which is why I'm
going to bed.

Goodnight to you all, and Happy New Year.

FULL OF BOHOONEY

I was posting some comments to some genealogy blogs
today and some of them had the word verification function.
Sometimes they are just a string of letters and numbers but
two of them today were words...sort of: bohooney and
iress.

I could imagine Diya using them. Maybe in a sentence
to an angry ruler?

"Don't blow your bohooney over it, Your Iress!"

DUM DE DUM DUMB!

It never ceases to amaze me how tone deaf the Republican
Party conservative wing continues to be. Latest screw up?
Some genius vying for the Party chairmanship sent out a
cd that included a satirical song from the Rush Limbaugh
show called "Barack the Magic Negro" that is set to the
music of "Puff the Magic Dragon". The retiring party
chairman issued a statement saying he was shocked that
someone would do that. The guy who sent them replied
that the song was "lighthearted fun."

DUH?

And then they GOP wonders why African Americans
vote Democratic? What's next, a "lighthearted" song
about Latinos?

Massachusetts Republicans have been shooting
themselves in the feet for decades with dumb moves.

Looks like the National party has caught the disease now
as well!

ANOTHER FAMILY PICTURE

This is the gravestone of my great great grandparents Jonathan
Phelps West and Louisa Almata Richardson and their son John
Cuvier West and his wife.

STRANGE QUESTIONS

Ok, my two favorite wacky customer questions of the Christmas
season:

"Do you have an English version of the Hebrew bible?"

"Well, we have many English bibles with just the Old Testament."

"No! There's mistakes in those translations!."

((Which led me to wonder if I should point out that there might be
in the item he was looking for, if we carried such a thing. I sent him
to Harvard Square and didn't muddy the waters by talking about
Aramaic versions of the bible. He didn't want a copy of the Torah,
either, btw.))

And.....

"Can you look up a book by a quotation?"

Turned out she wanted a particular trandlation of the Roman
writer Ovid's Metamorphoses and none of the five editions
we carried matched a quotation she had written down in
her notebook..which btw the was was full of quotations.

Diana would have gotten a hoot of out those!

THE BARKER FAMILY REUNION

Amos and Betsey, their children and grandchildren taken at
Norway, Maine in 1896. My great grandmother Charlotte
Lovenia Barker is second from the left in the last row.

MEET THE BARKERS

These are my great great grandparents Amos Hastings Barker and his
wife Betsey Jane Moore.

HOW MY ANCESTORS AVOIDED HEADCOLDS

My grandfather, Floyd West Sr, my great grandfather, Philip John West
and Alponsene Turgeon, my great grandfather's second wife.

That thing draped around my great grandfather's
shoulders is not a pet. It's a dead bobcat or lynx. Click on
the photo for a larger view.

No, he didn't wear animal carcasses to avoid headcolds.
But the money he made from pelts probably helped keep the
farmhouse warm.

HAVE I MENTIONED HOW MUCH I HATE HAVING A HEADCOLD?

Well, if I haven't, I do.

Blecch.

HO HO HO...SNEEZE SNIFFLE COUGH

Well, Christmas is over and now the after holiday sales
madness begins. It will taper off gradually over the next
weekand then we'll be into the Valentines Day sale period.
Hopefully the company will make it through another year.

Noah was a superstar at his baptism on Sunday. Not a
peep out of him, just a smile and a very interested look
on his face as the minister walked him around to
introduce him to the congregation. He save the crying for
the brunch afterward at the restaurant. The weather
was miserable, snow turning to rain.

Christmas Eve was spent at my niece and her husband's
place in Marshfield, which was very nice. But after working
frpm 10am to 6pm I was pretty beat, and the weather was
again rainy, although warm in the low 50's. I felt exhausted
and achy and around 10pm had a stuffed up nose and a
headache. As a result, I slept in this morning and except for
a laundry run spent the day here.

The weather isn't going to help, either. Up and down like
a yo-yo. Rain on Saturday and 60's on Sunday. Guess I
shouldn't complain since we were up to 20 inches in snow
last week about this time.


Anyway, hope you all have had a good holiday!

SNOW WHAT?

Welp, it did snow. There's somewhere around 8" or so outside
and the walkway us still covered. Landlord will most likely be
around with the snowblower around 7 or 8am. Then another
storm is supposed to hit us Sunday, which will stink because
my grandnephew's baptism is Sunday morning at 9:45 am.

I called out of work, I didn't want to try to fight my way into
the apartment through an unplowed parking lot and walkway
with a cane. Luckily, I'm nearly to the point when I won't
need it but I didn't want to risk a setback. What a difference
a year and a new manager makes. Mind you, with the
company stock now trading at .46 cents, I'm not sure if
there will be a Christmas there for me next year.

Anyway, I can hear the snowplow out in the parking lot
now so I guess I be heading into work tomorrow.

THERE'S A STORM A-COMING!

Just in time for Christmas too. Damn! You folks who don't
work retail don't know how much of a killer a big snowstorm
just before the holiday is. Especially when the company is
not doing very well.

Anywho...possibly 12-14 inches on Friday, with another storm
Sunday night (possibly mostly rain) and another on Christmas
Eve/Christmas Day. Having just finally recovered enough to
be able to walk a lot without using the cane, snow is NOT
something I want to deal with.

Ah well. Bah humbug, etc.

DOUBLE YAWN

Welp, another day gone.

I did manage to hammer out a very short genealogy blog entry
but that was it creatively. Rest of the day was the laundry run
and then watching the Pats crush the Raiders followed by the
Survivor finale. I dropped into Camelot but there was nothing
moving rp wise so I left after an hour.

Temps are expected to hit the 60's today maybe.

That's my story for the day and I'm sticking to it

EARLY SUNDAY MORNING

YAWN.

Not much to say. It's about 3:30 am and I'll crawl off to bed as
soon as I finish this. I'm hoping I can get my brain in gear to
write something...either genealogy or Cams wise tomorrow
(actually later today now). But I also need to do another laundry
run tomorrow because I had to do small loads the last few times
due to the leg. Now that's it's closer to normal I can manage a
bigger bag.

Work was a madhouse today. It's sort of a strange situation
since I'm not sure what the new year will bring as far as the
store's future or the company's for that matter. No sense
obsessing over it. It is what it is. Of course, given the economy,
I'd be lying if I said I', not worried. Let's face it folks, I'm not a
kid anymore. It's a bit harder finding a job at 60 then it would
be if I were 20, 30, or even 40 years old.


Anyway, that's it for tonight. Exciting, eh?

FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH

Eh,I'm in one of those ruts again. I pulled a muscle in my right
leg the night before Thanksgiving and in a spot that made just
about everything uncomfortable. I'm pretty much back to
normal, or close to it now, but find myself just dried up
creatively. I did a few things for the genealogy blog but they
took much longer for me to write than they would normally.
Story writing was zero. Roleplay was pretty much nonexistent.

Weather is a bit unusual so far this month. with one day in the
60's and then back down to the 30's the next day. Right now
it's pouring out with the temps in the high 30's-low 40's.
There's going to be some head colds going round soon.

No action in the channel tonight, so I'm heading off to bed
early.

WELL, I'M BACK!

I've been offline for nearly a week because of a switch in hi speed
connection provider from cable to Verizon which turned into a
convoluted game of (you should pardon the expression)phone tag.
The only time either of us is home during the work week is on
Thursday when I have a day off and we couldn't get a tech out here
until today.

The "us" is because my younger brother(I'm seventeen years older
than him) has been living here since early April.I think Skya & Matt
might be the only ones who know that in the online world.

Anywho, nobody seemed to notice I was MIA except Marie and
then Mike, and by that ime, I was back, so it's all good.

With that, I'm off to bed.

YAWN

Been a looooong day. But I thought I'd post something
before I sleepwalk off to bed.

Winter is slowly creeping up on Autumn. It was near 60
degrees out Monday morning when I went to work, and
only 40 degrees when I left the store 8 hours later. Eh,
that's New England for you!

Much of the leaves came off the trees all in one big burst
last weekend. There were so many leaves outside the
apartment you couldn't see the walkway. The landlord hasn't
gotten rid of all of them as of yet. We'll see if the landscapers
show up this Saturday.

Other than that, nothing much else new to report. Did some
genealogy blogging and I'm trying to get my Camelot muse in
gear and see if I can get some stories done soon.

But right now I am off to bed, because I'm really dragging butt here.

TIME FLIES AND ALL THAT

Eh. Today is the tenth anniversary of BT and Skye's first wedding
and I realized it's been 11 years now since I first wandered into
Camelot. Lot of water under the drawbridge and other stuff as well.
It's changed over the years but then again, everything changes
with the passage of time. Lot of laughs, some tears, and some
bovine excrement but overall I'm glad I did wander in that first
night, even though I'm sure there are those who wish I hadn't.

Anywho, finally got my arse in gear and posted another story.

Now I shall go mourn my beloved Red Sox. Wait until next year!

IT'S QUARTER `TIL THREE....

Hmm. Let's see. Headcold/chestcold almost gone. While the
stock market is in a tailspin, life as we know it has not come
to an end. And the presidential election drags on.

I won't discuss politics here because basically I'm just talking
with my self here anyway and I'm already firmly in the Obama
camp. I do sometimes wonder what Diana would have thought
about all this.

Hey Diana, I was right about Bush, wasn't I?

Good night Mrs. Callabash, wherever you are.

SHUFFLING DECKCHAIRS ON THE TITANIC

Wow! I don't think I've ever been as worried about the state
of things as I lately. I'm not sure what I have left in my 401k.
I don't dare look because I know I'll freak out when I see
how much I have left.

There's a possibility my store might be gone by Spring because
the whole damn company is likely to be out of business.

And frankly, I'm tired of the presidential election. My current
philosophy is Obama should win because the noompty we have
in there has screwed up this country in his two terms. Time to
let the other party see if they can fix it. It seems to be a
cycle:Republicans screw up the economy and Democrats fix
it until they do something stupid (like sex scandals) and get
kicked out.

At least if we had elected Kerry he might have recognized the
danger signs from the economy, or the people he had advising
him. I get the distinct impression old G.W. still doesn't have a
clue.

There's that old Chinese saying :"May you live in interesting
times!" I think I would prefer nice tranquil boring ones,
thank you.

ah-CHOO!

Damn, I hate colds!

Took the day off from work because my voice sounded like a foghorn
and my nose is leaking like a faucet. Didn't do any writing. Hell, didn't
do much of anything but snooze and sneeze.

Gonna try to make it into work tomorrow, though. Now all I need is
about 7 hours sleep without waking every few minutes to sneeze.

HEADCOLDS WERE INVENTED IN HELL

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

On the writing front, I finished and posted The Wyld 29
late Saturday night/early Sunday morning. I'm ready to start
the next story as soon as I stop wheezing, hacking and
sniffling all the time.

Hell, I tell you! Hell!

WELL IT'S A START ANYWAY

Ok..I have about a half post(@500 words) of a story. I decided
to catch up with Jeremy, Liam and Kevern, because it was
exactly a year ago that I posted the last entry in that sl
(Jeremy being taken captive by the Shadowlord). I know
where I want to go with this particular post but it's late
and I need sleep.

But at least I am writing stories again!

DECISIONS, DECISIONS!

Ok. I've got a bunch of dangling sls :

the Shadowdragon...

the Riverstone...

Merlin's Seat

Lughar...

Trouble on the Docks

and those two chars..brothers...dang..ok..the brain doesn't
function well at 3:55 am. I'll remember the names in the morning.

Anywho, I need to decide which one to start writing about again
first.

Gonna go sleep on it...

And, GO RED SOX!

FOR THOSE WHO HAVEN'T SEEN THIS YET

This is my Grandfather West in his WW I uniform.

WELL, DOH

Wow, this story thing might take a bit longer than I thought.
Not because there's a lot of them to read. On the contrary, I
found that I've only written 9 this year! That's the least amount
since I first started doing it.

I'm going to have to look at the end of last year to get what I
need. I can't believe I haven't written more.

Someplace,Di is tapping her foot impatiently waiting for me
to get on with it!

SO HERE'S THE PLAN...

I have been thinking about what I need to do to get the writing
back in gear and decided that I need to try to finish off or continue
some of the stories I've left hanging. Trouble is, it's been so long
I've lost the thread of the plot on some of them. So I need to do a
little reading tomorrow/today of the stories I've published so far
this year and then try to pick up the loose ends.

Luckily, it's my day off, there's no Patriots game, and I should have
some time to read and perhaps write at least one story. I also have a
few things I need to post in the genealogy blog.

So that's the plan!

JUST MY IMAGINATION

Won't be too long a post tonight. Got a case of sticky tired eyes.
As soon as I put away the clothes from my laundry run
I'll teeter off to bed. We're expecting a LOT of rain the next
few days so the car might be a bit balky tomorrow which
means I leave for work earlier.

I 've had a few story ideas the last few days and I'm going to try
to go some more writing over the weekend. If nothing else,
roleplay has kept my imagination running even when I don't
write it down, which leads me to a question for the folks who
might still be reading this. Do you still think about your old
characters, of what they might be thinking about or doing?
Do you ever think of a story for them and itch to write it
down? Have you found someplace else to let your imagination
run free, or is it something you've set aside because of rl, or
because you think you've outgrown roleplay?

Just wondering.

YAWN

Work is a lot different now than it was for so long. A better
atmosphere sure makes the day go better, that for sure.
Of course, like all companies these days ours is having rough
times and that translates to staff cutbacks, but I'm still
there so I guess they're happy with my work.

Hard reality is that I most likely will be working into my
70's if I don't get hit by a dumptruck or something
first, but that's ok, I'd be bored sitting around at home
most days anyway! The only thing is that the stamina
of a 40 or even a 55 year old has dwindled a little bit,
but that's life, eh?

Anywho, off to bed in a few minutes.

LEAVES ARE FALLING

Yep, it's Fall. Nights are cooler lately and I actually wore my
hoodie to work yesterday under my jacket. But at least there's
no rain so it's pretty nice weather.

Spent the day watching the Bradyless Pats lose before I
went out for food shopping. Also posted the final part
of the long version of my vacation over on the genealogy
blog, then got a little rp in tonight.

That's about it. No deep thoughts yet.

ANOTHER SATURDAY NIGHT...

Okay, so it's a little after 3am and it's COLD outside. Guess
Summer is now officially over. I've got a stiff neck from falling
asleep in the chair in the living room but I am off tomorrow and
I get to sleep in late and then watch the Patriots game. YAY!

I have some ideas kicking around in my head for stories and
all I need to do is find the ambition to write them. Even
though I haven't posted as many stories to the Cams list as
I intended to do so far this year, the Muse is still working for
me which is a good thing. Life would be pretty dull without
imagination. So even on the slowest night in the channel,
I at least flex that mental muscle a wee bit.

BE AFRAID. BE VERY AFRAID!

Ok, I have decided that I am going to go on a blogging blitz because
it's the only way I am going to post more here than the 52 times
I did last year.

Starting tomorrow night. Because I'm going to bed now.

But you watch!

PIC

Dang, I thought I posted this here already.

So, Guess Who and Guess Who!

BIG 60

So I turned 60 this past Wednesday. The day passed quietly
with some cupcakes at work brought in by a coworker whose
birthday fell on the same day and some birthday wishes
from my brother and sister. I ordered out for a birthday
pizza and then dozed off in front of the tv. Probably a
preview of things to come in my retirement or semi
retirement. Of course I'd already gotten a great birthday
present from my sister by her taking me on our vacation!

So here I am. 60. Man, how did it get here so FAST?

I'm supposed to go over to Cheryl's tonight to see my
grand nephew if they are babysitting him, but if I'm as
pooped as I usually am on Saturdays I might take a
raincheck

BLECCCH!

That is all.

WHAT I DID ON MY SUMMER VACATION

Well, I've been away from this blog for awhile..literally!
I just got back last night from a week's vacation. My sister
and I (she drove...her car is much better and bigger than
mine and so she did all the driving.Her rules!) went out to
Ohio to visit my Aunt Dorothy who is my Dad's younger
sister. She's the one who got me hooked on genealogy.
We spent much of the time with her daughters Diana and
Louise and their husbands Gary and Steve sightseeing and
dining at some of their favorite restaurants. They live in
the heart of Ohio Amish country and we saw many Amish
riding in horse and buggys or on bikes. Monday we visited
Yoder's Farm, a traditional Amish working farm which
gave me a better look on how most folks, Amish or not,
lived on farms back in the 19th century.

By the way, Ohio, or at least that part south of Canton in
Holmes County, is a beautiful place. Loads of great views,
and we saw many hawks, a few deer and one heron!


Aunt Dot and I talked genealogy of course and she showed
me some fantastic pictures that date back to the 1880's and
1890's and then offered to have Louise copy them for me.
So I now have a picture of my great great grandparents
Amos Hastings Barker and Betsy Jane Moore Barker and
their children at some family occasion.


We went out on Tuesday to visit Lehman's Hardware
(it's full of old time farming and home machines, vintage
toys and other neat stuff!) and then ate at a restaurant
at a marina at Lake Atwood. Afterwards we drove
back to Diana and Gary's home where I was surprised by
a birthday cake and gifts for my 60th birthday. Louise and
Steve gave me a steak knife with a hand carved handle,
Diana and Gary gave me the license plate from my
Grandfather West's Model A Ford, and my aunt Dot
gave me the family bible that belonged to my great great
great grandmother Arvilla Ames West which is 151 years
old (it was published in 1857) and probably was given to
Arvilla as a wedding gift when she married my ancestor
John Cutter West. It has handwritten records of the births,
deaths, and marriages of their children and descendants
I was stunned at being given this but Dot says she feels it
should stay in the West family.(Diana has the family bible
from the Bargers which is her father's family). Apparently
this had been planned right from the time last Christmas
my sister said we should take a road trip together. I didn't
have a clue they were going to do this!


Wednesday we left Ohio for Washington DC supposedly to see
the Vietnam War and World War 2 Memorials, but when we
couldn't find a handy parking space we opted for Arlington
National Cemetery where we visited the graves of President
Kennedy and Robert Kennedy, and saw the changing of the
Guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldiers which was
both inspiring and sobering. Seeing so many white gravestones
reminded me again of how many have given their lives in the
service of America. If it were up to me, every schoolchild in
America would have to visit Arlington at some point before
they graduate from high school to give them a deeper
appreciation of the price of freedom.


But Cheryl had another secret. She told me she'd made
reservations at some restaurant in Washington at the Old
Post Office Building but after we got there she sort of
wandered about and then said she was looking for someone.
When I asked who, she told me it was the daughter of one
of our old family friends, but now I was suspicious. The
"someone"turned out to be a certain redhead named Stacy.
This had also been planned for sometime and up until a
few minutes before she arrived I didn't suspect a thing.


Anyway, we had two hours of good conversation and
hopefully Stacy wasn't too disappointed to find out BT is
old, overweight, and far from elvish. (Yeah I know Stacy:"
Suck it up!") I also got to have a brief phone conversation
with E, although with the noise in the background behind me
I'm not sure I heard everything he said.



The ride home after was a bit wild. We got rear ended on the
highway in NJ but the other guy's van was damaged while
Cheryl's Pilot just had a scratch on the bumper. The a very
heavy and windy rainstorm kept stretching out the arrival
time home until the we wouldn't get here until 4:30 Friday
morning, according to the GPS, so we pulled into a Best
Western motel and continued on the next morning, and made
it home here around 6:30 last night.

So. That's what I did(in the short form) for my summer
vacation!

GOOD STUFF

Hmm...things are good lately. Work is so much better with
the New Boss.

And I'm going to Ohio in August with my sister to visit our
Aunt Dot.

And Cams is booming. The top two Most Active had over a
1200 lines each and the next three had over 700, and none
of them were the usual suspects! Two are newcomers to the
channel and one is an old timer recently returned and all
five are individual rps and not clones.

And best of all, I'm a granduncle. Nephew Paul and his wife
Jen have a baby boy, Noah Adam, born on Monday afternoon,
10 lbs, 1oz, and 21 inches long. Mom and baby healthy.

So, good stuff!

BACK TO WORK I GO

Well, vacation's over and today was my first day back at work.
Nice how I didn't dread doing it either, what with the New
Boss and all.

Of course after a week off getting back to 8 hours standing on
the sales floor is murder on my legs but they'll be back to
normal in a day or two. And for the first time in years, I'll
be off on the 4th, so I'm off Thursday and Friday, back to
work on Saturday and then off Sunday.

And the road trip with my sister in August will be to visit
my Aunt Dot in Ohio. I expect we'll be doing a lot of
genealogy talk.

The tournament in Camelot is still going on and doing well
but taking too long to finish. And channel activity is up!

I did a post on my genealogy blog about one of my
ancestors who was famous because of his armor which
really impressed the Indian here in Massachusetts!
Figures I'd have an ancestor like that, eh?

SAME OLD SAME OLD

So here it is four days later and my car is in the repair shop, I
still don't have my haircut and I didn't get into Boston yet.
There's been rain nearly every afternoon, including two
hellacious tstorms and the car gets cranky when wet. And
tonight I had to have it towed in because it wouldn't start.

But other than that, things are ok. It's been a quiet vacation
spent mostly at genealogy stuff or roleplay. If I get my car
back by Friday I might still make it into Boston.

The tournament is hitting snags now and again so I've
extended it until the 4th but hopefully it will be over by then.
.
That's about it. But I'm trying to post more so I thought I'd
share!

G'night!

GOOD MORNING!

*Yawn*

I'm on vacation this week and slept in today. I do have plans
for this week involving some genealogy research but I need a
haircut badly. The problem is my barber who I've gone to for
years is closed on Monday, so I'll get the haircut tomorrow
and take the train into Boston Wednesday and/or Thursday
depending on how much I find out at the three places I want
to visit. I need the haircut so I will not be mistaken for one of
the homeless people who hang around inside the Library
when I visit the main branch at Copley Square.


Given the fact that there are thunderstorms moving through
the area all day today and Ping the Car gets cranky when it
gets wet, today is just going to be a hang around the house
and computer day.


Camelot is out of the latest valley for the moment. The
Summer Tournament is in full swing and we have a few new
players. As always, one of the biggest problems is rl and
health keeping folks from rp but that's life, eh?


Work is good. While the company has had problems, at least
on the store level the atmosphere is much, much better to
work in under our new Boss.


That's it for now. I feel the need to feed!

WHAT IS SO RARE AS A DAY IN JUNE?

How about a blog post?

Hmm...been awhile. But then again it seems none of us blog
as much anymore, at least on Blogger. I never opened a
MySpace or Facebook account. Sometimes I think we've all
floated away from each other over the past few years.

Despite my best intentions, I've only written...hmm..9 stories
so far this year. But my Muse got a few nudges recently. I
finished one story the other night based on a sl another rp
suggested and the opening line is kicking around my head for
a new story where Baron Lughar finds out his daughter has
returned to Camelot. And I have the River Stone story's next
chapter figured out too.

Work is better with the New Boss. It's amazing how the
atmosphere at the store is changed.

Other than that, same old same old. My sister and I are
taking a week's vacation together in August. No idea where
we are going. We haven't vacationed together since we went
with our parents as kids. I guess we're having a last hurrah,
eh?

More to come. I need to blog more often if I'm going to do
better than last year.

CHECKING IN

ok.

still breathing.

check.

still working at the bookstore.

check. Much nicer place to work nowadays. Oh, and I
won District Customer Service Award for 1st Quarter!

still struggling with my Muse.

check and double check!

And ready to crawl off to bed to sleep.

check!

"IT'S QUARTER `TIl THREE...."

I’m at the point where I wonder if there is any point to some
of the things I do.

Was there any point there to begin with?

APRIL COME SHE WILL

Ok, another month....

SWMBO no longer is SWMBO. Somewhere Diana is giving a
big cheer.

My car is finally, finally, finally, fixed. At a cost of 1800
smackers. Had to take money out of the 401k . Not that I
was really counting on living a retirement life of luxury,
anywho.

Heard the first peepers out in force Tuesday night and
had my first near encounter of my foot with a jaywalking
toad of the season on the walkway outside the
apartment. So I guess Spring has officially Sprung.

Rah!

OK, WHO ELECTED THIS IDIOT?

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/03/republican-cong.html


This is the same type of crap that the John Birch Society
spread about JFK when he ran for the the presidency.
Their line was that if we elected a Catholic, the Pope would
take over the country.

Jeezuz, people! It's the 21st century already! Get out of
your Klan robes and join the rest of the human race!

JUST IN CASE

Ok, not to be morbid or anything…

I really really intend to wrap up the Merlin’s Seat storyline
soon and the Morgana’s Portal one as well possibly by Spring
if I can get people together for a miniquest or two.

But just in case I don’t and that piece of frozen waste from a
passing overhead plane conks me (or something else happens)
I hereby give my permission to those of you reading this who
still rp in Camelot to finish off my sls. A hint: that old librarian
dude from the Green Silences is SOMEONE ELSE.

I plan on getting all my sls wrapped up by June and not start
anymore long term ones. No, I’m not ill or dying but I will be
60 in August and frankly, there’s not enough channel activity
lately to make me want to start a real long story arc anymore.
I am starting one that will run for a shorter time and that won’t
be effected by lags in roleplay.

That’s the plan, anyway.

BY THE NUMBERS 2007

While 2007 was not as busy a year for Camelot
as 2006 was, it still was respectable in many ways.


Posts to the email list were 1280, down from the
2149 of last year and the 1748 of 2006 but still
better than our low point of 930 posts in 2005.
Part of that is because we ran 3 tournaments in
2006 and only 1 in 2007. So there were fewer match
results to post to the mail list. In July of 2006
alone we had 500 posts because of the busiest
tournament in years.


Storywise, we had a total of 76 stories posted by
14 different writers,down 4 writers from 2007.

Miniquests were down an appreciable amount from
the over 20 the year before to perhaps 6 or 7 this
past year.

We also had:
1 marriage (Robinton and Yandora) or was it 2?
DID Tyralor and Calandra marry?

1 birth (Robinton and Yandora’s child)

1 Knighting (Lucent)

and Three Balls: Valentines, MidSummer, and
Yultide.

and of course, the passing of Lady Wenndolyne.

Most of the activity was in the first half of the
year. The second half was less active and it was
hard for me personally to put my heart into the rp
after Diana’s passing. But as she’d be the first
to tell me, life goes on.

It’s a new year, a new page. We’ve already had 9
stories by 5 different writers in the Storm Watch sl
and I’m waiting for more to join in. I’ll try to get
more miniquests going and hopefully we can get
Camelot back on the right track we began on last year.


And while I've posted a lot on the genealogy blog I
posted what...52 times here last year? So I'll see
what I can do to do better with this, too!

V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N IN THE WINTERTIME

Well, waddya going to do? It's the dilemma of
having three weeks vacation time for having lasted
five years at the store. Use it or lose it

Since I hate cold weather I pretty much hibernate
on these winter vacations.I worked on some posts
for the genealogy blog and some stories for Cams.
I've already written three so far this year and
should have five or six total by weeks end. I had
30 for last year, most written before July when the
creative urge left me for a while for obvious
reasons. So this year my goal is to pass that.
Of course I didn't coiunt the bb posts to the BD
or the ads for the fair. Genealogy wise, I had
about 200 posts for that blog.


Other highlights of my week will include a
haircut and a laundry run. And more genealogy
research here at the comp. I've turned up some
interesting things that will never see the
light of blogdom, I'm afraid.

One of the drawbacks of winter vacation is getting
a headcold. I went to bed, couldn't sleep, so got
up started writing this again.

Think I'll see if it made me sleepy enough to
stay in bed now.

Night all!

FIRST OF THE YEAR

So,a New Year. Bout damn time, too.

It's been ok so far. Biggest news of 2008 is that
SWMBO is going elsewhere. I'm sure Diana is cheering
wildly over that someplace in the cosmos.

RP is at a slow point right now. I need to think of
something to get it moving again. I also need to get the
Muse back into the fiction gear. It's been pretty active over
on the family tree but not much elsewhere.

That's all for tonight. Got a big snowstorm coming tonight so
I need to get to bed and get up earlier to slog my way to
work.