Reflections in the Dragon's Eye: A Journal

7 December 2000

I don't often get sucked in by a video game. Myth managed it, but part of its charm was that I could play at work. Myth II didn't succeed. I've got a handful of other games that are diverting for an hour or two, but nothing that really grabs me... Except that now I've got Diablo.

I'm not sure how long it will hold me, but for now it's got me in a pretty tight grip. Yesterday evening was a series of hour-and-a-half sessions of slaying gibbous and gibbering minions of the dark, punctuated by breaks for food and water. I'm only lucky that Matt's playing the game, too, or he'd probably get pretty sick of my rambling.

I was feeling slightly guilty and moderately defensive about letting this game suck up so much of my time, and I rationalized to Matt last night, "It's not like I'm combing the internet for cheats or anything."

Silence.

I looked over at him. He looked sortof sheepish. "I was just trying to figure out how to get past the Skeleton King," he said.

I will attempt to restrain myself from talking about the game any more. As I've discovered by being an involuntary witness to hours of conversation about EverQuest, listening to someone else talk about a video game is pretty damned tedious.

Let's see... Tonight we're doing some laundry and probably some preliminary packing. Tomorrow we'll go to work until about noon, and then we'll go home, have lunch, finish packing, and leave the house around 2:30 or 3. We'll stop at the bank for a little cash, and then head down to the airport, checking in by 4. Hopefully we'll have only carryon luggage. At about 10, we'll be landing in Chicago. (Stupid two-hour layovers. I like to have plenty of time to get where I'm going, but even the biggest airports can be navigated in less than two hours.)

Matt's grandparents will pick us up from the airport, or maybe just his grandfather. Since it's about forty-five minutes or so between their house and the airport, it will probably be 11:30 or midnight before we get there. Gramma Brooks will want to know if they fed us on the plane. We'll explain that we ate at the airport between trips, but she'll probably try to feed us anyway.

I don't know what time the festivities begin for us on Saturday, but since we'll be getting in late, my guess is that we'll have to get up and get ready to go right away (after Gramma feeds us breakfast, of course). The wedding is at either one or three, I can't keep it straight to save my life. (And it doesn't matter, since we'll be relying on Matt's grandparents for all the transportation - we'll go when they say go.) I also have no idea how long the reception will last. But since I'm not in the wedding party, I'll be able to get away with comfortable shoes, and I hope to do some dancing!

Sunday we'll probably just relax around the house (and eat - with Gramma around, you always eat) until about 4, when we'll head back to O'Hare. At least the layover is only a little over an hour this time. Because the Newport News airport closes at midnight, our plane is scheduled to land at 11:59. Depending on whether we had to check bags and how far from the terminal we had to park, we'll get home around 1:30.

Which is why, if I post at all on Monday, it will be late.

I'm working already on my redesign for the new year. Not the whole site; just the journal. I'd like to move to a simpler, less cluttered format. I won't be changing the graphics every month. I may not have graphics at all, aside from pictures that are actually part of the entry. I haven't really decided.

I know a lot of journallers shy away from talking about their journals within their journals. If they decide they can't possibly avoid it, they'll apologize for it before they begin. "Okay, this is a little meta, but..."

I don't really get it, myself. What's the fuss? I guess if you're writing for your audience rather than yourself, and you know talking about the journal drives them crazy, you can apologize.

Me? This journal is for me. Knowing I have an audience keeps me writing - I've never been any good with paper journals because I had no reason to keep them up. But in the end, it's all for me. Sometimes it's simply a diary of events. Sometimes it's a closer examination. Sometimes I write facts, and sometimes I write fiction.

But when I write it, it's important to me. It's something I think I'd like to remember, when I come along to re-read, or something I think I should remember, or something that I think illuminates my personality and my mind. This journal is important to me, and so I will occasionally talk about it. Deal.

Word of the Day: gibbous - marked by convexity or swelling; in a moon or planet, more than half-visible, but not full; having a hump

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