Kevin and Rubi have been happily married and in love for over fifteen years and have three great kids. He's a Public Safety Communications Supervisor and a "fantastic fiction" geek. She's a wonderful wife and a great mom, and writes about computer games for a living at Massively.com. Kev and Rubi enjoy spending as much time together as they can given their busy lives.
One interview is at incgamers and kind of focuses on her new webcast: Guildcast TV which debuted last night (Thursday December 15, 2012). The other interview is at GuildMag and was just published today, but was actually done back in May of 2012.
Check `em out to learn more about what Rubi does! (And visit Guys Lit Wire!)
Christmas draws nigh and I'm sure many people are already finished with their Christmas Shopping. I'm one of those people that tends to put it off until December every year, and usually the back-half of the month.
This year, I've done more shopping online than in previous years. I scored a free Prime membership to Amazon, so shipping is free on just about anything I buy that Amazon ships (though not from their resellers). I'm just about finished buying for my wife - I could stop now and call it good, but I might try to pick up one or two more things for her - though I don't know what those would be just yet.
She and I are close to being finished shopping for our kids. We're completely finished shopping for our youngest daughter - deals for her gifts just seemed to fall into our laps this year and when we stopped to take stock of what we'd bought, we were surprised by how much stuff we had already bought... now we have to catch up on the other two kids. We do have some stuff for each of them, but we're not finished.
We also need to buy stuff for her parents, and maybe something else for my parents. We bought a little something for my parents, but I think I'd like to add to it.
As for myself, I had a mix of fun stuff and home-improvement stuff on my own gift list, in addition to all the cool stuff on my Amazon wish list. Some of the stuff on my list includes:
A kindle or other ebook reader.
Two ceiling fans for my house (to replace aging ones).
Two storm doors for my house (to replace aging or missing ones).
A tool chest of drawers and cabinets.
Geeky T-shirts, including anything Firefly/Serenity.
USB to HDMI adapter
Wireless laptop mouse
Saw horses.
A 13’ extension ladder (or thereabouts)
Those are some of things I've asked for this year. And hey, if you want to help me out... ;-)
I finally made it to my very first Gen Con this year! I only attended on Saturday, but I had a blast and hope to be able to attend more than one day in the future.
Gen Con is a staple of table-top gaming conventions; I’d say it’s the king. It seems like there’s never been a time I haven’t known of it. It moved to Indianapolis in 2003, which is close enough to me that I could at least make a day trip for one day. But for some reason I never managed to get around to it. This year, since my wife writes about computer games and I review books, we decided to try to make the trip. I could only get one day off from my day job though, so Saturday we got up at three o’clock in the morning and drove to Indy.
Our first stop was to meet some of Rubi’s coworkers for breakfast away from the con – next time we go, we’re doing the Tracy Hickman Breakfast. I’ve been hearing for years that it’s awesome, but since we only had one day this year, we had to scant time to do much. After breakfast, we drove into Indy proper and hit the convention center. Once checked-in, we flipped through the program to decide what to do.
While planning, we ran into a great cosplayer dressed as Darth Vader. A costumed violin player quickly set up near him while there was a crowd around and started playing the Star Wars theme, then transitioned into the Imperial March. That was a thing of beauty – impeccable timing and great talent! I really enjoy seeing all the costumes at cons.
Our first stop was the exhibition hall. We could have spent days in the exhibition hall. Especially with unlimited funding! I found so many things I wanted to purchase for myself, and for my family. One thing for future trips: we need to demo more games while in the exhibition hall.
As we were walking through the exhibition hall, Rubi found the line to see the cast of The Guild. I think the line stretched to Gary, Indiana and back. Rubi was crazy about speaking with Felicia Day in-person since she got to interview her for Massively Speaking, and she wasn’t able to swing an in-person interview during Gen Con for some reason. She opted to catch the after-lunch line instead of the current one.
We eventually made it to the Asmadi Games booth, where we had planned on replacing our missing We Didn’t Play Test This At All card game that we bought at PAXEast. However, they had a combo-deal that was too good to pass up – we got the card game, plus all its expansion decks, and the game Win, Lose, Banana! This purchase made the entire family happy. We also demo’d WDPTTAL, so we all got Cake! (That’s a card similar to the Banana card, only with Cake featured instead.)
By this time, we needed lunch. I’m cheap, so we hit the mall food court. After foodage, we headed back to the exhibition hall to make our round-about way to the line to see Felicia Day. Our first stop though was the art show. I was so impressed by the talent on display there. I see fantasy and science fiction art frequently and I know someone has to create that, but seeing the art right there on canvas with the artist sitting in front of it really brought that home for me. I saw more than one tip jar in the various art booths as well, to feed “starving artists”. They deserve every penny.
Authors’ Row was next to the art exhibit, so of course I had to stop and see if anything interested me. (Note to self: don’t do this anymore unless you plan on taking more money with you, or blatantly asking for review copies.) I did find several interesting books and Rubi talked me into buying one that sounded interesting to all of us. I traded business cards with another author, who upon reading my card, asked if I wanted a review copy. Of course I do! But only if the author is okay with giving me one. This author had a very nice hard-back ARC of his novel that had been autographed to another fan. The book had a small ding on the spine and the fan didn’t like that. Also, that fan had a very unusual name so the author couldn’t “recycle” the book for another fan with the same name. I happily took that copy and will be reviewing it soon. A few booths away was the artist who did the cover art for that book. His signature now adorns the cover of my review copy.
As we were wandering through the art exhibit, Rubi noticed a sign declaring an artist that did concept art for her favorite MMO would be there later. Later being while she was in-line to see Felicia Day. We walked her down to the line, where she’d have to wait for an hour or more, and returned to the art and author exhibit to finish our browsing and make finalize our purchases. Then went over and chatted with the artist for a bit. Rubi’s co-worker Justin asked some great questions and the artist was nice enough to provide some great answers.
A fun part of this trip was bringing our oldest daughter, Lizzy, with us to Gen Con. She’s been itching to go to a con, loves seeing the cosplayers, and wanted to pick up some con swag if possible. While Rubi was in line, I took our daughter around and she managed to get some fun buttons and some kind of plushy manga character. Rubi’s coworker Justin, hung out with us most of day too. That was a blast. I wish we had had more time to hang out with him and his family. While taking Lizzy around, Rubi called me to let me know she was almost at the front of the line and I needed to come take pictures. I sent Lizzy off to see the costume parade and visit the manga library while I met back up with Rubi and took pictures of her with the cast of The Guild.
After that, we decided, since it’s a gaming con, we had to at least try one game. We visited the Rio Grande Games room where Justin introduced to Dominion, which we must soon purchase. We enjoyed playing Dominion. We really should do more actual gaming next time we do Gen Con. While Rubi, Justin, and I played the game, Lizzy made it back to us and hung out for a few minutes, then went back to the exhibition hall to take some video on her phone.
I honestly don’t remember exactly what we did next. But eventually we ended up sitting on the floor near a pillar and playing We Didn’t Play Test This At All until Justin had to leave to meet back up with his family for their trip home.
After a quick dinner, in the mall again (next time, we must feast at the Red Dragon Inn), we got in line for our final event of the evening: The Guild panel. That was very fun, and Lizzy decided she needed to start watching The Guild. After the panel, we made our three hour drive back home and were in bed by midnight.
Long day, but well worth it. We all had a blast and now we’re jonesing for the next con we can go to as a family. Rubi’s heading out to PAX in September, but I won’t be able to go with her this time. I’m look for some inexpensive, closer to home, smaller cons that maybe we can do. We’ve already missed InConJunction this year, but there’s ConGlomeration a ways off around Easter next year.
Thanks to Gen Con for providing Sporadic Reviews with a media pass. I’ll get my reviews of the books I acquired at the con posted as soon as I can.
Yes, my wife took that picture. We walked by, and I said "Hey, I should get my picture taken with them!" in a wink-wink-nudge-nudge voice. Rubi answered "Don't think I won't take that picture, get over there!"
This is weird. My wife is almost a better geek than I am.
I'm proud to be a geek but I've never really been an active geek - participating in the culture, attending cons, etc. Mostly due to time constraints. When Rubi and I got married, she was so not a geek, and I suppressed my own inner geek a bit in order to focus more on growing a marriage and eventually a family. I still had a Star Wars poster hanging in our home, but that was about it (I still have that poster hanging in our home). Now that the kids are old enough to, well, be real people and not just crying pooping machines, I can let my geek hang out a little more.
What's cool is that apparently, over the years my inner geek has slowly influenced Rubi and turned her into an almost full-fledged geek. She's still learning some of the more esoteric aspects, but has embraced the life; playing computer games, hanging out in forums, attending cons, and writing about it for a living.
She may argue the point about whether or not she was a geek before meeting me. She played Mario Bros on the NES when she a kid, watched Blazing Saddles with her parents (and quoted from it). Perhaps she was just repressing her own inner geek until marriage and family made her comfortable enough to embrace geekdom. Her arguing that point is kind of like arguing if Star Wars is better that Star Trek.
We need to work on her a bit more though. There are times when the kids and I are just a bit too geeky for her. The other day at Target, Alexander and I got into a mock fight with a toy sword and battle axe. When I later told Lizzy about it she was offended we did that without her. Had Rubi been there, depending on her geek level that day, she might have grabbed a sword and participated or she might have pretended she didn't know us and walked away. I think sometimes it's better for all of us if she pretends she doesn't know us. Someone has to be respectable in this family!
Then there are times when she'll find something on the internet that is so incredibly funny and geeky that she'll call me into the room to share it with me and we'll both just about pee ourselves from laughing so hard. And no one else on the planet would find it anywhere near as funny as we did. Or she'll walk into a room full of quiet kids each going about their own tasks and say "Hey! You just lost the game!"
Ah, that's the life. Of geeks! And I'm glad it's my life.
Been quite awhile since we've blogged here. Our Facebook and Twitterstatusestell the story. To sum up: we've been busy, and micro-status updates are easier and more convenient to post than a lengthy, friendly blog update.
Back in September of 2009, Rubi got a job she'd been wanting for quite some time. She's now a writer for Massively - blogging about massive multi-player online games (MMORPGs). With the kids' schedules, the holidays, my crazy work schedule the last few months of last year, and the kids' winter break, it took Rubi quite awhile to settle in to a routine with her new job. She did, though, and is doing an amazing job - and even got her own column writing about Guild Wars, one of her favorite games.
Along with Rubi's new job comes new opportunities - we'll be traveling to Boston at the end of March to attend PAX East, a convention for computer games, board games, role playing games, dice games, card games, console games - basically any and all kinds of games are represented at this convention. Rubi will be working practically all of the time, interviewing people from the different PC gaming companies about their games. I'll be attending as her gopher, and also to have some fun of my own while she's busy (and to go to all the cool parties with her). We're also planning on attending the West Coast version of this convention over the Labor Day weekend.
At the start of the new year, I moved from my normal second shift hours of 3pm-11pm to a much more family friendly dayshift hours of 7am-3pm - which also has taken the family some getting used to.
Then mid-February (about 10 days ago), I slipped on the ice on the walk in front of our house, apparently did a mid-air flip to avoid my head or back hitting the concrete steps and concrete molding near me, heard a loud pop from my right ankle and was in quite some pain as I writhed on the snowy ground. Rubi called my coworkers (lucky me, "working at" 9-1-1) to ask for an ambulance for me. I griped at her during the call and made her hang up. I did not want to be the guy who took an ambulance to the ER for a sprained ankle (I had sprained the same ankle in high school, resulting in the need for crutches and a then cane and then a severe limp for several weeks). Shortly after I got her to hang up, I asked her to call back and go ahead and get me an ambulance. I figured I'd get seen, in and out of the ER, much quicker if I came in by ambulance than if I drove in and went through standard triage. While she was on the phone with the ambulance, they asked her their standard questions, including "Is he conscious and breathing?" to which she replied, "Oh yeah, he's awake and crabby!".
I did get right in to a room at the ER, saw a nurse (or three) pretty quickly and got to X-ray. Shortly after getting my ankle x-rayed three times, one nurse (who recognized me from high school) came in and told me I had broken my ankle and would probable need surgery to get screws put in, but she wasn't sure about the surgery part and the doctor would have to confirm that.
She came back a little later and confirmed I would need surgery and told me to go see the orthopedic surgeon the next day and would probably have surgery the day after that.
Sure enough, after seeing the orthodoc, he scheduled me for surgery the next day. I broke my ankle Monday afternoon, saw the doc Tuesday morning, and was in the hospital for surgery at 8am Wednesday. Getting into the hospital and prepped for the surgery took probably a couple three hours, the surgery was scheduled for 10:30am. The surgery lasted maybe 10-15 minutes - had 2 5mm screws put in to reattach my inner ankle bone pieces together - and I was in recovery until, I think, almost 5pm. Lortabs and an empty stomach didn't agree with me; I got a bit queasy. They put something in my IV (not phenergan, which is what I expected) to stop the nausea and it worked. By the time it had taken affect, I was ready to get up and walk out there I had been there so long. But they eventually wheeled me out in a wheelchair to my darling bride waiting with the van at the curb.
I've got a follow up appointment next week, where I hope to get this over-large, overly heavy splint off my leg and something smaller and more compact put on in place of it that's easier to dress around and easier to wrap so I can take a shower more easily. I asked the doc about the con in Boston, and he said I should be using a cane by then.
I ended up taking 3 sick days off of work, and a personal day to try and get used to having a broken ankle and dealing with it. I actually had 6 days off before I had to be back (those 4 days, plus two normal days for my weekend). My first day back, I only worked half a day - went home early. Worked the next day, when my boss brought me a nice wooden can wrapped in gold-colored ribbon and bow as a gift (the cane had been hers). Took another sick day to deal with continuing pain in my ankle, lack of sleep, and an upset stomach from taking pain killers on an empty stomach (when will I learn?!). And I'm back today working 12 hours overnight from 7pm to 7am.
In additon to my and Rubi's craziness, Alexander has had wrestling practice twice a week and/or wrestling matches, and Lizzy has art club and speech team; all after school, keeping us jumping all afternoon/evening some days picking up kids from school at different times, because none of those events ever end at the same time as each other.
And I think Lizzy has given up blogging here in favor of blogging at her Stuck in 7th Grade blog.
I've been writing book reviews sporadically over on my book review blog, and as mentioned earlier, Rubi and I have been facebooking and tweeting more often, and she and I started our own podcast. We have two episodes posted and hope to find the time to record more soon.
I did a decade in review first... then thought I might as well do a year in review as well.
January: Snowpocalypse! An ice storm forces us to spend a week with at Rubi's parents' house because ours was without power.
February: We got to come home!
March: uh... Daylight Saving Time began?
April: can't think of anything.
May: Duh, 15th wedding anniversary!
June: Massive remodeling project on the kids' rooms.
July: The kids spent a week with Rubi's parents. Awesome!
August: Rubi begins occasionally guest co-hosting Massively Speaking, the podcast from the website she will later become employed at.
September: Rubi gets hired on at Massively.com!
October: Rubi stresses over working two jobs, and her secratary job finally succumbs to the pressure. Kevin and Rubi start a podcast. Rubi's sister moves to Texas.
November: I have to work Thanksgiving. Again. The first episode of our podcast hits the feed.
December: We welcome Miss Kitty Fantastico into our home.
The first decade of the 21st Century: the naughts, the aughts, the naughties, the ohs?
Let's see what has transpired for The Bayer Family over the past decade.
2000: Alexander, our second child, is born. Yay! (Lizzy was born last century!)
2001: Catherine, our third child and second daughter, is born. Yay! (How'd that happen?)
2002: Lizzy started Kindergarten at the same private school I attended.
2003: I registered this blog... then waited a year to begin posting
2004: Rubi and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary on our first family trip to Walt Disney World! Thanks to Rubi's parents.
2005: I started reviewing books on this blog, and elsewhere, occasionally.
2006: Rubi and I became fans of Firefly via the DVDs.
2007: Our second family trip to Walt Disney World! Thanks Rubi's parents!
2008: Rubi and I took up in-line skating for the spring.
2009: Rubi and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary!
I am thankful for so much; God has blessed me in so many ways I could write a book of thankfullness. Instead, I'll summarize some of the high points.
I'm thankful for my bride Rubi, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish for all eternity.
I'm thankful for our kids Lizzy, Alex, and Catherine: three very different but equally loveable, smart, and just plain cool.
I'm thankful for our families, hers and mine. We both have great parents and extended families and they are a true blessing to us both.
I'm thankful for my job, stressful as it is. At least I'm employed and have some semblance of job security - not everyone can say that.
I could go on and on, but I'll end with this quote that one of my bosses emailed the staff yesterday:
"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow."
-Melody Beattie
Thanks to an idea from my mother-in-law, I've added another CafePress Store with items themed around kids inadvertently seeing inappropriate words around them.
Buying from this store helps support The Bayer Family.
Here are some things I've learned about remodeling rooms:
-It's a pain in the neck - literally. I've had a kink in my neck for over a week and my shoulders are sore. I fell the other day and still hurt; and I also stepped on a nail.
-Let your kiddos help knock out walls and stuff. They're also good at carrying things to the trash and bringing you things when you need them, or finding tools you've misplaced.
-You might be surprised what you find behind the walls in an old house. When we first moved in and did some work on the home, we found a giant hand-drawn R2D2 on one of the walls in the Master Bedroom. This time around, we found an old Bingo ball behind one of the walls in the closet. We also found really nice, though poorly maintained, hardwood floors under all the carpeting.
-It's a good idea to wear sunscreen while standing outside on a hot summer day painting doors and trim.
-It's a bad idea to wear your only really good pair of jeans to paint.
-Cheap face masks should have an integral place in every tool box, and are a must when sanding or installing blown-in installation.
-Paint rollers never EVER rinse clean.
-When you purchase carpet to install in two rooms at separate times, it's a good idea to get the carpet cut into two separate rolls. It's much easier to carry that way.
-Apparently, previous owners that did all the additions and remodeling before us believed in the addage "you can never use enough nails".
-They also had problems with straight lines, squared corners, and keeping everything level. (Maybe they subscribed to my remodeling ethic: "GAH! Let's just get it done! Who cares if it's perfect!"
-And for some reason, they really liked pink: Pink on the walls in the bathroom, in a closet; I actually think they used pink as a primer... And this really nasty shade of green in places inside and on the shutters outside.
-They also wired the house so that just about whatever breaker you throw, something in each room turns off.
-During remodeling, someone will inevitable curse in front of the children. Cursing during remodeling is, in itself, inevitable.
Our current project, Alexander's room, isn't finished yet. I may have more tidbits once that's finished.
While Elizabeth was off at camp this week, Rubi's parents offered to help us remodel the room she and Catherine share. We planned it as a surprise for Elizabeth. She didn't know anything about it.
I've included some pictures taken during the past week.
First off - you can see why we decided to remodel:
We found some sticks in our driveway and thought they might be useful.
Rubi decided to nail them to the floor.
So I locked her in a closet, but she tore her way out.
The little kids helped her escape.
And they put me to work.
But I tried to escape through the ceiling.
They found me though.
And put both me and Rubi to work.
Rubi's dad tried to get away too, but Alexander stopped him.
Rubi didn't want to help, so they punished her.
Finally! The room was finished!
At least, I think that's how the week went.
It has been a long but industrious week. Rubi and I both are sore and tired, as are her parents. And the kids are finally settling back in after having the house in a major mess for a week.
When Lizzy got home yesterday afternoon from camp, the family surprised her with a sideways video!
(I was at work though).
Working 3rd shift now, Friday night, and Saturday night.
Off Sunday (if sleeping half the day to recover from 3rd shift counts as "off") and Monday then back to work for more crazy schedules because of the holidays. I'm taking the first full week of January off from work though just because I can.
I finally got to do something I've been wanting to do for years!
For some reason this morning, when my alarm went off - I turned it off instead of hitting snooze button a gazillion times like I usually do. As a result, I got up ...a little later than I expected. And oddly, my kids slept in too. Which is okay, because usually they get up way too early anyway - but now it was definitely time to get up and they were all still asleep. So...
I threw open the doors to their rooms, turned on their lights and started loudly singing:
Rise and Shine And give God the glory glory! Rise and Shine And give God the glory glory! Rise! And! Shine! And! Give God the glory glory! Children... time to get up!
I was so happy!! My kids were all "daaaaaad... zzzzzzz". I've been wanting to loudly sing them awake with that for years!
Just a meme to fill the time until someone in The Bayer Family can come up with something better to write about. I got this from E. E. Knight's LJ.
01. What's the last TV show you saw?
Straight through? The most recent ep of Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles. Bits and pieces as I did other things around the house or fast-forwarded? The two most recent eps of Smallville.
02. What are you wearing at the moment?
Khakie work shirt over a green t-shirt, blue jeans, socks and tennis shoes.
03. Who is/was your favorite cartoon character?
ETA: I honestly can't think of one. I had some cartoons I enjoyed watching, but I can't think of a single character that was a favorite. Maybe Bugs Bunny.
04. What is your favorite scent?
Cake baking in the oven. Bacon frying in a pan. Rubi's hair. That un-nameable smell in the air that just says "It's autumn."
05. What is your favorite drink?
Water.
06. What do you drink the most?
Water and Soft drinks - I can't live without caffeine, but caffeinated beverages aren't my favorite.
07. What is your favorite food?
Pizza, Steak, cake, cinamon rolls, cheesecake.
08. What is your favorite Disney movie?
ETA: MCF did Favorite Classic, Modern, and CG.
My Favorite Classic Disney Movie would be Peter Pan, Modern would be The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, and CG is a toss-up between Toy Story and the Incredibles.
09. What did you want to be when you grew up?
A radio DJ and/or a SF&F writer.
10. What mythological figure are you?
Dadeattoomuch.
11. What animal do you identify with?
Koala Bear: I look soft and cuddly, but I've got a mean streak.
12.What mythological/fictional creature would you most like to be?
A sentient dragon.
13.What is your current desktop?
That I'm using now (at work)? Or at home? At home, it's an AMD 1.7ghz with a gig of RAM, a 120gb HD, and a 128mb video card. At work I'm using a Pentium D processor (somewhere between 2.4ghz and 3.2 ghz, System Properties shows both), with 1 gig of RAM and dual displays (and it runs slower than my PC at home).
14. What kind of person do you think the person who tagged you is?
He didn't tag me, I stole this meme from him. He's a published SF&F author of two excellent series, and sometimes posts inappropriate pics that I shouldn't be looking at.
15. What are you afraid of?
The death of family members.
16. What's your favorite item of clothing?
Well-worn in jeans and an old t-shirt.
17. What are you into right now?
Facebook, for some dumb reason. There's a AD&D application there called "Tiny Adventures" that's kinda fun.
18. What did you do today?
Woke up on time, made instant oatmeal for the kids, got Rubi and the kids off to work and school, napped, watched some TV, made cupcakes, played Guild Wars with Rubi and went to work.
19. What do you want?
For someone to give me strings-free lots and lots of money so I can pay off all my bills and such so Rubi doesn't have to work and we can live comfortably.
20. What should you be doing right now?
Paying attention to what's going on at work around me.
21. What's the meaning behind your username/name/nicknames you go by?
Most of my usernames are some variation of my real name.
What's fun about it, is Rubi and I recently heard a speaker use that quote to describe communications between wives and husbands (as in, the above quote is the way a woman feels about the way her husband hears her).
It's definitely true! We men often hear exactly what our wives say, but there's a difference between understanding the words, and understanding our wives.
Rubi says: "We should clean out the van soon."
Kev hears: "We should clean out the van soon."
Rubi means: "You should go clean out the van now."
(This is a purely hypothetical situation, mind you.)
Rubi says: "The grass is getting tall."
Kev hears: "It's time to teach Elizabeth how to mow the lawn."
Rubi means: "Go mow the lawn."
Rubi says: "I'm getting hungry."
Kev hears: "Let's order pizza."
Rubi means: "Let's order pizza."
Sometimes this comic-strip hits the family-life nail dead on the head:
Actually, Rubi has been doing a bang-up job with getting the kids to stay on-top of cleaning up after themselves. She has a system where we all get together and work on specific rooms. And in-between, she makes sure the kids know not to leave a trail of toys and whatnot behind them as they go from room to room to play.
I'm just glad she hasn't set her eyes on cleaning off my dresser.
We're still alive. Just been busy with life and all. (I'm at work on a 12-hour overnight shift, hence the blogging to stay awake.)
Rubi started a new job a few weeks ago. She likes the job, says it's like getting to play dress up with dolls - only using real people wanting to buy wedding and prom gowns.
Most of us here at TheBayerFamily caught colds recently and are either recovering from or still suffering it. Alexander lucked out and hasn't really caught anything more than the sniffles.
This weekend we're celebrating Catherine's birthday.
Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving!! I can't believe Turkey Day is next week. And I actually have that day off! Hopefully I'll be having some turkey salad sandwiches for lunch for a few days after Thanksgiving.
A little over a week after that, we're taking a family vacation! I'm trying to decide if it's possible to have the kids do school work in the van during the drive to Florida and back - or rather, if it's conceivable they will actually be able to do the work while traveling.
Next blogging goal: make a post before Christmas!!
Occasionally on my blog, I’ll post a few things and links to places I’ve been on the internet. I call them “THINKS”, a combination of the words things and links. It’s been months since I’ve posted any THINKS… It’s been months since I posted anything of substance at all. Lately it’s been random memes and questionnaires.
Here are a few THINKS, some related to my hometown – Evansville, Indiana. Others are just some things I find interesting.
If you’re a Star Wars fan, the Evansville region has it’s very own Star Wars FanForce fanclub (look for the “Welcome New Members” thread and introduce yourself!). They have monthly book club meetings, monthly collecting meetings, monthly costuming meetings, monthly General meetings (all optional, you can pick and choose what you want to attend and what you don’t). They also have occasional “unofficial” get-togethers and movie outings. Again: Join up! Oh, and the club also maintains a MySpace page.
If you’re in the Evansville area and a fan of Joss Whedon’s Firefly and Serenity… you’re out of luck. There’s no fanclub for us Browncoats in the area. There is a website for Indiana Browncoats to gather though. Once again I say: Join up (even if you’re not in Indiana, we’ll take anyone willing to make a trek to Hoosierland ever now and again for Browncoat revelry – Louisville, St. Louis, etc.)!
Lately I’ve been playing a couple of online games, both are sort of “Space Strategy” games. In oGame, you start a colony on a planet and build up your production to produce fleets of ships, conduct research into new technology, colonize other planets, and maybe attack other players’ colonies to raid for resources. In Dark Pirates, you are a loan pirate raiding transport ships, convoys, and fleets, attacking other pirates, searching for resources, and working on space-stations to earn money to repair and upgrade your ship or buy a new ship. If you join up at either of these, please don’t attack me!
And to finish up, my sister (who does not live in the Evansville area) has started her own blog. She’s better at it than I am.
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