The Sad Circus by the Sea: After 97 Completed Quests in Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion ...

February 2007

December 18, 2006

Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
				1	2	3
4	5	6	7	8	9	10
11	12	13	14	15	16	17
18	19	20	21	22	23	24
25	26	27	28

After 97 Completed Quests in Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion ...

I lie awake in a panic of bitter yet myopic shame when I realized that I lost one hundred hours of life to Bethesda and the world of player built game MODS. After a year of set-backs on ShutterBox Four, and seemingly endless interruptions from a dementia-ridden mother-in-law and grand mother who react to getting a hair cut with the tears of a prisoner released from hard labor, and with little time for Tavisha or I to play except in the virtual sense in giant-sized, grief-ridden catacombs known as the MMORPG, playing Oblivion was like drowning in a sensory depravation tank.

But look at that kitty up there. She don't care about nothin' but eating the ribbons off of presents. That's what I should be doing for this leisure Christmas season too. I was going to write a review about Darren Aronofsky's beautiful, The Fountain. I was going to start reading that stack of George MacDonald Fraser Flashman novels. I was going to listen to the Maya and Flash tutorials, finish writing ShutterBox Five, finish writing my other novel ... but no. I'm going for the ribbons.

Before I choke and die on this pile of silver tinsel garland, I'll share these photos of the Tokyopop Christmas party with you. You're welcome.

The party was appropriately located under a roaring roller coaster in the Kids Cove of Santa Monica Pier. I would have preferred a mini-golf course, but alas only Quixote gets windmills. Yes, I'm waxing poetic over mini-golf. Don't look at me.

Actually, I very much like the Santa Monica Pier, which is why ShutterBox Book One opens there. See? They have a big Ferris Wheel and everything.

Tavisha and I sat rapt with amazement as we discovered that not only were we no longer inside our house behind computer screens, but we were thirty feet in the air above wood, concrete and freezing high tide.

But too lofty those Ferris Wheel heights. I became enthralled with the elemental ichor of life, my mouth hung agape as I reached into the realm of the unknown. This is where babies really come from. Your parents lied to you. Holy shit, I'm fat in that picture.

Meanwhile, back at the party, while carnies grouped up in lethargic dens in fits of obsessive compulsive money-counting and shouting gracelessly in megaphones, Tokyopop editor Lillian discovered the bumper cars and waged some kind of bumpy-war or something.

But as always happens with bumper cars, someone dropped a singularity smack in the middle of the rink and all drivers were pulled at near-light speed towards their doom.

The resulting explosion tore the very fabric-softener-like stuff of the universe into manky little bits (that's right, manky, not mangy). But it is a slow demise, for time distorts in a black hole, and they are still there slowly bumping to their aeons-long peril.

So yeah, it was pretty swell.

-Rikki

(LiveJournal version of entry here: http://rikkisimons.livejournal.com/20473.html)

December 18, 2006 | Permalink

Verify your Comment

Previewing your Comment

Posted by: |

This is only a preview. Your comment has not yet been posted.

Your comment could not be posted. Error type:

Your comment has been posted. Post another comment

The letters and numbers you entered did not match the image. Please try again.

As a final step before posting your comment, enter the letters and numbers you see in the image below. This prevents automated programs from posting comments.

Having trouble reading this image? View an alternate.