The weekend update post
May. 23rd, 2011 01:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
drwexThe weather went from "hey, what's that bright warm thing I haven't seen in a long time?" to "OMG my joints are really not liking this crap could it stop now please?"
L really did poorly this weekend. I can't tell how much is him being actually unwell, how much is him mirroring Mommy's overt illness signals in an effort to get attention, how much is recalcitrance over homework he would rather not have to do, and whatever else. I don't think he's actually random - he just changes his responses so rapidly and fluidly it's hard as heck to tell what he's actually up to.
Saturday I had planned to do several things during the day, none of which came to pass due to a combination of exhaustion nappage, Pygment being sick, and various other minor stuffs. I finally de-lamed enough to head to the Restacking, getting only minorly lost on the way there and on the way home. Unfortunately I'm seeming less and less able to deal with crowds of people in small spaces. We arrived early and I tried to have a few conversations with folk but mostly couldn't do it. Hey, it's a party, what do you expect. The flavored rum was quite tasty, at least.
K went with me and on the way home we got into an extended discussion of what makes a good adventure plot. My DMing style is heavily influenced by my association with MIT Assassin games, in which there's not usually one goal that everyone works toward. Instead, there's an overall structure and theme, but within that there are layers and it's quite common for individual players to have sub-goals that add to, are related to, or may even be in opposition to the main theme. For example in one game I played the main plot was an attempt to find and defuse a bomb before it destroyed the spaceship we all traveled in, but I was allied with a character who had a goal to find and recover (secretly) a packet of diplomatic information that the terrorist had stolen before planting the bomb.
K, in case you haven't met him, is very literal-minded. Trying to get him to grok that stories have layers, and that clues should lead rather than explain, and that you don't wrap everything up at the end of one adventure so that there are hooks to lead the players to the next adventure... well, it's an interesting project. I'm overtly pleased that I have a geek kid who wants to have these sorts of conversations in the first place.
Sunday was supposed to be a birthday brunch, kids' Hebrew School graduation, a birthday party, a baby shower, and various house chores. Err, well, yes. I didn't plan everything to happen in one day, I promise.
The big complication here was that L had schoolwork he had to get done, and Pygment had let him spend all Saturday afternoon playing D&D and such. You might notice that he missed the Restacking? Yeah, well, he wasn't going to get his work done and we weren't going to be able to make him do it. Just a big stubborn, that one. Sunday morning he decided to escalate, and Pygment grounded him.
So instead of taking both kids to Hebrew school graduation, Pygment needed to take K and I got to stay home with L. This led to a running match of him shouting and throwing tantrums and upset over not getting to go, and me being firm about how much time he had to get things done before the birthday party. In the end, he got a reasonable amount done and I took him. Meanwhile I busied myself doing dishes and laundry and cleaning things. In this case the immovable object (me) won out over the irresistible force (him).
Unfortunately, the combination of things that needed to get done and the energy needed to manage L pretty much drained Pygment. She tried resting while the kids were at the b-day party but by the time we should have left it was clear she wasn't in great shape. Still, she felt obliged, she should go, etc etc etc.
So I looked at her and said: "You know that if I was feeling this sick you'd be telling me to stay home."
Being Right has its advantages. She stayed and I took the kids. The party was great, if quite loud. I felt a little out of place, as I usually do at showers, so I busied myself with eating and kid-wrangling, and finding time to talk to people I don't see often enough.
I managed to be of some small use to the hosts and to people close to me when they needed me. Unfortunately, K got overwhelmed by (I think) the cat hair on the carpeted floor and ended up needing to be taken home. He swears he took his meds that morning; I'm not so sure.
I got them home, tagged in Pygment, and went to nap myself. I find the whole emotional wrangling stuff to be quite exhausting.
L really did poorly this weekend. I can't tell how much is him being actually unwell, how much is him mirroring Mommy's overt illness signals in an effort to get attention, how much is recalcitrance over homework he would rather not have to do, and whatever else. I don't think he's actually random - he just changes his responses so rapidly and fluidly it's hard as heck to tell what he's actually up to.
Saturday I had planned to do several things during the day, none of which came to pass due to a combination of exhaustion nappage, Pygment being sick, and various other minor stuffs. I finally de-lamed enough to head to the Restacking, getting only minorly lost on the way there and on the way home. Unfortunately I'm seeming less and less able to deal with crowds of people in small spaces. We arrived early and I tried to have a few conversations with folk but mostly couldn't do it. Hey, it's a party, what do you expect. The flavored rum was quite tasty, at least.
K went with me and on the way home we got into an extended discussion of what makes a good adventure plot. My DMing style is heavily influenced by my association with MIT Assassin games, in which there's not usually one goal that everyone works toward. Instead, there's an overall structure and theme, but within that there are layers and it's quite common for individual players to have sub-goals that add to, are related to, or may even be in opposition to the main theme. For example in one game I played the main plot was an attempt to find and defuse a bomb before it destroyed the spaceship we all traveled in, but I was allied with a character who had a goal to find and recover (secretly) a packet of diplomatic information that the terrorist had stolen before planting the bomb.
K, in case you haven't met him, is very literal-minded. Trying to get him to grok that stories have layers, and that clues should lead rather than explain, and that you don't wrap everything up at the end of one adventure so that there are hooks to lead the players to the next adventure... well, it's an interesting project. I'm overtly pleased that I have a geek kid who wants to have these sorts of conversations in the first place.
Sunday was supposed to be a birthday brunch, kids' Hebrew School graduation, a birthday party, a baby shower, and various house chores. Err, well, yes. I didn't plan everything to happen in one day, I promise.
The big complication here was that L had schoolwork he had to get done, and Pygment had let him spend all Saturday afternoon playing D&D and such. You might notice that he missed the Restacking? Yeah, well, he wasn't going to get his work done and we weren't going to be able to make him do it. Just a big stubborn, that one. Sunday morning he decided to escalate, and Pygment grounded him.
So instead of taking both kids to Hebrew school graduation, Pygment needed to take K and I got to stay home with L. This led to a running match of him shouting and throwing tantrums and upset over not getting to go, and me being firm about how much time he had to get things done before the birthday party. In the end, he got a reasonable amount done and I took him. Meanwhile I busied myself doing dishes and laundry and cleaning things. In this case the immovable object (me) won out over the irresistible force (him).
Unfortunately, the combination of things that needed to get done and the energy needed to manage L pretty much drained Pygment. She tried resting while the kids were at the b-day party but by the time we should have left it was clear she wasn't in great shape. Still, she felt obliged, she should go, etc etc etc.
So I looked at her and said: "You know that if I was feeling this sick you'd be telling me to stay home."
Being Right has its advantages. She stayed and I took the kids. The party was great, if quite loud. I felt a little out of place, as I usually do at showers, so I busied myself with eating and kid-wrangling, and finding time to talk to people I don't see often enough.
I managed to be of some small use to the hosts and to people close to me when they needed me. Unfortunately, K got overwhelmed by (I think) the cat hair on the carpeted floor and ended up needing to be taken home. He swears he took his meds that morning; I'm not so sure.
I got them home, tagged in Pygment, and went to nap myself. I find the whole emotional wrangling stuff to be quite exhausting.
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no subject
Date: 2011-05-23 05:32 pm (UTC)Witness the power of naps
Date: 2011-05-23 05:36 pm (UTC)Also, Diet Coke.