I'm annoyed at Mass Effect 2 again. It yanked me around yesterday, invoking a rather dramatic plot point after an unrelated mission, with very little foreshadowing and no way back.

That the plot point's semi-interactive cutscene had a bit of the flavour of Dragon's Lair in its demand that I move a character exactly as directed or instantly die didn't endear it to me either. I don't like it when new game mechanics (even fluffy semi-cinematic ones) are introduced mid-title. 

Also it has been rumoured that the mission that narratively follows the plot point is time sensitive (as in, you should do it right away rather than fuck about side quests at your leisure), although no other mission in the game thus far has been time sensitive. If that is true, it will piss me off even more. Because I fucked about on some side quests. Because I only had an hour to spare yesterday. We'll see tonight.

Thus far I have not been particularly impressed with BioWare's games at all. They seem to tell great stories, but then, so do a lot of movies and books. I guess I'm supposed to be grateful that I'm getting a mini-series worth of lovely narrative, but it's interspersed with so much tepid and tedious "go here shoot that" gameplay, I more feel like I'm supposed slog through the interminable gun battles just to earn the right to see the next episode rather than eagerly play a viscerally enjoyable game with a cool story that ennervates it. Matter of perspective, I guess.

I'm thankful I'm playing on hard mode, though. At least I'm dying occasionally, though it's sometimes with a rather baffled WTF shake of the head -- "okay, what the hell was hurting me there?"  

I have some thoughts about the playing perspective differences between ME1 and ME2 that I'd like to talk about but I'll probably save them for after I'm done the game. Maybe even get started on ME3 before I really dig in.

Anyone out there started Dragon Age: Inquisition yet? Is that out?

My band of roughly 30 years has put out a collection of songs that we like to call an album. Available early next year as a vinyl LP, currently available as a CD or download. And, through the magic of the internet, it can be listened to in its entirety on Bandcamp. Give it a listen if you'd like.

I'm deep into Book 3, planning where the load-bearing beams will go and pouring footers.

Character profiles, setting details, plot points and major themes are all mapped out in rough form and I'm going through, putting finer details in here and there, calling out connections and setting up resonating imagery.

The Beeble's latest music obsession: March of the Siamese Children from The King and I.

He calls it "the Prince" because I told him that the Prince comes in when the music gets louder.

I turned it off before the end of the song this morning as we got to daycare and he had a nuclear meltdown.

Showtunes are serious business.

Nora Jones' dulcet, smooth style perfectly compliments my mood today.

I struggled to find my "happy place" earlier, when I awoke before the sun, desperately dashing the 20 feet from bedroom to bathroom. But the soft, brushed flannel duvet beckoned me, so I tiptoed downstairs to grab my computer and return to its still warm embrace.

I admit no small appreciation of working in bed, alone, in the hushed pre-dawn mornings. With windows closed, I can't hear the birds' morning conversations or the thwack of morning paper delivery. But a bit of quiet jazz or classical music often accompanies my musings - or, as was the case this morning, my attempts to refashion a syllabus for a class of intro to professional writing students who desperately need refreshers in mechanics and style.

A productive hour passed; my son's door opened and he burst into my room with a joyous energy that's as much a part of this four-(and a half)-year-old's being as his impish grins and penchant for panda parties in the forts we build together.

We squiggled down under the covers and snuggled, while he recounted his dreams from last night. Apparently, while visiting his Nana and Pop-Pop, their house was attacked by zombies. But everyone safely escaped.

Patrick called. "The highways are a mess this morning," he reported. "Best to go through town and avoid 22. I think 78's closed for an accident."

Ugh. Traffic. The clichéd yet apt bane of my existence.

Ben and I motivated - he attempted to levitate from the bed and satisfied himself, instead, with a conciliatory round of jumping-jackson on the mattress. 

The normal 20-minute commute from Fountain Hill to preschool morphed into a 45-minute circumnavigation around school and city buses, broken down cars, traffic lights refusing to turn green, and 18-wheelers determindly negotiating narrow city-street turns.

Our journey's soundtrack? Benjamin rapping along to his latest obsession: Disney Junior's "Blue Ribbon Bunny" and "DJ Shuffle."  I absolutely cannot succumb to road rage with these songs and my son's lilting little-boy voice surrounding me.

"Momma, we're gonna be late," Ben worried.

"We're lucky because we'll get where we're going, even if we're a little late, and we'll get there safe and sound. Other people won't be so lucky today," I replied.

I joined him in singing the theme song to Jake and the Neverland Pirates, and we pulled into the preschool's parking lot joining the congo line of traffic-delayed moms and dads.

Now, Nora's singing "Thinking About You," and while she thinks about me, I'm thinking about Ben, and a conference call later this afternoon, and revising an assignment for Thursday night's class.

I'm tucked away in a corner at Starbucks drinking my tall, skinny (sigh) Caramel Macchiato,  quietly amused by everyone (myself included) tapping away on their Macs and smart phones.

A W-shaped flock of Canadian geese aims south in the whitish-blue sky, and I watch them disappear over the red gold maple trees. I sip my coffee, content.

For those not paying attention, Home Star Runner is so back. Including a new Number One Jam.

Homestar is the gift that keeps on giving. Ever since I first stepped into its little ridiculous yet internally consistent universe I've been hooked on phonics.

Of course, they went away for several years, without a word of explanation, as artists will do when they damn well feel like it.

They first rose from their slumber to release a Windows 98 theme. Nice metacommentary on your "enduring relevance," bros chaps.

But then Strongbad appeared on Twitter. And now we have a steady stream of new ludicrousness in our lives.

I want to write the Long Day's Journey Into Night version of The Munsters. 

I know NBC tried pushing a Munsters reboot with an addiction metaphor, and I suspect I might be the only person who saw it that way. 

Am I the only person who sees The Munsters as a metaphor for living with addiction? And, if Herman was created to be Lily's partner, what does this mean for that poor schmuck? I feel very sorry for him. Is he supposed to be her enabler, or to keep her from being an addict? 

Think about it. Of the entire family, you have three vampires, one, uh, re-animated corpse construction, and one family member who passes for human. This scares me the most. Marilyn says she's "the ugly one of the family," but she's the one who passes for normal in society. She's a niece of Lily and Herman's, and she's part of the family in a full and consistent way. So, I can see how the show creators see her as a bridge between the "normals" and the Munsters, but how does she fulfill the metaphor? 

As the NBC reboot pushed it, she's the lure for Grampa's addiction issues. which makes sense. But what does a woman who has nothing and everything in common with her family want for herself? She really could leave them, but there has to be something that she wants. which means that either she's a really functional addict, or she's never been addicted, but something else makes her want to be there. 

which would mean she's controlling the addicts for her own purposes. a family of pet vampires. jeez, who wouldn't want that? 

Herman's conflicts seem obvious. he's made to be a partner for Lily, someone who won't be afraid of her addiction but doesn't share it. Then they've got a child. If you go by traditional vampire canon, either he's a child from outside the biological family who was turned, or he's the biological product of Herman and Lily. which asks the question if vampires can reproduce. I will not use Twilight as a reference. 

I am, however, stuck on the notion of Herman and Eddie sitting in the living room quietly trying to function with the fact that Lily is addicted upstairs and Grampa is addicted in the basement. 

I actually liked the NBC reboot (even though I generally dislike reboots).  I saw a lot of potential for it as a metaphor for addiction. Since Grampa becomes younger, sexier, and stronger after he's fed, it brings up the really sad part of dysfunctional families. Sometimes things are better when they're at their worst. Sometimes the happy memories of a gleefully drunk parent or remembering the smoky smell of a loving grandparent can be the worst parts of dealing with addiction. But the episode ended with a dead body in the basement, who would certainly be missed by the outside community. 

Pretty heavy stuff for something that's trying to get PG-13 audience numbers. 

I thought about writing a story about a family with a vampire-like curse, but not actually bloodsucking, fanged creatures. Let's say they suck the breath out of you or something. and you have that happening in three direct generations of the family, plus two family members who are half outside, half in, who are either enablers or protectors, who are stuck half in and half out of the family. Maybe this is worth pursuing. 

I've been watching a lot of American Horror Story in the past week. Probably not a good idea. I'm colossally bored with everything and I seem to be able to parcel this out to myself as a cheap treat.  I watched the whole first season, most of it in one marathon on Saturday night. I started watching the second season, and I'm into it so far. I like horror as a metaphor for other things. The writing is compact and it moves fast. It's a good reminder of everything I learned in school about writing. 

We added a feature this week to help solve the "where is everybody" problem:

1. Click "Read." (You're probably there already.)

2. Just below "Read," you'll see three buttons: "following," "network," and "public."

3. "Following" is your usual feed. "Network" is, basically, friends of friends - people followed by people you follow, but not by you, not yet anyway. Naturally it shows only public posts. And "Public" is the firehose: all the public posts in the entire OPWverse.

It won't be long before the "public" feed is impractical to keep up with, which is why we added "network." But "public" will probably always be a fun way to sample the zeitgeist.