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Origins 2009: Day 2

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The big difference between going to a big con before and after  having kids is that before your sleep deprived when leaving the con, after kids, you’re sleep deprived from day one.

I woke up Thursday looking forward to gaming, but nursing a headache from too little sleep and too much beer. Nothing a lot of coffee couldn’t fix though. We headed north for coffee and free wifi at Cup o’Joe. Great coffee but unfortunately the wireless network wouldn’t work with our iPod touches.

Coffee in hand and headache tamed, three of the Blackrazors headed to Hackmaster Basic tutorial session.

The first stop on Day 2 was the convention hall and customer service to get a refund on one of my Thursday events, which freed up my afternoon to wander the exhibit  hall.

My first event was Hackmaster Basic, which was an introductory event. It got off to a slow start – our table leader was still learning the rules himself, and we had several false starts. That said, character creation was a fun mix of random rolls and point building, and once we were done we got to run thriuh a scenario with one of the games designers. It’s very crunchy, but I’m looking forward to my own group’s playtest.

Origins 2009: Day 1

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Origins 2009 is off to a good start. After navigating some flight snufus, we checked into the Hyatt Regency without any problems and snagged a late lunch at Barley’s Brew Pub.

Then we headed over to the convention center proper, wandered around a bit looking for the pre-reg counter, found it and managed to get our badges and events in under 5 minutes. That alone was a huge improvement over GenCon.

We’ve sneaked peaks at some of the gaming areas, which are downright cavernous. It’s cool to see all the tables consolidated in one place, unlike GenCon’s scattered approuch. I’m curious to see how it plays out noise-wise tomorrow.

After registering we chatted with David Moore, his wife Erin and various members of the Gamemasters Show while we waited for the rest of our group to arrive. 

When we go to GenCon, we usually spend Wednesday night eating good food, drinking good beer and playing old favorites like Illuminati or Munchkin.

Except this time we forgot the games.

Fortunately Game Base 7 was around to save our Wednesdau They run a boards game library: give them your driver’s license, they go give you a game.

Confident we had a game solution, we headed out to Elevator, a brewpub on High Street, where we drove the bartenders slightly crazy by ordering four 12 beer samplers. The best one? Three Frog.

Twitter Follow Friday: 5/15/09

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Here’s my “Follow Friday” list for 5/15. I didn’t get any education-centric folks on my list this week, but I’ll try and make up for that next week. #followfriday @Crafty_Games (publisher of Spycraft, Mastercraft) @RPGObjects (Darwin’s World, Blood & Space) @SJGames (GURPS, geek culture) #followfriday @fredhicks (Spirt of the Century, groks the hobby game industry) … Read more

Baseball Nerds Unite: IronPigs Host Star Wars Night

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The Lehigh Valley IronPigs — the AAA affiliate of the Philadelpha Phillies — is hosting a Star Wars night. That’s right: Star Wars. And baseball. On the same night! The event is being held Thursday, June 11, 2009 from 5:45pm – 10:45pm at Coca-Cola Park in Allentown, Pa. According to the team’s Facebook page, fans … Read more

Goodnight Saint: 1996-2009

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Saint, our 13-year-old German Shepherd Dog, was a huge, friendly dog who spent his days guarding his pack, watching out for the ever-present feline menace, and keeping a mindful eye on the two-legged pups running amok in our house. We adopted him at age 3 as a “brother” for Madison, our yellow Labrador. We quickly … Read more

The Secret of Game Night for Kids

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My six-year-old daughter is a gamer. She’s had a Nintendo DS in her hands since she was three, and she’s been playing the Xbox 360 with me almost as long. She loves video games, and would play them every night (and every day) if she could, but we knew early on we’d need to set limits.

Since Stargirl was about four and a half, we’ve had Game Night twice a week. Game Night is held on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and lasts for one hour. She can play any game she wants — on the Xbox 360, on the DS, on my Mac, or even a good ol’board game (which she has occasionally chosen) — but she’s only got an hour.

Over the summer, we added a new wrinkle to Game Night: we take away minutes for bad behavior. Whining? Refusing to clean up your room? Yelling at your brother? Not putting your dirty laundry in the hamper? All these will cost her minutes on Game Night. She can earn these minutes back through good behavior.

Game Night’s worked out well. For one thing, it’s established clear limits on her gaming. She gets to play for two hours a week. She might get bonus game time on a Saturday night if the family decides to play the Wii, but that’s it. Game Night’s also gotten rid of the “when can I play my game?” whining that we had when she was four, and Game Night hadn’t been established yet. And it’s also helped with discipline.

Twitter Follow Friday: 3/13/09

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#FollowFriday is a new meme that’s popped up over the last few weeks on Twitter. The idea is that people identify folks they enjoy following and tweet about them using the #FollowFriday hashtag. It’s a cool idea, though personally I wish that people would spend a few more characters explaining why they follow them. I … Read more

The Baseball Thaw

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It’s February in Pennsylvania, which means we’re alternating between cold and icy, cold and muddy, and just plain cold. Oh we get the occasional spring tease, when temps spike up to the mid-40s, but those are quickly gone. Now granted, it’s not New England, which just got another foot of snow, but it’s still miserable … Read more