Mom calls. Pages – which came with her computer – wants to update. But when she says ‘ok sure update’, the App Store complains that she’s not authorized to update it.

“Hmmm,” I say. “That sounds like a problem on Apple’s end. I’d contact Apple support.”
“How do I do that?” she asks.
“Hah, I dunno. I’d google ‘apple support’ and go from there.”

And then she says thanks, and hangs up the phone to go do just that.
I am so delighted that my mom is NOT TOTALLY AFRAID OF COMPUTERS and understands how to use the googles.

So last night I was siezed by AN URGE: I wanted to make a D&D character. I have no real plans to play in a campaign. I just wanted to make a D&D character. Specifically, an assassin/magic-user multiclass, who mostly uses her magic in the service of getting behind people unobserved, stabbing them in the back, and getting away again before anyone can react.

I ended up grabbing a torrent of the 5th edition Player’s Handbook (if I actually start playing I’ll buy it for real – hell, if I could have bought a PDF for like $10-20, I would have, but WOTC only wants to sell me a physical book) and staying up until like 2AM flipping through it on my iPad , taking copious notes in a previously-empty black sketchbook.

The one thing that really stood out for me about the 5th edition – besides it being really really pretty with a ton of gorgeous, gender-inclusive art (and a paragraph that explicitly includes queer and trans characters!) – is its explicit insistence on storytelling hooks. Players have to choose a background of what they did before becoming wandering adventures, as well as picking an “ideal” the character aims for, a “bond” with something in the past, and a “flaw”. All of these are obvious places for the DM to hang stories. Much better than “well I rolled up this collection of stats, what happens now”. Hell, just deciding on a class offered story potential – I decided to pass up the “Arcane Trickster” rogue specialization in favor of a dual-class rogue-assassin/warlock (Arcane Tricksters cast magic, but only illusions, and a lot of the spells I wanted weren’t illusion). The warlocks are a species of magic-user who get their powers from A Deal They Made, whether with the Fair Folk, the Netherworld, or Tentacles Outside Of Space And Time.

Admittedly for all I know they could have started playing with the idea of ‘bake story hooks into character creation’ as early as 2nd Ed, as the last time I owned D&D books was 1st Ed AD&D, but whatever. I like it. Solely going on ideas from the Player’s Handbook, I ended up with a half-demon lady whose non-adventuring gig is “entertainer” (mostly dancer and tumbler), but who also kills people on the side, and has made a dubious deal with some Lord or Lady of the Fair Folk that results in her having magical power. There are a lot of blanks left to fill in, but I feel like the system is designed to evoke answers for these blanks – for instance, one of the starting items of an entertainer is “some token of a lover” and I’m wanting to put that together with “made a deal with the Fair Folk” and have her doing various dubious jobs to try and get back the lover who the fairies stole. Which, well, I mean that’s something that could drive an entire story, isn’t it? A hell of a lot better start than what I remember getting out of all the steps of character creation in 1st Ed back around 1983.

(also if I ever do actually play her I am going to beg the DM to let me take the bard cantrip ‘Vicious Mockery’ because I totally want to deal in INSULT SWORDFIGHTING now and then.)

Edit. I drew her over breakfast. Are you happy yet, brain? Can I get back to work?

I am wearing black leggings, a sparkly black dress, and a black blouse. They are all slightly different shades of black.

I feel like I am cosplaying Disaster Area’s sundiving ship.

The machine’s been broken for two weeks. But it’s fixed now. I have three weeks of laundry built up, which is going to mean at least three loads.

I am SO looking forwards to actually wearing CLEAN PANTIES again.

A scattered dream just now. Fragments:

– wandering an immense, dark video game arcade full of games with no controls and/or especially cryptic gameplay

– being kidnapped by a skinny old evil English artist who wanted to Make A Tarot Deck; his deck in progress was nothing more than the structure – a long list of how this card would correspond with that one, notes on how it would correspond to playing-card suits. He had it nicely-printed but all it was was glossy empty symbols on black, no art anywhere. “Sure, this could work,” I advised. “Start drawing, be prepared to completely abandon a few finished pieces for it if they don’t work.”

– a field full of little tents with tiny fires in front of them, each occupied by a small girl. Then they started singing in unison.

– A ticking that exactly resembled the ticking of the timer I use when making myself Get Stuff Done.

I woke up right after the timer, with a conviction that it’s time to get some serious drawing done. I’ve been spending the last few weeks wallowing in video games and moodiness.

Yesterday I unlocked the last main story mission in Dragon Age Inquisition. I don’t know if I want to bother playing it; much of the game had me really feeling kind of bored but playing anyway. Its lack of compelling side-quests really hurt it; I’m usually much more interested in fucking off and becoming an assassin or joining the elves or whatnot than being the Designated Hero Who Will Save The World, and DAI really just has a bunch of fetch quests for me rather than any real narrative. All its narrative is invested in the main story and the side quests of your companions. It’s pretty but ultimately it really felt empty to me; I may well sell it off without finishing the last main quest. I have just stopped caring about it. Anyone want it? PS4 version, in box, $40 plus shipping.

Miraculously, I once again was unfailingly polite to an upstairs neighbor who thought 2AM was a good time for bassy music. Nobody is on fire despite me having to go outside in the drizzle.

Thanksgiving was absolutely wonderful. I didn't talk to anyone. I didn't leave the house. I slouched around in my bathrobe all day.

I worked on decorating the living room – neatened up a bunch of cables, and fooled around with the LED clock I've been building the past few days. I got that to the point where I could hang it on the wall and watch it for a while as I played video games, and realize it still has some bugs to work out,

I ate absolutely no turkey.

And I played Dragon Age for a while. I now own a castle in that game.

I had a couple of invitations to things but I politely declined them all. It's good to have them but I am just a total hermit when it comes to Social Holidays.

Things I like about the PS4 controller:

• The headphone jack is pretty useful for playing late at night without disturbing the neighbors.
• The ‘share’ button is neat, and I will have to be careful to not spam the hell out of everyone once I get around to authorizing the PS4 for Twitter.

Things I dislike about the PS4 controller:

• Comes with a charge cable that is way too short to use while playing. My chair is right next to the console and it’s short, I can’t imagine using it in the usual arrangement of the console under the TV. It seems to be a pretty ordinary USB cable on both ends, so I’ll probably be replacing it with one that’s comparable in length to the 8-10′ charge cable that came with the 360; I don’t know what the hell Sony was thinking when they decided 6′ was enough.
• Battery runs out super fast. I could get like a whole lost weekend of cordless playing on the 360, the PS4 barely lets me play for a whole day without having to recharge. (Or is it just that I never really noticed recharging the 360’s controller because the cable made it possible to seamlessly move between wireless play and charging?)
• That stupid light on it. Why does my controller need to light up the room. Games can control its color but you can’t actually see the light as it’s aimed completely away from you so it’s not as if it’s really conveying any information; supposedly it is maybe there to work with the camera, but I have a projection screen and will thus never, ever be getting a camera. You can dim it, but you can’t turn it off. I suspect this is not helping the battery issues. I stuck some tape over it; I don’t need to have an eerie blue light cast on my thighs while I’m lounging there playing games.
• The ‘options’ button (which tends to get used for pause/menus/etc) is way too close to the giant touchpad, and hard to hit quickly.