As if I didn't have enough things with which to fill my time, I recently discovered (although I should probably say, "rediscovered") the fabulous world which is known as tabletop role playing games. Who knew that seeing a set of dice in a fantasy television show would spark such an intense interest in a new (old) hobby? Deborah and I were binge watching the first season of The Shannara Chronicles the other week, and one of the characters found a set of blue Dungeons & Dragons dice. Although I'm sure I may hear from fantasy purists about how awful this show is, or how terrible Terry Brooks books are in general, I'm okay with that. I'll be the first to admit the show isn't the best I've seen in its genre. However, it's far from the worst. Can anyone say, "Krull" or "Red Sonja"? I rest my case.
As far as Terry Brooks novels go, I'll also admit they probably aren't the best examples of fantasy fiction, either. But, like the show, at least they have entertainment value, even if you're secretly wishing the "hero" would get dropped down a well, already, like Timmy on the old Lassie shows.
The cameo appearance of those dice on the Shannara show sparked a bit of nostalgia in me, and brought back memories I probably haven't thought of in years. Anyone who was around in the early to mid 80s and heard anything about Dungeons & Dragons back then probably remembers the controversy surrounding the game. There were supposedly kids who were sucked so far down the rabbit hole that they were completely incapable of distinguishing the fantasy world of the game from the reality of the world in which they were physically living. There were even a few who killed themselves, and the game made a convenient scapegoat. How much of this was just media hype and hysteria, and how much was true, I'll leave you to judge for yourselves. All I know is that my brother and I weren't allowed to play the game for several years because of these reports.
Fast forward a few years, and I actually did play the game a little bit. I never did really play it a whole lot, but there were several hours of my youth spent creating characters, and many less hours actually playing D&D and other games. I'm pretty sure I played Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles much more than actual D&D, though. I didn't ever spend money on any of the multitude of gaming systems that were out at the time, and I've never owned any physical rulebooks or modules. I think the only money that came out of my pocket at one of the gaming shops was a couple of bucks for a set of purple dice.
After seeing those dice on screen the other day, though, I started looking for somewhere to play the games online, since Deborah and I move around a lot. I figured it would probably be hard to get plugged into an actual around-the-table group at a local gaming shop, and playing online would make a bit more since for our lifestyle. So, what did I find? Roll20.net. This place is amazingly refreshing. Even being complete and total newbies, everyone we've encountered has been crazy helpful, some of them spending hours at a time on chat via Discord, helping us out by answering all the questions we have. You mean to tell me there's still a place on the interwebs where people aren't judgmental, opinionated, and angry? Yes. In fact, there are two: Roll20 and Discord.
We've played a few sessions, and have joined another game that looks like it may end up being a long term continuing campaign. I'm sure some of you are probably thinking we're way behind on discovering TRPGs, but we've been trying to make up for lost time by nerding out as much as we can each day. If you're wondering what online TRPG looks like, just search for "D&D Adventurers League" on YouTube. You can thank me later for all the time this may end up costing you!
I've been telling myself that the scenarios we encounter while playing these games may help with my writing, since I'm writing a fantasy-ish novel at the moment. We'll see how that actually shakes out! At least in the meantime, I'll be having fun. And meeting new people is always a good idea.
Until next time, stay safe, and above all, be true to yourself.
That Aaron Guy
I actually momentarily deleted Facebook and Twitter off of my phone this morning. Everyone I follow or I'm friends with is conservative. Some more than me, and some less. I can't read a single post without being inundated with the lefty lemming troll haters from every direction. It's like they hang out on conservative pages just to flame and troll people. I'm getting tired of seeing the hate and lies, so I considered going on a social media fast for at least the next thirty days. Anyone who has been around me for any length of time at all knows how much I like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, discussion forums, etc. So for me to even consider turning everything off for a month should indicate how truly ridiculous I think the current situation has become. But, never fear, faithful followers. All has been redownloaded and restored to its proper place. If we stick our heads in the sand like ostriches instead of taking the fight back to the ignorant, no telling what our backsides will look like in a few days! ;)
It's even hitting my Google plus homepage via the bloggers group I belong to. Either the entire world is going crazy or it just seems that way because the internet has become a vile cesspool of idiocy. So I seriously considered just pulling the plug. I couldn't even sleep last night because I kept thinking about it. I'm not a worrier, but I kept thinking that the nation I love seems to be falling apart at the seams because of the fomenting hatred that the liars want everyone to think is everywhere. I finally came to the conclusion that there is only a small socialist faction that is just screaming so everyone thinks they're bigger and more powerful than they actually are. Most people I come into face to face contact with on a regular basis aren't of the lemming left ilk. It must be an illusion, right?
Focusing on the foolishness that is indeed going on has started to rob me of my peace, my creativity, and my happiness. I'm a logical, intelligent, Spirit filled child of the Most High God. This stuff has been creeping in day after day, and now I feel like I've been swimming in filth, breathing it in, and it feels like I've been poisoned. People have forgotten how to have a civil discourse. If you disagree with them, they go off the deep end and spew venom and vile confusion. I don't even think the vast majority of them have any idea what they're talking about. They've let everyone else do the thinking for them for so long that they haven't a clue what's even happening.
The country I grew up in seems to be completely gone. Or is it? Like I already mentioned above, people I see face to face don't seem to be buying into the hysteria that's infected every electronic means of communication. When I read Proverbs every morning, those ancient words are extremely prescient and they seem to be speaking to the very events and insanity that's been steadily ramping up over the past decade. There's definitely a correlation there. Just this morning I read Proverbs 17. Here are just a few verses that are relevant to this past week:
4 A wicked person listens to deceitful lips;
a liar pays attention to a destructive tongue.
11 Evildoers foster rebellion against God;
the messenger of death will be sent against them.
12 Better to meet a bear robbed of her cubs
than a fool bent on folly.
13 Evil will never leave the house
of one who pays back evil for good.
14 Starting a quarrel is like breaching a dam;
so drop the matter before a dispute breaks out.
15 Acquitting the guilty and condemning the innocent—
the Lord detests them both.
16 Why should fools have money in hand to buy wisdom,
when they are not able to understand it?
20 One whose heart is corrupt does not prosper;
one whose tongue is perverse falls into trouble.
26 If imposing a fine on the innocent is not good,
surely to flog honest officials is not right.
27 The one who has knowledge uses words with restraint,
and whoever has understanding is even-tempered.
The foolish truly are destroyed due to a lack of wisdom. It's being played out in HD on every screen I own. I know our country has had rough times in the past. Think the 1860s, the 1920s and '30s, and especially the '60s when the same socialist ideas that have been trying to take over lately were threatening to tear the country apart.
All of those problems came before I was around to see them, though. The current crises we seem to be in is the worst I've seen in my 41 years. While I don't want to engage the stupidity or feed the trolls, I really think that the only way to kill them off is to stand up and call good "good" and evil "evil". If you're angry all the time and the only outlet you have for that anger is to dress up like an urban ninja, running around attacking people and property, you definitely fit into the evil side of the equation. If you're crying all the time, not because of what someone else said, but because of who said it, you fit into the evil side of the equation. If you think that those who don't agree with you should be shouted down, run down, burned down, or beaten in the street, you fit into the evil side of the equation.
I vehemently disagree with all the racism, hatred, unprovoked violence, unrighteous anger, lying, slander, entitlement, redistribution mentality, "I deserve something I didn't work for because I breathe air and I feel like I've been slighted by society because of the color of my skin, so I'm gonna hate you and attack you and everything I think you stand for because you have less pigmentation in your skin than I do" diatribes that have been dominating our society lately. I don't feel guilty because I'm white. Neither do I feel superior to any other person. At all. This superiority/inferiority complex that's infected our society because you've bought the lies presented to you by people who don't care a whit about whether you live, die, eat, or starve, and who have made a fortune force feeding those lies to you makes me sick to my stomach.
People need to stop believing everything they see on the internet just because it was posted by someone they've aligned themselves with because the poster promised you can have something for free if you stay angry enough for long enough. The percentage of our population who have actually read a book that was written before they were born is entirely too small. If that weren't the case, there wouldn't be so many people running around regurgitating incoherent fallacies about our history, or about the intentions of the generations who preceded us. Yes, many in those generations messed up. Big time. But if we erase those mistakes from our thoughts and landscape because they make a select immature few of us uncomfortable, how are we to build on those mistakes and improve ourselves so we can protect our children and grandchildren from repeating the worst of those very mistakes? Sweeping things under the rug and pretending they aren't there doesn't negate the fact that they are, indeed, still hiding under there, festering, rotting, and growing into something that someone else is eventually going to have to clean up for us.
It's time for the adult humans of America to grow up and actually start adulting and humaning. For generations, people have been handed things they never deserved to receive. It's caused personal responsibility, dignity, and respect to wither and die. What's left is ugly, cankerous, and destructive. It seems to me that the recent full-tilt crazy that's been spilling into the streets has been caused because someone has finally stood up and officially said, "ENOUGH!" The free lunch and unearned handouts have begun to come to an end, and the freeloaders have, for the first time in their lives, realized there is something bigger and more important than them that they are going to have to answer to. And it's caused them to throw themselves down in the aisle of the grocery store, pitching a holy fit for all to see because they have been told that they will no longer be given those Cocoa Krispies, because the adult in the room has finally discovered Cocoa Krispies only make you fat and lazy.
If I sound angry, it's because I am. But, really, I'm more sad than angry. This country was built on phenomenal principles. Principles that fought to make everyone equal, and to give everyone a CHANCE to be happy. That happiness was never intended to be achieved stepping on the backs of other people, though. It was never intended to be taken from the one who earned it and given to the one who felt entitled to it. It was never intended to be co-opted through coercion, hatred, fear, threat, violence, or guilt.
My, how far we have fallen, America. I only pray we can rebuild from the ashes that are currently being spewed into the air as we all watch. Those who are actively working to destroy what has been built over the past 241 years are going to be mystified by the results that lie tattered and broken all around them if they succeed in their actions. I seriously doubt they'll even be able to see it, though. Eyesight is only restored to the blind through divine intervention, and those who deny they need help from someone more important and powerful than themselves will never receive it.
To end on a much more positive note than the majority of this post, if you want to read something vastly more uplifting than what's flooding your various social media feeds, my collection of poetry, Always Enough Air, is still available for free when you use the coupon UK65F at checkout here: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/733293?ref=ThatAaronGuy
Happy reading!
Until next time, stay safe, and above all, be true to yourself.
That Aaron Guy
The Epic of Eden: A Christian Entry Into the Old Testament by
Sandra L. Richter
My rating:
5 of 5 stars
In The Epic of Eden, Sandra Richter does a great job of pulling back the curtain on the Old Testament and explaining how it all fits together in an amazingly understandable style. I've been reading the Bible on an almost regular basis for almost two decades, and this book explained how and why things are laid out in the Old Testament in a way that I've never seen before.
The author does an exquisite job of defining the where, when, and why of the main events and people of the Old Testament and what they mean to us as New Testament Christians. The blurb on the back cover of the book claims that "This book will not only expand your knowledge, it will deepen your spiritual life," and it accomplishes this in an epic fashion.
My wife and I like reading books like this one together and discussing what we've read and learned as we go along. What I enjoyed most about The Epic of Eden is how clearly I now understand the culture, history, and geography contained in the Old Testament. The books contained there are not archaic or removed from my faith as a Christian. They are the very foundations on which my entire worldview rests. The relationships God establishes within its pages reveal His love, heart, character, and aspirations for the entire human race. I have a deeper understanding now of the character of Christ Himself, and the true proportions of what His sacrifice and love for me truly entail.
Whether you consider yourself to be a Biblical scholar or not, I strongly encourage you to read this book. It will reveal the Old Testament to you in ways you never before have seen. It explains the history of mankind and our relationship with Almighty God within the cultural context of the people with whom He originally established covenant relationship. This, in turn, explains the relationship He desires to have with you and me today.
If this book sounds interesting to you, you can find it on Amazon here: http://amzn.to/2fOxFOY
Until next time, stay safe, and above all, be true to yourself.
That Aaron Guy
View all my reviews
The Lincoln Lawyer by
Michael Connelly
My rating:
5 of 5 stars
Somehow, I've made it most of the way through 2017 without having read any of Michael Connelly's books. I'm not talking about just this year, but ever! I know I saw the film adaptation of The Lincoln Lawyer a few years ago, but it either wasn't memorable, or it deviated drastically from the book, because I was on the edge of my seat through the entire 500+ pages. I don't remember the movie being nearly so spellbinding.
Mickey Haller is a defense lawyer who honestly does not care a whit whether his clients committed the crime they're being accused of. He's in it for the money and to see how many prosecutorial cases he can successfully shoot down. Then Louis Roulet comes into his life, and his perspective begins to shift a bit. Roulet is accused of a brutal assault, attempted rape, and threatening to murder his victim. So, did he do it, or not? His defense is actually feasible at first blush, even though it seems far fetched, and he sells it to his new lawyer fairly quickly. Then Haller's world gets turned upside down, because he's always been afraid he would miss it when he came across a truly innocent client. He's also faced with what can only be described as true evil.
I've read quite a few thrillers from the likes of John Grisham, Tom Clancy, and Lee Child, and they all have their own unique style and flavor. Michael Connelly doesn't fit in any of the molds left behind by these other writers. His storytelling is fast paced, intelligent, and technical without getting bogged down in minuscule details. The pacing works, the characters are all believable, and the dialogue just fits the situations.
If you're looking for a fast-paced legal thriller that seems to turn its own pages, look no further than The Lincoln Lawyer. Mr. Connelly, you've found another dedicated fan here, Sir.
If this one sounds interesting to you, you can find it and other books by Michael Connelly on Amazon here: http://amzn.to/2wuMn1r
Until next time, stay safe, and above all, be true to yourself.
That Aaron Guy
View all my reviews
Die Trying by
Lee Child
My rating:
4 of 5 stars
***WARNING!!! SPOILERS!!!***
Die Trying is another great read in the Jack Reacher series. The book kicks off with him getting kidnapped along with F.B.I. agent Holly Johnson, and the action just picks up from there. Jack is fine just biding his time and protecting her, right up until the kidnappers make it personal by trying to kill him. Reacher feels this just made it personal, so in true Jack Reacher style, it's time to bust some heads. It doesn't take long at all before he's running through a field, dead body in tow, to hide the guy he just killed. Seems like the aforementioned dead guy made a grave mistake in his life choices.
The way this book is written, you'd think Lee Child had grown up in the U.S., particularly in the northwest, where there have been numerous militia groups like described in this novel. It's hard to believe he was born and grew up in England. In expert fashion, he delves into the conspiracy theories that seem to surround such groups and drive their actions and separatist beliefs.
In case you missed my last review of Lee Child's novel, Killing Floor, I'll repeat what I said at the end of that review. If you enjoy Mystery/Thriller/Spy/Military/Action novels, and you haven't started reading Lee Child, I think you're missing out. Pick one of his books up today. You can thank me later!
Until next time, stay safe, and above all, be true to yourself.
That Aaron Guy
View all my reviews
Why is it that some people never grow up? It's like they're stunted at five years old and have never discovered that the world actually doesn't revolve around them. They continually cause problems and then complain that there is a problem. Everyone around them can see what the cause of the problem is, but can't say anything because the one that caused it will throw themselves on the floor and pitch a fit, figuratively speaking, of course. At least I hope so. No one wants to see that kind of display, so no one says anything to point out the true problem. Instead, people leave at the first opportunity, cutting ties and shutting the true problem out of their lives.
We have an entire society full of people like this today. Just look at any given post on social media. No matter what the subject matter, eighty percent of the time, the comments descend into diatribe in five comments or less. This is now spilling over into life outside the virtual world. Everyone seems to think everyone else simply has to hear their opinion. And agree with it. We've become a nation of cowards who are ruled by their feelings, which are hurt all the time because they somehow have never learned that they aren't as important as they want to be. They've never gotten over being told that what they've done is amazing when it's obviously subpar. If you've ever watched American Idol, you've seen the results this can bring. This is where always focusing on self-esteem and feelings has brought us. Where do we go from here?
It would be a great idea to actually start taking score again in kids' sports. There are truly losers in this world. Not to say that losing makes you a loser, but if you get a prize every time you do something, even when the other team has stomped on you, you'll probably start to expect it. That doesn't translate well to the real world, and for good reason. I've worked with individuals ranging in age from eighteen to sixty-five who got all bent out of shape because they felt they didn't receive the proper recognition for simply doing their job. Here's a hint: if you got paid, consider that your recognition.
Now that I've addressed the employee side of the equation, here's one for people in management or ownership positions, who have people working for them that they should be LEADING. If you're the owner, stop whining about having to be there all the time. You're an adult, and have made decisions in your life that put you in the position where you currently are. If you own the company, that company is YOUR baby. You will never have employees who are as invested in YOUR company as you are. At the end of the day, every employee you have, no matter how dedicated, is there for one reason, and one reason only. A paycheck. If your company goes under, they'll simply go and find another job. You are the only one holding the bag of responsibility. Quit trying to guilt your employees into carrying that responsibility for you. It's not ever going to happen, and it shouldn't. All you're accomplishing by trying to get them to carry something you're obviously too weak to carry is chasing off your company's greatest asset: people who show up every day and do the day to day things that keep your company in business. Eventually, you'll chase enough of them away that word will get around, and you'll be left holding the bag, which is as it should be. Like I said before, it's your bag/baby/responsibility, and absolutely no one else's.
Every conversation you have with employees shouldn't revolve around what they did wrong, or what they screwed up. If all they do is make messes you have to clean up, then why are they still there? Once again, that's on you. More than likely, though, they do a bang up job ninety-six percent of the time or more, and only miss things on occasion. Pretty sure that's called being a person. How about, instead of constantly focusing on that measly little four percent all the time, you actually say two words that will carry most people for weeks or months. Either, "Good job," or "Thank you," would work pretty well, or you could go wild and come up with your own. Oh, and it helps immensely if you mean it when you say it. People will be able to tell, trust me.
If you're not that person that treats his or her employees poorly, odds are, you've worked for someone who did. I don't think I've ever met anyone who didn't have at least one boss who at the minimum treated them badly, and at the worst, flat-out abused them. If you ever end up in a leadership position, either in management, or as the owner of a company, remember how much you dreaded going to work then. Don't be that guy.
Oh, and if you're fortunate enough to work for yourself, remember not to be that guy, either. It's easy to be your own worst critic. Instead of focusing on how badly you may have just screwed something up, look back at what you've built thus far. It'll probably inspire you! Remember that when you mess up or fail, it's not a waste of time. You just figured out what doesn't work. So, here's a note specifically for writers, simply because I are one. Even if you just deleted thousands of words that took you weeks to write, you've just learned how NOT to write dialogue, characterization, or an action sequence in the future. Just think about how much time that knowledge will save you in the coming years!
Until next time, stay safe, and above all, be true to yourself.
That Aaron Guy
