To Blog or Not to Blog

Not. Just kidding. But really, who has time to be witty and funny and interesting? Clearly not I. I yearn for those days of bloggage, when the words flowed from my fingertips like lightning from the nerdy wizard I used to play in D&D.

That's Dungeons and Dragons. Yes, I said it. I played it. I lived it. Not "LIVED IT" like Tom Hanks, in his portrayal of a college student playing a game incredibly similar to D&D, but without the lawsuit, in the HORRIBLE (yet hilarious) movie "Mazes and Monsters" (Aka Rona Jaffe's Mazes and Monsters). If you want to get a completely wrong idea of D&D, and the people who play it, you should watch that fine piece of cinematic wonderdom.

Shhh... don't tell anyone, but I really miss D&D. Playing characters, living adventures through them, getting drunk. I never understood the "loser" rap that D&Ders got. What could be cooler than drinking? Just kidding. To me, it was just like being an actor (though admittedly, talent was not required) working without a script. You create a character, you get to choose how he reacts to different events. You get to choose to be naughty or nice (Don't tell Santa!).

I remember the original D&D game. We sold it at the first place I worked at. Actually, we no longer sold it by the time I worked there, but there was some dusty backstock at the top of some shelf in the corner. It was a box with dice, a one page instruction sheet, and a pad of graph paper. That's it. There were practically no rules. There weren't the dozens of books detailing every possible situation that are out there now. First, second, third, hundredth editions. It's ridiculous. It was, and still should be, a game of imagination.

Maybe that's where it got the bad rap. People think only children should play games of imagination. If that's true, then people are dumb. Imagination stretches the mind. Imagination leads us to think, reason, solve problems, create. I'll be honest, I think I was a better thinker back when I used to play a manic, thieving, back-stabbing nutcase of an Elf with a God-complex. For some reason, that character always had trouble making friends...

I also always loved being the DM (Dungeon Master, for the uninitiated). Creating a world for people to play in, having to think of whatever wild, insane, and yes, stupid, things your players would do. Often having to think on your feet to deal with those wild, insane, stupid things you never even dreamed those idiots... I mean players, would do. It was all fun. I honestly wish I knew people nerdy enough - I mean, cool enough - to play with now. Sadly, my wife is very much not one of them. About the closest she'll come to playing D&D is watching "The Big Bang Theory". And that's just a sad mis-representation of how the game is played. Come to think of it, no wonder people who watch that show think D&D isn't cool: They don't drink when they play!