Um. What? Sorry. Let's try that again.

Ahem.

Rich is the greatest 8-bit character drawing guy man dude in this quadrant. His 8-bit creations hold up the whole log jam, Bucko, because 16-bits are twice as many as he needs, Sport.

Anyway, I asked Rich if he'd be interested in doing an 8-bit version of me, because . . . well, because I really like his work and it's always been my life-long dream to eat the biggest sandwich at the fair.

Rich agreed, and the result is real and spectacular. I think it may replace mister "look at me and my tough-guy face" over there.

Thank you, Rich Stevens. I shall play Keystone Kapers tonight in your honor.

I asked him if maybe we could do something a little less extreme, but he assured me that it was the only way to be sure. Since my sneezes weren't going "achoo!" like they're supposed to, but going "Ftagn!" instead, I've decided to follow his advice, and I'm on Prednisone + Zithromax for the next five days.

I'm already feeling better, if not entirely back to normal, but I'm looking forward to getting my command and control systems back online within the next 24 hours. I have this overwhelming urge to blast my quads and rip out my delts, but I understand that will go away IN JUST A FUCKING MINUTE GODDAMMIT WHAT?!

Oh. Um. Sorry. Meds talking and whatnot.

In place of an actual blog entry, here are a few things that have been on my mind:

I was going to write this myself, but Charlie Stross explains why I won't be using Google Chrome better than I can. He even manages to avoid the phrase EPIC FAIL which I wouldn't have been able to do. Competing with IE = good. Competing with Firefox = profoundly stupid. Having the most abusive EULA I've seen in years? That's just fucking priceles, Google. Nice work on that one. I'd like to amend this paragraph, after hours of consideration and lengthy discussion with other people. Apparently, Google claims the EULA was "boilerplate" and they're going to update it. If they update it, great. But does anyone really believe that a company like Google puts out a new browser, one that is as highly-anticipated as Chrome, and doesn't fully vet the EULA? What did they do, borrow lawyers from John McCain? If Google is going to change their EULA to something less evil, that's fantastic, but I don't believe for a moment that this was a mistake. Google isn't that incompetent. As for my statement: "Competing with IE = good. Competing with Firefox = profoundly stupid." Yeah. I don't know what the hell I was thinking. I'd like to blame the sinus meds, but that's a pretty 80s excuse, isn't it? I haven't felt well for several days, and I typed without really thinking things through. Competition, as a commenter said, is very good, even (and maybe especially) for Open Source products. I hope I've earned the right over the years to ask for a little slack. If I haven't, I'd like to point out that this mountain is covered with wolves, and the bar is right over there. Thanks.

Cory Doctorow has a really good idea for publishers.

Today is one of those days where it's 97 outside, 81 inside, and only Miles Davis can keep the inside of my house cool.

Coilhouse has a fascinating article about a Modern Pirate Utopia in Hong Kong that has to be read to be believed. Coilhouse kind of rules. I highly recommend their magazine.

Doctor Horrible @ checked me on Twitter. I don't think this should make me as excited as it does, but OMGOMGOMG! The Doctor Horrible soundtrack is #2 on iTunes US, #1 in the UK and Australia. The number one album in the US is some rap thing that makes me stabby just to look at. Come on, American geeks, let's show the rest of the world what we're made of! (Also, the soundtrack is really awesome and fun to listen to.)

Moe's just isn't the same since he got rid of the dank. Come on, Moe! The dank!

I played a little bit of D&D 4e with Jerry, Mike, The Other Mike, and Scott Kurtz when I was at PAX. I got to play a Tiefling Rogue who was trying out to be the new intern at Acquisitions, Incorporated. It was massively fun, and it made me want to play D&D about as badly as I've ever wanted. I'm taking advantage of my . . . current condition . . . to read all of Keep on the Shadowfell in the hopes that I'll be able to convince Nolan and some of his friends to let me run it for them.

I got an insanely cool D&D thing via John Kovalic, but I'm forbidden to reveal it until he does.

I was mentioned rather favorably, in some very nice company, by one of the executive producers on Criminal Minds! "...we have scary locations and amazing guest stars like Jason Alexander, Luke Perry and Wil Wheaton." OMGOMGOMGOMG.

We're late to the party on this, but Anne and I have been watching Weeds on Netflix via our Roku box. We're into the 3rd season (which we had to get on DVD) and I'm not as crazy about it as I was the first two. The acting and writing is wonderful, but the storylines that dominate the 3rd season are leaving me a little cold. I don't believe a single Nancy does in this season, even though Mary-louise Parker is a phenomenal actor.

Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere is online for free from his publisher. This is one of my favorites, and I heartily recommend it, even though I'm pretty sure most of you reading this have already read it. However, Neil says, "For those people who grumbled about reading American Gods online, here's Neverwhere. You can read it online, and it's also downloadable. That's the good news. The bad news is you don't get to keep it forever. It's yours for thirty days from download, and then the pdf file returns to its electrons. But if you've ever wondered about Neverwhere or wanted to read it for free, now is your chance. And free is free..."

"America, we are better than these last eight years. We are a better country than this." A-fucking-MEN.

During my panel at PAX, I was asked a great question that I couldn't answer to my satisfaction: What episode of Next Generation best defines the series? The answer depends heavily on how you'd define the series as a whole, and the best I could come up with is "Star Trek is all about possibilities. It's about hope, so when you look around our totally fucked up world, you see that there is a better future for us." Which TNG episode best exemplifies that? Is that even what Star Trek is about? My answer sucked so hard, I can't even remember what I said. I blame the ConSARS.

A bit of blasphemy: I finally saw Dark Knight, and I was not blown away. Heath Ledger was spectacular, but I felt like the movie climaxed in the first 10 minutes, and was 2 reels too long. Maybe I'll refine my feelings on subsequent viewings, but it didn't send me into a Batgasm like Batman Begins did. However, it's the second act of the trilogy, and if it's anything like all the other trilogies I've seen, it'll end up being my favorite when the dust settles.

I first became aware of the Xbox 360 game Braid when Buckman mentioned on his blog that the developer licensed a bunch of Magnatune music (which I've listened to and love) for the game. Monday night, I couldn't sleep, so I downloaded the trial. 30 minutes later, I bought the full game, which is similar to Portal in a lot of ways. It's one of the most visually beautiful games I've ever played. Check it out if you've got XBLA.

You can listen to one of the artists, Jami Sieber, with this nifty little gizmo:

Hidden Sky by Jami Sieber

John Scalzi's Denise Jones, Super Booker, at Subterranean Online, dovetails brilliantly with Soon I Will Be Invincible, which I am still reading and still loving. And every single time I see, think about, or say the title, my brain fires up a chorus from Pat Benatar's timeless classic song, "Invincible," from the, uh, equally-classic film The Legend of Billie Jean .

And now that I've put it in your brain also, I'll sign off for today.

"If the Penny Arcade Expo has a star, it's not Gabe or Tycho. It's not special guests like MC Frontalot or Wil Wheaton. It's not even veritable champions of nerdery like PAX '08 Omegathon winner Joey Gecko. No, it's geeky culture itself. And when we gather to celebrate our own, wackiness invariably ensues."

- GeekDad Z, Wired's GeekDad blog.

"Best Thing About PAX: Ownership. PAX is everyone's so everyone tends to add their bit, creating something new or innovating. It's just part of the makeup of this demographic that things don't get left alone. I think that's what I like best of all, is how most of the con goers think of it as their convention, not just one they attend."

-Fellow PAX owner Steph.

The night before I left for PAX, I hardly got any sleep at all (thank you, ribacge, for picking Thursday night to hurt like a bitch) so by the time I got there on Friday afternoon, I was already down to single-digit hit points, and taking a -5 on all my rolls.

But an unexpected thing happened as soon as I set foot in the convention center. As explained by the quotes above, this weekend is our time. It's Goonie time, and the moment I walked in, I got +10 to all my stats and was restored to maximum HP.

Sometime on Friday night, though, I failed a critical save vs. ConSARS, and by the middle of the day on Saturday, I was feeling pretty terrible. I think I played though it pretty well, but I missed the concerts on Saturday night, and felt a little "off" for the first 15 minutes of my panel on Sunday, until I picked up another +10 from the ohmygodstandingroomonly crowd. By the time I got on the plane to come home yesterday, though, I was hovering around 2 HP, and I'd picked up a familiar I'll just call Wil's Sinusital Ooze (Level 4 Disgusting Annoyance. Gives owner -8 to all abilities, -15 CHA, and -6 to all reaction rolls. 5 successive Fortitude saves ends.)

I'll have to give a full report when Wil's Sinusital Ooze isn't launching Slimers out of my head every five minutes, but I think I can sum it up in five words I repeated dozens of times during the weekend: "This just keeps getting better!"

That happened earlier today, and (as you'll see at the end of this post) I thought it may be worth sharing here.

On Aug 28, 2008, at 12:52 PM, [redacted] wrote:

When you're writing something that's not for a blog, like a book or script, something that has to remain a secret until it's published, do you just go bonkers?

Yes. Yes I do. It's really hard, because as a blogger you're used to instant feedback to keep you going, but when you're working on something that can't be shared or released the same way blog posts are, you can lose your way and lose your confidence.

I've found a couple ways to help overcome this:

1. Blog less. It's incredibly hard to blog and write a book at the same time, because you're using different muscles. Think of it like trying to run the 100 meter dash and do a marathon at the same time.

2. Make a deadline for yourself, then work backwards to have milestones every day or week, whichever works better for you.

3. Give yourself little rewards when you make a big milestone (5K words, 10K words, 20K words, first draft completed, etc.)

4. Don't show your work to anyone until the first draft is done. Don't even excerpt little bits and put them on your blog. I put about 30 words from House of Cards online, and I lost all of my momentum as a result. I'm not sure why this happens, but it really sucks when it does.

5. Find an editor who you trust to work with you. Good editors do more than just edit the draft you give them, and I know this because I have a great editor.

You know, this may be useful to other people. I'm going to anonymize the line I quoted from you, and post this on my blog. I'm sure readers will have other bits of advice and experience to share in comments.

-Wil

This isn't anything more than common sense, I guess, and it's not even that original (the post I linked to day before yesterday about blogging vs. writing a book covers most of this in much greater detail than I did) but I hope it's helpful anyway.

I'll be at Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle this weekend. I'm not keynoting, but I am on a couple of panels, and I will have a booth, stocked with all of my books, plus my glasses and my shoes, so I have them. I don't have a ton of stuff, though, so you should probably drop everything you're doing and go get in line right now.

My schedule looks shockingly similar to this:

Friday

3-4PM: Signing in my booth

7-8PM: Signing in my booth

Saturday

3-4PM : Signing in my booth

6-7PM: Panel - "Is Casual Killing Core Games?" in the Raven Theater. This should be an interesting conversation. I don't think casual is killing core gaming at all, but I'm interested to hear from people who think it is, and tell them why they're so very very wrong.

7-8PM: Signing in my booth

Sunday

11:30-12:30: "The Wil Wheaton Panel!" in the Serpent Theater. I'm going to be honest: I don't think a lot of people are going to come to this. There are two absolutely awesome panels at the same time, including Family Feud with Gabe and Tycho, and if the panel didn't have my name in it, I would skip it, too. However, for those of you who will be in attendance, due to your sacred vow to never watch Family Feud, I'll be reading from Happiest Days and Sunken Treasure, wand I'll do a Q&A if there's enough interest. We'll have fun (oh yes, we'll have fun. We always have fun, and we float, Georgie! We all FLOAT DOWN HERE!) and it will be awesome.

12:15-2PM: Signing in my booth

I reserve the right to bail on signings early if nobody's there, and stay a little longer if that's necessary.

Please, please, please come introduce yourself if you read my blog, especially if you're a regular commenter. It's pretty awesome to have faces to go with the names.

Our college group wasn't big on subtle roleplaying. The anecdote that best exemplifies our attitude comes from a random night encounter.

The mage was on guard, heard a rustle in the woods outside the camp, and immediately unleashed a fireball.

"You aren't going to wait to see who it is?" asked the DM (different guy; we rotated). "What if it's one of your friends?"

"They can take the damage," replied the mage's player.

End of encounter.

There are times to take RPGs seriously (or so I've heard) but it's time like these that I look forward to the most when I play a tabletop RPG. If you listened to the Penny Arcade D&D podcasts (JIM DARKMAGIC FOR THE WIN!) you heard something remarkably similar to my friends and me playing . . . well, just about everything, really. That's sort of the whole reason we play games, isn't it?

I'm going to PAX this weekend, where I'm sure I'll engage in quite a bit of the video gaming. I'm especially looking forward to playing Rock Band 2 with the Enforcers, but more than anything else, I'm excited to spend some time in the Original Wireless Gaming area, which I missed last year. It's nothing but classic RPGs and hobby games, all donated and run by volunteers. Last year, there were opportunities to do a one-shot dungeon crawl, and I can't wait to get on the list for one of those if they're doing it again.

When I checked in on The Geek Group at Propeller this morning, I saw something similar: Ten Truly Underrated Sci-Fi Movies.

Take a look, and let me know what you think. I wouldn't have included Aeon Flux, which tried real hard but couldn't close the deal, but the rest of them are great, especially Primer, which never gets the respect it deserves.

I think Groups are where Propeller is going to set itself apart from the rest of the social news world, so I really want to build and nurture the Geek group. I think it's a fantastic resource and if there's enough participation, could become a wonderful place for geeks to gather and goof off - I already check in several times a day, even when I'm not doing admin work. In support of that effort, I'm going to close comments on this post, so if you're interested in commenting and stuff, you'll do it there. (Bonus: the Conversations are a lot of fun, too. D&D geeks need to check out What's the most audacious thing you've gotten away with in D&D?)

As I struggle through the first (really the zero, but that's just semantics) draft of this novella, I have to keep reminding myself that the first drafts of Just A Geek and Dancing Barefoot weren't as easy as Happiest Days , and the first column I wrote for Geek in Review wasn't as effortless as some of the last ones. In other words, I'm learning a new skill, and since I'm mostly on my own as I explore this new territory, it's easy to get lost and confused.

Luckily for me (and all other writers) there are experienced authors who are willing to share with us how they got where they are, so that we may try to follow in their footsteps.

Elizabeth Bear is one of the most fearless, honest, and generous of these authors. Cherie Priest (who makes me wish my name could be turned into a cool anagram) and John Scalzi are right there with her, and if you're a serious writer, you need to be reading their blogs every time they update. I've lost count of the number of times I've read something of theirs and said, "Thank jeebus. I thought I was the only one." It's tremendously reassuring to know that some obstacle I'm struggling with isn't unique to me, or a result of my inexperience or illustrative of a lack of ability, as much as it is just a part of the writing process, something other writers who are much more successful than me have also experienced (and, probably annoying to them but incredibly reassuring to me, still experience.)

Way back in February, Cherie wrote:

I give the hell up. On its present track, Awake Into Darkness simply isn’t working. It’s a tough thing to admit, especially when I’m almost 30,000 words deep in the draft; but if I’m going to be completely honest with myself, I’ve known from the start that it was b0rked — because I was doing a shitty job of recycling old material. I knew from the get-go that I ought to just trash the whole thing and rewrite it, and I didn’t, and that’s nobody’s fault but mine.

At least I’ve come to grips with it in time to do something about it. Following much head-desking and a whole lot of emailing, badgering, and drunken grumbling (at self, husband, editor, etc.) about this story, I think I’ve finally got an idea of how it can work — and yes, it definitely involves starting over from scratch.

I can't imagine starting over after 30K words. Hell, I have a hard time even getting to 30K words, which is something I look forward to not being completely intimidated by in the future. Cherie says that she wrote most of the stuff that didn't work when she was still a rookie (like I am right now). When I've struggled with a story I thought was worth writing, I always thought it meant that I sucked, and just wasn't cut out to write fiction. After reading this, though, I was relieved to have permission to let something go if it just doesn't work. It's also a good time to remind myself: Don't be afraid to suck, and learn from the mistakes you make.

Elizabeth Bear recently said:

... one of the reasons I need breaks between writing things is that telling stories is an exhaustive mental effort. They use up all my thinky, and then I am left without too much else to fill up my time. [...]

And it cracks me up, because when I am actually working on a story and it's ready to be written (as opposed to being hacked out of the living rock to beat a deadline), I am crabby and reclusive and very defensive of my precious time, and very very aware that there's not nearly enough of it. The winged chariot is right at my heels, and there is never enough time in the day and strength in my poor mortal frame to get as much done as I want to.

From time to time, I get creatively exhausted and no matter how hard I try, I can't put two words togeher. Usually, it happens after I get across a particularly important deadline, like my brain just shuts down and refuses to do anything until I take time off and recover HP. Problem is, I always feel guilty, like I'm being a deadbeat while Anne does real work during these times. Other times, I feel like a ferret on meth, struggling to help my fingers keep up with my brain as it unleashes idea after idea at me. It's reassuring to know that someone as successful and as consistently awesome as Elizabeth Bear experiences similar extremes.

In his introduction to The Secret History of The Lost Colony, John said:

The lesson here for writing is that even your “failures” — the stuff that doesn’t work for your book, for whatever reason — can still have value to you as you’re wrestling with your work. This is one reason way, whenever I chop out a significant chunk of text from a book I’m writing, I don’t simply delete it: I cut it and paste it into an “excisions” document that I keep handy. That way I can go back to that material for reference, or to drop a line or an idea into the final version, perhaps in a completely different context, but where it will do some real good. This is what I do, and it’s worked for me so far.

I got a whole book out of one of those folders. I'm intensely grateful to be living in a digital age when it's simple and efficient to hold onto tons of stuff that I'd otherwise throw away, if it was printed out.

As long as we're talking about writing, I wanted to point all my fellow rookie writers to 5 Writing Lessons I Wish I'd Learned the Easy Way. I also wanted to point all my fellow bloggers/writers to a fantastic post I wish I'd written about the difference between writing a book, and writing a blog.

I'm not under the delusion that I'm anywhere close to the same league as the authors I've mentioned in this post, but that's the point. They're all successful and talented and awesome, and instead of hoarding their knowledge and guarding their experience, they share it with us, so that we can dream of one day being like them.

This morning, SF Signal linked to an interview with Kevin Smith (I swear, this blog isn't going to be all Kevin Smith, all the time) where he obliquely discusses a movie that he can't really talk about:

Host: So thumbs up on The Watchmen, what else you got?

Smith: I saw a movie last night that I cannot talk about.

Host: Was it good?

Smith: It was phenomenal.

Host: Any stars, any break out stars, and do they trek?

Smith: The stars absolutely trek in this film. It is fantastic. Anybody who was worried doesn’t need to be worried–about this film I cannot talk about…It was in very capable hands. The director did a phenomenal job–the director and his crew. Top notch cast and the guy that plays the lead is an instant star. That dude is going to be so famous. He is so wonderful. He picked up a role that I would say is pretty challenging for someone to step into the shoes of, because it is a role that has been played before many times by the same guy.

Host: How do you out Shatner, Shatner?

Smith: I don’t know what you are talking about.

Host: I was just saying that as an expression.

Speaking of Kevin Smith (and, really, I swear this isn't going to be a regular thing), Anne and I went to the opening of Crazy 4 Cult 2 at Gallery 1988 on Friday night, thanks to an unexpected invite from Jensen, who I believe is the gallery's owner. It is phenomenal. Let me just say that again, to make my point: fuh. nuh. muh. nul.

I didn't know that some of my favorite artists are in the show, including Ben Walker (who does awesome work with bears and guns) and Dan Goodsell, who does Mr. Toast. Andy Suriano, who you may have seen play the part of my Russian mail order bride on Gorgeous Tiny Chicken Machine Show, also has a piece in the show that's spectacular. My favorite pieces in the show, though, have got to be Scott Campbell's*, including the poster for the show, and Kirk Demaris's** family portraits.

I was absolutely blown away by this show, and if you're within . . . let's say two hours of Los Angeles . . . it's worth the effort to come into town and see it before it closes. While you're in the neighborhood, you can buy comics (including the new Star Trek Manga that has my story The Art of War in it, plug plug) at Golden Apple, see a show down the street at ACME, and have dinner at Bulan Thai, the best vegetarian Thai restaurant I've ever been to.

* He has a webcomic that's tremendously entertaining. He also did great showdowns of the 8-bit era for I am 8-bit.

** You could easily lose a few hours enjoying retro culture at Kirk's Secret Fun Spot.

While I was doing some admin stuff on the Geek Group at Propeller this morning, I saw that member JBooth had submitted Atari: The Golden Years. It's a fabulous article at Gamasutra that covers 1978-1981:

This four-year period -- from 1977 to 1981 -- contains some of the most exciting developments the company ever saw in its history: the rise of the 2600, the development of some of the company's most enduringly popular games (Centipede, Asteroids) and the development and release of its first home computing platforms.

This comprehensive look back, filled with quotes from the original creators and other primary sources, offers a detailed peek into the company that popularized video gaming as the '70s turned into the '80s, and created the first viable market for home consoles.

If you ever owned an Atari computer or played any of their ubiquitous games, this article is going to be an awesome ride on the nostalgia bus for you. It's also useful for you damn kids today who want to understand why guys like me get all worked up about 8-bit computers, but get off my lawn before you read it.

You know . . . there are lots of great 80s computer emulators available now, and I've often wondered if it would be as fun as I think to fire up an Atari 400 emulator, track down one of those old magazines, and see if I can actually get one of those games to run.