September - Disaster Preparedness Month

Before we end September next week, which will be Gretcen and I's 2 year anniversary...

What an awesome day, sunny and 73 degrees, one of my best memories.

... let's talk about some basic things you can do to bolster your home and family for the coming winter.

First, an accounting of the Rule of Threes:

You will survive only...

... 3 hours without shelter

... 3 days without water

... 3 weeks without food

There's more but those are the basics for us common folks.

I'm not going to talk about tactical gear or much about guns, read further for boring yet essential stuff.

Shelter:

1) Make sure your insurance (renter's or home) is up to date. 

2) Now is the time for repairs, at least in our area as the weather is mild. Summer would've been best but you've still got time.

3) Think about what is a common natural disaster in your area. Get supplies for that now. Bags of landscape sand, tarps, boards, snow shovel, rock salt, trash bags, utility cordage... stuff like that.

4) Check your tools or update your tool kit. Hammer, nails, screws, screwdriver, wrenches, duct tape, glue.

5) Clothes. Make sure your winter coat is good or look into getting a new one. Socks and shoes. Hat and scarf. GLOVES!!

6) Blankets, time to get them winter throw blankets out.

7) Alternate heating system. Think about how to heat your home if the primary heating system were to go out. Our primary is electric, secondary would be our fireplace. I need to get some wood. The chimney has been swept.

Water:

First, The last 2 years we, in Portland, have had water situations. Both times the local news showed people going to the market and panic-buying water. My own Brother in Law went to Costco and it took him 3 hours to buy some cases of water.

General rule is gallon of water per person per day. This includes hygiene and food prep. I have a family of three plus three cats to care for - 4 gallons per day is my calculation. 5 days of fresh water (20 gallons) is my goal. Sounds hard? Just do this:

Buy:

Five Gallon Water Jug

Things to remember:

1) Cycle the water every 6 months or so. I use these for car camping so it's how I cycle through them. 

2) When I fill them I will add just a couple of drops of bleach to keep it clean in storage. This is not to purify, just keep things clean.

3) Water is heavy, five gallons of water will weigh over 35 pounds. If you will have difficulty carrying 35 pounds than take a different approach.

4) Learn to filter and purify. Learn the difference between the 2.

In a nutshell - 

Filtering gets "stuff" out of the water: dirt, pollution like mercury and DDT, bugs, motor oil, solid things like that. Some filters go down to the micron level and will pull microbes out too but that is not common.

Purifying kills things at a microbe level like crypto and Ecoli. This is done with bleach, UV light, boiling.

There are a ton of ways to explore filtration and purification.

That's it for now.... off to Historical Wargames Day at Guardian Games!

Edit: 

I failed to mention duct-tape and batteries. Have a good supply of both as both can save your bacon. Now is a good time to switch batteries out of flashlights, not when you need the flashlights. Personally I switch out my "utility" lights every October (my personal use lights get switched out more regularly as I use them all the time).

Crazy September!

Well, from my rather sedentary life as a Portland Working Stiff, it was crazy.

Finished off my performances of The Telling Portland 2014 and it was good. I was nervous every night of the performances but did well. Saturday night was my best night in my opinion. We also did Q&A every night after every performance. Some of it was pretty intense. Every night the audience was different, good, but in a different head space. Many of my friends showed up as well as a full house of my in-laws Saturday night. Opening night my Father and my cousin Katie were there and that was awesome.

After the show we took my wife to the White Owl Social Club for her birthday, many of us were there. She got gifts and lots of love.

I like that bar, kind of a tourist hipster place. You go there to SEE hipsters as opposed to being a hipster. It's cool, what with Portlandia being a popular show and all. Soon, Portland being a thing will end so I think enterprising people should take advantage of that now when they can.

The following Sunday we had a cast party at fancy bar Departure. That was nice.

Speaking of Sundays it's football season!! Alas, my Raiders still suck so I'm not too excited.

Not a lot of gaming this month. My RPG group is tired of Pathfinder so that's dead. I get it, though I love the system. I have no room to dick-out about it though so I just backed off and went with the flow. Savage Worlds: War of the Dead is still going strong and I'm enjoying it.

Jason wants to flex his creative muscles and home brew a fantasy world using the SW system. Looks like we'll be doing some kind of "Conan" style world. Low-magic and high adventure!!

This Saturday, the 27th, is the first Historical Wargames Day at Guardian Games. I plan to have a table set aside for some Saga. Kyle and I will be the primaries but we hope to introduce the game to others and get some of the other guys that don't play as much more into it.

My Varangians and Harald will make their debut there. I also hope to have 12 new "dark age" archers ready to go. Other than those 12 archers I have not much on my painting table.

Spencer and I's Old Glory order of the month just shipped today so we should get them early next week. I ordered a cart/wagon/peasants set that we can use for Escort Scenarios in Saga. This coming fall and winter I plan to bust out 7 points each of Pagan Rus and Rus Princes factions. This will bring me up to 4 full factions with Vikings, Normans, And the 2 Rus. A few weeks ago I also finished a William the Bastard mini to add to my Normans.

Last weekend I had off so I enjoyed some chill "me time" while Gretchen and my kid went off to Rose City Comic Con. I'm not into big cons like I thought I would be so it was just them. Saturday I did some cleaning and maintenance. I watched Lone Survivor and This is England 86 and 88. Great shows but all kind of bummers.

My kid (13 years old) was in the junior's cosplay contest and did well for almost no prep. It was her first and she learned how hard she will have to work to do well in those.

That's what has been going on. Plenty more to come too.

Very Busy Week - The Telling: Portland 2014

Very busy week ahead of me. I have a soft opening for The Telling tonight for press and such. Sept. 10-13 (Weds-Fri) I am live with my performances.

If you are interested in hearing vet's stories than here is ticket info:
Telling: Portland 2014 Tickets September 10-13, 2014
Also will be available at the box office. $15, $10 for veterans.

I'm working 8-5, my call time at the theater is 5:30, no dinner, curtain at 7:30, show done by 9:00, maybe home by 10:00. All week except Tuesday which is dress rehearsals 12-5 and I will be missing as I have to work. 15 hour days. No over-time pay. I'll be glad next Monday when all this is done.

The stories we are telling are not tales of glory or conquest. Maybe a conquest of our own selves but not of how we did it to others. This is rated R. We are not recruiting. The sharper of you readers of my blog, that also go to the show, will catch the Easter egg I drop - a bit about the relation between the title of this blog and where that came from.

Further, this production has been wrought with drama. Not a bad thing but the five of us on stage and the production and direction staff... let's just say more people have walked on us than are actually involved in the final production. Some of them for great reasons that I understand and respect. Most though? Fuck 'em. I never got to be a SEAL but I did stick it out with what is left of these guys and I'm chalking that up as something.

I try hard not to "not like" people. Not enough room in my life for hatred of others and their silly little egos. I'm human though and also have a silly little ego and, sometimes, the Viking in me over-takes the Buddhist in me. All the shit these people have done to end our show and we're still moving forward and performing this week. Whether we sell 2 tickets or 200 I don't care. I'm going through with what I promised to do and they didn't; It's  a tick against their honor, not mine. They get to live with themselves for the rest of their pretty little lives with dishonor hanging above their heads. Not me.

One thing a vet knows and may not admit, and I am far enough removed from that to see and admit it, is that 99.9% of us are not heroes. We'll soak it up when you give it to us but deep down inside we know we're mostly pieces of shit like a lot of other people. Most the guys I served with? Not your model human. Same goes with me. It's why we were there and not in college or doing something great that you end up hearing about on NPR. The military just beat "jail time" to the finish line.

All that said I'm excited to have an opportunity to stand before any willing to hear me out (and buy a ticket) and spill my guts about why I came home and was "so intense" when before I was just a big dumb jock that had some friends and a lot of hope but no direction and I liked to play Dungeons and Dragons and hang out with girls.

Did I just type 2 dichotomous actions in the same sentence? "Play Dungeons and Dragons" and "hang out with girls?". This was in the 80s.

Next week it's back to Varangian miniatures (done!), a few weekends of Saga, maybe another game of Savage Worlds, and some down-time with my wife and kid and reconnecting with my friends who I dearly miss.

Edit 9/9/14:
Soft opening is done and in the wind. Feeling much better about this. We all did well on the stage and no one fucked it up... especially me.

Added bonus is that a person we were told was in the "anti" camp actually came to the show and was impressed. So much so he invited us to perform on Veteran's Day at the big PSU auditorium. Cool. I'll think about that after this week is done. A few others did as well and gave us accolades.

After our performance we did a meet and greet. It was nice to be face to face with people, some of whom had similar experiences as us. We may do M&G or Q&A after our other performances.

Miniatures: Working on some terrain.

One thing that my new hobby of Wargaming has got me into is terrain making.

For role-playing (3.x D&D, Pathfinder, Savage Worlds) most terrain needs were fulfilled by vinyl mats and felt tip markers or, my favorite thing in the world, Flip Mats by Paizo.

I quickly discovered, after getting into All the Kings Men and Saga, that we'd need some "real" terrain pieces.

There was a learning curve there but we got it dialed in. I like a good MDF board base; I bought a sheet of the stuff from the local hardware store and had my friend, Mathew who has access to a water jet cutter, cut me some 5" and 8" round pieces.

These would become the basis (bases) of my terrain pieces. In Saga core rules you have 2 sizes of terrain - M (6" max) and L (12" max) so I thought 5" and 8" rounds would suffice. This fall I will be buying another sheet of MDF and will trade with Mathew to cut some 4"x6" and 7"x11" ovals maybe... will have to do math and find dimensions that will fully maximize the MDF sheet.

An example of how I would use a 5" terrain base. In Saga this would be a M-sized building.

This Labor Day I decided to make some new terrain pieces as it's been all Summer since I've made anything. I wanted a "stone formation" a la Stonehenge. I bought some stone outcropping pieces at the FLGS and put it all together:

I added some slate pieces like it was some kind of wall on the right side. I will be doing sand/grass mix on the outer edges for some contrast. Yes, that's five 5" bases glued together. Admittedly it's not my greatest endeavor but it will work for what I am trying to achieve - L-sized stone outcropping for Saga.

Next I worked on a tall grass/brushy area concept:

I glued down some fake fur remnants I had to make tall grass. Again, to make an oval I glued together three 5" bases. I'm flying by the seat of my pants here so I was not sure what to do about the fur-brown grass. I want it to look like tall reedy grass. I took a risk.

I took some light green spray paint and sprayed it directly down on the fur. I then took some Summer Yellow spray paint and sprayed it "up" from a low angle to high-light the fur. I think it worked. Now, I just need to flock the MDF parts with dirt and short grass and I think I've done it.

Saga, Welsh vs. Normans, playing some new factions

Played some new factions Friday night. Spencer played his Welsh for the first time though unfinished paint jobs while I played my Normans for a second time. We played 2 games, 4 points, Clash of the Warlords, and gave ourselves plenty of time to figure out stuff with our new factions.

Terrain was standard from the book - both games resulted in the Welsh picking 6 and Normans picking 1 for a grand total of 3 pieces.

This will be less of an AAR with winners and losers (Normans were losers) and more about points we learned about the factions.

The first game started strong for the Normans and some bold opening moves. They played Warlord and 2 points mounted knights, 1 point of crossbow warriors, 1 point of mounted warrirors.

Welsh played 2 points of mounted warriors, mounted Warlord and Hearthguard, and a point of foot warriors.

Crossbows can be awesome as long as they are protected. In this pic you can see how the Normans moved up to the cabbage patch and fired into the Welsh mounted warriors, killing 4 of them. Crossbows get a +1 to attack while mounted figures get a -1 to armor from ranged attacks. This being Welsh mounted with javelins that is one less armor to boot. Warrior armor is 4. The equation: 4- (-1 mounted/ranged)-(-1 javelins)-(+1 for attackers) = pretty much Normans having to roll 1 or higher and that is an easy thing to do.

That said, crossbow warriors get a -1 to armor rating too and not as easy of a day against anything but mounted troops.

Ha! Look how many we knocked down!!

I try not to blame the dice but you know what makes it so awesome Norman crossbowmen can't be awesome? No activations. Pretty much the rest of the game resulted in no "common" dice being rolled (1-3) thus no activations for my Cabbage Patch Shooters of death. Any rares that came up were used to supplement Saga board abilities needed to increase effectiveness of Norman Knights. Usually, we have the opposite problem (too many commons).

Since we did so well let's just camp here in this cabbage patch and drink wine.

The first game went on pretty heavy on the Welsh losses but a final mistake made by me left my Warlord open and he got killed.

It became a fight about angles and inches and the Welsh were able to exploit the Norman mistake and pull a win.

Points:

• Norman Crossbow Warriors are pretty awesome. They just need the activations.
• Norman mounted warriors? Meh. What they have is mobility. What they lack is activations and punch. I'd only use them for specific scenerios where area and speed are needed - like Sacred Ground (to get to that far terrain piece) or even River Battle where you can get them across a bridge with haste.
• Welsh sure can avoid melee. You need ranged attacks to do anything to them. If I was running my Vikings? It would've been embarrassing.
• If you are playing Welsh and your opponent is playing something with ranged capabilities? Rethink mounted Welsh warriors. That said, Spencer just wanted to surprise me with whoopin' out 16 mounted warriors as he did not tell me he was working on those. Sneaky.

Game 2 was the same as above except the Welsh were all foot, including the Warlord. The Normans went with only 4 Knights and used the extra point to hire some Flemish Mercenaries!

In game 2 Spencer used the Hell out of Child of the Land Welsh Saga ability. He was moving unimpeded through terrain that also gave him cover. My mounted Warriors on my right were almost taken right out of the game by round 2 as his Welsh Warriors javelin-ed then closed on them killing 6 and leaving 2.

Flemish Swords For Hire are good at one thing, defensive turtle-up. They are Warriors that have an increased armor value of 5. When not initiating an attack they also have hard/heavy cover. It's an increase in armor value and increase save numbers. BTW, Saga core rules goes back and fourth on the term "hard cover" and "heavy cover". Both have the same value. What you get when you interpret the rules from French to English?

The problem with Flemish Swords For Hire is that they do not get to use any ability that your faction gets to use. They get one free activation per turn. Movement is down to S. There is no real way to increase their attack capability. I attacked with them a few times but they didn't really do much to nudge Welsh from the rocky outcrop they were dug into.

What I should have done here was attack. I did not.

Spencer and I deduced that a good way to use them would be to hold a bridge or some terrain feature that has soft cover. Or, as an incredibly powerful screen of some kind (that is slow though). Next time we play the bridge scenario I'm totally using the Flemish.

The other thing I learned by this last game is that it does not pay to have an aggressive faction (like Normans) and not go for it. You really got to look at combos and using your units as a team. I was failing at that. By round six the Welsh were dug in well and ahead by 3 victory points and my options were few. I rolled my Saga dice and saw I did have the opportunity to send my Warlord in, take a lot of the Welsh warriors protecting the Warlord, and hit the Welsh Warlord with a Dex Aie. That's right... the Norman Nuke that uses 2 rare dice to activate.

It almost worked too but there were just enough warriors left over from my first attack that my 9 hits were soaked/saved by the Welsh and one of the Welsh Warlord's hits got through and took my Norman Warlord down. It was a tight game. One Warrior or Hearthguard with me may have saved my Warlord and, as I killed a bunch of Welsh Warriors, I may have won on VPs as I got 4 of them taking out his last band of Warriors.

The Welsh are wiley. Seemed to be on the ropes the whole time in both games but Spencer's skill and abilities always pulled through for his Welsh.

The main thing I need to do now is to seize the initiative and recognize those moments I have the aforementioned initiative.

Edit: It was pointed out that I had the activation dice wrong for my crossbow warriors. They are "Warriors" and activate on common or rare Saga dice. It was the common die, 1-3, that were not coming up for me. The correction has been made above.

Saga Varangians half done

Here they are... well, half of them...

Old Glory Viking Command and a Gripping Beast Harald Hardrada.

Ready for the table. With this I can run one Hero of the Viking Age (Harald) and 4 Hearthguard. I'm about 75% done with the other 6 and my juggernaut of Harald and 12 Varangians with Dane Axes will be ready to go.

This is how they looked 2 weeks ago.

 Looking forward to getting a game going soon though my full Varangian unit may not be ready until next week.

I just ordered Bondi Archers from Old Glory and I should get them next week. Next month I will be ordering Norse spear men to fill up my warrior ranks. Then, this winter, I will be working on Rus factions.

Also, with a copy of Warlord's Pike and Shotte in my hands, I am looking at some Italian Wars armies.

I'm interested in French and around the 1510s. Seems I can get both Swiss and Landsknechts that way.

Going to busy painting through 2015!

Heavy week last week

Coming out of a funk.

Last week was a tough one starting Tuesday and ending Friday. Had some follow through over the weekend.

First, the Telling Project. One of our cast members is telling her story and word got out among some outside group of "concerned people", that I found out to just be a bunch of Army groupies, and some Hell has broken loose. An ex-cast member leaked our private e-mails and private promotional pictures of us (and I am assuming our script) and we got harassed and spammed by the Army groupies. It got ugly. I am only involved via being another person telling their story of military service on stage. I have not met most of these other people in my entire life.

I was hurt myself. There is a reason I don't do a lot of organized Veteran stuff ; because of bullshit like this. I mean, really, how dare someone involve me in something that I have nothing to do with especially while I am in the middle of a project where I am opening myself up emotionally and quite publicly. On top of that, this person gave out my e-mail address, pictures of me, and a script containing information about myself. Some pretty deep shit too.

Then, there are the women who e-mailed ME with convictions so strong they felt they were justified in using my private information to involve me in something that amounts to a fucking love-triangle and pretty-princess syndrome.

To add salt to the wound these people are all involved in Veteran's health non-profits. Un-kickable like a box of kittens. Good job.

Anyways, the show goes on.

Then, I got news of 2 campers lost in the Tillamook forest. Sadly, quite common here. Found out later one of them is an old buddy of mine, Justin Norton. Justin hired me at Dantes when I needed some work after getting fired at The Crystal Ballroom. I was still kind of wound up from that... my thing, not anyone elses... and Justin gave me a good talking to and a chance to redeem myself. He was a good man that way. I felt I did right by him and moved on to the law-firm job i have now. We talked about going into business with each other but I chose the relative safety of a 9-5er.

I'd see Justin about once a year after 2003 and he'd always recognize me. I felt respected by him and thus I respected him.

Justin and his friend were found Friday night. Both were deceased. They had crashed their truck down a 200' cliff and were killed.

Then, I got news of Pink Martini percussionist Derek Rieth passing away. I went to school with him and, though not best friends, we were friends. His younger sister was in a German class with me and I considered her my own sister.

Again, while working at the Crystal Ballroom in 2003, Pink Martini was doing a show there. I had no idea Derek was in Pink Martini... Hell, he was a founding member. They were loading in and I was at the door when Derek walks up and recognizes me. We talked for about 30 minutes catching up since high school in 1989. Still, he did not mention he was in Pink Martini the whole time. He then said, "Well, I better go. Let's hook up and hang out man." and he walked in the door I was watching. I stopped him and that is how I found out he was in Pink Martini. I felt dumb and he apologized for assuming I knew.

I saw him next at our 20 year high school reunion.

Me, Stephanie Vlachos, Derek Rieth, Ryan Kruse - Fort Vancouver class of '89

After that, I was able to go to a Pink Martini show and got good seats up front and close. I took a plutonic lady friend with me but did not mention I knew Derek. Right after the last song he recognized me and said hello. My lady friend had been crushing on him all night and was impressed that I knew him. For what it's worth it made me feel good.

Derek is a good man.

Then, I learned that someone that is a part of my early life, high school, was just picked up by the feds for child porn. He was a friend, and I am sure his life is Hell right now but I can't say I have his back. Out of respect I will not name him. I'll let the Feds and media take care of that business as it 'aint mine. It pains me people were hurt in such a way.

Now, I understand that none of these things fit directly into my life. Bad news is just that, bad news. Still, things can get painful though.

In light of all that I had a good weekend. My wife made breakfast Saturday morning and I got some sleep. My rehearsals were decent and I got an offer for some mentoring from a writer and stage director. We got in a good War of the Dead game with Brandon, Jason, and Karen. Me, Wife, and kid went to the Jade District Night Market Saturday night and we got good bahn mi and the kid got her face painted. After that we went to our friend Andrice's b-day party and saw a lot of friends. My friend Emily bequeathed to me her Husband Dylan's heavy metal CD collection of over 200 CDs and I was honored to take it.

I promise my next blog post will be less emo.