Boot Girl

Okay, let's pretend for just a moment that GenCon never happened. That would be a terrible thing, because GenCon was actually quite fantastic for the most part. Fisherman's Wife did well, even though I am still binding and sending out the fancy versions. And it was such a pleasure to meet new people and see old friends.

The drive to and fro was loads of fun. Couldn't ask for better travelling partners than Tom and Graham. I learned so much slang, and engaged in potty humor. There were tragedies, like how I left all the unbound text of Fisherman's Wife and access to cash at home. And as if I needed reminding why I married Chris, the apple of my eye, my beloved FedExed my books, and I sold out of every one. Fisherman's Wife was mentioned in Ken Hite's "The New Hotness" column of the GenCon program. Steal Away Jordan did okay, all things considered.

I played a meaner, crueler pirate than Abyssinia from last year's Poison'd game. This time I played Seamus McShee, a woman disguised as a young man, who went from grumpy gunnery master to captain. Highlights of Captain McShee's career included ordering the cook and surgeon to cut up the body of a vanquished captain and feed him to his crew, and holding a red hot coin in the surgeon's hand because s/he disobeyed my command. Not a pleasant fellow. I also played a hard drinking space trooper Corporal Maggie "Shamrock" O'Malley in 3:16 (very much a pleasant fellow), and got through the darkest and saddest Fisherman's Wife with Ron Edwards.

But let's pretend none of that happened for now. Let's consider John McCain's $520 Ferragamo loafers. That's crazy! I mean they're okay, but he could've paid $90 for a similar pair of Kenneth Coles, and not gotten ridiculed about his footwear. And I can certainly appreciate a pair of Ferragamos.

I understand, Senator McCain, I have a shoe thing myself, rather, a boot thing. I get it from the woman who introduced me to Ferragamos, Dr. Bond, my shoe and handbag loving mom. I loves me some boots, especially lace up boots and cowboy boots. For the past few years, I've plunked down a few bucks for fashionable and comfortable boots. Not $520 a pair, but then again I know I own only one house. Maybe if things were different... Anyway, my birthday is coming up, and most years I treat myself just for the sake that I exist. A dubious reason to buy yet another pair of shoes, but there it is. Maybe if I ran for president I'd have a better excuse. This year was no different. See above, my hot new Made in the USA Lucchese western style boots. I think they're way cuter than Senator McCaine's Ferragamos.

A shared love of shoes does not a president make, though. I'm still an Obama Mama--in my freakin' awesome Night Cactus Lucchese Cowgirl boots that I got for a [relative] steal from Grapevine Hill!.

Getting ready for GenCon

JiffyCon, yay! I did two games of Tales of the Fisherman's Wife, which went amazingly well. I got some excellent feedback, and when we go to Maine next week, I hope to spend a nice chunk of time working on the TOFW text. I'm going to take it to GenCon as an ashcan and be part of the Ashcan Front booth.

I also got to play Steal Away Jordan as a player and not GM for the first time. My character was a 30 year old pregnant runaway seamstress, and one of my goals was not to give birth on the road. I completed my tasks and failed at my goal. Evan Torner, the awesome GM ran a game that was the funniest Steal Away Jordan ever. It was certainly a tragicomedy. There was a sacrificial suicide, a haint induced birth (my character's), a terrible betrayal which caused another character to get caught (we were runaways), and the hope and promise of freedom for a nine year old. It rocked! I like playing my game!

I'm also going to be working at the Indie Press Revolution/Forge booth, working the cash register and stocking the shelves. I will not be demoing Steal Away Jordan. SAJ is my first attempt at game designing, publishing, and selling. What a long strange trip this past year has been. I mean that in a 75% good way, and the 25% unpleasantly strange trip has been character building, to say the least.

All that to say that I do not plan to demo Steal Away Jordan at GenCon. First, logistically it just wouldn't be fun. I really want to push Tales of the Fisherman's Wife. Demoing is emotionally and physically draining. This GenCon I want to work my ass off and have fun, too. Secondly, demoing Steal Away Jordan is particularly emotionally taxing, and not in the positive character building way.

Okay, I'm going to say it, and gentle reader, especially you gentle gamers out there, please don't take this the wrong way. I am well aware that SAJ is not for everyone. I get that some folks out there find it off-putting to game race, and no matter how many times I deny it in a podcast, in a 15 minute demonstration of my game, race is what a good number of people will focus on even if I say, "this is a game about historical narratives and [African American] folk tales..." And I'm well aware that my skin color and gender are not typical among gamers and game designers. Last year at GenCon I felt my blackness and womanness--my otherness--more than I've ever felt it before.

Steal Away Jordan was not meant to be an "educational" game. African American history is rich in adventure, drama, and story, which to me seems to be perfect material for a role playing game of the "story game" type. It's not a game designed to make people feel bad or guilty about where they come from. Steal Away Jordan is not a game about hopelessness.

In other words, I don't want to spend my weekend explaining and defending my work (a celebration of my American cultural heritage) to people who glom on to my otherness. I was described as a "nice black lady" in one review, and my ethnicity was mentioned in several other reviews of the game. It would be naive of me to say I don't know why it matters, but the uppity part of me says, why should my race and gender matter? And maybe I'm actually a mean black lady! I don't think the writer meant it to be patronizing, but... Anyway, I'm taking myself out of the equation with the hope and fear that my otherness may be a barrier to some people's interest in reading the text and trying the game.

That said, I'm really looking forward to GenCon. I'm excited about seeing and playing with the kind people I met last year. I'm looking forward to buying some cool games and eating sushi.

A Serendipitous Encounter

I love Atlanta!

In the airport, on my way back home, I bumped into my cousins Chi Chi and Antonio. They were flying back from Argentina, where they were visiting their son, who works there. A luggage mishap kept them from leaving the airport and going home to Auburn, AL. It also made it possible for us to cross paths in a city neither of us lives in, going in opposite directions, but both going home.

I'm in Atlanta!

This is short notice, but if you’re in the Atlanta area, I’m giving a presentation on Steal Away Jordan and game design at Spelman College Monday, March 24 at 6 pm in the Ennis Cosby Reading Room.

I’m going to talk about how I came to design a role playing game about slavery, about story games, the community, being an “only” in the community, and anything else that’s relevent. I’m also going to do a brief demo of Steal Away Jordan.

There's a possibility that I might run an evening game at the hotel or on campus. We'll see. Email me if you're interested.

Slave Narratives: Prince Among Slaves & The Story of Catcher Freeman

[From Stone Baby Games] I have a new category: Slave Narratives. I'm on a search for all kinds of slave narratives in all kinds of media. Fictional, autobiographical, mythical, books, film, spoken word, still life. I am particularly looking for slave narratives that break with convention.

Last month, as I watched Prince Among Slaves (the book on which it is based) on PBS, I realized that Steal Away Jordan has more in common with a televised dramatization of a slave narrative than a text, such as Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl.

I push the notion that in SAJ you play a hero. Your character can be larger than life. Your story has a full orchestra soundtrack. Your character's costumes and makeup would win Oscars. Your characters may not get everything they want, and quite possibly may not survive, but they will go out in a blaze of glory. The audience will howl and weep and will cheer at the end.

Stories spoken out loud have that affect on me. It's one of those things that drew me to role playing games in the first place. I could not resist the chance to exchange stories. Reading a book is a personal story telling experience. Movies and role playing games are enjoyed best in groups.

Last night at work, I finally saw an episode of The Boondocks. Tonight I watched The Story of Catcher Freeman. It illustrates perfectly and hilariously the power of collaborative story telling. You have four people each giving their account of a legendary slave hero, in all his cinematic glory. Each story reflects the ideals and perceptions of the story teller, for better or worse. Best of all, it was painfully funny. You can see it here for now.

A Very Merry Black History Month To You!

or, blah blah Black History Month.

Dude, every month is Black History Month for some of us. I was going to run a special at Stone Baby Games to celebrate the shortest month of the year, but I changed my mind. That said, you can purchase and download a pdf of the snazzy new revised Steal Away Jordan at IPR.

Instead, in celebration of the time when Black History gets a fighting chance to be considered American History, as opposed to something unique and largely unimportant to any other American, I bring you Black Hyperlinks! (which come in all different colors!)

On Friday I stuck a Barack Obama sign in our front yard. That same morning I woke up and I was an African American, just like the day before and the day before that.

Here's something you might not know about me (unless you're my mom, the Director of the African American Studies Department at University of Memphis): I was Harold Ford, Jr.'s escort to his beautillion in Memphis.

Chris and I just watched Prince Among Slaves. I really enjoyed this, so much so that I want to read the book. I was doubly pleased with the realization that one could tell this story using Steal Away Jordan! Yay, me! (A Black Woman in February!)

There's an awesome conversation about one of the Steal Away Jordan sessions I ran at Dreamation over at Story Games.

Best of all, and most significantly for me, Black History Month is the same month Ingrid joined the world, a decendent of both Americans, Africans, and Vikings.

So there you go, now go out and celebrate!

Play Amistad with Me

Crossposted at Stone Baby Games...

I’m running a session of Steal Away Jordan at JiffyCon this Saturday. I’m trying to decide what the setting will be, and here are some that settings I’m toying with:

An Amistad-esque journey. Not quite sure where it would begin. I’m thinking I could encourage the players to stage a mutiny and go from there. It could be interesting if through most of the game, the subjugators were the stronger soon to be slaves. One of the conflicts might include divisions between the slaves of different villages. (The title of this post does not indicate what setting I've actually chosen.)

That Wikipedia article has several links to other revolts. That could be fun, too. I really want to see a good rebellion. Successful or not, of course.

Seth Ben Ezra was researching a Civil War era game. (Hey Seth! Have you played it yet?) This idea excites me as much as a good slave revolt.

I also want to play Kindred. I could play any of these and still have an unfortunate time traveler.

Folk Story Narratives heavy laden with devils with souls in their mouths, flying slaves, and trickster rabbits.

A more fleshed out version of that 18th century Carolina Rice Plantation I demoed a thousand times at GenCon. This is really the least appealing to me.

Come to JiffyCon and find out for yourself! I’m also running Acts of Evil. Hopefully I’ll be able to get some Murder Ballad Blackjack playtesting in, too. It only takes an hour, folks!

Strength of Strings

It's on it's way. My custom built 21 chord chromatic B model zebra wood autoharp by Timbreline Music. I have the UPS tracking code. As I type this, it's still in Colorado. Estimated delivery date is this Thursday. I have a good feeling it will be worth the wait.

The arrival of a new autoharp makes me want to finish putting the Lumbert Mountain Music diatonic chord bars on my OS EBH/R. (That's an Oscar Schmidt autoharp made in the 70's) Steal Away Jordan forced autoharping to the back burner this past year, but since I'm working on a game where folk music is an integral part of play, I'll have good reason to get strumming. Murder Ballad Blackjack will have the lyrics and chords to about 25 murder ballads.

My heart's all a-flutter! I'm also expecting some blodpudding to show up on my doorstep any day now. Blodpudding, autoharps, what joyful things arrive by mail.

Indigo Girl

I've been doing this off and on for years. Sometime between October and January, I color my hair black. My hair is naturally black, but the sun turns it reddish, and then I henna it mahogany in the summer, so it doesn't stay black for long. In the past I've used Miss Clairol blue black, and other "safer" herbal coloring kits from the health food store, but since I henna my hair, traditional color doesn't stay in very long, and it makes my dreads very unhappy. Tonight I'm trying something new: indigo! The recipe will follow.

Indigo reminds me of the film Daughters of the Dust, and Nana Peazant's indigo stained hands. (Daughters of the Dust is a Steal Away Jordan inspiration, too).

I need 2-3 boxes, bottles, or jars of any hair coloring preparation to do my hair. Three will cover it all.

Here's the recipe I used:

• Approx. 8 oz. or so of indigo (aka "black henna"). That was one jar of Rainbow henna (black) and 4.2 oz. of indigo from Acadia Herbals. I could have used another 4 oz, and Rainbow brand is very gritty. Too gritty for dreads. Normally I henna my hair with henna gel, but it's expensive given how much I need.
• 2 c. water
• 2 c. apple cider vinegar (I almost used kombucha)
• 1/2 cup black tea (an afterthought)
• 1 package of pectin (1.75 oz)
• Essential oils of ylang ylang, petitgrain, and vetiver (because indigo and vinegar smell nasty when mixed together)--about 1/4 teaspoon total.
• latex-free gloves (found in my lab coat after work last night)
• Plastic bag
• Towel

Bring the water and vinegar to a boil. Whisk in the pectin. Boil for 1 minute. Let stand for 10 minutes.
Add essential oils to indigo powder (I may have used too much, but it smells better than it would have if hadn't used them at all).
Mix the indigo and liquid together and let stand for 20-30 minutes.
It should make a gel. If half of my indigo wasn't so gritty I think it would have. It was more like a muddy, sandy gel.

I smooshed it all into my hair. It got everywhere. Halfway through the process I took off my shirt, put the bowl into the tub, held my dreads over the bowl, andsmooshed the indigo into my hair. Towards the end I just stuck the dreads in the bowl and mushed them into what was left. I needed more, but I coated most of my hair. Then I covered my hair with a plastic grocery bag, and played on the computer for a couple of hours.

I hate the rinsing part. It took 20 minutes to get all the henna out of my hair, where it usually takes an hour to rinse out all the henna cream. I still have a little plant matter in my hair, but not enough to be annoying or look gross. Next time I'll keep it on overnight. I didn't want to sleep with mud/henna in my hair, covered by a plastic grocery bag and a towel.

The next morning...
I looks much more natural than the hair dye, and my gray hairs are still visibly gray. The ends are still a little reddish brown, so I think I'll order more indigo, or some Surya henna cream, and do it once more in a few weeks. The powdered indigo wasn't as messy as I thought it would be. My dreads love henna. They feel silky smooth (for dreads) every time I henna them, even with the henna cream.

So here are my hair observations. Since I don't spend mych time on my hair on a daily basis, when I do something big like color it, I think about it lots.

• My hair is inconveniently long. I have to move it out of the way when I pee, I sit and lay on it (and get stuck), it entangles people, and I close it in car doors and windows, among other things. Even still, the benefits and conveniences outweigh the inconveniences.
  
• I spend more money per year on monthly eyebrow maintenance than I do on my hair. All I buy for my hair is henna, soap (the same I use for the rest of me), conditioner (which Chris uses up before I ever would), and hair oil, which I make myself. I splurge from time to time and buy a scarf or a hair toy, but I find people give me these more than I buy them.
  
• I spend very little time on daily upkeep and styling of my hair. A little water on the scalp, a little oil all over, and I'm good to go. If I want to get fancy, I can put my hair in a bun in 37 seconds, and do a half bun in 16.
• Strangers ask if it's all mine at least twice a month. (yes, it is, random man at the Y)
• I always go first whenever I play Aquarius.
• I find hair styling rituals fascinating. And shaving one's head is just subversive. (In a great for you, but no thanks for me way)
  
• I love to see people's reaction when I tell them I grew my hair out from less than an inch. (There's a picture elsewhere on my blog of me in my pixie cut)
  
• In my contraband drawer, I keep a Ziploc bag of my kitchen trimmings (I trim the nape of my neck every few months--the parts that won't dread, even after 9 years), and dead dread ends (the ends get thin, and I pull them apart). Next to my bag of White Rabbit candy, my fine fancy chocolate, and other items I won't mention publicly. It's the hair-cutting as an act of subversion thing.
  
• I think about cutting it short all the time. The thought makes me laugh.
• I have nightmares twice a year or so, where I get a haircut and regret it.

More about Daughters of the Dust.

The Awesome Thing I Can't Yet Tell

Is going to drive me nuts until all is confirmed. Once confirmed, I'll announce it in full at Stone Baby Games, because it has something to do with Steal Away Jordan. So without spilling the beans prematurely, I'm going to talk around the issue:

Back when I was looking at colleges, my grandmother really pushed for me to go to an historically Black women's college in Atlanta. But I didn't want to. I didn't want to live in the Dirty South anymore. I opted for a women's college in Massachusetts.

My grandmother would be proud. I've been invited to speak at that college, as part of a 2 day event on black women and the moving image, and I have the chance to talk about this project that I worked on for the past year in a different circle.

I am just blown away that someone might want to hear me talk about my project. I'm honored, excited, and feeling a little validated. It's not just because someone saw what I did and liked it enough to invite me to an event (and I think they're going to pay me!). There are very few people from my cultural/ethnic community engaging in the creative endeavor that I engage in (rpg design). The thing I did is very much about the strength and struggles of my cultural/ethnic community. Lately I've been doubting myself and the thing I did, but this invitation that I can't yet disclose reassures me that I did do something pretty damn cool, that's less controversial and easier to "get" for some folks because they are working with a similar subject matter (strengths and struggles of my ethnic/cultural community).

Is that vague enough? I think I even lost myself.
**See the update in Comments!**

The picture is of Bessie Coleman, the first African American woman pilot.

Long May You Run

I'm going to be 37 in a little over a week. Ten years ago, on my birthday, Chris asked me to marry him. We had a little picnic and hike at Crag Mountain in Northfield with our late dog Kaya (she was three at the time). He put an engagement ring in my apple pie. I saw the box in his shorts pocket, but I wanted to be surprised. My hair was really short back then, no more than 3 inches all around. Chris' was even shorter. A year later Chris and I went to the very last Bread and Puppet festival. A few months later I was married and pregnant with our first child. I thought about this all day today. I even thought about cutting my hair on my birthday. That thought was fast and fleeting, but I might take a couple inches off to even it out.

I sold my first copy of my game from my website today. So Ingrid and I took a little bike ride to the post office to mail it. Here we are about to leave (I had to document my first internet sale!)


On our way home we stopped at the food co-op to get some lunch. We met the group of kids you see at the top, Eric, Lexie, and Nate. I was taken by Eric's facial tattoos. I didn't notice until I uploaded the photo that Eric has a black eye.

When I walked up to the group, they were definitely a bit apprehensive, but as soon as I said, "I think your facial tattoos are beautiful" everyone softened. Then I explained that when I turn 40 I'd like to get my face tattooed. That won them over. I asked If I could take a picture of them, all of them, and they happily posed. I gave them $5, the last of my cash. They were trying to get to Brattleboro, at least that's what their sign said. I won't argue. When we parted ways, I said, "safe journeys, guys." I wish I'd driven them to Brattleboro myself, but Ingrid was in no mood for a road trip. It was hard enough to get her keep her in the bike trailer.

I used to love road trips. I had the benefit of a reliable car, a little money, and no expensive vices, so I never sat on the street and panhandled in order to get to the next destination. I just hopped in my car and drove, or gathered friends and sought mayhem. Oxford, MS; Little Rock; Nashville, New Orleans, Atlanta. When I was in college, twice I drove from Northampton to Memphis without stopping for the night. By the time I got to Nashville I was falling asleep at the wheel, despite my chain smoking, loud music, and open windows. So I pulled over at a rest area, hung a blanket around my windows and napped for three hours. I clutched a hunting knife, and I was terrified, but too tired to do anything else. Even my friends who out-wandered me--the Deadheads and Rainbow family folks--chastised me for that stupid move. Another time, I smuggled Kaya into a shady motel room with me in Virginia. I still couldn't sleep, even with a rottwieler in the bed and that same knife in my hand, because I got a bad vibe from the hotel manager. He was a nasty, creepy looking man, and looked at me funny.

After college I tempered my wanderlust and limited it to planned road trips to Bread and Puppet and Reggae fests. Then I got married. Then I had children. Last year I backed out of going to a Rainbow Gathering in Vermont last minute. I had too much to do and no money. Backing out made me feel old.

Ten years ago, I would have seen a little of myself in those kids. Fifteen years ago, they might have crashed on my floor while passing through--as Marcus and Skitch (below) did back in 1992. They were train hoppers that my housemates met somewhere out west on their travels.


Today, I worried about those kids. It's quite possible that they were still in diapers when I haunted the roads or kept a light on for people coming off tour or off the train tracks. I actually thought to myself, things are different nowadays. You have to be more careful. The drugs are worse and more dangerous. People are not as charitable to young people who look different. Maybe I recognize the danger in my more settled state. Still, I'm a little jealous of their freedom. Godspeed, guys.

And in other "news", we (Meg, Vincent, Emily, Joshua, and I) played In a Wicked Age tonight. Later, Joshua and I sat on my porch while I pitched a game idea to him: Scary Dolls, the role playing game. Here's what I have so far: You are a child, you have a doll. Like all dolls, your doll has a soul. You tell your doll your deepest darkest secrets. You treat your doll like a close confidant and, well, a toy. Your doll hates you. I don't want this to be any kind of metaphor for abusive relationships. I want this to be strictly about the fuzzy line between a child's imagination and true, pure scary doll badness. Any allegory to anything deeper is purely conincidental.

I'd Hit That

So here are the top 25 keywords that bring people to Parthenia's Blog, according to Google Analytics. I've bolded my favorites, the ones I find more flattering or amusing.

1 and 2. steal away jordan and "steal away jordan"
3. naked sauna
4. tatooed women
5. blodpudding
6. japanese octopus tattoo
7. kombucha troubleshooting
8. people find it difficult to resist your persuasive manner [My favorite. It was a very appropriate fortune cookie message.]
9. how to make ginger kombucha
10. jacci gresham
11. kombucha hair
12. kombucha stomach ache
13. naked women in sauna
14. sauna naked
15. stone babies
16. "stone baby games"
17. ask me psychic
18. bead stuck in nose [Apparently we're not the only ones with a child who sticks beads in her nose.]
19. bead up nose
20. continuous brewing kombucha
21. i like it rough [WTF? I've never said any such thing. I like what rough? Sandpaper?]
22. kombucha addictive
23. kombucha continuous brewing
24. restringing autoharp
25. sauna blog

Some others further down the list include:
"hippie librarian look" (yeah, that's me), "kill your rapist", "see my bare breasts", phrases with "japanese tattoos" and the words "hannya mask" and "octopus", naked women big boobs, other phrases with "kombucha" in them.

Does this say anything about me? I'd like all these keyword hits to incidate somehow that I'm really a nice person with no hang-ups. But people don't do keyword searches for aspiring homebirth midwife, loving mother, wonderful wife, hippie chick with a young-looking face, or the best looking eyebrows in Western Massachusetts thanks to Brooks and Butterfield Day Spa. Kombucha is harmless enough, and I have no shame about my tattoos, except when it comes to telling my parents about them.

But what's up with all the "naked sauna", "naked woman", "naked woman with big boobs in the sauna" hits? I haven't been in a sauna in a few months, and when I go, it's in the women's gold locker room at the local YMCA. The YMCA for crying out loud! I spend much less time in the sauna than all those sauna-related hits would imply.

If you're looking for a cheap thrill you might find one here, but barring discussions of my affection for Bettie Page, my mild obsession with the Dream of the Fisherman's Wife, and my quest to cover my arms in tattoos there's nothing terribly titillating going on here.

That said, I'm going to start discussing most Steal Away Jordan items at Stone Baby Games. Stick around if you want to hear me talk about anything else. I haven't talked about autoharps in a while. I'm still crafting my GenCon 2007 story. There's plenty more to talk about.

I'm planning a sauna visit at the YMCA this week as I return to my workout regimen, which I neglected all summer. There will be nakedness, I guarantee.

Joy!

So I had a mostly adequate time at GenCon. That's an understatement. I don't even know where to begin. As I type this, I'm watching Blood Diamond, which is one of the most upbeat and happy movies I've ever seen. That's a just a lie. But Blood Diamond is a fitting place to begin the tale of how I went to GenCon 2007 and had an indescribable time, and sold a bunch of copies of a game about slavery. By the way, the only diamonds I own are in my engagement ring, which is over 100 years old. It was my mother in law's grandmother's ring from Sweden. No more diamonds for us.

I'll start with the commerce aspect. I demoed my ass off at the Forge/IPR booth, which paid off. Steal Away Jordan made people uncomfortable, sometimes pleasantly so, sometimes unpleasantly so, sometimes somewhere in between. I had one couple pretend to get a cell phone call that they had to take. I had another guy tell me that he couldn't relate because, "there never was slavery in Canada." What-evah.. You can read an account of that incident at Alexis' LiveJournal., starting with "GenCon also had downside". But lots more people stayed on the ride, and came out the other side. This account from The Forge is my favorite so far. I sold 40 copies of Steal Away Jordan, and tied Dogs in the Vineyard for third top seller at the IPR/Forge booth. Vincent, you are the awesomest person ever. I just buy good candy, and pay attention.

Then there was the socializing and gaming aspect. After hours I had dinner with people I'd either first met at GenCon, or had met in passing on the internet. Too many to list and include everyone. I played Adventures in the Land of 1000 Kings, Best Friends, Poison'd, and Acts of Evil.

With Land of 1000 Kings, I met John Harper, whom I mentioned on the Stone Baby Games blog. (Oh yeah. It's up and chugging along, by the way.) I also got to know Seth Ben Ezra, who adopted some of my kombucha babies a few months ago. Also there was Matt Wilson, who designed the first rpg I ever played (as an adult), Ben Lehman, and Vincent. Now here's the cool thing about Land of 1000 Kings. You go around the table and basically say nice things about each other and what people say about you are marked as your stats: Brave, Strong, Sharp, Kind, and Beautiful. It was not difficult to find something heartfelt to say about each person there. By the end of the game, I could have added more loving kindness to each person's stats. Warm and mushy feelings abounded, and I got to work through some of my issues with raw tomatoes.

I'm going to skip to Saturday night's game, Poison'd, just for contrast. Now I've started two sessions of this already, and used the same character (Abyssinia de Cortez, daughter of a Barbary pirate), more or less. I recycled her for a third time, and am so happy I did, because I finally got to tell her story, and then some. So in this game there was Matt, John, and Vincent from last night, and Rich Harper, whom I'd met earlier in the day, and who has some of the most beautiful tattoos--and a dragony fishy sleeve, no less. While we didn't say very kind or flattering things about each other, we certainly got to know each other by the end of the session. It was one of the most intimate gaming experiences I've ever had and one of the most violent and brutal stories I've ever been in on. It was beautiful and disturbing and mind-blowing. We played themes of sexuality, power, gender, and violence. One of my favorite story lines was about the young pirate who tried to do all the nasty acts that the older ones did, but either we stood in his way, or just plain condemned him when he did it. Sorry, no actual play accounts here. I'm still sorta working through it. We played like a tight chamber ensemble, and we didn't need to look at the music. Ever.

In contrast to the Poison'd game, there was Best Friends, with John Kim, Marc Majcher, John (who gave me the fantastic list of Ghanan names, and whose last name escapes me at the moment), Gregor Hutton, and Emily. I've been wanting to play a full game ever since I had to leave the session at JiffyCon when Ingrid stuck a bead in her nose. This one was just absurdly hilarious. I have not laughed that hard and for that long in a while.

The ride home was fun, too. I dozed off and on, chatted with the van mates, reveled in the joy of sour cherries and homemade fudge, snuggled with Joshua, and missed Bea, Ingrid, and Chris. When I got home, Ingrid and Bea had grown up into young ladies, Chris was handsomer than when I had left, the cats were still fat, the house still messy, and I think my frogs are mating again. Ingrid did not wean as I had hoped, but we're working on it. We're substituting the marathon nursing sessions with stories about Razzle Dazzle the Chicken. A desperate mother's imagination will go to odd places if it's late enough and her breasts are on fire.

I'm leaving out a lot, I know, like how I lost my Dungeons and Dragons virginity. It'll all come back to me eventually. Stay tuned.

Now in "Actual Play" Stage

I'm taking the playtesting version down for Steal Away Jordan. You'll just have to buy a copy at GenCon. When I come back I'll set up a purchasey thing at the Stone Baby Games website (which will be www.stone-baby.com, and you can see the embryonic stages of that website here), and then points beyond.

I went to Nashville last week, and my mom read the proof. She thought it rocked.

See you in Indianapolis!

Update! Stone Baby Games is up and running, with copies of SAJ available for sale, and now they're also available at Indie Press Revolution.

There's a Game at the Print Shop

Above is the cover of Steal Away Jordan. I finished it yesterday, for the most part. I'm sure that after GenCon I'll get to work on the revisions and clarifications and the putting stuff in that I forgot. But for now, I have a very good looking GenCon edition. So now, in the next few weeks I'll finish up the Stone Baby Gameswebsite. Yay!

The sense of accomplishment I'm feeling right now is amazing. It's that same feeling I got when I handed in a research paper that I really got into when I was in college and in nursing school. The two I have in mind are my seminar paper for Medical Ethics in college and my research paper on the Nursing Considerations for the Patient with a Heroin Addiction. The presentation for Steal Away Jordan is much snazzier than those papers.

Best of all, the people who have read through it have given me great feedback, and I'm really pleased with how it came back. Yay again!

Coming soon from Stone Baby Games...

This is my draft cover for Steal Away Jordan. If Jupiter aligns with Mars then I should be totally done typing it all up by the end of next week and will commence with layout design. Jupiter probably won't align with Mars, and I'll be typing and doing layout design at the same time.

At some point there will also be a website, so bookmark Stone Baby Games now. Well, not now now, but soon now. There's nothing there yet. But there will be. Soon.

My mom left for Ghana yesterday (I didn't know she was going!!). She's going to bring me lots of fabric so I can play around with my new (to me) sewing machine. Speaking of fabric, Meg is doing this really cool thing for hardcover Dogs in the Vineyard books (and she used one of my character's dog coat--Sister Polly for a cover!)

Classes and Playtests

Attention Western Massachusetts locals!
I will be giving a short workshop on how to make kombucha on May 7th (time TBA) at Acadia Herbals. $20 gets you a few recipes, some samples of delicious homegrown kombucha, troubleshooting, and your very own (non demon) SCOBY. Nate at Acadia Herbals will have glass jars and organic tea available for purchase.

This Friday (April 20), I will have a playtest of Steal Away Jordan at Greenfield Games, 6pm. Please sign up or just show up.


For more information on either and both, email me at lucky dot lamb at verizon dot net.
Info on the photo.

Congo Square, New Orleans (More Playtesting)

I'm not going to go into too many details about this one. We played for about an hour, and had to leave--with people wanting more! Yay! It was with 2 people I've played rpg's with, one person I've played a game with (Werewolves of Miller's Hollow, which is sort of a rpg), and one person I've never played rpg's with: my handsome and princely husband. That was in interesting experience right there.

The setting was New Orleans 1840-1850. I borrowed characters from our Prime Time Adventures game from last year, which meant I didn't play for absolute historical accuracy. No one's master or slave driver came into play. Because it was a city, everyone had a different one. They all congregated at Congo Square. They made lots of bargains with each other, which would have been awesome to see used in a major conflict. Awesome interactions. I loved the pace of this one. The GM (me) had less involvement since there weren't any subjugators in play. I did get to play a free person of color who was sweet on a slave (played by my husband, by sheer coincidence).

I noticed that I had to referee more though. Maybe it's just a part of explaining the mechanics, but there was one bargain where the risk to one of the PC's was huge compared to the risk to the other player, and it wasn't very plausible either. I can do anachronism, abandoning historical accuracy, but I need plausibility. I had to get them to really think about it.

I also noticed that it's helpful to do worth assessments at the end of a session. I already knew that, but I see how I might have mis-assessed some people in the other playtest. On the other hand, I like that, too. The GM assessing worth is like the auctioneer deciding where to open bidding. The assessment will be based on the going rate plus the auctioneer's own prejudices.

Another interesting thing that came up (and I was waiting for it to come up), was a clear clash between modern ideals of sex, paternity, and male dominance, versus the Antebellum ideals of sex (with slaves), paternity (of the offspring resulting in the likely forced sex with slaves), and male dominance, where white men--more specifically white male property owners were at the top of the food chain. I have mull on that a bit more before I write about it.

Anyway, all my ideas and fears of people creating stereotypes are fast fading. I'm seeing that players are creating real people who happen to be slaves. On Sunday, I saw people create characters who, if they died suddenly, I think the player would be jarred, maybe hurt because he/she cared for the person. That made me happy, not in a sadistic way, but in an intent becomes reality way.

In non gaming news....
I have a job interview today for job I would totally take if offered, and I'm totally qualified for it. And it pays better than what I make now. And I could almost say I'm using my degree for it. Sort of. Roll some Lucky Sevens for me (which you'd get if you read the draft rules of my game).

I added ginger to one of my kombucha batches last week. It is soooo freakin' good. So good that my handsome and princely husband couldn't wait to drink it. It's all he talked about. He wants to bottle it and sell it, or give it away. I'm trying to get him to give kombucha babies to his co-workers. And yes, I have many kombucha babies for anyone interested. Kombucha will change your life. Really.

First playtest of the new rules

Wow. I'm a sucky GM, but I think I can learn.

Let's focus on the real stuff though. First session went well. Nearly everything I loved about what I wrote totally worked. I think it's interesting that all the PC's are male. I wasn't expecting that, but this morning in the shower I figured out something diabolically horrible that would work with that, and I'm excited to put my friends' characters through some torture. Clearly I need to turn up the bad.

So here's a run down of the characters. Here's the playtest report, so I'm just teasing you here. Go to the Forge and see what happened to the characters.

PC's
Cupit (Emily) a 22 year old male field slave, born in Florida. His Attributes: Nimble hands, friends who escaped in Florida, can run far and long, doesn't act seriously about anything, and is handsome. I'm going to skip the Motivations for now, so I don't cheat and look at their tasks and goals!
Friends: Ginny, who works in the house and is pregnant. May or may not be his child; Crissy.
Enemy: Martial
Worth: 12d6 (unskilled young man)

Martial (Joshua), 29 year old blacksmith (slave), born in West Africa. Attributes: Proud, has a bunch of tools, can read Arabic and French, is good looking, and "I'll own my own slaves".
Friends: Ginny (same as Cupit), Ephraim, the late Master's 10 yo son.
Enemy: William Jackson, the overseer.
Worth: 14d6 (skilled--blacksmith, young man young man)

Kato (Vincent), 17 years old, field slave, born on the Strong Plantation. Attributes: "I've got 2 thumbs and 5 fingers", "I'm tall, kinda knobby", "I'm a really steady worker", "I'm good with horses and dogs".
Friends/relations: Older brother Ned; the cook, Anne.
Enemies: Tom, William Jackson
Worth 10d6 (unskilled young man, missing fingers, minus 2d6 for his disability)

Tom (Meg),27, field slave. Born in Georgia. Attributes: Strong back, steady worker. Excellent memory & a good voice for stories, songs, news. Friendly and easy going. Children somehere?
Friends: Jonah, older field hand, Lucy, a cousin and housemaid
Enemy: Sterling, Lucy's suitor, Crissy's brother.
Worth: 12d6 (unskilled young man)

Playtest Me!

**Playtesting is over! Buy a copy!**

Last night I put the finishing touches on the rules draft of Steal Away Jordan. You can download the .pdf and the ugly character sheet here, on the condition that you playtest it and send me constructive feedback.

I've been going back and forth on the name. It's supposed to be the title of a spiritual, but it's actually the combined titles of two spirituals: "Get Away Jordan" and "Steal Away to Jesus." Jordan refers to the Ohio River. Cross over Jordan and you're in free territory. "Steal Away Jordan" just sounds good, though, and who's to say there isn't a song by that name?

Thanks in advance to all those nice playtesters who send constructive feedback.
Please leave a comment here if you download something.

Update!
The first playtest report!
The characters of the first playtest!