It’s two days after Christmas, and here in Maine we’re having a snowstorm. My father took another day off work so he wouldn’t have to drive through the snow to the coast (he commutes over an hour when the roads are clear). Brother can work from home, and he’s here through Sunday. A board game called Middle Earth Quest is taking up our entire kitchen table. Brother got it for Christmas and it’s epic, with like 20 decks of cards that do different things and 10 plastic figures and some more cardboard standups and a gazillion punched-out, printed-on-both-sides, heavy cardboard tokens. Oh, and a rulebook that is 40 pages long. We only got a few rounds into the game last night, but we think it will be fun once we figure out how to play. Here’s the cool video review that turned Brother onto the game in the first place (if you’re into boardgames (or even if you’re not), you should watch these reviews. They’re hilarious): http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/middle-earth-quest
It’s HUGE!
When my mother came home from work yesterday, she found me sitting on the couch, appearing entirely at ease. “What have you been doing all day?” she joked. And, with a wonderful and rare sense of accomplishment and self-justification, I answered simply: “Writing.” That’s right, sports fans: the Wanderlust train is back on the track. Cruising through Chapter Nine (To the Wolves), to be precise. I’m still overwhelmed by the amount of work to do, and in fact the “Plot and Narrative Issues I Need to Resolve” list seems to grow LONGER instead of shorter each time I check an item off the top, but I just have to finish this draft, and soon. So I’m going to go work on that now. In lieu of any illustrations, philosophical advice, or particularly eloquent bloggery, please enjoy this photograph of our Christmas tree (it’s a much smaller tree than our usual white-pine monstrosities that take up half the living room and are wider than they are tall, but I think it pulled together quite nicely):
*BONUS*
Have a photo of me on Christmas morning modeling some oven mitts.
Merry Christmas. I hope yours was magical. 🙂
Grace Makley 
The game looks fun! Does Brother watch TableTop on Geek & Sundry? It has games and Wil Wheaton…a lovely combo, indeed. 🙂
Congrats on the writing progress! Grace and I have both fallen into little writing slumps, but we’re planning to tackle things again after the first.
Have a great New Year!
I’ve passed on the recommendation, thanks! And Brother was just explaining to me about how Wil Wheaton is a geek-culture icon. :-p
The new year is a great time to get back on track with writing, I wish you both the best of of luck and a happy New Year!
Watched the Video, that Game Looks Awesome… My Brother and I are only 15 months apart, so we grew up playing a lot of Games… Such as “Conquest of The Empire”, and “Talisman”, both of which are Great.
I’ll have to pick that up, though My Brother Lives North of me, and I don’t see him all that much… It will give me a chance to dig into that 40page Rule Book, Lol… He has 11 and 15 year old boys that might like it as well.
Love the Tree
Merry Christmas, and Happy Holidays to you
DJ-
If you’re both gamers and you have some time to look over the rules, you’ll probably really enjoy Middle Earth Quest. Our problem was that we were teaching our parents to play at the same time we were learning how to play, and some concepts (like how combat works) were very foreign to them and required much explaining, whereas a gamer who was familiar with that type of system would pick it up pretty quickly. I bet the kids would like it too if they’re the type that can focus on a game for a few hours!
Thanks for the comment, and Happy Holidays to you as well. 🙂
Yeah, we’ve both played tons of Games… The boys on the other hand, though they’ve played some Games, at least in the past, My Brother would always remove many Rules to simplify the Games for them… Because of their Attention spans that is.
Though the other reason he may do this is, I was always the one that read all the Rule Books when we’d try New Games, Lol
Which is Ironic because though I’m a Writer, I’ve never really been much of a Reader… But the bottom line was, if I didn’t read the Rules, no one would, Lol
That’s how I ended up being a Dungeon Master for many years
I wanted to play Dungeons & Dragons, but didn’t know anyone that played, so I decided to read the rules myself. Basic D & D that is, later I incorporated parts of Advanced D& D.
DJ-