The circumstances around COVID-19 has sapped me (along with much of the world) of a lot of energy and ambition. There are many things I've been wanting to write about in this journal that I haven't been able to bring myself to sit down and try to pull together into a more manageable state.

So - once again - I turn to the highs and lows of D&D.

Today we (hopefully!) concluded Praxana's major backstory arc. I joked that Veit Copperlark was her very own "Princess Peach" - unfortunately plucked out of their grasp right back into mortal peril every time they thought they'd pulled him out of danger. While I generally play Praxana as quite brash and confident in most situations, the absolute terror of possibly losing her dad again after decades of him being MIA absolutely paralyzed me. I couldn't bear for him to die because I knew that she wouldn't be able to handle it. Praxana knew how absolutely devastating that would be, how much it affected her world-view. At one point she had pulled another party member - Zanner - aside, admonishing him for his reckless actions in battles that endangered both himself and others. She didn't want him dying for her family's problems, especially knowing that he had his own quest to find his missing wife. "I've been a bard long enough to know stories like ours more often than not end in tragedies," she told him, "But I'm banking on things being different from us. I want us to have happy endings."

In today's battle, the wits and efforts of my friends in-and-out-of-game absolutely saved my fake dad's life. A brilliant move by John's character - a frog-like wizard - got Veit out of the villain's grasp and the party absolutely decimated the bone devil that was after him. An unlucky (or poorly planned on my part!) sequence of event resulted in Veit suffering so much damage that he had two failed death saving throws and when he rolled an absolutely abysmal "4" on his third death saving throw, I was panicking. Luckily, having placed Praxana close to Veit and by the good graces of our DM, I was able to give Veit my "inspiration" for the game to re-roll, and with a "19" he had managed not to die.

I actually shed a few small tears and had to hide my face because I was so relieved about an imaginary character in our make-believe game.

In any case, this was about as much of a "good end" as we could have had, jumping feet first into a hellscape and escaping with none of our party dead with a hundred or so prisoners released. Sure, some decisions we've made are likely to come and bite us in the ass later, but for now Praxana and her family are alive, no one had to make any major sacrifices, and now she has a possible spell-induced proposal from a dwarven prince????

Ah, D&D!

Had such a fun time yesterday with D&D getting to play Cst. Huxley an anti-social, sarcastic bookworm who also happens to be a fighter. It was fun to banter with the Sergeant whom she didn't quite respect the way she should and display a total lack of disinterest in most people.

It was also fun hopping back into the comfortable shoes of Praxana and immediately emotionally terrorizing her charismatic and shifty younger brother when it looked like a quest for a lost father was actually going to be some sort of crazy heist for his own purposes. It made me laugh when - after going to a "private room" to work out this issue - everyone else was joking about how expressive we had looked in our brief interaction where Praxana rolled a 20 on intimidation and did her best to make her little brother pee his pants in fear.

Ah, D&D!

Well, here we are.

I love Dungeons and Dragons.

If you'd asked me five years ago whether I would ever see Dungeons and Dragons as the highlight of my week, I would have laughed. I have never really fallen under the thrall of "high fantasy", turn-based battles always seemed to lack any kind of urgency to me, and dice are my natural enemy in any game I've ever played. I was convinced that there was absolutely no way the combination of all three together was going to do anything but bore me to tears. But - as is so often the case - I didn't want to miss out on spending time with my friends, especially as our work commitments and adult responsibilities often made it difficult to find time to see each other. So I begrudgingly agreed to throw together a character for our first attempt at a D&D game. I approached the character creation itself with some enthusiasm, putting together a druid gnome mostly so I could turn into animals on a whim and cast spells because that sounded more fun than just fighting.

And thus, Ninove Loopmotin Cottontail etc etc was born. (I had read that gnomes were given something like five names so I made an effort to be "authentic". I cannot for the life of me remember the rest.)

I don't remember much of her backstory, she possibly didn't really have one. Our friend had volunteered to be our DM and followed the story laid out in the official book. A lack of preparation and his propensity for showing up 30 minutes to an hour late severely dampened my little spark of enthusiasm for the game. It was a slog to get through each session, and we accomplished very little in the 4 hours it would take to play. We did little to no roleplaying and fights took an excruciatingly long time to finish with very little tension. I often sat there at the table, committed but also bitterly wishing we were playing a board game instead, which would at least guarantee some kind of fun. Suffice it to say, I was trying to get my character shipped off to study with some other old druid or - a more permanent solution - have her killed in battle. I could never quite manage either.

The game fizzled out eventually, and I was honestly a little relieved. We went back to whatever our regular meet-ups were and I assumed that was the last of it.

Not so!

One of our friends who had joined in our previous campaign (he had one character he promptly killed and replaced with another character not too dissimilar from the first) volunteered to run a game. He'd had experience playing before and had invested a bit of time into world-building, placing us in a scenario where druids were outlawed and non-humans were looked upon with mistrust. Naturally, we had to make lives a little hard on ourselves!

Joining once again mostly because I didn't want to miss out on time with friends, I decided to stick with the druid class because I couldn't be bothered to learn a whole new system. Since I hadn't been that attached to my previous character, I decided to go with human male this time, reasoning that I didn't really have to know a whole lot to play a human character. 

And thus Darwin Brightwood IV was born.

I put a little more effort into the character creation this time. I crafted a backstory about Darwin coming from a family that lost its fortune and suddenly had a whole bunch of mouths to feed with no discernible skills to do so. Darwin was so far down the line that his name was an afterthought, sharing it with his father and his eldest brother. When the opportunity came to pawn him off on a traveling druid who was grateful for their begrudging hospitality, the family did so in a flash, and suddenly this hermit druid was saddled with a new charge who was none too bright nor studious. I decided that he was trapped on this island that was so hostile to druids because he had spilled soup all over a very important Arch Druid at some sort of druid gathering and had been cursed with a fear of water, and his mentor had run off with vague platitudes about Darwin having all the skills he needed.

It started off promising enough. We had a core set of players that were all game to have a good time. But while our DM this time was significantly better prepared and crafted an overarching storyline and a few recurring NPCs, he was impatient with us and handed out great boons and harsh punishments with little reason, like killing off a character's missing mother within the first few games because of our out-of-character indecision. We had some fun moments and he introduced some interesting mechanics (Jenga towers as a skill check was one), but overall I fell back into the same resigned feeling that I could probably be having more fun than those four hours tended to provide.

Eventually that game fizzled out too, with none of us really seeming too upset. I liked Darwin, but I never really had the chance to develop him beyond clumsy and good-natured, and there was nothing too compelling about his backstory to keep me invested. I didn't necessarily want him to die, but I wasn't going to be too torn up if it happened. When we quietly stopped scheduling games, I thought that surely this was the end of it. We'd given it two decent attempts, and maybe Dungeons and Dragons just wasn't for me.

To her credit, our friend Jessie was not going to give up that easily.

From my understanding, Jessie had had several very positive experiences with various D&D games and was convinced it was something that we could really enjoy together as a group. Having been part of campaign with friends from work under the guidance of a professional DM, she felt that we were owed a more "typical" experience with D&D than the ones we had been afforded so far. Seeing it as a kind of "last shot", she cajoled us into trying a one-shot game with the same DM and a few of her friends. I agreed, but was wholly unconvinced that it would be something I would want to continue. When it came to characters, we were given the option to create our own or pick from some profiles that the DM could randomly generate. Not really wanting to go back to my previous two characters and also not wanting to invest any time into the character creation process again, I opted for the latter. One week before our one-shot game, Jessie forwarded us the character profiles. I asked "Siri" to pick a number between 1 and 12 to help me choose a character.

And thus, Praxana Copperlark was born.

Or adopted.  Whatever.

I'm sure I could have made do with whatever character I ended up with, but I was somewhat delighted at the idea of playing a bard.  In my attempts to understand the potential of D&D for our second go, I often had episodes of Critical Role playing in the background while I did chores, cooked, or did crafts. While Percy was probably my "favourite" in terms of characterization and overarching storyline, it was hard to deny that Scanlan was the scene-stealer of the show, and the episode where he single-handedly took down an entire household of enemies with ingenious play was probably the first time I had felt truly invested. I had no misconceptions that I would ever match the truly comedic, inspiring, and improv-heavy heights that Sam Riegel reached with this character and class, but I recognized the flexibility and freedom in a bard character. I was pretty sure - at the very least - that I could probably have some fun with this character.

The character sheets prepared for us gave us all we needed to play our one game. Praxana was a Mountain Dwarf Valor Bard who had a Lawful Good alignment. My weapons and spells were picked out for me. I walked in having decided only that her goal was to collect stories and that if the opportunity ever arose, she was going to be very bad at accents. The DM helped establish a few relationships between characters to give us more of a "bond" and had us roll for tokens; Praxana ended up with a "butt earring" that made her more attractive to the opposite sex. All the better for a bard, really.

That first game was a ride. We went to resolve a mysterious wailing well for an old elf who cut our rope and sent us tumbling down to our deaths - a very-near TPK in the first fifteen minutes of our game (Joan's monk survived by sheer luck and grit). We were revived by a very young dwarven girl and journeyed through the Underground, eventually making our way to confront a bad guy in cahoots with the elf. We managed - after various mishaps - to win our fight and escaped to the surface. The DM skillfully guided us through the game, keeping it moving at a brisk pace but never robbing us of our choices. He populated the game with a few interesting NPCs to keep us engaged and left us with enough of a resolution that we could happily end there, but also with the promise of more story.

I wouldn't say I was hooked, but I was intrigued. Although I was in the background more often than not, I had enough small moments that I could get a sense of what I would want this character to be and how she would interact with the other party members. I could see how this could lead to a really engaging experience and a fun thing to share with my friends. The DM was clearly comfortable and confident in his role and I'd had a thoroughly enjoyable time. When Jessie suggested we consider trying a series of six games, I was open to giving this thing one more go. Maybe third time would be the charm?

Jessie sent us a few more resources to help flesh out our characters and prepare for the campaign. I spent a rainy day "rolling" my way through Praxana's life-story thus far with the help of Xanathar's Guide to Everything, piecing together her family tree and her otherwise pretty mundane life given her 107 years. I made a few changes, opting for the more flexible "Lore Bard" and the more forgiving "Neutral Good" alignment. I finished with a clearer sense of her goals and personality and entered our "Session 0" planning night feeling pretty good about what I had. Jessie helped us "roll" for relationships as we had some new players/characters joining where others had departed, and Praxana ended up with an old friend and adventuring buddy in a Cleric Goliath named Thrunk. We sat down and gave each other a few bare-bones important details that we felt our characters would have shared, and away we went, committed to bi-weekly games for the next six weeks.

We are now 21 games in, and I am hooked.

Our "core" group happened to gel nicely and these games have been a bright spot while I worked through my grief and increasing anxiety after my grandmother's passing. They have remained a bright spot as our daily lives were turned upside down by a global pandemic. Sure, playing online through various websites and apps is not quite the same as playing in person, but I'm grateful we get to play at all. While the mechanics of battle are things I am still becoming accustomed to, many years of LiveJournal and Dreamwidth roleplay have made me comfortable with becoming "attuned" to the instincts and reactions of characters and personalities that are not like my own. I have become increasingly more comfortable with Praxana (a more confident, ambitious, and cheeky personality than I am, but also a bit more cowardly in battle than I'd hope to be) and as a result, I am more invested in her story. I have enjoyed her commitment to stardom and the Ampersand Company, her tight purse-strings except when it comes to children and orphans, and her bond with her buddy, Thrunk. I am mildly perplexed but mostly amused that Praxana enjoying trying to get a reaction out of an uptight elf who is the head of the guards has resulted in the majority of the party "shipping" them. I have enjoyed occasionally pulling out songs for spells (I do love musical theatre, after all) and am immensely grateful that the DM has recognized how terrible I am at insults and does not make me come up with them on the spot for my Vicious Mockeries if I don't want to. I was surprised at how emotional I felt when soldiers died in an ambush on a supply escort and I knew that Praxana would feel this loss keenly and want news of their untimely deaths to be sent back immediately, so their loved ones would not suffer the way she and her family had, never knowing the fate of their missing father. I am honestly giddy at how fun her interaction with her youngest brother was - something that was not discussed ahead of time with the DM at all - and I am excited at the prospect of having some resolution to her only big (if rather straightforward) storyline, which was something I hadn't really anticipated. Unlike my other two characters, if Praxana were to die, I would probably be devastated.

Now I write down any songs that come to mind that may be useful in the future. I make sure I know my spells and how to utilize them to what I hope is their greatest effect. Inspired by Jessie, I dress up for our games, experimenting with hair and make-up in a way that I've never been inclined to before. I look forward to the 4 hours every two weeks where I get to forget that our world is falling apart, and instead get to play as a plucky dwarven bard who is hopefully helping to do some good. It has become so important to me that I have asked my boss and colleagues to help me juggle my schedule so as to miss as few games a possible. 

I love Dungeons and Dragons.

I have had three big "pop group" loves in my life thus far, for better or worse.

 

I have a bit of a reputation for being a Scrooge, and I know it's entirely earned. I often say that I am money-stupid, that if it was an option I would gladly keep all my money under my bed and do a Scrooge McDuck wade through it once in awhile. I joke that life keeps rewarding my habit of procrastinating when it comes to buying things because I tend to get things I need given to me for free. I know that I am incredibly lucky to be financially secure, but I still watch my savings account like a hawk, wanting to ensure the number is moving in the upwards direction most of the time.

When the 40% off sale items deal goes live at Anthropologie though, all that goes out the window.

Here's the thing - I am not a patient shopper. I've discussed this previously. I don't want to spend a lot of time at a mall because the experience generally isn't a lot of fun for me. And Anthropologie used to be the store that I looked longingly at. I love the style of their clothing, but it's too expensive for, was generally how I felt. When I made the mistake of trying on a dress while killing time with a friend and walking out with it after having paid full price, I swore to never set foot in that incredibly dangerous store again. Spending over $200 on a dress is not me! - screamed my inner - and frankly kind of inept - banker.

After my initially exciting and then progressively disappointing experience with FrockBox, I decided to make a pit-stop at Anthropologie one time because it was close to my local library anyway. That's when I first discovered the "40% off sale items" thing and walked out with three pieces. And if everything I tried on had fit, I would have honestly taken it all! I don't know what it is about that store, I just love their stuff! While the items I purchased were "good deals" I don't know that I would classify them as "cheap". They were heavily discounted, yes. But a heavily discounted Anthropologie item is pretty much a regularly priced Gap item. On the cheaper side, absolutely! But still a lot for my miserly heart to take.

I spent an hour in the store today and walked out with nine items. Nine. The very lovely cashier had to talk me off the cliff as I had a mild panic at my purchases. It's silly because I can afford it, I know this, but it's something I still have to convince myself of from time to time.

At least I'm going to have a nice little wardrobe for the summer!

Made a quick jaunt down to Seattle to visit some friends! The ability to do so shows how lucky I am in many ways. Lucky to have friends who will host me and make time in their busy schedules for me. Lucky to have the kind of freedom and financial stability to nip down for a quick visit whenever my schedule allows. Lucky to be in possession of a passport and to have a "trusted traveler" card that lets me move through immigration more quickly without undue harassment.

Anyway, I had a lovely weekend just spending time with people I love! I am still my old introvert-self in so many ways, but I will give my very muted extroverted side a bit of a stretch every once in awhile!

Have you ever walked into a store and bought something just because it seemed like a nice place and you want it to survive?

Because I sure did today.

A cute little cafe/gift shop recently opened two blocks away from me, and it has all the whimsical, twee little touches that tugs at my heart a little. It has little cloud lamps and a full moon hanging from the ceiling, cute and quirky greeting cards, journals both modern and leather-bound, quick-drying ink pens and wax seals and stamps, and kid's books and jewelry dishes in the shape of a Boston Terrier, amongst other things.

It's so niche and specific in the market it is trying to cater to that I am concerned it is going to fade away in my neighbourhood and that corner lot will be empty once again.

(I say this as someone who is not a great spender, though I have loosened up the strings on my coin purse over the years.)

I walked in with every intention of buying something, and then floundered around because I am always flustered when I am the only customer in a store. I found a pen I can use at work to sign sympathy cards that hopefully means I won't cause unsightly smudging anymore. I found a cute Paddington Bear bookmark, since I have been (successfully!) borrowing books from my local library. But that doesn't amount to much in the grand scheme of things, so I ventured to the little glass table display of jewelry. Some admittedly gorgeous pieces bore little handwritten tags with prices that were upwards of $500, and my heart sank a little. My Scrooge-like ways have almost never let me part with money for any jewelry over $50!

A more nature and foliage-based collection was also displayed, and I zoned in on a delicate little silver ring. Still over $50 but a little bit more within my means and it suited my limited "fashion sensibilities". 


I have thicker-than-average knuckles, so I thought "Well, if it doesn't fit, then it's not meant to be!"

So of course it fit perfectly.

Ah well, it's nice to spoil myself once in awhile and hopefully my contribution will help keep this little place afloat!

For most of my life, the importance of clothing has been somewhat lost on me. Not the fact that it exists and I need to wear it - I'm no exhibitionist after all! But not too long after being old enough to choose my own clothing, I went ahead and decided it wasn't that important and put little to no effort in at all. Sure, it had been fun to wear cute dresses when I was really young, but it was pretty apparent early on that I was going to be awkward in every definition of the word, and clothing wasn't going to help. So I pretty much lived in baggy Club Monaco logo sweatshirts and loose jeans. It was easy not having to try and coordinate an outfit, especially if no one was going to take notice anyway. To this day, a few of my friends will still reminisce about how that was pretty much my uniform. I felt like an ugly duckling and it was easier to dress for that mentality, to reinforce the idea that I didn't really care how I looked anyway, so no point drawing attention to it! The fact that I was an absolute Scrooge with my money also didn't help. I hated spending what I didn't need to, and no one was going to catch me paying for anything from Aritzia or Lulu Lemon, least of all because I had nothing to show off and no one to impress.

I still don't have much to show off and no one to impress, but I'm a little bit more relaxed on my spending habits and have learned how great it feels to be "put together" on occasion. Of course I still have ugly duckling days - I am under no pretenses about my natural looks. But there are also days where I will do my hair and make-up (neither of which I am very good at) and dress up to go out and run errands, just because I feel like it! I have also discovered that I have a very hard time walking away from things that I like! The solution is often not to try anything on if I'm already balking at the price tag; it's just safer that way. And while I still very much play it safe in my clothing choices (I am still my normal, introverted, meek self, after all) I did make two clothing purchases this year that - while not exactly off-the-rails - are pretty groundbreaking for me!

(I did not count anything from "My Year With Frock Box" because even if I purchased and loved a piece, I did not outright choose it for myself, so I feel like it counts less. Most of my Frock Box purchases were pretty safe anyway, aside from what I have dubbed the "Jubilee Jacket" - a bright yellow Moto jacket. Which I love, by the way.)

I realized today that I have lived just over half of my life in between the time when I first played Kingdom Hearts in high school, to when I officially started Kingdom Hearts III today.

Half of my life. I'll let you do the math.

I have never been a dedicated video game enthusiast. I have enjoyed the occasional multiplayer game because it's fun to play with friends, especially when things descend into utter chaos as they are wont to do! But it has always been hard for me to find the motivation to play single-player RPG-style games because I am: a) not very good at video games and b) not that inclined to invest a lot of time into grinding. But Kingdom Hearts hit that rare sweet spot for me (and many others, seemingly) of being a dynamic game that required only slightly more skill than just random button-mashing, had some pretty darn cute original character designs, and appealed to my hopelessly Disney-loving heart.

And I mean, it was mostly the Disney-nostalgia. The storyline in the original game was fun, but by the time I failed through a very short portion of the "Chain of Memories" game and decided not to continue, I was already going "I don't care much about this weird story-telling, I just want more Disney!" The more the team dug their heels into these incomprehensible storylines by releasing all sorts of games that were most decidedly not the third (official) installment of the franchise, the more I had convinced myself that even if they got around to finally releasing it, I was well beyond the point of wanting to play it. Sure, I'd forgiven them for foisting an unwanted Roxas on me in the first hours of Kingdom Hearts II (full disclosure: I nearly cried when his part of the story was over because I'm not heartless, ba-dum-cha!) I even managed my way into finishing the game 10 years after a false-start (see: my refusal to spend a lot of time grinding and properly leveling up Sora would come to bite me in the ass, who knew?) But that was it, I was done. I mean, what kind of audience is going to stick around when they'd been promised a follow-up that never materialized after over a decade?


Well! Joke's on me. I put out a call to friends to see who would be willing to let me play it on their game consoles within a few days of its release. Nostalgia has a strong pull, okay? The friend who did ultimately let me commandeer his PS4 for the night commented that he wonders if there's even an audience for it after all this time. To which I countered that if it could draw me - a self-proclaimed non-gamer - back into the fold, I can only assume it was able to do so successfully with many others.

Anyway, here's hoping the game will live up to the kind of anticipation that follows a wait like this. 

And Eeyore had better be in this game, is all I'm sayin'.

Best-friend-family have a lot of wedding obligations to attend, so we decided just to meet for breakfast this morning followed by a quick jaunt down to Granville Island. Semi-namesake marveled at the pigeons and seagulls and went absolutely bug-eyed for any buskers we came across. She's already so musically inclined, which is not a surprise given who her parents are. We also stopped by a section of shops I never really go into, and I finally got to visit the fabled Paper-Ya! Despite never really using it in any kind of meaningful way, I am an absolute sucker for stationery, so it was a bit of a dangerous undertaking for me. I even found the "one line a day" journal that I ultimately opted to leave behind for this Dreamwidth endeavour!

Just when I thought I was going to make it out unscathed, I came across this: