Belonging

I hadn't intended to write about Dollhouse again so soon, but they've hit it out of the park two weeks in a row, and the previews from upcoming episodes look like they're going to be in the same league. If you'd even consider jumping on the bandwagon, now is the time.

I know ratings ticked up a bit for a couple of recent episodes, but to be honest, I still don't hold out a lot of hope for the series to survive beyond the end of this season, so this really is not just me trying to get anyone I can interested. The series truly has gotten that good after a rough start.

If you want to give it a chance, I'd suggest checking out the last four episodes or so of the first season, and don't read too much into the slightly weaker first episode of the second season before the overarcing story kicks into gear. Trust me; this is well worth your time.

Staycation

My wife and I took the week off with no special plans in mind, and that's exactly what happened. We took care of some miscellaneous things that we needed to tend to and lounged around a lot. I'd like to say that I got more creative work done than I did, but it just didn't happen. I'm still feeling really stalled in that respect.

We decided that rather than buy each other separate anniversary gifts, we'd both get MP3 players and make the necessary musical conversion from CDs. It's going to take some doing to get our CD collection converted to MP3s, but then it'll be nice to be able to cherry pick some of the songs we like from performers we don't like enough to buy a full CD.

My wife continued on her anime kick and I finished season three of the Dexter TV series, both via Netflix. Dexter continues to be wonderfully written and acted. It remains one of the most tightly written television shows I've ever seen, and I can't wait to see season four. Not enough to subscribe to Showtime, mind you, but season four is already in my Netflix queue for when it is released in DVD. I watched a couple of other interesting movies as well, which I expect to cover in separate entries a little later.

On a side note, the Dollhouse TV series finally hit one out of the park with the episode "Belle Chose". Part of the reason this episode succeeded so well was that they really turned Enver Gjokaj loose in multiple roles and gave him a lot more screen time. Of all of the actors on the show, he's the one I find most convincing in truly different personalities. The other reason was Tim Minear's script, which took full advantage of the possibilities of the Dollhouse setting. The brass at Fox either didn't know what "belle chose" meant or thought the reference sufficiently obscure that most of the public wouldn't find out. I didn't know what it meant myself, but found it right away when I got curious enough to look it up. The capsule version is that it's a spicy Chaucer reference. Dollhouse continues to improve, but it's probably too late for it to achieve its full potential before Fox will have to cancel it for low ratings.

We also pulled together costumes for Halloween. We haven't decided exactly what we're wearing yet, but we each have at least two options. I'm looking forward to using them.

New Cabal Campaign Work

I've gotten a little more work done on the new Cabal campaign, thought there's still a very long way to go. The main thing I've done is work on Big Picture stuff, like the whole arc of where each of the player characters is likely to go over time, so I can build the shorter stories around those larger issues. It will ultimately be up to the players to decide the evolution of the characters; I just wanted some sort of road map for myself.

My thought process is that I might be able to use the individual character arcs to suggest scenario ideas I can use in the big picture. I haven't tried this approach before, so I have no idea if it will help at all. I'll post the result as things develop, either way.

October Music Project Session

We finally had the same three musicians turn up two sessions in a row. Rob was back on guitar, enabling me to stay on bass for virtually the entire session. My only guitar time was a quick run through one song to show Rob what I'd been playing for a song he was unfamiliar with, and two songs played through with Jason after Rob had left to keep those songs in some degree of practice for us while Rob gets up to speed.

The good news is that the songs that Rob has learned sound good, all limitations considered. A three piece band with one singer playing songs recorded by larger groups with more than one singer has to do some adapting to make things work. The bad news is that Rob learns relatively slowly. The good news is that we only get together once a month, so he has plenty of time between sessions to practice.

We've started hearing some interest from other people who'd like to come in to play at some point, which is what I'd had in mind from the start, but we're still not drawing much vocal help. Things are trending in the right direction, though, so maybe help will come in time.

Stressbuster

I think I've found the stressbuster I've been looking for. I haven't taken breaks at work in many years, but I've started doing ten minute mini-meditation sessions mid-morning and mid-afternoon, whether I feel like I need it or not, and it's really working for me. I've found that even if I feel fine, there's almost always a certain amount of stress lurking in the wings that I can find and eliminate before it builds to the point of being an issue.

Meditation in general continues to work for me. I feel generally sharper and calmer than I ever have. There have been some interesting side effects, too. I've always carried my tension in my neck, and now that I'm dealing better with stress, I can feel a significant difference there. It also seems to have helped my singing voice, which came as a pleasant surprise, but it makes sense. Less tension in the body makes it a better instrument.

Now if I could find a solution to the problem of there not being enough hours in the day to do everything I want to do, I'd really be set.