While We Wait: Writer's Block & Other Lame Excuses

[Tycho]

Farming in video games? I can do it for hours if need be, but it is horribly mind numbing in games like the Elder Scrolls and other assorted games.

 

[nutranurse]

No, no. Farming games. Games where you farm. My favorite one is Harvest Moon, but Shepherd's Crossing 2 is a damn close second due to how detailed it is. You want to make a blanket?

Well first you'll have to trade for some grass seeds, wait for that to grow, cut the grass and dry it, trade that for hay seeds, wait for that to grow and cut that, then trade it for more hay seeds so you can grow more hay, rise and repeat twice, trade your plethora of hay for some marmots, breed those, kill a couple, trade their meat for money to buy cabbage seeds, sow your fields with cabbage for a few seasons to get enough money/stockpiles to buy/support rabbits, grow those for a while and then trade them for sheep, make sure you have enough hay/grass or else they will die, kill a couple of the sheep for their meat/fat and sheer the rest to trade the wool for more supplies, now keep some wool, use the fat to make soap, clean the wool, make threads, sow into blanket.

Only took me several years. It's really, truly addicting.

 

[Tycho]

No, no. Farming games. Games where you farm. My favorite one is Harvest Moon, but Shepherd's Crossing 2 is a damn close second due to how detailed it is. You want to make a blanket?

Well first you'll have to trade for some grass seeds, wait for that to grow, cut the grass and dry it, trade that for hay seeds, wait for that to grow and cut that, then trade it for more hay seeds so you can grow more hay, rise and repeat twice, trade your plethora of hay for some marmots, breed those, kill a couple, trade their meat for money to buy cabbage seeds, sow your fields with cabbage for a few seasons to get enough money/stockpiles to buy/support rabbits, grow those for a while and then trade them for sheep, make sure you have enough hay/grass or else they will die, kill a couple of the sheep for their meat/fat and sheer the rest to trade the wool for more supplies, now keep some wool, use the fat to make soap, clean the wool, make threads, sow into blanket.

Only took me several years. It's really, truly addicting.

That doesn't sound overly complicated whatsoever...

 

[nutranurse]

It's so complicated it's amazing. In all honestly Shepherd's Crossing 2 is almost like a puzzle game couched in an agrarian theme, as there is a really complex web of actions that lead to other actions and there tend to be multiple ways to get one thing. For instance, I could have gotten that blanket by going for chicken instead of rabbits, allowing me to cut down on the cabbage growth (which freaking DESTROY the soil if used repeated, so crop rotation is another factor) and just stockpile feed. Trouble with chicken is that they are so easily picked off by foxes and the like, and I have no dogs to protect my farm :C

 

[Terrance888]

Then you need to get dogs?

 

[nutranurse]

But I'd have to trade my female marmots that I need for breeding stock!

 

[Angst]

Oh. I thought you meant MMORPGesque farming.

That thing you're talking about sounds like fun.

 

[Tycho]

Oh. I thought you meant MMORPGesque farming.

Same here... say, is there a thread for MMO gaming over in the All Games subforum, or am I imagining things?

 

[nutranurse]

Oh. I thought you meant MMORPGesque farming.

That thing you're talking about sounds like fun.

Who actually likes MMORPGesque farming?! Though years of playing games like Dragon Quest has gotten me accustomed to grinding till I'm raw.

 

[Tycho]

Who actually likes MMORPGesque farming?! Though years of playing games like Dragon Quest has gotten me accustomed to grinding till I'm raw.

It is actually necessary in many cases in many games, especially ones where you literally need money and everything else of the sort to thrive in the game... but I can assure you, most people do not like it and would rather find ways around it much of the time.

 

[Terrance888]

Just to note that my PM box has a few gasps of air left due to posts in the Show me Your Orders thread. However, actual space for discussions will not be available until after I update.

 

[nutranurse]

So a part of the huge paper I'm writing (it's about how Plautine & Shakespearean comedy transcend temporal boundaries and bro-fist via their Clever Slaves/Servant characters, whose roles are really just indicative of the rather unstable/uncertain transitory times that both the 3rd/2nd Century Romans and 16th Century Elizabethan English because, by in large, the good clever slaves end up serving their masters (hell, even when freed roman freedmen were beholden to their former masters as clients) and that these two populations really just needed a pat on their back to get them through some scary times that brought them—two fairly xenophobic cultures with a serious superiority complex—into contact with other foreign cultures) has caused me to read Dionysius of Halicarnassus' Roman Antiquities.

It's good to know that the time-honored tradition of batcrap-crazy alt history has its roots in the 1st Century BCE.

 

[Dachs]

Something we could use some more of, frankly.

 

[Thlayli]

I do have to wonder when times aren't unstable, uncertain, or transitory.

Iconoclastic scholars these days like questioning even supposedly settled times these days, like Bisson's Crisis of the Twelfth Century, which seems to have set off an academic shitstorm of epic proportions.

 

[Terrance888]

All times are transitory, so I guess they somehow need to measure the magnitude of transition.

 

[nutranurse]

Well I am defining 'transitional' in my paper as the point where a the concerned nation states (Republican Rome & Renaissance England) experienced periods of internal upheaval while muddling about in foreign politics that resulted in their rise/fall in standing (rise in both cases).

For Rome I am arguing that it is at a transitional phase because the Punic Wars, with the exception of the brief dickery that was the Gallic invasion and Phyrrus' attack in earlier centuries, were the first time that Rome had lasting/profound contact with a foreign power of equal/greater stature. The first punic war forced rome to break its mold that saw it succeed in its 'unification' of Italy (foreign govern put in place, a marked departure from its system of alliances in Italy; a navy was created; other things I need my history book in front of me to recount). The second punic war showed Rome that, well, it was not as unified as it originally thought with the defections of Capua and a smattering of Italian allies, and while the rebellious Capuans were not joined by the majority of Campania, Capua had been a longtime Roman ally (granted, not a reliable one) and had prospered during its tenure at Rome's side (at the time it was the first second Rome!). Not to mention Hannibal brought down the Greeks, Gauls, and Syracusans. And let's not get started on Hannibal, the man who invaded Italy when it had not been truly invaded since the Gauls/Celts came down through Northern Italy and under Brennus' leadership sacked Rome. Hannibal may not have been successful in his campaign's aims (dismantle Rome's system of alliances and subsequently bring it down; he was only partially successful in this, really), and hindsight may cause us to be "Well, Hannibal didn't win the end," but to someone living in Rome during these times, such as Plautus, the prospects of a foreign, capable general (and this time a marginally civilized one, not some stinky Gaul) wandering around Italy with all manners of barbarians, strange warriors, and demon-elephants would certainly be pretty damn scary. It's not unreasonable to say that Plautus & other Romans believed that at any day Rome would be sacked!

By the end of Plautus' life Rome was well along its way to conquering the Mediterranean, which subsequently brought countless foreign peoples under the fold of Rome. I am focusing in on one result of this: a tremendous influx of non-Italian slaves. The clever slave/slaves in general that we see in Plautus' comedies are indicative of the anxiety that Romans no doubt had about the peoples they had working under them. The clever slave's unerring loyalty to his master (even at the defiance of the pater familias or society as a whole) kind of acts as a way for the Romans to pat themselves on the back and reassure themselves that no matter what they, the Roman citizens, would come out on top and needn't fret over the strange slave serving their food. Likewise the disloyal slaves who are ridiculed and laughed at represent the other side of the coin: if a slave is bad he will be punished and man will it be funny.

England is not all that different, really. The states of change/upheaval that went on during Elizabeth's reign are numerous:

• She was a woman
• She ruled over protestants and catholics who did not like each other as much (albeit this manifested in less violent episodes than ealier decades)
• She was deemed a 'bastard' by the Catholic Church and thus unfit to rule, which subsequently brought the ire of Spain and other European powers seeking England
• England, at the time, was emerging from its more medieval state and its economy entering something more money based
• Emergence of a 'middle-class' (whatever that is, but a class of people who were not peasant farmers, not nobles, not established merchant families, but rich nonetheless—shakespeare himself is indicative of this development)

I am not as well-versed in Renaissance/English history, but due to my Shakespearean/Miltonic leanings when it comes to literature I know vaguely enough about the era to determine that Shakespeare's servants are remarkable in of themselves. Characters such as Malvolio and Launcelot Gobbo, (and for the others I'd have to grab my notes, but the plays that come to mind are: Comedy of Errors (Menaecmi v2), Two Gentlemen of Verona, Taming of the Shrew, and As You Like It) are pointedly made out to be the joke, or if not that then doggedly follow their masters' orders so that joke can be achieved.

I don't think it to be all that unreasonable to assert that an aspect of the empowerment or ridicule of slaves/servants is born out of the ruling class' need to reassure themselves that despite whatever the social/political changes happen to be, all is well and they (the ruling class) are still on top.

Writing this just helped me plot out my next chapter!

 

[TerrisH]

been thinking about replacing my avatar with something new. any suggestions?

 

[nutranurse]

I say a smaller size of this to complement your title.

 

[thomas.berubeg]

So, I've recently taken to Sauteeing Mushrooms and Onions in butter, and then making a glaze out of the various alcohols I've had in my cabinet. My Verdict:
Vermouth: Delicious, easily the best choice
Rum (Unspiced dark rum): Pretty Good, very distinct flavor
Vodka: Eh, nothing special
Gin: Delicious
Tequila: Avoid. Avoid like the plague

 

[SKILORD]

Mushrooms Onions and Tequila, where could that have gone wrong?

But the others sound interesting.