View From the Bushes

At the moment I'm playing in the "Family Campaign". For those of you that remember I hate being cut off from the Internet for any length of time. So even while playing D&D I like having a laptop in front of me with an internet connection. Now I'm sure that there are many of you out there who would consider someone who works on their laptop while playing D&D an incredible ass. There are people who consider me an incredible ass even without taking this into account, so in that sense I guess it's okay. I do have something of a defense my friend, who DM's the "Family campaign", likes the DireKobold Xenogenic System so much that he refuses to run any other adventures. So all of the adventures I'm playing in, I have not only read, I've edited them, programmed them and bled over them (metaphorically, of course).

The other day a guy I work with (he sat four cubes over) was fired. I'm not sure of the exact reason why he was fired, but I do know one thing, he was a pathological liar. His claims included being George Lucas' nephew, possessor of three PHd's, world-class bowler, archer and runner, acquaintance of Prince Charles and self-made millionaire. It seems that the older I get the more inveterate liars I meet. It's curious that they are so common but I guess it all goes back to the difficulty of proving a negative. It's tough to prove that someone didn't meet Prince Charles, or that he didn't break DES encryption or that he wasn't the first man on the moon (okay that I can disprove).

I'm not sure why I mention this, possibly because lying has been much in the news recently with the Jayson Blair scandal. In this very column I have stretched many truths for the sake of a few laughs, but in some respect that's sort of my job, and that's why writing in the RPG industry is so cool. We get paid to make up lies, compose tale tales, and embellish legends. It's a great job and one I'm thankful to have.

Carpe Diem Quam Minimum Credula Postero,
Ross