View From the Bushes

For quite a while I've been meaning to post a DireKobold update in my blog, and every time I think about doing it that thought has immediately been followed by, "Yeah that is a good idea, but there's not real rush... it can wait until tomorrow." By now dozens of tomorrows have passed and I need to get off my butt and do it. Part of the problem is that the news isn't that great. But it's not all bad either. It is what it is I guess, a reflection of me, a decidedly flawed individual with more than my fair share of lazy genes...

Okay, that may have been overly melodramatic. Let me back track a little bit. Shortly after GenCon 2003 I realized that the initial business model I had come up with was not going to work, or in any case that I did not have sufficent capital or time to wait for it work (if in fact it ever would). From that point I began to cast about for a way to make it work, from the perspective of the money and time I had to spend on it and from the perspective of my loyal subscribers. The resulting dead space has felt like the trenches of World War I: a desperate muddy stalemate with only occasional visits to the mademoiselles and the hope of American intervention keeping me from dying of despair. Okay, maybe that metaphor died while still in the mud, but hopefully you get the point.

Recently I had an idea which might in fact be the salvation of DireKobold; unfortunately it's not at a stage where I can talk about it. Yes, I know, saying stuff like this is fantastically annoying, but the alternative is to keep my mouth shut and give you the impression that I've done nothing. This idea is taking up the vast majority of whatever discretionary time I have, and as result there hasn't been much to see on the front end. For that I apologize, (yet again) but there actually are a few things coming up. Next week or the week after that I plan on putting up a redesigned DireKobold.com. Okay, maybe you're thinking whoop-de-do, but it is pretty cool, primarily because it was designed by someone other than me. Also come Hell or high water, I will put out a Xenogenic NPC this month (you'll understand this better next paragraph). And the Adventure Path will get completed, probably just not anytime soon...

All of this was done in preparation for the big announcement. In addition to the "idea" I'm working on, a new Xenogenic NPC, and a website redesign (not to mention work, family, cleaning and organizing the office (i.e. hundreds of books), playing the occasional game (all work and no play make Ross a dull boy) and a host of other things too tedious to list) I have decided to enter this "open call". I have a novel I've been working on, on and off for 15 years and despite what can only be considered impossibly inconvenient timing, the "open call" opportunity is just way too good to pass up.

The skeptics (and the realists and probably even the optimists out there) will be saying that all this can't possibly be done, and who knows, maybe they're right, but every so often (and maybe you've experienced this) you end up with so much to do that you become unbelievably effective. I guess it goes back to the saying "That the busiest man has the most time." So we'll see what happens. One of the things I'm going to need to do is focus my creative energy (I heard you guys laugh) on writing the novel, which means that blog entries, while not going away, may be more sporadic, shorter and if such a thing is possible, of poorer quality.

That's all I have to say for now, though I had hoped to say more (or at least elaborate more). As usual send hate mail to president@whitehouse.gov.

Carpe Diem Quam MInimum Credula Postero
Ross