My Centennial(100th) Blog Post dedicated to Wil Wheaton

Day 43: Decreased Visibility Due to Fog 

Showing up to Sing for my Kiddos

Last night was a hard night and it felt impossible to get out of my own head.  Like every night, my kiddos want me to sing to them before they went to sleep.  My daughter has been helping with chores, cooking, and nagging of her younger brother.  She helps so much it is like I see her growing before my eyes.  I almost didn’t sing but after mass, sparing, yoga, and board games I was able to get out of my head enough to show up for them.  I am not trying to say that being with my kids is too hard, it is everything else that creates a great fog in my brain.

The Bakersfield Fog

What if my brain is like Bakersfield; a great valley that suffocates those inside it because the pollution settles and cannot escape.  What if that pollution stops me from seeing them, seeing myself, breathing?  I am grateful that for at least one night that the fog didn’t keep me from singing. 

My daughter has an amazing teacher who introduced her to the Beatles and she has requested the song “Blackbird” the last few nights.  I feel her breathing slow as she leans in closer as I sing it in a whisper.  For me, Blackbird is a song that needs to be sung in a whisper and not belted out, as the words cradle my love around her.  And in this perfect moment I remember that when the dust settles after family board games and they are cuddled in my arms, they are still these innocent perfect little creatures. 

Wil Wheaton: My Kids Are Calling You Out

As promised in a previous post my kids made a video asking Wil Wheaton to come play board games in Bakersfield at Paladin's Game Castle.  

More than a fanboy plea this was more of a challenge by my son for Wheaton to play against him.  The part of this conversation that was not caught on camera is a question of Wheaton’s true identity.  My son is convinced Wheaton also plays Steve on Blues Clues.  He kept referring to Wheaton as "Steve" and he will not be deterred in this matter (from a six year old this is a huge compliment).  

Wil Wheaton Thumbs up MineCraft

Steve thumbs up Blue's Clue

My kids ground me and showing up for them is something worth striving for (hint hint Wil Wheaton).   I know when I describe the scary air quality in the B-twon visiting seems less desirable.  And coming to Bakersfield to play board games might not change the world but it would be super awesome and you would get a thumbs up from some adorable little kids. 

A Treacherous River in Kern: Love and a Broken Marriage

Day 39: Making Progress without dynamite 

Loving a man is like swimming a river; you feel their waves, their currents, weather the storms-- together.

Recently I came upon a dam in my river.  Like most academics, my solution to this dam was to become an engineer and find a way to move the boulders.  I have spent my days plotting and fantasizing about how much dynamite is needed to explode the wall blocking the flow of the water.  But no matter how smart, strong, or powerful I become—or how much sh*t I set on fire-- my efforts are in vain.  The dam will only be moved one pebble at a time.

I have a lot of people in my life who love me and ask about the dam.  I hate reporting every day that it is still there.  The real answer is that a small pile of pebbles has accrued over the last few months.  The flow of water is still blocked but each pebble I am reminded that the direction of the water could one day change.

Each pebble represents a small change that is moving the new.  Here is a list of some of his pebbles:

PEBBLES

Building a LoTR deck to compliment my stubbornness of only playing with base dwarf set.

Sleeving my LoTR deck.
Quit drinking soda.

Threw out every super hero shirt he has ever owned.

Started carpooling with me to work every day.

Matching socks.

Made doctors appointments (without nagging).

Started drinking hot tea (my favorite drink).

Opening my car door even when we are rushing in the morning to leave for work

Going to mass every week.

Threw out his computer.

Eating salad for lunch.

Gave up access to podcasts.

Letting me pick our games.

Contributing to our blog.

Threw out chanklas.

Comes to bed at the same time as me every night..

Sends me random selfies just because.

Packing kids lunches. 

Loaded dropbox program carousel on our phones so we could share family photos more easily.

Gets mad and tell me, instead of holding back.

Takes the scenic route, even though it takes longer.

Deleted Facebook account.

Told the truth before I caught him in the lie about games belonging to me.

Makes his student call me “Dr.” and not “the wife”

Cancelled an out of town trip because it was too much for kids.

Has not left the house while I am sleeping. 

Researching date food (Yay Korean Fusion & House of Tehran ftw)

RCIA meetings.

Loaded turn-based games on our phones so we can play, when we can’t be together.

Cleans his classroom so it will be tidy when I visit.

Learned “Our Father” prayer and says it out loud.

Playing turn-based iPad games when I know he wishes it was WarMachine.

Texts me first.

Wears old man dress shoes because he knows I love them.

Stopped at after-school program and just helped random kids with math.

Writes in our couples journal every night.

Talks to me about music.

Loads the dishwasher when cranky.

Looks at games for us, instead of games for himself.

Advice: See the pebbles.  When you are in pain it easy to only see the boulders, but my advice today is see the pebbles and hold on to hope.

The Return of Hope aka Wil Wheaton

Day 27: Just because we can, doesn’t mean we should.

This weekend was full of organic soup, family-time, cuddling, and games.  I set a personal goal for the weekend to beat the hill troll and find one thing to be hopeful for.  As my regular readers know I have had a hard time lately, and I have found a new obsession/ hope: Wil Wheaton. 

Wil Wheaton taught my Toddler Sarcasm 

Bakersfield was quite a flutter when Guy Feiri came to town and sampled a few eateries.  Guy is great and everything, but be-still my heart that the geek gods have spoken, and Bakersfield might officially be on the map.  I heard a rumor that Wil Wheaton might host an episode of Table Top in Bakersfield at Paladin.  Tabletop has been crucial to both our choice of board games and has strangely become a new family past time.  We watch tabletop so frequently that my 5-year old son Nathan has started mimicking Wheaton voice inflections, and not so charming in-game sarcasm. 

Gaming Updates

Since I have last blogged, we have hosted board game night where the hubs was named the new champion in Ticket to Ride Europe.  This also affirmed that we need to invite more couples over to play because it expands our board gaming options.  We finally beat the second act in Diablo3.  We found a rainbow goblin (will explain further).  Bur first, and most importantly, we finally killed that f*cking hill troll and beat the second scenario in the Lord of the Rings Card game.  

Wheaton fanboy/ gamers the next gen 

Dominating at Ticket to Ride

Don’t Kill the Unicorns

Many eons ago, before my career and children, the internet was upset that Diablo game art might be too cartoonish.  In response, and because Blizzard developers are awesome, the game creators included the ever-popular cow level.  The infamous cow level transported players from a horror movie landscape, into a level that was filled with walking cows constantly moo-ing except the moo's were made by humans to much hilarity.  Fast forward to 2015 and playing Diablo 3 on the PS4 when we chase down a rainbow goblin and it opens a glowing rainbow portal in the middle of a gulag.

In the game, me and the hubs, follow the portal and enter a land filled with flowers, pink teddy bears, and even unicorns (click the link to watch a video of us running from pink bears).  Then they start attacking our game characters and when I realize I am taking damage I start to flee. John wants to stand and fight, and bits of dismembered unicorn appear in the corner of my screen.  I yelped and started running away to the next rainbow to escape the fury of the adorable enemies in whimsvile.  In the end we only hurt a few characters enough to get away and took a video of the whole  endeavor.  The huge menacing guy holding an axe and running is my character and the violent Korra character belongs to the hubs.

HELP: Send Wil Wheaton

Tip of the day, just because we can kill unicorns does not mean we should.  And, Wil Wheaton needs to come to Bakersfield.  If that rumor is a lie, then we need to make it true, I will start the petition in moveon.org and work on a video plea from my 5-year old Wheaton fanboy.

*Note: I do realize there were several spelling errors in my initial draft the most notable the misspelling of Wil's name.  This is a hobby people, remember I don't proofread carefully.  Forgive me. 

Hey @professorCCB Where could this magic portal lead? #PS4share pic.twitter.com/HXfDIp7IUK
— MrNinjaman (@JohnRBoone) February 2, 2015

Me and @professorCCB #Diablo3 #PS4share pic.twitter.com/R4sCouI8e9
— MrNinjaman (@JohnRBoone) February 2, 2015

Gone Girl the Game

Day 13: Think Small

Game: LotR Card Game

System: Table Top

Developer: Fantasy Flight Games 

Kiddos grabbed a pic of us play LoTR

I am not known for my artistic or domestic capabilities but I pushed this year to keep my 12^th anniversary gift themed.  My gift was a scavenger hunt, without the Gone Girl evilness, that involved a series of 12 clues hidden throughout the house.  After puzzling out the clues the final gift item was a love letter from me, and the LoTR card game that I discussed in my previous blog.

I got a cool gift from my partner too.  It was custom artwork from a local artist, Johnny Ramos.  One thing that we discussed after we traded gifts was that we both went out of our way to acquire local items.  No, the LotR card game is not developed in B-twon, but it is sold at a local gamestore Otto’s.  Though we both contemplated sending flowers from big box stores or shipping something sparkly (like a game disc) via Amazon as an easy solution to shopping, we wanted to do something more thoughtful.

I am a Gamer not Hoarder…Really!  

I am totally fascinated by people who live in “tiny houses” and I have watched everything on Netflix, Hulu, and Xfinity, that I can to learn more about them.  It is profound to watch people pare down their lives to the bare essentials.  On the spectrum between Hoarders and Tiny Houses I am closer to the hoarding condition.  I have not been able to part with my GameCube, Super Nintendo, strategy guides, and cartridges, and have a china hutch filled with board games.  But when it comes down to it, I have reduced my marriage to the activity that brings me the most joy and that is games because it is about being together.

It makes me sad that when we visited Otto’s, the aforementioned local gamestore, that the neighboring bar was full (Sunday football) and the gamestore was empty.  I will admit that I loved having the space and selection of board games to play in store, but it made me a little sad.  I hope that my current challenge to my marriage that is about reconnecting with a person I love will inspire the 3 people who read my blog to enjoy someone they love, instead of just being with them.

At Otto's playing "Hey That's My Fish"  

At Otto's Playing "Tsuro"

At Otto's kissing the winner. 

Have Games will Travel

This weekend we will travel as a family for the first time since before the separation.  But living in a hotel for three days with two small children is not a reason to abandon games.  My hubby organized our new LotR card game into snazzy boxes and put the cards in sleeves so that we have a portable game to play while we are traveling.  Staying in hotels is like living in a small house, you start to realize you don’t need most of the stuff around you—you just need the people you love.