January 2012
2 posts
I'm not a feminist
I’ve been thinking about this a lot over the last few months.
I grew up in a house of women, run by my Southern grandmother for a long time before I just lived with my mom & my two sisters. It took me a couple years in college to actually get used to male socialization, because much of my communication has been very feminine.
You know that thing where dudes insult each other all the...
CNNMoney Tech Tumblr: Startup You →
cnnmoneytech:
Fake Grimlock, a caffeine-fueled giant robot dinosaur, has been stomping through the blogs of tech luminaries such as Fred Wilson, Eric Ries and Brad Feld dispensing advice and commentary on the startup scene. Here at CNNMoney, we’re fans of his rather stark perspective and tendency…
December 2011
2 posts
1 tag
October 2011
3 posts
The Internet will do its best to punish you for having vocal opinions on controversial subjects like politics, religion, medical care, mental health, the economy, identity politics, and so on.
The alternative is to punish yourself by censoring those opinions.
America: a nation founded by violent insurrection against repressive taxation and suppressed freedom of expression & religion, a majority of whose citizens worship a man known for beating and chastising bankers.
Huh.
On being "anti-American"
One of the bullshit things that conservative media say about #OccupyWallStreet is that the protestors are “anti-American.” That makes me pretty pissed off, because freedom of speech & assembly are founding values. Hell, that we had our protests suppressed when we were an English colony is part of what made this nation have the character it does. It’s in our history....
July 2011
1 post
Arguing about what is or isn’t a role-playing game is like masturbating with sandpaper while in public. Sure, for some perverse fools it might feel good, but to everyone watching, you’re just gonna look like a mutilated dick.
June 2011
3 posts
My favorite swear word
Chuck Wendig posted a contest asking people to share their favorite swear word. I didn’t find out about it until after the contest was over. On a lark, I wrote up my would-have-been-an-entry and emailed him, because, hey, why not. He asked me to post it publicly so that, in his words:
“I kinda feel like you should write this down somewhere in public so that PEOPLE KNOW YOUR...
May 2011
2 posts
An idea seed: Batman as Job
Something Chad Underkoffler said once triggered an idea:
Almost everyone is scared of Batman.
Everyone is scared of Joker.
The only person scared of neither: Lex Luthor.
He went on a touch further, but I went a different direction. First, put Luthor in Gotham — if not physically, then the influence of LuthorCorp. Then, get Christian Mythos all up in this house:
Lex Luthor is the...
April 2011
2 posts
February 2011
1 post
If I ever make an Unknown Armies heartbreaker...
I wrote this in IM a few minutes ago, to one of my friends that enjoys random initial story bits:
It is known that with God creates each man, he write the name of his truest love in his heart. As he does with each woman.
It is not as well known that God also writes the name of that soul’s utter antithesis, that soul’s nemesis, in each heart.
All magi know this, though, for with all...
January 2011
2 posts
Two churches located across the street from each...
paranoidrobot:
…Do the Presbyterians think Rocks are animals?
My wish for 2011
I thought about writing some sort of “year in review” for 2010, but there’s honestly way too much to think about — between moving to Oakland, getting Dresden out, my 20 conventions this past year, and a fuckton of personal shit. Then I thought about writing a list of people to be thankful to and why over the last year, but that didn’t feel right either. So instead,...
December 2010
1 post
1 tag
A #Barcon Proverb
The Hierophant of Barcon sat down with a rather fetching maiden and began telling stories of the Nobles of Barcon. When he got to talking about the Heretic of Barcon, he was reminded of what the Heretic did the night he was Ennobled.
You see, there was no Psychopomp at this Barcon, and so no one to accompany the unready on their journey. The Hierophant had do this this role, but he was...
November 2010
2 posts
Thankful 2010
This has been a hell of a year, so far.
I’m thankful to my old bosses at the state for indulging my experiment of half-time state work. That let me move from a city I no longer wanted to be in and live in a place I love.
I’m thankful for the community & friends I have around here, for Endgame being a center for that, for Chris & Chris & their countless hours of...
By popular demand #icmf
Since people have asked about some of the obscure hashtags the kids are using on Twitter these days:
#icmf — implicit “, motherfuckers” (pronounced “implicit-comma-motherfuckers”)
You use this when you are tweeting something that you feel needs a “motherfuckers” at the end. Like, say, if you’re being cocky or frustrated. The word is rather...
October 2010
3 posts
Being Suicidal: What it feels like to want to kill... →
claytoncubitt:
“…in his model, the appeal of suicide is loss of consciousness, and thus the end of psychological pain being experienced. And since cognitive therapy isn’t easily available—or seen as achievable—by most suicidal people, that leaves only three ways to escape this painful self-awareness: drugs, sleep and death. And of these, only death, nature’s great anesthesia, offers a permanent...
My name is a word
Every now and then, someone uses “Macklin” to refer to something.
This started as a form of play that, to put it briefly, makes a game go gonzo, further detailed by Josh Roby. That’s been in use since 2007, when I blanked on a question and answered with the first random thought in my head.
Earlier this year, Kevin Fitzpatrick (@kfitzpatrick) described an episode of drinking...
R.E.M.'s Stand, as a Parsely game
This is something Paul Tevis & I were joking about on Saturday night at the after-party following the EndGame Anniversary dinner. The idea popped in my head, and we riffed. Here’s the chorus of R.E.M’s Stand, as a Parsely game.
> STAND
You are now standing in the place where you live.
> FACE NORTH
You are facing north.
> THINK
You are thinking about direction and...
September 2010
2 posts
Game Chef 2010, damnit!
We have another Game Chef coming up, and damn it if it hasn’t given me ideas. I don’t know if I’ll do anything, but this is what I just wrote in IM to a friend (edited a bit):
—
Imagine a city around an oasis, lavish and beautiful. A city of trade, many traveling each day braving the harsh desert surrounding it to trade and to be seen. A prosperous city-nation, its...
Better Off Not Knowing
Every now and then, we think “man, if I could knew then what I know now…”
Well, if I knew ten years ago what I know now…
I would be worse-off today. I would be a man who knew horrible things coming up, and choose to avoid them. In avoiding them, I would deprive myself from really internalizing those lessons from hard times. I would be a man with ten full years of bullshit...
August 2010
2 posts
Other Than Awesome
Will Hindmarch said the following about me on Twitter a few days back:
So @RyanMacklin is always awesome, but sometimes he feels things other than awesome. He should focus on the awesome.
I’ve been thinking on that a bit, on the “other than awesome.” Especially as I now there’s a decision in front of me that could be unpleasant as well, resulting in more forms of...
On The Big Three-Oh
My good friend Lenny Balsera is turning 30 in half an hour. And since I fully intend to be in an alcohol-aided coma by then, I will share with him (and you) now what I decided upon my 30th birthday, some two years ago (though re-articulated today):
* Rule one: Do not waste time fucking up your life the way you did in your 20s. Life is too short to waste repeating old fuck-ups. Make new fuck-ups.
...
July 2010
4 posts
Too much metal for a day job
“Eras were meant to end so new ones can begin.”
—something Paul Tevis told me when he ended Have Games, Will Travel.
***
“The wolf is your friend. He makes you work hard.”
—something Jeff Tidball said to me when I mentioned publicly that I was leaving my day job (in reference to him talking about his freelancing life).
***
“Hear that click?...
Reflecting on a year
Yesterday I turned 32, my first birthday in my new life in Oakland. I spent the day working on This Just In From Gen Con (which I’ll be launching today or tomorrow), IPR work, and playing games at the first Go Play SF Bay pick-up game night. We had 18 people show up! It was pretty awesome.
I know that to a lot of my friends, I’m still pretty fucking young. “30 is the new...
A week in my life
It’s hard to know what day to start with, because, well, I have a fucked-up life schedule. Let’s start with Tuesday.
—
Tuesday:
Wake up at 5am so I can get on the bus to get to BART to get to Amtrak to get to the Light Rail to get to my day job by 9am. Sometimes I try napping on the train, but half of time that doesn’t work, even when I’m tired, because I’ve...
June 2010
1 post
May 2010
4 posts
About #ShitRyanMacklinSays
So, my friend Karen has started this thing and wants people to join in on the fun of chronicling the random shit I say…perhaps using that to attempt embarrassment. She writes down some of the shit I say and tweets it with the hashtag #ShitRyanMacklinSays.
Of course, hashtag searches being what they are, you’re not going to see the sheer volume of tweets she’s done to proclaim to...
Three years later...
I’m fond of saying that my life rebooted three years ago, back in early April 2007. That’s when the woman I thought I was going to have a kid with split up with me. (And man, that was an unhealthy relationship. Not that I blame her. Takes two—or more—to make a relationship that toxic.) Very, very few of you know me from before that point, and those that do don’t know...
So I have a thing
For some reason, I decided to start a tumblr account. I’m going to use this to talk about random shit in my life, mostly stuff that’s happened long ago that I occasionally remember and think is worth writing down. (I have a general prohibition against talking about my current personal life publicly. That’s what mouthing off with a beer over Skype or IM is for.)
I’m going...