Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Michael Hopcroft's LiveJournal:

Sunday, November 5th, 2006
11:08 pm	Get Motivated Another of the BBS things I've been doing recently is creating and posting faux-motivational posters. I use the generator sponsered by Flickr, which saves a lot of time and allows all sorts of whimsical results. The thing is that almost everyone I know who has tried this thing has found it maddeningly addictive. I've used all sorts of ideas and built up a surprisngly large collection. These two posters provide a nice example: the second was made as a follower to the first, sine it seemed inevitable.   (Comment on this)
10:56 pm	Fantasy Football Sans Elves Some of you who know me and know I am an avid sports fan and sportsgamer migth be surprised to know I am not a big fan of fantasy football. I have always found it much more artifical than actually controlling your team on thei field and winning or losing in a large part by your own efforts. That said, I am surprised that I don't seem to be all that bad at it. Or, at any rate, i seem to be pretty lucky this year. The forums at Hero Games, which are among my favorite places to hang out, has a fatasy football league this year, in which I have a team. It's called AFC Kamineko. My first draft pick was shaun Alexander, who went down in week 2 and is gone for the season. But my second pick was Philadelplhia QB Donavan McNabb. The league is run on the NFL.com system, which rpoduces odd-looking scores. And at the end of this week's game, the Killer Kitties 9as I have come to call them) are the league's last unbeaten team, with a 9-0 record. With a four geame divison lead with five games to go, they've clinched at l;east a tie in their division 9although the outcome of the divisional race hasn't been in doubt for at least a month). A win next week over the Rocky Ford Warbirds would give them the divison outright. In all my time as a sportsgamer, I have only won one league championship; that was a Statis-Pro basketball league in 1993. The improbable run of the Killer Kitties continues to atonish me -- thsi week's 111-99 win the second time I made a private concession to my opponent only to end up winning the game. Weird, werid, weird. (Comment on this)
Saturday, November 4th, 2006
1:15 am	I Feel Conflikted In a good way. A very good way. I just recieved the announcement for Conflikt, a new filk convention in the Northwest that is going to be held for the first time in January 2008. As for why I would notice something that earyl, well, it's a northwest filk convention. There hasn't been one of those in a while. And it is something well worth my effort to plan and save up for. And along those lines, I am trying to figure out the next step on finally getting my album finished. If I can have something ready fro Conflikt, t won't pay for the trip but it will make me look and feel better when I get there. (Comment on this)
Sunday, October 22nd, 2006
2:15 am	Restart, Renew and Revitalize (I hope) One of the things that occured to me this week is that there is little point in having a blog if one does not, at least occasionally, post anything to it. So it seems that an update on events at Chez Slappy appear4s to be in order. So here is a brief update on various matters. 1. Orycon I very much wanted to attend Orycon this year. I still might, but affording the membership is going to be a problem. The deadline for prereg is tomorrow afternoon, and I have no source for the money to buy my $45 membership. The hassles involved in getting a membership at the door are too horrific for me to contempla, not to mention coming up with the cash on the spot at the time. Thgis is especially annoying as it's the only filk-related event I would be able to attend all year. 2. Recording I have a working copy of Band-In-A-Box, and my PC's sound setup seems to be working prop[erly. Now if only I could figure out how to use BIAB -- probably not to Tom Smith's level, but at least adequately -- then I might make some progress on that long-overdue album. 3. Personal Finance Money is not my strong point. My meeting with an attoorney at law has made that more than clear. I have a hearing in Bankruptcy Court on November 22. It is not something I am at all looking forward to. 4. Game Writing Stuff I have a couple of propjects on the table that are not finished, I do have one that is finished, but I am waiting to hear back on its actually being available. It a sort of mini-splatbook for RuneQuest called The Celestial Chorus. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 4th, 2005
11:17 am	New Who! i finally got my hands this week on the rest of the new season of Doctor Who, the classic Biriths Sf program that jump-startedme into fandom 23 years ago. And if that doesn't date me, what does? The new season, which features Christopher Eccleston as the Docotr and former pop idol Billie Piper as companion Rose ftyler (there are two other people, both male, who become companions for a short time, one whom is essentially put off the ship and the other being the first openly bisexual character I've seen in sci-fi TV). It is good. I haven't watched all nthe episodes yet: here is my appraisal of the episodes I've seen: Rose: The intro to the new series is told from the point of view of the Doctor's new companion. Not the best story of the season, but a fine start. The End of the World: Earth is destroyed and everyone is too busy dealing with what is essentially a massive insurance scam to notice. A lot better than that brief description makes it sound. features a great supporting character in the form of Jabe, a humanoid tree who really likes being breathed on and who has a lot of nobility in her character. The Unqiet Dead: The Doctor clears out an alien-infested funeral home in 1969 Cardiff with the unwiloling assitan ce of Charles Dickens. Again, much better than it sounds. Dalek: WOW! A reclusive mogul is holding an alien captive undergournd, only to discover that his lack of knowledge of what he has is going to lead to unimaginable disaster. The sofa is not going to be enough protection, but while the Dalek is extremely effective, scary and tragic, one of the great pleasures of this episode is watching the Doctor confront his demons, both figurative and literal. Father's Day: Rose accidentally changes history and nearly causes the destruction of the human race. Heart-wrenching, and I loved every m,inute of it. The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances: Lodnon during the Bliitz is haunted by a bizarre plague, homeless children scraping to survive fear an all-too-real ghost5, and a time traveler is in town to run a scam. These threads all link toigether surprisingly and effectively, in probably the best story of the season. You owe it to yourself to see these episodes. Bad Worlf/The Parting of the Ways: The first part of this story is a brilliant spoof of the reality television craze, from Big Brother to The Weakest Link (complete with Anne Robinson voicing a killer robot). Then the Daleks show up and the story, while still entertaining, loses a lot of its edge. Not bad, but Davies would have been better served making "the return of the Daleks" into a separate episode and building a complet story around the reality-TV satire that dominates "Bad Wolf". The series will resume in December with a speical episode for Chrismtas that will makr the debut of David Tennant in the role of the Doctor and the rumored one-shot return of Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, the beloved companion from the '70s. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, August 1st, 2005
1:38 pm	Money -- the root of all deviltry At least in my life, money is the root of all deviltry -- massive confusion, much wailing ans gnaishing of teeth, etc. There is a lot of consuion concerning my bank, my status with my bank, the status of my pension, where my pension is going to go and when it will start going there, and all manner of extreme difficulties that are causing me to -- well, wail and gnash my teeth. To top it all off, I have bills coming due that are going to be utterly hellish. In short, my life is going to be interesting for the next couple of weeks. And remember, the old Chinese sayiong "May you live in intheresting times" is no blessing -- it's a curse. Current Mood: busy (1 Comment |Comment on this)
9:36 am	I'm back Well, I've been advised that I need to go back to keeping my livejournal again/. So here I am. Double the laughs, half the caffiene. For what it's worth, professionally I am in somewhat better shape than last time I checked in. I'm waiting to see what happens when The kevin & Kell Roleplaying Gameseriously hits the distribution chain. And I have a signing scheduled in Portland next weekend, August 6, at bridgetown Hobbies and Games in Portland. At the ed of the month it's off to the Seattle area for NASFiC, where although I don't know what specifically I'm going to be doing yet I have been asked to be a Program Participanjt. Which sounds pretty cool to me! It has been hot in Portland. My gatorade consumtpion has gone up almost exponentially. Normally I don't like the stuff very much -- salty drinks? -- but when it's this hot (and it's going to be scorching this week too) that is apparently what my body needs. Finally, I am wondering whether I should try and get my hands on a video game console. xBox 360's planned release in a few months is making me wonder how much of the boat I missed by not learning how to code video games instead of write RPGs. Current Mood: hot Current Music: I Need You -- the beatles (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, October 30th, 2004
2:13 am	Some general updates It's late, I;'m out of Diet Coke, and it's time to update the BLOG. Thursday afternoon I go into the studio space for the first time. we won't be doing much recording, but I;'ll be singing the songs from my album and my producer/accompanist John-Paul kelly will try to work out arrangements. We're going to be in that room for three hours -- about enough time to drive each other stark raving bonkers. Later that night is my long-awaited online meeting with Windstorm Creative's president and staff. Since I'm in the middle of some rather delicate talks about merging my old company (Seraphinm Guard) and ym new company (Michael Hopcroft Press), it's going to be tricky talking to the publishing partners at windstorm. Actually, I;'m surprised they want to talk with me at all. You can now preorder my album! I;ve already taken two preorders from some fairly surprising names. If you want to get in on the fun of financing my first album, go to http://www.mphpress.com/windsong.html and click on the buy button. it'll set you back 414 plus $5 shipping. i guess that means it'll set you back $19. Finally, next Firday through Sunday (Nov. 5-7) is orycon 26, where I am giving my first convention concert, opening for a stellar lineup that includes frank hayes, Blake Hodgetts, Callie Hillis and Cecilia Eng. I could say I'm nervous about it, but then i am not usually prone to understatement. Current Mood: energetic (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, October 21st, 2004
11:22 pm	One down, one to go The CORE team concert is over. It went re;laitvely well -- since I was the last item on the prgoram about half my audience disappeared by the time my set was finished and I had to vut it short by about two songs. And I think i might mentally remname the Kip[ling/Fish classic "The Hymn to Breaking Voice" -- clearly I should have done something more to warm myself up properly. My next gig (and last gig before I go into the studio) is at Orycon 26, where I will probably be performing only two of the same songs. And lest you've forgotten I;m an RPG writer, I have to call port Orchard tomorrow afternoon to scheudle a meeeting (online, hopefully) with my publishing partners. I'm nervous about it, but progress is being made on the books, or so I'm told. Thing is I will be given full control of layout on my next major books (on my currently-in-progress works it's been contracted out). The most telling comment I got after the concert was "the Christmas song was so sad." The person in question was referring to a song I wrote about the aftermath of, of all things, "Card Captor Sakura". basically, in every love triangle someone inevtiably loses out.... Current Mood: relaxed (Comment on this)
Wednesday, October 20th, 2004
10:28 pm	Well, the CORE Team gig is tomorrow Well, the CORE team concert is tomorrow. I could be singinf fdor as many as a hundred people who couldn;t give a flying leap about filk but who would be interested if I sang well. I hope I can do a good job. I ahve to select a six song set. I also ahve to make sure I';m properly rested, well-dressed and in general make a good presentation. I also hope they have decent security -- I;d hate to have someone climb onto the stage and rmable about how they want to kill somebody. When you deal with fellow mental health clients on a regular basis, you see, you run into a lot of people who get very upset. Sometimes they have a good reason, sometimes they don't. Today someone shouted in my general directiont hat they were going to shoot me through the head. I, naturally, was very upset about this. the producer, who is also my case maanger, assured me they were talking about someone else, but I don;t like to hear about ANYOEN being talked about that way. Obviously the person was not in control of themsvles, but when I;ve been out of control i;ve never threatened anyone other than myself. Anyway, I hope the concert goes well. I'll let you know. Current Mood: drained (Comment on this)
Monday, October 18th, 2004
5:23 am	Some fiscal challenges Doing creative work on a goivernemtn disability oincome is hard enough at the best of times. When that income leaves you only $160 a month disposable income for eveyrthing -- incluidng food -- some things appear insurmaountable unless challenged. For example, I have an e-mail invitation to attend Consonance this march. It's a big filk con in the San jose area and all the important people in the filk community that i really need to get to know again will be there. The menbership is no problem -- I can pay that with my next check. It's getting there that's the hassle. The cheapest and most conmfortable method is Amtrak, with a round-trip fare of $130. prlbem is coming up with $130 (plus whatever it would cost in fees to buy the ticket). I do have a PayPal account, so people who ahve cause to sned me money can do so. the question is -- who has cuase? I can;t really take peorders for the album until I'm done recording it, and those should really go to production costs. Somebody suggested a "tip jar" in the Internet on whcih I would place a sample track and say "LIke this? Contribute to the Tip Jar and support Michael's touring shceudle!" That, I suspect, would go over like a lead balloon, especially since PayPal likes to tack $5.00 shipping on anything that comes with a donation button. meaning people pay more than they wanted to, and they get cranky. None of my friends have money and I can;t really borrow the money because I have no reliable way to pay them back. Spending my entire SSI check and starving to death for the month would not be good eitherl. And I won;t get paid for my RPG work until next year. In short, things look pretty grim. And before you say "get a job", let me state that my disabilities are so severe that they cost me my last three jobs in a row. Plus a full-time job would play hacoc with my time and with my continuing mental health care. What do you guys think I should do? Current Mood: discontent (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, October 17th, 2004
1:06 am	Why did I write TH|WO Christopher Reeve tribute songs? Inspiration still has not left me, I guess. I wrote this new song which I won;t record but which I may do in concert. Superman! Lyric by Michael Hopcroft Tune by Julia Ecklar (“Ladyhawke”) In '78 'twas a time of despair With trust in the world ever fleeing There was danger abroad and corruption at home And it seemed there was naught worth believing No-one knew his name, the young actor they chose The talent they'd chosen to try But that all changed when he appeared on the screen And we believed that a man could fly! CHORUS: Superman! Superman! Fly bravely on! Image alive on the screen! Go up, up and away into the dawn! Fly on the wings of a dream! The role brought him fame, and yet it was a trap It seemed he could never escape it Yet he shrugged it all off and he lived out his life And he never dishonored the cape Until that fell day when the horse threw him down And his body was weaker than steel A moment like that would break any strong man Yet he still had more to reveal! CHORUS “Whatever the struggle, I will walk again And others will walk at my side!” Thought people kept telling him it was a dream The courage they never denied And now he is gone, with the dream unfulfilled But the dream has not come to an end And all who seek vision in hope in this world Will see Superman fly again! CHORUS x2 Current Mood: contemplative (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, October 16th, 2004
9:40 pm	Bleep! They say self-publsihing is the refuge of people who aren;t good enough to be published by others. They may be right. I just got a note from Steve Jackson Games. I had inquired about supplementing my writing income by writing for their e23 eBook series. What tehy essentially told me was "We've seen your writing on the company forums, and it;s crap. Don't bother us again. Don't weaste our time" Normally this wouldn;t get to me this bad, but I hardly think forum postings that take four minutes to write and run, at most, four paragraphs are a fair judge of someone's writing ability. Hero telling me "We're not interested, but only because we don;lt feel the eBook market is viable" is one thing, but at least HERO did not comment on my writing ability. perhaps the difference is that Steve Long has met me face-to-face and whoever i talked to at STeve jackson has not, so Steve felt the desire to be polite. Writers getting proposals rejected is nothing new, but I was denied permission to even SUBMIT a proposal. TWICE. And that stings. Am i really a crappy writer with no talent? Should I just hang up my keyobard and leave it at that? Current Mood: angry (2 Comments |Comment on this)
9:40 pm	My latest "gig" I;'ve been talked into perofrming the "exit music" at the Cascadia CORE team's 2nd Anniversary party this coming Thursday. It'll be nice practice, but I have a shameful little secret: I despise myself for being mentally ill, and being involved with the system at all. Thus I don't know how comfortable a setting this will be. I'm still doing Orycon next month, in about three weeks to the day of this posting. Give me a chance to debut a whole bunch of new material I wrote for the album, including my Christopher Reeve tribute song "Walking to St. Peter's Gate". I don;t knoiw what;s next. My travel will probably be very limited in 2005, to my considerable regret. I really wish I had more money on hand, but at least I have stable housing and medical care which would be threatened if I got a full-time job -- not that there are any to had. Current Mood: quixotic (Comment on this)
3:29 am	About Kumoricon.... I finally found out this week that "Slayers Inheritance" won the award at Kumoricon for Best Novella. I don;t know how muich good that does me, but it certainly is a feather in my cap as a fanfic writer. Now if only my filks and ym professional writing could get simialr recognition, I'd be set. Current Mood: quixotic (Comment on this)
Wednesday, October 13th, 2004
7:02 pm	Hoe dpressed can you get I find myself wondering how dperessed one can get without having one;s heart simply stop beating out fo despair. I know I shoulldn't be here. I have this incredible feeling that my input in the way thisnworld works is not welcome. I keep expecting bad news no matter where I turn. Something like "Sorry, we canceled your books" or worse. And of course the elections are coming. I don;lt want to vote for Bush, but I may have no choice, because every vote is going to be counted as a vote for Bush. Hope was outlawed in 2003, and it's only a matter of time before the mind cops come to blow me away. Current Mood: depressed (Comment on this)
3:14 pm	Bummed about some things, excited about others I am bummed about some things. First fo all, I;'m roecording a filk album! the provess will beuing in November and take about three months. I'm looking forward to seeing it finished, but I don't know if I'm going to enjoy the process. it sounds rough. On the disappoitning side, it appears I will be unable toi make a couple of conevtnions I usually attend, Rustycon and DunDraCon, because I can;t afford the travel. My agnme company doesn;t generate money until product is soild, and that;s not going to happen until my partners' contractor finishes laying out and printing the books. I was hoping another deal would at least pay my airfaire to DunDraCon, but no such luck. So I have to write the organizers (I had already signed up to run events) and cancel. This all to my massive personal disgust. I DON'T break commitments. Current Mood: irritated Current Music: Dr, Jane Robinson -- Fossil Fever (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, September 9th, 2004
12:02 am	The problem with conventions Well, i just found out today about a small game convention in Corvallis called Just A game Con (JAGC) on the first weekend in OCtober., normally, I would resist the temptation to add something so smaall to my travel schedule, but as this looks like a place to play more than anything else, and they provide crash space for a con that runs for 38 straight hours, I'm almost committed. I am committed to Orycon first weekend in November, and the only question on that end is whether I'll be doing panels this year. I've been asked to, and filled out the paperwork, and ym memberhsip is paid, but it's up to the p[rogramming director whether to actually put me on any panels and I don;t know if he will. I'll let you all know. Still recovering mentally from Kumoricon. And waiting for the results of the fanfiction contest, which should come next weekend. Current Mood: restless Current Music: Leslie Fish - Sam Jones (Comment on this)
12:02 am	War is heck I just made my latest attempt at trying to play a play-by-e-mail wargame, in this case the WWI simulation Paths of Glory. I'm playing the Allies and I don;t know if I;'m off to a good start or not. Nobody who is not a wargamer would understand the concerns I have about this game, but I can;t help but wonder what I;m doing wrong and how I can avoid an ignominious defeat. In other news, I finally got my hands on a GameCube again. I had one for a while, then lost it. Now I have a refurbished black model and four games; two figthing games, one game based on Robotech (GRR! Why couldn;t they call it Macross like it was meant to be?) and one game that iis just plain odd. I haven;t played it very much yet, and I'm not very good at any video games and probably never will be. I can beat up on someone in training mode who is standing still, but that;s about the limit of my skills. I could use a few more games, including a few RPGs, but my apartment is so small that it is highly unlikely that i can get anyone up here to teach me the games. Somehow is seems strange to me that an RPG designer can;t play video games, especially since I want to break into the videogame market someday. Finally, I am anxiously awaiting the results from the Kumoricon fanfiction contest. It'll take a while to judge the entrants in my category, Novella, because the stories were so big. And I doubt I'll win. But it would be nice to know. Current Mood: embarrassed Current Music: The M's getting clobberfed (Comment on this)
12:02 am	Starting over Well, it;'s time to start over with a new BLOG. I think I;'m going to try to promise myself that i will make an entry in this journal every night before I go to bed. And I will try to tell people to come over and read it. Hopefully this will result in a more successful blog than the one associated with a company I am no longer associated with. Two days ago I got back from Kumoricon, and it was a great experience. Meeting other people who think writing fanfiction is a perfectly respectable hobby was a revelation to me. I had a grand tiem reading ym fiction and listening to the others. The only problem is that my sotry was so long that no way was it possible to do ti jsutice in the time I had. the baisc plotline ahd not even started when i stopped! Nothing I could do about that, of course. I only wish my fatigue had not prevented my reading more of the story later. Still, if all goes well you'll get a chance to read it in the Kumori fanzine. It shoudl take about 14 issues for them to finish it.... I also sent some of my RPG products over to be edited/laid out/printed the previous week. The sense of accomplishment this gave me I can;t describe, define or even understand. Sometimes I woinder whether I reaklly accomplished anything. Current Mood: contemplative Current Music: Johnny Cash -- San Quentin (Comment on this)