Salmon Run in the Cedar River

So, today we took a walk along the Cedar River in downtown Renton  to see if the salmon run was underway. It's quite a sight, on years we get it right (the fish being unpredictable).

We've found a good spot last year, just down stream (north) of the Renton Library, which is right over the river. The viewing was even better this year. Whether the timing was right or this is just a better year for the fish I don't know. Maybe both.

I don't know how many fish there were --dozens and dozens--mostly grey with some golden, almost as bright as koi. A few were purple, which I suspect were either grey fish turning purple or contrarywise purple ones turning grey.

It helped that the day was beautiful, with sunbeams to shine right down to the river bottom (the Cedar being a fast, shallow little river).

All in all, a good outing. We'll see if we have such luck again next time.

--John R.

currrent reading: Tolkien's poem on Tea.

TOLKIEN AND LEWIS PLAY

So, the Taproot Theatre, a local theatrical group we enjoy getting to occasionally, has announced they'll be staging a  Tolkien / Lewis themed play, called simply LEWIS AND TOLKIEN. 

Written by Dean Batoli, whose work I don't know (apparently BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER scripts figured in largely), it imagines a chance meeting between CSL and JRRT at some point after the Inklings towards the end of Lewis's life. Sounds like it has potential. At any rate, I plan to go, so here's hoping it's good.

DATE: January 22nd through February 22nd, 2025

THE SEASON: just to give a better idea of what Taproot's like, the four other plays that make up this season are 

A RAISIN IN THE SUN (not my kind of thing), 

The Patsy Cline Story (likewise), 

MURDER ON THE LINKS (Poirot stories can be fun, but I'm doubtfull about their choice of a murder mystery play set on a golf course), and 

THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST (which I've seen more than once, and read several more times; the problem here is deciding how many times I want to see the same play). 

I guess we'll find out

--John R

The Antiquarian Book Fair

 So, it's that time of year again when rare book sellers gather down at the Seattle Center (the old World's Fair fairgrounds) to offer up an amazing array of collectables --anything from a Kelmscott Chaucer or copies of WEIRD TALES through local-interest booths and first editions of THE LORD OF THE RINGS. 

http://www.seattlebookfair.com/

These past few years I've been working at downsizing my collection, not adding to it, which calls for a whole different mindset. But it's still quite an experience just to browse. And I still occasionally at the end of the day carry away a book, particularly if it's something I'd been looking for a long time.

We'll see how it goes this time.

--John R.

My Tea Plant Flowers

So, yesterday I noticed that my tea plant (a kind of camelia) has put out its yearly flower. I'd just planted some pansies, which along with some violets (which if they flowered this year I missed it) make up my modest little flowers-in-pots minigarden for this year.

Possiblee adjustments include replacing the capnip, which died out at some point over the last few months. I'm also pleased to note the flourishing of the Italian shell beans' leafy greens so beloved of Hastur. Neither of our current cats show much interest, but Tyburn has taken some of some grass growing out of the side of one of the pots, so we'll let that stand for cat greens for now.

--John R

 

--JDR

P. S.: Thanks to JC for the photol

I Am Podded

 So, thanks to Ben Riggs, author of SLAYING THE DRAGON 

(a highly entertaining account of the fall of TSR)

and Gareth Hanrahan, whose work I'm not familiar with

 (his work on The One Ring rpg sounds particularly interesting), I got to enjoy an hour's online discussion of LotR. Ben has since posted the discussion in both audio/video form, complete with close captions:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sOa8nrmVxQ

I can see that I need to learn more about the One Ring rpg and see what the current license holders have done with the newest in a long line of Tolkien rpg. Sounds like the Shire starter set is a good place to start, if I can find it.  More on this somewhere back the road.

--John R.*

*bonus points: Ben knows how to pronounce my name

New Fish Long Ago

So, it's October 7th, which I always celebrate as the day I was hired at TSR as an editor in their rpg department. Over the next five years I got to work on a lot of adventures and sourcebooks and boxed sets, most of them for core AD&D / D&D but also at one time or another on just about every game world they were publishing at the time. 

 I got to work on a lot of great game modules (didn't keep count, but at a guess, about three dozen releases) and with a lot of amazing people. That same week I was one of four new hires (whom Jim Ward, our boss who's hired us all, called 'new fish') that same month on sequential Mondays. 

I arrived first on October 7th, followed by Rich Baker (designer) and Thomas Reid (editor), both on the 14th, with Wolfgang Baur (as part of the DRAGON / DUNGEON magazine team) on the 21st.

It was a great place to work, from the point of view of GETTING TO BE THE ONES WHO WORKED  ON D&D (how cool is that?) and a terrible place to work from the point of working conditions and the cluelessness of management carried to a high degree. 

Later there was coming and going, and coming, and going, for a total of ten years at three iterations of TSR / WotC / Hasbro and a lot more releases I worked on --events some of which I commemorate in turn. But that's the subject for another time.

--John R.

Jimmy Carter Day

So, Jimmy Carter has just turned a hundred years old -- something no other President has achieved. 

No one has ever done a better job of being Ex-President. An interesting legacy, and one that I doubt will be matched.

I met him at a book signing once (he was famous for his epic book-signing sessions), and I wonder if he might hold some king of record there as well. 

He's also the first person I voted for in a presidential election.

He didn't cure river blindness but he helped a lot of people over the years --from the roll-up-yr-sleeves and pitch in of Habitats for Humanity to election monitoring and off-the radar unofficial diplomacy. 

I hear they're planting a hundred trees in his honor. I wonder what kind, and where?

Well done, Mr. Carter.

--John R.