Gary Gygax, father of the fantasy role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons, died today.

I have always made fun of people like myself who  grew up geeking out in the basement talking about armor class, saving throws and hit points.  (And I always will.)   Still, the honest truth is that I owe a lot to that game.  Time spent as a dungeon master helped hone skills in acting, organization, management, and most of all storytelling.  I still remember a lesson learned at age 11 when my fellow players told me how much they enjoyed an adventure I’d written in which, while solving their main quest, they were chased by hooded assassins.  Conflict drives the audience’s engagement in a story, and subplot can control pacing.  Thanks, Gary.

I suggest we all observe a moment of silence.  Lasting 3d20 seconds.

• The Hottie and the Nottie, a vehicle for Paris Hilton, performed horribly last weekend. On Friday they had less than a dozen people per screen for all the showings that entire day. This is proof she’s not a star. Perhaps we will see less of her.
• Barack Obama won everything and finally leads in delegates and superdelegates combined. Pundits have started pointing out that Clinton needs more than 60% of Ohio and Texas to stand a chance. This is proof she’s not a star. Perhaps we will see less of her.
• The WGA seems happy and is claiming victory. Personally, I looked at the contract and still think it kinda sucks. (A writer makes NOTHING on ad revenue if a TV show is repeated on the internet, for the first 17 days. If you miss an episode of Lost, do you usually wait 17 days to catch up with it?) Still, I wasn’t on the lines and it’s not my financial well-being at stake, so if they’re happy, I’m happy.
• To demonstrate to a student the arrangement of bonds in molecules, I brought and orange to draw on, so he could grasp the idea in three dimensions instead of on paper. At one point he ran away saying, “let me go get some push pins!” Hey, it’s a little thing, but enthusiasm for learning from a teenager? You take it when it comes. Below is a molecule of ammonia. That’s an electron pair on top, and two of the three hydrogen bonds visible on the bottom.