Mission Statement

One of the problems I've found whenever I undertake a project, particularly one of a creative sort, is that I end up burning out. I'll have a bunch of ideas at the start, and am full of drive to do big things, but eventually that drive peters out, and I'll get caught up in other things, and eventually the old project will fall apart.

So, that's why this blog is starting with a mission statement. I'm going to lay out exactly what I'm going to be doing with it so that I'll have some clarity and direction when writing future posts. While of course some of this stuff might change as I go along, the core ideas will all be there.

I'm making a promise to myself now to produce at least one blog entry each week. While I'll certainly try to produce more content than this minimum, spread between all of the categories mentioned below, I'm going to write at least this much about something. Hope you enjoy it.

Core - Fantasy and Roleplaying
I'll admit, one of the big reasons this is the core for the blog is that I feel like it'll be easiest to write on. I've read a lot of other blogs and feed about roleplaying games, and feel like I can contribute as well. Entries into this category will take several forms:

• Session Summaries: I'm involved in several games at the moment (one Pathfinder, one 4e D&D, and one in a custom setting using rules hijacked from White Wolf's Exalted), and will summarize the events happening in each game in a narrative format, providing commentary as a player and as a GM on the situations that arise.
• Character Bios: Backstories and character sketches for different characters that I come up with. These characters can be ones I'm using, or planning to use, in one of my games, or one I'm planning to feature in a short story or novel chapter (see below), or simply a cool character idea I wanted to get on paper and share with everyone.
• Stories: Scenes, complete short stories, or chapters from longer works that I'm playing around with in my head. These will often feature characters mentioned in the character bios and be pretty much exclusively fantasy works.
• Setting Information: Places, organizations, historical events, and the like. Building a setting for my custom world and putting it somewhere. Most of the entries can be made to fit into a different setting without too much effort, however.

Secondary - Science
As a PhD candidate in Physics, I get exposed to some interesting scientific ideas. In addition, I Stumble through pretty much every scientific topic they offer, and come across dozens of press releases describing interesting results. I'll share those I find particularly interesting, either from a purely scientific perspective or from the perspective of the implications of the discovery.

In addition, as a hopeful future teacher and current teaching assistant, I'll occasionally feature an article attempting to teach some aspect of physics. These will likely be out of order at first, though after writing several of these they could be strung together into a coherent lesson plan, hopefully. I've always found the best way to understand something is to make sure you can clearly teach someone else it.


Secondary - Health, Food and Exercise
I've been on a recent health and exercise kick, with good results. One of the biggest indicators of future success in diet or exercise is keeping logs, keeping yourself accountable, and sharing your success with others. I'll share tips for healthy living, easy-to-make delicious meals, and fitness information.


Secondary - Better World, Better People
I've discussed philosophy at length with my friend Tom, as well as bits and pieces here and there with other people. While I'm not going to claim to be an expert on what to do in every situation, I'm struck now and then by thoughts which I feel need sharing, with the hope that if enough people hear them and take them to heart, then the world would have a couple fewer problems in it. These typically aren't huge things, but things I don't think most people think about and would agree would be better if they changed.

Small steps. Saving the world comes later.

Tertiary - Things I'd Like in My House
I'm subscribed to a number of different topics on StumbleUpon which give future tech ideas. Lots of these are ways to improve life in the house, increase efficiency and savings, and generally make the house better.

While I've been mentally keeping a list of these ideas in my head, it'd be nice to have a single place to look back to when I want to find them again, years down the road, when I'm finally at a place in my life where I can build a dream home.

Of course, it's even better to share these ideas with other people, for a variety of reasons. First, many of them simply make the world a better place by getting rid of something wasteful or inefficient, or making things nicer for little extra cost (though this cost is likely much higher if you're trying to retrofit a home with the idea rather than putting it into the structure when it's first made). Second, if many people hop on the bandwagon and ask for these features, they'll start to become mainstream, more people will figure out how to build them or improve them, and the price will come down by the time I actually want to use it.

So, feel free to steal any of these ideas for your own home, or share them with friends looking to get their own houses.