Month: August 2022

Last Nights’ Moon, Han’s Sleep Pattern Problems, and Writing Fixes

It was 1:30AM last night. I was between segments of my biphasic sleep pattern and preparing breakfast and lunch for the day-job, when who would toddle into the kitchen but my 6yr-old daughter.

“Heya, kid,” I said. “What brings you out here at this hour?” Were it a school night, she would’ve been sent scurrying back to bed, but it’s the weekend, so I don’t need to be strict.
“I woke up and couldn’t go back to sleep,” she said, peering at the pan full of food. “Why are you cooking?”
I explained to the 6yr that sometimes, Dad wakes up and has to wait until he’s tired enough to go back to bed. In the meantime, there’s chores to do. “Sorry, kid, but you get it honest. I’ve been like this for as long as I can remember. It’s rare when I sleep through the night.”
The 6yr stayed up for about an hour, asking questions while I went about the meal-prepping, cooking, storing, and cleanup. She asked for ways to get her to go back to sleep and was told to go read a book, since that has helped me in the past. She tried that and was passed out on the couch shortly after.

A Swift tradition, that.

Of course, I always have company during my “can’t go back to sleep” time. There are other gremlins that like to stare at me while I do my late-night cooking, just waiting for me to be clumsy.

After seeing to the sleeping gremlin-princess (she forgot a pillow and blanket but she did grab her portable night-light, bless her) I went about my own routine to get myself ready for bed. Dawn would be soon, and I wanted to be rested for the day shift. I did manage to get a decent picture of the night sky, with the full (or gibbous, I’m never sure) moon making its way across.

It was just when I felt like I could go back to bed when I realized something about the chapter I had been working on. I have been struggling to get it finished for the past week, but it had never come across as what I was looking for. I usually refer to my notes taken during the session when this occurs, but I couldn’t find the outline or session recording to factcheck myself (and this is precisely why I record the sessions, with the players consent, of course) so for a moment there, I was worried that I would have to do a complete rewrite.

When lo and behold, the recording had been accidentally downloaded into a different set of files, those meant for this sites’ wiki-styled articles! The outline was there! As excited as I was to be able to make headway, I told myself I could wait until the next evening or Sunday.

We have a session tonight! The Field Group has a terrific challenge ahead of them, and they’re going about it smartly, RPing their hyperspace journey as their strategy discussions. I’m looking forward to what they come up with.

Lunch break is done, so back to the mail I go. Stay safe, readers!

-JB Swift

He’s happy I’m home; he’s just old

This is five minutes after I’ve come back home from a long shift. He’s always stupidly happy when I come through the door, but once the formalities are out of the way, old man just wants his rug and for me to not leave my seat so he can justify staying there.

In a few minutes, the kids will be abed and I’ll be writing, so he’ll get his wish. But for now, there’s the chaos of parenting to behold!

-JB Swift

Old Man Casey’s Morning Routine and Computer Stress

I suspect he know I’m trying to leave when he suddenly does this instead of peeing in the morning. Oh no, Case, go ahead and take your time. Not like I have letters to sling or anything.

This is following the late-night stress that was my focused too intently on figuring out the calendar/scheduling problems that cropped up over the past day. I might be a millennial and have a basic understanding of technology, but when I say basic, I mean that wholeheartedly. The phrase “I don’t know what I’m doing” is reflexive once I have a computer in front of me.

But I eventually figured it out and sent word to my players about the upcoming events. I’ve debated linking that to the site so everyone could just come here to find out when a session will be available, but I couldn’t find a way to do that without my players’ identities being made public. That just isn’t something I’m willing to do without their permission.

At least today is one of the days this week where I don’t feel the need to skip lunch and be done early(ish). I packed the tablet with me and queued up my plots/chapters, so I’ll get some writing in during the day.

Back to slinging letters, readers. As a bonus, another majestic picture of Old Man Casey just living his best life.

He’s a good boy, and just as goofy as the rest of us.

Stay safe, readers!

-JB Swift

Early Morning Fog on an Unexpected Day Off

I’m betting it was the back-to-back 11.5 hour shifts. Maybe management is wanting me to take it easy and recover from the stresses of overwork. Or they had not gotten to my name on the “This Guy Don’t Need A Life” list before I had clocked out for the day.

Either way, I have a Day Off! It’ll be enforced by the Postal Tradition of “On my day off, I don’t have a phone and cannot be found”, while I wander around the house or to town to take care of chores and errands.

There will be a few writing sprints to attempt after the errands, but the next couple of days will also be used to refine the challenges for the Main Arc players. They’re in the Arc Finale Adventure, and while I don’t purposefully try to kill the characters, I want them to have an appropriate sense of difficulty.

The primary antagonist…oof. The players will have their work cut out for them.

While I’ve been considering the challenges of the day, be they physical or metaphorical, I was able to enjoy a few minutes of quiet on the front porch, while the woods around us was shrouded in the Louisiana fog.

Stay safe, readers!

-JB Swift

Today’s storm looked gorgeous and was a relief

Normally, I’d be annoyed at a high chance of rain while at my day-job. But given that the last few months have been filled with almost daily heat advisories, I was perfectly fine with walking in the rain for a few miles. It’s when there’s also lightning that I get nervous.

Managed to get this photo just before the rain started falling.

-JB Swift

Another Day, Another 11.5hr Shift, But Still Writing! Plus, an updated photo!

After clocking out and heading to my car in the evening, I mused about two things:
First, that it was two nights in a row that I was going to be home after my children went through their bedtime routine, so they haven’t really seen me for two days.
Second, that the evening sky was gorgeous but as I was surrounded by buildings and highways, I couldn’t snap a good photo for the site.

The second is mildly irritating, but the first hurts.

I’m not an old-school father. I want my children to know me as present in their lives, not just as their dad who works a lot. I’ll do my best to be done with work at a good time and get home to spend a little time with them before their routines kick in, but this doesn’t always happen. It never sits well with me when this happens, but hopefully the mail will be kind tomorrow and let me have at least a couple hours to see how their days were and help Sarah with their evenings.

With that, it’s an evening of mustering the energy to finish out the writing goals for the day. While I do pack my tablet to work so I can write during my breaks, I know the best times to make the attempt (on a workday) are in the evenings.

How well with this go? Eh…there will be an attempt!

It’s also been a couple months since I’ve shown my face here, so here’s a look at the tired postman.

All things considered, that’s probably for the greater good. Damn but I need to brush out my hair. I’m tempted to try waking up early and braiding it down.

So, we’ll try two writing sprints to see if I can finish out the sections I’ve been needing to get done. If I’m lucky, I might go for three before I being the “Big Sleep, Little Sleep” routine.

Sleep well, readers.

-JB Swift

Monday Morning traffic, Han’s First Day, and Sporadic Writings

Welp, I had promised that I’d write an update in the last post, and I’m here to deliver on that promise!

Granted, I was intending to have this posted about 20 minutes after that post, but it seems my sleep schedule had put its foot down. Went through a Little Sleep, woke up at 2 and wrote for another 20 minutes, then to bed for the Big Sleep until the alarm went off (and it worked this time!) and we made ready for the day.

The weekend had enough chaos to make it difficult to reach my goal, so we’re resetting the due date for the chapter’s posting to this upcoming Saturday. It’s not ideal, but I’m managing the schedule as best as I’m able.

Turns out that the Main Arc session was almost completely RP (Role-Played for the non-gaming-nerds) as the party learned about their mission. I apparently front-loaded so much that I’m having to write it out for the players who couldn’t attend, though we know our players enough to know how they would’ve reacted. I’ll be saving that write-up for when I get to Arc 2.

As to the why that I couldn’t finish out my writing goals: birthday parties. We’ve basically formed a family unit between us and our friends with kids, so when there are nearby birthdays, we hold them in one event.

That was fun for the kids, and I have to admit I’m very proud that they managed their own chaos (over 10 kids no older than 6 makes for a lot of chaos) as well as they did. With that, Han and Ben were worn out by bedtime and I began my evening routine of attempting to write before I passed out.

And today begins Han’s experience with the first grade! Wish her luck, readers. The kid is too smart for her own good, sometimes. I’m hoping she’ll be challenged enough to stay engaged with the class.

And now, I’m going to sit here in the mail truck that had decided it needed a new battery all of a sudden. That, of course, means taking the opportunity to write while working.

Stay safe, readers!

-JB Swift

Panicked Sunday posts, plus Korra!

It’s 5 minutes to midnight where I’m standing, and I’m just now remembering that I was trying to keep up with daily posts!

I’ve made it a week only to forget in the chaos that is my Sunday!

So, expect an update to this fairly soon, but for those stepping in to be disappointed by a short post, I present Korra!

She’s about one step away from slamming her front paws into me at this moment.

Updates soon, readers!

-JB Swift

Saturday Shenanigans, Main Arc Night, and Future Posts

Life wouldn’t be interesting if it didn’t occasionally put a dash of irony into my awareness. After writing about how the day job was starting to throw off my perception of time and schedules, I went to bed last night after a Side-Arc session convinced that I would be rested and ready to sling letters at 7:30AM.

So of course, I was woken up this morning by my 6yr who kept saying “Dad, you’re going to be late for work!”

It was 7:10AM, and it’s a 22-minute drive to my office.

So…you know: panic.

I made it to work with 10 seconds left on the clock before I’d be considered ‘late’, so no discipline will be coming my way. I don’t want to think about how fast I had to drive to get to the office in that time, but I got there. I was lucky to have grabbed my satchel on my way out; I’ll be out here without supplies or tools. Didn’t even grab a hair tie.

That’s survivable, but also very annoying. At least my water jug was in the satchel, but I did have to give an explanation as to why I also had the training device for the whip-chain Kung Fu forms. (Note: it is highly illegal to have a weapon on your person in a Federal building unless you’re authorized, even if it’s an esoteric melee weapon)

I won the argument by saying it was just a training tool, not designed to cause harm, and really, it looks silly if you don’t know what it’s for, so I was forgiven for my weirdness. So now, I’m out here, taking parcels and letters out to the community. It’s a pretty day for it, at least.

Tonight will be the session for Arc 2, Adventure 4! The finale of the Arc, and I’m predicting it’ll take at least a month to finish, given our scheduling and the amount of detail I’ve put into the challenges for the players. After that, I’m expecting everyone will want some downtime to explore their characters’ Side-Arcs and have some development, while I whittle away at the story-writing and page-posting. That “taking time off to write” idea is looking very tempting now.

There might be a new section on the front menu fairly soon, as well. I keep going back and forth on the “Postal Living” idea, but now that it’s been requested, I’m duty-bound to give it some attention. We’ll see where that goes.

Happy Saturday, readers. Stay safe out there.

-JB Swift