Day: November 10, 2022

A contemplation of upgrading

I’ve been maintaining this website for over a year now, and it’s become something of a preferred online home for me. While it’s primarily used for my Star Wars campaign (rather, I’m more obsessed with my campaign than other projects), I do use it for other writing projects. The problem to that is that there is no tension behind getting my writing finished here.

Put simply: I don’t pay for the website, and I don’t ask you, my readers, to pay me for what I write.

Granted, as what I write most of the time is Expanded Universe Star Wars, something that technically doesn’t exist anymore, so asking for payments to read that material would not only be overly pretentious but also inviting the Great Mouse to bring his wrath down upon me. But I do write other stories, and they get attention when and where I can give it.

I was looking at website upgrades and I had noticed the subscription options. It’s been something I’ve given some serious thought. Should I upgrade and let readers ‘subscribe’ to my writings? If anything, it’d force me to work on regular postings and to give it my best effort every time.

It’s something to consider.

Stay safe out there, readers.

-JB Swift

11/10 Been Down with the Sickness

And now the song is stuck in our heads. I’m not sorry.

I apologize for not posting for the past week, but I had come down with a double whammy of illnesses.

Sarah caught the flu on Saturday night, and my son Ben caught strep throat on Sunday. My caretaker brain kicked in and I looked after them on both days, only to find myself in a very strange lucid dream at 3AM on Sunday night.

I find it amusing that, even in a fever dream, I’m still focused on ‘progressive’ issues, as the setting was a world overcome by climate change and in a constant state of sweltering heat, and the narration was all about what could’ve been done to prevent it. I eventually woke up and checked myself, noting the 103-degree fever, which didn’t go down for nearly a full day.

That Monday morning, I checked in with my doctor (pediatrician and family member) and made a mental note that I had not seen an actual look of concern on his face in a very long time, but he looked worried when I came in. I caught both illnesses and my immune system was working overtime to keep me alive. I was put off work until this Saturday, given some very strong medications, and told to eat as much as possible. Also, a steroid shot, and there’s only one place someone with my BMI can take a steroid shot.

I couldn’t sit down for most of that day.

I’ve recovered enough since then to be considered ‘my old self’, which is to say a surly and cranky old man when I can’t have coffee. Lots and lots of green tea, though. This means I haven’t done any writing at all the past few days, unfortunately. Not even anything plot-relevant.

But as this post should indicate, I’m on the mend! I hope.

I owe a player a Side-Arc session, which I hope I can do an impromptu hosting tomorrow afternoon, and the Main Arc session is this Saturday. I also have a special request for a Sunday session, and that is looking to prove very interesting.

There’s a lot of writing to catch up on, and I’m afraid I have a strict time limit before the last of my evening round of medications kicks in and knocks me out.

Stay safe out there, readers!

-JB Swift