Gary Gycax - Out of the Game

Adam Rogers comments on the death of Gary Gygax last week in an op-ed in the NY Times.

GARY GYGAX died last week and the universe did not collapse. This surprises me a little bit, because he built it.

Gycax was the creator of Dungeons and Dragons, a game that still lurks in boxes in our house. Rogers credits D&D as the model for the digital world of today

Gycax co-created Dungeons and Dragons in 1974. I don't know whether I would have been attracted to the game if it had been around when I was a boy and teen, but I know that my son became a big D&D fan. Whenever he had gathered enough money, he was off to Bosco's to get another hard cover volume of the the D&D series.

I'm not qualified to judge Rogers' assessment of Gycax's impact on the content of our world today.

Today millions of people are slaves to Gary Gygax. They play EverQuest and World of Warcraft, and someone must still be hanging out in Second Life. (That “massively multiplayer” computer traffic, by the way, also helped drive the development of the sort of huge server clouds that power Google.)

But that’s just gaming culture, more pervasive than it was in 1974 when Dungeons & Dragons was created and certainly more profitable — today it’s estimated to be a $40 billion-a-year business — but still a little bit nerdy. Delete the dragon-slaying, though, and you’re left with something much more mainstream: Facebook, a vast, interconnected universe populated by avatars.

The idea that we all play roles in life is not something that Gycax created - it's been around in literature and psychology and anthropology and even management for a long, long time. And slaves just doesn't seem like the right word. As Americans, are we slaves to the crafters of the US Constitution?

But I can attest to the impact of D&D on the life of at least one geek. My son got totally wrapped into D&D but there weren't enough others he knew he could play with. So I got recruited, very reluctantly (on my part.) I had a lot of things I was doing and interested in and playing D&D just wasn't one of them. But J was so insistent. And the media had all sorts of hype linking D&D with Satanic rituals and other bizarre and sometimes deadly activities. I needed to know what my son was involved with. But there were about 12 volumes he wanted me to read so I would know how to play. Another big obstacle. I finally told him to make me reading assignments - no more than one hour a day - so I could learn enough to play. Focus on the essentials. He did, and I did my assignments.

And I was amazed at the sophisticated world that was there. Particularly, I was intrigued by the attributes of the various characters. Essentially, Gacyx created a model of human beings (well, he included other vaguely human like characters such as wizards,haflings, and gnomes) that were similar in structure (if not quite in content) to similar models of humans in the field of management. Essentially he identified key traits such as

Strength
Dexterity
Constitution
Charisma

I don't remember how many there were altogether. You had to roll the strange dice (were they 12 sided? I don't remember) to fill in points for each trait. High points in certain traits worked best with certain 'races' of characters. It was an analytical tool that I'm sure taught many people about such modeling, even if they didn't know that was what they were doing.

And we did play some, but I'm afraid I never became an enthusiastic a player.

My son also used the computer - we're talking Vic-20 and Commodore 64 if I recall right - to create tables to keep track of the points of his characters and those of his imaginary opponents.

It also gave him refuge from a world that he didn't seem to fit into very well at that time. As he moved on to other games, I used to ask him why all the games he played had as their goal to kill and maim as many people as possible. Why didn't they have games to find ways to feed the poor or find ways to overcome cancer?

All the skills he developed to support his gaming have come in handy as he grew up - the point that Rogers is making. And I suspect that his one time passion for Buffy may also have been linked to the supernatural world of D&D.

So, thanks Gary. You were at the right place at the right time and millions have learned a lot and had great fun from your creation. Sorry you had to leave us so soon. And perhaps you didn't have to.

In an interview with Gamespy after his stroke in 2004, Gycaz said, when asked about his health:

Gary Gygax: I feel pretty good now. I just can't exert myself too much. I'm still too overweight, though. I shouldn't even be smoking these cigars. I also quit smoking a pack of camels a day.

I know that George Burns was still smoking cigars when he died at 102 or 103, but he was a statistical outlier
.

Price of Gas and Election Payoffs

Sunday (It's Monday morning Thai time as I post this) was the mayoral election in Kamphaengphet Candidate #2 was the front runner according to Mook. But Sunday word was out that at leat two candidates were paying people 500 Baht each for their votes. Mook was upset about this, but his father, when we visited him, was asking how come he didn't get his 500 Baht. That is the same amount J and I had to pay each to get into Burma - about $15.

Meanwhile, the price of gasoline ranges around 30 Baht per liter for 91 octane. At about 3.8 liters per gallon and 32 Baht per $, that's about $3.50 per gallon. This is a little higher than gas was when we left Anchorage, but given that everything else is much cheaper than in the US, gas prices at US levels and above are extremely expensive for Thais.

Back in Chiang Mai

[still having trouble loading photos - there's a brief video of the hilltop temple below.]

Bus to Kamphaengphet from Chiang Mai. Comfortable and easy. Got to the bus station early so got on the earlier bus. Roads are really first class, four lane divided highway. But as we descended from the higher altitude of Chiang Mai into the lowlands, we got pushed to the left and the right as we zoomed downhill around the curves, I was reminded of taking this route when I first arrived in Thailand in 1967. The Peace Corps volunteers in the North were all sent up to Chiang Mai by train after a week of orientation in Bangkok. We left Chiang Mai in the evening. Then the road was not paved, two lanes, and I recall careening around the curves in the dark, lit up regularly by bright flashes of lightening which let me see the pouring rain outside. I remember that vividly still today as I just accepted that I would survive or not and that would be my fate.

In Kamphaengphet, Mook took us to the P Resort. The river across from the town is now lined with ‘Resorts” - we’d call them, motels, though each seems to be its own unique style. They had specially reserved an oval room for us that was over the river with windows about 200 degrees around the circle. It was pretty spectacular. We rested a bit enjoyed the view until he picked us up to go for dinner.

We went to an upstairs room at a Chinese restaurant owned by the children of a good friend of Mook’s father - they had come to Kamhaengphet about the same time.

Who’s Mook? I didn’t have Mook as a student in class - he was in grades above the ones I taught. But he did live with me for a while so he could practice his spoken English before taking the American Field Service (AFS) examination in 1968. There had never been an AFS student from KPP province, but he passed the exam. I got to know him and his family well during that time. He went to Iowa in 1969-70, a small rural town where he fit in very well. His daughter has also been an AFS student and now is living in Los Angeles. He’s been back to the US several times over the years, got an MPA in Bangkok and works at the HINO truck dealership. His family banana farm from the old days is now a huge sugar cane concern and Mook is head of the Sugar Cane growers association of KPP.

At the restaurant were Manoo and Sittiporn, two former students of mine. Manoo was an English teacher until he bacame an administrator at his primary school. Sittiporn is also a teacher. Both were good students when they were in my 7th grade English class.
There were also a few other people. One of the current English teachers at the school who is very enthusiastic and whom I promised last year I’d digitize some slides from 1967-68 of the school and of Kamhaengphet. They were very happy with the dvd - I played a slide show at dinner on my MacBook - and with the old student newspaper which had stories by Manoo and Sittiporn as well as Mook.

After dinner Mook had contaced Somprasong - one of the Thai teachers of the year - who was on a bus bringing students back from visiting the sea. His students live in the mountains and I imagine few if any had seen the sea. They were on their way back to Umphang and Mook arranged for us to meet them at a gas station as they were passing through Kamphaengphet. It was great to see him and his wife and son again. There were two big tour busses with 92 kids! Somprasong had gotten some businessman to donate the busses for the trip. But the big busses would not be able to go the small road to Umphang, so when they got to Maesot by 1am or so, they would have to switch to the small pickup trucks with benches in the back for the last three hours.

Right now I’m on the bus back to Chiang Mai. We had a lazy Sunday. We switched to the Techno Riverside Resort because the big room we were in wasn’t available for Saturday night. This motel was closer to town and also nicely situated on the river, but we didn’t have the great view we did the previous night. But they did have internet connection in the lobby so I could check email and make a post yesterday. Breakfast came with the room in a nice indoor-outdoor setting. Mook and his wife Aow came by with their 8 months old grandson. He was well fed and well slept, so he was in a good mood and we had fun. A real cutie.

Then off to Mook’s son’s (and wife’s) tutoring business. They have over 300 students who get tutored in English, math, and other subjects. Weekends are their busiest time. There we met Carlo, one of their English teachers. He’s a 48 year old Italian who was born and raised in Germany and is married to a Thai woman and lives 25 kilometers out of town.

Then to Mook’s house to drop off his wife and the baby. Then we stopped by a nearby wedding that Mook had been invited to. He dropped off an envelope with money and apologized to the bride’s (or was it the groom’s?) mother for not staying. Then we stopped at a spot on the river where his father first had a house when they got to KPP and where Mook and his brothers and sisters learned to swim. There were some people fishing and we also got to see the pens where they raise farmed fish.

Then we got out of town and onto the old main highway - the one that was the highway when I was teaching here. It was so much more quiet, the narrow two lane road going through fields along the river. Even though it is the dry season, there were bright green fields of new rice, irrigated by river water. And we stopped at a small temple - cemetary at the top of a litle hill. This was litterally a little hill as though someone had made it with a giant bucket of dirt. It gave us a a great view of the area, and there was another wedding loudly going on in the village just below. Mook said today was an auspicious day for a wedding and we must have passed three or four.

We got to Tak about two and had another great lunch. It is a little embarrassing because I’m not allowed to pay for anything in Kamphaengphet. Manoo slipped in and paid for our hotel room the night before - after Mook had told me it was already taken care of. Sutin and his wife paid for our hotel room last night I later learned. And this last lunch Mook would not let us pay. We had orginally planned to see the big dam in Tak today, but it was getting late and Mook has a meeting in Bangkok tomorrow morning, so I said we should skip the dam and just go to the bus station.

It was a little after three pm and we just missed the Chiang Mai bus and we could catch the four o’clock bus, but it might be 4:30. Mook said to just wait and see which bus came first (one from Bangkok or one from the Northeast) but I was concerned that there wouldn’t be enough seats. I should have taken Mook’s advice. The Bangkok bus came first, was a nice new bus with lots of empty seats. It left about 4:30. The Khonkhean bus from the Northeast came later and didn’t leave til 5pm. And it was pretty full. Our seats turned out to be broken and after a bit, someone got off and we got other seats. But we are making a lot of little stops - not like the direct bus we were on going to KPP. It’s almost dark (6:35pm right now), but I was able to get my battery charged fully before the busride. So I’ll end this post and work on another one that will be less travelogue and more things we’ve found out in the last couple of days.

Burma Thoughts

[Blogger's having problems posting pictures. I'll add more tomorrow]


[This is a little disjointed, but I just don’t have the energy to make it more coherentGoing into Burma felt a little strange and exciting. The contrast between Thailand and Burma - just walking over the bridge over the river Moei (in Thai, the Burmese call it something else) you could feel it. It is a major entry way in both directions for goods. Lots of Chinese things come in from Burma to Thailand. I’m not sure what all goes the other way - though we did see a couple of trucks loaded with plastic garbage cans.

And our guides told us that a lot of motorcycles - mostly used - come to Burma where they are repaired and sent back to be sold at a profit. I wasn’t sure to what extent the motorcycles were old clunkers they were salvaged or bought, or whether some where stolen and brought over the border. There’s a picture of a repair shop in yesterday’s post.

And Burmese drive on the right side of the road. Unusual for a former colony and with neighboring Thailand driving on the left. Our 'guide' said it happened in 1967 when the prime minister decided the left side was a British legacy he could do without.

But I felt uncomfortable at first going into this country where the elected president has been under house arrest for years and a rich ruling class supported by Western companies that extract natural resources from Burma - including US oil companies - and by the Chinese government. On the Burmese side there were far fewer motorized vehicles. A lot of men wore long sarongs, and things just seemed much slower and seedier and poorer. They also had goats which you don’t see that much in Thailand. Joan and I had to pay 500 (about $15) Baht each to enter Burma. Mook and Manoo, as Thais, had to pay 20 Baht each. They kept our passports at the border crossing at the end of the bridge and gave us a receipt for them and Mook and Manoo’s day passes.

Already on the bridge we got picked up by two Burmese men, one who spook good English to me and to Joan and one who spoke good Thai to Mook and Manoo. Actually our ‘guide’ spoke good Thai too. No agreements were made, but each guide began explaining things as we went along. They tried to get us into little tricycle carts to ride to the temple we’d decided to visit, but we wanted to walk so they walked along with us.

The temple was very nice. There was scaffolding around the pagoda, but even the scaffolding was aesthetic. And the pagoda was very similar to the one we’d seen next to Manoo’s house earlier that morning. It was in the temple that the English speaking guide started opening up more. Well, he did tell us about how hard he works and his son in college and daugher in high school and the rising cost of housing as people are now speculating that Myawadi land will get much more valuable as the Asian Highway - driving east to west from Hanoi to New Delhi - becomes a major route. It made me think about the movie Bagdad cafe which is just inside the Iran border and caters to the many truck drivers of all nationalities who need a place to eat. He never asks for money, but leaves that up to the people he guides. If I understood him correct, he said there was a group from the Discovery Chaneel that morning. Seems I’ve written about them already not too long ago.

Part of me wanted to ask lots of questions about the political situation, and part of me felt that wasn’t a good idea. But we saw a guy in a military uniform in the back of a pickup truck and a machine gun over his back. This was not the Burmese military, but a KMT ???? Soldier. I expressed surprise he is riding around so openly. There’s a cease fire and both can be open now in the province. Eventually we got to talking about the government. There was a sort of verbal dance as he gently tested me out and I him. But, ‘we have to be careful, there are spies everywhere.”

Everyhouse had a two story bamboo pole with a flat piece of metal maybe 10 inches by 8 inches. These are used to put out fires we were told. I guess if you see the fire right away and can beat it out this might work.

We had no Burmese currency and everything was quoted in Thai Baht.

I posted a picture yesterday of some kids playing footbal on a field that had a white stone monument on the right end. The Thai speaking guide told me it was in honor of Aung San Suu Kyi and that there were monuments like that in every province. But they weren’t allowed to clean them up or otherwise maintain them. But I got the sense that just having it there was enough.

And then we got to the Burmese immigration office. I gave them the receipt and they gave us our passports and the two Thai day passes back and we walked back over the bridge. I gave my guide 200 Baht, Mook gave his 100 Baht. We didn’t see any other Westerners during the time we were in Burma - maybe 2 ½ hours - and Mook said there weren’t that many Thais either. People were friendly. In one case my guide pulled me away from someone who was getting too friendly - he was pretty drunk. Alcohol was one thing, I was told, that was very cheap.

Back from Burma with 30 more days

We've done about a weeks worth in the last 48 hours and I don't have time to post much. Here are some pictures of today (It's Saturday night, March 8, 11pm in Kamphaengphet, Thailand). But I have another 30 days I can stay in Thailand in my passport. (Ropi, that should answer your question.) My first 30 days is up tomorrow. J and more time because she came later and then went to Singapore. But we both went with Mook and Manoo, two former students of mine.



We woke up looking at the sun over the River Bing from our hotel room.




After breakfast, we went with Manoo to see the Burmese style Chedee near his house. I know this temple from many years ago, but only recently did it get covered with gold paint.




Mook met us at Manoo's house and we drove to the border town of Mae Sot. There we had lunch before crossing the border. This was the fish that the restaurant was known for.


And here we are at a Burmese temple.
















This is a motorcycle wash and repair shop in Myawaddy, Burma.






Our unofficial guide, who picked us up as we crossed the bridge into Burma said that the grey stone monument on the right end of the football field is for Aung San Suu Kyi, but they aren't allowed to maintain it. But there is one in every province in Burma. This was after about an hour or more walking around that we finally got to these topics.









I've cut this really short and here we are back in Thailand on the way to Tak from Mae Sot stopped at the Musor Hill Tribe market.




And we got to stop to visit Maliwan, whose husband died a year ago - just days after we arrived in Thailand last year and before we got to see him. Idiris and I were teachers together when we were both very young men. My no flash policy didn't work out well here.

There's lots more but that will have to satisfy your for now

Kamphaengphet Tomorrow, Burma Run Saturday

Americans don't need a visa to visit Thailand - they get 30 days. My thirty days is up this weekend so we are making a border run in Maesod on the Burmese border. You can go into Burma, but not very far. I'll probably go in, get my passport stamped, and come back. But we'll take advantage of having to do that and get the bus tomorrow to Kamphaengphet where I was a Peace Corps volunteer in the late 60s. When we were there last year I mentioned that they didn't have very many photos in the school museum. They said there weren't very many. So I promised to digitize some of the many slides I have and I did just before we left. So we'll deliver the dvd and I also found some copies of the English newspaper that my students put out and I have those too. The winner of the name the newspaper contest was Sakchai and the winning name was "To You With News." I know all this because there's an article about who won and how much he won (10 Baht)in the September 1968 issue. To Sir With Love was a very popular song at the time, which I'm sure played a role in Sackchai's winning entry.



I snapped these pictures when we went to eat tonight down the street. First is Ozone Net, one of the many internet shops on the street just outside the Chiang Mai University campus. I'm outside on the street. Double click on the picture to enlarge it.



And here's a woman, at one of the many shops along the University outer wall, cutting the mango to put with my sticky rice, that I'm just now finishing while I post.

Oh yes, I met a Belgian on Saturday who lives in our building. He was going out 'shooting' and was wearing camouflage pants. I saw him again tonight as we were walking out and asked him how his shooting had gone. He immediately pulled up his short shirt sleeve to show me the marks of the BB's that hit him. I'd heard of paint ball, but I didn't realize people went out shooting each other with BB guns. I asked if he had eye protection and he assured me he did. He goes to some large warehouse nearby where they have various vehicles and other things to hide behind. And there's a Thai military base where you can do this outside. He said people come from all over Thailand, including Thai police and soldiers. I jokingly said, "They like shooting at foreigners" but he didn't seem to notice I was joking and said sincerely that he thought so.

J asked if any women participated. He said no, they don't like getting all marked up with BB wounds. He said he spent three hours the other day and five hours yesterday doing this. I live such a sheltered life.

Work, Lunch, Assessment,Sunbird, Heinrich Böll

Bird Call and Construction Wat Ramphoeng uploaded by AKRaven

I heard this bird outside my office window. It was somewhere in the tree on the temple grounds. I put these two pictures together so you can get a sense of the view. Yes, the orange is monks' robes drying. I spent a lot of working on the vocabulary of the work plan so I understand

• what they are supposed to do and what they have completed, and
• so I have the vocabulary to talk to them about it.

I also worked on a couple of pages on how to run meetings. I had the English knocked out in 30 minutes. Then I spent a long time getting the right Thai words - and not sure I did all the time - and plugging them into the page. Mostly I cut and pasted from Thai2English.com, but I'm also getting better at remembering where the Thai letters are on the keyboard. Since my keyboard doesn't have Thai letters on it, I've cut out pictures of the keyboard and taped them to my laptop. I'd say I remember about 15 or 20 now. If I only knew how to spell right. I really need a Thai spell checker on my computer.






I was invited to lunch that someone had brought into the office - sticky rice and various kap. When you eat a meal (as opposed to snacks) you "eat rice." All the curries and other dishes that go with the rice are "kap khao" or 'with rice." One interesting dish was kwitdiao noodle, but not as a noodle. Rather a big piece was used to roll up vegetables.


In the early afternoon Grib showed up. She's the local American Jewish World Service coordinator. It was time to do some assessment since I've been here almost a month. So we sat outside with Pet, my boss, and talked about how I'm doing outside. I said I eat, I work on the computer, watch birds... and Pet added "takes pictures." We got her a copy of my workplan - Pet got her the Thai version. I'd emailed one to New York when Dorcus had asked for it, but I'd forgotten to get a copy to Grib. We all agree it is overly ambitious. But it also includes local people working with me on each part so they can follow up when I'm gone.

The good news is that I think my perception of things and Pet's are similar. Since it was almost all in Thai, (I had to explain what 'getting up to speed' means) I'm not going to say I'm 100% sure what the others said. Language is still an issue - which is why I'm working hard to get enough of their workplace vocabulary - potential, negotiation, coordinate, state agency, experience, reform, take action, proposal, etc. - to be able to talk about work more easily. I also explained about A.D.D. when I got distracted by the sunbird and pulled out my camera. I'm pretty sure it's an olive backed sunbird - that dark throat on the yellow, the long curved beak, and hummingbird like activity all seem to fit.

When I said that Pet and I don't say a lot to each other, but we communicate without words, he looked surprised and said, "how did you know?" The workshop I did Monday was the kind of thing he wanted his staff to do and he'd like me to do more. He also told Grib how much time I spent in preparation - showing how I'd typed the handout in Thai. Too much time? Should I have an assistant? Grib asked. At this point, I replied, doing it myself means I'm learning it. After a while, having someone else type the Thai would be a lot easier and faster. Right now I'm trying to understand the organization before I start doing too much. But the short time I have left - about six weeks - does focus things and I will get, I'm already, moving with a sense of urgency. It was a useful chat for us all I think.



Right next to us were some of the election posters of the candidate the organizations here were supporting, but who lost. I'm still trying to get the vote count. Someone gave me the url of a Thai website, but I didn't have the time it would take to find it in Thai. I might not even know it if I did find it.



I've been taking different routes to work and back just to know the little streets around here. I was also trying to find a little place on the map called Pie Sabai which appears to be a little Western style bakery in the neighborhood. I saw it several times when people were taking me around in their car or motorcycle looking for a place to stay, but haven't been able to find it since. Even though it looks on the map I have to be on the way to work. But here's a picture of the sunset on the way home - it was about 5:45 and by 6:45 it is dark.

I also found out the Heinrich Böll Foundation is very near us. At least that's what the sign says, I didn't find the foundation itself. He's a Nobel Prize winning German author for those who don't know.

Why Clark Will Tell What He Knows

Anonymous asked in a comment on my earlier post on the Clark plea:

I believe that he is guilty as charged-- but do you think he would tell more and fib a bit and tell the FBI what they want to hear, as well?

Well, the 2nd Addendum linked by the ADN shows the Prosecutors have the same concerns, and they pretty much locked him in. Basically it says if Clark

• lies, fabricates, or implicates innocent people
• if he tells the truth, but withholds something relevant because they didn't ask the right question,
• if he stops cooperating after sentencing

it will be considered a breach of the agreement (and all promises to ask the judge to reduce the sentence are off) AND he could be prosecuted.

I don't know what charges the prosecutors might have had on him that they dropped or what else they may have ceded to him (like they promised Bill Allen they wouldn't go after his kids), but on Clark's side it looks like total surrender.

Detail below. The whole document at the 2nd Addendum link. I was hoping these would be a little bigger, but you can double click on them to see them more easily.








The rest is about how the prosecutors can only recommend, but the judge has the final decision and things like that.

Morning Birds - Black Crested Bulbul

It's at times like this that I'm jealous of whatever camera Anonymous has at Bird Anonymous. But I've left my ancient pentax and telephoto lens at home because the Canon Powershot fits in my pocket and I can have it conveniently with me all the time. But still, times like this I wish I had a better camera. My pics here are only to help me document that I saw them and to help identify them and I leave the fantastic close ups to Anonymous and the lucky times a bird lands on my nose.

So, here are some sketchy shots from our fourth floor balcony of today's visit by the Black Crested bulbul. Also saw to greater racket tailed drongos fly by. Thought maybe they were the ones making the the two toned doorbell like call in the video. But a little googling got me to Dave Farrow's incredible pages on SoundSnap which have different calls for that drongo.

So turn on the video and listen to the bird calls while you look at the bulbul shots. And you can go here for some better shots of the black crested bulbul.







It's in the middle, just to the left on the branch in the middle of the tree. You can double click all of these to enlarge them a lot.

Khao Lam - ข้าวหลาม

Tuesday, March 4, 2008, 11:30pm

While I was going through goals and objectives and outcomes earlier today, someone came in with two Khao Lams. Khao lam, one of my favorites, is sweet sticky rice, in this case with some black beans, cooked inside bamboo. mmmmmmmm.