An Introduction to Bad Parenting - The Orphanage Line

Glory is on her way back from a week in Mexico with her school chums tonight, a trip Audrey and I are incredibly glad they took. 

This is a group of friends who by and large have hung together and maintained their relationships since meeting randomly on their very first day of nursing classes at MacEwan. Now they are in their fourth year, having wrapped up their preceptorships earlier this month and readying for graduation in June.

Where they used to get together for some sort of outing at least monthly, it has been fiendishly difficult to coordinate get-togethers since most of them are working in different hospitals, clinics or even municipalities, many of them on shift work. 

Even day shifts left Glory little time for socializing, as she was typically heading to bed two hours after supper so she could get up at 4:45 for her 7:30 shift start!

Anyways, she and her friends have been tucked away at an all-inclusive resort on the Riviera Nayarit, north of Puerto Vallarta. She has been diligent about providing proof of life via Instagram and Snapchat every single day. I am hoping this event will cement relationships they will carry forward from their university days into their adult years, and for a long, long time to come.

Hearing about this sojourn or her upcomiong graduation, many people will say things like, "Amazing!" and "You must be so proud!" 

These are both indisputably true statements; I am proud of both my daughters, and with good reason, and can also confirm that they are both amazing!

But sometimes people will suggest things like, "you must be great parents!"

And I won't speak for my beloved wife, but in my case this is demonstrably untrue.

Let me give you an example.

It is no secret that of my too daughters, one of them was an easier-going child on the whole, and it was not Glory. This is not to say my youngest was a bad kid, but at times she was willful to the point of absurdity. How many three year olds have you witnessed put themselves on a time-out? Wild times.

On one such occasion, when Glory was no more than four years old, Glory stomped downstairs while I was at my desk and expressed to me in no uncertain terms that she was extremely dissatisfied with my authority and that of my wife, as well as her current living situation in general. Because she did not like it here anymore at our house, she had come down to inform me that she was, in fact, running away.

"Gosh," I said upon hearing this proclamation of intent. "Are you sure you don't want to live here anymore?"

She shook her head, resolutely.

"Well, if you've made your mind up, I am not going to try to stop you." I replied. "I don't want anyone staying here who doesn't want to be here. And it was good of you to stop by and tell me yourself instead of just leaving me a note or something." (Leaving aside for the moment that she did not at this point have command over many letters.)

She nodded, imperiously.

"Are you leaving right away?" I inquired.

"Yes!" she stated, emphatically.

I reached across the desk and picked up the phone. "I suppose I had better call the orphanage then..."

A perplexed look crossed her face. "The what?"

"Oh, the city orphanage," I said while I dialed eight audible but random digits on the cordless phone and then hit the hang up button for the ninth. "It is like a home for kids with no moms or dads, or runaways like you."

Confusion, perhaps a bit of panic on her face now. "But I don't -"

"Well, we can't have you living on the streets like a stray dog now sweetie, can we?" I explained as I put the inert phone to my ear.

"Daddy I -"

"Sssh, hang on honey, it's ringing." I paused momentarily, watching a cascading series of emotions run across her face. "Oh hello, City Orphanage? Hi, my name is Stephen Fitzpatrick and I have a four-year-old daughter who does not want to live at home with us anymore. Um hmm. Yes. Birth year? 2002. Blond hair, blue eyes. Hmm? No, no infirmities or disabilities..."

"Daddy, you -"

"Glory honey, I am on the phone right now. Sorry, yes, that was her, yeah. Mm hmm. So, I know it is kind of short notice, but how soon...oh, tonight? Yes, that would be great, thank you." I covered the mouthpiece of the phone and leaning over towards where she was sitting on the futon, I stage-whispered, "Go and pack your things."

Her eyes were now as big as pie plates.

I held up a finger. "Actually, hang on a second," I told her, despite the fact she hadn't shown the slightest indication of standing up. Taking my hand from the mouthpiece, I asked, I assume a single suitcase, right? Mm-hmm. And what about toys? Any one stuffy they can carry? Sounds good, just a moment please."

Covering the mouthpiece, I turned again to Glory, who was now looking fairly anxious. "Good news! They can come and pick you up in about an hour, so you should go figure out what clothes you want to bring, and one stuffy besi-"

"DADDY I DON'T WANT TO GO!"

I mustered my most surprised expression. "Really?" I said. "You seemed so sure a moment ago..."

"No, I decided I want to stay now," still in control, but upset in a different way than she had been, and maybe even on the verge of tears. A pang of guilt discoloured my enjoyment, and I decided to course correct a little.

"I would like it very much if you stayed with us until you are much older," I assured her, "and we can even talk about the things you don't like. Hang on a second - hello? Yes, I'm sorry about that...yes, it seems like she has had a change of heart. I will call you back if we need to - you are open until 8 pm, right? Okay, sorry for the bother, thanks very much. Ok, bye." I pressed the hang up button on an inert line, my offspring still none the wiser.

A few heavy breaths and some frank conversation later, we had a better understanding, and she returned upstairs a little more content than when she had come down, with no intentions of running away for the time being.

When I told other parents about this interaction, their reactions ranged from shocked to scandalized (with overtones of amusement, to be sure), with a covered mouth and statement along the lines of, "oh I could never do that!" being fairly commonplace.

As it happens though, I not only could, do it, I did do it, and not only that, I told other people about doing it and without even a trace of shame, as I recall it.

But none of that is what makes me a bad parent.

No, what makes me a bad parent is the absolute glee I derive from remembering it, even now, two decades later. This afternoon I realized that I had never written it down - and that is how I decided what to blog about today.

And I will be gladder still when Glory gets home tomorrow, and I am sure she made awesome memories with her friends. 

Amazing how both girls turned out, isn't it, given what their dad is like and all, eh?

I hope they splurged on getting one of these pics too

Escape To Dystopia? - Deathmatch Island

What does it say about our current state of domestic and international affairs that a current form of escapism is for me to pit my friends against each other as amnesiac competitors in a battle-royale-style game show?

In looking for an interstitial game for our online group to play in between chapters of the classic Warhammer FRP campaign, The Enemy Within, I naively suggested I could try running a short campaign of a new game one of the other players had Kickstarted called Deathmatch Island. It is not easily described but "Lost meets Squid Game" comes pretty close.

I was lured in a lot by the layout and design of the rulebook and quality of the artwork. Never before has Helvetica felt so oppressive! Tim Denee has does an awesome job on this book and its supplements.

The game itself has a lot to offer as an interstitial game, for the right group. Even with the players initially cooperating as a team, they are still competing for position and influence, and the game's narrative will eventually lead us into a Prisoner's Dilemma where each and every player must secretly vote to either Play to Win or Break the Game...and you must be prepared for it to go either way!

There is additional weirdness insofar as most TTRPGs have plenty of die rolls to distract you, but DMI (based on the SRD of a Greek warriors' game called Agon) has very few dice rolls, and there are no trivial ones.

After the Production player (the gamemaster, me) rolls a bunch of dice for the opposition and then adds the highest result to the Danger Level of that island or encounter and announces the target number, the party leader (based on the winner of the last round) dictates the goal and approach that will be taken. 

Each individual player then builds a dice pool based on their reputation or name, the chosen skill type, an additional skill type purchased with fatigue, support from other players, their occupation (if applicable) and use of disposable equipment. They roll all their dice, of varying sizes, and add the two highest (plus the highest of the d4s rolled for equipment). 

As you can imagine, this presents a huge range of outcomes with three results: not meeting or beating the target number results in a failure, increasing fatigue and possibly injury. Rolling a total at least equal to the target number is a success and the highest dice roller is the winner of that round, and the new leader.

Only after the dice rolling is done does each player have their "confessional" moment, talking to the camera or audience in turn from the lowest roll to the highest. They explain what they did and how they did it while including the rationalization for things like using their occupation for an additional dice or how they applied the expenditure of something like a weapon or 'small luxuries.'

In between their confessionals, the Production player adds in additional details and results, such as determining what happens to prominent non-player characters. Needless to say, rolling first and describing the outcome only after all the results are in has been a real switch up for most of us, but we are finally beginning to adapt to it!

There are no "plusses" and no re-rolls, just a handful of fickle, fickle dice.

Tim Denee has also done a marvelous job adapting his material to the Roll20 virtual tabletop, his preferred (and my most commonly used) medium for playing RPGs. Purchasing it (as our player did, bless you again, sir!), gets you fantastic looking maps and doodads, handouts and pre-set dice macros with marvelous looking results.

Add to that animated backdrops, 'rollable' maps that can switch from "public" to "classified" with a couple of mouseclicks, a 14-track musical soundtrack and assorted sound effects, and even a diehard math rocks and miniatures aficionado like myself can be swayed.

Not a game for everyone, certainly, and I have no way of knowing how the endgame will sort out, but having just cleared Island One, we are all looking forward to whatever's next!

And thanks to our benefactor generously gifting shirts based on the in-game uniform to us, we will also look good doing it!

All's Fair? - Warfare, Reviewed

Talking to my nephew after we had just seen the film, he was amazed when I told him that not only does Alex Garland's movie Warfare not have any score whatsoever, it only has a runtime of 95 minutes. This led me to observe that if larger movies like Black Hawk Down are like juice, Warfare is more like concentrate. 

Where BHD focused on the Battle of Mogadishu to illustrate the realities of modern war, Warfare is described as "a love letter from co-director Ray Mendoza to Elliot Miller, who after the traumatic events of the Ramadi Operation doesn't remember what happened to him."

Following a lead-up that begins as routine and boring but begins to ratchet up intensely, the majority of the film is a real-time recollection of an attack and casualty evacuation during one of the bloodiest battles of the Iraq War, the Battle of Ramadi.  

Viewers are immediately embedded with a platoon of Navy SEALs tasked with setting up an observation post and sniper team in support of a larger operation. A team effort that involves a nighttime infiltration, building security, aerial reconnaissance, intense observation through a rifle scope and tremendous tedium - until it doesn't.

The most astonishing thing about the movie is what it doesn't contain; in addition to a total absence of score (only two songs bookend the film), there are almost no personal moments or talk about what is going on back home, or post-mission plans and the like. No one gets a monologue to discuss the value or worth of their taks, or the Iraq theatre in general. There is very little in the way of banter or memorable lines, outside the stream of jargon and radio chatter as these young men go about their jobs in a manner that exemplifies competence porn - until it doesn't. 

It's kind of a shame in some ways, given the excellent cast they have to work with: Will Poulter (Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3), D'Pharaoh Woon-a-Tai (Reservation Dogs), Cosmo Jarvis (Shogun), Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things). Despite how little they have to work with at times, they and the entire cast do a remarkable job depicting their focus not only on the mission at hand, but each other, and the degradation of their entire situation. The movie opens with a dialogue-free scene of the platoon listening to music together - one of the few lighter moments in the film - and the directors and cast make the most of humanizing characters that will soon be virtually unrecognizable under not only helmets and goggles, but also dust, blood and emotion.

Many people will find the lingo virtually incomprehensible, and at no point does a character request paraphrasing or a subtitle appear to give context to the audience. (Hell, I enjoy that kind of stuff and understood less than two thirds fo what I heard.) This is purely by design - Garland (Civil War, Annihilation) and Mendoza are striving less for a dramatization and more of a reenactment, hence the stripping away of familiar elements like a score. The context and tone makes it easy enough to follow, even without the details we may be used to from other movies.

The filmmakers do a great job of depicting military monotony laid over a foundation of apprehension, and the surprising swiftness with which the SEALs find their disposition changing - all without narration or a comprehensive understanding of the larger picture. When the environment descends entirely into chaos, the sound design assaults you with explosions as well as the muted deafness that follows. When the wounded scream, it is not just the sound of actor conveying intense pain, but also terror and uncertainty, and it is hard to listen to - again, by design.

CBC reviewer Jordan Weaver took exception to this approach, but the people I saw Warfare with appreciated the opportunity to witness a depiction that is entirely cinematic in some ways, but decidedly untheatrical in others. It feels less like a movie in places and more like time travel, a chance to be a fly on the wall and bear witness to a single hour that changed the lives of so many who were there.

In the end, while I might think of Black Hawk Down as a stronger movie overall, Warfare is probably the most realistic war film I have ever seen, and I am extremely glad I saw it in a theatre.

_________, in the Blue Room, with the Knife - The Residence, Reviewed

Netflix's The Residence scratched a lot of itches for me, including the need to periodically binge a series, which I didn't even know I had.

But near the end of our Spring Break staycation, Audrey and I were looking for a show to watch, and the trailer had come up in my recommendations. As luck would have it, Fenya arrived back at home from an outing just before we sat down to watch the first of eight episodes before dinner on Saturday night.

We watched four more before going to bed and resolved to watch the remainder the following night, which we did.

The high-concept of "a murder, but in the White House" was enough to pique my interest, being a fan of shenanigans at 1660 Pennsylvania since The West Wing back in the day. I've never watched a Shondaland production before, but have heard great things about Bridgerton and Shonda Rimes alike, so that felt promising.

The story revolves around the murder of the White House's Chief Usher, A.B. Wynter (Giancarlo Esposito, who appears to be in everything now, and replaced Andre Braugher after his tragic passing) whose body is discovered in the Games Room on the same night as a state dinner for the Prime Minister of Australia. Consulting detective Cordelia Cupp (Uzo Aduba) is summoned from her planned bird-watching expedition, and has to deal with not only a seemingly impossible murder but all the political angles including an incredibly hostile Chief of Staff (Ken Marino) and an FBI agent (Randall Park) resolutely endeavouring to be useful but earning little more that exasperated tolerance from Cupp.

As murders go, it is a doozy, and switching perspectives from the events of that night to a senate inquiry months after the fact (chaired by former real-life Senator Al Franken!) puts an intriguing spin on it. But like the title says, the big seller here is the setting. From the sets themselves to the shots moving in and out of a meticulous model of the residential wing of the White House, I would still be inclined to believe you if you told me it had been shot on location. A former White House staffer gave them details about the areas that have never been photographed, and there are many details that give the entire affair a considerable veneer of credibility.

Of course, having all the legendary rooms, many of which are named for their dominant colour, come up in a murder mystery so often, the Clue comparisons are there for the taking as well.

Even if the setting has no interest to you, the amazing array of characters and the manner in which they drift in and out of the prime suspect box as the series progresses is similarly top rank. The quirks are maybe amplified as befits a murder-mystery comedy. The feuding chefs, one from a Michelin-starred Swiss resort, the other from a food truck in Portland are just two of several great examples.

Most critically of all, did they stick the landing? I definitely think so, yeah - enough so that Fenya and I may rewatch it just to make sure!

I'm not gonna lie; at this point in time, the idea of a murder in the White House is maybe a bit more compelling to people than it would've been, say 12 months ago? But whether you ration it out or binge it like we did, anyone who liked Knives Out or wants to explore a more profane take on Agatha Christie would do well to check out The Residence.