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Jamie

I am here for Friends

About Me

I'm a professional geek. I manage a game publishing company for my friend and favorite author, Margaret Weis . I'm married to my partner in all things, Renae, and am the father of three high-maintenance-but-otherwise-amazing kids. My desk is covered with plastic dragons and little Smurf figurines.

My Interests

I love to read, everything from fantasy and science fiction to mystery, horror, and "the classics" (on which everyone's opinions may vary). I love to play games, especially roleplaying games (D&D), but also card, board, and video/computer games. I like football and hockey live, but never met a baseball game I didn't love. Recently I've disovered that I love to cook, and have had a blast trying all kinds of new recipes. I love movies and television. Like to fish but never get to do it -- and have wanted to try ice fishing since I moved to Wisconsin. I love to travel to new places, but even more to return to places I've already been.

I'd like to meet:

Anyone genuine. Offer me a good conversation, something to think about, or a laugh and we'll get along just fine. Plus, I wouldn't mind, say...

    Tori Amos Alton Brown Steven Spielberg

Music:

My tastes vary and are pretty broad, though I like Rock more than any other category, and I only like certain Country and Hip Hop. I find myself getting all cheesy and nostalgic for 80s music! My favorite performer in the world is Tori Amos, whose music I fell in love with when I was 16 years old and hasn't let up since. My iPod playlist is eclectic and probably weird, but it gets me through my work day!

Movies:

Serenity!!!! Maybe this shouldn't count, since I wrote the roleplaying game licensed from the movie, but this film managed to grab me even after I had the screenplay practically memorized and had seen "rough cuts" of the film more than once. It was an amazing piece of filmmaking, and my hat is off to Joss Whedon as a writer and director. My taste in film is also all over the place, as I love independent and art films, like Girl With a Pearl Earring and The Machinist, like completely offbeat movies like Bubba Ho-Tep and Napolean Dynamite, but also love things like Raiders of the Lost Ark and old Arnold Schwarzzenegger movies. I like musicals old and new, from Phantom of the Opera to White Christmas -- and pretty much anything born of the theater, including Philadelphia Story and The Lion in Winter. I'm all over the place, and am kind of a film geek. I like reading screen and teleplays and listening to the commentary tracks on DVDs.

Television:

I watched Veronica Mars from the very first episode even when my wife and friends made fun of me -- who are now watching it every week. I love Lost, House, and have fun with crime shows like CSI, NCIS, and other acronyms. My appreciation for legal dramas comes and goes, but I've started watching Close to Home every now and again. I seem to like watching shows where mystery is an element one way or another. Everyone tells me I should watch Bones. I love things on Discovery, TLC, and the History channel. I also confess a complete addiction to the show Good Eats on food network, as Alton Brown is a geek who revels in his geekiness (something to which I relate), creating a cooking show for someone like me. I've been batting a thousand with his recipes, too.

Recently I've gotten the DVD sets for Deadwood (first two seasons) and Rome. Amazing stuff! And of course it's too good for television, since both are doomed.

Books:

Tell me a good story, and I'm there. I like everything from a Stephen King page-turner to weird old books like Turn of the Screw by Henry James.

Heroes:

The first hero I remember looking up to was Christopher Reeve, who will never truly be replaced as Superman in my eyes. I didn't have to know anything about him to know I admired him, and after watching him face overwhelming difficulties with unwavering hope, faith, and confidence all the way to his death, he is still one of my greatest heroes.Some might accuse me of brown-nosing, but it wouldn't be honest to leave my boss and favorite author, Margaret Weis, out of this. Her life story is an inspiration to me, because she kept at her dream and succeeded through major adversity and did things her way. She has faced difficult times in her health, family life, and more and got through it all with a kind of grace I could only one day hope to achieve. I work with her almost every day of the year, yet I probably respect and admire her more now than I did before I met her. I hope to be like her when I grow up.

My Blog

Blogging With My iPhone

As some of you already know, I've had an iPhone for over a month now. It's pretty amazing ... Both a cool tech-toy and something incredibly useful. I wanted to show just how cool it could be ... S...
Posted by Jamie on Thu, 15 May 2008 08:15:00 PST

Sin City

Hey everyone!I've been all quiet lately because this week I've been a temporary single Dad. (Renae's down in Georgia, attending a funeral of a family member.) On Sunday, Digger and I are taking off fo...
Posted by Jamie on Fri, 18 Apr 2008 06:52:00 PST

Start Spreading the News...

Howdy folks! For the third year in a row, I’ve been asked to be a Guest of Honor on the Gaming track for I-Con -- a sci-fi focused convention held on the campus of Stone Brook University in Long...
Posted by Jamie on Sat, 29 Mar 2008 10:25:00 PST

Renae Sends Porn to Campbells Soup

This actually happened last Thursday, but I had forgotten about it until Renae reminded me at lunch today. It's too funny not to share.Okay, first you need to understand that one of the artists who we...
Posted by Jamie on Wed, 05 Mar 2008 03:48:00 PST

Supernatural Campaign Journal, Part One

Warning: Professional Geek Talking About Extremely Geeky Stuff Below. Proceed At Your Own Risk.It's been several years since I have run a role playing game campaign. My Dragonlance campaign for D&D 3....
Posted by Jamie on Fri, 29 Feb 2008 10:34:00 PST

Before & After

...but it's not AFTER anything, since I'm certainly not done losing weight. But here are a couple of pics before my weight loss:San Fransisco 2006Birthday Party 2007And here are two that Renae just sn...
Posted by Jamie on Wed, 27 Feb 2008 04:55:00 PST

Weekly Weigh-In

Just a quick note. I made it! I'm only down a little bit more, but I've hit the milestone. I've lost twenty pounds since I started this! And more importantly, I can see a real difference. Not only are...
Posted by Jamie on Tue, 26 Feb 2008 06:45:00 PST

RIP HD-DVD

Of course, right after my Mom got me the X-Box HD-DVD player for my birthday would be when the format war would end with me stuck with this generation's version of Betamax. Might as well grab up those...
Posted by Jamie on Thu, 21 Feb 2008 05:07:00 PST

Walter the Fighter Triumphant

As many of you know, I'm a gamer. An über-geek, and proud of it. As much as I love wine, women, and song, I love games. I play and love 'em all, everything from Texas Hold 'Em to Battle Cry to Robo Ra...
Posted by Jamie on Mon, 18 Feb 2008 07:54:00 PST

Dragon*Con Guest

I've been going to Dragon*Con since I was a teenager. It started out small and ballooned up into something so huge that I have a hard time even remembering it how it once was. For those of you who've ...
Posted by Jamie on Tue, 12 Feb 2008 03:54:00 PST