ONE YEAR OF MALICE!!!!!!!!

Holy shit! I’ve been doing this blogging thing for a full year!!! What the fuck?? I even completely missed the exact anniversary of my first post because it really creeped up on me. I knew it was coming up, but not this soon. So much of my life has changed in ways I’m forever grateful for. It’s been awesome having a place to be able to share with others what I spend most of my evenings doing. I’ve stopped posting my own campaign notes, given attempting to balance a full time job, with planning and running a campaign, with writing for 1-2 different campaigns, with also having a life outside of those things has been difficult. But having a place where all the lore of Terrafirma lives in one convenient place, as well as session notes for other campaigns, has honestly been really cool. It’s a low stakes environment where I can practice my writing on a semi-weekly basis. It’s done wonders for my ability to follow through with something. It feels really fucking good to start a project and finish it.

The Dal Reports have also been great. It’s been such a fun way to reflect on what I’ve been up to and have gratitude for where I’m at. It’ll also be really cool to be able to look back and see how much things have changed. Last year was extremely rough for me and I’m very proud of myself for the improvements I’ve made to my life. The only place I think I’ve come up short is the lack of posts where I just reflect on shit. Previously, those have been my favorite articles I’ve written, but I haven’t written anything like On Discipline or Some People That I Used To Know since last December. I’ve started some things, but decided last second they were better fits for my diary than a public article I should share with people. But there are some things I’d like to write, particularly one inspired by my friend Rachel’s own blogpost, which you can read here - and I strongly suggest you do because I’ve been off and on working on my own post inspired by it.

Thanks to everyone who’s been reading since the beginning! Here’s to another Malicious year of posting.

Anyway, so what else have I been up to this month?

Friendsgiving

Cass and I hosted Thanksgiving for the very first time by having our friends over for a night filled with way too much food and fun. It was the first time I had ever made that much food at once, but I prepped as much as I could the day before and I had already scheduled when everything would need to start cooking. We ate on the leftovers for nearly two weeks after, which made our refrigerator a living hell to navigate, but was pretty convenient when it came to meals. It did also put a pretty big pause on my weight loss, but I haven’t gained since I’ve started so that’s still a win in my book!

A platter of cheeses, meats, and crackers on a wooden cutting board.

Ham, dinner rolls, cornbread, and stuffing sitting on a counter.

Mashed potatoes, mac n cheese, and gravy in pots on a stovetop.

Banana pudding, brownies, cheesecake, and pumpkin pie on a counter.

Tennessee

We visited Pigeon Forge for a long weekend in a cute cabin in the mountains. Truthfully, I don’t remember the bulk of it as I spent the majority of the time drunk or asleep. For some reason, the cabin owner thought it was a good idea to have a GIANT WINDOW without curtains in Cass and I’s room, so until I got an eye mask from Walmart, I woke up at the crack of dawn with the birds. Which was not great considering my parents are my biggest enablers to drink and was therefore hungover every morning. Our room was in general really strange, complete with a door on the ceiling and a mystery hallway leading to a locked room. Another strange aspect of the cabin was the real life incarnation of Joe Dirt who showed up at 10pm with a pistol openly on his belt to help us fix the air hockey table. He was actually a very nice guy, but it was mildly alarming for the platonic ideal of a hillbilly to knock on our door at night in an unfamiliar area. Anyway, he fixed the air hockey table by finding the two dozen pucks that had gotten stuck inside.

A small wooden door about 10 feet above the ground in an inaccessible place. A dark hallway in a wooden cabin leading into shadows.

I love being in Pigeon Forge, the forest and mountains are where I feel my absolute best and happiest. It was pretty cold out, but I sat out on our back porch as often as I could. One night I was even able to catch a lightning strike behind the mountains!!!

A bright forest in fall with yellow and red leaves from above. The sky is bright blue with a shining sun and mountain ranges extending far into the horizon.

A bright forest in fall with yellow and red leaves from above. Other cabins are visible in a small cul de sac.

A sunrise framed by the pillars and handrails of a porch. The sun rises on the horizon casting rays of light over the forest.

Fog permeating a forest of yellow and red trees.

A dark, black valley contrasted by a white sky from a lightning strike. The strike highlights a mountain range in front of it.

We also did a Scooby-Doo themed escape room, which was a mild let down for me? I love Scooby-Doo and the vibes were immaculate, but hints were kind of baked into the room itself. So you’d solve one puzzle, and immediately get a hint for the next. It felt kind of hand hold-y to me, but also I’m bad at escape rooms so maybe I should just take the win without complaining. While we were out and about in Pigeon Forge, we also went to Margaritaville and a nearby ice cream shop. The margarita was decent, the burger I got with it was mediocre, and the ice cream was great.

We spent a lot of time in the cabin just talking and playing a new card game I picked up after watching Smosh play it. It’s called Flip 7 and it’s all gambling and it’s so fucking fun. Basically, the goal of the game is to draw 7 cards into your hand, the cards are numbered 1-12 and you can’t have duplicates. So if you draw two 12 cards, you’re out for the round. You get points for the numbers written on the cards, so an 8 card is worth 8 points, a 3 card is worth 3, etc. But some cards are more common than others, which makes looking for big numbers like 11 or 12 risky. It’s a lot of fun and super easy to learn. I also recommend anyone watch the Smosh video because inexplicably they are a special interest and I think the video is funny and I regularly rewatch it.

Also before we left for home, we stopped at Cracker Barrel and I won the peg game. I am The Pegger.

Finished Cracker Barrel peg game with only one peg remining. The board says that I am a genius.

Art and Other Shit

I’ve been trying to make drawing more of a priority again recently. Finally got one step closer to finishing the party portraits for The Southlander Chronicles! All that’s left is Carver’s character, Vidar, then I’m finished!… kind of. I’m redoing the shading because Procreate (the name of my drawing app, not the act of reproducing) added some new painting brushes that I finally really love! So goodbye cell shading, we’re painting now. Unfortunately I’m slightly too slow at drawing and this change came at the tail end of me finishing this project up, but I’m slowly redoing the other portraits already. It only takes an hour or so, so it isn’t the biggest setback in the world.

A large turtle sticks its tongue out. It has a small mohawk made of moss. It's scales are green and brown with bright orange eyes.

I also did some mini painting! This was my first time experimenting with washes and I LOVE how it came out.

Donkey with a cart miniature. Same donkey with cart miniature at a different angle.

Other Small Stuff

YouTube Videos I Liked

Some of my favorite YouTubers have finally come out of hibernation to post again and I’m incredibly happy. Syonide is a really funny commentary channel who spent four hours going through his first reactions to watching all the Star Wars movies for the first time with his sister. It’s incredible seeing someone be able to get into the franchise so incredibly blind and simultaneously fall in love and in hate with it.

The Outdoor Boys also came back for a few videos!!! This was huge for me as Luke is one of my favorite creators of all time, I love watching camping and bushcraft videos and the amount of knowledge he has about Alaskan flora and fauna is incredible and makes him super entertaining to watch. He sprinkles in some dad jokes and silly moments to keep videos as entertaining as they are educational. He made the (probably correct) decision earlier this year to retire from content creation as it was beginning to affect his family in a negative way. His kids often come with him on these trips, and while they’re not the main focus of the channel, being featured in 20-50 million view videos probably isn’t the best for their development. Luke, who runs the channel had a decision to make. Keep making thousands from one of his favorite hobbies while being unable to experience it with his sons, or get a real job and keep their connection. Ultimately, he chose to prioritize his family. He said he had a few videos he was holding onto that he’d post later in the year, and now he’s posted them! It’s unlikely we’ll ever get more videos again, but these are certainly up there as some of his best work.

Record Store Day

RSD is an event that happens about twice a year where artists will release limited edition versions of albums and singles that can only be found at local participating record stores. The idea is to encourage people to shop local and not online and it’s a super cool thing. I lined up in the freezing cold for some Black Friday shopping around 7am. It wasn’t so bad. At the specific store I went to, they gave us free hot chocolate and coffee while we waited to warm us up. I wasn’t able to get all the exclusives I wanted unfortunately, but I was only there for two of them. I wanted the Chappell Roan 7in and a Good Kid compilation that combined all their EPs into one album. The Chappell Roan single was sold out, but I got Good Kid!

Cover of Good Kid 1-4 on vinyl.

Sides A and B of the Good Kid vinyl in a bright blue and orange. Sides C and D of the Good Kid vinyl in bright cyan and magenta.

The record store also had a sale one everything else in store that weren’t RSD exclusives, so I picked up some other things for my collection.

Cover of King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizzard's album Murder of the Universe on vinyl. Murder of the Universe vinyl in dark green with bright yellow chunks

The Ramones self titled album on vinyl.

Conclusion

Okay, yeah yeah, I’m late again. Later than I’ve ever been, and I don’t even have a good excuse! I think from now on just assume all Dal Reports are going to be a week or so late given the jobs and hobbies I’m working on. The days of these coming out on the last day of the month, or the first day of the following month, are long behind us. In the future I’m going to try and prevent them coming out this late again by working on them throughout the month rather than all at once at the end, so hopefully I’ll keep on track for that. I’ll blame the busy month and all the holiday celebrations for now.

Anyway, here’s the photo dump.

Tabby cat curled up in a basket of laundry. Tabby cat sitting on the ground looking up at the camera.

Tabby cat with ears pinned backwards with a very dramatic stank face.