The Colonies of Catan

The island of Catan evolved over hundreds of years. Weary settlers founded cities that would one day have their populations explode. Fields of wheat and pastures for sheep were eventually paved with concrete and decorated with skyscrapers and parking meters. The lovely forests, once thriving and healthy, were chopped to oblivion. The ore mines had all been expended.

A smoggy and grey metropolis, the island of Catan was booming with factories and shops, and was very dependent upon modern technology. Blissfully ignorant, citizens went about their daily lives, unaware that tragedy lurked just beyond the setting sun.

An asteroid was headed straight for the island. Scientists were baffled by its speed and didn’t see it coming until it was too late. There was little time to warn others to evacuate. Much of the island perished.

Now survivors must rebuild by using only what's left of the island to help them. A new world order has begun where it’s a race for resources and a fight to keep what’s rightfully yours. In this post-apocalyptic version of Settlers of Catan, players must recolonize the island, avoid being raided by marauders, and do their best to live off the grid.

Come play The Colonies of Catan.


Except you can't because of intellectual copy-write laws.

After spending a solid week of creating and designing my Settlers of Catan spin-off, I was told by the company The Game Crafter (a site that helps you create custom games and cards) that it was illegal for them to print a single copy of my game and I had to make changes or else provide express written consent from someone at Mayfair Games and their contact information for verification.

So I changed the name of my game to Colonies of Kazzah and that seemed to do the trick because my game has been shipped and I'm expected to get it by the end of the week. The game costs $65.31 to print one copy. It costs $30.60 to ship it to Canada. Not very cost effective, but I look forward to playing my prototype with friends. And if it's any good, maybe I will try to sell it at some point in the future.

So come play The Colonies of Kazzah!

Stranger-Danger

We were young teens having a sleepover at my house in Ste. Anne. It was a beautiful night out, so we decided to sneak out after midnight and go for a walk. It was something I'm sure we'd done together before. I'd even done it by myself. We weren't going to vandalize property or make any trouble, we just wanted to walk around a dark, ghost-town, giggling and talking in hushed tones.

I lived just outside of town. Not even 15 minutes after leaving did we reach the edge of town and turn down a family friendly street I often rode my bike down. Suddenly there was a van coming up fast behind us. We moved to the side of the street and the van pulled up a few yards ahead and blocked our path. The sliding door opened and I could see the back seats had been removed. There were so many beer cans that they fell out of the van as several older, drunk guys we didn't recognize ambled toward us.

Frozen on the spot, my fight or flight response hadn't kicked in yet. I just stared at them trying to figure out who they were and what they wanted. I quickly became afraid, but I couldn't look away or move. I didn't even notice my friend had started to back up until she yelled out to me. Chelsea! Run!

It just so happened that we were beside our classmate's house and I followed my friend as she ran up to the door and started banging on it, whispering to herself, please answer the door, please answer the door. Our classmate's mom opened the door looking very annoyed. My friend begged her to let us inside and pointed toward to the boys. The drunk guys took the hint and piled back into the van and sped off. The mom scolded us for being out late, accused us of causing trouble and quite rudely told us to go back home.

I was still pretty shocked, but we quickly scurried back to the main road that would lead us home, trying to stay out of the light and constantly on the look-out for the van. We saw headlights and hid in a ditch. It was dry and the grass was long. There was no street light, so we were well hidden. It was the van. We thought maybe they were circling back, looking for us, so we just stayed in the ditch, but the van drove away and we never saw it again. My fucking heart was pounding so hard, I was panting.

We hurriedly walked in the ditches the rest of the way home, completely on edge, and when we got to my yard we ran as fast as we could to the front door and got inside. We turned off all the lights and hid out in my spare room. She curled up on the bed and I was across from her in the swivel chair. The computer monitor was our nightlight. Every so often my friend would peer through the blinds. I was still so stunned. I said, we almost got raped or something. If you hadn't called my name....

It was one of those moments where I wanted to laugh out loud with relief, like we got away with something and it was exhilarating, except it was so freaky, I didn't know how to react. The realization that something bad could have happened to us blew my mind.

We didn't talk much about it and I never told my parents.

May 25th was Missing Children's Day. The RCMP has some tips on how to street-proof your kids and after reading them I think my mom taught me well. We had a code word. I knew who to call and where to go if there was ever an emergency or if I was in danger. I was taught it's okay to talk to strangers, but not okay to go with them. I was taught to kick, hit, bite, anything to get away from someone trying to take me and to scream out loud, He's not my dad! She's not my mom! We played license plate games.

But when I was frozen in that spot, watching those guys clamber out of that van, it was like everything I learned was out the window. If my friend hadn't called out my name, who knows what would have happened. Maybe nothing. But there's the very slim chance I could have died. You never know what people's motives are. Especially drunk people.

I think of my sweet, little baby with her angelic face and I just want to drill her with my version of stranger-danger information until her ears bleed. I want her to sneak out of the house after midnight and take a breezy stroll in the summer air with friends because I know how fun it is, but I also hope that if she's ever in a situation like I was in with my friend, she'll take after my friend and not me.

This is a Bitch-Fest

So fucking annoyed with life right now.
My GPS replacement I ordered still hasn't come in the mail and I can't get a hold of a human on the telephone and I can't create an account online like the telephone operator suggested because every time I try to create the account, it says there's a duplicate file. Every time I try to log in, it says I'm not registered. What the fuck? I emailed someone, but we'll see how long that takes to get a response.

I owe the government nearly a thousand dollars. When Bob and I declared that we were living common law as of September when we filed our taxes, all that money the government gave me is now being taken back. My savings account is totally depleted. What a huge mistake it was to tell them the truth.

Tesla's photo shoot is costing us more money than we can afford and it was supposed to cost us nothing.

I deep cleaned the carpets and couch and the next day Tesla decided to start randomly puking again. All that work is ruined.

I spend all day cleaning up the kitchen and at the end of the day it's a fucking disaster again. Laundry is a perpetual cycle of bullshit that I can never keep on top of because we literally don't have enough quarters. I keep smelling "cat" and I don't know what to do to get rid of that animal smell in the air.

Everywhere I look there is a mess, toys, clutter, disorganized shit. I'm worried about my grandma, I'm worried about my dad, I'm worried about Bob. My daycare is stressing me out. I just want to drink 2 bottles of wine, cry, and then take a month long all-expense paid vacation to somewhere beautiful and exotic, where there are no children, and I don't have to lift a finger.

A Lesson in Self-Control

Some people's parenting.... Some woman punished her daughter by sending her to school wearing ugly clothes. Read about it here. The jist of the story is that the daughter had been making fun of another girl's outfits at school. She told her that her shorts and tank top made her look sleazy and was teasing her about it for almost a month. The school deemed this behavior to be bullying and told the parents about it.

The step-mom didn't think grounding her judgmental daughter was enough since the daughter stood by her convictions that the classmate was dressed in poor taste and deserved to know about it. The step-mom decided to bring her to the thrift store and bought a few of the outfits that her daughter deemed ugly.

Then she made the daughter wear these outfits to school. Then she took pictures of her daughter wearing these outfits and posted them on Facebook.

The girl was so embarrassed and was obviously teased like crazy by her classmates. She felt so bad, she apologized to the girl she was bullying and thanked her mom for teaching her such a valuable lesson.

Barf.

Are you fucking kidding me? This is a much better punishment than making your kid hold a grammatically incorrect sign on the side of the road for a few hours, but it's still a terrible punishment and I don't think it really fits the crime.

When you get down to it, the daughter's crime was her lack of self-control. She opened her big, fat mouth and made hurtful comments to another person's face. If she had self-control, she would have kept her hurtful comments to herself, or maybe shared them with a friend when they had a moment of privacy so they could giggle and gossip out of earshot.

She is entitled to think that the girl's wardrobe is sleazy. She is not entitled to tell her that. That is the lesson she needs to learn.

Dressing her up in hideous clothing and sending her out into the world isn't a punishment and doesn't teach her self-control. Maybe she'll stop bullying that girl forever, maybe she'll finally realize what it feels like to be on the receiving end of teasing, but she wasn't being teased for being herself. She was being teased for wearing a costume to school which is totally out of the ordinary and a one-time deal. It's not an organic life-lesson.

What would I do if it was Tesla? I would probably give her a normal punishment like taking some privileges away and we would definitely talk about what it means to be tactful. I wouldn't force her to apologize, but I would request she do it. I would never publicly shame her by sending her to school in a ridiculous get-up and taking pictures to post online and blackmail her with later. People are sick.

A and F For The Homeless

I'm sure you've all heard about the Abercrombie and Fitch news from last week about how CEO, Mike Jeffries, made some comments a few years ago that his brand is exclusionary and only marketed to the cool kids

Enter Greg Karber. He made a nice little video about the whole thing and then decided to do a little unauthorized re-branding for the company to help out its image. Check it out!



This video is awesome! I don't consider it to be social activism, I just think it's funny! What a hilarious and unique way to put Mike Jeffries in his place. I don't think homeless people are losers, but I'm sure Jeffries does. None of the people on that street looked like they were going to sign any modelling contracts any time soon. They definitely don't look like your average A and F wearers. It just goes to show that anybody can have whatever they like and it doesn't matter what demographic you belong to.

It's so silly because we all know it comes down to money. It doesn't matter how fat and ugly you are, if you've got the money, you can walk in and buy whatever you like. If Jeffries was serious about excluding those who he didn't think fit the A and F image, he would have some sexy looking guards standing by to turn away those people so they couldn't even enter the store.

I've never worn any clothes from Abercrombie and Fitch before. It's not my style. If I ever come across any Abercrombie and Fitch apparel while off on one of my Value Village binges, I'm totally going to be it and donate it!