Rules of Time Travel

            In fiction, there are three main concepts for time travel. Each of them have their own rules that must be followed in order to maintain consistency.

            One of these methods is the constant timeline. This is the theory that events throughout time cannot be changed at all. Characters can travel backwards or forwards in time, but anything they change was already accounted for and had been changed for them. A perfect representation of this is in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, where the characters travel back in time in order to save some lives, only to discover that they had done so all along – one of them had even caught sight of themselves before they knew they were traveling back.

            Next is the theory that time is fluid. In this theory, a time traveler can go through time, changing whatever they want – and, in turn changing the future, sometimes with disastrous results. This is sometimes tempered by a rule that history will work itself out, such as in the Dr Who series where the Doctor and his companions are constantly saving people and changing things without altering the course of history.

            Thirdly, we have the dimensional theory. In this case, as in the fluid one, time travelers can change the course of events, but each change branches off a new dimension of reality. The changes are there for the people moving through time, but the other dimension (where the time travelers came from) usually remains unchanged. I some cases, if a big enough change is made, this method allows some branch dimensions to be erased, or at least cut off from the other dimensions. An example of this can be seen in the Back to the Future movies, were the main character nearly causes himself to have never existed – and later finds himself in an alternate timeline that is nearly apocalyptic.

            Now, it really doesn’t matter which theory of time travel is used for any particular work of fiction. It needs to be chosen to fit both the story and the world well. The important part is that once a rule set is chosen, it gets stuck to. Every story – or series – needs to follow the same rules, without jumping from one rule set to the other. As soon as the established rules are broken, the internal consistency is broken and the believability of the story falls to pieces.

            So, if you use time travel, choose and choose well. Then stick to it, no matter what.

            This semi-ranting blog has been inspired by Harry Potter and the Cursed Child – an good story, except for the part where the internal mechanics do not match those established earlier in the series.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Ebb and Flow

            Something that I find amazing about working an art-related job is that there’s no telling what items will sell, or when. Selling chainmaille this past weekend at ConBravo! was mind-boggling – I never could have predicted the way our sales went.

            First, some background. When Colleen and I first started attending shows with Ringcrafts, we had no idea what to expect. We didn’t know what would sell – or how much. As a result, we managed to over-prepare by quite a bit. We made five of each chainmaille design we had on hand, only to learn that at any given event we would rarely sell more than one or two of any given item.

            Well, we learned. We cut back to three of each item, and when something proved popular we would up the number to five. Alas, as soon as we had plenty of said item, it completely stopped selling. Plus, we discovered that we were having trouble finding space to store and transport everything as our variety steadily grew larger.

            So, we fine-tuned our system. When we make something new, we now only make one. If it sells, we make two for our next show. After that, every time we sell out of a particular item, we add one more to the total that we keep on hand – the idea being that we’ll always have one available for display. This is working remarkably well, and in part helps predict what is most popular and what will sell well.

            This year, though, has been very strange. Items that have never sold before are suddenly our most popular items – alongside things that were popular in our first year selling, but that have received little interest for three years.

            This weekend continued that trend, but in a new and unexpected way. Usually, most of what we sell are our low-to-mid priced items – keychains, bracelets, necklaces, earrings and such. We usually sell a tie or two per show and a few dragons, those being items that are getting into a higher price range.

            At ConBravo! this weekend, we were astounded by the number of large items we sold – not only did we sell a beanie, belt and coif (higher priced items that rarely sell), but someone bought the chainmaille Spiderman mask that we’ve had on display for over two years. We were blown away – with the track record, we’d thought it would never sell.

            We’ve talked to other vendors and artists, and they all say the same thing: you carry items around and have them on display for years without selling one. Then, suddenly, they’ll become the most popular product you have.

            The ebb and flow of what is popular really is an inscrutable thing. I’m very interested to see in what direction this latest trend will carry us – and what will happen next.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Culture and Technology

            I’m a person who thrives on technology. Not that I know how any of it works – and some of it, I can hardly ever get it to do what I want – but I can’t imagine a life without all the technology I have at my disposal. Yet, at the same time, I wonder what impact it will have on the natural progression of our society.

            For the last two hundred years, technology has advanced at an astounding rate. Along with it has grown our ability to preserve and display our own history and culture. At the same time as preserving, we’re reinforcing our own cultural identity.

            Through movies and internet, the various concepts, values and beliefs important to our culture are expressed over and over. We watch these and pass them on to our children; our history and ideals are passed on as they never were able to be before. We preserve so much, and yet, I wonder if we aren’t causing cultural progression to grow stagnant.

            On social media, on several occasions I’ve come across a video showing the standards for human beauty as they have changed over the years. But, when was the last time these standards truly changed? With all the movies and videos out there reinforcing our current standards, how many generations will it take before we move on?

            A character in one of the Assassin’s Creed video games once commented on a preserved city that “history is the study of change” and that when change stops, death occurs. It’s the same with culture – it is meant to be forever changing and growing.

            So, I wonder, is how much we strive to preserve things good or bad? Will our current technologies preserve our generation in a way that will make simple work for future archaeologists, or will it become the gospel by which future generations live?

            I guess only time will tell.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Augmented Reality and the Future

            In the past couple of weeks, the internet (and, indeed, the world) has exploded about the new augmented reality game, Pokemon Go. There are two major opinions – the people who love the game and those who think it’s stupid. To me, though, the important thing to look at is what this game means for the future.

            Last year, I shared the story of the Zombies, Run! app and how it got Colleen and myself out exercising regularly when otherwise we could hardly dream of it. Pokemon Go has done the same thing across the whole world – people who would normally be inside all summer playing video games are now outside, exercising, exploring and socializing. People with mental health issues, such as depression and PTSD, are reporting improvements.

So, what do those two games have in common? They make exercise fun, rather than a chore.

            Now, the term “Augmented Reality” is something I’ve become quite familiar with over the past year. Why? Because one day, while out running from zombies, I said to Colleen, “Wouldn’t it be cool if someone developed a technology that would let us actually see the zombies that are chasing us in the story?” I then went on to hypothesize that you could take a virtual reality headset, mount cameras to feed in the scenery and then add in the digital characters.

            I figured I couldn’t be the only one to come up with this idea, so I did some research. What I found was astonishing – in particular, a company called Magic Leap that is working on a piece of technology far beyond what I had been imagining. My brain was flooded with ideas for the possible uses of this technology – yes, games were at the forefront, but there are so many practical purposes as well. It functions as an immersive mobile computer, an art platform, a communications device. With it, people have the potential to holo-comute to work.

            To me, though, the best application of augmented reality is the ability to combine work and play. Imagine being able to go into work and have the work you do become part of a game. You could have high scores that you try to beat each days, achievements and awards for completing a certain amount of work at a certain speed. Goals and praise that can break up an otherwise dull and tedious work shift. From an employer’s standpoint, it could be used to improve worker output and even work quality through turning work into a game.

            Pokemon Go is just the tip of the iceberg. We’re entering a future where science fiction is becoming a reality, and it has great potential for improving life in innumerable ways. All it takes are some deceptive photons and a little imagination to make the world a better place.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Songs of Khrull

            Unfortunately, Colleen and I have fallen behind on Of Dice and Glen, so this month’s episode will have to wait for another day. However, on a related note, we’ve been having a great time playing D&D with a group at our local board game cafe. Out Dungeon Master has been keeping a blog record of our adventure, so if you’re interested (and starved for our D&D adventures), you can click here to check it out.

            One thing I’ve been having a lot of fun with while playing this adventure is writing songs. My character is a minstrel when he’s not moonlighting as an assassin. In order to subtly gather information about an assassination target, he claimed to be writing a song about them. So, to hold to the character, I actually wrote a song.

            And, since I’d written one, why stop there? Once we completed the first adventure, I whipped together a second one to summarise everything our characters had done. So, here they are!

Livinia the Mage (Sung to a tune adapted from “Ragnar the Red” from Skyrim)

Oh, Livinia the mage was the worst kind of scum,

With her half-orsine offspring, all four of them dumb.

They raided and looted the roads of Chiswell,

Til the King's Guard arrived to bid them farewell.

But Livinia the mage and her sons ran away,

To the south and the bridge leading to Gannaway.

Now, along come our heroes, with some other plan,

Mhurrun, Luna and Lumi, Cididel and Phann.

Evil Livinia, she plans out an ambush at night,

With an old man as hostage, she thinks they won't fight.

Our heroes did charge in and slay all her brood,

They set Livinia running and our heroes pursued.

By the time that they caught her, Livinia was deaaaad...!

With a mysterious arrow shot right through her head.

The Heroes of Tolvir (Sung to a tune adapted from “The Hero of Canton” from Firefly)

Now, Tolvir was a village in trouble,

It lately been plagued by a skulk.

It raided and pillaged the houses,

Everyone stayed inside to sulk.

Then along came some heroes, quite mighty,

They were hired by old Papa Kurst.

They set out to solve all their problems,

Preparing to deal with the worst.

(CHORUS)

The monsters are slain,

The skulks are no more,

The heroes of Tolvir,

It's one for the lore!

Luna's a barbarian tiefling,

She delighted in finding a spoon.

She hacked up some lions in battle,

The map she found proved quite the boon.

CHORUS

[Deleted verse]

[Cididel was really a coward,

Some illusions made him full of fear.

When assassins attacked in the night,

Cididel charged right for the rear.]

When assassins attacked in the night,

It was Lumi who levelled the field.

The elf, with cunning and stealth attacks,

Gave the villains not a chance to yield.

CHORUS

Cididel charged right into battle,

At a ramshackle villa, I'm told.

Blasting monsters with all his magic,

The tiefling proved himself quite bold.

CHORUS

In battle with hideous ghouls,

The elf Phann cut them down with his steel.

Whenever a friend became injured,

He was right by their side for to heal.

CHORUS

When attacked by a whole tribe of xvarts,

Half-orc Mhurren was eager to fight.

He slew goblinoids by the score,

With his maul fling left and right.

CHORUS

At long last they came to the skulk,

Its mind broken and wretched to see.

They took away its glove and slayed it,

Its death was an act of mercy.

(CHORUS)

The monsters are slain,

The skulks are no more,

The heroes of Tolvir,

It's one for the lore!

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Truth or Satire?

            A few years ago, I found myself reading an article about a recent study. The article talked about how this study, funded by a major oil corporation, had found that an increase in solar power would kill the sun faster, literally sucking the energy out of it to make our electricity.

            At the time, I was unaware that this was a satirical journalism website. Nothing clearly labelled it as such. However, as I simply couldn’t believe what the ridiculous article claimed, I started doing research to find out the validity. Before I discovered t was a satire site, I found myself going through the comments, seeing if people were believing what the article claimed.

            Most didn’t. Likely, many were aware that the whole article was a joke. However, there were some who fervently believed that this was true – solar energy was sucking energy out of the sun and would cause it to burn out faster.

            Since then, I have seen numerous satirical articles shared on social media by people who think they are real. Because they share some of the views being mocked by the satirical tone, they readily believe the articles without taking the time to check the information.

            It is so indicative of society. We see something official looking, so we automatically believe it. Researching takes too much time and effort. So, if we want or fear it to be true, we’ll believe it.

            On the rare occasion that someone wants to look into the validity of what they’re reading, it’s nearly impossible to get a confirmation unless you can get to the source. With the internet, information is right at our fingertips – but so is misinformation.

            Sarcastic and satirical people often make the mistake of thinking others understand their sense of humour. Unfortunately, there are a whole lot of literal people in the world, who take everything at face value. It’s no wonder there are so many people with no understanding of each other.

            Adding to the trouble is the requirement for news to be entertainment. I saw an episode of Gilmore Girls the other day where the main character, aspiring to be a journalist, had her writing criticised for not having her opinions in it. It’s the sad truth about our news these days – it’s all about the opinions of the people presenting it.

            What we really need is a news service called something like “Just the Facts” which presents nothing but the facts of a situation. Then people are given the freedom to decide what they think for themselves.

            But, that wouldn’t be entertaining enough, would it? And it sounds like a lot of work. Why would we want to make up our own minds about things when it’s so much simpler to agree with someone else? There’s no need to think when you can blindly follow.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

The Magic of Shiny Objects

            I spent this last weekend selling chainmaille at the Oxford Renaissance Festival and there were a few things I simply had to share. Namely, the magic of shiny objects.

            Friday was the first day of the festival, at least for school kids. It was Education Day, so a bunch of schools came out on trips to have some fun, watch some jousting and maybe learn something. Only a few of the vendors were present for the show – in fact, we were the only ones in the indoor location (our tent is annoying to transport – plus it is still broken from last year).

            Now, it should be mentioned that the festival was at a new location this year, which means that there is a lot of trial and error in figuring out what will and won’t work. For example, having a barn with only one vendor off to the side of where the majority of the festival’s activities take place doesn’t work.

            Because we were the only ones there, Colleen and I moved our whole setup right into the doorway of the barn, where we could be seen from outside. There were plenty of kids there, but because there was nothing else where we were, no one even looked in our direction (except one bus driver, who dropped by to chat for a bit).

            Until the end of the day. The sun had shifted enough to shine into the barn, glinting off the armour shirts at the front of our display. Finally, a few groups spotted us and came over. They didn’t buy anything, but that’s okay – the rest of the weekend made op for that with the normal festival days.

            Ah, yes. The rest of the weekend. The first thing that needs to be said about it is that it was hot. Outside, the sun was beating down – though a nice breeze kept the heat from being unbearable.

            Inside, there was no breeze. The barn we were in wasn’t one of those wooden barns, no. It was a metal barn, with metal roofing that the sun was beating down upon. Inside, it was an oven – even with doors open at both ends in an attempt to catch some of the breeze.

            A number of the events attendees commented on the heat in the barn, but there was one couple that went a step farther. After noticing we had an electrical outlet behind our table, they actually went home and brought a fan back for us. Isn’t that amazing? They left it with us for the whole weekend and came back to pick it up at the end of the show the next day. Needless to say, we were enormously grateful.

            Anyway, back to the magic of shiny objects. Along with the event’s move, the festival got some new partners – namely the local(ish) Boys and Girls Club. One of the new people involved came up with a wonderful idea. He’d grown up in an underprivileged household and he remembered loving events like these, but being sad that he never had any money to spend with the vendors. So he made “Coins of the Realm” that were given to underprivileged families along with special festival packages.

            All the vendors were asked to accept these “Coins of the Realm” at a value of $5 – which we’d be reimbursed for at the end of the festival. From the moment I heard the idea, I thought it was an incredible way to bring a little joy to people who have difficult lives. I can’t express how happy I was when they were used to make a purchase from me. Not only was I proud to be able to help these people, but the gratitude I could see in the eyes of the parents who otherwise wouldn’t have been able to buy something for their child – it was truly the best part of my weekend.

            Shiny objects really do have a magic all of their own.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.