Segment: Sho-Caudal #9

Breather Reco, or the first picture of one.

SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL #9 is just waiting for a read thru. The dominant presence is THE RECO REPORT, with details on how Recos are programmed from a cork, examples of the most common Recos, with an extensive background on Incupods and Corks (which is where little recos come from), a passing notion to Genons, a cork programmers checklist.

And way too much OTHER ARTISTS OF JORUNE - Part 2. Either one would have been good enough to fill a standard issue - this is FAT.

I'm playing with a Reco that has been mentioned but never illustrated, the Breather Reco. It plays a part in THE RED GATE, which will be in SSC #10.

And I've started playing with how the Colonial Authority recruited people to leave their worlds in the United Planets and Colonies to a backward world like Jorune. The original campaign to "Leave Your Word Behind." Not sure when that will be ready. Maybe in time for #11.

There is also "Other People's Jorune" with nuggets that have appeared in my email box over the years. Thought you might find that interesting.

I do.

But, as soon as get the Reco article examined by the head of genetic research at Vanderbilt University, I will send it out.

Really.

Oh - afterthought: When #9 is out the 6-month subscription option will go away 10-14 is the foreseeable future, and that isn't even 6 issues. The full subscription at 12-issues will include back issues and I will find some mechanic that allows advance on #13 and #14 (only two people actually subscribed thru #13 (a single issue followed by a 12-Issue subscription). #14 is because I did a real screw up and I extended their subscription one issue. They will be fatties, too, so the subscription thing will run its course. And after the sub will be different, and therefore evil.

Back to the Salt Mine

I was distracted by reality, but I'm better now and able to deal with my favorite delusion. And dang, if this keeps up my tombstone might read "Death by Enthusiasm."

Back to work on SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL.

I've been working on issue #9 and the feature is the "Reco Report" - which is turning into Topsy.  "I wasn't raised, I jes' growed."

Read a book.

This has become just two more pages, just two more pages, just two more pages...

The issue already has "Other Artist of Jorune Part 2" which is larger than Part One (and is also part the last), so it was already larger than any previous page, but I added six more pages to the Reco article, just in lists for the would-be Bio-tec artist.

And Issue #10 is really almost there, so it could be released as so as I clear the big hang up.

The big hangup?

Me doing art. I have decided on one image for cover and the splash of THE RED GATE, the interior black and white, the exterior, color of the same scene. I can do them. I just think the world would be better served by a real artist. This is a simple editorial evaluation of the work - the evidence of past art by the artist, regardless of who it is.

Bleh. But I seem to be horrible enough I can't get artists to work with me more than once – and I'm still not sure why that is.

I wanted to be a comic book artist, and I drew a lot. I really fell in love with 19th Century and early 20th Century illustration styles. I took classes - I am taking an online course to improve my drawing while I am fighting doctors and creditors in this ugly world, to create scenes from the dreamtime. I get a tiny warp that allows me to peek in on everyday life on Jorune and it is not always dramatic or action-packed.

Walking Home with Mom.

Sometimes it is just about walking home with mom, under multiple moons, with someone on a balcony, lost in their thoughts, And a friend who seems to know Mom - a Corastin guard.

This illustration is probably my favorite of anything I've done for Jorune.

I try. I might even get a passing grade on this one - the original is floating around my house somewhere - it deserves a better scan.

What is bringing this up is doing Part 2 of THE OTHER ARTISTS OF JORUNE and seeing my work alongside the work of people I consider to be real "artists." David Ackerman Robert Smith, Chris Lackey, Fred Lang, and others. Some of them are far from the style of Mile Teves, who set the tone from the first edition, but they are true to themselves and to the world. Marc Diebedour, Harold Ogle,  and more.

It may sound like flagellation, but it is not an exercise in self-hate - it is an assessment. And inventory.  I do consider myself an artist, a writer first but as an artist second. I am not as skilled in illustration. I do graphics. I tweak and repurpose old graphics. I do logotypes and Mastheads. I color black and white art. I love maps and floorplans. But I do not create compositions and execute final pieces of usable art.

"Walking Home With Mom" has features I like with bare cartooning skills. There is a sense of gravity - which I think is important. Mom and the boy are firmly rooted to the ground, and the Corastin on spot, in repose, seems to be weighted - and if he stood up he would dwarf them. I would barely be able to fit through the wooden door. And you can tall it is a wooden door. There is a little scragger running alongside for no particular reason. The dreamer on the balcony is abstract, but of the world. I think I lost it in the sky, the lack of consistency in the skylines makes it less satisfying. And I have republished it before with the top section lopped off.

December 1994, it says. 23 years ago. Time flies. And my frustration grows. First at being unable to get artists to work with me, and then at my inability to bring the scenes I see in my head to the page in a recognizable form. I think I am a good art director, I know what is needed. But I am not able to create the final art required - even for a little fanzine newsletter like this.

Showing the Scar

"Showing the Scar" is an exercise in frustration. It was intended to be a sketch to give a real artist to show what I had in mind for a scene near the end of "Scars of Far Temauntro" in SHOLARI V2N1. It is a collage from some 19th Century snips with Jorune tweaks. A Shantha showing the pit to two Corastin and ... someone ... with vodra in the sky with three moons. I know what time it is, with the sun in the far morning sky.

Couldn't get an artist to work on it. So I printed it out in blue to ink, like a comic book page (I have the technical pens required for that). But it was too dark to ink and have the illustration dominate. So I did a second version which was used on the SSC #2 cover, in conjunction with Steve Devaney's monument floating on an islet in the Scar itself.

Hopefully, someone will take pity on me and do some art I spec for the last few issues of the SHO-CAUDAL project. If any artists out there would be interestign to taking on an assignment, maybe for the inside, maybe for a color... contact me.

I should talk about that, too. But not now. Now it is too late and i need sleep. Issue #9 will be finished tomorro, then the editing, and I can't get editors to work with me, either. So I will do my best and people will complain. A lot. But I will try. I think I caught the typos in this post, but I'm too tired. I'll look at it later. And if anyone reads this and want to give me the edits, it would be appreciated. (Does anyone read this?)

Only five more issues to go.

Something Afoot

And it's my toe. My podiatrist says the toe gets to stay on the foot - for the moment - so I am less distracted than I was three weeks ago. I did a Plumfund page to cover 16 unexpected medical appointment and costs - and so far have raised almost exactly half of what was needed to do everything, but I am up to #8 on the scheduled appointments...

And things go on.

Back to SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL #9, THE RECO REPORT. I've been planning this for quite a while and have a good deal of information on CORKS, INCUPODS, and RECOS. This includes the basic information for anyone interested in that form of Bio-tec, including detail on cork cutting (programming), the real role of the Busk, and the programming outline to design your own Reco for fun or profit.

SSC #9 will also have THE OTHER ARTISTS OF JORUNE, including incomplete galleries of George Barr, Janet Aulissio Dannheiser, our own Steve Devaney, Alan Okimoto, and more (including my own artwork, with some embarrassment).

Number Nine will be a nice, fat issue to make up for the delay. I don't feel I've really fallen too far behind. I promised 16 pages a month and at least one issue a month. This will be eight issues in six months, and the page count to date has been:

   Issue 1 - Lamorri, plus - 17 pages
   Issue 2 - Day War, ORFA, Conversions and such - 16 pages
   Issue 3 - Heretics and for writers, Jorune or not -  22 pages
   Issue 4 - Jorune Cartography - 21 Pages
   Issue 5 - Angels of Drail, opening chapters - 17 pages
   Issue 6 - Warp Mechanics, The Mes Dig, Tables for Goodies - 16 pages
   Issue 7 - The Lattice, Kolo-Dissal*, a timeline of parallel worlds - 16 pages
   Issue 8 - Sharden, Other Artists of Jorune, Part One - 16 pages

Issue 9 - Reco report, Cork programming, Incupod Maintenance - 48 pages I type this, so I'll probably cut that down. But to this point - 141 pages, plus whatever the page count of #9 turns out to be. Call it 40 pages, so 181 pages going into the seventh-month averages to 25.8 pages per month. Above frequency, above page count - I don't feel bad taking care of my medical reality.

The issue after, number ten, will complete THE RED GATE, of which elements have appeared in several issues of SSC. That will be #10.


I'm not sure how I'm going to wind this up. There is material. I'm sitting on a bunch of stuff Heridoth based on a play by mail game at Oxford — the one in England —where the players ran city-states and came up with some really good ideas. I have original art from Miles Teves I don't think I ever published anywhere, so there's that. A bunch of people gave me nuggets for adventures, and I'd like to get those out in the world.

And the big one. I had a campaign I ran for a stable group (at least a regular - with those personalities... stable?) for about eight years, with a six-month break while I was out of state. I called it CHILDREN OF BOMOVERIS, and it linked a grand unified conspiracy that shared the powers of Boveris' blood, active earth-tec from the Desti Station, the powerful houses gathering against Dandrenn in Kirlan, and opposed by an equal force led by the Seraphim Guard, Shantha, the united Iscin Races, with human mutations (including Muadra), Cleash and Scarmis in the middle. And the middle is where the action is. A secret Earth-tec colony in the jungles of the Western Trinnu, five children of the revived Karl B from his Keeper Rod... It was a romp that had it great, satisfying closing firefight (with many kinds of fire) in one of the High Houses in Kirlan. No ray guns, but dyshas, automatic pistols, arrows... and the system we evolved together got the action going during the fight where it was just go, Go, GO!!! Almost combat in real time.

There were several people there at the finale who are still in touch with me. I think it is a proper exit blast. THE CHILDREN OF BOMOVERIS. SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL #14.

I had big dreams when the RETURN TO JORUNE started, and a few nightmares along the way, but I need to wrap this up. Paid subscriptions to SEGMENT; SHO-CAUDAL only go up to #12. I made a couple of errors along the way and as make-good, I'm committed to #14, so 14 is the swan song. And thanks for all the fish.

I'm not saying I'll never do another Jorune, but I will never again be this public or focused on that world.

The collection that may happen one fine day.

I have two in various stages or readiness - THE COMPLETE DANSTEAD TRAVELLER and THE COMPLETE BORKELBY'S FOLLY. SHOLARI JAMES pulled out in favor of having control to present his material, his way, and on his timetable. My own GOMO GUIDE: TAN IRICID are on the to-do list in 2018. they are in that order as to readiness. In fact, as soon as I get a cover and can convert all the English measurements to metric, I'm good to go on DANSTEAD. BORKELBY needs some work - permissions and organization. Someone suggested I gather my own work in one volume - not a 2018 priority, but it is possible. And TAN IRICID could be ready with just a little work. Some of it has been appearing in SSC, but so few people see if I could release the whole thing to a new audience with no qualms.

This next SSC issue will be worth the bother. Maybe the rest of it will be, too.

I have to go off topic for a post. I hate it, but that's what I've got to do.

I have had to put up a Plumfund page for Medical changes. Some people will think it is silly that I can't come up with the money - they pay more for rent. But, I can't, so I'm going public.


Sometimes, life sucks.

And now I'll go back to Return to Jorune posts on this page.

Trying to get the next issue of SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL up and out. I've been distracted.

A couple of medical things are taking up time. I'm working on the next SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL, but not as fast as I'd like. May make the 6th, may not ... we shall see.

Creeping to SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL #9

SSC 6 - Warp Mechanics
Revised

I wanted to do a thing called THE RED GATE for SHOLARI v2n2, but since that looks like it will not be likely to happen I pulled together the notes into a draft that may be ready to go for SSC #9. It will fill the issue, but I will probably add a few pages to it.

A couple of my old players may remember opening the Red Gate more than 20 years ago. It's about time, I guess.

The political fight between the different Thriddle factions is part of it, which has been common in most of my Jorune projects for many years. This issue offers part of the greater module and adds more about the Colonials from an automated supply base in an unexpected location and previously unknown Earth-tec.

It will pull together:

• The D warp from the original Warp Mechanics article ANNALS OF THE TAN SOOR HISTORICAL SOCIETY ten years ago or so where the whole thing started, updated in SSC 6;
• The MES DIG, THE HOL SONO LATTICE, found at the Mes Dig;
• the political rift among the Thriddle and how information from the Lattice may change the balance of power on Jorune - knowledge is power;
• THE KOLO DISSAL, the false skyrealm used in this adventure to escape the forces of the Dharsage, the House Zunis, the Tan Iricidi Thriddle, and some freeboot mercenaries (and because they can);

SSC 7 - Mes Dig and
Sol Hono Lattice

And to that I will add:

• The Red Gate itself - what is at the mated location of the D warp - at certain times - leads to;
• The Desti Base with all kinds of Colonial information, link dots, flexible body armor, Nannies, Frankenstein effect, Buildtons, Combatons, Titantons, and other Tech-tons from old Earth;
• Nanufacturing of the Colonials; and 
• The Seraphim Guard, which leads into THE ANGEL OF DRAIL, which might get completed and made available.

It's great fun to work on — I hope it will be fun to read. And maybe run. (What a concept.)

SSC 8 Sol Hono Lattice and
the Body Measure Map

I have asked a couple of people for feedback. They may give it, they may not. But the plan is for it to go into SSC #9. I might have to draw a cover. Bleh. I don't like my art - Jorune deserves better. But can't seem to get an artist to draw this thing I have in my head.

That issue will have a new look on the inside.  Just warning you.

SSC #10 looks like it will have the Reco issue I've been wanting to do for a while, which will tie into the Breathers in the Red Gate construct.

And I have some idea on #11 - at the very least. The will probably get fatter, but we are nearing the end.

And who knows where all of this may lead.

I just had a horrible thought. I may have contents in the various issues wrong. I need to go read them, but I have a class to teach in 10 hours and need sleep first. Priorities - sleep, class, Jorune. but Jorune is still in the top three.

SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL #8 and a Blunder

Lost Corondon art by Teves

Number Eight went out last night, and I offended at least one reader in the email. And there is a guideline in publishing that if one person writes, they represent 19 other people who didn't. And since there are only 20 people on the list ...

The writer made a very key point, that this is a fringe product for a small population and 35 years later. I bristled - 35 - I've only been involved since 1992, but there are people who have been involved longer than me and - he is right.

Sigh.

I got that right after checking my blood sugar this morning - and it was 60. It is supposed to be between 80-120, but it wasn't. Not an excuse, just a reality.

So I'm thinking what I can do to repair that offense.

In the meantime, SSC #8 with the Sharden memoir and the first part of an "Other Artists of Jorune." #9 is moving along as are #10 and #11.  The new cover looks good and next issue the interior will change. Again.

And the work with SSC is leading to reviving a product I was willing to let go. We shall see.

I try. I really do. And sometimes I'm offensive. I'm like that in life. I may not be the only one, but I'm the only one in this skin. And that skin gets thin sometimes.

Onward.

Sharden

Sharden, per Teves map from 2nd Edition.
And then gussied up a bit.

I've wanted to do a piece on Sharden for a long time, and it just sort of blew up on me while I was working on the Lexicon project. So SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL #8 will have a memoir from a Tologra who has is coming to the end of a two-cycle tour of the planet before returning home.

I want Sharden and the Tologra to be something more than just another fantasy race, so I brought some of my ethnographic interest to play to paint a picture of the people as they saw themselves, their relationship to Shantha, Ramian, Salu, and Blount, and their reaction to Bronth missionaries almost thirty years ago, when they spread out to bring the Iscin races together to share their common history of Iscin.

It is not quite a religion – the Tologra knew their own history but had lost contact with the other Iscin races. They do not worship Iscin - they revere him for his work to make their races exist. The had their own version of captivity under the Crugar, and then under the Bronth before three Tologra escape to Sharden. Tologra had been "lost" since the Great Wanderings, so we learn how they came to Sharden, and what happened when the Bronth arrived to bring them "into the family" of Iscin's Children.

It is what I look for with new Jorune pieces - entertaining and revelatory. Even to me.

Satisfying to work on, and I got to do one of my favorite things. A map. Love me some maps.

SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL #8, coming soon to an email near you. If you subscribed. Or bought a block.

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It is comforting to see a clear line of future issues mapping out before me. I should be able to meet my at-least-one-a-month schedule by quite a bit, even with my Joe-isms and reduced typing ability. Slowing down might work. I'm willing to try it.

Flime Ties

That would be a proper Jorune phrase, wouldn't it? Flie ties when you're having fun.

Time changes things, and I just had it pointed out that my subscription system for SEGMENT; SHO-CAUDAL is out of date.

I just had someone subscribe at $5 a month who then asked about getting the back issues.

Something I have not harped on is that I am only committed up to issue #14. And I have some ideas about that issue already. SEGMENT: SHO-CAUDAL is not a forever-and-ever project. It was born of frustration with the DriveThru-RPG pre-press system that kept rejecting covers and interiors for reasons no one could answer. SSC gave me the flexibility to get out an idea, quickly and under my control.

The PDF format allowed me to issue orthopedic edition, correcting the errors that seem to be the trademark of my production history. So 1c, 2b, became the early issue labels. But more recently I just make that notation in the colophon of the second page.

But subscriptions. Originally 12-Issue subscriptions seemed appropriate, but now - not so much.

So I guess part of my day will be spent wandering the mystic e-halls of PayPal to:

• Delete the 12-Issue subscript.
• Put up a 6-issue subscription.
• Change the short subscriptions to Back Issue options.
• And then post those changes to the subscriptions and SSC pages on the website.

I have a fairly clear idea of the remaining issues, but am not sure what order they will be in, and feel jes' fine about adding material to make the issues a bit fatter. And there will be some spin-offs that may become separate purchases.

But I am halfway to the 14-issue commitment. And understand no one is paid up to #14. I extended the subscriptions for a couple of people because of a screw up in coding their names properly to get their copies as part of the mass mailings. I plan to do something different with #13 and #14, outside the original subscription-newsletter model.

But I need to think about what I'm doing, and then reflect the new thinking on the website.

United Geeks and OCD

Well, someone actually volunteered to help with the Lexicon project so I have to shift gears into database and tables development mode.

Anyone with some previous OpenOffice Suite Base databases - just a few fields with at least three lookup tables - your help is also needed.

The design is simple. The basic design would have a few up-front field, with three (so far) look-up tables.

• RECORD NUMBER - with scribe id and file numbers - bookkeeping for reference at some later date. (10 Char max.)
• WORD (20 Char max.?)
• PRONUNCIATION KEY (20 Char Max.)
• DEFINITION - 150 characters Max. (?), anything beyond goes into Notes. Or it needs to be a basic flexible field. Is that even possible?
• LANGUAGE/CULTURE (look-up table) - Tongue, or Racial group, or Nation - 20 Chars.
• SOURCE (BOOK or FANZINE that is the origin - look-up table) - 1st Ed, 2nd/3rd Ed, Fanzines/Webzine, Newsletters/Columns
• CLASSIFICATION - Item, Geographic (Jorunographic?), Isho, Earth-Tec, Personality, Historic. (another lookup table eight or nine classifications)
• NOTE - anything that needs elaboration, such as a Colonial tongue, but it has to be specified as Thanterian/House Adwa or some such. I hope this can be just a flexible field.

I already have the look up tables for Language/Culture and Source, am deciding on classification but do not think that will take all that long.

That will then allow reports to be extracted for Shanthic, Isho-related, specific countries, historical personalities, wars ... whatever kind of report is needed. And will appeal to people who just want to soak in the Jorune word pool.

So I need additional scribes to pull the words (don't want the new guy to get lonely), and now I need help with the database design.

I used to work in dBase ][, but that was in the early 1980s. My last database was 1982.

And things have changed.

The Geeks of Jorune Unite

Uncle Sho Already At Work

Uncle Sho Wants You

Time to move on something I have mentioned before. A return to the previous future.

Time to activate The Lexicon Project. To create a database of the words of Jorune, and code them for the source (book, fanzine, web article, etc.), the Nation (country, culture, or language), the pronunciation key, etc., grouping, (place name, proper noun, common noun, generic word) composed into a database table that allows a simple input screen, and multiple scribes to do the job on inputting from various sources.

We have the basic 1,600 word database that has circulated for years, but we have many more words with the reemergence of the First edition (available as a PDF through archive.org), but we now have the fanzines (Sarceen's Knowledge, Sholari, Borkelby's Folly, and Annals of the Tan Soor Historical Society), webzines (Danstead Traveller), newsletters (Segment: Jorune, Segment: Sho-caudal) and such other sources as may appear.

I'm working on an Open Database (.odb) file for equal access through an open source Office engine to create the master table, a basic glossary to which each scribe will enter for their assigned source, and then combine them all into one big master glossary to serve future Jorune development, should there be some (which is a real possibility).

It would be nice to have some small group of us decide on the best way to create the database. An .odb startup would be easy to convert to a more advanced system if it were proven to be superior.

Act Now

Are you a Jorune geek with an interest to help develop a tool for use in whatever future Joruning there may be? Games, adventures, articles, etc., would be able to use your work for their references.

I would like to get this project up on the web as a freebie in the fairly near future. There may be big Gemlinks for your in your spare time, with nothing more than eyeballs and wiggling fingers on a computer keyboard.

Really. If you volunteered to do work for a Jorune project before but never did, this could be your big chance. Write me for details.

Segment: Sho-Caudal #7

Yeah. It's about to be mailed out. With less than 20 subscribers. But ... I feel like Horton the Elephant. Just sitting here, hoping something hatches. I made a commitment.

There is an article on Isho and the need to define it for various game systems, which is part of the growing BLENDED JORUNE development - blending the world of Sho-Caudal to an existing, near future, science fiction game, before the human colony, and then transporting them 3,500 years into the future to OUR Jorune. Isho will be key to any conversion to a system for a Sholari's home game.

Another article from the Red Gate adventure - the Kolo Dissal, a Thriddle escape device that may seem familiar to some people.

And the Crystal Lattice, a relic of almost religious significance, if Jorune had religious significance, that ties into a power struggle between different Thriddle cultures.  The underdogs plan to use it to coerce cooperation from their Tan Iricidi cousins.

But I may be able to get #8 out a little faster - and may change the whole production technique.

But in the meantime - #7 is almost ready to boot out into the world.

I have committed to 14 issues. Halfway home.

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Addenda:  Jan 22 - just got the last edits in, will apply them tonight and hope to have the issue in the email Tuesday night. Fingers crossed.

Juvenile use of the word Boner

I have been forced to admit one of the biggest mistakes in the development of Return to Jorune. Almost as big as getting involved with the Return to Jorune effort.

But it is bad. And it is big.

But only the very clever Joruni will identify it. Maybe.

So I won't even say what it is at this point, but it requires a rework of material that might go into a larger Jorune frame in the near future.

It is enough to make me feel dumb, even if nobody else ever knows. And somebody else already knows.

Damn.

But - push. Just push.