I suppose 9:30 in the morning is too early to post something with such a dreary title, but that’s about how I feel at the moment. “Hallowent” is sort of the past tense of “Halloween”, to my mind Halloween, Halloweening, Hallowent. And even though the day just began, it’s pretty much a lost cause already.
I love Halloween. Love it. It’s my favorite holiday of the year. Still, the last couple of years have been sort of blase for Halloweenery. This is largely because for the last couple of years I’ve been pretty laid-back about meeting people, and as a result don’t get invited to many costume parties. Hence, the lack of need to make a costume. I’d been planning to go as Destruction from the Sandman series, since I am a big fan of the Double Duty Costume, which is a costume you can wear when out in public without too much grief. Since Destruction is usually depicted as big and bearded (or at least fuzzy) with long hair, and most recently in a simple shirt and jeans, and seeing as how I myself am big and bearded with long hair, this would be an easy costume to pull off. The only props I’d need would be a hobo’s stick and a sword, and maybe a dog and a copy of Keats. I am also a fan of the Cult Costume, which is a costume that only a few people get. For that same reason, I’d also contemplated going as Mal Reynolds, which would have been fairly simple as long as I could track down a big brown coat.
However, not having any official reason to dress up this year, all of that work was simply set aside in favor of, well, conferences and homework. This is sad and somewhat depressing, and I am consoling myself wth mellowcreme pumpkins and the knowledge that someday, maybe sooner and maybe later, I’m going to be the guy who throws the big crazy Halloween parties that everyone talks about. I used to be that guy back in high school, and when I have my own house and a large community of friends all in one place, we’re going to have ourselves a time. Someday. But not today.
Happy Halloween, everybody. I miss you all.
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Storyteller, scholar, consultant. Loving son, husband and father. Kindhearted mischief-maker.
I'm the Director of the Games and Simulation program at Miami University in Ohio, where I am also an Assistant Professor in the College of Creative Arts' Emerging Technology in Business and Design department. I'm also the director of Miami's Worldbuilding and Narrative Design Research Laboratory (WNDRLab). I have a Master's in Comparative Media Studies from MIT and a PhD in Media Arts and Practices from the University of Southern California.
In past lives I've been the lead Narrative Producer for Microsoft Studios and cofounder of its Narrative Design team, working on projects like Hololens, Quantum Break and new IP incubation; in a "future of media" think tank for Microsoft's CXO/CTO and its Chief Software Architect; the Creative Director for the University of Southern California's World Building Media Lab and the Technical Director, Creative Director and a Research Fellow for USC's Annenberg Innovation Lab; a Visiting Assistant Professor at Whittier College and director of its Whittier Other Worlds Laboratory (WOWLab); the Communications Director and a researcher for the Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab; a founding member of the Convergence Culture Consortium at MIT (now The Futures of Entertainment); a magazine editor; and a award-winning short film producer. more »
The opinions put forward in this blog are mine alone, and do not reflect the opinions of my employers.
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