Starting Now... A Few Years Later... PART TWO!

(( ... continued ))

As it turned out, all we needed were a few cheesy "McDonalds Drive Thru" headsets, a nearby computer and a penchant to ramble. He explained that we would try to plan out a thing or two to discuss and hopefully share our AWESOME gaming experiences and wisdom with listeners.

.... not that we believed there would be any.

So next week, we sat there with a circa 1937 microphone, enough cables and wiring to gag a mule and a plan. The plan consisted of Chris pointing at people and giving them frantic gestures to get them to pipe up and contribute.

Well, that in itself isn't very interesting, but what IS interesting is that I LOVED IT! I was instantly our Podcast's #1 fan. I started calling myself "The Shark" just because it sounded tough, mysterious and.... well.... sharky!!

Pretty soon I was bogarting the microphone with the best of them. We talked about what games we were playing, how we created characters, why we gamed, women, booze, movies and dang near everything that popped into our heads! We recorded these for ourselves, but soon realized that people were listening to us.

....Wow.

People started writing to us asking questions, requesting advice, and just overall wanting to contribute to the podcast. To handle all of this, Chris built a website and forums for us.. Now people could interact with us directly. To me, this was the single coolest thing I'd ever been a part of.. I was experiencing an almost perpetual multimediagasm!

I still experience the ticklepee-pees just thinking about some of the cool folks we interacted with on a regular basis. Brilliant people. Creative people. Down to Earth people.. People from across the world (we had listeners in Denmark and Eastern Europe... no kidding!) I still run into some of these people even now.

However, all good things must end. Scheduling conflicts, internal strife, divorce and other factors slowly prevented us from getting together and podcasting. Our listeners slowly drifted away to look for more active Podcasts, and we just kind of stopped. There was no speech given, no eulogies read... just silence.

But, it's STILL in there.. It's an itch under my skin that I can't figure out how to scratch. It's a nagging in the back of my mind... "Jeez, that would be awesome to 'Cast about.." I wonder what our listeners are listening too right now, and if I'd enjoy it too..

But most of all, I just wanted to cram as much of life into my mouth at once as possible...

RIP, Starting Now.

PS - Thanks to Miked! for inspiring me to reminisce about the show..

Starting Now... A few years later... Part One

Several years ago, in another life, a truly brilliant friend of mine suggested that we break into the brand spanking new world of podcasting. Our responses were a clear signal of how progressive minded our group was.. It went something like this:

What the hell is a Podcast? Why the hell should we do it? Will this cut into gaming time? HELL no! Can we make money doing it? Is it going to be work?

However, as I mention this, I realize that I've started this story in the middle. Let me take a step even further back..

**the air shimmers into flashback montage mode**

You see, I am a gamer. I'm not ashamed at all, I LOVE gaming. I love the people that game, I love my contributions to gaming and I love damned near every element of gaming. I play board games, card games, roleplaying games, computer games.. you name it, I play it.

Like every other element of culture, the people who game tend to gravitate towards others who game. Eventually, in many cases, you develop a "group". A group of gamers tend to share certain fundamental beliefs about gaming.... for the most part.

Anyhow, I have known my current groups for many years. At this point I'm really good friends with pretty much all of the folks I game with. We don't just hang out to game, we socialize in all other elements of our lives. So, there's a pretty strong bond there that lasts even longer than the gaming itself, as some people change their views on gaming in general. (Hang on, I'm SOOO almost back to the story at hand.. honest!)

So our gaming group, we'll call them TaNGG (Tuesday Night Gaming Group..) met weekly. The night consisted of an hour of BS'ing, 3 hours of solid gaming, a half hour of post coital BS'ing and then back to our normal lives.

One of our members, The Hoffmangler (AKA Mistah "H", AKA Hoffamunch AKA Chris..) is always on the cutting edge of whatever fad is coming our way. He ALWAYS inflicts this fad on us ruthlessly (for our own good) and then loses interest in the blink of an eye.

**Josh snaps awake, quickly wiping drool off his chin and forcing his eyes into what he hopes is an alert demeanor**

RIGHT!!

So, there we are.. Wondering what the hell Podcasting was all about, and what it would take to distract Chris from his "dream" of being real live podcasters.

(( To Be Continued.....))