For the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would i want to do what i am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something… almost everything – all external expectations,all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to loose.
Steve Jobs, college dropout and CEO of Apple Computer, Stanford University Commencement, 2005
What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.
– Herbert Simon, Recipient of Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics and the A.M. Turing Award, The “Nobel Prize of Computer Science”
Yesterday I was looking at the Wizards of the Cost website and discover a new link “New To D&D Videos“. They have a great YouTube video on that page called “Introduction to D&D”. It is one of the better videos for people who are just learning about Dungeons & Dragons. So if your new to D&D, have never played, or just want to understand why i keep writing about it on my site here, Take a minute and watch this video. Hopefully it will answer some questions.
I have no clue what the HELL came over me or what possessed me to do this. I feel like I had a real ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind‘ moment. You know the scene where Richard Dreyfuss is eating diner with his family, and he uncontrollably starts sculpting the Devils Tower from his mashed potatoes? That’s how I felt! I just saw these two Apple iPod Touch boxes lying around and I uncontrollably starting building a dice tower out of them with a rubber band, an exact-o knife, and some super glue. It took me about 45 minutes.
I have had dice towers on my mind. They seem like a good idea and a sure fire way to increase the randomness of ones dice roll.
After building the iPod Dice Tower and showing it to my weekly Dungeons and Dragons group, the response was not what I hoped for. Everyone seemed very impressed for the first round of game play, but after that everyone switched back to just rolling their dice on the game table.
Here is how you can make an iPod Touch Box Dice Tower
1.) You need to iPod Touch boxes. Not just a top and a bottom but two complete boxes. You will also need an exact-o knife (modeling knife) and Super Glue
2.) You can see how the top iPod Touch box holds the bottom iPod Touch box insides it’s self. The bottom of the box has a layer of foam attached to it which makes for a soft landing for your dice.
3.) Next we are going to be prepping the hard plastic case that held the iPod Touch still in the it’s box.
4.) Being very careful with the knife your going to want to cut the top 3rd of the plastic case off. This will be used as one of the “Shelfs” that the dice will bounce off inside your iPod dice tower.
5.) Here you can see how I have attached the 2 cut off sections of the plastic case and super glued them inside the bottoms of 2 the iPod Touch boxes. One close tot he top and one close to the bottom.
6.) Carefully using the exact-o knife I cut out a square on the top of the box. I also cut and exit hole on the bottom of the same box. Here I am using a rubber band to hold the to bottom boxes together and placed them inside the top of the foam filled iPod Box
7.) Using super glue I attached the last 3rd of the plastic case to the top of the new iPod Dice tower. The whole in the plastic case just happens to the right size for a standard set of gaming dice.
Gotham City is plagued with crime and corruption in places high and low, but one man has taken a stand against evil of all forms: the dark avenger known as Batman. But now the Dark Knight is dead. “Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader” is a captivating and mysterious tale, the likes of which Batman and friends have never experienced before. Delving into the realms of life, death and the afterlife, no stone is left unturned in this exploration of every facet and era of Bruce Wayne’s life. Neil Gaiman, the multiple award-winning author of “Sandman” and “Coraline”, is joined by legendary artist Andy Kubert (“Batman and Son”) for the ultimate Batman story!
The hardcover edition I picked up also came with other Gaiman stories from Secret Origins #36, Secret Origins Special #1, and Batman Black And White #2. I felt that some of these stories where on par, if not better then “Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?”. One is a story on Poison Ivy which really lets you see her true side. A side I had never seen before.
Another story focused on the Riddler. I found this one very interesting because the Riddler is a character from the early days of Batman villains like King Tut, Book Worm, and Egg Head. The Riddle still exists today but (at least in my opinion) never really has found a nitch in the comics like the Joker, or Catwomen. In the comic it’s brought up by the Riddler and he comes off as depressed by it. It was just a good a good read.
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