Looking forward to Origins! Do let us know what all you get to play there.

How does one hug a YouTube video? How can I do that?

You have just participated in an ancient and sacred tradition, brewer. What you're drinking is not just beer. It is the stuff of a thousand cultures, a common thread through human history, one of the happy signs that we, as a species, can transmute the world around us into other things—into potions with the power to change the way we think and feel, into a shared experience across more than generations but continents and empires. Also, it is beer.

As you say, it reminds me a bit of the writer's life, too—all that time alone with your imagination and your concentration and your characters. So much is different about the actor's and the writer's experience, too, but I'm always intrigued by the commonalities. Think of the writer, alone at his desk, reciting dialogue to hear if it sounds right or miming to herself in search of just the right words to capture a bit of movement. The writer has, in many ways, the easier gig, because he gets to rehearse and rehearse until one good performance is down on paper—two shows a night sounds like a lot of work to me—but I also imagine that the actor's job is a little like being paid to jump off a bridge every night with the part as a parachute. That's exhilarating if you're up to it, right? I know that, for me, the loneliness of the writing job is some days a joy and some days a problem. So it goes.

What is it we say? Squee? Well, SQUEE! Dragon Age is wonderful, for sure, but I'm sort of especially giddy to see Felicia Day, this great cast and crew, all being put toward a dramatic project for the web, which is sort of swimming in comedies right now. That this project will be tying that drama to Dragon Age is like a bonus.

That's weird, 'cause I often spell it "dialogue" myself. Huh. I may have used that spelling to get it to sit right on the back cover, I don't recall.

ETERNAL LIES is going to be phenomenally fun, Wil. Thanks for coming on board that project. I can't wait until people see—and hear!—the finished product.

Honestly, Wil, I thought a little bit about being offended by that tweet. I found some of high school quite boring (and adored other parts of it) and I found college to be an experience I wasn't ready for, which is a form of "too hard," if you see my meaning. I've been a slacker and I've been a workaholic. I've worked the graveyard shift at a gas station, where I was mocked by customers, and I took a stab at what I thought would be my dream job. And here's what I know: Almost nothing worth having comes easy. Almost nothing goes as planned. I have some sympathy for kids who find college too hard. I have some sympathy for kids who might be bored by high school. Here's the thing, though: the grind is worth the toil when it leads to better things. Hard work is what gets the goods, and sometimes hard work isn't immediately rewarding or glamorous or satisfying. Sometimes it's just hard. Sometimes it's just work. We've all got to do things we don't like doing to get and to keep the things we love. So, anyway, I thought about being offended and I decided not to be.

You're a weird dude, Wil Wheaton. Go forth and conquer.

I will return the one I bought you, then.

So, then, you own that ornament now, right? We shouldn't get that for you, right?

Dragon Age was a bloody great time. (Get it? Bloody? I'm so lame.) I was so glad we got to play the same characters from Gen Con and see your Dalish Elf go through a little character arc and everything. I also really dug re-learning Pieces of Eight. I've got to put that game back in my bag for cross-country travels. Gamma World was a frakking blast. I loved the sheer volume of moves that Dancebot had in his repertoire. Magnificence. And beating mutant plant-pumas with a parking meter is just a rare treat. Like you, I'm not sure how often I'd play Gamma World, but I think I'm going to pick it up for the occasional pick-up game. Cheers to all the players in all the above games! I had such a great time at PAX Prime that I'm thinking about getting a room for PAX East, now!

This is excellent, Shane. Blog more.

Listen, when next I see you, I'm going to do this thing with my hands where it looks like you're giving off heat and I'm warming myself by your fire. That is exactly what I'm doing.

Last night I got a chance to play Steve Segedy's Vegas playset for Fiasco with a bunch of new players, and it continued the game's streak of damn good fun. I made the decision last week that I'd like to get real good at writing Fiasco playsets, and so I keep tinkering with them when I should be doing other things.

WTF? Could I look more bored in that photo? I was just trying to play it cool in the face of such overwhelming epic grandeur, I guess. Such a good time.

Aw, shucks. Thanks!

You know a pretty good book about dice, too, don't you? It'll be for sale at the IPR and Adventure Retail booths at Gen Con, as a matter of fact. :)

Hear, hear. Author Jeff VanderMeer put it this way: "Everyone you know if more than one thing." I am a big believer in this thought. Accepting and embracing people's complexities is good for all of us, I think.

Oh. Oh my.

Oh, THIS thing you've been working on since December! :)

Is this relaunch of WWdN something you've been working on since December?

It kills a part of me to know that I am moving back to Chicago just in time* to miss w00tstock. It stabs this part of me with one of those plastic cocktail swords and leaves it bleeding on the warehouse floor. Sadface. Of course, I am sad because I know the show will be hawesome, and that I will miss it, and that it will be hawesome. So have a great show and say hi to my beloved Chicago for me. *(Okay, I'm missing it by weeks and weeks, shut up.)

Not boring. Sometimes we don't know what something's about until we're in the thick of the writing of it, right?

You got me with this one, Wil. I'll admit, I projected my own experience a little bit onto yours, but you got me choked up all the same. Would that we could appreciate great gigs while we had them. Here's to doing it from now on.