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that time i hosted blizzcon

I’m sitting in Phoenix, hoping that I get on a flight that leaves in an hour, because the flight that should have put me home twenty-five minutes ago was cancelled after many delays. I’m on standby, and I’m cautiously optimistic. One way or another I’ll get home tonight, but I hope it’s earlier than later, because spending five hours in an airport isn’t my idea of a good time. Also, Fallout 4 is waiting for me.

Anyway, now’s a good time to catch up on some stuff.

First: Blizzcon. I was terrified. I thought I was prepared, but I just couldn’t shake the voices in my head that insisted the people who were going to hate me no matter what were right about how much I suck at everything. The stage was bigger than I expected (even though I expected it to be big), and the audience was enormous. At over 12,000 people, it was tremendously difficult to keep them all engaged at once, and even when I had around 7,000 people responding to what I was doing, I couldn’t think, “Wow, 7000 people are enjoying this!” all I could think was “You suck, Wheaton. Half the audience hates you.”  For the first part of my hosting, my IFB was turned up way too loud in my ear, and I could hear myself cranked up to 11 in just my right ear. It was very distracting, and it really threw me off. I couldn’t take the IFB out, either, in case the director needed to say anything to me. Which he didn’t. Yay.

I thought I was … okay … but the feedback I got from everyone there, tons of people online, and everyone at Blizzard was very positive. In fact, other than the people who were always going to hate me, and the people who are determined to be angry about all sorts of things, everyone seems to feel that I did a good job.

If I were grading myself, I’d give myself a solid B. I made some embarrassing mistakes, like saying it was 2016 several times (I blame my brain for being excited that the next day was my 16th wedding anniversary) and for saying “Etcetera” when I was supposed to say “E T C” during the talent contest. In my (weak) defense, I didn’t (and still don’t) know who ETC was, which I guess will confirm that guy who was all “WIL WHEATON IS NOT QUALIFIED TO HOST BLIZZCON” so congratulations to him. Maybe they’ll find that guy and hire him for net time. To further defend myself, I read what was on my card, which said “Etc.” and not “E.T.C.” which probably would have saved me some embarrassment and some hardcore WoW players consternation.

The stuff I wrote, though? It seemed to work out mostly well. I asked Ryan to help me write some journal entries from the point of view of a character we called Boogers the Boggit, and while I felt like it died in most of the room, a ton of people have told me they thought it was clever and funny. I’ll repost it here in the next few days and you can decide for yourself if I’m the worst thing, ever.

Blizzcon itself, though, was incredible! The enthusiasm and passion and excitement was infectious, and I honestly feel sad for anyone who loves the Blizzard games who can’t embrace that sense of community because they need to be mad about stuff. The gatekeepers are really missing out on something wonderful.

After Blizzcon, a bunch of us went over to Trader Sam’s at the Disneyland Hotel, and we had all the flaming drinks until it closed. I may have been partially responsible for giving Randi Harper one of her first hangover, but I’d never admit to that. The next day, Anne and I celebrated our anniversary with some of our friends at Disneyland and California Adventure. It was incredibly fun, and Chris Hardwick and I posted a bunch of dumb pictures of us being silly while we were there. They’re on our Instagrams if you want to see them.

Monday, I flew out to Atlanta to work on Powers. I can’t say anything about it, but maybe I can after the episode airs. I guess that I can say that my day started at 430am, which was 130am as far as my body was concerned, but I was wrapped by 1pm, which is good because I was approaching an exhaustion I haven’t felt since we wrapped on Eureka and I went straight form an 18 hour day on the set to Dragon*Con without going to sleep.

I wasn’t prepared for how excited the cast of Powers was to meet me and to welcome me to the set, but I’m looking forward to going back next week to work with them again … right after I do another Big Bang Theory! Tomorrow, I start a few days on an episode that also features Bob Newhart.

Holy shit, I can’t believe that I get to meet Bob Newhart! I’m going to do my best not to go all When I Met Henry Rollins on him, but I will say that there’s a non-zero chance that, in the future, I’ll be doing a bit in my stand-up set that’s Bob Newhart’s agent taking a call from him about meeting a nerd who was embarrassingly excited to be there and made it really weird.

Okay, they’re about to start calling the standby passengers for my flight. Cross your fingers for me.

Eliot got comfortable on my desk this morning.
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if the zombies were real, they would have gotten me today.

Eliot is not a zombie, though she bites and claws like one if you touch her belly.

Yesterday, I finished writing all the stuff I plan to do at Blizzcon, with the help of my son, Ryan, who is both a fantastic writer and a very experienced Diablo and Warcraft player. I have decided that, since Diablo is my favorite of all the Blizzard games, and since it’s the only one I’m even marginally competent at playing, that’s where I’ll focus my stories and jokes and anecdotes. I’m still nervous as fuck about it, though.

All this week, my brain has been a real asshole. I’m having nightmares every night, from stress dreams to straight up terrors, and last night my idiot brain woke me up every five minutes so I wouldn’t oversleep and miss some very early radio interviews I needed to do today, because I’m on The Big Bang Theory tonight.

So, of course, after ensuring that I didn’t get any rest (though it says 8 hours on my sleep thing, I really feel like I slept for maybe 45 minutes) my brain decided that the best time to fall into a deep sleep was when the alarm went off. So of course I slept through it, and missed my first interview, which was a call into the Bob and Tom show. We tried our best to reschedule it for a little later in the morning, but due to something with football on their end and a very full schedule on my end, we weren’t able to make our ends meet. I’m disappointed, but there’s nothing I can do about it, now.

I did get to talk to a number of fun and friendly hosts across the country, including the hometown crew at KROQ, which was pretty great. I don’t listen to much radio these days, but I grew up on KROQ, and part of me always gets excited like a teenager when I get to do something with them.

After my interviews, I ate some breakfast and got ready to go do my training run. I’ve been staying on track with my Zombies 5K training, and I love it SO MUCH. I look forward to every run, even when it’s hard. Today, I began week 5 … and pulled the everlovingfuck out of my right calf muscle just as I was starting my first 10 minute free form run. I did everything I could to gently stretch it out, massage it, beg and plead and bargain with it to relax and let me run some more, but nothing worked. I limped back home for a little over a mile.

I’m sort of annoyed, but mostly disappointed, because I feel really good and happy when I’m running, and because I had a lot of gas left in the tank. I was pretty sure I’d be able to run the entire time today, and maybe exceed the 29 minutes of running I did a few days ago, too.

So I finished today with about 19 minutes of running and 40-something of walking, and I’m probably not going to be able to get back on the — horse? street? shoes? Whatever we call it when we go back out to run again — until Sunday at the earliest, and I leave Monday to go work on Powers. I hope I’ll be able to keep training while I’m on location, because the running part of my life reboot is my favorite.

Speaking of that, I’ve heard from thousands of people from all over the world about that post. I guess it’s been really helpful and meaningful to more people than I ever imagined, and the thing I wrote about artists getting paid for their work blew up, too. It feels good to say something helpful and positive when people are listening.

Checking in on the seven things I pointed out, I’ve been able to keep on track with all of them, except for watching more movies. I just haven’t had time, because all the Blizzcon preparation has consumed my life. When I’m not writing, I’m worrying, and when I’m not worrying, I’m worrying. So that’s fun.

I had a really exciting and awesome moment a few days ago, when I realized my life reboot had moved me from a size large to a size medium, and I had to get rid of more than half of my T-shirts. I also discovered that some clothes I bought months ago, anticipating losing a little bit of the flab around my belly, started to fit this weekend. It’s not the biggest deal in the world, but it’s still kind of a big deal. I don’t have the best self esteem on the planet, and something like putting on a shirt that I like, and fitting into it because I did the work to fit into it gives me +1 to awesome, even if it’s only temporary.

When I was supposed to be working on my Blizzcon thing, my brain threw a bunch of stuff at me that’s relevant to another story I’ve been working on. I allowed myself to write it down, even though it was technically Resistance (per the War of Art), because it’s still something I’m creating, and that I’m excited about. It’s a cool story, and I’m looking forward to putting it at the top of my queue after the weekend is over, and I’m done preparing my character for Powers.

If you’re on Project Reboot with me, I hope you’re enjoying it, and finding successes. Don’t give up if the successes you want aren’t the ones you’re having. Success of any kind is still success, and everything worth doing is hard.

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I’m joining the cast of Powers

Brian M. Bendis is one of my favorite comic writers, and Remi Aubuchon is one of my favorite TV writers, so when they offered me a role on Powers, I said yes.

All the specific details are locked down with an NDA, but I start work soon, and I’ll hopefully be able to share some things from the set once I settle in, like who is directing my first episode (someone I’ve been dying to work with for decades!)

Here’s some of the press release:

Brian Michael Bendis, an executive producer on Powers and co-creator of the comics, says this new character will be revealed in upcoming issues. Wheaton’s character on the show is described as “exciting, mysterious and powerful.”

[…]

The series is available on the PlayStation Store for free streaming to all PlayStation Plus subscribers, and can also be purchased episodically. Season 2 is slated for a 2016 premiere.

I’m still putting a lot of time and energy into writing, because the things I pointed out in my reboot post haven’t changed, but I love Powers, and I love the people involved, so I’m excited to be invited to play with them, and bring this character to life.

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you can’t pay your rent with “the unique platform and reach our site provides”

A very nice editor at Huffington Post contacted me yesterday, and asked me if I would be willing to grant permission for the site to republish my post about the seven things I did to reboot my life.

Huffington Post has a lot of views, and reaches a pretty big audience, and that post is something I’d love to share with more people, so I told the editor that I was intrigued, and asked what they pay contributors.

Well, it turns out that, “Unfortunately, we’re unable to financially compensate our bloggers at this time. Most bloggers find value in the unique platform and reach our site provides, but we completely understand if that makes blogging with us impossible.”

I translated this on Twitter thusly:

This set me off on a tiny bit of a rant:  

I’m very lucky to not need exposure or “reach” or anything like that, at least not right now and not this way. I’m also very lucky to be able to walk away from things like this because I believe it’s the right thing to do. If I’d offered this to Huffington Post for nothing, because I hoped they’d publish it, that would be an entirely different thing, because it was my choice.

I don’t know what the going rate is for something like this. At six cents a word, which is SFWAs lowest professional rate for short fiction (not a perfect comparison, but at least something to reference that’s similar), it would be $210. That’s not nothing, but it’s not house payment money. Maybe I should have just taken their fabulous offer of exposure?

I don’t think so, because it’s the principle of the thing. Huffington Post is valued at well over fifty million dollars, and the company can absolutely afford to pay contributors. The fact that it doesn’t, and can get away with it, is distressing to me.

The exchange I had with this editor wasn’t unpleasant, and I know that she’s doing what her bosses tell her to do. I don’t blame her for the company policy. If I’d brought this to Huffington Post and asked the site to publish it, it would be an entirely different situation, I think, (I already posted it on my Medium account, anyway), but this is one of those “the line must be drawn here” things for me. I don’t know if I made the right call, but I do feel good about standing on principle, and having an opportunity to rant a little bit about why I did.