Doug Bolden's wyrmis.com
The site that once was and still (somewhat) is.
The site that once was and still (somewhat) is.
What was once "The Dickens of a Blog // wyrmis.com" has now become three separate projects after several years of dormancy. Other things might exist, but will largely be treated as an extension of these things.
The basic blog for my thoughts, musings, reviews, writings, recipes and whatever else I wish to share. Much like this version, it is just a broad catchall for things I want to share [even if I am the only person that regularly reads it].
The blog where I share my solo roleplaying game exploints along with some tools, musings, oracles, and other oddities related to the hobby.
Not sure what "solo roleplaying" is? Well, well, well... seems like you might enjoy clicking! :wink.gif:
https://www.dougtalksweird.com
This is my focus blog on weird, horror, mystery, strange, and more speculative fiction. I review books and movies (etc) and talk about various tropes in those genres. The heavy focus is on weird, folklore, and cosmic varieties but moods and taste vary throughout.
I also want to take a second and give a special shout to The Doug Alone Prologue. My blogspot blog that was a forerunner to the Doug Alone [hence prologue]. A lot of the original stories and let's play sessions were posted there and have been left though newer content is now posted to Doug Alone itself.
Up through 2016, this blog had multiple updates a week. In the summer of 2016, due to reasons, this blog suddenly went to zero updates. This had two side effects: a) the people who were finding my blog suddenly saw a stop of updates around the time a lot of the then recent updates had been a bit fraught and b) a few details that were best kind of temporary ended up getting enshrined into the front page for months and then years.
What were the reasons? That's a bit complicated but it comes down primarily to three:
Just to catch everyone up, here are some of the various changes that have occurred:
Towards the end of Summer 2016, Kaz and I realized they were pregnant.
March 2017, our daughter—Barbara Philosophia Bolden—was born.
May 2017, unfortunately, Kaz's mom died relatively young due to an unexpected complication related to an illness.
Over the next couple of years, Kaz began their transition and became a lot more statisfied in their gender identity.
2017 - 2020, overall work satisfaction and hobbies were good and fulfilling. New gaming. New photography. Poetry took one hell of a nose-dive but overall life quality was good.
2020, COVID-19 occurred.
Summer 2020, Cinderella, our cat of 17-years, grew sick and died. Even without COVID it likely would have been soon but COVID made it harder to get her the care she needed but she lived relatively comfortable her last few months.
Later in 2020, my mom died not due to COVID but because of some health issues 100% exacerbated due to COVID.
Somewhere in here, we adopted two new male kittens. Both tuxedos: Marshal and Chase. The names come from Paw Patrol. I wanted to call them Machen and Blackwood but my daughter overrode me at the time.
2021-2022, we transitioned to more active lifestyles after COVID: getting out more, trying to work back in some more travel.
May 2022, while hiking near Chattanooga, TN, I fell and slammed my leg into some fairly hard stone and ruptured my tendon, destroyed my knee, tore muscles, etc. It took a decent amount of surgery, months of bed-rest, and a lot of physical therapy to get me back to walking again. I still walk through the use of two walking sticks and will never really be able to move unassisted to a degree.
2022, Kaz's dad died due to cancer and complications and the aftermath was pretty rough dealing with finances and such.
Early 2023, a third cat — this one orange — essentially adopted me. Due to the sounds he made while eating, we named him Turkey.
March 2023, Kaz and I, after 20 years of living in an apartment, finally bought a house and spent the first couple of months learning fun things like "Renovated houses sometimes flood due to unforeseen plumbing issues". We have spent the past year and half getting a lot better at being home owners.
At the start of 2024, I stopped smoking for the most part. I still smoke a pipe once a...week, month...not frequently. Smoke something like a pack of cigarettes a month. It is nice. Now I just need to work on losing weight. I gained quite a bit while more deeply disabled but it is hard to lose a lot of weight when I still have strong limits on how far I can move and how fast.
Mid 2024, I had been solo roleplaying for a bit and finally decided to make a blog for it (which is now: The Doug Alone). That blog not only got me even more into solo roleplay and back into creative expression, it is basically what got me back into sharing stuff online and blogging after a eight-year absence.
Mid 2024 through Early 2025, though I had been winding down for years, I finally started removing myself from most social media. Now only a few fragments remain and those are likely limited in their lifespan.
May to July 2025, we have moved to Belgium (near Brussels) for work and just general life reasons. It is not yet expected to be a permanent change. It has been an interesting challenge. But it is nice.
September & October 2025, the time finally felt right to start waking back up my online presence. Spent some time getting my domains shifted together under one roof, getting online hosting set-up better, and rebuilding the "Three Headed Serpent" as explained, above.
It is still there. For now, at least. The links below will lead you through the old pages.
However, keep in mind that the back-end updates never occurred so a lot of that will likely be flawed in the modern internet space. I will fix some things, delete some things, etc, but that will be a longish process and one that will take a bit of a backseat to focusing on moving forward.
I currently have no plans to extensively fix the stylings of this old work. I might change my mind as I go but a lot of this is over a decade old and while maybe not best forgotten — some of it is still quite useful — it still shows its age and my age at the time I wrote it.