Urspo plays (inner) Dungeons and Dragons

I took down The Dungeons and Dragons Monster Manual the other day, for a sort of late night bed time story. For thems unfamiliar with Dungeons and Dragons, it is a game of fantasy mostly in the minds of the players. One person is Dungeon Master, responsible to make a world and a quest for the other the players. There is a goal to find a treasure or destroy the villain etc.. No quest is done without adversity. Rather than people, the D&D antagonists are monsters – and there is no lack to choose from. They have heaps. Indeed! My copy of The Monster Manual is MM-III, which boosts on its back cover ‘500 fearsome foes!” Jolly good fun! When a group encounters a monster, the Dungeon Master announces what type, how many. You are trying to pick the lock of door when coming up behind you/your party are six owlbears and a shambling mold. That ain’t good. Everybody starts rolling dice to see how much damage they give and receive. A ‘saving throw’ tells you if you missed whatever was tried against you and vice versa.

As Anna Russell famously said “I’m not making this up you know!”

It is one thing to whack away at a group of zombies, trolls, or stirges (my favorite) but what about the monsters in one’s mind? Indeed, the header of my blog reads now and forever:

To live is to battle with trolls in the vaults of heart and brain. To write; this is to sit in judgment over one’s Self.

Come on into my mind and see what D&D monsters lurk in the recesses of my pumpkin.

The Past Intruder. This devious creature lurks in rafters or just out of sight and makes a jump to insert its snout into my brain to inject a painful or embarrassing memory, usually some awful stupid thing from my youth, something I have no need to remember. The Past Intruder isn’t difficult to fight off but it’s hard to kill off and likes to keep coming back.

The Mind Flogger. This is a cousin creature to The D&D Mind Flayer, a very nasty entity indeed, that sends out psychic energy to fry your brains into docility. The Mind Flogger isn’t so lethal. When encountered, it zaps my brain into immediate short term memory loss, making me incapable of remembering what I was doing or why did I come into this room or what was it that Someone was saying. The Mind Flogger seldom kills but if I fail to make my savings throw, I will be stupid for some time.

Refrigerator Sirens. I’m not talking about The Sirens who tried to lure Mr. Odysseus to his doom, but a later version who live in the kitchen, usually on middle shelf of the Frigidaire. At night they sing their sonorous song for me to follow it into the kitchen come look for them. They and their song quickly disappear upon opening the fridge door but while I am in there, might as well eat something at eye level.

The Car Key Gnomes. Urs Truly has written frequently on these types. They are little folk who take items and place them in areas no one would think to look to find them. They are most fond of keys, but are content with moving wallets, headphones, cellphones, and pencils. The Cup Fairies are similar but limit their shenanigans to half-consumed tea cups and glasses of water. I am better at battling these two as my wizardry spell has improved to keep put-down items to stay where I place them.

Cerebral Will-o-the-wisp. The usual ones live in swamps and forestland while these lurk just outside my immediate vision. I will be doing something, minding my own business, when I am distracted by something across the room causing me to loose track of what I am doing and focus on the distraction or worse get up to see. As soon as I try to approach it, it moves away. I go chasing after it, my project abandoned and maybe never returned to. Rationalists in the house suggest using a strong focus spell or ingestion a magic potion like methylphenidate to assist with these pesky monster types.

Spo-fans may recall Henrik The Ghost and ask if he is a D&D monster. No he is not. Henrik isn’t a monster but a nuisance. For awhile I thought he was the one responsible for generating as if by magic piles of laundry to use to smother me ,but I think this may be a new monster to itself. I will see if MM IV has anything to say about such.