Rambles & Whimsy is a creative blog packed with horror articles, strange history, true crime, movie reviews, tabletop RPG advice, writing updates, science curiosities, and darkly funny essays. From cosmic horror and cursed objects to Dungeons & Dragons tips and behind-the-scenes looks at original fiction, Rambles & Whimsy is a cabinet of stories, curiosities, and creative oddities for readers who like their facts fascinating and their fiction a little strange.
Crying is a Free Action
Crying is a Free Action is my corner of the internet for all things tabletop role-playing.
Here you’ll find thoughts on running games, building worlds, telling better stories at the table, and surviving the occasional rules argument. I write about Game Mastering, player habits, storytelling tricks, and the strange, wonderful chaos that happens when a handful of people sit down with dice and imagination.
Some posts are practical advice. Others are reflections from behind the GM screen after many years of rolling dice and making things up as I go.
Whether you’re a veteran GM, a curious player, or someone who just loves the idea of collaborative storytelling, you’re welcome at the table.
Grab your dice, check your character sheet, and remember:
Sometimes the only thing left to do… is cry.
The Chop Shop
The Chop Shop is where things get a little darker.
This corner of Rambles & Whimsy is dedicated to horror in all its strange and wonderful forms. Here you’ll find essays on unsettling history, disturbing curiosities, eerie folklore, and the stories behind some of the genre’s most fascinating creations.
Sometimes we’ll dig into real-world horrors that are stranger than fiction. Other times we’ll explore the films, books, monsters, and ideas that make the genre tick.
If it’s creepy, macabre, grotesque, or just plain fascinating, it probably belongs here.
So step inside, if you dare. The lights are low, the scalpel is sharp, and there’s always something interesting on the table.
Rambles & Whimsy
Rambles & Whimsy is my little corner of the internet where curiosity gets to stretch its legs. Here you’ll find odd stories, strange history, creative musings, and the occasional rabbit hole that was simply too interesting not to follow.
Some posts explore writing and storytelling, others dig into peculiar facts, folklore, forgotten people, or the weird corners of culture that make you pause and think, “Huh… I didn’t know that.”
Think of it as a cabinet of curiosities in blog form. A place for ideas that don’t quite fit anywhere else, but are too fascinating to ignore.
If you like stories, strange trivia, creative thinking, and the occasional bit of delightful oddness, you’re in the right place.
Pull up a chair, pour yourself a cup of tea, and have a ramble.
Horror Has a Class Problem
Horror has always known how to spot the rich and the poor before anyone spills a drop of blood. From murderous aristocrats and immaculate penthouses to rusting cars, bad teeth and houses at the end of dirt roads, class is often written into the monster long before the monster acts. But why does wealth get a motive while poverty gets a chainsaw?
When the Dice Say No
What happens when the dice say no?
Too often, the answer is: nothing. The rogue fails to pick the lock, the ranger loses the trail, the bard can’t sway the guard, and suddenly the game is staring at a dead end with all the charm of a smug brick wall.
This article is about making failure useful. Not kinder. Not softer. Useful.
We look at how failed rolls can move the story, shove the party sideways into fresh trouble, or explode dramatically when the stakes are high. From botched lockpicks and awkward bargains to traps that wake up and cursed idols that become everybody’s problem, this is a practical guide to keeping the game alive when the dice betray you.
Because failure should still have teeth.
And if nothing interesting happens when the roll fails?
Don’t roll.
Horror Tropes Under the Knife
The Harbinger: The Lunatic Who Was Right
Every horror story has someone who knows what is coming.
They are the wild-eyed stranger beside the road, the traumatised survivor nobody believes, or the obsessive researcher shouting into the digital void. They warn the heroes, get dismissed as mad, and are inevitably proved right by a rapidly expanding pile of corpses.
This instalment of Horror Tropes Under the Knife examines the Harbinger: horror’s battered Cassandra, doomed to see the nightmare clearly and cursed to be ignored.
There and Back Again
Too often, travel in fantasy RPGs becomes either a hand-waved loading screen or a mandatory wolf tax. But the road should be more than dead space between the tavern and the dungeon. It should reveal the world, test the party, foreshadow danger, create choices, and make the destination feel earned.
In this article, we look at how to make travel exciting without turning it into a hex-crawl tax return, from meaningful random encounters and campfire moments to consequences that pull on boots and start walking toward the players.
Also included: a big d100 table of travel encounters that aren’t just wolves.
Probably.
When the Monster Has a Point
Horror monsters are rarely innocent, but they are often evidence. From Frankenstein’s Creature and Godzilla to Candyman, the Xenomorph, Sadako/Samara, the shark in Jaws, and the zombie horde, this article puts the monster on trial and asks an awkward question: what if the creature is not the disease, but the symptom? Sometimes horror’s real terror is not the thing with claws, teeth, hooks, or cursed videotapes. Sometimes it is the world that made room for it, profited from it, ignored it, or called it unnatural after creating the conditions that brought it crawling into the light.
04-09-26 On some pacific islands, shark teeth are used to make skin tattoos.
03-09-26 Roughly one-third of Greenland, the worlds largest island, is national park.
02-09-26 Babies born in May are, on average, 200g heavier. This could be due to the extra sunlight, and therefore vitamin D, that mothers are exposed to. The weight of a foetus increases by around 2.4 billion times in 9 months.
01-09-26 28 grams/one ounce of gold can be drawn to 69 kilometres/43 miles long.