I'd guess my most persistent role-playing-related passion has been mapping. Even during the years when I lacked an active group I would happily crank out maps, some of them massive affairs on 17x22 paper. I've spent endless hours trying out new techniques on paper and the computer... and never got tired of the process.
But I think I might have just completed my last elaborate map. I had finished a simple top-down city map for my next adventure, but it just didn't look right, so I embarked on something more demanding. But detailed maps require countless strokes, and about halfway through I realized (yet again) that's something I just can't do anymore. There are still a million details I want to add but the will required to do so has long fled the scene. I think my hands are going to ache for a week just getting this far!
I'm sure I'll figure out something artsy for future efforts to try and paper over the lack of pen strokes, but as with noodling on the guitar for hours on end, I will miss sorely my happy hours fashioning maps.
But I
do have a cool mental image for the dungeon map... and I'm sure after a couple days rest I'll feel much better...
