Appendix N.5: This Time With Feeling

If you're a player in my Fortunes of Ewistar game, please don't read this post. This month, Vulcan Stev at Vulcan Stev's Database hosts the RPG Blog Carnival with the post, "Inspiration! Where Does Yours Come From?"1 Normally I'd dig a bit more into the prompt's discussion because that's often where the interesting stuff is, but in this case I think the post title does a good job of capturing the prompt in its entirety: Vulcan Stev's asking us where we get our inspiration. Clear enough, right? Credit: Claude Lorrain, Apollo and the Muses on Mount Helion (Parnassus), 1680. But, on reflection, maybe it's not quite so clear after all. I've never really understood what "inspiration" is supposed to mean. Or, I suppose, the word is used for so many things that it's rarely clear to me how a person's using in any given case. For instance, "inspiration" can often just mean a story, image, or slogan that motivates you to work toward a certain goal. So-called thinspiration is an obvious example…