Jake's Journal

Aaaaand, relax...

2009-11-27T19:40:24Z

Been a while since I posted, so quick update.

Well, October & November have been somewhat manic for me - in 8 weeks I've had:

Two LARP events (Harts & Unicorns, both were fun)
Five concerts (Ensiferum, SLF, Fleetwood Mac, Alice Cooper and Rodrigo y Gabriela) - would have been six except Dio cancelled :(
Birthday part for my sister in law
A week's holiday in Egypt
Work being very busy with an ongoing project

I now seem to have some time almost free to start relaxing... except it's 4 weeks to Christmas now *sigh* and I've hardly started doing the requisite shopping for it...

Oh, well, not that long to a new year where I can hopefully get a chance to catch my breath... before fatherhood strikes.

Entertainments

2009-08-22T16:33:23Z

Well, over the last couple of nights I've been to different ends of the intellectual spectrum for entertainment.

Thursday night was GI Joe at the Cinema (Jane didn't want to see Inglorious Basterds which was my first choice and District 9 isn't out yet). Reasonably amusing film apart from the fact that the two Scottish characters were being played by people who blatantly can't do a Scottish accent. One was Irish and was mercifully only onscreen for a short time, the other was Christopher Eccleston (ex Doctor Who) who we had to endure murdering the accent for the entire film *sigh*. Then there's the bit where the plane is voice controlled, but since it's built by a Scot, it's done in Celtic... at which point I was thinking "WTF? Do they mean Gaelic?" - then one of the characters turns out to know "celtic" - which is strange, because 90% of the people in Scotland can't even speak Gaelic. *sigh* And when did Gaelic/Celtic acquire a word for "eject"? This is the language where the word for helicopter is... helicopter.

cronvek managed to get tickets for Faust in a competition, so went along to see that with her. Main word for the show has to be "weird". Also kinda freaky. Most amusing is the fact it's supported by "The Ministry of Culture, Cults and National Heritage of Romania". All I can imagine is someone going to the government and saying "Hi, I've just started a new cult. I'm small at the moment, but I have ambitious plans for brainwashing; any chance of a government grant to get my first sacrificial altar?"

Summer Moot

2009-08-10T12:02:18Z

Well, the moot is past - 2.5 weeks to the Gathering... Various stuff under cuts:

Hot - getting onsite in 6 hours from leaving Edinburgh - new record for me, mainly down to not stopping off as much on the way, limiting it mainly to toilet breaks and grabbing water for drinking.
Not - lunch at services on the way down - chicken was dry and the sprite was awful - got a refund on the sprite, though.
Hot - food on the way back up at Westmoreland - that's reminded me of the gulf between Westmoreland services and Moto.
Hot - weather through most of the event
Not - the pissing down rain on the Thursday night, but at least I got my tent up before it started.
Not - not drinking enough water on Saturday which gave me a sore head and left me feeling a bit down.
Hot - 95th doing a lot of good stuff & making friends
Hot - doing rituals & getting good marks
Not - both the rituals I did were teaching which ends up being a bit "samey"...
Hot - enchanted through at range is awesome :)
Hot - got training sorted out so next year it'll be enchanted strikedown. At range :)
Not - didn't get down to the archery practice due to the camp getting attacked. Then the Gryphons got attacked, then our camp. Again.
Hot - none of the 95th died, despite rumours to the contrary.
Not - couple of Vipers died in the Akari attacks, including one of the Starcrafts who'd been, ah, helping in the brothel.
Hot - singing round the campfire - must do this more :)
Not - my knee playing up on Saturday night - I'm going to have to get some tubigrips for that for the G
Hot - while flexing my knee on Sunday morning, it very audibly clicked back into place with no pain. Tubigrip is still happening though.

Now, some really, really bad news for the fate of the planet. Unfortunately for the survival of the human race, I'm going to be a dad, meaning that my genes are going to continue their existence on this planet after I'm gone.
On the other hand, I'm happy about this, while being nervous about it (I believe the technical term is "bricking it") much as any expectant dad would be. The due date is about the 26th of January next year, all being well :)

Religion

2009-07-19T19:44:12Z

As you're probably aware, many christians tend to take a dim view of homosexuality, often citing Leviticus 18:22 "Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman"

Now, in the interests of fair mindedness, I've chosen a few other choice sections from Leviticus to show other things that God disapproves of (per Leviticus)

- Don't wear any clothes which are made of a mix of cotton & polyester (19:19 Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material)
- No goatee beards or mohicans (19:27 Do not cut the hair at the sides of your head or clip off the edges of your beard)
- tattoos (19:28 Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves)

I don't recall anything much being said about the wickedness of artificial fibres by the church recently, do you?

Since everyone else is doing it

2009-06-08T19:15:22Z

Total comments: 114

1	jakeriddoch	25
2	auriol	18
3	rayvanna	15
4	briccy	10
5	weeble_man	9
6	cronvek	7
7	phoenix_blaze	4
8	krenath	4
9	d20yfx	3
10	swiftblade	2
11	bhata	2
12	littlemiscowboy	2
13	stevie_goblin	1
14	tatty_tigermoth	1
15	fundessie	1
16	electrokin	1
17	raselhague	1
18	plucky_lass	1
19	nubantu	1
20	larpexiles	1
21	johnciall	1
22	tarynish_lt	1
23	sheyna	1
24	endis_ni	1
25	huuggs	1

Generated by LJ Comment Stats.

Spring Moot

2009-05-05T12:47:36Z

Tired, oh so tired...

Moot was good; my keen was low at the start, but I ended up having a pretty enjoyable event. New characters are always hard to start off, especially with a low turnout in the unit, but the surprise additions of Matt & Kristof helped.

It was also the first time I'd gone down the A74(M)/M6 to Derby from Edinburgh and saved about half an hour on the trip, so that's definately the way forward! Even got back while it was still light last night.

I'm actually regretting not going to the GEF now, but the holiday is all booked & paid for, so it'll have to wait until the Summer moot before I'm back.

Irony..

2009-04-15T12:21:22Z

Reading the paper and they had a picture from a school sit-in in Glasgow protesting against school closures with the painted banner saying "Save our school's" (sic).
Or, is it part of a cunning ploy to show they need better schooling?

Sudden outbreak of common sense...

2009-02-17T22:01:26Z

All I can say is about bloody time:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7894763.stm
Hopefully they can spread this to other chargers; it's a pain trying to find the right charger for {insert name of electrical appliance}.

Seen in edinburgh

2009-01-26T18:50:03Z

I was cycling home from work and saw a fairly tall bloke in a beret and greatcoat and had to take a double take as I thought it was briccy. Can you guess which of the following reasons made it obvious it wasn't him?

He had grey hair, not black?
Surely briccy would have let me know if he was in town?
The coat was grey, not black?
The fact the beret wasn't folded properly and didn't have a 95th cap badge?

I'll leave you to decide...

His grandfather's grandson...

2009-01-11T15:56:06Z

Nice to see Prince Harry following firmly in his grandfather's footsteps for verbal gaffes:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7822883.stm

While I have to agree it was pretty stupid and/or naive of him to use the term "Paki", the press is doing it's usual "shocked outrage" at the entire incident making the Himalayas out of a molehill. Again. It would be interesting to find out just how many other members of the class also used the same terms as him.

In other news, I seem to have caught yet another cold/flu bug. I seem to have had extraordinary luck at catching bugs this last 6 months... *sigh*

Edit: realised I really meant grandfather, not father; it's Prince Philip who's been "entertaining" for his gaffes rather than Charles.

jakeriddoch @ 2008-12-01T22:45:00

2008-12-01T23:08:11Z

MEME, duly yoinked from raselhague
01. Put your music player on shuffle
02. The first lines of twenty songs = a poem; the first line of the twenty-first song is the title.

I Guess I Could If I Wanted

I feel like I'm at something
The night has a thousand eyes
Turn the spotlights on the people
These are the eyes that can't see me

You walk through the subway
Mama they try and break me
I'm a wheel, a wheel
I can feel it in the darkness

These fits of depression are torturing me
Everybody's screaming we're only bleeding
You could find ambition
More food mama

I am he the bornless one
I'm your average ordinary everyday kid
Look into the future
Guess who just got back today?

sigh

2008-11-10T21:14:47Z

Well, I was at the Bullet for my Valentine gig last night and it was depressing to look around the crowd and think "I was moshing before most of you were even born".

*sigh*

That said, it was good gig. Bleeding Through were a bit "meh", but Lacuna Coil looked interesting... May have to look into them a bit more.

Also, I managed to get extremely lucky with parking and hit a spot right outside the Corn Exchange without trying :)

It's official...

2008-09-11T17:27:00Z

Ok, we've officially been sucked into becoming part of the US. See Disturbed's tour dates here where Glasgow is listed as:

Academy
Glasgow, U.K.
United States

*sigh*

Deciding whether to go along to that gig as well now...

Random stuff

2008-09-08T19:51:25Z

Been a while since I posted, so here's a random splurge of stuff.

Music:
I've been on a minor spending spree on CDs. Wound up buying four in a short space of time:
Dragonforce - Ultra Beatdown. Not bad, bit too much of "look how fast we can play!" and bits of it are pretty predictable. Fairly enjoyable, kinda reminds me of Helloween a bit.
Flogging Molly - Float. Pretty cool, nice songs.
Nightwish - Century Child. Very different; some absolute crackers of songs (mainly the first 3 on the CD) some stuff not so good. For fans, I'd recommend checking out this clip of Netta Skog (now playing with Turisas :P) doing a cover of Dead to the World.
Dropkick Murphys - The Meanest of Times. Excellent album, mix of the Pogues and rock/metal :) Definately going to get more of them, I think! Couple of decent campfire potentials in there too, (F)lannigan's ball definately rocks, trying to work out if I can mangle it into a Viper version ;)

Also went on a spree for concerts, got tickets to see the Damned and Bullet for My Valentine (Edinburgh) and the Stranglers (Glasgow).

LARP:
I haven't done the whole "post Gathering" spiel for a few reasons. Partly because everyone seems to have covered it and partly because it wasn't that outstanding an event for me. I enjoyed it, but I didn't get the level of buzz that the rest of the unit (and faction) seemed to have. Still, that's probably as much me not doing as much to give myself things to do as anything else, the Vipers are still a cool faction and I'm looking forward to more years of RPing with them.
Still not sure about October event; I'd love to go, but it's down in South Wales (of all places!). On the one hand, the Viper events are supposed to be really good, but on the other it's a loooong drive from Edinburgh. Probably going to be down to Lizii if she wants to come down (and keep me awake) or can't be bothered (and give me an excuse to save diesel and a day off work).
December event is definitely looking like a goer, heard good things about Bugman's so should be a good night :)

Fitness:
Something seems to be working on that as I still seem to be managing to drop a bit of weight and today's gym session was probably the longest I'd spent on the machines for a long time/ever and I could probably still have kept going a bit longer. Looking forward to a new, fitter me :)

jakeriddoch @ 2008-08-15T19:54:00

2008-08-15T18:57:00Z

Well, I'm surprised some of you couldn't get the last few songs on this:

6. When my foots on the throttle there's no looking back, I leave the motor tickin' over when she's back on the track - Saxon, "Wheels of Steel"; possibly not that well known.
7. We ride the cosmic streams of time, We are the fools you came to trust - "Soul Intruders" from Tyranny of Souls by Bruce Dickinson. Not surprised no-one got this one.
8. T-t-teacher stop that screaming, teacher dont you see? Dont wanna be no uptown fool. - "Hot for Teacher", Van Halen. You're all useless!
10. Well I'd like to tell you all about my dream, it's a place, Where strip malls abound and diversion's mere moments away - "Americana", Offspring.
11. Never win first place, I don't support the team, don't take directions and my socks are never clean - "Don't Let Me Get Me", Pink - dunno what it says most about, my musical taste or all yours ;)
12. Do unto others as they've done to you, But what the hell is this world coming to? - "Fight Fire with Fire", Metallica - opening track on Ride The Lightning.
13. I'm comin' down, comin' down, It took so long for me to come around - this one even had the title in it - "Comin' down" by The View.
14. The sky is cryin', look at the tears running down the street, I been lookin' for my baby, I wonder where my baby can be - And again, the title in the lyrics, "The Sky Is Crying", Gary Moore.
15. Well we know where we're going, but we don't know where we've been - didn't anyone listen in the 80s? "Road to Nowhere", Talking Heads.
17. The soldier came knocking upon the Queen's door, he said "I'm not fighting for you any more". Really surprised no-one got this; d20yfx came close, it's "The Queen and the Soldier", Suzanne Vega.
18. I've been phoning night and morning, I heard you say tell him I'm not home - "If this is it", Huey Lewis and the News
19. So throw it down, Cleveland rain, The queen of love has flown again - kinda obsure, "Wonderful One" from No Quarter by Jimmy Page & Robert Plant

Music Meme Pt 2

2008-08-11T19:03:37Z

Since there's still a few no-one got (including a few I'm pretty sure some of you will know), here's a repost with some more:

1. ~~Can't you see he's the man, Let me hear you applaud, He is more than a man, He's a shiny golden god.~~ Classico, Tenacious D guessed by weeble_man
2. ~~Only yesterday they told me you were gone, All these normal people, will I find another one?~~ Addicted to Chaos, Megadeth, guessed by weeble_man
6. When my foots on the throttle there's no looking back, I leave the motor tickin' over when she's back on the track
7. We ride the cosmic streams of time, We are the fools you came to trust
8. T-t-teacher stop that screaming, teacher dont you see? Dont wanna be no uptown fool.
10. Well I'd like to tell you all about my dream, it's a place, Where strip malls abound and diversion's mere moments away
11. Never win first place, I don't support the team, don't take directions and my socks are never clean
12. Do unto others as they've done to you, But what the hell is this world coming to?
13. I'm comin' down, comin' down, It took so long for me to come around,
14. The sky is cryin', look at the tears running down the street, I been lookin' for my baby, I wonder where my baby can be.
15. Well we know where we're going, but we don't know where we've been
17. The soldier came knocking upon the Queen's door, he said "I'm not fighting for you any more"
18. I've been phoning night and morning, I heard you say tell him I'm not home
19. So throw it down, Cleveland rain, The queen of love has flown again

Music Meme

2008-08-09T12:55:05Z

Since everyone else is doing it... 20 random songs from my playlist, guess song & artist, no Googling.

1. Can't you see he's the man, Let me hear you applaud
2. Only yesterday they told me you were gone
3. ~~Did did did did you see the frightened ones?~~ Goodbye Blue Sky, Pink Floyd, guessed by bhata
4. ~~Finished with my woman cause she couldn't help me with my mind~~ Paranoid, Black Sabbath, guessed by auriol
5. ~~Spring comes to Kyrie~~ Fields of Vanaheim, guessed by d20yfx
6. When my foots on the throttle there's no looking back
7. We ride the cosmic streams of time
8. T-t-teacher stop that screaming, teacher dont you see?
9. ~~Overkill enough is enough~~ Ultimate Sin, Ozzy Osbourne, guessed by weeble_man
10. Well I'd like to tell you all about my dream, it's a place
11. Never win first place, I don't support the team
12. Do unto others as they've done to you
13. I'm comin' down, comin' down
14. The sky is cryin', look at the tears running down the street
15. Well we know where we're going
16. ~~She was a fast machine, she kept her motor clean~~ You shook me all night long, AC/DC, guessed by auriol
17. The soldier came knocking up the Queen's door
18. I've been phoning night and morning
19. So throw it down, Cleveland rain
20. ~~Lazy days calling to you~~ Lazy Days by Robbie Williams, guessed by auriol

Interesting mix of songs in there... I've missed out a few "spoken" lines at the start of a couple of songs (3 & 8).

I iz published...

2008-07-28T20:10:22Z

As I'd posted before, I had a pic up for inclusion in a tourism website for Edinburgh. Today I got a mail through saying that my picture had been selected :) Go me! ;)

Pointless comment of the day:

2008-07-26T10:11:02Z

From http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7526628.stm, a story of an American who shot his lawnmower after it wouldn't start (as you do...):

A local retailer said that Mr Walendowski might now have difficulty getting his lawn mower repaired.
"Anything not factory recommended would void the warranty,"

Urm, wow - who'd have thought - shooting a lawnmower could void it's warranty. They should make these things clearer in the handbook...

T in the park

2008-07-14T16:46:22Z

Well, back from T in the Park. Actually, I was home by half past 9 this morning, but went to bed for most of the day... Obviously more tired than I'd realised.

Anyways, higlights:

Weather - forecast was for rain Friday/Saturday and I think we had about 2 short showers and a few spots of rain :)
Verve - ace set, worthy Friday headliners
Eddy Grant - he seemed to be having a whale of a time onstage, including a bit of showing off with the guitar
Gun - on after Eddy, played a good set ending on "Word Up"
Stranglers - punk is back :) They'd also played a couple of songs I hadn't heard in ages, "Always the Sun" and "Strange Little Girl" reminding me that I need to listen to them more. Definately worth a recommendation!
Kaiser Chiefs - wild set, good vibe. Only downside is that 4 new songs felt like a bit much; while it's nice to hear the new stuff, it's generally a better vibe off tracks people know.
The Enemy - back to that punk thing; reminded me of the Jam, which isn't a bad thing...
REM - good close out to the weekend. Seemed to be a different sound for them live vs recorded which was cool.

Lowlights:

King Tut's tent being packed for a lot of the best gigs :( Need to sort something out there...
Queues, queues, queues. 45 minutes to get on the bus. Hour and a half to get through the gates (!).
Toilets - while they at least got cleaned this year (they didn't last year, which was... unpleasant), there were massive queues in the arena. Glad I'm a bloke, and the urinals usually didn't have massive queues.
Finding out that someone had died in his tent and another had been stabbed - kinda puts a downer on it.

So, need to try and get tickets tomorrow for next year's show - although I'm at an offsite meeting all day which might make it tricky. Hurrah for 3G cards + laptops :)

Meme

2008-06-25T20:10:06Z

Yoinked from littlemiscowboy

The Big Read reckons that the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books they've printed. Well let's see.

1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
2) Italicise those you intend to read.
3) Underline the books you LOVE.
4) Reprint this list in your own LJ

1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling - maybe some day... too much hype for me, though.
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Bible
7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare - some of them
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19. The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25. The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34. Emma - Jane Austen
35. Persuasion - Jane Austen
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41. Animal Farm - George Orwell
42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding - admittedly at school, but...
50. Atonement - Ian McEwan - saw the film, don't really feel the need to read it.
51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52. Dune - Frank Herbert
53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold - hated it!
65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones' Diary - Helen Fielding
69. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
73.The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett - I think I've read it - either that or I'm misremembering from seeing it on film/TV.
74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses - James Joyce
76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77. Swallows And Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal - Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession - AS Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte's Web - EB White
88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94. Watership Down - Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

So, 14 out of 100 - not too bad... :P

BTW, isn't 98 redundant because of 14????

Photography

2008-06-25T17:33:34Z

As some of you might know, I'm trying to take up photography and I've been putting pics on Flickr for a while. However, it's all been a bit of fun, nothing serious although once I got better, I might take it more seriously.

Today, I got an email through:

I am writing to let you know that one of your photos with a Creative Commons license has been short-listed for inclusion in the fifth edition of our Schmap Edinburgh Guide, to be published late July 2008

Makes me think maybe I have a better eye for a photo than I thought!

For info, the picture they're referring to is here
Personally, I didn't think it was that great; the composition isn't too bad, but there's too much haze in the air. Still, could be my first published photo (even if it doesn't mean I get paid for it). :) Of course, they could decide not to include it anyway, but we'll see...

Worst cover songs

2008-06-23T16:29:17Z

Noticed this in the paper while getting a haircut and just found it on the BBC news website: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7468837.stm

How can any list of worst covers not include the Scissor Sisters murdering "Comfortably Numb"? Yes, let's take a song about someone being messed up with drugs and mental problems incapable of performing a gig... and make it a nice happy dance tune... I was driving when I heard it first and I was lucky not to crash, that's how shocked I was with the cover.

And don't get me started on Rolf Harris doing "Stairway to Heaven" *shudder*

Moot 1

2008-06-16T19:08:38Z

Well, various people have been posting about the moot, so figured I'd do my bit...

Overall, a good event. It was a lot of fun bringing in the new group with new characters. I spent a lot of money on new kit, but I'd expected to do that before I got there anyway. The stuff I have now is hopefully mostly re-usable in various places if I need it to be.

After 2 years of doing the whole "no armour" thing, I was worried about being too hot, getting fed up of the weight, etc, but overall it wasn't too bad; I think the type of armour I have isn't as warming as what I used to have. Between the armour and body dev, having 5 hits per loc is a welcome respite from being a 1 hit wonder! Even the make-up wasn't too bad, although it's a nightmare having an itchy nose at times. Still need to work on the teeth, though.

Bullet points:
Good:
- New unit & characters; everyone seems to be having fun with it, although 2 have wimped out of the make-up already...
- Vipers faction; pretty much everyone was willing to come speak to us and get us involved.
- Being able to actually fight and not have to run away!
- Weather; almost completely dry and not ridiculously hot.
- Being loaned the Demon bane sword and helping the Unicorns fight off their attacks of demons :)

Bad:
- getting a headache in the final battle which meant I couldn't enjoy it as much as I'd wanted to. Seemed to be a combination of heat, light, dehydration and contacts causing a bit of eyestrain.
- Armourer's guild duty was mostly boring.
- No diesel at Asda or the Shell on the A52; meant I had to pay motorway services prices, although it wasn't as big a ripoff as it sometimes is.

Looking forward to Moot 2 and especially the Gathering :)

I lol'd

2008-05-30T16:24:42Z

This gave me a laugh at lunchtime when I checked BBC's website:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7427206.stm
Now, I should probably be annoyed/sad/infuriated by the stupidity being displayed, but I can't help but laugh at it.