Ran the third game in the Harlequin arc today. I think it went well - the format was a bit weird, in that it was very much non-linear, but people seemed to enjoy it.

Currently feel utterly drained and blah to the point of constant trembling from not eating properly and being so tired before we even started. Also I'm worrying about a couple of people, but that's nothing new.

Oh well. Four more regular games in the arc, the maybe next year's HL 36hr to run to finish it off.

Are full or empty beer bottles sturdier and does their fracture-threshold suffice to break the human skull?

Heck yes.

Banquet was certainly interesting, and not entirely what I was expecting - even though I knew it was a level 2 sanctioned event, I assumed it would still be relatively sedate.

Boy, was I wrong.

Rosalind offered up sex in exchange for retrieving one of her scouts from the bandits after a simple tracking session went horribly wrong only to find out he was already dead. She ended up retaliating by trying to chase down two bandits on her own and cutting the ear off a captured bandit with far too much enthusiasm.

She is now the chosen daughter of Khubeth, Moredhel god of the hunt, after the previous incumbent basically went "Here you go!" and has been commanded to start a cult in his name.

Just to complete the evening, Orthae (her friend-with-benefits-honest) got himself doubly cursed - he couldn't lie, and he couldn't see or interact with anyone he cared about and any attempts to cheer him up only made things worse. This led to various attempts to communicate which degenerated into throwing things at him and not quite shouting at him for being emo.

So, yes, I enjoyed it, Rosalind is now about one incident away from a nervous breakdown, and I still feel guilty for being successful and not dying...

IC recounting may happen laters.

Instead of working on my padding this weekend while staying quietly at home with the lurgy, I ended up making a phoenix mask and a new set of spider legs for the game on Sunday.

There's a sense of satisfaction involved when the monster that picks up the spider legs decides he doesn't want to take them off again...especially when all that was involved was two large pairs of black tights, two and a half cheap newsrags, some thick edging ribbon and some linen thread. I may need to make a spider hat to go with them at some point, and wings for the phoenix.

Edit: Courtesy of Louisa...spider!

As I'm now part of the scary grown-up world of being a car owner, does anyone have any recommendations on which insurance companies aren't going to screw me over?

Edit: Cheers all, I've decided to go with Direct Line simply because they're offering me the best price and cover combination. And yes, putting Warren on there saved me £60...

One night of bad sleep on top of larp, my hip is now a little ball of firey pain.

If I'm unexpectedly grumpy at you, please don't take it personally.

It's a ten year old Ford Escort Finesse 1.6l with 63k on the clock in near perfect condition.

And it's red.

On the other hand, I can't currently pay for it because the Halifax have suspended my account. Argh.

I have a new housemate that I approve of.

Not only is she an extreme Pratchett fan (hush magicaddict), but when I said I was working on making armour padding she said she'd come help if I needed it. Then I caught her cleaning the kitchen. I approve.

Speaking of the padding, quilting padding is evil, evil stuff. It catches on rough surfaces such as holes in fingers from unexpected pins and stretches unexpectedly. Currently the padding is going slowly but steadily; think it'll take me two weeks rather than one, so this will be a monstering weekend.

I have the kit fair-let sorted out, which makes me happy. I organised things in a grown-up way! Pity I can no longer attend it, but that's probably all for the good.

Now I need to put my payment for Banquet in, if I can summon the keen in the slightest. So far keen is very much not happening due to various.

...my room looks like it has the pox under the stuff thrown merrily everywhere, my knee hurts from spending too much time balancing on it to avoid touching the fabric, my throat and lungs and sewing machine are full of fluff and my fingers are full of holes, but...

Caroline has a cloak and a shirt. And, apart from a few wibbles, they're damn fine. Really, really damn fine.

I'll post pictures once I've taken them.

I just really, really hope they fit...


Next week, I make my armour padding. That should be different ^_^

I don't like the person that the CP Viper boards seem to be making me become.

And I'm not sure what to do about it other than give up reading them altogether, and possibly CP as well. Except I don't want to just up and quit until Rosalind is played out; I felt bad enough about doing that to Whisp and all the people she did manage to interact with.

Why do I get the feeling that Ros is going to get a lot more suicidal very quickly?


Edit: Or I ask for one of the admin to IP ban me from the boards. That could work.

Moved to a new site for this year - Glenny Wood, near Nailsea (Bristol way for all the northern types). Quite a neat little site all told, but there is an emphasis on the little. Decent size hall with a patio and portico arrangement, not much in the way of a camping ground on a slope, adventure playground, lots of wooded slopes to run up and down in a manic fashion. Maybe a better 24hr site than a 36hr site, although not much room for a tournament ring, but it worked for the compact come-back-to-this-spot-repeatedly plot.

I spent a lot of the weekend playing Eve from Wall.E. This was Caroline and Dave's fault. I had innate Disruption 12. This was my fault.

I also played an 'avatar' of an elven god of Anarchy, and utterly confused the players by hiding the token they were meant to collect off me behind my back in my bag straps while holding out my dagger to them. This lead to them running off with the dagger, only for Warren to come puffing back up the hill some time later muttering curses at me.

The atmosphere was remarkably relaxed; I only recall one serious rules argument over the weekend, and that was due to a Tony clarification that makes no sense (one of the many new ones). Dave's cooking was awesome, and there were copious hot drinks and automatic tidying due to the entire monster crew playing the likes of Kryten and other robots when not otherwise engaged.

The plot was engaging and mostly straightforward and finished up the campaign nicely. It also included an unexpected aerial battle between the players in a flying ship and goblins in hot air balloons, simulated by the entire monster crew shuffling towards the player crew in a threatening manner and having Dave shout Right or Left at us as appropriate.

It was good, and I got away with stealthily feeding birthday cake to people without people singing at me.

...that so many of my friends need a pick-me-up right now, here are two things that might help a little.

The Wondering Minstrels - an online poetry anthology picked by random students over the course of seven years.

My Life Is Average - random snippets of people's lives, often surreal.

Still can't decide what vet pick to take - I have a short-list, but don't know which one to take. Help?

Choices from:

General - Corp 1. This is more for Mute (sentry killer) and Enhance Senses than for healing, although I'm trying to work out how to covert cast on scouting jaunts successfully.

Versatility - Tracking. We currently only have Vinnie who can track, and as he can't get to all events a second person would be helpful.

Discern Truth (if this is a human pick); Again, doesn't seem commonly taken, and given some of her duties it could come in very handy.

Scrounge/Forage are also possible, but lower on the list for now.

I tend to sing along to music if I'm listening on my mp3 player and my brain is otherwise occupied.

So far this morning I've looked up three times to see my work colleagues staring at me.

Going to hide in a hole now.

Books have been shipped this morning.

Hopefully they will arrive some time in the next couple of weeks.

Will start collecting teh monnaies from people once they arrive - Sarah, will send you payment details asap.

I was going to wait until I was back on an even keel before posting my round up, but it looks like that isn't going to happen for a while.

To put it in short, I'm already starting to regret my decision to stay in CP.

One of my main reasons for disliking fest systems is the proportional increase in drama ooc, not helped by the proportional increase in dickheads. I get that this is a downside of putting a large group of people with artistic temperaments in an emotionally charged situation for whole weekends at a time, but it's wearing me down. To be honest it's leaving me angry, frustrated and inclined to consider switching factions at least to get away from a certain group before I inflict ooc violence on them. Then again, given my response to their query about whether I knew ic what had happened to Agmar it wouldn't surprise me that I 'just happened' to get targeted and murdered at the next event.

Anyway.

Had a pretty good event for the most part - the Nameless were shaping up really well, we'd started getting some snacky bits together, we'd got ref-praise vicariously.

True, I still suck utterly at the scouting stuff, but that can be learnt with practice.

Orthae and Rosalind being publicly and obviously together only received one negative comment, which was a bit of an anti-climax, but it paves the way for future insanity. Ros successfully got away with switching back to her real accent on a regular basis without being noticed, and had two arguments with Jemmy without getting caught. She also got away with knocking out Malus, but he had just done likewise to Orthae so it was all okay.

Also, have bought a sword.

This has gone horribly rambly, but meh.

Edit: Turns out the person I ranted at was in fact Spence. I'm not sure if that counts as a "Whoops?" moment, but I suppose at least now the refs know where I stand - on the side of cleansing things with fire.

I've found quite a good vanity publishing site, and I've just prepped Traveller for printing.

To put it in short: anyone want a copy? £2.50, and I'll even sign it for you ;)

Will want to put in the order soon, so any takers let me know by Friday please.


Running total: 10 copies.

Order now placed.