Glass Half Empty

The week has been kinda uninteresting, hence the total lack of posting. One of our favourite receptionists at the Sports Centre busted her ankle in almost exactly the same way as I did last year, under almost exactly the same circumstances, and is now hobbling everywhere. My work is continuing: this week, I have been mostly implementing ring buffers in everything, as none of the fixed-length buffering code I hacked together some time ago actually works properly past the zeroth index. *sigh* I hate pointer arithmetic... So I'm not using it any more :)

Traditionally, I relax as far as possible on weekends. This means I tend not to get a lot done, but I'm unwound and ready to face the world again on Monday. Saturday this week may have been a record, even for me: I woke up past midday, and can't think of a single useful thing I did all day. Except maybe the washing. Hmm.

At least Justin was in town today. He, and I, and a few mutual friends had the chance to catch up, first over a pint in the Great Eastern, then later in Wagamama over tea. The food in Wagamama is pretty good (Japanese Cuisine, which ISN'T sushi, thank $foo), even if the wait staff are a bit dismissive. At least this time I didn't get stepped on, just nudged around a bit. And their chocolate fudge cake with vanilla ice-cream and wasabi sauce really shouldn't be that good.

...that was the old roleplay group, actually. Me and Justin, Al, Sam and Rhi: since Justin moved to Horsham, and one of us got involved with an SO, and the world got in the way... I'm not sure we're gonna meet too often now, and if so mostly as friends. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that, I suppose, even if a small part of me pines for Alex's Magical Tortoise, the Sensible Stealth Trousers and the other puzzling things that happened to our poor characters on a near weekly basis. Things move on, and I'm now aware of another roleplay group (coincidentally involving nearly all the same people, plus more) in the area to which I might wander at some point.

Guess we'll see.

In other news, my PC has been whining intermittently for a couple of weeks. Craig dropped in this evening, sat on my bed and talked for a bit, then stood up, handed me a washing-up sponge, and told me to wedge it between the machine and the desk. I did so. End of whine: 'twas a rattling case panel, it seems. I hate it when other people are right :)

The Glass: half-empty

A new year, just like last night at about this time, and still I haven't written anything of it down to supplement my unreliable memory. Well. My unreliable *personal* memory: facts and figures are easy, but what I did yesterday, who I met, what I said... fade, with time, and not much of it.

Anyway...

Seasonal break with the family was nice, even if my brother was only able to stay a couple of days due to Work in his hometown needing him on the 27th. It was nice to catch up with people in Worthing (aunts, uncles, cousins, old school-friends and so on), and the week or so I was there wasn't really enough. I must try to sneak back there a little more (not least so the home improvement work at my mother's house doesn't back up again... ;) ).

After the seasonal break, well, I had a whole day to organise myself for a New Years' party in Fishersgate. The theme? An 80s night (since all the attendees were born in or remember the 80s). The invitation? Had a still from the movie "Beetlejuice" on it. Since I still have all the parts for my Brighton Below costume in the cupboard, Instant Costume! Well, plus a green furry wig/hat from a stall in Kensington Gardens.

Navigating the streets and stations of Brighton in such a costume is an interesting experience, and reminds me (again) why LARPers tend to travel incognito and finish rigging their costumes at the event itself. Reactions from passers-by, and there were many, were mostly positive (even if I was misidentified as the Joker by a 6-year old). "Holy shit, it's a bear!" sticks in the mind, and the ear, somewhat, but the speak^Wshouter was emerging from an off-license, so alcohol may have been a factor. Still, rigging at the party would have lost the impact of the entrance (although it was tempered slightly by finding everyone else in more standard 80s wear. Oh well.)

The party itself was good, what with period food (good), period games (NES and 80s Trivial Pursuit, better) and period music (best!). Around 2340 (and just as my team was about to win Trivial Pursuit, damnit!), the 1980s party was invaded by an allied party taking place in the 1880s. The Time Agency and the well-known Tempus Fugitives appear to have been responsible, but no-one was harmed, and the temporally-displaced people adapted quickly to the change in scenery, and more quickly yet to the buffet. As for the temporally-displaced... well, it turned out that about 60% of the cast and players from Brighton Below were there. And there's me in a tweaked version of my bbelow costume, thinking I was relatively safe in throwing it on quickly for the party. Had I known they were coming... well, I'd have worn something else. So it goes, I guess.

...it still freaks me out slightly that of the 1880s group, there were I think two people I didn't know (or, at least, couldn't identify on sight). Granted, some of them took longer than others ('chelle, in particular, taking almost thirty minutes). These days, I know more people than I can recall in one sitting. Even two years ago, I don't think that was true.

Anyway, the new year thing happened, plus the extra second to account for the Earth's inconvenient rotational period, and there are photos of me dancing inanely on Facebook somewhere. I blame the punch, which I know had the best part of half a bottle of rum in it (and I should know, I put it there). A while after midnight, our party invaded the 1880s for a bit (a five minute walk to the relevant house), then we wound things up and I found myself walking home at 0530 in 2009. About six miles in the cold, in a suit, with a rucksack, and at the end of a very long day. I've no-one to blame but myself, really: I could probably have found a corner of floor that wasn't being slept on, even if some Tetris was involved, and if I hadn't forgotten my sleep-apnea medication (stops me snoring loudly enough to wake the room every half-hour or so) and didn't want to get out of the full-face makeup. And, and, and... I finally staggered up the hill as dawn was breaking, and fell asleep at about 0650. Today I woke at 1400. *sigh*

New Years' Resolutions? I've more or less resolved not to make any, on the grounds that TODOs written down on one day are no more special than any other, and no more likely to be achieved. I'll write a list of something like Resolutions at some point in the very near future, incorporating things like "eat better and lose weight" and "try to focus on whatever I'm doing better", but I refuse to tag it to the beginning of the year, for no obvious reason.

I hope anyone reading this had a good holiday, and is looking forward to the challenges and triumphs that accompany this and every new year.

...now I just wish I felt as positive as I sound.

The Glass: half-full

Well, it's been a busy few days, what with Katsu and Mike in town and the last of the run-up to Christmas. Not that I'm complaining, of course.

Friday, I managed to get everything I wanted done, done, and shut down the machines in the lab. Now I can't work over the holiday, even if I wanted to (apart from maybe reading a few papers).

Saturday, we all wandered into town for a spot of last-minute Christmas shopping, then returned to Fishersgate for a one-shot Serenity RP. A certain stoner mechanic turned out to be surprisingly good at beating information out of low-lives, while the captain tried to prevent the crew from killing each other. I don't know why I normally run stoner characters in Katsu's games, but this one came by it honestly (he has the complication "Hooked", which I selected for him a long time before I decided his actual personality). Pacing of the game wasn't perfect (it got a bit rushed toward the end, not least because the last train was approaching and we took so long to set up characters), but I think everyone enjoyed themselves so, success. I quite enjoy Serenity, and I may have to run a game at some point: the system (the dice mechanic on which the game's rules are based) is pleasingly simple, and I know the background fairly well by now...

Today was Sunday, and we went to Nandos for lunch. Food was good, restaurant crowded, staff distracted... no big surprise at this time of year. A brief side-trip to a guerrilla art market, a stop by the new doughnut shop and then back to Fishersgate again for the lighting of the first candle on the Hanukiah and a few games (including Munchkin Cthulhu, Ia, Ia...).

Now, I'm back home, fiddling with the code for this website and getting ready to go to bed. Tomorrow I go home for Christmas, and Katsu and Mike move on on their whistle-stop tour of friends and family in the UK. They'll fly home before I'm back in Brighton, and be 3000 miles away again. I suspect I can make do with the friends I have around here, but I'll be sad to see them go nonetheless :)

The Glass: half-empty

So, every time I come here to Colorado, I tend to end up playing an NPC in David's Garou game. Last year, I ran Agent Smith (psychopathic underworld enforcer with a distinct predeliction for shotguns and arson) and "Mr Satan" (middle-management daemon resident in the Qwest building, and peripherally responsible for a large portion of the Bad Things that take place in Denver). They were a lot of fun, both hypermasculine, powerful, nasty people empowered to do unfriendly things to the player characters, which is where most of the fun in the game comes from as an NPC.

OK, cool thing of the day. At the end of a live-action Garou game, it is traditional to nominate one player who did an exceptional job of portraying their character that session, and as such deserves an extra experience point. Since David's game is full of NPCs, I picked up a couple today just to mix some variety into the acting. Consequence?

I got the XP award for a character I don't even freaking OWN. The guy is an NPC, one of the middle-management group for what can safely be considered a Big Bad in Denver (a Weaver Hive affiliated to Pentex, for those of you to whom that means anything). Since he's basically responsible for the company's public presence, he answers to half a hundred names, at least one for every corporation 'based' in that building. As such, when asked, he never gave his own name, which led to him being nicknamed "Mr Satan" by the werewolf he was talking to at the time (Kairos). What with him and Studies Mists, a pot-smoking theology professor at CU Boulder, I had a good deal of fun today.

I do so love NPCing. If only I were here a little longer, or on a more regular basis, I'd consider running a character in that game, but for two sessions once a year, it's somewhere way short of worth it. Pity really.

Other than that, the time since my last update has been kinda unremarkable. I spent an interesting time in Boulder on Friday (and that place does remind me somewhat of Brighton in the attitudes, and the terrain, and the people). On Saturday, there was supposed to be a Paranoia game, but that kinda went down the tubes when two of our players got caught in the Traffic Jam From Hell and took three hours to drive twenty-odd minutes. They were in no shape to play when they got here, so the game was postponed, which made me a little sad. So it goes.

TIMESTAMP: 0157MST 0857BST

The Glass: half-full