An odd question?

One of the new girls at work asked me a couple of days ago what my plans were for New Years' Eve, and I have to admit the question caught me a little off-guard.  It's been so long (2002/3, to be finicky) since I did anything for NYE that I almost forgot that other people tend to go out and celebrate at this time of year.  I still don't quite understand why they do, other than excuse for a good ol' piss up, in which case the whole event doesn't really interest me anyways.

From an entirely frugal point of view it saves me a few quid, which is all the more important this year seeing as I'm hoping to move out in a few weeks and will need every penny I can lay my hands on.

So how am I spending my final few hours of 2011?  Well alone, obviously, as has become the norm.  Does this make me sad?  Oddly no.  A few years back I found single NYEs to be a decidedly miserable affair, but this year I'm rather enjoying just pootling about and keeping myself amused.  So far I've watched the top 25 (I think - I tuned in half way through) magic tricks, which had history been different I might have been on!  No, I'm not a magician, but I was short-listed to load the gun for Derren Brown's 2003 russian roulette stunt, which featured on the show.

Now that's finished I'm playing a bit of Dead Island and then will probably round off the night by reading a bit of Cain's Last Stand before I crash out.

And what do I hope 2012 will bring?  Well, not the end of the world.  That would be a nice start.  A decent 30th birthday.  A long list of films (I've actually compiled a written list of things I plan to catch at the cinema next year).  And of course somewhere to live away from my parents' house.  I've got viewings lined up for a couple of places in Lichfield, so if all goes well I shall be living in peace and quiet by the end of February :)  And also with fish.  I've decided I'd like some fish to give the place a bit of life.

Anyways, pointless, unstructured ramble is over.  You may go about your business.

...I have zombies to kill.

Chilly?

Apparently the Bullring bull has a new winter jumper. This perplexes me greatly.

Sad dreams

I had a dream last night about someone I haven't thought about in quite some time, and it made me feel far more sad than I would have expected.

I don't know what else to say really.  Sorry, bit of a rubbish blog entry.

Cosplay progress?

A few days ago I posted about my dream cosplay - Colonel Commissar Ibram Gaunt, from Dan Abnett's Gaunt's Ghosts series of novels.  Since then I've been on the hunt for that perfect Napoleonic war-style officer's tunic to get the constume started.  It hasn't been going too bad - fortunately The Black Parade made that kind of style very popular in goth/alternative clothing circles, so there are things like that out there, even if you have to wade through mountains of chaff to find something worthwhile.

However I was talking about it at work with my sister yesterday, and one of our clients overheard our conversation and told us that his brother's friend owns a shop in Wednesbury which sells replica old-style military uniforms for historical recreations and the like.  They're probably going to cost an arm and a leg, but for Ibram Gaunt I'm willing to spend the money and assemble the costume slowly over time :)
With regards to my more immediate cosplay plan - Ford Prefect - the search continues to go well.  Although I still haven't found the perfect Argyle sweater/boating jacket combo I've come incredibly close, and that's only after one week of searching.  So with that in mind I have every confidence that this costume is going to come together nicely for Spring Memorabilia :)

FNM Result 25th November

Get ready for a mini blogging splurge!  Rather than having one massive and convoluted post, I'm going to make 3 entries about different bits and pieces.  So here's Friday Night Magic to start with.

This week's FNM was pretty good, although a little bit messy to start with.  I took my adjusted vampire deck along with me this week, and I say 'adjusted' because it's no longer pure vampires.  It always had Grave Titan and Sheoldred in there anyway, but I added Skirsdag High Priest, Royal Assassin, and 2 Reaper of the Abyss just to see how they performed.  Sadly the Reapers never made an appearence, but the Royal Assassin did his job well.  The High Priest wasn't too bad, and I managed to activate his 5/5 Demon ability once, but he wasn't consistent enough to justify a future place in the deck.  Definitely a sideboard card though, but in the meantime he'll be dropping out in favour of another low-mana vampire.  It was also the first time I tried the deck with Witchbane Orbs and Norn's Annex, and both of those cards worked nicely.

The evening started messily seeing as I was given a Bye with the first round.  There were uneven numbers and it was just luck of the draw.  Then after I settled down someone else appeared and was told 'you might as well play Rob', so we had a couple of games.  What neither of us realised was that we'd been officially paired up, so we thought it was just a friendly game to pass the time.  As a result we weren't really keeping score, we were sitching decks, and basically not adhering to the rules of FNM at all.  We only found out what had happened when we were asked to record our score and we didn't have one, so it was chalked up as a draw for official purposes.

After that the evening went considerably downhill with a pair of straight 2-0 defeats.  The Vampires at least held their own, and managed to put up a good fight before being defeated.  Now it's been a long time since I left FNM with less than two victories, so having racked up two defeats and a draw from the first three games I was on the verge of my worst performance for months.  I needed two victories out of two, and my Vampires didn't disappoint.

Round 4 was a straight 2-0 win.  The vamps came out thick and fast, and the removal spells in the deck helped me to keep control until I'd got an unstoppable tide of creatures out.

Round 5 was a little more nervewracking, as I was playing against a specifically anti-vampire white deck.  The first game was a devastating loss, my poor little vamps being smashed mercilessly to bits.  But then in the second game they managed to pull together and just scrape a win.  And then in the third they well and truly got their revenge, with a clobbering victory over their human adversaries.

So all in all it was a decent evening.  The simple result breakdown being:

Game 1: Draw

Game 2: Lost 2-0 vs Blue Illusions

Game 3: Lost 2-0 vs Red/White Artifacts

Game 4: Won 2-0 vs Black Vampires

Game 5: Won 2-1 vs White Humans

Overall ranking 16th (out of 31)

I'll probably be taking Vampires again next Friday, but version 1.0 of my Zombie deck is now finished :) I need to playtest it a lot this week, but if it looks alright then I may give it a FNM baptism of fire next week instead.  I think it may be suffering a creature shortage though, so it may need some tweaking and some more low-mana zombies.

In the grim darkness of the far distant future, there is only... cosplay?

On stage at Memorabilia this weekend I was asked what my dream cosplay would be, and I have to admit my mind went completely blank.  In spite of the fact that I was expecting that question, I just suddenly couldn't think of a single thing I'd like to do.  But if my brain had been in gear and I'd been thinking straight there would have been one dream cosplay, and one alone, which would have come to mind...

From The Black Library, and the pen of Dan Abnett, Colonel Commissar Ibram Gaunt.  The commanding office of the Tanith First and Only from the Warhammer 40,000 universe.  I've always loved the commissars in 40k, and their uniforms are just fantastic, and Ibram Gaunt has that edge over the rest of them with the iconic Tanith camo cape and the sword of Heironymo Sondar.

So there it is, my dream costume.  And ye gods I promise to myself that one day I'm going to do this, and grace the stage at Memorabilia as one of the greatest military commanders the Imperium of Man has ever seen!

For Tanith.  For the Emperor.

No one would have believed...

...that in the early years of the 21st century, Richard Burton would be replaced by Liam Neeson.

But apparently that's exactly what has happened.  I just received a text off an old workmate saying that there was a new tour of Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds next December, and that Liam Beeson was playing Richard Button (don't you just love predictive text?).  Now I have to say I'm feeling well and truly divided over this.

I absolutely love Jeff Wayne's WotW and have been desperately waiting for another tour so I can go and see it live again, but I'm a little hesitant about Liam Neeson's role in it.  I think Neeson's a fantastic actor and he's got an amazing voice, but Richard Burton as the voice of the journalist is one of the most iconic things about Jeff Wayne's production.  Whenever I watch the dvd or listen to the soundtrack I always get chills when I hear Burton's opening monologue, and I don't think there's anyone who could match that.

That said, I would be very happy to be proven wrong in this matter.  The addition of Neeson to the big screen background sounds like it should be pretty cool, and if this is the direction that the live tour's going to take then I have no other choice but to give it a fair chance.

So, just a quick entry in light of some exciting/interesting/forboding news about my favourite stage show.  Hopefully in 12 months time I'll be eagerly blogging about how excited I am about going to see it in a couple of weeks!

A picture Prefect cosplay...

Well it may be another 4 months until the next Memorabilia, but I've already got the grey cells ticking over with regards to my next cosplay.  I've been to most Memorabilias in recent years, but I've never attended on both days before unless I've been running a stall, but in March I want to cosplay twice so I'll be there on both the Saturday and the Sunday :)

There's going to be a very noticeable theme over the weekend... something to do with Hitchhiking around the galaxy ;)  There are two tweaks that I'd like to make to my Arthur Dent costume, so I'll definitely be going as him again on one of the two days.  First of all I want to get a Babelfish sorted, and second of all I want to get a toy bulldozer, so that I can lie down in front of it to pose for photos!

For the second day I've had the seed of an idea planted in my head, and now there's simply no way to get rid of it!  So cosplay number two...

Arthur's constant friend and companion, Ford Prefect.  The Ford from the movie was terrible (as were a lot of things in that film), so for those who don't recognise this shot, it's the definitive Ford from the BBC TV series.  I've already started on my hunt for the argyle vest top and stripey jacket, and feel quietly confident that four months will be enough time to get this costume together :)  The only problem is that I know my hair won't be thick enough or long enough by March/April to match Ford's style, but I'll just have to do my best with what I can grow!

Stay tuned for updates over the coming months...

Dent Arthur Dent

I managed to get hold of a photo of me dressed as Arthur Dent at Memorabilia on Sunday! :)

This was taken when I was up on stage during the mini-masquerade.  Unfortunately Arthur Dent doesn't have a great deal of dramatic poses he can strike, but I do have a trick up my sleeve for next time ;)

Thanks muchly to Zoe (Romana from Sunday) for uploading this, and seeing as I'm shamelessly stealing her pics it's only fair that I put a link to her page of photos from the day, so here it is.

Memorabilia Sunday

So Memorabilia is over for another six months.  From a trading point of view it was still pretty disappointing, but from a fan's point of view it was a lot of fun again :)  I met a lot of nice, like-minded people, and had a good laugh with some friends and new folk alike.  In terms of spending I didn't pick up anything else for myself, but I started my Christmas shopping :)

So now I'm knackered and ready for bed, but first of all a quick costume roundup...

Indiana Jones was a nice surprise :) Not a costume you see very often.

Then I saw The Riddler from Batman.  There tend to be a lot of comic book cosplayers at Memorabilia, so I had to snap one when I saw him.

Two of the sponsored costumes at the show - Xena and Captain Jack Sparrow.  Both of them looked really good, and 'Jack' had the mannerisms down to a tee :)

From one of my favourite videogame series - Chris Redfield from Resident Evil 5

And another comic book cosplay - Loki, from Thor :)

Then a little later on I saw this group of three Final Fantasy XIII cosplayers, and was very grateful for a group shot :)

And last but definitely not least, Romana from Doctor Who :) This was Zoe, who I'd been nattering to on the Memorabilia forums and was a delight to meet.

The only one I'm missing is myself! I completely forgot to get a photo of me in my Arthur Dent costume, so I'll have to see if I can find one on the internet or get one from a friend.

So that's my Memorabilia experience for November.  Now, if you'll excuse me, it's time for bed :)

Memorabilia Saturday

Well, day one of Birmingham Memorabilia is over!  From a trading point of view I have to say it was very disappointing.  We barely made one-fifth of what I really needed to make, so I've just got to hope that I can pull out all the stops tomorrow to clear a lot of stock and make some money back.  I've got a few tricks up my sleeve though, so we'll have to wait and see what happpens ;)

From a fan's point of view it was a pretty damn good day :) The nice thing about having an anime stall is getting to interact with all of the fans, and it was great to have a good long babble about Death Note, Fullmetal Alchemist, Bleach, and a few of my other favourite anime series with the people who stopped by.  Even the ones who were only spending a pound, or even who weren't spending anything, it was great fun to just chat with likeminded people.  I didn't get a chance for many photos, but I did take a few...

First up, Kenpachi and Yachiru, from Bleach :)

Then Reno from FFVII (I think), Matsumoto and Byakuya from Bleach.

 Followed by myself as Ichimaru with Matsumoto from the previous group.  Anyone who knows Bleach will know the history between these two characters, which is why I wanted to get a photo of just the two of us.

Then a pretty awesome Battle Royale contestant, complete with exploding collar!  From the fact that she's still alive I'm guessing she must have won ;)

And then finally, from Bleach once again, Ulquiorra.

I did see a few more cosplays, including a pretty cool Lightning from Final Fantasy XIII, but I didn't have my camera on me for a lot of the time.  Tomorrow I'm going to have access to pockets (yey!) so I'm going to try and keep my camera on me at all times so I don't miss any cosplay photo ops.  I'm also going to be entering the masquerade tomorrow, so hopefully that should be fun.

On the shopping side of things I didn't go too nuts today.  I bought a bulk pack of Pocky from Tokyo Toys, one of my favourite anime retailers, and I bought the Kick Ass graphic novel, which I've been wanting to read for some time.  I also got myself three autographs - those of Derek Jacobi, Bruce Boxleitner, and Alice Krige.  They were all really nice folks and I even get to witness a really nice moment when Brice Boxleitner actually approached Derek Jacobi's table to shake his hand and tell hime how much he admired his work.  I've never seen that happen before at one of these events, and it really put a smile on my face.

Tomorrow's shopping list is largely work-based.  I'd like to get a calender for the wall or my desk, as well as some nice geeky coasters and a mousemat.  Aside from that I just hope to have a good day's trading, meet some more awesome people, and have some fun in the masquerade.  I shall blog again tomorrow night with tales of the final day as well as more cosplay photos!



Memorabilia jitters

Well I wanted to get a good night's sleep and be well-rested for the weekend's Memorabilia show, but it seems that's not going to happen.  I hit the hay about 11:00 last night, but then woke up at 12:00, 3:00, and finally 5:00, and this time I haven't been able to get back to sleep.  I think it's safe to say that nerves are the cause.

It's been 18 months since I last worked a Memorabilia, and 2 years since I last worked the pre-Christmas one.  But I think the biggest point of anxiety is that this is going to be my last Memorabilia, so I need to get as much stock sold as possible, otherwise it's just going to be left cluttering up the loft.  And seeing as all proceeds are going to paying off my debts so I can move out, there's a bit of extra pressure to do well.

I think the most important thing is that I just try and relax and enjoy the show, there's some great guests there this year who I can't wait to meet :) Today I'm hoping to meet Derek Jacobi (British acting legend, has appeared in damn-near everything, but my personal favourite was the title role in I, Claudius), Bruce Boxleitner (TRON in... well... TRON), and Alice Krige (The Borg Queen from Star Trek: First Contact).

Youtube wins

A pair of absolute epic Youtube wins which I felt compelled to share.  First up...


A mockup trailer for a 'serious' Super Mario Bros film.  I would pay good money to see this if it was made into a real film!
And second...

Excellent AMV for Jonathan Coulton's song, Code Monkey.  I heart this song ever so much and this is just an awesome video :)

Memorabilia Countdown

Just got home, all set up for Birmingham Memorabilia tomorrow :) Just need to have a shave and sort out my Ichimaru costume, and then grab an early night!

Salvation reached...

I've just finished reading Salvation's Reach by Dan Abnett, and after a slow start I have to admit it was pretty damn good.  Not one of the greatest in the Gaunt's Ghosts series, but probably up with the likes of Honour Guard.  The story was good, and a few characters said their farewells who will be sadly missed.  But I didn't really like any of the new characters, and was frankly a bit disappointed that they all made it through the book in one piece.

This has been the first time in a few months that I've got through a new book in the course of just a few days, and it felt good to be immersing myself with characters I love for a few hours a day :)  Now I'm up to date with the Tanith, the next thing to read is the latest in the Horus Heresy series; The Outcast Dead.  Once that's finished I have the sixth book in the Ciaphas Cain series, Cain's Last Stand, and by then I should have received my first ever Sisters of Battle novel, which has been preordered since the start of the year.  I've never read any of the novels about the Adeptus Sororitas before, but James Swallow is a good, solid author, and I have a feeling it's going to open up a whole new branch of the 40k universe which I previously knew very little about.

And THEN, once I'm all up to date with my favourite Black Library series, I can finally get back to A Song of Ice and Fire :)  I stopped part way through Steel and Snow, so it'll be good to get back to the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros.

Muchos reading still to do :)

Salvation's Reach, opening verdict...

Currently am about one-third of the way through Salvation's Reach - the 13th book in the Gaunt's Ghosts series.  Have to be honest, I'm not loving it so far.  It may improve, but at the moment this seems to be falling into the same kind of area as The Armour of Contempt.  Blood Pact and Traitor General are my two most recent favourite, but the series needs another big, rip-roaring novel like the glory days of Necropolis and Sabbat Martyr in my opinion.

FNM Result 11th November

Yes, two posts in quick succession, but I didn't think the little chocolate lament would fit in particularly well with this week's FNM result.

So another experimental week, this time I was using a slightly altered version of the Illusions deck I used at last Sunday's tournament.  A few counterspells have been removed to add a few unsummon spells, just so I have a defence against creatures which are already out.  I had high hopes for this deck, but sadly it still needs an awful lot of work, and completely fell apart on the night, resulting in my worst FNM performance since I started attending.  In one particular game I was killed in 6 turns, and in every turn all I did was play a land.  It was painful, to be quite honest.  The only victory of the night I got was against someone who had only been playing for a couple of months, and was at his first ever tournament of any description.

I will probably be unable to go to next week's FNM as I'll be setting up for the Birmingham Memorabilia event on the Friday afternoon, but if I get finished quickly enough then I will see if I can make it, and this time I will probably be playing Vampires again.  I'm also currently putting together a blue/black Zombie deck, but I've yet to playtest it.  However, given my love of zombies in general, this deck could well become my main deck if it works well.  I have a couple of cards on order for it and will post a decklist when they arrive, and then I'll be updating as and when I get a chance to see how it runs :)

But in the meantime, here's a breakdown of the Illusions' embarrasing performance on Friday

Game 1: Lost 2-0 vs Green Werewolves

Game 2: Lost 2-1 vs Red/Black Vampires

Game 3: Won 2-0 vs Green Werewolves & Tokens

Game 4: Lost 2-0 vs White Artifacts

Game 5: Bye (automatic 2-0 win)

It's the first time I've had a bye for poor performance in FNM, so I'm now feeling more determined than ever to get my Vampires and Elves up to a good fighting standard, and the sculpt these new Zombies into something terrifying.

A sign of the times

I've just been to Asda (Walmart, to you folks in the States... hello, folks in the States :) I do hope you're having a good weekend.  Trans-atlantic hugs), and have been confronted with a distressing sign of the times we live it: shrinking chocolate.

Oh I haven't had my head buried in the sand, I'm well aware of the fact that bars are getting smaller.  250g became 230g, half an inch got trimmed off Mars bars, it's all been happening since the recession.  It's a shame, but it's something we've all had to learn to live with.  But one thing I though was safe were the tins of chocolates.  Whenever Christmas approaches and the tins of Roses, Heroes and Celebrations (even Quality Street, if you have no soul) hit the shelves, they always seemed like they were going to weather the storm of chocolate shrinkage.  But today I picked up a tin each of Roses and Heroes, and have had to face the fact that they are now a whopping 20% smaller than in days gone by.  1kg has become 800g.

This makes me quite sad.  That is all.

A wholly remarkable book...

Here it is, ready to go.  My Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for next Sunday :)

"In many of the more relaxed civilizations on the Outer Eastern Rim of the Galaxy, the Hitchhiker's Guide has already supplanted the great Encyclopaedia Galactica as the standard repository of all knowledge and wisdom, for though it has many omissions and contains much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate, it scores over the older, more pedestrian work in two important respects.
First, it is slightly cheaper; and secondly it has the words DON'T PANIC inscribed in large friendly letters on its cover."

And the finishing touch...

Really looking forward to the weekend now!

Coffee shop girls

Why is it that coffee shops tend to employ girls who could best be described as "criminally attractive"?

Not a complaint.

Finally, a lie-in! :)

After a fair few weeks, finally I've managed to sleep in on the weekend! Ye gods it feels good :)  Not sure why, but recently I've just been so fidgety that I've been completely unable to stay in bed past 8:00.  It's about to come crashing to an end as I have to get up to go to Hobbycraft in a few minutes, but it was certainly a nice treat while it lasted.

It's been about a week since I updated, but there's not a great deal to talk about really.  Work's been pretty good.  The two new girls in the lab have settled in nicely and helped to ease the workload in there.  I'm quite looking forward to monday as our new admin girl starts then.  For the last few weeks I've been doing the admin assistants job seeing as our old one left, so once our new girl's settled in I can start actually doing  my own job :)

In the world of Magic I have been buying pretty new cards (as always), and am in the process of building a pretty funkeh Zombie deck :)  On paper it should work pretty well, but I'll have to wait and see.  Really can't wait to try it out at a FNM.  Oh and I now have 19 foil forests in my Elf deck :D  This Friday I tried out a Blue Illusions deck at FNM and it really didn't work out, but I shall post a full FNM result later on.

And the other big news is Memorabilia.  I've now got all of the stock I want for my stall, my dealer's pack has arrived, and I'm just about ready to go.  My Arthur Dent costume is all set for Sunday as well :) I bought myself new pyjamas and a new towel especially for the occasion, I just need to make my Hitchhiker's Guide now, which is the reason I'm off to Hobbycraft!

So I must go now.  Hoopy things are calling...

Elf Deck List

Yes, I'm posting a third blog entry for this evening.  Just before I head off to bed I wanted to finally post my Elf deck list from Magic The Gathering.  There's another mini tournament tomorrow, so it's got my MTG brain working away, and as a result I feel compelled to do this.

To be honest I'd rather be giving my new Vampires another test run, but seeing as my sister's going to be using them then I shall stick with my tried, tested, and much-loved Elves.  I have spent months working at this deck and am happy with it, but the Vampires are new and in need of as much playtesting as possible!

I have been on eBay this morning and purchased the only Elf this deck was missing :) I have to admit I didn't even know about her until this morning, but was so good that I quite simply HAD to get her and slot her into my deck.  Character-wise she's a bit of a mis-match, but ability-wise she melds nicely and will be a very welcome addition.  So the following list is not actually the one I'll use tomorrow, but in about a week it will be the final (probably) version of my first-choice deck... I rather think I'll be heartbroken when the Scars block rolls out of Standard Legal!

Main deck (yes it's 68 cards! *gasp* sue me.)

• 4x Llanowar Elves
• 4xCopperhorn Scout
• 4x Ezuri's Archers
• 4x Ezuri's Brigade
• 4x Elvish Archdruid
• 4x Ezuri, Renegade Leader
• 2x Glissa, The Traitor
• 4x Platinum Emperion
• 4x Swiftfoot Boots
• 4x Darksteel Plate
• 4x Naturalize
• 2x Titanic Growth
• 19x Forest
• 5x Swamp

Sideboard:

• 4x Gladecover Scout
• 2x Titanic Growth
• 2x Melira, Sylvok Outcast
• 2x Trepanation Blade
• 2x Phyrexian Metamorph

Happy Bonfire Night!

Sorry for the shortness of my last post, it was the first time I'd tried blogging whilst mobile with the hastily-downloaded Blogger app.  It's not fantastic, but it's certainly going to be great for blogging photos on-the-go :)

So anyways, yes.  Happy Bonfire Night.  It does seem somewhat strange to me that we British celebrate someone's attempt to blow up the entire government.  It seems even stranger that we liked the idea enough to still be celebrating it several hundred years down the line.  But I guess if Guy Fawkes had never tried to blow up parliament then we'd never have had V For Vendetta.  So good Guy Fawkes *pats head* Have a gold star.

I don't really mark bonfire night at all.  I sometimes spend half an hour or so watching fireworks out of the window, but I never actually go out to bonfires or firework displays.  I do love walking on November 5th though, as the smell of fireworks is very nice, and I was glad I got the opportunity to do that this evening :)

Yes, this evening I went out on bonfire night!  But no it wasn't anything bonfire/firework based in the slightest, it was a night of all-you-can-eat sushi at Woktastic in Birmingham (see previous post for a dynamic sushi conveyor belt action shot!).  I've eaten off their set menu before, but I've never had their sushi buffet, and I have to say I wasn't disappointed.  Fantastic selection, a nice handful of hot dishes, and a couple of welcome desserts.  In the end I filled up on a whopping 22 dishes, so I certainly got my money's worth!

It was originally organised as a work night out, but in the end only 3 of us turned up; Cass, Rich (Northie) and myself.  I was hoping for about half a dozen or so, but illnesses, family gatherings, and prior engagements whittled the numbers down.  It was still a good night though, and fun was had all round.  The one and only downside was that by 8:00 we were all stuffed and ready for bed!  It probably would have been a good idea to book later... perhaps that's something to think about if we decide to go again in the future.

So that's about it.  Happy Bonfire Night, people of the UK! Happy Saturday, everyone else.  And happy sushi to me!

Oh yes, and in other news, I watched Unstoppable this morning (Denzel Washington, Chris Pine, and a runaway train).  I was quite interested when I saw clips of it a few months back, but never saw it at the cinema.  I enjoyed it, and would certainly recommend it to folks :) A good flick, that's for sure.

Okay, I'm very sleepy now.  Post-food naps are needed.  Bye bye.

WOKTASTIC!!!

So much sushi!

I think 22 plates has filled me though!  What a cracking evening :)

FNM Result 4th November

Yep, it's Friday Night Magic results time!  And last night was a little different because I finally played with my vampire deck instead of my usual elves.  They do work a little slower than my elf deck, but I have to say they're a lot more fun to use, and I did a lot better than normal with them!  Sorin Markov, Bloodlord of Vaasgoth, and Grave Titan all saw action, so I did quite well with the hands I drew.

There were two downsides to the evening though.  Firstly the traffic was ridiculous so I arrived over half an hour late.  I was given a bye (automatic win), but I'd have rather had a proper game even if there was a chance I would have lost.  And secondly at the end of the night I left early and forgot to stay for the random promo giveaway.  November's FNM promo is a Go For The Throat, which I really like so am a bit annoyed with myself for losing the chance to win one.

But aside from that, I had fun.  Like I said, the Vampires were fun, and even when they lost they certainly put up a fight.  So, the results in full...

Game 1 - Bye (Win 2-0)

Game 2 - Lost 2-0 vs White tokens

Game 3 - Lost 2-1 vs Artifacts

Game 4 - Won 2-0 vs White tokens

Game 5 - Won 2-1 vs Vampires

Game 6 - Won 2-1 vs Vampires

I'm using the Elves again in a tournament tomorrow, but I think they may have to go into a FNM timeshare with the Vampires :) I'll probably use Vampires all month at FNM to see how they do, but at the moment they do seem to be the more powerful deck.

Baking fail?

...at this point we just don't know.

The book club man came around at work today and, as I often do, I picked up the obligatory cookbook in his latest offerings.  And being something of a Cadbury whore, I was very happy that it was a Cadbury's chocolate cookbook.  I had a quick leaf through it in the staff room earlier in the week - there was nothing in it that particularly stood out, but for only £3 I figured it was worth picking up and looking at closer.  So this evening, about midway through Masterchef Australia, I decided I really wanted to bake something nice but simple tonight to take into work and share with my minions tomorrow.

I had a good read through and I found a nice simple Chocolate Mousse cake, which I already had all of the ingredients for except for 200g of dark chocolate, so I swiftly scooted up the road to pick that up, and then came back home and got to work.

Now this was a very new experience for me - baking a cake without any flour.  Might sound strange, but all it contained was chocolate, butter, eggs, sugar, and some orange liquor.  According to the recipe it was supposed to rise during baking, then sink during cooling, and then once cooled it should have a texture similar to that of chocolate mousse (but with all the added bonus of being a cake).  The downside to this recipe was that there was no photo accompanying it, leaving me with no idea as to how well I'd managed to make mine.

Anyways, I ploughed on undeterred, and about an hour and a half later I took my finished cake out of the oven and it looked beautiful... which was quite a pity because I knew that it was going to be collapsing in on itself imminently.  About 20 minutes later I came back to a sorry-looking cake, which was just about cool enough to take out of the cake tin and transfer to a plate.  So now I'm just left waiting until morning for it to have cooled completely so that I can try slicing it and see what the consistancy's like :) I'm quite nervous, but I'm looking forward to giving it a try.  Unfortunately it still looks rather pathetic, so I wont be taking it in to share with the folks at work.  But anyways, yeah, I'm now just left counting down the hours and waiting to see if I've made an epic baking fail, or if I've managed to make an ugly looking cake with a soft and yummy heart ;-p

Hmm. Dreams again.

Evening folks.  Seems a bit of an odd time to be blogging about last night's dreams, but hey, what are blogs for?

It was a bit of a weird one.  Obviously in recent weeks I have left my old hospital job in order to return to my previous workplace in a more senior role.  It's been going alright, and I haven't for a moment looked back on the hospital days.  But in my dream last night I'd gone back to the hospital and had just started there again, but the weird thing was that the building itself was actually my new work place.  I was feeling kinda weird for being back there, but then suddenly I saw that one person I was hoping I'd never have to see or deal with again, and my heart sank.  Suddenly I was left thinking "god, why have I come back here?"  I woke up soon after that, but it was something like 5:00 in the morning, so I was still very tired and it took me a few minutes to remember where I actually work at the moment!  Needless to say when I worked it out I felt incredibly relieved, but that few minutes was a little bit horrifying, especially considering how realistic and tangible the dream felt.

Anyways, that was my nightmare last night.

In other Wednesday news, we interviewed folks at work today, and should very shortly be having some lovely new people starting.  They seem nice and level headed, and I frankly can't wait for them to start :) It'll be nice to have some fresh faces, and to see the place back up to full staff levels again... plus I'll have more minions to make me feel more like a proper Bond villain.  Tomorrow we're interviewing for another role, and I'm hoping we get some good interviewees seeing as they'll be working pretty closely with me.

And the other exciting news is the arrival of more Magic The Gathering cards for Memorabilia.  I've now got everything I want to sell, and the bonus is that if they don't sell I get lots of cards for my own collection!  I've also treated myself to 2 of the alternate art foil promo version of Bloodlord of Vaasgoth for my vampire deck.

So that's my Wednesday.  Now umming and ahhing over whether to watch Biggles, Sucker Punch, or Yu-Gi-Oh: The Abridged Series.  Decisions, decisions.

Sorin Markov has arrived...

...and I can't wait to try out the finished Vampire deck with him in it.  Well, I say "finished" but it's not. This is more like version 2.0.  I'm completely certain that it will need a lot more work in coming weeks, but for now it's looking pretty decent.  The Bloodlord of Vaasgoths arrived today as well, so they're ready to slot into the deck tomorrow.  I'm a little worried about the mana-curve in this deck, so I've broken slightly from the Vampire theme and am looking at throwing in a pair of Diregraf Ghouls to give a couple of 1-drop creaturs to help give the deck some staying power until the more powerful creatures come out to play.  I really want to take it to FNM this week, but after the truly embarrasing Innistrad celebration yesterday I kinda want to go back to the Elves to give my confidence a bit of a boost.

So yup.  Vampire deck is now Planeswalkered up and ready to go :) Hopefully tomorrow I'll get a full lunch break at work and I can test it against my trusty Elves.

Innistrad celebration

It's 6:45pm on Sunday evening, and for the first time in a week I finally have some time to just sit back and chill.  Sure I've been doing things like Magic tournaments, but this is the first time that I've been able to stop, put my feet up, and just know that I don't have to be rushing out of the door for this, that, or the other.  It's quite nice.

Well the Innistrad celebration event was an absolute dismal failure.  I hurriedly put together a zombie token deck before leaving the house, and it proceeded to get annihilated in every single game.  I can't even give a result breakdown, because the games were over so fast that I didn't even get time to tell what decks my opponents were using.  The biggest annoyance was the fact that I lent my Elves to someone else to use, and he actually ended up placing 6th out of 12, whereas I came in rock bottom.

I have learned two valuable lessons though.  Firstly, that swiftly made decks quite simply don't work in MTG.  They need time and refinement to be able to do anything.  And secondly, that my Elves have been shaped and honed into a good deck at last.  I still like my vampire backup deck (and will like it even more so when Sorin Markov arrives), but Elves are definitely the way forward for me.  I'm looking forward to FNM this Friday to give my vampires a test run, but next Sunday it'll definitely be Elves which get my full attention again.  Saying that, I might even forego the vampires this Friday and go Elvish again.  Even Rich said today that the latest version of my Elf deck is pretty kickass, so I think it's time to start unleashing it.

On the plus side today, I did get two more promos (one shiney, one full-art), and another booster pack.  So it wasn't a total loss.

FNM Result 28th October

Wow, what a manic day it was yesterday!  Work was truly ridiculously busy, which meant that I didn't get any breaks at all and still finished 15 minutes late, so that put me struggling for time right from the offset.  So I had to scoot back from Lichfield to Sutton like a bat out of hell in order to pick up my sister, who was attending her first Friday Night Magic :) Then she hopped on the back of the bike, we scooted into Birmingham, and just made it in time for registration.  It's cool that she's getting into the game, at the moment she's using the vampire deck which I threw together for her, but she's started to buy a few of her own cards and is looking at getting a starter deck as well which she can chop and change.

The vampire deck's actually working pretty well.  I've ordered a set of 4 Bloodlord of Vaasgoths (which I plan to put 2 of into the deck), and a pair of Sorin Markovs to make it a bit tougher, so I'm looking forward to seeing those arrive.  I'm hoping that my sister gets her deck sorted soon, as I'm quite looking forward to trying this deck out myself at FNM!

So in the meantime I'm sticking with my elves.  It's been heavily overhauled since I last used it.  It used to be a pure elf deck, but now I've taken out a load of low-cost elves in order to put in 4 Darksteel Plates, 4 Platinum Emperions, and 4 Swiftfoot Boots.  After last night I've got to say the Plate and the Boots pulled their weight, but the Emperions didn't really do too much.  So I'm going to tweak it a little more today and take it in with me to the Innistrad celebration event this Sunday.

All in all, it was another average performance for the Elves, finishing 12th out of 19, and here was the breakdown:

Game 1 - Lost 2-0 vs White Creature Tokens

Game 2 - Won 2-1 vs Blue/White Control & Artifacts

Game 3 - Lost 2-0 vs Elves

Game 4 - Won 2-0 vs Red/Blue Flashback

Game 5 - Lost 2-1 vs Black/Red Vampires

My sister also won 2 and lost 3, so that was a good performance for a first FNM :) So, time to go Elf-adjusting, and I'll let you all know how they get on on Sunday!  ...unless my sister can't make it on Sunday, in which case I'll be playing vamps!

Evening all

Howdy folks.  Been a bit quiet on the blog front this week, to be honest I've just been feeling a bit shattered after work and haven't had the energy to waffle on about this and that.  I'm actually still feeling too shattered, but I felt compelled to make an update.

And now I've said that I really can't think of anything to talk about.  I'm sure there is stuff to talk about, but my tired brain just can't keep focused.  Epic blog fail.

Up!

I just finished watching Up! (the Pixar film).  It made me sad lots.  Very good film though.  Just too many sads.

Greetings to the UAE!

I've just been looking at the stats for my blog, and in the last month I've had just over 90 views, of which 23 were from the United Arab Emirates.  I have to admit this has taken me by surprise somewhat, so I just thought I'd extend a warm greeting to my readers from the UAE!  Hello! :)

Closure

I've just posted off a Thank You card for the folks at City Hosptial for the cracking leaving do and the awesome leaving presents they got for me :)  It feels like closure.  I mean, yes I'm still going to be seeing the games group on a regular basis - Rich in paprticular, as he's the most frequent FNMer - but this is my last communication with the hospital on the whole.  It's kind of odd, but kind of nice.

Bye bye City.

FNM Result 21st October

Just a quick blog entry this evening.  It's been a rough couple of days settling into my new job.  Today again there was no lunch break and no drink breaks, so by the time I got out of work my brain was feeling well and truly frazzled and I was physically exhausted.  But Friday Night Magic only comes around once a week, so I didn't want to miss out.  I wish there was somewhere nearer to Lichfield that did a FNM, but as it currently stands I have to make the 20 mile ride into Birmingham to play.  As you can imagine, by the time I was there and ready to play, I wasn't in the most tactical frame of mind!

Anyways, this week the Elves had earned a rest from having their asses kicked, and I decided to try out my blue Illusions/Artifacts deck.  It hasn't really been tested, but I've had it for a few weeks now and thought it was time to give it a baptism of fire.  It actually started very well, winning in the first round, but then it lost the next 3 rounds and then just about scraped a victory in the final round.  It was interesting to try out a different play style, but I'm looking forward to returning to normal next week.  Although I'm actually unsure of what too run next Friday.  My Elves have a new secret weapon which I'm dying to try out, but at the same time I'm also eager to give my newly made vampire deck a try to see how it plays.  The most likely outcome will be Elves next Friday, and then Vampires the weekend after :)  I'll probably post a deck list for my new and (hopefully) improved Elves at some point this week.  In the meantime, here is the full breakdown of this week's result.

Round 1: Won 2-1 vs Green & White

Round 2: Lost 2-0 vs Artifacts

Round 3: Lost 2-0 vs White Humans

Round 4: Lost 2-1 vs Black & Red Burn

Round 5: Won 2-1 vs White Tokens

A Strange New World

It's been a quiet couple of days on the blogging front, so I thought I might as well do a quick entry before it's time to turn in for the night.

Well I'm past the half way point in the first week of my new job.  So far it's been pretty mind-fragging.  I may have worked at this place before, but I'm having to learn a whole new side of the job and it's a lot to take in.  On the plus side I feel like I'm picking it up quite quickly, I'm just going slowly when it comes to carrying out all of the new stuff.  Obviously I know that I'm going to be slow - everyone's always slow when they start a new job, speed comes with time - but I've always hated feeling like I'm holding everyone else up, and that's kind of how I've felt so far this week.

One thing which has been good is having a full lunch hour in which to play Magic :-D  I've been teaching my sister to play lately and she's been enjoying it, so I told her I'd put together a vampire deck for her to use.  It's not a refined deck in the slightest, but I just put together creatures and spells that felt right, and lo and behold!  I made a deck which I can't frikkin' beat lol  Even though she's just a beginner, nothing I do with my Elves seems to be able to beat these vapires!  There wasn't time for a lunch break today, but hopefully there will be tomorrow.  So I'm going to try my Illusions against the vampires, and if I still can't beat the damned things then I think I might have to take them to Friday Night Magic this week ;)

So yep, that's been about the extent of my week so far.  Lots of work, lots of brain-overload, and lots of Magic.  And now it's time for lots of sleep!

Brrr!

F*** me, it's cold!!!

By the way, if Emma Watson or Scarlett Johannson happen to be reading, that was an actual request.

A Night To Remember

No, I'm not referring to the film about the sinking of the Titanic, although I do actually verily like that film.  There's not many black & white films that I am keen on, but that is one of them.

Anyways, I digress.  The night to remember is, of course, my leaving do last night.  I was a bit reluctant to go on my scooter as it meant that I could only have one drink, but on reflection I'm glad that I did, as it meant I stayed sober all evening and can remember the entire thing :)  So to start - the outfit.

One of the guys did tell me at one point that I looked like a film director.  I have to be honest, I took that as a compliment, even if it wasn't intended as one lol  I really liked the look overall, so now I just need to start going out more often so I can wear this stuff some more.

So to start with we went to Frankie & Benny's at Broadway Plaza in town.  I had a bit of a panic as I was supposed to meet everyone at 6:00, but I was so busy teaching my family how to play Magic that I lost track of time, and when I checked my watch it was 5:00 and I still needed a bath, a shave, and to sort out my clothes.  But after a record-breaking mad dash I ended up getting there on the dot at 6:00, only to find that the table was actually booked for 6:30, so at least it gave me time to settle down at the bar with a diet coke.

So it got to 6:30, everyone got seated, though there were a couple of stragglers who didn't turn up until about 7:00.  All in all we had 10 people attending, so it was a decent turnout... group photo!!!

All in all Frankie & Benny's was a good experience.  Food was good, cocktail was top-notch, service was great, waitress was rather lovely ;) lol  And those bastards that I work with even arranged a "happy birthday" presentation for me, which obviously came as a bit of a shock.  And then came time for presents!  (I knew there was a reason I left that job! ;-p)

I have to admit I was kind of stunned by the range of pressies these guys got for me, I honestly didn't think they knew me as well as they obviously do.  Firstly I got a lovely card with a £30 Hotel Chocolat gift voucher in it, which was a pretty frikkin' epic win.  I'm going to try and be good though and save it for an end-of-season sale to get the most out of it!  Then my geeky gift was two shiney forests for my Magic the Gathering Elf deck.

I do love my shiney cards, and these were a very welcome addition to my collection.

Next up, was a supremely awesome 16-month Chuck Norris calender!  Because Chuck Norris is just too much for 12 months!

Eveyone knows I love Chuck Norris jokes, so this just made me laugh so much when I unwrapped it.  And bundled up with it was...

How to draw monsters :-D  I need to get back into drawing, and this might just give me the excuse I need.  And even if it doesn't it's got some awesome zombie artwork inside.

Then came a present which I'm amazed anyone thought of (I certainly wouldn't have!) and which was really cool...

Completely unexpected, but well done to the guys for thinking of it.  I've really enjoyed watching The Borgias on Sky Atlantic, but knew nothing of their true history, so now I have this massive tome to read through and find out the truth behind this intruiging family.  Of course the major downside is that I can't read any further than is covered by Season 1 of the series, otherwise it'll spoil the next season for me!  So I will have to be good and limit myself.

And then my final gift, courtesy of Suj.  A t-shirt with this wonderful slogan on it.  Hmm.

Of course if anyone didn't know either of us they'd just think we were a pair of nobs.  But it was of course meant as a joke and I took it as such.  Have to admit I'm fairly sure I'll never wear it though lol

So that was pressies.  W00t!  After F&B's we headed next door to Bowlplex for the rest of the night.  We got in at about 8:30, but the lanes were fully booked until 10:00, so we spent the time in the arcades and on the pool tables.  I had a couple of dances on the DDR machines - first to Cotton Eye Joe, and then to The Neverending Story.  I say this with no shame.  I did completely get my ass kicked, but then while everyone else was having their turns I noticed that someone had left 2 credits in the House of the Dead 4 machine, so I played on that for a bit before heading to the pool table.  By the time 10:00 struck there were only 5 of us bowling, but I think any more would have made the games drag on too long, so it was good.  I lost every game, but I had a good time, and I think I needed to let my hair down.  In the end it was just before midnight that we all went our seperate ways and I headed home.  Now I'm just looking forward to our sushi meetup next month!

So yeah.  That was my leaving do.  All fun and games, and nobody lost an eye.  Only bad thing to happen all evening was that one of my cowboy boots was irrepairably scuffed when a slightly tipsy Suj stood on my toes.  Honestly, I should have learned from my BBQ to give him a wide berth after he's been drinking lol

FNM Result

Yesterday was Friday, and that can mean only one thing!  New QI!  No, that's not it.  New movies on Sky Go!  No, that's not it either....  Okay, Friday means lots of things.  But in my case I'm referring to Friday Night Magic!  Having been swept up in the addictive, geeky fun of Magic the Gathering in recent months, I now try to get to our local Friday Night Magic event as often as possible.  For those unfamiliar with Magic I plan to do a brief summary at some point in the next few days (I can sense your excitement), but for those who know what I'm talking about, FNM is a standard constructed deck format, and is a great way to have fun with the hobby, make new friends, and improve your deck through the best possible way - losing!

Seriously though, losing is the best way to find your deck's weak points.  Normally I play an Elf deck, and I've got a few more cards on their way for me to add into it for next Friday, and hopefully make it a bit more formidable.  The optimum number of cards to have in your deck is 60, and sadly my new additions will take mine up to 73, so I think I need to cut back a bit.  I've worked out how I can cut it back to 60, but if I do that then it might be leaving it a little bit too vulnerable.  So the plan of action is to try out 73, and then if I find it's not working out I'll start trimming back a couple at a time until it's running smoothly.

So anyhoos, my results from last night.  Across 5 rounds:

1) Lost 2-0 vs. White Control

2) Won 2-0 vs. Green Humans

3) Lost 2-0 vs. Red & Black Vampires

4) Won 2-0 vs. Green & White Humans & Werewolves

5) Lost 2-0 vs. Red Burn.

So overall I finished 21st out of 28, which isn't too bad.  Hoping my new additions will bump me up into the top 20 next week.  My deck's very inconsistent at the moment, but does seem to be averaging out wins and losses.  I do also have a blue Illusions deck which I'm dying to try out, so I may play Elves next Friday and then switch to Illusions the week after.  The nice thing is that my new cards will fit into both decks, so I can chop and change to find the best combinations.

Stay tuned next week to see what happens!

Time to leave...

Morning folks!  Okay, by the time I actually post this it'll be early afternoon, but at the moment it's still just about morning, so that's whay I'm choosing to say it.  So there.

No, no, it's not time for me to leave my blog.  In fact it's been flourishing pretty well since I left Twitter.  I think I'm enjoying having a good old ramble once every day or two a lot better than just typing the odd line every few minutes.  Do I miss Twitter?  Not really.  I miss the Cadbury's competitions as they've been very good to me over the last year, but that's pretty much it.  Anyways, when I say "Time to leave" I'm actually talking about City Hospital.

Confused?  That's fair.  I actually left the hospital on Tuesday afternoon, and my last official day was yesterday, so as of 17:00 last night I am no longer an employee of the NHS and, by extension, Her Majesty's government.  But the leaving I spoke of relates to the most sacred tradition of all who abandon their employers: The leaving do!

It feels a little weird having a leaving do when I had one just over a year ago.  Maybe I have to somehow go back in time and erase the old one, seeing as I'm returning to that workplace anyway.  But odd as it may feel, I'm very much looking forward to it.  There's already been one cancellation this morning, which is a dreadful shame, but there's still set to be 10 of us in attendance, so it should still be a decent night :) To be honest I can't wait to get out there and rock my new waistcoat lol

Intolerance Alert.

I dislike the new med student in Season 7 of House.  She bothers me.  A great deal.  I want to smush her face against an acid wall.

Salvation's Reach

No, this isn't some kind of pretencious title for a blog entry, it is the title of the latest Gaunt's Ghosts novel from the wonderful Dn Abnett, which arrived on my doorstep yesterday morning.

 

Now anyone who knows me knows that I love to read.   I like the odd bit of mainstream, and in recent months have been trying to branch out and try a few genres and authors I don't know, but there's one specific area of literature I keep coming back to, and that's the work from the Warhammer 40,000 universe.

I don't play 40k at all any more really, but the depth and the backgroud of the 40k universe is, in my opinion, the single greatest science fiction setting in history.  Forget Star Wars, Star Trek or anything like that, the 41st millennium is the richest and most intricately woven piece of work any fan could hope to enjoy.
And out of all of the 40k books out there, there are two series which I keep coming back to.  One is the Horus Heresy series, which tells the story of the events of the 31st Millennium which shaped the galaxy of the 41st, and the other (and the series which got me into the Black Library's works) is Dan Abnett's Gaunt's Ghosts series.  In fact I now consider Dan Abnett to be one of my favourite authors, and I am proud to have 25 of his novels in my collection :)

Anyways, I'm babbling, as I tend to do when I start talking about a subject I have passion for.  So yes, Gaunt's Ghosts - the Tanith First and Only.  I was first introduced to these books about 7 years ago by a very good friend, with the first book in the series; First and Only.  This may sound an ironic title for the opening book of a long and successful series, but the novels follow the lives of one particular Imperial Guard Regiment - the Tanith First.  The beautiful tradgedy of the Tanith is that they were the only regiment to be founded from their homeworld before it was destroyed by Chaos - the archenemy of mankind - and so they were given the monicker of the First and Only.  A lot of Tanith fans love the series as it has a proper old military feel to it, and I've heard many people describe it as being "like Sharpe in space", which I thing is wonderfully accurate.
Having read and loved First and Only I immediately went onto the second book in the series - Ghostmaker, which took me onto Neropolis (book three), Honor Guard, Straight Silver, The Guns of Tanith, and then the seventh book, Sabbat Martyr.
And then the unthinkable happened - I had caught up to date with the adventures of Colonel Commisar Ibram Gaunt and his men.  It may have been 2004 when I started to read them, but the Gaunt's Ghosts novels had been getting steadily released since 1999, so I was catching up with 5 years of work.  So ever since then I have had to patiently wait, as one new novel gets released every 1-2 years.  This latest one has followed a particularly long wait, and now I finally have it to crack into (once I've finished The Lies of Locke Lamora - I hate reading 2 books at once).
The previous novel in the series, Blood Pact, was quite a different animal to the usual 'Ghosts book, as the Tanith spent the entire novel rotated out of service and sitting tight on a secure Imperial world, while Gaunt was embroiled in an assasination attempt by the archenemy on a high-value prisoner.  It worked brilliantly and I have to say it's one of my favourite in the series, but now the First and Only are back in the front lines where they belong, and frankly I can't wait to sink my teeth in and see how they get on.
And there is one more thing which has interested me a lot about this book, and that's the cover art.  On all of the previous covers, Gaunt was always portrayed heroically, with very lean and almost perfect features.  Now the boooks, as I mentioned earlier, have been going for 12 years, and usually several years pass in between each one.  Granted, in the 41st Millennium they have rejuvination treatments, which keep the higher classes looking young well into their hundreds, but Gaunt is a man who's been through the meatgrinder, almost literally.  He's aged and he's accumulated scars, and for the first time the front cover actually shows Gaunt for the man he is now.  So I'm really quite interested to find out if we're going to start seeing him slowing down as he enters his autumn years, and how he'll cope with front line action as he moves on in life.

So yes, ridiculously long babble over, but little excites me more than a new Gaunt's Ghosts book, and now I have one :) Yey!

The Avengers Trailer!

I've just seen the new trailer for The Avengers and had to share it!

I have to admit I don't think it's a particularly strong trailer, but I am very excited about this film, and it's in no way deterring me from wanting to go see it when it gets released next year :) In fact, if anything, it's just made me hungry for more footage!

Anyways, just a quick blog post here to mention that, now I must be off for purposes of Masterchef Australia. Tata.

The end of a (short) era.

Well today was exactly one year since I started working for the NHS at City Hospital in Birmingham.  And, as fate would have it, it was also my last day working there.  Okay, technically I actually still work there for 3 more days - I'm just on annual leave - but for all intents and purposes my NHS days are over.

I have to admit to having been a sneaky bastard in the weeks leading up to my exit.  I had been loudly and frequently announcing that this coming Friday was my last day in order to avoid a song and dance being made over me leaving, so when I told people this morning that I was lunchtime today it seemed to catch most of them off-guard.  As a result there was no time for a presentation, or a leaving speech, or anything of that ilk, and I was able to say my goodbyes quietly and slip out without pomp and ceremony.

In all honesty it was a bit of a heartfelt farewell, and I did have a lump in my throat.  I may only have been there a year, but I've had some good memories there, and met some good friends.  I've made sure that everyone has my number who I'm willing to give it away to, so hopefully those I still think of as friends will keep in touch.  Obviously I'll still be seeing the games group, but it's those outside of that group that I'll keeping an ear out for.

The ride home was a bit of a sad one, I couldn't help thinking about the people I was leaving behind.  Will I be missed?  Will I be forgotten as soon as my replacement arrives?  I'm sure there's a few who will be as glad to see the back of me as I am to see the back of them.  And then there's the matter of the NHS itself.  I was so thrilled when I got this job (and beat 360 other applicants to it!), and realised I'd be working for the single biggest employer in Europe.  It felt like a job with a great future, and somewhere I could truly feel pride in my work, so even though it hasn't worked out that way, I still felt as though I was letting go of a good thing.  Every time anything interesting has happened in the last 3 weeks, every time I've had a good laugh with my workmates, and every time (though few, in that place) that I was given a pat on the back for doing well, I just started to question if I was doing the right thing by leaving.

But I've left now, and I just have to keep telling myself it was the right thing to do.  Because it IS the right thing to do.  They say the grass always looks greener on the other side, and now the NHS IS the other side, and is looking far nicer than it ever did while I was there.  The money at my new place is a lot better, the responsibility is a lot greater, and quite simply having a management role under my belt is going to look great on my CV.  Plus if this company grows as much as it potential should allow it, then I could end up in a senior position of a true powerhouse in its field.

But all of that is in the future.  Right now, at this moment, in my last few days of NHS employment, my brain's just overloaded with doubt and questions.  And it'll take a few weeks of settling in behind my new desk before I can truly put them to rest.

Bit of a solemn post here.  Expect my next two to be more upbeat and infinitely more geeky.  I want to have a babble about two things which have nestled quite happily into my life - one of them in the last 6 months, and one of them 7 years ago!

Cake verdict

Well today I took in all of the cakes that I baked on Sunday.  It was a bit of an effort getting them all into work in the first place - I completely filled the space under my scooter seat and had to carry the rest in a bag over my shoulder as I rode!  But I made it in without incident.  At least if I got pulled over I could bribe the police with blackberry gooodness.  om nom nom.

Anyways, at work we have a low filing cabinet at the top of the stairs, and anyone who brings in cakes puts them on top of the cabinet so that folks can grab one on the way to their break, so I got in this morning, trudged up the stairs with a stack of cakes only to find that someone had beaten me to it!  It was one of the girls' birthdays at the weekend, so she'd brought in a load of cakes and they were sat on top of the cabinet.  Not panicking, I checked the dates on them and they were all quite long-dated, whereas my stuff was freshly baked and needed to be eaten asap really.  So I thought I'd put her cakes in the drawer until tomorrow, and then my cakes could be eaten today, so I opened the drawer and... MORE CAKES!  And then I opened the bottom drawer to find it was full of biscuits!  So there was a bit of a cake overload today, and as a result about half of mine didn't get eaten.  I've left them at work in the hope that they'll get finished tomorrow, but I'm not sure how well they'll cope with being left for another day.

On the plus side though, people seemed to enjoy them, so mission accomplished on that front :)  And at least I know I'll be able to stuff my face again when I go in for my last day tomorrow.

Final cake result!

So here we go, as promised, the photo result of my immense baking session today! Started just after 10:00am, finished about 5:30pm, and producing roughly 85 cupcakes.

So we have Vanilla & Bitter Chocolate (blue cases), Blackberry Cornmeal (pink cases), Cornmeal Rumcakes (white cases), and Triple Citrus Cupcakes (Green/Yellow cases).  Having tried the citrus ones I've decided not to bother with the icing.  They taste nice enough on their own, and adding icing will make them a tremendous mess when I have to stack and transport them tomorrow.  I like the Blackberry ones as well, the Vanilla/Bitter choc ones are passable, and the Rum ones were a bit of a letdown, but all in all I'm happy with the selection I'm taking in tomorrow.  And if there's any left when I finish at 5:00 then they'll be coming home with me ;) lol

Also, I've bought two extras...

I've got one workmate who's very keen on Carrot Cake, and I didn't fancy making one on top of everything else I had to bake today, so I picked up an Asda Extra Special one, which I've had in the past and I know it tastes good.  Then on the way out of Asda I spotted their Hallowe'en cake range, and in the Death By Chocolate cake :) It's your typical mega-chocolatey cake, but the topping is decorated with icing gravestones and a hand bursting its way out of the ground.  Now anyone who knows me knows that chocolate and zombies are two of my favourite things, and now they have been brought together through the wonderful medium of cake.  I've tried everything I've baked today, and I've had the carrot cake in the past, so I'm determined to get a slice of this tomorrow, seeing as it's something new to try.

So there we go, my cake adventure is finished!  Tune in tomorrow and hopefully I'll have had some good feedback from my fellow labrats :)

Cake report: Part 3 of... umm, 4 , I guess.

Okay the final cupcakes are mixed and currently baking away.  These ones are triple citrus - lemon, lime, and orange - and tomorrow morning they'll be topped off with some lime icing.  In the meantime however, based on the taste of the batter, these are going to be freakin' amazing!  It was kinda hard to measure out the zests for the 3 fruits, so I just kept grating, mixing, and sampling, and eventually I came out with a batter which tastes so good that I'm tempted to keep it all for myself lol.

So in about 40 minutes I should be all done bar the icing, and I shall take a photo of the truly epic cake spread I have prepared for the hospital lab monkeys!