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!

Cake report: Part 2 of 3

Well first up there be good news, my marble cupcakes weren't a complete disaster.  The chocolate part is still extremely bitter, but the vanilla does balance it quite nicely, so if I advertise them as Vanilla & Bitter Chocolate cupcakes I should get away with it :)

Anyway, part 2: Blackberry and cornmeal cupcakes.  I haven't tried one yet (they're cooling as I type), but they look absolutely delicious!  A lovely golden colour, just slightly browned off where the sugar topping has caramelised.  I really can't wait to try one!

Plus there's a bonus!

This Martha Stewart cupcake book always gets the measurement a bit off, so you end up making more cakes than the book says, and these were no exception.  Unfortunately the blackberries were the only thing which there wasn't a surplus of, so further blackberry/cornmeal cakes were out of the question.  So I thought "I know, I'll put in raisins instead, so they're raisin cornmeal cupcakes", then I thought "oohm wait... rum & raisin cornmeal cupcakes!".  So I mixed the rum into the remaining batter, went into the cupboard and... no raisins!  Well I've done enough shopping trips for these things, so I just left them as is.  So there is one small batch of experimental Cornmeal Rumcakes!  I hope they come out alright, but only time will tell!

So that's stage 2 done.  At this point I've got enough cakes for everyone at work, but I think I'll still go ahead with the citrus cupcakes, because they just sound too nice to leave out.

Cake report: Part 1 of 3

First batch of cupcakes are finished, and may I wish a plague upon the house of Martha Stewart.  The marble cupcakes are an absolute disaster!  I would blog more, but I have to press on with part 2: The blackberry cornmeal cupcakes.

I have not lost heart in the slightest though, the marble were the most complicated, so there's still all to play for :)  Back later!

Clothing success

I have, for the last couple weeks, been slightly preoccupied with thoughts of what to wear to my leaving do next weekend.  Yes, it's a scary thought, but in a week's time I'll be away from the hospital and celebrating with a good old (alcohol free) knees-up in town.

Well I despertely needed new jeans and new boots, so I got both of them just over a week ago, but I have been struggling somewhat with tops.  I do have many t-shirts, and many hawaiian shirts (which I love dearly), but I did fancy something a little bit snappy, yet still casual.  So over the last 2 weeks I have been searching in vain for a casual waistcoat, and a shirt that works nicely with it.  Well today my search is over, for in the H&M sale they had... no waistcoats!  Okay, that doesn't sound particularly triumphant.  But they did have in the sale a very nice, lightweight but long-sleeved white shirt, and outside of the sale they had a plain, black casual waistcoat, which was significantly cheaper than its more ornate counterparts.  Now I like cheap (cheap = good!), but I won't go for clothes just because they're cheap, I'd rather spend a few extra pounds for something I really like, especially as I buy clothes so infrequently as and such get a lot of wear out of what I have.  But this plain, unornamented waistcoat was a hundred times nicer than any of the other ones, so it won hands-down in every respect.

So now I have new shoes, new jeans, new shirt, and new waistcoat, and I'm ready to dazzle next Saturday :) Also I think I'm just about done with clothes shopping for another couple of years lol  Except perhaps for finding one or two more plain shirts that go with my new waistcoat.  It'd be a bit frustrating if I only ever got to wear it with the one same shirt.

Okay, clothes babble over.  Thank you for putting up with it folks, I shall try to make the next post extra-manly to make up for it.

...actually I've just thought, my next post will probably be about my cake-baking.  Perhaps not so manly then.



Why did the blonde walk around with her purse open?

Because she'd heard about the change in the weather!

But seriously though, what a change!  It was just over a week ago that I was spending my lunchbreaks sunbathing in the hospital garden with friends from work.  Now it seems like an age ago, both in the temperature drop and in the fact that I wouldn't want to be spending my lunch with some of those people.  Not all of them, there are still a few friends left there, just not as many as there were a fortnight ago.

Had a decent evening last night - Friday Night Magic with Rich (aka Mr. Anderson).  Lost 4 games and won just one, but that one was won in such spectacular fashion - swinging for 38 poison counters with Trample in a single turn.  If you don't know Magic: The Gathering then that won't mean anything to you, but those who play it will know that was a truly incredible feat.  It made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

Anyways, the weather.  Sweet monkey Zeus it's frikkin' freezing!  Most definitely time for 2 blankets on the bed, and very nearly time to add a hot water bottle into the mix.  I do need to psyche myself up to get out of the house though.  I want to pop into Sutton to see if the H&M sale has started, and if it has, do they have any waistcoats on sale?  And secondly I need to get myself up to Asda to get my ingredient shopping done.  Would Mr Kipling be a cheaper/easier option?  Yes on both counts.  But I've decided I'm going to be the better man in this hellhole of a workplace, and I'm going to make cakes for everyone.

In lighter, staying-in-bed news, the weekly SkyPlayer (Sky Go) update has been a good one!  Sadly District 9 has dropped out of the listings, which I really wanted to see, but in its place we now have Rules of Engagement (back from before Samuel L. Jackson appeared in EVERYTHING!), and two films I've always wanted to see but never have done: American Beauty, and Girl Interrupted.

Anyway, this blog entry is actually me procrastinating and refusing to get ready to leave the house, so I'm going to sign off, get dressed, and venture out into the arctic wilderness...




Oh and I must watch last night's Masterchef Australia!  Om nom Dani nom ;) lol  Seriously though, it's an awesome show, so much better than UK Masterchef.

Weekend baking challenge

With my final day at the hospital looming, I turned my attention this evening to the important matter of cakes.  Obviously taking in cakes on my final week is mandatory, the only question is whether to do a spot of homebaking or just buy a load to take in.

If you've read my last couple of blog posts you'll know that I'm not entirely enamoured with work at the moment.  It's completely doing my head in, as are many of the people there, and so the idea of slaving for hours to make cakes for 50+ people seems a lot of uneccessary effort.  On the other hand, I do enjoy baking, and purely from an ego-stroking point of view it'd be nice to dazzle them with some homemde cakes as I leave that place forever.

So this evening I sat down with my Martha Stewart Cupcakes book and picked out 3 recipes, which should be enough to make 50 cakes.  I say 50, but this book always underestimates, so I expect the actual number to be around the 70 mark.  I've selected 3 recipes:  Marble cupcakes (a swirl of chocolate and vanilla), Citrus cupcakes (lime, lemon and orange in the cake, with a topping of lime frosting), and Blueberry cornmeal cupcakes.  They're 3 recipes I've never tried before (which is all the more fun!) and the do look absolutely delicious.  However, I have now compiled together a combined ingredients list for them all, and ye gods!  Not only are these going to take hours to make, but they're going to cost me a small fortune to buy the ingredients for!  Adding onto that the fact that I'll have to catch the bus into work because all of those cakes will never fit on my scooter, and it's becoming quite the colossal task.  I mean even if I was completely devoted to this job, it'd be a lot to do, but in my current mindset I'm not entirely sure I'm up to the challenge.

Stay tuned, and in a few days there'll be either a tale of triumph, or a trip to the supermarket to buy a few boxes of Mr Kipling cakes!

Counting down the days...

Now that Tuesday's over I've officially got less than a week until I leave the Hospital for my new job.  I can't express just how much I'm looking forward to seeing the back of that place, severing all ties and never looking back.  City hospital's caused me nothing but misery in recent months, and soon I can finally start putting that episode of my life behind me.

And then I go into my first ever management role! Scary!!!

Well well well. 7 months

So here I am, back again on the dusty old blog.  I guess I haven't had much to say the last 7 months.  I only really blog when I fancy a ramble or if there's something I need to get off my chest.  Well in this case it's the latter.

I learned something today (in the South Park style).  It's a lesson I get slapped with a lot, but it never seems to take hold.  Never trust anybody.  If you put faith in anyone, you will end up getting burned for it.  Maybe in a week, maybe a month, maybe a year, but they'll always prove you were wrong to let them in in the first place.  I'm very much hoping the lesson will stick this time.  I did perfectly well for a long time with no friends to put hopes in, and subsequently no one to let me down.  Maybe it'd be easier going back there.

Don't know what the hell I want right now.