Rocket launchers

Nerf rocket launchers that plug into your USB port. Imagine the possibilities.

Ron and I decided they were probably key pad operated, point and click firing. This alone would no doubt be fun. But even better would be combining it with motion detectors to fire on anyone coming in the room or maybe an alarm clock so if you didn't get up quick enough your computer would start launching rockets at you!

Why were we looking at a USB rocket launcher? Well because I'm trying to find a USB Wi-fi adapter that will work on Mac OS 8 of course. Harder than I thought. I know they exist. It says so online. But just try finding one in Glasgow. Ah, well, the quest continues.

Wet Kitten! Mew!

Mew!

Ok, impatience carries the day. If the photographer wants me to take it down I will, but the cuteness must be spread! Just look at the sulky outrage...yep, that's me when I named this blog. Annoyed by soggy adventures but hopefully still cute. :)

Anyway, the kitten's name is Discordia and I found her on parody.org in the author's photo journal. Is she not awesome?

No big news today so I'll leave you with cuteness.

Friday Night Musings

Have I mentioned Madrigirls is loads of fun? Well it is. It is so very wonderful to be singing lots again, and in beautiful harmony. The only thing that would make it better would having Meg and Manda there too (and then I would practice more too for we would surely wander around singing in parts!).

The Chivalric Dream Society starting up here is a bit odd (hopefully this won't get back to anyone that will invoke a lynching; the geek community is so small after all). It is sort of a cross between SCA and LARPing. Kinda. The SCA has historical personas who run around in a made-up set of kingdoms which, when you break it down that way, is already a bit weird. But the Chivalric Dream people have added a fictitious extra British Isle about the size of Ireland to the south west and locate their game-thing there. So you have people with suedo- Anglo-Saxon, Viking, Pictish, Spanish, etc. background as well as "native" people who need even less ties to the reality of European history. And everyone, yes everyone, is separated into one of ten ruling families. And everyone is noble and going for knighthood.

Now that I've heard more of their fighting rules, I don't think I'll be playing with them after all. The fencing teaching contradicted many basic things I'd been taught (in two kingdoms and for a few things even in foil fencing!) and the heavy weapons armor does not at all sound safe (Chainmail and helm and sturdy shoes. That's it. Did I mention this is for use with metal weapons? Yes, running away now.) Anyway, the first craft projects are supposed to be leatherworking and chainmail making so I might stick around for those days and then abandon them. They got a fun bunch of recruits. It makes me wish I had made a go at starting a branch of the SCA when I was here as a student. They got a good 25 people at the first meeting and about 16 or so came back for the second. We'd've killed for numbers like that at St. David's! I suppose it would be evil to seduce people away from them to the SCA now? Anyway, I am nominally signed up for the "Pictish" family, so perhaps I can inject a note of historical accuracy there at least before I abandon them all forever.

Tigery Kittens!!

So I was doing an image search on Kushiel because I wanted to see the Kushiel's Dart rose...and about one in ten images were of kittens! Kushiel Bengal kittens to be specific. They looked like tigers only domestic cat size! And then, the very next day Ron came home with a newspaper with a front page story (well, a front paged tease leading to the story) on Toygers! Once again, domestic kitties bred to look like Tigers. Wee!

Prayer

I hardly know where to begin. Prayer is hard and praying with people of subtly different beliefs is harder. That seems as good a starting place as any. There is little about the prayers offered up in Sandyford's prayer meetings that I can point to and say, "I don't agree with that." However, the sum of the songs, the bible studies and the prayers leaves me worn out, often angry, feeling isolated and lonely and frustrated. Often there are fairly specific things that make me mad. I thought that was bad. Last night was worse. Oh, sure, I disagreed slightly with the bible teaching but it was silly, more of a "I agree with your premise but not how you got there from Psalm 70 which doesn't say that at all" situation. But I felt weighted down in the actual prayer, restless and trapped. By the end I was sitting there quietly crying. I added nothing aloud; I just couldn't manage it. I added my silent prayers to theirs where I felt I could, altered them where I couldn't and at times just sat there.

Why am I doing this? Well, for one thing they keep saying piercing things about the importance of sticking with it and how hard it is. And until I know if that's just them or God speaking through them I can't manage to ignore it. For another, Ron goes. For a third, I did a church hunt when I was first in Glasgow and this was the best I found. So I quieted myself enough to show no traces at the end of prayer and left as quickly as possible--and then cried half the way home, much to Ron's dismay.

An interesting point within all this--I was desperately homesick for BREAK@8. I'd not have thought I would miss anything in Atlanta, but BREAK is people more than place I suppose. But I missed them terribly. In honor of them, and because it is one of my favorite prayers, I'm including the Franciscan Blessing we used to close our prayer groups this past year. I've certainly long been blessed (and cursed) with a restless discomfort about easy answers and half-truths, and it continues to plague me here more than ever. I prefer it, however, to the alternative.

May God bless you with a restless discomfort about easy answers, half-truths and superficial relationships, so that you may seek truth boldly and love deep within your heart.

May God bless you with holy anger at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people, so that you may tirelessly work for justice, freedom, and peace among all people.

May God bless you with the gift of tears to shed with those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, or the loss of all that they cherish, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and transform their pain into joy.

May God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you really CAN make a difference in this world, so that you are able, with God’s grace, to do what others claim cannot be done.

And the blessing of God the Supreme Majesty and our Creator, Jesus Christ the Incarnate Word who is our brother and Saviour, and the Holy Spirit, our Advocate and Guide, be with you and remain with you, this day and forevermore.

AMEN.

Of Gaming and Other Things

Well, Glasgow is bidding fair to have a beautiful autumn. As much sun as clouds most days for more than a week now. And today I wore a T-shirt walking to the QM. At first it was a bit strange because everyone else I saw was still wearing coats and scarves. Just about the time I was beginning to doubt that the day was actually warmer and to wonder if I had simply acclimated at last, I saw a stream of about five people who, like me, were carrying coats or sweaters but were down to wearing short sleeves. So the earlier people must have just been going around in disbelief that it could possibly be short-sleeve weather in October in Glasgow. One of the folks at church, though, said that many people book their holidays for this time of year since the weather is often more reliable now than in summer.

I'm back in the same spot as last time...well one window over. This is actually and even nicer view since the Boyd Orr building is now completely blocked from view while the fine old eighteenth/nineteenth century tenement-houses-turned-faculty-offices have come into view down the lane. And the tower and the lovely autumn trees are still centrally framed.

I have mixed reviews of GUGS last night. As I predicted, Ron and I showed up just a little too late to hear the announcements and descriptions of the campaigns starting up. Since at this point everything is starting up fresh (do they never have campaigns carry over from year to year I wonder?) they at least had sign up sheets with brief descriptions. I'm not sure sign up sheet would be the best method for filling all types of games. As a GM I think I'd prefer some informal interview processes for some games with the chance to scare away anyone who seemed like they would be more disruptive than otherwise. Oh well, as I'm not ready to run my game, it was a moot point. However, this means most people inclined for a campaign will have one by the time I get going, so I probably won't have much choice in players either.

Anyway, it turned out that the game I signed up for the GM was not actually present yesterday. Nor does anyone seem to know him. This is discouraging. But his description sounded interesting and the only background that sounded more appealing was being run by a GM I can't stand (I shan't even hint at why, not knowing who will eventually read this). I wish I had heard the descriptions though as most of the written ones were just one liners or even just “Torg” or the like. I'm sure the GMs would have rambled a bit more in person.

Well, seeing as I had no game for the night, I demanded board games. Eventually the person with the GUGS locker key showed up. (I think it rather foolish that we have only one set of the keys. We are role players after all, and not renowned for...practical considerations. The very fact that I now have the keys rather than Johanna who got them from Alan just emphasises my point.) This meant that I got to go up to the GUGS locker for the very first time ever! Very exciting. It was in the laundry room which I never would have guessed, though it makes sense now that I think about it. Just about all the other rooms are subject to being completely monopolized by one group or another and if the lockers were in such a room you would have to forgo getting at your stuff all too often or else disturb some other group. The laundry room on the other hand is always open. So we went to the locker, which was cool enough, but when it came down to it, it appeared I had a choice of: Settlers of Catan, Puerto Rico or Gang of Four. Now this was a hard choice since all three are very subject to phenomenon whereby those who have played often can almost always win against newcomers who don't fully realize the full implications of the rules. Because of this, I chose the one I am most familiar with, Settlers, in the hopes that I would not be entirely slaughtered. I have played at Red House several times (though many of those games ended, if not quite in grief and recriminations, close enough) and in Glasgow maybe once which is at least better than my twice with Puerto Rico and one time with Gang of Four. Johanna and I did have fun playing around with a pair of nearly-useless Spiderman walkie-talkies on the way back down with my loot. Nearly-useless because their range is such that by the time you are out of normal earshot, the walkie-talkies are out of range too! Still, some minor hilarity ensued anyway.

However, on returning to the other folks whose campaigns were not starting that day, Settlers was met with an “oh, no, not Settlers” by one, and from Louise, “I've got one question for you, Erica: have you got wood for sheep.” The proper response may have been, “I haven't got any wood at all” but I contented myself with rolled eyes. I don't know about the rest of the world over where Settlers is played, but in Scotland that joke is very well worn by now.

Anyway, there was a good deal of sitting around doing nothing till at last Brian pulled out Fairy Tale, took half an hour convincing the other guys that their manhood would not be in any way impaired by playing such a girly-looking game and we finally played that—I did pretty well, but Louise won it hands down. After that I was dispatched to go bring down Puerto Rico. Louise tried to tell everyone she had never played before, but seeing as she had used this ploy back when I had never played before (and then proceeded to beat the rest of us into the ground) I exposed her and then was left with the job of explaining the game to those who actually hadn't played before and warned them all that the game was really gang-up-on-Louise. As such, we won. One of the first-timers did win, disproving my standing theory about these games, but I think this was at least partly because we were all concentrating on keeping Louise from carrying out her nefarious mechanations.

Well, I would get to work but the QMU wireless is still not working. Hmm. I did put in for life-time membership today. I guess it goes up before the board which only meets on the last Monday of every month, so I've got a bit of a wait.

Ooh! Breaking news! My thesis-article-thing is still in the book collection! The contract is still in negotiation. My but these things really do take a long time. But considering how long I took to finish up my contribution, that was all to the good.

Ooh! Look, a bird!

I still find it strange after all these years to see seagulls in Glasgow. Yes, it is known as a port town, but a river port not an ocean port. It's pretty far up the Clyde as the crow--or seagull--flies. Anyway, today I have a lovely view up University Gardens Ave. No gardens in sight, I'm afraid, despite the name, but there is a row of lovely trees all dressed up in Autumn colors--mostly gold with remnants of pale green and tinges of darker orange. And just beyond them is a lovely view of the main tower of the university. If I just mentally block out the sight of the pebbled concrete monstrosities on either side of my window (and thankfully I don't actually have to look at my beloved QMU building since I'm sitting in it) then it is an all-around lovely view. I do wish they had made an effort to keep to a more uniform (lovely) style when they added more buildings to the university. I remember Dublin University did it, carefully reviewing the plans of future buildings to make sure they would blend in with the others. So it is possible. But no. From Glasgow Uni to UCSC, we just have to add giant rectangular concrete slabs.

The picture is of the QMU, from wikipedia. I think this picture is from before the remodeling, but the essentials haven't changed. See the round red sign on the 2nd floor up (it says "The Food Factory" in case you can't make it out.) The sign is gone now or changed but I'm sitting a couple of windows to the right of there--pretty much the last full window you can see on that level. Yup, that one. (waves!)

Food and Games

Ron's old supervisor took us out to lunch today at a Chinese restaurant. It was funny how much he expected it to be very foreign to us--of course it somewhat was. He ordered in rapid Mandarin and there were only a few familiar items (I couldn't name any for you, except that some were Dim Sum dumpling type things and others were wide rice noodles). But I at least acquitted myself with chopsticks reasonably well. Manda, I can't even remember how to say "a cat" in Mandarin anymore! Sigh. Anyway, it was a nice chance to visit and to talk practical job stuff and the rest.

I'm writing from GUGS today. No games for me! Sigh. There's a Descent game but no room for me and the only other thing around is chess. I don't know why we don't have the rest of the games today. I did put up a post in Witchfire though. Things are going strangely but interestingly in my weird online rpg. My assassin just caught another assassin at the opera, my cook has just been visited by a queen, my warlord has won a battle and now he and his men are partying, and my queen is getting news that should lead to her actually claiming her throne at last. Great fun. Meanwhile at Hogwarts (as of yesterday), my poor little Slytherin is having crises of conscience that are only going to get worse as time goes on. She's trying to be nice to the Mud--er, Muggle-borns. But it's so hard (as well as politically inexpedient for a Slytherin). Other than the fact that her best friend is in Gryfindore (oh the shame!), things aren't going too bad for her though. The Gryfindores on the other hand are getting in lots and lots of trouble. Hehe.

La la la Mew!

I had my first madrigirls rehearsal last night. Leading up to it I suffered a few doubts, both wondering if I was up to the challenge as well as wondering why I was giving away yet another night of my week (I'm getting awfully booked up!) and all for one concert. All such doubts were banished by the end of warm ups, let alone rehearsal. Oh, man, how I've missed this! Not that I've ever done anything quite like it--and I think Madrigirls promises to be even better than most of the choirs I've been in. Such fun music (much of it medieval, yay!), such good singers, and friendly directors.

Afterwards a few of us went to the Post-Grad Lounge for drinks. That was fun. Turns out they all knew what role-playing was (Stop and marvel. Every single one knew what it was.) and several had tried it. They talked lots about local (and not so local) folk bands and singers and I wished I had a better memory for names; it'd be fun to try some of the music. But oh, well. I had skipped dinner so my one pint had me pretty sloshed and memorizing band names was therefore well beyond my capabilities. However, I learned the names of all three people there which for me is quite a feat.

Well, I have made a grand discovery. My old union, the Queen Margret Union, now has free wi-fi! Well, I'm sure I'm supposed to be a student or something, but surely "visiting scholar" is close enough. Anyway, this makes the internet issue easier as I am bound to have an easier time finding space and a power outlet here in the QM than I was having in the library, but I don't have to watch the minutes like in a cafe... although there is a cafe in here, should I want a coffee or mocha or something. Mmm, mocha.... Bye now!

Wanted: Mascot Kitten

I need a mascot for this blog I think. I've emailed someone about permission to use a shot from her photo journal--I hope she says yes because its a priceless picture of an wet kitten full of kittenly outrage at such an impairment of dignity. But anyway, I wondered if Megan or someone else had any good pictures for consideration. Even setting aside the question of finding copyright free pictures or getting permission to use one, it is strange how few pictures of wet kittens I could find. Almost all were of kittens getting baths covered in soap which is not quite the effect I was going for. I guess a cat lover's natural reaction to seeing a kitten in the rain is to bring it inside and dry it off rather than run for the camera, but you think of the web as having pictures of everything. I'd ask Ron to draw me one, but it would end up being a mutant battle kitten, soaking wet but wielding a bazooka. Hmm. On second though, maybe I will ask Ron. That could be fun.

A Back Post

02 October 2007

Blogging:

I have begun to find that, while walking or cooking or whatnot, I think up things to put in this blog, and then can't remember what has actually made it in. After all, I don't quite manage to make it to a library or cafe every day and even when I do, I am usually pressed to use my allotted wi-fi time as wisely as possible. Thus I end up typing up whatever comes to mind at that moment and hitting “post.” One day I got around to trying to post just two minutes too late; my internet had timed out and it would have cost another cup of coffee to post. This has at last led me to a rather obvious solution: I can type up a post in advance and simply post it when I next have a moment of wi-fi access!

It has also occurred to me as I try to write this blog, that audience becomes a very tricky thing. Between role-playing groups, SCA, prayer and church groups, friends from English or Medieval Studies, friends from other random sources, and various family members...well, many of you who may be reading this know only one or two sides of me. Some of the stuff I ramble on about here will seem quite strange—maybe in a, “oh, yeah, she mentioned she did that stuff” kind of way, and maybe in a, “what the heck is she talking about?” kind of way. And certainly I tremble wondering what my family may make of all this. But oh, well. I guess this is no reason not to try anyway. So I'll try to give a more or less even account of life in all its weirdness, though I've found myself writing to the folks at Red House (SCAers and role-players in California, the whole lot of them) as a sort of core target audience, probably because it was Amanda who got me to do this in the first place. So, whoever you are, welcome to my blog. If I don't know you, I don't know why you'd want to read any of this, but feel free. If you're friend or family, welcome to my ramblings and please don't get too concerned about the likelihood of my freezing to death. It's really quite low, honest.

Glasgow kitten weather report:

The weather here must have heard me talking earlier and rallied itself for one more push of lovely weather. For three whole days now we've had blue skies and sunshine. This has been tempered by cool to cold breezes and liberal amounts of clouds though I grant they have been of the white and fluffy variety even if they do compose more than half of the sky. The effect has been very pleasant over all and I've been seen out in nothing but a t-shirt and sweater. Ron persists in wearing sandals. Madness, I say. Still, since here it labels him as a crazy sandle-wearing hippy, I use it as proof he is well suited to relocation to sunny California should the opportunity ever (please!!) present itself.

Randomness:

It has begun to seem natural to me that the silverware and the toothbrushes are kept in the same drawer. After all, they all consist of long implements that you hold at one end and stick into your mouth. Right? Still, I thought I would comment while I still had some vague memory that this is an unusual practice. (My mother would probably be horrified simply at having all the silverware and can openers etc jumbled in one drawer without dividers or anything, let along with toothbrushes mixed in for good measure.) Why, you ask? Well, because the bathroom is scary of course. Scarier than a kitchen with the roof falling, you ask? Oh that. Well, hygienically, yes, much scarier. The bathroom is shared after all, and is usually quite disgusting. I've taken to washing my hands at the kitchen sink as well since sometimes just touching the bathroom sink will make my hands much worse off than they'd been before. Worse than any dorm I've lived in actually, but only just barely. I shower in flip-flops just like in the dorms, but I shower downstairs in the less scary bathroom anyway. It's just pointless to tromp all the way down there just to brush my teeth when there's a perfectly good kitchen sink at my disposal. It's just funny that what seemed a strange clash of the worlds of bathroom and kitchen to begin with has begun to make a certain kind of sense.

Craft projects:

Well, as most of you who know me know, I usually have some sort of craft project going or in planning. Sometimes this is as elaborate as tablet weaving or sewing garb for the SCA, sometimes it is as simple as luceting or a bit of cross-stitch. At present my craft plotting and scheming has taken a practical bent. I have two projects in the planning stages. Project Jeans involves a pair of jeans that I thought I had sufficiently mended over the summer. A first wearing over here, however, reopened most of the tears, proving me wrong. Since skirts are really only good for the rare dry days and I only have three other pairs of trousers (er, pants to the Americans) with me, it would be very nice to have that pair of jeans back in commission. Though stretchy enough to apparently fit fine, I have wondered if they are a bit too small. Along those lines I have wondered if I could simultaneously sew some supporting material along the inside of the seams that are going (inside the thighs) while letting out the seams that run along the outside of the leg, adding a strip of contrasting fabric or a wide ribbon to help let it out. I think it would look too weird to have the contrasting strip run the inside seam, but letting out the outside seams might take the pressure off the inside seams. However, if I'm wrong it would be a lot of time and a bit of material wasted. The other project, Project Sweatshirt, is less chancy but also less necessary. I got a free black sweatshirt during Fresher's Fair but I really don't like the picture. I'm not fond of the advertising slogans either, though I could certainly live with them. But it has occurred to me that perhaps I don't have to. If I can find a way to creatively decorate the sweatshirt I could cover up the offending picture and slogans. I'm working on a few ideas, most of which involve finding pretty remnants for much less money than I would spend buying another sweatshirt. I guess the question is whether to go for fabrics that won't fray and cut them out in cool patterns, or cut out squares of woven fabrics and fringe them and tack them on every which way for the patchwork look.

Life in general:

Went to Alan's birthday party last night. That was fun. There I finally tried Kopparberg which is one of several things advertised on the sweatshirt mentioned above, and it is actually quite tasty pear cider. Yum. Er, for those who don't know, Alan is one of my gaming society friends here, comes from France, and is playing Griffendore to my Slitherin in Molly's Harry Potter role playing game. Speaking of which, I made the Slitherin Quidditch team (as a first year no less) in the most Slitherin way possible: an exchange of political favors. That was quite fun. I am trying to play a non-evil Slitherin, but that doesn't mean she isn't above bending the rules now and again. I seem to be doing lots of kid-related role playing right now. The one-off I played in last week was suedo-Power Rangers and we were all teenagers. Now in Harry Potter I'm playing an eleven-year-old. I may need to intentionally seek out a game tonight in which I can play a full grown adult who knows what she is doing. If anyone is running such a game at the moment that is. People continue to ask when I'm going to run Serenity. I'm not ready yet, though, and I'm rather enjoying just being a player. Campaigns start for the term next Tuesday so I need to make some decisions this week about whether I'm going to try to run Serenity at Tuesday GUGS or whether I want to play in one of the other campaigns. Michael has offered to run a four-week campaign that could then give way to mine to give me more time (and a game to play in in the mean time). I'll have to give him an answer soon. It is very fun to be back in the midst of all this role-playing again.

It all plays off the fiction-writing impulses too. At the moment I am in the process of accessing what work would have to go into any given story to make it a novel. I plan to pick one or two (with two you can switch to the other whenever you get stuck on one) to work hard on. It looks like I have serious world-building to do on just about any of them before I can return to actual writing. I know some authors manage to write there stories without actually planning out their worlds. Ursula K. Le Guin talks about it as if she were exploring the worlds just far enough to write the story at hand. But while I certainly start writing novels that way, I seem to always hit hangups along the way, things that just don't quite make sense and I feel I have to resolve them now before they present bigger continuity issues later.