Well I’m finally working in earnest on something that I may have mentioned to you in the past, my own role-playing company

Woke up nice and early to beat the commuter rush to Manchester and found the cold that had been threatening to take hold was well and truly here. In a sort of achy limbs, snotty nosed grumpy way. Had a nice hot bath, did exercise and even had a nice breakfast. None of this would break the green funk that had descended upon my head.

So I decided to troll into work and have an easy day of it. Which I managed to do. Felt accomplished for it, since it would have been pointless staying at home to mope. However the green was still with me. Talked to Rach who showed 0 sympathy, because she is currently doing nights. Resigned myself to felling crap for the rest of the week. Even the curry I made myself was green…..

Then after tea and a cup of coffee it suddenly vanished. I spent the rest of the evening catching up with people, playing on-line games and laughing uncontrollably to myself.

CLUTCH rule your feeble existance.

The lords of the megaverse now return you to your regular reality.

I’m currently finishing this wonderful book about the Ptolemies , the Greek Pharoahs of Egypt, by Duncan Sprott. The first part of a quartet of books, it deals with the founder Ptolemy I, who is one of the sucessor generals who inherit the empire of Alexander the Great, and his immeadiate heirs. Narratated by Thoth the Egyptian god of Magic and Knowledge, the writing style is simliar to Robert Graves’I Claudius and at first a bit difficult to take in, but I gradually warmed to it. I’m in the last couple of chapters and its striking me that the book is less about the historical story of Ptolmey and his children, but the differences between the Greek invaders ( who are brash arrogant, very much the Yuppies of the Ancient world) and the Egyptians ( who are calm, very socialist, mystical and a have a society based upon ‘Maat’ a principal of right action governed by the heart/feelings).

I picked this book up a couple of weeks ago at a charity shop and I will be geniunely sad to finish it. I feel the comparisons to Robert Graves I Cladius (another one of my all time favs) is well deserved. If you like well written historical fiction pick up this book

The trailer for Frank Miller’s Sin City.

Warning: Features Large Explosions, Black n white comic book style cinematography and BRUCE WILLIS

Looks good anyone else fancy going to see it?

The sun is shining outside in Manchester and I’m back playing my own game after getting involved in other people’s games at work (which are characterised by the words, arrogance , bullshit, and academic fluffy headed boss).

The weekend was a grand relaxing one. Went to see Oceans Twelve on Saturday Night with Giles and Ness who were in chipper if slightly subdued form after a very boozy Friday night. The film was entertaining nonsense and while not as dire as some critics have made out, it wasn’t as slick as the first one, relying a bit more on belly laughs produced by the banter between the characters.

Sunday was another play with Linux day, with the emphasis being on finding a working web design tool. There doesn’t seem to be anything to rival the mighty Dreamweaver MX, but there were packages which do bits much better. Bluefish for scripting and NVU for HTML design. Also installed a Wiki for my upcoming RQ Pavis and Big Rubble game. The idea being that people contribute locations, items, characters and adventure plots for a free rooming game. Not much to see at the moment but here it is PAVISWIKI.

Monday was full of fun and games of the bosses looking over the school website redesign, making lots of suggestions which leave the project after 3 hours of meetings….EXACTLY THE SAME. I came home and snuggled up with Rach, who is on nights until Friday.

Well what a surprise this was Mr Newt interfacing with the commercial entity that is Manchester City centre. Yes I’ve been shopping, mainly for trivial items such as magazines, rechargeable batteries, flax seed oil (veggy version of cod liver oil), but I also picked up a cheep (5quid) mic n headset for on-line gaming nonsense and fifty quids worth of computer books, (Visual Quick Start to Photoshop CS and the Linux Cookbook) which work will pay for yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Now all I have to do is consolidate my goodies into one easy package for carefree transportation home (which occurs in 1hr 45 mins)

YAR!!!

So another weekend is on the way. Hoorah! I’ve broken the back of a busy period of work and the train journey is becoming less tedious and soul destroying. Got a ton of stuff I want to get done, but not enough time to do it 🙁 I think some projects are going to have to go by the wayside and I’m going to have to discipline myself to get the remainder done.

Thats enough of my serious head stuff. The weekend is on its way and its time to play. I wonder what games I’ll get upto over the weekend ??

After a couple of busy previous weekends I was due for a quiet one. For some reason my mind woke up on Friday morning with the instruction ‘ this weekend is Iron Maiden weekend’. Not willing to argue with instructions from the depths of my subconscious, I decided to revisit my heavy metal youth.
Let the games commence!
My Iron Maiden Weekend