Sleepypete's Pillow

And with my new found quest to learn how to draw, you probably know what’s coming for the thumbnail ….

There we go.

Gosh, this one has felt like a grind which is a shame because there was a lot of good stuff in there. Book ? Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

The book has a two main threads running throughout and it alternates between the perspective of the creatures on the planet and the humans on board the Gilgamesh, an ark ship with the last remnants of the human race fleeing a dying and toxic Earth.

The planet they arrive at is the subject of an ancient terraforming project headed up by Dr Avrana Kern. However … at the culmination of the project, all sorts of crazy people erupt and overthrow the old order. Humanity is thrown into chaos, all sorts of bad things happen and the original subjects of an accelerated uplift project all burn up in a firey reentry.

Hopefully going to avoid the spoilers !

With the monkeys all gone, what’s left to inherit the uplift project ? The book is split up through various epochs, where the crew of the Gilgamesh wrestle with Dr Kern and with themselves in various vignettes.

Similarly, the spiders on the planet steadily evolve into far more complex and intelligent creatures and face their own challenges.

The book ended well and the various challenges were well written. It’s a very well written book looking back on it.

But I didn’t really enjoy it and found it a bit of a slog to get through to the finish. maybe due to the constant swapping between perspectives ? I don’t think so, I’ve read similar books and enjoyed them. I suspect I formed a low opinion of this one quite early due to the tiredness and general burning out feeling but I didn’t want to give up on it.

What’s next ? Not sure actually ! I might well go back to an older book. Nah. I’ve got a few books on the Kindle waiting to be read.

PS That’s totally not a Thargoid up there that’s hosting Dr Kern’s Sentry Pod.

People have had me looking for a cake joke just now and I found an old meme … You know me and memes, can’t resist. And I couldn’t resist updating this one.

But … cake ?

Cake from the archives ! This was great cake.

Meme ?

The idea is that you will learn a lot of little things about your friends that you probably didn’t know already. It’s going to be curious how many of these have changed since the original post in 2006.

1. What time did you get up this morning? Awake 0710 ish, on the bus at 0730. My morning routine resembles a terrified realisation that quite soon I will be in work and terror can be a powerful motivator. (I skip breakfast at home, have a teacake at work and gradually wake while on the bus).

2. Diamonds or pearls? Diamonds are more sparkly ? Yep. Same answer.

3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? That time it was Narnia. This time it was Battle Angel Alita, which I would highly recommend for a bit of anime style action fun.

4. What’s your favourite TV show? Currently, it’s Star Trek Discovery because it pulls off what it does with a certain style and it has continually kept me guessing as to where it’s going to go.

5. What did you have for breakfast this morning? TEACAKE !

6. What’s your favourite cuisine? Pizza. Yep. Still pizza.

7. What foods do you dislike? Foods that are too mushy or are hassle to eat.

8. What is your favourite crisp flavour? The Flaming Bacon type flavour.

9. What’s your favourite CD at the moment? It was Alisha’s Attic Vaults cd 1 back then but I’ve since developed a heavy Nina Persson addiction and it’s between the A Camp self titled album and Long Gone Before Daylight by The Cardigans.

10. What kind of car do you drive? Back then it was a Puma, now it’s a Lexus IS300h. Both are fantastic cars in their own ways.

12. What characteristics do you despise? Misplaced Arrogance – gotta agree there. Still the same.

11. Favourite sandwich? Ham tea cakes. Not had one of these in years ! (I don’t keep butter in the house any more because I waste it by not using it quickly enough)

13. Favourite item of clothing? Clothing with no holes in the wrong places. Jeans, t shirt, leather jacket. Same ! I have a newish T-shirt with a kitty in a ball of string that says “It was like it when I got here !” that’s a favourite (link !).

14. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? Kennedy Space Centre on the way to the Moon. No change here !

15. What colour is your bathroom? Blue and yellow (I haven’t repainted it since moving in). And it’s still the same colours.

16. Favourite Brand of clothing? I avoid clothing brands that put their name on the item as they’re not paying me to advertise their stuff. No change there, although I would happily recommend Genki Gear and Fuzzballs (link)

17. Where would you retire? Caribbean probably – cos of the cricket. Might not like the heat there though. Not any more, due to attitude of people observed while the cricket coverage is on. Now it would be on a canal barge, touring the canals.

18. Favourite time of day? Getting home from work. Same ! Oh and stream time or any time I get nice messages from good people.

19. What was your most memorable birthday? Can’t remember many of these … The last few when I’ve had gifts 😀

20. Where were you born? Birmingham. No change there ! I have not been cloned since the writing of the last post. I think.

21. Favourite sport to watch? Cricket. No change there !

22. Who do you least expect to send this back to you? It’s not really a sending back to thing any more ….

23. Person you expect to send it back first? See above

24. What fabric detergent do you use? Was Persil. I actually have issues here now due to my outsides. Believe it or not, I am allergic to hypoallergenic washing blobs. Nowadays it’s Persil blobs (still!) and Tesco softener, although I’ll switch the softener when it runs out.

25. Were you named after anyone? No. Don’t think so …

26. Do you wish on stars? No. Although they are very nice to look at.

27. When did you last cry? 17 – just before going into an exam. (Tears weren’t due to the exam !). That’s changed ! The tears come a little more often now, the emotions seem to have woken up a bit more. Last time was actually Friday, with a few tears pulled out in bits of Alita.

28. Do you like your handwriting? Nope. Can barely read it. And … it hasn’t improved much at all.

29. If you were another person, would YOU be friends with you? Aye – Unless I’d rubbed me up the wrong way. Haha, no change there.

30. Are you a daredevil? Yep. I’ll risk stuff, although I do wear a helmet when batting now. I’m older now but I’ll still go for stuff. It’s just moderated by what my body currently lets me do.

31. Do looks matter? Only to those who don’t look at the personality beneath the looks. Are they worth knowing ?

32. How do you release anger? I get aggressive and try to release the aggression on sport. I try to redirect the anger/aggression into driving myself harder. Tough one, I don’t think this has changed much, except I don’t have that release in sport. I generate much less anger now because I redirect it into better emotions.

33. Where is your second home? Lincolnshire with the parents. Same !

34. What class in High School was totally useless? Previously : Foreign languages. Make them speak English ! Muahahaha. (heh – kidding). Now : Religious Education.

35. Do you use sarcasm a lot? Yep. When I can, although sarcasm tends to be destructive and I prefer to use constructive humour. I try and use it more now too, hiding daftness behind words that take a little time to decipher.

37. Favourite movie? Previously : Sky Captain. What would it be now ? The Martian is right up there, Rogue One. Must watch Sky Captain again.

38. What are your nicknames? Then – Sleepypete or Ice. Now, I’ve adopted Sleepydwagonman as the nickname I tend to use online.

39. Do you untie your shoes when you take them off? Yes – makes it easier to get them back on. No change.

40. Do you think that you are strong? Reasonably – can hold my own in cricket but I suffer from injuries too much. Haha, not any more ! My legs are probably above average strength but they’re not getting the exercise at the moment while my arms are affected by really unhappy shoulders.

41. What’s your favourite ice cream flavour? Vanilla. It’s Mint Choc now.

42. What are your favourite colours? Then : Red, blue. Yellow for cars. Now : Blue’s a good one, last two cars have been dark grey metallic, which has worked well with them.

43. What is your least favourite thing about yourself? Easily distracted, absent minded. Add “has difficulty with wrods” to that now.

44. Who do you miss most? The dogs. Oh yes. Muttleys are awesome. Add my dad in there too.

45. Do you want everyone you sent this to send it back? Muahahaha – maybe 🙂 Lol, if anyone who sees this does a copy/paste/change, let me know !

46. What colour pants are you wearing? Then : Dark blue, unless you’re going by the American definition in which case it’s black. Now : Erm … exactly the same. And they’re not the same two items of clothing. Oh wait ! Switch them around. And no the underpants are not on the outside.

47. What are you listening to right now? Then : 3 phone conversations and 2 people (inc me) tapping a keyboard. Wonder what the other person is doing … An Enter Elysium video, Heychrissa streaming on the laptop and the current iTunes track is “It”, the first track on the Chaleur Humaine album by Christine and the Queens.

48. Last thing you ate? Then : King Size Twix. Now : a small Smarties Easter Egg. Yes. I have no shame in that. HA !

49. If you were a crayon, what colour would you be? Then : Rainbow. Now : probably green for the dragons.

50. Last person you talked to on the phone? Then : Mortgage people. (Wonder what that was for ? It was +1year after I had to remortgage). Now : a fella at work about a training solutions meeting tomorrow.

51. What is the first thing you notice about the opposite s*x? Then (I believe being sarcastic !) Hair. Unless I’m sitting down or they’re way taller than me – then it’s breasts. Now : eyes and what the eyes are saying in their silent way, curiously though, I can never remember someone’s eye colour. Then hopefully a smile :-D. The grin tends to bring out an answering smile.

52. What’s your favourite drink? Coke (diet). Same !

53. Do you wear contacts? No but I have glasses on through most of my waking hours. Now – I still have the same glasses I had back then. I need new ones ….

54. Favourite Day(s) of the Year? Christmas, days out of work and the day I bring the donuts in to work (sometime near birthday). No change ! Although add in Comic Con plus the Lords trip in the summer.

55. Scary Movies or Happy Endings? Then : Happy Endings but endings that are definite. I.e. not a Spielberg multiple ending. Now : happy endings. Movies that have a satisfying ending.

56. Summer or winter? Cricket season. <- br="" this.="">
57. Hugs Or Kisses? Hugs, although anyone I know who I spot with Iceangel is in danger of a good tickling. Now : Hugs are awesome.

58. What Is Your Favourite Dessert? Then : Chocolate fudge cake – must resist … Now ? Hmm. Still cake ! Although the lunchtime thing if I have cake is usually a lemon muffin.

59. What Book are you currently reading? Then : The Apocalypse Troll by David Weber. Now : Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

I meant to slot a few tasty pictures in there to break it up but I think the way I copy/pasted it in made the format go a little wibbly … However !

Historical accuracy is everything.

Seem to be busy again at the moment !

Definitely missing the chance to do more posts. Things happening lately and I’m ending up crashing out when I get home and turning the brain off as much as I can. I did feel like an escape to something where I definitely could turn the brain off though …. this was Friday pm.

What’s that ?

Friday’s escape was a film called Battle Angel Alita. Without giving too much away (like some of the images that Google will show you !), this one is a live action / cgi film set about 500 years in the future where all of the cities of Earth have fallen in an apocalyptic war, save one. The film is set in Iron Town, below the flying city of Zolom. (I may be getting a couple of the references wrong here).

I really enjoyed it and …. a tear or two may have escaped at certain points. Actually, I’ve been feeling the crispiness of impending burn out this week* and it feels like this film gave me a much needed reset. Films tend to be like that.

*(what I mentioned last weekend, plus I damaged my eye last Monday which was getting me down too. It’s ok now.)

Anyway, the story picks up with our Alita being found in a junkyard and being put together by Dr Ido, very ably played by Christoph Waltz. She has no memory but everything that she sees and experiences is met with total joy and absolute commitment.

And there are those big wide eyes too that take in the world. But there is more to Alita than the big cute eyes and a personality that wants to jump into absolutely everything.

And the story leaps off from there. As usual, there is daftness involved with the storyline and shortcuts to make it all fit into a film. But … lots of action, plenty of spectacle and I thought the central character was incredible.

Thoroughly recommended.

Friday’s escape wasn’t just about the film though. (It was on at 5pm so I needed to find something to occupy until then ! Plus lunch).

One thing I’ve been observing over the past years is that our High Street is steadily disintegrating. It started with a few big names collapsing when the banking collapse happened. But it’s continued ever since then.

My theory is that the continuing austerity regime means that people don’t have any disposable income any more, so the shops that thrived on that have been driven out of business. The curiosity shops with knickknacks and trinkets. Fun stuff. Useless decorative stuff that makes you smile when you look at it.

Those shops don’t exist any more. We have expensive clothes shops, nail bars and vape shops instead. I’m not interested in those. I’m not sure if I’ll be doing the old run across to our local Mall any more, with the closure of the HMV shop there. That place now has an increasing number of empty lots and the HMV was one of two shops I’d regularly have a look in when there. (The other was the Lego place).

It’s a similar story in town, except that it still has its HMV and its Foyles bookstore. (And Waterstones too). The HMV thing is curious actually, they’ve just suddenly closed another 27 stores out of their 127 and some of them are very painful looking closures indeed. (Here’s the BBC story with the list).

It’s only part austerity though. Some of it is down to the online people who don’t play fair. Like Spotify who draw you into their renting model and other places who don’t pay their taxes. Places like Waterstones and Foyles can’t get away with that and compounding that, have their prices fixed by the publishers. I’m not even seeing the old Buy 1 Get 1 Free type offers that the bookshops used to do.

I choose what I buy based on what’s more economical to buy, which means favouring Kindle over Paperback. But …. I’d much prefer to buy paperback if it were the same price because … paperback will always be better and you’re helping to support the awesome people who work in the Foyles and the Waterstones.

Oh and I’ll always want to own my music rather than use Spotify. Even better to acquire the music from places like Bandcamp or as downloads from the artist’s own site. Spotify and Youtube are rubbish for supporting the creators … and if those creators aren’t getting the recompense for making stuff for us to enjoy, they will quit and get jobs to let them eat. I’d rather see them making videos or music.

I sense I should come down off that particular soap box though. I did acquire a few things on Friday :
Seal – Standard
Jean-Michel Jarre – Equinoxe Infinity
Ed Sheeran – divide
Lorde – Pure Heroine
It might take a while before I get to listen to them though, there are still 6,000 unlistened to tracks in the library and I’m going from A albums to Z albums …. (After 6 months with the laptop, I’m in the C albums).

There’s a Steam sale going too …. and games called Frostpunk, Unavowed and Blood Bowl 2 have been acquired. (Maybe a little dealing with Sad by buying stuff ? Haha, maybe).

Last bit … I’m trying to develop the drawing still. I have ideas, one nearly emerged for today but after cogitating on it over the last week, I didn’t get a solid enough idea. Not like the one someone gave me the other week … Here we go :

There we go. A Sleepy Wagon Man, dreaming of pizza.

I’ve been enjoying watching as much of the Inklings streams on Geekspace.tv, led by Steph the sourfruitjunkie who has a thing for crows. She saw the Sleepydwagonman username I use on Twitch and wondered what a Sleepy Wagon Man would be like. And then there’s pizza.

I quite enjoyed making that one, as I’m enjoying learning more of technique from teaching streams like Inklings and by observing what I’m seeing. When you look at cartoons, drawings or animations, keep an eye open for the technique. It may surprise you how flat the colouring of the picture is ! Gotta keep it simple though, as less seems to be more.

Erm. That “it’s getting a bit too more” pinger is going off, especially as I haven’t had me dinner yet and it’s getting later ! Cya.

Snow seems to be coming at convenient times at the moment here !

Last year, I can’t remember the circumstances but I spent the Thursday working from home, so I missed the announcement that said the site was closed on the Friday. We have laptops, which is pretty much all we need to enable working from home. That said, the laptop hooks up nicely to a big screen while in the office and you can talk to people more easily. (And they do teacakes which I could do here but …)

I could hook up the laptop to my home monitor but … I’d honestly prefer not to do much rearranging of the cables.

Wait … snow ! It arrived a few hours later than advertised, starting properly at maybe 8pm instead of the predicted 2-3pm. We got a little less than last year, maybe a couple of inches and it was actually starting to melt even as the last of it was falling.

The snowman above was made by a neighbour. It’s glorious isn’t it ? Definitely pretty snow when it started coming down.

As always, click for bigger. Most of these are phone camera but there are a couple with the proper camera.

I was able to do my usual Friday thing of working to around lunchtime and then taking advantage of accumulated flexi credit during the week to disappear. I used to have the standard 9 to 5 pattern, plus leaving a little later when I wanted to finish something off. I still have the pattern of hanging on until about 5pm but I start earlier … means I build up those extra hours.

Yep. Totally not noping out of venturing too far. (I’d left my boots in the boot of the car).

The main roads had been fairly well cleared by the time I ventured out at lunchtime. The pavements were still pretty dangerous though. What I can’t believe was that idiots were cycling on the icy rutted pavements still, instead of sticking to the clear roads. Well, that’s cyclists for you. They’re not smart round here.

There was, of course, a battle still raging on the surface of Hoth …

And up in orbit.

A snow kitty was looking on from afar.

Which gave me ideas ….

A path to chips ? (And pizza).

That wasn’t the idea that popped into the head, although I did raid a rather busy local Chinese later. I do love the muffled crump crump crump as you walk through snow.

Before I go, a proverb. The early bird beat the snow and got the worm, this is the late bird.

I wonder if my new front door guard is still there !

I’ve been attempting to learn to draw again ….

Before I launch into that though, lots of things are still going on and I feel really busy and I can’t remember very much of it ! Honestly, I think I got a little burned out doing Star Wars Advent this year and I’m still bouncing back from that. I hoped they were high quality posts and I enjoyed the making of them but I was definitely feeling a bit of pressure to get 3 distinct books every day without just going down the list of one, two or three particular authors.

Oh – there’s been some background feelings going on that are affecting me but I’m definitely not going to be going into those here except to cryptically say that it’s 1 year on.

Sketch ? Here’s the latest :

There we go. Art skills of a 5 year old. Except that’s probably an insult to your typical terror with crayons.

That’s actually one inspiration for the drawing thing. Ideas have been popping into the head mostly as per the usual thing. I’ll see something and an idea will spark off. Usually an idea that is way, way beyond my talents but …. maybe in quite some time (I reckon a decade and by then arthritis will probably have overtaken my hands).

Talking of a 5 year old with crayons, here’s one from last week :

Yep. Stick men. I thought …. skill level of a 5 year old ! Let’s own that. And it was most amusing to see people in chat requesting fan art of a non player character called B’ebb (he’s a massive show favourite) and …. people following that by saying that there was fan art by B’ebb … and linking it.

I depend heavily on my self confidence and when I unleash one of these creations on an unsuspecting world, my default is to think that people hate it. That’s the way my mind works. No feedback = they think it’s nasty. The depressive side of manic-depressive tendencies really sucks that way.

So when people, totally unprompted (I was hiding), pull out the pictures and show them to the stream … and people seem to love it, yep. That’s me going to Super Happy Sleepy Mode.

Oh … there’s a lot of references there and you’d need to be up to speed with the show (on Roll4it link to the right) to catch them. It’s been great fun tuning into this light hearted capering on a Sunday evening.

That was the second Stargate drawing ! Here’s the first again :

Jaffa Kree PD ! Last picture from the Stargate selection so far :

Chalk this time ! So a mix of two types of arty thing this time. The original blackboard was nicked from a stock site but the rest is me. So there’s chalk from our B’ebb with the stick men again … with all of the cast this time. Papa’Rak (aka Ga’Rak) is intentionally twice as tall as everyone else. And then there’s me looking to draw people again.

I think that’s it for today with the really bad art.

I hope I’m showing signs of improvement. There are other pictures that have been done that you aren’t allowed to see :-D. One is a pic that might not be seen by anybody … (Too scared) and the other is one that was supposed to be a “We’re all here for you” message for a person on one of the Discord servers who is in a really bad place at the moment and the Discord people are rallying around to give them an internet hug. Hope they’re ok. I struggle to know the right words to say at times like that (and coincidentally this particular day today for me and I’m not going to expand on that) but sometimes the best thing you can do is keep being around people, give them time, let them know that they’re free and encouraged to show their emotions around you. And that’s especially the sad ones.

Cos if we bottle those sad emotions in, we’ll break.

I hope you all got some positive feedback today.

Oh and that Dragon in the Easter Egg pic may well be a harbinger of this year’s Easter Avatar … Not felt like eating that egg yet though !

That’s last year’s Easter Pic. Nite all.

Ever get those weeks where you have been really busy but when you look back on it, you’re not sure what you were getting up to ?

Feels like last week has been one of those.

(Picture is from someone called Organbutt, made for the Drawception game. I hope you won with it !)

I have been getting chance to catch up on the recorded stuff, both in games and on the telly. The start to the latest Star Trek Discovery series was excellent and I suspect I will be a big fan of Captain Christopher Pike through this series. He stole the show on his debut episode.

The Orville has also been as fun to watch so far this series as it was last series. I’m not convinced that I’m going to stick with the DC Universe series on Sky though. Those have lost their way and I think they ran out of stories a couple of seasons ago.

I have my vouchers from the credit card loyalty thing ! Still got most of them. The only acquisitions so far have been Old Man’s War by John Scalzi and Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky. I’m still kinda grinding my way through his Children of Time, which apparently has a sequel coming.

The cricket on the telly is showing a game with an incident that I still hold a grudge for (Eng vs NZ ODI in 2008). It’s the infamous incident where an umpire intervened to attempt to get the England captain to change his decision on a run out. Lots of bad behaviour involved, pretty much all of it on the side of the New Zealand players. What happened ? A NZ batsman (Grant Elliott) who has been involved in many other incidents, including abusing his own team mates while on the field, ran straight at the bowler and knocked him out of the way. He was knocked down too, resulting in an easy run out.

The umpire intervened to attempt to get England to withdraw the run out appeal, when they really should have given the guy out “Obstructing the field” instead. The batsman ran straight down the wicket, as they should … however there was no intention or effort to avoid the bowler who was coming for the ball. It felt pretty clear at the time. Still does.

That’s in the past though. I’ve been playing Battletech again. And there’s bad behaviour around this one too, believe it or not.

Spaceship ! That’s the Argo, which (light spoiler) is the ship you play out most of the game flying around in to various places to go stompy stompy with your Battlemechs.

They did a decent job with this one in its vanilla form, although they’re getting heavily criticised for a poor DLC (costing £15.49 which is too much in my opinion) that doesn’t add very much. The game has to be installed on a SSD or it’s frustrating to run … but I was enjoying bouncing from battle to battle on it this morning as my force of mechs and pilots steadily build up their initial training skills and strength. More story soon.

It’s a shame the lead designer has been hounded off Twitter, although that’s a reflection on how poor Twitter is at controlling harassment on its site. I keep a very low profile on that site and steer clear of the potential harassment. It’s not worth your time or mental energy to interact with people like that, just stick to the good ones and don’t hesitate to block the bad ones.

One thing I would like to do is mod the game to expand on the basic mechanics. They’re a bit dumbed down compared to the original tabletop game rules. I’d like some of that complexity back. But …. while there is a mod to do that (called Roguetech), it’s a huge collection of a bunch of other mods that I don’t think play well together. They also replace the original story campaign with something open ended and … boring.

I’ve had a quick look at Roguetech and either it’s beyond the capabilities of my PC (which is just over 7 years old to be honest) or … it’s broken and otherwise unplayable. I’m actually going with the broken and unplayable because I’m suspecting that the massive slowdowns I’m seeing in the strategic layer are due to Roguetech trying to talk to the servers that run the online campaign and just freezes while doing so. Or it’s needing a bit more memory than my PC wants to give it.

Anyway, byebye Roguetech and if anyone’s got a line to a mod that expands the equipment and customisation options out without crippling the game, let me know in the comments. Oh there’s also a bit of he said/she said playground level behaviour in the forums over there which just looks a bit silly.

Oh and a new Battletech campaign run means more names to think up …

I’ve been having fun with the games today.

Fun in the senses of bashing your head against the wall as well as enjoying playing them.

Yesterday was fine, it was a mix of Skyrim and Motorsport Manager. I’ve fairly heavily modded Skyrim since getting the Special Edition and it seems far more resilient and stable in that version. It’s still pretty much a run across the country randomly murdering people who get in the way though.

And very pretty too as a game. Even as a 7 year old game. I think that screenshot benefits from a water effects mod and I have a pretty town graphics mod too and a series of others. Oh it’s also benefiting from being played on a nVidia 1060 card, which is more powerful than any of the cards on the market when Skyrim first came out.

It is still pretty much a murder simulator though as your character runs around doing the quests. I haven’t taken a side in the civil war yet in case it causes issues but I know which side I’ll take. Similarly, there’s one mod which I’ll try later that I won’t use yet because I think it’ll cause issues.

That’s the thing with mods, they look great but can cause the issues.

What does get annoying is where the issues aren’t caused by the mods, they’re inherent in the game itself. That’s really frustrating. Problem games recently include :

Sid Meier’s Ace Patrol – this would run a bit on my laptop … and then crash to desktop not long after. Annoying. Haven’t gone back to that.
Grey Goo – is a strategy game from a few years ago that I really should have tried before now ! But I fired it up today and had the usual issues where it resizes all of my desktop windows and to top that off, tried to fit itself in a window that wasn’t the right size and was black. No joy with that one.

I think that’s partly an issue with my monitor actually. It’s a fantastic 1440p monitor but … I have display scaling enabled in order to make the text appear in a size that is readable. However, games get confused by the display scaling. Or they’re just obnoxious.

Star Wars Empire at War is the latest for the hall of shame – this one was playable as far as I tried it today but had a massive problem with flickering on the screen. I don’t think I have the condition where people have massive issues with flickering but … I dislike it and it’s not something I would want to be tolerating in a game.

(I’m trying Empire at War again due to the dissatisfaction with Stellaris at the moment)

And I had a look at Battletech again today. I quite enjoyed playing through the campaign last year. It’s a solid game, if heavily lacking in variety. The standard thing is for your lance of mechs to go into battle against a force around twice its number, albeit weakened. I tried the Roguetech mod again today which … massively opens up the variety but it proved unsatisfying to play due to massive slowdowns. (It was maxing out the 8GB of memory available in my computer).

So that’s 1 good, 4 annoying, last one for today is Motorsport Manager, which continues to be a fun one. I ran through 3 races this morning and my people are starting to win races …

That one was a bit of an aberration as the AI teams and drivers weren’t doing well with the rainy conditions in that qualifying session.

This is a cracking game and the best ever of its type, in my opinion. (There isn’t much competition as the last good one was Grand Prix Manager 1/2 in 1996). It’s properly testing and will punish mistakes while having a strategic layer that needs figuring out before you start to win.

The team could win the championship this year. We shall see …

Back to fiction though …

I’ve got the Stargate Horizons episode on in another window. It’s reminded me about Stargate again. They start it off again in about a week ! Definitely queuing up that one for another watching.

PS If anyone recognises the first dragon pic as being theirs … please do drop me a comment or an email and I’ll supply proper attribution. Google found it from a betting site and I’m definitely not linking to that)

SQUIRREL !

Up is a great film. I’d highly recommend you see it. Kinda connected to the pictures coming ? Concerning random squirrels though, I kinda wish I could show a picture or two of the squirrel-friends that run around the site at work. Can’t take pictures at work though. They’re quite brave squirrels … we’ll see them a lot running around the greenery between the paths.

Wait …. Squirrel !

I picked this up before Xmas from a new shop that’s opened up in the centre of Bristol. It’s another modelling and curiosity type shop and it sells various things including the Jigzle puzzle above from a site that can be found at www.greentanet.com . They have all sorts of things there, like animal kits, architecture, lifestyle, vehicles and movie tie ins. I am highly tempted to pick up another XWing, a Millennium Falcon, definitely their Star Trek Enterprise and they also have the Niffler.

And Dobbie. They have a Dobbie. (And a BB-8)

The first few bits. One thing I’d immediately say is that the laser cut wooden bits are not quite in tolerance (translation – they’re not cut enough and are marginally too big) and they fit together very tightly. That means there’s no free play between the bits, the models won’t fall apart but … you really shouldn’t have to get a wood file, pliers or a hammer to help you put them together.

Yes. That is a hammer.

Coming together with a pair of front paws.

Almost there. The models are made up of a frame comprising large bits of wood and are rounded out by smaller pieces fitting in to more slots and grooves.

Job done ! But let’s have a better look from another angle :

Click for bigger as per usual.

On the whole, an enjoyable kit to put together and the finished Random Squirrel is rather cute. Will I get some more from the site ? Quite likely actually. There are a couple of small pieces missing because some of the elements of wood broke away but I’ll know to file the grooves open a little more for the next one.

This was a far more satisfying kit to put together than the attempt at a Metal Earth kit. I’ll go back to those when they intimidate me less but I barely got the central fuselage of my Metal Earth XWing together before giving up. It was too fiddly and wasn’t cooperating with the staying together while being put together thing.

Shiny !

Oh and the wood smells amazing.

A few things to mention today ….

Haha, partly because going into depth on 2 of them will lead to massive spoilers !

Yep. Gratuitous use of spider picture. The spiderfriend above is a gift from FuzzyFreaks (link on the right hand column) who is a lovely, crazy, batty, funny streamer who I’ve been enjoying watching over the last 6 months since finding the channel.

Recommended. Check her out, at the moment especially if you’re interested in pirate sailing games. Yep, the Fuzzy One is well and truly addicted to Atlas, a pirate ship MMO.

First film of the day ! Spiderman into the Spiderverse. This one is an animated charmer of a movie, opening with its star, Miles Morales. He gets bitten by a spider and …. you know what happens after that. Definitely an origin story movie but …. you gotta start somewhere. It brings in a number of other great characters along the way, including more than a few surprises.

I cannot recommend this movie sufficiently. After being somewhat in the doldrums over the Xmas break, this film kinda hit that reset button and got me charged up again. (Haha, until the next day when lack of sleep was getting the better of me).

Go see it and …. I think it’s one of those films that genuinely benefits from being in the cinema too with the scale of the visuals. I’d see it again in the cinema before it goes, given the excuse.

(Yes, that’s giving you the excuse to give me the excuse to watch it again).

I watched Arrival today after getting home from work. A curious film. It goes back and forth in a way you cannot truly comprehend. At least not until you’ve seen it all the way through.

It starts with an alien … incursion ? Visitation ? Anyway, the aliens are here in 12 ships spread around the globe and no one can find a common frame of reference in which to communicate with them. Until that is, our Louise appears and gets to figuring it out.

Mind bending film. Definitely recommended.

Rising ?

First completed book of the year is Persepolis Rising, book 7 of the Expanse series. This follows the trend of the 6 before, in that it starts off a new trilogy in the series. So this one is set a few decades after the sixth book and the crew of the Rocinante are figuring out what to do next, when all hell breaks loose.

As it does.

Not sure what to make of this book and I’m somewhat in fear for the success of the series. I’ll get the next two books (when they drop in price … and when they’re written !) so I get the complete story. I kinda have an unfinished business feeling with series that I don’t finish, even if I’m not enjoying them too much. I have to Know.

Anyway, there’s a bit of an Irresistable Force vs Immovable Object theme going through this book and … I wasn’t convinced this time that the set up and scenario made sense the way it did with the previous books. The nemesis is rather too strong in this case.

But perhaps that’s straying too close to spoiler territory. If you’ve read the previous 6 books, you know you’re going to get this book for the continuation of the story. If you haven’t read the others, then you can only start with the first book, Leviathan Wakes.

Last one ! Resident Evil, The Final Chapter.

You know what to expect here. Lots of zombies, guns, Milla Jovovich kicking butt, absolutely zero sense in the story. This time, they start off a little bit of time after the last one finished and revisit old territory. Alice is going back to the Hive.

A fairly enjoyable romp too but … as for a few of the entries above, you wouldn’t be seeing this one unless you’ve seen the previous films.

So …

For the thinkers – Arrival was really good.
For absolute fun – Spiderman into the Spiderverse is a must see.
For the space opera – The Expanse continues its epic tale.
For BRAINZZZZZZZZZ – Resident Evil.
For madcap capers in a pirate boat – FuzzyFreaks playing the Atlas.

Yep.

Back in tomorrow, don’t feel ready but I have been hitting that stage where I’m having trouble getting to sleep because I’m not that tired. Oh and also random going to bed times (partly courtesy of games, partly due to watching streaming people on the internet).

Oh ! Happy New Year everyone. Hopefully 2019 will be a good one. I’ll want to put 2018 behind me for a few reasons but there are those few steps forward as well.

First … picture.

Toasty thing is very toasty after a minute in the microwave. (It’s a Warmie, it’s supposed to be heated up !)

I’m almost better on the outsides … that’s something that’s been a long time coming. There are still a few hold out bits that aren’t finishing up their healing but those have been looking better after a week of not doing very much at all. I have been pondering putting plasters on again though as I’m literally my own worst enemy with my outsides and keep attacking them. It’s become a habit that I definitely need to ditch.

New job … haven’t talked about that much here but it’s a move back to engineering and not too far either. I’m still in the same larger team, just a different part of it. It’ll be a stepping stone to something higher up either in the same team … or a different one. We’ll see what opportunities are out there over the next year or so.

Bookwise, I set myself a target of 52 books to be read in the year last year. How did I do ? With a little cheating with some short ones, I got up to 29. I still have to write the review for number 29. I had a good start but somewhat stalled in the middle of the year. Probably watching too much cricket and not enough book. Also somewhat too tired to read after a while too. Book number 29 is Persepolis Rising of the Expanse series which I’ll write more about soon. This one took a whole 2 months after The Martian …

It has been good to be reading again and the next one will be on the Kindle again, either Children of Time or Thrawn of Timothy Zahn. I also have book 1 in the Annihilation series to read on the Kindle plus a few books donated by my mum. Lots to read. Oh ! The book about horrid games too should be a good chuckle.

One thing I need to definitely do over the next year is get cracking on sorting out the house. There’s new jobs adding to the old jobs that I haven’t had the energy to tackle over the last few years.

Yep. Back in tomorrow, which means :

That’s tomorrow and I need to do a Mall run after work as well.

Doctor Who’s new year special was good. It wasn’t Weeping Angels like the pic above (I personally really dislike the Weeping Angels, they’re a jump scare alien that doesn’t actually make any sense outside of plot devices).

Colder today due to something apparently called an Omega Block where a high pressure bubble is trapped over GB. That causes the clouds to disappear and all the heat to escape. Wonder if we’ll get snow again this year ? I did enjoy the little snow expedition last March, although I was very glad to get back indoors and put the kettle on.

Last thought – I’ve been seeing stories about the expedition to check out the Ultima Thule asteroid. They have a picture :

That looks familiar …

Cya !