100 Secrets, Lockwood and The Martian

It's approaching the end of September and things have been difficult at work recently. I'm hoping October will be rather better for me in the office.

I cheered myself up a bit, by taking the family to Kew yesterday. I always find that green spaces make me feel better.



September also featured the end of the second Act of 100 Secrets. This was something of a "mop up" and included a number of different threads:

• Worm trading - It turned out that worms were being turned into "The Essence" (whatever that was, we had dark suspicions about it being a mind-magic aid) and mostly being traded by the Ryne family.
• The Rurach - The ruler of Eyestone Hill stepped down (and mentioned six white stones in passing). Her successor, chosen by her, was one of the people of the wood.
• The armour - This seemed to be the remains of The Sorcerer... we hope (also called the Travelling Sage). The armour is being restored.
• Owls Crossing - Owlsroost is back and his home (derelict in our world) looks very different in the mirror world. We also found the "Abandoned Mill" which is where Owl's Crossing's founder (Marta) is supposed to have fought a battle then forbade anyone to go there (the battle seemed to be linked the the founding). Animals and Images really don't like the place.
• Rat's future - A triangle with an eagle, an eye and a frog.
• Ingenuity - Is starting to recover.
• Carlos' wedding - This happened and was huge. He discovered he hadn't destroyed the three crowns.

Now we prepare for Act III.

The fourth book in the Lockwood & Co series is out; it's called The Creeping Shadow and I have both bought and read it. I really enjoyed it and I'm still loving the characters, concept and plots. Sadly, I'll now have a much longer wait for anything more to appear in this series.

bateleur and I watched The Martian (courtesy of LoveFilms). We thought the premise unpromising, but had heard good reviews. The result turned out to be very watchable, helped by neither of us being spoilered (I saw the trailer afterwards and was glad not to have seen it before - it's very spoilery). It's a decent film that makes some attempts to realistically deal with the issues facing anyone on Mars (with mixed success) and is very watchable.

Today I finished Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords. It's not as good as the first one and, having spoken to Alistair, I gather this is because it was rushed out. It feels rushed out. The battles vary hugely in difficulty, some plots are left unexplained, Revan is referred to as both he and she throughout (you say which it was, but there's enough places where it doesn't correct to that as default) and the ending is both abrupt and slightly unsatisfying. It's also got that somewhat annoying feature of building on the first one in such as way as to rather ruin it (in the same way that Alien 3 does by adding to/changing the ending of Aliens). It's still a good game, but I'd have liked it more if it hadn't followed Knights of the Old Republic I.

I've changed the Cooking With The Twins routine this month. In the past I'd alternate weekends cooking with Ryan and Bea and they would get to choose what we cooked. I've now got a rota of three weekends - cook with one, cook with the other and then cook by myself (but they are welcome to watch / help) and, crucially, I get to choose the dish on that third weekend. I see this as more of an improvement than they do so far (although they did both like Shepherd's Pie).

Oh, and I gave blood a fortnight ago. It was very straightforward and without iron-count problems this time.