Lathany

Bea got some Bobballs (little soft toys) in her party bags at the weekend. I wistfully admired them (Bea got a tiger and Ryan a leopard); so Dom, at Bea's prompting, said he would get me one.



So meet Babylon, the Zebra. (named after Technobabylon).

Dom's 100 Secrets campaign ended last night, with champagne brought by Andie. It started on Saturday 17th August 2013, so has been going for slightly more than four years. There were three seasons in total and five players - although not always the same people at the same time. The first season was myself, Andie, Sarah and Jon. The second swapped Sarah for Krys. The first half of the third included all five players and then Jon retired and we were back to four for the last half-season. It was a very good fantasy game which was set after Monde and before the original Swordsmaster game in the same universe. Turns out that my character was a teacher of Arilzean the Cold, which is rather cool. In terms of our actual party; Rose became queen, Loy was acknowledged and now heads both family and the Guild of Cartographers, Carlos and Aeryn both now run cities on the eastern continent. The characters all did pretty well for themselves. It's also the first campaign that Dom has run to its original planned length for over a decade - so that's pretty good too.

I've watched the first tv season of American Gods and that prompted me to read the book. I think I prefer the book overall (not least because it ends and includes the follow-up novella Monarch of the Glen). It's a lovely piece of work with decent characters and a nice scattering of gods. Also, Shadow makes a sympathetic protagonist, for all that he starts off in prison for a crime he did commit.

Finally, last week was my second first week of my new job. I'm going to cautiously say it's going OK, but I'm finding these early days very tiring.

Friday night we sat down and watched A Monster Calls. Very good, well-acted and extremely sad. A story about a boy whose mother is suffering from cancer and how he relates to that and his problems with bullies at school. With the added dimension of a story monster which is the elm tree he can see from the house. Recommended if you have plenty of tissues.

Last weekend was the penultimate session of 100 Secrets. This was all about us descending the staircase to a place where we did not have our Secrets. We spent about half the session pottering around wondering what we should be doing, observing that this place seemed to be what had been above some generations ago. We then spotted the issue: the giant beetle of DOOM was actually awake and trying to destroy the temples through affecting the dreams of a key person known as the Maker. We spent the other half of the session frantically deciding what the solution should be. We discovered that the man known as the Maker seemed able to affect our world quite directly with moving people around (we think this seemed like a teleport on the surface) and changing the landscape into a desert. However, we have told him about the beetle now. Next week we hope to take the Maker up the staircase and finally mop up all our loose ends.

A fortnight ago, 100 Secrets ran. We had just finished playing with the time travel so were effectively back at the start of the previous session. We travelled back to the capital to collect Rat and then had another go at figuring out the temples and what to do with them.

This time around we found a new temple, complete with guard mole with a rune tablet in its head. We gained Faradine Coldass as a companion, the first of the previous party. We also located and conversed with the nomads, finally speaking with the Master of Guides on the mountain. This encounter was interrupted by a Ryne assassin who we killed. We discovered that the temples were stores to fight a powerful being from another world which was some distance away trapped in a mind maze. If it ever escaped again, the temples would be needed.

Finally, we were helped by the nomads to visit the inside of the mountain and speak with the gods. We eventually succeeded, although not until after we had explored, seen the staircase and the gods' puppet-workings. We made contact by prayer. The gods agreed to give us the power to shut down the temples so they could not be used for a power-grab.

The last Lockwood & Co book, Lockwood & Co: The Empty Grave has finally come out. It's the fifth of the series and marks the end. I liked it and felt it wrapped up several plot lines, but there are still unanswered questions. Also, I didn't like it quite as much as the previous books.

I also ran some Lockwood & Co. The players' agency - Dalton and Clay - took on two cases, the ghost of a recent murder victim and then a dark spectre (formerly a newsreader). The background works well on a case by case basis.

There were also owls at Center Parc. These weren't quite as exciting as the falconry (and was for age 3+ rather than 12+), but they were still pretty excellent. Again the twins came along, as did my mother-in-law Jo.

There were fewer owls, but here is one with Ryan.



And then round to Bea.



This is a different owl sitting on me.



And finally a baby owl.



The last was a big hit with all the smaller children.

At the moment I'm sort-of replaying games. Plus playing the on-line Final Fantasy (XIV) with ao_lai, chrisvenus and Alistair.

The first is Syberia II. I'm playing this because I've just finished replaying Syberia (I) and want to remind myself of the story before I play Syberia III. (III came out this year and I bought it in the summer sale).

Here's a rather unexciting screenshot - I'm only at the start of the game.



As for FFXIV, I'm pretty near the start for that. However, I won't be playing next week, so I'm doing some solo catch-up.

Here's a dubious mage I met on my travels.



There there's Secret World Legends; it's the relaunch of The Secret World. I'm playing the current event - The Whispering Tide. This involves killing the Bird of the Zero-Point Pathogen, aka Flappy.



That's been my week!

Today I took Ryan to Kew. This was the counterpart of Wednesday's shopping trip.

We started with The Hive, although it was already quite busy.



From there we headed down to the Pavillion for cake (he had blueberry and lemon and I had banana and coconut).

Next was back to Palm House.



Then we went to the Treetop Walkway.



We also managed the Princess of Wales conservatory and Sackler Crossing. At some point we found this.



Then we headed home for a late, small lunch.

The legal part happened on Friday when I was in London. The large event was on the Saturday in a hall near Kew Gardens.

The afternoon started with the ceremony itself.



Then there was the cold buffet. Here's a picture of the bride and groom.



There was also wedding cake.



And finally music, dancing and chat.

I've bought Dragon Age Origins Ultimate Edition for the PC, as the Playstation is very popular in this house. I've been playing through as a rogue for the first time (and as an elf for the first time).

We've just killed Flemeth.



With luck I should finish it whilst I'm still on leave.

Hopefully this will survive on my leg for this afternoon. I decided to mix the glitters more as this worked well for Bea.



It's Elle and Andy's wedding celebration and I hope to get a set of decent photos.