Lathany

We arrived on Friday much later than expected but, fortunately, still ahead of the Tesco delivery bringing supplies for the next three days. Despite all the delays we were first. I received a phone call from ao_lai telling me that he was going to be very late as the traffic was horrendous. Instead he arrived third after davefish (I think).

Entering the place, we discovered that we hadn't booked a holiday cottage but a hobbit hole. Nine bedrooms, two sitting rooms and three kitchens. Below is a picture of the bedroom bateleur and I shared.



And this is the largest kitchen.



The rest of the Con began to appear (lanfykins and shadowjon) then (chrisvenus and quisalan). At which point I started dinner (pasta) followed by fruit tarts and then glowsticks. We finally got an Alistair just before bedtime.

The Saturday was beautiful and a good day to go for a walk. I had company.



In the afternoon the games began - I (pinkvader) was playing in The Goat King's Palace with davefish (2wild4u), lanfykins (happypanda) and quisalan (dizzycat). The blurb was:

"The game has been running for two years. With a fanbase of over a thousand players, more than six hundred puzzles already solved and a bewildering range of topics spanning philosophy, politics, art, mathematics and music Goat Trail is one of the most successful alternate reality games of all time.

As the end draws near, a problem appears. Clues begin to hint that the game cannot be won by the community working together. A small number of selected players will experience the endgame and the rest will get nothing. Although this is very much against the ethos of the ARG community there have been hints of a similar attitude on the part of the creator(s) throughout the game. Public pleas to soften this condition have received no replies.

Time is running out and competition has begun amongst the community. Long held values have been set aside. Multiple groups - maybe dozens - are known to have begun the hunt for the final goal, the Goat King's Palace. May the best team win!

Goat King's Palace is a mystery drama game. The PCs are members of one team competing for the prize... but they are about to discover that winning is the least of their problems and the Goat King's prize is not at all what they expected."

In the first half (Saturday) we (Team Spare Parts):

• Phase 1: Escaped a building within four minutes (by following the Goat King's instructions) - 3rd place
• Attended a social which involved all the lights going out and us spotting the map on the ceiling of the bar - 2nd place
• Chased the goat across the city every ten minutes - 1st place (Hurrah!)
• Phase 2: Ran around the city solving puzzles to get tokens and then played join the dots (five I think)
• Went to the gardens in disguise to get tokens and avoid being photoed (one I think)
• Went back to the bar to consider allocating points to another team (which another team got by using the letter of the rules and setting off the fire alarm)
• Phase 3: Had to hide from the public when we holed up with the other teams in the top five (Weak Excuses, Grail, Bendy Harp and 420) - we got no points as we were found about half-way through.

At the end of the first half we were given a million credits for expenses. I also think we had another token-winning exercise in there - possibly solving puzzles on-line.

Saturday evening was risottos cooked by quisalan followed by ice cream. It may also be the day I got my glitter peacock tattoo from lanfykins.

Sunday was another glorious day - the hottest of the week. Again, I went for a walk, this time on my own.



The second half of The Goat King's Palace took place in the afternoon and things became very weird. Team Spare Parts:

• Phase 4: Made a paper airplane that broke all the rules of physics - 4th place I think?
• Made a child's toy that similarly broke the laws of physics (it really flew) - 2nd place I think.
• The token machines opened and we discovered the prizes were parcel (post to anywhere), key (opens any door lock) and sleep (refreshes in a moment)
• A puzzle exercise to track down people where we got codes from members of the public (five lots of twenty points).
• Next we had the join-the-dots of churches and this ended with a treasure hunt on an island where we got to post 120 points home with our parcel.
• Phase 5: The haunted house. Actually haunted by us and copies of the other teams. This was creepy as some copies drew guns on us and demanded our phones. We eventually locked ourselves away safely and missed out on points, but also on other horrors.
• A competition about making some sort of public performance. We came second by making an exhibition about the Goat Trail so far (paying some people to do it professionally). The winner in this section was Bendy Harp who produced a musical about a sad seal.
• I think there was another round of on-line puzzles in here.
• Final task: One of us was taken away and we had to find him before the Monster did. We placed second.

After all that - we won Goat Trail and were invited to the Palace! Except, by this point EV (another contestant) had told us that the Goat King was actually a rather nasty old man who had raped her mother. We did not know what to expect.

Turns out - we were in a copy of the Earth. The Goat King was actually an engineer who, through a screw-up had wound up in the copy and then decided to stay there and play God. The actual Earth had much better tech than we did and consequently he was able to do things we considered impossible. We arrived at the palace to find his Light and Dark histories (he wasn't entirely evil), his dead body (suicide) and a choice - contact the real Earth, carry on as Gods or carry on as ordinary people. We chose option 1. That was more-or-less the end of the game, but we saw enough going on to be happy with our choice.

Sunday dinner was a roast - much hard work from davefish - followed by puddings (cheesecake and chocolate brownie).

Today bateleur's family came over to celebrate his birthday (which will be Tuesday) and to hand over various presents of both a birthday and an Xmas nature. We went out to our local Chinese, Swans, for lunch. It was the first time I've been in for lunch and it turned out to be a good call - unlike in the evening, service isn't slowed down by takeaway orders. Also, I'm fond of the place, even though we only manage to go once a year.

It's getting colder. Reeve is mostly huddled in my room during the day now.

Three weeks ago was bateleur and my dating anniversary and so, as ever, we went out to celebrate. This meant back to Trinity for a third time, although they were no longer doing a tasting menu with matching wines. The menu on the website has since changed (which is actually unusual) but my dinner was pig trotters (which were amazing), duck (which was good, but was served with polenta which I discovered I wasn't fond of) and then what was described a a new twist on tiramisu. We shared a bottle of red wine (Pinot Noir Grace Bridge) which went very well and then desert wine/port.

Last Friday I went with chrestomancy to see Dear Esther at the Barbican. This was the computer game with a live orchestra, narrator and a live play through. It was very good and thought-provoking as the game is about exploring a surreal landscape after an accident.

I've had three roleplaying sessions since I last posted.

The Star Wars one went like this:

• We were told that that senior official on Coruscant wanted to hear our side of the story. After debates about whether it was a trap, we travelled there.
• We met the official, he believed us and said there was some collaborating evidence. It arrived at the bar and then the whole place was blown up.
• We survived the explosion and rescued who we could. We regrouped and agreed to go after the evidence, which had probably survived.
• We pottered around in the lower parts of the planet looking for the evidence. We found the illegal market and the robot factory.
• We agreed to go hunting in the sewers, where the evidence had been sent by a cross Hutt.

The Warhammer 40K (Vibius) session involved Golden Age technology and warfleets.

• The party started on Jihator in a room with Eldar technology. They managed to make it work to show a map and discovered that others had been there.
• They then travelled on to an asteroid belt and met a priest. They saw a Garden named Eden and a machinery base called Neon.
• The characters discovered that the next planet, Hitofex, was under enemy control.
• Finally they returned to an earlier planet and dealt with the aliens that were indeed buried there. This included heroically fighting off a boarding action.

The Warhammer 40K (Atlanor) session was more of an interlude.

• The party spent the entire session on Bearmyn trying to gather information.
• They met a retired Inquisitor named Itzelle Antonin and a Tech Priest who was the descendant of another Inquisitor named Queod. From these two, they gained information about a possible alien sighting on the other side of the planet.
• They travelled to the Dimeit Ring and found the information to be correct. Troublingly, they also found Chaos creatures.

Finally, I have finished XCom 2. I'm not sure I liked it nearly as much as the first one. It seemed a bit too hard in places, there wasn't enough explanation of the differences in mechanics and it started the game assuming that you'd lost the first game early.

We arrived in Penn Station on the evening of Saturday 13th. This was a grim experience as the station was not air conditioned. We left quickly and took a taxi to meet the person who would let us into our apartment. This turned out to be straightforward and we had a nice, although small, place not that far from Times Square.



We went back out once to buy food and then settled in to sleep.

Sunday was a bit of a non-event, well for me at least, it was hot and I was tired and didn't fancy venturing out. So we only went around the corner (to Amy's Kitchen) for pizza slices and cupcakes for lunch and made use of the apartment kitchen for dinner (vegetable risotto to bring some welcome vegetables to our diet!).

Monday was the Museum of Modern Art. This turned out to be a disappointment. It wasn't bad, but it was the first place we'd been recommended that just wasn't excellent. The Museum tends to rotate artists, so I assume we were just a bit unlucky with the current selection. This was also the day that we discovered that the Lonely Planet book, which had been great for Washington, was not nearly as impressive for New York. It failed to correctly locate the Tourist Information.

Lunchtime we bought some burritos from around the corner. In the afternoon we located a launderette for the mid holiday washing. We found it and found an English couple from Bristol doing theirs (they were out for four weeks). This was good as we got to chat about holidays and also very useful as they were able to advise on using the machines and things. No-one was very hungry for dinner so we bought cake from the bakers around the corner.

Tuesday we had pancakes for breakfast. It was also the day we discovered that the Museum of Modern Photography had moved. So bateleur suggested The Top of the Rock. We thought it was a bit of a long shot - as it's one of those attractions where they advise you to book - but tried to get tickets anyway. And, actually, had no problems at all!



The Top of the Rock was probably my favourite attraction in New York. In the afternoon we visited the M&M store in Times Square and bateleur cooked more veggie risotto for dinner.

Wednesday was Central Park. It made a pleasant change from wandering hot streets (the temperature for the week was mostly 30 degrees C.



For lunch we had hot dogs. Dinner was cous cous and fried beef.

Thursday we went to Madam Tussaud (without Bea as waxworks did not appeal to her). This was a big hit with Ryan as it had both Ghostbusters and The Avengers as exhibits. Lunch was huge pizza slices and dinner was pasta.

Friday again started with pancakes and it was our shopping day. I bought a t-shirt for chrestomancy and chocolate for work. For dinner we went out to a nearby Italian called Amarone Ristorante. I had the Orecchiette ("w/ Leeks, Prosciutto, Smoked Mozzarella, Pink Sauce" - where pink sauce is cream and tomato) and then Tiramisu.

Saturday was a 4am start to catch our plane back. We had arranged to be picked up by a Dial 7 car and this worked well (you can't book yellow cabs, only hail them, although it turned out that we saw plenty at 4am). I was unimpressed by JFK compared to Heathrow - pricey and lacking in seating. The flight was decent (we were served breakfast and also muffins). We landed early at around 7:30pm London time.

We got home to a rather surprised, but well-fed, cat. chrestomancy had looked after him well.

Our flight from Heathrow to BWI (Baltimore Washington International Airport) was very good and took eight hours. We were fed drinks, dinner, water/orange juice and then chocolate with tea/coffee. I re-watched Captain America: Civil War, which was still good and generally felt better than I expected. The rest of Saturday was utterly awful, though. Never fly to BWI if you want to get through immigration and everything else within a decent timespan (I later discovered from condign that it's well known for being awful). Then it took us ages to find the car hire place (which turned out to be a shuttle ride away) and then we queued for another half hour or so to pick up the car (as the car hire place's computers were on the blink). Next we had problems with the car and finally couldn't find the hotel (not helped by it being called something different from its website). A few helpful people later, we eventually arrived, several hours after we had intended and well into Sunday morning (UK time). About the only plus was that the Baltimore people were nice and helpful.

Our hotel in Baltimore (the Radisson) was rather mixed. The receptionists (and other staff) were friendly and helpful, the cost included breakfast (mainly buffet things including waffles, bagel, doughnuts and, curiously, fat-free yoghurt) and the rooms were large with working air-conditioning. However, there was a music festival going on over the weekend and other guests were extremely noisy for the first two (of our three) nights. I particularly hated the girl who spent both nights in the corridor having lengthy mobile phone conversations between two and four am. Also, the traffic noise was loud and took some getting used to. That said, Monday night was good and I think we mostly saw it at a bad time.

Anyway, back to Sunday. We emailed Nina in the morning (after having freshly cooked waffles from the buffet) and, having heard a little of our car woes, she came and collected us and ferried us round for the day. She suggested the American Visionary Art Museum, so we went there.



This turned out to be an excellent suggestion. The museum had a mixture of exhibits, some good and some not so good. The museum describes its stuff as:"Visionary art as defined for the purposes of the American Visionary Art Museum refers to art produced by self-taught individuals, usually without formal training, whose works arise from an innate personal vision that revels foremost in the creative act itself." I liked the pictures made by a prisoner from varied colours of sock thread, I found the Fart display amusing (mostly you can't take photos, but they encourage you to do so of a few things and this was one), the Mouth was weird (you could climb inside and it felt like being on plasticine) and I utterly loved all the clockwork toys that you could play with (they reminded me of the Syberia computer game series).

Here is a photo of the inside of the Mouth.



After the museum, we went for lunch to Five Guys Burgers and Fries. I enjoyed my burger and would recommend it, also the fries are actually made from potato. Next, Nina took us back to the hotel and we braved the car journey in our own car to hers for the evening. There we met Bizzy and Silas for the first time. Bizzy had been cooking a huge southern feast including pulled pork and peach cobbler. After dinner bateleur and the duo made badges (Nina has a badge-making kit) and I now have a Loud Quack badge. Overall, an excellent day.

On the Monday, we headed off to Baltimore's big attraction - the National Aquarium. This was rather pricier than the AVAM, but turned out to be totally worth it. All the displays and talks were great - I particularly loved the turtles and the jellyfish.



We lunched at Potbelly which did excellent food (I had an Italian Flat), but none of us knew how you'd actually eat those sandwiches as takeaway without getting the filling all down your clothes, shoes and everything around you.

In the evening, we went back to Nina and Bizzy's. This time we had bolognese and watched Zootopia. It was the first time I had seen the film and I really enjoyed the plot, the voice acting and the scenes.

On Tuesday morning we packed up, checked out and drove to Washington.

Today was both the last review body meeting of the year and also the work quiz. The former meant I had champagne (from the generous Chair) and mince pies and the latter meant quiz questions.

I was very happy as I'm usually bad at quizzes (but want to be better) and this time I got several answers that no-one else did.

• Knowing that a sonnet had 14 lines
• Guessing which of the elements of the first twenty on the periodic table was likely to be the most unpopular when people were asked to name one - well, at least the most unpopular of any named by teams (Boron)
• Correctly naming Rosalind as the heroine from As You Like It
• Attributing a quote to Dr Suess from a list of quotes and people (although, sadly, I missed the Rowlings one)
• Knowing there were 78 cards in a tarot deck
• Recognising Arthur C Clarke from a photo

Our team managed a respectable third place of five.

Update: Forgot to add, but it's obvious - I felt much better in the morning than I had the previous evening.

I then followed up yesterday's meal out with another one - this time Italian with the work team at Strada opposite St Pauls. This was also good, although in a very different style. From the Christmas menu I had Arancini (slightly greener than the ones from the usual menu), Roast Duck Leg (served with orange and pomegrante which I thought was an interesting choice, but I didn't like as much as I hoped) and then Fondant (chocolate and orange pudding with salted caramel icecream (good, although I wonder if caramel will ever be unsalted again...)). One of the team managed to turn up well over an hour late. Maybe I'll hear why on Monday.

For our 20th anniversary meal, we went to Five Fields in London. They had a tasting menu for £80 or £140 with wine parings. We went for the latter and also, when they were other wine options had one of the supplements and one not.

As well as the menu courses, we received pre-courses. We also drank still and sparkling water (which they charged for separately - I think it was three bottles at £4.50 each).

Serving -3: Olives
We were given some green olives. As they had stones, I only tried one (I have problems with olive stones). They were good and bateleur really liked them.

The server asked if we wanted an aperitif to begin (suggesting fizz or G&T). Having seen the extensive wine parings, we said no (this turned out to be an excellent call, as it was we were very drunk by the end).

Serving -2: Hors d'oeuvres
These were two little stacks of food, about the diameter of a two-pence piece. Lovely, but I don't remember very much more.

Serving -1: Soup
These were little cups of cold pea soup with some goats cheese in it. I'm a huge fan of cold pea soup (having had it at Trinity last year) and was impressed.

Serving 0: Bread
There was a choice of four types of fresh bread - all wonderful. Sadly, I can't remember any more about them apart from them being served with melting salted butter.

Serving 1: Lobster
Wine: Assyrtiko Barrel Aged, Estate Argyros, Santorini, Greece, 2014
The lobster was served with tomato and watermelon. It was the first time I had eaten lobster and I quite liked it. I was less convinced by the tomato and watermelon though. The wine was a good, dry white. This was the point at which we started to realise that bateleur got poured larger glasses than me (we're not sure whether it was the result of prejudice or past experience). Not a problem - we swapped around depending on who liked it the most.

Serving 2: Foie Gras
Wine: Reisling, Kanta by Eigon Muller, Adelaide Hills, Australia 2009
The Foie Gras was served with cucumber, strawberry and yuzu (I gather this is a citris fruit). (In answer to questions, no, I wasn't sufficiently familiar with Foie Gras to know whether to ask if it was gavage-based production.) This was the first time I'd had Foie Gras and it was really, really lovely. The wine was pleasant and matched.

Serving 3: Orkney Scallop
Wine: Sake Ikekame, Red Turtle, Junmai Daiginjo
The scallop was served with smoked bacon and also coconut and tamarind. The bacon arrived at our table as this large glass jar full of smoke. It was very impressive. Again, a lovely course. I didn't think much of the sake on its own - but it went amazingly well with the course. Probably the best pairing in that respect.

Serving 4: Chicken
Wine: Chateau Marsyas, Bekaa Valley, Lebanon 2011 or Chardonnay, Chateau Montelena, Napa Valley, California, USA 2011 (£18 Supplement)
The chicken was served with apricot, girolles and yeast. I enjoyed this. I really liked the cheaper wine - probably my favourite white as it was sharp and fruity. However, the Chardonnay was clearly very expensive and bateleur's comment was "I now see what other chardonnays are trying to taste like". It was an excellent chardonnay. Also, the expensive wine was brought in a separate glass (rather than being poured at the table) and the (female) server who brought it gave it to me rather than bateleur.

Serving 5: Cured Turbot
Wine: St Laurent, Alte Reben, Pittnauer, Burgenland, Austria, 2010
This was served with kombu, ginger and shiitake. I think it was my favourite fish course. The wine was the first red and was quite light. It was fine, but I prefer richer reds.

Serving 6: Truffle
Wine: A top-up of the previous one
This was apparently served with egg and potato. Presentationally, it seemed to be truffle flakes upon a fried egg. Maybe the potato was mixed into the egg white. The truffle was fantastic - very tasty - and I now see why people rave about them.

Serving 7: Herdwick Mutton
Wine: Two Blondes, Andrew Will, Yakima Valley, AVA, Washington, USA 2011 or Chateau Lynch Bage, 5eme Grand Cru Classe, Pauillac, Bordeaux, France 1998 (£32 Supplement)
This was served with turnip, caper and parsley. Needless to say it was extremely tasty, tender meat. The red wine was disappointing. I preferred the cheap to the expensive and neither of us were that taken with the latter. Admittedly we had both drunk enough by this stage that this may have been a factor, but hey.

I think it was at this point that we were offered a cheese course. We were sufficiently stuffed that we decided against (and still courses to go...).

Serving 8: Pre-Dessert
Wine: None
I think that there were little balls of a palate-cleanser. They did say what and I can't remember now.

Serving 9: Muscat Grape & Hazelnut
Wine: Ratafia Champenois, Androphore, Domaine Sanger, France NV
Served with chocolate and yoghurt. My memory is hazy now, but this was fairly light and tasty. The wine was a decent dessert wine.

Following all this, I had coffee (separately charged for). This arrived with some truffles for both of us. We then paid the bill and were sent away with a small box containing little sweets made/shaped into towers.

Overall, very impressive. The bill was just shy of £400 (including all food, drinks and service). We concluded that it was a good restaurant, but not twice as good as our beloved Trinity (which costs half of that) so we would probably stick with the latter in future. However, still highly recommended. Particularly if you want to try truffle or lobster.

Twelve people roleplaying in a house in Cheltenham. On the downside, the week included many ill people (including me); on the upside, it had excellent roleplaying, gin, tapas, roasts, steak and much, much fizz. There was also a train graveyard (Final Fantasy fans take note) and bateleur and I went for walks most days.

Note: Anyone planning to play in a re-run of any of the week's games should not read the spoilers. (However, I don't know how many will re-run.)

Friday
Friday afternoon we all arrived and took rooms. Most were ensuite and all were lovely. I don't have a particularly clear picture of my room, but it did have a balcony with some good views.



quisalan cooked risottos and we ate in the long dining room.



Afterwards people headed for various sitting rooms and leathellin lit a fire in the biggest room. We sat around with drinks (and some people played boardgames).

Saturday
The first game was bateleur's Alt-Thulhu game Grand Exhibition: "The great painter Pauline deMoor has died. Now you are in the process of helping to put together a grand exhibition of her life's work." This turned out to be portals, alternate timelines and the possibility of ending the Universe. Particularly memorable was the tunnel to Hampton Court where a painting used to be. After ladders, giant beetle-like things and confusion we saved the day. And all the other days. Dinner on Saturday was the first roast, courtesy of zandev.

Sunday
Sunday's game was smiorgan's Powered by the Apocalypse game Transuranic World: "Based on the TV and audio Sapphire and Steel series. PCs are agents from a "higher power" who fix breaches in Time. Closed environment, mystery, supernatural agents and enemies, modern era (more or less)". I got to play Steel (a female version) and was very happy. This captured the TV series atmosphere beautifully. The Agents were mystic (and also somewhat out of their depth), the situation was very confusing and the human got shafted. I'm less convinced by the system, but I suspect that's down to personal taste. This was the first game we played in the largest sitting room.



Dinner was burritos from bateleur. I think this was the night that we played Betrayal at the House on the Hill. smiorgan became the traitor and beat the rest of us.

Monday
This was bateleur's systemless game The Perfect Shopping Experience: "A game about helping customers and taking pride in your work and respecting your colleagues. You can't remember what you did yesterday after you got home from work. In fact, you can't even remember where you live. You know your name, though. It's on your badge. (Spoiler: This game is not at all about what it seems to be about.)" A surreal experience of being sales people in a department store whilst our memories were - supposed to be - reset every night. We eventually figured out that we were centuries in the future and were part of a twentieth century experience experiment trying to cure the population of depression caused by a lifestyle where they had little they needed to do. Fortunately, the rebel faction rescued us and explained that our strange legal status meant we could run the new world and make decisions about the future of the human race and also AIs.

I think Monday was the first lovely day of weather after which people were outside more.



Dinner was roast number two from davefish.

Tuesday
This was my GMing day and I ran Keeper's House (percentage dice and cards): "Five people stay at Keeper's House over the weekend. This is a standalone tabletop game set in the present day. It involves pre-written characters and should be fairly system-lite." I may re-run and if anyone is interested, don't read the spoiler text. Supernatural creatures, an unfinished historical treaty between the races and snow. And a beeb. I enjoyed running this one a lot. Dinner was tapas from leathellin with triskellian's garlic and cheese pie. I think this was the night I played Flashpoint for the first time.

Wednesday
quisalan ran Relics of the Past: "Modern day game where "magic" has begun to emerge into the world in the last two generations. You are a looking for an old religious relic in Paris for a private collector, willing to pay a decent amount for it. You just need to find it..." I played the historian hunting the relic, I had been assigned two security people, a logistics man and a local guide. Plus we all had magical powers that had been appearing around the world since the 1970s (there was always something about the seventies). We tracked down a ancient church artifact and then battled it away from the person who had been using it and killing children. The powers were very nice and chrestomancy's character was very pretty.

This was my Evening of Stress as I was cooking (shepherd's pie). However, I was helped by davefish and bateleur before I dissolved into a small puddle of panic. I've not cooked for twelve before. Wednesday was also zandev's birthday and there was much champagne.

Thursday
First thing in the morning (OK, after everyone was up), chrestomancy and I went shopping for dinner. On the way back we took a somewhat unplanned detour. Although this gave me the opportunity to photograph some sheep.



Finally - the Warhammer 40K game from ao_lai: "Rogue Trader themed. Board the derelict, seize anything valuable, secure the ship if possible. What could go wrong?". It was something of a sequel to the 2012 Con game and the universe had indeed been Johned. We found a Tech Priest ship floating and its crew were chaos-tainted. We managed to destroy it... but still have a copy of the AI blueprint that's causing all the corruption (although we're not fully aware that it is the problem).

Thursday dinner was steak and salmon from chrestomancy.

Friday
The usual tidy-up and stuff.



We got home around midday to a surprised and rather vocal puss. He's been climbing on and off my lap all afternoon.

This is Carter - chosen for me by bateleur and the twins.



She's named after a The Secret World character.

Today has been a good day. Christmas dinner all came together as hoped, I've been playing my new Final Fantasy CD of battle music (with thanks to quisalan) and I've been for a walk. I'm a bit headachey now - but it was worth the cocktails.