See You Next Wednesday
Uncle 4: a new final revenge master on patrol.
Congratulations Jo and Michael. In Sydney at about five o’clock on Tuesday 28 September 2004 the as yet unnamed boy, fourth
child of my siblings, was born measuring fifty centimetres (twenty inches) and thirty-two hundred grams (seven pounds four ounces). I believe everybody is happy and well.
I, um, er...
I saw Risky Two:
The Set (Up) by The Fondue Set at the Australian Choreographic Centre. Elizabeth, Emma and Jane clumped around the room in high heels and sequined boob tubes in choreographed variations on themes with the help of two dozen chairs, half a dozen spotlights, a microphone on a stand and a piece of loud rock music. I liked it a lot although the sequences of variations seemed to be truncated and failed to develop quite a much as they may have. Maybe there were timing issues, or artistic differences. It was clever, but it could have been cleverer. Also, Mister Loud Friend sat at the back and laughed too much. Nevertheless I enjoyed the whole fifty minutes of patterns devolving into tame chaos. I give it three and a half bastard children of Ray Harryhausen and Jane Turner out of five.
Xad’s axed.
At Dave’s
Dungeons & Dragons game my barbarian, Exadnah, was throttled to death. Jimbo was ill and Ian had to leave early so I was not without characters to play (Randolph hits it with a stick, Womp bites it, Muzrow shoots it). The party did get back to Ripplesand where Dexy Footfall, my halfling monk, joined them on bandit patrol.
Your tax dollars at work.
I’m going to post this now because I’m on a flex tomorrow.
Volleyball is the winner.
Next Week For Sure were knocked out of the finals in a really good volleyball match. Our opponents sped out to an early ten point lead but as Kate learned to serve in her first volleyball game since she doesn’t know when, Cubby overcame her double hitting demons, and Al got his breath back we got right back into the game. We were up by five or six at one point and lead into the final quarter by two goals. Then we had a run of everybody leaving the ball for someone else (overconfidence) and lost thirty-seven to thirty-nine.
Full as a state school port rack.
I went to Sydney on the weekend to celebrate Mikey’s birthday. On Saturday at half past twelve Ashley, Donna, Michelle and Rod joined Andy, Mikey and I at a pub to drink beer. Then we bought more beer to take home and were joined by Jo, Dave and Ute before everyone went to another pub for dinner. There we were joined by Richard, Sandra and Tania. After the Cowboys beat the Broncos ten to nil some people went home and some people went to see a band. However the venue was sold out (for the first time in memory) so we went to the Imperial Hotel and watched the drag show. During the evening more people went home until there was nobody left at half past four. On Sunday the picnic was relocated from the park to the (slim) back yard as the weather was positively impending. During the afternoon Andy, Anne, Arthur, Ashley, Chris, Christian, Donna, Ian, Jo, Joseph, Katrina, Lucy, Michael, Michelle, Minnie, Nick, Penny, Rod, Ron, Sean, Susan and Tania all wished Mikey a happy birthday. He is forty.
Back in Capitalopolis.
On Monday the intrepid band of new acquaintances set off from Ripplesand to rid the local farmers of a terrible thing which was destroying their crops, identified by eyewitnesses as a giant beetle (but suspected by the paladin to be pirates). After the party nearly fell to a hail of crossbow bolts from a randomly encountered bandit gang, the end of session monster was dispatched in less than two rounds. However Dave had cleverly hidden a second, different, terrible thing in the cave, providing a perilous cliffhanger to end the night.
This week
The Muppet Show has decided to put on a matinee play in the middle of the autumn run. This one is a three act version of one of the winter season items, only they don’t know when they want to interrupt the schedule yet and there isn’t any money to pay for it. Also, it involves the cast from
Pigs in Space who are currently trying to get more say in how the sets are built by refusing to negotiate.
Shax
I saw Bell Shakespeare’s
Twelfth Night with my mother. It was an awkward production, a bit tired after four weeks on tour, involving lots of declarative delivery and spitting (under spotlights against a black backdrop) from everybody, all the time. Antonio seemed to think it was his story and Sebastian was the supporting character; for being a prat and a ninny Malvolio’s comeuppance was psychological torture; and the revelation of Viola’s disguise and the twins’ reunion was stifled by a colonnade of bit parts standing around waiting for cues before upstaging the story with hastily ejaculated lines and some grotesque makeup. Also, the fourth wall was figuratively pierced by one of the actors exclaiming "Shit!" when the fourth wall was literally pierced by a broken sword blade flying into the audience during the duel. The cast carried on splendidly, but it didn’t help the suspension of disbelief which was already strained by glimpses of the backstage through the frosted doors and Orsino’s iPod ("If music be the food of love..."). There were good bits, but if you knew the story you knew they were coming; there were no new good bits. I give it three Shakespearean men failing to recognize a woman they love because she is wearing trousers out of five.
Clix
I was completely thrashed at the final two Heroclix Olympic events thanks to abysmal dice rolling. For example, Judge Dredd rolled snake eyes twice during the close combat event and failed three consecutive breakaway rolls in the foot race. Mega-City One fell from third place to be not even mentioned in the wrap up. But then I bought some booster packs and got a veteran Doctor Fate and a unique Witchblade. Sweet.
Flex
On Monday Doc was unwell with a swollen head and had disappeared before Linda could get him to the vet for x-rays. I had the day off which I spent at home (watching
Doctor Who and
Sapphire and Steel while gluing together matchsticks and doing my tax) in case an emergency medical evacuation was required. In the evening I went to Dave’s new house to start a
Dungeons and Dragons campaign with Alastair, Ian and Emma (who we met on the internet and then at Starbucks on Sunday) joining the erstwhile crew of the
Starship Manticore game. Gathering at the Unearthed Ankheg in the port of Ripplesand our disparate characters formed an adventuring party on the strength of a pub brawl. Who would have guessed?
Hex
Yesterday evening I went to a Pagans in the Pub meeting which was fun. Beer helped. Lance and Chris had an argument about free will which Tammy also contributed to. I think they decided there's nothing a pagan can't do if he really doesn't know whether he believes in anything or not.
Yesterday #13161 to #13167
My
biorhythms for 7 September 2004:
Physical 0% going down
Emotional +100%
Intellectual 0% going up
Intuitional 0% going down
I didn’t even know intuitional was a word, let alone a biorhythm, but apparently mine was at a critical point yesterday and has headed down since then.
Thursday’s soccer game was irksome. We lost two to five but the score line flattered our opponents who were the beneficiaries of lenient refereeing and some (three) wicked deflections off our defenders. On the other hand we weren’t playing at our best and were muscled off the ball a lot (again). Also, despite having two substitutes, everyone was knackered by halftime. This week’s lesson:
The winner, the Buddha says, sows hatred because the loser must suffer. Give up winning and losing, then find joy (
Monkey 1:10).
The Heroclix Olympics continued with fencing and swimming. Mega-City One scored a bronze in the fencing thanks to the Judges Mortis but in the swimming I zigged Judge Dredd into a kill zone instead of zagging him into cover on my first move and he went down in the fourth round. Greg, on the other hand, won two gold medals with Flash and Batman respectively. So, well done that man.
In Jonathan’s modern
Golden campaign Ancelyn dug up some lilies. No, wait, that was me. While I was digging up lilies Ancelyn was saving the team from some bad guys. Later, when I got to the store, someone thought we should infiltrate the psych ward. The Guardians of Justice were captured and had their minds probed. After we escaped (and Shoalin Surfer regained his marbles) we returned to Gotham with Freelancer’s evidence all ready to shut O.M.A.C. down. Yay, us!
On Monday at Dave’s, Kato Bari’s cocky bravado put the entire starship in peril until the pirates rolled a critical failure for their missile attack and had to let the Manticore escape. After a bit of trading, some jokes and a Thargoid we ceased production on the pilot episode of
Starship Manticore and tried to salvage something from the experience. We agreed random character generation was not conducive to synchronizing character motivations with campaign plots. And we need more players if we want to crew a starship effectively, so I might go to a
Canberra roleplayers meetup and see what I can see.
Tuesday evening has recently become vacant with
Golden moving to Sunday. Last week I tried out the
ANU Magical Girl Club which was chock full of magical girls but clubwise it lacked dimension. This week I was going to go to a movie, but there was nothing I wanted to see. Instead, putting off my ironing and my tax return, I finished the SimnoTek Building, made Jimbo Cola and X Produxions billboards for throwing and some team flags for capturing at Heroclix. How creative is that?
Meanwhile, at work, I still do not know how to do my job. If you have a problem and you have looked into it enough to find my name, then you already know more about it than I do. If you are lucky I will find someone to pass it onto within the week. I can feel my character building by the hour.
Getting ahead of ourselves.
Next Week For Sure experienced some teething troubles as we develop into a well oiled multisport machine losing twenty-nine to forty-two (I think) at the volleyball net. Last week’s netball lesson "if you can’t be accurate, be tall" has it’s parallel in volleyball:
if you can’t be tall, be accurate. This week we also established the lemma of our previous soccer lesson "remember the plan, stick to the plan" which is:
have a plan, everybody have the same plan. Amongst our plans were such diverse elements as: Ian looking to block unforthcoming spikes; Dave’s dig, set, spike drill; Alastair’s unconventional attacking libero megrim; and my "any legal return is a good return" theory. Only Christine and Fiona had the same plan: to overcome their fear of the ball (which they did).
Falling back.
The Heroclix Track and Field event was cancelled when the Road Race ran way over time. Mega-City One failed to prevent the aliens ruining the game for everyone else but picked up a silver medal. Back at Charmed Pages on Sunday for the modern
Golden game the introduction of Ancelyn went smoothly if not well. Failing to appreciate the magnitude of the operation, storming the O.M.A.C. 'fortress' to rescue Sarah Jane Smith resulted in the party being overwhelmed before we made it through the garden. Later, when the Guardians’ plan to raid the 'over one hundred level' citadel was revealed in its greater than 'snatch the prisoner and run' majesty, I scrambled onto the same page as everyone else just in time for the cliffhanger. Ancelyn failed to shine.
On Monday Dave played Jimbo and I in his first game of Heroclix and kicked our butt with Xorn. Then Kato Bari and Dr Lazlo left Spacestation Hephaestus on the newly crewed
Manticore carrying a relief crew and supplies for an outer system station. But not before Dr Lazlo annoyed some Capricorn Marauders.
Heroes of Love, Courage and Honour; wish, believe, do your best.
On Tuesday I went to the
ANU Magical Girl Club.
