photo saturday: bricking it

You know, it's kind of hard to start these things off when there isn't really a lot to say about the week that was. Which is partly why I've been staring at a blank screen for the last ten minutes on and off.

So, yeah, not a lot really happened this week.

I did have a really nice compliment after I ran a DnD game on Wednesday... one of the guys (who'd also been on my table on Monday when I ran) said that he only ever wanted me or one other DM to run for him. And if the other DM was the one I think it is, that's pretty damn high praise.

Also it doesn't hurt because he's quite cute and seems to be a functional human being, which is occasionally in short supply.

I also got to the "run the same module four times" threshold with a second module this week, which is kind of impressive. Granted it's one I enjoy running because it's just a straight dungeon crawl, full of undead creatures, so it's pretty easy to run. I will say that the last time was the only time I've really run the full final encounter with all of the 17 enemies (usually we're running out of time at that point, so I tend to shorten the encounter), which was kind of intense.

That's really about it... I mean Friday was Australia Day, but public holidays don't mean very much to me right now, so I just stayed home and tidied up a bit, then played video games for a while, then watched some stuff on YouTube... so a fairly standard Friday all things considered. And probably what I've done for the last several Australia Days to be honest.

Today was stupidly hot (well, actually, it wasn't as stupid hot as it was supposed to get or that is suppose to get tomorrow), so it ended up being a pretty brief day all up.

We did the supermarket thing, and we possibly both got a little over excited with buying things... me partly because a whole bunch of things in my kitchen all chose to run out in the same week.

Normally on a hot day with not much else planned we'd go to the movies, but even though Ma has aircon in her car, I didn't want to send her home during the hottest part of the afternoon, and there really wasn't much on close by.

So we just went down the road to Big W, poked around there for a bit, I was looking for something that either a) doesn't actually exist or b) exists but not in the places we were looking, which is always helpful. In either case, I'll work something out to do what I need.

Then we headed over to Target, but took a detour past the Laygo store on South Road, just for funsies.

And there wasn't really much at Target, although Ma bought a big tub of mini candy canes and a couple of Christmas stockings for the grand total of 50 cents.

After that we headed back here and Ma headed off down the road before it got much worse, heatwise.

So, yeah, not terribly exciting, but that's basically my life anyway. Although I suppose not doing a whole lot now is a pleasant lead-in to when Fringe starts in 3 weeks.

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movies: the shape of water

Director Guillermo del Toro's new movie The Shape of Water is strange, and beautiful and the most unique thing I've seen since perhaps The Red Turtle.

In short, the poster kind of tells you what you're going to get... a woman falls in love with an Amphibious Man... it's part Creature From The Black Lagoon, part Hidden Figures, part Hell Boy.

Coming from del Toro, that last one isn't too big of a surprise, and while it does feel like it's an extension of the Abe Sapien story from those movies, this is entirely it's own thing with just a few idea sprinkled in from Abe's story.

The other thing that's incredibly unique about this movie is that the two lead characters don't talk. One is a fish person, the other is entirely mute. Which leaves the majority of the talking to be done by secondary characters, and given that they're a black woman and a closeted gay man in the 1960's, speaks volumes.

The acting is amazing throughout, Sally Hawkins as Elisa and Doug Jones as Amphibian Man put so much into both of their characters (although the focus is really on Hawkins) that it doesn't matter that they don't speak. Richard Jenkins and Octavia Spencer as the aforementioned characters who do all the talking are likewise excellent, but then Spencer was also excellent in Hidden Figures.

Michael Shannon is also perfectly cast as the 1960's Company Man/Army villain... he does creepy incredibly well. An additional shout out needs to go to Michael Stuhlbarg who plays one of the scientists and makes a slightly odd character incredibly likeable and engaging.

The story is very sweet (mostly when it's focused on the main characters), although there are a couple of points where you need to suspend disbelief (and things like logic and physics) beyond the fact that fish people exist. There's also weirdly a "circled date on the calendar" that makes no actual sense when you think about it (without spoiling anything, why exactly do they need to wait for the rain... can't they just drive to the ocean?).

But the story and performances are so charming and beautiful that I'll happily let those things slide.

yani's rating: 4 boiled eggs out of 5

photo saturday: circles and rectangles

Let's be honest, I've had better weeks...

It's not like anything major fell over/down/off, it's just been a less than idea week.

The weather definitely didn't help towards the end of the week and I felt a little... housebound. It's not that I didn't leave the house at all, it's just the time I did spend here was in a closed up house. I dunno, maybe I was in my head a little bit too much.

I will say that I've never been more pleased to own a functional air conditioner though.

Monday's DnD session was something of a clusterfuck... a bad DM, too many people/too much fucking around and an adventure I've not only played before but run on four different occasions. I really, really wish I'd run a table of my own to be honest, which is what I may do next Monday, depending on circumstances.

Wednesday and Thursday were much better, not least of which was because I ran adventures.

I feel like I'm getting to the stage where I don't want a lot of general fucking around in games of DnD, and that I'd much rather run something that be subject to a bad or mediocre DM. But at the same time I have so many new (and some existing) characters I really want to play.

It's a problem.

The other thing I did a bunch of this week was play Assassin's Creed Origins. Mostly doing a lot of side missions and general fucking around unconnected with the main story, but some of that too.

Otherwise a whole lot of nothing this week to be honest.

Today was... well, it wasn't much of anything also.

We did the shopping thing, we returned a DVD Ma accidentally bought two copies of (not at the same time, obviously), then we went to Marion, wandered around for a bit before going to the movies.

Then we had pizza and came back here before Ma went home (this time remembering her shopping, unlike last week).

So, yeah, I'm basically declaring last week null and void and moving on to next week if that's okay with everybody.

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photo saturday: waving

This week involved:

• a haircut
• a lot of Assassin's Creed Origins
• three games of Dungeons and Dragons
• a trip to the chiro.

Monday was Haircut Day... not much new or exciting to report there... although my hair did end up a little less purple/silvery than it has in the past, which was nice. Also, weirdly, because there was construction on the freeway, I ended up driving for what felt like quite a while at 25kph, which is very odd, considering the actual speed is 100kph.

I also reached that point in every Assassin's Creed game where I stop following the story and wander around the map, unlocking everything I haven't already and finding all the other stuff. In Origins this is much more of a task than it's been since the "collect all these feathers" days of Ezio. And, to be honest, much more interesting. I've also hit the level cap of 40... but that's going to be increased to 45 some time this month when the new DLC comes out.

Have I mentioned before that everybody in our regular Thursday DnD group gets a little bit insane when the the weather gets stupidly hot? I'm not sure if it's because the place we play has questionable air conditioning at best, or everybody was nuts when they arrive, but, yeah.

Also one of them wouldn't shut up about a non-existent dragon during an adventure featuring various kinds of giants... and I'm running for them all next week. Guess who found an adventure with an actual dragon in it? Guess who's also not telling them that there's a dragon in the adventure until we sit down at the table? Guess who's getting hit with it first? Yup... not that I want to kill anyone in that party, but if you ask for something long enough and it will appear.

Otherwise on Monday a different group finished the third part of a trilogy we've been trying to complete since the end of November, and I ran an adventure on Wednesday for some of my favourite people (and some people I'd never met before).

I was actually tempted to go in on Friday and play (since there's now games available every day of the week, but I still think three is about my limit for now), but I was a little bit... cranky after Thursday, so I didn't bother. Instead I just went in for my chiro appointment and then wandered around briefly before coming home.

Today was, kind of brief, to be honest. Or felt that way anyway.

There was the usual shopping, and I realised I probably forgot some stuff, but it wasn't anything urgent. Then we just headed into the city for a bit. Ma watched a Lego documentary on TV the other week and for some reason that (as opposed to me being obsessed for the last several years) has triggered off a desire for her to get her hands on some Lego. She'd already bought a couple of small sets, and I gave her the Beach House, which I had to disassemble to make room for Emmett's Construct-o-Mech.

But she wanted to have a look at what was available in town, so we ended up in both Toyworld and Myer and she decided on getting the London skyline which matches the Sydney one I have.

We also poked around a couple of other places and then went to the new and improved Burger Theory for lunch.

And I do mean new and improved... they've totally redecorated and the place feels very bright with a touch of the 70's, and they've stripped the menu back to just four items, three of which are now made with 80% kangaroo meat and 20% beef and the bun is now one made with potato flour so the whole thing is more sustainable. And it tastes amazing.

I also really like that since they were renaming things, they renamed the former No 1 burger to Truckburger... because that's where it all started, even if they don't have the truck any more.

It was also slightly unusual because both Dan and Rob were in the store, so I got to chat with them both and tell them how much I liked the new burger, which was nice.

And that was about it really... well except for the fact that Ma forgot her shopping when she left my place and I didn't notice it was sitting in the middle of the living room floor for some reason until she was about five minutes from home. Oops.

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movies: coco

Disney Pixar's latest, Coco, is beautiful... and reduced me to tears.

This isn't necessarily something new for a Pixar movie, I quietly fell apart at the end of The Good Dinosaur and Toy Story 3, and they usually get to me even on the less emotive titles. But this one got to Ma in a big bad way as well, which is more unusual.

I also appreciate that between this movie and Moana, Disney has shown a level of cultural sensitivity that, while still not perfect (although I'm not an expert on either Mexican or Polynesian culture), definitely feels like an improvement on past efforts.

At its heart it's the story of one family and its relationship to both music and each other, and while some of the story structure feels like things I've seen a number of times before (the proverbial ticking clock, the chance encounter, etc), everything is handled here with the usual Pixar deftness.

It is definitely a slow movie though. Even at it's most frantic, it's still probably the slowest of all the Pixar movies, which isn't a bad thing, and suits the ton of the movie. But I feel like it may be better for a slightly older audience (child-wise). It's also one of the only Pixar movies I can think of with the on-screen death of not just one, but two characters. There's definitely some darkness here.

But, as always, the visuals are stunning... from the bone textures on the skeleton characters to the vibrant colours of the world of the dead and the warm tones of the human world, the whole thing is a feast for the eyes.

It's also partly a musical... I mean it has songs in it, but they're diegetic songs, songs that can be heard by the characters in the movie. So, not a musical as we might think about a Disney musical. But here they also got everything, if you'll excuse the pun, pitch perfect. I'm not surprised that the team responsible for Frozen also wrote the big number in this one.

At the end of the day though, it really doesn't matter what I have to say about Coco, it's just a movie you should go and see.

yani's rating: 5 alebrije out of 5

photo saturday: statuary tones

Let's sum up what happened this week, shall we...

Not a lot... played quite a bit of Assassins Creed Origins, played a couple of games of DnD (although I should have run a game on Wednesday, as the DM we had was woeful), took down my meagre Christmas decorations, put away my Christmas presents where appropriate... and that's pretty much it.

Oh, and I also mistakenly thought that Friday was Haircut Day and was a couple of minutes down the road before Tink called me and told me that no, it was actually Monday. At least I'm in the habit of texting her to tell her I'm on my way, it would have been a long way to go for nothing. Well, technically not that long... but it's a drive I only want to make when I have to.

As for today... today was hot... so we spent as much of it as humanly possibly inside airconditioning.

The shopping was... shoppingy. I did clean my fridge out when we got back and dumped some stuff that was on the turn, so it feels much neater now.

Then we headed off to Marion, mostly to go to the movies, but also for a general wander around.

To be honest, nothing of excitement happened, but we went to the movies, which was good.

Afterwards we wandered around a little more, and had some lunch, then got back into a very hot car (since we couldn't find an undercover parking spot and came back here before Ma tootled off home.

So, yeah... a simply thrilling start to 2017.

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2018

Hello 2018... how you doing?

Normally I theme the New Years image with whatever the "international year" of the year is (well, 2016 was a little hard)... but "contrary to common practice, the United Nations has not declared 2018 as International Year for any specific topic".

So instead, have this image of Cameron Boyce, beautiful freckled human.

My New Years was average as these things go... and I'll be honest, both yesterday and today just feel like any other day, which has happened a lot across the festive period this year.

I tidied the house a little in the morning, left my Iced Coffee in the freezer a little bit too long (the slush to liquid ratio was sub-optimal), did a little blogging, grabbed some lunch and then settled in to play a couple of hours of Assassin's Creed Origins.

I will just say that even more than some of the other AC games, it's very easy to get totally lost in that world...

But I resurfaced around 7pm, made some dinner (if by dinner you mean cooked a plate of dumplings, then, yes, dinner) and settled in for my usual NYE moviefest.

This year my choices were Cars 3 and Logan... definitely an odd pairing, but I was impressed with Logan. I finished up just before midnight, waited for the clock to tick over, listened to the fireworks for about five seconds, saw the top inch and a half through the trees and then headed to bed (lamenting the fact that You Can't Stop The Music was on yet again, but there was no way I was staying up to watch it).

So, yeah, the thrills never stop around this place.

Happy New Year!

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