photo saturday: the dino ranger

Did I just realise that just under half of the past ten images have all been halflings? Not until just now, no. Am I going to apologise for that? No, I I am no. Is it plausible that we're about to do a run of halflings? Yes, yes it is.

And a little like last week, this week's DnD Character Colouring Book is a character that was never really properly a character... Mielo Thornhill.

Mielo Thornhill did kind of see the light of day as a sidekick when I ran the one on one DnD game for Ma a couple of Christmases ago, and given that the new DnD source book has a ranger class I'm interested in, a bunch of racial changes AND default beasts for the Beastmaster that can be reskinned into anything you like, Mielo may very well get repurposed into a functional character at some point. I very much like the idea of him running around with a little parrot-feathered velociraptor (you know, the actual, historical, turkey sized ones, not the fictitious people sized Jurassic Park ones)... So he deserves another chance at some point. 

It also continues to boggle my mind the difference between what I was putting together in Photoshop four years ago, and what I'm basically able to pull out of Hero Forge directly with a few minor Photoshop augments.

Also, there are certain Hero Forge hairstyles that I just get instantly obsessed with... and this is one of them. And I've had to restrain myself from giving more characters either this version of the more textured version from last week.

And what better character to give a leopard print outfit to than a ranger living in Chult (where the dinosaurs live/they keep all of the jungle). This might also be one of the more subtle tattoo placements thus far, but I like what the Mayan symbols for "spirit", "book" and "bone" say about his character.

It's also highly likely that the Mielo model might get reused at some point, put in a different outfit and given different colouring, because it's a good looking face. Speaking of faces, I did enjoy that, pretty much accidentally, the Hero Forge raptor mount came out with just the right facial expression to give some indication of the character of Rascal. Also that if a 3 foot tall halfling has a 1.6 foot (at the hip) velociraptor companion, they're not that far off in scale from each other. Also the idea of a big fluffy idiot of a dinosaur in ridiculously bright parrot colours just appeals to me. As does putting them in a spiked collar, even though it makes sense in protecting him from other creatures.

I also wonder if me giving Mielo the same surname as the lead character in Hitchcock's North by Northwest was intentional or accidental. I assume the latter, but I wouldn't put it past my brain to have done it subconsciously.

Also, the name of the crossbow, written across the stock, is Lavinia.

Anyway...

Well, I gave up on the of dyeing the new chair covers. I washed them in preparation, and remembered just how much of a giant pain in the ass dealing with them just for that was, let alone all the extra drama of actually dyeing them, then rewashing them and drying them... so I threw my metaphorical hands up in the air and went "fuck it". And once the covers were dry I just put them on the chairs.

Firstly, stripping the old covers off the chair was a surprise, because I'd forgotten just how red the original chairs were. The answer is, very. So, putting the very beige covers over them was a little sad. I mean, they look fine, it's just that beige isn't particularly my vibe. But it will do for now.

Two weeks in a row of Thursday Night DnD... nobody jinx it. Most of the session was multiple waves (well, two) of combat, but at least it was combat that required a small amount of planning and strategy.

And I will say that as much as I enjoy the optional Steady Aim ability for rogues... it does mean that I tend to just stand in place the whole time. Which feels... less roguey. But then my boy Dax is much less of a "run and hide" kind of character. So, swings and roundabouts I guess.

Friday Night DnD was... a tale of two parts. Firstly, don't introduce a fucking Deck of Many Things into a game I'm part of. I don't want it, I'm not interested in it, I won't every fucking pull a card from it no matter what. It's a bullshit item that wrecks campaigns and there is literally no positives to it, even with this new "extended deck". No thank you sir and ma'am.

The other half was proactively kicking the ass of something that was 100% going to try and ambush us at some point.

Anyway...

If I live to be 1500 years old, I will never quite understand why people loose their goddamn mind on Easter Saturday at the supermarket. Are there really that many people who normally shop on Friday, Sunday or Monday that suddenly have to squeeze in their shopping on Saturday morning? Have the people who I know lost their minds on Thursday night because the shops were going to be shut for a single day who also need to get more things on Saturday? Do people actually do big gatherings that require the buying of items on Easter Sunday? Or is that just something that supermarkets try to tell us all is happening?

But the literal fucking clown car of people that descend on the supermarket on Easter Saturday has always and continues to boggle my whole entire mind.

Whatever... 

This week marks the beginning of Soup Season. Not that you'd know it from this weekend where we're having an Easter around 30C. But I'm going to essentially freestyle a "Mexican style chicken soup". We'll see how we go.

After supermarket mayhem we just came back here, watched the penultimate episode of Canadian Pottery Throwdown and then called it a day.

photo saturday: punk rock halfling

There are some characters who are minimalists... you put them in an outfit, you look at that outfit, you go "yeah, that works" (although the last time we had one of those on the blog was back in early February with the elderly halfling barbarian) and some of them are decidedly maximalists.

Because they require a lot of fussing around in Photoshop, and then once you have done, you realise something about it needs tweaking, and so you start from the beginning again.... and then you do that a second time. And then you keep seeing things you could tweak, and you keep adding to things and before you know it you've done three versions of the character and the Photoshop file has over 75 layers.

And it all started with the hand.

Well, technically it started back in 2021 when Inky was one of my potential backup characters for our Avernus game.

Firstly we have Thaddeus "Inky" Oakfoot, halfling tattoo artist, monk and cleric to one of the more obscure halfling goddesses. The selection and addition of his tattoos was fun, but I will say that I enjoyed coming up with the history of his tattoos even more, and the fact that he'd basically been in or around all the major cities in Faerun right before the events of the major adventures. That his halfling luck told him that he really needed to head somewhere else before everything went to shit. Also, I do really want to play a Trickery Cleric at some stage.

But I was going through and deleting or updating some older characters and I looked at him and figured he might as well get a new face. And a new staff, new hair, new pants, a new pouch... basically a do-over. And I was playing around with the new hand poses when I tried the "devil horns" and, suddenly we were off to the races. He suddenly became much more "punk" in my head.

So first the tattoos got some updates. And the idea that he had perhaps avoided the events of major adventures kind of morphed into the idea that he was there for most of them, just at a different time and doing different things that the adventure as written. Which meant that some of his tattoos got upgraded to cover books the old ones didn't. And the largest tattoo, which covers his whole chest is of Yondalla, the matriarch of the halfling pantheon.

Then I decided to give him the same brooch as Miss Jamjar, because it's Yondalla's holy symbol. Which triggered the idea of punks and badges... or just badges in general.

And I started adding various "in world" badges. Things he definitely could have gotten his hands on, things he probably couldn't have. Things that tell a story.

Then I realised he should always have been an Inkfoot and not an Oakfoot.

And in looking up details for the goddess Dallah Thaun and saw that prayers to her start off with "If only...". So that became the repeated motto on the metal parts of his staff in various in-game (and not) fonts. Which then led to the "graffiti" on the staff. And the invention of a partner or lover or something with a first name starting with M. I haven't even decided on a gender for them to be honest. There are also some definite "crossing into other fictional universes" references across his whole deal.

One of the last additions was taking some existing items (much larger items like chain-whips and a giant padlock) and turning them into his padlock necklace. 

Also, not that you can see it but just because it amuses me and is it's own in-joke, he only wears pink socks.

Maybe some version of him should just be my perpetual back-up character. He would also work well as a different idea for the first character from the 2024 PHB, which is kind of what this version is. And a character that would start out at Level 10.

On the plus side, now that he's been posted to the blog, I can, hopefully, stop making changes LOL.

Anyway...

We seem to have reached that point that comes around every March where I start the week in shorts and potentially end in a hoodie... although perhaps not as cleanly as that since it's going to shoot back up to over 30 at the end of this week, but the nights have gotten cold, so I'm very much on board for that.

That also means that it's very nearly the start of soup season... depending on how the weather goes next week.

Thursday Night DnD actually happened. And was... a lot of fumbling around on a very confusing map. But, you know, one step closer to getting to the end of this adventure.

Friday Night DnD, by contrast, did not happen. For all the usual reasons.

Anyway...

Today was the usual supermarketry... but afterwards I managed to cross a few things off my to-do list when we took a trip to Big W.

photo friday: birthday boy and purple pal

Let's get a little weird... in any number of ways. So the idea of what the first character I might make from the 2024 version of the PHB has been floating around in my head for the last little while, and the one new subrace that they floated that really caught my eye was the Chthonic tiefling.

Which led me to this week's DnD Character Colouring Book... Liberty, Chthonic Tiefling Sailor, Great Old One Warlock and Swashbuckler Rogue.

I know what you're thinking... because, literally, it was what I was thinking up until about 75 seconds ago when I googled "chthonic"... it's less about Lovecraft and Cthulhu and literally just means "underworld". Which, honestly, makes it make a lot more sense. And had I realised that at the time, might have altered my theming... but instead I discovered the Piscoloth, which is one of the possible Neutral Evil fiendish ancestors.

So, why wouldn't I lean into the cool, purple, aquatic, nightmare lobster and make it more people-like. Also, leaning into that idea meant being able to make a hornless (bald) tiefling. Which I dig. Originally he didn't have a tail, because I wanted to lean away from a number of the regular Infernal tiefling visuals. But he just ended up looking like a purple dude... so, sometimes you can't get rid of all the tropes.

The tattoo is a combination of a "Great Old One" sketch I found, two lots of "Lovecraftian" text (keeping in mind that Lovecraft was a racist asshole) at 90 degrees to each other, pulled from the Dagon short story (specifically the passage describing the titular creature) and a symbol for same. The idea would be that it's less of a tattoo and more something his patron inflicted on him.

I also, mostly for my own benefit, I included screen shots of the specific Warlock Eldritch Invocations he would have with six levels of Warlock and four levels of Rogue. I'm not convinced about the Gift of the Depths option, it would be one of those there I'd have to have a conversation with the DM and ask "is this a thing that's actually going to come up or be useful at all?". Because if there's like, one room in one dungeon in the whole adventure where this might be useful and nowhere else... then I'll just take Eldritch Smite (maybe).

The tail cuff was originally three rings, but the more I looked at it, the more I went... "that would just be uncomfortable and impractical", so instead I defaulted to the singular cuff. And engraved it with the name of three ships he's served on. One of which might just be a Spelljammer ship (probably a Damselfly Ship). Because as much as I probably don't ever want to PLAY Spelljammer, tying him into that idea might be fun. I also just realised that two of the three ship names I came up with are alliterative... so either I need to change the one that isn't so that they're all like that, or change one of the ones that are.

In my head, he would also have light, silk robe/jacket that would go over the armor... but that's not a thing that would work in Hero Forge. Think something that's kinda Burning Man, kinda Coachella, very dramatic, big wide sleeves (or no sleeves)... something you could get a good "King Thranduil" shablam moment out of before a battle... yeah. That.

And lastly, because he has Mask of Many Faces, I also mocked up his... default disguise. Because as much as the playtest information says "thanks to the victories and sacrifices of these legends, tieflings throughout the multiverse enjoy widespread acceptance", widespread isn't total and there's going to be times when it's much easier to pass as a brown skinned gentleman with a relatively normal tattoo than it would be to be a very distinctive purple gentleman with a tail. The names of the ships appear up in the tattoo also.

Anyway.

This week was Birthday Week.

But before we get to that...

I'm not going into this too deeply, but my landlord is literally the most awkward man to ever live. Also, I finally got my stovetop fixed. Because it kept fucking up... but nobody actually seemed to bother investigating what the issue WAS, the electrician just upgraded the fuse that the oven and stovetop runs on. So we'll assume that fixes the issue. I guess. But also, because electricians can't ever give you a time, he was supposedly coming "mid afternoon" and it was basically 4pm by the time he showed up. So that ended up being most of my Wednesday, at least from a "taking up space in my brain" perspective.

Most of the week was me hiding in the aircon, because fuck the last throws of Summer, which always thrashes around like a dying octopus before it disappears out the door.

Thursday was my actual birthday... and I just realised that I did not do my annual "it's my [number] birthday and also [insert male celeb's name who shares my birthday]" image... because, frankly, I completely forgot about it. Also, I'm basically recycling celebs at this point. So... maybe we skip this year? Maybe. Which is sad is the only other time I skipped it was 2021... and, honestly, yeah, I was clearly in a mood for the entirety of 2021.

And did I just take a detour and go and do a search to see if anybody new or interesting had popped up? Yes, yes I did. But I also don't know that I want to go, create an image and then backdate a post. Seems like, honestly, too much work. I forgot, so maybe we'll pick it back up next year, maybe it's a meme that had it's day. Which is something of a shame this year, given that it's my 50th. Also, I'm 50, who the fuck let that happen.

So, getting back to Thursday.

I started off with a message followed by a phonecall from Ma wishing me Happy Birthday. Then I did my usual visit to Boost Juice and Baker's Delight in order to collect the free shit both of those places give you when it's your birthday.

Thursday Night DnD is... as Fluffy and I have remarked on many occasions, cursed beyond the telling of it. So, that fell over and died, because our host wasn't well. Which meant that I had a nice quiet evening.

Friday was Chiro Day... so I went and did my usual wandering around town after getting my back sorted out. I did spend a while pottering around Dymocks considering potential books to buy with the money left over from last birthday's gift voucher. But I have two issues when it comes to books right now. Stuff that I have read and enjoyed... I'm not sure that, for most of it, I actually need to own it or, for right now, wouldn't really be that bothered going back and rereading (mostly because, right now, I'm enjoying just cycling through all kinds of new and exciting books)... and when it comes to things I haven't read yet... well, why wouldn't I borrow it from the library first to ensure I'm actually going to enjoy it? Which then turns into the first issue.

And the one book that I did think that I might buy just so that I actually own it... they didn't have. But wandering around books was an enjoyable way to spend a little while.

Then we get to Friday Night DnD...

And it turns out that directly after I have everybody a "hey, important birthday coming up, but I don't really need STUFF, but I also don't know what I want... you figure it out and don't ask me things..." just after Valentine's Day, they commenced Planning Things.

Some of that planning came to fruition when Fluffy asked me "a quick question about a totally fictionalised situation that will have no bearing on actual events". Which turned out to be a question about cake. And that I initially said I didn't have a lot of strong opinions about, and then proceeded to have several strong opinions about. Because marzipan, white chocolate and baked cheesecakes are all, in fact, literally The Devil.

So it wasn't a great surprise when Fluffy messaged me when he got here on Friday to say "could you get the door for me and spare some room in your fridge". Because you have to put hypothetical cheesecake in the fridge, obviously.

Then when we got there, it turned out that they'd been plotting and scheming and working together. But due to circumstances, the plan didn't quite work as it might have done... but that was okay, because for the plan to work, time travel would have needed to be involved. So we dealt with the timeline we're currently in.

Because, honestly, you don't want to give me the power to mess around with the timelines at this point. Not least of all because I'll just go and buy a bunch of Apple stock and several copies of Action Comics #1 featuring the first appearance of Superman. Or something.

Where was I? Oh, yeah, presents. There was a set of group presents... that's a confusing sentence. There were three presents, from the group. A present "to celebrate", a present "to remember" and a present "to inspire". Yeah, like I said, they'd been plotting and planning.

Celebrate was a... well, I don't know what the official name of it would be... a diadem or a corolla, maybe a coronet... not a tiara though, because it's a full circle... essentially it's a tiny crown. Which is made of some kind of metal and has little fake gemstones and repeating fleur-de-lis... which is funny because my first tattoo was, in fact, a fleur-de-lis.

And why... because, I am, in fact a Pretty Pretty Princess.

Does it fit my oblong head? Not remotely. Is it clearly designed to be worn by a bride with a veil and connection points where you attach it to a hairstyle with bobby pins? Yes. Is it very cute? Also yes.

Remember was a very lovely Sketchgoblin portrait of my girl Nightingale. Is it the version of my girl that I would have designed if I'd been dealing with the artist directly? No, but I think they were working from the 2020 version of my girl... and I think I've slightly redesigned her several times since then, and, honestly, she's about to go through another slightly update next week when they drop some new jacket pieces. Also, I'd possibly be a nightmare dealing with an artist. Or else send them a full terrabyte of reference images.

But, again, this is "remember". So, basing it around the version of her that finished the game is entirely appropriate. And I'm also perfectly happy for this to be... "fan art" of my girl. Also, just so we're clear, it is quite lovely. And the perfect group gift from this group of people. Because that was the first character I played with them when we started doing our Friday thing back at the end of October 2019.

Entirely fitting.

Inspire was scarlet yarn. Several balls thereof. Half of which was acrylic and half of which was merino wool. Weirdly, if you'd showed me the acrylic yarn and asked if that was my preferred colour of red, I would have said "absolutely", right up until I looked at the merino wool, which is slightly darked and a less orange leaning scarlet.

What am I going to make with it? Not a fucking Scooby. Scooby Doo. Clue. You got that, right? Cockney Rhyming Slang.

And then we have some very delightful tropical/passionfruit cheesecake from the Cheesecake Shop and played a game of Sheriff of Nottingham and a game of Sushi Go (both of which Fluffy won, because I goaded him into not playing Sheriff the way he normally plays it, and none of us really ended up  challenging each other when we were clearly all lying). But it was a pleasant evening.

Anyway.

Today was also pleasant.

We did the supermarket thing, came back here and watched more of the UK Portrait Artist of the Year only to discover that the episode marked as Episode 4 was actually just Episode 3 again (nobody cares, I understand)... also that the last episode that seems to appear online is like a month ago... so that train may have run out of steam. Then we watched Canadian Pottery Throw Down, which is just Great British Bake Off but for pottery (well, actually it's the Canadian version of The Great Pottery Throw Down, which is just GBBO for pottery... again, nobody cares)... only to discover that the Totally Legal and Absolutely Autorised Version that we were watching cut out literally two seconds before they announced who was going home this week. Rude.

Then we went down to the Parade, avoided the insanity going on today at the Irish pub on the other corner for St Paddy's Day tomorrow, and went to the same cafe we went to for Ma's birthday last year.

Should I have gotten the focaccia/baguette instead of the chicken burger? Probably. And when the problem with the chicken burger is... the chicken. Well, what are you going to do really? It wasn't bad... just... highly underwhelming.

So, Happy Birthday to me I guess. On the plus side, I do have half a cheesecake in the fridge right now.

photo saturday: grumpy ghosthunter

I've said it a few times of late, but the difference between some of my earlier Hero Forge models and what it's capable of now is pretty much night and day...

 In fact, Orryn, who appeared in a DnD Character Colouring Book after the post-Kickstarter HF 2.0 dropped now looks like the action figure version of this character. Part of that is the Face Customiser, part of that is the newer items being much less chunky than the older ones, part of it is just the many, many, many hours experience I've had posing the little fuckers.

I'll be honest, I do still want an updated (and two armed) version of Orryn's original jacket (also, more short katanas, technically wakizashi I guess) because I love that thing, but I also love the single armored arm. And the very grumpy face.

Orryn was my first gnome character (they're a race I just don't much care for, especially when comparing them with my preferred halflings), who I made for a one-shot back at the end of March... who is a class from the world of Critical Role, who took part in a solo adventure (one DM, one player) that was mostly The Witcher but with more than a little of the Mandalorian thrown in. Neither of which I have seen/played. But it wasn't bad. 

I didn't realise it until I was looking back through Discord messages that he was very much an "early days of lockdown" character, where we did the one on one session entirely through voice chat. And that that was so long ago while also feeling like it was literally five minutes ago.

Also yes, I liked the name so much that when it came time to design my first gnome who would survive beyond a single game, I reused it for Quillamina. An alternate universe branch of the family perhaps.

While this version is still a Critical Role Bloodhunter, I did think about re-imagining him as a Psi Warrior Fighter... or, as I mentioned at the time, possibly a Phantom Rogue (but as much as I love Rogues, I'm not sure that Phantom necessarily vibes for me without a very strong hook). But I'm also kind of feeling the need for a more close up melee character. It's not generally my thing, but there's some character with a sword sitting in the back of my brain and banging on various bits of grey matter. And I think it's definitely a sword... rather than any other weapon.

We'll have to see what happens when the new 2024 rule books drop towards the end of the year.

But part of the reason Orryn got a do-over was I was going through and clearing out some of the Hero Forge models I don't need anymore (mostly the old versions of character who now have updated faces), and one thing led to another.

Anyway.

So, at some point, I think I've brought up seeing the Indigenous weather calendars for various places around Australia, and the fact that while some places (mostly on the east coast) have up to 6 different seasons, and some places have as few as 2, the Kaurna calendar is more or less the same as the regular calendar, but just offset by a month. So Summer is January thru March, etc.

And honestly, that's my new calendar. Because we're at the start of March and having a heatwave as we speak.

Fun times. Although, honestly, much less stressful that it was back in the days when I had no aircon.

Otherwise, not much to report.

Not Thursday Night DnD because of reasons... the reason mostly being that the game is mostly cursed and it's going to take us for-fucking-ever to finally finish up the campaign.

Friday Night DnD was good... did I perhaps slightly stretch the capacity of what I was supposed to be able to do in a turn of combat... yeah, yeah, I did. But not on purpose. I just perhaps got a little over excited in the moment. It also didn't help because we were playing without a battlemap. And that always fucks me over.

But no harm, no foul.

Anyway...

Given the aforementioned heatwave, we did the supermarket slightly earlier (not THAT much earlier, but early enough that it seemed like the clowns had all escaped from the circus. Or, alternatively, the people who would normally go to the supermarket later went much earlier because of the heat.

But we did the shopping thing and then came back here and watched some YubTubs for a while before I sent Ma off into the world/home.

photo saturday: undead druid boy

There are times when I look back on the "hand coloured" minis I made back before Hero Forge did colour and I go... the fuck was I thinking? There are also characters where I go... awww, you poor bastard, you didn't stand a chance.

Dal is both of those things. Also, a halfling, because we know how I feel about halflings. He was, if memory serves, my second ever halfling.

Dal has been through some stuff. He spent a lot of time running around as a dinosaur defeating undead pirates. And as of the last time I played him, he's sitting out in the jungles of Chult on the edge of a ruined city with a ruby in his forehead, technically an undead creature. I kinda need to play another Moon Druid. I like the Circle of the Moon... changing into big dangerous animals is fun. Changing into dinosaurs, even more fun. And being a Ghostwise halfling and having the ability to communicate telepathically while in animal form.

The original DnD Character Colouring Book with him in it is from three years ago now, and the poor character didn't last beyond 2017 if I remember my timeline correctly. But I do like this version. The "octopus armor" is a magic item he got before he got fucked over by an adventure that was later changed. And I like this version with just one big embroidered octopus.

Anyway...

Very minor catastrophe this week... I was showering when I heard an almighty crash and the breaking of glass and I thought "well, that can't be in my house, I have all the windows wide open, surely that was from outside somewhere"... but I had to check, so I peaked around the corner into the living room only to discover that the big framed artwork that has sat, perfectly fine, on the chest of drawers, had done a 270° rotation swan dive off the top, landing face up on the floor, broken glass, thankfully, mostly still contained in and around the frame.

So, I did the only sensible thing and got back in the shower.

And then got dressed and put shoes on and spent about the next half an hour picking up thin shards of glass from atop the artwork and the surrounding floor.

Not a fun way to start a day really.

I also don't have any idea HOW it fell. Did I slightly nudge it when I put my book on it, was it already in the danger zone and the wind whipped through the house (see aforementioned windows) and nudged it past the point of no return.

Thankfully the artwork itself was predominantly unharmed, a couple of very minor nicks, but the frame is toast.

Thursday Night DnD was good... weirdly, this session made me more interested in reading the adventure when we're done with it, mostly because I want to read what the book outlines as the reasoning and ideas behind some of the elements. I've definitely formed a particular opinion about certain elements, and I'm not sure if they're because of the way things are written, the way DM Fluffy is running/playing them, who my character is or some combination of all of the above.

We're definitely in the final act though.

Friday Night DnD was... something different. Fluffy was off doing Fluffy Things, but we'd reached a point in the story where the other two characters were going off to do something without his character, so, we had a session anyway.

And... it was weird, right up until the point we actually started playing. It was weird not having Fluffy roll up on my doorstep, it was weird not having him in the passenger seat on the way there (and the way back), it was weird rocking up at the door sans Fluffy... it was just weird.

The session itself went... well. It wasn't exactly what I thought it was going to be, and that's fine... with any D&D game, choices are made and those choices lead to situations and events. And in this case, that was a left when I'd assumed a right, but overall it was good. And, Fluffy, I told you I wasn't telling you anything... so go away now.

It was good to have some one on one time with Mr's character though.

Anyway...

Insert the Saturday Mix Tape... Supermarket, etc.

Although after that, we went on a little side trip to IKEA. Originally there had been a plan for looking at new armchairs and, obviously, frames. What ended up happing was that I decided that a frame I already had would serve for the time being... or, potentially, I'm considering going through some of my existing artwork and seeing if there's something I want to swap over to.

And as for armchairs, honestly, the issue is getting new chairs up the stairs and getting old chairs down the stairs... so, I'm going to try the "dye chair covers to a colour that isn't beige" trick that I attempted with varying degrees of success back in late 2019/early 2020. But I'm also not going to rush it this time around.

I'll also be honest, after reading the fucking instructions for dyeing things, I'm bordering on not giving a fucking shit because the whole "do it on the stove top" for items that are essentially 55% cotton and 45% polyester was something of a nightmare at the old house, and potentially even more of a nightmare here with a different stove top.

But like I said, I'm not going to rush into it... I'll give it some thought beforehand. And maybe this time, we don't try for bright red, since I don't know that that's going to happen anyway after last time. We'll see.