character saturday: lord shadow

So, first off... I really want to play a Shadow Sorcerer at some stage. But this was more a tone poem for DnD Character Colouring Book while playing with particular outfits in Hero Forge.

But I like the combination of the outfit in black and grey and the magic in blue and purple.

Beyond that, as I said, it's mostly a thought experiment.

Secondly, this might be the last Colouring Book entry for a hot minute. At least until Hero Forge releases the Face Customiser and I loose my tiny mind redoing everyone's faces. Of course, I also reserve the right to go back on that idea if they release something cool I want to do a character for.

Anyway...

I had a red hot go at Lasagne Soup again this week. I did try it once before, last year I think, and it was a success. Although this time I kind of made it up as I went and didn't follow a specific recipe. So, mostly it was kind of just pasta sauce with broken up lasagne noodles. Tasty as hell though.

We'll file the rest of this week under "Flat".

Thursday Night DnD and Friday Night Probably Not DnD were both cancelled.

But Friday was also Chiro Day... so I did my monthly trek into town and the associated Wandering Around Looking At Things that comes afterwards.

Anyway...

Today was basically just the supermarket because the weather decided that we needed All The Rain this morning.

Oh, and brief rant. Remember how a couple of weeks ago I lost the ticket for the car park and had to pay for a replacement. Just to add insult to injury, last week, as I approached the barrier it just raised up on it's own before I scanned the ticket, which it does from time to time. And then today it also just opened on it's own. Which I just call rude. You couldn't have done the day I lost my ticket?

Granted it was too late by that point. And would I have been even more annoyed if I'd paid for a replacement ticket, gotten up to the gate and it had just opened, yes. But it's the principle of the thing.

Anyway...

Current mood:

character saturday: decopunk valet

Is this week's DnD Character Colouring Book pure fantasy? Is it Steampunk? Is it Decopunk? Is it Rococopunk? Is it all of those things and also slightly none of them? Is it a ceramic Warforged who is decorated in some form of blue and white china patterning? Do I imagine that the face would look like actual pottery painting that I couldn't find a way to appropriately replicate? The answer to all of these things is possibly yes.

But here we have Six. Thus called because they are marked somewhere on their body as either 1/6 or 6/6, as in either the first or the sixth from a set of six. I haven't really decided yet. And I'm also not sure if they're actually a limited edition piece, or something weird happened and their ceramic body was actually repurposed/reformed from limited edition tea service set. Likewise, I think if I followed this idea all the way to the end, the markings would be different across the body. Maybe filling out more of a limb or being more delicate or something. I don't know.

I also kind of dig the idea that they only have a face when they need one. When they're in combat for example, the face goes completely blank. And afterwards the markings on the side of the head swim across the face (a little like Rorschach from Watchmen) and create a simple face.

However, I feel like he's a much more High Magic kind of character. As in, from a time when magic was basically modern science. And he was somebody's personal valet and bodyguard. Like, he could prepare and serve you high tea and also murder a whole room full of people if necessary.

And I like that.

Anyway.

This week's soup of choice was Boring Vegetable Soup. It wasn't great, it wasn't terrible, it was just boring. But it was also filling, so I'm not really going to complain.

Thursday Night DnD was... [insert travelling montage]. Which is never the most exciting of sessions, but I also don't hate them.

Friday Night Not DnD was the last of the HeroQuest adventures for now. And we won. Which, really, surprised nobody. Given that we've been mostly walking through the adventures. Not to say that they weren't enjoyable or interesting, but I'm not sure we've been overly challenged by any of them since maybe the first couple. We also totally geared ourselves up and did all the "correct" things in order to kick the ass of every single adventure.

Team KillBox for the win!

Whether or not we actually start the new DnD campaign next week depends on the DM, but if not, we'll just pick something from the extensive selection of board games.

Anyway.

Not really much excitement today... basically just the supermarket run.

Current mood:

character saturday: reprise boys

A little reprise for our return to DnD Character Colouring Book... 

This is Macabe's third appearance, and as much as I liked the high collared previous version, that didn't come sleeveless as standard, but I like this version of the tattoos more. Would I still like a high necked undershirt under the armour? Yes, yes I would. But I'll live with this version for now.

Likewise this is Fenris's third showing, although the outfit mostly remained the same. This new version is the vest, gloves and boots from a new set... and an older set of pants.

Also, it's very weird going back and looking at the self colouring versions I was so very proud of at the time and thinking "well, that looks like absolute trash".

Anyway...

This week's soup was a not too bad chowDAH... although there ended up being a lot of it.

Oh, and for the first time since I bought them, I had to finally charge my Bluetooth headphones this week. Which is fairly impressive, even if I'm not using them all the time.

This week's Thursday night DnD... actually happened, so that's unusual. We're still in the early stages of Getting The Plot Happening, but it's good overall.

Friday night Not DnD also happened. We're nearly at the end of this little between campaign diversion, and it's been fun, if, you know, a little overly simple once we all tricked ourselves out with weapons that can do damage diagonally and every possible piece of armour we could get our hands on.

Anyway...

Today was basically just the supermarket, followed by a brief to Haighs afterwards.

Current mood:

character saturday: artificial paladin

So... I have a complicated relationship with AI generated art. I understand why artists find it problematic, and I agree with them. For further reading on the subject (based on a quick Google search)...

• AI Art and the Ethical Concerns of Artists 
• AI-Generated Art Controversy: The Future of Creativity or a Replacement for Human Talent?
• The Ethical Pros and Cons of AI Art Generation
• Why some artists see AI-generated art as a threat to their livelihood
• ‘It’s the opposite of art’: why illustrators are furious about AI

It very often makes nightmare images where people don't have the correct amount of fingers or have extra hands in places hands shouldn't be, or very much likes to, you know, blend things in weird ways or otherwise make you go... "no... none of that... kill it with fire".

It is also capable of making beautiful images. But it's hard to make a very specific, very detailed, very exact image right now. The generic idea of something, yes. A very specific, "I want exactly these elements, arranged in exactly this way" detailed in a "just so" way, then you go see an actual artist and commission something.

But, of course, I was going to try my favourite loveable lying little shit... my halfling paladin/rogue, Peregrin. Is it perfect? No, of course not. The armour is completely all over the place, the hair is entirely too blonde, it refused to give me an eyebrow piercing, the eyes are the wrong colour and I think the face should kind of be about half-way between these two options.

It's what happens when you ask for "art nouveau" on the left and "photo realistic" on the right... and when you use "jewel tones" as a descriptor. Also, there's a healthy portion of Magic The Gathering art in the DNA of the left image.

Do I like them? Absolutely.

Anyway...

A short run down for this week.

Speaking of halflings, Halfling Tomato Soup continues to be the best tomato soup recipe ever.

As of Tuesday, we can reset the "Yani Fall Down Go Boom" counter at 0. It's been a hot minute, but there we are.

I tripped over one of the many, many uneven paving stones on my morning walk and went down like the proverbial bag of potatoes. Mostly I was fine, although I skinned my knee quite spectacularly based on sliding across the rough pavers. So yay for that. Weirdly I didn't end up with the giant bruises I thought I would on the heel of my hands, so that's a plus. And I didn't break my fancy new headphones when they came flying off my head either.

 I then spent a large chunk of Tuesday's public holiday making a lot of very small jars of apple and plum (plus tomato, obviously) relish. It came out pretty good honestly. The issue now is distribution.

Otherwise, no Thursday Night DnD because of headaches and coughs and such.

Likewise, no Friday Night Not DnD because of head colds.

Pfft.

Anyway.

Today was basically just the supermarket. With the added bonus that I discovered that if you lose your ticket for the parking garage, it costs $25 to get your car out. Where did the ticket go? I hear you ask... If I knew that, I would not have needed to pay $25 to get a lost ticket ticket.

However, if I just happen to find it randomly in the next week I will be very unhappy.

And that's about it really.

Current mood:

photo saturday: complementary colours

Did we see Sofles lovely purple and yellow art already? Yes. Is it lovely enough that we can revisit it for some close up detail shots? Also yes.

Anyway...

I got a little philosophical about soup in my Insta post for this week's take on Halfling Everything Soup...

• Step 1. Make soup according to recipe
• Step 2. Modify recipe slightly to fit your tastes 
• Step 3. Make soup based on your vague memory of the recipe

Which is more or less what I did this week. I bought the ingredients as specified, more or less, but then didn't look at the recipe once. Because, honestly, it's "Everything Soup", so I can put whatever I want in it... and the recipe was always slightly tedious.

And, I stand by that for soup in general.

Otherwise, not much of note this week...

I rage-quit the book I was reading, so had to go to the library on Thursday. I'm currently two books away from reading more books in a year than I've read since I started tracking them on Goodreads. And it's only April. Libraries, man, they're the best.

There was no Thursday Night DnD. And no Friday Night Not DnD. But we're doing Friday Night Not DnD tonight, because of... reasons. I think Mr and Mrs had a thing, I don't honestly remember. It did make the whole week slightly weird tho. No anything on Thursday or Friday. But Friday was also Chiro Day. And I didn't make bread on Thursday but on Friday night instead. And today is Saturday but also Friday Night Not DnD Day.

Yeah. It's all very weird.

Anyway.

Today wasn't much of anything... or at least, not yet anyway.

Basically, just the supermarket and then that's your lot... at least until I need to do things before going out later. So there's that.

Current mood:

photo saturday: brewery art

Some big old brewery vats as this week's photos with various artist's work.

Anyway...

It's been a while since I made pea and ham soup... but the one I made this week was really quite good. I don't know whether it was the mint I added or the ricotta I used in place of cream... or the fact that I bought new mushroom based stock. Yeah, it sounded weird to me too... but it definitely added to the flavour.

In other news, Ma is vastly improved over last week... or as vastly improved as you get while still using a walking stick... but honestly, she probably should have been using a stick for a while, so if there's any positive that came out of last week, it's that she went from "I don't like sticks" to "Gimme that blue stick" without much of a fuss.

So that's a plus.

In other pointless news...

Thursday night DnD was good... although, let me just say, DnD adventure writers, stop putting "chase/races" in your adventures, when you hamstring the classes that can move faster than everyone else. That is not a "chase/race"... and it's irritating. Or better yet, don't call it a "chase/race". Because it's not. And it works both ways, when you do let people go the speed they're supposed to, the "chase" finishes after about a round. 

So, just stop doing it. It's dumb and it doesn't work within the rules.

I did get a fancy magic thing though, so that's nice.

Friday night Not DnD was also good... less challenging than the session a couple of weeks ago, but still enjoyable.

Anyway...

Today was basically the supermarket followed by a trip to Haighs for post-Easter broken egg... so nothing exciting, but I do now have Haighs in my fridge, so, yay.

Current mood:

photo saturday: port roker

We all love a good Pawn Roker...

There are still a few Wonderwalls images, but these were just general Port Adelaide images that I really liked, and that seemed to match, at least a little. It was also kind of amazing how quickly they packed all the stuff away when the pawn broker closed for the day. I didn't think that we were gone all that long, but suddenly the footpath was completely clear.

Back to actual street art next week.

Anyway...

Some minestrone soup this week... pretty good actually... lots of bacon, some Chinese cabbage that just kind of bulked it out a bit but didn't really affect the taste or the texture... and some bonus stock powder that really boosted the taste.

In other news...

It's been a rough week. I'm not going into details, I just want to mark this as a line in the sand. For future reasons. Ma wasn't well this week... and that just stresses me the fuck out because of reasons. I mean, she's feeling better, but still, it stresses me out.

Otherwise, not a lot of anything this week... no Thursday DnD, no Friday DnD... 

There has been some Horizon Forbidden West though.

Anyway...

Today was... see earlier comment about stress. But overall, perfectly fine. Just, you know, residual stress. We did the supermarket... we ran some errands... it wasn't much of anything.

So, yeah. That was this week.

Current mood:

photo saturday: cerulean humps

This week was... many things.

Oh, also, rounded things in tones of blue and purple from the Wonderwalls photos for this week.

And Soup Season began this week... I made a decent chicken chow-DAH.

This week was my rental inspection. So I basically cleaned across three days. Not for the whole day, because that way lies insanity and also broken Yani. So, first there was The Tidying, where I put things away, got rid of the things that needed to be gotten rid of, etc. Then there was The Kitchening... which generally involves pulling all the stuff off the kitchen counters, putting it elsewhere, cleaning said counters, then cleaning the stove, forgetting to clean the filter for the rangehood (m'eh, it's not like the appear to check) and then on Wednesday that was The Wettening. Which is basically cleaning the bathroom, vacuuming and then mopping the floors.

Did I do more than was absolutely necessary? Probably. Is cleaning for an inspection my opportunity to do a big clean I wouldn't otherwise give a shit about doing? Yes.

Do I always like the way the house looks after I've done cleaning for an inspection? Also yes.

I kinda preferred every single other land agent who tend to do their inspections somewhere between 9am and 1pm, rather than this land agent who seems to prefer the 2-4pm time slot.

But Thursday rolled around and after installing Horizon Forbidden West on the PS4, I shuffled down the road to the bakery and then went to the library to pick up the giant stack of books that had just happened to all come in at the same time, and read the non-library book I was already reading. The last couple of times the agent did the inspection just after the 2pm start time, and I realised that I could have just come home early... so I kept checking my email for the inspection report email. And, you guessed it, it didn't show up until about 3:30. So much for that plan. But the tiny postage stamp library is nice enough to hang out in.

Thursday Night DnD was decent. And we finally made it to the start of the hardcover adventure. I will say that it did kind of feel a little bit like "enforced fun", just because there were a bunch of "busywork things" on offer for the group, given that we've arrived in time for a festival with associated games and contests and whatnot.

Friday I rewarded myself for all the cleaning by starting Horizon Forbidden West. It's good... I mean I only played until I got to the first place you could save the game after the title finally game up. So, like three hours. And I'm enjoying being back in the world, although all the models for the characters from the first game just seem a tiny bit off... I know they changed Aloy up a bit, but everybody just kinda looks like their own celebrity impersonator. It's not enough to throw me out of the game, more of just a "huh, okay then".

Friday Night Not DnD was also good. The interesting thing is how the Hero Quest can take the exact same board and make each level feel somehow unique. This particular level had us going through magic teleportation doors and bouncing all over the map. Which was fun, if sometimes occasionally frustrating, especially given that getting to certain points meant rolling specific numbers.

But my character also lucked into finding the MacGuffin for the whole adventure in the first room she went into, and also just happened to have the magical vial of Plot Development necessary to do things with it.

Today was... different. Mostly because Ma didn't come down to go shopping with me because of reasons, so I was on my own. Which I don't hate, because I can just put on my headphones, crank my jams (by which I mean the 99% Invisible podcast) and just potter around.

Which basically gives me the rest of the day to myself. So maybe I might need to go fight some robot critters...

Current mood:

photo saturday: weird little guys

We can't forget paste-ups and stickers in the grand pantheon of street art. So, some weird little green buddies for today.

Anyway...

A relatively short one for today.

No Thursday Night DnD.

Friday was Chiro Day... which also included my monthly Wandering Around Looking At Things. This time that mostly meant taking photos of things in bookstores that

Friday Night Not DnD was good... I do enjoy that in the absence of actual roleplay or whatnot, we've basically started using what little story there is and making up our own story. Or, you know, mostly just amusing ourselves.

Anyway...

I think we've finally hit that break point between "Argh Summer" and "Oooh Autumn", so I bought soup ingredients today.

Woo.

And that was it really.

Like I said, a short one.

Current mood:

photo saturday: post-birthday lady walls

Some more walls. Surprising nobody.

Interestingly, these were more or less the first (on the left) and last (on the right) shots I took last week.

Also, two examples of the importance of having lighting in the right place when it comes to street art photos. But also, not wanting to spend a whole day waiting for the light to move around.

Anyway...

This week was my birthday. Obviously. But we covered that already.

There wasn't any Thursday Night DnD this week... because people were sick and we're at a Very Important Point of getting to the beginning of the story... so... we skipped this week.

Friday Night Not DnD was good... once again, we have a system down, so we're not getting hammered as much as we were in the earlier levels. I assume the game will take it's revenge soon enough.

It was also my Friday Night Birthday... so presents were had and tiny cupcakes were eaten.

Anyway....

Today was a non-zero amount of the supermarket, looking at very old recipe books and then taking a trip to Spotlight for reasons. Not thrilling, but perfectly fine.

So, a short one this week. Which is also perfectly fine.

Current mood: