I got inspired the other night. Last Saturday's gaming session was spent playing a pick-up RPG called Everyone Is John. It's a game where there is only player character (the eponymous John), with the players taking turns to control him. John suffers from multiple personality disorder and is pretty useless at just about everything, so whenever he ( Read more... )

Suppose you threw a curry together one evening only to discover you'd made a top-notch madras? You'd want to make another one, right? So you try to repeat it a bit later, same ingredients, same cooking time, same everything, only to find that it wasn't quite as good. Still not bad, but not as good as the first.

That's how I felt walking back from ( Read more... )

At least that's the main impression I was left with after our regular Saturday gaming fixture was cancelled so we could all troop off to the cinema. Do I need to tell you what we went to see? And you know what, it was pretty damn good ( Read more... )

I know, I know, I haven't posted for ages. So feeling I ought to let people know I am still alive, I thought I'd summarise the last role-playing game I managed. It was the most slack-arsed system I've ever designed. And it turned into the best game I've ever run ( Read more... )

You could do worse than try this quiz.

Somehow I got 80%.

No this is not about superheroes but it is I suppose an opportune moment to mention that I recently picked up a hardback copy of Watchmen for a mere quid in a charity shop. I can sense Watervole tearing her hair out in anguish already at this ridiculous underpricing. No, this is about bats ( Read more... )

I think I might have seen that Tawny Owl on my way home this morning. I can't be sure, indeed I can't even be sure it was an owl, because it was too dark and too briefly seen, and even if it was an owl I can't rule out Long-eared Owl which is at this time of year the most likely owl to be encountered in urban Thanet ( Read more... )

I was going to say I haven't seen many Tawny Owls, but actually I have racked up a fair few sightings over the years. Most, however, have been blurry blobs by starlight. Only once did I see one perched out in the open in broad daylight. As it happened it was on a TV aerial rather than in a tree, and because the house was lower down the hill than ( Read more... )

Since I ought to make an aten't-dead post from time to time, here is one. I'm on holiday this week, and it just so happens that Mad Moss Man Malcolm is visiting Thanet this week to refurbish a relative's kitchen. He needed an excuse to get out for a day and I was it. We went for a lovely walk on the Worth Marshes, near Sandwich, and our route ( Read more... )

Yes, I know, I may as well have ceased to exist or been spirited away to some nether dimension of eternal doom and despair (I have been there, actually, it was called Croydon). But I am still around, and will no doubt appear again from time to time though don't lay any money on when.

Anyway, this is what I saw this morning:


( Read more... )