I'm showing all of the physical symptoms of stress at the moment, but I haven't consciously been noticing feeling stress. Admittedly it's been a high pressure period of work, but still...

Annoying that my body has to send me painful messages rather than my brain just expressing it in conscious thought.

I GOT THE JOB!!!!

Yeah, I know I've already got and completed Guitar Hero World Tour on the Wii. However I'm enjoying it all over again with the World Tour Guitar on the Xbox 360. The slide bar is great fun, the graphics are so much nicer (obviously) and of course I get achievements (whoever thought those up at Microsoft should be racking up a huge salary, biggest appeal to a hunter gatherer like me ever...). Great game, and when I get a chance, it now means I can pick up Rock Band 2, Guitar Hero 5 and Beatles Rock Band. If you don't know what the appeal is with these games, well, I guess the childhood version of you is looking at you from the past and shaking their head, sadly disappointed in what you've become.

Running - Is it wrong that I'm actually enjoying it now? I mean, don't get me wrong it's still exhausting and leaves my legs stiff, but I'm enjoying the improvements I'm making in my ability. Need to figure a way around conditions worsening as we head towards colder months and shorter days.

Xbox - completed Assassin's creed. Could go back for achievements but...meh. We'll see. The game was good fun and I'm looking forward to part 2. In the meanwhile I've returned to GTA IV and got past one of the sticking points...seriously, the game could do with far better checkpoints in missions. That last one involving two sets of driving just to get to the actual mission, well, very frustrating to complete. But it's still a really rich game. Would like to get some 4 person Left4Dead going again, that was top fun. For now though, I've got an Xbox Guitar Hero World Tour guitar, and the game should be arriving in the next couple of days so...

Creative stuff - I need to keep the ball rolling on some projects, particularly on a roleplaying front. Like the rules for Savage Worlds so we'll see what happens with Falkenstein. Looking forward to the next session of Jada, be interesting to see what missions are on offer...as always Mark's downtime emails are great fun to plough through for plot hooks :).

Bleeargh. Singularly lazy weekend. Too hot, and too tired after invigilating on Friday. Spent Saturday and Sunday completing Assassin's Creed. Tried to restart GTA IV, from where I'd left it. Unfortunately it's a high likelihood of death mission with two long and tedious stints of driving before you get to it, so if you die it's back to the start again. Badly designed.

Other than that, got some stuff done and out of the way, so wasn't entirely unproductive, it just felt that way. Hopefully more sleep tonight will improve my outlook.

Woohoo! Swashbuckling against ancient evils tonight!

In other news, stumbled across a great podcasted Audio Drama series called Wormwood. Sort of "Cthulhu Now" crossed with "House"! :) Check it out on I-Tunes for free, definitely a strong recommend from me.

So tired at the moment. I think it's my brain switching off due to lack of input. I kinda work like a processor, I mashup ideas and so I need input to generate output. Inspiration.

Anyway, I've got a shed load of stuff to get done on the computer at home. Got a great next scenario lined up for Causa Potentia...not sure where it goes but I think it's got a really good creepy atmosphere, and brings in a new storyline that ties to at least three of the characters so that'll be fun.

Tom has finally hassled me into sorting out a vague date for a new session of Castle Falkenstein (which I haven't run in about 3 years). Except it won't be Castle Falkenstein. The background origins will remain, but the gameworld will be modified (IC), and the system behind it will completely change. I want something fast and free-flowing still, but I need something a bit more crunchy to work with than the Falkenstein rules, and there are just some things about the background that I've always wanted to jetison and bring closer to my natural horror feel.

And then there is the bank holiday weekend. Pip's at the Gathering. I'm at home. Probably bored. I could plough through some DVDs and play some Xbox and maybe get some more material written up. Some day I'm going to actually see through my idea though, and have a weekend for Ex-LRPers to play board and card games, getting a competitive bragging rights weekend games fest going and some DVD marathons on in the background and the like.

Oh, and mysteriously, next year appears to have become the year of offers of international travel for us both. Might be worth making some firm plans. Might be worth actually getting around to getting a passport...

http://xkcd.com/626/

This made me laugh...particularly if you've ever seen Jim Carey's take on Horatio Cane from CSI: Miami...

Yeesh. Last weekend took it out of me, and I haven't caught up yet. Add to the fact that my usual diet of TV that feeds my brain has been interrupted, so I've kind of had a powerdown when I've got back from work. Dozing on the sofa, possibly impolite whilst we have a visitor, but a necessity.

Watching Bleach on my laptop. Which is fun, but I'm falling asleep during that too.

Browsing social networking sites, and blog sites (Wired, Boing Boing, Dark Roasted Blend and the like).

So completely unproductive...

Should really be writing things up, but that will have to wait until next week.

Meanwhile, this weekend, I'm loading vans and moving furniture out of my Dad's house...

So, a cool Sunday for my weekend. Whilst Pip was away at an event, I went to my brother's birthday treat to see the Banksy exhibit in Bristol. I can't sing the praises of that experience enough...so instead you can see my videos of it on youtube (I'll put the link up over the next day). I guess it's probably a matter of taste, as to whether you think it was intelligent or just "clever" art. But (being faux-pretentious for a moment) it was very much about context and juxtaposition. The fact that this stuff was in amongst a traditional setting for works of art, and indeed played off being in the setting was captivating for me. And it did have a point and a message and say a lot about modern Britain. In and of it's time.

Went to Forbidden Planet in bristol on the way home *drool*. So much pretty stuff, and not enough money. Settled for a T-shirt. Which goes towards my rapidly accumulating kit...seriously, that stuff is coming together.

Didn't get much sleep over the weekend. Didn't get much sleep last night either, due to tidying in preparation for Pip's Mum and the Dog & Cats visiting. Did however watch a lot of episodes of Bleach. Just concluded the second story arc (around episode 61). Wow, ok, didn't see that twist coming...it's a rich mythology and manages to turn all of your expectations of characters. I'm glad I have found some good sources for Anime now (since the close-down of the Anime-Central Sky Channel)...Getting hold of episodic stuff without having to fork out for multiple pricey box-sets is a good thing, and there is so much good writing in these things if you look around. Not sure I can sell cartoons to many of my friends, who can accept Graphic Novels, but haven't yet expanded their reach to animated series, but hey...small steps.