Master Chief Naked
Now when I re read that title I got a scary image of
Lloyd Grossman popping up <shudder>. Fear not it's not that sort of thing.
People often quiz me on how different bits of our games are put together and just last week someone sent round a link to a
great little page that does a cracking job of showing how a character with only a couple of thousand polys can look like one with tens of thousands.
.20:54/11/02/2003/zebra3
Norway to treat a friend
Well I'm back from a week snowboarding in
Voss, Norway. Big thanks to Bjarne and his family for allowing us to invade their home. First day was glorious blue skies from horizon to horizon and about a meter of good snow (a little bit heavier than powder but still most carve able). The other days were overcast but still packed with
good snow and
slopes to hurl ourselves down. For those worried out there Amanda didn't come but I have a feeling the situation may be reversed next year as I get to stay at home with two little uns.
Only had one bad fall unfortunately it was when the board disappeared on ice and dumped be rather heavily down on it at a fair old whack. Chest was killing me for a couple of days but the x-rays have come back clear and the docs are satisfied the lung hasn't collapsed. I was already pretty sure it hadn't cause I'd done another two days on the slopes which I may have forgotten to tell them about :)
I am very pleased that it's just bruised/strained but it'll still be two week getting better they say.
.20:10/11/02/2003/zebra3
Pop Pop Bang
"Drugs blamed in gun death" a common headline but now now I can provide you with a good back up to that headline.
MindFX sell drugs that let you kill more people in less time than ever before and then even more drugs that will sort your head out
afterwards. Honestly I don't know if I should laugh or cry.
Personally I have a glass of Jamerson's and a pint of water next to me while gaming and treat myself to a warming sip every time my team wins or water if it ends in a loss. Kinda a self balancing tactic as well ;)
.15:00/01/02/2003/zebra3
21 Dog Years - Doing Time @ Amazon.com
Mini review of a recent book read.
.14:50/01/02/2003/zebra3
Free Games
Free games... can't be real, must be a con... well it is kinda.
Steve Jackson Games many years ago created the Generic Universal RolePlaying System or GURPS for short. When everyone else was creating roleplay systems tied directly into a setting, Ars Magics, Cuthulu, Paranoia for example each with their own rules for the minutia of roleplay life, the idea with GURPS was you learn one set of rules to cover the basics the rest you made up or bought modules for the type of roleplay you wanted to do. You can grab a lite version of the basic rules here
GURPSlite. Now the real reason for posting is that the
GURPS Online site has gone online and could be the starts of something big... deffinatly worth keeping you eye on anyway.
.20:36/30/01/2003/zebra3
Newcastle 1 Guildford 1
Just back from a short notice trip up to our Newcastle office to sort a number of things out. Faced a couple of lousy days of rain but bright crisp sunshine on the final day and once again Newcastle is a fine place to be. They seem to be digging most of the centre up at the moment and if you get a road clear of cones there will be a couple of buildings being gutted/rebuilt/enlarged/refaced. The Newcastle quayside redevelopment is now pretty much finished and the Gateshead side is going to look just as great. The sony opera house is looking like a true norman foster monstrosity already and it's only half done. IIRC they are going for city of culture and once this current burst of work is complete I think they'll probably get it.
In other news Mr. Whitton photographer extrodinare has developed and passed on his pics of Zac's 1st birthday back in the hazy days of summer. I'll evdevour to select a few of the best examples and get them up here soon but it'll be hard as they really are great.
.21:31/23/01/2003/zebra3
Winter Wonderland
Jo and Mike came over from Boston this Xmas and saw the New Year in with us. They kindly bought Zac a proper cold weather coat (he had a warm duffle coat but this was a serious winter coat). A week later boy did he need it ;) Funny that we've just taken the Xmas cards down with all the snowmen and wintery woodlands on them but Zac now gets to see and do it all himself. Check out the gallery for a few snaps of what he got up to and his extremely cold nose.
.10:50/08/01/2003/zebra3
Office move
Well the hell of the last three months is nearly over and Mucky Foot are now in our new offices, both in Guildford and in Newcastle. Been a really hectic time with the moves, Xmas, and the rest going on but hey it's done now. Drinks time :)
.22:52/02/01/2002/zebra3
Attack of the Hives...
Xmas day was a corker managed to see both sets of grand parents and one of the great grandparents so Zac was a happy chap. Amanda and my self were not so perky though as Zac came out in a terrible rash on his legs and torso on Xmas eve and on the day itself the rash had turned into large golf ball sized red rings with the skin inside looking pale yellow/grey.
NHSDirect (nurse/doctor on a phone) were great though and confirmed that it was just almost certainly just hives.
Hives are a allergic reaction gone slightly haywire and is most common in children. Lucky Zac didn't find his hives itchy or in pretty much any way annoying to his most excellent day. Unfortunately our Xmas pics are always going to remind of us of a worrying couple of days as they ended up on his face to. Main thing is he was fine through out though and had a great day. Indeed still have presents to open on boxing day.
.23:59/25/12/2002/zebra3
Rambo IV
Thrust World had a John Rambo competition, Para and knife only for ten nights. Cough err err
I won. I'm really quite chuffed and really have to decide what game I want as a prize. But guess I'll wait and see what Santa brings me first...
.20:12/20/12/2002/zebra3
Attraction by Urchin
Ok couple of mails and a post about magnetic paint so I guess I need to share a little more :) We got ours from
Urchin (kids stuff mail and web site) Not cheap at
£25 a pint but worth it for a rooms special feature. The site it's self is a rare thing a baby/child site that has some (though by no means all) decent pleasant creative but not stupid and bright toys and ideas for parents... sorry children.
Having used the paint 4 coats seem the order of the day with kids, clumsy fingers and small magnets, but it works fine with 3 coats and adults or decent sized magnets. Amanda says it's nasty stuff to paint with 'cause it is runny yet full of iron fillings and dust so leave a very textured surface. Still a cool idea though.
.21:39/10/12/2002/zebra3
Home Sweet Home
Zacs getting impatient for his little sibling to arrive so keeps feeding Amanda's bump his milk??? It's working, Amanda's huge already and there around four months to go. Shocking stuff so we have pulled our fingers out and changed the spare room into Zachary's room. Took a couple of weeks of planing and painting but we got it all sorted so that when out for a couple of hours on Saturday the room transformed. He was well chuffed and we didn't have to coax him into sleeping in there rather than the nursery.
Very cool bit was some
magnetic paint Amanda found. A few coat of that in an area then paint over with normal paint and voila a iron steeped surface that fridge magnets will stick to. Much more interesting than the Swedish furniture.
.11:58/03/12/2002/zebra3
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2002/10/22 thru 2002/11/24
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