O Nostos (again)

What follows below is the two posts I wrote on the flight yesterday.

My plane arrived in Pearson a half hour early. Customs was no toruble at all. But my baggage took nearly two hours to get through the carousel. I spent msot of last night online or eating and watching DVDs. Stayed up till 3am, making it a full 24 hours I'd been awake, just to try and acclimate myself back to Eastern Standard Time. Hasn't worked too well today. I got five solid hours of sleep, and the rest was tossing and turning. I think I got maybe 7 or so, in total.

Hopefully tomorrow I go into Toronto and buy Mage the Awakening. I hope. Depends on if the Hairy T can get it in or not. Their suppliers are assholes sometimes.

Oh, and I didn't get pizza last night. I made myself blackened salmon (damnably good, perfectly cooked), mashed taters, and asaparagus. Even when exhausted I'm still gourmet. God I love blackened fish.

BEGIN TRANSMISSION

Transmission from 35,000 feet (part the first)
11:25am EST (4:25pm in London)
Aprox. Time in Air: 3 hours, 25 minutes
ETA: 4pm EST (4 1/2 hours more to go)

Flight is uneventuful. I finished V for Vendetta in one sitting, and The Adept: The Templar Treasure in the airport. Listening to the fourth Hitchiker's Guide collection on my iPod, though I've been struck with the desire to watch the V for Vendetta trailer again.

Meal on plane was passable, surprisingly, though I'm still pissed that the lunch I had at the O'Neil's (the franchised Irish pub I've spoken of previously) at Heathrow had no Strongbow on tap. A man should not be forced to cope with Stella Artois at 11am in the morning.

Got to the airport EXACTLY 3 hours early. Checkin took about 10 minutes. Customs took another 10. They didn't even want to check my computer for bio-weapons, so apparently being lilly white has assisted me for once. Well, that and the fact that I was wearing a top hat. I think the English have a bio-psychic compulsion to obey or ignore any man in a top hat. Go socio-programming!

No real further thoughts. My laptop only has another hour and a half of power or so, so I'm going to ration it a bit. I shall continue chronicling the flight for you, my duitful and loyal readers.

Maybe I'll get around to some scripting. Alexander's given me his feelings on SUICIDE YAKUZA, and I'm awaiting JasonK's impression. Alexander's good for technical stuff, but on topics like this one Jason thinks on a far more similar wavelength to my own. I'm going to get off the cover letter to Marvel this week. I just need to print the form off, sign it, and mail it off. Hopefully will hear back sometime before October...but you never know.

END TRANSMISSION

Transmission from 35,000 feet (part the second)
3:10pm EST (8:10pm in London)
Aprox. Time in Air: 45 minutes
ETA: 4pm EST (4 1/2 hours more to go)

Flight continues to be uneventful.

The Hitchiker's Guide continues to get more incoherent by each phase.

On the upside, my iPod has been running for at least 6-7 hours so far, and is only one third of the way through its power cell. I thank my father for indepedently powered headphones.

I love the headphones. They dampen sounds very nicely when they're off. When they're on, they're damn close to soundproof. Which makes them PERFECT for plane uses.

I have been fed substandard, cold four cheese pizza. It was either that or "salami" pizza. There have so far been no cookies. I am very dissatisfied by this circumstance. I'd also like some peanuts. Not bloody likely.

ALl things going properly, I should be home in a couple hours...which is when I'll probably post this, though I need to go grab some things first. Among them, probably groceries. I'm not in the mood to cook, but I think it may be my only option tonight. I may just order out for pizza.

END TRANSMISSION

Final post from Jesus College

Man. Has it already been 6 weeks? It seems like almost yesterday that Brian and Maureen picked me up at Heathrow.

But I'm going to bed in a few minutes. And I'll get up at 7 or 8am tomorrow, and head out to Heathrow again. Its a 6 or 8 hour flight back to Pearson in Toronto.

I'm going to miss England. I'm going to miss it a lot. This country has become home to me. Its been kind, and generous. I've met no rude people. Everyone's been friendly and welcoming. I've even managed to affect an accent, which I'm told is very similar to a Sussex accent.

I've had quite the travels here. London every weekend, up into Lancashire for one of the most relaxing holidays of all time, and even my studies here in Oxford have been magnificent. I've been to three great Barbelith gatherings, a full weekend Camarilla event as well as another one day set of two games.

I've gone to museums, and travelled cities. I've learned to navigate the Underground, and I've put together a mental map of Oxford. Hell, I even frequented a pub and gaming store at least a couple times a week. The Chinese take away place down the street got to know me by sight and knew that I liked carrots and bean sprouts in my special fried rice. Hell, even the bartender down at the Eagle got to recognize me.

There have been slight displeasures. The rest of the people on this trip have been, largely, insufferable. They're mostly the sort of people I left behind in high school...who are strangley older than me.

But other than that, its been great. I love England. I will return some day. You can count on that.

I also have nearly a gigabyte of pictures. Well, 800 megs or so. Its kind of sick. But I have a lot of pictures to remember things by, as well as souvenier books, a new top hat, a new cane...yeah. The pictures are the big thing, though. Everything else is just the icing on the cake.

Now its time to go take a shower and go to bed. Final packing once I get up tomorrow (just one or two things that are really last minute pieces). The next post I make will be from home.

Rule Britannia.

I'm pretty sure the anime came first...

Warning, not for the weak of stomach

Quote Of the Day

"I would have made a good Pope."
-Richard Nixon

"I am not a crook. Amen."

Now full. Thank god.

Had a big lunch over at the Eagle of bangers and mash with carrots, broccoli, and runner beans. And a pint of Strongbow. And then I went to the fancy French bakery around the corner and got a sugar cookie with jam in it called a "somethingorother framboise". Delicious. Tastes just like what my babika (Czech for grandmother) makes for Christmas.

I am now full, moderatly so. Too full to go out and have some lemon cheesecake at Pret-a-Manger, which I WILL do before I leave the country.

But I'm also going out for tea in another 3 or 4 hours or so. High tea. At the expensive hotel. Cuz I just gotta do it once.

How Fucking Tired Am I?

I've begun to obsess over bangers and mash. Three nice, plump sausages with garlic herb mash, peas, and pickled cabbage served with nice, thick onion gravy and a pint of Strongbow.

I last ate at 5:30pm. It is now about 20 past midnight. I probably won't get a chance to eat again till noon tomorrow. If I remember, I'm going over to the Eagle. I will probably require additional food therafter, though, so if you hear about daylight zombie attacks in Oxford please assuage your fears of contagion. Its just me. Being hungry.

Brains.

The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy

If you haven't heard the original BBC radio program of this, you're mixing out on an experience. Its got to be one of the greatest BBC radio productions of all time. It was written by Douglas Adams and, IIRC, it actually predates the book.

So I was quite surprised when I found that there were three other disc sets in addition to the main one. So I picked them up. All three of them. Cost me 35 quid, sure, but it was worth it, dangnammit!

Currently burning them. They will make good listening in my travels. Plus...y'know...always wanted to listen to them agian. Its been a few years. And...Robot cricket players! Just to make the game even MORE incomprehensible!

I get up in the morning and THIS is what I'm forced to see in the streets

The sad thing is that its apparently so normal that people just ignore the man with the giant inflatable dildo.

The Only Kind of British Ashes I Like

Went to the Ashmolean Museum about an hour and a half ago. Wandered around a bit. The place is in a bit of a state due to renovations that will result in most of the building being annihilated and redesigned.

However, about 15 minutes in I inserted myself into a lecture on Indian art and theology, which was quite outstanding. The lecturer wasn't an Oxford prof, but rather appears to be some sort of travelling research archaeologist. She was BRILLIANT. Professor Deware in my Roman Civ class had this kind of animation to him. She had an energy to her, and a great passion for what she was talking about.

...I also became the butt of her lecture on the topic of elephants. Basically she was talking about Alexander and the Persians coming to Indiana, and I misheard "elegance" as "elephants"...and thus for the remainder of the lecture all the topics eventually swung around to elephants of one sort or another. It was fun.

I took over a hundred pictures of both the Ashmolean's remaining central galleries, and of their Graecho-Roman cast gallery. Its bloody billiant.

That is all for now.

Stratford Photographs

Enjoy.

Really, they're too kind

Finally, a town that pays homage to ME

Now, I'm no marine biologist, but...

...I'm pretty sure that dolphins aren't fish.

Superboy really IS a dick

Look what he did to that poor busker!

As tough as it may be to believe, this is NOT a BDSM porn shop

That's right, ENCOURAGE the Clown Prince of Crime

When "King" reads "Swill"...at a King's randsom

For those who don't know, 8 pounds 88 pence is damn near $20 Canadian. I could get a 2-4 for that much in Canada.

EDIT: AlexanderLambert has reminded me that, as it's "Coming Soon", they just randomly entered in price numbers for it. STill...$20 for a pint of Bud is a great story.

Barbelith

I strangely seem to be seeing more of the people from Barbelith these days than I do my fellows in the Camarilla.

I've gone to two Camarilla events (well, Reading counts as one event). I've so far met one 'lither for drinks (and am having dinner with her and her partner at some point), gone out for drinks with another set, am likely going out on Thursday with ANOTHER group, and finally am going down to Brighton on Saturday with yet ANOTHER group.

Fun people, though. Ok, sure, Illmatic has no fashion sense with his lollypop-colored polo shirt, but really I won't hold that against him.

Stratford (pictures forthcoming)

Went to Stratford-on-Avon today, aka Touristtrapborrough.

Stratford is a town who's sole fame lies on the fact that Shakespeare lived there, which, it seems to be assumed, infected the entire town with a terminal case of coolness.

Not so, my dear friends, not so.

Stratford is a tourist trap. But it has its good points.

Popped by Arbor Antique Arms & Armor. Nice shop specializing in antique weaponry, both melee, firearm, and heavy. Pity I couldn't afford one single object in the bunch. There was some VERY nice shit. Had an interesting conversation with the proprieter regarding the fact that all the pieces are unique, and the fact that many collectors are apparently quite anal about getting to be the ONLY people who can tell the story of their collectables, and thus no photographs could be taken. Was a very interesting conversation, which also included the finer points of sword canes, Italian rapiers vs. English rapiers (the difference being about a foot and a half...bloody cheating Florentines [but of course I knew that one already]), and the transplanting of Damascan steel blades onto English hilts for military use.

After that went to the antique market where, to make a long story short, I ended up shelling out $100 for an antique, 1922 silver and horn cane. Beautiful piece. Just fucking beautiful. What's great is that I managed to haggle about 10 quid off the price. I hate haggling, I suck at it, but...meh. Saved me $22, I tell you what.

Saw a magician in the park. Funny guy, did a humorous routine involving straight jackets, pies, whips, and small children (not nessecarily in that order). It was his banter that got me to pay up to him, though. He was a nicely sarcastic, acerbic bastard. Strangely like another Englishman I chanced to meet back in March.

Had dinner at a very nice Italian restaraunt. Some sort of lemon cream sauce with fennel and celery. Beautiful tiramisu for dessert.

Indulged my love of Edgar Rice Burroughs by purchasing a trio of John Carter of Mars novels that I didn't own. I think I now have 7 out of the 11 novels published. Still kicking myself for not picking up a nice condition first printing of John Carter of Mars for $4. Stupid fucking me.

Finally, went to see a WONDERFUL performance of Shakespeare's As You Like It. Now, for those that don't know the last time I was in Stratford was 5 years ago, and my father and I went to see a fantastic performance of Romeo & Juliet, which we unfortunatly fell asleep halfway through when jetlag finally caught up to us.

Not so with this performance. I sat with one of the girls in the class, Stephanie (who is, sadly, already involved with someone else...I know how to pick em), and we gave our own little quiet commentary in single sentence comments back and forth to each other over the course of the play. Just the way that Shakespeare wrote it.

This was a fun performance, including slightly alternate costumes, Orlando dressed as Riley Finn's pattented "Cowboy Guy" (not quite, but it was the first thing to pop to mind), an appearence by a trailer trash character (don't ask), and some guy who might have either been Dionysus, Hyman, or possibly Jesus.

Was quite good.

Now back at university. Tomorrow I think I go to the interesting bangers and mash place I saw the other day.

Photos, with humorous titles, are forthcoming.

Saturday LARP

Did Mage and Requiem on Saturday.

Mainly just Mage, as in Requiem I just NPCed a large variety of human wait staff.

Mage was fun, though. My semi-NPC was USEFUL. Mainly because I think I was the only character in the group who had combat skills. So when the thirty school kids and their teachers all pulled machine guns and told us to be getting down on our knees, I calmly turned to the ST and said "I'm waiting for a distraction. And I'm biting my lip, and sucking on the blood. Once the distraction comes, I'm spitting some aggravated blood in the matron's face."

Well, the distraction came in the form of the Etherite's orgasm ray (don't ask). Which quickly resulted into the Technocrats being incapacitated (don't ask). Which allowed me to Prime blood the matron, then knife her to take down the group's leader. Then narrowly avoid getting shot by the...busy...students (don't ask). Then finally knocking out another of the Technocratic agents as she refused to let go of one of our Traditional companions as we tried to drag him of (please, dear god, don't ask).

Then the church fell on them (did I mention this all took place within a church?).

I believe one of the Men in Black outside was heard to say: "Bloody Progeinators. Control's going to eat whoever planned this op alive. Tom, you've got some rubble on you." "So I do. Thanks, George." "No worries. Do you mates fancy a pint?"

And now Joshua le Blanc, questor for the Holy Grail, soldier, Celestial Choruster, and sometimes-pilgrim is stuck with the London Mages, working with them to save the world.

I kind of wish it had been 7r4d3m4rk with them. He'd have been MUCH more useful in the main area that they lacked influence (media). Still...Joshua's fun.

I missed Dark Ages and Star Wars LARPs today becuase I was just too tired, and it costs $25 to get into London, plus tube costs. Plus food. So I'm just sticking around Oxford today. Got some sushi from Pret-a-Manger (who's sign looks more like "Pretamancer"), and some crappy chocolate cake, and some elderflower presse. That was lunch. May go over to the Eagle for dinner, since it seems to be one of the few pubs serving dinner on Sundays.

I may also try the Lebanese place. I've eaten Indian a grand total of four times in the last few weeks, I don't go out for Italian anymore, and if I do Chinese I'll go to one of the nice looking buffet places...which probably aren't doing Sunday buffets. So...yeah. That basically just leaves pubs and hotels, and if I go to a hotel its going to be for tea. I can't seem to find any French places around here that aren't just creperies.

I'm pondering going to the movies. Or perhaps not. I may save up for when "Unleashed" (with Jet Li) is released at week's end.

I feel...betrayed

Chocolate just tried to kill me.

I ate a piece of chocolate, and it went down the wrong way, causing massive burning pain in my throat. Its still there.

Chocolate, why hast thou betrayed me?

SUICIDE YAKUZA issue 1, finished

THere. Done. A full 22 page issue, finished in a week.

Now its off to JasonK for a first draft read through. Jason's a great editor, he really helped me out with the first issue of Project Beowulf.

Now its off to the botanical gardens to read Hamlet.

Cookies By the Kilo

There's this place in Oxford's covered market called "Ben's Cookies". I think its a franchise of some sort.

They sell cookies, as is obvious from the name.

But their cookie marketing scheme is not the typical one of many other fast cookie houses. Not for them is the bussiness of $1 chocolate chip cookies, or $1.20 double chocolate cookies. No no. Ben's marketing scheme is unique.

They sell cookies by weight.

And these are BIG cookies. Not big to the point of being a whole meal, or being too big...but just right big. Big so that you feel satisfied after eating your mega-cookie extravaganza. They have, like, 9 different variations on the chocolate chip cookie.

And they're priced by the kilo. One kilo of cookies is 12quid. Two cookies is 2 pounds 20 or so. That means that two cookies is exactly 1/6th of a kilo. A kilo of COOKIES!

For some reason I think I will very much miss Ben's Cookies when I go home. They're just...wonderful. Freshly baked, moist, gooey in their chocolatey center. You just can't get shit like that in Canada...at least not without some searching.

Half Eagle and Half Child

Not the start of some bizzare Kipling parody.

I ate the Eagle and the Child twice today (pictures forthcoming). Food was surprisingly good, though the place is more than just a touch touristy. But its sort of a prideful touristy, like they're very proud that prestigious authors ate there.

Food was, yes, decent. Had bangers and mash for lunch, which had a nice onion gravy that I suspect is made from powder. No matter, they were still quite nice. Had the Sunday roast for dinner. It was several levels above my aunt's. Overcooked to the point of falling apart, the gravy was nice, but probably also from a packet. Yorkshire puddings were surprisingly light and crispy, very close to what Kath over at the farm made that day we had steak pie for lunch. Had a half pint of Strongbow to accompany each. It really is better over here.

Finished lunch with a chocolate cheescake, which was...good. You don't find a lot of really good cheesecak at restaraunts, mainly due to the fact that most pastry chefs outside of the higher class places either buy their's from a central distributor like Dufflet, or overcook the poor things till they're dry, mushy, and tasteless. This was different. It was VERY chocolaty, and baked perfeclty...if it was baked at all. I'm not sure, but I suspect it might have been chilled rather than baked. It had almost that sort of consistency to it.

For dinner I went out to a small franchised creperie and had crepes citron, which is crepes with lemon juice and sugar. I became addicted to them in Paris half a decade ago, and you just can't seem to them done properly outside of Europe (the UK included). It takes just the right amount of fresh squeezed lemon juice, and just the right amount of coarse sugar. But...man. Damn. These ones are good.

I'll be going back to the Child at least a few more times before I leave. The food's affordable, as far as pub fair goes, the atmosphere is nice, and the food is tasty. Barring me finding anything else interesting, I'm claiming the Eagle as my pub of choice for the duration of my stay. Goodbye franchised Irish eatery, hello classic Oxford.

Apparently this was a real problem back then

Courtesy of the Sherlock Holmes Museum.

"Willy Wonka / Willy Wonka / The Amazing Choclatier"

Dear.

Sweet.

Merciful.

God.

WOW!

This makes up for the filth that was Dark Water. Its bigger than Batman. This is just...goddamned.

It's hard to put into words just how outstanding this movie is. It captures all the weirdness of the old Gene Wilder stuff...but more so. Updated. This movie is just plain nasty at times, really. I mean...its more obvious than the first that Wonka's factory is a fucking gauntlet of vice. Every displayed room catered to tempt children into doing mindlessly stupid things if they are obsessed with their own vices. Gluttony, Pride, Greed, errr...Primal Stupidity...yeah.

The Oompa-Loompas are fantastic. Its one guy, duplicated over and over again via CGI in a variety of strange PVC costumes. With music that ranges from pop to heavy metal. They're at once more, and less, human than the old orange guys. Well...that and the suggestion that they're all coke fiends ("Too many cocoa beans" says Wonka)...

Anyway. Yeah.

Johnny Depp's Wonka is ten times creepier than Wilder's. He's not a happy go lucky toymaker...he's a fucking Nocker with like...negative 10 Social Traits. He has absolutly no ability to interact with people normally, and is so self involved he has a fucking robotic diorama built just to tell people how outrageously cool he is. Depp delves deep into his memory of playing Edward Scissorhands for this character...and he pulls it off. Yeah...if Wilder's Wonka was a Boggan, Depp's is a Nocker who's gone so far into Bedlam he's come out the other side and went around the loop a few more times just for good measure. Unseelie as all hell, you can almost see him pulling Glamour off the frightened kids and parents as the kids suffer horrible accidents as a result of their own idiocy. Its not about teaching them the error of their ways...its about giving them EXACTLY what they want...and then six or seven tons more.

And that scene in the beginning of the last quarter: "Where are all the children? I thought there were five." "Errr...they're all gone sir. I'm the only one left." "Huh...I guess that means you won, then." You're honestly looking at it and going "...did Wonka just have a schizophrenic episode?"

And the flashbacks...damn. There are some weird questions, though. Like: where the fuck did the house go? And how the fuck did the house end up where it was? And what did Veruca do to that poor pony of her's in such a way as to require a new one?

Yeah. Go see it. Because if it could drive ME to this level of incoherence, think what it will do to YOU!

"My new home. I think maybe a lot of people killed themselves here."

Quote from: Warren Ellis' "FELL"

Script progress

Well, I'm about halfway through the first issue of SUICIDE YAKUZA. Which means its about time that I dig out my big of pulp cliches and throw one of them in. Probably either having the main character murder someone, or get the shit kicked out of him for reasons that only become clear in later issues.

In other news, I am having a boring day. I spent about 20 or 30 minutes playing flash animation games like "Chainsaw the Children" and its lovechild, "Father and Son" (or whatever the hell its called). The second game is, by far, the most amusing. And surprisingly interactive. You can hit, throw, or destroy most of the environment that isn't a wall or a background, and while you can't interact with cars, they can interact with you. The game has a suprising number of moves that your character can perform, especially give that there are four movement buttons and only two combat buttons. Its all about the timing.

I think I'm going to go the franchised Irish pub for dinner tonight. Becuase I'm feeling too lethargic to haul myself down to the Eagle and the Child, and not quite adventurous enough to try the gastronomic delights of Lebanese food. I think I may also go see "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory".

In the next few days there will be pictures of Oxford. PREPARE!

It was the pornography that did it, wasn't it?

Damn JasonK. Now I'm being sent to the eigth damn circle of hell. I don't even rate the freezing lake of torment wherein the Adversary is imprisoned. At least I'll be warm during those longer winter nights, though...

The Dante's Inferno Test has banished you to the Eigth Level of Hell - the Malebolge!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

Level	Score
Purgatory (Repenting Believers)	Very Low
Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers)	High
Level 2 (Lustful)	Low
Level 3 (Gluttonous)	High
Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious)	Moderate
Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy)	Moderate
Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics)	High
Level 7 (Violent)	Moderate
Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers)	High
Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous)	Low

Take the Dante Inferno Hell Test

New comic idea

SUICIDE YAKUZA

Combining Japanese suicide pusher cults, manga cafes, and homeless Yakuza gangsters.

Yes, I am now creating comics solely by going through my file of saved internet news articles and putting three random concepts together.

A Something of Something

Finished George RR Martin's A Storm of Swords the other day, now meaning that I am up to date with his "A Song of Ice and Fire" novels. To reiterate: these books are great. They're some of the best fantasy novels that I have read in a long time.

Go. Read them. The RPG's coming out in September, and I'm honestly asking myself whether or not I love these books enough to drop $100 on the Deluxe edition that has Tri-Stat rules in addition to d20, not to mention color. I bought the Dexule Tri-Stat Silver Age Sentinels and have never regretted it.

That should keep me busy whilst waiting for A Feast of Crows to come out in paperback. I think.

And remember: Winter Is Coming.

God, they should make these into a movie...if they could get them right. Because the House Words would make great tag lines for each of the main characters. Y'know, on the posters with Eddard, Robb, Bran, and Arya you'd have the colors of House Stark with the words underneath "Winter Is Coming". For Cersei, Joffrey, Tyrion, and Jaime "Hear Me Roar". I cannot, for the life of me, remember what the Baratheon and Targyan words are. But I can just see the posters now.

"Jenny Sparks is talking about us again, and she's smoking those foul English cigarettes that smell like the bottom of an oil drum"

So, I spent the weekend in the hellhole of a town they call Reading attending a pretty amusing Camarilla regional event. Why is Reading a hellhole? Well, to be fair, its probably a rather nice town when you're not trying to navigate their bus system. A bus system that makes Oakville seem convenient. At least Oakville sees it as sensible to tell you when the buses come and go. Reading does not. As far as I can tlel, in Reading you find out when the buses come purely by word of mouth.

Similarly, their hotel, the Moat House, where the game was held does not have an actual telephone number listed on their booking page. Its a link to a general Moat House chain booking call center. The important thing here is that the call center is not allowed to tell you the phone number of the actual hotel, under any circumstances. Still trying to figure that one out.

Anyway, I got to the event by the total kindess of strangers. Some girl on the bus overheard that I was trying to get to the Moat House, and asked her mother on the phone...and her mother spontaneously offered to drive me. Hot damn. So I got a ride from a rather good looking girl and her mother...in retrospect I should have got her number. Ah well.

My biggest complaint about the weekend is the fact that the English have no ban against smoking in restaraunts, or hotels, or anything like that. And their ciggarettes, just as the Midnighter said, smell like the bottom of an oil drum. They're foul. More so than American ones. So I was exposed to THAT shit for four hours a day for the last three days. I had to invest in a bottle of Febreeze and shower after every game.

The games were pretty good, though. Werewolf was a bit too plot driven rather than RP driven, but given that the game's only been an actual LARP venue for a month or two this is actually pretty understandable. Still, it was fun. I got to play a sleazy Pure, and through some rather useful RP, and rather badly done social interaction on the part of the Forsaken, we managed to achieve all our objectives. Including a rather amusing scene where I beat one of the local pack alphas upside the head with a crowbar. Literally. As he was beating on one of my packmates I caught him underneath the chin with a crowbar. Just a great image considering that I was playing the Pure alpha, who was kind of a sleezy Cockney grifter type of guy.

Mage was better. I was semi-NPCing a Celestial Choruster who, to make a long story short, was the humanist embodiment of the Holy Grail. Britain's Mage plot is steeped in Arthurian lore, so it really fit. We found Excalibur buried in the stone (not REALLY Excalibur, since that was given to Arthur by Nimue after the first sword of the stone broke), and we each had to attempt to draw it, at which point it asked us why we were worthy to draw it. Most people gave stupid answers like "I'm not worthy", which the sword didn't like. MY answer, however, wowed the ST and genuinly gave everyone a good direction to go in. My answer? "I seek the sword to seek the Grail", at which point it promptly teleported me to a bunch of Traditionalists who were planning for an assault on a Technocracy stronghold to, among other things, free the Keeper of the Grail. It was a fun scene of madcap mayhem where I got to use my Blessing (I have a 3pt Background that functions as a built-in Wonder that lets me use Life 3 to heal epople with my blood) on two or three different people, and got to Life heal myself, as well as chop at some robot drones with my magic sword. It wasn't as fun as playing 7r4d3m4rk, but it was a good day's play.

After Mage I got to hang out with Bex and Ian, a pair of UK Mage players (OK, Bex is UK Mage ST), and we got to talking about a lot of stuff and trading stories back and forth. It was, honestly, an INCREDIBLE time. A well spent two hours.

Sunday we did Changeling. That was the BEST. I played Innis instead of an NPC, so I got involved in a lot of shit, including a quest for a magic book to keep England's chimerical landscape from tearing itself apart thanks to having multiple people claiming to be King and/or Queen. I was honestly helpful. Then I got to ask the King and Queen of the UK Fae for a favor, the real purpose of my trip. The magic chains that had washed up on the beach, so that we could use them against the Fomorians. And they GAVE IT TO ME! Fucking A! So yeah...I was rather impressed and amazed by that. So yes, everything's gone well.

I am absconed at Jesus College now. I should have internet access on my laptop by tomorrow I'm told. At which point I'll do a more in depth post, as well as posting some pictures from the trip, including one of my current accomodations.

Excelsior!