Rare “I’m not dead” update

Blimey. It’s close to 3000 hours since my last post. What a fucking shambles.

So, what have I not reported on?

1) My holiday to France, Belgium, Germany, Austria, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Turkey, Iran and Syria. It was great, although eight days on a train for a man of my advanced years isn’t something I’d recommend lightly. Highlights included the cross-eyed hotelier in Tehran, the racist, permy-haired light entertainer in Romania, and a visit to the World’s biggest restaurant. Pictures are below.

2) My trip to Iceland, doing my best to save their ravaged economy. Highlights? Eating puffin, swimming in the Blue Lagoon on a blisteringly cold night, and that exhilarating Arctic wind. Photos follow.

3) Finishing my animal eating A-Z for The Observer. The full list of articles is contained in one nifty package here. I’m especially fond of ‘Y’, for yak.

4) Drinking lots of ginger beer. Ginger beer is ace. Especially the Bunderberg variety.

5) Cooking my finest ever meal: roast venison with parsnip puree, parsnip crisps, demi-glace and red wine sauce, braised red cabbage, beetroot fondant and creamed autumn mushrooms, followed by a chocolate and vodka parfait pyramid with mango and passionfruit coulis. I’m the white Ainsley Harriott, I tell you.

6) Buying an internet radio, listening to weeks of pre-election build-up on C-Span, and realizing that the most dangerous part of democracy is the bit where ordinary folk are allowed to vote.

7) The Hank Williams Unreleased Recordings box-set. To draw a parallel, this is like finding five previously unheard Beatles albums, all better than the original releases. Literally country & western-tastic.

8) The Kittenwar 2009 Wall Calendar! Available from Amazon now!

9) The Kittenwar 2009 Daily Calendar! Available from Amazon now!

10) Getting to review the new AC/DC album for the mighty WORD magazine. This is one of life’s checkbox moments, like visiting the Grand Canyon, eating at the Fat Duck, or sharing a bed with two of Girls Aloud.

11) Realizing, finally, that Bjork is never going to leave her husband for me. Or Lila Downs. Or Yma Sumac. Mind you, she’s dead, and when she was alive she was really old and stuff and probably smelt of ointment, so that’s possibly a good thing.

12) Realizing that I obviously have a bit of a thing for foreign ladysingers.

Ideas

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RPGCast - Episode 56: "A Mouthful Of Candies"

Did you know Canada won't allow Ethan to drink Mountain Dew Code Red? It's true. Other things that are true include zombie plagues in World of Warcraft, bugs in Fable II, and upgraded Vista Solitaire graphics.

RPGCast - Episode 55: "A Tremulo'd Toodle-oo"

This week we say goodbye to Shawn "Lusipurr" Cooper as he leaves the podcast and the site to pursue his education. Our listeners have lots of good things to say about Shawn, Paul Koehler has lots of good things to say about TGS, and Shawn has lots of good things to say about Mother 3. We'll miss you, Shawn!

RPGCast - Episode 54: "My DS Smells Like Bacon"

TGS is over and we take a look at the big announcements and game demos. Star Ocean, White Knight Chronicles, and The Last Remnant all caught our attention. Fable 2 would have none of it, however, and attempted to recapture our hearts as it responded to last week's criticisms. Pata Pata Poooon!

RPGCast - Episode 51: "The Open Source Podcast"

Kingdom Hearts gets a new keychain, Suikoden DS gets details, and White Knight Story gets a release date. The panel, however, gets a ton of feedback from listeners in the first segment. See? We do care!

Links for 2008-08-23

• 
  
  God, will you look at these Microsoft TV adverts from the last ten thousand years.
  
  
  Some of them are so painful, I can’t watch them all the way through.
  
  


• 
  
  I wish I could be in Brighton for dConstruct 2008 – it looks like it’s going to be great fun
  
  
  Matt Biddulph and Matt Jones, Burka, Tantek and all on stage with the awesome and extraordinarily nice Steven Johnson. Can’t go wrong really, can you. Very happy making.
  
  

RPGCast - Episode 47: "Login To The Lost Woods"

This week David Chang and Andrew Fernandez from GamesCampus.com join us to talk about their unprecedented "Guaranteed Fun" promotion for Asda Story. Free zhevras, Tales collectibles, and future Fallouts round out the podcast.

RPGCast - Episode 44: "September 2nd"

This week we have the big news regarding the release date for Infinite Undiscovery. Oliver Motok responds to the claims that have been made against him. Finally, Too Human makes a splash on Xbox Live.

Banned

Blogjam.com, as it appears in Iran. I must be in league with the Great Satan.

Links for 2008-07-20

• 
  
  “Erik Huggers made BBC new media boss”
  
  
  I don’t know the man at all There was clearly some succession planning going on here, though, which doesn’t entirely fill me with joy. Sigh.
  
  


• 
  
  All electronic music fans need to listen to Delia Derbyshire’s “Experimental Dance Track” from the late sixties on this BBC News story
  
  
  Extraordinary. Unbelievable how contemporary it sounds.
  
  

RPGCast - Episode 42: "Pre-3 Explosion"

The industry has decided to buck tradition and give us a bunch of news the week before E3. Prepare yourself with this week's deluge by reviewing all the awesome news of the last week with your friendly neighborhood RPGamers.

Off

Bollocks to this, I’m off to Belgium, Germany, Austria, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Turkey, Iran and Syria.

By train.

RPGCast - Episode 41: "Explorers of Thyme"

Nintendo chooses a new mineral for the Pokémon series, Sony pulls their long awaited update, and fans rebel against Diablo 3 having more than 256 colors on this week's show. Also, Oliver prepares himself for the impending backlash to come if he doesn't like Diablo 2.

Will Smith, Superhero

Leicester Square, just now.

Photo by Peter Hill.

RPGCast - Episode 38: "Two Point Conversion"

Little Kings, Unions of Yggdras, and Prinnies each get their turn for discussion this week. Mikel also recounts his Dungeons and Dragons Game Day experience. Listen to see if he smacked some halflings or hawked any ten foot poles while he was there.

Vegetarian: Final Round-up

I’ve written up a roundup of my short-lived stab at vegetarianism over at The Observer’s Word of Mouth blog. It’s actually a pro-vegetarian entry, in the sense that I think they’re often short-changed with regard to the meat alternatives I sampled and the lack of options available at many restaurants, but you’d never know it from the vitriol that rained in. C’est la vie. I do wonder, though, if a column written by a vegetarian bemoaning the same lack of choice would have been received in a similar way. Perhaps the image I used to decorate the piece gave people the wrong idea.

Vegetarian: Day Seven

Breakfast: Neglected, as I sleep in.

Lunch: A very interesting pesto pasty from Deli de Luca, a Norwegian cross between Pret a Manger and a 7-Eleven.

Dinner: The hotel menu doesn’t appear to have any vegetarian options (the £15 salad includes cured sausage), so I nip across the road for a falafel kebab. It’s not bad, although anything in pita bread is difficult enough to eat as it is, so why you’d want to add sweetcorn into the equation is beyond me.

One of the things I don’t like about some vegetarians is the continual bleating about the lack of choice for vegetarians on restaurant menus. You know what? I really don’t care:

a) You’ve made your choice. Presumably you factored in this kind of ‘hardship’ when you made that decision. Now live with it. Don’t bitch about a situation you knew you were getting yourself into.

b) Eat somewhere else. I just did. It wasn’t difficult.

I’m writing this on the morning after Day Seven. I’ve just been down for breakfast. In true Norwegian style, it came with meat. Lots of it. Sausages, bacon, various hams and salamis. None of it was particularly good quality, but I piled my plate high and ploughed through the lot. It wasn’t the best thing I’ve eaten in a while (Thursday’s couscous gets that honour), but it wasn’t bad, and some time in the next couple of days I’ll eat something that’ll top anything I’ve enjoyed during World Vegetarian Week. It may well be fatty. It might contain blood. It might quite possibly be to the detriment of my long-term health. I may feel the veins around my heart tighten or swell as I eat. And yet, it will be quite delicious in a way that nothing I’ve had over the last few days has been.

It’ll be made of meat, and I will love it.

Links for 2008-05-22

• 
  
  The Online Shoppe of Christopher David Ryan includes some lovely bits of design involving Apple Shortcuts
  
  
  Pretty much as design nerdy as you get without actually replacing your limbs with anglepoise lamps and Eames chairs.
  
  


• 
  
  How Many Five Year Olds Could You Take in a Fight?
  
  
  Apparently I could take eighteen.
  
  

RPGCast - Episode 34: "Redacted"

The Run to the Sun coverage continues with Anna Marie and Mikel's impressions from Aksys. We also discuss RPGamer's first Jack Thompson letter. Hooray, we're all growed up.

Links for 2008-05-13

• 
  
  Domestic sell all kinds of weird and awesome vynil stickers and stuff to put on walls
  
  
  I think we’re going to try and get some of these for the Brickhouse office to design it up a bit. The more it feels like a teenager’s bedroom, the more creative we’ll be.
  
  

RPGCast - Episode 32: "Rambling From Around The Net"

GTA IV did a good job killing most of the news this week, but we find a few things to talk about. Atlus has some disappointing delays, Diablo 3 might be coming soon, and Shawn Cooper has sold half his game collection. But if that's not enough we can always ramble on incessantly.

Links for 2008-04-22

• 
  
  Plazes has added support for Fire Eagle!
  
  
  And this blog post explains all the value that they’re getting out of being involved. Very excited to have them with us!
  
  

Links for 2008-04-17

• 
  
  Jeremy Paxman’s position on ‘User Generated Content’ should now be clear
  
  
  And truth be told, he’s right. The last few years have seen a decent number of fairly feeble attempts to harness the wisdom of the crowds that do indeed end up schlocky and amateurish. People will get better at it in time.
  
  


• 
  
  There’s a fun argument in progress over at 37 signals about whether urgency and long working hours are ever a good thing.
  
  
  People always generalise from their own experience. You get several incredibly bright, diligent self-starting friends in a room and–shock–they’re naturally productive and find their own equilibrium.
  
  

RPGCast - Episode 26: "Adjacent Mania"

You asked for it and so we deliver. This episode starts with the panel playing Super Smash Brothers Brawl and here's a hint: Chris doesn't do too well. Finally, we go over the big news like Persona 4 and the Two Worlds sequel.

RPGCast - Episode 21: "On the Utility of Mr. Game and Watch"

An updated Dragon Quest Swords release date, Mass Effect DLC, and a Lost Odyssey interview make up the bulk of the news this week. But don't despair, we unveil a new retro coverage segment. Finally, the panel tells Chris that he has no choice but to unlock Mr. Game and Watch.

RPGCast - Episode 19: "Falcon Punch"

Oliver Motok joins us for his first RPGCast this week. That means one thing, of course, there's not much RPG news so we hit Currents again. We get into the controversy over Mass Effect's sex scenes as well as the huge console sales of December. Also, you'll get to find out what game has gotten Shawn to not play much FFXI this week.

RPGCast - Episode 18: "Bonzai Best Of"

It's award time at RPGamer and RPGCast doesn't miss a chance at the fun. First up are big stories for games like the Sonic RPG and the Star Trek MMO. Then we go through the awards list and give our reactions and personal opinions about who came out on top. Over two hours of punditry, what else can you ask for?