Wood Cubes and Cardboard is Greg Aleknevicus' boardgame site. Highlight is the articles he has written for Counter magazine. (via Terminal City Gamers)

This is challenging stuff: buynothingchristmas.org (thanks Burnt Toast)

Actually, it's probably not very challenging for a closet-Scrooge like me - secretly I would love to forget the whole business and not bother with cards or presents for anyone. Not from a desire to change the world, sadly, just from selfish idleness.

Guardian guide to Thanksgiving:

Every year the US president pardons a single turkey, a tradition begun by former president Harry Truman in 1947. This year George Bush pardoned a "fine looking turkey" named Katie.

Confession. Blogging seemed a bit tame after kayaking with wild dolphins, or enjoying wine and a cold buffet served off the bonnet of a safari truck, with two black rhinos strolling by, or climbing Table Mountain in blazing sunshine, or tubing down the Storms River. And I returned from holiday to a full-on panic at work, where I was seen as The Guru who could miraculously save our systems from grinding to a halt. It's taken over a week to disabuse them of that illusion. So I've been a bit too tired and fraught for gaming or blogging.

But I finally got round to some wargaming with Dave last night. Battle Cry: set them up, charge them forwards, shoot them down, great fun! And ideal for someone who's feeling a bit tired and fraught. We played Brawner's Farm, which is slightly biassed towards the Confederates, but Dave's Federals came very close to beating me before attrition started to tell. Battle Cry is great, can't understand why it has been gathering dust on my shelf for so long. I'm going to download some extra scenarios from John Foley's excellent website and have me some more good old-fashioned wargaming fun.

South Africa was fantastic.

I got back a week ago - standing in the concrete hell of Heathrow waiting for my bus, with cold rain sheeting down from a dark sky, I wondered why on earth I had come back. A week of driving up and down the M4 to Newport to struggle with database performance issues has done nothing to dispel this feeling......