Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Only two weeks now until NimrodCon, the annual gathering of friends at Hay-on-Wye in the beautiful border country out West. Regular visitor (and close relative) Phil has suggested a strict one-game-per-person rule, to avoid the loss of sunlight we usually suffer because of piles of unplayable wargames that get stacked up on all the window-ledges downstairs in the cottage where we stay.

I think the legalistic one-game limit is unrealistic, but in the spirit of his suggestion I think I will attempt to prioritize my game carriage requirements this year.

Games I really really really want to play at Hay this year or I will burst:

Two-player
Command and Colors Ancients
Multi-player
Settlers of the Stone Age

Games I really really want to play at Hay this year or I will get a headache:

Two-player
Twilight Struggle
Multi-player
Struggle of Empires

Games I really want to play at Hay this year or I will feel mildly hard-done-by:

Two-player
BattleLine
War of the Ring
Multi-player
Amun Re
Shadow of the Emperor
1825
Age of Steam

There, only 10 games - I think Phil will be pretty impressed with that.....

Tag:

Monday, May 22, 2006

Still finding sand in my mouth

So I'm back in rainy England, after a week paragliding in the sunshine at Dune de Pyla on the Bordeaux coast. Disappointingly the weather, though superb from a relaxing on the beach angle, was not great for flying, and I was only in the air for about 15 minutes in total all week. However, I learned a lot, mainly from getting dragged up the dune in strong winds (filtering sand through my teeth like some bottom-feeding fish), and slowly learning (with some great coaching from the Flight Culture instructors) the best ways of controlling this giant kite that I foolishly strap myself into every time I go paragliding.

Next trip is to the Austrian Alps in late June - that should be a different flying experience again. Chairlifts will be a nice change from slogging up a 400 ft sand-dune with a 20kg load on my back.....

Tag:

Thursday, May 04, 2006

Offline living

I'm falling behind with my online life - huge numbers of unread posts in Bloglines, nothing posted on nimrods for a while, even less on Best of Boardgames, a stack of emails not replied to, I'm completely unaware of the latest flamewars on BoardGameGeek. I'm just losing touch.

Thing is, life offline is becoming so interesting these days - the sun is shining, summer is on the way, I've been out on the hill flying, or out in the country on long walks with Sue. I've been actually playing games (instead of just reading about them on BGG). My job is very busy and strangely enjoyable at the moment. I'm teaching Phil to drive, and preparing for a flying holiday in France next week. The way it's going, I just don't know when I will ever catch up with my online life again. Perhaps when winter arrives or the sun stops shining......