Feeling a bit woozy, a bit stressed, this morning. Was out late Monday dancing at the Clapham Ceroc club! Last night spent most of the evening being phoned by a project manager trying to persuade me to work from home all night upgrading his stupid database for his about-to-overrun stupid project. In the end the dial-in didn't work - heh heh! For some reason Phil was refusing to speak to me this morning, very strange, but this is adding to a feeling of not-quite-coping. And it's choir rehearsal tonight - 120 of us definitely not coping with Brahms.

But I did get my car washed this morning, so something is going right.

A nice little parable from Ockham's Razor: A philosophy professor stood before his class with some items in front of him. When class began, wordlessly he picked up a large empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with rocks about 2" in diameter. Then he asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was. So the professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar of rocks. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles, of course, rolled into the spaces between the rocks. The students laughed. He asked his students again if the jar was full. They said yes, it was. The professor then picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. They laughed again.............

Everyone should see this! Booking has opened for The Valkyrie at ENO - I went to see their RhineGold earlier this year and it was wonderful. These are semi-staged productions in preparation for a fully staged Ring Cycle in a couple of years time. Can't wait!

Howard Jacobsen: Subtly, a little more each day, as though it is the very mark of a civilised community not to mind what is done to it, we ratchet down our sense of outrage. What if we deserved it... what if we deserve more... what if we don't win... what if we don't deserve to win?

Ridiculously huge selection of Playing Cards for sale, including loads of European Tarot decks (game-playing variety). I'm still itching to play Zarcana/Gnostica!

Machiavelli has his own directory in Google!

Machiavelli Online Resources: links to essays, biographies, texts.

Nicolo Machiavelli: The Prince: full text online. Lots of other philosophy texts here as well.

Melvyn Bragg is back with In Our Time: I enjoy formal conversations (I don't much like informal conversations, I hate dinner parties - people just sprawling about, talking about anything - it's a complete waste of time) but to get the chance to talk to people in a concentrated way about what they really know best, it's an enormous treat.

It's a treat to listen to as well. One of the biggest things I got from reading Francis Schaeffer is the primary importance of ideas. History is driven not by armies and leaders but by thinkers and philosophers. In this wonderful show on Radio 4 Melvyn Bragg plunges into the sea of ideas, swimming confidently between ages and continents. This morning's discussion (on democracy) ranged between classical Athens, the English Civil War, and the American Revolution, stopping en route in early Islamic political thought. One gem was about Machiavelli who saw the importance of conflict (rather than harmony) in a healthy political system. Very relevant at the moment - all the loud slanging matches in the West about military action probably auger very well for our civilization.

Excellent! Just found this new Up Front website.

This is so surreal it's hard to believe it's true. Osama Has a New Friend: Reuters photographs of a rally this week organized by Jaamiat-e-Talabaye Arabia, a radical Islamic organization, show that protesters created a pro-bin Laden sign out of a collage of photos they apparently lifted from Internet sites. But -- is it fate or coincidence? -- the sign featured a Bert muppet sitting on the left side of the man believed to be responsible for the bloodiest terrorist attack in U.S. history.

Saturday nimrod set-piece?

Does anyone fancy a big set-piece game on Saturday? I was thinking either 1830 or Advanced Civilization. (We can decide which based on whether or not Dave turns up?) Start at about 2pm, pop out for a takeaway at teatime, finish before midnight (hopefully!)

I'm quite excited about this - I've volunteered to help playtest GMT's Strike Eagle Leader. This is a solitaire air mission game in the Hornet Leader series. I've always wanted to try Hornet Leader but never been able to find a copy. They are going to email me a playtest kit in PDF format, so I'll be spending happy hours printing and cutting out.

Still digging into Tarot Games. It seems the tarot deck was originally developed for games playing and only got hijacked for fortune-telling centuries later.

After getting disillusioned recently with the offroad performance of my Specialized "hybrid" bike, I took my old Raleigh Amazon down to the bike shop for refurbishment. I collected it on Saturday - it has had a full service, new saddle and saddle-post, new handlebar stem, new tyres and inners, new quick-release bolt for saddle-post. (Less than £100, much cheaper than a new bike!)

I took it out yesterday afternoon on Laverstock Down. It felt lovely to ride, really stable and responsive, great fun on descents. All I need now is a fit, athletic body to match....

Peggy Noonan: It is not only that God is back, but that men are back.

Play Spaced Penguin! Who needs a fancy PS2 when you've got the Web?

This is excellent, very informative: The World After WTC - A War Blog by Bjørn Stærk Temporarily created, hopefully shortlived, to cover the war and its consequences. (via NutLog)

Howard Jacobson: On balance I'd say it's unlikely Osama bin Laden is going to get his own TV series when this is all over. Good in front of the camera, I grant you, and reads autocue well in unfavourable conditions. But I doubt he has the joky youth appeal which Channel 4 would be looking for, and I don't see the finger-wagging going down well with either BBC channel.

More game acquisition news from James:

Charity shop find this weekend was Heroquest for 50 pence.

This last two weeks have played:

GMT's Barborossa - urghh! I am sure it appeals to some but I did not enjoy.

Mystery Rummy cases one and two - great as ever.

The Kosmos 2 player Lord of the Rings - there are better ones in the small box series.

Labryrinth the Card Game - poor copy of a great board game.

And have purchased Cafe International Card Game

I've just watched episode 3 of Band of Brothers, I was really impressed. This is a real nimrod's show: the tactical situations look convincing - when Winters ordered the company to attack "down the middle" at Carentan I winced - I could see what was coming. Sure enough.

It makes you feel like pulling Up Front!, Breakout Normandy, or Squad Leader down from the shelf again.

In fact, I think I will. I was wondering what to do with this weekend.

The series has come in for criticism - nor enough character development, too reverent, even too noisy. I think this is unfair. So may of the details ring true to what I've read of the Normandy campaign. The producers - to their credit - seem to be avoiding cliche war-story lines. Instead they have attempted a documentary-drama. I think it works well, it doesn't always show the Americans up in a good light - plenty of prisoners get shot, for example - but it gives a credible window on the experience of World War 2 combat. Which is something well worth doing.

The Games Store website now does ecommerce. Great - I now have only seconds to fight off the game-buying impulse when it strikes, rather than the minutes I used to have.

The fantastic game designers Looney Labs are planning a set of 5 cards designed to make Fluxx more fun for Christians! Excellent. See What's on the Stove?

There'll be no XP for me: What all these new XP "features" have in common is that they make Windows more convenient for Microsoft but less convenient for users. (Via Scripting News)

Makes me wonder if I really want to continue with a Microsoft-based career. At least maybe an excuse to get one of those sexy iBook toys?

Gosh, I want one of these! A Relapsed Catholic T-shirt!

This is very, very clever: The Postmodernism Generator (via Relapsed Catholic, where else?)

nimrods is back!

First, an apology to the folks at Blogger. It wasn't your fault at all, it was my ISP - NTLWorld - who decided on 28th September to disallow FTP from anywhere but a dialled-up connection. Nice of them to let me know. This is also a bit ironic as I work for NTL, moreover, in the very department that runs NTLWorld! So I don't know what chance the poor average punter has of finding these things out......

Not sure if I like this BlogSpot. It's not proper webspace so I can't put my pictures and graphics up here. But I suppose I can redo my HTML to link to content that sits on my NTLWorld space. And I can pay the $12 to get rid of the ugly banner at the top. But I'm not sure about hosting my blog in the same building as Blogger - I liked the disaster recovery element of actually hosting my blog in a different country. Not that the world would miss my blog archive much - but I would.

Anyway, all that is for the future. For now, I can blog again, and that makes me happy......

I am so cheesed off with Blogger! I haven't been able to FTP to my website for a week, it just comes up with "530 Login Incorrect". This happened to me once before and I fiddled with the settings a bit until it sprung into life again. Well, I've done a lot of fiddling this week and - nothing! Hand-coding the entries just isn't the same - much more hassle than Blogger (when it's working). Sigh! It's very frustrating, just when nimrods was starting to build up a loyal readership.

Predictably, the paragliding school cancelled because of the weather, but we had an excellent weekend anyway, a highlight of which was cycling up to and along the Ridgeway in warm sunshine. During this trip the limitations of my Specialized hybrid bike in real off-road conditions became painfully apparent. Anyone want to buy it off me?

Our trip finished with the film "Enigma" about the Bletchley Park codebreakers in World War 2. About 15 minutes from the end it was interrupted by a power cut and we were evacuated from the cinema, so I don't know how it ended! Has anyone seen the film and would be willing to fill me in?

A progress report from James on his quest to acquire every game ever published:

Saw Steve's report so thought I would write in with what I have got up to game-wise, in the last few weeks.

I have an opponent in Aldershot and we meet once a week for a wargame. Last week was Wilderness Wars the Tournament scenario and after some great Indian Raids by me (French) I was one VP away, when Louisberg and Quebec fell in six card plays by use of amphibous landings and surrender cards. I thought I had it in the bag up to that point.

Today was ASL, and it gets better as you play more and more. I could drop all other games (what a statement). Also played Rosenkonig: a great 2 player small box game.

Purchased GMT's Red Badge of Courage and what a monster that game looks, the box recommends a weekend to play. At last an honest time estimate on a wargame!

Also on the games front I have taken to trawling charity shops, this week's finds were Avalon Hill's Kremlin (£2) and Game of Nations, the Gibsons 1977 game of fighting for oil in the Gulf (£1.29) - no rules though. Can anyone help?

Feedback from Gavin: For heaven's sake don't buy a leather jacket! Phil is right - you'll just look like a dodgy old geezer. Instead, buy a marvellous 21st birthday present for your number one son!

If you run a spoof news site what do you do after something as horrifying as the WTC attacks? Well The Onion has decided, and it's pretty stunning. See for example God Angrily Clarifies 'Don't Kill' Rule: "I tried to put it in the simplest possible terms for you people, so you'd get it straight, because I thought it was pretty important," said God

Opinions wanted

I just got a refund from the Inland Revenue! I was thinking of spending it on a leather jacket. My trendy son Phil says Don't do it Dad, you'll just look like an old man trying to look young.

Does anyone else have sartorial advice to offer? Votes on an email please!

A very short game report from Steve:

Played Dave at Bull run card game last night. I won but it was probably because I kept drawing powerful artillery cards every 5 minutes rather than any skill. I also met Dave's dog which was cool.

Yes, I've got lots to do this evening - go to Tescos, cook and eat tea, pack a bag for the weekend, put my bike and bike rack in the car, remind Nick to feed the cat etc etc. But at the back of my mind is the thought that tonight is a Ceroc night, and perhaps I could get over there by 9 and put in a couple of hours on the dance-floor. Not a good idea really - I've got a long day tomorrow - and I've already been once this week.

I need help....

This is why I can't do a nimrod session this Thursday - I'm going to the ParAvion paragliding school this weekend and I need to put my affairs in order before I go.

No nimrod session this Thursday I'm afraid. Just can't fit it in this week. Hopefully next week will be OK but I'll let you know nearer the time.

I'm sort of encouraged by how things are going. Although it's a small group of people there does seem to be a level of enthusiasm for meeting to play multi-player games. Nick is back in the fold, John is becoming more active, and James's enthusiasm is a real boost. And I think people are doing quite a bit of 2-player gaming as well. I hope I will be able to make Thursdays a regular event, and it may be better attended as the nights draw in and sitting in the garden seems less attractive!

Maybe a big set-piece game one weekend would be a good idea, something like Advanced Civilization or Pax Britannica? And is anyone interested in joining a party up to Midcon 2-4 November? Let me know.

It takes a Scot to give us this bracing, unsentimental analysis. Anne McElvoy: The rest of the prattle about needing to understand what drives people to such extremes, like some social worker ministering to the world's guerrilla movements, is beyond satire. Behind it lurks a cynical argument masquerading as a liberal one – that you can buy off terrorism.

Had a great weekend's gaming. Went up to Nick's flat on Saturday afternoon to play Paths of Glory. I drew the Central Powers, and we decided to play with the optional rules and the extra cards from the Player Guide. I kicked off with Guns of August, and Race to the Sea shortly afterwards allowed me to cut off the Belgians in Antwerp. Nick and John (who had just turned up) accused me of timidity, but I played Entrench and sat on a fairly conservative line just inside France.

We paused from POG so that we could play Empires of the Ancient World with John, which was great fun Even if I came last I had the satisfaction of sinking the other two in big naval battles in the last turn. Nick produced a truly excellent curry and John beat us at Carcassone to round the evening off.

On Sunday afternoon Nick and I picked up the POG game again. There was a confusing tussle in Russia, then Nick brought in the Italians who broke through into Austria. Then he launched a very effective sequence of offensives on the Western Front, evicting me from France completely. Unfortunately for Nick, his focus on the West allowed me to encircle 5 Russian armies and 2 Italian armies in one turn.

We wrapped it up at that point (after 6 turns). Although Nick was rightly discouraged by his lost armies, my position in the West was shaky. If we had continued I would have urgently SR'd German armies back from the East, while attempting to get an outright win by snapping up Italian and Russian victory points. By no means a sure thing, and it could easily have swung back in Nick's favour.

What a great game this is! Looking forward to playing it again soon. Thanks Nick.

Fergal Keane in Saturday's Independent: In all the debates we have had we have missed that fundamental moral equation. When a man commits mass murder he has made a choice. No individual forces him into that act and no history can be blamed. It is down to him. This is true for the hijackers as it is for those who sent them on their mission. The so called progressives who have sought to characterise this attack as the inevitable consequence of American foreign policy should bury their heads in shame.

Last night's nimrod session, though attended by just 3 of us - myself, John and James - was good fun. We decided to play 1876, a "micro-1830" which is set on Trinidad. The game has a very small map, only three companies, and just one 4-train, 5-train and 6-train. Everything happens very quickly. Especially when John is playing, who was cruising to an easy victory when we wrapped it up at 10:30. It's amazing how this little game packs most of the flavour of 1830 into such a small space.

David Aaronovitch: They argue that the US, alone among nations, should have no reason to get angry when its citizens are killed

James Lileks: I’m tired tonight. I’m tired of people who can watch 5,000 people from 62 nations burned alive and crushed to death, and think: well, you know you had this coming.

And Howard Jacobson writes with his distinctive despairing insight:
So on we go, surfing the channels for more, sitting up half the night, watching over and over, conscious, at the same time, that we are doing exactly what the perpetrators mean us to be doing. Marvelling at their work.

Scarily intelligent columnist Anne McElvoy talks a lot of sense in yesterday's Independent:
Terrorists committed a mass execution of American citizens. This must, of course, be America's fault. It had it coming for being arrogant. It had it coming for supporting Israel. They had it coming for being so big and rich. In short, it had it coming for being America.

Sadly, respected blog-pioneer Dave Weiner at Scripting News produced a typical example of this crazy attitude:
People don't sacrifice themselves for no reason. Let's find out what it is. And if we did something wrong (no doubt we did) let's apologize, ask for forgiveness, and then ask how we can do better.

Nimrod Session

Please come over to my place this Thursday at 8pm. I think we will probably play Samurai and perhaps an IceHouse game if time permits. But bring your own ideas and games with you....

I've always thought the Foreign Office was a moderately useless organization, but the Travel Advice on their website is actually up-to-date. I was amazed! (The last time I looked was about was about a week after the massacre of the Nepalese Royal Family, an event which the Foreign Office website seemed to be blissfully unaware of.) So I've signed up for email updates on travel to Nepal so that I will know whether it's wise or not to go over there in December as planned.

Having just filled in my tax return I'm pleased to be getting something useful for my tax pennies.

Had a great time on Sunday at James' place. We kicked off with Wilderness War - the tournament scenario - which I thoroughly enjoyed. As the French things are starting to turn against me in this scenario, with large British reinforcements and competent generals (like Wolf) arriving. But I was able to make plenty of successful Indian raids, burning stockades and settlements and slowing down James' offensive towards Montreal. In the final turn James was left with too much to do in too little time. This is a fantastic game, beautifully produced (except for the usual ultra-thin GMT map), a notch below POG in complexity, very enjoyable and reminiscent of We the People. It took us about 5 hours but of course James had to spend a lot of time explaining the rules to me.

We finished off the afternoon with two enjoyable fillers: Titan the Arena (James won), and Lost Cities (I won). The latter is excellent - really interesting tactical play with very simple rules.

Thanks to James and Emma for their hospitality and an excellent lunch!

I guess most people are feeling the same way, but a weight of depression settled on my heart yesterday as the reality of the tragedy in America started to sink in. It hasn’t lifted yet. I feel as if I’m going through the motions at work, living in a daze.

I’ve always loved history, and with that perspective I thought I could be fairly philosophical about bad news. After all, the history of mankind is just one bloody massacre after another. But today that thought doesn’t seem to help. I feel sickened and weary of this age-old procession of violence and hate. This world is often so much like a paradise, but as a race we seem so determined to turn it into hell-on-earth.

Last night I went to the choral society’s first rehearsal of the autumn. We are singing the Brahms Deutsches Requiem. When we came to the climax in the second movement:

Den alles Fleisch es ist wie Gras

Behold all flesh is as the grass

It was so desperately sad, I don’t know how we kept singing.

Heaven on Earth
We need it now
I'm sick of all of this
Hanging around
Sick of sorrow
Sick of pain
Sick of hearing again and again
That there's gonna be
Peace on Earth

U2, Peace on Earth

On a day when all the big news websites are impossible to access Dave Winer's Scripting News Weblog is doing a reasonable job of keeping up-to-date with the unfolding tragedy over in the US.

I've got an identity at last! Apparently I belong to Generation Jones.

prolific: beyond the polder is my weblogging twin!

Monitor the moves you learn with this Ceroc checklist.

Types of Cerocer is pretty cutting!

How not to Ceroc is actually the only useful guide to the Ceroc moves I have found.

Ceroc stages: I'm definitely at the the "Dammit I wish I didn't have to eat, sleep or drink so I could spend more time Cerocing" Stage.

Actually there are very few Ceroc resources on the web at all. I've blogged the best of them here, and there are websites for local and national clubs as well. I guess everyone is too busy enjoying themselves dancing to be messing about with websites!

Fluent Dance - a great essay on Ceroc, really captures the experience (that I'm currently going through) of learning to dance for the first time. I watched myself transforming from a fellow who loathed dancing into one who couldn't stop himself from trying.

In today's Telegraph Jonathan Sacks says: In a world run by MTV, nobody has time to think.

The Irish Times says Bono ripe for sainthood. If nothing else, U2 have served the church by not leading the youth of Ireland astray, the direction traditionally favoured by rock bands. The worst they can be accused of is a series of bad-hair decisions during the 1980s, a time of general lapse in this regard.

(via the ever-fantastic Relapsed Catholic)

Wow! Have you seen what the sun is doing today?

These current solar images from the SOHO mission are blinding!

James Lileks is finding that you learn from your children:

Last year fall and winter arrived perfectly - Gnat had given us both a sense of each day as a dense & concentrated object, and we paid attention like never before.

Nimrod Sessions

I'm quite heavily booked up for the next two weeks, so no Thursday sessions until 20 Sept I'm afraid. I didn't want it to be like this, but hopefully I will get my life under control shortly!

Today Heather is practicing Pronoia: "The opposite of paranoia; the sneaking suspicion that the whole world is conspiring to shower you with blessings. Symptoms include sudden attacks of optimism and outbreaks of goodwill."

A writer I admire discusses a writer I worship - Yancey on Chesterton

Well, I'm back on dry land (and at last it has stopped rocking beneath my feet). On last week's passage I was reading "Master and Commander", which was even better second time around. And not surpisingly a lot of the nautical terminology made a lot more sense to me in these surroundings. I have a few ideas revolving around my head for making a solo game of this wonderful book. This website devoted to Patrick O'Brian will be an invaluable resource if I get round to working this up.

Whatever next? - PhotoShop tennis!

Fine bunch of nimrods you are!

No-one turned up last night! Humph. But I was determined to have a nimrod evening so I actually finished glueing my IceHouse pieces together. Now I can play IceTraders, Martian Go, Zarcana etc. Groovy!

Anyway, I'm so disgusted that I'm running away to sea - on the lovely Irene Jack. So no more postings for a week.

Read Robert Locke's refreshing plea for an open mind about evolution. Excellent stuff!

About Board Games is a massive resource - and I'd never even heard of it before today. Loads of game-related stuff.

For example they have a fascinating interview with James Ernest, the founder of Cheapass Games.

From Kory Heath - an illuminating discussion of game design, elegance and emergent phenomena. It would be interesting to think about these ideas - which Kory has developed through his interest in abstract games - in relation to elegant wargames (they feel elegant to me, anyway) such as Paths of Glory or Krieg.

This is not a drill.

Come over to my place Thursday (23 August) at 8pm. We might play Samurai. We might play 1876. We might play Cosmic Encounter. (Why not? Let's live a little!) My paper IceHouse pieces might even be ready for action. Bring wine and beer. Eat Steve's corn-chips.

And I promise not to cancel this one.

Having spent Saturday night sleeping in a marquee (don't ask), I was napping at 2pm on Sunday when James arrived hungry for a Paths of Glory foursome, closely followed by Dave and James. I was still feeling groggy, so I let James and Dave slug it out in the grand old manner, while I had a quieter afternoon teaching Steve the game and having a much gentler war of it.

The slugathon next door came to a spectacular conclusion when James managed to lose about three quarters of the German army in France, and Dave gave a fine example of his trying not to look smug face. My Germans were dealt a lesser but still bruising setback by Steve's Brits at Calais. After poor James left for home we gave my new Aquarius deck a quick outing, which everyone agreed was great fun, and more thought-provoking than the hippy graphics would suggest. A great nimrod afternoon - thanks guys.

Andrew Maly's Up Front Page is still there, after all these years, and back issues of Mike Nagel's (now defunct) Relative Range.

Amazingly, Andy has also published the whole UpFront! Rulebook as HTML. What a labour of love! Mind you, this game deserves to be loved.

Big congratulations to Phil, my younger son, who achieved great results in his AS-levels. Here are his grades:

A Law
A Sociology
B English
C Art

Well done, Phil!

John Cooper's four-eleven is one of the weirdest, but also most strangely compelling, weblogs I have come across. He just records whatever is happening to him at 4:11pm every day! He is part of the Looney Labs crowd so his entries are quite often games related. He also has some sort of science job and I'm still trying to figure out what it is from the limited snippets of information in enigmatic entries like this:

010703 tue
"That's our big guy," I say, pointing to Hardy, our lab's six-foot diameter sphere. Then Sandy and I turn to exit the cleanroom.

Isn't it always the way? When I'm looking forward to a quiet evening at home to catch up with chores, I always seem to get button-holed for some urgent task just before I leave work! But the people concerned have just given me a Lions rugby shirt, which is a really nice gesture of appreciation. And it's still only 6pm, so it wasn't actually that much of a sacrifice!

More from Gavin, who writes:

Kill me now! I have just ordered my first ever real BOARD GAME! After reading about "Kill Dr Lucky", I decided I had to have it. And it was only a fiver! Bargain.

[If any potential advertisers are reading, please note the revenue generating potential of this weblog.]

Gavin has also had an article published on www.bbc.co.uk/bristol!

Had a great time on Saturday at Jonny and Caroline's new beach-hut down at Bournemouth. It was a bit blowy, but regular cups of tea kept us warm, and we played boules, rounders, and even went for a dip, as well as having a massive barbeque. Lots of people there, with lots of little kids running around, it was great!

A bit of serendipity had a feature on Radio 2 yesterday about beach-huts, pointing out www.beach-huts.co.uk where I can search for one of my own to buy! However, there are many more wanted than for sale or to let adverts.

Gavin really needs to work on his negotiating skills.

When I offered my tape-chewing VCR to anyone who wants to risk it, Gavin offered to give me £30 for it!

Talking of Gav, the vote about his plastic surgery is balanced on a knife-edge, so go over there and vote NO to save him from a future with numb lips.

Apologies to anyone who was planning to come, but I'm cancelling this Thursday's session at my place (16 August) as I am going to the Proms!

Does anyone want a VCR?

I replaced mine this weekend, because it occasionally chews up tapes. I'm not willing to risk my Star Wars trilogy! It's a Toshiba, only three years old. It may be relatively simple to fix. If you want it you can have it.

Friday evening picked William up and drove over to James' place deep in West Wiltshire. Met Emma, his wife, who is not only pretty and charming, but also a keen games player. Easy to see now why James always wears a happy smile!

We played Linie 1 (I can never get my head round this game), Castle (intriguing - but has little rules printed on cards which you need to read from the other side of the table), and Kill Dr Lucky. The last one was the highlight - like Cluedo, only fun. Instead of detecting a crime you have to commit it! You wander around a big house looking for a nice old man called Dr Lucky, then attempt to kill him! This is a great piece of game design, elegant, amusing, and very tactical.

Thanks James for a great evening, and for feeding and watering us so generously.

Observations of a Game Tester is a great piece of writing which shines the clear light of experience on what makes a good game. It also puts into words many of the reasons why I enjoy mucking about with games so much.

Good grief, a massive archive of IceHouse games!

Well, is Happy Fun Die a game? It's certainly the funniest set of game rules I've read in a while.

Place your vote at Planet Gaz for whether he should have his jaw operation. As his Dad, I'm campaigning for a big NO vote!

I was as irritated as the next man when Seamus Heaney pipped JK Rowling to the Whitbread Book Prize: but I'm listening to him reading his translation of Beowulf as I drive to work this week, and I have to admit I'm bowled over by it.

More tantalising details of the forthcoming Napoleonic Wars. Better start saving for 2002 straight away - there's going to be this, Barbarossa to Berlin, and Ancients Battle Cry, just for starters.

killingthebuddha is fantastic.

Any nimrod with an interest in the Napoleonic Wars will be pretty excited by this news from GMT Games. Oh there's a bright day gonna dawn.......

James Lileks is fascinating today for his American-eye view of The Royle Family.

Betty Bowers is a Better Christian Than You - pretty bad taste but very funny! And a fair target?

There will be no gaming at my home this Thursday, but James has kindly invited us over to his place for a session on Friday (10th August). Please contact him (JamesCros@farming.co.uk) if you need directions. (I know I do!)

The Cheapass Games Double Secret Web Page looks interesting, especially Brawl. Kickboxing teenage girls in leotards, sounds good to me!!

Stuff this! I'm going out on my bike......

I'm also spending far too much time in front of my PC this weekend when I should be out in the sunshine. Unavoidable, as it is work-related. Upgrading a development box to SQL Server 7. Lost one of their databases unfortunately - oops! Hope no-one notices.

Hmm. Still glueing my paper Icehouse pieces together. Good grief, there are lots of them......

OK, as promised, here are some Things that Grind my Nads

Guys gesturing at me when I overtake them

Chocolate on my new keyboard (Phil!)

John Humphreys

Overfishing of the North Sea

Bad losers

Erm......can't think of anything else. I'm just not angry enough!

Good grief, the ultimate in design-your-own religion! - the SpeakOut.com Religion Selector. Worryingly, I came out as 100% Eastern Orthodox or Roman Catholic. Which confirms what I have suspected for a while, I'm just not cut out to be a Protestant!

Low turnout at last night's nimrod session - just William!

Where were you all? Enjoying yourselves doing something else, I suppose.....well, that's just not acceptable!

We played Space Hulk, great fun, I won both times, but William seemed to enjoy the game nonetheless.

No session next week, I'm afraid, normal service resumed Thursday 16 August.

Do I come across as too enthusiastic?

Reading my recent posts I get that impression. All these positive feelings can be a bit wearing. There are lots of things that grind my nads too, maybe I should write about them sometimes? What do you think?