ghoti_mhic_uait

Jack took the children and I to Oasis Camel Park in noth Suffolk. I can't get the photos off the camera atm but I will eventually, and then there will be pictures. It's very small, but if your day can be made by seeing 5 different types of camelid (and goats and donkeys and stuff) and maybe feeding some and stroking them, and you drive or have a handy driving friend, then it's perfect.

I've also mentioned Hamerton zoo a few times recently. They specialise in unusual animals - binturong, jaguarundi, oncillas, aardwolves for the dictionary fans, and tayra (an unusual mustelid).

Film wise, I'm still buzzing about Cars 3, which I absolutely loved. If you love films about intersectionality, with a side story about learning to be a better ally, then this is the one - protagonist Cruz is, well, I don't even know where to start with her, but she's believably imperfect, interesting and just generally, I loved it.

I've been rereading one of my favourite childhood books, Roller Skates by Ruth Sawyer. It's a fictionalised autobiography. Protagonist Lucinda is left behind when her mother has to go to Italy for her health (it's not clear to me why, but that seems like the sort of thing that American doctors suggested in late 19th Century USA) and suddenly finds herself with a lot more freedom, to explore New York and find herself as well as make friends throughout the city. This quote on tragedy is possibly my favourite bit, where Lucinda's uncle is explaining tragedy to her (in the context of Shakespeare): "what happens must be inevitable - unescapable. It must make you feel right about the ending. And great tragedies must have beauty in them; otherwise what's the use?"

I've been watching Andi Mack. It's a Disney show about a girl who learns that the person she thought was her sister is actually her mother, and the family coming to terms with the secret being out. It's a nice family drama and I particularly like that it's good at having conflict while being sympathetic to all of Andi, her sister/mother and mother/grandmother. Similarly, Andreas has got into Stuck in the Middle, a Disney show about being the 4th child of 7, and how it can be tricky but actually, she's surrounded by people who love her and the balancing act of a big family is not glamourised but works like it looks like it does in real life.

I've been listening to more music too, but I don't think I have a thing that stands out particularly to recommend.

Current Music: Rockstar 101 - Rihanna

This summer I have spent a lot of time wandering around Europe with my family, and a small amount of time playing with exciting people, but they were particularly exciting people.

forestofglory visited, for example, and we had Friday night dinner and talking.

Then there was Bärli's parent's 40th anniversary. Bärli's family are so lovely. At one point there was a bit of a clash of understanding between Bärli's mother and Andreas, and both of them said to me they were worried the other would think they didn't respect them. But it was OK. And the whole family is so lovely and welcomign to us.

This weekend was

huskyteer's birthday. Huskyteer is one of those people who is just so cool I can't imagine why they'd want to talk to me, but of course, also cool enough that they don't even think like that. Anyway, I can't think of a better person to introduce me to my first complete James Bond film (which I greatly enjoyed).

Now it is back to term, and I am doing so much! Band twice a week and karate, and Wednesday home ed stuff, and playdates. Remember how a year ago I was grumbling about never having time for me? Well, my people arranged it so I could, and it's wonderful. Thank you my people! I get two whole hours of cycling by myself, plus band (it's 10 miles away and I get a lift to Friday band but cycle on Sunday).

Rest of life round up:
Eating: sausage ragu with rice, made by the lovely

jack
Reading: Just finished 'In My Own Time' by Nina Bawden, her autobiography, which is rather lovely. Her respect and love for the people around her really shines through, and she seems like such a nice person.
Playing: Argo. Not my cup of tea. Littles were playing Stratego, which I also can't get my head around, so I'm glad they have each other to play with.
Watching: Pororo. Cute Korean penguin and friend.

On Friday it was my turn to cook for me & Tom, and I had no ideas and no decision making powers. So I went to Iceland and found a random selection of food that sounded nice, with only one text to Tom asking him to decide, and we had quite a pleasant dinner of barbecue duck, pulled beef, macaroni cheese and salad. I do like that that's a strategy that more or less works, turn up at Iceland, choose a couple of ready meals, and throw it all in the oven/microwave at Tom's. He said he'd decide on only one thing in that situation, but narrowing it down that far was beyond me. We played Kingdominoes while the food was cooking, and started on our lego rocket when we'd finished.

Yesterday, I noticed that there was nothing in either child's pencil case. I mean, they have about three pencil cases each, but the one for each that we could find had nothing in. So we went to town for stationery, and then to Tom's for more lego. I tried to persuade them to eat cake at Tom's/on the way, but Greggs has new fruit pots so they ate fruit instead, which I guess is a win? And Tom and I had Belgian buns because they were out of bread pudding. The second part of the lego was four identical pieces, so we each took one and built them in parallel. It was hard, especially for Andreas, but then, the box says 14+ so that's to be understood.

Today I have band, so I have to remember how to get to Eversden and which way up a euphonium goes, but it will be fun :) and we are into Benedict's last week at home, he leaves for university on Saturday.

Media roundup:
Reading: still brothers Karamazov
Watching: the Art of Japanese Living, a BBC documentary about Japanese art, with surprise porn just as Judith walked in. Oops. Also, they mentioned an interesting sounding book by Isao Takahata (which doesn't seem to be translated) about how anime grew out of earlier art forms.
Playing: yesterday I played Disney Apples to Apples and Paku Paku, because there were 6 of us wanting to play and those are good for bigger family groups.

Yesterday, Colin and I watched Michael Collins, which is a film about the war of independence leading up to the formation of the Irish Free State in 1922, and in particular, the revolutionary Michael Collins who lead the guerilla army. I was surprised to see them using the tricolour, given its symbolism of peace; sorry if I'm teaching you to suck eggs, but the Irish flag still in use today is a tricolour green - white - orange which, in the words of the Irish government "green represents the older Gaelic tradition while the orange represents the supporters of William of Orange. The white in the centre signifies a lasting truce between the 'Orange' and the 'Green'."

I'd always assumed it was adopted by the free state in 1922, with people fed up of fighting, or even the Irish republic in 1937. No. It was first used as a symbol in 1830, and used extensively until 1848, at which point it fell out of favour somewhat as a symbol, and was one of many, until it was adopted during the Easter rising in 1916. I'd kind of assumed it took something like the Croke park massacre (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloody_Sunday_(1920)) to make people long for peace, but no, basically, that's always been part of the Irish call for independence.

Anyway, I basically didn't learn anything about the Irish war of independence before, so generally, very interesting, and I'm told it's more or less historically accurate (although the bit where the directors decided to show tanks shooting at children because it was less scary than what really happened is a bit grim, but, British empire, what do you expect?) so if that sounds like the sort of thing you might be interested by, and you can cope with ALan Rickman's 'Oirish' accent, might be worth a try?

Rest of life round up:
Reading: still Brothers Karamazov
Watching: Michael Collins
Eating: spaghetti with broccoli, smoked salmon and a creme fraiche sauce, and Judith learnt that she likes smoked salmon!
Playing: Paku paku, but I got a present of Founding Fathers which is a US political history game I'm super excited about

I've often wondered why my shoes seem to wear out more quickly than other people's, given that I don't wear them often and I don't walk very far. Only Tom said I walked more than other people so I went to find the statistics to prove him wrong and it turns out, he's right. So, I generally walk about 15000 steps a day, according to a few varieties of pedometer I've tried (10000 on sedentary days, 20000 on busy days) and according to the NHS an average person walks 3000-4000 steps a day. So no wonder my shoes wear out quicker!

I do feel like more walking would benefit me, though, I don't tend to do very well on 'moderate' exercise, I get sleepy and lethargic and sad.

Speaking of, I am seeing a response to the folic acid. I'm getting fewer pins and needles in my legs, and they're generally more comfortable. I'm still very tired a lot, though, and I still feel worse if I eat less meat.

Other stuff:
Reading: I just finished Oz Reimagined: New Tales from the Emerald City and Beyond, edited by John Joseph Adams, which is delightful and if you like Oz related stuff, worth reading
Watching: nothing yesterday, but I've been listening to LeVar Burton Reads, which is a podcast of short stories with an introduction and a few words at the end.
Playing: On the Underground, Colin and I drew! Child favourites at the moment are Hey! That's My Fish and Coup. I really like Coup, can take or leave the penguins.
Eating: orzo with a tomato, mushroom and mozzarella sauce for the adults and lamb chops for the carnivores.

Also, I have stopped panicking about Kazakhstan and relaxed into excitement instead, and furthermore I think that Tom and I have answered the important question of what duet to sing at karaoke, and it's Especially For You.

I noticed earlier that chamomile needs to be sown by the end of May, and that it is May. So the children and I have just done that, covered the bare section of garden in lawn chamomile. That also ended the dithering of lateral thyme or chamomile - sure, thyme might be slightly better, but either is better than nothing, and in any case I was probably going to decide chamomile anyway.

We also planted some purslane seeds, will have to see how that goes.

My pepper plants are tiny, but living, and everything else is thriving. I've a tiny fig and a diminutive almond, three growing currants and a blueberry, a happy looking fuchsia (before its sibling was stolen, this was a miserable fuchsia), a rosemary, a handful of raspberries and strawberries, one potato and a lot of Jerusalem artichokes. Two clumps of rather downtrodden clives. Also, on the other side of the path, a Mirabelle with rather fewer aphids than before I put a lot of mail-order ladybirds.

In other news, I have new glasses which always makes life easier.

Watching: some kind of Lego superhero thing, because we're excited about the Lego Batman movie which we'll watch later.
Reading: Death's end by Cixin Liu which suffers somewhat from being the first thing I've read since Ninefox Gambit but is otherwise rather lovely
Eating: a lot of veg and hummous, in a tomato sauce with soft cheese stirred in at the end, served on spaghetti with garlic bread and salad, and a fruit salad made by chopping all the most attractive fruit in the shop, adding chocolate covered raisins and chopped dried apricots and leaving to soak with vanilla sugar and apple juice, and then serving with creme fraiche mixed with more vanilla sugar.
Playing: lots of lovely bridge!
Making: working on a sleeveless dress in bronze and black stretch velvet.

Today we went shopping, ostensibly for clothes for me but we spent most of our energy in the book department of Smiths. I wanted two or three not-black dresses with high necklines, defined waists, circle skirt and at least 3/4 length sleeves, something like this would be ideal except I'm not sure about red, a cardigan and a pair of shoes. What I got was a sleeveless navy shift dress, a cardigan, four books (for the children) and two pairs of shoes. And some fruit, but we ate that already.
ETA: It occurs to me that

rmc28 already told me where to get the ideal dress as described above, and it's eShakhti, but if any of y'all know where to get them in the UK, I'm interested to hear where.

I've not been in the White Stuff shop before, it was as pleasant as a shop can be. They have a waiting room with a TV showing children's stuff and colouring and things, and I think I spotted a coffee pot. And helpful staff, an clothes that don't make me look like a sack of potatoes, for similar price to M&S, whose design principles seem to be 'everyone loves chips, right? So that's what we want people to think of when they see someone wearing our clothes'.

Judith recently agreed that, rather than pack a ton of books, I could load some onto an ebook reader on her tablet. When we went to Hungary, she packed 47 books. While we were out she remembered that the McDonalds free ebooks are Kobo brand, so she'd like Kobo, and I have installed that and am filling it with books. She's got a bunch of Ever After High short stories, a couple of Tinkerbell books, some free things I figured might be worthwhile but haven't read, Pollyanna, Black Beauty, Heidi, the first Harry Potter, the first two Narnia and Minnow on the Say by Philippa Pearce. Because I can never resist a book recommendation, and because it's fun to think about, what would you give to an 8 year old who is just becoming enthusiastic about books, and who likes the sort of thing I mentioned (plus Worst Witch, American Girl books, Lord of the Rings). Also, do any of y'all have experience of using the Kobo app for Project Gutenburg books? Is it easy, or should we find a different app for that?

This weekend marked two years since the flapjack muse and I started dating. It feels quicker than that, largely because I'd had a crush on him for years, but also because neither of us quite felt confident so it felt like a very casual series of one off dates for months before we realised it was probably a relationship. But also, because of said feelings, and because he has long been a good friend it feels like longer too. We celebrated by a day in London; a visit to the House of Illustration, which had a Jo Brocklehurst exhibition. Brocklehurst did a lot of drawing in clubs, lots of gay bars and punks and generally an artist of the alternative scene. She also spent a lot of time doing Alice in Wonderland themed drawings, which were simply delightful. Because of working in such dark spaces, she used a lot of neon and UV reactive colours, which make her work really distinctive. Or maybe she used those materials already and that's why the darkness of the clubs didn't bother her.

Then we walked to the Thames, because both of us love walking through London, and we ate ice cream on the beach until it was time for dinner. Dinner we ate at Ethiopian restaurantLalibela, lots of lamb and pumpkins and aubergine and plenty of injera, and delightful coffee ceremony coffee afterwards.

Reading: Two Serpents Rise by Max Gladstone, as I enjoyed Three Parts Dead which I just finished
Watching: finishing up Orange is the New Black, and there's more coming
Eating: I will definitely cook something any minute now
Playing: Jack and I played Small World which is a fun rise/decline of civilisation game, and he beat me 94 - 91. Andreas and I played mancala. The rest of us have been playing Lego Harry Potter, which has lots of sliding staircases.
Making: I bought a new bobbin plate for my sewing machine, so I totally intend to start sewing again soon.

On Friday I had date with the flapjack muse and it was my turn to cook. So I made razor clams in white wine sauce and served with linguine. Fry an onion and some mushrooms, when they're soft, add the clams and a generous slug of vinho verde, and some baby sweetcorn and mangetout, steam about 5 minutes. Then we watched Les aventures extraordinaires d'Adèle Blanc-Sec, which is what happens when someone decides that the world needs a sillier, female Indiana Jones, and by the way, Luc Besson should direct the film.

Saturday we pottered. Judith and I played Flags of the World, which is a memory game about flags, and we are slowly learning flags. We did tidying and cleaning and reading and all that stuff, and then in the evening we watched Doctor Who, both the new episode and the Christmas episode which we had previously missed.

Sunday, Bärli and Jack came over for Dungeons and Dragons.

jack has a write up if you're interested in the precise details, but it was nice to play the five of us and Andreas kind of wandered up and rolled my die occasionally. Judith's really getting into it, and it's nice to have a thing which Benedict enjoys. Benedict's character got badly injured, so when out of game B had to go to work, the rest of us had a side quest to do anyway and that worked really well. I recently read this article on the educational nature of DnD as a game, this seems like a good place to drop the link.

Monday, Bärli and I had planned some shopping, but not very well, so when we got to the shops we wanted to go to, they were shut. So we went to John Lewis and then lunch. Bärli got the yarn and knitting needle she needed for her next project though, so that's good. Immediately after lunch I got super sleepy so B put me on a bus home and I enlargened the print on my kindle so I could keep myself awake with reading, and then as soon as I got home I took a two hour nap and felt a lot better.

Monday evenings are Colin date time, so we watched the Expanse. I'm also currently reading the first Expanse book, and keeping a little way ahead of the TV series, which is interesting. It's very dark, visually, which I often find difficult, but it fits with the Miller as Sam Spade thing they have going on, and I'm loving the story. There are bits in the TV series added from later in the books, which is interesting, and there was one point where I had to find the relevant bit in the book to show Colin because the TV show dropped some nuance (or hasn't shown the nuance yet) but on the whole I'm finding both at once quite interesting.

And I've been talking again about how I find it weird that everyone else reads the same books and stuff, but I'm a bit more shy about talking about that, so I'm going back to adding my media consumption to the end of posts. So.

Watching: mostly the Expanse at the moment
Reading: Ditto. Also I just finished the second Cafe la Femme book, which I didn't like as much as the first, and the first Max Gladstone book.
Playing: lots of flags! Can now recognise Kyrgyzstan.
Eating: nothing exciting, carbonara yesterday
Making: I can't find my knitting :( I had planned to spend April finishing things and then it didn't happen, so, more on that soon maybe?

Monday morning means Emerald City, which is Oz for grownups. It's based on not just the first book, but subsequent books, and I'm less familiar with those. I think there's some new stuff thrown in, and certainly I can think of at least one character where they've amalgamated two and I'm pretty certain they were separate in the book. But it's gripping, I'm loving it.
Content note: there's a trans* kid who gets forced off his meds. It's so emotionally hard, and that's the point, to show how he really needs that help.

I'm reading Magic for Nothing by Seanan McGuire, which is the latest InCryptid and told from Antimony's perspective. Lots of roller derby and lots of fun. Also Taking the Village Online which if you like academic parenting books, you might be interested in, but otherwise, maybe not? IDK.

Playing: Colin just got the Ghostbusters boardgame so we haven't played that yet but it's our next plan. I haven't been playing so many games recently though.

Also, yesterday I made blackbean enchiladas which made Colin happy, and Jack cooked for me so that made me happy. A nice salsa though, finely chopped onion, tomatoes, mixed salad leaves, lime juice and a lot of pepper. And lime and black pepper soured cream, I normally just offer plain soured cream or yoghurt, but that was a good plan. Also in recent menu, mixed nuts fried with rice wine and rice vinegar, they were really good.

I made cheese pudding for tea, because I suddenly thought it might be a good idea, and although Judith said she liked it a bit, and ate about half of what I gave her, the general conclusion was that cheese pudding is for feeding to

cartesiandaemon (and not the people who live in this house).

I finished the Emily trilogy by LM Montgomery. Unlike the Anne series, this is deeply creepy and uncomfortable. It's a story of the grooming of a young girl, how she was broken and how it affected everyone around her.

Judith and Bärli and I watched Hidden Figures at the flicks, and it was glorious. Judith is just starting to notice racism, and of course loves space stuff and she described the film as 'fascinating'. I find I don't have a lot of words, but it was wonderful and if you think you might like it you want to see it.

I started a knit along for the Iditarod, but I haven't got very far. I think April is going to be finishing months, I've got so many left gloves and bits and pieces! Maybe lots of months will be.

I'm getting a package every couple of days now. My most recent was a cute little screwdriver set but I can't remember where I put it. Been a while since I showed you anyway, so I thought I'd gather a selection.

There's an art postcard, a couple of necklaces, a bracelet, some stickers, a gyoza maker, some heart shaped stones with words painted on, and a small snail for clipping your teabag string to your mug.

Or I suppose it could just sit on the side like this:

Rest of life:
Reading: still Oz Reimagined
Watching: Colin and I watched Once Upon a Time and Judith and I are watching our way through Hannah Montana. Love that mummy/Judith time.
Making: Lace fingerless gloves for a knit along and simple crochet hat for when I need something with less concentration (also a crochet along)
Eating: bratwurst, mashed potatoes and carrots and Apple sauce last night. I've a sweet potato and black bean casserole from the box for tonight which will be more interesting but I haven't tried it yet.
Playing: introduced the littles to Cat Boxes, quite successfully. Andreas is really into Blokus at the moment.

Not so much exactly what I've been reading as what kind of thing I've been reading.

13 in total.

6 written by women
7 written by men

(I think)
3 written by authors of colour,
10 written by white authors

4 fantasy
4 non fiction
3 slice of life
1 poetry

Actually, right now I'm reading Oz Reimagined which Colin gave me, a set of short stories inspired by The Wizard of Oz.
Knitting my Alice gloves still, photo when I'm done
Watching The Secret World of Alex Mack with Judith (90s Nickelodeon show about a girl who gets caught in a chemical accident and has to hide that she has resulting superpowers - I loved it then, and I'm enjoying introducing the rest of the family to it)
Playing, well, I got dragged into a Skylanders game yesterday but mostly

I've just realised I cast on fewer stitches than I was meant to in the gloves I'm making. They're meant to have 6 columns around, and they alternate hearts and diamonds on the left glove and spades and clubs on the right. I've got 5 columns around, which means that two columns together are the same. I think it will be OK to make those be the two nearest the thumb, as the thumb breaks it up a bit, and they''re a good fit at the moment.

In other knitting news, I signed up to a Mystery Knit Along, a shawl based on Fool's Assassin by Robin Hobb, and the group that's in is pretty dogsled enthusiastic (they do a knit along for Yukon Quest and Iditarod as well, and I plan to do the knit for the Iditarod. Basically the pattern will be released at the start of the race, and the group tries to finish before the Iditarod is over. This has lead to me also paying attention to dog sled racing, which turns out to be quite exciting even over radio or watching online trackers.So if you see me and I'm talking about the weather in Alaska, or something equally random seeming, that's why.

Reading: Fool's Assassin by Robin Hobb :) and Anubis Gates by Tim Powers. Both compelling in different ways
Playing: date night! Pandemic Legacy
Eating: meatballs for the beef eaters and beans for the bean eaters, in tomato and courgette sauce and topped with grilled aubergines, very tasty, would eat again.

I've recently had some lovely dates.
First with Bärli, who wanted to relearn to knit, I provided her with a Yarmulke kit and we sat and she worked on that and I worked on the shrug in my userpic, and we watched White Christmas, which is about what people do when they've been trained for war and the war is over, with lots of singing and dancing.

Then I made dinner for the Flapjack Muse which I was really proud of - chicken stuffed with halloumi (he doesn't eat pork) and brie, fondant potato and swede, buttered leeks and chili-garlic butternut squash. The squash and swede were late additions I threw in because they were in the fridge and needed using up. It all worked together beautifully and he was happy :) and we played Tokkaido because I love it and it was new to him, but he was instantly keen too.

Last night, Colin and I watched To Walk Invisible, a Brontë biopic. It was written by an acquaintance of ours, but I think we'd have watched it anyway as I'm reading a lot of good reviews. Anyway, it was beautiful and wonderful and if you're at all interested, I'd recommend it. Colin doesn't have a lot of Brontë experience but he was swept away too.

Tonight, I'm going out with Jack to celebrate his birthday; happy Jack day!

It is 5 weeks into my year, and I apparently didn't mention resolution as such here. They were to do more learning and make more things but I didn't phrase it like that.

Anyway, I'm not doing brilliantly with the first - I've started on the Korean book but very slowly, and also picked up the Swahili book again which is lovely, Swahili as a language just feels right. I did, however, make a whole scarf and I have been doing well at revisiting languishing knitting projects - I've nearly actually finished Judith's Halloween hat which she wore almost finished as I ran out of yarn.

The main problem was that I was feeling like there was no time for me. I was too busy with everyone else's projects and needs and not managing my own. My partners staged an intervention and have been making sure that changes somewhat, especially they've been making sure I get to church which is great. Conversation with Colin didn't exactly go 'If I don't spend any pocket money for two years I can buy a spinning wheel' 'We should double your pocket money then you can get it in one' but it sort of almost went that way. We also finally got round to making me a separate bank account. Ideologically, we both feel that anybody in my position - the no income partner in a relationship where not everyone has income - should have a running away fund, but I've felt that actually making one for me was more hassle than it was worth. Well, it turned out that it took about 5 minutes on a website and was super easy. So my pocket money's being paid into there, and if I wanted to funnel more in I thnk that would be easy.

So I am trying to make sure that I actually do something me-ish and not just be subsumed into family. I can't wait for later as 4 of my family aren't going to grow up and not need me, and the other 3 need the example of me learning and growing and being a proper rounded person!
One of the things I want to do is to have a me-party like I used to. Slow, long events with people in and out, very casual, and cocktails and food and stuff. I wanted to do it over Christmas, and even bought cocktail ingredients, but I have run out of days which aren't booked, even with moving Epiphany to Sunday.

Real life:
Playing: Top Dogs, which is a game of dog sledding and betting and arithmetic, of which Judith seems to have an instinctive grasp.
Reading: Dear Leader by Jang Jin-Sing, which is an account of his life in the North Korean propoganda machine and his escape from it. I'm finding it riveting.
Watching: We're on season 5 of Once Upon a Time again, and I'm really enjoying the direction it's taking.
Making: as mentioned above, finishing Judith's halloween hat, and I've a wee shrug to finish and my DebConf shawl and my November hoodie, for which I keep losing the hook but it'll be OK.

Happy Christmas to all! We had a wonderful day yesterday.

( Description )

Today I am mostly excited about Dark Minds which is a horror/noir short story collection including a story by a girl I know - she was in Benedict's primary school class, and she's the daughter of Andreas' godmother. Today was a day I had planned for finishing my Christmas shopping and sitting in a cafe with a book, so if all goes to plan, I'm going to get my copy in Waterstones later.

This is also a reminder that I'm running a bookswap in January, sign up here, if you fancy some new reading material and are happy to enthuse about your favourite books, it's as simple as 'send a book you like to someone else' and it should be low-pressure and mean we get to read something a bit new.

Also, yesterday I was;

reading: The House of Shattered Wings by Aliette de Bodard
watching: just finishing up a Gilmore Girls watch through, and then I'll watch the new ones agan
playing: Andreas nad I had a round of Princess Cupcakes, and Colin, Judith and I played Tsuro of the Seas
eating: dal with roast butternut squash, fried onions and flatbreads

I often say 'Oh I don't like computer games' but then spend all my free time playing Tsum Tsum or Webkinz or Moshi Monsters or something. I like Yucata but couldn't get my head aroun Board Game Arena.
So it's an over simplification, and I told Bärli I'd witter a bit more about it, on here.

The main thing is that I like tabletop games because there's a clear set of rules, which you have to follow, and I dislike video games because there's no clear rules, you're often set up to work it all out for yourselves. So Minecraft, for example, I can't make head nor tail of, and I find it very frustrating. That's more or less true for a lot of games. So why do I like Mao or other games where you have to learn the rules? It's because you're told when you transgress them and the telling is usually explanatory, unlike in life where they're often universally understood but vague and difficult to explain.

Board games on a computer can have the same property, difficult to work my way through, the interface is an extra level of obfuscation I can't uite manage. Some of the Yucata games I find difficult for this reason, and a lot of other implementations. Some of them, like Set Online, are sufficiently close to the board version that they make sense to me.

So what do I like? I really like the lego games. I haven't played Lego Dimensions although I expect that to be the best of the lot as you get to build lego during it. In general, though, they're very good at saying 'You have to do this' and you get going before you get to a puzzle that's hard to solve, and then it's quite satisfying to be able to think about the puzzle rather than having to work out all the commands at the same time as working out the puzzle.

I like puzzle games like Tsum Tsum and Emoji Blitz, the kind where you have to join up similar characters. They're quick to play, and easy to get the hang of, and for some reason I find them a lot more intuitive than most puzzle games. There was a hidden object game on Facebook I used to like, but it disappeared and for some reason I don't understand none of the others have the same appeal for me. Actually, I just went and looked at Facebook games in case there was another one, an it's back! So Gardens of Time, that's where I'll be for the foreseeable.

I hadn't thought about American Girl for a long time, having more or less moved on to other interests/obsessions. But I still have my dolls, and Judith has got to the stage where she's ready to be hooked.
So, taking Kit down from the shelf to give to her (Kit used to be Benedict's but he asked that I give her to Judith when I considered she'd be most appreciative) we decided to watch the Kit film. I used to have all the books of all the historicals (up to Rebecca) but there have been some releases since Rebecca and I can't now find any of the books except Rebecca and one of Josefina's. I should acquire new copies maybe.

Anyway, watching the Kit film allowed us to talk about the Great Depression and the New Deal and the Chicago World Fair, and the World Fair we're going to next year, and flu, and innoculations, and casual sexism.

Life stuff: I didn't read anything all day because I put my book down somewhere and now don't remember where. Andreas and I played Colt Express, which is a game where you play train robbers and have to get the most loot. He likes it mostly for the mechanic, which is programme your move then move, and it's quite physically satisfying with bandit meeples and a cardboard 3d train instead of a board. We ate coca-cola chicken wings (http://www.goodtoknow.co.uk/recipes/537286/coca-cola-chicken-wings) with rice, carrots and baby corn; Judith in particular was enthusiastic.

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ghoti_mhic_uait

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Entries tagged with real life

Recommendations

In which I play with the cool kids.

That's why mum goes to Iceland.

Irish flag

Of shoes and ships and sealing wax

Other things

Things in my garden which are not dead; in which I just about get the May sowing done.

Weekends, shopping, complaining, the usual

What I did with my weekend

Media round up

Cheese pudding and other life things

Recent bobcats

[Meme] Books read in January

Silly mistakes

Date night

Resolutions

Christmas

Book excitement

When I do like computer games

American Girl