Another Late Update, As Per Almost Usual
Jun. 15th, 2022 11:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
crossover_chickThough it's a less stressful one -- I was just having trouble finding something for item four on the to-do list. Got it sorted in the end, though!
Work – Quiet but productive – spent most of the day working on that report of people’s pledges the credit card people sent us, putting on some Easter gifts (yeah, this late in the year), looking up addresses on returned mail, and doing some reversals. Nothing too strenuous, though as usual the credit card people annoyed me by being kind of shit at their jobs. *sigh* But I’ve had much worse days at work!
Beanbags – Very nice day, though cooler than I expected (no, trust me, good thing – it’s been annoyingly hot at night lately), so yes, of course we went out. I had some good games, though some faltering throws at the end of the first allowed Dad to snipe me for the win – poor Mom, though, is back to her losing ways. :( Final scores were me 2-W-2; Dad W-3-W; Mom 3-2-3. We’ll see if we can get back to more egalitarian scores tomorrow!
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: Check – another night on the bike, another half-hour with the Oxventure stream “Gnome Alone!” Cloudiana has arrived to threaten our heroes! And she’s less effective at it than she might be because she can’t think up any good one-liners to threaten them with! XD Seriously, though, after explaining that Liliana was their nemesis and the reason for the rumors of Egbert’s death almost NOT being greatly exaggerated, the group was only too happy to mock her for her lack of a cool parting line behind the safety of Merilwen’s Wind Wall keeping her big cloud face at bay. You do not come to these showdowns unprepared with this lot!
. . .Unfortunately Cloudiana came prepared with her “cloud of knives” spell, and even if she couldn’t use it on them thanks to wind, she could sure as hell use it on the balloon. The Oxventurers, Max, and Shattershield rapidly went into freefall into the mountainside, and only Merilwen’s frantic shouting got Corazon to cast Featherfall on them and Shattershield in time (with Merilwen grabbing hold of Max to protect him). Even with the cushioning, though, it was still a rough enough landing to cause them all to black out for a bit. . .and when they awoke, they found themselves down a deep cave, having fallen through a gap in the ceiling. The walls were sheer and slick, meaning there was no hope of climbing them –
But even if there had been, they wouldn’t have been able to make up there as Shattershield hit the wall on the way down, and just busted his leg. Egbert used some paladin-style Cure Wounds (once he looked up how it worked – as per Jane, this is apparently how it ALWAYS is with Mike and healing magic, TTRPGs or video games) to stabilize him, while Prudence gathered materials for a splint – and, thanks to a low roll, ended up splinting the wrong leg. XD At least Max was there to do the right one! While all this was going on, Corazon wandered around looking for a potential exit. He found one tunnel so dank and musty he immediately ruled it out as a possibility; one tunnel less stanky but with no obvious wind to mark it as a way out –
And one tunnel crammed full of about twenty gnomes with swords and bows and suchlike. They followed Corazon back to the others when he went to report, angrily accusing him and the others of being the “Sharp Ones” who keep spiriting members of their community away in the middle of the night. The Oxventurers tried to explain that they’d fallen out of the sky, which the gnomes disbelieved – and then, of course, Corazon and Prudence started claiming they were the Sharp Ones and began demanding gold. XD Egbert finally asked if they could help with the Sharp One problem, stating that they didn’t want to be stuck in the caves and could use some tips on finding the way out – the gnomes were still rather mistrustful, but agreed to a deal where the Oxventurers would help them defeat the Sharp Ones and they’d show them the way out. Gnome dinner time thus commenced (to show the Oxventurers that they WERE civilized and had proper day/night routines despite living in a cave, thank you very much), where they explained that basically these Sharp Ones show up for a couple of nights, take gnomes, then disappear for a little bit before doing it again. They’re called “Sharp Ones” thanks to all the blood that was left behind after one gnome tried to fight back. Merilwen promptly asked if they’d heard about “Gnome Alone” and setting traps for the monsters (and yes, as you might imagine, there were a LOT of gnome puns being slung about – Merilwen got Inspiration for “gnome-cooked meal”) – they said they’d tried that, with a couple of gnomes showing off injuries they’d sustained during the process (one guy had lost his bottom!). Corazon immediately tried to exhort them for cash by claiming they were all expert trap-makers, but the gnomes were having none of it. XD
Eventually, a plan was settled on – the gnomes would all gather in one spot, and the Oxventurers would keep watch over the whole huddle, ready to take on and kill the Sharp Ones, as Prudence was so insistent on. The gnomes decided the best place for everyone to hunker down for the night was the gymnasium, and so they all headed there (it is currently unclear if Max and Shattershield are hanging behind, or if they’re there and just being quiet because one of them broke his damn leg). The gnomes all gathered in the center, with the others checking out the exits and asking the gnome elder if there was any pattern to how often the Sharp Ones came (it’s roughly weekly, apparently). As there were exits/entrances at each of the four cardinal directions, it was agreed that each Oxventurer would take a doorway and defend it how they saw fit. Egbert promptly claimed the East as it began with an E, making it easy to remember, and gobsmacked everyone by revealing he had a spell called “Nature’s Wrath” that he could use against intruders, which is like “Entangle” only it’s more than just some grasping vines. There was a lot of baffled and amused “since when do YOU use MAGIC” (through Merilwen approved of the nature theme at least). Merilwen took the West entrance because it’s a spiky letter, and her choice of defense was her Spike Growth spell! Prudence went North so she could become Nude-ence (“it’s my battle form,” she claimed to general hilarity), grabbing some scimitars from the gnomes to make some spiky barricades. That left Corazon with the South, which he was fine with because it was on Island Time, baby. And of course he just filled his corridor with grease. XD I left off with everyone managing to pass a Constitution check not to fall asleep, yay! Next time – Sharp Ones! Maybe!
2. Continue writing “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland”: Check – Alice has received her mission from LaCroix, and told him a bit about her meeting with Nines. Including the fact that Nines won’t take him as a golf buddy. XD But yes, now we just need to get her back to the lobby (reintroducing the lackeys Van and Terrence along the way), then it’s off once more to Santa Monica to invade a boat!
3. Keep up with YouTube Subs: Half check, technically – but to be fair, I was not expecting James Turner to upload twice today. Neither was I expecting those videos to be 40 (showing off Build/Buy items from Werewolves) and 35 (showing off how he built the starter home that comes in Moonwood Mill in Werewolves) minutes long respectively. James, neither Kevin nor Gray should be uploading tomorrow – I’ll catch up with you then! In the meantime –
A) First up was Call Me Kevin and “I made Minecraft way too realistic and went to the nether!” Yes, it is the return of Realistic Minecraft, which requires so much power to run what with its realistic gravity and suchlike that it actually gets its own personal PC! Kevin decided it was time to go check out the Nether and what it entailed, so after some mishaps gathering buckets of lava (non-cuboid lava is a LOT easier to burn yourself on, that’s for sure – fortunately Kevin had 29 loaves of bread on hand!) and carefully shaping a portal, he got his golden sword and ventured in!
The Nether basically looks like Hell in this version of the game. Like, someone’s actual, literal interpretation of Hell. XD I mean, it’s also super-cool-looking, but even that was hellish – namely because it allowed a Gast to sneak up on Kevin while he was admiring the view. XD Kevin just managed to survive the attack and went exploring, picking up some glowstone and using his Military Genius (aka the old boat trick) to kill a bunch of Endermen for one Ender Pearl. XD And then he got attacked AGAIN when he went back to the portal. Fortunately he died right as he got through, meaning all his stuff was right on the other side; unfortunately, a couple of Piglins followed him through, and the kid Piglin ended up hanging around grunting at him while he was trying to fix up his roof to add a nice skylight and set up the glowstone in the ceiling. Piglin, Kevin’s got enough problems with his roof collapsing every time he tries to upgrade it. XD
And then the final bit of the episode was Kevin’s hunt for diamonds, which – did not go well. He found a cool lava pit in the center of the earth, sure, but his desperate digging for anything useful led to both zombies and waterfalls being dumped on his head. He did find the spawner and some nice useful items for later, sure – but then the framerate got so bad during his next round of mining that he literally fell out of the world. It took “creative mode” and some frantic mining to get back into reality, and shortly after that he decided he didn’t need diamond, he needed to be up top in the fresh air with actual ground underneath his feet. XD This is a fun little series, even if it tortures poor Kevin’s PC so. Everyone’s curious about what The End will look like, and I am with them on this curiosity. Will it all collapse if Kevin mines a single block? We will (hopefully) find out. . .
B) And then second up, GrayStillPlays with more Happy Wheels! We started with a bottle flip with “fun buttons” (like alcoholism, and watermelons, and a family dinner, all of which could lead to death!); moved onto a tricky pogo spike jump between two rather close walls (Gray ATTEMPTED to cheat this one by climbing over one wall and trying to get enough of himself on the bit of the win platform poking out to get it to trigger, but no dice – had to be done the right way); went to the “Hard Normal Jet Fall” (basically just solid jet floors all the way down – Gray won solely by virtue of hitting the win before he got minced); swung through another rope swing board (with giant conveyor belts and a massive scary face at the end); took a trip to the Masochism Board and its three endings (including the heroic way with meteors, mines and harpoons aplenty; the yammering way with a long drop down a tower of text into spike hell; and the “dipshit” way which was “just how long will Gray pedal down this one platform?” Long enough to win, buddy); avoided the alligator birds (who were flailing in rage over their broken eggs, which is understandable); and finally braved the board that claimed “You Can’t Win!” (featuring a nasty squeeze to start, then bouncing through a little gap on the back wheel, then finally finding your way across one of the nastiest Happy Wheels bike parkour bits I’ve ever seen. What do you do if your platforms have turned to mere dots beneath you and you’ve lost most of your limbs and you keep getting caught on every little thing? POWER THROUGH AND GET THE DAMN WIN – even if it does take 290 seconds. *does the math* Almost five minutes! Wow. . .). Some true suffering in the Gray Community today – love it. :D
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check – reset the queue speed on Victor Luvs Alice to one, and – after some searching – found a good song for Song Saturday (Uncle Kracker’s “Smile,” which is one of my older ones – I felt that, after a Thursday featuring Valicer stuff, it fit!). So that’s all set for the rest of the week!
Not bad, not bad. . .plus my tumblr friend Nebby drew some more great Victor sketches, and I have found a fantastic way to cool my room for sleeping tonight using the fan we bought for the bathroom while the ceiling fan wasn't working/being changed (it has an "exhaust" function, and I put it in a window and put it on THAT to suck all the HOT air out of my room -- and trust me, it's made an AMAZING difference. :D Also much quieter than the standing fan, that's for damn sure). So even if this is a late update, I had a good night. :) Time to go to bed and hope Thursday is okay! Night all!
Work – Quiet but productive – spent most of the day working on that report of people’s pledges the credit card people sent us, putting on some Easter gifts (yeah, this late in the year), looking up addresses on returned mail, and doing some reversals. Nothing too strenuous, though as usual the credit card people annoyed me by being kind of shit at their jobs. *sigh* But I’ve had much worse days at work!
Beanbags – Very nice day, though cooler than I expected (no, trust me, good thing – it’s been annoyingly hot at night lately), so yes, of course we went out. I had some good games, though some faltering throws at the end of the first allowed Dad to snipe me for the win – poor Mom, though, is back to her losing ways. :( Final scores were me 2-W-2; Dad W-3-W; Mom 3-2-3. We’ll see if we can get back to more egalitarian scores tomorrow!
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: Check – another night on the bike, another half-hour with the Oxventure stream “Gnome Alone!” Cloudiana has arrived to threaten our heroes! And she’s less effective at it than she might be because she can’t think up any good one-liners to threaten them with! XD Seriously, though, after explaining that Liliana was their nemesis and the reason for the rumors of Egbert’s death almost NOT being greatly exaggerated, the group was only too happy to mock her for her lack of a cool parting line behind the safety of Merilwen’s Wind Wall keeping her big cloud face at bay. You do not come to these showdowns unprepared with this lot!
. . .Unfortunately Cloudiana came prepared with her “cloud of knives” spell, and even if she couldn’t use it on them thanks to wind, she could sure as hell use it on the balloon. The Oxventurers, Max, and Shattershield rapidly went into freefall into the mountainside, and only Merilwen’s frantic shouting got Corazon to cast Featherfall on them and Shattershield in time (with Merilwen grabbing hold of Max to protect him). Even with the cushioning, though, it was still a rough enough landing to cause them all to black out for a bit. . .and when they awoke, they found themselves down a deep cave, having fallen through a gap in the ceiling. The walls were sheer and slick, meaning there was no hope of climbing them –
But even if there had been, they wouldn’t have been able to make up there as Shattershield hit the wall on the way down, and just busted his leg. Egbert used some paladin-style Cure Wounds (once he looked up how it worked – as per Jane, this is apparently how it ALWAYS is with Mike and healing magic, TTRPGs or video games) to stabilize him, while Prudence gathered materials for a splint – and, thanks to a low roll, ended up splinting the wrong leg. XD At least Max was there to do the right one! While all this was going on, Corazon wandered around looking for a potential exit. He found one tunnel so dank and musty he immediately ruled it out as a possibility; one tunnel less stanky but with no obvious wind to mark it as a way out –
And one tunnel crammed full of about twenty gnomes with swords and bows and suchlike. They followed Corazon back to the others when he went to report, angrily accusing him and the others of being the “Sharp Ones” who keep spiriting members of their community away in the middle of the night. The Oxventurers tried to explain that they’d fallen out of the sky, which the gnomes disbelieved – and then, of course, Corazon and Prudence started claiming they were the Sharp Ones and began demanding gold. XD Egbert finally asked if they could help with the Sharp One problem, stating that they didn’t want to be stuck in the caves and could use some tips on finding the way out – the gnomes were still rather mistrustful, but agreed to a deal where the Oxventurers would help them defeat the Sharp Ones and they’d show them the way out. Gnome dinner time thus commenced (to show the Oxventurers that they WERE civilized and had proper day/night routines despite living in a cave, thank you very much), where they explained that basically these Sharp Ones show up for a couple of nights, take gnomes, then disappear for a little bit before doing it again. They’re called “Sharp Ones” thanks to all the blood that was left behind after one gnome tried to fight back. Merilwen promptly asked if they’d heard about “Gnome Alone” and setting traps for the monsters (and yes, as you might imagine, there were a LOT of gnome puns being slung about – Merilwen got Inspiration for “gnome-cooked meal”) – they said they’d tried that, with a couple of gnomes showing off injuries they’d sustained during the process (one guy had lost his bottom!). Corazon immediately tried to exhort them for cash by claiming they were all expert trap-makers, but the gnomes were having none of it. XD
Eventually, a plan was settled on – the gnomes would all gather in one spot, and the Oxventurers would keep watch over the whole huddle, ready to take on and kill the Sharp Ones, as Prudence was so insistent on. The gnomes decided the best place for everyone to hunker down for the night was the gymnasium, and so they all headed there (it is currently unclear if Max and Shattershield are hanging behind, or if they’re there and just being quiet because one of them broke his damn leg). The gnomes all gathered in the center, with the others checking out the exits and asking the gnome elder if there was any pattern to how often the Sharp Ones came (it’s roughly weekly, apparently). As there were exits/entrances at each of the four cardinal directions, it was agreed that each Oxventurer would take a doorway and defend it how they saw fit. Egbert promptly claimed the East as it began with an E, making it easy to remember, and gobsmacked everyone by revealing he had a spell called “Nature’s Wrath” that he could use against intruders, which is like “Entangle” only it’s more than just some grasping vines. There was a lot of baffled and amused “since when do YOU use MAGIC” (through Merilwen approved of the nature theme at least). Merilwen took the West entrance because it’s a spiky letter, and her choice of defense was her Spike Growth spell! Prudence went North so she could become Nude-ence (“it’s my battle form,” she claimed to general hilarity), grabbing some scimitars from the gnomes to make some spiky barricades. That left Corazon with the South, which he was fine with because it was on Island Time, baby. And of course he just filled his corridor with grease. XD I left off with everyone managing to pass a Constitution check not to fall asleep, yay! Next time – Sharp Ones! Maybe!
2. Continue writing “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland”: Check – Alice has received her mission from LaCroix, and told him a bit about her meeting with Nines. Including the fact that Nines won’t take him as a golf buddy. XD But yes, now we just need to get her back to the lobby (reintroducing the lackeys Van and Terrence along the way), then it’s off once more to Santa Monica to invade a boat!
3. Keep up with YouTube Subs: Half check, technically – but to be fair, I was not expecting James Turner to upload twice today. Neither was I expecting those videos to be 40 (showing off Build/Buy items from Werewolves) and 35 (showing off how he built the starter home that comes in Moonwood Mill in Werewolves) minutes long respectively. James, neither Kevin nor Gray should be uploading tomorrow – I’ll catch up with you then! In the meantime –
A) First up was Call Me Kevin and “I made Minecraft way too realistic and went to the nether!” Yes, it is the return of Realistic Minecraft, which requires so much power to run what with its realistic gravity and suchlike that it actually gets its own personal PC! Kevin decided it was time to go check out the Nether and what it entailed, so after some mishaps gathering buckets of lava (non-cuboid lava is a LOT easier to burn yourself on, that’s for sure – fortunately Kevin had 29 loaves of bread on hand!) and carefully shaping a portal, he got his golden sword and ventured in!
The Nether basically looks like Hell in this version of the game. Like, someone’s actual, literal interpretation of Hell. XD I mean, it’s also super-cool-looking, but even that was hellish – namely because it allowed a Gast to sneak up on Kevin while he was admiring the view. XD Kevin just managed to survive the attack and went exploring, picking up some glowstone and using his Military Genius (aka the old boat trick) to kill a bunch of Endermen for one Ender Pearl. XD And then he got attacked AGAIN when he went back to the portal. Fortunately he died right as he got through, meaning all his stuff was right on the other side; unfortunately, a couple of Piglins followed him through, and the kid Piglin ended up hanging around grunting at him while he was trying to fix up his roof to add a nice skylight and set up the glowstone in the ceiling. Piglin, Kevin’s got enough problems with his roof collapsing every time he tries to upgrade it. XD
And then the final bit of the episode was Kevin’s hunt for diamonds, which – did not go well. He found a cool lava pit in the center of the earth, sure, but his desperate digging for anything useful led to both zombies and waterfalls being dumped on his head. He did find the spawner and some nice useful items for later, sure – but then the framerate got so bad during his next round of mining that he literally fell out of the world. It took “creative mode” and some frantic mining to get back into reality, and shortly after that he decided he didn’t need diamond, he needed to be up top in the fresh air with actual ground underneath his feet. XD This is a fun little series, even if it tortures poor Kevin’s PC so. Everyone’s curious about what The End will look like, and I am with them on this curiosity. Will it all collapse if Kevin mines a single block? We will (hopefully) find out. . .
B) And then second up, GrayStillPlays with more Happy Wheels! We started with a bottle flip with “fun buttons” (like alcoholism, and watermelons, and a family dinner, all of which could lead to death!); moved onto a tricky pogo spike jump between two rather close walls (Gray ATTEMPTED to cheat this one by climbing over one wall and trying to get enough of himself on the bit of the win platform poking out to get it to trigger, but no dice – had to be done the right way); went to the “Hard Normal Jet Fall” (basically just solid jet floors all the way down – Gray won solely by virtue of hitting the win before he got minced); swung through another rope swing board (with giant conveyor belts and a massive scary face at the end); took a trip to the Masochism Board and its three endings (including the heroic way with meteors, mines and harpoons aplenty; the yammering way with a long drop down a tower of text into spike hell; and the “dipshit” way which was “just how long will Gray pedal down this one platform?” Long enough to win, buddy); avoided the alligator birds (who were flailing in rage over their broken eggs, which is understandable); and finally braved the board that claimed “You Can’t Win!” (featuring a nasty squeeze to start, then bouncing through a little gap on the back wheel, then finally finding your way across one of the nastiest Happy Wheels bike parkour bits I’ve ever seen. What do you do if your platforms have turned to mere dots beneath you and you’ve lost most of your limbs and you keep getting caught on every little thing? POWER THROUGH AND GET THE DAMN WIN – even if it does take 290 seconds. *does the math* Almost five minutes! Wow. . .). Some true suffering in the Gray Community today – love it. :D
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check – reset the queue speed on Victor Luvs Alice to one, and – after some searching – found a good song for Song Saturday (Uncle Kracker’s “Smile,” which is one of my older ones – I felt that, after a Thursday featuring Valicer stuff, it fit!). So that’s all set for the rest of the week!
Not bad, not bad. . .plus my tumblr friend Nebby drew some more great Victor sketches, and I have found a fantastic way to cool my room for sleeping tonight using the fan we bought for the bathroom while the ceiling fan wasn't working/being changed (it has an "exhaust" function, and I put it in a window and put it on THAT to suck all the HOT air out of my room -- and trust me, it's made an AMAZING difference. :D Also much quieter than the standing fan, that's for damn sure). So even if this is a late update, I had a good night. :) Time to go to bed and hope Thursday is okay! Night all!
