Trying To Wrap This Up Earlier

As I went to bed WAAAAY too late last night, and kind of paid the price today (especially since I was also dealing with Period Tired on top of it). So here's my to-do list for this Monday now instead of later:

Work – A rather “eh” Monday, all things considered – though that’s at least in part because I was dealing with my period and the lack of sleep from last night and thus I was more scatterbrained and tired than I normally would be. But I got through it, doing the GL, catching up on a few other items that needed resolving, updating a couple of credit card pledges, and working on another QC file. And looking at the dramatic lighting of the eclipse outside in the afternoon. :p Didn’t have the special glasses to view the eclipse itself, but frankly I think I would have been too nervous to look up at it even if I DID have them. For me, it’s best enjoyed in pictures! (We weren’t even in the path of totality anyway, so. . .)

To-Do List –

1. Get in a workout: Check – another night on the bike, starting “D&D But. . .Everyone Has Amnesia, Part Two!” AKA the other half of the Oxventure Two-Shot that got uploaded recently. At the end of the last episode, the gang had learned from a sodden captain’s log in a chest that they accidentally “bought” off a bunch of Kua-Toa with a hidden signet ring in Tiddles’s (Mike’s) robes that they were likely prisoners who’d survived the sinking of their prison ship, and that the captain and his men had gone around to the other side of the island with the special artifact that was holding their memories. Red (Jane) and Man-Bird (Sullivan, who had decided to double down on the bit and give his aarakocra the surname “Birdman” while he was dealing with the amnesia) were naturally keen on getting their memories back, while Tiddles was a little more reluctant because he didn’t like the idea of being a bad person. He remarked that he didn’t feel like a criminal, but then again, we are all constructs of our memories and experiences, aren’t we? Luke called for a Wisdom/Insight roll, which Mike was actually eager for because for once his character had loads of Wisdom –

Cue the Egbert luck kicking in and Mike rolling a critical 1. Luke tried VERY HARD not to laugh. XD He ended up ruling that Tiddles’s musings were solid, but he got too into his pontificating, tried to stand on a rock for height, and busted up his splint, leaving his six-hit-points ass back down on the ground in a crumpled heap. XD The group decided that, Tiddles’s worries about their former lives aside, they definitely had to track down the captain, and Man-Bird took to the sky despite the storm raging above them to see what he could see. His Perception roll was JUST good enough to spot some sort of fire at the very tip of the island – and his Constitution saving throw against being hit by lightning was phenomenal, fortunately. XD Luke interpreted the save as the divine force of Man-Bird’s god deflecting it off him just in time, and Man-Bird getting a memory of being inducted into a holy order as a result, which was cool. :D Man-Bird descended and reported his findings to the others, then went to summon his steed –

Only to find the pony already standing beside him, ready to accept passengers. It even magically stretched itself and added a couple of extra legs to accommodate all three of them. Because this pony is awesome. :D Everyone thus piled on, and the pony trotted them through the forest as the storm raged on above them. The sky was just starting to lighten and the rain gradually taper off when they came out of the forest and onto a large rocky area –

With a giant crevasse in the middle of it. And two anchor points on the side that looked like they used to hold a bridge. Hmmm. Tiddles was immediately like “well, we already know your pony can stretch itself,” and the pony seemed willing to try and become a bridge, so Man-Bird directed it to give it its best shot. The pony stretched itself to its absolute limit, just barely reaching the other side. . .but then faltered and fell into the crevasse before getting de-summoned. D: Leaving the trio both without a bridge and without an awesome intelligent pony ride, booo.

Tiddles decided now was a good time to see how intimidating he was and attempted to intimidate the crevasse. XD He only rolled an eight, so it was hard to tell if the crevasse’s lack of response was due to it being a crevasse, or due to Tiddles just not being intimidating enough. XD Red decided to do something more useful and call upon her magical abilities to see if she had a super-jump of some kind – and discovered that she had the ability to use Fist Of Unbroken Air to punch people and punt them like twenty feet. Which, okay, COULD be useful as some sort of “rocket jump,” but Red definitely didn’t want to use it on poor broken Tiddles, so she instead tried it on Man-Bird.

Who, they all remembered at the last minute, can fucking fly. XD The punch actually did WORK, though, shooting Man-Bird across the gap – and because he succeeded the saving throw, she didn’t even do any damage to him. :) Inspired by this, Tiddles decided to reach into his well of secret abilities, and discovered the ability to move extra-fast with catlike grace. This gave him the zoomies, which wasn’t particularly great with a broken leg. XD But he did see an old stump with lots of vines that could be good for swinging nearby and directed his burst of speed that way, grabbing hold and JUST managing to swing himself across and grab the edge, despite all his shattered bits. That left only Red on the other side with no obvious way across –

When, suddenly, a horrible cacophony started up from the bottom of the crevasse as a trio of harpies appeared! Red and Man-Bird managed to resist the enchantment of their singing, but poor Tiddles was bespelled and kept staring down at the half-woman, half-vulture creatures. Initiative was thus rolled, and combat began! Red went first, and – after determining that Burning Hands wouldn’t work here – decided to use Fist Of Unbroken Air on the harpy trying to lure Tiddles, knocking it deeper into the crevasse and stopping it from using its magic on him. (And recalling a memory where she learned, as first in her class, she’d been selected to be part of the Duke’s personal security detail. . .) Man-Bird was next, and reached deep inside of himself to see what useful ability he might conjure –

And came up with the knowledge that he could Cure Wounds! Which, would have been better to remember EARLIER, but at least he could grab Tiddles’s paw and apply a healing touch now, bringing the poor guy back up to twenty-four hit points, yay. Unfortunately, the harpies went next, and while the one that got punched laboriously climbed her way back to her sisters, one of the others began singing about how great it would be to jump into the crevasse at Red, who sadly failed her Wisdom save and was bewitched. Tiddles, seeing this, decided he had to return the favor of saving her and reached deep inside of himself to discover a hopefully-useful ability. Fortunately, THIS time he came up with one that allowed him to use his powerful Insight to scan an enemy and gain the ability to sneak attack them for massive damage. He used it on the singing harpy and determined that the wings and the throat were the places to attack, grabbed a rock, and lobbed it at the harpy’s neck –

And fluffed his throw on a roll of seven (WITH advantage!), meaning the rock bounced off the wall of the crevasse, flew into the water below, and murdered an octopus. XD Oh dear. . .we’ll see what the remaining harpy does, and if Red can shake off the effects of her enchantment before she throws herself into the crevasse so the harpies can collect her bones, tomorrow!

2. Continue editing “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland”: Check – we have swapped back to focusing on Alice again, who started her portion of the chapter being dropped off at Venture Tower by Mercurio. Because he’s a stand-up guy, at least when it comes to Alice. :) She is currently on her way up to LaCroix’s office with her cargo manifest and police report, ready to tell him what she saw on the Dane – but she’s a little nervous about the fact that Chunk let her know that LaCroix is apparently having some sort of meeting with a bunch of other vampires. Mostly because she has no idea what the meeting is for. Carpenter has assured her all will be well so long as she doesn’t mention the Scottish play, but Alice being Alice, that’s just tempting her to say it more. XD Don’t worry, Alice, the meeting’s not about you. . .this time. :p

3. Keep up with YouTube Subs: Check – GrayStillPlays-only night, with “Cars vs graters in GTA 5!” Another Patented Alex Torture Board, this one saw Gray take a selection of cars up against a bunch of custom-built graters! (With a repair kit after each challenge, as this board was made to basically destroy cars.) Specifically, we had –

I. Adjustable Height Grater – A pair of graters made out of “Please Pull Forward” signs – the first had them sticking upside-down out of a bar above the car at just the right height to catch windshields and skulls, while the second added a set of tiny bumps made out of the same signs to the ground into the mix. Gray had to use the super acceleration Alex had gifted him to force the cars through the gaps, derping them up more and more each time. He had a lot of fun reading various pained facial expressions in the crunched up front bumpers – at least before they came off entirely. XD

II. Fine Coil Grater – A trio of graters made up of spiky spinning tubes – the first two set horizontally (with the second being narrower than the first), then the third vertically. Again, super acceleration was needed to force the car through the rollers WITHOUT getting poor Gray inside skinned – and that second horizontal roller with its 2.5 meters of internal clearance was a BITCH, I will tell you that much. It’s a wonder Gray got ANY car though it. . .though a few cars discovered a way to fly OVER it by glitching out as their various bits began dragging on the ground and doing Bethesda physics. XD Whatever it takes to beat the board! As Gray said, you should have put more invisible walls up, Alex. XD

III. Cheese Grater If Cheese Were Made Of Metal – A single grater consisting of a giant box with an angled ceiling of spikes – Gray had to super-accelerate into the high end and force his way through the low end, again without getting spiked. Those few cars that managed to get through the coil graters generally got stopped here due to a limit of how much they could compress without dying/catching on fire/some combination of the two.

IV. Long Car Grater (plus there is a giant invisible hand that grinds you into the grater, makes sense?) – Basically exactly what it says on the tin, a long grater run where the gravity was turned up to max the moment Gray teleported on to grind his car into the spikes below and make sure he got through with as little of it as possible. All Gray had to do was get to the teleporter at the other end to win, but that was a pretty hard prospect when bits of the car kept getting forcibly grated off!

So, which car won the challenge? Well, the green convertible Gray picked first actually did pretty well, but couldn’t make it through the coil graters, while the cybertruck offered up some hilarious deformations but failed to make it through even the first adjustable height grater. Most of the other cars got stopped by the coil graters (specifically that second one, as I said), and the few that didn’t – including a dark pink supercar and a cherry red “Infernus” that I really thought was gonna make it – got beaten by the cheese grater. The ultimate winner was the “ELEGANT” silver super car, which was thin enough to make it through the coils without much problem, low enough to get through the cheese grater, and JUUST hardy enough to survive the long haul down the Long Car Grater. And was still running well enough at the end that Gray could get through the win without the repair kit. *nods* Impressive. You may join the Wastelander as part of the “cars I would want in the apocalypse” set.

4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check – just Victor Luvs Alice to worry about tonight, and I decided that my Wednesday post was going to be about my adventures in CAS with Alice, Smiler, and Victor on Saturday. Mostly because that was a simple post that I could make by copying the text that was already in my Dreamwidth entry and tweaking it a little bit. Since I was juggling it with doing some social stuff and answering another Valicer-related ask that appeared in my inbox (someone suggesting a Modern AU Valicer scenario where Smiler is a The Smiler employee, with Victor and Alice meeting them during a date to the park during The Smiler Takeover – I suggested that Smiler could be a Felix, since karaoke and singing is kind of their thing, and that the Relationship Shenanigans could start with Victor and Alice running into Smiler when they’re out of costume and realizing they’re just Like That, and Smiler realizing that the guy is cute and the girl is funny and they want in XD), I didn’t QUITE complete my draft – still need to do the image alt text and tags – but I SHOULD be able to pull that off tomorrow!

*nods* Not too shabby for a Monday, especially a period Monday. And now it is time to wrap up and hit the sack. Hopefully getting a little more sleep tonight will help me tomorrow. . .night all!