What I did on my holidays

[undyingking]

Just been away for a week's holiday courtesy of iCon, as organized by triskellian and smiorgan. It was great! Many things happened, among them:

• We ran a playtest of T's new murder mystery, Malice In Wonderland, from which there are photos. Game went generally well, lots of good feedback from the players, Wonderland was saved from the depredations of goblins etc, and hopefully a good time was had by all.
• There were castles! Lots of them -- we saw three without even trying. I have a vague memory from school that they were all sacked by marauding Scots moss-troopers during the Wars of the Roses, and frankly some of them still look like it.
• I suspected that this was the furthest north I'd ever been in my life (barring being in aeroplanes taking counterintuitive Great Circle routes). There was some debate about whether Moscow, where I had a work trip one time, was further north. I think now that they might be pretty much on a level.
• I played in three excellent games. Considering that each had a small and more or less random selection of the 27 people attending, it seems more than a coincidence that in practice all three of them contained secondhand_rick:


• Eridu, run by leathellin -- also known as The Boys of Sumer. We were an elite Urukian snatch squad sent to Eridu to grab some sacred goodies on behalf of our goddess Inanna, who selflessly distracted her father the city god Enki by geting him drunk. Much debate about who was the traitor, but for once the heist went off with scarcely a hitch, hardly anyone got their head cut off with a big axe, and there is now a reason why the Japanese invented shuriken. I also found out that "cuneiform" does not rhyme with "uniform".
• The Magdalene Conspiracy, run by killalla -- a mini-freeform in which I was a Grail cultist trying to strike a deal with various undead forces to help us fight demons pending the coming End of Days. My character had a tremendous brain and would have easily won any pub quiz that had taken place between us, but sadly there was none. Very nice to do some role-playing with hearthfire, my twin in the game, after many a long year.
• A Foreign Country, run by cardinalsin, frax and ealuscerwen -- an interesting game concept which I'd probably better not say too much about. It was set in the past of Ellingham Hall itself: during the preceding days we'd each received various prelude-like snippets, handouts and incidents about the lives of the characters whom we would be playing on the day. Pooling these produced more confusion than enlightenment, but it all tied in together nicely during the game.
• There was also boardgaming -- Ticket to Ride Europe, a game involving many trains, as tutored by nickeyb. A neat game but I'm not sure it would have huge amounts of replay value for me -- and success seemed rather random. Some thoughts about whether the use of stations (not present in the original game) made it too conflict-free, but then sometimes you don't want that sort of frustration element I suppose.
• I got to explain my Cat Fatness Test, which is as follows: look down on the cat from directly above, while it's walking slowly or standing. If there is no visible waist, ie. it doesn't go in at the sides at all between ribs and hips, then it's fat and sould be put on a diet. Some people thought this was a slightly harsh criterion, but keep 'em lean keep 'em keen, say I.
• I got to help with a bit of cooking, assisting variously leathellin, triskellian and secretrebel. This was fun, but I still boggle slightly at the notion of planning a meal for 27, taking into account all the various allergies, dislikes and so on. Hail to the chefs!
• secretrebel and cohorts came up with the excellent iFlag game, which I'm sure will be explained elsewhere. I came pretty much last, but had a great time nonetheless and also sponsored the prize for Best Clue (Mathematically Assessed). My own iFlag, "Ceci n'est pas un iDrapeau", suffered somewhat from my inability to draw. "Is it a magic lamp?" people said. Maybe it was.
• Watched some good TV, including 2001: A Space Odyssey on the projector courtesy of al_fruitbat, and was reminded of what a curious mix of brilliance and boredom it is. The sequences involving solarized terrain footage must have been brain-frying when it came out, but now look very dated. Also plenty of Jeremy Brett Sherlock Holmes from killalla, plus some Famous Detective Holmes / Sherlock Hound which I hadn't seen before (and to be honest it's not all that brilliant, although you can see the embryonic Miyazaki touch coming through).
• Also managed to fit in both cricket and croquet, although didn't play 5-a-side football as hoped. Next time!
• On the way home we got caught in a torrential downpour. T was driving at the time, and we decided to pull in and swap. Pulling in = sensible, swapping = decidedly not so, as we got utterly drenched in the process. sesquipedality had to put up with us both steaming gently all the way into Cambridge.

I now need another holiday though, one that involves sitting around vegging gently, reading books etc.

Comments

[secondhand-rick.livejournal.com]

...it seems more than a coincidence that in practice all three of them contained [info]secondhand_rick

Pah!

I cannot be contained so easily.

[triskellian]

it seems more than a coincidence that in practice all three of them contained secondhand_rick
Ahah. Rumbled. Yes, he's secretly in love with you and pleaded with me to put him in the same games as you. I caught him trying to bribe the Foreign GMs to make him the groom in that game, too... ;-)

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

He'll always be the bride, never the groom...

[triskellian]

Groan.

[bateleur.livejournal.com]

Hurrah ! More writeup !

I got to explain my Cat Fatness Test, which is as follows: look down on the cat from directly above, while it's walking slowly or standing...

My own cat fatness test works as follows: look at the cat from the side when it is standing. If none of its four feet are touching the ground, it's a fat cat.

[thalinoviel.livejournal.com]

Our cat fatness test is less demanding:

1. can cat fit through catflap?
2. When cat goes through catflap, are there gaps around the corners?

If the answer to either is no, cat is severely obese and you need to take them up & down the road to ask your neighbours to please stop feeding him.

[lathany.livejournal.com]

Lots of them -- we saw three without even trying.

Which three?

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

Alnwick, Bamburgh and Dunstanburgh. And there was also a pele tower in the next village, Preston, which we didn't see but I think kauket and others may have.