Oh Dear....

On Fathers Day, I was lucky enough to acquire an extra present.

Number One Son had a normal Kindle, but has recently bought a Kindle Fire too.  He loves the Fire so much that the old Kindle became redundant - so guess who the new owner is?

That's right!

So far I have downloaded 3 books, all freebies.

One is TAFL, a book about a Viking/Saxon boardgame, similar to chess.  It has lots of variations in board size, number of pieces, etc, but the basis of all versions is the same.  One player starts in the middle of the board, with a King and some soldiers.  The other player starts with a larger force of soldiers set up around the edges of the board.  The King must reach the edge of the board and escape.  I am sorely tempted to make a nice wooden board and find some nice figures to play it with.

The other books are classic history books, one about Scotland (background for my Scottish army) and one about the Goths.  All good stuff.  And it won't be long before I start looking at proper books - some holiday reading.

Yes, I have a couple of things on my hit list already...

The Weekend

It was, of course, Fathers Day on Sunday, so I was able to get some time in painting my new toy soldier army - early Scots!  Here are some spearnen on the painting board:

 

 

Think of the Scots in Braveheart with a few Vikings mixed in, commanded by Macbeth and you more or less have it.  I am wondering if saying "Macbeth" before or during a game will bring me bad luck?  Will I have to refer to my CinC as "The Scottish Commander" or something similar?

 

I think I was still a bit car-lagged from the trip on Thursday, as I felt pretty drained for most of the weekend, but this did give me an excuse to watch a couple of movies - Men in Black 3 and the latest Die Hard movie.  Both good fun, dishing up exactly what I expected, especially Die Hard.  I just love the way he survives certain death over and over again, just walking away from car wrecks with just a couple of scratches and another rip in his vest.  Gotta love it, IMO.

 

Looking forward to a normal, quiet week, this week - hope you had a great weekend!

 

More soon...

Checking in...

Just had 3 days off...

Tuesday was mainly spent at home - early dog walk, trip to the dentist (minor filling, did not even need a jab which was nice!), a bit of shopping, back home, cleaned out the rabbits, undercoated some new toy soldiers, walked the dogs again, played guitar, sorted out dinner...

Wednesday was our anniversary (28 years together) but the weather was pants so we popped in to town with our daughter, did some shopping, went home, watched In Bruges for the first time (really good, starting to forgive Colin Farrell for Alexander), then I made some Mexican for dinner.  Mmm, very nice too!

Yesterday was the 650 mile round trip to collect Number One Son from Uni.  It was a nice trip (except for the squalls of rain that kept sweeping over us at intervals), giving me plenty of time to catch up on the latest with my little brother who drove.  Once the car was loaded, we went to the on campus Chinese restaurant for lunch.  I had noodle soup with crispy pork....

The trip takes us along the busiest roads in the country....

Gah!  This is one of the reasons I never wanted to learn to drive - doing 60 with an 18 wheeler trying to drive up your ass is not my idea of fun...

Once home, we unloaded, unpacked and got him settled back in.  It is good to have our baby back again for the summer...

Taking the Scenic Route Home

During the summers, I sometimes take a slightly longer, more scenic route home, but last time I tried this route (a couple of years ago) a section of woodland that I had to walk through was being logged and it was almost impossible to get through.  The other day, I decided to give it another try...

 

 

Once you turn off the main road, it is small lanes, tracks and paths all the way to the edge of my town.

 

Just how English do you want your countryside?

 

Then I got to the part that had caused problems last time I was here...

 

Yes, it was wonderful, with marked paths and new growth everywhere!  Might take this route again tonight if the weather is good.

 

 

Meanwhile, I am in for a busy week next week - working Monday and Friday, I have to return to the dentist for a small filling on Tuesday, so I decided to take the rest of the day off - will probably spend a good part of it catching up with the typing of my zombie book.  Might post another snippet if I do...

 

Wednesday is our 28th Anniversary - not sure what we will be doing, weather permitting I think another seaside picnic is a current favourite.

 

Thursday we are going to collect Number One Son from his Uni and bring him home for the summer.  He has one more exam to go (Tuesday) and seems happy with the ones he has done so far, which is good.  He always seems to have an accurate feel for how things went (unlike some I have known who have come out of exams saying how easy it was...).  Having said that, this year is just a pass/fail year, so given the quality of his coursework he has probably passed already - but I know he wants to get 1st level grades all the way just for his own ego satisfaction, which I am happy to encourage.

 

So have a great weekend!  See you all soon!

More Cakes with Mrs RC

 

Another delightful lunchbreak in the sun with Mrs RC and my daughter who decided to join us too.

 

 

We had been sitting there for a while, watching a bird collecting bits of bread that my daughter was throwing for it, when this thing landed on me:

 

At first I fell for the camo, thinking he was just a dead leaf, but then I realised that he was alive and crawling up the strap of my camera case, so I fired off a load of pics of him, which he seemed to enjoy.

 

In retrospect, maybe he was a spy working for these guys:

 

 

Which reminds me that I need to get Starship Troopers on DVD...

Mr and Mrs RC Get Saucy

Friday evening.

It had been a very warm day and we weren't that hungry, but knew that we should eat something.  After running through the options, Mrs RC and I settled on fish portions in baps with Tartar Sauce, sort of recreating the old Fillet o Fish that McDonalds used to do.

Not long later, there we were, filling our buns - a thin slice of cheese, then the fish, then a huge dollop of Tartar Sauce.

Mrs RC took the first bite, hesitated and then asked me to get the gherkins out of the fridge.  Apparently the sauce did not taste gherkiny enough.

I handed her the jar, finished putting my buns together and joined her at the table.

It looked great.

I took a huge bite...

Ooh, something not right here...

The sauce tasted totally wrong...

A bit more spicy than expected...

With a nasty aftertaste too...

An aftertaste that made me think of vomit - the taste you get when you heave right from the pit of your stomach...

Yes, it was THAT bad...

Mrs RC caught the look on my face and burst out laughing...

I swallowed my mouthful (the alternative was to spit it back onto my plate, but I didn't want to put anyone else off their food).

Then a thought hit me...

I looked at the sauce jar...

"Um, this isn't Tartar Sauce, is it?  It's Horseradish!"

I HATE Horseradish Sauce...

Mrs RC had grabbed the wrong jar from the fridge - easily done, I guess - they are both the same size and shape, the only real difference being that one says

TARTAR SAUCE

on the front while the other says

HORSERADISH SAUCE

on it.

No wonder Mrs RC thought she needed more gherkin!

Not wanting to waste my dinner, I tried to scrape and wipe off the sauce before applying a massive dollop of Tartar Sauce.  It sort of worked, I only got the occasional taste of pit of the stomach vomit.  But I faced the challenge, not wanting to cook anything else or go hungry.

My suffering must have been clear, though.  Every so often I would glance sideways at Mrs RC, who would instantly dissolve into uncontrollable laughter, with tears running down her face.... 

At least she enjoyed the experience!

Another sniff at Summer...

Last night's barbeque was great - a good turn out of staff and students, with some nice food and beer.  Mrs RC enjoyed getting to see everyone too, with the added bonus that the rain stayed away for us.

 

Today is a nice, sunny day, so I wandered down to the river to eat my lunch.

 

 

This is a little park that I tend to forget about - in fact most people seem to forget about it as it is amazingly quiet, given that it is only a few yards from the centre of the city!  I sat on the wall by the river, ate my lunch and wrote another scene for my book.  Very nice - I even got to listen to the talks being given by the guys who do the boat trips for tourists, featuring very elaborate descriptions of what the river would have been like in days gone by, when it would have been the city's main sewer...  But, happily for me, the river is wonderfully clean these days with no smell to spoil my lunch.

 

The weekend looks like being a nice one weatherwise - not sure what is in store for me yet - I have a suspision that it will involve clearing stuff out of the shed, which has become horribly cluttered over the winter.  This is a shame as Mrs RC has it all set up as an art room all ready for painting and stuff.  I might be tempted to have a go myself - I keep seeing the great stuff that others are doing and wonder... 

 

Have a great weekend!