More GLMF 07

I was walking through the Medieval Faire in the early morn, just after opening, when a high voice didst called out to me "My Lord, wouldst thou like thy Tarot read?"

I responded to the fair young maiden sitting on the bench in the wood "How much of my gold wouldst such a reading cost?"

She responded "None my Lord, tis' free".

Now being a wary old sea dog I am not normally taken in by such frivolous things, but being that it was said to be free (doubt ringing in the back of me mind) I chose to give it a try nonetheless.

This fair maiden who didst go by the name "Michelle De Nostradamus" (hmmm... why didst her name sound so familiar?) invited me to sit whilst she did turn over 4 cards for me, which was apparently her form of reading the Tarot. Now I have never had my cards read before, but it did seem to me there should be more cards than that, but being that the price was so cheap I figured this must be the wal-mart version.

The first card she turned was "The Lovers" which she claimed to represent my past. Now as there have indeed been lovers in my past I was not overly surprised by this, but it surely did not tell me anything new.

The second card she turned over for me was "The Poppes" which she did tell me represented my present and after consulting the small book in her lap, didst also tell me "this represented balance and was a good thing" (after seeing her consult her manual and her seemingly unending hesitations I was getting the impression that she was maybe not the most spiritually gifted of "tellers" in the fine shire of Avaloch but then again, still no money had passed hands, so this was still all good). I thought upon the "Balance" this card was said to tell and I surmised that this was indeed also true as I have not fallen down in some time (at least not since I quit imbibing spirits), so this did seem reasonable to me as well, but as with before, no new revelations.

The third card which she didst turn over for me was "The Hanged Man" which she said did represent my future. This card did suggest to me that there was death in my future, which once again did not surprise me, as not being immortal, I do fully expect that I will die at some point. Nothing new to figure out here either.

The fourth and final card she turned for me was "The Magician" (kinda like the joker) and this card she did say was for luck. Well knowing my luck with gambling, as well as with the ladies, has always seemed to be a "joke", I did not see anything new here as well.

She did not have any more revelations to tell me as to exactly what the cards meant and did mostly seem at loss as far as what any explanations for them might be, so I did thank her and went on my way but not before tipping her a couple of pounds for at least trying (I suppose it worked since some money did end up changing hands).

As I walked away thinking what silliness these things are, and being a man of science, how is it that people can believe in such nonsense as Tarot Cards, Fortune Telling, Palm Reading and alike, it suddenly dawned on me "That her telling had been exactly correct after all!"...


"If fortune smiles, who doesn't? If fortune doesn't, who does?"
-Chinese Proverb

The March of the Penguins

Back at Christmas time I posted a meme and one of the questions was "What I wanted for Christmas". My response was "Would it be too mach to ask for the Penguins to make the playoffs". Apparently it wasn't too much to ask, because I finally got my Christmas present, Yes my Pittsburgh Penguins are in the National Hockey League Playoffs!

At the time they were lounging around 12th place in their conference (you have to be in 8th or better to make the playoffs) and though they were doing much better than their last place 58 points of the previous season (they are at 101 points now), with 15 teams in their conference, they still weren't anywhere near a playoff birth. Since the all-star break they have been absolutely stellar though, and have seen a very busy March schedule where they managed an amazing 12 and 5 record for the month, guaranteeing them a place in the playoffs. Right now they hold a tenuous 1 point lead in their division with 3 games remaining in the regular season and though they may not be able to hold onto that 2nd place spot in the conference, due to the fact that their remaining schedule is with much tougher teams, than the team that they are ahead of right now, they will manage to finish no worse than 5th in their conference. Still quite a turnaround from last year.

I've been waiting a long time to put up this post. I'm a little superstitious when it comes to my sports, and I didn't want to jinx them. If I tune into a game late and my team is winning, but then they start loosing after I've started watching the game, I will change the channel, figuring it was me that brought them the bad luck. Silly? Perhaps, but these superstitions were formed at a young age, when I spent many winter days on local ponds with other youths trying to "put the puck in the net", or in our case, the piles of snow that served as goals since we didn't have the real thing. The rule was whoever scored had to be the one to dig through the snow to find the puck so that the game could continue. If you had a really good slap shot you could sometimes blow the puck right through the "snow goal" to keep yourself from freezing your hands, having to dig through the cold snow afterwards to find the puck. I remember getting up early in the morning and lacing up my skates (with bread bags inside them to keep your feet warm), and skating up the road to one of the local ponds where all my friends would gather for the days games. We lived on a dirt road that would freeze in the winter and you could actually skate on it, so I could put on my figure skates at the house, no I couldn't afford hockey skates, but that was ok, since most of the kids didn't even have real hockey sticks, I was one of the few that did. Often these games would last all day and well into the night, if the moon was out enough to see by. We would return home well after dark, ravenous, having not eaten all day, and exhausted from the exertions of skating all day, and absolutely ready to get up again tomorrow and do it all over again. These memories are where my superstitions and my love of the game were formed and are held very dearly to this day.

I don't know how far my Penguins will make it through the playoffs, I guess my only wish right now is that they make it through the first round. With players like Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Jordan Staal and Marc-Andre Fleury they sure seem to have the talent to go far in the playoffs, but you never know when they are going to run into a hot goaltender that can shut them down. This season very few teams have been able to totally shut them down and no deficit seems too much for them to overcome. Last night they played the Toronto Maple Leafs, and though "the Leafs" had a 4 to 1 lead in the second period the Penguins were able to storm back and score with 4 seconds left to tie it up and send it to overtime. The Leafs did eventually win that game in overtime (after a long delay because of a medical emergency in the crowd, I guess a fan got too excited), but they sure are fun to watch. Many of the Penguins away games have sold out, even in cities with teams that haven't been selling out, as it seems the rest of the hockey fans around the league want to come out and see these phenomenal young stars play. So even if you aren't a Penguins fan or don't even care about hockey or sports in general, I suggest if you get a chance to see the Penguins play, you do so, because with this team, hardly a game goes by without some miraculous, impossible goal being scored and no game ever seems over or out of reach until the final horn blows... "Lets Go Pens!!!"

Do You Have The Time?

It seems like lately 24 hours in a day just isn't enough time to get everything done that I want to accomplish. If Dubya really wanted to help instead of starting daylight savings time early, he should institute the 26-hour day. Between shoveling snow, keeping my pellets stove clean (it's been burning on high a lot lately) and overtime at work, time has been at a premium.

Of course any more daylight is always helpful and I do like it when it starts staying lighter later, though maybe that's just because it's spring springing. Last week I took some pictures of my Daffodils just popping their little heads out of the ground. Unfortunately that was just before it dropped down into the teens again and they got buried under more of that evil white stuff. The last couple of days have dawned warmer and more spring-like so hopefully this is a portent of better things to come, I sure am tired of shoveling. The forecasts are saying it just might be so, but of course that's what they said about last week. I've learned not to get my hopes up too soon and certainly not to speak it out loud, as I might offend "the Great God of the Lake" and bring "the bad stuff" crashing back down upon us. Never EVER Get the short sleeves out or put up the storm windows too early, as this is a temptation that fate just cannot resist. I'm hoping that hinting about it in a blog isn't going to cast us back into the frozen depths of hell. We'll just have to wait and see if the God is offended by my words and more punishment required.

On the brighter side I made Hope's Chicken Enchilada recipe, which she posted on her blog, and I have to admit that they are the best Enchiladas I've ever tried. They are a lot of work though, it took about three hours to put them together, but are definitely worth every minute of the effort (on a weekend). I tend to get "stuck in a rut" when it comes to my cooking, so it is always a pleasure when some new wonderful recipe is discovered. I really do believe that the food we eat can have a huge effect on how we feel about any given moment in our lives. For example, I've gone to Mexico twice and I still feel that the second trip far surpassed the first because the food at the second hotel was far superior to the first. The chefs and restaurants at the hotel on the second trip had a much wider variety with no two days offering the same menu. Entertainment and accommodations may have been better at the first hotel but in my book they don't have as much effect on your attitude as the food you are consuming. Either way, neither hotel had Enchiladas near as great as Hope's.

I am happy to announce that I have finally succeeded in defeating "Drakan: Order of the Flame"...woooo hooooo... I have played many different video games in my life but this may be the first one that I have actually taken all the way to the end. It's always a sore point if I have something started and left unfinished, but with video games that seems to be the norm for me, to play them for awhile and then put them aside. I know it's only a video game and not really any kind of an accomplishment at all, but they always seem to be, like a book left unfinished, or any project left uncompleted, that they add to the overall feeling of a lack of accomplishment in your life when they are not finished. Any project left uncompleted is somehow worse than one that is either not started, or one that is finished but not to your satisfaction. The only problem with this game is that it really isn't finished. The game ends with the evil "Navaros" escaping into another realm with "Delon's" body ("Rynn's" brother whom he has possessed and she is trying to rescue) and "Rynn" and her dragon "Arohk" diving in after them. So I guess now I have to go out and try to find the sequel, "Drakan: The Ancients' Gate", in order to find out if "Delon" is ever rescued. The best part of the game may not be getting to fly a dragon, but all of the wonderful weapons you acquire in different parts of the game. In the first picture "Rynn" holds aloft the "Runeblade" which is the strongest weapon you can attain, though I was partial to the "Mourn Bringer" sword, it didn't score as many hit points, but it was very cool to look at, as it had blood constantly "flowing" off of it, it was indestructable (sometimes after using a blade a while they would break) and it made a wonderful "death moan" every time you swung it. Actually for most of the game I did very well with a massive "Mithril War Hammer" (I was surprised to see that particular metal in the game, taken from LOTR) and of course the various bow's with explosive, magic, and poison tipped arrows. Definitely a game for someone who likes swords and dragons, though playing this could have attributed to my need for a few more hours in the day as well...

PS: Blogger actually coded this right from compose mode, has something changed for the better?

Here There Be Dragons

"...and from the ashes of the Old World, another breed of man will be born. A man born in peace and not in war. And to his kin, the teachings of the Order will be as myth.

The sacred pact 'twixt Dragon and Rider forgotten, dormant in time.

Yet fear not, for when the darkness is once again made flesh, The Order will ride again, delivering righteous fire from the sky..."

-From the sayings of Rimril, Fourth Archmage of the Order

Lately I gotten back into playing an old video game of mine called "Draken Order of the Flame." I'm really not a very serious gamer, since I tend to play them for awhile, and then put them down and forget about them for a year, and then start playing them again. This one I have had for quite awhile and it is definitely one of my favorites.

Most games don't really do much for me, but put me in one where you get to swing a BFS (Big Farkin Sword), Fly a Dragon and protect a Fair Warrior Maiden, and I'm all there.

The story revolves around "Rynn" (that would be the Fair Warrior Maiden) who is traveling the land of Draken searching for her younger brother "Delon" who was carried off when a band of "Wartoks" attacked and destroyed Rynn's village. Along the way she hooks up with the ancient dragon "Arokh" and together they search the land for Delon, all the while having to fight off all kinds of creatures like Wartoks, Orcs, Giant Spiders and Scavengers. During the quest all manor of weapons, Armor, Potions, Magic Crystals and Runes are found to help them in their search.

I spent most of the day today playing, though in truth I had to start over at a previous game save because I got my dragon "stuck" in a mine and couldn't get him out. I don't know if it was a glitch or what, and at first I thought maybe he just wasn't allowed to go any further with Rynn until I played on for a while and realized he was really supposed to be with her. I had to start over again at a save that was quite far back in the game and spent most of the time just getting back to where I was. Once I got back I found the going much easier with Arokh, it really helps to have a fire breathing dragon with you when you are slaughtering bestiary. These dragons should really come with four-wheel drive for moving around on the ground and in caves and mines.

There are a lot of places in the game where Arokh cannot pass and Rynn has to go on alone until she can unlock a gate to allow him to come through. Some of the time you are flying around on Arokh's back blasting the creatures on the ground, fighting crow dragons in the sky, and dodging the shots from the cannons that the Wartoks use to try and blast you out of the sky. Other times you have to traverse underground mines and caves on foot, fighting the creatures with sword, mace and bow.

I'm not the greatest gamer in the world and I do manage to get Rynn and Arokh killed probably more often than many other gamers would but that's when the health potions and game saves come into play so I can keep on going through the game wreaking mayhem and destruction on my enemies.

I collect swords and dragons, and even have a couple dragon tattoos so this game pretty much has everything in it that I could possible want in a 3DVR game. I also like going to Medieval Faires and this game really has very medieval flair to it. You just can't beat a game where you get to fly a dragon and swing a sword, so if you will excuse me now "It's time to go hunt some Orc"...