Conference Report

So one of the reasons for one's silence has been having to concentrate on surviving Conference Season.

Luckily one had many friends to help see one through these tough times.

As well as the traditional attendance of Sis, Old Mate, and MoneyM, this year also saw Sidekick make a long overdue interstate trek to watch one's back and the dangerous "social events".

At the 80s Glow Party one did have to contend with a continuing knee blowout and an "everybody dance" obsessed Jeza. The sight of lycra clad Nicks Fan also gave one a slight doubting of one's love of the 80s.

Of course ones greatest support through that time was Hulk's Baby Tasha and, of course, ones lifetime companion Scottie (what is he?). Both of whom fully embraced the conference spirit as can be seen below.

Partaking in a rest upon arrival

Admiring the view of the most scenic of walls.

Working hard - or starting to snooze?

O what to read

Having recently finished the fifth-ish tome of The Expanse series one is now at the stage of selecting the "O" book of one's A to Z of Unread SciFi and Fantasy Authors.

This one may, as alluded to in comments by Amoeba, be a rather narrow range of choices.

There is naught a one on my to-read shelf - although Rebecca Ore does have a short story in an unread collection up there and that would take some of the stress off the shelf...

Still, let's see what comes up.

The Rules
Titles should be in the sci-fi and fantasy realms, or speculative fiction if you prefer.

The Author's Surname should begin with the letter O, and they should be one who's wares one has not sampled before.

Here is my Author list of already read Os from the time span of The Tales:

[no results returned]

Hmmm, not a one. A quick perusal of several Internet lists can add: George Orwell, and ...


So better get to it Internet, and recommend away.

Bonus points if the book is available in the work catalogue

Even more bonus points, and probably the win by default, if you place your recommendation into one's hands.
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Deliver Me

So yesterday one had the interesting situation of a package delivery experience - or perhaps one should say non-delivery experience.

Said package was one of those packages that Salsa Girl does not need to know about because expansions don't count for the "no new board games until the existing ones have been played a lot" rule.

An anonymous Amazonian deliverer sent an email saying the package would arrive today and be  delivered by 8pm in the evening. The email was sent at 4:35pm.

At precisely  4:36pm a second email was sent with the message stating that they had tried to deliver but nobody was home and sorry we missed you.

Looking around my place of work which doubles as my delivery address I found it quite hard to imagine how a half dozen people working at desks could appear to not be home to take delivery.

Still I believe I'll give the deliverers the benefit of the doubt as most of us were not really mentally still at work by that time of the afternoon.
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The Ceremonial End

So it turns out that the luck from lucky jocks can run out if they are worn for the entire finals month of football.
And when it runs out it is two minutes too soon.
And you end up suffering a devastating whisking away of the purest form of happiness that is a sporting win.
And no amount of thinking "it's only football" can console oneself.

Sigh.
So having Sneaky Pete, The Great Sandro, Hulk, and Salsa Girl, all watching the game with oneself in one's home seemed like a good idea - especially with all but The Great Sandro draped in the black and white.
Things seemed good at first. And then nervous for a while. Then suddenly good again. Then even more nervous. And finally settled on terribly disappointing.

The Great Sandro showed his usual lack of concern for our passionate despair with nigh suicidal comments along the lines of "you have to admit, Phill and Pete, that it's good for me because my betting on Eagles who I don't support won me money"

Luckily Hulk was there to occupy one's lap with her inherited disappointment in the result and give some perspective on life versus sport.

All that remained after the game was the traditional end of footy season ceremonial burning of the lucky jocks - a process Salsa Girl thoroughly endorses as she is big on tradition and ceremony.

And so, with the end of football season, one now turns one's thoughts to the next season of import ... Gaming Season!

One expects a multitude of thoughts about boardgames and card games to soon displace the currently frequent PTSD flashbacks.
Because, after all, it is only football.
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