Moe Lane

Is this the one that I’m thinking of?  I mean, this is the most popular version of this song, right?  I only ask because I sing the chorus to myself from time to time and it doesn’t sound quite like the memory in my head.

Queen of Hearts, Juice Newton

This is what Charlie Stross calls a ‘saving throw vs. shiny‘ situation. I haven’t played Munchkin in years and I’ve avoided buying all the supplements and whatnot, but… still.  Still.  Steve Jackson Games knows my weaknesses, don’t they?

Question: should I shade my creative content accordingly?  There’s gonna be a bit more anyway, given that Halloween is a fun holiday for me.   But I do not know whether a steady diet of more spooky stuff is going to still be well-received on, say, October 23rd. Thoughts?

…They’re still casting black people* for all the major roles.  Can Hollywood stand the strain?  The sheer insanity?

Marvel has added a new villain to the mix in director Ryan Coogler‘s upcoming film Black Panther. Person of Interest actor Winston Duke will be taking on the role of Man-Ape. That means there are three villains in the film so far. The other two are Michael B. Jordan as Erik Killmonger and Andy Serkis as Ulysses Klaw. Duke also joins Chadwick Boseman as Black Panther, Danai Gurira, and Lupita Nyong’o.

Yeah, I’m being sarcastic.  But less than I’d like. Even for a, you know, African-themed superhero story it’s still mildly noteworthy that they’re going to cast accordingly…

Moe Lane

*And Andy Serkis.  Soooooo… I guess we now know which character’s going to be mostly motion-capture?

Great!  Just click on my Patreon. As little as one buck a month will get you stuff like that.

Blame this.

Spirit Infusion

Creating a Spirit Infusion is relatively easy, or at least not very involved: collect rainwater in a clean gallon container.   Wait for a ghost to drown in it.  They will, if you wait long enough, and maybe entice them with ghost-attracting smells or sounds (specific ghost attractions vary by culture and campaign).  You’ll know when you have a ghost drowned in your water when you look at your container using an Icelandic sunstone and see the distinctive greenish-purple glow.  
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…because the kids are home.  But it’s very good!  I’m halfway through Episode 4 at this point, and so far Luke Cage has been highly enjoyable.  You’ll probably want to watch at least the first two episodes back-to-back to get the full effect of the setup, but it’ll be worth it.

A Clockwork Yellow

Background: In 1995, some idiot in Burnaby, British Columbia decided to use The King In Yellow as part of an experimental and flatly illegal psychological reconditioning study using criminals.  And ‘some idiot in Burnaby’ is about as detailed as a description as one can make, these days: part of the fallout of that particular disaster was the permanent erasure from human language of the phonemes that made up that man or woman’s name. Don’t think about it too hard, particularly if you have a family history of neurological incidents.  The resulting disaster turned out to be of the ‘time bomb’ sort, rather than the ‘Azathoth has been summoned’ sort: while the staff all went messily and flamboyantly mad – like you do – the reconditioning appeared to …work, sort of.  At least, all the subjects went permanently catatonic, which is not the worst thing that can happen when you’re exposed to Carcosa, right?

Unfortunately, the investigation was handled by Canada’s anti-Mythos government agency (M-EPIC) – and, just as unfortunately, M-EPIC’s remit has mostly been involved with Ithaqua cults and the like.  Cleanup squads knew to close down the site and cover up the evidence; and the original researchers typically found new and exciting ways to commit homicide-suicide while still in custody, and before trial.  But the research subjects were allowed to live, in the hopes that they’d wake up.  Which they never did: the last one died in 2014, still on a respirator.  By then, the relevant M-EPIC staffers had all done the usual round of retirement, resignation, reassignment, gone mad themselves, or committed suicide; which meant that nobody was left on this plane of existence who still possessed any institutional memory of the original case.

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Give It Away, Red Hot Chili Peppers

Supposed to be available at midnight: I’ll watch one episode now, then catch the rest of Luke Cage over the weekend*.  I’d do it all tomorrow, but I have actual stuff to do.  Including a couple of deadlines.

Moe Lane

PS: The chili Fritos thing went fine.  I baked mine; my wife just told me to nuke the chili and pour it over the dang Fritos already, because she was hungry.  She ate two bowls, so I’m scoring that as a win despite the utter lack of cooking involved.

*Assuming it doesn’t suck, of course.  But a lot of the reviews assure me that It Does Not Suck.  So we’ll see, eh?

I have never met these men and women; and they have never met me.  But we would understand each other extremely well.  Instantly, too:

A group of “warriors” are staging a 300-mile march to echo King Harold’s journey to the Battle of Hastings.

English Heritage has organised the trek on horseback and foot from York to East Sussex to mark the 950th anniversary of the famous clash.

The volunteers will arrive on the battlefield 950 years to the day since Harold fought William of Normandy.

And then they’ll recreate the battle itself.  Because that’s what you do.  No, seriously: that’s what you do.

If you find this interesting, the link to the site covering the march is here.

However, the reviews for this this version suggest that the most common American edition got edited by villains and knaves.  What version of Iron Monkey should I be getting?  – Bearing in mind that I won’t buy special equipment to watch a DVD.