Baby?

Emily and I have been talking, and we would both like to have kids. We're just not ready at this point in time. We have figured out what we feel like we need to do to get ready.

1. Finish the bathroom. This isn't really necessary, but we just bought all, or at least most, of the things we need to redo it and we might as well get it done as soon as we can. We're thinking after Denise leaves.

2. Get a new car. We're thinking a hatch-back car, good gas mileage, safe, dependable, and ideally purple. Our Neon is still working, but at this point it's not the most reliable. It's ok for driving around Northfield, but it makes us a little nervous on long distance trips.

3. Install a dishwasher. This one will be a little tricky, seeing as our kitchen isn't dishwasher ready. We'd need to set-up the pot rack to store our pots and pans to make space in our cabinets to fit a dishwasher. Then of course there's the plumbing and electrical that would need to be done. Our thoughts on this is that it'll not only make our lives easier, but it's a great way to sterilize baby bottles, which we'll probably be using a lot since it's pretty likely that Emily will be on anxiety meds and won't be able to breast feed.

4. Get a new stove. Our current stove only has like 2 1/2 burners that work and the oven preheats to your desired temperature and then turns off for a few hours before deciding to heat back up to that temperature. It's just dumb and annoying and a new one would also be safer.

Some things I think we would like to get done, but don't feel like it's quite as necessary:

* Clean out and organize the garage, so we can use it for entertaining, art studio, car storage, get a freezer set-up in there.
* Really, just clean and organize the rest of the house. We already have a lot of stuff that we don't use or even know about and we just need to make more space. Not only to make room for a child, but just to make our lives a little less stressful. I guess it's also safer for a baby if there's not all this random crap around.
*Pay off our debts. To be honest, we've been pretty good about this so far. Depending on how well we handle our finances, we should be able to pay off all of our credit cards by the end of this year, just leaving school loans and our mortgage left. That would free up so much money.

So, uh, yeah. That's where we're at on the baby situation, in case you were wondering.

Cat Conclusion

Simon came through alright. I won't go into any major details, but he had some liver problems and had to be fed through a tube for a while, but now he's doing well. He's still recuperating and has to take medicine, much to his and Melanie's dismay, but he's showing signs of getting back to his old self. I'm glad he's doing ok and Melanie's happy to have him up and about again. She's still taking donations towards the Simon Relief Fund, if you feel inclined to contribute.

Cat Concerns

It's not any of our cats, but my sister-in-laws' cat Simon has some medical issues. They're not sure exactly what is wrong, but it seems to be liver related. They're going to conduct some more test and put him through medical test and what not to find out what's going on and how to save him from it. Melanie's not sure how much this going to end up costing. In that vein, they are planning on holding a yard sale at their place (5246 34th St, Minneapolis) this weekend. If you can, stop buy and give your well wishes, and possible buy something as well.

Emily's Birthday Party

A quick notice, Game Night for this Friday will be at Nancy's house.

OK. Now on to Emily's third birthday celebration. I don't know if you've heard the details, but it will be this Saturday, January 9th. The first movie will be Newsies at it will be starting at noon. You are welcome to come over before then. After Newsies, we will be watching Grease 2, at about 2:15pm. Then we will be watching Xanadu, starting around 4:30pm. That should all be done around 6:15pm or so.

But the party doesn't stop there. Afterwards we can play Rock Band or board games or card games or Karaoke Revolution. I guess we'll keep partying as long as we have to.

As far as food is concerned, that hasn't been nailed down. We have chips and crackers and numerous beverages. We might cook/order pizzas (most likely from Boston's for their gluten-free options). People are welcome to bring food with them, just remember Emily is eating wheat-free now. I can't guarantee anything in particular, but we certainly have things we can make if needed.

You're welcome to show up, well I guess at anytime throughout the day. Don't feel obligated to watch all the movies; feel free to show up for your favorite and join in on the sing-a-long that I can almost guarantee will be going on for all of them. Presents are welcome, but not necessary. We will enjoy your company either way. (If you're looking for gift ideas, gift cards are good, especially from Ikea or Target or even Just Food. They will be used.)

Maybe I'll see you there. Later days!

Holidays

This past Holiday season went well. Thanksgiving was at Cherish's and we cooked the turkey there. Rock Band was played; dinners were eaten; naps were taken . My mom and sister came up to join us and as far as I could tell, a good time was had by all.

Christmas it snowed, a lot. Emily and I were stuck in the house for a couple of days, which drove Emily nuts by the second day. We didn't really do anything celebratory, which in hindsight was probably a bad idea. We woke up, opened presents, and then Emily took a 4 hour nap and I played video games throughout the day. It was relaxing, but didn't really feel festive and so we felt ho-hum about the whole thing. Luckily, the following Sunday we were able to celebrate at Cherish's with Emily's family and that helped satiate the holiday hunger we were feeling. Next year I think we need to make sure to try to celebrate some what on our own. A few decorations and a planned dinner at the very least.

Emily turned 30 on the 28th of December. Her first birthday celebration was rolled into the Haskell holiday party. Her second celebration was on the 29th, we went out to Fermentations with Alex and Susan and enjoyed a tasty meal. Her third and final celebration is this Saturday (January 9th) at our place. The plans are to watch Emily's favorite movies (Grease 2, Newsies, and Xanadu) in the living room and have board/card games going on in the dining room. There might be Rock Band downstairs for those who want, but no guarantee on that. We're still hammering out details. I'm guessing it will start around noon, and I would guess that it would be potlucky, though we still have chips and snacks from New Year's to serve. I'll let you know more soon. Feel free to stop by and partake of the festivities.

As far as New Year's is concerned, that went well. We hosted some people at our place where we played various games and ate various food and had various laughs. Everyone enjoyed themselves, and only the very youngest Beeby fell asleep before the ball dropped.

So a belated, Happy Thanksgiving, Happy Chanukah, Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year to all!

Holidays

Thanksgiving went great. We played games (Rock Band and Scene It) and had a lot of delicious food. Cherish and Melanie did a great job decorating and hosting. The two turkeys we bought were tasty. They weren't perfect, but they were fairly close to it. It was damn sure better than what happened to some other turkeys (I'm looking at you Beebys).

I had fun with my mom and sister over the weekend. They came up to join us in the Thanksgiving celebration. I saw Boondock Saints 2 with my sister at the Lakeville Theater (btw, did you know they have a Medieval Madness pinball machine?), which of course was pretty crowded. The movie was very enjoyable. It's pretty much more of the same, but I liked the first one. I just find the fact that it was even made impressive.

Emily has decided that for the month of December she's going to take it easier and do less things. Basically, except for a few events, she plans to be less social. No cow nights, every other game night at our place (at most) and no spur of the moment outings or parties. It's not a bad idea, it seems to work well for Joey. As it is we're already pretty booked with Colin's birthday, Cherish's birthday, Winter Walk, Christmas, Emily's birthday, Donata's Gift, and the Just Food parties that Emily has planned.

What's going on?

First off, for those that care, we're having Game Night at our place on Friday. We'll be playing Battlestar Galactica starting at 8pm. We'll be having a new guest with us this night, Nolan, son of Lindsay the Front End Manager of the Just Food Coop. Due to this, there will be no alcohol consumed, since he's underage and all. This is fine with me, I think it'll still be fun. Oh, and Lindsay will be joining us later that night after she's done closing. OK, on other topics.

Not sure if you heard, but Facebook can now be accessed through the Xbox 360. One of nice things about this is that you can find the gamertags of your facebook friends more easily. Also nice, through this you can see the real name of your Xbox friends, no more trying to remember who YougartKing really is anymore. Although it does require that you both have added and used the facebook app on your 360, but whatever. I think this is just awesome, finally the Internet is starting to piece together my social networks so that there's more, I don't know, synergy(?), interconnectivity(?). All I know is that it's nice to have one list of something instead of having to copy the list at every website.

Thanksgiving is right around the corner and my mom and sister are coming up to spend it with us. Exciting! I don't really have any plans other than the feast that will be enjoyed at Melanie and Cherish's, but that's usually how I roll, or at least how I like believe I do. I do have to work at Just Food for about an hour from 2pm to 3pm on Friday.

With Thanksgiving so close, that means that a bunch of Haskell birthdays and Christmas are right around the corner. This year is Emily's 30th Birthday. I don't know what we're doing for it, but Emily what's to host it somewhere suitable for a group of people to celebrate. She feels that our house is to small for such things, especially in the winter, when you can't really hang out outside. Right now the thoughts are at her sister's. The only issue with that is that it's in the cities, so I'm not sure how many Northfielders would attend (some of them think Dundas is far). But we've still got a while to work that out, it's not until the 28th of December. There's also been talk about doing it in a Logan's Run/Renewal motif. We'll see.

Exasperation

I've been thinking and I believe that it's probably a good thing that we're not hosting Thanksgiving this year. I've been feeling overwhelmed lately and Emily is feeling constantly in pain and tired and is unable to do much at home because of it. We haven't cleaned the house in weeks and the few times we do eat it ends up being cheese and crackers or possibly fudge and chocolate squares. Yeah, it hasn't really been very productive or healthy in our house as of late.

Not only do I feel like I have try to take care of myself as well as Emily, but there's the ever looming presence of tasks and projects I want to get done. Emily thinks I schedule too much for myself, with the second job, and game nights, and D&D, and socializing with others. That's all on top of household projects like clean out the garage, and setting up coat hangers, and cleaning up the bedroom, and organizing the office, and cleaning out the kitchen. Although, it's hard to relax when your free time is just trying to finish up the things on your “fun” to-do list like finish Borderlands, or Gears of War 2, or Fable 2, or Half-Life, or Wheelman, or Dead Space, or GTA IV, or Fallout 3, or watch the rest of Weeds, or Dexter, or Deadwood, or Mad Men, or Fringe, or Leverage, or Lost, or X-Files, or Tough Love, or all the numerous movies out there to watch and the multitude of podcasts to listen to. There's just not enough time out there to get things done.

BTW Nintendo told us an awesome secret! SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Gaming and Games

Well, my weekend has been fully booked. Tonight we're having Game Night at Nancy's, which is awesome. She makes some really tasty snacks. Saturday I have D&D, depending on how the child watching situation pans out for Todd. After that, at 8pm, I get to help Alex at Just Food move shelves and tables and things around the store to get ready for the floor repainting going on later that night. When that's done I'm heading up to St. Paul to hang out at Pipe's (sorry, I mean Paul's) game night, which could go on until 2am or so. Then on Sunday . . . actually Sunday's free as far as I know, but I'm guessing there'll be some chores and errands to do, possibly I'll get some video gaming in. Or I just might end up sleeping through the whole day.

Speaking of video games, you should go download our newest game Excitebike: World Rally for the Wii. It's a WiiWare title and is basically a remake of the classic Excitebike. We improved the graphics a lot and even tweaked the gameplay a little to make it, in my opinion, more fun. There's also online multiplayer, which I hear is popular now-a-days. It's only $10. OK, that's probably enough shilling.

Concerns and Achievements

I just found out that we are having Thanksgiving at Melanie and Cherish's this year. For the past few years we've been having it at our place. It's a little small but we were able to make it work. I feel some what conflicted over this change. On the one hand, it will be nice to have someone else worry about all the cleaning and decorating and hosting and have more of the cooking parceled out, plus they do have more space and Cherish does have a knack for party hosting. On the other hand, it was nice to have a tradition of my own and I enjoy cooking but I don't like the cleaning so I don't cook that much and Thanksgiving is an excuse to do some cooking, but I guess we'll still have to cook some of our usual dishes like Broccoli Casserole and Candied Pecans and Herbed Cheese Croissants. I also don't know if we're still going to cook the turkey or if someone else will be. I guess there's really not that much to worry about this year. I would like to know what the full plans are, in particular what we need to bring or prepare, as well as if we need to pick-up anything from Costco for others.

Last weekend I played Chez Geek at Adam's with some of his friends. I had a blast and it was nice to meet new people. Saturday I had to work at the coop (to Nancy's credit I wasn't originally scheduled to but I ended up switching with Monica) and I followed that up with some gaming at Scott's, which went great. Usually when Scott hosts a Game Night at his place we only get in one maybe two games due to all of the food prepping and hosting and teaching of new games. This time that wasn't a problem. It was only Scott, Chris, Janine, and me so there wasn't as much corralling needed. We also played games that the majority of us had played before, cutting down on the game teaching. Of the games we played (Pandemic, Chicago Express, and Kingsburg), I only won one, and that was because Pandemic is a cooperative game so either everyone wins or everyone loses. I still had fun though.

Sunday, since it was so nice out, I got some yard work done. I put away the last of the hoses, mowed up all of the leaves around the house, put up and stored the hammock, and finished getting the mulch where it needed to be. I would still like to get the trees pruned before it snows, but I don't know anything about doing that, so I'm a little hesitant to start cutting. Other then that, I think we're ready for the coming of winter.

Game Night tonight

Adam has offered to host Game Night at his place, which I think is awesome of him. We figure we'll start at 7:30 or so. I know he has Guillotine and some Settlers of Catan games and Carcassonne as well. I also plan to bring a few games in case a number of people show up. I'm looking forward to it. If you want to go and don't know where he lives, ask me or him. He lives real close to the golf course.

I know, short post, but whatever.

Portland Trip

Portland was fun. Emily had a good time at her conference, learn a lot of good things and made a few friends while she was at it. She and Paula really hit it off, which is nice. I'm glad she has some HR friends now and doesn't feel so lost. While she was at her conference, I spent the time wandering around Portland and reading the graphic novels I brought along.

Graphic Novels I read: Invincible (1-7), Preacher (1-5), Scott Pilgrim (1-4).

Places I ate at (that I remember): Henry's Tavern (awesome vanilla banana creme brule), Voodoo Donuts (open 24 hours!), Cupcake Jones, Pazzo's, Saucebox (tasty cocktails and appetizers), Kenny and Zuke's Delicatessen, the Flying Elephant deli, Fuller's Diner, Whole Foods, Pizzicato (had a delicious pear and caramelized onion pizza slice), The Macaroni Grill, various food shack vendors.

Places I visited: Portland Art Museum (crazy layout but some interesting pieces), Finnegan's Toy Store, Powell's Bookstore (big bookstore that happened to be re-organizing all my favorite sections), Counter Media (small alternative comic shop), the Chinese Garden (with a small tea house inside), the Japanese Garden (everywhere you look is a great photo opt), the Goodwill on 10th (one of the fanciest goodwill's I've ever been in), West Elm store, Bonnet.

We planned to rent a car the last day to drive out and tour the Tillamook factory as well as see the Pacific ocean, but when we went to pick the car up we were told we needed a credit card and not just a bank card. The only credit card we had on us had been used for the hotel room and so had no available balance on it. Instead, we decided to walk the 10 or 12 blocks to the Japanese Garden, which just happened to be uphill the whole way. It was quite the hike, but it turned out to be a lovely destination. Afterwards, we walked back into downtown, ate some dinner, and passed the time in a bookstore until it was time to get a cab to take us to the airport.

We caught our 9:00 flight to Seattle (where they served a complimentary glass of local beer or wine), waited/slept for 2 hours until we could board our flight to Minneapolis, flew/slept-as-best-as-we-could-with-babies-seated-in-front-of-us-and-a-loud-snorer-a-few-rows-behind-us-in-seats-that-barely-recline our way home in time to drive back to Northfield and start back up at work.

Game Night Peril

Game Night tonight is being held at Nancy's place. She's wanted to host for some time now and today both she and her husband have the evening off and are looking forward to having people over and playing some games, even if it is just Emily and me. The kink in the plans is that one of her sons has just been diagnosed with the H1N1 virus. They've been spending most of the day cleaning up their house, especially the downstairs, and disinfecting everything. They really want to have this happen, so we're going over there tonight. Plus, Emily doesn't want to have to try and clean our place. Double plus, Nancy said that she was going to bake a few gluten-free dishes for Emily to enjoy. If you were thinking of coming to Game Night tonight and choose not to after reading this, well, I understand. We'll see how well Emily and I fare on our trip to Portland after having this adventure.

Honestly, I suspect a few of my coworkers' kids might be carrying it, or any number of the customers I've helped at Just Food. I'm just saying, chances are I've already been exposed to it.

Update: Turns out it was not H1N1 but Strep. A relief?

Additions and Changes

My Geekscape shirt came in today and Jonathan added a Geekscape pin/button and, as a bonus prize, a tape of the radio program The Shadow. Weird. Unfortunately the shirt's a little on the large side and they don't have any mediums. I guess that's why they're pretty cheap right now. (This reminds me, I still need to order the Hurm shirt from iFanboy).

Shawn was at Barnes and Nobles the other day and grabbed Scott Pilgrim vol 1 for me. Score! Now I can start reading the series, or at least the ones I have. Today Scott grabbed Street Fighter IV from Target for me because it was down to $10 on their clearance. Double score!

Emily has started rearranging the bedroom, but there's only so much space to work in and with. She wants to put the bed in our closet and line the walls with dressers and armoires. She seems to have a vision for it, and maybe we'll actually keep our clothes organized. We got a little closet thing for hanging our clothes in from Target the other night, but when we put our clothes on it, the bar slipped out. That's not going to work. I think Emily wants to go to Ikea now to get a more long term solution.

Honestly, I think we need to get rid of some of our clothes. We'll have a pile of clean clothes on a chair and in drawers, but for some reason Emily needs the clothes in the dryer to get dressed. Didn't she just wear those clothes? Why do we have all these other clothes if we're not going to wear them? Yes, I have quite a few dress clothes that I don't wear now that my job doesn't require it, but I'd rather take them to a consignment shop then donate them, if for no other reason than the fact that most of them are really nice and were kind of on the expensive side. I don't know, but is that wrong of me?

I haven't really played any video games since our trip to Kansas, I'm having trouble finding the time. Next week, we're going on a trip to Portland. Emily has a Human Resource seminar thing going on down there and I'm tagging along to check out the sights and catch-up on sleep. I'll also probably get quite a bit of reading done. We're flying down there Monday and getting back Sunday night, I believe. Hopefully Emily will find this trip more relaxing then the last one.

Speaking of trips, I believe Marty has started his trip back to Northfield. It'll be nice to have him around again. He was a game night regular, so now our numbers are growing. Plus, when he goes to an event, the chances of Isaac showing up increases by like 10% or so. Anyways, Marty's a fun guy who's usually up for anything. I like it much better when people leave California to live here than vice versa.

Cleaning out

Fallcon was fun. I went with my nephew and we had a good time looking around at the vendors and checking out some of the artist's work that was on display. He bought a couple of comics and a few toys, while I massively increased our graphic novel collection. I got the first 7 of Invincible, a couple more volumes of Preacher that I didn't have, Scott Pilgrim 2 thru 4 (still need number 1), the first 3 volumes of Buffy Season 8, and few extras like Walking Dead vol 2, and Death: At Death's Door. We both picked up some of the free comics they had left over from free comic book day. If I had planned better, I would have brought some of my own books to get signed by the creators that were there, but I didn't do any research beforehand and honestly, I wasn't expecting to see anyone that had worked on any of the things I had read. We then stopped at the Source down the road because they were having a 20% off sale for con goers and I was hoping to find Scott Pilgrim vol 1, but to no luck, so I bought Roll Through the Ages and Ultimate Werewolf instead. That'll show'em.

Emily recently got another test for celiac, but we haven't heard the results yet. No matter what, she's going gluten free. She just feels way better off the gluten. We've recently started eating gluten free and to begin with she juiced up a storm this weekend. Now we have all kinds of juice to drink, apple, zucchini, carrot ginger, apple with zucchini.

Unfortunately our place is a bit of a mess right now. I haven't cleared off any space for the new books I bought and the kitchen table has juicing remains scattered across it. I think we should have enough time tonight to get some cleaning done. Hopefully.

Weekends

Our trip to the Lake of the Ozarks went well. We stayed at a lake house some of my family own; for most of the time it was just Emily and me. We did a lot of sleeping and sitting around and reading and we swam in the lake some (the water was like 70 degrees). It was nice and relaxing. My sister came down on Friday and she drove us around the area on Saturday. We didn't talk much, due to the lack of both of our communication skills, but I thought it was nice to spend time with her. My mom came down for the rest of the weekend and brought her boyfriend Alan. I had a good time and I think Emily did was well, for the most part.

I can't believe it's already Thursday. Where does the time go? I'd love to have a game night tomorrow, but our kitchen table is still a mess.

I was thinking of going to Fall-con in St Paul on Sunday (I'm working pretty much all day on Saturday). I haven't been to any cons before, so I thought this would be a nice introduction. I'd love to go to more cons, especially the big ones (Comic-Con, E3, PAX, Origins, Dragon-Con, etc.). Someday.

Who's in charge here? Wait, I am?

I feel tired. Not surprisingly consider the amount of work I have this week as well as my inability to go to bed at a reasonable time in most cases. Tonight (Wednesday night) is the only night I have free. Ok, technically I have Friday night free, but that's usually Game Night and I canceled last week and feel bad about canceling again. I wish Game Night was at a local gaming store and there was a group of people that regularly attended so I wouldn't feel so bad about not going every once in a while.

Really it seems like lately anytime I want something to happen, it's up to me to take charge and be the person who works out all the details and shoulders most of the responsibility. I understand that someone has to, but it can get a little tiring. There's game night, there's D&D, there's various parties, there's house repairs. These are things I want to do, but I want to be the guest person. The one who gets invited and can show up and have fun. I don't want to have to be the one inviting everyone and working out timing issues and locations and activities and yadda, yadda, yadda. I know, I know, if I want to do these things the only way to make sure it happens is to actually set it up myself.

I mean, I like playing board games. I have games I haven't played yet (though not that many anymore). Unfortunately, there's no local game store/club where people can get together and play games, so I started up game night to play with my friends. But that makes it my responsibility and I know that some of my friends enjoy getting together and playing games as well. The problem is that every once in a while I don't feel up to having a game night (like say I've been working 60 hours all week), but I feel obligated to do it for the sake of others.

I enjoying playing RPG's. Dungeons and Dragons came out with a 4th Edition and I wanted to try it out. The friends I used to roleplay with still lived in the cities and I was inconsiderate of Emily and came home late a few nights, making her less than happy to see me drive up to the cities to play with them. Plus they got addicted to World of Warcraft. If I wanted to play D&D, I would need to get a group together and be the DM. Don't get me wrong, I have enjoyed DM'ing, but it requires a lot more work beforehand than just being a player. It also requires more during play as well. Maybe I would enjoy it more if I had created the adventure myself instead of going off of a module, but I've only just started DM'ing and I haven't played in a whole lot of games either, so I don't have much faith in my skills to do that, but that's a whole different issue. I would love to just play in a game, immerse myself into a single character instead of 100's of them.

Emily helps out quite a bit, and I love her for it. It's awesome to have a wife who wants to see me happy and helps as much as she can. But it still leaves the stuff up to me and she's not as excited about it as I am, so she has no interest in taking the lead on any this stuff.

I don't know, maybe I'll feel better after this vacation and once I've caught up on sleep.

Thunderspire Labrynth, 2

Having received the package Bairwin required, they decided to make the trip back to Winterhaven right away. They spent another week traveling the trade routes and arrived in town, much to Bairwin's surprise. He gladly paid them for their troubles and complimented them on their unexpected speed. With a little more coin in their purse, they headed back to Thunderspire.

Upon arriving, they noticed that they were treated a little differently than before. They received wary looks and were given a wider berth. A few people would quickly cross the street to get away from them. Nachi seemed to take some enjoyment of this new treatment and scared a few passerbys. At one point, Sophana caught what looked like Brugg chuckling out of the side of his mouth when seeing this.

Saul wanted to get a magical item he had in mind so they went to shop at House Azaer. He didn't have nearly enough gold to pay for what it, so he performed a ritual to create fool's gold and entered the store with Nachi, and Sophana. They met Noristo, a young tiefling merchant with a sly smile, and were able to pass off the fake gold as real gold and left with their new goods. Soon after Allyria and Tasil entered to look around. Allyria unknowingly caught the eye of Noristo, who offered to personally help moisturize her tail. Allyria turned red (which is quite a feat for a tiefling) and stumbled out the door with Tasil close behind snickering.

The group decided to question the duergar in the Grimmerzhul Trading Post about a letter they found in the Bloodreaver's hideout. Nachi attempted to intimidate his way into some information and while everyone was distracted Tasil stole one of the bracelets on display. Nachi's attempts were met with near-open hostility and they decided to take a different approach. Nachi went up to Brugg and informed him that he had proof that the Grimmerzhul clan is purchasing slaves and that he might want to get the mages involved. Brugg informed him that while he respects the group after hearing some of the rumors about them, unless there's something happen within the Seven Pillared Hall, he and the mages don't care what happens.

Finding no help, they decided to take matters into their own hands. They returned to the Chamber of Eyes (the Bloodreaver hideout) to find it empty and tracked the slaves from there. With the help of some teamwork, Sophana is able to track them through the tunnels until they ended at the Horned Hold, a minotaur fortress that the Grimmerzhul converted into a stronghold. It consists of three parts connected by bridges over a deep chasm.

Upon arriving at the entrance they were greeted by some orcs inside the gated entrance. After dealing with some crossbow shots and spear stabs, Nachi teleported past the gate in the hopes of finding a lever to open the door. Unfortunately all he found were some angry orcs and a duergar guard, who quickly surrounded him. The rest of the party was left outside, fighting as best as they could through the gate while Tasil attempted to unlock it. Nachi got knocked unconscious numerous times before everyone was able to take control of the room. After a short rest and some healing, the party took a look around at their surroundings. They found a hall with a few locked doors and examined the rooms behind said doors. One of the doors opened into a armory, which they proceeded to ransack. The other doors opened into empty barracks with footlockers filed with nothing but clothing and hygiene products, much to the disappointment of Tasil.

The next door held back the sounds of roaring fires and hammers hitting anvils. The party gathered their courage and burst through the door to meet a couple of duergars and orcs working in a blacksmith area being directed by a large duergar covered in soot carrying a huge hammer and barking out orders. Within no time a fight broke out with the smithy flinging spells and slurs in equal measure. It was a hard fought battle, but in the end the heroes won out.

They searched the area and took what finished weapons they could find. They also stumbled upon the smithy's bedroom and were surprised to see an ornamental scepter that resembled the one Gendar talked about. Other than that they found little of value.

Having dealt with two groups of foes, everyone was feeling a little worn out and decided to take their chances and sleep in a small abandoned room off of one of the barracks they discovered. Saul magically locked all the doors they had explored and the group went to sleep with Nachi going into his trance to keep an eye out. Within the first hour, Saul was awakened with the knowledge that one of his locks had been broken. He quietly crept up to Nachi to let him know what was going on. Hour after hour another lock was broken, some leading to their room and some leading away. The rest of the party needed 8 hours to be fully rested and it wasn't until the ninth hour that the duergar search party unlocked the door leading to them. With everyone else well rested, the party sprang to the defense, taking out duergars left and right. Nachi and Tasil were able to take out an invisible scout before he could warn the rest of the hold. Together they decided to head down the hall the scout was head toward and find the slaves.

Got the time?

This week is going to be busy. I'm working at least 1 job every day this week, starting this past Sunday (Just Food: Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday; Monster Games: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday). Plus we're taking a week long vacation next week, so we need to prepare for that as well. You know the usual packing and cleaning and preparing that goes on before any long trip.

I learned a great tip about Facebook. Did you know that there's a way to hide status updates of people you don't care to hear from? There is. I don't know how long it's been there but I've been wanting this for a while. Just hover your mouse over one of the unwanted updates on your home page. A little box titled “Hide” will appear in the top right corner of the update's box. Click on the “Hide” box and select “Hide ___” where the person's name is in the blank and you're done. Now you'll never have to see the person's updates again, unless you really want to. This is great, now I 'm more likely to see updates from people I want to see. Yea!

Fun times?

Last night I had the largest single transaction I've ever dealt with come through. It totaled $1825.95. It was a whole butt loads worth of special orders for Farm House. That check was over half of my whole nights total. Crazy huh?

The facebook app for my iPod touch stopped working, because they updated it so that it required the iPhone 3.0 upgrade, which I hadn't purchased yet. But it seems like more and more apps are requiring it to work now, which is annoying since Apple is charging for it. So I broke down and bought the upgrade. Surprisingly, the upgrade only costs about $6 instead of the $11 it used to be. I still think it's crazy that they're charging for it, but whatever, I ended up buying it didn't I? I really hope it makes my iPod run better. The annoying thing is that I started this in the morning and it took a half hour just to download it, then it had to update the iPod and because of the update, now it has to restore it, which means uploading all the apps, videos, and music files I originally had on there. That's close to 30 gigs worth of stuff. I ended up just leaving it at home to finish while I went to work. Hopefully it will be done by lunchtime. It's going to be weird not having it for the day.

I'm not sure if you heard (or if you care), but Connor is sick so the “party” at Kathie Smith's is canceled. I hope Connor starts feeling better and I'm sure Kathie will host another party when the timings right. In the mean time, Susan's offered to have Game Night at her place. I think that'll be nice, I know she enjoys playing games, but can't make it out since someone has to keep an eye on sleeping kids. So for tonight, Game Night will be held at the Beeby's.