Pacific Northwest: Part VII (Walking Around Seattle)

30 August 2007 | sila | | Family Pics, Friends
 

After the Space Needle, the first thing we did was get ourselves an early lunch at the Bite of Seattle. It's a big food fair where tons of local restaurants manned little booths and we got to taste a bunch of different foods pretty cheaply. It was a smorgasbord of delights. I ended up eating fresh shrimp rolls, pad thai, and a bunch of other little snacks. However, it turns out, I was so busy looking through all the booths and foods that I didn't actually take that many pictures! None of the stalls! Just this one of Vincent and Lil while Lil ate her lunch:

Vincent and Lil by a funky fountain
 

Pacific Northwest: Part VI (Seattle and the Space Needle)

29 August 2007 | sila | | Family Pics, Friends
 

I meant to blog more over the weekend but I got distracted with other stuff (don't even ask me what because I can't seem to account for too much of the time, except I did watch 2 movies at home on Saturday night). But excuses aside, here's the next part about our travels in the Pacific Northwest. We picked Lil up at the train station, and then turned in for the night. The next morning, we had breakfast and went off to see Seattle!

But on the way there, we saw a semi truck that was on fire (did Starscream manage to score a direct hit on Optimus Prime?). The EMTs were there and firemen were putting out the fire. I whipped out my handy dandy camera and got a quick shot of it but after the last of the flames were put out:

Fire's out
 

Pacific Northwest: Part V (Lavender Farm and Back to Seattle)

24 August 2007 | sila | | Family Pics, Friends
 

So many things to blog about, so little time to actually do it! Picking up the travel from the Dungeness Spit, we drove east to Kingston to catch the ferry back to Seattle. On the way there though, we kept seeing signs for lavender farms so we took a quick detour:

Lavender Farm
 

Pacific Northwest: Part IV (Dungeness Spit)

15 August 2007 | sila | | Family Pics, Friends
 

After our disappointing Hurricane Ridge outing, we had to recover so we opted for an early lunch. We were planning to have a big sushi-buffet feast for dinner, so if I recall correctly, my lunch consisted of clam chowder, a few of Vin's fries, and a slice of chocolate cake. A highly nutritional meal, no? ;-) But, lo and behold, after lunch, as we drove onwards, the sun came back out. We decided to risk stopping at Dungeness Spit.

Dungeness Signboard
 

Pacific Northwest: Part I (Hoh Rainforest)

09 August 2007 | sila | | Family Pics, Friends
 

Last month, we packed our bags and took a flight to Seattle, WA for an almost week-long Pacific Northwest extravaganza. We met up with our friend Vincent (a citizen of Gloomville), who went to good old ACS way back when, and who is an Admin at the Unofficial ACS Alumni Forum, and he had thoughtfully planned an itinerary for us. We arrived in the evening and Vincent took us out to a lovely dinner (but we didn't take any pictures because we were so out of it from the flight that I forgot to take pictures). We checked in to our hotel and Vincent said goodbye, but he would be back early the next morning for the first thing on our Pacific Northwest itinerary was to go to the Olympic Peninsula for a couple of days.

This means an early morning ferry ride on a weekday (to escape the huge summer crowds). Thanks to Vincent's excellent planning, we didn't even have to wait to get on!

Edmonds Ferry Terminal
 

Who, Me?

04 August 2007 | sila | | Friends
 

Well! It's been a while, and I apologize for being so slow about it, but it's been a busy July (see? now August oredi..). Since Hijack Queen tagged me, could it be true? Am I? Really? Little ol' me? Well, shucks! Thanks :-)

I Rock?

Thanks, Queen! Let's party like it's 1999!

So let's pass it on. I tag you, Rockin' Girls:

1. LiLiaN who, is rockin' towards her PhD

2. Athena who is in a rockin' new grove

3. PreciousKambing on rockin' Planet Kambing

Rock on, girls!! (Sila gives the "rockin'" hand sign and sticks her tongue out a la Gene Simmons, and rocks on to the sunset to the soundtrack from This is Spinal Tap)

 

Gary's Book Nominated for 3 Ennies

19 July 2007 | Hisham | | Friends, Role Playing Games
 

Children of the Horned Rat - Black IndustriesCongratulations to Gary Astleford for getting the book he co-wrote for Black Industries, Children of the Horned Rat nominated for 3 Ennie awards. The nominations are for Best Interior Art, Best Writing and Product of the Year.

Product of the Year is a hell of a big deal, of course, but I am very proud of him for the nomination for Best Writing. I seem to remember a conversation with Gary a long time ago. It was on how gaming products nowadays focus too much on rules, or intersperse rules with fluff on the campaign world... as opposed to try not breaking the fourth wall and write the book as if it was genuinely from that campaign universe. Then finally have all the custom rules for the book and such be an afterthought but easily accessible and indexed when required.

Now, going by the subtext of the Best Writing award, which is, "Awarded for the book containing the best prose and descriptive text (ie."cream" or "fluff")", I'd like to think Gary had a lot to do with it.

Congratulations, man.

Skavens are cool.

Was Brown Jenkins a skaven?

 

Fantastic Four: Meme Redux

11 July 2007 | Hisham | | Friends, Humour
 

Another meme arrives and since my fellow bloggenstein who happens to also be my sister has tagged me... Wait, are there any rules about tagging your fellow blogmate based in the same weblogsite? No matter. I shall give this meme a whatfor like it's never been given a whatfor before.

A blog whatfor!

A blorgthwthfor!

 

My Debut as a G.I. Joe

06 April 2007 | Hisham | | Friends
 

Lookit! Grenades!Shane, who's made some great dioramas at Joe Dios, has unveiled his latest custom G.I. Joe figure, a jungle trooper codenamed Monsoon.

I'd like to add to Monsoon's background: He's carried a lot of emotional baggage on his shoulders, ever since May 1999 where he faked sick leave to catch the premiere of Star Wars Episode 1 The Phantom Menace in the theatres. During the screening, his squad was called for a simple milk run, a reconnaissance mission to the jungles of Papua New Guinea to investigate the reports of a new Cobra bioweapons lab. There was an ambush and everyone was killed in action, except Monsoon who was watching Star Wars. Now a member of the Last Chance Squad of the G.I. Joes, Monsoon has a strangely adverse psychological reaction whenever Star Wars is mentioned.

Click on the link to check out Monsoon at Joe Dios. On the figure itself I only have one thing to comment: "Damn! I am hella thin."

 

On the Topic of New Daughters...

28 February 2007 | Hisham | | Friends
 

Gary and Amy both went out and gotten for Stephen a new baby sister! Welcome to the world, Madeline.

Don't worry about it; you're in good hands. You have the best parents and brother to take care of you.

 

5 Favourite Movies - A Meme

16 January 2007 | Hisham | | Friends, Movie Review
 

Tagged by the Hijack Queen with her metahuman abilities to hijack any sort of forum thread - quite an impressive feat if I might add - I will attempt to oblige her with my top favourite movies of all time as of today.

The "as of today" statement is a proviso, cause the movies can sort themselves differently as time goes by.

If this was 20 years ago, there would probably be two hundred science fiction and fantasy movies crammed into just the five spots. Since this is the here and now I will cut it down to one movie per spot, and diversify genres somewhat.

Hey, you know what? Let's put in a mini-review for each just for the hell of it.

 

Shanes Spectacularly Shows Off His Joes

04 January 2007 | Hisham | | Friends
 

My pal Shane, seen here as a COBRA Crimson Guard commander, has the best collection of G.I. Joes I've ever seen. Now it's not just the quantity, but his Joe figures is used thoroughly in the photos Shane took and posted at his JoesDios page where he goes by the monicker, LordRaven. There are quite a number of excellently composed photos in his gallery.

Check it out here.

 

5 Things You Didn’t Know About Me - A Meme

29 December 2006 | Hisham | | Friends
 

Brem has tagged me! So I guess to allow this meme to survive and spread out to masses I have to list out the 5 things that I believe the lot of you do not know about me.

So what are five things I think I should tell you people about?

 

A Tag! A Meme! A Meme Tag!

03 November 2006 | Hisham | | Friends
 

Diamond Lil tagged us with a meme about blogging it would so we have to oblige some answers to a set of questions.

1. Are you happy/satisfied with your blog, with its content and look? Does your family know about your blog?

I am somewhat happy with my blog, but not really satisfied. I tried getting it to make me coffee at nights but it just sits there immobile in my computer. I might not be talking to it correctly.

Yes, our family knows about the blog. We tried to ensure all of our relatives know about and read it regularly, even the ones without any computer or internet connection. Unfortunately none of them liked me kidnapping some of them in the middle of the night for me to perform surgery to implant neural Wi-Fi datacommunication transceivers in their brain, so they could browse the blog whenever they're in satellite range.

 

The Quest for a Fregg

08 April 2006 | Hisham | | Friends
 
A fregg is a perfect fried egg, according to my buddy Ben Flood-Paddock of Brighton. And he has put up a page that would chronicle the quest to create such an egg. To read about and view the pictures of his endeavour (and a couple of pictures of my own freggs there) go to Chrome Eggs on his website Colonial Chrome.

There you will also find some wonderful deckplans of ships such as the Skipray Blastboat, the CEC R10 "Republic Cruiser" transport, the Haor Chall "Sheathipede" shuttle and the Wild Gundark freighter type: the YZ-900.

Anyway, stay tuned for more pictures and tales on the journey to achieve the ultimate fregg.

 

South Park Portrait

10 December 2005 | Hisham | | Friends, Humour
 
Brem posted an entry which reminded me of something I posted in the ACS Sitiawan Forums last March. A Flash South Park portrait generator! Appears to be Version 2.0 now. You can access the page from Brem's link as the link in the ACS Forums now also points to the new location. Check out more pictures at Brem's page and in the ACS thread.

Here's me in March:

I broke the dam.
 

COBRA's Crimson Guard

24 November 2005 | Hisham | | Artwork, Friends
 
Here is another painting and deviantArt upload I made in the last couple of days. COBRA's elite Crimson Guard platoon with its leader unmasked, who is based on my pal Shane Welin, companion of Duckie, who's in a G.I. Joe mood this month.

Click on the link under the image below to view its deviantArt page.
Crimson Guard Platoon Leader

Crimson Guard Platoon Leader
 

Harloth Graf, Naboo Guard

14 November 2005 | Hisham | | Artwork, Friends, Star Wars
 
Here's a portrait of Harloth Graf the Naboo Guard in the Star Wars RPG Sabredart campaign I posted earlier, using Photoshop to pencil and paint the piece. I wish I had a better photo reference of player Stu Cunningham for it, though. Close enough, Stu? Or more work needed? ;-)

Harloth Graf of Naboo
 

The Meme Tagged thingamabob...

04 October 2005 | sila | | Friends
 

Since Lilian tagged Hisham and I for the meme thing and Hisham actually did his, here's my meme. Quick story about "Meme", when I first saw it, I thought "grandmother?". My friend and colleague Jo's granddaughter calls her "Meme" (pronounced meh-may). But anyway - my contribution:

 

I Hate People T-shirts

03 October 2005 | Hisham | | Friends
 

Chris and Derek over at CCDO are selling their world-famous* "I Hate People" t-shirt on the blog. Read the entry here. Then buy it! ;)

* Okay, I exaggerate.

Awesome T-shirt