No news is…. No news.

Still no news on the house; the post has not arrived at the solicitors, so it might yet be ok, but at time of writing (9-11am*) it isn’t. I’m going to call again in about an hour, so watch this space.

 

I managed to do about an hour of Dutch last night, going through the vocabulary of the earlier chapters, which was a pain, but got me some sense that the day had not been wasted. I’m meant to go to my Dutch course tonight, but I’m not enthused; astoundingly,  I managed to muster enough enthusiasm to pack my Dutch books – just in case I decide that I’m going to go tonight, but the omens are not too good.

 

Later on, I also spoke with Col_Cruet, who first confirmed this weekends plans (Fuji Hiro 1-30pm, Saturday) & then talked me through setting up & hosting a game on Dawn of War. After several attempts, we finally managed to get set up & enjoyed a multiplayer game., though there were more than a few aborted attempts, which was a real pain. Still & all, for the first time I got to see the post-game screen without it hanging; in retrospect, I think I know what it was – when I was going through the 15-minute irritation that is setting a game up (going back & forth between the desktop & the game), I encountered a windows box in the background asking me something about a graphics card (honestly, I forget what). I clicked on ok and since then, it seems to work. I ask myself, was this hanging in the background, patiently waiting for me to click on it? Perhaps this was the cause of the problem…?

 

It was a useful learning experience in that I learned that you can upgrade buildings (specifically listening posts so that they can carry weapons), that groups of forces can be collected & selected with the touch of a button & that 3 sets of 3-tau stealth units are completely useless against hundreds & hundreds of orcs, even with friendly player assistance. Go figure.

 

In other news, I had odd dreams about moving to New Zealand; I dreamed that I was there with Lyra, but without C, with the entire thing having a rather bittersweet feel to it all. Mind you, I blame all weird dreams on the combination of the Discovery Channel playing something about Auckland last night & also the cat as she was trying to smother me in my sleep; I woke up with her across my wind-pipe, a kind of warm & furry (and gently purring) garrotte…

 

S

no news is bad news

No sign of the bank deposit form as yet.