Germany 2019 day 4

When I woke up today I packed most of my things and then went down to the last breakfast. While having breakfast one of the receptionists came into the dining room along with a guy who looked like a construction worker. The receptionist asked around for anyone staying in room 311. Which ofc happened to be my room. When I said it was my room he asked if they could have access to it because there was a problem with the heating in all of the hotel. If I hadn't been diligent with putting the Do Not Disturb sign on my door every time I left the room they probably would have gone in anyway. I asked if they could wait 30 minutes to an hour because then I was checking out. He wasn't happy about it but accepted. The only probable reason I could think of why they needed my room is because my window opened up on to the roof. We finished breakfast and then went to pack the last few things and met up in the lobby. We checked out and went to the fair. Before packing up my laptop I made sure to write a bad review on TripAdvisor.

I was happy to be away from the hotel - nothing about that place equalled a good stay. There wasn't enough light in the room - if my laptop keyboard wasn't lit up I wouldn't have been able to see it at all, and the walls were too thin - during most of our stay there I wouldn't have needed my own alarm; I woke up in time from the alarm from the guy in the room next to me. Anyone who knows me can attest that I am not a light sleeper in any way.

Our time at the fair was spent mostly as the previous days and then we left for the train station around 3pm to take the train to Düsseldorf airport. And once again the German train system decided to give me anxiety. We had looked up beforehand which departure train we would need to get to the airport on time. When we got to the train station it wasn't even up on the big departure screen yet and there was less than 30 minutes to go (the Swedish departure boards usually show up to an hour or more). Some Norwegians ahead of us in the queue for tickets couldn't make sense of the ticket machine so the station guy had to help them. It really isn't all that complicated - just change the language to English first and it all makes sense. When we got our tickets the departure train for the time we had checked still hadn't shown up on the board. There was less than fifteen minutes left. With around ten minutes to go the train showed up on the board, but it didn't say anything about the airport and the station guy had gone up in smoke. We asked around a bit. Most of the people there were from the fair and were going in the same direction. Then suddenly the station guy showed up again out of nowhere (have the Germans invented teleportation?) and we asked him and it was indeed the train that said nothing about the airport but had the right departure time. So we rushed to the track with less than five minutes to go - and then ofc the train is ten minutes late. When the train arrived and we got on and got seats I took out my phone and got on to Deutsche Bahn's website, changed it to English and looked for our departure and train. Found it and it was indeed going to the airport. Relief. Note to DB: it could be a good idea to show on all screens and signs which trains are going to airports. Confused and stressed tourists aren't at all nice to deal with (speaking from experience).

We arrived at Düsseldorf Flughafen Bahnhof (the word Flughafen is so much fun to say that I kept saying Flughafen instead of airport throughout our whole stay) and after a quick look at the screen (double checking it because we are great at confusing ourselves lol) we got on the SkyTrain to the airport.

Düsseldorf airport is a mess. Just as last year. We had to go around the security to get to our check-in desks and because Germany hasn't caught on to the whole self check-in service we had to stand in line. I had forgotten how much we used to queue at airports before self check-in was a thing. Which it still isn't in Germany. After much waiting we got our boarding passes and dropped our luggage and then went back around the security so that we could enter it. Great design, guys! The security control went pretty smoothly until they got to the woman before us. Apparantly a first time flyer who couldn't be bothered to read signs. She hadn't prepared anything before it was her turn and she had brought her entire make-up and toileteries bag with her carry-on and hadn't put anything into the little plastic bags so the security guy had to ask her to leave the queue and she put up a lot of fuss about it, but finally left the queue so my dad and me could prop down our coats and laptops and laptop cases and phones in the crates push them through and then smoothly go through the scanner. Get out of our way, we've done this before! :P

After security we went to find our gate and then had dinner at a restaurant close by. We both chose the burger and a last German beer (no kölsch in Düsseldorf though). The burger was really good but had some interesting components. Like coleslaw made from red beets so the burger was all pink/purple in the bottom :3 and stewed onions in the top. Still made for a great burger that we probably wouldn't be able to find anywhere in Sweden! We also met up with a group of Swedes at the restaurant and had a last chat with them before boarding our plane. This plane was bigger and the ride was much smoother. No delays, and when we arrived in Copenhagen our bags were almost the first ones to arrive! We managed to catch the train we had planned and the switch in Malmö to the commuter train out to my hometown was smooth as ever. Mum picked us up at the station and then we spent a few hours relaxing in the living room before bedtime.

Germany 2019 day 3

Today has been mostly in the line of yesterday. A lot of walking and talking, but while yesterday was more about exploring and possibly finding new contacts today was more about renewing old ties and talking to old contacts. Most of my dad's old contacts are aware who I am so today's wtf moment was when one of the contacts asked whether I was new in the company. Dude, I was born in the company. I didn't say dude, but otherwise that's what I said. I've been helping out for as long as I can remember and I've been working since I was 13 and legally could.

The day passed incredibly quickly. This year my dad decided to participate in the international Rotary meeting at the fair and I tagged along. I spent most of the time sitting a bit to the side, not really participating. But when a Japanese guy showed up my interest was piqued. After the meeting I decided that I wanted to have a look at the two Japanese companies that were present at the fair. The biggest one was a lot of fun. They had a lot of inherently Japanese things that I had never tried or hadn't tried in ages and they were all so impressed and happy when I talked to them in Japanese. Even if what I said was mostly yes, thank you, and I understand.

After the fair we went back to the hotel and changed clothes and then we met up at the Dominikaner. We had originally planned to go to Haxenhaus to have dinner, but we ended up att Früh, because most of the people we were with didn't want haxe for dinner and Früh does other dishes besides haxe a lot better than Haxenhaus. So we went to Früh and I had haxe for dinner. Delicious as always :D If I just have one chance per year to have haxe, then I will have haxe.

Tomorrow is the last day at the fair so we will check out from the hotel in the morning and then bring our luggage to the fair, and then go directly to the airport from the fair in the afternoon.

Germany 2019 day 2

Today was a day with a lot of walking. I woke up at 7am and after getting ready I walked down to have breakfast with my dad at 7.30am. Breakfast was as good as a hotel breakfast usually is, though the flow was odd so there was a lot of walking back and forth to get things, also I would've liked the bacon to be more crispy.

After breakfast we went back to our rooms to get ready and then walked to the train station to get on a train to the hall. Almost any train will do and it's just one stop.

Most of the day was spent walking around. We talked a lot to the Swedish exhibitors as well as my dad's contacts from Spain. We did tie some contacts with people from Denmark, Poland, Belgium and Ukraine which might lead to some new and interesting things. Mostly it all depends on the cost of transport. Which was one of the major reasons we didn't talk to anybody from the UK because as things are nobody can predict what will happen to transport costs and customs after Brexit has been completed.

Most of the time I spent quiet and listening, but I would like to credit myself with some ideas. More than my language abilities (which don't really matter because we never speak to anyone who knows French or Japanese) I believe that my occasional ideas is why my dad asks me to come along to these things. I have literal life-long experience with his business, but my dad and I see things differently and so we think of different things and I believe that's sometimes of use to him.

Reason why we never speak French or Japanese? French-speaking countries usually only deal in cookies or chocolate which are of no interest to my dad's business, and when it comes to Japanese the transport is either too expensive or the expiration date is too short. Also there are hardly any Japanese exhibitors at this thing. We talked to a few during my first year at ISM back in 2016, but nothing came of it due to above reasons. I really like Japanese things and would love for my dad to deal with them, but from what I've seen in Japan and otherwise, none of their things really fit what he does so dealing with Japanese things would mean opening a brand new chapter.

As is almost traditional we had bockwurst for lunch and then spent some more time walking around the fair. These days are odd because it feels like we're doing the same thing for ages and it feels like time doesn't move but then it's suddenly 4pm and you start to wonder where the day went.

Just before 6pm we left the fair hall and went back to the hotel. We changed clothes and then met up with some friends at the bar Dominikaner, which is just across the street from our hotel. This bar has become our meeting point over the years and we always meet up here for a couple of pre-dinner kölsch (beer). Anytime anyone at a bar or restaurant asks what you want to drink, always answer kölsch. After our traditional beers we walked over to a restaurant our friends knew of and had dinner there. And then we spent a whole lot of time there just talking and hanging out. Around 10pm we went back to our respective hotels.

Now there'll be a little bit of reading and then it's sleepy time. Breakfast at 8am tomorrow!

Germany 2019 day 1 - The day which was more miss than hit

So this has been a pretty crazy day with hardly anything going our way. We left my parents' place around 11am to go to the airport. We had done the online check-in thing the day before and so we just went to one of those check-in machines to print our boarding passes and luggage tags. Then we went to do the bag drop. The lady there shows my dad ahead to the queue to the bag drop, but she stops me and tells me to go somewhere else because I already have the tag. She says I don't have to stand in line, I can just scan it myself and sent my bag away. My dad has the tag too so when he hears this he leaves the queue to go with me to the automatic bag drop. My dad's bag scans fine, but ofc mine doesn't. So it takes us a couple tries to make it scan right. But finally the machine approves and sends my bag away. We move on to the security checkpoint, which for once is very fast (at least we had that working for us) and then we move on to exchange money and grab something to eat before our plane departs. After lunch we start walking to our gate which is usually somewhere in the middle of the airport, but this year it had been moved to the farthest end possible and it took us probably 20 minutes to even get there. We sit down and wait and when there's ten minutes until boarding starts they announce that the plane is overbooked by eight people and they would like eight people to volunteer to stay behind in Copenhagen for a few more hours and then go to Düsseldorf via Frankfurt later in the evening. Also receiving €150 as compensation. Three people volunteered. When it was actually time for the boarding to start they upped the compensation to €250 and two more volunteered. Still not enough so they picked eight people according to the list that would have to stay behind. Luckliy neither my dad or I was on that list. We got on the plane (the tiniest plane I've ever seen, if anyone was obese they wouldn't have even been able to get on it). Took forever to get the boarding done because the plane was so tiny and then we just stood there waiting. Then we finally got rolling and then we stood there again for a long time. Then we got rolling and we got all the way to the edge of the driveways. Where we had to stop again because they were deicing the plane before us and that took forever. We finally left Copenhagen 45 minutes late.

The pilot rushed through the whole thing to the point where only the members got appropriate service and the rest of us had to chug our coffee, without even getting a chance to buy something to eat should we want to. We land in Düsseldorf and the deboarding was just as much of a mess as the boarding because tiny planes have no room to move about in, and to stand up straight by your seat you'd have to be no taller than 5 feet or 150 cm. Bus to the terminal, pick up our bags, then from the terminal to the airport train station we got on the Sky Train (which is pretty cool tbh) and then we hurried to buy our tickets for the train only to miss it by 30 seconds and then have to wait 25 minutes for the next one. 40 minutes spent on the train and then I was really looking forward to just get to my room and relax a bit before dinner. This day had different plans.

We got to the hotel, which wasn't the same as we usually stay at. There were two receptionists, both of whom seemed completely uninterested in doing their jobs and totally lacked any kind of service-mindedness. First of all we had to fill out a form to make ourselves exempt from the city tax because we were there to work, and then we had to fill out yet another form. I think some kind of guest information form. They had computers but this hotel seemed very old-school. They even had that wall with actual room keys hanging from it. Actual keys. Wow. I've been staying at different hotels in different countries almost every year for the past 25 years and I've never seen that. That's extremely old-school to me.

I got to my room by way of an elevator the scared the shit out of me every time it stopped because it stopped with a slight bounce making me feel like it would just drop. Then I got to my room and struggled with the lock and as soon as I got the door open I could hear the radiator clanking. I tried turning the knob on it but that just changed the noise from clanking to a very loud hissing. Great. I decided to try to grab my power bank for my poor dying phone from my suitcase before going down to the lobby and demand a new room. Couldn't open my suitcase. I have never set a code, it's always been on the default 000. But the dials must've gotten rolled around somehow during transport and somehow I had received a code without meaning to. I started to try combinations, but just got more pissed by the annoyance of the constant clanking/hissing from the radiator that I just grabbed all my stuff and went to my dad's room. He struggled a bit with the suitcase but managed to get it open. And then he came with me to my room to have a look at the radiator. He also struggled with the lock to my door and he couldn't get the radiator to shut up. So we went down to the lobby and I asked for another room. She said to wait five minutes and while we waited she checked in another guest and then told us to wait another five minutes. Another guest came down and complained that he couldn't have the room he'd got due to his asthma and the smoke from the nextdoor restaurant got in there. He got a new room, no problems. Then I asked. The receptionists asked what the problem was with the room I told them and they told me that they were full and couldn't change today unless I wanted a room at a sister hotel. I asked them why they could change rooms for the guest before me but not for me, and they pretended to not know what I was talking about. But after some annoyed talking and me actually knowing the room from which the earlier guest had changed, I managed to get the room above the restaurant. It was quiet and slightly bigger. Much better. When I grabbed my luggage from my old room I decided to slip them my business card where it clearly states my position at the hotel I'm working at. Like a quiet way to tell them that I know every trick in the book, I know what they are doing and what they should be doing and how they should behave. When the receptionist noticed she tried to get me to sign another form because I had given her a business card. I took the card back and went to my new room absolutely fuming. I quickly unpacked and then went back to my dad's room. I had to walk by the lobby and the receptionist calls to me that we already had that form and "my" business card. No, they don't. They have my dad's business card attached to the form that exempts us from the city tax. I told her that if she had bothered to look at the cards she'd see they are not the same. But that it doesn't matter.

My dad and I left and went to look for dinner. We ended up inside the old and trusty Löwenbräu and each had a really good burger and a couple beers. Then we decided to have an early night. We each went up to our rooms and I had a shower and changed into jammies.

The situation with my room and the receptionists and the general appearance of this hotel appalls me. If we had acted anything even close to how those two receptionists were acting we'd get an earful from the manager. Their behaviour was lacking in all aspects. No interest, barely any attention, no smiles, no courtesy, no service-mindedness. They did the minimum required for their guests but nothing more, nothing extra. If a guest had come down to us complaining about a room and asking for a change we would've changed that room, no questions asked. All we need is a reason for the change. Even if the hotel was fully booked. Because if all guests haven't arrived yet, then we have the means to change. Changing to another hotel is a last resort thing, it's not something you do just because somebody wants to change a room early in the evening.

I've half a mind to actually tell them off tomorrow and slip them my card again. And also for once I'll be the one to leave a scathingly bad review on TripAdvisor, rather than having to respond to one.

My past 5 books: YA, a classic and fantasy

1. A Sky in the Deep, by Adrienne Young. This is a book I got in an OwlCrate a while back. I started reading not expecting much, but it turned out to be really good. I wouldn't say that I love it and the plot is pretty simple and common, but it's a plot that works. It really works even though an attentive reader sees pretty much every twist coming from a mile away. Even so I really enjoyed reading this book and it was one of those reads that I just didn't want to put down.







2. Thérèse Raquin, by Émile Zola. I read this as an old Swedish edition that I got from my grandmother. I thought I had read it before, but I mixed up the title with Thérèse Desqueyroux. This book was a lot less "classic French" than I expected. Not so much melancholy, but more about moments and actions. I could draw parallells partly to Thérèse Desqueyroux, partly to Madame Bovary and partly (actually) to Le Père Goriot. It's this whole piece of life writing that makes it seem like so many classical French authors drew inspiration from each other. Anyway, I liked this book a lot more than I thought I would. French literature was so ruined for me when I studied French literature, that I just expect everything to be a hard read that the author has made more complicated than necessary just for sport. But this book was really good and I could actually see myself reading it again.

3. The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak. I've seen the movie more than once, and I really wanted to read the book. And I loved it. Just like I love the movie. Death is a great storyteller and the random tidbits throughout the book just struck my fancy rather than being annoying. I just really enjoyed this book.










4. Half A War, by Joe Abercrombie. Finally got around to reading the last book in this series! The funny thing with this series (and with Abercrombie's writing in general) is that you keep discovering that you don't really know this character liek you thought you did. In the first book I liked Yarvi and felt for him, in this third book I'd just rather he wasn't. Or didn't. Anything he did throughout this book I'd just rather he didn't. Yarvi is so ruthlessly ambitious and clever that he never once stops to consider what consequences his actions might have. Princess Skara was the main character of this book (like Yarvi was the main in the first, and Thorn Bathu was the main in the second) but Skara seemed so... flat. I actually had to pick out the book and read the back cover to remember her name. And Skara just kept giving me Elizabeth Swan vibes throughout the whole story. Thorn Bathu was consistently the best character in this book, just like she was in the last one. I also really liked Raith.

5. Sharp Ends, by Joe Abercrombie. Abercrombie's first collection of short stories. They all tie in to the books in the First Law universe. Same places and mostly familiar names, cities and characters. My favourite stories were the ones featuring Shevedieh. There's something romantic about thieves in fantasy settings that I just really enjoy. And if you add the obtuse Javre and the douche Carcolf to the mix you have a romantic comedy! Yes, really. Anything featuring the Northmen was also good but for an entirely different reason. I just love how blunt they are and how simple they make life seem even though they're surrounded by war and death. This was a really enjoyable collection. The stories I didn't enjoy reading were properly distanced between the really good stuff so when I was done with it the feeling was that it was really good. But there are some stories that were a drag. Like the very first one.

Elder Scrolls Online: When your guild goes completely mad, pt. 2

Exactly one year ago we did a lowbie run of Sanctum Ophidia. This year we decided to do the whole thing again, but up the stakes. Level 5-6 characters in Maw of Lorkhaj, which is generally accepted to be one of the most difficult trials (raids) in the game.

I kind of wanted to try dd-ing again, but I have the most experience healing Maw of Lorkhaj even on veteran (hardmode). In the end all the healer spots were taken so I signed up as dd. Upping the stakes once more as I chose a class I haven't had anything at all to do with before: Dragonknight.

The day finally arrived two days ago and we grouped up and went to MoL. Hilarity ensued almost immediately as half the group had forgotten to add the Mundus buff as well as forgotten to bring pots, buff food and soul gems. With that sorted out we started the trial. It demanded more attention than it usually does on normal, but most of us in the group had veteran experience of MoL and it was way easier than veteran. Still, we decided to go through the trial using as much veteran mechanics and tactics as possible, which helped quite a bit.

We completed Maw of Lorkhaj with only two wipes, which feels pretty alright for a mainly social guild doing a lowbie run for Christmas funzies.

Maw of Lorkhaj was completed in 1½ hours and so we decided to do a quick run of Aetherium Archives as well. That one is quick and easy even on veteran and it was quick and easy even on a level 7 character. Would've been faster if all of us could've just left the bookshelves alone :P

So after Aetherium Archives two of us had to leave but most of us wanted to do an experiment. In the newest trial Cloudrest there is a boss that requires bar-swapping as to not kill your whole group. But since we were level 7-8 and bar-swapping is unlocked at level 15... we simply wanted to find out if we would simply just wipe at this boss or if something different would happen. So we went to Cloudrest with our diminished group and tried out the boss. Funny thing! The bar-swapping mechanic simply didn't happen! So our diminished group killed the boss and then we decided that we might as well complete Cloudrest as well.

So two of us went to Craglorn to recruit the last two people. We said nothing about us being lowbies or that it being a special run. Just that we needed two more dds for nCR. Their reactions were hilarious! But they stayed with us and helped us clear Cloudrest, which was done very quickly.

So now we all have a level 10 character that has completed three trials! xD

Some streamed the event and some recorded it, so here's Luke's video:

Rollspel: Mutant År Noll - del 7

RP gör klart hamnen och påbörjar arbetet med en milis. De får besök av en person från villan en bit bort. Personen är en kvinna vid namn Barbro som berättar att hennes föräldrar har tillfångatagit en av Folket. Hon behöver Folkets hjälp att släppa honom fri och döda sina föräldrar. Index manipulerar och frågar varför Barbro vill döda sina föräldrar. "För att jag hatar dem." Kvark frågar varför hon hatar dem ("För det de gör är inte rätt.") och vad det är de gör ("De fångar oskyldiga människor och sätter dem i bur.") Danko frågar hur många de är i villan och får till svar att de är nio personer inklusive Barbro. Kvark frågar vem de har tagit och Barbro säger att det är en stor kille men hon vet inte vad han heter. Kvark frågar om de är kannibaler och Barbro säger ja. Jony frågar hur många vapen som finns. Pappa har ett gevär, Barbro en revolver, annars är det sånt som finns i hemmet typ brännbollsträn och knivar. Jony frågar om det finns några fler mutanter utöver fången. Barbro säger nej.

RP vandrar till villan och kommer fram på kvällen. Det första de ser är något stort i trädgården som ser ut som ett monster med en massa tänder. Index boostar Kvark att Förstå sig på. Kvark förstår att det är en s.k. dinosaurier av plast från tiden innan undergången.

Danko sparkar upp grinden och genast kommer fyra hundar springande och skällande, och han stänger grinden igen. Jony manipulerar Barbro och RP gömmer sig bakom staketet och Barbro går in till hundarna och stänger in dem i garaget. Utanför garaget ser RP en Volvo med husvagn. Båda två bepansrade. Kvark frågar om hennes syskon är med på att döda föräldrarna. Barbro är inte säker; hennes syskon har vuxit upp med det här så de förstår det inte.

Jony tittar in genom fönstret och ser vad han antar är föräldrarna i mysrummet. När han vänder sig om ser han buren hänga och dingla bredvid ytterdörren. Han känner igen personen i buren. Det är Jonts (fiende till Jony och Danko). Danko öppnar buren och tar med sig Jonts ut utanför staketet och slår honom med Lucille. Jonts svingar ett slag mot Danko men missar. Index förstår sig på hundarna och får veta att de är seniga och mellanstora (typ pitbullaktiga). Jony bussar sin hund på Jonts som tvärdör.

Danko smyger in i huset och in i köket och täcker över munnen på mannen där inne och drar ut honom i hallen. Danko försöker manipulera men misslyckas. Mannen (Halte Harry) tar upp en kniv ur fickan och hugger Danko. Danko lyckas parera och tar bara två skada. Index rusar in och hugger sin katana i Harry som tvärdör.

I hallen hör de umgänge och tonerna av Lill-Babs från mysrummet. Jony och Kvark rör sig från staketet till huset. Danko går ut ur hallen och käkar lite. Barbro kommer till hallen och frågar vad som har hänt. Index förklarar. Barbros gäer "Det är ok. Det är bara Harry. Han är helt med på mina föräldrars notor." Index drar ut kroppen i trädgården i en kundvagn och lootar. Hon hittar basebollträ, kniv, kundvagnen och en midjeväska full med grillkryddor.

Kvark går in i mysrummet. Två personer sitter i soffan och lyssnar på musik och umgås. Det är mamma Sveah och lillebror Keps-Olle. Jony går och ställer sig bakom Kvark och sikar på mamma. Jony får in en fullträff som bränner av Sveahs huvud. Keps-Olle vänder sig om och rusar mot andra sidan av rummet mot ett basebollträ. Barbro rusar dit från hallen. Index rusar in i huset och bort till de andra. Alla misslyckas med att övertyga Keps-Olle utom Danko som kommer inrusande och får honom att sänka vapnet med Barbros hjälp. Index förklarar situationen för Keps-Olle och frågar om han också vill ha hjälp att komma därifrån. Olle säger att han trivs i huset och med livsstilen men att han gärna kunde önska att de inte åt människor.

Kvark går in i sovrum nummer ett och ser en äldre man i säng med en hyfsat ung kvinna. Kvark skjuter och gubben tvärdör. Jony går in i sovrum nummer två och där finns de sista tre syskonen. Jony manipulerar dem och förklarar situationen och syskonen är okej. De har hört skotten men deras pappa har ett jaktgevär och skjuter emellanåt så de har inte kopplat att något var fel.

Danko lootar köket och hittar en bensindunk och ett konstverk. Barbro samlar ihop sin familj och frågar om de får lov att flytta in i Arken med hundar och allt. RP går med på det så länge de slutar äta människokött. RP lootar huset. De får 5 ransoner vatten var och några ransoner krubb (ej människokött) var.

Index lootar och hittar ett batteri och smärtstillande tabletter. Kvark lootar gubbens tillhörigheter och hittar jaktgevär, parfymflaska och en läskburk, han lootar även huset och hittar paraply och gitarr. Jony lootar och hittar karta över zonen och generator.

Danko och Barbro går till garaget. Barbro flyttar hundarna till husvagnen och Danko lootar garaget och hittar en skiftnyckel. Index hämtar Harrys kundvagn och går in i garaget och hittar en mountainbike. Kvark hittar en moped i garaget. Jony hittar en motorsåg. De tar sig tillbaka till Arken.

Dealing with backlog: Two games of Solitaire

Faerie Solitaire Remastered: I got the original several years ago as a gift on Steam and I quite enjoyed playing it. Then this year I suddenly had the remastered version in my library. This time I didn't take the time to watch the story as I already knew it. Boy finds his way to a magical land and accidentally destroys it as he goes along, to make up for it he agrees to destroy the evil faerie and free the magical land. It's a pretty standard story and pretty straight-forward so I just skipped the story sequences and moved on to the next card phase. The card phases are pretty simple and when you buy the upgrades with in-game currency it becomes even more simple. It's a fast and simple game and it was perfect for  those days when I got home from work and didn't really have the energy to play something that required concentration but I still wanted to play something.

Regency Solitaire: I got this because I enjoyed lazy-playing Faerie and I like the whole 19th century British nobility setting. This game also has a prety generic story of a young woman struggling to throw a ball because her stupid brother has gambled away all their money. But she has a rich godmother and a rich uncle who both help out in settling the brother's debts and helping to throw the ball and get her out of an arranged marriage that was arranged to settle her brother's debts. And in the end everyone lives happily ever after. One of the first things I realised about this game is that it isn't as forgiving and simple as Faerie, but I still never struggled a lot with getting every single hand to perfect. Perfect lazy-playing game.

Dealing with backlog: Two old Telltale games

Back to the Future
Funny thing: I was never such a big fan of the movies. I have seen them, of course, I know their stories and characters, but I just never got that wow feeling from watching them. But I picked up this game and Tales of Monkey Island because I wanted to experience the early things from the Telltale portfolio. Back to the Future is divided into five episodes in the true Telltale spirit. I wasn't overly fond of the first episode so after having played through that it took me a while to actually get going with the other four. But once I did the story really evolved and got surprisingly good (I might actually like this game more than the movies). Episodes 3 and 4 are the best ones. I didn't really like the ending. But here you have a time travel story that involves 1920's gangsters, speakeasies during the probation period, Marty meeting his grandparents, both Marty and Doc being in danger of being written out of existence, a dystopian Hill Valley, and a Hill Valley that just blinked out of existence, and more often than not it's up to Marty (you) to save everything and get everything back to the way it was/is supposed to be.

Tales of Monkey Island
I've only played the very first Monkey Island game, but as I really enjoyed that I felt like this game was a must-play! As with Back to the Future this game is divided into five episodes and I wasn't really a fan of the first episode, and so it took me a while to get going with the other episodes. But just as with Back to the Future once I got around to playing the other episodes they proved really good. Once again episodes 3 and 4 are the best ones. This is a story of Guybrush Threepwood thinking he has once and for all ultimately defeated LeChuck, only to accidentally cure LeChuck from his zombie pox and instead releasing it upon the world. Now Guybrush must find a way to cure the Pox from the Caribbean, but first of all he must figure out how to get off Flotsam Island and put some water between himself and the crazy French doctor who wants to chop off his Pox-infected hand. On the way towards the end he (you) gets to meet mer-people. he gets to befriend the cured LeChuck, he gets to spend a couple of days inside a giant manatee, and he gets to defend himself on the trial of the people vs. Guybrush Threepwood. Just as the name Monkey Island promises, this is a wild ride from start to finish.

My last 5 books: One fantasy and four Swedish thrillers by the same guy

1. Magician, by Raymond E. Feist. This is the book that made me realise how much I've missed reading old school epic fantasy of the fantastical kind. The age-old story of an orphaned boy who is meant for so much more and who comes into amazing powers (both magical and political). A fantastical threat to be defeated and an ancient dangerous magic that contemporary people can only hope to understand. What's not to like?! I had missed the cosy feeling that a well-written introduction to a new fantastical world gives me, while at the same time it makes me as excited as a child on Christmas to get the story moving and see where it takes me, because it's sure to be a wonderful trip! I look forward to reading the next part!



2. Midvintermörker, by Lars Wilderäng. Wilderängs första thriller är i mina ovana "öron" (ögon?) till största delen babbel på militäriska. Alltså en massa termer som inte en djävel som spenderat hela sitt liv utanför armén kan tyda till 100%. Själva premissen är intressant, vilket är anledningen till varför jag plockade upp den här boken till att börja med - vad skulle hända om Sverige hamnade i krig idag? Ovanpå det ett krig som utkämpas på svensk mark mot bjässen Ryssland som står som obesegrat i modern tid (hell, har någon någonsin besegrat Ryssland? vartenda stormaktsrike som försökt har misslyckats afaik). Wilderäng är fruktansvärt förtjust i uttrycket "det vobblande ljudet från artillerigranater" som upprepas minst tre dussin gånger genom hela boken, och framåt slutet kunde jag inte låta bli att sucka högt och himla med ögonen varje gång det dök upp. Min generella känsla under hela tiden jag läste den här boken sammanfattas väldigt bra genom en av karaktären Eriks repliker mot slutet av boken: "Ge oss en chans, för helvete!"

3. Midsommargryning, by Lars Wilderäng. Uppföljaren till Midvintermörker som utspelar sig strax över tio år efter slutet av Midvintermörker. Den här boken var på många sätt bättre än Midvintermörker (trots artillerigranaternas fortsatta "vobblande"), till största delen tack vare Widowmaker och Vova som från varsitt håll gör historien intressant; Erik var den drivande kraften i historien men större delen av tiden satt jag och suckade "Vad i helvete håller du på med?" varje gång han fick ta plats i historien. I Midsommargryning är Sverige återigen i krig med Ryssland, men den här gången sitter fienden närmre än vad svenska folket tror. Kriget är nämligen framkallat av ÖB och som kronan på verket utför han en statskupp när han ändå håller på. Karaktärerna känns mer utfyllda i Midsommargryning och inte bara som actionfigurer som utför stridsmanövrar på beställning. Dessutom innehåller Midsommargryning betydligt mycket mindre militäriska, vilket uppskattas högt från stackars civilare som jag själv. (Tror dock att Wilderäng får äta upp att iPhone X skulle vara sprillans ny år 2023)

4. Stjärnfall, by Lars Wilderäng. Den här boken var inte vad jag förväntade mig, kan jag lugnt säga. Uppföljaren till Stjärnklart som var en fantastisk katastrofroman om vad skulle kunna hända om all elektronik dog. Stjärnfall är den återuppbyggande uppföljaren till katastrofromanen Stjärnklart som förvandlas till en vampyrplågad zombieapokalyps med ett UFO-problem. Yes, you read that right! A vampire plagued zombie apocalypse with an alien problem. Nope, det låter lika galet på engelska. Emedan den var ganska långrandig på mitten så blev Stjärnfall riktigt bra mot slutet.

5. Stjärndamm, by Lars Wilderäng. Sådärja! Då har vi gått laget runt från katastrofroman till zombieapokalyps till full-on framtids-scifi. Läsarens resa som började i en hemtam värld som strax skulle gå under då all elektronik slutade fungera samtidigt avslutas här i en främmande rymdålder där människorna på jorden tycks ha utvecklats till högteknologiska vampyrer. I'm not even kidding. Jag kan ju lugnt säga att när jag plockade upp Stjärnklart så förväntade jag mig inte den här vändningen, men den är inte helt obehaglig. Jag gillar Wilderängs twist på vampyrer och zombier, men jag är fortsatt nyfiken på nanomiterna - var de medvetna eller inte? Var de bara användbart stjärndamm eller var de ett sorts hive-mind med ett verkligt medvetande? För om de var det så var nanomiterna ett långt mer skrämmande hot än kentaurerna.

Elder Scrolls Online: Murkmire DLC

This DLC has an interesting background story. The same zone called Murkmire was actually under development back in 2014 and was originally planned to be another adventure zone like Craglorn - group based end game PvE content. But Craglorn wasn't very positively received and so the idea for Murkmire was scrapped until now.

You can pick up a prologue quest in your Alliance's first big city as with all story-driven DLCs since Morrowind. In this prologue quest you help a group of Imperial treasure hunters find an old Argonian relic before the person that betrayed the group can use it for evil. This prologue turns out to be two quests which then turns into six daily quests.

Then we get into the DLC proper!

The whole main questline is a long string of quests to find an ancient relic called the Remnant of Argon. It takes you all over the map where I kept getting side-tracked doing side quests. Until you get to the ancient Xanmeer (temple) of Xul-Thuxis it's mostly a quest through the swamps and different Xanmeers. On the way to Xul-Thuxis there's a quest where you go through a dreamstate and find out that the ancient Ayleids once attacked and invaded an ancient village and that they somehow saved themselves by using the Remnant of Argon, after you get through Xul-Thuxis you find out how, by going through a long string of portals full of echoes from the past. The portal realm actually reminded me a lot of the realm of Eluvians in Dragon Age Inquisition. As usual the main quest is kind of meh until the very end where it's just holy shit upon holy shit in classic Bethesda fashion. But that's the way I like it :) That way you know there's something amazing coming if you just keep at it.

 Murkmire portal realm to the left, DAI portal realm to the right.

The Argonians and Black Marsh are far from my favourite race and area in the Tamrielic universe, which meant that I wasn't overly excited for Murkmire, but it proved very interesting and so worth it. Looking back on the sidequests I really liked the quest in Bright-Throat village where you find out that someone has been experimenting on eggs and their hatchlings and you get to decide whether the last survivor of these experiments live or die. This last hatchling experiment looks like a fully grown woman, but she doesn't act like it and the other Argonians are concerned because the Hist doesn't speak to her, which means this Argonian woman is basically born outside of the hive mind that all Argonians share. She seems severely autistic, which imho is an amazing inclusion in the Elder Scrolls verse.

I also really enjoyed discovering the other version of Argonians in Dead-Water village. A version of Argonian that's more fish-like than lizard-like. All in all this DLC proved a lot more interesting than I originally thought it would be.

Dealing with backlog: Borderlands

Toni and I played this game together which is the main reason it has taken us this long to complete; the need to find a time when we both had the time and energy to play. It also meant that it could take months between each session, which kind of disrupted the whole connectivity thing of the quests and NPCs as we had to get to know the people again after a long time away. Because of this I feel like my whole experience is a little disjointed, but despite this I really liked the game and the stupid humour in it.

So we land in Pandora and start exploring. I'm a Hunter and Toni is a Soldier. We do all the quests and meet up with Tannis for the first time and get a first hint of the Vault and the Guardians. Old Haven was probably our least favourite region of the base game. The Crimson Lance was simply just too annoying to fight. I'd take a maniac with a shotgun any day! When we get to the point where we only have three regions left to explore we decide to do the DLCs since none of us were sure whether Borderlands had a hard ending or not. This turned out to be a mistake, which we only discovered later, but first things first.

The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned was probably our favourite DLC, mainly because its spooky theme was right up our alley! Zombies and pumpkinheads and wereskags and lots of stupid humour (way more so than the other DLCs). The only annoying thing is that we discovered Zombie T.K. way too late (after we were otherwise done with the DLC) and his quests to collect zombie brains for him to munch on became so tedious that we just didn't complete them.

 
Mad Moxxi's Underdome Riot was a bore. Arenas in any game usually are. We gave it a try nonetheless, but this should probably be done with a four player team. Moxxi is a really cool character in any case, but her arena wasn't.

The Secret Armory of General Knoxx absolutely sucked if you're a completionist like us. We wanted to do every quest in the area whcih resulted in a lot of time spent on the highways going back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, to a point where it just wasn't fun anymore. The main questline of the DLC was good though and when we finally found the armory and general Knoxx it was actually hilarious how much he wanted the whole thing to be over... A bit like us tbh!

Claptrap's New Robot Revolution was our second favourite entirely due to the stupid humour in it. Though we got a little sick of the fact that the claptraps were always so many! It was like mowing down a horde of them each time we started shooting!

After we finished all the DLCs we went back to the base game to finish the last of it. This is when we discovered that nothing in the base game had leveled with us and so we got barely any exp at all from doing the last few quests. However the closer we got to the endingthe more we got to tangle with the Crimson Lance and the guardians. In any other game I'd be annoyed that after all this we didn't get to enter the Vault, but with Borderlands it seemed meant to be.

Next game: Borderlands 2

Dealing with backlog: Kingdoms of Amalur Reckoning

It took me way too long to play this game because of mixed reviews. But I finally did and I loved this game! It gave me strong Dragon Age: Origins vibes and as a whole I feel it's a mix between Origins and Oblivion, which is extremely high praise!

The only thing I feel like this game is missing is the opportunity to have deeper relationships with NPCs. I miss having friends and companions. Basically I just want a gang. Romance is secondary, but that would've been great too.

The fighting style is odd for an RPG, but it changes as you improve. I played as a rogue-like character and to begin with my character just did jabs with her daggers/faeblades, but as she progressed and got better at wielding her weapons it turned into launching enemies in the air and ferociously attacking them to ending with amazing jumping finishes.

Unfortunately the game was on the easy side, even for me. I believe it's all due to the fateshifting mechanic. I learned early on that if I save my fateshifting (which is basically an ult in MMO speech) then I can defeat almost any boss in less than a minute or even 30 seconds, which kind of undid the whole "omg it's boss battle time" feeling. The most obvious exceptions being Balor and Tirnoch, who did require something more than just bashing them while fateshifting.

The whole world is fascinating. Instead of having the obvious rifts between humans/dwarves/elves, there's a rift between the old race (the Fae) and the younger races (humans, elves and gnomes). The younger races are mostly scared of the Fae who are eternal beings that can't die, while the Fae mostly find the younger races fascinating - especially the concept of death. The Fae also look down on the younger races for being young, reckless and dumb. Having a much shorter and limited lifespan the younger races don't know and don't learn as much as the Fae.

The game has a wide array of creatures. I adore the cute little Brownies and Boggarts, and Niskaru were always fun to fight. But I hated coming against Banashae and Crudoks, they weren't difficult just annoying. Bolgan, Ettin and Jottun were interesting to begin with but soon just became a hurdle to get past, and Webwood made me permanently sick of spiders.

 Troll, Banashae and Jottun

The story begins with you dying and being brought back to life which causes amnesia. This somehow gives you the ability to fateshift and you're the only person in existence who doesn't have a destiny, which the game's Fateweavers are more than happy to point out. You're recruited to go to war against the Tuatha, a corrupt section of Fae that the younger races have been warring against for a decade. The main reason that the war has been ongoing for ten years is that the Tuatha are Fae and thus won't stay dead when killed. But you can change fate, the only person in existence with this ability, and the hope is that with your power to change fate you can change the tide of the war and actually permanently kill the Tuatha. Along the way you meet up with Alyn Shir, who knows your past from before you were brought back to life but she's reluctant to tell you. As you progress you find out bits and pieces about your past and towards the end you find yourself back where it all began. The game ends with a frickin badass boss battle that's totally epic.

 
The two DLCs were great. I especially loved The Legend of Dead Kel. Give me pirates and I'm happy! But the Teeth of Naros with all of its references to Ancient Greece and the Roman Empire was amazing too.

Kingdoms of Amalur proved one of the most underrated games I've ever played. If you haven't played it, do it.