blackspot WhiteGhost Enters the Beyond Times

[WhiteGhost]

23 hours ago, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

I would imagine most people wouldn't want to be a chef after being a butcher.

I normally don't mind it, especially because it means I don't have to spend time defrosting something in order to cook it.  Sunday I was just not in the mood for it.

 

22 hours ago, Manarelle said:

Agreed. The (very few) times I've helped render whole animals, I didn't want to bother with cooking for a while afterwards. Anything more complex than "stick it in a spit and throw it over a fire" was right out.

I've only ever done fish and poultry, so not sure how much more difficult other animals are.

 

22 hours ago, Manarelle said:

Any plans for the male-only week?  

We were going to go camping with some other families from church, but it suddenly turned quite cold, so we may cancel on that.  I was getting a lot of pushback from my family here about that trip anyway, because they are all super uncomfortable with me going and spending time with a bunch a foreigners (even though all of them have all been here the entire time as well) 🙄

 

------------------------------------

 

Today was cold and rainy so I didn't go to the park.  Instead I stayed home and made some Kiwi bread (We have a whole box of kiwi fruit that I am not going to finish before it goes bad so I needed something else to do with it).  It was really very bland and unimpressive.  I expected it would be like banana bread (or pumpkin or zucchini or even mango) but it very much wasn't.  Not sure why.

 

I also spent some time and learned a new song on the ukulele (500 Miles by Peter, Paul & Mary).  It was a lot easier than I expected it to be, which is always a nice surprise.

 

I spent most of my afternoon/evening reading about various D&D topics and ideas for things I can do to be a better DM.

[Manarelle]

1 hour ago, WhiteGhost said:

We were going to go camping with some other families from church, but it suddenly turned quite cold, so we may cancel on that.  I was getting a lot of pushback from my family here about that trip anyway, because they are all super uncomfortable with me going and spending time with a bunch a foreigners (even though all of them have all been here the entire time as well) 🙄

 

Ah, family. But yeah, maybe not camping when it's cold. Could do living room camping, I suppose. Not quite the same.

 

1 hour ago, WhiteGhost said:

Instead I stayed home and made some Kiwi bread (We have a whole box of kiwi fruit that I am not going to finish before it goes bad so I needed something else to do with it).  It was really very bland and unimpressive.  I expected it would be like banana bread (or pumpkin or zucchini or even mango) but it very much wasn't.  Not sure why.

 

That's a shame, since kiwis have so much flavor raw. Could make a kiwi sorbet: https://www.superhealthykids.com/recipes/kiwi-sorbet/

[WhiteGhost]

22 hours ago, Manarelle said:

Ah, family. But yeah, maybe not camping when it's cold. Could do living room camping, I suppose. Not quite the same.

Had some more discussions with the family and got them all onboard with my trip.  They have never done cold weather camping before so they just assumed it would be all miserable and freezing the whole time.  I used to do winter camping every year as a boy scout so I was able to convince them it was possible to be safe and fun, even if it is cold.  I also somehow convinced them on the Covid/foreigner issues, so the camping trip is back on!

 

22 hours ago, Manarelle said:

That's a shame, since kiwis have so much flavor raw. Could make a kiwi sorbet: https://www.superhealthykids.com/recipes/kiwi-sorbet/

Cool, I will give that a try when I get back.

 

-------------------------------

 

This morning I stopped by the park after dropping Ghostlet off at school and ended up having a really good workout.  It was mostly focused on bar stuff, doing front/back levers, jump muscle ups, bar dips, and even some other stuff like Russian dips and human flag progressions.  Mostly just having fun and getting a lot of movement in. 

 

When I got back I wrote a letter to Ghostess explaining my thoughts about the camping trip.  I do not communicate all that well when speaking and feel much more comfortable presenting ideas in written form.  People tend to react better to thing I write than what I say, so I thought it would be a good idea to try it.  She was very happy to receive the letter and we ended up having a really good video conversation later.  Once we had everything settled and the camping trip was back on, I spent most of the rest of the day getting preparations ready.  We will head out tomorrow after my D&D game. 

 

After dinner my inlaws came over and I was able to chat with them as well about the camping trip and now they are on bard as well   Once they left I made some mango bread to take with us on the camp out.

 

This one turned out way better than the kiwi bread  

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

It's amazing how may problems get solved with good communication.

[Scaly Freak]

42 minutes ago, WhiteGhost said:

This one turned out way better than the kiwi bread  

 

As expected, given the superior awesomeness of mango over kiwi flavor.  

[WhiteGhost]

On 9/30/2020 at 10:51 PM, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

It's amazing how may problems get solved with good communication.

You'd think it would be really simple, but good communication can be really hard.

 

On 9/30/2020 at 10:54 PM, Scaly Freak said:

 

As expected, given the superior awesomeness of mango over kiwi flavor.  

You make a lot of sense, Mango is certainly the superior flavor here

 

-------------------------------

 

The last couple of days were kind of a blur.

 

I started out on Thursday with our Lost Mine campaign which was a lot of fun.  One of the people in that group is really hard to predict, and this game was no exception.  When the bandits came and tried to intimidate the group, he responded by putting together a makeshift Molotov Cocktail and hurled it at the group.  It resulted in a really messy fight, but at least it was a very interesting way to get into initiative.

 

After the game wrapped up, we went over to the in-laws for lunch which was nice.  We haven't been over tho their house for a long time.

 

As soon as lunch was over, we threw all of our gear into the car and headed up to the campsite, which was about a 3 hour drive (~160km) north of the city.  We managed to get there with still plenty of sunlight to get our campsite set up and then I just sat around talking with other parents while the kids ran wild.  This may have been the first time for Ghostlet to just run around in the wild unsupervised so even though I was curious to know what he was doing, I intentionally just stayed away and let him do his thing.  I think that kind of un-monitored activity time is important for kids his age.     

 

Once it got dark we all sat around the campfire, which due to local restrictions was not allowed to be on the ground.  To get around this, a couple of families brought up giant woks (the giant ones that are about 3ft across) and we used those as fire pits.  It didn't take long for the temperature to plummet and by the time we finally crawled into our tent it was about 5C.  I gave most of the spare blankets to Ghostlet who slept quite well, but that meant there wasn't enough for me and I ended up being super cold all night.  

 

The next morning we drove out to a nearby section of the wall that has some touch up work done in the 80, but for the most part was just completely un-restored.  It was really beautiful there and we couldn't have asked for better weather.

We got back in time for dinner and then because I was not looking forward to spending another night freezing, we packed it up and headed home.  

 

We both crashed almost as soon as we walked in the door, and I don't think I have ever been more grateful for a warm soft bed

  

[Scaly Freak]

12 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

You'd think it would be really simple, but good communication can be really hard.

 

Well, it actually is simple. Be honest, and be open.... and good communication is achieved. That's it. Doesn't mean it's easy though.  

[Manarelle]

On 10/2/2020 at 11:38 PM, WhiteGhost said:

We got back in time for dinner and then because I was not looking forward to spending another night freezing, we packed it up and headed home.  

 

We both crashed almost as soon as we walked in the door, and I don't think I have ever been more grateful for a warm soft bed

 

Oof, good call. Cold camping is the pits. The very first night I ever tried tent camping, the weather noped the heck out of the area and I got zero minutes of sleep, just shivered through the night. Definitely made me unwilling to try again. 

 

Glad you had fun, though, and definitely agree with the "unsupervised time being good for kids" thing. What was Ghostlet's take on the whole experience? 

[WhiteGhost]

On 10/4/2020 at 12:24 AM, Scaly Freak said:

 

Well, it actually is simple. Be honest, and be open.... and good communication is achieved. That's it. Doesn't mean it's easy though.  

Definitely more difficult than it seems on paper

 

  

11 hours ago, Manarelle said:

 

Oof, good call. Cold camping is the pits. The very first night I ever tried tent camping, the weather noped the heck out of the area and I got zero minutes of sleep, just shivered through the night. Definitely made me unwilling to try again. 

 

Glad you had fun, though, and definitely agree with the "unsupervised time being good for kids" thing. What was Ghostlet's take on the whole experience? 

Cold camping isn't so bad if you are geared up for it, which we weren't.  Well, I had enough stuff to keep Ghostlet warm all night, but I was certainly freezing.  

 

Ghostlet's take: "10/10 would recommend"  

 

--------------------------------

 

Saturday started out with a family D&D session for the kids.  They spent some time fighting a giant spider and then some flying snakes.  I think they are starting to get the hang of combat, but the role playing stuff is still very superficial.  Which is fine, of course, but it is clear that these kids are primarily there for the combat.  The next game I run with them will certainly need to be more dungeon crawl than anything with a substantial amount of role play. 

 

In the afternoon I got all of the camping gear unpacked and put away while Ghostlet did homework.  In the evening I made some Chicken Tikka Masala and it was really good.  Ghostlet even asked for a second helping  

 

Sunday started out with church which is now back to live, in-person meetings.  It was Ghostlet's first time back since the pandemic started (last Sunday was a School day) and he seemed to enjoy it as well.  We stopped off for ice cream on the way home, because we were out and I was really craving some. 

 

We relaxed for the rest of the day, with me on Skyrim and Ghostlet playing PUBG. 

[raptron]

Those pictures are gorgeous. I love cold camping, but having warm enough layers is 100% essential. I bet you guys slept so well when you got home. 

[WhiteGhost]

10 hours ago, raptron said:

Those pictures are gorgeous. I love cold camping, but having warm enough layers is 100% essential. I bet you guys slept so well when you got home. 

The great wall in the fall is incredible.  If we had gone up  couple of weeks later the whole place would have been an amazing display of fall colors.  We all slept like logs the next few nights  

 

--------------------------

 

Yesterday was a complete throw away day, I didn't exercise or eat a single healthy thing.  It is a holiday here, though, so that's my excuse.  I will get back on my game after the holiday ends. 

 

I spent a good part of the day getting my PbP D&D game moving again.  I am excited to see how that one progresses and equally terrified that it will progress out of control.  Luckily it seems to be very RP heavy, which is a lot easier to control than trying to manage a  lot of combat encounters.

 

I played a bunch of Skyrim again and then in the evening I decided I wanted to introduce Ghostlet to one of my all time favorite movies so we spent a couple of hours watching Month Python's Search for the Holy Grail.  I love that movie, but Gostlet was like "WTF is this" the whole time  

[Scaly Freak]

47 minutes ago, WhiteGhost said:

I played a bunch of Skyrim again and then in the evening I decided I wanted to introduce Ghostlet to one of my all time favorite movies so we spent a couple of hours watching Month Python's Search for the Holy Grail.  I love that movie, but Gostlet was like "WTF is this" the whole time  

 

It's just a rabbit. Obviously.

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

7 minutes ago, Scaly Freak said:

 

It's just a rabbit. Obviously.

That's no ordinary Rabbit!

[WhiteGhost]

On 10/6/2020 at 11:20 AM, Scaly Freak said:

 

It's just a rabbit. Obviously.

 

On 10/6/2020 at 11:28 AM, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

That's no ordinary Rabbit!

 

 

-----------------------------------

 

Yesterday was another day of very little accomplished holiday.  I have just accepted that this week is going to be a write off and will get back on my stuff next week.   Tomorrow is the last day of holiday here so I will have the weekend to get back up to speed.

[iatetheyeti]

I'm highly intrigued by the mango bread. What recipe do you use for it?

 

[PaulG]

14 minutes ago, WhiteGhost said:

Yesterday was another day of very little accomplished holiday.  I have just accepted that this week is going to be a write off and will get back on my stuff next week.   Tomorrow is the last day of holiday here so I will have the weekend to get back up to speed.

Is it something about the time of year? I’ve been feeling things sliding into write-off territory for this challenge too, and I feel like we may not be the only ones.
 

What’s the holiday for you guys? Anything fun?

[WhiteGhost]

On 10/7/2020 at 3:34 PM, iatetheyeti said:

I'm highly intrigued by the mango bread. What recipe do you use for it?

 

I just used a friend's banana bread recipe and swapped out the mango for the bananas.  If I do it again I will reduce the sugar because it came out a bit too sweet for my liking, but otherwise really good.  Or did you mean you want the actual recipe?

 

On 10/7/2020 at 3:35 PM, PaulG said:

Is it something about the time of year? I’ve been feeling things sliding into write-off territory for this challenge too, and I feel like we may not be the only ones.
 

What’s the holiday for you guys? Anything fun?

I don't know, but I am just in a funk, and I need to snap out of it.  Especially with all of the US eating holidays coming up.

 

The one we are on here is the Chinese National Day, which is the Chinese equivalent of July 4 in the US.  It is one of the two biggest holidays of the year and we have 8 consecutive days off (usually 7 but this year we had Mid autumn festival in the middle of it so we have an extra day to make up for it.)  Of course it means last Sunday and this coming Saturday are school/work days, but it does mean a long break.  

 

---------------------

 

Not sure if yesterday was even worth a write up.  I was on the couch pretty much from the morning until bedtime, and ate nothing but delivery (except for all of the ice cream that was already in the house).  It kind of feels like the early days of the pandemic lockdown again.    

 

[iatetheyeti]

8 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

I just used a friend's banana bread recipe and swapped out the mango for the bananas.

 

That's more than enough information for me to work with, thanks! I did wonder if just switching things out might be the case. I've got a pretty good dairy-free banana bread recipe I can use and just stuff some mango in there (might also make the banana version though...). We'll see how it goes  

[WhiteGhost]

22 hours ago, iatetheyeti said:

 

That's more than enough information for me to work with, thanks! I did wonder if just switching things out might be the case. I've got a pretty good dairy-free banana bread recipe I can use and just stuff some mango in there (might also make the banana version though...). We'll see how it goes  

I hope it works out for you  

 

--------------------------------

 

Yesterday was a bit of a change from the rest of the week.  To wit, I actually did some things.  I spent most of the day cleaning the house and getting everything organized so that Ghostess didn't end up coming home to a huge mess.  In the evening I went to the airport to pick her up and the place was a madhouse.  The place was completely packed, and the only difference from holiday travel in regular years is that the international terminal was a ghost town.  

 

In normal times, that board can only hold about 45 minutes worth of flight info

 

Today Ghostess had to go to Yanqing on business so she was gone by the time I got home from dropping Ghostlet off at school.  I dithered for a while about going to the park but eventually made it out the door and had a pretty good workout.  I even got some good work in on human flag progressions and psuedo muscleups.  A friend there took a video of my human flag work, but she didn't have any signal to send it to me so I will try and get that uploaded tomorrow.

 

When I got back I played xbox for a while until Ghostlet got back and then I spent a bunch of time doing some D&D stuff while he did homework.

[PaulG]

On 10/8/2020 at 9:32 AM, iatetheyeti said:

 

That's more than enough information for me to work with, thanks! I did wonder if just switching things out might be the case. I've got a pretty good dairy-free banana bread recipe I can use and just stuff some mango in there (might also make the banana version though...). We'll see how it goes  

I’ve never owned a loaf tin, but suddenly I want to make mango bread so badly that I might just buy one...

 

5 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

A friend there took a video of my human flag work, but she didn't have any signal to send it to me so I will try and get that uploaded tomorrow.

We’re gonna hold you to that promise

[juliebarkley]

On 10/8/2020 at 4:03 AM, WhiteGhost said:

I don't know, but I am just in a funk, and I need to snap out of it.

Since we are both slacking on our stretching/spinning goals, feel free to message me anytime I am online and guilt encourage me to do a quick stretch/spin with you. If we do it together, maybe it will be more fun? Certainly more likely to actually happen.

 

Also if you ever have kiwi that you can't use up quick in the future, dehydrate them. They are the best dehydrated fruit ever IMO, even better than mango (and I love dried mango).

[WhiteGhost]

On 10/10/2020 at 4:33 AM, PaulG said:

I’ve never owned a loaf tin, but suddenly I want to make mango bread so badly that I might just buy one...

 

I owned this pair that I have for years before ever actually doing anything bread related with them.  I originally bought them for making meatloaf.

 

On 10/10/2020 at 4:33 AM, PaulG said:

We’re gonna hold you to that promise

I was feeling really sleepy yesterday so I crawled back into bed after dropping Ghostlet off at school.  I was planning on staying there where it was warm and comfy until I saw this, and I realized I needed to actually go to the park to get the video for you guys.  I hope you're happy!  

 

On 10/10/2020 at 5:53 AM, juliebarkley said:

Since we are both slacking on our stretching/spinning goals, feel free to message me anytime I am online and guilt encourage me to do a quick stretch/spin with you. If we do it together, maybe it will be more fun? Certainly more likely to actually happen.

As you know I took you up on this and did 10 spins.  I did not enjoy that one bit and the room kept spinning for way too long afterwards, but all in all it was not nearly as bad as I thought it would be.  I might even do it again today  

 

On 10/10/2020 at 5:53 AM, juliebarkley said:

Also if you ever have kiwi that you can't use up quick in the future, dehydrate them. They are the best dehydrated fruit ever IMO, even better than mango (and I love dried mango).

I do, in fact, have more kiwi and mango than I can finish in my house right now and I need to something with it fast.  However, I am not really sold on this dehydrated fruit thing.  I have had both (kiwi and mango) but they are soo filled with sugar to be basically just candy (and not even delicious candy at that).  Also, I don't have a kiln or anything for it.  Is this something that can be done without a lot of time/equipment investment?

 

------------------------------------------

 

Yesterday I dragged myself out of bed again because of all the dang accountability going on in here and headed off to the park.  Obligatory video follows:

 

 

I was feeling really sore in my entire upper body from Friday's workout so I decided to do a leg workout.  I haven't come up with a new program since the one I did last year so I just went with that.  By the end of it I could barely stand up, so walking home afterwards was an adventure. (Spoiler: I am sore all over this morning and can barely move  )

 

In the afternoon I decided to try my hand at bread again and went with Kiwi again, but a different recipe from last time.  This time it came out really good, so I suspect the problem last time was the recipe and not the kiwi.

 

I spent most of the evening getting ready for our Sunless citadel D&D game, which has been on hold for more than a month as we try to work out our schedules.  I had a really great time and was really grateful to @jonfirestar for putting together a one-shot that we could do because not everyone could make it.  We didn't want to advance the main storyline until everyone could join so this was a brilliant workaround.

 

Session notes below for anyone interested

Spoiler

 

We started out doing a side quest that we heard about at the end of a previous session.  Some hunter said he saw some undead wandering around a ruin not too far away so we went to go check it out because we had a few days to kill before the main quest picked up again.  We originally thought it was just a few zombies so we attacked, only to find out there was also a wraith hiding in there.  My cleric decided to try out his turn undead skill which worked so the wraith sprinted out into the woods while we mopped up the remaining zombie.  Noticing that there was some magic stone nearby that pulsed every time our wizard ( @Mr_Willes ) cast ray of frost, we decided to try casting ray of frost directly at it just to see what would happen.  It ended up making the rock disappear and inside we found a skeleton with a dagger in it.  We mage handed the dagger out just as the wraith was coming back, but apparently that was what it took do dispel the wraith and it disappeared just in the nick of time.

 

Later that night, my cleric and the wizard were having a conversation about the nature of truth in the inn common room when we were approached by the shaman goblin from the citadel with a mission for us: a dragon heist!  Well, actually just stealing a crest of a dragon from a local wealthy collector.  We were trying to come up with plans when our sorcerer ( @Jarric ) wandered over so we included him in the planning.  Given that my cleric avoids the truth at all cost, ha came up with a way to convey his plan by saying "a terrible plan that I would never contemplate would be" and then proceeding to describe the plan.  The sorcerer rolled extremely low on his insight check so he was really struggling to figure out why I kept talking about all of the terrible plans that I had no intention of doing  

 

The base plan was for me to find a way to meet with the collector and et to know his voice, then we would convince him to leave his home at which point I would use disguise self to make myself look like the collector and use my actor feat to mimic his voice and just get his servants to bring us the item in question.  

 

Trying to figure out how to arrange that crucial first visit we asked the innkeeper about him who said that the barmaids liked the guy.  We then questioned the barmaids who said that a friend was his gardener so we paid her a visit, with me pretending to be a potential business partner doing due diligence on the man's character by interviewing his employees.  That actually went better than expected and we learned that he is really proud of his collection and may be willing to show it off.  In an abrupt change of plans, we decided to try another approach in which I posed as a collector from another town who was passing through but heard about his collection and wanted to see it.  The sorcerer posed as my assistant and the wizard made himself invisible and followed along stealthily.  We managed to persuade the collector to let us in and he gave us a tour of his collection.  On our way out, the wizard tried to snatch the reliquary that held the dragon quest but completely failed his slight of hand check.  Luckily for us he is a chronomancer so he just did a big rewind and rolled back time to the point where we started wrapping things up again and tried again.  Luckily he made this one and we managed to get out of the house with just enough tome to get away before the disguise and invisibility spells wore off.

 

A successful heist and now we just need to figure out just what the heck we are supposed to do with this thing, because the "buyer" was dodgy AF about it.  

 

It did strike us a more than a little odd that we would contemplate a heist like this without bringing our rogue ( @Red1263 ) but he was unfortunately not available for the session due to family commitments.  

 

 

[deftona]

2 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

I am sore all over this morning and can barely move

 

[WhiteGhost]

21 hours ago, deftona said:

 

^^^ Accurate representation of how I was walking yesterday

 

-------------------------------------------

 

Yesterday was not a great day.  I stayed up until 3 playing D&D (which WAS great) but it meant I was pretty dead for the rest of the day.  I spent some time in the morning working on my next challenge because I am kind of done with this one and have already mentally moved on to the next one. 

 

Ghostlet had classes in the afternoon & evening so I spent a bunch of time shuttling him between classes and tried to get caught up on NF.  Plus a few naps thrown in for good measure.

 

I made some chicken & broccoli stir fry for dinner, which was good but it seems like a less than ideal way to prepare broccoli so I don't think I will make this again.  I was ready to pass out by early evening so I went to bed early which was 100% the right decision.  

[Mr_Willes]

6 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

I stayed up until 3 playing D&D (which WAS great) but it meant I was pretty dead for the rest of the day. 

 

It pains me a bit to read this, but i'm also really glad you are as flexible as you are to making this thing work as often as possible!