Here, there, not quite eaten by dogs

Wow, is it really 11 days since I posted last ?

That's a little too long. I like to keep in the habit of making posts and one of the aims for this year is to easily make 100 posts. I've done that for the past few years, although 2017 was mostly by the virtue of going nuts with the Advent calendar in December.

I did like the pattern of writing less but more often. Hopefully you liked that from the point of view of the reader.

What have I been up to ?

Burying myself in work as per usual;
It's coming up to Easter and I'll want to get everything in a good state before I disappear for a week. There's a combination of not wanting to worry about stuff while I'm away plus not wanting to leave work for others. Cos it's bad if other people have to do my work for me. I don't like that.

The way my system sets itself up is that I'll dip into the hyperactivity while at work and then the cost of that is to crash in the evening and weekends. And I can only do it for so long. The Xmas to Easter run seems to be a particularly tough one probably as a combination of the duration of the period and the lack of daylight. People are partly solar powered I think.

Especially as the sunnier times of the year are when the cricket can be watched (in sensible hours, I probably won't watch much of the NZ vs England tour).

What else ... games ...

I've been quietly addicted to the Idle Champions game again. It's playing at the moment while I tap this post out and watch a stream and video while the music is on. That's probably a bit too much going on to be honest but you can leave the idle clicker game to do its business in the background while you do other things. They've gone as far as they can go in the present run, so they're picking up money. I could even run it overnight. I don't think I will though.

I was thinking about doing another Planetbase run and recording it .... probably too late now, it would have had to be a weekend because a full base run is about 20 hours. I'd compress that for a video. Anyway, Planetbase is due to thinking of another game coming soon called Surviving Mars, which could well be an exceptional game and right up my alley for building a colony on Mars. It's a bit contrived in places though, like in its highly accelerated time for people living. It's not a game over years, it's a game over days ... or Sols.

There has been more Lego and the pictures will come in a later post. I have a 4th Millennium Falcon ... no not that one, a smaller one. It was a quick build but I enjoyed it nonetheless.

That arrived as part of being a vulture with Toys R Us and Maplin. Both stores are in closing down procedures, basically they charged too much for what they sell, didn't keep up with changing trends (or consciously went against them!) and people went elsewhere with the consequence that both big chains will disappear or shrink into a more commercially viable form.

But that means that now there are discounts and potential shinies to be had. Except even with the discounts, they were more expensive than the shops down the road. Oh well.

It was also a Mothers Day weekend here and a bit more involved than usual ... Instead of going to the parents place, I drove to where mum lives on Friday, over to the sister's on Saturday, Mothers Day things on Sunday, back to mum's place on Sunday night and back to Bristol on Monday. And visiting :

That's Murph the Slurp. He's very friendly. Bit more scared of things than he should be maybe but quickly went into full on slurp mode. He has a sister/not-sister called Ice who is a big ball of fluff.

Very interested in my toes for some reason. My knees got checked out as well.

(I think both of them were investigating how I might taste. I may yet get eaten by dogs ....)

Just kidding on that. Icey seems to have a lot of anxiety along with the big ball of floofiness, which means they have to keep her isolated away from other people and visitors. She defaults into a perceive threat -> attack response. Normally I'd be reasonably rough with dogs. Not hitting them of course but definitely giving the fur a good bit of ruffling. Playing with them. But only up to the point where the dog is still having fun. If the dog is not having fun then it's abuse and you don't want to subject pets to that.

Dogs like interaction with people. They enjoy you playing with them (or they wouldn't come back for more!). You can't do that with Icey as a stranger but I suspect with more visits, Icey will end up favouring me with as many slurps as Murph does. It was getting close at the weekend :

Some animals you can be a bit rougher with. Vigorous belly rubs and things like that. Other animals you need to give a bit more time with. Dogs are naturally curious. If you approach them when they're not ready, it'll scare them and you'll get that perceive threat -> attack response. We're bigger than they are and they understand body language differently. If you let them approach you, let them give a gentle investigative sniff, that will open the way to the trust for the stroking and the belly rubs.

Unless it is a badly trained dog and then you want to be ready with the crossed arms over the chest to ward them off and definitely more wariness with that outstretched hand for them to sniff. But that's not Ice and Murph.

Looking forward to meeting the doggypair again at some point. I don't often find myself in that area though.

One last pic ?

Yes Murph that is your best side and you are definitely a handsome fellow.

(His gave may or may not have been drawn to CAKE in this picture. I can neither confirm nor deny any rumours about that).

It's good to be around dogs who are part of the family again. I do miss the old fellas.

Scruff looking forwards to a good bit of ruffling. He did like a good throat and belly rub.

And Ben loving life like he loved people. And like how he loved treats.

(Also Goldie the athlete dog but I don't have any pictures of the golden one)

Last bit - still aiming for the 52 books, although I've kind of stalled lately with Revelation Space. It seems to be taking its time to really get going.