Bank Holiday Pain. Also spaceships and cricket

I had a plan this weekend !

I had intended to go visit the Book Barn again as they were running another bank holiday sale. Nope. Leg had other plans.

(And I do hope that's one of those occasions where dog wasn't having to be super tolerant of small human).

What happened to the leg ? I don't actually know. I have a vague recollection of a very heavy leg cramp on Thursday night / Friday morning but I thought that was lower leg. Apparently I had a heavy strain or tear in one of the muscles on my upper leg, on the inside. Couldn't straighten the leg properly. Very tender, very sore. Couldn't touch it for Pain. Was struggling to get around the house on Saturday and Sunday after it tightened up on the Friday afternoon / evening. Definitely wasn't feeling like doing anything strenuous or stressful like gaming.

Oh and my back was joining in too, being its own wall of pain. Ouch.

I rarely resort to painkillers but it was very tempting over the weekend. Would have involved walking to the place where the painkillers are though and I wans't too sure if I'd get that far.

So Bookbarn on Sunday or Monday was a case of "maybe next time".

Cricket was awesome though this weekend. There hasn't been a finish like that to a Test Match since .... Sri Lanka pulled off something similarly (but much less spectacular) last ditch earlier this year to I believe South Africa.

Definitely enjoyed catching that on the telly over the weekend. England is blessed at the moment with 2 players in the team who are among the best I've seen, plus a couple more who should be there. When Jofra Archer started in the England team, I wasn't so sure. He was very stiff in his first game and through the World Cup and I didn't see what the fuss was about. But he's broken out of that into something that is a true challenge to face and if he stays fit, he will break all sorts of wicket records. Ben Stokes is the other one. People say he's the best all rounder we've had since Ian Botham. I think he's much better. (And then there's Joe Root and Jos Buttler who need to sort themselves out)

Also spaceships ...

The Black Sheep was on the prowl, running missions, blowing up pirates that she could take on and running very quickly away from the pirates that were a bit too big. She's a very fast ship for Elite, one of the quicker ones. Here she is picking up salvage from one pirate who tried to bite off more than they could chew.

There's the Black Sheep looking sleek against the stars while coming into land at Newholm Station. They tend to shoot at you if you try to enter the stations without asking permission ....

One of the stations I've been frequenting has a curious pair of co-orbiting moons outside. I called this shot "Moon and Moon" and there's a wonderful Bat For Lashes song of that name. (Youtube link and there's a little bit of intro before that)

It wasn't all space stations though, a few of the missions involved heading into a planetary moon base with some curious canyons again there.

It was an odd couple of sessions on Sunday and Monday. The aim for me in game at the moment is mainly to get Federation ranking up high enough to unlock another end game ship with a secondary objective of collecting more engineering materials to make that ship better. It's a bit of a grind to be honest, with lots of going from one place to another running cargo and data. It has made for some nice screenshots though.

Last one for today. This is a closer look at that planetary base and it sparked the engineer's curiosity. This is an airless moon, so you'd be suiting up to go outside. The ring of objects on the outside are landing pads. So ships land, pilots and crew come off for shore leave, cargo goes in and out. I can see where the cargo goes in, at the doors at the base with roadways outside.

What I can't see is how the people come and go. Does the base operate a taxi service ? I can't see walkways going from outer landing pads to the central area where I'm assuming the fun is. Perhaps there's a mass transit or tramway or train thing underground. Maybe. Underground would be a good way to do it.

I'm probably overthinking it. When Elite Dangerous was first released, this kind of base wasn't available. It's great to see things like this being added to the game, with more development occurring. The planetary bases and starbases may be made up of what I think is a toolkit of graphics modules to glue together but they look great and that toolkit gives lovely variation when you're meandering through the game to different places, different star systems, different planets, different bases.

Good night, fly safe.