Second day off, cold and wet

The weather today could not have been more different to yesterday. Yesterday was hot and smoky, but the cold front swept through with thunder and lightning about 10pm, and the temperature dropped dramatically. Today was cool, even slightly chilly, and very rainy.

I didn’t venture out except to take Scully quickly for her toilets. I would have put on a raincoat and gone for a walk at lunch, but I hurt my lower back yesterday and wanted to really rest up today. That seems to have worked, since it’s much better this evening compared to last night.

Not much else to say. I worked on comics, both Darths & Droids and Irregular Webcomic!

New content today:

First day off, hot and smoky

Today was the first free day of my Christmas break. I took Scully for a long walk early in the morning before it got too hot, because the forecast was 35°C. it didn’t get that high, however, because of a combination of overcast that made the day very steamy, and the distinct smell of bushfire smoke that drifted in late morning. The smoke made the air very hazy (news story here), but it wasn’t local. It had drifted on the wind from a large bushfire near Narrabri, some 500 km north-west (news story here).

But the walk was before the smoke. It was cooler, but still hot and humid enough to mean I was drenched in sweat by the time we got home, at 9 o’clock. Along the way though I was excited to spot a striated heron! These birds are not common in the area. According to my eBird stats, this is only the third time I’ve seen a striated heron around here since late 2020. I tried to get a photo, but I couldn’t get very close and my phone wasn’t up to zooming in that far with decent quality. But still, this is my first photo of a striated heron! It’s the 127th Australian species I’ve photographed.

Striated heron

For lunch I took Scully for a drive instead of a walk. We went to the Allambie Heights pie shop, which I’ve been craving for a few weeks now, but it’s a bit of a drive so not something I can do any old day. And when we got there, they had special Christmas pies!

Christmas pies!

These are more expensive than the usual menu, and contained roast turkey, brie, and cranberry sauce. Of course I had to try one! I also got a Thai chicken curry pie to round out lunch. Both the flavours were excellent – this is a pretty good pie shop.

The temperature continued to climb and reached a maximum about 6pm. It’s cooling down slowly now, but there’s a cold southerly change coming through about 11pm tonight, which should bring thunderstorms and cooler temperatures. The next few days are forecast to be much cooler, thankfully.

New content today:

Last day of work for the year

Today I had four ethics classes, finishing off the “Rebuilding Civilisation” topic for the week, and my classes for the year. I’m taking two weeks off over Christmas and New Year, starting up again in January. It’s been a very interesting topic to discuss with the kids. One of the ethical questions I ask them: In a disaster situation, where your own life is in danger, do you have a responsibility to help other people survive, or look after your own survival first? Almost all of them have been pretty clear that in this situation it’s sensible and reasonable to ensure your own survival, not necessarily help other people. Some of them quoted the airline safety briefing, that when oxygen masks drop from the ceiling of the cabin, you should put your own mask on first before helping anyone else.

This evening, my wife and I agreed to do something very unusual, and go out for dinner on a Monday night. We normally only ever go out on Fridays (usually) or Saturdays if we have skipped the Friday. Well, we skipped Friday because of my D&D night, and then I just cooked something at home on Saturday. We both kind of felt like something special, so we walked up the street to the local shops and sat in the warm evening air outdoors with Scully at a bar. They do bar snacks type food, and we had arancini, haloumi sliders, and soft tacos with two different fillings: hoisin duck and pulled pork. To wash it down we had some nice cold cider. A bit decadent, but very delicious!

Tacos and sliders

Oh, and the other day I took a Christmas portrait of Scully, after her grooming appointment.

Scully's Christmas portrait

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A (mostly) lazy Sunday

I slept in this morning! It was my first time getting up later than about 7:15 since I returned from Italy. So it felt pretty good to just snooze until I wanted without any urgency.

I did get up eventually, and went for a 5k run straight after a quick breakfast. The weather was cooler and cloudy, with some intermittent light drizzle, which was a very nice change from the heat we’ve been having lately.

After that my wife went to visit her mother and help set up her Christmas tree and decorations. She took Scully, which meant I had the house to myself – a rare occasion these days! I didn’t really take advantage though, and spent time writing and making a new Darths & Droids comic, which took a while due to some writer’s block. What else did I do? Gosh… um… I made a sourdough loaf and in the evening cooked dinner in between teaching three ethics classes. And that’s about it.

Oh, my wife came home with the Christmas ham for our family lunch. I’ve been handed the role of preparing a glazed ham every year since the one time I volunteered to do it! I think this year I’ll try doing a version with an orange marmalade glaze.

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The Wyrm of Brandonstead, session 3

Friday night I ran the third and final session of our Wyrm of Brandonstead D&D adventure. The first two sessions are here and here for your recapping pleasure.


Return to Brandonstead

After retrieving Sir Brandon’s magical dragon-slaying sword from his tomb, the heroes returned to Brandonstead. Here they reunited with Brigette, who had travelled from Neensford after completing her training. The rest of the group filled her in on their adventures around Brandonstead so far.

Nogge experimented with the warning stones discovered in Sir Brandon’s tomb, to determine if they vibrate only when living creatures cross the perimeter or whenever something is within the area. He determined that anything inside the convex hull of the stones would set them off.

Notgandalf wanted to find someone to construct a grasping device that could hold his solidified eyeball at the end of his 10-foot pole when he uses his magical ring to pop it out of the socket. This would allow him to poke the eye around corners to spy out the terrain, without needing to roll it around unconstrained. Quinn at the Golden Egg Tavern suggested he go see Warwick the town smith.

Warwick and the Fairy

Warwick turned out to be a burly man, but rather simple-minded and superstitious. His workshop was covered with lucky charms: horseshoes, rabbits feet, clovers, which he’d nailed to all the walls. He said he could make Notgandalf an eyeball holder but it would take a couple of days and cost 20 silver coins. But he’d had problems sourcing metal for working, since the dwarves who traded with him hadn’t visited for a few weeks. He also said that a “fairy” has been harassing him, spying through his window at night. The charms are to keep it away, but he’s not sure they’re working. Sometimes the fairy leaves flowers on his windowsill.

The heroes decided to stake out the smithy overnight and see if they could catch the fairy visitor. Nogge wanted some sleep to heal minor wounds, but was interrupted around midnight by the warning stones he’d set up near Warwick’s window. Brigette spotted a human-sized shape in a cloak approaching the smithy, but the figure bolted into the trees when the warning stones went off. Brigette chased and the figure, who stopped and removed her hood to reveal Ingrid, the town’s alchemist who they’d met before. Brigette and Nogge questioned her about why she’s spying on Warwick.

Nogge: “I’m not going to be surprised by anything you say about Warwick.”
Ingrid: “I’m in love with him.”
Nogge: “Okay, I’m a bit surprised.”

Given Warwick’s simple-minded obliviousness, and Ingrid’s nervous shyness, it’s clear any potential romance is doomed to be awkwardly difficult. The heroes suggested Ingrid write Warwick a note rather than spy on him, but she pointed out he can’t read. They said they would talk to Warwick and told Ingrid to go home. The next morning they talked with Warwick and asked what he thought about Ingrid. He said he thought she might be a witch, but the heroes assured him she wasn’t, and suggested he go talk to her.

Seeking the Dragon

That morning the heroes set out to try to find the dragon, now they had Sir Brandon’s sword. Brother Leonardo decided he had chores to do in the village, so stayed behind. The retainers Tarlan (cleric) and Fingers (thief) and a few others followed the heroes.

Following the path north along the river, they caught up to two men also heading north, a short fat one carrying a pitchfork and a tall one carrying a net and with a dead pig slung over his shoulder. The heroes caught up to the men and chatted with them. They were Tad (short, fat, only 4 teeth) and Zach (tall, big Adam’s apple). They explained in simple yokel language that they were going to use the pig to lure the dragon out, then toss the net over it to catch it.

Nogge: “They could make decent bait themselves…”

After some aside discussion, the group decided to let Tad and Zach try their plan, while they followed from a discreet distance and observed. And if the dragon really appeared, they could decide what to do then. After all, the dragon might have some trouble dealing with them.

Drashi: “I don’t think it’s going to have much trouble with a dead pig.”

Tad and Zach stopped at a spot close to the foothills of the mountains and staked the pig out near the eastern river bank, then took cover in the bushes nearby to watch. The heroes stayed about 100 metres south, hidden in the trees. A breeze was blowing south out of the mountains, so they were downwind of the dead pig, which they thought was sensible as the dragon would not smell them. Nogge decided to try to get some sleep while the rest watched throughout the day.

Mid-afternoon there was a commotion across the river, and the watchers spotted four goblins emerging towards the river, chatting, singing, and generally acting half drunk. They had short swords and ill-fitting armour. The group roused Nogge, who again failed to get a solid healing sleep. One of the goblins spotted the pig on the other river bank and they began wading across the river. Garamond loosed an arrow, which found its mark in the lead goblin’s chest. As it slumped dead in the river, the other goblins panicked and fled back into the western forest. Notgandalf tossed a dagger as well, but it splashed into the river.

Tad and Zach confronted the heroes, accusing them of wanting to steal their dragon. They calmed the brothers down and decided to head to the northern side of their stake-out. Once out of view, they resumed their surveillance from a distance. Now they were upwind of the dead pig.

The Dragon

No more events occurred until after sunset. Nogge tried again to get a full sleep, but was roused around midnight when a slithering, slobbering, snuffling sound carried across to them from the western forest. Emerging from the trees was a large crocodile-shaped creature, 10 metres long, low slung and heavy on the ground. Its mouth glowed with a sickly yellow light and tendrils of smoke drifted from its nostrils and slavering jaws.

The Dragon crossed the river and went for the dead pig. Garamond began sneaking up through the cover of the trees. Tad and Zach rushed out brandishing pitchfork and net, but the dragon breathed a cloud of yellowish smoke at them and they began choking. Zach fell where he stood, while Tad raced to the river to wash away the noxious fumes and rinse out his throat.

Garamond charged the dragon with the Sword of Sir Brandon! The magic sword found its mark, puncturing the dragon’s side. Drashi also hit and Notgandalf loosed a magic missile. The dragon clawed at Garamond, raking its talons down his side, and lashed with its jaws at Drashi. Brigette joined combat and Notgandalf hit it with another magic missile. Nogge got a hit in, before Garamond skewered Sir Brandon’s sword through its mouth and up into its skull, vanquishing the fell beast.

Tarlan raced over to provide magical healing to Zach, saving his life. As everyone watched, the dragon’s scales fell off and its body dissolved into pools of acidic slime. Amidst the ooze were not dragon bones, but the skeleton of a dwarf! The heroes collected the bones, and then discussed with Tad and Zach, reinforcing the narrative that they had, in fact, slain a dragon, even without the ability to bring the dragon’s head back to town.

Confirmation and reward

The party, with Tad and Zach, returned to Brandonstead. They went to the Clumsy Fox Tavern to seek out Eric the village Reeve, who was relaxing there. They related their story, including that the dragon dissolved when dead. They suggested that Eric accompany them north the next morning to see the dragon-stained grass by the river to confirm their story. Bentley, owner of the Clumsy Fox, complained that he’d been having trouble with someone stealing his best booze from his cellar.

Next morning, they set out with Eric the Reeve and Lady Hilda, the captain of the village guard. They reached the spot where the dragon had died, seeing the large area of grass burnt by the acidic slime. Eric accepted this as evidence and promised the heroes their reward when they returned to town.

But the party wanted to search for the missing dwarves, and so parted ways with Eric and Hilda, who returned to the village. The party crossed the river and followed the dissolved vegetation of the dragon trail through the forest, coming across a collapsed log cabin near a hillside with a mine entrance. Digging through the ruins of the cabin, they found a mining pick with the name Grimni carved on the blade, and a silver dwarven beard comb. They then found the body of a dwarf, wearing a ring.

Investigating the mine entrance revealed a collapsed cave-in just inside the entrance. Brigette and Drashi used their dwarven skills to shore up the roof and excavate a bit, finding another dwarven body. This one was holding a pick engraved with the name Kedri.

The party decided to follow the dragon tracks further west, leading them to a cave in the base of the mountains, surrounded by blackened and dead vegetation. Investigating, they found the cave to be a simple chamber containing the dragon’s hoard! Around 2000 gold coins, 6 golden rings, most still on severed fingers and hands. Garnet earrings, still attached to a rotting human head. A carved stone skull with red gemstone eyes. And a magnificent cutlass decorated with gems of different shades of blue. The group collected the treasure and began hauling it back to Brandonstead.

Character moments

  • Brigette – Chasing down Ingrid the alchemist through the midnight forest outside Warwick’s smithy.
  • Drashi – .
  • Garamond – Slaying the dragon with Sir Brandon’s magical sword.
  • Nogge – Playing with warning stones. Suggesting Tad and Zach would make good dragon bait.
  • Notgandalf – Commissioning an eyeball holder for his 10-foot pole. Two magic missiles on the dragon.

Loot

  • Ring from dead dwarf – magical.
  • 2000 gold coins
  • 6 golden rings – estimated value 10gp each.
  • Garnet earrings – estimated value 140gp.
  • Stone skull with red gemstone eyes – estimated value 250gp.
  • Blue gem decorated cutlass – magical, Drashi.

This pretty much wraps up this adventure, so I’m planning the next one now! There are a few loose threads, but nothing major, and I think we’ll address those pretty quickly at the start of the next session before launching into a new adventure.


At the game, we had a feast on Greek chicken and lamb with pita bread, because my wife’s work had a lunch function which was – as is always the case at these things – heavily over-catered, and so she brought home two big boxes of food.

Today (Saturday) was hot again, 35°C. Scully had her pre-Christmas groom, and my wife had the groomer cut her har a lot shorter than we normally do, because of the hot weather. I spent some time shuttling them both around in the car to avoid walking around in the heat of the day. But we all went for a walk together in the evening as the sun was setting, which was much nicer.

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Another hot day

Sydney hit 40°C again today in some places, and unlike last Saturday it stayed hot well into the evening – it was still 33°C at 8pm. The evening news said this has been the hottest first fortnight of summer ever recorded for Sydney.

So I sat in the house most of the day with the air conditioning on. I had to take Scully out at lunch time, and I also needed to get some lunch since I’d run down lunch supplies before tomorrow’s grocery shopping. Rather than take her for a walk, I drove over to Naremburn and we sat in the shade while I got a sausage roll and a lamington from the bakery.

Today’s also a busy day for my ethics classes, with two before lunch and three in the evening. In the afternoon I worked on assembling more the Irregular Webcomic! strips from the photos I took on Monday. Both my first two classes this evening were plagued by Zoom issues, with some kids disconnecting or lagging or having other glitches that meant i had to repeat questions multiple times, and ask kids to repeat their answers multiple times. This occasionally happens, but it was especially frustrating tonight.

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Early morning birding

I forgot to mention yesterday: In the morning I usually take Scully on a walk and yesterday I took her on a longer one to avoid doing a big walk in the heat of the middle of the day. We went by the harbour shore, and for the first time in a while I did a bird count using eBird. Normally when I do this around this area, I can accumulate about 10 species observed. But yesterday I managed to find 18 different species, which is notably high. Sometimes I get 14 or 15, but 18 is close to a record for a single observation near my home. I won’t reproduce the list, because you can see it on eBird here. Looking for birds early in the morning definitely helps, as they are harder to find in the heat of the day. And summer means the Pacific koels are around (they migrate north for the winter). There are also channel-billed cuckoos, which have been around lately, but I didn’t happen to see any yesterday.

Today I dropped Scully at doggie daycare in the morning, and then I went to my dentist for a regular cleaning and dental hygiene appointment. The hygienist was pretty happy with my teeth and there were no concerns, so that’s good. Afterwards I celebrated with a roasted vegetable pie for lunch from the nearby pie shop.

Being out without walking Scully, I took the chance to drop into the brand new library that opened up not long ago in a new development nearby. It’s a branch of another library that I’m a member of, but when I showed them my card they said it had expired. I wasn’t on their system at all! I guess this goes to show what the Internet has done. I used to borrow books frequently, but of course that dropped off some years back. And… this isn’t the first time that my card has expired through lack of use! Some years ago I went into the library and tried to borrow some books only to be told my card had expired. I feel kind of embarrassed that this has happened to me twice now!

I’m also getting ready for the next Dungeons & Dragons game, which I’ll be running for my friends on Friday evening. It should be the climax of the current adventure (which started with rumours of the return of a dragon and continued with the party recovering a legendary dragon-slaying sword…), so hopefully lots of drama and fun!

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Cyclone Jasper

The main news today in Australia is the approach of Tropical Cyclone Jasper to the north Queensland coast. This is a long way from me so there’s no direct concern. But the forecast track looks like making an almost direct hit on the town of Port Douglas tomorrow around lunch time, with the much bigger city of Cairns also within the zone of destructive winds. Hopefully people in the region will be prepared and nobody will be hurt.

Here it was warm again, but felt a bit less humid. I assembled comics in the morning and then took Scully for a drive over to the Italian bakery for lunch. I had a slice of mushroom pizza, and the special pastry today was a panettone snail. It was a scroll of flaky pastry filled with candied fruit and almonds and was delicious. This bakery is always creative and coming up with new things. I just wish they’d do the banoffee croissant again!

This afternoon I wrote my next ethics lesson for this week, on the topic of Restarting Civilisation. We’re going to start by imagining that some disaster such as an asteroid strike kills a few billion people, and then consider what life would be like for the survivors. How would people get food and water? Would they be likely to cooperate for survival, or become hostile? Do survivors have an ethical responsibility to help other survivors, or to maximise their own chances of survival? Once groups of people have stable food supplies, what aspects of modern civilisation should they prioritise in rebuilding first? (laws, education, electricity, transport, etc.?) Should we take some effort (and expense!) now to provide usable information and resources to future survivors in the event of a global disaster?

Tonight for dinner I tried a new thing. I like fennel whenever I go to a restaurant and have a dish that includes it, but I think I’ve only ever tried cooking with it once, doing it as a roast vegetable with other vegetables. On a whim last grocery day I grabbed a fennel bulb, determined to try something else with it. This afternoon I decided to make caramelised fennel and eggplant calzones with a tomato sauce. I caramelised the finely sliced fennel with some balsamic vinegar, then let it cook slowly with diced eggplant. I made pizza dough, and stuffed it with the fennel and eggplant, plus some mozzarella cheese and baked it. And made a separate sauce with onions, garlic, chopped tomatoes, and oregano, to spoon over the top of the baked calzones. It turned out really good!

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New comic batching

I had a final five classes today on the current ethics topics. But my main achievement was finishing off scripts and then photographing a new large batch of Irregular Webcomic! strips. I put together the first one for tonight, but I’ll have to start assembling the rest tomorrow.

The weather continues to be warm and humid. We reached 29°C today, and the humidity never dropped below 70%. The next week is looking like being uncomfortably warm, with overnight minimums never dropping below 21°C. In fact we haven’t had any temperature below 20°C since Thursday last week, so it’ll be 10 or 11 days in a row at least. That’s too warm to sleep comfortably, but fortunately we have air conditioning to cool things down a bit further so we can sleep.

I’ve also been organising a Christmas event with my family. My family traditionally does gatherings on Christmas Eve, which is kind of nice because it means everyone can do things with their spousal families on Christmas Day without any clashing. Last year we went to a gathering of extended family, but my mother lives up the coast and doesn’t travel much these days, so she missed out. This year instead my wife and I, and my brother, have made plans to go visit my mother on Christmas Eve. I’ve booked a place where we can go out for a nice lunch, with outdoor seating so we can take Scully as well.

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Humidity and comic writing

The heading kind of sums up today. It wasn’t nearly as hot as yesterday, only reaching 28°C, but it was very humid, with a cloudy overcast locking in the moisture. I went for a 5k run at 7:30 and it was 20.6°C with 100% humidity. I did manage a faster time than yesterday though, so that was good, but boy was I dripping with sweat by the end of it.

After having a cold shower I spent much of the day writing new Irregular Webcomic! strips. I’m planning to photograph a big batch tomorrow, just in time for the new week of strips. Hopefully.

Another thing I forgot to mention yesterday: I played another game of Root (the board game) with my wife. We’ve only been playing the cats and the birds factions so far as we’re both still learning the game, but this time I tried the Woodland Alliance for the first time. My wife played cats and absolutely destroyed me. Final score was 31-14. I can see the Alliance strategy will take some time to learn.

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