Borders

Between poohsoc and douglas's party, I phoned lots of people and seized the opportunity to browse borders with nothing particular in mind. (Why is it called Borders? Is it a reference to Edge Witchery[1] or what?)

* There was another point, but I can't remember it.

* Goodkind's Sword of Truth series is rrrreaching into double figures. Does Robert Jordan have a rival?

* I read some of Princess Bride. I managed not to buy it then, but I think it's definitely worth getting.

* Dianna Wynne Jones and Narnia have made the move to the adult fantasy section. Narnia even comes with new arty black and white adult covers, which as always I rather like. The lion photo is as good as you could ever hope of conveying "so beautiful you want to hug it, even if you're disembowled for it."

* Has anyone read The Hickory Staff? It was on display and caught my eye.

* A group of sixth-form/first-year girls paraded through, one being dragged by her friends away from every book in the place.

[1] Gakked from TP or someone: the magic of edge effects and pushing boundaries.

Review - Men in Tights

Do I like men in tights? That is, do I like "Men in Tights"? I though this was supposed to be a classic comedy but most of it seemed a bit dull and predicatable.

But I'm glad I left it on, because there were some lovely moments in the last two minutes:

( spoilers )

Douglas's Party

Then, I went on to Douglas's birthday. It showed another cross-section of friends -- not in the normal sense, but the opposite, a "knowing douglas" plane that defines a group I hadn't seen together before.

Douglas and Louise have a good book collection. Mine needs to be organised.

There was the chess variant where 6 people take a piece and choose a rule defining how it moves, and two players try to play whilst deducing these moves by being told which moves are legal.

You rename the piece giving some clue to its rule, and many were pleasing: warp spider, trebuchet, heddim (sp?). It was interesting, though perhaps unfortunate, when one rule-intersection produced about four pieces of the "massive explosion" sort, and pawns which teleported pieces all over the board; several games ended quickly.

But were interesting. I would play again. Though it might be good to have some understanding or incentive for rules to be constained somehow to prevent too powerful or boring ones.

There was massive wrestling and tickle fights with Ian, Louise, and the lovely Susan, though were not as interesting as they might have been if everyone could not become un-ticklish at whim. Louise's remembered Judo worked well, and we just about managed to not destroy any furniture, glassware, or DVDs.

ETA. And then, having chatted until about 3.30 about everything, eg. fantasy books and series, and just about dodging a great god debate, we decamped. I wasn't very drunk by this point, but was very tired, but woke up in the pre-dawn cold. It was incredibly misty, which is always slightly eerie, looking too much like the world stops just beyond the limit of your vision, but I got back fine.