Time Flies So Quickly

Who Knows Where The Time Goes.....Sandy Denny and Fairport Convention. And she couldn't be more right! Last post July, so long ago. Thought I would do a short post on this significant day, my 65th birthday! I remember thinking way back that gosh, I will be 52 when we hit 2000. That was 13 years ago, so that song is really apt. I do not play board games nearly as much as I used to, miss the tuesday nights at Horsham with Richard, Garry and Steve. But I do play occasionally, had Star Trek Catan as a birthday present and gave it a run yesterday. I must say I like it, the character cards give the game a new twist. Especially if you are a Trekkie. So in a few days another year gone........(takes large gulp from glass). Happy Christmas everyone!!

Air Challenge 2012

Well another month gone by. We had Tina's sister to stay for a couple of weeks and while she was here it was the annual Air Challenge. Organised by the biggest hotel in St. Wolfgang, the Scaleria, with a lot of input from Red Bull. There are lots of seaplanes landing on the lake and this year we had the Dornier DO-24 ATT as well the Sikorsky S-38. I think the Sikorsky had  been in the film 'Aviator' with Leonardo Di Caprio.

Anyway, here are a couple of pics that I took with the Nikon and the 55-200 lens.

                                         Dornier DO-24 ATT doing a flyby

                                         Dornier DO-24 ATT and Sikorsky S-38 doing a flyby

                                         Dornier DO-24 ATT landing on the Wolfgangsee

Sikorsky S-38 landing on the Wolfgangsee

Oh Deer!!

 Here a couple of shots that I took out of our dining room window. The deer was feeding only 20 or so feet away. Quite oblivious of me, she just carried on eating.

Just click on the picture for a larger image.

Wow.....another post

Yes, here I am again. Been busy again lately. Doing a bit of decorating and spring cleaning, I know it's not strictly springe...but hey what the heck. Apartment looking better now. Rearranged all my games, moved the units around and they look better. Got rid of a few games so I can actually get all my games into the units.

Also got a new computer, gone Mac. There was nothing wrong with my old PC so donated it to the local school. They are really grateful so that's nice.

On the photography front, had a bit of luck. Sometimes we get deers in the back garden and just lately there was one feeding only about 15 feet from our dining room window. Got out the trusty Nikon with 200mm lens and took a few shots. I will post a few in the next update.

Been playing a lot of Clash of the Dragons on facebook, it gets really addictive (ask Tina). But I like it a lot.

Euro 2012 footy tournament has just started. Yesterday about 30 mins before the first match, Poland v Greece,  we had a terrific storm with hailstones as big as grapes and then had a power cut for 60 mins. So missed the first half of that game. Watched all the Russia v Czech Republic though, the Czech's got hammered. Can't really see England doing much, with all the injuries and new manager as well. Still, I will support them just the same.

That's all for now, watch out for the deer pics.

Still Here

Yes, I'm still here although I havn't posted for some months now. Spring has come and gone and we are speeding into Summer. We have been to England for a couple of weeks back in April to visit family etc. I must admit that I haven't played any boardgames for quite some time. Just don't seem to have the time. At the moment we are in the process of decorating...not my favourite pastime. But it has to be done. Our friend that moved out here last September is getting his apartment in order and has been buying a lot of flat pack furniture. I think we are experts at putting it together, although the times given in the instruction manual are obviously for a team of supermen because we didn't get anywhere near them....:)

Frozen Lake and Snow, Snow, Snow

We sure have had our fair share of snow here, it's been snowing for about 2 days now and last night the wind was gale force as well. We have tall trees opposite our apartment and they were really bending in the wind. The snow plough has been up and down the road outside several times during the day, but 30 minutes after it's been through, it looks just the same again. The lake is completely frozen over, the first time since 2006. There have been loads of people walking on it. Skating, curling, walking the dog and having barbeques. Just so you get the idea, here are a couple of photos I took.

                                         View taken from the White Horse Inn.

                                         Looking out from the Promenade.

                                   Looking towards the Church and White Horse Inn.

If you would like to see more shots of the frozen lake and the snow, please go here.....

https://picasaweb.google.com/101102439900309501191/FrozenLake8212#


Stay warm!!

Losing Touch....Moving On

I seem to be losing touch with a lot of my old 'pals'. I sent a load of Christmas greeting emails to old work colleagues and gaming friends, but did any faint 'Merry Christmases' come echoing back through the ether.....well just one! One, from an old work colleague, but none from anybody else. I suppose with their busy working lives they haven't got time to reply. I send the occasional chatty email but I very rarely get any reply, only from this one guy....a good friend. I guess that's that....people move on.

I find that I am playing less and less boardgames now. Of course I miss the weekly meetings we had when I lived in England. But there aren't any boardgamers over here. Tina plays occasionally, but she's not what you would call a fan. I think she just plays to humour me. So what do I scratch the gaming itch with? Facebook to the rescue. I play 3 collectible, not tradeable, card games on FB. The Clash of the Dragons, sort of fantasy based. Tyrant, a modern super machine based and Berserk, The Cataclysm, again fantasy based. CotD is my favourite, their are 5 zones to battle through, with 3 difficulty levels so there's a lot of play. It is free to play, although you can buy 'Dragon Coins' to purchase cards packs with the rarer cards in.

You can also belong to a clan, this is a way to chat to fellow gamers, exchange deck ideas and such. As well as the gaming zones there are brawls. This is where you and your fellow gamers battle against tough bosses for rewards which enable you to 'craft' cards for your collection. There are special clan brawls which only clan members can take part in as well. It takes a lot of my time at the moment....as Tina will tell you. Maybe you might want to give it a try.

The next book

Well, finished 'The Bones of Avalon', several days ago in fact. Did I like it? Yes, it was a good read if you like historical novels. Not one of the best I have read, the Matthew Shardlake novels by C.J. Sansom are better in my opinion. But, it was interesting. At over 500 pages I thought was a bit too long. The author tended to waffle a bit in places and I'm sure he could have told the story in 350 pages or so.

So, on to the next book. This is a crime novel by young Swedish writer Camila Lackberg. I haven't read any of her previous novels so this is a first look at her work. I'm about halfway through it and it took awhile to start to come together. There are many story threads going on at the same time and also time shifts between the present and the second world war. A description curtesy of Amazon...

'Crime writer Erica Falck is shocked to discover a Nazi medal among her late mother's possessions. Haunted by a childhood of neglect, she resolves to dig deep into her family's past and finally uncover the reasons why.

Her enquiries lead her to the home of a retired history teacher. He was among her mother's circle of friends during the Second World War but her questions are met with bizarre and evasive answers. Two days later he meets a violent death. Detective Patrik Hedström, Erica's husband, is on paternity leave but soon becomes embroiled in the murder investigation. Who would kill so ruthlessly to bury secrets so old?

Reluctantly Erica must read her mother's wartime diaries. But within the pages is a painful revelation about Erica's past. Could what little knowledge she has be enough to endanger her husband and newborn baby? The dark past is coming to light, and no one will escape the truth of how they came to be…'

I'll let you know my thoughts when I finish.

More snow over the last few days and also quite a lot of rain, still cold as well.

On to the next book!

This is next book I am going to read. And this is a publishers description, curtesy of Amazon.

'It is 1560, and Elizabeth Tudor has been on the throne for a year. Dr John Dee, at 32 already acclaimed throughout Europe, is her astrologer and consultant in the hidden arts... a controversial appointment in these days of superstition and religious strife. Now the mild, bookish Dee has been sent to Glastonbury to find the missing bones of King Arthur, whose legacy was always so important to the Tudor line. With him - hardly the safest companion - is his friend and former student, Robert Dudley, a risk-taker, a wild card... and possibly the Queen's secret lover. The famously mystical town is still mourning the gruesome execution of its Abbot, Richard Whiting. But why was the Abbot really killed? What is the secret held by the monks since the Abbey was founded by Joseph of Arimathea, uncle of Christ and guardian of the Holy Grail? The mission takes Dee to the tangled roots of English magic, into unexpected violence, necromantic darkness, the breathless stirring of first love... and the cold heart of a complex plot against Elizabeth. '

Sounds like my cup of tea.....looking forward to it.

Snowing hard here and very cold. Don't think I will be going far today. Playing Clash of the Dragons on Facebook.....lazy, lazy.

Just shows what I know!

I a previous post I was saying that I was enjoying Heresy by S. J. Parris, well I have just found out that that is a pseudonym for Stephanie Merrit. That doesn't change the fact that I really enjoyed reading it. Set in Elizabethan England it's full of secret catholic masses at dead of night, bloody murder and intrigue in and around the colleges of Oxford. Sort of like a medieval Inspector Morse. She has a new book coming out in April and I shall definitely be looking out for that.

Been taking a few photos of the lake

The weather hasn't been that good for photography, but here are a couple of recent shots of the lake.

Taken on rather a misty day with my Nikon D3000.

I have been really enjoying my new Kindle. I found a programme called Calibre that manages your ebook collection on your computer. If you have a ebook reader I would say this programme is indespensible. It gives you such a lot of control on your collection and is free, although you can donate to the author. I reckon he gets a lot of donations because this programme is so good.

I must say that I enjoy historical who-dunits, and I have just downloaded a few from Amazon. Amazon.de that is because I am resident in Austria the UK site will not let me download from them.......so much for the worldwide web!!! I have read every Matthew Shardlake novel from C. J. Sansom in paperback, and I have been looking for novels in a similar vein. I found these, Hue & Cry and Fate and Fortune by Shirley McKay. Another author that writes this kind of book is S. J. Parris, I am reading Heresy on my Kindle at the moment and it's a cracking who-dunnit set in the period of Elizabeth I. Looking forward to reading his other novel Prophesy. While browsing the Amazon site I found 'Mozart's Last Aria' a historical crime novel set in Vienna in 1791 by Matt Rees. Looks intriquing so I bought this one as well.

Starting to look a bit better now

Not being much a computer programmer, I have been fiddling around with the settings and it's starting to look a bit better. Now there is a link to the old blog 'Austrian Ramblings' on the right if you want to have a look at old post.

New Blog for New Year

Well, you all know I didn't like the way the old blog looked, so I've started a new one. Shame really, there are quite a few years of archived posts on the old one. You can see them here.

http://coljenngamer.blogspot.com/

So let's see what the new year brings.