Been busy. The rain continues. I went for another long bike ride last weekend despite the rain. This time I did 16 miles in an hour and 8 minutes, which is two minutes better than last week, and an average speed of 14 mph. Also got around to trimming the neighbor’s willow tree that hangs over into our yard. I swear that thing gets bigger every year.
Saturday I taught an Origami Connect event. I taught my model Gladys the Platypus, which uses my hex base. It went well and was alot of fun. Also helping me get my head in gear for the upcoming OUSA convention in July, thinking about what to teach, what to exhibit, and try to get some new stuff finished. On a related note, I’m down to my last two boxes of old origami to consolidate.
Got my performance review at work: “Exceeds expectations”. Man, I really overshot the mark. I was hoping to get laid off with a nice fat severance package so I can get an early start on retirement. In a way I’m a bit surprised because last fall when I was deep in my grief, it felt like there were lots of days when it was pretty hard to focus and function at all, let alone be all creative and innovative and super sharp and tech leadership-y. On the other hand, I did kinda lean into work as something to do to keep me going. Anyway, I guess that’s mostly behind me now. And on the plus side, Data Rights Protocol 1.0 has shipped, and that was my main project since I started this job. Then I successfully transitioned over to a new project on the Experimental Engineering group, and that’s going well so far. Using AI software to write AI software, such irony!
Our D&D campaign has been very entertaining lately. We’re playing The Isle of Dread, which an Expert D&D module from the 80’s that I’m running using 5th edition rules. There’s alot of trekking thru the jungle on the way to central plateau, where there’s an ancient evil temple on an island in a lake in a crater of a dormant volcano. Along the way the party befriend a tribe of flying monkeys and fought a next of evil, magic-using spiders, where they gained a cache or strange magic items.
More recently the party had to cross a river to get to the plateau, and chose a shallow swampy location. Safy and Bart decided to hop across on a chain of small grassy patches sticking up out of the water. Nyx flew across with Skrill on her broomstick as a passenger, left him on the northern shore, and returned to ferry the others. I rolled a Hydra as the wandering monster encounter. I didn’t realize it, but the 5th Edition Hydra is alot more powerful than the old version, and I feared the party might have met its match. Midway on her way back, Nyx was attacked by a five-headed hydra, but she was able to fly away in the nick of time. Combat ensued. Skrill, alone on the far shore, was attacked and almost immediately incapacitated. The Hydra lost two of its heads but regenerated them next round. The party rallied and cut off several more of its heads, although still more grew back. In the end, Aliana the sorceress found a Fireball spell on a scroll and used it to inflict massive damage and finish the beast off.
The party decided to try and ascend to the central plateau by crossing a rope bridge high over the gorge, when they were approached by three pteranodons, a kind of flying relative of the dinosaurs. Bart charmed and befriended one, while Skrill attacked another. The friendly one landed on the bridge, causing Luna, Aliana and Safy to loose their balance and get thrown over the side. Ali and Safy hung on, but Luna plummeted. Nyx threw her broomstick to Luna, who caught it and was able to fly away safely and avoid getting smashed up on the rocks far below. Safy climbed back onto the bridge but Aliana remained hanging. Two pteranodons attacked Skrill, while the 3rd one let Bart and the rabbit climb on its back. Next round, one of the pteranodons attacked Ali, and she fell, but was saved by Luna, after casting magic missile. Safy finished off one of the flying dinosaurs with some holy damage spell. Now we’re at the bottom of the round, with one pteranadon flying away with Bart on its back and Nxy in its claws. Luna and Ali are flying around on a broomstick. Skrill has hooked the last remaining winged beast with his fishing rod and is attempting to reel it in. Safy is hanging out on the rope bridge, looking cool for the moment. I wonder how this will all end.