Web Comic of the Week
I can't believe that a week has already passed by since I posted the first of these - it must be my age.

This week's choice is one I nearly made last week's choice and the only reason it wasn't was that I've known Sean and Wendi online longer than I've known Steve. Anyway...

Web Comic of the Week for this week is Acid Keg by Steve Hogan.

Steve creates the kind of artwork that instantly speaks to the viewer. It's comparitively simple look is very deceptive because beneath that simplicity lies skill, knowledge and talent that only ever comes from years of hard work and dedication to creating the best possible artwork. If it was for the art alone I would return to Steve's site regularly, but when it's combined with the superb, off-the-wall and thought-provoking writing, then Acid Keg is a must for everyone's favourites list.

Please visit the site, read all of the strips, take a look at his other artwork, fall in love with it, tell him so, form a fan club...

A new Dane & Joe
The latest Dane & Joe strip has been posted at the Just Adventure site. It will be posted on my own site next week.

You could be a writer...
Slightly surreal conversation today. I'm busy at my computer in the middle of an important story document and my fingers are flying over the keyboard like things posessed, when the guy next to me pipes up:
"You could be a writer."
"I am a writer." (I point at the text on screen.)
"No, I mean, you could make a living at it."
"I AM making a living at it!"

New phone
Now I'm not one to hanker after the latest technology just for the sake of it, so when my old mobile phone started getting a little dodgy in its behaviour I wasn't looking forward to replacing it. I don't use it very often - a couple of calls a week is busy for me - but you can guarantee that when I don't have it on me is the time I'll need to make a call. So today I took the plunge and bought one on special offer and only payed 50 quid. My god it's tiny compared to my old one and so light I will no longer list to one side when I have it in my coat pocket.

My new new CDs
The replacement has already arrived and the second CD is the second CD and is in the CD drive as I type this. Quality stuff!

My new CDs
One of the CDs I bought was a double and I only had the chance to play one disc on Monday. When I came to play the other disc I found that it was another CD1. I immediately sent an e-mail to Amazon asking for a replacement and when I checked my e-mail tonight found that they'd replied and a replacement was on the way already. Now THAT's what I call service. They also gave me a freepost address to send the other one back to so that it won't cost anything. Top marks to Amazon!

0 = 1
One of the things that has always baffled me and continues to baffle me is how it has been established in computer programming that the first thing in a list is 0 (zero). For instance, in a 256-colour palette the colours are referred to as colours 0 - 255. This happens all over the place. Who was the first person to do this and why? More to the point, why has it stuck? Why does everyone just accept this convention?

Having done a lot of maths (in an alternative life, I think) zero was always an absence of anything, so it strikes me that the first item in a list cannot be zero or it wouldn't exist.

Been to college
Just had to trek over to Hull to visit my son's college and talk to his tutors. There was no problem, it was simply a kind of progress report. He appears to be doing well, but they emphasised that with a bit more work he could do even better. We also talked with him about what he's thinking of doing at the end of the course and so he needs to think about the kind of career he wants to concentrate on. He's decided to spend his free time for tomorrow in the library.

The Sapphire Claw
I'm sorry, but there is no episode of The Sapphire Claw this week as re-adjusting to the hectic nature of working as a game designer has taken its toll. :)

Who says you can't train a cat...
Because Acrasia, the cat, is getting a little old and prone to the occasional "accident" she now has a cage to sleep in on a night. This is rather a large cage, so she has room to manoevre (it's actually a dog cage). In order to encourage her into the cage, June has been tempting her in with cat treats (me, I just nudge here, gently of course). This morning as we were getting ready for work she decided to walk into the cage unbidden and then meowed at us to draw our attention. When we ignored here she came out of the cage, but then a moment later returned and meowed once more. This repeated a few times and quite clearly she was telling us that she expected a treat for going into the cage. :)

Forum gone...
I just took a trip to my forum on the off-chance that someone may have posted there, only to find that it is no more. And this without a word of warning from the forums organisers that it was going to happen. Still, no big loss. If people at some point in the future feel that a forum is needed then I'll worry about it then. The blog seems to be working out much better than the forum ever did anyway. :)

At the moment I am listening to...
I received two albums in the post this morning and am listening to one of them now. Both are by David Sylvian and I bought them based on reviews I read on another weblog, Unproductivity, so thanks to Tom for that. The one that's on the turntable, I mean in the CD player, is "blemish". The other is "Gone to Earth". I already have a few of his CD's (I just hope he doesn't want them back) and reading the reviews gave me the excuse to buy more. Very ambient work at times, melancholy at others, but always fascinating.

Mailing list
For those of you who may be interested, I have a mailing list to which anyone can subscribe. Not only do you get the comic strips sent through to your inbox, but every time I post to the web log it's copied to the mailing list. To subscribe, send a blank e-mail to Juniper_Crescent-subscribe@topica.com.

Juniper Crescent
New strip posted today!

Lunch time
I'm back at work and it's lunch time. It's pretty quiet in the office as other people are now either on holiday or out of the office on business. I spent quite a large chunk of this morning sorting through 1780 e-mails, most of which were spam. It's always weird when you come back to work after a good break - everything is pretty much as you left it but there is the feeling that things have happened you know nothing of and need to be brought up to date. And some of the people who would bring me up to date are not here...

There was a very brief crisis when I arrived. I thought that someone had stolen my chair. It's funny how you get used to the way your desk and equipment is set up and as soon as something changes you know instantly that it isn't right. Luckily it had only been moved to a nearby empty desk. :)

I need to change some of the pictures on the wall near my desk. Something fresh and vibrant, I think. Suggestions please. :)

Knights of the Old Republic
I finished this game on Friday night and have been thinking a lot about it since. It's an excellent game that really had me hooked, though I became a little frustrated by the final battle and I can't help but feel it was more down to luck than skill that I won through. But that aside I would really recommend this game to anyone who has an XBox or a PC.

My only gripe was that I never heard my character speak. In a story where they expect the player to empathise with the main characters, the hardest to empathise with was the one I was playing because without hearing an actor speak the lines he didn't appear as fleshed out as the other characters. It also meant that there was no real dialogue between the player character and the other characters, certainly not in the way that made the films so enjoyable. When I made a choice of what to ask about, it felt like I was triggering the other character to start a short monologue rather than having a proper conversation.

Of course, this probably stems from having worked on games where the player character spoke as part of the game and what enabled us to develop his characterisation so much better. So I may be biased. :)

Back to Work Tomorrow
After having three weeks away from the office it's back to the grind for me tomorrow. I'm refreshed and raring to go once again and looking forward to working hard on the next project. I know that for many, the prospect of going back to work after such a long break would not be a prospect they'd savour, but I'm very fortunate in having a job I enjoy immensely.

I've been thinking long and hard about Broken Sword - The Sleeping Dragon, particularly in the light of some comments that have been made about the game. Although the overall response has been incredibly positive, it's clear that there are still one or two areas that we can look at with a view to improving in the future. I've already got lots of ideas of where we can start moving forward once again and I'm relishing the prospect of brainstorming the ideas with the rest of the team.

New visitors
Many thanks to those of you who have already visited after seeing my postings on various forums concerning my Web Comic of the Week. I hope further visitors will find the site to be of enough interest to warrant further visits.