Just a Ramble…

The problem with me and writing is that I go through periods where I get very little done at all, then I get back into it and make some progress.
Part of me thinks that explains why I am a plotter at heart, I need the structure in place so when I get back to it I can easily pick up where I left off.
The other part of me, says “screw it! Just write!” but the issue with that is, it is harder for me to get back to as I forget what I was thinking and planning from the last session.

I think that is the wonderful thing about Blogging, I can write a little or a lot just to exercise the creative part of my brain a little, the other problem is once I have written a blog post, half of me wants to keep writing while I am mentally ‘warmed up’, and the other half just wants to stop writing there and be done for the day.
Especially when I have games like Assassins Creed: Valhalla and Watch Dogs: Legion constantly dancing into my mind when I am trying to concentrate on work!
My concentration has markedly improved recently, and I am now able (some days anyway) to concentrate on something for longer than five minutes at a time. Beforehand, I would really struggle to focus on a task, even something as mundane as watching TV with dinner would be a task.
But I guess that is all part of living with Depression.

Depression has been with me for longer than I can remember, and it has really sunk it’s claws into me. Writing is one thing that if I can only focus on it and have a never ending supply of coffee nearby, I think I have a shot at pushing it out of my head for a little while.
I am trying my hand at coding which scratches that same itch, the desire to create, to get it all out of my head and onto the page, and shove Depression aside for a bit.
So, yeah a bit of an uncoordinated ramble today, just trying to get my thoughts down on paper so I can really get stuck back in to writing and coding and endeavour to be free of Depression, even if only for a little while.

I must say though, it is nice to be able to enjoy things again some days, rather than lockdown being a time to worry, stress out and be bad tempered, it is looking like a time for creating and educating myself.
I use Udemy and Centre of Excellence which I highly recommend, I also have a Skillshare account but have not used it yet despite it being recommended by others.
But that is my thoughts for today, tomorrow will come when it comes and I can only hope for a day where I can look forward with a hopeful expectation rather than backwards on the past.

I have no idea where I would be if it not for the constant presence of my beautiful wife and best friend Tracey, without her support this year and the past sixteen years, I think I would be in a very different situation.
So, if you are struggling too, consider trying to educate yourself on a hobby, something that interests you and can distract you from your own head for a little bit; it definitely works for me some of the time.
I know people say exercise is a Depression killer but I hate it! I have a workout routine to keep me active that I do three times a week, but so far I am still waiting on the fabled, ‘feel good’ feeling that is supposed to come with it. All I feel is relief it’s over!

Ah well, time to end it here as I have rambled on enough, I have a workout to do, more writing to do, a supply run to the shops and if I listen to Tracey, decorations to put up!

Have a great weekend folks!

Google Play Drama!

Hi there, welcome back! It’s been an interesting week. A couple of months ago, I was notified that Google Play music was to be replaced with the new Youtube Music app.
After getting hopelessly lost in various posts on line discussing the ups and downs, I decided that it only meant that I would not be able to purchase music from the Google Play store anymore but would still be able to listen to my own music that I put on my phone.
The other day, I was happily listening to Mississippi John Hurt no problem, I turned the app off when I was done and not five minutes later I changed my mind and wanted music again and I was presented with a screen telling me to use the Youtube Music app and locking me out of my music library.
To say I was a tad annoyed would be an understatement, I do enjoy my music and it is a large part of my life to have such a large music library in my pocket at all times.
Well, first we tried the new app, not a fan as I couldn’t find my purchased music and the music it did find it wanted to search Youtube for instead of my library which was ridiculous.
Tracey did some digging and found an option on the Google play music app screen to “Manage Your Data”, and by following the steps managed to export my entire purchased library to be able to download! Downloading my library didn’t take too long and we were then ready to copy the files back onto my phone.
The downloaded folders contained a load of .csv files which must have been some sort of metadata as a lot of the tracks were in play lists, but simply using the search box on the window’s top right corner for *.mp3 managed to filter them all out and just show those lovely tracks! Filtering further by artist name and creating new folders on my SD card in my phone and in no time at all I had everything back on my phone and ready to go!
We used the amazing (and FREE!) VLC Media Player to test the .mp3’s and to make sure that the metadata was in place like track name and artist’s name and so on.
The next problem was finding a new music player, having a look through the app store, we narrowed them down to two, Muzio Music Player and Music Player, trying them both out, I settled on Muzio as it had a cleaner look and automatically sorted my albums by name which the other player did not. Only a small thing but it was enough to make me decide.
So now, music app in hand, music library ready to go and all I need to do know is learn the intricacies of this new music player app!

I have been on the PC mainly this past few days sorting out my backups and occasionally loading up a game, (though my concentration has been low recently, so only a short while on each game until I gave up).
I am still trying to teach myself how to set up manual attacks and use the modded tools like the RAOBF and Attack Disc for Silent Hunter 3 LSH 2015 with varying degrees of success, even if I forget most of it by the time I load my career save, it is still interesting to watch tutorials and re-learn it all.

I managed to get back into my writing aswell as coursework which I am happy with, and am hoping I have hit a turning point.
The problem with my writing is that I am still not sure if I am a “Plotter” or a “Pantser”, meaning do I outline and plot every detail in advance of writing, or simply write “by the seat of my pants” and just go for it?
It would appear that I am a mixture of both, I like to have a general outline and a few lines for each chapter overview to keep me focused, but the bulk of the writing is done as I go and as it comes to me.

Though, how much my writing and coursework will be affected by Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla which released today and I hope to pick up tomorrow remains to be seen! I am still enjoying Watch Dogs Legion a lot and have recently started Pillars of Eternity on Xbox (there is a Game pass achievement reward of 75 points if I kill 5 enemies which I have done multiple times without the achievement popping for some reason). Also, Tracey emailed Microsoft as the Watch Dogs Legion punch card award worth 250 points when activated would not fire for me either so I lost out on those points. To my great surprise, they emailed back within an hour or two awarding those points retroactively, Nice one Microsoft!
We needed to order a new Christmas tree recently too as our old one makes such a mess with the ‘needles’ shedding every where (Which is supposed to be the main reason to have an artificial tree right?) and the new one is a touch smaller but has fibre optic ‘lights’ which according to the pictures looks really cool.

Which leads me to my final point: Is it too early to put up the decorations? I have heard friends on facebook are putting up or at least considering putting their decorations up early as it’s been a difficult year and doing so seems to make people happy.
The tree is sat in it’s box patiently waiting, and the decorations are still in their boxes in the shed so not sure what to do, on one hand it will make us happy seeing the decorations, but on the other, it is only early November and last year it was towards the end of November we put them up.

We also managed to put together a bit of the Firefly crate but still have a long way to go, we were hoping to have it sorted out before the tree goes up but that won’t be the case if the decorations go up soon!
The problem with it is the pieces do not fit together nicely requiring a bit of force with a hammer to slot into place. I am terrified of breaking the thing every time I hit it and worried I am annoying our neighbours with the banging, but I am sure it will be worth it in the end.
Well, it is time to sign off and either get some more writing done, or do my coursework that I didn’t do yesterday seeing as it was our unofficial anniversary (16 years ago we got together!) and Tracey let me off it!
Take care and have a great week!

Gaming and Clearing Out

You may have been expecting another post from me in six months or so based on my usual post schedule, but I thought I would have another shot today and surprise you all.
I recently picked up Watch Dogs: Legion and have been playing the hell out of it and loving every minute.
I have been waiting for this game for some time and I cannot believe it is finally here!
I have my eyes on Assassins Creed: Valhalla next in a few weeks and I will be able to get a nice discount off it thanks to the Game Pass Quests adding points up nicely as I play other games, gotta love a discount!
So far, I have barely touched the main story, preferring instead to simply wander the streets of London hacking CCTV and random people and watching what they are doing.
I love the feel of the game, it really does feel like you are in London, and I must admit, seeing well known landmarks in the game is a true pleasure.
The sound is extremely well done with the city feeling alive around you as in the previous two Watchdogs games.
The auto-driving feature as in the Far cry games is well done too, though I did find myself getting caught up in traffic more than once so I needed to take over and do some fast overtaking!
I know it may seem strange to some, but in open world games, I sometimes just want to walk or drive around the map for a bit and see what is there and if something happens on the way then more fun for me!
It’s not that I don’t enjoy a story, I certainly do, but occasionally I just want to forget the real world for a bit and see what there is to see for a while.
I can’t quite put my finger on exactly why I do this, it’s just the way I prefer to play.
I have very fond memories of playing The Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion, Fallout 3 and Knights of the Old Republic for many, many hours well into the night just exploring the world and taking in the sights and doing quests here and there, unfortunately, that means I have never actually finished the main storyline despite starting fresh time and time again as I am unhappy with my character or have simply not played for a while and wanted to start again.
Of course, every time I add mods I tend to start a new game no matter what the the title is.

Yesterday, I cleared out the bottom drawers of the cabinet next to my PC, finding a load of manuals and guides for various games and sadly having to throw some away as they were now obsolete and hadn’t been looked at in years anyway.
It was hard to throw them away, but it did clear enough space to put in most of the guides sandwiched between my PC and the desk into the drawers and consequently tidy up the whole area, only keeping out the guides for games I am currently playing.

That is a problem I have always had, letting go of things I probably should. It doesn’t matter if I have not looked at or thought of it for a long time, upon looking at the thing, I would suddenly be extremely reluctant to letting it go. That’s where Tracey comes in, if I am having trouble letting something go, she helps me to realise that it is okay to get rid of it.
It is annoying to get rid of very large guides or tutorials that I had printed out and had bound, but newer versions of software render them obsolete anyway. I did keep a lot of them for games that are still relevant though, even though I am sure I will think of looking something up in the discarded guides at some point in the near future before remembering they are gone.

We also are planning on sorting out the top two drawers today as they are full of random cables and other assorted junk, then we will be going onto the Big Damn Crate Firefly box (for the awesome Firefly: The Game) that we got ages ago and have only partially assembled due to the wooden pieces not quite fitting together properly, causing me to become terrified at the thought of using the hammer and risking breaking a part and rendering the whole box useless.

I am back into my reading now as you can probably tell from my Goodreads widget to the right, the problem I have with reading is I rarely stick with one book until it is finished, I tend to jump around depending on what room I am in or what my mood strikes me at the time. I always have at least one non fiction book on the go alongside a fiction book to keep things fresh and give me a change. It is not that I do not enjoy the books on their own, it is simply that sometimes I fancy a change or to learn something.

My main reading time is before bed when settling down, though recently my tablet has started working more or less consistently (at the moment) in the bedroom again, after Virgin destroyed our Wifi with a new router that was supposedly better though it obliterated our Wifi and they won’t do anything about it despite three engineers coming out and declaring it all working properly, but as the cable connection into the house is stable there is apparently nothing they can do, so I am watching videos in bed again which I know is bad before sleep due to the blue light but I do enjoy them anyway, even if it take me a little longer to get to sleep.

Well, it is time to finish my post, get a coffee and tackle those drawers! Once that is done, it is housework time and then having a crack at the Firefly crate before heading out for a supply run and finally settling down with Watch Dogs before dinner and TV with Tracey. We are currently trying to watch the older stuff on our Sky hard drive as some of it dates back to 2016! Last night we watched Humans which was cancelled a couple of years ago but was still very enjoyable, and that’s not including the DVDs we have of various shows! Maybe this lockdown we can make a dent in our series?

Anyway, I will sign off for now so have a wonderful day!

It’s Been A Strange Year So Far

It’s been a bit of a strange year hasn’t it? Since lockdown in March, and lots of people spending more time at home with loved ones, there have been two schools of thought:
Those who believe the year has raced by, and those who believe that 2020 will never end.

I am not sure which camp I fall into.
As a key worker, I worked through the lockdown and saw the consequences first hand, less people shopping, and those who were tended to be panicking and buying all the stock of certain items like toilet roll and pasta, preventing others like us from being able to stock up.
I fell behind on Slimming World during this as we simply couldn’t get all the food we normally could and had to make do with whatever random food items were left on the shelves.
So I started putting the weight back on, not going out for my runs didn’t help either as we quarantined at home except for work.
Well, I thought at the time that I now have plenty of time to catch up on my writing (which has slipped), reading (paperback and Kindle, fiction and non fiction) and games.
Boy was I wrong.

Even with the extra time at home, it seemed like we had no time at all, very little of note was accomplished and sadly I didn’t get any writing done.
Well, after so long not even doing my coursework (I have a dozen or so courses on Udemy and Centre of Excellence, as well as my BITC Paranormal Investigator course which has been languishing in development hell for years despite my interest in the subject matter).
This past week after some soul searching, I have managed to get back on track.
I have made slow but steady progress on my courses every day and have managed to dust off Scrivener and throw myself at this post.

I have thought a lot about my future goals, and realised that I would like to be able to work from home, I have enrolled on a couple of Web Developer courses over at Udemy and signed up to a couple of sites namely Code Academy and W3Schools to get me going.

I have finally started inputting my family history into the fantastic software Legacy Family Tree (which I recommend) and out of the battered folder and endless sheets of paper that it has been trapped on for years.
So far things seem to be going well and I hope to continue full steam ahead.
Now it comes down to games, I have been getting more concentration back the last week, despite recent months of being in an anxiety-ridden, depressed nightmare and have been able to play my games for longer than five minutes before switching and as my games are a very large part of my life that fills me with joy.
I have been mainly playing The Outer Worlds this week and loving the quirky humour and gunplay a lot and highly recommend you to try it if you are on the fence, at the moment, it is free on Game Pass and I just picked up the first expansion with an eye to getting the second expansion early next year when it releases.

I also have my eye on a few upcoming games, namely Assassins Creed Valhalla, Watch Dogs: Legion, Farcry 6 and Cyberpunk 2077 (which got pushed back by a few weeks but will be well worth the wait I’m sure).
Hopefully I will be able to pick them up soon, I especially enjoy getting games on sale which I tend to do with every purchase, though it will be some time before these games go on sale as they are new probably next Christmas (though I did buy Fallout 76 at full price after launch and less than a week later it was reduced to 50% due to poor sales and reviews which did not please me) I also remember picking up Skyrim Special Edition at full price (still worth it) and THE NEXT DAY it goes on sale! Well I suppose that’s the way it happens sometimes.

I have mostly got my outline in place for my work in progress and it needs a little more time to bake before I can get started on it in earnest.
Well, that is the update, sorry it’s been a long one but it has been some time since my last post.
I am now going to export this from scrivener into WordPress and do some editing and then get back to my WIP.
So whether this year has gone really slow for you, or it has sped by, I wish you all the very best and I will speak to you again soon.

Euro Trucker

I thought i would post a little bit about the various games i am currently enjoying. I understand this is somewhat different to my usual posts but if you want to get a little more in depth on my current gaming this is for you! I will be posting about modding some games too where appropriate, though these will not be tutorials as they are already prevalent and almost definitely explained better by others anyway!

I have been spending some time recently with SCS Software’s Euro Truck Simulator 2.

The act of driving the highways of Europe ferrying cargo from place to place doesn’t sound exciting i agree and i was sceptical at first but the game came on a good sale and i thought i would give it a go.

I’m glad i did, there is something relaxing about just driving with some music on. This kept me occupied for a little while but then i discovered mods…

The biggest mod i use is Promods, which adds a ton of new roads and cities to the base game.

I also use the following mods which i highly recommend:

Grimes Seasonal (currently Summer)
Sound Fixes Pack
Romania Extended
Real European Gas Stations (Steam Workshop)
City Lighting (Steam Workshop)
Realistic Vehicle Lights (Steam Workshop)
DP Realistic Traffic (Steam Workshop)
Jazzycat’s Trailer & Cargo Pack, Painted Truck, Bus Traffic and AI Traffic
Sisl’s Trailer Pack & Cabin Accessories (Steam Workshop)
Rusmap
Promods, Promods Cabin Accessories and Trailer & Company Pack (click Downloads drop down menu. You will need a free account to download promods and there is an option to pay a pound for a faster download which i recommend, otherwise you need to download the main mod in parts, but it is free).

All Steam workshop mods can be found by searching the ETS2 workshop, when you find it just subscribe to it and activate it in ETS2’s mod manager (check your load order!).

It took some trial and error and many, many crashes to desktop before i got my load order working almost flawlessly (I do have a small issue with the city locations on the map being offset which i have been unable to fix, so if anyone reading this plays ETS2 with a similar mod setup and has fixed this problem, i am all ears!). I am pleased to say it was all worth it in the end as the game is absolutely huge and is now twice the size with the map mods! I also like listening to TruckersFM and Simulator Radio though i do have a couple of my own albums in there too if i fancy some George Thorogood or Classic Chillout depending on my mood!

It took me some time to set up the controls to my liking as i use a Xbox 360 controller (i know that’s terrible but i didn’t get on too well with my wheel and pedals due to the angle my desk is at). There’s a ton of options to tweak from changing the myriad graphics and sound options to control inputs and keys/buttons, so you can set it up exactly how you want it, my setup may not work for you and vice verca.

So all in all, give this game a try and you may surprise yourself! try a couple of mods first to change things up a bit and Happy Trucking!

July 2019 Already?!

We are here in July 2019 already.

Where has this year gone? With the sudden loss of my father in law earlier this year which hit us hard and my ongoing struggle with weight loss it has been a rough start.

Losing Tracey’s dad suddenly was unexpected and knocked us quite a bit, he was a kind man who loved his family and his books and always had an eye for a bargain!

I have been with Slimming World since January 2018 and have managed to lose a little over four and a half stone since then, but these last six months have been hard and I have only been scraping by with half a pound gains or losses each week. I think the problem is as I have lost so much weight now, it is getting harder to lose the last bit I want to, though now summer is officially here (finally), we can think about getting the bikes out.

We used to ride often before Tracey’s surgery five years ago but have not ridden since, we have a few nice routes we want to try but it all starts with a quick ride around the block to blow off the cobwebs and make sure the bikes are good to go so to speak and see how we get on.

We walk a lot though which I am sure helps. It may not be as quick as riding but it gets us there and gives us some exercise at the same time.

My writing has sadly taken a back seat in recent times as evidenced by this post, now I am hoping to change that and get a good writing session in today after I post this.

I have also been spending more time than I should on the PC and Xbox with my flavours of the month currently being Red Dead Redemption 2, Alien Isolation, Witcher 3, Euro Truck Simulator 2, Crusader Kings 2 and Europa Universalis 4 which are excellent games and I highly recommend them all! (and no, I am not paid to promote them!).

I spent a couple of hours the other day updating all my mods on Euro Truck which was…fun, finally got the load order right and am now ready to continue my trucking across Europe once more!

Work is going really well and we have had some extremely busy times recently with the heat drawing people out! Lately, I have had a lot of friendly customers which is a nice change and helps the shifts go smoothly. Having a great team that are really friendly too also helps!

I have also gotten really far behind on my reading, with my target of 14 books now being impossible to achieve with my current total at 4 with 3 other books being nearly completed as I dislike sticking to just one book and usually have at least one non fiction book being read at any one time alongside fiction.

Tracey keeps finding me more books on BookBub though as it keeps recommending her military sci fi and space opera for some reason so on my wishlist they go! My poor Kindle is already nearing capacity and I even have Elon Musk’s biography on my phone for those times when my Kindle isn’t handy.

I am trying a new thing out lately by “time-blocking” my days and so far so good, I have started a Master Herbalist course over on Centre of Excellence which I have carved out some time each week to do which is going well and also my Python course. I have a load of courses over on Udemy too which need finishing but will need to block off some more time for that without burning myself out! Regular breaks seems to be the key so I can get up from the laptop, stretch and walk about for a bit.

There are a lot more courses on CoE and Udemy I want to do though I need to finish my current ones first before jumping! That is a real problem for me as I always want to jump onto the next thing that takes my fancy so I need more discipline!

Well, I want to get back to my WIP so I will say goodbye for now and will speak to you all again soon.

The Great Update!

It has been a busy year so far in the Bennett household.
Firstly, I started work at a local large retailer which has had its ups and downs but overall is going well.
I also started a course on mental health at City college as a distance learner which is going well so far, and when I pass this course, I am thinking of going on to the next mental health course and possibly a counselling course with an eye to trying my hand at working within the mental health system. I have had so much help over the years from my local CMHT that I would like to be able to give something back by being a CBT practitioner or counsellor working for a local mental health team.

I have also registered on a part time Accounting course which starts in September which I am really looking forward to! It is something a little ‘out there’ for me but may open up doors in the industry when I qualify and especially if I go on to do the higher level courses.
Tracey has also got her eyes set on a beauty and make up course at City, I’m sure it will be strange the both of us being back at college again after 14 years! After she has qualified, she is then hoping to go onto the part time manicure course then possibly start her own business (with me as her accountant haha).

That leaves the writing.

I haven’t forgotten about my writing either though I have been having somewhat of a dry spell in recent times, I am hoping to get back into it using my trusty laptop and Scrivener now with the collaborative novel with my brother in law (now he uses Scrivener too).

I also aim to get back to my unnamed manuscript for a novel I have been working on, again with Scrivener.

Well, that is the great update, things are going pretty well at the moment and I can see a light at the end of the tunnel of my depression finally after a long time.

Thank you for reading and keep an eye out for future updates!

Feel free to find me on facebook at www.facebook.com/officialterencebennett and like the page to keep updated on my work.

Belated Happy New Year!

Well I am somewhat surprised to find myself in 2018.

The last few months have been really busy with appointments and other commitments.
I have also been watching a lot of motivational and instructional videos recently about life and writing by various authors I follow on YouTube and other people I am finding inspirational.

I have been binge watching Ana Mascara, Kristen Martin, Kim Chance and Jenna Moreci.

A special video i must recommend everyone to watch is Baz Luhrmann’s excellent “Everybody’s Free To Wear Sunscreen” which a dear friend sent to me during a dark time and it really lifted me up and still does, have a listen you wont regret it.

I must say that they have been very helpful and taught me a few tips and tricks to get my motivation going such as Mel Robbin’s “5 second rule” which is handy.
I have also been away from the Xbox recently and playing more games on the PC (though even then I tend to get distracted easily and switch games often).
I was excited to get some Christmas money and head over to the Winter Steam sale and picked up a few bargains there and on Matrix Games website.
I picked up Gary Grigsby’s War In The East and War In The West, Pandora First Contact, Graviteam Tactics Operation Star, Rimworld (which I have been after for ages but waited fruitlessly for a sale!), Outlast, Startup Company and a few assorted DLC.

Anyone reading this: can I make a suggestion if you buy Outlast (A survival horror set in an old asylum) play with the lights off and the headphones turned up!

I have also been trying to get the amazing (and FREE) Dwarf Fortress Masterwork v1.3 working, but so far it always seems to crash when generating a new world so I will be having a more detailed look at the options (Masterwork is basically Dwarf Fortress on steroids, it includes all the utilities you will ever need for DF plus new creatures, items, workshops and a ridiculous level of customisation) I switched to Masterwork from the Lazy Newb Pack which I highly recommend for new players, (now known as PeridexisErrant’s Starter Pack), it has most of the same utilities and functions as Masterwork but has a simpler UI and less options.

I also bought Styx Master of Shadows for the Xbox as it was on offer and sounded good (not played too much of it yet though as I said above, I have been on the PC almost exclusively).

With the decorations and the Christmas tree down, the place does look kind of empty now as I sit here at the table, though I am sure I will get used to it fairly quickly.
I have been trying to read 25 pages a day too, I have so many fiction and non-fiction books on my shelf and on my Kindle that I want to read so I am currently reading His Last Command from The Lost Omnibus by Dan Abnett on paperback and Hitler’s Last Witness by Rochus Misch on my Kindle.

I have even been so organised that I have been colour coding my appointments and meetings in my diary and keeping track of everything, for someone as usually disorganised and chaotic as me it is unprecedented!

I have my goals for 2018 broken down into monthly, weekly and daily goals and trying to make permanent good habits (no nail biting for one!).

I have plans for this site too that involve a bit of reworking and tweaking, i updated the theme and started to make some changes but there will be more to come as soon as I have a really good dig into the customisation options.

So, watch this space!

I hope your New Year has gotten off to a good start as mine has!

Thanks for reading!

Witcher & Writing

I have recently been playing a bit of The Witcher 3 Wild Hunt and loving it!
Having a huge world to explore on horseback and kill monsters and harvest their bodies for alchemy ingredients to make potions with is just great!
Yeah sure I can take a wrong turn straight into a high level enemy and get obliterated but that is part of the fun! Mark it and move on.
I am a little naughty though as I couldn’t resist getting Witcher 3 even though I have not finished Witcher 1 or 2, which I understand follows on but I am familiar enough with the characters and basic plot to understand what is going on even so.
I have had to start Witcher 1 Enhanced Edition again due to my long term save becoming corrupted or something, meaning I could no longer carry on with the main quest which annoyed me no end as I was pretty far in.
I have also recently picked up Witcher 2 for the 360 as it is backwards compatible with the Xbox One and had to start that again too so all fresh starts all round!

I have also been getting back into my Udemy courses on accounting software and Python programming language which seems to be going well.
I had installed Python Anaconda where you get the core language plus a metric ton of additional libraries for use as well as an IDE and a few other tools which I have literally no idea what they are for.
Problem is, I had to uninstall the old versions of Anaconda, which also uninstalled the new one for some reason then had to reinstall everything! Oh well, it seems to work fine now albeit a little slow.
Once I have completed all the courses on Python, I will be moving onto C# which is another language I would like to use for making my own game eventually.

Writing has been a little slow recently due to my health and my penchant for getting distracted by games or the Internet, but I have been watching loads of writing videos on YouTube and feel quite inspired to write again now and also bought a couple of books recently which are proving to be a good read (Your First Novel and The Writer’s Idea Thesaurus) which were recommended by YouTuber and author Kristen Martin who I have been binge watching in recent weeks! Go check out her channel!

Well, I am off to do some more writing so I will end it here, thank you for reading and have a great week!

A Small Update

Well, it has been a while since my last update.
We visited relatives in Wales recently which was nice, though there were a lot of train and bus journeys in unfamiliar territory!
We went bowling, played air hockey and visited Caerphilly Castle which was good for a few pictures.
We also had a lovely fried breakfast in a cafe in Merthyr after doing the charity shops and markets.
I even found an unopened copy of Star Munchkin for £3 in a charity shop which I snagged very quickly seeing as it is nearly £20 online!
When we got home, we opened the box after reading it was for 3-6 players and that had previously put me off buying any of the munchkin games but it turns out to be a whole lot of fun with just 2 players and we rapidly bought the expansions for it and now it has been added to our lounge/gaming room collection!
I can recommend it if you like killing monsters, taking their stuff and screwing over your friends! (as it says on the box!).

One nice thing about Aberdare is the views from the top of the garden were fantastic and more pictures were taken, though there is the small matter of the steep road/cliff face that you need to traverse to get to the house which tired us both out! But we enjoyed the sun and sat out in the garden enjoying the quiet before venturing indoors to play Red November and Mille Bornes, two other games I can highly recommend.

One good thing about using the bus every day was we got to see a lot of the Welsh countryside.

We did miss our little furbaby Milo terribly though and we asked our friend who was kittysitting for us to send us daily pictures and updates to help, though he was glad to see us when we got home and it was cuddles all round (from Milo that is!).

Recently, I have been toying with Dwarf Fortress again, more specifically the Mod Dwarf Fortress Masterwork, which is not for the faint hearted! I usually use the Lazy Newb Pack as it has all the mods and utiities you will ever need to run your fort, though Masterwork has all these tools and then some, I am hoping to learn enough of MW DF to post AAR’s on here for anyone who may be interested in reading how quickly my fort falls!

I have also been enjoying Fallout 4 and Alien:Isolation on the Xbox, which are both great games in their own right, though on Fallout, I tend to just drift around in survival mode and try not to get killed rather than doing any of the missions! I strongly recommend playing on survival once you have some experience with the game on normal difficulty first (it is a whole different beast of a game that way!) so far, I am only a few levels in on my survival character though enjoying every minute of it! Though I do need to go back to my main character and finish the game (which won’t be anytime soon).

Well, I will finish off here, I hope you enjoyed this small update and I have given you a few games to go and try!

Now im off to Scrivener to try and get some writing done!