Morning Moon
Was a pretty cold morning in these parts. The grass in the garden was crisp underfoot as I tried to coax Bubbles back into the house at 8am. The sky was an amazing blue and the moon was still clearly visible. I grabbed the camera (Bubbles watched from her flag stone near the shed) and took some shots.
That’s how it looked to me. And then with camera zoom and the fence to keep my hands steady,
Pretty breathtaking.
Surprise!
Grete’s dad stayed over last night after a semi-surprise visit. He brings his little dog so we didn’t see Fizz all evening (she doesn’t like the dog) but Bubbles just tends to do her own thing, trying to pretend the dog doesn’t exist.
Once Grete’s dad left, it took us a couple of hours to convince Fizz the house was safe, but she finally came downstairs on her own.
We’d noticed Bubbles was keeping her tail down yesterday, but that’s a pretty natural pose for cats which are a bit spooked and just trying to go under the radar, but we were less happy when she kept doing it today, and then when we tried to investigate she made some pretty unhappy noises.
So 5pm visit to the vets, and I guess we both knew something was up when we got her into the cat box without any major struggling. The good news is that it’s just a couple of small wounds on her back, near the base of her tail. Either from Fizz or from some other creature in the neighbourhood, that had gotten a little infected and swolen. The vet (and the vet we use is superb, Ashfield House Vetenary Hospital in Long Eaton, I really recommend them) had her cleaned up and gave her some painkillers. We could tell almost immediately before we left she was happier because she was standing up in the cat box demanding to be out. She’s got more painkillers and a course of anti-biotics to get through over the next few days.
Which means a lot of tuna.
We didn’t get into Tesco until 7:30pm to buy food for ourselves and the weekend, and haven’t been back in the house very long.
So a hectic two days. Hopefully Bubble’s will heal up nicely and she won’t need a return visit. This is her finishing up Fizz’s share of the tuna.
The Guild – Season 3 – Episode 9
The David Gemmell Legend Award For Fantasy – 2010
Just received this press release.
New Award Categories
When we established The David Gemmell Legend Award For Fantasy it was with the intention of subsequently introducing further award categories to cover other aspects of the fantasy genre. We are now pleased to announce two new, additional awards, to be presented at next year’s ceremony. They are –
The David Gemmell Morningstar Award for Best Newcomer
and
The David Gemmell Ravenheart Award for Best Fantasy Cover Art
The Morningstar Award will give recognition to emerging talent in the field of fantasy fiction. As David Gemmell always took a keen interest in new writers, and helped many onto the path to publication, we regard this as an appropriate category to add, and one we feel sure David would have approved.
The Ravenheart Award will honour the best fantasy book cover art. The importance of fantasy cover art deserves admiration, as do the artists who produce it, yet there is no major UK award acknowledging this. The Ravenheart Award will fulfil that role.
Like the Legend Award, the winners of these new awards, for best debut author and best cover/artist, will be decided by popular vote. The first Legend Award, for best fantasy novel of the year, presented at a ceremony in London in June of this year, garnered an incredible 11,000 votes from around the world. We are confident that the Morningstar and Ravenheart awards, which are being created with the full approval of the Gemmell family, will be greeted with no less enthusiasm.
Details of the process whereby these new awards will be administered can be found on our website.
Our aim is to establish, over time, a set of awards covering all aspects of the fantasy genre. Launching this pair of new awards takes us a step nearer to that objective.
The 2010 David Gemmell Awards ceremony will again be held at The Magic Circle headquarters in London, on Friday 18th June.
Please feel free to contact either of us if more information is needed.
Stan Nicholls (Chair)
Deborah Miller (Awards Administrator)
Ares I-X Pictures
Check out some awesome pictures over at The Big Picture of the Ares I-X launch.
Ares I-X Launch
I’m not a huge space buff. But I can’t help but be amazed by the space programme and I’m always interested in launches of new craft. I’ve been listening to NASA TV for a couple of days while they went through the process of test launching the new Ares I-X Rocket, and they got it off the ground today.
There’s a longer video on the NASA TV site, but I can’t seem to generate a direct link, and certainly can’t embed it. Here’s the link to their main site and you can find the video under Most Recent, Ares I-X Lifts Off on Flight Test.
The Guild – Bonus Halloween Episode
More sunset
Something about this time of year, and where we live, gives us these sunsets.
Quick guide to Lord of the Rings Online Galadhrim reputation
Introduction
A couple of friends are just about to enter the Lothlórien area in Lord of the Rings online so I thought I’d whack this quick guide together so they know what to expect.
The area beyond the Mines of Moria, in the Lord of the Rings online game, is Lothlórien. Much like the Elves in the books and the films, the Elves of Lothlórien in the game are distrustful of outsiders and more than any other location in the game, this area absolutely requires you to do reputation work.
There are some mild spoilers in this article, including the map below, so if you want to explore and learn all of this for yourself, stop reading now. You’ll have to forgive me if I use the word faction rather than reputation, I’m still too used to EverQuest terminology despite having not played for quite some time.