One Year

July came and went, all to quickly, it feels like. A year ago, mid-July, I was at my daughter's for a visit and the annual Spectacular Death meet-up. If you remember, I returned home with memories and a new fur baby.

How could it be a year now, that Hamlet's lived with us? I almost don't remember what it was like to have only 2 cats. He plays chase with Pilchard and, occasionally, Mija. He's a fount of energy. He's adapted to life with us or maybe we've adapted to him; who really knows.

The big change is Hamlet himself.

He takes up a lot more real estate than in July 2016.

I also note that, because he's more of a lover than the other two ever were, they are starting to demand lap time to curl up and sleep. Pilchard used to sit, for at least 2 hours or until the feeling started leaving my knees and I'd have to move her. Then, with Hamlet demanding attention, she quit sitting in my lap. She's back to that now, although not as long as before he came here. Mija just recently started wanting my lap when I'm sitting down with my feet up.

And there's the lying on mom when she's trying to sleep. I get that he was probably dumped too soon and I'm mom cat, but 1:30 in morning is not a good time to climb up my chest and lie down. Because he does it, Mija's been doing it. I don't want to have to shut them out of the bedroom, but I need a full night's sleep.

I'm trying an experiment this month with Feliway. Around the 10th of every month, I've been replacing the bottle because it's run out and I notice more antagonism between the cats. This month, things seems to be quieter so I have not replaced the empty bottle with fresh. So far, knock on wood, we are doing okay. I'd rather they just learned to live together and not have to rely on pheromones to do so. Maybe we've reached that point. We'll see.

Love my boy. I still call him "kitten britches", although he's hardly a kitten anymore. I was worried about adding another cat into the household, but rescue makes you do strange things, like rub the belly of a lap sleeping cat because, at 15 pounds, he's slowly cutting off the circulation to my feet.

Beverage:  Water

Deb

A Gift

Running a World of Warcraft guild can be a thankless job. As any manager of people can attest, you have a wide variety of personalities all thrown together. And while we don't have a product to offer, as would be the case of a work place, we have goals. Achieving said goals means working together and that can be tough when Brenda is having a panic attack, Rob's girlfriend dumped him, Mona's dog is throwing up all over the living room carpet, and Derrick's mother is yelling at him to take out the garbage and help her move a table. You become confidante, counselor, and crisis manager. Still, I wouldn't disband my guild for anything because, in spite of all of this, many of us are, deep down, friends. We've bonded over pixels on a computer screen and have extended that bond into our real lives.

There are some people I don't know very well. They are names on the screen; avatars in a group; there, but not extraordinarily present. I don't know their lives. They come on, do their thing, and log off. They are happy to be in a guild with lower pressure to play. I never know if they are happy or just don't want the hassle of trying to find another guild. And then I get asked for my name and address because, "I have something to send to you."

Ordinarily, my real self isn't available to people I don't know. But guild members who have hung around for at least 8 months, even if they rarely talk in chat, can "break that 4th wall", if you will. So, I gave Kacy my name and address. I really didn't have a gut feeling she would abuse it.

Last month, I got a slim, small, packet in the mail.

There was a pin depicting mages, one of the classes you can play, and a green mesh bag with something inside it.

It's a silver necklace with the guild icon in it. I was, and still am, blown away by this kindness. I'm not one for jewelry anymore, but I will wear this every day during the guild's trip to Disney World in October.

People surprise me in very meaningful ways. All I need to do, when I'm feeling oppressed about dealing with people, is to look at this and remember, everyone has bad days and how I lead is important. I guess I'm doing something right.

Beverage:  Dr Pepper

Deb

Perfect Gifts

Santa Baby,
Just stick some stickers under the tree
For me.
Been an awful good girl.
Santa Baby,
Hurry down the chimney tonight.

(I hope you know that song, but if you don't, here's a link to Eartha Kitt's version.)

As I age, I realize the gifts which make me deliriously happy are simple. One of them is stickers. All boxes and mailers and letters leave my house with stickers attached; unless they are mailers from Target. Those things require me to glue my stickers on. Not going to do that.

Christmas was a magical time. Carole sent me a whole bunch of stickers. I think she went to Hobby Lobby several times to accumulate this mass.

My friend, Liz, and my sister also got in on the act.

Liz's were all from Disney, thanks to her trip to Disneyland in November, and Sharyn's were all 50 cents or less.

I vowed, this year I would be better about writing people. I was gifted with some lovely note cards which don't take hours to draft a note. Thanks to this and a vow to be better about sending cards, I've used up 80% of this stash. I had to buy more stickers in March because I was running low. I put together Easter baskets for my great-nieces and nephews and bought stickers to put in those, which gave me a few more. But I realized I'd need to, probably in June, set aside some cash and hit up Hallmark. They have neat stickers, even though they are a bit pricey.

Enter Mother's Day.

The last three years, Carole has sent flowers. While very appreciated, 1-800-Flowers was not sending me good blooms. She would get a credit because the flowers would arrive with brown edges or would fail to open. After last year, she said, "I'm never ordering from them again, mom." There are a lot of things which would be great if she wanted to send me something, but she didn't ask so I didn't volunteer. When the Mother's Day card came, she said I have been gifted with a 6 month membership to Pipsticks. Huh?

Pipsticks. This is one of those subscription crate services which are popping up all over. I get a package every month. The clear mailer holds a pouch which contains stickers;

oodles and oodles of stickers;

all sorts.

I don't know if you can see them. On the left side of the keyboard are translucent colored raindrops. I'm not sure about the big rainbow piece at the bottom. It might be a place to stick stickers onto. I haven't tried to see if it's one huge sticker itself which would be awesome on the back of a mailer or flat or on the side of a box. I have a method for stickering packages and I just haven't gotten to that piece, yet.

Also included is a picture to color, a pre-stamped postcard and a newsletter, which is the heart covered paper. I sent the postcard to a friend and added the coloring page to a color book I got last year.

I am thrilled. I have not used these up. I've been really busy and haven't written a lot of letters. I sent out some parcels right before and right after Memorial Day and it was so wonderful to adorn them with stickers. It was hilarious because I sent a flat to someone who had never received a letter from me. His reaction was priceless. On the guild Facebook page he typed, "OMG! You guys! Letters from Gimm come covered in stickers!" A large number of people responded, "Yes, yes they do." The postcard is blank on the other side so you can use your stickers to create a scene. I just covered the side with anything which would fit.

My subscription runs through October. This might become my birthday and Mother's Day gift, I was told, assuming each pack stays as great as this one. In October, I'll have the rest of these to use up.

I bought these to use in achievement books when my guild goes to Disney World in October. (See below.)  I have two boxes full of stickers. We won't use all of them and the boxes are small enough to carry in my purse for stickering on the go.

This makes me so happy. I'm trying to get my life in order so I can sit down and write some notes. If I have to take boxes to the post office, I go to the one near the office. The clerks there get a big kick out of what I mail.

Beverage:  Klarbrunn Black Cherry Seltzer

Deb

It's Really Real

I've been saving for a guild trip to Walt Disney World this coming October. As of today, it's 132 days until I'm in the air on my way to Orlando. It hasn't seemed real until May. Finally,  Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party dates and tickets released. This was, kind of, the big reason we chose to go in October. It's pricey, particularly to our overseas guild mates. But, there was sheer joy when I got a letter from Lake Buena Vista, Florida.

There it is. My ticket to the Halloween party. This one plastic item caused me to really ramp up the collection of things. The next thing was to order this bag I'd had my eye on.

When I went to Disneyland in 2015, I wanted to pare down all the stuff I carry to a small handbag; a wristlet, is what it's called. I love this bag. I use it exclusively now. It fits in the glove box or under the seat or in the well between the seats. Everything I could use fits in it. But, DisneyWorld requires a different strategy from Disneyland. The sheer size of the park means I need to carry more things. Building on the lessons learned from the Land trip, I need a portable phone charger. My phone and my digital camera wore down with all the picture taking. Disney World has portable chargers for sale. But I felt I should do my research and get one before I got there, mainly to figure out how it works. Thankfully, one of the tech sites I frequent had a recommendation AND a coupon code.

Viola. The $20 phone charger the same size as my ancient iphone. It takes an hour to charge the phone to full when it's less than 40%. It take 10 minutes to charge the charger, when it's 50% or greater. 

I'm going to need a water bottle. I can't duck out of line to get water and I don't want to pay $3.50 for a bottle of water. Staying hydrated is going to be important. But my little blue bag certainly can't hold a water bottle or this charger. 

Then, I had this thought; when I made dinner, lunch and breakfast reservations back in April. There will be times when I'll be standing or sitting; waiting for whatever is next; i.e. our table to be ready. I need to bring a paperback book with me. I read everywhere. The blue purse certainly can't hold that. I don't read books on my phone. I prefer the joy of flipping pages. I was now into large purse territory. I am not carrying a backpack. Disney searches ALL bags and they pay particular attention to backpacks. My little blue purse makes it easy to see exactly what I have with me. I need something bigger.

Four years ago, I bought a leather purse with a Celtic emblem on the front. I looked at that purse. While I like it, I've always had issues with the interior pockets. Getting stuff out was a chore. This wasn't the right purse for Disney. I looked into just a large "beach bag" with a zipper top. No. That didn't appeal to me at all. Then I got a catalog in the mail and there was this steampunk "shoulder satchel", they called it. Now THAT was something I could get behind. Weird and funky and just the right size. Plus, it wasn't too big that I might be tempted to bring everything with me. We have this list of items people on various web sites have said are worth bringing with you. You would need a backpack to hold it all. One of my friends goes with her mom to Disney and the problem with her mom's backpack is, invariably, what mom wants has fallen into the bottom of the backpack. It takes her 10 minutes to find wet wipes. I am not going to be "that person" in the group.

The purse was $70. That's kind of pricey for something I might not use again. And then I thought, "Who are you kidding? You're going to be buying all sorts of things you'll only use for this vacation." I started searching "steampunk purses". Double viola.

The pin, to the left, is a Christmas gift from Liz. That's the Small World facade. I wanted canvas and a sturdy strap because, while I don't collect pins, I will buy a few as souvenirs. The purse itself, is canvas with probably cardboard(?) or some other thing in the flap, front and back, to give it bulk and to hold shape. The side pocket is too small for a cell phone, but will be perfect for pens or other small items. There is the small top pocket and a zippered pocket on the back and one inside. Otherwise the interior is open.

The three bottles on top will be filled with glitter and glued shut. In the game, players have status bars which increase or decrease based on what they are doing. Health is red. Mana, which can be thought of as the essence needed for spells, is blue. Hunters, which is what my main is, use focus, which is an orange red.

All of this fits inside the bag. There's plenty of room for a small container of wet wipes (a great idea), a tube of sunscreen, my cell phone and ...

This handmade booklet is a take-off on the in-game achievements available to players. Liz and I spent months, going back to her trip to Disneyland in November, coming up with "achievements". The first one, "Attend Spectacular Death's 10th Anniversary Disney World trip", is done. Every guild member and family member going with us, got a book. Most of the achievements are completed by taking a photo of something. Then, you show me the photo and I'll put a sticker on the page. After receiving my Halloween party ticket, I spent two weeks printing, cutting, folding and stapling books. They have all been mailed. I was going to pass them out when I got there, but we're coming at different times and I know I'd want to have it sooner so I can plan where to go to do the most achievements at once. I'm going to try to do every achievement in the book. We came up with some which can overlap others. "Take a photo of Mickey. Double sticker if you're in the photo." can be combined with "Take a photo of a character not in their usual costume", because we're going to a character breakfast in the Animal Kingdom and Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and Daisy wear tour guide outfits.

I took the car in for an oil change and tire rotation and I'm going to need to replace the brakes. There is a sale at my mechanic where I can get $50 off new brakes. I sighed on the way home. How can I save when I need something important like this? It's not like I don't have the money, but it's spoken for. I decided I had better pay for the vacation so I know what I have to save for. That was done Friday. Disney has acknowledged receipt of payment. The only thing left is airfare and the travel agent is watching those numbers for me. I need to have $137 for my foot and leg massage on the Wednesday we are there. I have that saved. I need $40 for an Epcot fireworks boat ride and $48 for a tour of the Disney steam train. I have those saved. I can now look at the calendar and plan to rent a car and get the brakes fixed toward the end of the month. Then, save for souvenirs.

Whew.

Beverage:  Poor man's mimosa

Deb

The Next Save

In December of 2017, on the 15th to be exact, my World of Warcraft guild, Spectacular Death, will celebrate 10 years of uninterrupted time in the game. That's a long time. We were talking, last summer, about doing something spectacular to celebrate. Brainstorming came up with a guild trip to Walt Disney World. After presenting the idea, it was approved.

In September of last year, I put a down payment on the trip. I had tucked away a decent sum until house repairs forced me to dip into the Disney fund to get things fixed. It makes me sad because I have to, essentially, start all over in saving and there's less than a year to do it. February and March see the highest heating bills so I'm scrambling right now, to figure out where money goes and what really needs to be done in 2017, since I put down money on this.

I was at my favorite bookstore and this was on the shelf. The last time I bought one of these guides it was 1990 and I was going, as a family, for the first time. My last visit was in 2005, when my pen pal was still alive.

A guild member, Liz, went in November of last year and took these amazing photos of the fireworks at Epcot.

She went during the time of that Super Moon.

These were taken from a pontoon boat which you can reserve to watch the Epcot fireworks. Unobstructed views and snacks are guaranteed. We are going to do this.

So far, 13 of us are going. We're not going as an official group because that locks us into a certain discount and the travel agent we are working with says she can get better deals if we are just a bunch of friends going at the same time. We're going in October, to take advantage of Halloween and the annual Food and Wine Festival. I have selected the venue for our character breakfast but we're getting down to the wire to pick the place for the 'Goodbye' dinner. I told the group I would pick 4 places and we would vote. The place with the most votes would be where we'll go. We can make reservations for rides and dinners as early as April 17th. When it was November, that was a long way away. Now that it's January, *gasp*, that's almost here.

I know I can do this, but I really need for there not to be emergencies. I'm not going to take another traveling vacation this year, opting to take days off here and there to save money. Having a car that doesn't need monthly maintenance helps tremendously. Now, I need for it to be mild in temperature so the heating bill is not astronomical.

Beverage:  Dr Pepper

Deb

A New Goal

Next year, my little guild in World of Warcraft turns 10 years old. Lasting that long in a video game is notable. We need to do something as a guild, something big and splashy. So I put this to the guild's Facebook page. Things were suggested but what stuck was a Walt Disney World vacation.

I started talking with a guild member, Liz, who goes to Disney 3-4 times a year. The more we talked about the things we wanted to do, the more we explored resort properties, the more confusing the options became. It seems, with Disney, why have 5 options when you can have 45. Liz suggested we should look into Disney travel agent. Enter Hollie. She is paid by Disney so even if we don't have a huge number of people coming along or, if it was just me, she would still be paid to help with a trip. She helped me price out a vacation and, at the July meet-up, I gave a presentation.

The one thing we needed to decide was when did we want to go. The cheap time is January, the week after New Year's through the end of February. But, if we want to spend a bit more, we could go in March, when the Flower and Garden Festival is, or go in October, when the Food and Wine Festival AND Halloween run concurrently. Well, when presented with these options, it became a decision about how fast you could save the money and we decided October of 2017 was the best time.

The big attraction is the two festivals going on at the same time. You know that Disney will do Halloween fantastic. When I went to BlizzCon last year, Halloween was only at the Haunted Mansion. Christmas hadn't quite wandered in but Halloween had wandered out. We will be going at the height of the holiday. It's going to be exciting to see the decorations.  We're going to do Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party. Rides. Trick or Treat. A special parade and fireworks and the Magic Kingdom all to ourselves and anyone else who buys a ticket to the party.

And then there is the Food and Wine Festival.

Located at Epcot World Showcases, this is a celebration of food. The World Showcase part of Epcot is my favorite place at Disney World. Even with a lot of people in that section of the park, it is peaceful. I love to wander through all the countries and see what they have to offer.

During the festival, each country has food carts and special food indicative of their culture.

Having been to Disney World 4 times, one of the things I've wanted to do is "Eat Around the World", stop at each country and eat something at each country. With the festival going on in October, I can do this just by eating at the food carts stationed around the lagoon.

It took the summer to figure everything out on what I thought I would want. Hollie and I met in mid-September to go over possibilities, and, after looking at everything, she gave me a price and I put down a deposit. Now comes the saving.

I have to say I'm excited. A year ago, I was excited to go to BlizzCon. I spent a whole summer and most of a fall, saving for that trip, which included 2 days at Disneyland. This is going to be a whole week. I'm going with guild members; people I respect and whose company I relish. I'm going to be sharing a room with Liz. I admire and respect her and her company will make this that much more fun.

We will be going for a week in the middle of October. We looked at going as a group, but the group discounts didn't amount to much and Hollie said there are usually always discounts on things which we wouldn't be able to take advantage of if we're a group. So, we picked the days and then let everyone decide where they wanted to stay and what kinds of additions to their vacation they wanted.

In case you are wondering, WDW shut down this month for only the 7th time since opening, due to Hurricane Matthew. People who couldn't use tickets for events slated for Thursday night through Saturday morning, received compensation and/or had their tickets rescheduled for other days. The price of the resorts in October is one step above the base rate and two steps down from "We're going tomorrow and it's Christmas" rate. We were told this is primarily because October still has the potential for hurricanes raining, literally, on your parade. I told guild members Hurricane Matthew is a good example of why trip insurance is a very good idea.

Liz and I are going to stay at the Port of Orleans, French Quarter resort.

It's a moderately priced resort and the theme is New Orleans French Quarter area; heavy on the jazz. I can't wait. They serve beignets at the cafe in the main building.

They won't be the Mickey beignets that the restaurant in the French Quarter of the Magic Kingdom at Disneyland had, but, beignets!

I've needed to make some decisions with regards to what we're going to do so people can plan. I'm arriving on a Saturday, so I've decided my "Eat Around the World" at World Showcase can start then. Liz assures me there will be ample credits from the middle priced food plan and I will be scrambling on the last day to use them up. I remain unconvinced, but, several of us are going to Epcot and will take turns buying snack items to share. I'm planning for needing cash for meals.

We're going to the Halloween party on Sunday evening, to give people a chance to get to WDW. A Halloween party ticket acts like park admission so we can go to the Magic Kingdom as early as 4 pm and get in. Costumes are encouraged, within reason, so we'll have to see what we can do about that. Eighty percent of the rides are open so I expect to cross most of my "must ride" off the list then.

I want a Character Breakfast and a final meal. Those were things I felt were important to me. What people did with the guild wasn't as important as those two things, such as going to the same parks or eating at the same restaurant. But people were coming in and leaving on different days so trying to schedule within those constraints was hard. I finally decided, as guild leader, I could pick the dates we'll go, as a guild, to breakfast and dinner and then hope that people can fit those things into their schedule. I also made the decision on where we're going to eat breakfast. Guild members decided they really wanted Goofy at our breakfast so I've settled on the Tusker House in Animal Kingdom on Monday. Look! Goofy!

Dinner is going to be a majority vote decision. Liz and I have looked at a wide variety of places. We're going to pick 4 and offer them to the group, with plusses and minuses for each place. Then, we'll let the group decide and that's where we'll go. We're going to do that on Friday night. I leave a week after arriving.

Also in my sights are a foot and leg massage, a Steam Train Tour, a fireworks cruise and game night on Wednesday night, where everyone will come to the French Quarter, if they aren't already staying there, and we'll play games. My feeling is that it's their money and outside of a few suggested things, they should spend it however they want. They don't have to come to anything I arrange. I hope they do, but it's not required. I feel requiring things takes all the fun out a special vacation like this. Ben and Natalie are engaged and may use this as their honeymoon. If they do, we have plans, oh boy. Wendy is going to rent a scooter as she has an issue walking a lot and you will walk, a lot. We've already decided to trick out her scooter.

So, that's the current savings goal. It's been kind of an expensive year so I'm very glad we decided to do this in October of next year. It's going to be such a fun time.

Beverage:  Cookies and Cream hot cocoa

Deb

Identification

Conventions have their own rules for ticket holders and BlizzCon is no exception. You must wear the issued name tag at all times when you're in the convention hall.

Players take that mandate farther and commission artists to draw their game toon. I wasn't exactly sure how that worked, but I knew I needed some sort of temporary ID until I could get the official one. The official one comes with a lanyard.

Casting about my home, the only lanyard of any note was one I got about 10 years ago when I visited Colonial Williamsburg. While that was okay, it came with a heavy duty clear ID pocket, it was absolutely NOT geeky enough for me.

Speaking of geeky, there is a service called "Loot Crate". Every month, you get a box filled with miscellaneous stuff tailored to your gaming interest, or your dog. (They don't do anything for cats.) I think it was in either August or September's Loot Crate, there were World of Warcraft items. One of my coworkers, Tara, gets a crate and, knowing my game play, gave me a few items she didn't want. She also got these in her crate and she didn't want them.

At first, I thought it was a lanyard. One of my guild members who also gets a crate said, "Um...Gimm? (Gimmlette is my game toon's name. Everyone calls me "Gimm".) Those are shoelaces." Okay. I can make this work.

I've accumulated some lanyards which are very lightweight and tried to create a stronger necklace to wear until I got the BlizzCon one. I found an old luggage tag and, with some experimentation, this was the end result.

The shoelaces were long so I wound up folding them in half to make it work. The Marvel design was clearly visible and, after printing out a screenshot of my toon, the whole thing worked moderately well. This was credit card size and, if I had so desired, I could have kept an ID or a credit card in the pouch where it was easily accessible. But my purse (see below) did such a fine job, I never resorted to sticking anything other than the photo in the container.

Once Ashley arrived, the three of us set out to get our tickets and goodie bags. Part of what you get is a premade lanyard and ticket combo.

This is nice. If I wanted to, I could reuse this for some other event. It's got my name and my toon's name on it. When you're in a convention like this, your real name is almost secondary to your toon's name. The few times I introduced myself, I was "Hi, I'm Gimmlette, from Spectacular Death on Llane." It's your toon name, guild name and server name. That's who you are. That realization was rather humorous. The ticket pocket is big enough to stick something behind the official ticket, if you wanted. My shoelace improvisation can't hold a candle to this.

I don't know where, exactly, to display it. I'm extremely glad I got to attend this event. This lanyard and ticket are treasured keepsakes. I just need to find a place worth of them with which to display this. Onward with the cleaning and purging.

Beverage:  water

Deb

Framed

Remember the minion poster I had all my guild members sign who attended the meet-up last month?

I finally framed it and put it on the wall. First step was deciding exactly where I wanted it. I have a poster from the "Who Framed Mr. Burns" The Simpsons' episode. It was in TV Guide, back when that was still an extremely popular magazine. A friend kept the poster and gave it to me. It hangs in the hallway in the house above a plaque reading, "Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons for you are crunchy and good with ketchup." I had considered moving The Simpsons poster to a different wall and putting the minion one in its place. But this is bigger than The Simpsons one and would require a readjustment of the plaque and new holes and an eventual repainting and I didn't want to mess with that.

Then, as I was leaving for work one day, I remembered how I wanted to repaint the back entry.

My kitchen has been yellow since Carole was little. The apples were added a year after the kitchen was painted. I thought one of my goals would be to repaint this space a lighter, brighter yellow, a more Minion yellow. The door frame and the back of the back door would be painted yellow. The ceiling would be painted yellow and I'd paint over the apples and put strategic minions around the space. And the old, very old, cork board, which is really just a catch all for paper junk, would go. Tell me that's inviting. I double-dip dare you. It just looks junky and I never use anything stored on the board. Time to give it away.

So Pam and I found a frame at JoAnn Fabric that I felt would work. It more than worked. Look at the space now.

What a difference a piece of art makes. I almost don't need to repaint the walls as the color complements the poster. I still think I'd like a coat of a lighter yellow just because it would give the space a fresh feeling to it. But there is not the feeling that painting HAS to be done now, you know. I can still paint through October and leave the door open so the space can breathe, if I get better and have my energy back. The cork board went to a local Veteran's group that takes donations. Someone will be happy with it.

Now, whenever I leave the house via the back door, I smile. I will stop and read the names of guild members on the poster. It makes me happy and that's what spaces in your house should do, make you happy.

Beverage:  Water

Deb

Minions

I haven't seen the Minions movie, yet. It's on the list of things to do, but so are a lot of other things. Still, I can celebrate all things minion. I have help in that one of my friends, Meredith, is kind of minion obsessed. She contributed to my enjoyment with a box of goodies.

So many goodies, most of which were at the dollar store. I use the minion cup for beverages while I'm at the computer. Right now, it has Coca-Cola in it. The tic tacs sit off to the right. I'm not sure if I want to open them. The hand wash is in the bathroom. It's apple banana scented and is heavy on the apple, but light on the banana smell. I don't know if I want to use the toothbrush. It's cute. I will use the toothpaste, once I've used up what I have now. And the mouthwash is, well, interesting.

It's called "Bubble Fruit" flavor. I had just used up some cinnamon flavor ACT mouthwash so I jumped in to use the minion branded one. Maybe if it had been dyed pink. I won't say it's horrible, but I won't rush right out and replace like for like when it's used up. Maybe it's my "adult" palate, but I thought the flavor was a bit too chemical and not fruity. Still, at a dollar for a bottle, it's a better value than the ACT brand I was using.

There was going to be another Spectacular Death guild meet-up while I was in Virginia visiting Carole and Larry. With the movie out, it was the perfect time to do something of a minion theme. Meredith found minion paper goggles which we used for a guild photo.

I'm grateful to the guild members who attended for going along with the goggles for a photo.

A minion balloon marked the driveway.

Meredith made name tags featuring minions and put them in a minion folder.

I didn't have a printer or the time to make name badges. Next year, we probably won't need them because most everyone will know everyone else, but having minions was funny.

I bought a minion decorating package which contained spiral hangers and a banner.

Everyone got a goodie bag containing a minion bubble wand, their goggles, a sticker and a minion activity book which contained crayons. Mom helped assemble the bags.

The best minion item, however, is my poster.

This is done at weddings. There is a poster or photo or something on which attendees can write messages of congratulations. I found this poster at AllPosters.com. Sadly, this doesn't seem to be available on their site anymore. I had each guild member, and Carole, pick a minion and sign their toon's name on it. I'm going to take this to JoAnn Fabrics next weekend, after I get paid, and have them frame it. I was trying to think, after making that decision, where I'd put this and suddenly it hit me. Of course, that's where it needs to go. You'll have to wait to see where that is, after it gets framed.

We don't really NEED a theme for a guild party. The theme could be just "Spectacular Death gets together", but it was fun to assemble something totally silly. I can't thank Meredith enough for the goggles and the name tags. She also sent me a minion note book where I can record my thoughts about what crazy things my guild could get into.

For the record, the red item in the box is an M&M zipper pull. It's gone onto my winter coat.

Good times.

Beverage:  Coca-Cola

Deb

Gaming

Can't go to Carole's without playing games.

It started with the creation of a "Corn Hole". I looked at Larry. "A what?" I asked. "A Corn Hole," he replied, as if telling me again would make me understand it better. Out to the garage we went.

Once I saw these, I knew what they were for. We would call the whole thing a "Bean Bag Toss" set up. The object of the game is to toss a bag full of beans or, in this area of the country, dried corn kernels, into the hole from a distance. You get 3 points for getting the bag through the hole, 2 points for getting the bag on the top quarter, near the hole, and 1 point for getting the bag on the bottom of the ramp.

Larry had seen these at a store but they wanted an exorbitant amount of money for them. So he and his dad built their own.

The rectangle has two feet at the top which fold out to give the piece its slant.

This one was a little wobbly on the driveway, but once in the back yard, it was fine. My job was to paint chalkboard paint onto the top so topical items can be drawn or written on the face. It was warm on Friday morning when I did this.

Larry didn't want the sides or the interior of the hole to be be painted so there was blue painter's tape to edge those areas. I could not get the blue tape to stick to the sides. It worked for a bit with the interior of the hole, but I gave up on the one and just did my best to not have it drip. This was the first coat. It took a bit of mixing to get the paint to come out evenly.

Ultimately, it took three coats to get an even surface. I brought sidewalk chalk along but that was too hard for the surface and I had to paint over the markings. You need to use chalkboard chalk on this paint. The can recommends a drying time of 24-hours so I painted this on Friday as we were going to use them at the 3rd Annual Spectacular Death Guild Meet-up, held on Saturday. By Saturday, they were ready to go.

In this blurry photo of Larry and Luke, we had a great time playing "Corn Hole".

It was hot and humid so we wound up not using these as much as I think we would have had the humidity not been so oppressive. The chalk markings erased very easily. When the bean bags would land on the ramp, they would erase the chalk.

Late Saturday night, we played Cards Against Humanity.

On Monday evening, we blocked off the whole evening and played three games. First up was Star Trek Catan.

It took me a little bit to remember how to play Settlers of Catan, but once I remembered, this plays exactly like Settlers. Your pieces are the Enterprise space ship and Federation space stations. Carole won this.

Next up, we played Ascension.

I'm not one to enjoy card games where you have strategies utilizing various cards. Magic: The Gathering and Blizzard's Hearthstone card game are like that. Ascension is similar but it's easier for people like me to figure out. It was fun. It might be something I'd enjoy doing on a regular basis. Larry and I played Pirate Munchkin on Sunday afternoon. I do like that game, mainly because the cards are hilarious. I believe Larry won this round of Ascension.

Carole said there is an Ascension app for smart phones. She spends a lot of time playing the game on her phone. I looked at my smart phone and shook my head. I use my phone to make and receive calls, occasionally check the weather and find mapping routes, and as an alarm clock when one is not available. Play games on it? I don't think so.

We ended the night with my favorite game, Trivial Pursuit.

This was the newest version, the one Larry gave Carole for Christmas. Mom joined us and we played the fast way where you got a pie piece when you answered a question correctly. I won. I'd been stumped by the green Science and Nature category so they thought that was a good one to give me at the end. My question? "What kind of dog was Lassie?" I thought, at first, Larry, who was giving me questions, was joking. I was really expecting something along the lines of "Name one of the nobel gasses." I'd have had to actually think about that. It was kind of disappointing to win on what, to me, was a hugely easy question. Oh well, it was still fun.

I've been playing Dungeons and Dragons online with a group of friends since May. I just added a table top Dungeons and Dragons event which may play as much as twice a month, but right now, we're looking at just once a month. Years ago, bi-monthly gaming dates with friends was a part of my life. Games are a way to connect and have fun. It's slowly coming back into my life and I couldn't be happier.

Beverage:  Water

Deb