Sam Richards is no longer M.I.A.

I've been off the radar for quite a while, but I'm back now. It's been a very busy week and a half!

I've been in Portsmouth since Monday, helping at a music academy that my church is putting on. I had to learn four songs for the academy, "Mercy" by Duffy, "When You Were Young" by The Killers, "Stop and Stare" by One Republic and "Hit Me Baby One More Time" by Britney Spears. The last one was an interesting choice, but we've made it quite 'rocky'. I had to spend most of last week working out all the parts and learning them, hence my absence from the blogger-verse. 

We had one guitarist yesterday, who didn't turn up today, and isn't going to come anymore! So I taught the songs to the other guy helping with the teaching, because I'm off home tomorrow and won't be there for the performance on Saturday. It was useful for me to be there anyway, because they needed someone to practice with the kids.

It has been very tiring though; we arrive at 8ish in the morning and finish at 5. Because we have to stay with the kids all day I spend 8 hours a day in the great indoors. I was so glad to get outside at the end of the day!

Bought a new DS game the other day that's really good. It's called Puzzle Quest: Galactrix and it's uber-geeky. Essentially it's Tetris crossed with Star Wars, and therefore, very cool. Also got the new Divine Heresy album, which I will review for you in the not too distant future.

Thank you Nintendo customer support

At last my Wii is working again. I went to set it up a few weeks ago and for no apparent reason the remotes wouldn't sync. Oh well, I thought, I don't desperately want to play it. So I left it for a bit.

A week or so ago I thought I'd try it again. New batteries and all that, read through the manual and followed the instructions to the letter. Nothing. I sat there for ages pressing the little red buttons with my hand in the air. Nothing. I thought it must either be the sensor bar or the remotes that were broken, meaning I'd have to spend some money on new equipment. 

Before I followed that assumption I borrowed my friend's remotes and sensor bar just to check if it was my things that were broken. And they didn't work either. So in my despair I went to my last resort. I rang customer support. 

When I got through to a human I told him I'd tried everything in the manual and was at a loss. 

"Ok, press the button on the Wii, don't hold it," he said. I pressed it. "Now press the button on the remote." I pressed it. "Is it working now?" I'm all prepared to answer in the negative, and then the mickey mouse glove appears on the screen! Simple. 

My question is this; why didn't it say in the manual to try that? Why did I have to ring an 08 number to get this simple solution? I don't really care though, I'm just glad I don't have to shell out to get new accessories.

On the subject of Nintendo products I'm fully obsessed with The Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass. The Zelda games are annoyingly good. Annoying because you easily get hooked but also because when you get stuck, you get stuck. One particular puzzle in the ghost ship completely halted my progress. And in the end it turned out that I just needed to apply some numbers in a different order. Still a great game, regardless of the frustration. 

I'm clean at last!

I'm now back from camping in Wales, where the washing facilities weren't much to talk about but lots of fun was had nonetheless. We all had a really good time, the weather was beautiful for the most part and there were only minor issues to deal with.

My main blight of the week was the numerous insect bites I sustained throughout the camping, some of which blossomed very painfully and disgustingly. I had one on my wrist which was particularly gruesome. It turned into a pus-filled boil which I named Juarez. Its gone down now thankfully, I kept catching it on things. Ouch.

My night-duty responsibilities were fairly simple. Nothing really happened so all I did was watch films and play on my DS. I got quite far on The Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass, which I was previously stuck on. The best film I watched was Stranger Than Fiction. Its got a fantastic plot and great performances, especially from Will Ferrell who proves there's more to him than just comedy. Also watched quite a few episodes of Flight of the Conchords and The Mighty Boosh, both of which I had never seen before and found very funny and weird.

Well I guess I should get on with some writing now that I'm back, need to work on some stories to post. Also I'm kinda realising how much work I've got to do over the next year for uni; I worked it out at about 50,000 words give or take. Slightly scary, but that's what I chose to do, so no one to blame but myself!

"Ten O'clock and all's well"

This will be my last post for about a week or so as I am heading off to Wales to help with the youth camp my church puts on every summer. I'm on night duty for the week, protecting the kids from a variety of nocturnal dangers. In reality all I have to do it sit in the car watching films on my laptop, as nothing bad ever happens. The worst event last year was when a fox got stuck in our camp site, and I was more worried for him than anything!

I was gonna post a review for the new Killswitch Engage album, but I've decided against it. Basically, it's a very average album, not really worth the time and effort of writing a review on. It feels very diluted, in that all the elements are there, but never becoming more than the sum of their parts. A bit of a disappointment really. Maybe it will grow on me in time, we'll see.

The Men from the Forest - part 3 of 3

Absolute terror. He is gripped, controlled. He wants to be so far away. Back in the cottage, wrapped up in his patchwork blanket, clutching his toy bear, enveloped by sweet sleep. But he is feverish, fervent, hopeless. The chasm within him is opening up, consuming him. He wants tears to rock his body, to pour out of him. The boy feels something.

She has drunk. She contorts, writhing, her naked flesh flashing like a gem in the torchlight. Death echoes in the chamber. She has filled herself, she is powerful, delirious, drunk on the fountain of his youth, his naivety, his innocence. She laughs, a rich peal of danger.

The knife is in his hand before she can break his neck, the claws enclosing. The cackle distorts into a scream as the blade violates her. Somehow he is dressed, he is tumbling down the stairs, a howl of pure rage pursuing him, snapping at his heels. He crashes through the door, across the clearing, plunges into the trees. She follows, a silken trace of scarlet falling in her wake, grasping her way through the treetops, panting, gasping, bleeding, ashamed, furious, alone.

She dives through the branches, knocking him to the ground, claws flurrying about his body, stealing more of him, ripping his clothing. Wildly he slashes. She pouches back, a streak of luminescent blood drawn on her white cheek. He stands, tall and cold. His shirt is in tatters, revealing his muscular chest, gashed. His dark hair is feral in the wind. His eyes pierce her emptiness. She is disgusted. He repulses her. Melting into the darkness, she returns to her tower, her hatred healing her skin, her pain eating her heart.

The villagers hardly recognised young Benjamin Thorn when he returned. He was so stern, so chilling, somehow taller and broader as he emerged from the Devil’s Whim on the third day. The grand old maids averted their gaze, knitting the funeral shrouds for the newly born babes.

He is a man now, they say, a shiver of discomfort running down the lace of their shawls. Benjamin grows up, he marries, becomes the father of a son, and then a daughter. He sends his son out on his fourteenth birthday, the son returns a man. He carries on living, as we all do, he builds Karletto’s first airship dock on the hills nearby, as air travel sweeps a new generation of travellers from the coast to the capital. As the village grows and becomes a town he grows old, sinks into bed, and ponders his dance with the beast in the forest, while his son stands in the dusky light, his newborn boy held in his arms, eyes piercing the night sky, watching the hills roll away, over and over, over and over.

The End