A Spooky Crew wedding!
The biggest news at the moment is that Vix and Billy finally got married! It was an honour to see their beautiful ceremony. I cried a bit because I am secretly a romantic (don’t tell anybody, for my street cred, you see). I didn’t take pictures of the ceremony itself because I thought that would be rude, but it turns out I was indeed meant to do that lol.
Not only did I get to see Vix again, I finally got to meet THE VILY in person after about 5 years of gaming and messaging online. She is every bit as beautiful and funny in person. But when we met and we hugged, my necklace got stuck to the boob area of her dress and it was awkward. She also got to witness the Ranch Sim-physics of my chair in the street.
Also, I think I need to get new hearing aids because one doesn’t turn on.
Sheffield
I was hoping we’d manage to lease a car in time for the wedding so we could just go on a chill road trip up to Sheffield, but that didn’t work out, so I had to brave trains again for the first time in many years.
Trains are an accessibility nightmare; you rely on a member of station staff being booked to come and put the ramp onto the train down. Good luck if they don’t turn up. The wheelchair spaces are cramped and you are often competing with strollers and luggage. I have a Foldachair D09, which when we got it was the narrowest powerchair in the world, maybe they’ve made a narrower one since but idk. But the point is, even my tiny chair with tiny turning circle, cannot navigate the ridiculous fixtures and spaces properly, they clearly never tested any carriage designs with actual chairs.
I think it would help a lot if trains had fold-out electric ramps like London buses do. Because they flap out and down, they would land wherever the corresponding surface is, even if the platform is higher than the train or vice versa. Or maybe the trains themselves should be able to change height, although that doesn’t help gaps. Carriage layout also needs a serious rethink. They’d do better with the subway style seating, long benches on either side, facing each other. As well as having proper wheelchair spaces, there would be so much more room in the middle if needed. But, I realise this would be difficult centrifugally. Not sure what the solution to that is. Japanese bullet trains can apparently have sideways seating (often facing outward rather than inwards), so presumably it is possible to sit sideways while going very fast. Those are my unsolicited train opinions anyway.
At least, from spending time on train platforms, I could observe that leopard print is definitely back in fashion! I’ve probably gone on about my love of leopard print before. Esp. blue leopard print and also blue camo (almost deffo because Tomb Raider 3).
Our first train was slow so we missed our connecting one. On the way back, the accessible door on the train we were supposed to get, was broken, so we just had to wait another hour for the next train. But we managed to do some shop-browsing in that time so it wasn’t all bad. The customer assistance staff went above and beyond for us here, it’s just a place that physically sucks.
The worst English train station I have ever seen is officially Birmingham New Street. It’s under a shopping centre, and the roof of it is so long as to make it underground without really being underground. Idling trains apparently emit a constant horn-like sound, and this is really amplified at Birmingham New Street. And THE SMOG. It’s full of what are apparently diesel fumes. The people who work there must be ill as all hell. I just wore my face mask on the platforms on the way home, looked like a dork because I wasn’t sick, but I literally had an irritated respiratory system after my first journey through.
Also, when we were waiting at the assisted travel section, we saw a guide dog trying to alert to there being a seat, but the owner wasn’t actually looking for one, she was just standing there. But the dog was like, ma here’s the chair! Bless that dog. I do miss working with dogs but I’m just so old and tired.
We stayed at the Leopold, it was a nice hotel in an old building. The only downside really (aside from them not doing room service nachos), is that they clearly didn’t clean the room after the last guests checked out. They changed the bedding, but that’s it. There were visible brown smudges on things.
The Leopold has a scheme you can opt-in to where you simply decline housekeeping services during your stay, but they surely should be cleaning in-between guests? Normally I don’t like to have housekeeping come in during a hotel stay because I just want to leave my stuff where it’s convenient and sleep at odd hours. But this time, we did ask for housekeeping, they changed the bedding again but didn’t appear to do anything else. It doesn’t even look like they’re going over fomites with so much as a Dettol wipe. We paid a lot of money to go there and stay in what was unfortunately a dirty room. But the staff were very nice and helpful to us, especially when the wheelchair lift decided not to work.
Aside from that, it was a bit awkward that our room just happened to be where lots of loud drunk people stood literally right outside the window for hours; very uncomfortable to bone your spouse next to. And there was also a tram line right there.
Sheffield is a nice city, we didn’t have much time to explore it (arrived the evening before the wedding, left the morning after), but what we did see on the way to and from the train station was really nice. It’s very clean and pedestrianised as well as having a lot of old architecture.
My sister-in-law was watching Naboo while we were gone, he was apparently a good boy for her.
Now I shall insert a little bit of gaming news.
FO76
Despite my love of my previous little camp, I had the itch for a rebuild. It looks more like an official Whitespring outbuilding. I haven’t made it that much bigger, most of the size increase is a porch around the outside. But there’s a bit more room inside.
They’ve introduced something called a “legacy season” this time, which allows you to unlock things from past seasons that you weren’t around for, as well as working on the new current one. However, they’ve done the same annoying thing they do for the mini seasons, forcing you to unlock items in order instead of just selecting things you actually care about.
RDO
I have been slacking on Red Dead Online because of the new Fallout season. But I have some horse screenshots.
RDR1
I think I’ve found everyone they want me to look for, so I’m not sure what else can happen with the plot between now and the ending. I guess I’ll find out when I stream next. And then I’ll probably do Undead Nightmare.
General life stuff
I haven’t been getting a lot of other gaming done, tbh. I think I forgot to mention last time, that I’ve gone back to streaming only one day a week, on Sundays. There’s just so much going on that I need to borrow the time back from my other two streaming slots.
And last but certainly not least, is this little guy, a Phasmophobia figurine I literally forgot I ordered back at Easter time! This is the best photo I managed to take because the box is so shiny omg. Maybe in sunlight I could get a better one, but I’m on a bit of a night cycle at the moment so not seeing much daylight in my office lol.
Before long it shall be Halloween, the most wonderful time of the year!
- A Spooky Crew wedding! - October 14, 2026
- I’ve got a fever, and the only prescription is more horse - September 15, 2026
- A whole year of Naboo! - August 9, 2026