Weeknotes 17 Jul 2020

The weeks really seem to be flying by this year. News is saying that Texas (where I live) is generally doing poorly with COVID right now. I don't happen to live right in the middle of one of the hot-spots. Close, sure, but distant enough.

One optimistic thing I've observed in the past week is that most everyone seems to be wearing a mask when they are out. Not 100% of folks, but enough that I feel a lot more comfortable going out places. I don't anticipate instantly better statistics, but if the rest of the state is behaving the way I see my neighbors are, I anticipate things trending for the better in the coming weeks.

Work

Having shipped a big project, things are settling into a new routine still. We're still taking COVID seriously. Back to work, but everyone who can work-from-home, is working from home.

And what seems strange, is that this month, July 2020, is turning out to be the biggest sales month in our company's history. By a wide margin. I say strange because Power Home Remodeling is a company that sells to people in their home. We're doing everything we can to be safe and keep our customers safe. We're making it work.

Movies

• Hamilton I guess is not strictly a film, but a filmed Broadway musical. I'm positive seeing it live is much better than a small screen. That said, I can see what all the praise has been about. Thoroughly enjoyed this. Had a number of the songs running through my head days after.
• The Old Guard is about a small group of immortal soldiers who fight for good from the shadows. They try to stay in the shadows because they know what the rest of mankind may do to them if they find out. They sense each other through some mysterious connection they have and a new one has appeared. The first half of the film is pretty good. The rest was just okay.

• 1990: The Bronx Warriors is a film I swear I saw one summer in my teens rented from the local video store because there was absolutely nothing else to rent. The Reel House Foundation coordinating with the local Alamo Drafthouse hosts some online films you can watch with other film geeks and make fun of bad films. This one is some Italian knock-off of The Warriors and Escape from New York. Just nowhere near as good as either of those films. Still a fun time when you and others are having a blast making fun of the film.

Repo Virtual by Corey J. White

Corey J. White's Void Witch Trilogy made me a fan of his for life. Repo Virtual reinforces his status. The book is set in a future, somewhat cyberpunk, version of our world where Zero, an online game/universe/company, has people both playing and working in it.

Our hero has a side job repossessing virtual spaceships in-game within Zero which has a very real economy. Something which leveraged some skills he picked up in his younger years stealing things in real-life.

I won't go any further so I don't spoil anything. A fun, fast read with a lot of great characters. Would love to see a film. Based on the title, I thought most of the book would take place in a virtual world. It does not. But virtual has many meanings...

Board Games

Cartographers

A fun game that can play up to one-hundred people if you want. We played with four. Each player gets a sheet like the one pictured below.

Rounds are based on four seasons. Each season has a couple of ways to score points. Cards are revealed that offer a shape (rectangle, L-shape, etc.) and a terrain-type or two which you can draw on your map. You try to place those on your map in the most efficient way to score those points.

Everyone was the same starting map, so you think you'd see duplicates. That doesn't seem to happen though. At the start, all players see how each season will get scored. Some may go for quick points while others may play a riskier long-term strategy. Riskier because you don't know what shapes/terrains will be presented. Towards the last season you may find that you blocked yourself out of moves which can cost you the game. Especially when there's a chance that monsters may appear allowing your opponents to block out portions of your map!

Crazy Farmers and the Clôtures Électriques

This game was recently funded on Kickstarter but they already have the online version available at BoardGameArena.

A fun, fast, simple game where you drive a tractor building a fence around spaces to increase your farmland. Fence around a barn and you get a special bonus. Like dropping a bale of hay to block another farmer, or electrifying your own fence to protect it against another farmer plowing it over.

Things get really tense when you realize that in order to win, you will likely need to take over another farmer's farmland. It's a battle for land and you can't win without getting your hands dirty!