karohemd | An expensive but fun afternoon/evening

Left work 20 minutes to 2, drove to the station, realised I didn't have a parking ticket, bought one (hint: if you buy the ticket at the station ticket office, it's cheaper than from the machine), found spot to park at very end of car park and promptly missed the cruiser at 2:15 :o(. Continued to read Northern Lights while waiting and on the train where the plot thickened. Again just missed the tube to Olympia from Earl's Court so had to wait for 15 minutes. Got there, registered, walked in, got accosted by Robert Rankin to buy his new book but managed to get out of it with a whimsy excuse ;o) Walked around the trade/demo hall and promptly ran into a number of people I knew both in front of and behind the counters. Naturally, ran into a bunch of Cammies as well. Bought

grimjim's Slayer's Guides (the look fantastic from what I've seen so far). Found the Millennium Moon stand and stopped to chat and pick up my character briefing. Met old GenCon buddies Hoggs and Tim (who played the Nos Jens and Dupin at Dave's game) and chatted for a while.
Went back to the trade hall and picked up a nice set of dice. Finally found the Hogshead stand (empty, though) and marvelled at the gorgeous First Edition of Nobilis (oversized hardback on glossy paper). It's a diceless game, a bit like Amber and focuses on politics and intrigue rather than Hack&Slash. I really want to play a LRP version of it sometime, hopefully someone will run one at Dragonmeet.
Found one of the photos I had taken of John Kovalic in the Dragonmeet flyer and finally found James Wallis. Of course, I had to buy Nobilis, despite the hefty price tag of 29.99. Still, I think it's far better value than WW's limited editions.

Note to self: Don't forget to bring bottle of German beer for John Kovalic on Saturday.

Bought some horrendously expensive food at the cantine to save time and sat down upstairs to read through my character (Malkavian Ambassador and Bletchley Park Codebreaker) which looked like it would be fun to play.
Encountered Mel and friends of Epic Experience and promptly reserved a character for Saturday. If you're into freeform/purely interactive live roleplaying check out their games, they're fantastic.

Then Dave's Garou of the Baskervilles started at the usual CMT of plus half an hour and it was great. I'm not going into detail here as he might run it again and I don't want to spoil anything.
Basically, it was a classic murder mystery, with the murderer being one of the PCs. It was also more of a freeform than a common Vampire game, with hardly any challenges but with the concentration on interaction and actual roleplaying. All the characters were just wonderfully portrayed, with special mention of Tim for Dupin, [whatever his name was] for the fop,

dreamingchristi for his girlfriend and B movie actress Myra, Gemma for Grandma (typecast again ;oP) and [if only I could remember his name] for Diamond Sam. Very very enjoyable despite us not being able to actually find the murderer, which was beside the point, anyway.

One thing I had an idea for when I saw the floor plan of Baskerville Hall. How about a live version of Kill Dr Lucky? We only need to find some mansion somewhere and off we go ;o)

Chatted some more and took a taxi back to EvilHQ, where I collapsed on the sofa but couldn't fall asleep for quite some time because Christi left the light in her room on which shone through the window above the door and through the glass door in the lounge. I simply need darkness to be able to sleep properly. Fell asleep eventually and only woke up at 6:40 when Steph got in and Isi's phone alarm went off. I'm not sure if I had woken up if Steph hadn't come in as the alarm wasn't very loud.
Woke myself up with a generous helping of water in my face and pootled off. Starbucks at Waterloo Station wasn't open yet so I left without the coffee. Promptly missed the 7:45 train because it left from a different platform and I was a bit late so I had to take the slow train at 7:51 which got me to Cambridge at 9. Drove home, had a shower, drove to work, worked.

Curiously, I'm not as knackered as I should be after this...

Tonight, not much apart from reading, maybe a bit of IRC and then an early night, off to London asap tomorrow. Plans include: Meet and greet, give John Kovalic his beer and pick up some back issues of Dork Tower I haven't got yet and maybe Chez Dork, maybe join a demo game somewhere (I'd like to play Nobilis), will surely find some funny card game or other as well to increase my collection. Play Epic Experience in the afternoon, wander around the Vamp game taking photos and probably do some more random spot gaming. Take the last train back to Cambridge because I need to do things on Sunday :o(.