Month: Apr 2021

New Job

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I can, at last, announce that my interview the other day as part of our restructure was successful. I am going to become the group manager for our local libraries. This means I’m effectively replacing my existing boss, who is shuffling sideways to another area in search of new challenges.

All very exciting.

The biggest goals ahead are to finish the rest of the restructure, and to continue reopening our services to our communities and partner organisations. In doing so I want to expand the range of organisations we work with, and become much more inclusive and cooperative in planning the services and use of spaces that we have.

Fair to say the brains of myself and colleagues/staff are fizzing in contemplation. In addition I’m now styling myself as the King in the North (of Surrey) and will be setting the Saturday staff tomorrow the challenge of designing me a new throne out of spare acrylic stands and withdrawn bookstock. This is probably a joke.

I hate sitting on good news, but it was only fair to wait until everyone who had been interviewed or involved had been contacted and updated. I may have shared a bottle of rioja with Lady M last night in celebration.

Onward!

For A Few Designs More

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Work was work, and so this evening I’ve worked on some old graphics to bring them up to scale to use on tshirts on Amazon UK. I’m considering putting a few up for other countries at some point, but as far as I know the majority of our DDC audience is UK-based and this is hardly a superstar blog.

Still, you might enjoy these:

Family Tree: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B093S2ZJFL/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_fabc_KF9RA0TSVTH25XB53CJ5

Gothic Butterfly: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B093RBRRD2/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_fabc_QFYWSQXZEXF88NM0RC7Q

Reflection: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B093G9VG5T/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_fabc_93EN37ATGWZ619G5F5A5

Fractal Fishpond: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B092TB3BZG/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_fabc_JFXBHQBHGCTD92WNJXXN

Hope there’s something there for people to enjoy. If nothing else it’s a good way to relax for me.

All A Blur

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The interview this morning was okay and yet still the hour sped past at an incredible speed. I wasn’t stumped by anything, but who knows how it went? I certainly won’t for a few days.

And I think I did some work today as well, but my stress headache seems to have blotted it out, so I’ll see what’s there in the morning when I go back.

On a lighter note, I’ve made some new tshirt designs and posted them. We now have designs for each character in the DDC, as well as some hoodies:

Thorin: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B092P5Z9Q3/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_fabc_4964T38WRB2GXRW4W0Y3

Valenia: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B093N1251L/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_fabc_DV3K2KKXS6CQ3QWX12QG

Kerne: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0927DSVWQ/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_fabc_6SVNRSHTHR84J8NXDYTN

Caeluma’s Family: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08W91PDTT/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_glt_fabc_Y3JRQEYC91GWYJDHKSW8

So, if you fancy treating yourself to support the channel or your favourite character, you now have even more options 🙂

On Edge

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I have a job interview tomorrow and I’ve spent all day reviewing and revising documentation while also preparing a presentation on expected challenges

It’s an internal post that has come up during the restructure, and so if nothing else its a good practice run for the application for my own post that I have to do at the end of this week.

And that’s about all I care to say about it all at this point because I’m frazzled and anxious and my perfectionist side is warring with my confidence to wing it in much the same way as it battles when I prep for one of the weekend games.

So if you know me and think I’m being quiet, that’s the reason why. It’s been a busy week between the mental health first aider assessment, the Sunday game, and this interview. That’s not even mentioning the day job. Oh well. Wish me luck!

How Bizarre

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I was about to write a blog and found three unpublished drafts from over the last few weeks, so I’ve hit the button on them. That should confuse the stats.

It’s been a very busy weekend – we finally caught up with each other yesterday – so today’s gaming session was a bit more subdued and roleplay-led than our more recent weekends.

The DDC ended up visiting a casino and taking advantage of Thorin’s local fame and popularity to sweettalk the owner into giving them some information about the missing Lord Kemsler. They now have the office address and name of a skyship captain who transported the artificer.

It doesn’t sound much, but the session was full of visits to tailors, shopping for gifts, and asking questions of suspicious town hall gnomes. It was gentle, but we had fun.

We’re also starting to get a regular viewership – a steady half dozen or so listeners all the way through and another couple of dozen who dipped in and out. According to our stats we also have a healthy number of people who check in on the recordings during the week – so if that’s any of you, thank you very much and hope you’ve enjoyed it as much as we have making it.

If you’re not sure of the link, have a listen to www.twitch.tv/princessleah1980 and we’ll see you soon.

Bemused Moments

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Sometimes, when I have an idle moment, I cast an eye out at the carpark outside my current library (we rotate between sites mostly, it feels sometimes, to annoy the staff) and I marvel at the parking skills on display.

My particular favourite in the loosest sense of the word today was the SUV that was half parked across one and a half disabled bays. By half parked, I mean only the front half of his vehicle was in the chevrons surrounding it, leaving the rest poking out and blocking egress for any other vehicle that wanted to leave.

He’d just dived in you see, and not being disabled he didn’t want to take up a marked disabled bay. So he blocked everything and two disabled bays at once. I did point out the free parking on the other side of the road that was totally empty but by then he was fleeing with his child’s reserved books.

Couldn’t make it up…

Why Kobolds?

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Last night’s game ran over time, but was great fun, mixing the freeform joys of a festival with a guest player who needed to recruit the DDC. As with last week, I’d drawn up a timetable for events to help keep us on track for the session and by and large it helped us clip along at a brisk pace all the way through.

Was a good session

Our guest character, Zorra, was a warlock from the University library, well known to Kerne. An aarakocra looking like a large humanoid owl in a smart suit, Zorra had been shut out of her home by an invasion of kobolds and needed the DDC’s help getting back in.

Home Alone style hijinks then started before the group managed to break in and fight off the small statured but persistent pack – while Valenia and her wolf fell through into a sub basement which looked to be where the kobolds had come from.

We did overrun, so the story will continue next week with our guest returning – but if you’d like to hear and see what happened then go to www.twitch.tv/princessleah1980 and you can catch up there.

Together Again

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At long last we’ve been able to get all together. I took advantage of the good weather and a gap in my rota to call out for us to gather. Christmas presents needed exchanging for one thing

And I’m so glad we did all get together. We met in one of the local parks and the relief and happiness all round has been just what we all needed.

It’s a shame we couldn’t stay down there, but we do at least have the game tomorrow to look forward to.

Certified in a Good Way

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I had the assessment today for the Mental Health First Aider course I was on last week and I’m pleased to be able to say that I passed.

I of course spent most of the morning beforehand in an anxious read and re-read of the course materials and nearly set off an anxiety attack with my brain catastrophising wildly.

Gentle breathing exercises and customer enquiries to distract me kept me going, but I’m now exhausted. Who knows what’s in store for tomorrow…