Robot Claw

Adam had a great idea for a blog post: both of us listing (in 50 words or less) ten places we’d love to visit. This post contains mine; read his list here.

The Bay Of Fundy in the southeastern corner of Canada is known for delicious seafood and some of the biggest tidal surges in the world. We were going to go last year before covid changed our plans, and once the borders reopen it’s high on our agenda.

There’s many good reasons to visit New Zealand, but ever since I saw them on TV as a child I’ve wanted to visit Waitomo Glowworm Caves. Imagine an ‘underground’ boat trip lit only by worms! That’s magic 🙂

The Isle Of Wight off the south coast of England has the worlds largest wild kangaroo population outside of Australia. It’s also a popular tourist destination with sunny beaches, tourist activities and natural beauty aplenty. I’ll go one day for sure.

Selecting a single destination in Switzerland was difficult but in the itinerary I made for our intended trip Zermatt was the destination I was most looking forward to. The reasons for canceling that trip seem silly now post-covid so maybe I’ll visit one day after all?

Arashiyama Bamboo Grove in Kyoto barely needs an explanation. Of everything on this list, this may be the first one I visit.

Speaking of Japan, I’ve always wanted to visit Okinawa! I hardly need to explain my love of Japan, and I think of this as ‘Japan’s Hawaii’ so naturally I’d love to see it for myself.

I’ve always been interested in the Mediterranean Riviera and while France is an obvious destination I’ve already been there so the picturesque Portofino is a natural alternative. I’ve made so many jigsaws of this place, and I’ve always wondered what it would be like to visit…

Gundam Factory is a brand new (in 2020) attraction in Yokohama Japan that I absolutely positively will visit. I guarantee you’ll read about it on this very blog when I do 🙂

Tasmania has always held a strange fascination to me, and ever since Bernard offered to chauffeur me around in a rented luxury car Hobart has jumped to the top of my ‘Oz capital to visit next’ list! I bet I’ll get sick on the ferry though…

We’ve been to the northernmost point of England, and ever since I’ve wanted to hit the southernmost point – Lands End – as well. It’s a tourist trap for sure, but they also have the southernmost post office on England so I can buy postcards and send them from right there!

And there you have it: ten locations, at least 8 of which I hope to visit within the next five years. Which ones sound most interesting to you?

It’s my birthday today! I was brought into this world at least 21 years ago to bring joy to my friends and despair to my enemies!

And as befits one of my stature, I received wonderful gifts. A lot of gifts. Too many in fact. Here’s some of them, so I can look back in future years and marvel at the bounty I received.

Let’s get some tedious stuff out of the way first. I got a bunch of games, mostly for the Switch. Many of these I bought myself and KLS squirreled away until today, and I’ll probably be playing them over the next year.

If you think this is a lot… well here are the DVDs!

There’s a story behind this haul: we’ve been doing ‘movie nights’ on Fridays and Saturdays for a while, and despite having a wealth of options available via streaming are stubbornly watching DVDs, mostly purchased for a song ($3.74 usually) from Walmart. Eventually we thought to check Amazon for cheap DVDs (yes, we actually searched for ‘cheap DVDs’) and found a goldmine! Some of those in the photo were under $3!! Yes we’ve seen almost all of them already, and yes many are ‘bad’ films, but neither means they won’t be fun to watch again 🙂

I got loads of books as well – 15 in total including a few hardcover art books – but that’s boring to most of you so I’ll skip it and move on to the more unusual stuff, like this:

A Pac-Man watch! It’s a Timex digital watch made to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Pac-Man! It’s all metal and has a snappy design and even plays the iconic theme when you hold a button down. I like this a lot 🙂

I got three boxes of trading cards! The Hook ones are from the movie (that I’ve never seen) that came out in 1991 and include stickers that you may see on a future postcard. The other box are Japanese ‘card + wafer’s for a game series I’ve never played. The cards are plastic with fantastic art though and I like them. I got a second box in a different series as well. (Alas Bandai stopped making wafer cards last year…)

This titanic LEGO kit came from J&J and was a massive surprise since I didn’t even know it existed. A 4000+ piece working roller coaster?!? You can expect a detailed blog post when I get around to building this one!

Bernard sent me these nifty photo coasters, and he was nice enough to include some stylish photos since he knew we didn’t have a printer. They’re extremely well engineered coasters and have already found their way onto our tables and desks!

A surprise gift from KLS was this amazing tiny synthesizer that makes all sorts of groovy electronic sounds and tunes. I’ve only played with it briefly but it seems to have a lot of depth! I’m very impressed so far and looking forward to composing a killer tune on it.

As I said I was spoiled mightily and this post doesn’t even show the model kits (yes plural), the candy (including sent from Australia – thanks SMC!), the shirts (including the one in the first pic – thanks SFL!) and various other items. Special shout out for my birthday cards: I got many this year and they were all extremely high quality 🙂

With birthday cupcake in belly it’s soon time to prepare dinner – Chicken a la Zoffë, Tuscan style is what I’ll cook myself – then an evening of dueling in my new Yu-Gi-Oh game. A great end in other words to a great day!