thou shalt not play

okay, the situation is this: meralco fried one of our home PCs, the one that was jazzed up to play the games we love (the other one was crippled earlier by some sinister hardware issue). So I went and got my office PC, just for holidays, because apart from gaming, Nikki and I use the computer to write and surf.

I also planned to zone out with some new games (new to me, at least). So unflinching was my faith in my computer that I went out and got the entire Neverwinter Nights set (main game plus Shadows and Horde expansions), the new Magic: The Gathering Battlegrounds plus a couple more things.

After much struggling and frustration, I managed to install only the NW set (the others simply refused, even after much cajoling, praying, internet research and fiddling around with things the Dark Powers only fully comprehend), only to discover that everything moved too slowly. Yup, my office PC doesn't have much power when it comes to these mammoth things that require all sorts of hardware.

So.

No gaming.

Gah.

This means I'll actually have to write to entertain myself.

I started on a new story, Pang Li's Garden, after devouring the entire short story collection of my new short form idol Jeffrey Ford (his long stuff is padded and very flawed). I was inspired by the second best story in his collection, "At Reparata" (the best one was, of course, "Creation", which went on to win the World Fantasy Award for Best Short Story this year)>.

I'm also keeping myself occupied with the wonderful new non-fiction book by Giles Milton - Samurai William, courtesy of my lovely wife. Milton also wrote a pair of earlier books I enjoyed immensely: Big Chief Elizabeth and Nathaniel's Nutmeg.

So, for the holidays, it's back to the basics for me: reading, writing... and porn (sympre naman, what is the internet for?).