Hem and Haw: January 2012

Firstly, this post is 1 month and 1 day late. Secondly, please excuse the many many photos… but I did warn you about not being able to just pick a couple of good photos unlike every other blogger who somehow can. To our dismay, we wasted a good half an hour just trying to run into each other’s paths. Long story short, we met in Melbourne Central under the clock at “noon”. The whole day was reserved for pure shopping (and the in between lunch break). Christmas shopping, in fact. We hopped from shop to shop, stall to stall and mall to mall. Tiring? Yes, but only by the end of the day (refer to last picture for photographic proof. =S)

That day was special because it was the day I fell in love... with Topshop. It was true love at first sight. The metallics, the sequins, the velvet and above all… the SHOES! *faints* I still haven’t yet quite recovered from the hard fall, and I don’t plan to.

-Kim

When not being girly and fashionable with her cousin Kim, Rachael occasionally writes Let's Plays. Just warning you now that she is quite prone to Capslock.

A little while ago, when I thought I was the most hilarious person on the Earth, I wrote a really brief Let's Play series called 'A Girl on Minecraft'. I thought wearing dresses and lipstick on weekends qualified me as a new age outsider; a novelty in an obviously nerd dominated world which therefore made me funny. Well I'm here to tell you that I'm still female but I realised being that didn't make me laughable.

Being really shit at gaming did.

Read now, complain later.
~ ~ ~

Skyrim greets me with overly dramatic sound effects of swords clanging together when I click 'New Game', telling me immediately that just about everything in this game is going to be all 'I AM NEEDLESSLY EPIC'. The ominous, grumbling tone of the music accompanies a fancy and obscure poem about prophecies and apocalypse in the loading screen. I'm painfully aware of the fact that I haven't even begun playing the game and the theme of DRAGONS, BITCH has already been plastered up on my screen. Song of the Dragonborn? As in, something born to a Dragon? That has the ability to compose verse and then sing it?

I wake up on a wagon, having apparently been unconscious and meet a ruffian whose name I've now forgotten. I think it started with R. Let's call him Rodolf. He's our token macho-rebel-mentor-wrestler-looking guy. When it appears that we've arrived at Token Medieval Village and the coachmen nonchalantly mentions the 'headman', Rodolf sticks to his macho guns, telling Wimpsie Pickles opposite me to cut his whiny bullshit and deal with the fact that he's about to die.

"Also your tunic is ugly"

We're unloaded and Wimpsie makes a run for it before being killed by incredibly slow archers. I am then invited to take a leisurely jog by Obligatory Woman Soldier, but am saved by the fact that I can't actually move yet.

Here comes the 'Unexplained Anonymity' part and my executioners ask politely who I am. What follows is like Create-A-Sim from The Sims franchise but on a couple heavy doses of Tolkien and sugar pills. There are so many ridiculous choices that I write to my gamer friends asking what I should be. My first choice is 'Brenton' because they look the most human, but with a name like 'Brenton' and an apparently adeptness at spells, I sense the 'Brentons' are the nerdy kids on the block. With no other tactic to choose, I completely disregard what ever specialties each race has and try to find one that resembles me.

Clearly this one.

Finn advises me to be a Wood Elf, who are good at archery and are probably smaller than most of the races. I am at least half those things, so the choice is made. My comparison to Create-A-Sim at this point looks a bit understated, because faced with the ability to customise my neck colour, I get the 'NEEDLESSLY EPIC' vibe again.

"I heard that Lucii from Fala Village has a blue neck. That's so fetch"

As I watch the bloody beheading of Overly Brave Prisoner, an otherworldly shriek comes from the distance, echoing through the mountains around us. It isn't loud, but it sounds of horrors only found in deep abysses of endless caverns, into which water falls but never sees enough sunlight to be again evaporated and escape the darkness. The shriek is hollow and pained. It's foreboding, and also foreshadowing. I waste no time to wonder what it is. Shoved down onto execution block, my head is tilted conveniently towards the sky.
Another shriek. Obligatory Woman Soldier insists the proceedings press on.
Then the tension splinters with the arrival of the foreshadowed terror.

Huh. Didn't notice.

Chaos rains down on us, along with the sudden mass of rubble and I'm sent flying through the burning village like a cat with its tail on fire. I run for my life, bravely dodging all manner of fire and stone hurled at me like the born rogue Elf soldier that I am.

Loljks I was more scrambled than eggs in my feeble, sweat-laden, scream-inducing attempt to not die.