I played an adorable short game called Drowning in Problems by the guy who made Minecraft. Basically you keep clicking to solve the problem and as you progress, things get more complicated. A very nice, short text based game.

It's been raining and thundering on and off all day, so I took advantage of a lull in the downpour this evening to get out. Hooray for a little bit of sunshine between the clouds!

It was a pretty lazy night. I read comics, watched tv, and in general didn't do much of anything. But for a Monday, that's ok.

Chris stumbled across an article about a dice game called Cee-lo. So we spent part of the afternoon playing the game, modifying the rules as we went along and enticing the cat with new things on the table.

We're not going to C2E2 this year, but that doesn't mean the weekend won't be filled with comics! I kept my subscription for an extra month to the Marvel U app to finish up some comics, so I read a bunch of random stuff in that (including all of the Cloak and Dagger I could find, since I liked them in Runaways). Then finished up the day with the latest Saga books.

I received an invite today to the closed beta of EverQuest Landmark, so I logged in as soon as the servers were up and got to character creating!

Landmark is the world building component of the next series of EverQuest games (Next is the MMORPG). So while an MMO is more my style, I have no qualms about beta testing a game where I can build my own castle in the side of a mountain.
Anyway, I spent several hours wandering around aimlessly destroying things (like trees) for resources. I had no idea what was needed, how to build it, or anything of that nature.

Apparently you start right next to a Portal Stone (which I completely ignored) and that has a forge, mailbox, and other things.
So right now I have a fair number of resources (I think) and I'll have to start laying claim to land and do more serious building in the next few days.

There were lots of deer out while I finished up week 1 of C25K running (since I repeated week 1 because I had too big of a gap between sessions). Too bad my phone doesn't have the zoom of my SLR. You'll just have to trust me that they're in the photo.

C2E2 is this weekend, so Adam and Comfort stopped by for the afternoon and evening on their way to Chicago. We ate dinner downtown, stopped at Vault of Midnight (where I picked up volume 2 & 3 of Saga!), and then headed back to our house to hang out.
Dan stopped by to say hi too. It's always amusing to see Leki spend all of his energy hissing at Comfort (and by proxy, Adam), but then stop to cuddle with Dan. That cat is so sexist.

Today isn't as warm or sunny as Monday was, but I still managed to get out after work run along the nearby trail.

The weather was so wonderful today that I had to spend my lunch outdoors, reading a book. I love sitting out and reading infinitely more than pacing the skywalk in bad weather.

The last few times I tried running I either held my phone in my hand or had a jacket pocket I could stuff it into. Neither solution was ideal, but there was no fancy armband lying around to use. And of those fancy arm bands that do exist, I don't think any would fit my phone - I don't have any of the popular Android phones and I don't have an iPhone.

I did a quick search and found a link that suggested just using the top of a tube sock as an armband. I didn't have any tube socks, but Chris had picked up some crew socks for me.
So I cut off the tops on a pair of crew socks and sewed them together...
...then went out for a run to try it out.
The sock-armband worked pretty well. Because it's two tops of the socks sewed together, the band is long enough that I can cover the top of my phone and secure it in place so it won't pop off my arm. And it's tight enough that the phone doesn't try to slide around at all. The armband even doubled as a spot to tuck my house key, since my pants don't have any pockets.

Because of unrelenting winter, we haven't been over to the east side of the state in awhile. That means today was a whirlwind of visits, all of them too short.

Kati's mother (who is like a second mom to me) just got off of the hospital, so I stopped by briefly to see how she and Kati were doing. It was a short visit, and I complete forgot to take a photo, so please enjoy this cupcake photo instead.

Because Chris's dad lives just 15 minutes away from Kati, I swung by to pick up Chris (where I'd dropped him off on my way to Kati's) and very briefly visited there. Again, I forgot to take a photo. So, please enjoy this cupcake. It was a very tasty cupcake.
We arrived at my parents house a few hours late, but all of the food was still there waiting to be devoured, so I'm glad they didn't get too hungry at eat without us. I was pretty hungry though, so I pigged out on all of the cookies and candies before eating a late lunch.
After letting everything digest a little, we headed over to Chris's mom's house to have dessert. Chris showed her a bunch of photos of things going on since we last saw her at Christmas.
then it was on to dessert! Well, more dessert, since I ate a bunch of cupcakes at my mom's house. So really, this was a chocolate cake dinner for me. I foolishly cut a large piece (on the left) and then spent the rest of the evening all sugared out.

It was a very busy day, but worth it. I do feel bad that every visit was so short, but it was good to see everyone!

It was a pretty quiet Friday night. Work has been pretty stressful the last month, so it's nice to come home, play a little of a game, and then read. It's just nice to take the evening at a slower pace than work has been moving at lately.

A delicious Easter-themed cupcake, ready for devouring! Thursdays are always delicious treat days at work.

With the snow yesterday, there was no way I was going to try another day of running. So with the warmer weather today I headed out. Ugh, I felt kind of terrible after. But at least there was no snow!

Sure. Why not.

Art. Downtown. is going on downtown (and has been since the 11th). Since it was a little chilly out today, I walked through the skywalk and got to check out the pieces in DeVos Hall.

The workout pants I wore yesterday are insanely long. Like 4 inches too long. I kept stepping on them while running. So this afternoon I tried my hand at hemming them. Didn't end up the prettiest job, but since they're only workout pants, I think it will be ok.

Since the weather was warm and rain wasn't supposed to start until the afternoon, I decided to start week one of the Couch to 5K program. Since I don't actually like running around in public, we'll see how long I actually stick with running around outdoors in the neighborhood. I suppose if we had a treadmill I'd feel more comfortable, although I've heard that treadmills arent as much work as running outdoors.

But it was good weather and nice to get out, despite how dreary it looks in the photo.
Then we ran some errands around noon and took a stroll at Heritage Park where the ducks usually swarm people for food.

And all that running and walking so early in the day meant taking a nap for several hours on the couch while it rained outside during the afternoon. Which I suppose isn't a bad way to spend a rainy afternoon.

Earlier this week the python scripts on the Raspberry Pi linux server stopped working properly with the Philips Hue lights I set up a few years ago. So I logged into the little Pi that sits on my desk and did some minor tweaking so the two scripts that run in the morning - Sunrise Lamp and Weather Lamp - started to work again. Mostly it just involved downloading the latest phue library (python library for the Philips Hue) onto the Pi.

It was an easy fix, but it's been so long since I've actually had to do anything with the lights, that I forgot how fun it is!

Strolled around downtown on my lunch and enjoyed some sunshine. The Grand River has receded a little and some of the paths by it's edge are dry now.

 
Spent some time playing under the shadow of a volcano in Elder Scrolls Online. So much ash everywhere...

The weather has been sunny and warmer the last few days, and it's glorious.

The Pinoccio I backed on indiegogo last year has arrived! It's a cute little microcontroller (arduino compatible) with built in battery and wifi.
Of course, the device took so long to arrive (it was supposed to originally ship last Summer) that I ended up doing a work around for what I had intended this little things for. So now to come up with a project!

Chris suggested something with the hue lights and a button, so maybe I'll make these into tiny remotes.

The sun was shining and the sky was blue this afternoon! Perfect weather for a stroll around the park and an afternoon nap.

Chris was much more productive than I was today.

It's been a pretty low key day. We skyped with Adam and Comfort for a few hours to talk Captain America, comics, and life in general.
I played some more Elder Scrolls Online, and even stumbled across M'aiq the Liar.

It was a pretty rainy day....
But that wasn't going to stop us from meeting Dan and Angel's little one. Lorelei is absolutely adorable. Look at that face!
After a quick bite to eat we were then out the door and on our way to see Captain America: The Winter Soldier with Dan.

The movie, by the way, was pretty freaking good.

A chilly, overcast day after morning rain isn't depressing at all.

No.

Not at all.

I miss the sun...

It was a long day at work. Very long. And I barely took a break to even eat lunch. So what did I do when I got home? Hung out online with some co-workers.

A bunch of co-workers also picked up Elder Scrolls Online, so I spent part of the evening running around doing some quests with them. Playing video games beats being at work.

At least, it is cold out there if you're wandering in the north in Elder Scrolls Online.

Luckily it's not nearly as snowy outside in Michigan.