And so it came to pass that my former student Aidil invited Ain and I to play woodball at the university’s woodball field. With Irfan away at college, we thought it would be a great way to pass the time and learn new things. Apparently woodball is big at the university. The game feels like a mixture of golf and croquet. The video will tell the story better than words would. So, here is the video. Thanks to Aidil and the Woodball Club for the invitation.
Continue readingAuthor Archive: hisham
A Relationship with Transience
“You’re constantly feeling this gain and loss, gain and loss, and as a result you have a healthy relationship of how transient everything is.” Chloé Zhao
Continue readingThe Emptying of Nest Begins
And it came to pass that Irfan was accepted into a course at the nearby Polytechnic. For many weeks, we prepared for his going. Before long, we discovered that it was time for him to go. We drove him to the Polytechnic where he registered for his 2-week quarantine period. During this time, he would be living alone in a room with neither official activities not classes. Because entry protocols were strict, we had to follow the directions laid out by the security officers and the student facilitators. Even at the main gate, there were personnel in PPE taking our temperature from both sides of the car. The officers placed a green sticker on Irfan’s entry form which presumably meant that he was from the green zone. At his block, Ain had to ensure the facilitators that despite Irfan’s Kuala Lumpur identity card, we live in Perlis. The facilitators assigned […]
Continue readingDelta Green: Chicago Hopeless
We began a new campaign on Discord and Foundry VTT. This time it’s Delta Green, gamemastered by Ivan. Delta Green is a game of conspiracy of Lovecraftian proportions set in the modern age, and published by Arc Dream Publishing. It uses a variation of Chaosium’s Basic Roleplaying System for Call of Cthulhu. This was the second time I played it. The adventure was played over two nights and my title for it is obviously not what it really is. Dramatis Personae Jim Kurtz – Bill Mueller – Dan Palmer – Doug Sale – Hisham Part 1 Played 12th February 2021 My name is Sale. Caleb Sale. I used to be a mechanic, an Airman First Class for the United States Air Force. My speciality was rotorcraft maintenance, specifically the V-22 Osprey. One day, I saw something strange that changed my view on life and how the universe worked. I weathered […]
Continue readingSTA: Echoes of the Past
Star Trek: Thine Own Self S01 E05 Echoes of the Past *** Stardate 57669.4 – Sep 01 2380 2349 UTC Starfleet Dramatis Personae Lt. Kodar Tamat, Cardassian engineering officer and mission commander Lt. J.G. Simon Cañete, Human security officer Lt. Cmdr. Jora Mungar, Trill conn officer Ensign Sparik, Vulcan conn officer (NPC) Last time on Star Trek Adventures: Thine Own Self Previously, as the Saber-class USS Sienkiewicz under Captain Vosgal Toor investigated the missing New Orleans-class USS Nairobi in the Melpomene Sector, Cardassian engineer Lt JG Kodar Tamat, Human engineer Lt. Simon Cañete and Vulcan pilot Ensign Sparik travel to Delta Melpomene V on the Danube-class runabout USS Moonstar where they discover that the archaeologists the Nairobi had picked up had taken with them a huge pillar that might have been made of time crystal. The Moonstar then warps to nearby Balateen to rendezvous with the Sienkiewicz. Meanwhile, another Danube-class […]
Continue readingThe Expanse RPG: Sister Moon
The Expanse 05 Sister Moon Last time on Scheherezade Tales… Kazuo Khan, Detective of Scheherezade Safety and Security Concern (S3C) of asteroid colony 643 Scheherezade a.k.a. Zadi was authorised to be transferred from the settlement to Keris Gangsa, the asteroid’s only armed patrol boat for a trip to Ganymede. His old friend Captain Furaha Ding was the commander of the patrol boat. Kazuo also made friends with the brand new pilot Batbayar Gray. En route, XO Sasithorn Fawzi was killed by a micrometeorite fragment. Weapons officer Greg Farnsworth during an EV repair job on the hull exposed himself as a traitor. He shot engineer Zoë Mufolosi, but Kazuo mmanaged to successfully incapacitate Greg with a bullet. Here’s a short synopsis, because Irfan and I made an actual play video of our The Expanse RPG session last night. Check it out, embedded at the end of the page! The City on […]
Continue readingBirthday Dinner Consolidated
In order to save some money, we consolidated the birthday celebrations of both Ain and I earlier this evening. Her birthday is today, but mine will be coming around in ten days or so. There is a steamboat restaurant between the town and our house which we have never visited six years we lived here. It was finally time to visit it; not to mention we could finally afford a visit. Again, I do not have much to write about concerning my slow but sure march towards being half a century old. Only that I am very grateful to still be here to be able to spend a birthday dinner with my loved ones. Here there be photos: Time flows onward and wends its way like a river, and I continue to eagerly see what comes next around the bend.
Continue readingThe Cousins at Kangar Street Art 2.0
Once upon a time, we posted a blog article about Kangar Street Art. Some time in the last year, they have upgraded the alley to Kangar Street Art 2.0. It looks much better now even though a lot of the previous murals have been replaced. Tonight, we visited the alley with Anya and family. Here are the photos of our jaunt. It was great to see the cousins Anya and Irfan have a lot of fun together.
Continue readingAnya Visits Lakes and Mountains
On the second day of Anya’s visit, we sent to Tasik Timah Tasoh Resort, then to the viewing point of Wang Ulu. Anya was delighted to see dinosaurs. Videos can tell the story better than still photos, or words even. Here are two videos from today.
Continue readingFloating Market in Town
Earlier today, we visited the Floating Market in Kangar, which was located close to the Denai Larian in town. Denai Larian is what we called the River Esplanade in a blog post just after we moved to Perlis. Only once did we visited a honest-to-goodness actual floating market and it was when we chaperoned students to Songkhla How does this floating market rate? It was a pleasant place to visit. There are boat rides and food stalls; even picnic spots. At far end of the lake is a fishing pond. Check out the video and photos below. Next time we visit we will rent one of the paddle boats!
Continue readingART: Renegade Jennys and Boilerplate Jacks
Miriam Robern commissioned this spread for the beta version of Kallisti Press’ upcoming game: Renegade Jennys and Boilerplate Jacks. She ordered the art months ago, and only now was I able to deliver the final artwork. The pandemic has been hell on my spoons even though I don’t normally see anyone face-to-face these days. Not my colleagues nor my students. Is this an indication that my art production is slowing down catastrophically? We shall see.
Continue readingEsoteric Underground Cover
Several months ago, Chris Mennell requested a cover are for his new RPG zine entitled Esoteric Underground. I tried to finish it as soon as I could, but it was still a slog to get through because of day job workload. Needless to say, I was late in submitting the piece. Recently, Chris unveiled Esoteric Underground #1 with layouts by Beau Sheldon. The zine is a “zine collecting information about upcoming and current tabletop roleplaying games in that are on the fringes. ” Here is my cover art. Click on the image to expand it. Where is this robot? What is it looking for? Why are there huge sarcophagi in the background? What are the blue crystals in the strange rock formations behind the stele? You may download Esoteric Underground #1 for free from itch dot io here.
Continue readingBeacon in the Dark
I received a package this morning. Chris, an old friend from Sitiawan who now resides in Belfast, sent it. It was a Moleskine notebook for Irfan, which looked great. Furthermore, it was a limited edition Gundam cover Moleskine! I am grateful for the gift. So is Irfan, needless to say. But what is more dear to my heart are the notes he wrote for Irfan and I. I had been uncertain whether my friendship with a lot of my old friends at school mattered. Sure there were some that says hi every now and again on text chat or on social media. But for the longest time, I wondered if I did right with the friends whom I ran Star Wars RPGs (and sometimes ShadowRun) for, the ones who hung out with me discussing books, movies and music, and spent their free time obliging this eager nerd with his nerd […]
Continue readingMy Gamemaster Screen Around The World
Once upon a time I created a Star Wars RPG gamemaster screen inserts for the 2nd Edition Revised and Expanded by West End Games. Recently, online friends sent me photos of the GM screens inserts printed out and used on their gaming tables. Here is the GM screen in Sweden, as used by Daniel Sundström. He sent the photos to me earlier today. Last month, Greuh of France posted his GM screen on Twitter. The player side of the screen has artwork by Najael. I am pleased that the GM screen inserts are being printed and used around the world.
Continue readingSunday Dinosaurs
Several years ago, we drove in to check out Timah Tasoh Resort, right by the Timah Tasoh Lake not too far from the Timah Tasoh dam. I remember it that it was a weekend and although the gates were open, there was hardly anyone there. We did not even take photos as we drove through the resort. Fast forward to this weekend, and we now have dinosaurs. The dinosaurs are quite well-sculpted. They possess no feathers and I suppose featherless Jurassic Park-style dinos would be more popular with the visitors. They seem to be made from foam, so I hope the public does not damage them. Check out the video and photos above. Both contain a guest starring cat. Besides the dinosaurs, there were a whole load of other things you could do such as renting a bicycle, an electric motorbike and a children’s train ride. Check out the video […]
Continue readingA Virtual Eye For OBS
Finally OBS Studio virtual camera works! The Story So Far… I have been using OBS Studio to record classes online. I post these recordings on YouTube so students would be able to review the class. The students would do well to review the lesson delivery, activities they did and instructions I vomited out my piehole. I had been attempting to use OBS Studio for another thing, which is as a virtual camera to be used in Google Meet or Discord video chats. There are a lot of neat things you can do with it such as live transitions, camera switching (if one had more than a single camera), overlays and neat filters as well. In Recent Days… I have been having problems with installing the plugins that would allow me to use the OBS screen output as a virtual camera. I cloned the two different modules required, obs-v4l2sink and v4l2loopback, […]
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