The Haul Report 399

 Hello everyone, kicking off this week's haul report, we have this short clip...

My loot of the flea market last weekend in Deurne, right next to my door.

But of course there is more, as I got this special set with beer glass of my favorite soccer team, Standard de Liege.  Every euro counts I say to hopefully allow them to rise to their former glory again.

But that's it for this week, a small and especially tasty loot report.

On the Painting Desk 286

 Would you believe it!?

I actually scored the vows I made last week, doing all the things I was planning to, and even get some more in.

It did came at the expense of night's rest and not being able to go out for yet another week to play some Underworlds, as both Thorin as well as Noshi where stricken by a nasty cold.

Now, maybe tomorrow at the tournament I run I'll get some games in, depending how many players show up, but it will be with an unplayed so far warband in the form of the Skinnerkin.

That being said, let's check out this week's complete paint progress, and talk a bit about what is planned next once these advance some more!

So there we have it, check back next week to see if I actually got anywhere...

Ghostbusters Frozen Empire

 After the succesful Afterlife, a new Ghostbusters movie arrived with Frozen Empire.

And even more then in the first one, it brings the new and old generation together.

Three years after the Summerville incident, Callie and her boyfriend Gary, together with her children Trevor and Phoebe have relocated to New York to aid Ray Stantz and Winston Zeddemore in reestablishing the Ghostbusters.  But after capturing a ghost, their long-time rival Walter Peck, now mayor, threatens to shut them down, forcing them to remove the still underage Phoebe from the team.

Upset, she meets the ghost of a girl her age, Melody, while playing chess in the park.  As Ray and Podcsat collect cursed objects, they are approached by Nadeem Razmaadi who posesses a strange brass orb.  The PKE meter goes of the scale when he tries to scan it, while a cold wave eminated from it damages the Ghostbusters HQ ecto-containment unit, which is dangerously close to full capacity.  Winston takes the orb to the privately owned research center of dr Lars Pinfield, but they can't extract any spiritual energy from it.  Trevor and Lucky visit Nadeem, and together with Peter Venkman discover he has latent pyrokinetic powers.

Ray, Phoebe and Podcasts learn from a research librarian the orb was used millenia ago by four mythical firemasters to trap Garraka, a phantom god who sought to conquer the world by using the power of fear itself.  Nadeem's grandmother belonged to the bloodline of on the firemasters, one of whom prevented the ghost to escape the orb in 1904.

Peck uses Phoebe's involvement to shut down the operation, and Phoebe in turn flees to the research center to extract her ghost for two minutes from her body and interact with Melody.  She learns Melody is involved with Garraka who has promised her afterlife if she aided him.  Using Phoebe's body, he can escape his prison and goes to reclaim his horns to augment his powers.  Garraka begins freezing the city, set out to free the ghosts locked in the containment unit at the Ghostbusters HQ.  Both generations gather to defend the unit, aided by Nadeem who attempts to master his power still.

Garraka overpowers them, but Phoebe, who enhanced her protonpack with copper alloy as this turns out to be the god's weakness, is aided by Nadeem and Melody who has been betrayed by Garraka.  Together with the veteran Ghostbusters they can trap him in the containment unit, as Melody reconciles with Phoebe before passing on into the afterlife to her family.

As the city thaws, the Ghostbusters are hailed as heroes again, with Peck forced to reinstate Phoebe and support the team...

So, this was an enjoyable film, though not as hilarious as the previous instalment I must say.  Never the less, it is great to see them in action, as this is a generational franchise and remain great family moment movies.

On Tour to the Frituur part 4: Frituur Condor in Deurne

 So, as promised in part 2, it's time for my "home place" frituur, and due to that reason this episode has a slightly different format.

 

 

You see, at least once every fortnight we go and get fries for dinner, and we do that at Frituur Condor, located in the street behind ours.  A 3 minute walk ensures everything is still nice and warm when I get back with it.

 

Located at the Condorlaan 1 in 2100 Deurne, it is being ran by a friendly chinese family.  They have some specialties, like the "japanese snack" which are fried tempura, and a home made spicy sauce, a combination of chili, samurai sauce and fresh onions, which packs a serious punch.

 

Our order

 

Being a family dinner, the order was bigger then usual.  A super sized portion of fries with sate spices, 2 smoked cervela sausages, a kipcorn (chicken in a crusty coat) and a cold meatball and two pots of sauce, namely andalouse and the above mentioned spicy homebrew, adding up to a total of 16.80 euro.  The fries where bakes perfectly dry, so no grease on them, while the cervela, being of the garlicy variety, are a lovely pink inside compared to the dry bakes deepfrozen ones of regular variations.

 

 

The frituur has some inside seating available for eating in, but also if wether permits some big bench tables to sit outside.  This is actually pretty nice, as it is located in a fairly calm street traffic wise.

 

Conclusion

 

 

Apart from being the regular take out spot, this is just simply put a very good frituur.  It has a very wide selection of snacks, even selling bags of kroepoek (chinese fried prawn crisps) if you want something on the side.  Prices are on normal levels, the people are friendly and it is all clean, resulting in a personal score of 8 out of 10 from me.

 

 

So, that is the homebase covered in this series, now it will all depend on where and when I end up for the next instalment of the series.

My Dress-up Darling volume 9 - Shinichi Fukuda

 Let's revisit our favorite otaku girl Marin, in the 9th volume of this cosplay slice-of-life romance series!

 

And Marin is all to happy to tell people about "her" Gojo.

 

 

Like the employees in the beauty salon she frequents, but then one of them makes a reward she seems to have put on a little weight.   During her shoot later on though, she gets the same remark.  She finds out it is indeed so, yet is amazed Gojo doesn't bother with it, offering to resize her costumes a little.

She suprises Gojo as she bought an expensive camera he had been wanting to buy, as he remains suprised by Marin's force of will, but also her impulsivity.  Trying out the new camera they are amazed by the quality of pictures they can make with it.

Visiting a cosplay event to try out the new camera instead of participating themselves, Gojo wants to learn how to make props for costumes.  He has arranged to that end to meet up with Akira-chan, who writes online tutorials on the subject, while Amane is meeting Marin.  But it turns out Akira-chan is a woman, and she thought Gojo was a girl...

 

 

Learning about camera angles, Marin and Suzuka meet up with Gojo and Akira, to invite them to an afterparty.  But this causes Akira, who was open with Gojo, to suddenly fall silent, unnoticed to the others.  Gojo has a feeling though he met her somewhere before. 

They all go out together to eat, when the plan is formed to do a group cosplay based on the videogame Coffin.  Marin calls JuJu-san to make sure they get to six people for the event, as all the others she knows chime in to do it.

And so another instalment ends of this loveable series, and hopefully soon I will find the time to read and catch up on the series some more as it remains something relaxing after a busy day.

Into the Under-Ekeren Participation Token

 The tournament I'll be running is getting very close now, and the participation tokens where delivered last week.

One for every participant, it is based of a file I found years ago on Cults, and had it modified to spell the club, gamesystem and year on it.

Of course, that also means that I needed on to paint up, to have it on the judges table as an example (before far better painters take a swing to it).

With the club logo being yellow letters on a black underground, I kind of tried to reflect that into the hex as well, going for a black edge and yellow build up from dark sand for the letters.

The tentacle was the hardest to decide on actually, as I long doubted between going for the green, or go for a more brownish look instead.

But, I like how the token turned out with a quick paintjob in the end.

Now, come and claim yours the coming sunday at the tournament!

The Haul Report 398: it's anime time!

 Kicking off this week, it's time for some additional reading material!

As my Archonia My Box arrived, delivering some fresh volumes for series I'm subscribed to with them.

So that means volume 11 of the immensely cute My Dress Up Darling, as well as the newest instalment of That Time I got Reincarnated as a Slime are now added to the (to big for confort tbh) manga pile I need to dive into.

My haul from TokyoCatch also arrived this week, and as a result I have some lovely figures for the collection, ready to be unboxed soon.

Last sunday I was also at a flea market, helping mom selling stuff from my passed away father last summer.  But that doesn't mean I wouldn't go round for a little tour and score some stuff.

And the inner person also got strengthened this week, as I obtained some gift boxes.  The Duvel one I bought purely for the lovely glass, while I got the other one for it's intresting beers from a brewery, De Kip (aka, the chicken) which I haven't tasted anything from.

 

 

And then the final haul... a new (or rather, renewed) nipple piercing, as a bday gift from Noshi.

So this is an awesome week full with the good stuff, joyous times!

On the Painting Desk 285

 Well, again no real  progress on the projects on the table...

And again due to something "urgently" coming in between, though this time it truly is as such.

I received the participation tokens for the Warhammer Underworlds tournament I'm running next week, and as such I need to paint up an example for some last moment promotion for the event.  While it will be a limited affair as the entry list stands now, that doesn't mean it wont be a fun thing to do!

Next week though, I promis (cough) to get some actual work done on the running projects, so check back next weekend!

Gor

 What better stuff to view during a long painting session then a classic sci-fi / fantasy movie!

And the choice fell on Gor, starring Jack Palance and Oliver Reed, in another jewel of campness and poor production value.  Just the stuff we all secretly love, is it not.

Loosely based on the 1966 novel Tarnsman of Gor, this movie even managed to get his theatrical release cancelled, so picking my intrest even more.  

Tarl Cabot is a socially awkward professor, who gets dumped for a weekend out right before they would leave.  Driving off in the rain, he accidentally activates a ring he was researching, which teleports him to the planet Gor.  He goes to a village, which is just being attacked by the High-Priest Sarm who wants to collect all the Home Stones of the villages.  In the fight, he kills Sarm's son, resulting in the rebels seeing him as a sort of promised warrior and take him on amongst them.

He is nursed back to health by Talena (the ravenous Rebecca Ferrati, because back in those days, you just needed to have bikini clad playmates in your movies), a barbarian princess of Ko-ro-ba.  He learns Sarm has captured her father and joins the rescue mission.

Going through a tavern town to gather supplies and a guide, they enter the lands of Sarm, but are soon captured.  Sarm rules a land of enforced hedonism and debauchery, and tries to tempt Tarl in joining him.  Yet he resists, and manages to free Talena and her father, and slays Sarm.  They return to Ko-ro-ba, where they are approached by Xenos, the high priest taking care of the Home Stones.  But just as he and Talena admit their love to each other, the Home Stone activates sending him back to Earth.

So yeah, well, errrm, what can I say.  A not to spectacular, so bad you just need to see it movie.  The fighting scenes are hilarious, Talena even holds her sword one hand on the hilt, one on the cutting side when stabbing a guard during the prison break (and to add to it, they are clearly styrofoam swords), yet still keeps all her fingers... to name just one of the above mentioned production value issues.

So, just watch this for it's campiness, but don't expect anything more then a laugh at "how it could have been better is they did this or that" moments!