it's a steal at half the shoggoth

Graham Walmsley, a rather talented author of scenarios Cthulhoid for the Trails of Cthulhu RPG, will have written a rather excellent little book on adapting the Cthulhu mythos to games, called Stealing Cthulhu. It's not just of interest to a gamer either, since in order to do so it has to examine the tropes of the mythos from the literature, and examine how they might apply in various situations. The excerpts I've read look interesting, especially the analysis of the mythos creatures, and make me sad that the full library edition is out of my price range. Oh well. At least it means that my copies of Al Azif, Cultes de Ghouls, and The Pnakotic Manuscripts won't pick on the gamer on their book shelf.

an ale, landlord

Later today is The English Ale up at Mylor. This has become an annual event celebrating Morris and other traditional English pastimes (such as Morris dancers drinking beer). It includes a torchlight procession with giants (at least one*), culminating in the burning of a Wicker Man, and a concert in the hall afterwards. As usual, Spiral Dance will be playing, this time with Damh the Bard from England. There might even be a Mummer's Play. There is a gathering of Druids from 2pm, Morris throughout the afternoon, the procession is about 6ish, and the concert is from 7pm (Pagan Standing Time**), although tickets for the show go on sale from 4pm. [This year there is limited entry as the event is generally bigger than the Hall.] [* I gave up on adding a dragon to the parade because it would have required about 18 puppeteers working together to make it truly come alive. Then again it takes about six people to manage a standard giant, so it's not that bad. And there have been one person giants at the parade.] [** Australian Central Standard Time plus a variable bit as everyone gets organised and comes in late.]