GRAH!!! CHEF SMASH YOU INTO BLOODY PANCAKES!

Err, the hamburgers we serve are 100% beef. Honest!

The temptation, however, to pound my (former) suppliers into meat paste and grill them up for lunch is strong. Monday, the regional rep from US Foods visited to introduce the new local rep. So we sat and talked and they acted all buddy-buddy. Later that day I placed an order for a couple boxes of fries, as I knew I'd need them soon. Tuesday, no fries. Wednesday, no fries. Both times I call in and politely leave messages to reiterate my order. Today, still no fries and a message on the answering machine saying that US Foods no longer wants to do business with me because I don't order 200 bucks' worth of stuff at one time. Look, I can understand their costs, but waiting three days to tell me? Any reputable company would have gotten me my freaking fries and then said "sorry, we can't afford to keep on like this." Of course today my supply of fries ran out and I lost business because of it, this is exactly what I was trying to avoid by ordering well ahead. I'm getting other supplies lined up, but if anything goes wrong tomorrow I'll be up a creek. Grr...

Postcards from the Spanish Main

Greetings to all my friends and minions, especially those who are both. This is the Evil Overlord, taking a few minutes to kick back, pour himself a rootbeer float, and spout meaningless drivel. Drivel is a fun word...

Okay, first off the news. There really isn't much news. Business at the shop has been lousy this week, but I don't feel like panicking yet. There's a parade on Saturday, and I wouldn't be surprised if the business from that doesn't make up for the entire week by itself. The phone company is evil, but most of you knew that already. They're sticking us with an enormous bill for all the services the previous owners had but never used. Seriously, why would a chip shop need two phone lines, voicemail, caller ID (when the phone doesn't even support it), and a host of other crud? And of course since I didn't know about it, I didn't know to cancel all that. Feh... At least if I go under I can use it as a launchpad to get myself into a good job with one of the foodservice companies, I've noticed that all their reps have had restaurant management experience at some point or another. Anyway, it's a thought.

Also, I got my copy of Harry Potter First Blood Part 6 Friday night. Yes, I went to the mall at midnight, it was actually kinda fun. There was a fair amount of pretty girls around, and while I'm never the type to actually strike up a conversation I do enjoy the scenery. Also ran into a pack of Leavitts (Thom knows who they are), and we gave each other heck while standing in line. Anyhoo, I read the majority of the book at the market the next day, and had it finished by late afternoon. This week I've been rereading it to make sure I caught everything... Anyhoo, I'm not gonna go into much detail unless I know the person I'm talking to has read it, but let me just say that wow, Harry's life stinks. He's not a self-pity rageboy like the year before, but he still has a bad habit for obsessive behavior. Plus the hormones have really kicked in all around, which makes life interesting. Anyway, to me the book feels like setup for the end of the series more than a self-contained story, but there's nothing wrong with that. I'm just sorry I'm gonna have to wait another two years to see whether things are really what I think they're gonna be... Book 7's gonna be one heck of a ride...

Anyhoo, I just got done playing Pirates of the Spanish Main. I've sunk more money into it (which I probably shouldn't have, but too late now), and I've got a big enough flotilla that I can set up a pretty good game with whoever wants to play. I set up a three-way game between England, Spain, and France earlier, with a few homebrew elements to keep things interesting. Here's a few things I've learned:

*Ramming a five-master is never a good idea, especially when you're significantly smaller than it. And most everyone is...
*Tricked out with the right crewmen, a zippy little yacht is something to be feared. At least until something hits it.
*Moving fogbanks make close-quarter slugfests very interesting.
*Building a fortress on an island isn't worth squat if no one will come near it.
*Putting all three base islands on the same side of the board tends to result in a lot of ship battles and very little treasure hunting.
*I just love it when things go kablooey.
*If a particular ship changes hands more than twice in the course of a single game, you're probably doing something wrong.
*Shipwrights, helmsmen, and captains are your friends.
*Crimson Angel would be a great name for a rock band.
*This is what happens when demented people play with powerful toys...
*I really want rules for creating my own ships & crew.

Congrats to Thom on finding a buyer for his house. I hope he finds a new one before he has to move out... Maybe after he moves, there'll be a one-week period where I can safely come visit him before his two furry beasts shed enough fur at the new place to be toxic... No, I'm not talking about any of his kids, so hush.

Heh, I always seem to do long posts every now and then rather than short ones regularly. Does anyone care? I thought not.

Arrh and Other Letters of the Alphabet

Years ago, my brother Thom learned to curse my name when I showed him how to play the Star Wars CCG. He somehow won the first game (I didn’t let him, honest! Well not much, I don’t think…), and the next thing I knew he was going out and buying several boxes of cards. I’d like to think we both got our money’s worth in playing each other, as frankly most of the best memories I have of those years were of gaming with my bro. I think I’m the one who got him started on Warhammer too, and if you know Thom well at all, you know he’s sunk a lot of time and energy into those Bretonnian knights of his. Heavens, he even has his own Bretonnian website now too… Anyway, I had better be careful this time, as I’ve gotten into something else that given half a chance, Thom would love. Heck, even Dan might dig this one…

The game is called Pirates of the Spanish Main, and it’s somewhere between a CCG and a miniatures game. The CCG part comes from the fact that your vessels come in playing-card-sized pieces of cardboard, which you punch out and assemble to build ships. Yes, there’s common ships and rare ships, with corresponding abilities and point costs, but unlike some games the rares in PoSM don’t automaticly dominate the board. Where the miniatures aspect comes in is that you have these assembled 3D models of ships that you use as pieces, and you sail them around on a board laid out with islands and treasures, trying to grab treasure, sink/capture ships, or both. Sure, there’s crews and rare treasures you can use to enhance your ships, but that’s pretty much it in a nutshell. The thing is, it’s fun as heck.

The evil creators of this game, a company called Wizkids, have done a very good job of making this game both simple yet challenging. At their core, the rules are very simple. Movement and ranges are done by measuring either with the long or the short side of a card. Shooting is done by checking the target number of your cannons and rolling over it. Damage is marked by removing masts from your ship. Everything else is a refinement, but the rules are not so complex that your average 11-year-old couldn’t pick it up in the course of an afternoon. That said, the tactical potential on this puppy is fantastic. Maneuvering is everything, as you cannot move and shoot in the same turn unless you have a Captain on board your ship - I don’t know how common they are, but I have yet to see one.

Case in point: La Victoire. She’s a rare ship according to the naval lists, a massive bruiser with guns out the wazoo and a reasonable amount of speed. By the numbers this ship should eat enemy fleets for breakfast, but so far I’ve yet to play a game where she didn’t get captured or crippled by smaller ships that managed to outmaneuver and get the jump on her. I’m coming to the conclusion that I need to use an escort ship to box in enemy vessels and make them hold still long enough for Vicky to beat the snot out of them. That or get a Captain. If I ever get my hands on one of those, Vicky’s gonna be one scaaaary ship.

Anyway, it’s a really evil game. It’s fun, it’s challenging, and you can get everything you need to start playing in one $7 pack rather than your usual $10 starter deck or $70+ boxed set. Each pack gives you two ships, the rules, an island, a couple crew, a handful of treasure counters, and a d6 (albeit the teeniest little d6 you’ve ever seen). The assembled models are both sturdy and attractive, and while I don’t think the ships themselves are historical, the designers put a lot of time and effort into research to make them reasonably accurate. You’ll see mangy tubs, spit-and-polish navy ships, sleek schooners, and even ships whose worn paint reveals another nation’s colors underneath. Dan the nautical nut (okay, he’s mostly sane but the alliteration was irresistible) would probably love this game for the ship models alone. Or not, he’s already got hobbies aplenty.

Anyhoo, yes this is me doing a fanboy freakout. Hey, I’ve been working hard and I feel a little entitled. Besides, who reads this thing anyway?

P.S.: Thom, no I’m not actually trying to talk you into buying this game. But if you want, I’ll show it to you next time you’re in the neighborhood and we’ll see how you like it. Quenton and Dallin are already talking about buying a fleet, so by the time you visit next we could have some serious sea wars going on…

GRAH! CHEF SMASH!

I really hate being me sometimes. I have a tendency to believe that no matter how good things get, it won't be long before they abruptly become really lousy. The frustrating part is that I'm usually right.

Take today. The last three days have been the best days my cafe has seen yet, but today it was one crappy thing after another. For starters, some bunch of idiots set off bombs in England. Granted, that's a bigger tragedy than what happened to me, but there's nothing I can say about that that a lot more eloquent people haven't already. Anyway, right before opening the former owner of my cafe comes down and announces that he's going to give me a bunch of free publicity. Apparently one of the local news channels decided to interview him about the bombings (he's probably the most notable Englishman in town), and for some reason I'm still not too clear on he decided to have them shoot it in front of the shop. That's all well and good, but in exchange I also got a lot of unsolicited advice on how to run my business and my life. I can respect the man's abilities, but frankly I've noticed that once a person starts giving advice, their ears and brain turn off. Doesn't matter whether they know anything about what you're doing, they know what you should be doing. And there's no way to politely tell them to sod off... Frigging civilized habits...

Anyway, that was annoying but not too terrible. Maybe it'll even be publicity, but I have my doubts. The real kicker is about ten minutes later when my cook accidentally drops her thermometer in the fryer. Not only is the thermometer ruined, but the entire batch of oil (which we had changed just a few days prior) was contaminated, forcing us to take fish and fries off the menu for the rest of the day. We could have just drained the fryer, cleaned it out, and replaced the oil and been back on the go in under an hour except that someone (me) hadn't gotten around to ordering in more oil after the last time we changed it. I had figured we had two weeks at least before it would become a concern. Feh...

So, we were stuck without a fryer for the day, and more importantly without our most popular menu item. We're quickly building a rep for our fish & chips, and when people came in and found out we couldn't serve them any (mercury poisoning is a no-no), about 95% of them turned around and walked back out again. Grr.... I told everyone that we'd be back up to speed tomorrow, so hopefully they'll come back. But my instincts tell me that quite a few will just think "that place isn't reliable" and never return. Restaurants live and die by word of mouth, and it doesn't take much bad press to do in a joint. Unless of course you're a McDonalds and everyone knows your food is crap but they buy it anyway...

Anyway, the short version is that we're out a day's business, one thermometer, and a jug and a half of fryer oil. Fortunately we can afford it, but still, after three days of excellent business it's a real kick in the stomach. I'm trying hard not to be mad at Kayleen for it, but it's just ...frustrating. Oh well, tomorrow morning we should get the rest of the oil we need and with a little luck we'll have another really good day. And hopefully they'll catch those fragging al-Qaeda creeps...

Muah ha ha ha haaaaa! And oh yeah, Happy Independence Day...

::countless evil minions and flunkies pump their fists in the air while chanting "EVIL OVERLORD" loudly::

Today, the Evil Overlord's Cafe o' Doom utterly rocked the cashbox. Rather than take the holiday off like most everyone else, we decided to celebrate the true spirit of America and get down with our capitalistic selves. We sold donuts and OJ to the people setting up for the 4th of July parade, we sold more donuts and OJ to the people along the parade route, we handed out flyers to everyone who would stand still for two seconds together, and we sold lunch. Boy howdy, did we sell lunch. We sold lunch like I would not believe. We sold lunch until we more or less ran out of lunch. I'm not kiddig either, we're completely out of several key food items, if our suppliers didn't get our message in time to get a delivery out to us tomorrow then we just won't be able to open. Hard to run a restaurant with just three hot dogs and a dozen hamburger patties... Anyway, this is the best day Union Jack's has had since I took over. I hope we can make something of a habit of it. :)

Tonight, I intend to sit back, relax, and gloat while watching a movie. To heck with fireworks...