The sensationalist title of this post isn't meant to imply that during the hurricane I got drunk and played board games, although that would have been nice. West Hartford weathered the storm very well. We never lost power, although at present our house has no internet connection other than our smartphones. I can (in theory) share my Galaxy S3's connection, but my wife's iPhone may not have the same ability. Can anyone offer a free tethering solution for a non-jailbroken iPhone?
In terms of games, I finished Alan Wake last night. I know that everyone who has an XBox played this game back in 2010, but I bought it over the summer when it showed up as part of a Steam summer sale. Ten bucks for Alan Wake and the American Nightmare sequel, I think it was. The game was good. The appearance of the character models had bothered me when I'd seen preview videos of the game, but the third-person shooting ended up being pretty good. The flashlight mechanic worked well too.
And speaking of not having a console, my Wii shat the bed on Friday night. Specifically, the disk reader seems to be gone. So while I can apparently play any of the Wii's vast library of downloadable titles (sarcasm), I'm not going to be able to finish Skyward Sword any time soon. And Lia won't be able to play Mario Kart, Boom Blox, Reader Rabbit, or her Diego game. I'm now considering a Wii U, which seems very cool, but given the high price tag and lack of good launch titles, I'm still on the fence.
I've been playing a ton of Neuroshima Hex since the latest update added two new armies: Neojungle and New York. The iOS version has had these armies as well as the Smart Army and Vegas for quite a while, but they're new to Android. They've also beefed up the AI quite a bit, and the hard AI setting is no longer a pushover.
And speaking of board games, have you seen Tabletop yet? It's become my favorite YouTube show, and I haven't yet missed one of its episodes. During the latest one, they played Last Night on Earth, which was one of the board games I'd wanted most. I hadn't realized that it was competitive, but I still think it could be a fun game. I still think that Elder Sign would be even more fun - they played that game on an earlier episode.
Last up, my homemade liquor experiments. I recently finished my third batch of Howley's Irish Cream, which is always delicious. I use the following recipe, which I found at Cupcake Project.
1 C light cream 14 oz sweetened condensed milk 1 2/3 C Irish whiskey 1 t instant coffee 2 T Hershey's chocolate syrup 1 t vanilla 1 t almond extract Combine all ingredients in a blender and set on high speed for 30 seconds. Bottle in a tightly sealed container and refrigerate. Shake before using. Will keep for up to 2 months.
It's incredibly easy - takes about ten minutes. I also made homemade kahlua, using an amalgam of various recipes I found around the internet. My kahlua was thinner than store-bought stuff - less syrupy - but passable. I may try again at some point in the future.