The last few months have been hard for me. I’ve not enjoyed my job, lost my girlfriend of two years and now hate the flat where we shared the last year together. Consequently I’ve spent some time off work and generally not been a very happy bunny. On the good side, I continued to get…
Apologies to those of you who’ve wondered where I’ve been; it seems life has gotten in the way of fun as usual. I recently started a new job and while I’m loving it, it has been keeping me insanely busy. Way too busy to play Magic. It’s also been mentally draining, which has interfered with…
It’s really time I wrote my novel. I decided that this morning. I was pumped full of caffeine, heart racing like a trip hammer, a small bead of sweat working its way down my back. I was sick of my job. My wonderful, excellent, almost the best job in the world job. It was time…
TOP O’THE WORLD, MA! Ever wondered what its like being a competitor at the M:TG World Championships? Yeah – so have I! But given I’ve got as much chance of attending as a DOLPHIN has of climbing Mount Everest in a Tu-tu, I thought I’d fantasize for a bit. Unfortunately, they won’t publish that, so…
First off, I’d like to congratulate John Sorrentino for graduating from Virginia Tech. According to him, his future plans include moving to Atlantic City and becoming a Yes Man. And yes, ladies, he’s single and he takes good care of his cat. You know what that means! That’s right! Time for the article. How many…
A few weeks ago, Pete and Omeed asked me if I had any objection to StarCityCCG.com officially adopting the column title "Casual Fridays". I told them they’d have to check with Dockers, and if there were no legal entanglements from them, we ought to be all set. I also checked in with the good folks…
There are several ways to rate a card. You might think about how a card interacts with other cards or how it fits into a deck. However, when looking at, say, a brand new card without any clue how the metagame will be affected by the other cards in the set, you can’t use these…
This November. A Type II Pro Tour. Sounds like a birthday present to me! (My birthday is in November, yes. I have a disturbing driver’s license to prove it, too). Well, that’s what I call good news! After months of petitioning, the DCI has announced that Type II will enter the regular Pro Tour lineup….
The qualifiers are over, at least here in England, and we have a little break before we have to start testing for the big event. Last weekend was also the monthly Bath Magic tournament so I thought I’d see how Blastogeddon would do against some of the decks in the current environment. After playtesting and…
Too sexy for the DMV, indeed! You’re all jealous, I tell ya, jealous of my swanky good looks. But I get the feeling you’d rather not hear me discuss the secrets to my inner swankiness (to order, call the number on your screen or send $29.95 to….) I know, let’s talk about Regionals like everyone…
As a parent, one of my biggest worries centres around my children being brainwashed by watching too much television (that and committing me to a "Care Facility" where the walls are smeared with poo and eight-foot tall ‘Native Americans’ keep destroying lavatory fittings); more specifically: how it affects their capability for social interaction, the definition…
A strange psychosis begins to creep into every writer’s head when they become a feature columnist; I’ve seen it happen time and time again. They begin to imagine that they have an audience. Now let’s be honest: Do you really even care whether I write anything? Of course you don’t. Every couple of days —…
is probably the most interesting card from Nemesis. A few of my friends have been talking about it– I had gone so far as to predict it to be the breakout card of Regionals, saying that it would take multiple people to Nationals. The thing I find most interesting, as put it, is that people…
I’ve been putting off writing this report. I didn’t do well, the playtest group that I was involved with didn’t do well. We failed. I do it plenty, don’t get my wrong, and I learn from it and I get better. But failure is embarrassing, nonetheless. While some have the excuse that they didn’t try,…
Salvete ————- Greetings and salutations, my ever-changing moods! Welcome to the patchwork quilt that is my latest article. And in a packed page tonight we hear a blast from the past, when I share with you something I discovered in the dark recesses of my spare room; we get all philosophical with 57 alternative uses…
