Richard and I caught up with another Rob so we could battle; Risk was the game.  I secured myself along the Jade Sea and pushed forward into the Dothraki Sea (yes we were playing the extended Game Of Thrones edition) whilst Rob constructed a rampart of men in Slaver’s Bay. Richard withered in the corner of Andalos but it was still in the early stages and I didn’t want to eliminate him; this was the day he taught me in fine Conan form that you must crush your enemies and see them driven before you. Richard limited his borders whilst mine were sprawling across the centre and I had to protect each tile which left me spread thinly and Rob was the thorn in my side preventing me from maintaining the continent bonus. Slowly Richard grew until we could repel him no more; I could see in three moves he would claim the board. We called it a day. Good game.

Other exciting ventures include catching up with Emily, Joe and Becky for Becky’s birthday. These fine people were and have now finished studying Viticulture and Oenology, the science and production of wine.  Becky’s tag appropriately was, “anyone for a class of wine?”. They’re really cool people who took me in for a month after I graduated and before I left for Australia. Wine science is such an unusual but fascinating thing to study. Whilst at University I used to enjoy homebrewing and in my last share-house we had a designated brewing-cupboard. Of course what I was doing in no way measured up to the skill of these guys but it was fun.  I had a surplus of bottles which I left for them when I went to Melbourne, however it was really a game of Russian roulette; some were bottled incorrectly and so the quality was…. well you wouldn’t use it to clean your dunny. Red wine isn’t the greatest cleaning agent to begin with and these sucked. So depending on what you picked it could be delicious or complete swill. I’d forgotten about it until Becky reminded me, she said it was always a great game to see what the shelves would bring when they ran dry.