Author: Padraig Fahy

  • 33

    33

    And here I am… 33 now.

    While I have don’t have any major goals or plans for this year, it’s fun to have some “it’ll be cool if it happened, but I won’t be disappointed if it didn’t”

    I am having a more relaxed birthday this year.
    Last year, I was in London for the Final Fantasy XIV Fan Festival. I had an amazing time and met some cool people, including a friend who I have not met in the 12 years of knowing each other.

    Today, I am planning to have lunch with my mother in a restaurant and discuss something that we are planning together. A holiday!

    My mother is an Irish mammy as they come. She has been outside of Ireland to go to Spain a handful of times (Ibiza and Tenerife mainly)
    The last time, that I was on one of those holidays was to Ibiza, and that was in 2008!

    It wouldn’t be until 2016/17 that my mother and father went on another holiday, and that was with my half-brother and sister. I didn’t go on that trip.

    Since my father’s death and the pandemic, I have moved back home to be with my mother. We initially spoke about a weekend trip to mainland Europe (either Amsterdam or Germany) but those plans fell through.

    We never really spoke about going on a holiday since it fell through… Until last week, my mother was watching This Morning. They had Jeff Brazier in New York City, highlighting the city and some of its landmarks.

    My mother started talking about it more and more. After a couple of days, I blurted out: “How about we go to New York, then?”
    She hasn’t stopped smiling. She is really looking forward to going. We’re planning to go in February so we have time to plan things out and more importantly, get our passports renewed.

    This wouldn’t be my first time in NYC. I was there with a friend in 2018, and while I enjoyed my time then, there is much more I wanted to see and do, and now I have a perfect chance to do it this time with my mother.

    We are adamant on actually committing to this. Once we have 1 element of the holiday booked (Flights and/or hotel), then we are committed.

    And this is the start. I have already said to her, that we should do weekend trips to European cities a thing, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

    Other than that, I would like to lose some weight. I have been a big guy since the pandemic. I am not looking to get a 6-pack or anything, but just lose some of the weight. If I can drop a size or two in trousers while I am at it, that would be cool.

    What about online stuff?

    With the changes that are happening, I am no longer going to be using Twitter. I am not a fan of the changes that Elon has made in the last few weeks regarding the AI and the “blocking”.

    As you all know, I am on the Fediverse (mainly on Mastodon.ie) where I have been since November 2022 and that will continue to be my main place to go to for posting.

    Bluesky has received a surge in users after Twitter was blocked in Brazil and another surge this week regarding the aforementioned AI and blocking changes that were made.

    Check out the footer at the bottom for the links to my profiles.

    I am also available on Telegram or Discord (Just search for crakila) if you want to chat to me on those platforms.

    I have taken a step back on doing projects as I feel I was stressing myself out. So I am cutting down on the amount of websites that I am running, and I am looking to improve the ones that I have and make the existing ones a bit more lively. This would apply to padraig.blog, pf.ie and 39.ie, especially the last one!

    Gaming

    To the shock of no one, I am still playing Final Fantasy XIV, and I will probably be continuing to play it for another year. During some downtime of the game, I have been dabbling in other games, including but not limited to:

    Let’s see how this year goes and let’s hope that my post for 34 looks back at this post, and I am able to reflect on a what a good year that I had!

  • Big Brother UK 2024 – Day 12 – Live Eviction

    Big Brother UK 2024 – Day 12 – Live Eviction

    • Baked Potato goes straight over to Nathan’s bed to have a chat.
    • Nathan is in the DR – He is speechless. He really likes Baked Potato. Besides politics, they get on very well.
    • Marcello, Segun and Dean are in the kitchen cleaning up.
    • Baked Potato in the DR – Baked Potato is giddy about this ‘relationship’ with Nathan.
    • Emma is making her mark in the smoking area. Inside the smoking room is back walls and doors. She is writing on the door with her nail.
    • Daze in the DR talking about her potential last full day in the Big Brother house.
    • BP and Nathan are in the upstairs talking. They are OK that their relationship is out in the open. Everything is chill!
    • Nathan stands up to wipe his arse.
    • Izaaz is talking with Marcello about what happened yesterday.
    • Lily is in the DR, talking about her potential last full day in the house.
    • Ali is in the DR – Ali thinks that people’s true self is coming out. She doesn’t want to go home now.
    • “It’s giving rule break” – Martha has written her name on the doors and walls of the smoking room. This breaks rule 12 of the house rules where messages cannot be written or communicated.
    • BB: “Half of the luxury budget has been removed. All tea and coffee gone. All biscuits banned. All sweets seized. All 140 packets of crisps has been confiscated. Fizzy drinks? Forget about it.”
    • Marcello ‘attempts’ a double flip
    • Martha in the DR after writing her name in the smoking room. Other housemates (Emma) have also written on the walls and doors.
    • Martha feels that she is on borrowed time.
    • Will (Presenter): “The spirit of Nasty Nick lives on”
    • Today’s task. The housemates are wearing letters. First question. Line up with their front letters in alphabetical order.
    • Dean in the DR showing his O face. Dean cannot spell coffee.
    • The klaxon goes off, and they line up to spell “Bagel”
    • Marcello in the DR – “Nathan stole my girl” – Considers Nathan and BP a power-couple. Marcello admits to being over-flirtatious with BP. BB: “Is Marcello after any new potatoes?” Marcello liked Emma.
    • Lily has been called to the DR – “P is for what, Lily?” – She blurts Pussy. BB asks question some questions that the answers are all “P” which is a letter that she is wearing.
    • She got 6 out of 7 questions correctly.
    • Shopping is available in the storeroom.
    • They have 3 minutes to spell out words to describe Marcello.
    • Housemates passed their task for today. They have earned a disco. Lily is screaming.
    • Ali doesn’t like “Sarah”. She doesn’t have a connection with her.
    • Lily is screaming continuously. Sarah, Hanah, Emma is not liking the screaming.
    • Hanah goes into the bedroom and asks people to flush the toilet.
    • Hanah in the DR – She is disgusted by someone not cleaning up after themselves in the toilet.
    • The housemates are dressing up for the disco.
    • Ali has got close to Martha, Lily, Daze in recent days.
    • BP is in the bathroom. She is pissed off with Lily highlighting Nathan and BP’s ‘relationship’
    • VOTING IS NOW CLOSED.
    • They are having their disco.
    • Lily is praising Hanah.
    • Lily is sucking toes.
    • Hanah is in the DR talking about the people who are up for eviction. She doesn’t want Martha or Daze to go.
    • Will & AJ talking to the house.
    • The viewers have spoken and the 2nd housemate to be evicted is: Daze.

  • Big Brother UK 2024 – Day 11 Notes

    Big Brother UK 2024 – Day 11 Notes

    • The hot water is still not on.
    • Police officers Izaaz and Thomas are talking about other housemates.
    • Cuts to the morning. They have been doing this shift for 11 hours. BB announces that their shift is over.
    • The cabinet minister could have spent £30,000,000 out of their budget to spend on turning on the hot water. They reject it.
    • They made a speech to the ‘nation’ informing them of this decision.
    • Thomas and Izaaz are asleep.
    • Dean in the DR – He is upset with Izaaz shit-stirring about the bagel.
    • Baked Potato and Nathan are getting to know each other more. They are being flirty with each other. Baked Potato has butterflies.
    • Lily in the DR – Her Number 1 point in her manifesto. Ban phones and everyone should have iPad’s. Free everything (House, shopping, cars, etc)
    • BB has the morning newspaper. Sarah cartwheels in the house on the way to get the newspaper from Storage. The newspaper includes news about the party last night and Bagelgate and the fact that they didn’t have a 3rd person on shift.
    • Martha in the DR shouting at BB… She is fuming that the politicians had a party. She needs a “genny lec” (General election) right now.
    • Big Brother radio is on. The prime minister and cabinet are having a radio interview.
    • Each of them speak about a housemate. Nathan is saying that Izaaz is a game player. Sarah is too nice.
    • Housemates get to ‘call’ into the radio to respond. Sarah is on the ‘phone’ to the ‘Sinister Minister’.
    • Khaled would not like “Lily” to be Head of House as it would be chaos. Lily on the phone. She hangs up on the PM, Khaled.
    • Izaaz is angry about staying up all night and the politicians not choosing a 3rd person.
    • Thomas and Izaaz are thinking that the politicians are game players and last night will affect future tasks in the house.
    • Hanah is in the DR – Angry about the politicians in general. Nothing specific.
    • They have 1 last task to carry out. The housemates must make butter. They have 30 minutes to make 8 blocks of butter. Hanah and Sarah has been chosen.
    • The politicians are paying £60 million of their budget to add Tom, Izaaz and Segun. Izaaz is visibly angry.
    • Thomas and Sarah were going to throw dirt at Nathan. Hanah objected and the 2 of them got into an argument.
    • Not only does the cow produce milk, but it shits.
    • They make 8 blocks of butter, and they play in the mud by wrestling each other.
    • BB has gathered the housemates for the results of the Shopping Task.
    • Results: Roadwork team was successful. Martha generated enough energy. Police kept Number 10 safe. Government didn’t dodge any questions on the radio show. Workers successfully made butter.
    • They get a luxury shopping budget and the hot water and appliances have also been switched on.
    • They are playing “Never have I ever”. Sarah voted for UKIP.
    • Izaaz in the DR – Thinks Segun is a game player. Is no longer going to be on anyone’s side.
    • Khaled and Segun are talking about Izaaz. Khaled is going to distance himself from Izaaz for now.
    • Nathan, Baked Potato and Lily are in the garden. Lily is screaming “kiss kiss kiss”. Lily and Baked Potato kissed. Baked Potato and Nathan kissed.
    • Marcello and Ali came out and asked what was going on. Lily spilled the tea to Ali and BP.
    • Nathan and BP run off into the bathroom to talk. Dean and Martha walked in on them having a chat. Then they went into the bedroom and spoke with Dean. They just wanted to run away from Lily.
    • Nathan is denying that there is anything between him and BP.
    • Lily is in the DR – She has gossip and told BB about what happened between BP and Nathan. Lily just wants to kiss people.
    • Nathan and Ali are talking in the corridor. During the fire alarm the other night, there was a temporary evacuation. During that time BP and Nathan talked about going on a date once the show is finished. Cameras never picked it up.
    • Someone left a condom in Nathan’s bed.

  • Big Brother UK 2024 – Day 10 Notes

    Big Brother UK 2024 – Day 10 Notes

    • The house has been turned into Downing street.
    • “Things can only get better” By D:ream plays to wake up the housemates.
    • It’s time for this weeks Shopping Task!
    • Head of House Khaled is now Prime Minister Khalad as part of this weeks shopping task.
    • Emma is the Minister for Transport.
    • Daze is the Minister for Energy.
    • Nathan is the Minister for Agriculture.
    • Izaaz and Thomas are plotting something.
    • PM and their ministers are in their cabinet office.
    • They have a budget of £100 million that can be alloted to tasks over the next 2 days.
    • First task: The roads have potholes. Roadworkers have 60 minutes to fix the potholes.
    • They have a choice of paying £50 million for better tools or £30 for an extra 30 minutes. They chose not to spend any money.
    • Roadworkers are Lily, Ali, Dean, Baked Potato and Marcello. Ali and Baked Potato are painting road markings. The other 3 are filling in the pot holes.
    • Nathan in the DR – Excited to play as Boris Johnson.
    • They manage to complete the task.
    • Citizen Lily is delivering lunch to the Cabinet office.
    • Izaaz and Sarah are knocking on the door asking for Rishi. Rishi Sunak is not the Prime Minister. Kier Starmer is.
    • Cabinet Ministers are returning from lunch. Dean threw the remining food (A bagel) from the cabinet’s lunch into the bin to prevent any failures.
    • Khaled and Izaaz are debating about the bagel. Izaaz believes that the bagel should have been put in the fridge and not the bin.
    • The next task is to do with Net zero emissions. They must generate clean energy. One person must keep blowing wind turbines for 20 minutes. They have 30 minutes to do this.
    • They pay £10 million for an extra 10 minutes.
    • Martha has 40 minutes to blow 3 small wind turbines for 20 minutes.
    • She has blowing the wind turbines for 32 minutes. Martha has completed the task.
    • Baked Potato is talking about the bagels… again. Izaaz is trolling.
    • Izaaz is still trolling about the bagel.
    • Izaaz in the DR – Admits that he is up to no good with the mischief.
    • “He’s getting on my tits” – Emma about Izaaz.
    • Ministers and Prime Minister must pick 2 people to protect Downing Street tonight. Tom and Izaaz has been chosen. They have chosen to not spend £20 million on a third person.
    • Thomas and Izaaz cannot fall asleep during the task.
    • BB has thrown the cabinet ministers with a secret party.
    • There is extra refreshments but Nathan and Emma must sneak the drink from the storeroom past the police men.
    • They go into the house and straight to the store room without raising any suspicion. Dean nearly catches them but they managed to go back into the cabinet office with drink stashed under jackets.
    • The housemates hoped that BB threw a party for the ministers and PM, but Nathan is denying that a party happened… Like the Covid party IRL.
    • Hanah in the DR – Doesn’t have faith in Izaaz and Thomas to stay awake.
    • Dean is pissed off that Izaaz was winding people up about the bagel.

  • Gaming News – 16th October 2024

    Gaming News – 16th October 2024

    • The release date of Alan Wake 2‘s DLC ‘The Lake House’ has been leaked. It is set to be released next Tuesday (22nd October) alongside the physical edition of the game.
    • Riot Games is cutting 32 employees, with 27 being from its League of Legends team and 5 from publishing. This is in addition to the 530 jobs that were cut in January.
    • Mark Rubin is working on a recovery plan for XDefiant and has admitted that there are no plans to shut down the game after Season 4. There were meetings last year regarding their Year 2 plans.
    • Nobuo Uematsu has stated that Fantasian Neo Dimension is his final game project as a composer but has emphasized that he is not retiring. He is going to be cutting back on the video game music work so he works on other music that he wants to make. He will continue working on jobs for one theme song (Like he did with ‘Dragonsong’ the theme for Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward)
    • Activision has released the PC specs requirements for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 which is out next Friday. Preloading will begin on Monday at 5pm. Game Pass players, the game will launch between 12pm on Thursday and 7am on Friday. Steam and Battle.net will have to wait until 5am on Friday.
    • Xbox has announced the following games are coming to Xbox Game Pass.
      • South Park: The Fractured but Whole – Console, Cloud and PC – Released today (October 16th) for Ultimate/PC/Standard Game Pass.
      • Donut Country – Console, Cloud and PC – October 17th for Ultimate/PC/Standard.
      • MechWarrior 5: Clans – Series X|S, Cloud and PC – October 17th for Ultimate/PC.
      • Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 – Console, Cloud and PC – October 25th for Ultimate/PC.
      • Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III – Cloud – October 25th for Ultimate.
      • Call of Duty: Warzone – Cloud – October 25th for Ultimate.
      • Ashen – Console, Cloud and PC – October 29th for Ultimate/PC/Standard
      • Dead Island 2 – PC – October 31st for Ultimate/PC
      • Starcraft: Remastered – PC – November 5th Ultimate/PC
      • Starcraft 2: Campaign Collection – PC – November 5th Ultimate/PC
    • Bioware has released the PC specs for Dragon Age: The Veilguard and has confirmed that there is no 3rd party DRM (Such as Denuvo)
    • Sony is going to be holding PlayStation: The Concert in over 200 cities in the next 2 years. The show will feature performances of music originally composed by Gustavo Santaolalla (The Last of Us), Joris De Man (Horizon), Ilan Eshkeri (Ghost of Tsushima), Bear McCreary (God of War) and more. The first show will be in Dublin’s 3Arena on April 19th 2025. Tickets are on sale now.
    • It Takes Two has sold over 20 million units.
    • Resident Evil 4 remake has sold over 8 million units.
    • Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero has sold over 3 million copies within the first 24 hours.
    • Hades II is getting its first major update in a free update today ‘The Olympic Update’ – Trailer – They have also added native support for Mac’s with Apple Silicion.
    • The source code for Rogue Legacy 1 has been made available for free – Github
    • Bandai Namco has cancelled or paused development of several games including an upcoming Naruto and One Piece game. It is not known how many jobs are at risk.
  • Big Brother UK 2024 – Day 9 Notes

    Big Brother UK 2024 – Day 9 Notes

    • They are still without hot water.
    • Marcello said to Sarah that she smells like teabags and periods.
    • Martha is in the DR – She is more calm, knowing that the nomination was direct and better than the house voting for her.
    • Ali is speaking with Khaled. Ali doesn’t dislike Khaled. Ali was scrutinising Khaled. She wants to “park” the problem.
    • Ali wants to leave the house (before the eviction). She doesn’t want to have arguments with people. She didn’t like how Khaled spoke to Hanah in the store room. Ali is taking responsibility for the situation
    • Ali didn’t like that she was ‘scruitning’ Khaled right after he nominated Martha. She thinks that the wording made it out worse than what it was.
    • Ali could have talked it out privately but decided to do it in front of everyone else as Martha was crying.
    • The discussion seems to be going around in circles. They hug it out and it ends.
    • Ali went into the DR – She is requesting to leave the Big Brother house. BB asked if Ali got much sleep last night, she didn’t.
    • Hanah and Dean are talking about managing the food situation and that they should have a house meeting, but the Head of House Khaled is… kinda busy right now.
    • Ali has been in the DR for over an hour. She is going back into the house.
    • Nathan immediately hugged Ali as soon as she came out. He doesn’t want her to go. She goes to the garden
    • Marcello in the DR – Not a fan of the hot water is off. Many housemates stink, including Ali’s attitude.
    • Khaled has apologised to Ali. Ali is sorry that she picked on him. They hug it out.
    • Daze and Khaled talking about the killer nomination. Daze apologised for immediately scrutinising Khaled after choosing Martha.
    • Today’s task. BB asks a question. 2 names are pulled out of a hat per question, and housemates must stand on A or B in response to the question.
    • Head of House Khaled and Segun are in the DR and have to predict what the majority of housemates will choose.
    • Example: BB asks: “Who is the most loyal?”. Two names are pulled out of the hat are: Marcello and Lily. Everyone else must choose either A for Marcello or B for Lily.
    • Khaled and Segun must choose A or B.
    • Khaled and Segun predicted the questions correctly. They completed the task successfully. They have been rewarded by having the hot water turned back on.
    • Housemates are dropping ‘beats’ in the kitchen area.
    • Lily is in the DR – Missing home. She knows why people nominated her, and has to suck it up. Close with Daze and Ali. Ali means a lot to her. She doesn’t know what Ali and Daze say have the time.
    • Housemates have broken the rules again. Lily said to Sarah that she knows who voted for her. Separately, Martha said that she knows that certain people didn’t vote her for.
    • Lily and Martha have been sent to jail in the garden.
    • The hot water has been turned off again.
    • Daze in the DR – She was also thinking about leaving the Big Brother house, but she didn’t. Doesn’t like people talking about them
    • After 4 hours, Lily and Martha have been released from jail. They have been provided refreshments.
    • Nathan, Dean and Baked Potato are talking in the bathroom. Nathan hasn’t got on with Sarah.
    • Lily and Martha in the DR – They have apologised to BB.
    • Marcello commented on Sarah’s twerking at the door of the storeroom whenever they were provided refreshments. He is being very misogynistic once again towards Sarah. Sarah is not happy
    • Izaaz, Emma and Marcello are talking in the bathroom about it.
    • Sarah walks in and Marcello apologises. Sarah thinks that they have a brother/sister relationship. He thinks it is going to be more. He doesn’t know the boundary.
    • Dean in the DR – Pissed off with the rule breaking. Annoyed that the hot water was turned off. Says that Daze is upset about the nominations, but it is part of the game.