This is less of a recipe and more of a recommendation: try spices in your coffee! I don’t mean just the good ol’ cinnamon (though that’s nice too), but things like cardamom, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, and my favorite allspice. Especially now that the weather’s getting colder, the pumpkin/christmas spices are really nice in brew. They also work in black tea (see: various types of chai), hot apple cider and hot cocoa. They also work really well if you sweeten with brown sugar or maple syrup.

I don’t like chewing on spice, so I usually add it to the coffee grinds/tea leaves, but a sprinkle on top ain’t too bad.

Hi there! I’m looking to get back into MU*ing and would love to re-connect with people. I was She-Hulk the building staffer at the first Crucible City (Mutants & Masterminds game), and mainly played Samantha Covenant the supernatural P.I.

On The Reach I played Pepper the terrifyingly happy Cheiron Hunter, and Q the Mortal.

On Haunted Memories I played Bela the Mortal, Lucrecia the Mage & Tea the Changeling.

On Darkwater I played Ida the insect Fairest, Eve the broken city Mannikin and a handful of others. On Darkwater the Return of the son of Darkwater I also played Ida.

On San Francisco MUX I played Ida the Insect Fairest again.

On City of Shadows I played Heloise the Fungal Changeling, Celandine the tiny fury of the three witchy Gale sisters, and almost created a werewolf named Perish.

There’s tons of people that I adored playing with and would love to get back in touch with.

New current ( as of February 2024 ) : I have an active and approved character again! You can find me as Gwen on City of Glass.

@Cobalt said in City of Glass - Discussion:

head on desk Someone write my character for me.

Cobalt. Cobalt. I made a character on this game.

I MADE A CHARACTER

It’s been literally half a year since my last attempt. YOU MUST JOIN. D:<

An actual recipe this time! For all of you I have unearthed my slightly customized Guinness Chocolate Cake recipe.

For the cake: butter for pan, 0.5 cup Guinness stout, 10 tbs (1 stick + 2 tablespoons) butter, 1 cup unsweetened cocoa, 2 cups superfine sugar, 1/2 cup sour cream, 2 large eggs, 1 tablespoon vanilla extract, 1 cup all-purpose flour, 2 1/2 tablespoons baking soda.

For the topping: 1 1/4 cups powdered sugar, 2 packages (or 16 ounces) cream cheese at room temperature, 1/2 cup vanilla or maple yogurt, preferably whole milk. Optional: make it a 1/4 cup whole milk yogurt and 1/4 cup heavy cream, or otherwise alter the balance as you prefer.

1: Heat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9-inch springform pan and line with parchment paper. In a large saucepan, combine Guinness and butter. Heat on medium until butter melts, then remove from heat. Add cocoa and superfine sugar, whisk to blend.
2. In one bowl, combine sour cream, eggs and vanilla, mix well. Add to Guinness-butter mixture. Add flour and baking soda, whisk again until smooth. Pour into buttered pan, bake until risen and firm: roughly 45 minutes to 1 hour. Place pan on a wire rack, leave cake in pan until completely cooled.
3. For topping: using food processor or the raw power of your own mighty muscles, blend cream cheese with powdered sugar until smooth. Add the yogurt/heavy cream, mix until smooth and thick enough to be spreadable but not runny. Make sure to take taste samples, some like it sweeter and some less.
4. Remove cake from pan and place on platter/whatsit. Ice top of cake so that it resembles a frothy pint of Guinness. Devour.

This is my modified version of Nigella Lawson’s OG one, which you can find here on her site https://www.nigella.com/recipes/chocolate-guinness-cake - the original version is also in milliliters and such, for my fellow non-americans.

Arise, chicken! So half a year later I actually have an approved and active character on a game again. You can find me as Gwen on City of Glass!

Whew, this is a tough one. Hmm. Maybe…
A) My ESL still shines through, and there are certain things that I can never stop spelling a certain way. I use a mix of British and American spelling (it’s “colour” not “color”, but it’s also “truck” instead of “lorry”), but I also misspell a lot, or use weird grammar. For years I would also smash colors together a la “whitepink”, “greyblue” etc, because that’s how we do in my native language.

B) My OOC behavior. I am very chatty, very friendly, use and abuse smileys from to ^_^ without shame.

C) I seem to have fallen into a pattern of making either beautiful evil or monstrous good: I love noir femme fatales as well as characters that look innocuous and harmless but are actually completely vile or amoral, but I also love making characters that look terrifying or grotesque but are actually super kind.

@mietze I’m in that area too. It’s so unnatural feeling. I miss rain like crazy. Everything is dirt colored and dirty feeling and sad.

@Kay I went hunting through my logs and here’s a room description I really like.

This was a restaurant on Crucible City 1, I don’t remember if I described it or someone else did but I always thought it makes a really pretty mental image.

The cafe part of La Cantina, this inner courtyard has had much work done to give an illusion of being outdoors. The roof sports a bona fide glass cupola, the floor is covered in green marbled stone plates, and there’s enough man-sized potted plants (evergreens to palm trees) that the air is perpetually perfumed with a refreshing green aroma.

As one enters through the dark oak double doors, there are wooden staircases leading up to the landings, the latter edged by intricate copper railings that glisten with tender care. The landings are also dotted by man-sized potted plants, though these are all of the flowering variety to give sweet scanted barriers between the private tete a tete tables for two.

Below in the courtyard, the seats are mostly benches in white painted lacy wrought iron as well as sturdy wooden chairs around larger tables and the glass fronted counter with its display of pastries and copper-bronze-steel coffee machines.

As the hours have sped away from the daylight ones, the ambience in the cafe has become more intimate. Little red-glassed lamps have been lit on the intimate tables up on the landings, something sweet, forlorn and classic is crooning from the radio at the counter, and the handsome baristas are just as busy shamelessly flirting as they are in pouring coffee.

It’s raining. Finally like real, solid rain. And it’s washed all the smoke and dust away, and the air is so sweet and clean I can’t really describe it. But I am definitely following the advice of the smoke map notice.

@Kestrel said in Good things in Mushing:

Finding a niche of our incestuous little hobby that’s filled with people I don’t know and have never played with before.

Yeees. That’s such a fun and bewildering thing. It’s rare!

@Snackness said in City of Glass - Discussion:

@Kay Sovereign?

I have absolutely no frame of reference as to whether or not this was him, but that’s who I thought of from your description.

That’s it! Rex/Sovereign/et al, that’s who the name sent off an alarm in my head over, and possibly something about the writing style. No idea if it is that person but thank you so much, that’s what was sending off the alarm! It was driving me a little batty to have that nagging sense but not being able to pin down where it was coming from, only that it had to do with the name.

Re: “Royal”, the dude’s name sent bells ringing in my head when he first showed up, but I couldn’t pin it down and just let it be because don’t want to accuse innocent people over nothing.

But now since he’s banned and the alarms in my head were proven valid, I’m wondering – does anyone else remember there being a well known bad player creeper type who frequently went by those kinds of names? I.e Royal/Regal/King/Duke/Earl/bladiblabla? I tried to search both on here and the soapbox but couldn’t find anything. I don’t know if the name match is just a coincidence or not, nor can I remember where I remember it from.

@Cobalt said in City of Glass - Discussion:

head on desk Someone write my character for me.

Cobalt. Cobalt. I made a character on this game.

I MADE A CHARACTER

It’s been literally half a year since my last attempt. YOU MUST JOIN. D:<

Arise, chicken! So half a year later I actually have an approved and active character on a game again. You can find me as Gwen on City of Glass!

Currently willing to sell non-existant firstborn to game Gentry able to provide a Changeling the Lost game. Even more so if it’s multisphere in some fashion or another.

Seriously, I need an outlet for my “I want to play a candle/dragon/book/avatar of murder/troll/mirror” etc shenanigans. I need my Changeling hit!

Also I know I’m not alone, you’re guaranteed to have a super popular game on your hands.

@Pavel I voted for potatoes but I object against bread being one of the options - bread is a thing, not a starch specifically. You can make bread without starch!

I only rarely eat potatoes, but rice and different kinds of breads are part of my regular diet so.

@devu Excellent~

Joining the oodles of people trying out Wyrdhold! I’m working on Briar there, probably be a Psychic?

@Tat Thank you Tat! Do you know of any specific games that are newbie friendly?

Hello! A buddy of mine has expressed interest in trying out MUs. They’re into gaming but have only played tabletop role-playing games, and did not even know MU*s were a thing.
I realized as I have not been playing regularly myself for quite some time, I have no idea what currently available games out there might be newbie friendly.
Please help with ideas for games for them to try out! Any and all suggestions are welcome, though I’d prefer to stick with MUSH/MUX so I’ll be on familiar code turf when I help them, but Ares is also a-ok.