Mossburn Craigellachie 10 Year Old 2007

I'd not heard of Mossburn until about 30 minutes before I bought this bottle. It was the last bottle of this particular type on Expert 24.

Craigellachie 13, which is more readily available, is a lovely fruity whisky that is definitely worth your time. This is interesting to compare to it as it is obviously similar and then different in ways that could be attributed to the barrels used or being slightly younger. There's a bitterness at the back of this that contrasts nicely to the honeyed fruits that you get at first.

Now I have heard of Mossburn, I do fancy trying a couple more drams.
 

BONUS LEGO REVIEW

Little blue landspeeder, baby you're much too fast. A pleasure to build and a great little model even if I can't remember this being in The Mandalorian. I especially like how the round piece under the bonnet gives the impression of a grill.

Teeling Stout Cask Finish

 

I like the normal Teeling a lot. It's a got a lot of flavour and the 46% ABV gives you a bit of wallop that's missing from, say, Jameson at around the same price point. I think it smells like over-ripe bananas but in a good way.

This is the Stout Cask Finish version and it adds some notes of cocoa and coffee to make it even more drinkable. Good stuff but the sticking point here is the price: €38 at Expert 24 is about €10 too much.

BONUS LEGO REVIEW

A tiny Imperial Armoured Marauder. You can admire the effort, but it doesn't quite work

Tamnavulin

Tamnavulin: what €20 of whisky tastes like (TBF it's not bad just not anything in particular).

BONUS LEGO REVIEW

I think they are targets for the previous day....

Bunnahabhain 12 Year Old

 For some reason Bunnahabhain is a bit of a blind spot for me. I must have had it previously as I am a fan of Islay malts in general and know I've talked to people who are stans for "the Bunna".

There was an online knockout thing where the Bunnahabhain people good-naturedly roused its supporters to a decent placing (nothing was going to beat Laphroaig, though) and then it got nominated for the OSWA's best beginner's whisky categorie and, well, I had to know.

It smells like the sea. As for taste, it's a soft experience, especially compared to classic Islays, but there's sherry and nuts and a light touch of smoke. For when you want a quiet evening with something well-made but not too challenging.

BONUS LEGO REVIEW

This is the e-web blaster. Lego have done a few different takes over the years and this is decent and keeps the advent theme by firing snowballs. After three days of good stuff a come down was inevitable.

Flora & Fauna Teaninich 10 Year Old

 Teanininch has some nice little history nuggets that you can tell people as you share it with them.

It's owned by Diageo and produces 10.2 million litres of whisky a year, so it's one of the biggest distilleries in Scotland. Most of that, though, goes in to various blends, including Johnnie Walker.

To produce the wort for the whisky they use a hammer mill and mash filter. No I don't know either but it's the only one operational in a Scottish malt distillery.

It's good to keep them distracted because when you let them taste it they will tell you that it's grassy.

And it is, there are some sweeter layers and there's some fruit, citrus and vanilla, its a curious layered whisky that needs some time to open up.

But mostly they will say it's grassy and beg you to give them another dram of Glenallachie 15.

BONUS LEGO REVIEW

It's a Stormtrooper.

Wild Turkey: Longbranch

This whiskey is the result of a collaboration between of Wild Turkey’s creative director Matthew "Mahogany" McConaughey and master distiller Eddie Russell.

Short review: It's alright, alright, alright.

It's Wild Turkey filtered through mesquite charcoal and then, for whatever reason, watered down slightly. So it's a gentle bourbon that packs plenty of flavour. It's a fairly typical WT with extra woody notes layered over it. 

An effortless sipper you are probably meant to drink on a rustic porch somewhere while looking lightly windswept.

I would have liked it a lot more, though, if it were 100 proof.

€38 a litre at Expert24 , so a decent price if you fancy some of Mahogany's juice.

BONUS LEGO REVIEW

Day 2 brings us another spaceship. One that you have to Google if you aren't a hardcore Mandolorian fan - it's from some other bounty hunter and has about 2 seconds of screen time. Another fun build, though, and, for its size, very swooshable.

 

Kilkerran 12 Year Old

 I could describe this to you, but it's better if you just track down a bottle and try it for yourself. A pleasant surprise every time from nose to finish always managing to be slightly different. Not too expensive either (€55 from Weisshaus) but it does tend to sell out.

Bonus LEGO review:

From the Star Wars Advent Calender Day 1 is a small but fantastically formed Razor Crest. Instantly recognizable and a fun little build. Hope the other days are this good.

Hold My Beer This Is Going To Be A Long One

• You Can Stop Apologizing for Your Sick Sense of Humor As an Englishman who definitely has the propensity to say "sorry" way too much, I don't think I ever started apologising for my sense of humour.
• And Here We Go Again! Why Should Guys Pay For Prenatal Care in Insurance? Of all the weird things Republicans believe this, to me, seems to be one of the most indefensible.
• Monkey Island (or, How Ron Gilbert Made an Adventure Game That Didn’t Suck)  A confession: I haven't read this article yet, but it's Digital Antiquarian talking about an absolute classic, so I'm not too worried about sharing it.
• Password Rules Are Bullshit But a solid password is not.
• Dogs use deception to get what they want from humans (a sausage) It's not only cats that can be untrustworthy.
• Pour one out for “Hold my beer” Another phrase declared passé before I've even had a chance to try it.
• Thief: tense narrative through level design and mechanics
• Arkansas wants to ban all classroom mentions of Howard Zinn Because in order to make America great again you can't also be told that maybe America was never all that.
• Dennis Skinner and Richard Burgon just did the ‘heroes and heroines’ of Orgreave proud. A bit of a nothing of an article, to be honest, but always nice to be reminded Dennis is still around.
• XCCD on chat systems.
• The Guardian Looks At Internet Trolls.  The Guardian, of course, not being above trolling its own readership. At least I assume that's why they still employ Jonathan Jones.
• Brutalism's Rise And Fall, As Told Through The Architecture Of Paris. Brutal means raw in French but I wonder if the English meaning was more of an influence. That said some of these buildings do look great, though I can speak to whether they are fit for purpose.
• The internet promised open markets, delivered rigged ones, then fake ones, then outright monopolies. 
• Side Quest Syndrome: Designing The Road Less Traveled Game Informer have a quick look at side quests in RPGs. Witcher 3 is probably better crafted than most in this respect but I don't think it's quite the great leap forward that people want it to be.

Sharks And Such

• Why Americans seem to really, really want European cities to be lawlesss hell-holes:
  Depictions of Europe in American TV
• The Real Difference Between Apple And Google. Apparently they are similar blobs of connections that have telling differences if you stare long enough.
• The basics of crypto, in 4.5 pages, using only small words lawmakers can
• But her E-mails! Due to the oddities of where I get my news on the Internet I could link to hundreds of articles like this, but this one has most of the major points.
• People Like Sharks More When They Swim to Upbeat Music  This could also be good advice in general. If you want to be liked, try to only be seen in places with happy music.
• Broken dragons: In praise of Morrowind, a game about game design Why Morrowmind might be the best Elder Scrolls game.
• Death and Tax Cuts Paul Krugman boils things down to their essence.

A Little Gamier

Over at a site called Twenty-Sided they've spent a while, and 50 articles, looking at Mass Effect.

Apparently the last one was in June of last year so I'm a little late to the party. 

Mass Effect is interesting as a game as it straddles a couple of types of Bioware Role-Playing Games (more numbers based to more shooter-y based) and also has a controversial ending -- the games were all about the choices you made and how they had an effect in the game-world. The ending had you choose between three different-coloured buttons no matter what had happened before.

Twenty Sided is arguing that the problem with the ending has roots in the changing culture at Bioware and these problems are ingrained in the game much earlier than the last 2 hours or so (a full play-through of all three games is probably a minimum of 100 hours).

But then again, the ending of a lot of RPGs is to wade through a long tunnel of super hard enemies to make an arbitrary choice before the credits roll. I think people were upset by the implied promise of more, but Mass Effect was not an overly egregious offender in this respect.

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Another party I'm late to is an Oral History of Day of the Tentacle. Tim Schaffer may have frittered away a huge amount of goodwill over his last few projects (DF-9, Broken Age, that hacking thing) and DotT is a touch over-rated but this is well worth a read.

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Gaming Nostaglia is something Ron Gilbert seems to be an expert in. And if Thimbleweed Park turns out to be any good we'll forgive him for it (chances are it'll look nice).