Where are we going, and what am I doing in this handbasket?

 We're past the 100 day mark of Russia's invasion into Ukraine, and Ukraine is still holding out, so that's something.  How much of that is because of the rest of the world's half-assed support in the way of supplying the Ukrainians weaponry, but only the weaponry that won't piss off the Russians too badly (because heaven forbid that weaponry should leave a mark on Russian soil).  There's also the various economic sanctions against Russia, of course, that appear to be having mixed results at best, while empowering a wave of inflation the likes of which I've never seen in non-Russian countries.  It's a mess, and it's not getting better any time soon, especially while we refuse to do anything more direct about it.

Of course, we're not going to do anything more direct any time soon.  In fact, as often happens when something unpleasant is about, we're doing our best to distract ourselves from it.  In the UK, they're taking the more civilized route and holding a Platinum Jubilee for the Queen this weekend.  In the US, we're distracted by the immediate issue of a rash of mass shootings, while we wait for the Supreme Court, packed by the same party that refuses to do anything helpful on multiple fronts, to officially pass down its already-leaked ruling on abortion protections, the first of however many precedent-shredding decisions likely to come in the near future.

So, the world and national scenes are both shit-shows at the moment.  Locally, it's not so bad, outside of a rising homeless population amidst the rising prices for everything, due to an uncertain mix of "proper" inflationary pressures and larger companies trying to use those pressures as an excuse to jack their prices even higher than where those pressures would naturally result.  That, and, of course, the ongoing threat of more pandemic entertainment from a new variant strain or a brand-new disease entirely.  So, yeah, local's fairly shit as well, really.  I'm thankful I'm in reasonably good shape financially, with a secure, low-stress job, and a predisposition to stay home already firmly in place, courtesy of things like books, streaming video and video games.

Yeah, video games, that's not entirely shit at the moment.  Let's see, since last I blogged, I did do a quick round of Game Pass to catch up on some of the mildly-interesting games that came out in the past few months - sorry to say, nothing that made enough of an impression to really write about this time around.  The remainder of that time, I tried out some more Elden Ring - multiplayer does improve the experience, even without bringing anyone into your game, but not enough to keep me paying a monthly fee just for that.  Finally, I did get back into Mass Effect 2, and I'm still having fun there, but I'll write that up properly later, likely after I finish it.  And... that's about it, for now.  Of course, the Steam Summer Sale is coming up shortly, so that may throw another spanner in the works there, but we'll see what happens there in a couple of weeks.