My friends,

Haha, Christmas always throws me out of whack with reports =P Well, we're back into the grind now. Our ACC Ladder concluded with a win by default, as the other finalist Orv was made Seneschal. If you haven't already, congratulate the guy. So, that makes me Shade Warrior. We'll be fictionally getting some background into this soon - hopefully before the GJW. Speaking of which, it's less than a month away. We've been preparing for this since before Mejas resigned as Consul and have established a stable, reliable workhorse of a summit to keep you guys up to speed with the GJW and more importantly make sure you're all motivated, but I need you guys to understand something: the GJW will be a grind. It will be 6-7 weeks long of constant fiction competitions, ROs and gaming, not to mention several other misc events. It will not relent, and neither will the competition we've got in other clans, so we will have to work hard to keep up with them. If you have friends that are semi-active in the clan, wake them up. We will need them fully active for the GJW. They can idle for the rest of the year, but these 6 weeks are when we need them most. Raken's promised us a bitching story and from what we've seen of the plot updates (latest has been posted yesterday) it looks promising. Anyway, yeah. Zandro put in a lot of hard work for the Arcona ACC ladder, managing it largely on his own. Coupled with over two years of leadership in Arcona, he is more than deserving of the title of di Tenebrous Arconae. I've heard some rumours that this is 'Erinos favouritism.' In response to these rumours, I say 'grow up and look at the facts.' It's not favouritism to reward members who have worked their asses off, and in future if you have concerns about my ability to fairly distribute awards, I strongly encourage you to not just bitch about it behind my back but speak to me about it in person. Failing that, the Grand Master and Deputy Grand Master are always there to hear concerns about their Consuls.

Before I forget: In case you didn't notice, I've changed my email address to [Log in to view e-mail addresses] - getting 50+ spam mails a day in the old one was just making things too tricky to manage, so I abandoned the yahoo ship =P

Oh and we'll be having a Shadow Oath before the GJW starts, so if you're below PRT and inactive, your days are numbered =P

Comps:

We've pretty much wrapped up the Black Tempest and a fair few of the medals have been awarded (Ku-DOS Vor!). We're just waiting on the RO now, which has been extended right up until the GJW begins. More on that story later. Other than the RO (which I strongly encourage you to participate in) there are a number of house level competitions running at the moment

Tasks:

As I've said, GJW preparation has taken a priority, but Vor and I have both been quietly drilling away at the Arcona Prospectus update and the plot of this RO. It's being extended, and the end of the first 'phase' will be marked in the next few days. The second phase will follow immediately after, as we have a lot to get through before the GJW. Other than that, I've been able to shelf some of the mediation the job usually requires, as the clan has been playing nicely recently! Keep up the great work of not pissing each other off, guys. It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy when you aren't trying to kill each other through the internets =P

RL:

Recently had my anual new years' man flu, which is mostly over now and University is kicking my ass, however it'll be over by this summer so I can sigh in relief and then panic about getting a job afterwards. My housemates and I have discovered Halo 3 (let's hope the GJW supports some Halo pwnage!) and the next couple of weeks will be busy as it's the boyfriend's birthday coming up. But yeah, manageable atm.

As always, if you have any comments or questions, get back to me on IRC or via [Log in to view e-mail addresses].

Thanks Arcona,

Sashar