Sideshow & Syrana

Seeing as how I haven’t logged into WoW since the first weekend of July and we’re tightening our budget in anticipation of our spawn’s arrival… I decided to cancel it.  For now.

Things are very busy right now IRL.  I’m used to short breaks and hiatuses, but this is the longest I’ve gone.  I’m on a pretty epic real life quest and I’ll resubscribe when I have the time and attention to give to the game.  But right now, I’m just not playing enough to justify continuously paying for it.  My account runs out on Tuesday.  I actually went in a few weeks ago to cancel and thought I might pop in a bit before the end of my sub… but nope.

Will I complete Loremaster of Kalimdor before Cataclysm drops? Who knows.  I still would like to…

Will I be back for Cataclysm? Hell yeah, but maybe not right away.  It depends how it lines up with the arrival of babygirl.

Do I play anything anymore or am I just a fuddy duddy now?  I still play some games.  Once the weather gets cooler I’ll spend more time in the computer room again rather than loungin’ on the couch with the laptop.  Otherwise my gaming staples right now are on my iPhone: Words with Friends, Carcassone, and Civilization Revolution.

My sense of time passage has become very skewed.  The hours at work seem to drag on forever.  My evenings during the week are gone before I know it, as are my weekends.  In the back of my mind I think need to get a post up, been a few days.

And that’s where the problem is.  I keep thinking it’s only been a few days or a week.  When I sat down to write the Sims Saturday post yesterday, I was honestly surprised that I hadn’t posted anything for almost a month.  But, with my body running hotter than normal due to my 24/7 bun oven, it’s often difficult for me to spend much time in our computer room.

That means less gaming and less blog posting.  Yes, yes, we have a laptop, which is what I’m typing on right now.  But then I don’t have access to all of my screenies and such.  Plus, there was something about physically sitting in front of my computer desk that tied to my motivation and muse.

So, anywho, here’s a bit of an update.

I haven’t played very much WoW since I completed Loremaster of Eastern Kingdoms.  I really want to finish Kalimdor before Cataclysm is released, so I keep hoping I’ll have enough time yet.  I even missed out on my favorite in game holiday, Midsummer Fire Festival.  My baby draenei priest alt got to complete the fires of Eastern Kingdoms thanks to Gertbee’s chopper and patience to drive me around.  I still had to split that up into 2 separate sessions… and I procrastinated until the last weekend of the holiday before finally going on.

I had planned to take several characters around to honor/piss on fires.

I’ve also been playing some Sims 3 Ambitions.  I like it and find the new professions fun: ghost hunter, tattoo artist, stylist, firefighter, architect, etc.  Again, haven’t been able to play as much as I’d like due to being hot (only so much the A/C and fans can do for that room, I’m afraid), but it’s been entertaining.

Then there’s Facebook “games” again.  After a 5 month hiatus from touching any of them, I started playing FrontierVille and Family Feud.  I was playing them daily.  Recently it’s slowed down again.  I haven’t touched Family Feud for a couple weeks and it’s been about a week for FrontierVille.  I must say though, FrontierVille is a huge step up from FarmVille and is moving in the direction of being more of a game than just clicketyclickclick.

At some point I’ll be able to spend more time in front of my desk again.  But for now, most of my internet connectivity is via my iPhone or the laptop… that way I can lounge on the couch, put my feet up, and have a fan blowing on me.  Ahhh, bliss.

(Sidenote: And of course, you are always welcome to find out what’s going on IRL with the spawn-on-the-way.  Although, I don’t write on that one nearly as often as I’d like to, but it’s more frequent than around here lately.)

I think the lil one will love these, don’t you?  I mean, I didn’t buy them for myself….

Huzzah! Eastern Kingdoms complete.

I didn’t even finish Booty Bay’s available quests, nor did I go into Blackrock Mountain… I have a TON of left over Eastern Kingdoms quests.

Now Kalimdor… I have around 20ish left to complete and I’m struggling (STRUGGLING, I tell ya!) to find them.  It’s nuts.  I’m checking out the listing of hard to find quests on the WoW forums as well as using the addon Everyquest.  I think there are some more Booty Bay quests that will have parts of their chains go over to Kalimdor and count there.

At least I hope so.

*frets*

Wow, the sale of tickets for BlizzCon 2010 is upon us.  And I say….Good luck to you!  Last year was a bit nerve wracking as we tried to get tickets, so I really do wish everyone good luck to get tickets if you so desire.

We won’t be going through the crazy queue this year.

I know, I know, after last year’s BlizzCon I was already talking about going back… even if only for the meetups outside of the convention.  However, due to the little one on the way, we won’t be able to go.  Last year it was so hot in August, going in October would have been nice… but… I won’t be allowed to fly and will be gettin’ ready to pop.

Now, if any of you want to get this lil’ one a cute plushy from the convention, that would be awesome. 

Also, the holiday weekend (travel and time off) threw off my sense of what day of the week it is… #iblamepregnancybrain

Forsaken!

Now, if only we could determine for sure if Baby is waving, throwing the horns, or flipping us off…

(No, we still don’t know the sex yet.  Should know what kind of gear Baby’s equipped with at our next ultrasound in 4 weeks.)

Hey all, I’m going to just kinda ramble in this post a bit.  Hope ya don’t mind.

This week has been a bit nutso IRL.  Last week was too, but it’s always even more crazy when trying to get as much work stuff done as possible before taking some vacation time around a holiday weekend.  It’s been hectic and draining this week, but now I get to relax a bit before rejoining the rat race.  (And believe me, it will be crazy when I return to work since there’s a lot I could not finish before leaving.  Blarg.)

Yesterday was nice… it was the start of Sideshow’s and my 5 day weekend.  Yesterday was doubly special because it was our wedding anniversary.  A little later today, we’ll be traveling out of town to visit my parents for a few days.  So, it will likely be a bit quiet around this corner of the blogosphere for a few more days.

But that’s alright because I’m sure you have cookouts or projects or something you have planned for at least part of this weekend!

One of the bummers about this past week being hectic is that I haven’t gotten much WoW time… I only need 2 more quests to complete Loremaster of Eastern Kingdoms! Uhh! So close!  ….still need another 30 for Kalimdor.

Funny, I thought Kalimdor would be easy to finish off because it seems filled with so many Horde zones and I’d have to search more to complete Eastern Kingdoms.  But noooo, I’m finding the complete opposite to be true.  Although, there seem to be more dungeons and raids in the Eastern Kingdoms…. which have plenty of quests that count towards Loremaster.  In fact, I still have a TON of Eastern Kingdoms quests I can do – easy to locate ones!

Whereas… I’m struggling to find more Kalimdor ones.  I’m hoping some of these leftover Eastern Kingdoms quest chains will take me back across the sea to count for some Kalimdor turnins.  I mean, it is quite likely since I’d seen a few chains bounce back and forth already… some counting for one continent and some counting for the other.

*Looks around* Ya know what… I think I should log in and finish off Loremaster of Eastern Kingdoms before we hit the road… so I can make sure to have that special screenshot.

The people of Stromgarde don’t bother with posting “No Trespassing” signs.  Instead they post warnings like this:

Thought I’d provide a brief update regarding the wonderful World of Warcraft.

See, I haven’t been running dungeons, raiding, or even doing dailies.  You might be shocked to know that I still haven’t used the random dungeon finder nor have I ran any new dungeons from Trial of the whathaveyou or beyond.  (Nope, no jousting runs, and no Pit or Reflection or any of that).

Shocking?  Perhaps.  But I’m still having fun and I’m busy.

I’ve been getting some achievements accomplished.  They may look a little odd along the sidebar there (and that widget is not very good at updating promptly, by the way) since there are several old Azeroth lowbie dungeons on there.  See, when I leveled Syrana it was before they first sped it up during The Burning Crusade, but I still leveled her quickly.  She rarely ran with a level appropriate group on her way up and if I was getting a run through for experience/quests or gear, it wasn’t always the whole run…. plus, she was leveled to cap before the achievement system went in and sometimes things didn’t count when they should have.

Anywho… (continue reading…)

(Part 48) For a complete list of this series, please go here.

Aerissa perched on top of the crate, waiting patiently for Valtos to return.  She attempted small talk with the flight master, but it was clear they weren’t interested in her company.  She sighed and thought about the events of the last few days.  She couldn’t recall her life being so interesting before.  She knew all of her memories hadn’t unlocked yet, but she was quite certain that most of her life had been quite uneventful.  At least, until the night her fiance tried to kill her.

A chill went up Aerissa’s back, causing her to shiver.  She looked up to see Valtos approaching with three hawkstriders.  He was riding atop one and leading the other two behind him.  She grinned, amused at the sight of Valtos bopping up and down on the back of the large bird.

She knew her people had a strange attachment to hawkstriders, which looked like overgrown, colorful chickens to Aerissa, but she thought even the most sophisticated elves looked comical riding on the back of one.  Their movements were choppy and bouncy, having only the two legs to stabilize their large bodies.  Aerissa grimaced, imagining the headache she would have to endure from the constant bouncing motion.  (continue reading…)