Fumes...

It's one of those days when you kinda want a button to push for a do over.

My office is heavy with the scent of paint fumes. I have no idea who painted in our building, but they must have done it overnight and the stench is enough to kill more brain cells than I have to lose!

So I am sitting here wondering what in the world to do with my day and wondering if I am going to accomplish the mountain of problem solving I need to get done.

Problem solving has been on my mind a lot.

I have been trying to hang on to my love for DDO. It's been a struggle. I came back from Gencon brimming with energy and bubbling enthusiasm. Then we had the live event debacle. Most of my joy leaked out as quick as a balloon with a pin hole.

I remain deflated.

Age of Conan has yet to tempt me back. I know they had a huge PVP patch and I have heard from guild mates that it has gone well. I recently updated the game...I just can't seem to press the trigger to play.

There is a dearth of fun lately. I think that's whats got me in a gaming slump. I log in and gather up my friends and we run raids. And we run raids. And we run raids.

We can do most of them with our eyes closed, we can short man the raids, we can bring eclectic class choices to liven up the danger and we still win.

I started a new sorcerer recently. I play her when my guy has a chance to log on. He has a wizard he is leveling. She is fun. And it is a good time to go back through the content again.

It's just I have no surprise or WOW factor. It's all become terribly predictable.

Now friends are never predictable really. And I adore all of the gamer buddy's I have made in DDO. We have played together a couple of years now. We know each others habits.

And we are all BORED!!!

New content is coming with Module 8. I am hoping it drops soonish because the long summer has ended and we approach the time when people stay indoors and battle the winter blahs with gaming.

DDO is an awesome game and I don't picture myself ever leaving it permanently until they shut down the servers.

I loved meeting the team working on my game at Gencon and seeing the twinkle in their eyes as they hinted at things to come.

And their are supposedly some really AWESOME things coming.

So, ok. I have people bailing on the game left and right again. Friends will leave for a couple of months and go do something else while they wait on the Turbine team to put some great content in the game.

I will simply have to go play something else and dabble in DDO until the next big patch hits.

Or who knows...maybe I will actually PACK MY HOUSE!!! Or read a book... or pick a blasted wedding dress???

Real life is fun and all but I sure would like to hide out in a pixelated world for a few hours and shrug off all the thinking :)

GAME ON!!!

Its only Monday

I am finding my life is marked by doing complicated time calculations...

What time is it where he is (add whatever time zone he is in the world) ???

Wait... he said something like he would be home to talk at...oh christ there were a bunch of numbers...ummm I think 18:00 is like ummm 6pm?

Recalculate to make military time civilian time plus the time difference... and you get?

My brain exploding?

It sounds convoluted and when I am tired, I get the time wrong but honestly its not as bad as I make it out to be...

I am also aware of the counting of days since I keep trying to figure out which date we are slotted for him coming back stateside...I then try and figure out the time difference so I can make it minus a day or plus a day considering where he is...so I can figure out when we are actually moving. I have kinda been packing, but I am still working. I know I will need to let my boss know something kinda soonish if we get one date. *shrugs*

Basically I live in a warped limbo...

I am learning all kinds of new things since falling in love with a sailor.

I write letters...A lot of letters... he seems to like getting something in the mail besides bills.

Hallmark is making a ton of money off of me between stationary, cards, envelope seals and little organizers to keep all my letter writing organized.

I write e-mails...a lot of e-mails... wordy missives filled with little substance but the nattering of my thoughts when I have all of a morning, afternoon or evening looming in front of me while he is in bed asleep.

I leave my IM on almost 24/7 now in case he has a chance to log on and say hello.

We are both gamers... and we can't seem to find the time to GAME!!!

It frustrates me actually. I miss spending a few hours blowing off steam blasting away at little kobolds and nuking orcs into smithereens.

I haven't been podcasting lately either. I need to revamp my show a bit and haven't hit upon the right idea. Thoughts are swirling and hopefully something will come up.

I mailed off some packages on Saturday to my beloved. I was unaware I needed to fill out a forms and then answer 20 questions before sending him stuff. It was illuminating.

I need to try and figure out how to squeeze my new stuff around my old stuff because I miss my gaming friends. I miss playing. I miss not thinking about time changes, letters, e-mails, how many more days until he gets home, moving, weddings, and so on and so forth.

Basically, yes I am ranting a little bit.

I love my life, but it feels a little like a spinning top and out of my control. I have done fabulously well with all the changes I think. I just need a few reminders of my old life and gaming is one part of me that is never going to go away.

There are a zillion things my guy does to open up the world to me. He has quietly gotten me to spread my wings a little further and invite new friends into my world. I just don't want to forget my old ones.

Am I making sense at all?

Totally off topic...

STO is on the cover of this months Game informer.




Isn't it pretty?

I still have my Age of Conan account and I updated it the other day with all the patches. I still haven't played the game in months.

DDO gets played at least once a week with my static group. They are my saving grace. At least once a week I sit down with friends and enjoy some time. BY now we all know each others families. We've been playing about 19 months once a week steadily. We are still not capped out :) There is still a ton of content left for us to be slaughtered by...I mean for us to slaughter!

*grumbles*

Life is complicated. I need like an extra 20 hours in my week to make room for everyone. I just hope I am carving out enough time for the one person who matters most.

I still haven't finished reading the Halfling's Gem. I can't seem to sit down and read. Every second seems consumed with other things these days.

Anyways, if the boss stays gone I might actually get that one finished. And if I get home in time I may even game... who knows...

Wait... I have laundry

/le sigh

Someone lend me an extra set of arms and some spare time?

GAME ON!

Crack berry

Ok, its happened...

I have finally fallen so low as to own a blackberry! (ok secretly I have been coveting a pink one for years)

It consumes my life. I can do pretty much everything I want on it.

I have my all my social apps like facebook, myspace and twitter. I have been told I can blog from there, but I haven't been brave enough to try it yet. I have all my IM service's (yahoo, aol, gtalk and msn) hooked into it through this handy little app called Jivetalk. I get my e-mail on it. I have all my music on it. I take quick photos on it. I can listen to my audible books on it.

Oh... and oh yeah... I can talk on the phone LOL

It's seriously a sweet little machine and quite frankly I can't remember how I ever lived with out it?

Of course... being so technically saavy *rolls her eyes* I decided I needed a way to sync all my contacts into it...

Ummm have I mentioned I think Microsoft is the bane of my existence? So ummm.. yeah. I was supposed to do this the easy way by using microsoft outlook express. Of course, I didn't do it the easy way.

I installed thunderbird on my computer. YAY it worked the first time out of the gate... now the gmail syncing is a little flaky as I type this, but generally thunderbird is AWESOME. It brings in my yahoo, aol and gmail. Sweetness.

Here is the hitch in my giddy up.

Thunderbird does not sync with the blackberry :( *groans*

So off I went to goggle again.

I have used Plaxo (which was recently gobbled up by the evil of comcast) for a really long time to keep my contacts up to date on the web. So often someone will shoot me an address while I am at work, and I just want to get it saved quickly and have access to it later.

So I had plaxo. I had thunderbird... hmmm ok.

Well those two can sync up so thats nice... except I still haven't gotten my contacts on my phone.

*SIGH*

So It seems plaxo can also sync with the evil that is outlook express...

Yes ladies and gentleman... I succumbed to the peer pressure and just said screw it. Currently my pink little machine is talking to my pink computer and deciding how it likes syncing...

And I am tired... a wee bit more bald than I was 3 hours ago and staring at the three empty wine cooler bottles on my desk :)

Once again technology tried to best me... but I won...I think... maybe?

__________________________

Moving on.

Things are busy here. Still trying to sort out moving and wedding and well stuff.

My family is ok in Houston for which I am extremely blessed. Hurricanes are not wimpy these days and this one left a swirling mess of destruction as it cut a swath through my hometown.

Zeff is still in Italy, but doing well generally speaking. I am still mad as a hatter for him.

I haven't been gaming, blogging, twittering or anything much else of substance lately. I am hoping to get a little bit more organized and make my life a whole lot less stressful. I need to remember to have down time as well as busy time.

I am addicted to watching Army Wives...




I am still reading the halfings gem. I left it sitting on my desk this morning and was furious when I went to dig it out of my bag on the train and my hand hit the empty space where it should have been.

The weather is turning colder and I am loving the changing leaves, the brisk wind and getting too wear clothes that I haven't seen since spring.

Stay warm and GAME ON!!!

Tombs and fun?

My static group and I went out to run some more of the Tombs quests last night.

I have never expressed great love for the Necropolis series. It is not one of my favs. Some of the quests are brilliant in a conceptual way, but running them is a slog.

Last night we ran Tomb of the Tormented first. I don't think I had ever had the pleasure of running it. There are a series of gates and a mesh maze beneath your feet. You defeat zombies then pick up their "meat" and drop it through holes to make a rat step on a pressure plate to open the series of gates.

It is rather frustrating in truth. Our little band tried to finish it the first time through, but we had been a little non conservative with our spell points. We deceided to give it another go.

It was tough. Our merry troop soon found tempers frayed and equipment degrading. We finished, but just. The ranger had to recall because his sword snapped. Our cleric ran out of wands.

Perhaps the most entertaining part of the evening was listening to Zeff call out how he needed "Meat" and yelling out "You flippin rat get in the hole"

Next came the disease Tomb. I can't recall the name of it right now.

All I can say is it might not have been wise to attempt it after all of us being so on edge and grumpy after the Tormented debacle.

We wiped many times. There was yelling. We never yell. We didn't yell at each other as much as we yelled at the screen.

We did finish, but I think we were all so exhausted we weren't jubilant at having bested the hordes of undead.

I love my group and last night we put ourselves through the ringer. We have made lvl 12... ok the rogue has made lvl 13 but we won't let her take it :) Quests are getting tougher and tougher since we don't have a single piece of uber gear. On normal they kick our rears.

But I love them all. And I look forward every week to getting to go adventuring with them.

Tropical Storm Hannah is set to dump some rain up my way this weekend. Verizon still insists there is nothing wrong with my DSL. Ok. Fine. Then why is it every time it rains I have NO Internet for HOURS?

I do not see much play time in my future this weekend. :(

Zeff is a sweetheart. I had a down few days and was feeling off kilter. About 3 or so my time this afternoon, a delivery man showed up.



Yes they are pink. The man knows how to bring a smile to my face :D

I finished Streams of Silver. OMG OMG OMG I have the next book in my bag and I am hoping to start on it the second I get out the door today. Holy moly. I HAVE to know what happens.

I also have a confession to make. Some of my girlfriends have been talking about the "Twlight" teen vampire series. I was feeling left out of the conversation. While I was in walmart this weekend, I saw the first book in the series sitting on the shelf and thought "Oh ok... go ahead buy it." I was enbarrassed. It's teen fiction. Not adult fiction.

I cracked the book open over the weekend feeling like I was back in college with a homework assignment I needed to finish. I looked up an hour later to realize I was on page 188 and I was enjoying the story, much to my own chagrin.

I ended up buying the rest of the books in the series from borders. They should arrive on my doorstep any day now.

So without too much fussing I will tell you I get the buzz. The story in the first book is solid.

I am still kinda icky on reading teen fiction, but thats what they make book covers for LOL

I am off for home. Everyone stay dry and safe!

GAME ON!

Love a good adventure

I finally got in some gaming time this weekend.

I had to examine why I hadn't been gaming.

There were several reasons really when I took down some notes.

I have had a real life. This is perhaps the most important thing. I spent the last year or so in flux. Trying to get things sorted in my personal life. Dating still sucks. It is never going to be fun. I am sooooo very glad to be done with it at last. I would hide in my gaming so I didn't have to get out and live. I don't do that anymore.

I had nothing I looked forward to playing. I found this one the hardest to admit to myself. I love to game. I love the sounds, the animations, the complex character building and crafting. I love the people I game with.

I tried Age of Conan. I still have my account, but I haven't logged onto it in a month or more. If Zeff says lets go play AoC, I will go. I am curious to see how things have changed, but I am not sure I want to really play it. There was only so much I could take of being an errand girl. That and the bugs were driving me nutty.

DDO, my addiction, has been slow. Some of my friends had left to try other things. It's the normal summer routine of people getting out and doing real life stuff and not sitting at the keyboard. There hasn't been anything new I was super interested in going and doing in Stormreach. The crafting mechanic in the game I was initially excited about has turned out to be a dud of a grindfest. *shrugs*

But, Zeff has been whining about playing more. I kinda dragged my feet on it. This weekend though I was determined to play with a modicum of graceful acceptance.

I had a blast. I ended up playing until 4 am Saturday night with the old raiding crew I love and adore. I am getting to know the people in Zeff's guild more. I even pugged. :)

Any which way I slice it, Zeff is good at making me go out and do stuff. LOL

And this also means I will be back to podcasting. I hadn't been playing, so I felt bad trying to do a podcast segment. Gencon started a fire and I am ready to let it burn the airwaves. Prepare a flamesuit for this weeks segment.

I am off to pretend to work I think.

Oh, I finished the Crystal Shard. I have moved on to Streams of Silver. Will they find the Mithral Hall? *ponders*