Two Hundred and Eight, Progress

I know I'm a geek. My time goes into studying for school and Warcraft! On that note, I did want to say what a difference I see in myself ingame from when I used to play to the past few months. As part of a guild working together to beat all the challenges the game throws at us, I have really come to appreciate the bonds you form with your fellow players. Tonight I stayed up 2 hours past my bedtime because were were slowly making progress. We had reached a point our guild members had never reached before by downing the next to last boss in the current end-game content AND began working on our strategy for the final boss. Included below are before and after pictures of General Vezax! I realize you can't really see anything but dangit, I got the pictures on here! I'll see if I can't get on to expand later on.

Before

After

Two Hundred and Six, Scariness

So my computer sometimes decides to not see the wireless card. It's a little scary. The two computers that I have made have both been very special and worrisome. This is interesting only because all my friends' homemade machines work fairly well. Why both of mine would be messed up as they get, I have no idea. The worst part is that I'll just pray and keep using the machine as it throws up signs of machine dementia. No one really has any idea where to go or what to do. All of my friends--even the tech savvy ones--eventually throw in the towel on my machines. Makes me wonder if I should even mess with creating my own computers. It's sad because I get some joy out of creating my personal Frankensteins and that joy is being pulled away from me. As in baseball, the third strike you're out so I'll understand what it means if on my next machine (still some years in the future) I run into the same problem. Only time will tell.

Until then, I'll be bumming the Internet from the Roomie and school as I can. On the plus side, no reason to worry about Warcraft progress!

Two Hundred and One, Time's Endless Progression

My world is static to me.  I wake up, go to school, come home, hang out with the same peeps, sleep.  Rinse.  Repeat.  Ever since high school, my life has consisted of this same pattern.  There were some derangements such as weddings or the birth of some new kids or the passing away of some folks but my immediate life has had no change.  At home people still argue a lot and do things the way they want instead of compromising.  At my friend's place, we still get together and play games.  In my college town, I still go out to dinner with people to have a good evening.  I still play computer games like crazy.  I still make mini road trips to see other friends in nearby towns.  

The doc I worked with on my away rotation went through medical school not expecting children since his wife had had extensive radiation for an early cancer and was deemed infertile.  To his surprise, a few years into his established family practice, he had a couple little girls.  He told me how before the girls, time for him was at a standstill.  Now with the little ones, he sees old mannerisms disappearing while new ones begin all the time.  To him time is running rampant and he cannot get it under control again.  He loves his daughters very much but still admits he misses things they used to do when they were younger.  

I don't cuddle up with my dad anymore.  I also don't fall asleep on my grandmother's lap while we watch an evening movie.  I also don't cutely offer to help with cleanup after dinner and instead make sure I do the heavier cleanup so no one else must.  I do still run over to my friends' home but stay much later than I used to.

Tomorrow I go to take another test in a multitude of tests I have taken and that I have yet to take.  After it is over, I will celebrate by either running around outside a bit, paying bills, or playing Warcraft.  Then Saturday I'll drive home for a night.  All of it has happened before and will happen again.

But one day it won't!

One Hundred and Ninety-two, Death of 'Ole Blue

Around eight years ago the four of them came into our lives as brothers of the same factory.  The gentle blue with a glowing insignia were soothing to our sense, the ergonomic shape eased into our palms.  We four had found our mice.  Lord Chaos, the Beatnik, the Engineer, and myself revelled in our gameplay for many years with these mice.  Switching to each other's computers was simple with the same peripherals.  Orcs, dwarves, trolls, gnomes, terrorists, scientists, Gordon Freemans, robots, Soviets, Allies, GDI, NOD, pyros, engineers, Psilons, Silicoids, roller coasters, trains, Civilization(s), Tribes vehicles, mutalisks, carriers, seige tanks, Jedi, Sith, smugglers, bounty hunters, augmented UNATCO operatives, Ylloj - my frost sorceress, a red Boba Fett-lokalike named Silencer, fantasy warriors, X-COM operatives, cities, evil minions and mistresses who you could slap, Kabuto, and Meccs are but a few of the creatures and races under the sway of our mice at one time or another.  

'Ole Blue has travelled a lot too between three different cities and almost 10 houses/apartments.  He provided my thumb a gentle gel-filled pad on which to rest.  He outlived two of his three brothers in regular usage.  One got lost to the annals of "old equipment" while another hemorrhaged out gel fluid.  One sibling remains who still feels the love of a human daily.  The Beatnik has just built himself a new computer and his mouse will hopefully get to experience it for many years to come.  Mine decided six months was what it could last on my new PC.  Today the years of rough use and the cord's weight to the ground finally pulled some connection loose inside the mouse.  I tried a splint with tape but it can't hold with the pressure needed.

Today I went out and found the great-great-great-great grandson of my Mouseman Wheel, the G5 Laser Mouse.  

It's been hard with it because it is unruly and different.  My thumb sits slightly differently, there are a few extra buttons, and the slide is smoother than I'm used to.  I'm sure I'll get used to it though.  Already today I've gotten to like the slide and messed around with the extra buttons.

But I'll still miss that blue glowing symbol on my first real mouse.

One Hundred and Ninety-one, The Lich King

Wrath of the Couch Potato

One Hundred and Ninety, Epic Fail

I won't say a game is sucking my life away because that would imply that I am miserable playing it both with people I know and with people I've never met.  That, however, is not the case.  I felt a thrill of joy in the weeks leading up to the release of the expansion and now I have some goals on what I want to accomplish with it.  I've taken my first steps into Northrend and they are thrilling and sturdy ones.

One Hundred and Eighty-eight, Dalaran

The search begins in two days for the city that used to fill this crater.

One Hundred and Seventy-three, Day 3

Today was Lecture Day. I sat through eight hours of lecture while my phone charged in a corner of the room. I took my milk over to a friend's home who has a powered fridge. I also picked up a couple sandalwood scented candles and lithium 123 batteries. I'm thankful I have a powerful flashlight that doesn't use C or D batteries and, having grown up Hindu, that I love the smell of sandalwood.
In 2004 I went for a week without power. They're saying the same again this time around. I'm ok with it although a little frustrated. Maybe it's karma. Saturday I played Warcraft with the Beatnik and had a good time and picked up useful loot and now I can't play. Of all the weeks to lose power, this one is the best since I have a midterm coming up. At least this time the weather is cooler than during the previous outage. Back then my housemates and I stayed at school ALL day and returned to sleep at night. In the mornings, we'd shower and head back to school. It was miserable. This one is much better!

One Hundred and Fifty-four, Mind Stew

The past few weeks have been quite a rough road for me and others around the country. The part I keep trying to wrap my head around is that Life and Time don't stop. Every now and then you get into this point where you're having fun and enjoying yourself but it's hard to stay right in that position without something throwing a monkey wrench into your fun. I did spend some of my days off playing Warcraft like an addict and it felt great compared to the grind of the questions and study materials. But inevitably, I'd notice the time was 2 or 3 AM or my lids would automatically droop and I'd know that when I woke up, it would all be gone again traded in exchange for another set of grueling study hours. The Engineer just bought himself a house and is in the process of moving over there. He's had many points where he had decisions to make and time would force his hand when he would have rather had the chance to make carefully reviewed, forward-looking plans. Many of my friends are looking to the next few months and wondering how their life will look and where it will be. And for them it's probably the scariest. But that's what the rest of us are for and willing to help them cope with. Their minds are all in a jumble wondering what progress they're making on their goals and if they're going down the right road or just a screwed up one. Sometimes they can't even sleep well at night because of the cacophony of thoughts with them.

I still wish my mind would quiet.

One Hundred and Twenty-eight, The Beauty of Rest

This morning I helped with the physical conundrums of throwing a fundraising 5k run/walk. I had to be there at six in the morn...Yeah, it was tough. The adrenaline from being standing kept most of us going strong but towards the end, it began hitting a lot of us. Not that we looked like sleeping idiots during it, but we could tell our energies were flagging more than they should. Over lunch Amish Girl was getting sleepy-eyed and when I returned during Warcraft, my head would nod off. So I headed off to bed promptly fell asleep for four hours. I'm curious how this will mess with my sleeping schedule, if at all. We'll see!

One Hundred and Three, Mythical Creature

Say Hi to BoB!

One Hundred and Two, Begin: Endgame

Looking back, luck had a lot to do with it. I imagined having to work really hard at a couple of places before accomplishing my objective, but instead Fortune smiled upon me and gave me the people I needed. We blazed forward through difficulties others quailed before. Rarely had a group this efficient been seen thrown together by the random LFG channels. Yes, Shattered Halls became my peon. During the glorious fight with Kargath, I reached the peak, the pinnacle of the low man in the game: Level 70.

I did it with my friend the Engineer beside me shooting fire from his fingertips and next to the Beatnik who was on the phone with him during the process. Earlier Lord Chaos had given me The Talk about reaching this state of being and how not to take it lightly but I scoffed.

"It's just another goal, what of it?!"

The second it dawned upon me, as one of my groupmates typed, "Congrats!" that it wouldn't happen again, I was floored. This was it for me. I glanced down at the experience bar and it was gone, a figment of my imagination perhaps except for the 480+ hours (over 20 days) where I slogged through, hour after hour, keeping close tabs on that bar. Excitement imminent when the bar was reaching the end and satisfaction when I *dinged* to the new level. The simple reward system was quite gratifying. What began with a level 1 dwarf paladin named Valin in January 2005 has followed a long and bumpy road to this point. In one sense, he even died for 2 years only to be resurrected by the enticement of spending time together with my friends.

My character reached level 70 during a furious battle with Kargath Bladefist at 12:45 AM February 11th, 2008. No one is exactly sure when the event happened during the battle. But the victory was unforgettable as well as the extremely smooth run through that dungeon.

Oddly enough, I was more proud when my friend complimented me on how well I accomplished my role of Main Tank.