Sold!

Money's too tight to mention....

But I just mentioned it. Silly song! In order to help pay a few bills before they became critical, hubby and I listed a few trading cards on eBay. I listed them around the lower end of what everyone was selling them for. I hoped they would sell, but I was kind of skeptical. It's not like the auction house in game, where if you don't sell it, you just re-list it. We needed the money, and I was sure we weren't going to get it.

I was wrong. A couple days into the auctions, I flipped over to our eBay sellers page, and we had sold one! I started packaging it in its promised inner packaging, and checked the delivery instructions. Between the street address and the city, state, and zip code line, the instructions read,"leave by back basement door".

I have been sitting here waiting for something witty to say about the instructions. Something about stereotypical gamers...I got nothing. But the instructions made me giggle. I guess that is enough. Well, the money is nice, too. Thanks for paying my utilities!

Blacklisted

A couple of days ago, I logged in Delgada, and my favorite paladin tank ever is playing around on his hunter, so I whisper,”Wanna kill Coren Direbrew?” He’s holding a trinket of mine.” He replies,” Sure. Let me log in Graham.” I tease my hubby into joining us, so that we only need 2 dps. Since this is my first day of Brew Fest, I take the portal from Dalaran to Orgrimmar and start doing the Brew Fest dailies. Our server is one of the many plagued with a targeting bug, so I waste about 10 minutes chucking mugs at a robot that won’t be hit. I finally learn that if you stand next to it and chug, you will most likely chuck your mug at him. Two minutes later I am on my way to get my third Brew Fest stein. (I really want a house or a guild hall where I can put my trophies, instead of them gathering dust where only I can see them in the bank.) I get my stein, run the barrel run twice, and then decide it is high time we found more party members. I advertise, and find one. I keep advertising to no avail. I decide to run into the gates of Orgrimmar and advertise there. This requires some fumbling on my part as I turn on Trade chat (I loathe and despise trade chat, so it was turned off). Once it is on, I advertise for one dps. Someone replies, says he would like to bring his warrior. Fine! I wait until he logs in and he whispers for an invite. We are on our way. Hubby portals the group to Stonard, and we make our way to the instance.

Now, I am not one to study loot tables before an instance run. I only know Coren has trinkets because he dropped trinkets last holiday. I have no clue what they are called, let alone what they do. I have a vague clue that he drops mounts and some remote control for a mole machine. So, we get into the instance, take the mole machines to the bar, and begin our piñata breaking. It really isn’t fair to piñata breaking to compare it to the Coren Direbrew fight. When you play with a piñata, you are at least wearing a blindfold. This fight is much like cheating and beating the piñata to smithereens while able to see it. For those that may be new to 80, I imagine this fight is a little harder. Once you have taken the daily from the spy around the corner, you talk to Coren and insult him. This makes him angry, and he has two friends with him. The best way to handle this fight, in my opinion, is to focus down the boss, because when he dies, the additional mobs disappear. During the fight, more mobs (non-elite) will come out of the ground in mole machines, tossing you in the air if you are over them when they begin to surface. Please know, if you are the one to insult, make sure no one else is trying to insult him at the same time. It will use both, and that will leave the group with one last chance to summon him. Anyhow, we only had four attempts, as Graham had done his the night before after reset. I forgot to tell our two pick up members this, slightly upsetting the warrior, but at the time it was late, and tanks with summons were all but unheard of.

The fight begins, and ends, and begins, and ends, until all four insults have been used. Stamina trinkets dropped three times, and on the fourth time, a critical strike rating trinket drops. I only saw the critical rating on it and rolled need. My husband followed my lead and rolled as well. Graham is so over geared I’m sure he didn’t even care. I don’t think I have ever seen him use his Retribution spec. He is the ultimate Paladin tank. The warrior won it, accused us of trying to ninja the trinket for the guild, told us we were blacklisted, and left party and used his hearthstone. I was stupefied. He had won 2 of the three stamina trinkets, and the critical strike trinket, and I could not see what this guy’s problem was. We stood there in the tavern for a good five minutes or so. Then I looked up his character in the armory. This warrior had only one low level trinket. So, he obviously needed them. I wasn’t mad about that. So I scroll back to the trinket and bring the item description up. The second part reads that it increases melee or ranged attack power. Alright, I goofed. I saw critical chance and started drooling and didn’t care about the chance on hit wording below it. My husband says, “I just do what you tell me to do. It’s all your fault.” I try to whisper the guy, but he is already offline. So I look up his guild. No guild master on. I then remember the name of the character he whispered me on, and I whisper him. I apologize for not having read the rest of the description. He goes on to tell me I’m a noob. I told him it was an honest mistake, and that I am glad he got the trinkets, since he obviously needed them. No response. Whatever!

So, I’m on someone’s blacklist. I can’t read. I’m a noob. But I am NOT a ninja. I don’t roll need on something in an instance that would not benefit my character, unless I am instructed to disenchant it. Even then I usually wait until the end of the instance to shard anything, just in case someone decides later on it’s something they need. I hope he never has trouble finding a healer. He made my “I don’t like to play with“list. It’s not a black list. It’s a list of people that need to redeem themselves before I heal for them. I mean really. Take the game a little too seriously?

The Internet Invades The Emmy Awards

From a retweet posted by @feliciaday, I found out something exciting. Neil Patrick Harris, who will be hosting the Emmy awards this Sunday, will be doing something out of Dr. Horrible sometime during the show. How Exciting! That's all I had to say. I'm not some big fan of Neil's or anything, but it's geeky, and it's internet, and it's just backward of the usual. Television usually hands to the internet, not vice versa.

Oh, and this may just be a nod to the fact that Dr. Horrible did win an Emmy this year. Cheers to the whole crew!

Bacon.....

Hubby and I went out to dinner tonight. We are so broke, that going on a date for dinner means we grab whatever fast food coupons we have and pick from there. Tonight, we had the choice of Del Taco (2-for-1 Bacon Double Del's), McDonalds (two for one Big Macs), or Carls Jr.(about 4 different 2-for-1 burger offers). So, we decided on Carl's Jr. We bought buy one get one free Double Western Bacon Cheeseburgers, and a medium drink. Remember when 32 0unce sodas were considered large? We are sitting there, slowly eating our burgers and debating the greatness of this burger over the last we had. Why are we eating slowly? Because we are less than a mile from home, and we aren't in any hurry to get back to the kids. We get away pretty seldom, and rarely for more than an hour. They're safe. My oldest is watching them. If she isn't busy messing with MySpace. I hope they're safe...

Well, back to the story. We decided we liked the last one better, if it had bacon, and onion rings, and barbecue sauce. Then we realized that was what we were eating, except it would also have lettuce. Taking another bite and slowly masticating it (That is not a bad word. If you don't know it, look it up.), I listen as my husband makes his proposal. He's going to open a restaurant. Everything will be made of bacon. That sandwich we had decided on? It would lose the burger patty, and just have a patty made of bacon. Did you want fries with that? No! You will have more bacon! I read somewhere they even have bacon ice cream. And tonight, I stumbled upon (I love that silly button!) his first breakfast item on the menu. Brown Sugar Bacon Buttermilk Waffles... with a side of bacon, of course! Bacon garnish, too? You got it!

We would call the restaurant Your Last Heart Attack, or maybe The Porker Palace. The sign out front would be a neon sign with a line of pigs entering a barn and leaving as dancing bacon strips. On the cover of the menu would be a man, laid out as if for a viewing, with a bouquet of bacon strips clutched at his breast and a huge smile on his face. Next to the salt and pepper shakers on the table would be low dose aspirin packets (the right size to forestall your next heart attack). There would be no diet drinks, only highly caffeinated and sugared drinks. For those not keen on sodas, there will be sweet tea. If you ask for water, we will assume you are on fire, and bring out a hose to put you out. Wait, this is a bacon joint, so you'd be in the middle of a grease fire! We will instead bring out salt, baking soda, or the appropriate extinguisher to put you out.

Oh, and you would have to sign a release form stating that, if you were harmed by anything you ingested or encountered in the restaurant, that you came of your own free will, and would hold all employees, owners, and denizens of the restaurant harmless, and perhaps remember them in your will. :)

While I was looking for an image to head up this article, I found this. I want one. I almost feel bad that I wasted my opportunity on a lesser burger today. Damned diet....

Facerolling

Yesterday, I logged into Shadowsong and found the guild was raiding Trial of the Crusader. So, knowing noone else was on to do dungeon runs, I logged in to Bladefist. I asked if anyone was interested in running anything, got the standard no reply, so went off on my own to find things to do. I got into a 10 man Vault of Archavon, only dying once (glass area in the fire guy's room is bad!), got the achievement but no gear. So, I was invited to a 25 man Vault of Archavon run that was slow filling up. I asked in guild if anyone wanted to go, got no response. By then I decided I would get into ventrilo to see if anyone was in there and chatting. There were two guys in there talking about jobs that involve unions and parking cars. I didn't want to interrupt, so I left the server. I found out later, when I asked a second time, that the guild was saving themselves for a run some night later in the week, at around 10 server. I'm glad someone piped in. I wish someone had said something earlier.

Back to the point. Since noone wanted to run anything (I asked again not long after finding out about the raid times), I logged in to Delgada, logging in to the KNR ventrilo at the same time, and joined lfg. I chatted with two of my guildmates who were playing Aion while I skipped around Dalaran. I got invited to the heroic daily, picked up the quests, and got summoned to the instance. I stepped through the portal then opened my bags. I had in my bags 1 epic drake mount, a hearthstone, a duplicate robot pet key, and a piece of level 75 meat. No candles, no water, no buff food, no potions, nada. I healed all of Old Kingdom, on heroic, with nothing! I even died once, got rezzed, and the tank went off without a care in the world. Healed up a little, got a very small bit of mana, and kept healing.

After that instance, I hearthed back to Dalaran, bought some water and a couple of mana potions, and raided my bank for some food. See, I had emptied my bags so I could cart all the stuff that got sent back by Blizzard from the time our guild bank was cleared out, and I forgot to restock. What a dummy! Now, with part of the items I needed, I went off with the same tank to do heroic Culling of Stratholme. I let one of the rogues die (I think I was being attacked by a kitten), so we just missed the timed event. Quest complete, we hearthed out, and I logged out after that.

So, I guess Delgada is at the point where she could pretty much faceroll through heroics now. Too bad the guild is off doing their own thing. I miss them!

September Edition: What I've Been Doing.

I can't seem to get a post to the point where I want to post it. Is it still considered a post if it isn't posted?

Last week, my focus was on gearing up my mage, renamed Dinnaeh and moved to my friend's server. I would log in, check to see who in the guild was online and where they were, and ask if anyone wanted to run anything. Being a new 80 and new to the guild, I was hoping to find a few people who would be willing to take me along on some heroics. After all, everyone's running them! I wasn't asking for a free ride. I had taken some time and gold to assemble some nice epic crafted items and a few good bind-on-equip blues, and was still trying to get into regular instances for some of the items I might need. As I was working on my arcane spec, one of the guild mates offered up his mage as a model and taught me what my cast sequence should be. I'm not lazy. I had already been looking on WoWPopular for a good arcane build and the glyphs to go with it. I had also another tab open looking for cast sequence. But I took the information, and headed to Darnassus to play with the dummies, right after I took my hubbies start out nuke macro from him (It's a doozy. If you want it, I'll share it!). I found she was putting out a decent bit of damage (around 1700 is not bad for a starter mage, right?) So, I joined the LFG channel, as noone in guild was biting, and got into a regular Trial of the Champion. The first group was horrible. The heals needed help, then the tank had to go, then we wiped several times on the nightmare encounter. The group fizzled. I rejoined lfg, started doing the dailies in the Tournament, since I was out there. She got into another group, this time whizzing through the instance twice. She got a trinket, but passed on the ring that dropped when I saw that the healer needed it. The healer and one other promptly degrouped, and I silently flogged myself for not having needed the ring. From there on, it was a mess of people dropping and trying to find replacements. I had signed up with this group to do four runs, and I had every intention to stick it out. An hour went by, we struggled through oiur third run, but wiped on the nightmare encounter. We lost another group member. I decided it was time to hang up my hat for the night. I apologized, wished them luck, and logged off.

The frustrating part of all that was not so much that I couldn't keep a good pug group going, but that my guild, of the at least twenty that were on, only one answered when I was looking for a healer, and noone answered when I was asking for people to run things with. I looked. There were a couple in instances, but for the most part, they were hanging out in major cities. I'm wondering if I had been a healer, or a tank, if they would have been more inclined to run things with me.

This week, done with the frustration of looking for groups with a dps character, I logged in to say hi to my guild mates on Shadowsong. Guild chat here is always hopping, people are in ventrilo chatting at peak times, and it's just a friendly place to be. The second I logged in my bank character, I got a tell from one of them saying hi. After finishing the banking, I logged in with Halinka. I set myself up to heal a regular Trial of the Champion. I failed miserably. We did fine on the first part, killing all the horde combatants. I could not keep everyone up during the nightmare phase of the Paletress encounter. The group broke up, and I set to doing the dailies over there. Somehow, I got into a regular run again, this time as dps, to help gear someone's mage alt. It went from that to running a 25 man Vault of Archavon, then a 10 man Vault of Archavon, then a race through Gundrak on heroic with two teams, to end in a 25 man Obsidian Sanctum. Halinka got a nice pair of pvp pants and a robe to go with it, and she got a nice pair of pve pants, too. She spent a few badges and bought herself a nice belt. Then, she went and gemmed and enchanted the whole lot.

What is great about this last few days is that, this guild does things together, and not just on raid night. If someone needs a hand, all you have to do is ask, and if they can't it's usually because they are truly busy. The difference between this character and the other? Not much , really. Sure, Halinka could heal, if she had the gear. They are both dps at heart. Halinka, thanks to an active and very social guild, is getting crazy upgrades (i-level 245 pants to replace i-level 200!) Dinnaeh needs to get to know her new guild a little better, I guess. Or switch to her bank alt paladin and level a healer. Because noone seems to want another dps on that server. Things may take a turn for the better when the cross server lfg system goes into place.

Tonight is raid night for my Shadowsong guild. I might pop over and say hi to the other guild. After this daily...

Who? What? Where? Why? How?

Who - I found out a girlfriend from my high school days plays WoW, and went to Blizzcon.

What - Of course, if you have real live friends to play with, you want to play on the same server.

Where - Bladefist server, Alliance side.

Why - Because I really wanted to hang out with my one of my first online and offline friends. We used to chat on those old Bulletin Board Systems. Play text games. Anyone who ever logged into a MajorBBS system will probably remember dropping gems in a certain pattern in a stump, or saying a certain phrase at a hidden shrine. I miss the pizza parties. Somehow chat in WoW is never like what it was there.

How - I transferred Esoterique, changing her name to Dinnaeh. I've been leveling like a madwoman. The guild is looking for more. Try and reach Bloofie or Alii , or pretty much any Titans member. What do they need more of? I hear healers are in short supply. Not sure on anything else, so if you are interested, and you are geared for mid-late Ulduar, send a tell!

So that is what I have been up to the last week or so, in a nutshell. Prior to Eso's transfer, I had made a paladin and got her to about 15, and parked her in Exodar. You have to have a bank helper, right? Servers are back up, and it's time to put Dinnaeh's nose to the stone. Tell me what you have been up to below! Yes, I know you're out there, lurking. So come out for a minute and say hi. I'm pretty sure I don't bite.