Secret Squirrel

As Berathe has pointed out, more eloquently than me, I’m arranging the second in a series of ‘secret santa’ arrangements for our LotRO guild. The first was a Christmas sweet swap, where we bought local sweeties to mail to guild members, Easter seemed to suggest chocolate, and yesterday I received a very posh little Easter egg as part of the swap. Was awesome.

It reminds you that guild members are real people, and it’s always nice to get little surprise packages in the post.

And it led to me chatting with Spinks yesterday about how one of our guild members is keen on a cheese swap sometime. I think that’s more because they all know I hate cheese, and because we have plenty of members living in good cheese-producing regions. It’s not a bad idea. I think the best swaps to do are those where something very local can be sent – because that highlights the diversity of a guild/kinship.

But, that didn’t stop us joking about what other swaps we could have, which included a ‘random’ swap (proper Secret Santa style), a sock swap (blame Spinks) and a recipe swap (where you provide the non-perishable ingredients too).

I don’t want to swamp people with it though, so it may well take a rest till Xmas 2010… and then I will put a poll up for the guild to decide. I’d love to do a wider one too, with other guilds, or with twitter friends, but I wonder if the organisation would kill me…

[and, because I chose to post today - a big happy birthday to my sister, Spinks]

What I’m up to

So blogging has fallen a bit by the wayside. I went to London/Reading to visit family and haven’t really got back into a schedule yet.

Add to that a bit of a turn from LotRO – I’ve been there, done that. I have 750 Dol Guldur medallions now and no weapon or emblem decent enough to spend any of them on. I can run through Sammath Gul without standing on a bone pile with my eyes closed. Volume 3, Book 1, was a small distraction – but didn’t do what I wanted it to. We’re raiding Barad Guldur, and making good progress, but raiding has diminished for me somewhat, and I think in the future I won’t be quite so gung ho to go twice a week. Ah yes, the casual vibe has started to catch me…

…I still log onto LotRO almost daily and do some of the daily quests to level up yet another emblem. They’re all rubbish. I feel, as I do it, as if I’m wasting my life. I really hate the LI lottery these days. And then I realise I’m raiding with what I consider rubbish and no-one cares, so why should I struggle to upgrade? Why pursue the Symbol for crafted 2nd Age items, when it may just be a wasted piece of crafting that someone else craves a lot more than I do?

Is it the end for me? I don’t think so. There’s plenty of people who aren’t so jaded as me, and perhaps I should spend some time helping them get to do what they want. It’s no surprise to people I’ve been logging on a lot less these days – that’s just a reflection that it’s just not as fun as it once was, though it might well be in a month or so. Lifetime sub…

But I also started a new job this week. Well, it’s the same job, but more hours, different library. So I’m out the house more. And my husband is super-stressed in the final term of his PGCE (teacher training course). He’s now teaching fulltime and doing coursework, and having to apply for jobs for September. So, we barely see one another. It’s 10 weeks of hell, because we’re not really used to these levels of organisation or stress.

And then, I turned 40. Which was cooler than expected. I got some lovely presents and went for a charming meal with co-workers, which got me out of the funk I had on the actual day (was my first day of work 9am-7pm, and I was knackered when I got home!). Someone even gave me a Starfleet Command button for my uniform ;p

And, as Spinks points out, I’ve returned to dabbling in WoW pre-Cataclysm. The idea is really just to putter about for a couple of mornings a week, play with the dungeon finder, and gather some money and resources for Cataclysm. I have no expectations for WoW. It’s just this MMO I spent time in a while ago. Having no expectations helps. I don’t care how fast or slow I level, I don’t really care what my gear is, and I’m not too bothered about raiding (see my previous point re: LotRO). So it’s quite chilled out and a change of scenery. Plus we have a little guild and they’re all very accommodating with my lame questions! Good stuff.

And I have a cold. Which is what’s contributed to this week’s slump. When it’s gone I expect to feel a good deal better about everything.

But, if, as they say, life begins at 40 – then I start mine in the firm knowledge that I have a good bunch of friends both offline and online, and that I care about them all a lot. And that good things can happen at work.

Last of the Cat Updates

Diesel’s now in full recovery mode – has the run of the house and has no longer to wear the protective collar.

I’m back to semi-normal, but gaming not QUITE as much as usual.

I will attempt a return to blogging properly next week. Be scared.

The Name Game

LotRO has 12-person raids, on the whole. We go on fridays and sundays, on the whole.

Tonight, as our group formed, I noticed the first 4 members all had names that started with vowels. And then we started to play the name game – working out which people who raided in the kin had names that started with a vowel that we could incorporate, and whether we could get a rounded group that way.

I have a feeling I’ll be playing this and other name games all night. Next, I was thinking how another kin Captain whose name starts with a B would manage, and decided he could try for a group that had names starting A,B,C, etc.

It’s a silly thought and perhaps an odd way to return to talking about games on this blog. But I had it, so I thought I’d share.

I’m bored so..

Any questions you want to ask me, I’ll answer. About LotRO, Dragon Age (and my playthrough), the TV I watch, holiday plans for next year, how my husband lets me get away with playing games, Diesel and Malarkey…

Still Alive

I am, the blog is, I’m just a bit under the weather and finding time or something to say isn’t my priority.

In LotRO, I’ve been running the 3-man and 6-man Dol Guldur instances, finally finished all the Mirkwood quests (bar the raid one) on my Captain. And slowly getting Minstrel up via Lothlorien repeatable quests. It’s incredibly lazy but pretty good rep, xp and not much killing – which suits my minstrel well.

In Dragon Age – I’m in the final fight, somewhere. But died, saved and haven’t had a chance to go back yet. And now letting my husband have a play at it. It’ll happen, before 2010!

In other news – moved my computer up to the study. A 3rd bedroom in the house that started as a study for my husband and then became a dumping ground for ‘stuff’. So we cleared that out on sunday and moved the computer up. So I now have my own little den. It’s pretty cool. But further from the kitchen. Oh noes!!!

St Andrew’s Day thoughts

This morning, I can’t recall a computer game that’s had a good Scottish accent in it.

Is it because I mostly play MMOs and have never recovered from WoW accent-abuse?

Would be interested of any people can think of (bear in mind if Dragon Age has good ones, I haven’t got to them yet).

Charity thoughts

The MMO Blog Alliance Charity Drive. First I’ve heard of it, despite my sister being involved! but hey, it’s a good idea, so I thought I’d shove up a quick post for anyone that could possibly read this blog and not any of theirs. Anyone? Bueller?

Go visit their links and peruse all the places you could donate time, money or just a blog post about over the holiday season:

• Epic Slant
• Spinksville
• Psychochild
• Multiplaying
• Stylish Corpse

As we all know, this year I’m poor, and will probably therefore donate to a few local causes – one for ovarian cancer since a colleague died of that last year, the hospice my dad died in, and possibly a cat one!

If there was somewhere I could give time that involved a cause I was into, I’d consider that, but I think I’ll be in and out of the area so that might be further down the line.

Maybe we should have a charity levelling contest ;p

Random thought…

They say ‘more than a handful is a waste’ in terms of boobage. Think ANY games designers have heard that? ;p

D’oh

I often eat during the early part of a raid, it fits in with my life, and I’ve been doing it for so long I know how to make it fit in with playing and not adversely affect the raid.

So my husband was highly amused when I suggested making myself corn-on-the-cob for my raid night. Yeah, not much worse a healer could try and eat, eh?