Boo-yah!!!

OK, so I didn't start a new hunter the other day, simply because I didn't feel like sorting out the stuff I kept on the character I would have deleted. Instead, I leveled up my draenei to 32, and got her a fancy gorilla! His name is Fonzie, and with him, leveling is even more of a breeze.



Seriously, I don't think I ever had this much fun while leveling my nelf huntress - around level 35-40 she started pulling aggro off her cat, and it got a bit boring holding back. With this one, with Fonzie, I can take down 3-4 mobs at a time, no problem. Also, all other potential pets have gotten little special twists, making them all that much more fun.

And now, back to Thunderstomping stuff! Weeeeee!!!

Stupid brain.

Last night some deluded part of my mind thought it was an excellent idea to play WoW at 8 AM today, not realising that today is Wednesday. Frickin' maintenance day. Not that I wasn't getting up anyway, but I simply don't like plans that don't work out. Oh well, time for proper breakfast and studies, I guess. Was going to save that for about 11-ish, but yeah, we'll have to move that one around - thanks, brain!

Anyway, the reason that I was so excited to get up and play a bit before my work day starts, is a bit silly, maybe even slightly stupid. I'd kind of like another hunter. I know, I've got my hands full with my druid, and with leveling the draenei, my beautiful Bunnyhop, but this new one would probably be sitting somewhere at levels 1-12, until his/her time comes. Now, what would be so special about this hunter, you ask? Well, here it goes: It would be a dwarf! I have 2 accounts in my possession, and so far no dwarf has set his/her foot in there, at least not past the planning stage, and I have decided it's time to end this madness. Don't know if it will be a he or a she yet, though.

I'm quite familiar with the male dwarf sounds and animations, since my flatmate has a pally of that kind, but I have very little experience when it comes to female dwarves, so I might just check on Youtube to see if it might be possible to see some examples. I mean, seriously, people put up all kinds of crap there, so why not female dwarf animations? Still, I'm leaning towards a male, since I'd love to have a character with a real beard!

Flying, hunting, choosing.

I'm in the middle of trying to understand, and apply, the Learned Hand rule, and am getting a tiny bit frustrated, so it appears to be time for blogging.

Yesterday my druid regrew her wings by turning 77, and learning Cold Weather Flying, and I spent quite a bit of time exploring Northrend, until I got the World Explorer achievement - it comes with a title, and you get a tabard for exploring Northrend. The tabard is very meh, and I'll probably bank it as soon as I've made room for it (I save a LOT of junk), but the title's fun, even though it's quite easy to get. Not everyone feels like devoting a day's gameplay (roughly, and obviously not /played time :D) to traveling around all of Azeroth to find every little nook and cranny, and the completionist in me is mighty proud. Also, I'd love to get the Loremaster achievement done, but I need to do another 700 quests in Azeroth for that, a lot more Northrend, and some scattered quests in Outland, so that would definitely take a while. Also, I'd like to get her to 80 within the next few days, so I highly doubt that I'll be doing any quests that don't give me xp or cash anytime soon.

Also, yesterday I logged on to my draenei huntress, and did some easy going questing in Ashenvale. She's 28, and moving up fairly fast. She is a hunter, after all! Now, I do have a level 70 hunter - a female night elf - and she and I have had a bit of fun, but somehow I can't muster up any passion for her. A lot of people would say that a hunter is a hunter is a hunter, but that is so not the case. Not only does my draenei girl get extra hit rating and a HoT, but she also has a sleeker, cooler look, compared to her nelf sister. It's not that I have anything against female night elves as such - I wouldn't want my druid to be any other race (although, a gnome druid would be adorable) - but when it comes to hunters, they just don't cut it for me. The innate reclusiveness of nelfs works great for the druid, but I'd really like a hunter with a bit more "oomph!", and along comes Bunnyhop, and her fearsome boar Hurricane!

Of course, I wont be deleting my nelf huntress - I'll probably level up her engineering a bit, and maybe do some farming - but I wont be farming for Loque'nahak or Nuramoc with her - I'm saving that work for the draenei!

Back to the books, need to get this working in my brain before it's time for dinner.

Just another one!

I overslept today. Not as badly as yesterday, but still. Got up at about 9.45, when I had planned to be up and about at 8. Still an amazing improvement compared to yesterday, though. Anyway, I'm having some tea, and in a bit I'll be off to the library, after dropping off a package at the post office.

Ever since I found out about Stinker, and what I had to do to get him (I've wanted a pet skunk from the moment I first saw them as critters in the draenei zone) I have been looking for new mini pets to get my hands on, and I've collected quite a few so far - feel free to check my collection (which spans mutliple characters) at WarcraftPets.com - including Stinker. The day before yesterday I finally got my druid to Dalaran - not by portal, but by turning 74 - and I've started working on my Kirin Tor Familiar. He's kind of the reward for completing this achievement, and so far I have found one of the books. I just tried to log in, to do a quick check of the different spawn locations before I have to be off, but alas, the servers didn't come online at 11 am as usual - they'll be down until 1 pm, and by then I hope to be on the bus. Hopefully I'll get enough work done today, to feel like I can work on this little project for a while tonight! Should fit in nicely with a bit of fishing...

Eventually I'm going to have to level up to at least 76 - in Sholazar Basin there's a weird faction called The Oracles, and when one hits revered with these guys, one can buy a Mysterious Egg, which may contain one of four different mini pets, or just an Aged Yolk (eww). So, the required level for questing with these guys seems to be 76, which shouldn't be too hard to accomplish after getting some rested bonus while camping for books and doing some fishing. While doing that, there's always the chance I pick up one of these! Fishing sure does rock.

Right, I'm off to the library.

With a Song in My Heart!(?)

This Tuesday has so far been slow, and off topic when it comes to this blog (which is just as it should be, since I have a lot of non-WoW-stuff to do). I got up a late, since I went to bed late, and have spent some time trying to figure out the next step in my "get a move on"-plan. I guess the obvious next step is just that: Get a move on. I just need to have lunch and a shower first.

The reason I stayed up so late last night was incredibly important: My druid finally reached level 74, and got to do the "going to Dalaran"-quest! Finally, the ultimate hearth spot! Of course, I've seen it before, on the beta, but now it's the real deal! It is a pity though, that there aren't any class trainers there, and no auction house. Well, I guess that would have been the final blow for Azeroth, and that would probably kill the game, in a way.

Now i don't really know what character to level- should I continue with the druid, and move on towards 80, or should I start levelling the mage, so she can get a bunch of low level alts to Dalaran at 74? Should I give the hunter or the rogue a bit of love, so that I get the farming going a bit? Ah, no. I have a feeling there'll be enough farming in the future, so I think I'll just stick to the druid for a while, and have fun doing a lot of new and fun quests. I did this quest last night - took 2 tries to figure out, but it was hilarious! Very Mario Kart!

You know what else is hilarious? My neighbour. She sings, and plays the piano. She plays quite well - seems to have some kind of classical training behind her - but the singing is, most of the time, just loud. About half an hour ago she almost had me rolling on the floor in fits of laughter when she did the title song from Phantom of the Opera. For a long time she was obsessed with "Wind Beneath My Wings" (Bette Midler song), and there's usually a lot of Bon Jovi and Aerosmith ballads from the early-mid nineties on her repertoir. Her playing+singing is only audible in the livingroom, so it's not really a big problem. It can get a bit repetitive after a while, though - three hours of "Did you ever know that you're my HEEEROOOO?" can make anyone feel a bit nauseous.

OK, I have to get going. I need to eat something, take a shower, get a package to the post office, and try to figure out my school work.

Checking off the list.

Annoying morning. I stayed up waaay too late last night, but for a reason: There are a few "kill that named mob, get that drop from it" quests, that are heavily camped (and heavily ninja'd) these days, when everyone is doing them, and as I like to keep moving while levelling, I have simply postponed the completion of those quests. Anyway, at about 3AM the amount of players online has dropped significantly, and I could easily do Words of Power, The Assassination of Harold Lane, Cracking the Code, and Slay Loguhn - lots of nice XP and cash in my virtual pocket!

About the "annoying morning" thing: For some reason I couldn't open the Gmail website while being connected through my router, and I had to go through a bit too much dragging of cables and climbing on furniture before breakfast. Now Gmail works, and I'm going to have something to eat, and hope the rest of the day will be a walk in the park. I might even go for a walk in the park later - I really need to get some air.

While My Server Gently Weeps.

Server restart. What to do? Blog.

Today's questing/exploring has so far been a bit sparse - I'm awfully old, and my body simply couldn't stand sitting in front of the computer screen all day, so I went out for a well needed walk earlier, did some dishes, and cooked myself a proper dinner.

By the way, I'm typing this on my laptop - since I grew tired of alt-tabbing between WoW and Firefox to check wowhead.com (in the middle of the unavoidable crappy fps that comes with everyone being online), I decided to connect the laptop to the router, and simply be my own QuestHelper (I have that addon too, though - as much as I enjoy the lore, it's just great getting a big green dot showing me where to go).

I managed to reach level 72 surprisingly early last night, somewhere in the Star's Rest area in Dragonblight. That place is also so pretty... It's got a lot of the look from Winterspring, but still with its very own angle - I love it. Anyway, I'm taking it quite easy - not that I'm standing around fishing for hours, but I'm trying to take time to do most (if not all) of the quests, explore, and just look at everything - since I'm not in a raiding guild, and hence don't have the pressure on me to ding asap, I'm just going to try and play through the content.

So, soon I've done all of Borean Tundra, and then I'll be heading back to Dragonblight. Eventually, I might even try and get into some dungeons - the screenshots I've seen of the Nexus are amazing, and instances are fun (if one manages to find a nice+reasonably talented group).

A last note: I've really missed the keyboard of my laptop. It's nothing special - a regular laptop keyboard - but the keys are so much softer than those on my PC one, and there's a really nice, worn spot on the space bar. If I ever write my great Swedish novel, I'll so be doing it on a laptop.

Time to check if the server is back up, me thinks.

Delirious.

Ah, it's pretty, so pretty. And my moonkin is a dream to level. She can take a beating from a few mobs at a time, nuke things down quite fast, and the downtime is basically non-existant - Borean Tundra is cake! The lag + low fps can be a pain at times, but the environments, the fancy new skins, and the quests are so effing great I don't really care! She's gotten to 71 so far - I'm taking it quite easy, but I'd like to get to 74 soonish - Dalaran awaits :)

My mage has been chosen as my no. 2 leveling project, so when the Borean Tundra starts to feel too harsh, I head over to the Howling Fjord. This rather newly dinged mage doesn't have the kind of semi-fancy equipment my druid has, though, so it's a bit slower, with a few more deaths. Not as tricky as Hellfire Pen could be at 58, but those few mid 60s quest rewards can make even my badass mage squishy...

Downside: My home server was full, and queued, last night, and it's the same thing tonight. Serious queues, too - last night I was no. 420! Hopefully it'll get better in a while, but right now there's really no way to easily switch between my two accounts.

Anyway, back to the game - aiming at getting to 72 sometime within the next 24 hours, which shouldn't be a problem :)

Hi-tech Durid.

Sadly it seems the day has come for my graphics card to retire. I haven't managed to find the correct drivers for it (no CD anywhere, and not online, since it's oooold), and now everything is either stretched out vertically (the regular interface, Firefox and so on), or horisontally (WoW). Also, since it's a bit older than what Blizzard recommends for WotLK, and since my fps has been heartbreaking for a while, I've decided to get a new one.

Well, semi-new, since I can't afford any of the ones I actually want. So, I'll be getting a Nvidia Geforce 9500GT, upgrading from the fancy MSI Geforce 7300GT - better late than never, right? Guess it's time to keep my fingers crossed that the rest of my darling computer will survive this ordeal.

Another reason for not getting a better one, is the vain hope that I'll be able to get a whole new computer sometime next year. I would love it so dearly, and tenderly keep it as dust-free as I can! Hence, also keeping fingers crossed for an improved spring economy!

Sooner than expected.

Once again I've found a mail from my favourite online game store in my inbox, and today they're telling me that I'll be getting the expansion in the mail on Wednesday, i.e. tomorrow! I'm a grown up (no, really!), so I wasn't too bummed that I wouldn't be able to go through the whole "World Server down"-craze that is most certainly going to start a few moments past midnight, and go on well into the afternoon on Thursday (everyone and their mother is going to be online, so it's bound to happen), but now I'm actually a bit stoked about being able to at least try to get to Northrend early!

About the WotLK-preparation: I just spent about 400 gold on friggin' mithril bars and solid stone, to level blacksmithing on my level 39 pally, so I might have to try and make some more gold :D I believe tonight and tomorrow evening will be filled with as many dailies as I can stand, and since the druid has access to basically all of them (Ogri'la, Skyguard, Netherwing, Isle of Quel'danas and cooking&fishing), and has epic flying, she's going to be doing a lot of the dirty work. I'll probably get the rogue out too, for a bit. Epic flying really speeds things up.

Also, still have to try and find the original CD for the graphics card. The basement is not too tempting, though...

RL: I've found an actual idea for my big, final paper-thingie! At least I hope so, will have to do a bit of research, but it doesn't look too bad.

Monday, Monday.

Meh. I haven't been down in the basement to look for that CD - yet - so my WoW-graphics are still slightly fucked. But it doesn't have any real impact on my gameplay, other than the fact that I'll be endlessly delighted the day I actually get it to work, or get a new computer, and get to see all the fancy colours I know are there.

In a few minutes I plan to go out for something to eat. I had a fancy McDonald's lunch earlier, and I'm still a bit full, so I'll probably just get something small. Fruit, maybe? While waiting for the rain to stop (it won't, though, so I'll have to go out anyway) I'm camping a vendor in Aerie Peak, so I can get these blacksmithing plans for my paladin. She's at 225, and those plans are supposedly the cheapest way to get to 235. They're apparently "limited supply", so I have to camp for them /yawn. Anyway, I think I'll check a couple more times, and then I'll head out.

Thursday will come, I'm sure of it.

I just checked my inbox, and found a "we'll be sending you the stuff you ordered"-mail. More specifically, a mail stating that I'll be recieving two Wrath of the Lich King - Collector's Edition on Thursday! That's right, two boxes, one for each account - Frosty galore!

Hopefully my darling computer will survive - I think I'll have to try and find the original installation CD:s for my graphics card, though - there has been a few too many glitches while playing lately... Arakkoas, epic elekks and Cenarion Hippogryphs have certain parts blackened out, and I believe that happened after a panic reinstallation of the card, using some drivers I found online. So, I 'm keeping my fingers crossed that the original CD is still in the basement, and that it will be some kind of magical solution to my problem. Honestly, this baby has been shivering and shaking so much in the last year, I would've bought a new computer if I could afford it. Maybe sometime next year, when I've found a job, and gotten settled in a new place.

Of Tauren and Boots.

Just remembered: This morning I briefly logged on to one of my few horde alts, a tauren druid who goes by the name Moonberry. I got her to level 13, and then I had to go start my "work day", but I do really hope I'll get her levelled up properly one day - female tauren druids look amazing!

This afternoon I bought a new pair of winter boots. Not WoW-related at all, but if they were a piece of equipment, they'd definitely be epic. They're bound to keep my feet warm and fabulous for a few winters - at least two, hopefully more than three! :)

En attendant WotLK

Over the last few days I've been laying low, WoW-wise. Not a very big surprise, considering Hallow's End left me exhausted, and without a new title (poo!). Also, my studies actually seem to be moving forward, which has required quite a bit of focus. I spent yesterday evening getting my human priestess up to level 50, and now she only has the (in my opinion) really fun areas left:

• Felwood - OK, I guess some of those demon guys (if not all of them) are a bit too resilient to shadow damage, but it looks sooo cool.
• Un'goro Crater - A lot of quests to do, all in one go (maybe two), as you move in a circle around the place.
• Western Plaguelands - A lot of quests, of course, really close to eachother, and quite a bit of runecloth - yay for tailoring!
• Winterspring - Let's grind some funky reps! OK, so I may not feel like grinding all the way to exalted with Timbermaw Hold, but I love the quests in Winterspring, and the blindingly white environment.
• Silithus - On a second thought, no. I don't like Silithus. Only good reason to go there is to pick up this cooking recipe from a quest, to get cooking to 300 without too much fuss.
• Eastern Plaguelands - This is where I usually do that last grind to 58, killing Scourge and gathering even more runecloth, while enjoying the (yes, once again) effing amazing environment. I like the spookiness of the place, how it feels abandoned, and how one can almost flinch in surprise if actually running into another player in somewhere like Plaguewood. It's just got a really nice atmosphere.

Still, I don't know if I'll feel like doing the final grind all the way to Outland before the expansion comes, which is next week! I'd really like to try and grind some cash (lately, it seems, I've spent it as soon as I've had it), so I can upgrade skills and stuff like that without giving it another thought, and not having to focus on gold for the first few levels in Northrend. On the other hand, I don't really plan on spending a whole lot before getting to 80, except on riding skills, since I honestly don't find it necessary to be fully enchanted when you're running around in quested greens.

Anyway, I'm probably going to try and get enough cash to pay for slow flying for a mage and a shaman, and hopefully about 1000 gold for each of the 70 chars. Should be enough.

Now, I'm going to spend some time trying not to fall asleep, while waiting for my flatmate to get back from work. I made dinner yesterday, and the day before, so I'm expecting food, dammit!

Also: Yay Obama!

Now, let this be a lesson!

I stayed up rather late last night, hoping and wishing that my druid would open a treat bag or a crudely wrapped whatever, and find a Hallowed Helm inside. This, of course, did not happen. Instead, my level 48 priest got a helm, so, I now have 6 characters with the Sinister Calling achievement completed, and only one of them is level 70 - my nelf hunter. What do we learn from this? A classic, obviously: Random loot is random. Le QQ.

Anyway, I'm pretty much over it - considering I only pugged the Headless Horseman three times, getting about fifteen kills, and only trick-or-treated and did the fire-daily, I did pretty well: Next year I'll just have one thing to complete on the druid to get the title, quite a few of my alts got a boost in the form of one or two levels, and ten(!) of my characters got a Squashling! Also, all the switching-like-a-crazy-person between alts made me realise which one to delete in favour of my future Death Knight. (A poor, forgotten human mage, abandoned at level 23. Unfortunately her name is boring, so I'll have to come up with a new one.)

Some time last night I noticed a rather common conversation in trade chat:

Person A: "Why do people talk so much crap in trade chat? It's called "Trade chat", and should be for just trading..."
Person B, C, D...: "Who cares, yada yada. L2P, u r stoopid!"
Person P: "Why do people have to point that out - don't they know it just makes things worse?"

And this is where I just had to jump in:

Me: "The first rule of trade chat is "You do not talk about trade chat"."
(If you ask me, this is a well known pop culture reference - not for my parents' generation, but certainly should be for the WoW community. For the uninformed: I made a cheap parody on some famous lines from the movie Fight Club.)

After this I get a whisper:
"but thats just what u r doin", to which I reply:
"I think you missed a highly relevant pop culture reference."
Now, the answer I get back, I don't really know what to do with:
"NK u should get a relative life".
What? I make a joke, including a reference to something outside WoW, and I'm told (I assume) to get a life? There's really no way to please the average idiot, is there?

Of course, I can't take for granted that everyone will understand and appreciate my sense of humour, but what's up with sending rude whispers to random people in trade? I guess I should also point out that I very rarely say anything in trade, so I'm not exactly a "public" person. I mean, the Dirge-spammers are begging for it.

So, rant over. I'm off to buy sushi.

Sigh.

This day is starting to make me exhausted... My druid only needs one more item to get her "...the Hallowed"-title - the Hallowed Helm - and I've spent all day trying to get it. I've trick-or-treated at least seven times, and I've pugged the Horseman twice, unfortunately with only four summons each time, since the healer in the first group disconnected (and I had to take over), and in the second group I was the one with no summon left. The helm dropped with the second group, but someone else got it. :´(

On the bright side, though: While it was cake healing the well geared warrior tank in the first group, I managed to heal a pally tank, who had 9.5k hp and 390 defense rating >.< , and his buddies, a rogue and two warriors (one 65), all of whom loved to steal aggro, and stand in the whirlwind... Now, with most groups, it's easy to solve the problem by going "hey, try not to take so much damage, step out of the whirlwind", but since this happened to be a group where everyone but me preferred communicating in italian, this didn't really make any difference. The tank only died once, though, and the boss went down a millisecond later, so it still worked ok.

Anyway, since Hallow's End ends tomorrow morning, at 4AM, I'm planning to trick or treat every hour until then, which gives me... 10 more chances to get the helm. Not bad, but considering I haven't gotten it earlier on the druid, I can't say it feels very good either. I'd rather have the event continue for another week...

There's always next year, but the perfectionist in me really wants to see that achievement completed, and the title above my main character's head, and not later, but as soon as possible! So, I'm keeping my fingers crossed - since I don't really have the energy to try and get a spot in a pug without being able to summon, it seems to be all there's left to do...