Easy As Pie

If you are an achievement junkie, on the Xbox 360 or on PS3, I assume (for trophies), then you should be renting/picking up Hasbro Family Game Night.  It is also available for download via the Live Marketplace.  This is a collection of popular board games most families enjoy playing together, except digitized for us lazy television watching fools :)  It consists of Yahtzee, Connect Four, Sorry, Sorry Sliders, Battleship and Scrabble.  Within 15 minutes of playing the games, I had racked up 10 achievements.  There is also a Hasbro Family Game Night 2, which has a few more selections to choose from.

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Jennifer made an awesome cake last night.  Chocolate Caramel Cake (with cool whip and chocolate chips.)  Will post a recipe for it later.  I’ve also been enjoying some Rotelle dip my mom made.  That is, a dip with melted cheese, rotelle and ground up beef and sausage.  A bit spicy since she picked up a cheese with jalapenos in it, but it adds to the wonderful flavor.

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New Years Resolutions – 2010 is coming soon.  I’m still working out my list.  Yes, I know it’s already 5 days in to the new year, but these things take time ;) 

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I watched District 9 on bluray the other day.  AWESOME MOVIE.  I wasn’t sure what to expect and was afraid the movie wouldn’t live up to the hype I’d heard about it.  I was wrong.  Oh so wrong.  This movie rocks, and it is my favorite of the entire past year.

Also, I finally received my Legend of the Lone Ranger dvd from Best Buy.  I loved this movie as a kid, and it’s hard to find these days.  Just so happens, Best Buy now carries it.  It is a true origin story for the Lone Ranger, starting with him as a kid, how he grows up to be a Texas Ranger, a shoot out gone bad, how he is left for dead and how he rises up to assume the identity of the masked man.  I haven’t watched it yet, so I hope it still holds up after nearly 20-some years :)

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Finally, I picked up, at long last, Book 2 of the “A Song of Ice and Fire” series, A Clash of Kings by George R. R. Martin.  49 pages in and I’m already catching up to speed and loving it.  Martin is a great storyteller, and even though it’s been nearly a year since I read the first book, I feel as if I just put it down.

3 Days In To The New Year

Four days off and I didn’t accomplish even half of what I had originally planned.  The main goal for the holiday weekend was to level my DK to 80.  Instead, I’ve been busy with everything but!  Well, perhaps busy isn’t the right term, but it’s close enough :)  Things I’ve done so far in 2010.

1 – Leveled Mogathorn, my Death Knight, to level 76.

2 – Played a butt-load of Wii.  Mainly Super Mario Bros. Wii, but also some Animal Crossing and Mario Kart as well.

3 – Played some Xbox 360.  Fallout 3 (I’m at a point where I’m dying a lot again) and Hasbro Family Game Night.  The achievements just roll out as soon as you put in the disc and boot up the game.  First time playing last night, and I scored 10 achievements right off the bat.

4 – Tonight, I finally started in on A Clash of Kings, the second novel in the A Song of Ice & Fire series by George R. R. Martin.  I can’t wait to see what HBO is doing with the series they are producing.

5 – I have ventured back into cellphone ownership.  Not wanting another contract (my wife still has her ATT Wireless plan), I opted for a prepaid plan.  Straight Talk is a decent alternative to Cricket.  Decent older model Samsung sliding keyboard phone, too.  $45 buys you the unlimited talk/text/data plan and $35 buys the 1000 Minutes/1000 Texts plan.  I’m not concerned with data, as all I really need/want is the ability to text and talk.

6 – Enjoying my time off.  It’s gone by too fast, but I get 3 more weeks of vacation time in February, so I can surely make it until then.  I’ve already planned a couple of days off to recoup :)

I hope you have had a great New Year, so far, and continue to do so.  If it isn’t starting out too hot, hang in there, things work themselves out in the oddest of ways, sometimes ;)

Take it easy, I’ll check in on you again later.

2010: The Year We Make Contact

Once the stuff of science fiction tales, we have arrived at the year 2010.  We don’t drive flying cars to work or live hundreds of miles above the wastelands of a postnuclear world ala The Jetsons (because, you know that’s why they lived up in the air, right?).  Anyways, just dropping in and knocking the dust off the blog to say,

“Happy New Year” to you and yours.  I hope it’s better than the last for all.

From: Me, To: You

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and a Prosperous New Year!

Nook Update Coming Soon

As I predicted when Engadget first reviewed the ebook reader, it seems Barnes and Noble will be rolling out a software update that will fix several issues.  Engadget has more in their official post located below.

 

Engadget: Barnes & Noble Nook to get an Update This Week

Shavelle Achievement Update

Mainly, on Shavelle (my hunter), I’ve been logging in to do dailies.  Specifically, I’ve been focusing on The Shadow Vault, Argent Tournament, Cooking and Fishing.  They all provide rep for their related faction, and along with the “Wrath” feature of earning specific rep in dungeons when wearing a tabard, I’m almost exhaulted with The Knights of the Ebon Blade. 

I’ve gotten a little discouraged after finding out there can be some “noob” haters, even within random dungeons via Dungeon Finder.  Seems that the only way to get better gear is through dungeons, yet if you are in a party with people who have better gear, some of them tend to hate on you for holding them back.  Gotta raid to get gear, but some won’t let you raid without gear.  Hmmmmm … 

Anyways, Shavelle’s recent achievements include:

Cooking with Style

Exhaulted Champion of Ironforge

Champion of Ironforge

100 Dalaran Cooking Awards

25 Dungeon & Raid Emblems

100 Stone Keeper’s Shards

and, Dual Talent Specialization.

Oh yes, I broke down and invested 1,000 G into dual spec.  I checked on the ‘net and found several different marksman and survival builds, tried them both, and am currently working on a 0/18/53 build for Survival.  Meh, without better gear, though, I’m only pulling in 1,500 dps according to the Recount add-on.  I’ve got my fingers crossed.  I may get up enough nerve to venture back into some more dungeons soon.

Dungeon Finder, You’ve Changed My Life

What did I spend my Friday afternoon doing?  Why, funny you should ask!  After nearly three years of avoiding them like the plague, I finally broke down Saturday and tried out Blizzard’s new Dungeon Finder.  Dungeon Finder is, of course, the upgraded version of the old LFG tool (that’s “Looking For Group” for the uneducated).  The tool matches you with dungeons in your level range, for example, if you’re level 72-80, you’ll be allowed to select random, heroic or specific content from upper level Outlands to Northrend.  At 80, you’re allowed to select from random heroic, regular or specific Northrend only dungeons. 

So far, the only character I’ve used this on is my 80 Hunter.  Frost badges are the new hotness in patch 3.3, so it adds another level of conversion to the whole picture.  To get lower level badges, you suddenly have to be a mathmatician and able to deduce which badges need to be downgraded to fill a certain quota to buy Gear X.  In current order, it goes, to the best of my figuring: Frost –> Triumph –> Conquest –> Valor –> Heroism.  I’m extremely interested in Heroism badges because they allow you to buy some Heirloom gear, which is account bound and can be sent to lower level toons for xp bonuses.  The gear grows with the character, readjusting their bonuses as the level increases.

I’m getting a little of topic, I suppose. 

What I’m trying to say is, I’m excited about the Dungeon Finder and plan on taking full advantage of it.  I love the fact that I don’t have to spam for groups, worry about being rejected for gear reasons, etc.  Though, part of the new system is the ability to kick someone from the party, with enough votes, so I suppose that could still be a problem.  From what I understand, the system compares gear, and will usually place an undergeared toon in with some overgeared toons so the party won’t be too hampered.  I’m still buidling up badges to upgrade my equipment, so it’ll take me some run time.  But, you can’t upgrade if you don’t run, so it’s a bit of a catch if you start getting kicked from groups. 

All of you folks that have never wanted to group before, you have to give this a try.  Pretty much everyone I’ve grouped with, so far, has been nice, gets in there and kicks butt, and I’ve only seen the group vote to kick once, and that was on a priest who wasn’t healing during fights.  We all died (including the priest), well, I feigned death because I was the only one left and the mobs were heading my way!  It all turned out good, though, as we hardly had to wait at all for a replacement to be sent in.

Dungeon Finder is also a great, quick way for casual folks to get their raiding in without having to wait for guild runs or, as I already said, spam trade or worry about being rejected.  Now, no one really has a reason to complain about not getting good gear.

So, go try it out, don’t be afraid.  The worst that can happen is you get voted out of a group, but it does have to be unanimous, I believe.  Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go collect some badges.

Engadget’s Barnes & Nobel “Nook” Review

It isn’t the greatest review, but as far as the complaints, I assume that could all be fixed with a software update. 

Read the full review here: Barnes & Noble Nook Review (Engadget)

19 More Days ‘til Christmas

“It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, every where I go!”

Well, not really.  It could have looked a lot like Christmas Saturday, but for some odd reason the 1/2-inch of snow everyone else got completely skipped us.  It doesn’t really feel like Christmas to me, yet, either.  We have our Christmas tree up, a few knick-knacks set out, gifts wrapped and under the tree, but, as with last year, I haven’t completely let the season overtake me.  I can honestly say that it isn’t the economy or even money that has me shuffling about.  We (my family and I) have been very, very blessed to have not been affected, so far, by the past years economic downfall.  I’ve been lucky enough to still have my job (knock on wood and praise the man upstairs) and we’ve done pretty decent with our money.  It is looking to even be a comfortable Christmas, despite my being off a week without pay from work (well, not just me, but you know what I mean).

Anyways!  It has been a nice and uneventful weekend.  Yesterday, Noah and I wrapped gifts, ordered pizza, popped popcorn and watched “Night at the Museum 2.”  Today, I’ve done as little as possible, taking off some trash, picking myself up a bite to eat (yes, 2 days of buying food, I’m splurging a bit), and cleaned up the garage a bit, digging out what little outdoors Christmas decorations we have.  At some point this week, or perhaps next weekend, we’ll hang our lights, put up a reindeer skeleton, some candy canes and a little Santa train along the front porch.  Aside from that, we don’t go too far out with the decorations, at least, not this year. 

Gift-wise, there is one more thing I’d like to pick up for my mom and a couple of more items I’d like to get for Jenn.  Noah is completely done, aside from any add-ons we might see or hear him mention at some point between now and then.

So, that’s my “personal” post for the weekend.  I hope all of you are doing well and preparing for a great holiday with friends and family.  In the meantime, hang in there and watch as little television news as possible to keep the cheer up and the blood pressure down ;)

Fun While It Lasted

Well, it was fun while it lasted.  Yes, there for awhile, I was a daily-running fool.  I even discovered a section of Icecrown I hadn’t been to before: Death’s Rise, with dailies to help raise your Ebon Blade reputation. 

Alas, all good things must come to an end.  I broke my streak because it became an issue to run everything I wanted to run in one night, and impossible to finish it up in the daylight hours of the week.  There is family and chores to be attended to, you know.  And as far as my nightly ventures, I decided to focus mainly on my cooking and Argent Tournament dailies.  Of course, I have been trimming my time down there as it is, doing select dailies to earn badges and marks.  It impairs my growth, but it isn’t going to kill me, I mean, hell, it took me two hears to reach 80 on a single toon. 

But, yeah, I just wanted to complain about my laziness.  Plus, while leveling my death knight, I’m reminded of all the other daily quests I passed up the first time through that can raise my reps with various factions (Wyrmrest Accord, I’m looking at you!). 

And now, it’s back to folding clothes.