Winter’s log, earthdate 201601.24

Well, here I am – a little later than I would have liked to have been, but we had a good solid day in Draenor – we even went up a level! I did die, once – I’m not quite sure how it happened – we were fighting an Elite “Boss Mob”, and I was watching my health, and that of my Pet, fairly carefully… but, one minute we were both fine, and the next? I was dead – and my Pet wasn’t! Go figure! He was supposed to be helping and protecting me! No liver treats for Boojums tonight! 😉 I guess I must have zigged when I should have zagged, or something, but I got better (death is such a transient state in these games!) and Julian and a few NPC “extras” killed the nasty Elite Boss, and all was well! 🙂 We did spend a fair bit of time in our Garrisons though, as there’s still a lot to be done there – I can easily see it becoming a distraction from the questing we’re supposed to be doing (and also, a lot of the questing is actually for the Garrison!) I have a strange feeling that it won’t be long before the Garrisons become our main base of operations in Draenor – I’m not sure what Julian’s up to in his Garrison, but I’ve just built a very nicely appointed Inn, a Storehouse (with a personal Banker in it, no less!) and an Enchanter’s Study. Now you’ve probably heard me muttering in the past about “DE-ing” things, or “disenchanting” them down to their basic components, which can then be used by the Enchanter to make new and better frills and fancies for your armor or weapons – or sold on the Auction House (hopefully for a profit!) Now, normally, only an Enchanter can “disenchant” items, meaning that if you don’t have an Enchanter in your Guild, you either have to use the Chat window to ask (read: beg) for either a kindly disposed, or a bored, Enchanter to disenchant your goods for you – for which service he or she usually expects a handsome payment. Honestly, it’s quicker and easier just to Vendor the goods for a pittance – which is what most people do. Anyway, getting back to this truly amazing Enchanter’s Study that I’ve just built in my Garrison, anyone, Enchanter or not, can just come in and use your Study to DE (“disenchant”) items! This is très cool! 🙂 – And this is just the “first rung of the ladder” of possible Garrison Buildings that you can put up! I’m hoping that somewhere along the line we’ll be able to get access to a Guild Banker as well – otherwise the whole Garrison set-up is rather pointless – I mean, what’s the point of having everything but the kitchen sink in your fabulous Garrison, if you still have to go to a far away capital city to get to your Guild Bank! I shall do some more research into that… So, we rode around Draenor in Mouselet’s motorbike and sidecar, dragging whole “trains” of ravening creatures behind us – and had a really good time. As I said – I died once, but it didn’t last, and Julian didn’t die at all! I do most definitely have to go in and tidy up not only my own personal banking slots, but also the Guild Bank, which hasn’t been touched for about four years! It’s crammed absolutely chock-full with archaic weapons, and gear that’s no longer needed, or even, in a lot of cases, relevant any longer! Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll get much of a chance to do anything tomorrow morning before the Funeral, and my favourite eldest daughter will probably be over on Tuesday – Wednesday we have the Burial Service to attend, so it looks very much as though I won’t be able to do any Bank Clearing until Thursday – if we’re not too busy unpacking boxes! 🙂

Food stuffz: last night we had sausages for dinner – the nice King Island Beef ones, with five chips, half of the last Heirloom tomato, and some green beans – all delicious, and  I had one of my raspberry licorice jellies for dessert. For lunch today, I had two Ryvita crispbreads with a thin layer of garlic hummus, sliced sandwich ham, some pieces of Halloumi cheese, with a couple of pieces of chopped up semi sun-dried tomato – and for once, I didn’t manage to tip it all over myself! 🙂 Tonight we’re having the marinated lamb back-straps which I’ve been talking about so much – not cooked on the BBQ this time – it’s not worth the hassle of cleaning up the whole BBQ for a couple of pieces of lamb back-strap – a small frying pan is a lot easier to clean (and can go in the dishwasher after you’ve rinsed it!)  so they’ll be pan-fried instead. I’ll let you know what they’re like, and if the marinade is any good, I’ll post the recipe for it here! 🙂 As usual, I’ll be having another of my raspberry licorice jellies for dessert… Hmm… I wouldn’t mind getting a few extra low-fat yoghurts, just to have as a change from the jellies now and then… they really are nice! (especially the “burnt fig and salted caramel” ones – I love figs, and I want to put in a fig tree – I think one should fit in the front garden…) So I’ve been being very careful with what I’ve been eating, and…

Weigh-in this morning. I almost couldn’t believe my eyes! Yes, I had gone down… just a bit… a whole eight points “a bit“! I went from 63.5kg down to 62.7kg. I now weigh less than I did when I was 16 years old! This is the lightest I’ve been since I was fourteen, and had just stopped doing ballet! I honestly didn’t expect to lose so much weight! I set my “goal weight” at 70 kilograms, but got myself down to 65, so as to have some “wriggle room” before I fattened up to 70 kilos. So, when I got to 65 kilos, I put myself on Maintenance, fully expecting my weight to start going up! But it didn’t. It just kept on going down… down to 64 kilos… then 63 kilos… and now I’ve gone down to 62.7 kilos! And, I’m eating! I’m eating! I’m just wondering where it’s going to stop and plateau out! Anyway, I really don’t want to go down too much more!

Even though we played WoW for most of the day, I still managed to get both of my 1.5 kilometer walks in – and I have to admit that breaking the five kilometer walk in half, and doing it in two “goes” is working out well! I don’t know that there are too many things quite as boring as walking mindlessly on a treadmill (I can sympathise with rats and hamsters!) but doing the distance in two lots of 25.5 minutes each makes it a lot more bearable, and it also makes it possible on Sundays to slot the second walk into my “lunch break” without interrupting “The Daring Duo’s Dreadful Deeds in Draenor” time too much. Talking about Draenor, I might get back into things after I finish writing this – and at least start to cull Wynterthyme’s personal Bank, as well as sifting through the stuffed-to-overflowing Guild Bank – and selling off its excesses might even give us enough money to be able to “donate” – through the Auctioning off of some vastly overpriced slices of watermelon – enough gold for our Horde counterpart to be able to buy their fifth and final Guild Bank Vault! And with that happy thought, once again that’s about it from me for this evening! 🙂 Don’t forget to look in again tomorrow night -I’m sure you’re all waiting with bated breath to hear what my weight did overnight! Did it go up? Or is it still going down! The phrase “I’m melting!” does tend to spring to mind – Julian says he feels cheated – he now has less wife than he had when he married me! And will I have made a start on the onerous job of spring cleaning the banks?! What other adventures may have befallen us? There is one thing you can all be sure of, though – and that is that you’ll find out all about it tomorrow night! 🙂 So, until then, do try to bee as good as you can, remember that it’s not good enough that we do our best; sometimes we have to do what’s required… and don’t forget to look after yourselves, to keep cool – or warm – depending on our silly summer weather, and to always drive carefully – but above all, please don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂