Winter’s log, earthdate 201602.14

So, Happy Saint Valentines Day! 🙂 I don’t know about how all you lot spent your Romantic Day, but we spent our Day in Draenor, rushing hither, thither and yon, trying (sometimes unsuccessfully!) to make sense of the often horribly obscure quest instructions. Oh, sorry! What quest instructions?! At one point, you’re told that a comely young Mage is going to accompany you. You’re not told why – she says “Ready when you are!”, and you’re supposed to go off and… do what!? Oh, before you were introduced to the blonde Mage, you were given three tasks to complete, but never, at any stage, is it ever mentioned that those three tasks are the quest, and that the blonde Mage is actually the quest giver! So you dribble on down the road a ways, with your ditzy blond Mage in tow, and kill some large, bi-pedal purple monsters, which do at least drop one of the items on your “Three Tasks to Complete” shopping list. The road then comes to an end. The only way forward seems to be a very long, long drop, straight down, which you understand will lead to your immediate demise, so you straggle back up the road, killing more of the large, bi-pedal purple monsters, completing one of your three tasks. That’s where it dawns on you that the blonde Mage is the quest giver, because she suddenly develops a rather painful looking bright yellow question mark over her head! There’s a magickal portal at the other end of the road, so at your wit’s end, you step into it – and find yourself instantly transported to… a place that looks strangely like the place you’ve just come from – only it isn’t, of course – so it must have been my eyesight or something. Julian was doing another quest – the annoying thing about Garrisons is that they’re “individual” – as soon as you get your Garrisons, you and your team-mate are flung into exactly the same Garrison, only in different instances! We can see eachother’s little blue “team” dot, but we can’t interact with eachother – we can type to eachother in the Chat window, and of course we can talk to eachother because we’re both sitting in the same room in Real Time – and depending on how you’ve set your individual Garrison up, and depending on your individual talents, we often get given different quests which we can’t help eachother with. Some of them we can “Share”, when we meet up outside the boundaries of the Garrison, and some we can’t. Depending. So he was off doing one of his special quests, and I was off doing that stupid one with the blonde Mage, and I just got so fed up and frustrated that I went and played Solitaire until Julian finished his quest and could come and do that part of my quest for me to see what I was actually meant to be doing. I did get it done in the end, but not before cursing Blizzard to always wear their socks twisted – just enough to be mildly uncomfortable! Another quest we had to do, which was actually inside our Garrison (individually, in that we couldn’t see or help eachother) was to defend our Garrison against a large-scale invasion. Julian said to me, from his desk a few feet away, that it was imperative that I kept my Pet alive – I grimaced, because in order to keep my Pet alive, I have to keep sending it very weak “healing” spells, and of course then I can’t fight because I’m constantly sending off these (almost ridiculously weak!) healing spells. Well, the fight was quite chaotic – it was dark (as in night time) there were hundreds of these invaders – if I fired off just one shot, my Pet was left “slivered”, so I just stood there, getting attacked from all sides, while I manfully (or should that be “womanfully”?) kept Boo going… and I, of course, died… Julian (Mouselet) was even worse off than I was – same scenario, same attackers, same everything – except that he didn’t have a Pet to help him fight (not that I managed to do much fighting!) or even take the focus off him, so he died quite a few times. Still, we both dinged level 96, and I upgraded my Garrison “Storeroom” (where my personal Banker was) to level 2, with the addition of access to the Guild Bank from within the Garrison – hmm… I must find out if there’s a way to get an Auctioneer into the Garrison! I’d never have to go back to one of the big capital cities again! 🙂 So apart from a few death experiences, and my vast annoyance at some of the idiotic quest instructions (or rather the lack thereof!) that Blizzard come up with (they do it all the time – you’d think that I ought to be used to it by now, but no… it still riles me to the point of apoplexy!) we had a great day, and really looking forward to next Sunday’s “bash” 🙂

Food stuffz: dinner last night was sausages (King Island Beef), half a tomato, chips, and green beans, with a low-fat passionfruit yoghurt for dessert… and just before our lunch-break today, Julian went up the street to get some bread with which to make sandwiches for lunch, while I did my lunchtime treadmilling. You know, I think it really does make a difference if I walk before, or after lunch? I think I should always try to get my lunchtime treadmilling in before lunch – every time I do, my weight seems to go down (a little bit) more, the next day (of course, I could just be imagining it, or not remembering properly – I am getting old, you know!) We had ham, low-fat cheese, and home-grown tomato in our lunchtime sandwich, which was very nice indeed. And for dinner tonight we had omelets, with Halloumi cheese, onion, ham, red capsicum, and chopped parsley – I think Julian really makes the best omelets! 🙂 For dessert tonight I had one of those really weird “Chia Pods” – it’s weird because it’s sort-of “gloopy”, but it’s not “liquid” – it’s gelatinous, but then again, it’s not like a jelly… it’s ever-so-slightly “crunchy” (I suppose it’s crunchy the way I imagine caviar would be? Never having had caviar, of course, because I’m allergic to any form of sea-food) but it’s really too small to be really “crunchy” – it’s mild, almost bland – but it tastes “pleasant”, and it tastes “cool”, like chilled custard – and it doesn’t stick to the container or your spoon – it sort-of just slides off it… see? weird! But I do like it… and it seems to be pretty low in calories/kilojoules…

Weigh-in this morning. Well, I was really expecting to go up a few more points today – after eating that yummy wrap for lunch, and then sausages, chips, and a low-fat yoghurt at dinner – but in fact I went down one point – from 63.7kg to 63.6kg (and I did my lunchtime treadmilling before lunch yesterday, too!) Then again, my weigh-in yesterday could have been slightly “off” – it was done two hours earlier than usual… but we shall see what the scales have to say tomorrow morning… because I did have a very nice sandwich for lunch instead of Ryvita crispbreads, and a reasonably big omelet for dinner (not to mention that weird Chia Pod dessert!)

Tomorrow is going to be an interesting day! Our cleaning lady is coming in the morning (and this time I must not forget to get her to clean the glass brick window in my bathroom! Paul was supposed to have washed it down, but it’s really grotty – and I’ve been meaning to get K. to clean it every fortnight when she comes, but I keep on forgetting!) Clarke will be coming over sometime around midday (I think!) so I’d better have some sort of diagram or drawing/sketch ready for him regarding the aviary, and then Josh will be over in the evening to do my hair – shame he and Clarke won’t be here at the same time, because Josh knows what’s needed, and I don’t! Oh well, I’m sure I can find something amongst all the pictures I’ve been looking at! The trouble is, I know what I want built, but I don’t know how to draw it, or explain it properly in centimeters and square meters and stuff – when I said that I was “totally non-technical”, I wasn’t kidding, or just being modest, you know! I really meant it! So… tomorrow night’s blog could be quite entertaining (not to mention “colourful”, if I forget to get K. to clean my bathroom window – again!) And so once again, Gentle Readers, that’s really about it from me for this evening! 🙂 However, do call in again tomorrow night – to see if doing my lunchtime treadmilling really does make me lose more weight (or if I’ve gone disgustingly up again!) whether or not I was able to convey to Clarke what I actually wanted in the aviary, and if I remembered – this time – to get K. to clean the glass bricks in my bathroom window! However, until tomorrow night, remember that patience is a virtue, so do try to bee good, don’t forget that Motivation is what gets you started, and Habit is what keeps you going! and remember to look after yourselves, to keep cool – or warm – depending on the weather, and to always drive carefully… but above all, remember to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂