LFR, FTW!

So, umm, I wanted to write a new post about some WoW stuff that came out over the weekend at BlizzCon....but I feel the need to address something a bit more serious and personal, first.

This past week, my family experienced a tragedy. Specifics will be left unsaid because, frankly, it still hurts like hell, and it will for a long time. However, I will say this... life is fragile and short. If it can be helped, don't let a day pass without letting your loved ones know that you love them. Stop procrastinating. Because...well...just because.

Ok, now, indulge me in my avoidant coping behaviors as I write about some gaming stuff!

At BlizzCon, they announced the new expansion pack for WoW and gave us the cinematic trailer for it....and it was amazing!! Now, aside from a couple of random blood elves I've definitely been 'for the Alliance' all the way...but, c'mon...you can't see the trailer and not fangirl over Sylvanas in banshee form, not at least a little bit! If you haven't seen it yet, check it out!

It looks like Blizzard is shifting the focus of gameplay back to the faction vs. faction rather than both sides fighting the Legion.../shrug meh, okay. Sure, I suppose it will be a decent change of storyline...I'm hoping that means that they'll wrap up everything in the Legion expansion first, though. I'm currently crawling my way through Argus, confused, but curious to see where the story goes. [Not really a huge fan of Argus, tbh. Haven't played much of it since that patch came out.]

Another big announcement pertained to the development of Blizzard-operated Vanilla servers! Now, I'm one of those who played 'back in the day'...my first toons were during the original, vanilla days...the fabled days of hardship where quest tracking was an add on, you didn't get mounts until level 40, talent trees were complicated, and leveling a toon to max cap was truly an accomplishment! I can easily see where people are enchanted by the idea of revisiting the good ole days of WoW...before all of the expansion packs and simplifying of game play...but there's one particular feature that I've noticed that players are split on and quite unabashedly vocal about...

LFR/LFG [stands for 'looking for raid' or 'looking for group'] is a tool that came out in one of the expansions that allows players that are looking for groups to run dungeons/raids to be quickly grouped together...thus, allowing you to get to the gameplay fairly quickly! Now, before the implementation of this tool, it could be quite a chore to get a group together. Typically, you would have to travel to one of the major cities [larger city, larger population, more potential players to join your group]. Now, this would take you away from whatever questing  or solo grinding you were working on...meaning, while you're waiting to find a group, you can't earn xp and you can't work on leveling. [Definitely a drawback, in my opinion]

Now, unless you had a guild that was 'good' about running dungeons and such...most players were left to 'spam chat channels' to try and find players for the group. This consisted of 'LFM DM' or 'LF Tank, SM'...essentially,  you'd be left to constantly type your 'advertisemnent' into the chat channels, over and over again, until you ended up getting enough people to notice and join your group. I found that venture to be painfully time consuming! It wasn't uncommon for it to take anywhere from 30-45 minutes, sometimes over an hour, for a group to come together. And! After you finally managed to get a group assembled, there was no guarantee that all of the group members would stick around to make sure the dungeon was completed! Quite often, members would bail and that left you to start the whole cycle all over again. 

My fiancé posted a video about this on YouTube, yesterday, and the amount of crap that he’s gotten is a bit mind boggling. Anti-LFR players are vocal almost to the point of being rabid about their ‘if you use LFR, you’re a cissy noob that needs to stop playing’ mindset. It’s annoying. 

I mean, I’ll concede to point that it can’t be ‘100% vanilla’ if LFR is involved...that’s true! But is a tool that streamlined the gaming process and gave you more time to *gasp* play the game, the actual, literal ‘worst thing that ever happened’ to WoW?!? 

/shrug. Maybe it is. Maybe it is and I just don’t get it...but I seriously doubt it. I mean, did they not play during Warlords? Garrisons. Hello?? I, personally love the LFR tool! I’m not terribly social, and that carries over to gaming...so if I was ever in a guild, it was probably because I had real world friends in it, and I’m there for the guild perks. Because of that, I didn’t do dungeons or raids. I just didn’t! I didn’t want to waste the time I could use grinding experience standing around looking for a group. Plus! As someone with social anxiety, I didn’t want to risk ‘messing up’ and causing my group to fail [I actually still struggle with this, but not to the same extent] LFR kind of takes that social anxiety edge away, in regards to finding a group. I still get crap, sometimes, because I play a hunter and most other classes kind of hate us...but now, the game puts me in a premade group of players who all want to run the same dungeon, and I don’t have to worry about being ‘picked’ to play!

Also! As a working adult, parent, and family oriented person, I just don’t have hours and hours to waste sitting at my computer! Most nights, I don’t even log into WoW...but when I do, it’s usually during that magical little pocket of time after dinner and household tasks are done and before bedtime...I’m sure at least some of you know what I’m talking about! So, no! I literally do not have 45 minutes or an hour to wait for a group to form! One person commented that only ‘old people’ are so pressed for time...well, maybe! But most of us that played during vanilla (I was in college back then!) now have families, jobs, and many obligations that we simply didn’t have back then! Is that our ‘fault’? No, I don’t think so...rather, I think it’s pretty cool that despite the years passing and our lives evolving, we still find ourselves able and wanting to remain in the gaming community! WoW is often a huge part of who we feel that we are, and I truly appreciate being able to experience most aspects of the game, even though I can no longer spend countless hours playing. (Which wasn’t a smart thing to do, even back then...trust me!) 

Anyway. When it comes down to it, if someone wants to utilize a brilliant, convenient tool to play content in the most efficient way available, shut your mouths about it and let them use it. If not, stand around and yell at other players to join your cause...either way, aren’t we all just trying to play and enjoy the same game? There’s no need to be assholes about it ^_^ 

Costumes, Pumpkins, and Candy...

Hey guys!!

Hope you all had an awesome Halloween....hopefully scored some candy while getting to wear a cool costume...I absolutely love getting to dress up and go trick-or-treating...with the kiddo, of course! [Who am I kidding, I probably enjoy it more than the kiddo does!]

**Hiss**

This year, we went with a Minecraft theme...the kiddo was Steve, my fiancé was an enderman, and I was a creeper ^_^ I ordered the character 'box heads' off of Amazon and we all wore clothes that suited our characters...it was a lot of fun! However, for anyone considering buying the character heads, be warned that they're not very practical...the boxes are so big, it's nearly impossible to get them to stay in position...and it's even more difficult to position them so that you can see! It wasn't as big of a deal for me and the fiancé, but the kiddo ended up holding his Steve head most of the time.

Itsa Bendy!

One thing about Halloween that I like even more than trick-or-treating is carving pumpkins! Ever since those little pumpkin carving kits became popular, it's been one of my favorite autumn things to do...now, I'm decently proficient at using the carving tools and patterns, so I like to try and branch out and carve designs that aren't necessarily 'pumpkin patterns.' This year, my kiddo asked me to cave him a Bendy pumpkin [from Bendy and the Ink Machine], so I gave it a shot! What do you think? I think it turned out pretty darn good!

However, as much as I love celebrating Halloween with my little family, I'm definitely glad to have the holiday behind us...mostly because that means its that much closer to our wedding day!! [I know, I know...I'm sure all of you will be relieved when the wedding's over with and I start posting about other things!]

Well, between now and then, don't be surprised if there are another couple of wedding-related posts...especially as all of the pieces that we've worked so long and hard on start coming together! Plus! I've got to share my crazy stress stories with someone! ^_^

Monday Mini-Rant...

Well, it's another Monday...which wouldn't be a Monday without a boat load of stress!!

Today, I received a letter from my heath insurance company, notifying me of my wonderful annual rate increase. *eyeroll*

So, as of now, my monthly heath insurance payment is already more than my rent and car payment combined! And! With my lovely increase in cost, there's a decrease in benefits!! How lovely! *more eyerolling*

My coverage was already 'meh' in the first place...and, oh boy, I can't wait to start paying more for even less services!! *so much eye rolling, my eyeballs have fallen out of my head*

Angry face!!!

Now, I'll be the first to admit, I don't know everything there is to know about politics. And I don't know much about the health insurance industry and why it's so complicated. But, I do know that it's horribly broken and is beyond ignoring or passing along to the next batch of incompetent political blowhards. What crap is this?!? Muck up the insurance system so much that even the most basic of plans in unaffordable...and then, charge us a penalty fee when we can't afford it!! Seriously?!?

*sigh*

Sorry for the mini-rant there...

It's just super frustrating. The fiancé and I are trying our hardest to save up as much as we can...but life has this obnoxious habit of getting in the way.

However, as much as I'd like to continue to complain about finances, I also need to acknowledge some of the positives!

We are in the teens of days left until our wedding!!

My fiancé and I met with our pastor to go over and finalize the order of ceremony...and she liked what I'd come up with! [I brought her a copy of my working draft of the wedding program to look at] So, in the next couple of days, I'm going to go have them printed off ^_^

Also, this week, I'm going to pick up my dress from alterations and we're supposed to be able to pick up the kiddo's suit...

I can't wait for the wedding to get here....and to finally be finished with all the craziness that comes with wedding planning!! But, I wonder, what will my brain do with all the free time when everything's finished?!? [Mostly kidding! I'm sure my INFJ brain will find plenty of other things to ponder!]

Flowers, Timelines, and DIY...

Hey, hey!

Hope this post finds you well ^_^ I'm doing okay, just more of the same [work, parenting, wedding planning, repeat...]. Just a few more weeks, though, and wedding planning will be an ordeal of the past!

Since my last post, I've taken care of a few more wedding things! We've made a practice bouquet and boutonniere...and they both turned out surprisingly great! Feeling fairly confident that we could handle the flower arrangements for the big day, we went ahead and ordered the flowers today! [Such a huge relief!! For some crazy reason, flowers have ended up being a source of contention...flowers. Of all things...] So! I'm hoping that since they've been ordered, the flower drama will end! *happy dance*

There's been lots of pencil twirling and staring
at blank sheets of paper *sigh*

Over the last few days, I've been putting a lot of effort into coming up with and streamlining an order of worship and reception. [Man, I had no idea that I would have to come up with and place all the pieces to that puzzle! I guess I thought it would just...happen?]

I feel pretty good about the basic format and timelines I've come up with, and we meet with our pastor this weekend to hash out the details. As tedious as this has been, I can't help but start to get more excited about the wedding day!! Writing down the bits of our ceremony, I can't help but daydream and imagine what all of those things will be like....hearing the organ play, seeing all my friends and family there to support us, and *big smile* getting to marry my best friend and love of my life? Yeah. It's going to be pretty awesome!

We've also taken care of getting the kiddo a suit [he's going to look pretty darn snazzy!], getting some accessories for the groomsmen, and solidifying ideas for reception decor. I even got my fiancé to help out with painting some of our signs! [We're going to use these arrow signs to help guide our guests to the venue...gotta love country roads with spotty GPS service, right?!]

I feel like, as stressful as the whole ordeal is, all of the pieces are definitely starting to fall into place...

Guys...We're going to get married, and soon!! *squee!*

Progress

I can relate, Anne! (Anne of Green Gables ^_^)

Do you guys remember how upset I was over wedding planning details?

Well, I am in the depths of despair no more! (For now at least)

The last few days, we have made a pretty significant progresss! I’ve finished gathering gifts for my bridesmaids, my new veil arrived (and it is gorgeous!), I picked out a hairpiece and earrings....we ordered our favors for our guests, ordered our cake topper, and made some good decisions on reception decorations!

I went out to our wedding and reception venue with my grandmother and the lady that will be playing organ for our ceremony...she said the organ plays great, and it sounded wonderful! 

We picked out songs for the singers that will perform during the ceremony (guys, it’s going to be awesome!) and we’re starting to pull together everything we need for programs...

And earlier today, I took my dress to get it altered. I haven’t seen myself in it since the day we bought the dress, which was almost 9 months ago! Luckily, it doesn’t have to be altered too much...it’s a bit too long, but when you’re short, everything’s too long! I do feel good about my dress though! I was a bit torn about the dress, my mom had mentioned that it might be too plain. But seeing myself in the dress again definitely helped! It is a simple dress, but it rather suits me ^_^ I’m not really a fancy, glam kind of girl...so I think keeping the dress on the simple end of things makes more sense! 
Besides, the new veil that I picked out will really tie things together...it’s longer than my original one and it has beautiful lace appliqué...I think the veil being a bit ‘fancier’ will help to balance out the simplicity of the dress. After the dress alterations are complete, I’ll definitely try it all on together ^_^ (crossing my fingers that it looks like I think it will!)

Continuing on the progress train, we are going to pick up my fiancé’s suit today!! I’m super excited to see how handsome he’ll look in his suit! (I think he’s excited about it, too!)

See what I mean? We’ve made progress! 

Oh yeah! I forgot to mention that we’ve figured out a contingency plan in case of rain! The man that owns the venue has a ‘tent guy’ that we can rent a tent from, if we need to. It’ll be an extra expense, of course, but one that can’t really be helped...unless it doesn’t rain! (I hope it doesn’t!) 
In the next few days, we are going to get a suit for the kiddo and order flowers and ribbon...and we’ll order tablecloths and design our programs...and we are going to check into getting our wedding license!!!!

It won’t be too much longer now, I can’t wait! 

Frame Rates and Forgiveness...

Hey guys!

So, some good news...my computer is up and running again...mostly. It's definitely more functional than before I took it to the shop, but it's still very much on the struggle bus.

The tech guy put the cheapest, most basic hardware into my pc, just to get it up and running again. Which is fine, if you don't use your pc to game with...but, I do!

Long story short, my computer is still pretty broken. It will run World of Warcraft, surprisingly...but it completely derps when my kiddo tries to play Minecraft Story Mode. [My incredible fiancé stepped in to save the day and got me a new graphics card that was a huge upgrade! However, it didn't solve the problem] So, it seems the saga of the broken pc continues...

In other happenings, I've been struggling with something lately...

I noticed that I have a really hard time letting things go. [slightly embarrassing to admit, but it's painfully true]

More than a few times in the last month or two, the topic of forgiveness has come up in our bible study lessons and sermons... and it's kind of stuck with me as something I need to work on...especially if I expect to receive forgiveness, myself!

There are certain situations and individuals that I wholeheartedly admit to purposefully holding on the hard feelings over...though, I'm not sure why, exactly. [If there ever were a time to delve into whether or not you hold grudges, it's when you're trying to decide who to invite to your wedding! With so many potentially hurt feelings at stake, I've had to consider getting over past hurts for the sake of having everything go as smoothly as possible!]

If I'm being honest, I don't know why I intentionally choose to hold on to hard feelings...it's certainly not beneficial, and I know that. Especially if the 'offense' was particularly minor, maybe even silly, in hindsight. I know I should be a better person, take a deep breath, and let go of past hurts and resentment...but dang it, it's hard!

Why is it so hard? Is it pride and ego? Or maybe habits of the heart?

Regardless of the cause, I realize this is something that I need to work on...any tips? Seriously. Any advice at all would be enthusiastically welcomed!

Alrighty, I've got a kiddo to get ready for bed...hope you all have a great night!

Wednesday...

More wedding updates!

We finally applied for our passports! Passport applications are stressful, for whatever reason...and they're quite expensive! One thing's for sure though, I know we're both glad to have passports out of way!

Another wedding thing: I ordered our invitations today!

I'd put off ordering invitations because I couldn't decide on a ceremony time. But, this morning, I bit the bullet, chose a time, and finally settled on an invitation design! Plus, there was a fantastic deal for wedding invitations on Groupon. I got the invitations and RSVP cards for about 40% of actual cost! **happy dance** With the wedding getting more and more expensive, I'll gladly jump on just about any opportunity to save money. We're doing pretty good about staying on budget, but the goal was to come in as much under budget as possible...

Not much else is going on for us right now; more of the same work/school, home, sleep, repeat. Gotta love that daily grind, eh?

Sidenote: I'm very weakly setting a personal goal to try to lose a bit of weight before the big day...the fiancé and I have been talking about it since long before we even got engaged, but we haven't really made any of the changes needed for results. I'll keep you guys posted about this, hopefully I'll have some positive updates for you, next week!

Wedding, Wedding, Wedding...[and More Wedding!]

Okay, so I'm going to have to start this post off with a little complaint...

See that?? See how bent and wonky the left side of that gate is?!? That's the gated entrance to where I live...the gate had been fixed for about 3 days when that happened [this is after it had been inoperable for months!]. This, people, is why we can't have nice things. /smh

Busted gates aside, we've had a busy and productive(ish) couple of days!

Over the last week, my fiancé picked out his suit for our wedding and also picked out suits for the groomsmen! That's one detail that I think both of us are pretty glad to have out of the way!

Another pre-wedding accomplishment: We've started our pre-marriage counseling sessions!
Maybe not the most exciting bit, but I am glad to have the opportunity to sit down with our pastor and talk about potential issues that might arise after we exchange vows. Our pastor is really nice and pretty easy to talk to, so I think all of the sessions will go really well. ^_^

Another substantial thing we can check off the wedding 'to do' list? Rings!!

We finally got to pick up our wedding bands! We picked them out and bought them a couple of weeks ago, but they needed to be ordered since they were 'custom bands.' [I don't really quite understand how they were considered to be custom bands...all we did was have them ordered in our sizes....which are common sizes....sooooooo....???] Little frustrations aside, I was outright giddy when we got the phone call saying we could pick them up! I think my fiancé was equally excited about them, we went the very next to get them. Naturally, we tried them on, and let me tell you....we're totally stoked about getting married! I might be a bit biased, but we look pretty dang awesome with wedding bands on!
And, finally, I had my trial run for my bridal hair and makeup! I think it turned out pretty well...it's more makeup than I typically wear, but I think that's normal for wedding looks. I'm happy with how it turned out, so that's officially one more thing to check-off!

I know that's a lot of wedding updates...promise that wedding stuff doesn't typically take up that much of our daily lives, but it sure did the last week or so!

That's about all I've got for now, hope everyone's having a great week so far! /waves

Updates...

Hey guys!

Hope you're all doing well, I know it's been a bit since I've posted and I apologize...I've had a definite lack of time to write lately, and I've also been pretty stumped on what to write about. So, that being said, if you have any suggestions, let me know!

Since my last post, there's been a few things of note to happen. Here's the quick re-cap!

Me and my fiancé, just before my birthday dinner

• I had a birthday!! Now, I'm not embarrassed by my age, but I'm definitely no longer at the point of being excited by birthdays...however, this one was pretty nice ^_^ I got home in time to spend the afternoon and evening with my wonderful fiancé. We went out to a really nice dinner, spent some quality time together, and then got to watch a seriously kick-butt episode of Game of Thrones...yep! Definitely my kind of birthday!
• If you noticed, I said "I got home in time," which suggests that I'd gone somewhere...which, I did!! Last weekend, I took a quick road trip to Baton Rouge to visit with my roommate from college and her wonderful family. I had a great time and can't wait to see them again in a few months for *drum roll* our wedding! (Eek!)
• Some wedding stuff is falling into place...it's hard to believe that in just a little over 3 months, we'll be married! I'm sure that there are dozens of little details that still need to be attended to, though.
• School has started back for my kiddo...I cannot believe how quickly the summer flew by! I swear that time moves much, much faster than it did when I was a kid!
• I haven't been gaming much, lately. I just haven't had time! Not that it's a terrible thing, at all...but it makes it harder to write about gaming if I'm not playing at all!

*Ponders*

Well, I think that might be about it! I will try to be better about posting on a somewhat regular basis, promise!

Until then, hope you guys have a good week!