Sleepypete's Pillow

Scarlett Johannssen….

Joins SleepyPete in dreamy moment….

Here at the Family Aginoth place today. We be watching a heap of dvds and nattering.

Lots of natter about blogs cos they’re even more addictive than things like World of Warcraft.

Seen Scooby Doo 1 so far, which is good fun and has Linda Cardellini in it, which is enough to keep me happy. We’ll be watching The Island later. Hmm. Scarlett Johannssen. Hmm.

Dreamy moment – Please wait until normal service is resumed

Ah – that’s better. More later maybe. Currently sitting here, stealing an Aginoth laptop, writing this entry with an evil grin on my face. Muahahahaha !

It’s funny how a job that needs a huge amount of concentration and attention paid to it gives you a rush when it ends up as a job well done. I took my warrior into the Lower Black Rock Spire today, to help a few people through a quest sequence.

How did it go ? Before that, I’ll give a little history. We’ve hammered at this place before and it wasn’t pretty. It took a lot of effort and frustration to get the job done. Tonight, the team was Zalzar healing, Tauranius doing everything, Tarook being mage and Augorn being ranged damage with his hunter. My job, as the professional punchbag (aka warrior) is to hit enough things just enough, so that the bad guys hit you instead of the more vulnerable people. How did we do ? We aced it … We died about 3-4 times but you expect that. Sometimes you just can’t stop extra mobs coming in, which is when you have lots of problems. But despite that, we got all the way to the end, with the bosses (toughest things in the area) not knowing what hit them.

How did I do ? I run something called damagemeters, which is a stats person’s dream. Even though I only contributed 1/7th of the damage, between 5 people, I hogged 54% of the damage done to us 🙂 Which, considering that a hit on me does half the damage that a hit on a mage or priest would do, I’m pretty impressed with that. However, it helps having a decent priest to keep you alive. We announced what we’d done on the Guildlink chat channel and were greeted with disbelief 🙂 Think I’ll be walking my warrior into future raids. When I take my breaks from semi WoW retirement that is …

Oh yeah – I got to spend an hour in the same room as the lovely Miss L while at work, so a very good day all round.

Ha – I’ve been struggling for the past 15 minutes to figure out something to put today, so I thought I’d give a little bit about me. Things that people who know me now have only seen glimpses of.

Curious ? Muhahahaha !

What do I do ? I’m an Electronic Engineer by trade, specialising in computers and software. I studied at Nottingham University, taking 4 years to do a Masters in Engineering. Since then, I haven’t actually used much of what I learnt in the lecture hall, I’ve used what I learnt at home with the PC instead. I’m still using that as well … You see, I build my own computers, have done for 10 years now, starting with my second. It’s a pretty good way to get something better without spending huge amounts in one go.

I’m now using that Electronic Engineering to help out on a project that needs a lot of computers to work together, in different linked systems. They need to pass data around between them, they need to be robust and they need decent performance. And they need to be usable by normal people. So that’s what I do ! I try to get my fingers into absolutely everything …

Fun 🙂 Especially when you get full clearance to do digging where people didn’t really want to tell you anything.

Back to uni – 4 years at Nottingham, where I met friends who I’ve kept up with since leaving. There’s 1 or 2 Centre Parcs trips every year, where we meet up, play games and where I get challenged at badminton. The fella I was chatting to on Eve last Sunday is one of those friends.

1st year – I got second in the year, with an 82% average. I also met someone called Alyse who I eventually ended up going out with in my second year.
2nd year – Alyse and the PC appeared … and my work done amount suddenly went through the floor … Oh yeah – I was also the van driver for the hall shop, which my Astra didn’t thank me for.
3rd year – Living in a house with Alyse and Fraser (Maths grad, very smart – First +10% probably). Moved into the house to find Alyse curled up with some other bloke … End of that relationship. Shame I still had to live there for the rest of the year. I spent most of the time at the uni hall with the Centre Parcs people.
4th year – Living with the Centre Parcs people. This was actually a fun year but I’d got disenchanted with the uni lecturers and uni method by then. If I’m looking at things that have been done many times before, I’m just not interested …

So that’s uni … and that’s it for now ! Especially as the dinner bell’s (microwave timer) been gonging for the past 5 minutes …

[chuckle] You should see how much a tag of “Guild Leader” can make people go on tippy toes … Definitely helps in the dominant and powerful bit 🙂

Except I’ve got rid of that tag now, I’ve passed it on as part of my semi-retirement from the game.

dominant and powerful…..snigger

🙂

cq

This one comes courtesy of time travel, as well as Craziequeen’s and Dawn’s blog. Tomorrow’s blog today ! After a gap, I’m trying to stay ahead.

Curious results … I can see some of it in me but not all. Wonder what other people think … I like the month bit. Easter comes in April, which means Easter Eggs. Best time of the year outside November/December.

Your Birthdate: November 13

You’re dominant and powerful. You always need to be in charge. While others respect your competence, you can be a bit of a dictator. Hard working and serious, you never let yourself down. You are exact and accurate – and you expect others to be the same way. Your strength: You always get the job done Your weakness: You’re a perfectionist to a fault Your power color: Gray Your power symbol: Checkmark Your power month: April

Ah well. My world of warcraft retirement lasted until today. I came back in to help out some guildmates carry out some murder, death, mayhem and destruction.

My job ? Take all the hits so they don’t have to … Did ok too, ended up as the top damage taker, which was good, because I was the lowest level there. Lower level means you don’t do as much damage, which makes it harder to persuade the mobs to hit you. Trick is to do a little bit of damage to everything, so it goes for you instead of the fella who’s trying to heal you.

The downside is that you don’t tend to do very much damage. It’s a selfless task, you need to go kamikaze because of the way the damage rules work. If a mob hits for 1000 damage, that damage gets reduced by armour. Bashara has lots of armour, giving around 55% reduction. That means that the 1000 hit only does 450 damage. With Iceangel, she only has 10% reduction, making that 1000 hit do 900 damage. If you also factor in the damage that can be taken, Bash can take 9 of those hits, whereas Ice will be dead after 3. So the aim is to get all of the hits going in against the tank, with the warrior class being specialised to have lots of tricks to persuade mobs to hit them.

It was pretty food fun too. Being the damage leader means I was doing my job properly, which was confirmed by no one dying over the whole time we were in there. Pretty decent achievement, although we were maybe a little overpowered for it. It’ll be tougher on Friday – will be tanking for a group in a harder instance.

Mostly avoided paying attention to everything outside the job at hand and I wasn’t in the capital city too much. The capital is where the morons tend to congregate.

On to Stargate … and then to Battlestar Galactica so I can see what happens before reading all about it on the work forums tomorrow.

I like Teamspeak, it’s a many to many voice communication thingummy that lets groups of people talk to each other online. Extremely useful for gaming as it means you don’t have to type things in and you don’t have to have a chat window open either.

Anyway, had Aginoth and Mrs A on there last night, running a Civ4 game as well and today I had Widget from Eve on there too. Widget is played by a very good friend from uni. Might even restart my World of Warcraft addiction by moving to his server.

(breakout – Bloody hell Claudia Black is hot. Watching the Stargate SG1 episode that introduces Vala)

Back to Eve – I’ve got to the point where I can ditch the starter ship in exchange for something far, far better. Merlin class frigate called Iceberg which lasted about 30 minutes before being blown out from under me by a pirate player. Ah well … Widget bought me a new one.

(Claudia Black is really hot) Glad I taped this SG1 episode – I’ve been ignoring the Channel 4 ones because they’re a season back on what’s on Sky. But Vala is definitely worth it. Might need a cold shower in a bit.

Saw this one on Mrs A’s Blog and couldn’t resist nicking it …

Here’s the original : The musings of a juggling mother: A new year meme

1. What did you do in 2005 that you’d never done before?
Visit a different continent – the USA

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don’t tend to make resolutions at a certain time of the year, but I do try setting targets for myself. The target for now is to get ready for a better season this summer, which means being ok to bowl, which also means losing a little weight (only about a stone).

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Heh – Mrs A – the person who I nicked this Meme idea from !

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No, unless you count the numerous times I killed off my World of Warcraft characters … (probably doesn’t count !)

5. What countries did you visit?
USA and Scotland. Hey ! When you don’t go to that many other countries, you have to include the really close ones ! Forgot Wales – visited there as well.

6. What would you like to have in 2006 that you lacked in 2005?
Company.

7. What dates from 2005 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
June. See above …

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Highest score batting – only 40 but it’s improving … Would have liked to get a bowling average under 20 as well (I should average 10) but the shoulder didn’t quite cooperate.

9. What was your biggest failure?
Keeping myself intact, failure to foresee what would happen after coming back from the States.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Muahahaha ! I always suffer injuries … I just play too hard. This year, it’s intercostal muscles on the right side and a reoccurance of the groin strain. No broken bones this year, as far as I know. I rarely feel the breaks. At least I didn’t tear up the shoulder again, just the rib area.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
I’m tempted to say World of Warcraft, because it kept me entertained for most of the year and it made up for the lack of company.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
The Crazies for putting up with me over a rough summer. Miss L for giving me some confidence back (she probably doesn’t realise that she got me back on the road to getting out of a deep depression pit). IT Girl for being an angelic pixie. Oh yeah – Zaphyr/Zalzar, Souleater, Re/Charge, Fubb and Makai.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

14. Where did most of your money go?
Mortgage and remortgage (having to release some equity because of what happened in June). Car for petrol, apart from that though, I’m pretty economical. £275 on a washing machine ?

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
The USA trip.

16. What song will always remind you of 2005?
Tough one – I’ll have to go for Free, a rare demo track from Alisha’s Attic.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:a) happier or sadder?
Little of both. The future is a little clearer and I don’t feel as if I’m marking time any more. Which makes me happier. Bit sadder though due to lack of company.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Getting out more. More exercise.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Snacking ! One of the things I’m trying to do now is to not eat when I don’t have to, instead of just constantly grazing.

20. How will you be spending New Year’s Eve?
Spent New Year’s Eve playing Eve, an online multiplayer game that I’m just starting out with. So a quiet night … Think I started my Star Wars marathon that night as well.

21. Did you fall in love in 2005?
Several times 🙂 But one now completely ignores me and I’m not sure about the other 2.

22. How many one-night stands?
None.

23. What was your favorite TV program?
Stargate Atlantis. Good start for that one takes it ahead of my other unmissable – ER, which has been slipping a little of late.

24. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
Hate is a sad waste of time and energy. There’s a few people who I’ll be avoiding over the next year or so but I wouldn’t say I hate them. Pity is a more appropriate word.

25. What was the best book you read?
I’ll go for 3 here, which still counts because they’re re-releasing those three as a single book. David Weber – Mutineer’s Moon, Armageddon Inheritance and Heirs of Empire.

26. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Being free to listen to music again instead of having to ignore cartoons.

27. What did you want and get?
England winning the Ashes back.

28. What did you want and not get?
An injury free year.

29. What was your favorite film of this year?
Serenity.

30. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
Bought donuts for the team at work, restarting a tradition that had faded 🙂 Went to see my parents and sister and got molested by the dogs. 31 this year.

31.What one thing made your year measurably more satisfying?
Being in control of my destiny again instead of having to manage and apologise for a manic depressive.

32. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2005?
Does it fit ? Does it have a subversive message, does it have any holes in it.

33. What kept you sane?
Work people, the Crazies, World of Warcraft core guildmates and joining them is this blog. This blog is letting me talk about the things that normally wouldn’t get known about due to not getting past the exterior. If someone asks me “everything ok?”, it turns me into a pathological liar because the alternative would be a thirty minute summary.

34. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Suzi Perry.

35. What political issue stirred you the most?
Iraq – should never have been sucked back in there by the Americans.

36. Who did you miss?
Family because I don’t go back to see them as much as I could. Brother still.

37. Who was the best new person you met?
Miss L.

38. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2005.
Make sure you can stand on your own before demanding help from others.

39. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
“I wrapped up all the love we had And threw it in your face” from Alisha’s Attic’s Valentines ’98.