Caaaaaaaaaash

   So here's a quick heads up on mah cash situation. I decided I wanted to try to be a little bit more business like about how I deal with my money in game. Not that I want to be like Ebenezer and hate people without it, but just not as wasteful in the spending, and more productive smarter in the making of it. 

    To that end I started liquidating my unused items via the AH (Auction House), this put me up to about 3.6k gold. I decided to make an investment and try to actively make money. I bought 218 eternal earths for ~ 6.25G each and made them into rings to disenchant. This made roughly 287 infinite dust, 29 GCE, and 5 shards.

Here's the outcome:

Investment:

Roughly 1362.5G (I need to keep better track next time)

Base Product:

109 Stoneguard Bands (got a guildie to make them and forced him to take 50G for the work)

Manufactured Product:

287 Infinite Dust

29 Greater Cosmic Essence

5 Dream Shard (Which I kept)

Outcome:

287 * 4.5G each = 1291.5G

29 * 25G each = 725G

Total = 2016.5G

Return On Investment:

1.43 (Total result / (investment + processing cost))

    Now I realize that I used decimals so you might be tempted to think those numbers are exact, but they're not. I basically bought all the eternal earths on the market that were

    So I made ~600G in about half an hour, the selling took longer, but I usually just count the time actively spent making it.

    I plan on trying to find some other stuff that's cheaply made and resold, but atm enchanting is my on high level skill, so we'll work with that. Further reports on a later time!

~ish/joe

Hmm

    Okay, so I started reading Greedy Goblin about a week ago just to try and make some cash. For those who don't know he's a fairly popular WoW blogger who has amassed a fairly insane amount of gold. And I'm trying to be a little less dependant on farming and dailies for cash.

     The reason I bring this up? Well he made a post about a conversation he had, it was pretty funny, but he went and posted another one, which wasn't so funny. I mean, he really was kind of rude to the person asking him. This bothered me at first, but later when I checked back for some reason he had removed the post saying he was going to post about it today.

     Fastforward to today, here's the post. Go read it real quick. Okay, on one hand I kinda still think he was rude, but on the other hand he has a really valid point.

     I've taken a communication class, and my mom has her bachelor's in communication and I recognize all of the ploys he's talking about (go edukayshun!). I've run across that sort of thing, though usually not that polished a lot. Usually from random strangers asking me to run them through VC or Stocks.

    Now I have absolutely no problem with running guildies through. Heck, usually I offer to do it first, just because it's fun. But even if they asked me, that's why we're in a guild, happy to oblige. But total strangers? Another story.

    The point of this? I'm not really sure. I guess just to help people understand that you can say a firm no to really nice people without needing to feel rude. Was he perhaps a touch ruder than needed? Maybe, but he also helped that person understand that he was asking a silly question, which he might not have.

    Welp, that's about it, cash post coming soon!

~joe/ish

What fun!

    Okay, so classes started this week, and I forced myself to be there on time, and even had the book for most of the classes. Of course I did check with the professors first, but I usually just wait. 

    Soooo, last semester I disliked the vast majority of my classes. A fair amount of that had to do with the teachers, but the classes themselves just weren't interesting/challenging. I mean I did have some good moments in Intro to the Internet (which surprised me) while doing some of the html assignments. And intro to databasing was more interesting than it sounds, but the others were mostly a drag.

    Here's a recount of school for this semester:
Programming Fundamentals 2 (3 hours, intro to C++): Awesome teacher and interesting class =D
Intro To Web Programming (3 hours, javascripting): Awesome teacher (same as the last one) and a fun class with a co-worker as a fellow student =D
Internship (4 hours, aka work): What? You're paying me to go to get credits? FTW!
Advanced Database (3 hours, online, mostly using Access): Nice teacher who, while having deadlines when stuff must be done, will let us work as far ahead as we want. Including letting us take the final when we want. Can we say finishing mid Feb?
Network Security (3 hours, 1730-2145 Wed): Fairly fun class, read the chapter before class, he talks for ~1-2 hours about said chapter, you labs, you go home. Grade is completely made up of three test OR you pass the compTIA Security+ cert and get an A, regardless of scores. Can we say hopefullyfinishingbeforeApril?
System Analysis And Design (3 hours, mainly project management, 1800-2100 Thu): Odd teacher, but he does seem like he honestly wants to get us all jobs before we finish the semester. Not at his place exactly, but through class projects hook us up with local companies. 

    That's most of what I'll be up to besides work, which happens 7-11 M-Th and 700-1330 Fri. Except when I go in for extra, or tell them ahead of time and do something else. Mainly I just need to do 20+ hours a week. I'm aiming for a solid 24/wk with bumps upwards as time goes on and I get more acclimated to school/work. Or get more poor.

    Now that the real world is accounted for we move on to a recount of the WoW stuff:
Vishni (66 Shaman): Currently enhance spec, but planning on moving to elemental come 80. Currently moving along nicely towards 80, hopefully get into Northrend sometime this weekend.
Ishvi (80 Paladin): Ishvi is very strongly holy atm, but the last two raids I've logged on around had WAY to many healers, so he may see some ret action depending on how long it takes Vish to get up to 80. Hopefully she'll be my dps toon and Ish will stay heals until he can dual spec tank/heals.
To all my other characters: Look forward to being bank alts for a very, very long time.

    I think that about wraps it up. So I'll be talkin' to ya'll later. =D

~joe/ish

p.s. See! I can write short posts!

The New Year: Part 2

     Now comes the non-WoW part of the new year. The part where I take a look at what I've done, what I'm doing, and what I plan to do. Now while I sit back and relax to tell you how it might be, go make me a sammich. No? Well then sudo go make me a sandwich! Why thank you!

     So where was I the start of last year? At work, kinda aiming halfheartedly towards a nursing degree. I had signed up for a couple classes for the spring, no real passion to go though, just the certain knowledge that I had to do something. So we go through that semester, I get my butt handed to me in one class (A&P_grade = 'C'), and manage to do a decent job in the other (Microbiology_grade = 'B').

     Why did I do so poorly? Oh quite a few reasons: I wasn't really interested. It really didn't make any sense. I worked lots of night shifts. I started play WoW again towards the end. And I'm really bad at rote memorization.

     I also volunteered to go do child care in Germany for two weeks for a mission conference in July. Not really important here, but comes into play later on.

     So here comes the summer, I was ready for it! I even had a plan to keep me busy and away from playing to much WoW. I was gonna (sorta) work for one of my doc friends helping him clear property to (eventually) build a sort of missionary resort dealie. This was also gonna help me get some funds together to play for my mission trip.

     So I went out working with him, and he's a great man of God so I started talking to him about what I'm doing in life. How I'm kinda wanting to do nursing, but most of that has to do with the fact that I adore my co-workers, no real love of the work itself, and no real natural talent in that are. Other than usually being pretty good at taking care of people. After we talk and pray about it some we both kinda come to the conclusion that I was just doing nursing for my co-workers. All of my natural skill/talent leans towards computers. 

      About this time is when is when my plans started coming down. First the government decided that I owed them something in the neighborhood of $25,000 and they weren't going to force me to pay it immediately, but they were going to confiscate my $813 tax rebate and continue taking any more I had until I paid them back. This was a problem because, well, not only did I not have the money and needed that rebate, I also did NOT owe them $25,000. Or any money at all.

     Cherry on the cake to that? My arm broke. Me and my friend were out clearing brush trees (DIE CEDAR!), namely chainsawing and burning them. Well he decided to start a patch on fire that was still up against the other stuff, planning on just moving the brush in as the fire consumed it. Or something like that. Anyways, I kinda raised objections, though I really didn't put enough force into them, but he did it anyways. The end result being it got out of control, he screamed at me, I ran over, helped him move one of the larger trees that was sorta on fire about to go up in flames. It caught on something, then got uncaught sending me about three feet in the air off an embankment and instead of falling on my nice large rump, I put my hand down to catch myself. Craaaaaaaaack.

     So there I was, nothing to do but play WoW. Short a LOT of money for my mission trip. And really, really bored. So what did I do? I played WoW and got a lesson in humility by having to ask people for money to the tune of roughly $2,000.

     Now I realize that missionaries do that sort of thing all the time. Heck, I've given money to them plenty of times, and I'm sure you have as well. But asking people for money? Yeah, I had a bit of a pride problem with that. Namely I always had enough money. Never asked people to pay for my meals, always tipped well, and always could pay for someone else to eat as well (though it might mean I ate Top Ramen for the next few weeks). Bit of a pride issue there.

     Anyways, God provided the money in time (like always) and I got to go on the trip. Woo! Which is a good thing too, it really reminded me how much I need him on a daily basis, not just Sundays and sad-days.

     Came back from the trip just in time to get ready for the school year. Pellgrant paid for everything plus a little (it ended up buying me WotLK =D) so I didn't have any financial issues in that regard. 
     
      The rest of the year kinda went smoothly. The only hangup being when I drove to my parent's house for my mom's graduation/birthday. Yeah, found out about 100 or so miles out of Waco that my front left brake was riding metal on metal. Made for a very prayerful trip to Las Cruces.

     But I made it there without any problems! No tickets, no major mechanical failures, no one peed in the car, and I didn't fall asleep/starve to death on the way! Buuut there was still the matter of getting my car fixed before I drove back (I know God is infinitely kind and merciful, but I don't usually feel like testing him).

     I was in luck though! A good friend of mine hails from El Paso. You wonder why this is lucky? Her dad owns a car shop! Yay for reliable mechanics! Got over there, got it fixed, found out I had WAY more problems than I thought I did, but still affordable!

     Well, I say affordable, theres a pride story in that one too. You see, I could pay for it right then, but that would leave me barely making it back, and no paycheck for two more weeks. This would be a far less than optimal situation, especially with that month's bills to pay.

     Usually I'd just borrow money from my Dad, he's great like that. But after having all the family down, helping pay for stuff, and graduating in general, funds were kinda in short supply there too. Not that he wouldn't have helped me, but there's a good chance he might have to put stuff on credit cards, and debt is icky, and if I won't put myself in debt how could I ask someone else to do it? Soooo, time to call people!

     But God has supplied me with an ample number of friends, good ones at that! So I called Jolene, who honestly counts more as a sister than a friend, and asked if I could borrow $274 or something like that. Namely the exact amount of the bill, and pay her back on my next paycheck. Her response? She gave me $300 and wouldn't let me pay her back. Dang women!

     Oh! And I got my spiffindefiliss internship! Which is actually where I wrote most of this, gotta do something on my lunch break after all. Welp, just about time to get back to work. I'll try to sit down this weekend at some point and describe how wonderful my job is, but that'll have to wait. This post is to long already!


~joe(ishvi)

p.s. sorry for the extended length and bad formating. I made it over a series of lunch breaks

A new year! Part one

     Ah, a new year is upon us. For many people this means many different things, new years resolutions, last party before the next semester, or just an opportunity to sit back and look at what we've accomplished.

     In this first post I'll cover what I've accomplished in WoW, I'll cover what I've done in real life tomorrow, or maybe Tuesday.

     Where was I at the start of last year? I was fiddling around on my rogue on Silvermoon, kinda hanging out with some old friends, making a few new ones, just generally wasting time, not even trying to accomplish anything. 

      Well, that changed shortly afterwards when my brother invited me over to play on Kael'thas with some of his blogger friends. Wanted me to transfer characters and all. I thought he was kinda nuts myself, I mean, really? You read these peoples blogs and you want me to change servers to play with ya'll? Neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerd alert!

     But reservations aside I hoped over to 3B's site and read the guild charter, and was actually pretty intrigued. I mean, it sounded like a pretty good set up of intelligent people acting like adults. However I was not to be swayed that easily! It's fairly easy to put down a beautifully sounding charter on paper, but acting one out can be much more difficult.

     So I decided to roll an alt, you know, just a quick something so I could say I tried and then go back to my rogue and friends-who-were-slowly-not-playing-anymore on Silvermoon. Rolled a human pally, why? Well, I'd heard paladins could solo insane amounts of murlocs with very little trouble and that appealed to me...but also the RP behind them.

     Now, I don't RP, pretty much ever. I do however associate with my characters. While I may not be them myself, I have to be able to see something in them that I would want to be around. This is why I've never gotten a warlock past level 20-something. I honestly don't think I'd hang out with someone who had a succubus at their beck and call, even if they never did call it. But a paladin? I'd so hang out with a paladin, he heals, he smites undead and demons (I really don't see much of a difference), and he protects what is important to him, the people.

     Anyways, so I roll a toon, apply on the guildportal and start playing. Well whaddya know? The people acted pretty much the way the people I hang out with act. Nice, friendly, and a few people I can jab in the ribs with sharp sticks in return for jabs (that goes for you Aloix/Ash if ya'll still read it). Oh, and they're helpful, need help with an instance? They'd almost fight over it sometimes! To many people sign up for something? They would fight over who sat out, and I mean they wanted to sit out so other could get their giggles.

     This inspired me, I mean, playing was fun again, for more than just the game. So in a fairly short, not record setting by any means, but fast for me, I made it up to level 70, my first toon to hit max level. That's where the fun stuff started happening.

     First, I had researched how to tank and what was needed, after all I didn't want to come off as a complete idiot (though I know I did at times). But, well, do you know who writes guides to how to tank as a paladin? Main tanks. I don't know of a single guide out there on how to offtank something. So when I finally got into raids I had no idea how to not be the main guy, but no actual experience (or much of the needed gear).

    Second, well, my personality in normal 5-mans started coming out. I like doing stuff, I like doing it in waves and quickly, being spontaneous and off the wall. This might have gotten us wiped a few times. Just a few. So I ended up getting compared to the famous Leroy Jenkins. A lot.

     But eventually I did manage to get to doing a good job tanking though. No where near the level of a certain tank we all know and love, but I could get the job done, usually anyways.

     However time passes and with the new expansion coming out last Nov I had a chance to do something I had never done before: actually do new content as it came out. Is it important to do stuff right off the bat before other people do it? Nope. Should you put important stuff to the side so you can be the first one to do that mob? Heck no! Is it really fun to do it when you can though? Oh heck yeah!

     So I started looking for a raiding guild, but I was hampered by something. You see, not only are the Sidhe Devils an awesome group of people (and the new guild would have to live up to them) but I heartily believe that RL comes first, and that's part of what made live with the SD easy. If RL stuff hits the fan theres not a person in there that will try to guilt you into playing the game instead of taking care of whatever needs to be done. Family always comes first.

     But I waited long enough and good things came! While in NM for my mom's graduation and subsequent birthday (go you mom!) I ran across some people who thought I'd fit in with them and we gave it a shot. It went beautifully, the raid times matched pretty well for me and off we went.

     Since then I've cleared 10-man Naxx, almost all of 25-man Naxx, and 25-man Sarth. Were we server first? Nope. Did I have a lot of fun doing it? Heck yeah! Did I possibly spend to much time to do it? Eeeeh, maybe.

     Anyways, that catches me up to where we are these days, and it's far past time for me to hit the sack. But I have one last question before I go. Just out of general curiosity, why do you play the class you play? Is it the class mechanics? The RP? The fact that it's the one you got leveled and you don't want to bother leveling another? Just out of curiosity.

~ishvi/joe

p.s. Sorry about the long unorganized post, I started writing it while tired, and just kept going