A week off.

Whoa. Holy Moly it’s been a while since I posted. That’s what having a week off work does for you. That and crazy children who sap your time like the desert heat saps your energy. Oh, they do that too. Thing is I really don’t mind as I work such long hours, when I get home when working, I don’t get to see them really apart from on the weekends. So, I had a nice relaxing week with the kids, enjoying breakfast out down the port every day, and sometimes visiting The Straw Donkey for their wonderful pancakes and lashings of syrup. Both my daughters love those. Like crazy. My one daughter who is only a year and a half old polished off a whole adult plate of pancakes a couple of days ago. Man she’s a tank. The woman at The Straw Donkey even came out to the terrace to ask if everything was ok, because my baby girl was shouting at the top of her voice (continually) “More! More!”.

Aside from that we have had a few days down the beach, chilling with family at the Chiringuito (Spanish Beach bar) and messing about in the sea and back at home by the pool. Some pretty valid family face time for sure. All good stuff.

But what about recreation when the kiddies have gone to bed? Well, you’ve guessed it, pretty much spent most of my spare time either playing EQ2, Lotro, watching The Office, Moto racing, re-reading ‘Legend’ by David Gemmell and er, oh yeah, I have had a few chats with me wifey too. Oh, and a beer or two.

EQ2 is getting better for me progression wise. I am finally starting to learn the new expansion. It’s at this stage I wish I hadn’t taken a break for about 5 months spanning the period when the expansion came out. I am consequently still behind and trying to catch up. I’m still at the stage where sometimes when discussing new content I really have no idea what I’m being told. I’ll get there I’m sure. It’s not the speed of advancement that bothers me (although it does a little bit..I like slow but crawl speed is a bit much). It’s the fact that I am missing out on groups and loots and by the time it comes for me to be back up at the top, I will still be behind. Maybe I should get back in to raiding when I get up there to boost my kit quality. Not sure If I’m bothered enough to make that time commitment to raid though.

I wanted to mention a new phenomenon I have not experienced previously to the degree I am now, and that’s the seemingly growing confidence people have in their abilities. Even when they are crap. This last week whilst I was off I have been involved in soooo many groups that have over estimated their ability and as such, usually around 5% exp debt later and only one or two named in to the zone I decide to move on. It comes to something when an 85 Dirge is grouped with a load of 90’s and is only being out-parsed occasionally. It shouldn’t be so. If you think about the levels of the mobs in the 90 instances, they are usually around 87-95th level and as such it should be harder for a level 85 to connect a hit. Luckily I did have a few exceptions, mostly guild groups. Part of the reason for this I’m sure is the amount DPS has increased this expansion. Those who are doing 4 or 5 k dps now are thinking wow, my dps has increased (when they were previously doing a smaller amount) but in reality they should be doing (depending on classes of course) but I would say on average they should be doing about 10k more this expansion at level cap.

I’ve started playing my Mystic again in EQ2 also. Just for a bit of light relief from dirgey or bruiser questing really. He now sit’s at level 76 and is progressing slowly but steadily. Since I made the choice to play him again I have been rolling for him on WoE runs and hopefully by the time he reaches 80 he will have most of his tier 3 armour. I already have two pieces for him.

Huge way to go though. Wifey informed me last night that she only needs two more pieces of armour to get her full tier 5 raid armour which reminded me how far I’ve got left to go. It may or may not happen, but either way as long as I keep enjoying the game, top tier kit is not an issue really.

Finally, I made a pretty momentous decision the other day. I’m going to start writing my book again and with renewed ferocity. I love writing and started a novel some time back. I’ve always written short stories, but this is a full blown novel with plans for sequels. It’s getting started that I find incredibly difficult. Once I have been sitting down for 10 minutes writing I am hooked again, but it’s that initial push I need to get all my papers out and re-read my research notes and so on. It’s a momentous decision because it will mean time and effort. Which more than likely means less time online to play games. But hey, I’m in my late thirties. I’ve got to grow up at some point eh?

Be well.