Blaugust Reborn – Deciding to Blog

There are tons of reasons that people start blogging – and there’s no one right reason, there’s just the reason that is right for you. When I started 12 years ago (holy crap, it has been a while) I just knew I wanted a little space on the internet to get some thoughts out about EverQuest 2. At the time I was not playing anything else and blogging was becoming a popular way to get out there. I didn’t care about how many people read, whether they left comments, and I certainly didn’t think about where the blog would take me.

I stuck with it (obviously, I’m still writing) and have been incredibly surprised at how rewarding it is. For me, persistence has been key (despite the fact that I blog far less frequently now than I ever have).

I still don’t worry about how many people stumble into my little corner, I still write just for me. I do accept the occasional advertisement that emails me (more about the controversy of this in another post) but my base reasons for blogging have shifted slightly. I now write as a way to relieve some stress and create a record of memories that I can look back on. I no longer blog about EQ2 (or even keep my posts video game related) and instead embraced the fact that I’ve got multiple hobbies. All of this is perfectly fine. You can have one reason or a hundred reasons to get your thoughts out there but I do want to stress the fact that if you want to keep at it, and not just give up after the first week, or month, that you should set it into some sort of a routine. Getting a quick post out before work, or making a post on your drive with some voice technology, or even having a waterproof whiteboard in the shower to jot down those important ideas will all help.

If you’re not having fun with it, re-assess why you’re blogging and try not to berate yourself or stress yourself out. Some days you just may not feel like it – and that’s OK too! You don’t need to have it figured out right away, and your blog will certainly go through some changes over time. Just keep true to yourself and what you want from the experience.

If Reality Feels like a Game, Play Along and You’ll Get the Most of It

When you’re a gamer, it is really easy to get lost between reality and the virtual world. Especially in recent years, when games are becoming even more and more immersive each year. You can basically build a whole new virtual life and communicate with your virtual (yet real) friends. I’ve watched a movie not so long ago, called Ready Player One that really portrays what a life of a gamer may turn into and although it might seem a little bit crazy, it may really happen. The sooner you realize, the better.

The thing is, a regular person wouldn’t understand the life of a gamer, so in order to have a successful communication with that person, you as a gamer have to start thinking about life as a game.

Think about it… The moment you were born you became a random avatar, then you’ve spent years upgrading, learning and collecting skills, you’ve leveled up and now you can start strategizing. As simple as that. Life is a game strategy. The main goal, of course, is managing your time and resources and surviving the mini-games and challenges that life brings. Competing against opponents, sex, and school, learning to drive, dancing, dating… These are all the mini-games that come along the way, through which you lose or collect points and learn something.

But like in any game, be it an online battle royale game, a casino game at feedbackcasino.com, or a simple bowling game at the mall, what is the most important thing? Time. Time is of the essence. Planning and managing your time thoroughly and properly brings a lot of points.

Unfortunately, the main difference between most games (not all) and real life is that there is no second chance, no respawn. That is why you should drop whatever you’re doing and start strategizing and planning time and resources.

Think of it like starting a brand new game: you’re new to this, but you still have some background in it. You know how to play a game, so whatever this new game brings, you will know how to handle it. You might make mistakes, but you’ll learn from them. What has changed? Your point of view.

As a gamer, your real life will become significantly easier if you think of it as a game. Your family complains that you’re not spending enough time with them? Think of it as a mini-game where you collect points in your family’s eyes, and you collect energy. Your friends invite you to a pool party? Great, another mini-game. Go there, have the time of your life and remember you’re gaining skills, social skills.

Don’t feel confined or guilty if you need your space to actually play a video game. It is just a game within a game. You’re allowed to do that, you’re gaining skills again, a skill within a skill actually.

See? It is that easy. The sooner you start treating life like the one thing you know to do best, the life starts for you.

14/365 – Fingerless gloves

I still need to finish off the thumb, but my first fingerless glove is completed – yay! There are a few imperfections with it, but I don’t mind, they’re what make it unique to me. I can’t wait to wear them this fall! They would have been completed a lot faster had I not just had a newborn (laugh) but I’m still really pleased with the progress. Expect a review about the yarn that I used in a few days time, for now I’ll just say it was an absolute joy to work with and I LOVE the stitch definition (an important component to good yarn).

Day 13/365 – Fingerless Gloves & Beta Yarn

A few more rounds (12 or so) and my first fingerless glove will be completed! I meant to finish it before I had Nugette, but alas time has never really been on my side, there always seems like there’s so much to do and so little time to get it all done in. That being said I’ve still managed to eek out some knitting moments here and there between nursing and all the rest to get a few rounds in, and hopefully the first fingerless glove will be completed before too long so I can finally post my review of this amazing yarn I’ve been beta testing.

Xu-Fu’s Pet Guides & Rematch

I’ve been using the rematch addon for quite some time, but what I didn’t realize was that there’s a website that compliments it so perfectly. Xu-Fu’s strategies allows you to import teams of pets through the rematch journal along with notes so you know how to defeat your opponent. You can see lists of pets you own, what pets you need to follow the guides, and discussions with other players if that guide isn’t working out for you. You can customize and adjust all of the scripts to better suit you pet battle needs – and let me tell you this site was amazing when it came to completing the Deadmines pet battle dungeon. It saved me so much time and was completed in a relatively fast amount of time.

You can link it directly to your bnet account so that your pets are imported, and it can provide you with all sorts of handy lists and guides besides importing them into the game. You can search for guides by expansion too, so if you wanted to do that celestial tournament that you keep putting off, this is a fantastic resource.

What I especially love is that I have a number of tabs for each expansion in my pet journal and then just import the battles I want for those expansions from the Xu-Fu site to populate it. No more searching out of game for tactics on each battle or wondering what pets I need.

Importing the battle strings also sets the skills for your pets and it will even load your team based on your target – incredibly handy things.

Honestly, I just can’t recommend Xu-Fu’s Pet Battle Strategies & Rematch enough if you’re any sort of player who does pet battles. If you happen to try them out, let me know in comments what you think.

As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!