New PC Has Arrived!

So last time I posted, I was waiting impatiently for my new PC to arrive. Well! What a day that was! First off, it was supposed to have arrived on the Friday but due to a mix up, I managed to get a delivery set for the Saturday morning. I set my alarm for 9am, pretty sure that would be plenty early enough not to miss the delivery guy but luckily I woke up earlier because it gave me time to brush my hair & actually get dressed before it arrived!

I was super excited, as I'm sure you can imagine so I dived straight into unpacking the giant box and finding my new baby amongst all the packing materials! I crawled under the desk, tidied up all the cables, worked out which ones I still needed and was just ready to connect the monitor when the first problem of the day surfaced! My existing old monitor has only a VGA port, the new PC has only a DVI port - argghhh!

To make matters worse, I had no idea what the ports were called either so I put an emergency tech message out on Twitter to ask what the blue port thingy was called! I have some lovely tech capable peeps on my twiiter feed and at 10am on a Saturday morning, it seems that quite a few were lurking as I had about 5 answers in under 10 minutes! Thank you guys - you saved the first bit of my sanity that day!

OK, so I had 2 options - an adaptor cable or a new monitor. Luckily, I had the cash for a new monitor, I just hadn't got around to actually buying one! So I jumped in my car and drove 10 miles to the nearest PC World and treated myself to a gorgeous 24inch widescreen monitor - that's quite an upgrade from the Dell 17inch square-ish one I was using!

screenshot from old Dell monitor

I drove home carefully and got this beautiful beast out of its' box & packing, crawled around under the desk again, sorting out yet more cables, went back to the box for the final cable and....NOOOOOO! there wasn't a DVI cable in the damn box, it was another blue thingy one! But I checked - I checked in the shop & I asked the guy 3 times if this monitor had DVI - you can imagine my frustration and it got worse as I tried to contact the store to find out the best course of action.

It seems PC World only has a central customer service phone line and their response was to take the whole thing back & get a new one! Well, apart from the fact that the stand is a push fit & won't come undone again so I couldn't get it back in the box, I really didn't see the point of taking it all back when all I needed was the correct cable - which should have been in the frickin box right???

In the end, I gave up trying to phone anyone and just jumped in the car & drove back to PC World. I found the same young salesman who'd served me originally & he recognised me, so that was good (I think!). I explained what was wrong and off he went to check it out. Unfortunately these monitors all have seals on the now and they can't be broken before selling them to customers so he couldn't check any other boxes for the correct cable. Instead he went to the cable aisle and had a look there for a DVI cable.

You won't believe the next bit - I sure as hell didn't! They didn't have any DVI cables, only the by-now dreaded VGA ones and some other kind. Honestly, I could have screamed right then but I held back as another salesman approached. He had obviously heard my story and the only suggestion he had was for me to try Maplin's in town.

Bearing in mind, this is now 3.30pm ish in the afternoon, heading into the centre of a busy shopping town was not my idea of fun but I knew I couldn't wait 2-3 more days for Amazon to send me the correct cable or to wait for PC World to get a fresh supply so I gritted my teeth, smiled & politely thanked them for their help and stalked out of the store.

screenshot from new widescreen monitor!

Needless to say, it took me almost another hour to get my hands on the correct cable and get home again but at last, I could fire up my new PC & monitor and view the internet in all its glory!

Now I could finally download that beta I wanted so desperately to try and get WoW downloaded too. All I can say is thank god for the ipad and Twitter because there wasn't anything else on my new machine to keep me occupied for the evening!

I got there in the end though and Sunday was a glorious day of gaming all day!

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Five Podcasts and a New Computer!

Oops! I knew the last few weeks had been busy and slightly weird but I didn't realise it was so long since I posted here! I got to chat with the Godmother when Marcus & I invited her to guest on the show and that turned out to be a really interesting show for all of us I think. That was the last of my days off too so I spent the Sunday getting my shit together to head back to work.

I finally went back to work on the Monday after New Year, after being deemed fit to work (post-op) by my Doctor so that was pretty good actually. It sounds great to have a month off over Xmas but when it's recuperation time and it feels like everyone else is out partying, it's kinda tough on your mental state, you know? It was especially tough as it was also my first holiday season alone, ever!

My boss was great though - she even let me finish at 3pm every day so I could come home and have a nap. I still managed to get a load of catching up done so that was a good week but busy! But the best bit was on the Saturday morning - I finally got a chance to chat to Leeta as she interviewed me for her Behind The Avatar podcast. That was great fun and I'm sure it won't be the last time Leeta & I talk for a couple of hours!

The following week was my birthday week and between baking cakes and cookies for work and being taken out to celebrate by my parents and then standing in at the last minute for Rez on EGP, I didn't get much chance to log into WoW. I could have logged in Friday evening I guess but I just sat there and kind of spaced out in front of the PC. I'm honestly not sure what I did that evening at all!

Another great Saturday morning - recording the show with Marcus Ty and that was about all I could manage that day! Sunday dawned grey and cold but it was another busy day - lunch with Mum (and getting laundry done!), afternoon chats with Cold then another first - recording Girls Gone WoW with Sil and Raven. That was great fun too & it turned out we all had a lot more in common than I expected. I've been invited back at a future date so I am looking forward to that already!

So in just about 2 weeks, I've done 3 guest spots and recorded 2 shows with Marcus, gone back to work, caught up there and had a birthday week so I guess it's not surprising that I've been a little slow posting here!

This last week has been strange too - I'm back to my regular full hours at work but I've been a bit out of it all to be honest. My Doc gave me some new medication which seems to be doing its' job but I think it's making me spacy - I actually caught myself reading Twitter the other evening and I had to remind myself to scroll! However that could also be an effect of the previous 2 weeks and lack of sleep in general, hopefully these meds will help all round and I'll be back to normal soon.

I need to be - I've done nothing productive again today and I have a huge list of things to do before I fly back to the States in a few weeks! That's given me something to look forward to as well so I'm staying as positive as I can in between sleeping at random times! I'm also expecting delivery of my new PC tomorrow - I really am struggling to wait patiently for that - my current set-up is kind of old and I'm only running 2Gb of RAM as well. Roll on tomorrow and WoW on high settings for the first time ever!

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Real Life Catch Up

I can't believe it's been almost 3 weeks already since my last post! But to give you an idea of how things are going - it's 8am on a Saturday morning & I've already caught up on my Twitter feed from overnight (about an hour), have made a to-do list for the weekend & I'm about to start sipping my 3rd cup of coffee! Yup - my body clock has readjusted to working hours & didn't believe me when I told it to go back to sleep, it's the weekend. Grrrrr.

I can't say work has been interesting, it's just a data entry type job but having been off for 4 years, I've got to start at the bottom again. The people are nice & as it's a charity working for & with disabled people, it's actually quite an interesting place to work. Many of the desks are taller than normal to accommodate wheelchair users, the spaces between the desk areas are much wider too for the same reason & the bathrooms are huge with all sorts of special equipment. We also have quite a few volunteers working a day here & there - it gives them a little experience in an office/work environment & for some, it can lead to a proper job to give them some independence.

I do find it a bit difficult sometimes - I've never had much interaction with any kind of disability before & I'm meeting all kinds now - I'm kind of nervous of putting my foot in it by saying the wrong thing or being over helpful. I don't want to be 'that person' who raises their voice when speaking to a blind person or overly solicitous just because a guy walks a bit wonky, you know? It's also really hard not to stare sometimes - I'm not being rude to them (not intentionally at least), I'm just in awe of their ability to keep going even though just getting to the office is a monumental task and to be honest, I'm curious.

At least Spring has arrived!

I've only got a few more weeks there by the sounds of things. They are interviewing for the position I'm covering but I haven't applied as I know it is too junior for me & I won't last. Yes, I know a job is a job but you have to be realistic too - I know myself pretty well & I know that within a month or two, I'll be bored to literal tears & will probably leave anyway. I just can't handle it.

But on the upside, I'm planning a trip to USA when this position finishes so woo hooo! It's only been 4 months since I saw my friend & I'm really in need of some cuddles! That's probably the hardest thing about running solo these days - almost no physical interaction - it's surprising how much of a difference a hug can make but as much as I love my Mum, her hugs don't quite cut it! She's of a generation or an upbringing where hugs just aren't the done thing so she always feels awkward. I still hug her though - she's alone too so I'm guessing she misses hugs as much as I do.

As for WoW, well, I've not been very active at all in game - I'm just about managing to log in & relist my auctions most evenings, hence the lack of posts on my main blog, AH Addict. My guild is dying but as the only original member & currently the GM, I don't want to let it just die & fade away or let it go to someone else - crazy I know! I'm planning on finally getting my Shado-Pan reputation to exalted this weekend - just a few more dailies & farm work orders should do it.

With the just announced drop in XP required for leveling 85-90, I don't feel the urge to continue leveling my priest either so I guess this weekend will be a few scenarios on my Paladin - I still don't have the Scenaturdist achievement & it's almost Children's Week too which is the last Holiday achievement I need for the Violet Drake meta-achievement. Damn that PvP element though!

So there we go, that's where I am right now. I have no real direction so I'm just poodling along. I hope I can knuckle down & find something productive or fun (or both!) to do soon. I have no idea where this blog is going but in the meantime, it's great just to write it all out. I just hope you're nosy enough to enjoy my blatherings and bear with me whilst I get back on track!

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This Week's To-Do List ( 9th Feb)

Well I did finally get my Elders visited & now I only need Children's Week to get my Violet Proto-drake for the 'Long Strange Trip' achievement too but other than that, I've not had much success in doing any of the stuff on my last to-do list from 2 weeks ago! I've been having intermittant disconnection problems with my router & it really put me off trying to quest in WoW.

But after almost 2 days of no internet at all, I think we got the router sorted out & fingers crossed, the disconnection problem seems to be better too! I did manage to get my DK within spitting distance of level 90, she's about 50% of the way through level 89 & honored with the Klaxxi already. So my plan for today & tomorrow is to get her to 90 at least, even if I do nothing else in game!

The internet problems have messed with my other online stuff too so now I have a backlog of to-do things outside of game. I don't know if it's just me but I feel like my girls are nagging at me to get them moving! It's kind of distracting whilst trying to get my photography website redesigned or writing additional content for my newsletter over at AH Addict. Both are taking chunks of time & I just want to get back to my nagging girlies!

It doesn't help that I'm addicted to Twitter & Facebook too. I hate waiting for answers/replies to comments I make so I try not to make others wait for responses from me. What that means in reality though is that no matter what I am doing, I'm always interrupting myself to check Twitter or FB which of course, slows me down further!

I think I need an intervention!

Anyway, given that I keep making work for myself, my in game to-do list this week is very short!

• Get DK to level 90
• Get Warrior to level 88
• Do some dailies with Paladin, probably Shieldwall ones as I've started those but I should start on Shado-Pan or August Celestials too

That's it! I know it's Love Is In The Air week too but I have that achievement. I'll have to check to see if I have the Lovebird mount though and if not, I'll add getting that to my to-do list as well.

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Saga's 20 Questions - Day 2 Why I Started a Blog

The topic for day 2 of Saga's 20 Questions is "why you decided to start a blog". Now it may surprise you to know that actually this is only my latest in a long line of blogs & I explained the start of this one in my very first post here.

My first blog was back in 2005/2006 and I was really heavily into my photography. I'd only just got my first semi-decent digital camera but the photos I was producing were getting a lot of favorable comments from friends & family. I started looking around for a way to make my hobby pay for itself & I found a whole bunch of microstock sites (like Shutterstock, Dreamstime etc) & I found Etsy & Zazzle.

I loved Etsy but standing out from the crowd there was really tough - I got totally hooked on the super busy forums which is where I learned about Twitter, Stumbleupon & blogging. My first blog was a mish-mash of my photos, friends stuff on Etsy & any 'news' about hitting the front page there or whatever I could come up with. It wasn't very focused to say the least but I did get quite a good readership going, even without knowing any SEO type stuff!

My next blog was an offshoot of the first one - I started a photo-a-day project on Flickr & decided to put them all in one place. I think I got to about 3 months in before life overtook me a bit & I also found World of Warcraft at this point so that didn't help me focus on my photography!

I've since amalgamated both these old blogs into one as the basis for restarting my photography blog - 2013 is an onwards & upwards year & I intend to play my WoW AND get my photography going again. If you want to have a peek at the old me or if you just want to have a look at some pretty photographs, you can find my alter ego at Helen Shorey Photography - my! doesn't that sound all growed up! lol

After about a year of playing WoW almost full time (I was off work due to illness), I found myself alone in game & started gold-making. Around the time that Cataclysm arrived, I was getting itchy fingers again & AH Addict was born. & has just celebrated its 2nd blogging birthday! I have thoroughly enjoyed writing there about my gold-making adventures but I do sometimes find it a little restrictive subject-wise so here we are - my 'anything vaguely WoW' blog was born.

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