Back in harness
Mar. 12th, 2009 10:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
norcumiSo I realized I haven't had an update, though life has updated. So... yeah. Here we go.
Back at work as of last Friday - it's a little weird. I'm virtually useless in the back, so I'm the one sitting out at the register - yes, sitting; the boss got me a bar stool with a back which is moderately uncomfortable, yet nowhere as excruciating as standing for more than 5 minutes at a time would be. And I'm sitting out there all. Day. Long. I've gone through more books in the last week than I did in the entire month at home. Admittedly, it has been spring break, but still. Dang. Boss is out of town this week, and I'm starting to try to justify my existence by asking the coworkers a lot if this really helps - apparently, it does help a lot. Don't get it, but not gonna question it much more. Willing to take what I can get.
Speaking of a month off - that's what it came down to. A month away from work having to keep my foot elevated "23 hours a day". As of last Wednesday, I no longer have to do so, though it's sometimes more comfortable. The stitches came out, which was unpleasant but not as bad - most of the awfulness was from a sucky personality on the !#@$%^ that took them out. Whatever. UPMC doesn't get high points for decent folks, though Mayo is far worse in the jackass sense. I think getting lost by the UPMC folks for several hours on 2 occasions is part of the bitterness.
Getting to and from work is a bit of an adventure: I'm takin' the bus! So far, the folks on the 56U line get nothing but love from me, 'cause they've uniformly been awesome. One day I thought I was late and missed the bus, so I was standing out on the sidewalk waiting for my taxi to arrive, and the U came tootling down the street. I wasn't making eye contact 'cause I live halfway down the block, and the stop is officially a block further down from that anyways, and there was no way in hell I could even make the half a block unofficial stop before the bus got there - but the driver stopped and asked if I wanted to get on. So much love. I'm going to write a nice note to the Port Authority folks when this is done, 'cause damn. It's been little things that astonish me in the meantime: asking where my stop is so they can make sure they pull up so close to the curb that the bottom step of the bus almost overlaps the sidewalk; waiting till I'm sitting and give an all clear before the bus starts up again; the 1 occasion where I'd stumbled getting up from the bus stop bench, skinned my knee, and was digging through my backpack for my wallet when the money taker thing mysteriously "broke" and the driver told me it was on him.
Hells, yes, I always thank these folks when I leave the bus.
The month off from work was productive in many ways, not so much in others. Didn't do much reading at all - too much of a hassle in many ways*. I spent much of my time playing games instead (or occasionally catching up on rest). WoW, of course, got hit pretty hard. I'll save that rant for an entry all itself - hopefully tomorrow - other than to say the following: Holy CARP. I'm diggin' death knights all of a sudden. I think this is a class that I can finally get my head around and play successfully (though I suspect not very efficiently, but optimization isn't my goal, having fun is, and dang am I managing that). Kharisa is who I've been grinding, and I love it. It helps that my guild leader told me how to take on Outlands this time, and so it's not only been fun (something I have NEVER thought Outlands could be), but I've been making some pretty steady progress**. Hells, Kharisa's been into outlands dungeons - please note, that's a plural there, and while Ramps might not be much of a dungeon, for someone who avoids them like a truly vile plague-y thing, I'm vastly content. It helps to find someone to tag along with and is tolerant of my whispers that "I have no idea what to do, so if you want me to do something other than just hit things until they're dead, say so."
I actually, gods help me, want to take her to the battlegrounds before too much longer, 'cause what the hells, why not, right? Unlike my much beloved but so vastly frustrating main Mel, she doesn't have the personality quirk of liking everyone and thus never wanting to go near PvP with a 10 yard pole.
Also? Kharisa's turning into such an achievement monkey. See? See? This is what characters do to me. They start off as such nice, quiet angsty death knights who are former priests back in the day before, ya know, dying and serving the Lich King, and then what do you know, they get 1 baby blizzard bear, and then bam, suddenly they're pointing out that they like living things, and why not get pets, a lot of pets, and ooo hey, it's only a few kills away from getting PvP achievements and look at that we're exploring so much of Outlands and why not try -
Yeesh. As a relevant aside: "HI!!!!!" and huge hugs to said guild leader, in case he's reading. Miss ya, Soz. I gotta say your advice about Outlands helped huge bunches, BTW. I suspect poor Mel and Sozur are gonna take their time working through Blade's Edge, but Kharisa and Yuna may well be noodling around the same battleground one of these days. Hope things are going good.
The other big time sink for me has been Valkyria Chronicles. So much love. I'm about 60 hours into it (Chapter 15, for anyone who cares, though I'm stuck on "Flower of the Battlefield"), and the art is wonderful, the story is terrific, and I adore the mix of real-time strategy and turn-based war game. If you have a PS3, please please please look into the demo, if nothing else. If you don't have a PS3 - um... the things are good blu-ray players, but look into an Xbox 360 instead? (ps3 is such a broken platform....)
I meant to write stuff over the month off. I didn't. I pondered getting on IM. I didn't. And now all that time off is over, and it's back to work, though I don't know what my schedule will be starting next week.
Oh yeah, and my leg is still broken. We're now at about 5 weeks until I can put weight on it. -_-;; Better than it was, though.
* I have, however, and much to my chagrin, started reading Bleach. Like I need another time sink. sigh.
** So much progress, that she has surpassed my main. There's something wrong with that.
*** Also, I've been watching Ursula Vernon, and between too much of that and Terry Pratchett in the past, I'm descending into asterisk land. Wheeeee! ****
**** No, there wasn't a 3 asterisk in the text body somewhere. Just 'cause I suspect someone on my friend's list will point that out.
Back at work as of last Friday - it's a little weird. I'm virtually useless in the back, so I'm the one sitting out at the register - yes, sitting; the boss got me a bar stool with a back which is moderately uncomfortable, yet nowhere as excruciating as standing for more than 5 minutes at a time would be. And I'm sitting out there all. Day. Long. I've gone through more books in the last week than I did in the entire month at home. Admittedly, it has been spring break, but still. Dang. Boss is out of town this week, and I'm starting to try to justify my existence by asking the coworkers a lot if this really helps - apparently, it does help a lot. Don't get it, but not gonna question it much more. Willing to take what I can get.
Speaking of a month off - that's what it came down to. A month away from work having to keep my foot elevated "23 hours a day". As of last Wednesday, I no longer have to do so, though it's sometimes more comfortable. The stitches came out, which was unpleasant but not as bad - most of the awfulness was from a sucky personality on the !#@$%^ that took them out. Whatever. UPMC doesn't get high points for decent folks, though Mayo is far worse in the jackass sense. I think getting lost by the UPMC folks for several hours on 2 occasions is part of the bitterness.
Getting to and from work is a bit of an adventure: I'm takin' the bus! So far, the folks on the 56U line get nothing but love from me, 'cause they've uniformly been awesome. One day I thought I was late and missed the bus, so I was standing out on the sidewalk waiting for my taxi to arrive, and the U came tootling down the street. I wasn't making eye contact 'cause I live halfway down the block, and the stop is officially a block further down from that anyways, and there was no way in hell I could even make the half a block unofficial stop before the bus got there - but the driver stopped and asked if I wanted to get on. So much love. I'm going to write a nice note to the Port Authority folks when this is done, 'cause damn. It's been little things that astonish me in the meantime: asking where my stop is so they can make sure they pull up so close to the curb that the bottom step of the bus almost overlaps the sidewalk; waiting till I'm sitting and give an all clear before the bus starts up again; the 1 occasion where I'd stumbled getting up from the bus stop bench, skinned my knee, and was digging through my backpack for my wallet when the money taker thing mysteriously "broke" and the driver told me it was on him.
Hells, yes, I always thank these folks when I leave the bus.
The month off from work was productive in many ways, not so much in others. Didn't do much reading at all - too much of a hassle in many ways*. I spent much of my time playing games instead (or occasionally catching up on rest). WoW, of course, got hit pretty hard. I'll save that rant for an entry all itself - hopefully tomorrow - other than to say the following: Holy CARP. I'm diggin' death knights all of a sudden. I think this is a class that I can finally get my head around and play successfully (though I suspect not very efficiently, but optimization isn't my goal, having fun is, and dang am I managing that). Kharisa is who I've been grinding, and I love it. It helps that my guild leader told me how to take on Outlands this time, and so it's not only been fun (something I have NEVER thought Outlands could be), but I've been making some pretty steady progress**. Hells, Kharisa's been into outlands dungeons - please note, that's a plural there, and while Ramps might not be much of a dungeon, for someone who avoids them like a truly vile plague-y thing, I'm vastly content. It helps to find someone to tag along with and is tolerant of my whispers that "I have no idea what to do, so if you want me to do something other than just hit things until they're dead, say so."
I actually, gods help me, want to take her to the battlegrounds before too much longer, 'cause what the hells, why not, right? Unlike my much beloved but so vastly frustrating main Mel, she doesn't have the personality quirk of liking everyone and thus never wanting to go near PvP with a 10 yard pole.
Also? Kharisa's turning into such an achievement monkey. See? See? This is what characters do to me. They start off as such nice, quiet angsty death knights who are former priests back in the day before, ya know, dying and serving the Lich King, and then what do you know, they get 1 baby blizzard bear, and then bam, suddenly they're pointing out that they like living things, and why not get pets, a lot of pets, and ooo hey, it's only a few kills away from getting PvP achievements and look at that we're exploring so much of Outlands and why not try -
Yeesh. As a relevant aside: "HI!!!!!" and huge hugs to said guild leader, in case he's reading. Miss ya, Soz. I gotta say your advice about Outlands helped huge bunches, BTW. I suspect poor Mel and Sozur are gonna take their time working through Blade's Edge, but Kharisa and Yuna may well be noodling around the same battleground one of these days. Hope things are going good.
The other big time sink for me has been Valkyria Chronicles. So much love. I'm about 60 hours into it (Chapter 15, for anyone who cares, though I'm stuck on "Flower of the Battlefield"), and the art is wonderful, the story is terrific, and I adore the mix of real-time strategy and turn-based war game. If you have a PS3, please please please look into the demo, if nothing else. If you don't have a PS3 - um... the things are good blu-ray players, but look into an Xbox 360 instead? (ps3 is such a broken platform....)
I meant to write stuff over the month off. I didn't. I pondered getting on IM. I didn't. And now all that time off is over, and it's back to work, though I don't know what my schedule will be starting next week.
Oh yeah, and my leg is still broken. We're now at about 5 weeks until I can put weight on it. -_-;; Better than it was, though.
* I have, however, and much to my chagrin, started reading Bleach. Like I need another time sink. sigh.
** So much progress, that she has surpassed my main. There's something wrong with that.
*** Also, I've been watching Ursula Vernon, and between too much of that and Terry Pratchett in the past, I'm descending into asterisk land. Wheeeee! ****
**** No, there wasn't a 3 asterisk in the text body somewhere. Just 'cause I suspect someone on my friend's list will point that out.
