Blech

So I know that being out in the rain isn't actually supposed to make you catch a cold, but it sure did seem that way this week.

First things first: we did move successfully. We couldn't get quite as much into the storage unit as we wanted, but we got more in there than we'd hoped, leaving not too much to be stored either in closets or attics until we're back in our own place. And the bedroom is definitely "extra-cozy" with Pat and I tripping over each other when we're both in here, but hey, you do what you have to do.

The one thing that didn't go smoothly with the move was the weather. Both Saturday and Sunday were rainy, crappy days, so of course starting on Monday I've been feeling sick all week. Cough, sore throat, congestion (and that fuzzy sense of hearing that comes with congestion). I was sneezing as well, though the upside is that I was able to get rid of that by taking Claritin. All other symptoms, however, are going strong, to the point that I called in to work today and, after falling back asleep, slept until noon. My mom has pretty much the same symptoms, which she's blaming on the drinking game we all played on Friday ( . . . long story), as drinking tends to lower her immune system, which of course is what being out in the rain actually did to me. So whether she gave something to me or I gave something to her, who knows. But basically it sucks. Pat's mom is worrying that I have bronchitis, but I'm hoping that after giving myself today to rest (something I haven't had the luxury of doing yet this week), that I'll feel better.

Moving

Well, the weekend is upon us, and . . . yeah. Our place sort of looks like we're moving soon, but definitely doesn't look like we're moving tomorrow. I suppose I should go and remedy that rather than sitting here typing a blog entry, but it's just so overwhelming. And there are a lot of factors making this move more difficult than times we've moved in the past, the biggest thing being that everything is being split up into two locations. The majority of our stuff is going into storage, while certain key items are coming to my parents' with us. Unfortunately, the stuff that is easiest to pack is the stuff that's coming with, and everything else is just . . . there. Personally I'm ready to just drag a dumpster under our window and toss all of it, but I think that would be frowned upon by a certain significant other.

I'm just so frustrated, and ready for all this to be over.

Slumber Party!

Okay, so Pat was recently reminiscing about high school (sort of), so of course about a week after that, I go to an old school slumber party. Well, old-school aside from the fact that we had alcohol and half of us were married. But whatever.

It was a ton of fun. Would have been even more fun had I actually been able to spend the night, but since I was working the next day I decided I'd rather go home and sleep in my own bed. It's times like these I really wish I had a normal M-F schedule like everyone else. As it was, I couldn't even have one drink (because, regardless of the fact that one drink barely makes me tipsy, it WILL give me a mini-hangover the next day, which really sucks . . . not that I'm the kind of person who needs alcohol to have fun, but it would still be nice not to worry about it).

Lynsey actually brought out the game "Girl Talk," which I don't think I ever actually played back in the day, and which I still haven't played because we decided it was just too pointless for a group of 25+ women to play what is basically Truth or Dare (and all of the dares sounded pretty dumb anyway, even if we were the appropriate age). So we ended up playing some other games, my favorite of which was definitely what we've dubbed "Pictionaphone," or the alternate title, "Telephonary." I'm still not sure which I like best, but it was a fun game. As the names suggest, it's basically a combination of Pictionary and the Telephone game that kids play.

Everyone gets a small stack of scratch paper, as many pieces as there are people. Everyone writes down a name of a movie (well, we chose to go with movies, you could also do songs, TV shows, whatever, but movies works really well), then passes their stack of paper to the right. Next person looks at the name, and puts that paper in the back of the stack. Then on the next clear piece of paper they draw out a representation of the movie that was listed. Pass to the right again. That person looks at the picture, sticks it in back of the stack, and on the next clear paper writes what they think the drawing represents (without going back and looking at the original movie title). So, it may or may not be correct, but then the next person gets to draw their version of that title, and so on and so forth until everyone's stack makes it back around to them. Sometimes the original movie remains constant till the end, and sometimes . . . not so much. But it was really fun.

WoW is like High School

Two posts within a month of each other...I hope I don't break the internet. Also a quick note for anyone who may be reading this that doesn't already know. When I say "WoW" it is short for World of Warcraft. I know Charleen has linked to this blog from her facebook page, but I have no idea if anyone has actually followed that link here.

Anyway, let me explain about the title of the post. I loved High School. It didn't require a lot of responsibility on my part, it was fun, and I had a lot of great friends. WoW was much the same for me, and lately I've been missing it. I apologize for the random rambling that this post will likely have. Charleen is the writer, not me.

Especially right now, that lack of responsibility part is something I miss. Charleen and I are 26. We (or at least I am) are still in that phase where High School and College don't feel like they happened all that long ago and real life and responsibility suck. The current economy isn't helping that last part. While I really look forward to owning a house and working on projects and the yard on my free time, right now real life responsibility is pretty sucky. As Charleen mentioned, we're going to be moving in with her parents. Since currently I'm supposed to be the primary bread winner, the feeling of failure is weighing down on me pretty hard. (ok, I could go on, but I'm cutting this rant off right now) Back to what I was originally talking about. WoW was nice. You didn't have any more responsibility than you decided to take on. The biggest responsibility that you really should have in WoW personal courtesy. If you start an instance run, make sure that you have the time to do so with the exception of stuff that comes up out of the blue. High school was pretty much the same. There was homework of course, but the only extra responsibility that you had was extra curricular activities that you decided to take on.

Kind of going along with the responsibility thing is just how much fun WoW was for me. Right now I could really use that kind of escape. I loved running instances or doing quests. Heck, even fishing grew on me. (and that was before they made all the big changes to it) But I think the biggest fun aspect for me was the fact that you could make yourself goals and always be working towards something (also one of Blizzard's biggest hooks for a subscription based game). I loved the long term project of it. As far as console games go, RPGs like Final Fantasy or Zelda have always been my favorite, but as much fun as they are, there's always that part of me that was sad when a great game came to an end. WoW didn't have that downside. Right now I'm getting my game fix with a couple of facebook games and by replaying some console games that I have, but they'll never be as complete a game as WoW.

Finally the thing I miss the most about WoW (and high school) is talking almost every day to those great friends that I made. I'm terrible at keeping in touch with people that I don't see every day. The original point of this blog was as a way to keep in touch and keep those friends up to date on what was going on in our lives. It's nice that some of them like Wulfa and Dammerung have a blog that they post on all the time. I especially love seeing pictures of their kids 'cause they're so darn cute. :) But reading about someone's life and talking with them about it is very different and I miss that. I miss hanging out online and just chatting with folks like Wulfa, Dammerung, Shrinn, Fal, and Ishvi to name just a few. I don't know, when I get back into an Engineering job again, I may start playing WoW again, but right now I just feel...I don't know if it's the right word or not but...nostalgic. (ok, just looked up the definition:a yearning for the past, often in idealized form. It's exactly the right word)

And since I was just taken away from my computer for a bit, my train of thought has been completely derailed. Something about feeling the same kind of nostalgia for WoW as I do for High School for a lot of the same reasons. At least I'm posting again, right? Lets see if I can aim for a second post inside of a week next time.