my brief journey to the World of Warcraft

Katie was picking out which photos to print at the photo shop. Since the CD I burner her had hundreds of photos it was taking a while to load. I popped over to the video game store. I found Quidditch for GameCube for $8! Fun stuff. Then I saw this 2-week trial of World of Warcraft for $1.99. I knew better. I'd often said that the reason I never tried that game is the same as the reason I've never tried heroin--I knew I'd like it and I'd get hooked. (Clearly an exaggeration and I don't mean to belittle people suffering from chemical addiction by equating it to addictive video games). But I was curious and figured it'd be fun to try it out over vacation. So I played for a few hours today and what I found is that it sucks me in and it's hard to stop but I also don't enjoy it as much as other things I could be doing.

It also hurts my wrists to play for a long time. The bottom line is that my time is limited and how much I can do that taxes my wrists is limited and I'd rather do other things. So I uninstalled it and threw the DVD in the dumpster.

So many things that I have to do require sitting in front of the computer, plus it's how I keep in touch with friends and family. Together that gives me more than enough time in front of this bright screen. Which isn't to say I don't enjoy the occasional computer game, but not one that requires as much time as WOW.

For me games are mostly a social pastime. I really like a recent series of ads (see this example) for Dungeons and Dragons I've seen in comic books--it's just so much more fun to play with people in person.

Monk on iTunes

My cousin Hilary gave me a gift certificate to the iTunes Music Store (iTMS) for my birthday and I used it to buy episodes of Monk. I only have one episode before I'm caught up on Season 5. I think that for me it's a cheaper alternative to cable, since I don't watch that much TV. Also I can watch them whenever I want, pause them, and there are no commercials. My monitor is 19" vs. my 20" TV, so it's pretty much the same quality. Monk is just so funny, and I also enjoy the crazy plots. I don't think I'd buy 30 minute shows on iTunes, though. $1.99 seems a little pricy for that. My gym has TV's on many of the cardio machines, so sometimes I try to time my workouts to catch an episode of Scrubs or Colbert Report.

On the subject of Monk, these cleaning tips are funny, but some of them also seem useful... (Katie cringes).

Oh no, must post before midnight...

Played Settlers of Catan with Jan and Katie. Katie won. It's a great game and I picked it up a few weeks ago. First time I've played in years. I'm very much posting to get my daily post for the month.

Photos From Saturday

I've posted some photos from our trip to Hillsborough here. Katie took a lot of the ones of the Eno River. I'll add my 23hq.com site to the sidebar eventually. I'm off to bed.

Boo!

Halloween here is a big deal. Katie went as Raggedy Ann. I went as a wizard trying to dress up as a muggle (like in Goblet of Fire when they go to the Quidditch World Cup): dress slacks, tennis shoes, Hawaii shirt, bath robe, floppy hat.