My first post about World of Warcraft dates from March 9, 2010 and I was only level 55. Now I have 3 characters at level 80. My warlock, Trizilla, is a Kingslayer (the biggest title in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion), my DK, Giraluna, is well geared but going through a DPS crisis; and my mage, Mafalda, just hit 80 last week and made me less afraid of PvP. The fun thing about it all is that while I’m still leveling other toons, I know there will be a lot of work to do when the new Cataclysm expansion hits us next week and I can’t wait! New gear, new dungeons and raids, new things to learn, and a whole new world to explore. Blizzard, I love you.

But like I mentioned in my Blizzcon post, the aspect I enjoy the most about this game is getting to know and make friends with really cool people. They’ve become such an important part of my life, that my husband and I are even making plans to spend New Year’s with some of them. They’ve become a family, people I care about, people I miss when they’re not around. That’s the beauty of MMORPG’s, human interaction. And Cataclysm will give us the chance to stick together, play as a team, have fun as friends and get to 85 so we can kill Deathwing one day. Guild achievements and reputation, FTW!

My husband and I were listening to podcasts from The Instance and they were talking about favorite WoW moments. Mine are: Hitting 80, getting exalted with Ironforge so I could get a ram mount (my favorite!) and seeing my husband scream when I finally killed the Lich King. Every day brings something new, I love seeing those achievements pop in my screen. It’s an awesome game!

So yes, I’m extremely excited about Cataclysm. I’ve already downloaded it and I’m sure I’ll be up all night comes Tuesday. No better time to release the new expansion, since my birthday is this weekend!

I’m going to leave the technicalities of the convention to my husband and Daniel De Guia, but Blizzcon was an amazing experience for me. I’ve never seen so many people in line, and I never fully realized how Blizzard has brought all kinds of people together… it’s just wonderful! You’re there, standing in line, waiting for those doors to open, and you feel connected to thousands of complete strangers. You forget all about classes, race, economical status, disabilities… we’re just one big mass of human beings who love gaming and made it all the way there. Conversations are spontaneous and fun, you learn, you share, you exchange ideas and play strategies. People are happy, they don’t care about standing in line for hours or the huge crowd. It’s just happy time, geek time!

World of Warcraft is one of the things that took me a while to discover (mostly because I refused to play and spent too much time giving my husband wife aggro) but it’s become a big part of what I do during my free time. Yes, I’m addicted, I love it, my warlock rockz and rulez and there aren’t enough achievements in the game for me to get. But what I love the most about WoW is the social aspect; I have tons of fun in guild chat and talking to people over vent. I’ve made friends, great friends, and I got to meet a bunch of them in California. You think people are going to be different when you meet them in person, but I was actually amazed by the fact that personalities do show in game and every person I met is just like I imagined. Now I feel even more connected to my guildies and I’m looking forward to the next time we meet.

And last, but not least (actually the best part of it all), I finally got to meet Nathalie, my good online friend of 10 years. It was unreal, we screamed like teenagers. I just wish it wasn’t so crazy so we could spend more time together, so a trip to Calgary needs to happen. But that deserves a post of its own and I’ll work on it later.

So, who’s ready for Cataclysm? :-D

No, I am not trying to be tragic or talk about the Armageddon. But the Mayan prophecy about the transition that will supposedly happen on December 21st, 2012 has been following me everywhere I go these days. I have to be honest and say it is more than common that I will see titles about this when I’ve visited the bookstore more often lately; but I’ve also seen it on TV, YouTube, the pharmacy, internet ads. So I started wondering about it.

Do I really want to read about what the Mayans said would happen? Yes. But at the same time I wonder if I really want to make my brain burst with an overload of things I will probably not be able to comprehend. And then there comes Physics and Astronomy in the equation… No thanks! But I’m still curious. And I found some pieces of information, mostly for my own knowledge, but since I’m supposed to post something on my blog today, I might as well share it.

Mayan End Times Prophecy — This will give you more or less general information about what the Mayans predicted, and what (according to them) would happen. Mind you is a long read, but if you’re interested, you may find it entertaining. It’s a little bit scary for me, but that’s because I relate everything that sounds apocalyptic with fear.

No Doomsday in 2012 — An explanation of why there won’t be such thing as Doomsday on 12.21.2012. And that’s the one I’m more interested in, probably because I think there’s still too much to do for the human kind to go belly up right before Christmas.

Nobody really has the answer, and Doomsday is something many people obsess about. From religious individuals, to cults, and even scientists. What is there for a mere mortal like me to do? Rationalize the fact that there is a big need for better things, and that the world is definitely not going through peachy times. But I can’t spend my time thinking when it all will end… I would go nuts. Besides, let’s say I start getting ready and anxious and I die before Doomsday. There went all my energy when I could’ve used it in a better way.

The resources are many online and offline. I might read a few, just because I’m curious like that. But I think Doomsday for me will be the day when I lose all hope. And I don’t plan to do that.

Now if only I could figure out how to create a decent archives page…

This year, as part of the activities leading up to World Diabetes Day, TuDiabetes.com and DiabetesDaily have teamed up to get more than 20,000 signatures as part of a petition to ask Google for a World Diabetes Day doodle.

TuDiabetes.com is inviting EVERYONE touched by diabetes to join this initiative:
-Add your signature to the Diabetes Doodle petition @ www.diabetesdoodle.com

And now, ladies and gentlemen, I have IE, Firefox, Opera and Safari installed. But it is not enough. Especially now that Google has come up with its own little, nice, simple, easy to use browser called Chrome. So guess which one I’m using to post this?

And people say technology makes life easier…

Now I have to wrap it up and join the husband and his friends at the bar to celebrate a birthday.

And some headers…

And some miscellaneous images…