What has happened to you since the City closed?

[Ironwolf]

I know many of us are very busy people and life continues on marching forward. What has happened to you in the last few months since our City shut its gates?

I personally have had so many things happen that I am not sure where to start. Many of you read about my grand-daughter and the effect that a nasty custody battle had on her. Well next Wednesday I am filing for Limited Guardianship of her and she will be living with us for at least a year to remove her from all of that upset. I have put her in Sylvan learning and in just 12 short hours she has taken her math from grade level 2.8 to level 4. She will be starting also on her reading level as it is also at grade 3 or so and she is going into grade 6.

My job may or may not be moving locations. I currently work in Detroit, but my company has announced they are closing quite a few buildings - ours was on the list for closure - but our management filed a letter asking it be kept open due to access to legal venues. I work for one of the largest insurance companies and 80% of Michigan's litigation is in the Detroit area.

I crashed my truck and had a head injury that set me back 3 weeks. I had my timing belt snap on my Kia and cost me $700 to repair. I had the differential on my Subara go bad as well! Cars have been the bane of my existence lately.

On the positive side my youngest daughter got married! She also announced they stopped using birth control. More babies!

I have been using the hot weather to prepare for Pennsic War 42 in Pennsylvania. If you have never seen a modern day Medieval war - here it is from a helmut camera!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYv3bbMTbKE

[JaguarX]

well mostly been trying to hunt down electrical problems in the Jag. XJ8 Vanden Plas (X308) First the TPS started to act up got it fixed, was good for a bit. Then a few months later lost all power and trying to chase down the electrical issue. In the meantime friend blew head gasket on the Lincoln Town Car that I loaned him, but on the flip side bought a 2007 BMW  328i coupe, a little rougher in ride quality than what I'm used to but it's ok.

Another friend bought her husband a birthday present. Ask me to help her drive it from Dallas. Best 11 hour trip I ever had. Inspired me to work on getting me one.



Dealing with furloughs, luckily wont cost me much. just a loss of 88 hours over all when it's said and done. Still have a job thank goodness. Lot of contractors cant say that these days.

Besides that usual eating sleeping, turning wrenches whether on my own car or others, working, sleeping.

[houtex]

I have been wrestling with semi-restoration of a '95 Honda PC800 Pacfic Coast.  I just keep having... issues... that keep me from putting it back together from its various 10000 bits.

If I ever get those wheels done, I will ride her every stinking day it doesn't rain.  And even if it does (I have a rain suit.)

So yeah.  Excepting work, and the occasional family dealings, that has been sucking up all my extra time.  Well, there was the whole "I'm gonna insulate the garage with a 'ceiling' and put in a portable A/C so I can work in there and not overheat", which worked, but I need more insulation and maybe a vent in the garage roof.

Other than these... life is a little unextraordinary.  Just sorta bouncing along.  Sorta lucky I guess.

[SerialBeggar]

On the positive side my youngest daughter got married! She also announced they stopped using birth control. More babies!

[SerialBeggar]

Last year I took a big risk and bought a house.  I was just settling in on a routine that allowed for quality COH playtime when the announcement came. 

The only significant thing to affect my life, in an indirect way, was Hurricane Sandy.    It drowned a couple of company buildings and all the equipment in them.  This necessitated the company's decision to move up decommissioning these sites and consolidating their purposes at another site with newer equipment.  This was on top of ongoing decommissioning projects.  I guess someone gave the bigwigs an FYI that the upcoming annual  head count reductions might not be a good idea.  You know, what with the "all hands on deck to resolve this crisis", but hey, who's left to do the regular work?  There hasn't been any informal surveys for volunteers  this year, so my job is secure another year.

My greatest achievement since the shutdown was just last weekend when I finally completed the 2nd to last (I think) compaign in Starcraft-1: Broodwar (the expansion) -- without cheating!   13 years ago, this campaign stopped me cold.  In my despair, I resorted to using a resource replenishment cheat code.  Even so, I was still getting my butt kicked so bad that I could only, and barely at that, maintain my defensive line.  I only "won" because the computer eventually ran out of resources.  I wasn't able to defeat the final campaign.  I wasn't even able to re-defeat this 2nd to last campaign again, and with cheating too!  But now, I've figured out what needs to be done.  I'm going to give it another run this weekend to prove that it wasn't a fluke and do it with a better time.

[Razy]

 I had lower back surgery, all went well, and im doing fine. Work is as usual, some days boring some days very busy. Started to work night shift, woot, woot, and i got a little raise 
 One of my best friends is moving out of the country tho  .
 Started to play Defiance,  is a so so game. Started to play DCUO, i solo all the time, and managed to get to lvl 30.

[The Fifth Horseman]

My greatest achievement since the shutdown was just last weekend when I finally completed the 2nd to last (I think) compaign in Starcraft-1: Broodwar (the expansion) -- without cheating!   13 years ago, this campaign stopped me cold.  In my despair, I resorted to using a resource replenishment cheat code.  Even so, I was still getting my butt kicked so bad that I could only, and barely at that, maintain my defensive line.  I only "won" because the computer eventually ran out of resources.  I wasn't able to defeat the final campaign.  I wasn't even able to re-defeat this 2nd to last campaign again, and with cheating too!  But now, I've figured out what needs to be done.  I'm going to give it another run this weekend to prove that it wasn't a fluke and do it with a better time.

The Terran campaign, wasn't it? IIRC there is a trick to that mission - IIRC first you need to get at the Cerebrate to the north: a squadron of Siege Tanks on dropships with Wraith spotters / escorts will do that. The Wraiths can then fly at the edge of the map into a location where it's possible to attack one of the other Cerebrates and kill it with low losses. Not sure what was with the third one tho, been some years. As for the Torrasque, bunch of Siege Tanks in permament Siege Mode, walled in with Turrets. Let him get bust with the turrents while the tanks blast seven shades of dead Zerg out of him. :p

[Ironwolf]

Game wise my only acheivements worth noting are not completely sucking playing Left For Dead 2 in Versus and Scavenger mode. I played the other day against someone who was so much better than my whole team together (his/her name was Frost Bite) that I was given a verbal high 5 when I actually managed to kill them once by my entire team - it was the only time we managed to defeat the person.

After I killed Frost Bite, I immediately said in open chat - I have to applaude you Frost Bite - you are above me as a player like the moon is above the earth. I am actually sorry I killed you because it was a pleasure to watch you slaughter us with reckless abandon. I learned a lot about how to play this game watching you and again thanks for showing us how to play the game.

[Brightfires]

Life goes on pretty much as usual, here.

There were some medical issues to deal with, but that started a bit before the shut-down, technically, and has been pretty much sorted at this point. We still haven't found another MMO to play, though we've tried several. FCM has been spending most of his gaming time catching up with console titles... the latest DMC, Dishonored, Bioshock Infinite, the last Gears game... that sort of thing. I've spent most of my now-free time taking care of my garden.

One bit of sad news though... my little cat Sara, of "AFK a sec. Cat Aggro"-fame (something the Liberty folk were all too familiar with seeing from me ), died in early June. She was 19 years old, and always loved sitting on my desk and watching me play the game. Even occasionally "helping" by walking on my keyboard and randomly setting off powers. <_< In her own way, Sara attended almost as many trials, Hami raids and MSRs as I did. She was absolutely a gamer chick.


"All your laptop are belong to me."

[SerialBeggar]

The Terran campaign, wasn't it?

No, this was in the 3rd batch of missions which is Zerg.  The objective is to get Duran to 5 Protoss outposts to set bombs.  The upright, squat map is set up where you start at the lower right corner.  The 5 Protoss outposts (raised plateaus) occupy the upper 2/3rds of the map.  They surround a massive Protoss base which is inaccessible from the ground or the air.  This campaign had a no transport and no Mutalisk restrictions.  There is a small Protoss base at the lower left corner and the outpost at the top, center is a medium sized Protoss base.

[Ashen Fury]

Its been a pretty rough year in most aspects of my life, one thats left me with too much free time and no CoH to fill it with.

[Kaos Arcanna]

Life goes on pretty much as usual, here.

There were some medical issues to deal with, but that started a bit before the shut-down, technically, and has been pretty much sorted at this point. We still haven't found another MMO to play, though we've tried several. FCM has been spending most of his gaming time catching up with console titles... the latest DMC, Dishonored, Bioshock Infinite, the last Gears game... that sort of thing. I've spent most of my now-free time taking care of my garden.

One bit of sad news though... my little cat Sara, of "AFK a sec. Cat Aggro"-fame (something the Liberty folk were all too familiar with seeing from me ), died in early June. She was 19 years old, and always loved sitting on my desk and watching me play the game. Even occasionally "helping" by walking on my keyboard and randomly setting off powers. <_< In her own way, Sara attended almost as many trials, Hami raids and MSRs as I did. She was absolutely a gamer chick.


"All your laptop are belong to me."

I'm sorry for your loss. 

[Rust]

2013 frankly sucks. Majorly.

Far, far too many funerals to attend this year - the big two being my grandmother and my father. Lost an uncle and an Aunt (Two different family branches, so that's extra fun). About half a dozen non-relations or wife relations along the way too.

So yeah. Kinda in a holding pattern waiting for 2014, because I've written off 2013.

[ukaserex]

Well, I developed a faulty gall bladder. I get to yank it out by the roots this next Friday. I also got my third raise in a year at a job I'm very much overqualified for, but feel very blessed to have. Gotta take the good with the bad.

[Joshex]

 had a few supernatural instances, Started work on a new game project, learned some new programming skills, moved around the world,  re-enrolled to finish college.

and a multitude of other things that are more minute.

[Nightwatch]

I appear to be annoying my daughters and wife more by hanging around them "unnecessarily".

[Ad_Astra]

Well, I'd like to say I will be seeing Ironwolf at Pennsic - but there will be about 10,000 (yes, I meant to use that many zeroes) other people there.

One big event in my life is that a very good friend won Middle Kingdom Crown Tournament last Memorial Day, and I'm helping his team manage all the backstage stuff to help create the showy parts of being a Prince and then a King (plus helping his lovely wife as Princess and then Queen). Lots of traveling with them, and my Pennsic War will be busy.

In modern life, nothing that new or exciting has been happening....

[Ironwolf]

Ad Astra, I will be serving dinner for the Midreal meal with Sir Osric, perhaps we will see you then

I am really happy to see new Crown winners the last 2 tournaments and I may try again this spring if my lady is fully healed from her surgery. The last 2 years she has been in great pain and even walking is hard for her. Now we are waiting to see how the nerves in her hip regenerate and if every thing is good she should be back to nearly normal in 6 months!

[hard]

I came across a facebook entry one of my daughters posted it says:

'Someone plz find my dad a girlfriend, it's weird that he talks to me since his video game has broken down, he needs something else to do!'

It brought a smile to my face for hours afterwards

[Shenku]

Been a rough few months for me as well (It's kinda comforting, in a strange sort of way I guess, that I'm not the only one around here in a rough patch), but that goes back to slightly before the announcement when my hours got severely cut around this same time last year, and I've been working only the one to two days a week, while still going to school which is a 2.5 hour commute each way which ended up costing me more than I actually made for the past eight plus months (I had to borrow money from my family several times...), so it basically leaves me completely flat broke and owing money to everyone and their cousin's best friend from preschool... The plus side is, I still live at home with my father relatively rent free (for the moment, though that's suppose to change supposedly once I'm completely done with school...) and he hasn't decided to kick me out... Yet...

In other  news, as I mentioned about attending school, I just turned in my final paper and did my last class presentation this past Friday (although the last day of class isn't until this Friday), and am just waiting to see what my final grade is for the class. So long as it's passing, I'll be happy, because it'll mean that I'm done with school completely, and can stop sinking so much money into commuting costs... Now I just need to find a job semi-related to my field of study (Bachelors of Applied Science in Game Art and Design... Yay?). ((Anyone know of any companies out there looking for 3D character artists...?))

I also had a recent giveaway of my first book earlier this month, and was actually surprised that I got about 78 downloads of it while it was free, though only one purchase after the deal ended... Still, much better than the months of "nothing" I'd been having... Now if only I could actually get half of that number in actual sales, I'd actually consider the book a mild success (though certainly no Lord of the Rings, but I'm not expecting that)... I'm still waiting for my father to follow through on his promise though, to paraphrase: "when you get your book published, let me know, and I'll go down to Hollywood and sell it so they make it into a movie like that Harry Potter stuff." ... So far, I'm still waiting, but I'm not exactly holding my breath that he'll do it, or if he does, that anyone would buy it...

In sadder news, back around February-ish my Grandmother passed away, so now all of my grandparents on both sides of the family are gone... I wasn't really that close to her, but it was still a sad loss. I was kind of annoyed when I found out several days after the fact when my entire family who already knew were talking about it in the kitchen casually like everyone was already informed... Not the best way to find out a relative died, and I was kind of angry that no one had thought to even tell me...

In other news, I have a little bit of money coming in shortly which I plan on using to get myself a replacement for my current laptop (my current one died about two months ago... Didn't even give me any warning, it just kinda quit and won't turn on anymore... Thing's too beat up at this point to be worth the hassle of fixing, I'd rather just scavenge the hard drive and start over with a new one...). The problem I have is, I'm torn between getting a normal gaming laptop, or getting a tablet(Either a Surface or an iPad, still debating pros and cons of each), or getting one of them fancy hybrid convertible laptops that acts like both... I still have my desktop for PC gaming and digital art stuff(both 2d and 3d), but I kinda want something for when I'm on the go or hanging out with friends (I loved working on a Dragonball Z model (I want to say it was Chi-Chi) at an IHOP one time a few years ago when a little kid around 8 years old-ish behind me recognized the model on my screen and got all kinds of excited pointing it out to his parents. Then he said it was a character from Dragonball Z Kai and I had to pretend I didn't notice the kid talking about what I was doing while resisting the urge to pick a fight with the kid over the major differences between the two versions with his parents sitting right there.............. What? ). I'm still unsure which route I want to go though... An actual laptop would be nice, but I've kinda wanted a tablet for a while now, and I'm not sure how great the hybrid ones are either since I don't know anyone who's had one...