Gitr

Diogenes at Quasi Fictional asked me for an interview, and here is a link to what came about from that:
[tag]Fine Art of Blogging[/tag]

An excerpt to whet your appetite:

Blogging is a great tool for people of all stages and walks of life. If you are lonely, you can find companionship with a following of readers (or go off the deep end if no one is reading). If you want to run on for hours about things you know, you can write as many posts as you want educating and enlightening the world. If you want to add a level of transparency to your business, blogging is a great tool.

What would you write if this was your [tag]last blog post[/tag] ever? In a meme started by [tag]Urban Monk[/tag], I’m following [tag]Starbucker’s lead[/tag] within my sphere of reading and joining in on the fun. Here is the call:

The blogosphere is ending. No more blogs. Blog apocalypse. The internet is still working, the world is fine. But you can’t write anymore. Write your last post. Make it a good one. What is the reason you blog? What is the last gem of knowledge you want to leave? What do you want to be remembered for? Who are you? What is the meaning of life? Haha…well not exactly but you get the point. Pour your heart into it.

This should be fun. Here goes:

It has been fun. It has been good. Has it been really good?

Yes, I’d say it has. I started Gitr’s WoW Blog on Blogger back in 2005 with no hopes or aspirations of anything cool, other than journaling my journey with my computer character through my newest game. Little did I know that I would start getting traffic from Google, getting a domain, and becoming known as Gitr around the world.

I have learned about CSS code, WordPress, affiliates, copyediting for online content, and forged new friendships both in-game and in real life (YAY [tag]SOBCon07[/tag]!). I have written over 600 posts to date and check my site stats hourly during the work day. Now it is all over. The blogosphere is collapsing.

Never fear. I’ll still be here. My wife and I will survive and go on to new things of my geeky taste. I’ll find something to do.

I leave you with this little thought.

Find something that you enjoy. Plant that seed and let it grow. Watch it blossom and branch out into something that you care about and that others come to sit under its shady canopy. Then give those seeds to others to plant and have their own refuges to let others come to. Pass the love. Share the joy.

All is well with my plans to go to Chicago tomorrow for the greatest blogging conference yet. I’ve had my plane ticket reserved for a couple of months and arranged the hotel stay after bartering for the costs of my stay. [tag]Tariq Khan[/tag] was kind enough to sponsor someone to attend sans-registration fee, and he and [tag]Liz Strauss[/tag] chose me.

Today, my wife is packing my bag and getting my stuff ready. I’ll pack my laptop bag with extras, such as my camera with my mom’s larger memory card and any other geek-essentials that I think of today. Shoot, I’ll only be gone for 30 hours, so it’s not like I need that much.

Tonight, I’m going to neaten up my beard and my wife’s going to shave my neck. 🙂 My stupid [tag]neck hair[/tag] grows twice as fast as my rapidly receding hairline loses its edge.

Tomorrow, my wife is bringing me to work at 6:00 to get an early shift in before picking me up at 12:00 to take me to [tag]Tampa International Airport[/tag]. I love the airport and like to get there 2-3 hours early to relax and people-watch while I read and magnificently ignore eye contact with passersby. If all goes well, my plane lands 45-minutes before the concert and open-mic night begins, so I’m hopeful that it’s not far to walk to the doors and that the hotel shuttle is right-quick.

I have an existential topic today on how we became a guild. When it comes right down to it, Buttered Monkeys is like a pre-planned [tag]PuG[/tag]. We are merely players who all read (and write) [tag]Gitr’s WoW Blog[/tag]. There were no class, race, or experience requirements to join.

I was pondering this topic after having such successful and exciting group experiences with my guildmates. So far, we’ve done [tag]SFK[/tag] a couple of times, [tag]The Deadmines[/tag] (with 2 level 16s), and run 2 people through [tag]Ragefire Chasm[/tag] and 3 people to the stables in SFK.

Mindkiller, Snowstormer and Bloodr took down Dar’Khan way under-level, and learned a lot about our classes in the process. We are constantly improving our techniques and our teamwork. I fully expect that when we hit the upper 50s, we will be taking on places like LBRS and BRD down like a hot knife through butter.

But we are a PuG! You know my history of PuGs, and they suck, big time. This is my favorite PuG of all-time. I can’t wait for Excaliber and Tomas to get back to the game, and then will very likely always have 5 people on in the evening after 8 or 9pm EDT.

I’ll detail some of my experiences with my favorite PuG for you:

1. We took down SFK with no healer in the party. One death (a slip-up) and no wipes.
2. We took down Dar’Khan with a 21 and 2 17s.
3. Ravenkiller, Nynave, and Paladr aggroed 6 mobs in SFK and lived to tell about it.

With a couple of more levels under their belt, I think we should try SFK with Paladr, Nynave, Ravenkiller, and Shurshot as a 4-man. I’m working on my blacksmithing now that I have some funding and will get a shield spike soon. At level 30 or so, I’ll be next to unstoppable when aggroing multiple mobs and having awesome healing support from Nynave. He is a really good priest. Ravenkiller watches his Threatmeter quite nicely to make sure I have enough threat and unleashes with perfect timing to take something down so I can gather threat on the next target.