World of Warcraft Sketches Ahoy!

Not really sure why I put "ahoy" in the title of this post, but there it is.  Live with it.

Just a quick post really to say that I, with the aid of the excellent, funny, and very patient Andy of Bad Dog Gaming, have produced "WoW Life" - a series of World of Warcraft sketches!  The sketches are now live and viewable on my YouTube channel, or follow this link to go direct to the video.

Andy eating a cookie after turning me into a vibrating pig through the use of a polymorph spell.

Unfortunately the sound isn't quite 100%, I have spent a huge amount of time working on the spell and it is massively better than when I started, but there's still some bits where the wind does disrupt things a little. Nevertheless I am pleased with the final result and I hope you enjoy it too.  Be warned that there is some mild swearing in there - along with some extremely dodgy acting!

Special thanks to my parents who provided a lot of the props for the day (check out their weird and wonderful magical mail order goods at https://www.facebook.com/RavenMagical) and obviously thanks to Andy for indulging me.  My other half particularly recommends Andy's sign off at the end of the video.

As an aside, it took the bruises from the "auto follow" sketch about a week to clear up!  Hope you enjoy the video, if you do feel free to like / share / comment / subscribe to my channel!

Warning: Blogging Is Seriously Addictive

I am so addicted to blogging.

I love being creative and being able to get stuff out there, it's so cool.  But it's difficult to try to impose quality standards on yourself to make sure that what you put out is half decent.

I've had this blog going for just over a month now and I wanted to thank you all for reading it.  Over the time I've had something like 110 unique visitors to my blog and somewhere between 700 and 800 pageviews.  Not exactly a massive amount but from nothing just a month ago I'm very happy.  Something like 25% of visits are for more than a minute too so not everyone is just coming on, going "oh my god" and leaving.

Just 65% of them :)

Interestingly after the UK the most popular countries visiting my blog are France and Canada, so if you're from France or Canada - thanks! Bonjour!

My dad is going to be producing a guest blog in the not too far distant future so stay tuned for that.

But it's weird how much effort I put in to getting the blog promoted.  I've signed up to numerous blog directories, I've got a t-shirt with my blog address on it, a load of blog business cards and a handful of blog postcards (all very cheap - thanks Vistaprint!)

We're having a bit of a clear out at the moment prior to the launch of Mists of Pandaria next week, so I'm tempted to do a bit of a giveaway to people willing to promote my blog for me.  I'll have a look round and see if I've got anything anyone would want.

Apart from blogging I'm getting stuff together for making my The Guild Synopsis video on Saturday.  For those that missed my last post, The Guild Season 6 premieres on October the 2nd, and they're asking for the community to do video synopsis of seasons 1 to 5.  I've got a draft script but I just need to make my props.  As mentioned in the last post, if you'd like to help do let me know.

Anyway - got to go and play some WoW!

I accept the embarrassment.

Something that I did in my past keeps coming back to remind me of how...odd... I can be.  So to deal with the various people thinking that they can embarrass me by referring to it, I decided to blog about it.

About 4 years back now I went to i36, one of the LAN parties organised by Multiplay.  Had a great time (as I always have done at an i-series, get down there)

Now at the opening ceremony, they were dishing out free stuff, t-shirts, lanyards, the usual stuff.

Plus some of these:

These is a Sennheiser PC 350 headset.  A very nice piece of kit, great for gaming, an all round excellent headset.

And not a cheap one.  Even today you'll do well to pick up a pair for less than £100.

Anyway, they threw one set into the crowd, and kept the second back to do something with at the end.

I thought to myself   They're going to make someone do something embarrassing on stage, then give them the headset.

I kind of have an objective when I go to i-series.  The tickets to go cost about £95 now (less if you book early) so I kind of like to try to get free stuff to the same value or more.  This sounds tricky but bearing in mind at another one I also won a Intel Quad-Core processor which I then sold for about £150, it's surprisingly possible if you take part in the various competitions and games (which I always think forms part of the festival experience anyway)

So, I made sure I got my hand up first.

And went on stage.

And did this.

For those unaware, I was attempting to replicate the female night-elf dance from World of Warcraft.  I'm aware that I missed a chunk of it out (you can see it here) and obviously wasn't that good, but at least the crowd (and many people who have seen it on YouTube since - I never thought about it being recorded!) got a good laugh.

Surprisingly to me, I got a lot of positive feedback afterwards, from people impressed that I was willing to do it.

The other thing I get is people asking for a repeat - I always say that if they're willing to give me another £100+ headset for a minutes work I'll consider it!

Am I pleased that I did it?  Ultimately, I guess so.  We're on this planet for such a short time (where we go from here we all have our own views on) that shouldn't we really make the most of it?  I'd rather be considered weird than boring.

And just to put up some pictures of other people doing stuff...

Here's a photo of my dad playing Just Dance 3 on the Nintendo Wii.  With his first attempt ever using a Wii, and using the controller with his other hand (he's left handed) he still did better than me.

And here's my son controlling the touchscreen on my tablet with his nose.

It's a virus!!!

Hi folks,

I've been off the blog for a few days due to illness.

Monday night I had a really bad night sleeping, to the point where I was up for about 2-3 hours in the night watching videos on YouTube because I just couldn't sleep.  A sore throat had turned up out of nowhere (Monday daytime I was absolutely fine) and on balance Tuesday morning, although I wasn't too ill I was tired from lack of sleep and my throat was aching a good bit, I decided the best way to see off this cold was to take a day off work, rest up, and get back on Wednesday.

I was wrong.

Tuesday night I had as bad a nights sleep as the night before, but my throat decided that it wasn't going to do any of that throaty stuff like swallow fluids or anything, it was far too painful for any of that.  Simply making a swallowing motion was enough to make me wince in pain.

Wednesday morning I began throwing up, but I noticed that there was blood on it, and after the third time, each time the amount of blood was increasing, I thought I ought to make sure I was okay.

I went through my symptoms on the NHS Direct website and was advised to see my GP today.  Now the issue is that currently my GP's practice is down on staff (one doctor has left, another is leaving shortly) so although you can get in there, I'm reluctant to take up their time if it's not really needed.  So, I decided to use the NHS Direct telephone service to get an opinion from a medical professional.  For those that haven't used it, it's excellent.  We've used it five or six times in the past, and it's great - you get through to a healthcare worker who goes through an assessment with you, and agrees action from there.

Anyway, I got about six questions into the assessment with the healthcare worker, and she said:
 "You need to go to A&E and get checked out.  Can you get there okay?"
 "Yes, sure." Oh - might be serious.
 "Can I double check your contact number just in case?" she added.  This was definitely beginning to worry me.

As it happens we live about five minutes drive away from Hull Royal Infirmary, so I got in there and saw the A&E reception staff.  And waited.

And waited.

This isn't a rant about the NHS.  In my view, the NHS are excellent.  They get a lot of negative press, when the bottom line of the NHS is, if you are ill we will look after you.  I'm not saying that they are perfect, but when in many other countries people who need life saving treatment must have medical insurance or face a huge medical bill, I like having the NHS in the UK. I remember when my other half was in hospital getting ready to give birth to our son, and it took a while.  But in particular, I remember one point in the birthing suite where they were having a problem finding his heartbeat.

And the room filled up with staff.  Suddenly, they were needed.  And they were there, doing all the stuff you want them to.

He's been busy this week pooing on the lawn but that's another story, and shows that they did their job okay then.

So anyway, I waited ages.  I did get to see a triage nurse, and someone took my blood to check, but I waited about two hours, then my other half turned up - I was so glad to see her, it surprised me.  Then we waited almost another two hours before we saw the doctor (which took about 10 minutes as you expect).

Bottom line, I have a viral infection in my throat.  Because it's viral antibiotics have no effect.  Basically it's rest up and drink lots of water (which has been really hard because it was hurting so much to swallow - you don't realise how much saliva your mouth produces until you have to force yourself to swallow it).

I slept on and off for about 17 hours after going to hospital, and I've spent the last two days resting and basically doing as little as possible.

One fun point was the use of technology for communication.  I had to get a message to my mum after hospital to tell her that I wouldn't be going round on Thursday, and that she needed to go and tell my gran this.  This sounds straightforward, but...

• I can't speak due to throat, so the phone is out
• I'm too tired to go and drive anywhere
• My mum checks her emails and Facebook page once a day (at most).  She doesn't use Facebook chat.
• My mum plays World of Warcraft (I don't have a live subscription)

So, I went on Facebook, and found an old friend (hey Abyss) on there.  I asked Abyss to contact my mum on World of Warcraft to tell her to check her Facebook, and I sent her a Facebook message.  She then rang up to see what was going on, so my other half explained what was going on.

With having some downtime, I have actually started playing World of Warcraft again.  It's a nice and fun game and lets you be social with people (hey Guild Ravenswing!) and the new expansion, Mists of Pandaria, looks like it is going to be really good.  I just need to learn how to play my hunter - I've never really been happy since they took away my mana bar and changed it to focus - but that's just me whinging!

Anyway - catch you later!

Thog

The Cat Is Alive!

My gran's cat is alive and well.

To clarify, my gran rang me yesterday morning very upset as the cat was acting extremely strangely and very unwell, with the likelihood being that it would have to be taken to the vet's and put to sleep.  Now the cat is not a young cat and hasn't been very well for a while, so we knew this day would come, but of course it's still extremely upsetting as it is the only pet my gran has now, and she has had pets pretty much all of her life so not having one would be difficult for her (she's now 81 and not up to having another pet after this one).

I was out all day yesterday (hey Alex, Mark, Phil and Dave if you're reading) so I couldn't take the cat, but I arranged to ring my gran back at lunchtime, and when I rang the cat was no better so things were not looking good.

So it was not in a terribly cheerful mood I arrived at my gran's this morning, prepared to extract the cat from wherever it was hiding (it is extremely nervous and hides when I'm around, probably because every time I go near it I take it to the vet).

However, the cat had completely recovered! Good news.

I should have known really.  We had the same situation about four months ago, when the cat was behaving very oddly again, and I went to collect the cat, to again take it to the vets.  The cat had hidden under a dresser in one corner of the room, so I pulled the dresser away from the wall, only for the cat to get around me and go behind the sofa.

I looked behind the sofa.

I saw a cat.

And a second one behind it.

Piecing information together we worked out that about four days beforehand a second cat had entered the house, and rather than leaving again which my gran had assumed it had taken up residence behind her sofa. So, when her cat was behaving oddly it was due to the intruder on its territory.  We extracted the rogue cat and sent it on its way.

So, all good news on the animal front.

I'm trying to decide whether to return to World of Warcraft - I still have a lot of friends on there (hey Guild Ravenswing!) and of course the Mists of Pandaria expansion is released on the 25th of September which a lot of people are very excited about - who doesn't want to be a very deadly, and cuddly, panda?

Apart from that, I wanted to flag up a set of websites that always entertain me, the Not Always group, namely:

• notalwaysright.com
• notalwaysworking.com
• notalwaysrelated.com
• notalwaysromantic.com

These sites get real funny stories submitted for your reading pleasure.  The first one, notalwaysright.com was the first site and covers all those customer service stories of people trying to deal with difficult customers.  For anyone who has worked on the customer service side you'll relate to some of the stories!  One of the top stories is Lost In Translation - a story which makes me glad I can't speak a second language!  Over time I've pretty much read every story on there.

And if you have a minute spare, why not watch a video of a man gobbling at turkeys too!

One last thing, I've been enjoying the Jeff Lewis 5 Minute Comedy Hour on YouTube - I mentioned it the other day but it's worth repeating as it really is funny.  Jeff Lewis, who plays Vork in The Guild (again, go and watch it, very very funny indeed) delivers some excellent comedy in 5 minute chunks.

I'm pretty tired tonight so going to leave the blog there - oh, I did have a slight panic earlier, when I noticed my website address is http://thoggy.blogspot.co.uk/ - the other day I ordered a load of cheap promotional materials (postcards, business cards and labels) with thoggy.blogspot.com on them.  I've just checked and they both end up in the same place, relief is mine!

Diablo 3 - by a noob. And shaving - by a noob.

Hmm - I think I've got a spot on my chin.

The reason that I'm not sure is that I have a fairly decent beard growing.  I try to keep it under control whilst at work, but I haven't been at work for 5 days now and it's sprouting quite well.  And I think somewhere underneath it all there's a spot.

Might have to shave an exploratory gap to check.

Anyway - off topic.  I've just completed Diablo III on Normal difficulty.

Diablo III, for the people that don't know what it is, is a very good game.  You essentially play through an adventure game, killing monsters, picking up loot, typically being accompanied by one or more helpers as you explore the lands, ultimately heading towards taking care of a rather nasty chap called Diablo.  Apparently he's the root of all evil or the centre of evil or some such gubbins - I've heard that not only does he not pay his television license, but he even helps himself to a grape in the supermarket without paying for it (that annoys me no end)

So, I created a mage called Raistlin - whilst many people know me as my WoW hunter Thog, Raistlin goes back a lot further, to when I was a kid and read a book called Dragons of Autumn Twilight.  I got this book in with a game for the ZX Spectrum - the game itself wasn't memorable, but the book was.  Raistlin was basically this mage, who starts off neutral but over time turns to evil.  If you want to know his story, read the Dragonlance books - they're good. (And to any readers of the Dragonlance books - I know I massively oversimplified Raistlin's backstory here)

So, Raistlin was a cool character and so I used his name in various old RPG games, notably Dungeons of the Necromancers Domain and Mordor.  But when I played WoW, I couldn't get Raistlin as a name, so he fell into longterm memory for recovery at a future date.

And then Diablo 3 came out.

So, Raistlin is back and has just kicked Diablo's ass on Normal difficulty.  I won't go through the details in case you haven't played the game yet (I do recommend it), but I would say that the way the game is set up is directly against how I play.

If I play a game, I usually play it on the lowest difficulty setting, so that I feel like less of a noob, and once I've completed it, that's it.  Don't play it again.

But the idea of Diablo 3 is that you play it on Normal, then on Nightmare, then on Hell, and finally on Inferno.  Now my understanding is that I'm essentially going to play the same game (albeit harder and with better loot) four times, and to me it just seems like a grind.

I like seeing new content, that's cool.  And new loot is always nice.  Perhaps I need to party more?  I'm a bit of a solitary player (mainly so that I don't look bad in front of other players) and I've done very little partying.

I guess I'll leave it a little then give it a try on Nightmare mode - my fiancee has played through the difficulties and loves the game, so there must be something to it.  Any comments folks?

Right - I'm going to try to find a spot!

(Fifteen minutes pass)

No spot.

Damn that hurt.

I (stupidly I know) dry shave.  I generally use an electric razor to get the thick of the beard, but then I always need to use a Mach 3 or a Fusion Power Stealth Ninja Deathblade to remove the last few rogue hairs (and even then it's amazing how often I look in the mirror and a single inch long hair has sprouted overnight) and when it's been a while since I last shaved the dry shave stings a bit.  I constantly get told to wet shave, the trouble I find is if I wet shave the razor gets gummed up with bits of cut beard almost instantly, so you have no option but to buy a new blade (and I like to make the blade last as long as possible - which also unfortunately increases the pain), so instead I dry shave.

Ultimately, the problem with razors is that we don't really know anything about them. The only way we can measure the quality of a razor is by the number of blades it has. So manufacturers are having to outdo each other on the blade front, and it is only a matter of time until we are all using a razor that is also used in Chinese takeaways to produce shredded crispy duck.

To go further, there are manual razors (that don’t need electricity) and electric razors. Electric ones usually don’t give as close a shave, but last ages and don’t peel your face off. But now you can get manual razors that need a battery. I await the day when I own an electric razor that doesn’t need electric, and instead you rub it on your calf for five minutes to generate enough static electricity so that all your hairs on your body stand on end and you get to pluck them off one at a time with a pair of tweezers.

Battery powered tweezers, of course.

Windows is downloading updates...

Little tired this evening - have been for a few evenings, in fact.  GP rang up today and told me to go in for an extra blood test next week as my iron level is a little low, so I've got that to look forward to.

Apart from that, it's been a good day.  I really enjoyed reading up about the Mars Rover and what it's up to at the moment after making its successful landing on the red planet and blasting a little rock with a laser (I'm now imagining it featuring in a Wh40K story about the Mechanicum...)

I particularly liked the press release at http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/news/msl20120811.html - although the article is about the pretty cool colour pictures of the Martian surface, it does mention the rover "undergoing a brain transplant" which I translate as being the Nasa term for updating your motherboard drivers.  I wonder if it's Intel or AMD?

To stay on geeky subjects I've started watching The Guild again.  Last time I got halfway through series three and then stopped for some reason, but this evening I've just got through series one and reminded myself just how cool it is.  For the uninitiated, The Guild is a internet TV show about a group of people that play games together in the same guild.  While the show does take things to extremes, WoW players (and players of other MMOs) will recognise something of MMO life in the show, especially the characters.  I want to be Bladezz (but I'm probably Vork!)

If you've no idea what I'm talking about go to http://www.watchtheguild.com/ - each episode is only 4-5 minutes long so you don't have to worry about spending your evening watching something you might or might not like.  It'd be interesting to know what do non-gamers think of The Guild?

For construction folk, remember the Yorkshire & Humber Construction Best Practice Awards are currently open for submitting entries.  There's a ton of categories so there's something for everyone.  Go check it out at http://www.constructionsectornetwork.org/best-practice/best-practice-awards-2012/ - the website says that the closing date is Friday 24th August but I've got a tweet saying that the date has been pushed back to September 14th so if you thought it was too late to enter think again.

Okay - I've got a long day tomorrow promoting G4C in the Yorkshire region (get in touch if you want to get involved by the way, more info about this construction best practice initiative for newcomers to the industry in my last post) so I'm going to do some chores and get some sleep.  Night!

Ey up!

Ey up!

Welcome to my blog.  I've had one of these chappies in the past, but it kind of died due to neglect a while back.

I'm Thog (or Thoggy if you want a cutesie name to call me by), I work at a council, and I have a partner and a kid which are both epic. (just to round that off my job is excellent too)

Here's a pic of my WoW character and my many companions!

Basically I like to game and read, and write, but the writing bit I do far too little of. As 99% of writers in the world do, I imagine of the day that a publisher will come round to my house and say "You're so great! Here's ten million pounds! Please relax and enjoy your life because you're brilliant!"

But apparently not too many publishers actually do that, something to do with reducing their carbon footprint by staying in the office more.

So basically I'm going to use this blog as a good practice for me to get into writing more and more, and hey if it entertains some people for a minute or so then all to the good.  I recently got into the Joel Runyon's website - basically if you need any inspiration for getting on with your life go check it out at http://joelrunyon.com/

I have colitis - meh, you're not going to need to know about that and you're probably not interested unless you have it.  And fortunately it isn't that bad (lot better than it used to be, if you suffer with this you have my sympathies).  All I would say if you do have it is take your medicines, use your doctors, and look at your diet.  This week I basically fasted for 2 days (well kept to 500-600 calories) which was due to some documentary that I refuse to watch but apparently is really good, and actually it made a fantastic difference to me, so I'm seriously looking at reducing my food down to what I actually need, bearing in mind that I'm overweight, am an office worker and do very little exercise so my calorie intake is generally way over what I need.  Obviously anyone reading this and thinking about changing your diet - go get some professional advice, doctor or dietician.  If you want a nutritionist speak to me, I'd be an ace nutritionist. (apologies to steal from the master that is Dara O'Briain, but basically anyone can call themselves a nutritionist)

What do you call condensed milk? Mlk!

I tried to have some evaporated milk with some fruit for supper but it floated out the window.

There's a couple of extremely bad jokes I thought of this morning.  I harbour some ideas of trying to be a stand-up comedian but I suspect I simply don't think quickly enough, especially to handle heckles. Perhaps a comedy writer like David Mitchell (must go check out his latest Youtube video at http://www.youtube.com/user/davidmitchellsoapbox?feature=watch)

For those on a budget and that like a beer can I suggest Lidl - they've currently got (at least in my local one) Mann's Brown Ale, a decent and inexpensive basic brown ale for only £1.19.  The sneaky thing also is that it's only 2.8%, which for a lightweight such as myself is ideal!  So far I've had two various beers tonight (one of these and a "Lucky" beer which my mother suggests smells of fish) and I'm somewhat relaxed so that gives you an idea of how little alcohol it takes for me to go from sober to unsober.

I saw the trailer for Mists of Pandaria today, the upcoming World of Warcraft expansion, and it looks ace.  It definitely made me want to go and preorder the expansion.  I used to be a big WoW gamer but I lost enthusiasm a while back and despite going back once or twice for short periods I've mainly moved on from the game.  That said, I'm sure I'll be getting the expansion and levelling up to level 90 along with everyone else!

Okay, I've kicked this thing off so I'm feeling pretty good. Time to go conquer the galaxy in Birth of the Federation!

Thog