New Hobby?

So I learned something really interesting yesterday and I think it might have to become my new hobby.  I complain about a lot of things, but until now I have not had a way to get some sort of follow through.  So, I ask you my few readers, would you like to unite with me and take a stand?  Let me share my joy with you.

One of my pet peeves are people who smoke in their cars with the windows down and at the end fling their smoking butts out into the road.  I think it's disrespectful, and rude.  If they don't want their cigarette smoke around them when they are driving what makes them think I do?  But what can you do about it, short of rolling down your window and saying something to them which will only resort in a fight in varying levels.  You know anything from name calling to some form of road rage.  Well, my readers, you do have an option.  If they throw their smoking cigarette butt out the window it is an offense.  So what can you do?  Simple.  Call the local police, not the emergency line-they do not like that, and report the offense.  An officer will have to take the report.  You will have to sign it.  They will track down and server the offender and they will have to appear in court.  You will as well, but in my opinion it is worth it to take a stand.  When you make the report you need to know the license plate number, the location it happened (parking lot, street name and closest intersection) and it helps to know if the person is male or female.  They have to come and take your report, it is your right.

This is the same for drunk or erratic drivers, so if you witness or are a target in road rage you do have ways to fight back.  Given it's not right in that moment.  But I'm ok with it biting them in the butt after the fact.  So what am I saying?  I'm saying unite, take back our roads and make them cigarette butt free and maybe a little safer.  I'll go to court if it means maybe one more person things before chasing someone down or flipping that smoking butt out the window.  Spread the word and join me in some karma.

~Emily

I'm Not Asking For The Moon, Or Am I?

I pay for a service.  Ha ha!  That sounds almost dirty!  Let me rephrase that.  I pay for the "privilege" of playing an on-line massive multi-player blah blah blah (World of Warcraft).  I do this, for the opportunity to slay beasts with complete strangers, some of them being incredibly immature and obnoxious youth, and some of them being people I enjoy knowing on a pixel-basis.  I like being able to log in and either run around by myself, leveling a toon to the mighty level of 80 so I can do whatever level 80's do in their spare time, or with a group of pixel approved friends for a greater purpose.  This might be running instances for loots and fun, or doing dailies for to make money for all those most-have items.   Where am I going with this (besides sharing what an geek I can be)?

Well, for about the last maybe month, the game has been barely playable.  The lag has been intolerable.  When I kill a big fat ogre (I affectionately call them "fatties") I want to be able to immediately loot my treasure and move on to the next fattie.  That is the way of the game, and the way it normally is.  For the last few weeks things have not been like that.  For example, today it took me 40 minutes to log in.  I spent 20 minutes waiting for the character screen to come up, and then another 20 minutes at the loading screen.  Once I finally made it in, the game was still not playable.  There was a huge delay in interacting with the characters in the game-which made turning in quests, picking up quests or selling garbage in my bag impossible.  It's been like this every night I've tried to play for the last month.  Some nights you can patiently play through the lag.  Might I suggest a drinking game?  Every time you have to wait to loot take a drink.  Every time you have to wait to talk to an npc, take two drinks, etc. You get to the point where you really don't care about the lag, or playing for that matter.

But now to my point.  This is not the service I am paying for.  I am not paying to wait 40 minutes to log in. I'm not paying to sit and drink with my lap top while I attempt to play.  What completely blows my mind is that even though others complain, many many others, Blizzard Entertainment can't seem to be bothered with such trifle problems.  They blame my internet connection.  Yeah, nice try.  Try again.  I would be way less frustrated if they would acknowledge the instability of our server, and would even say that they are working on improving play-ability.  Oh, and it would be nice if they would credit my account at least a month of play time, for the month of un-play-ability.  Grrr.

~Emily