I hate phones.

No really. You likely do not understand or appreciate the depth of my tele-hatred. It goes beyond all reason. In fact, in an effort to encourage me to actually use a phone and be somewhat reachable in an emergency (since my previous cell phone had sat in my purse, dead and unopened for the past 6 months though I still paid the bill), my fiance gifted me an iPhone. It has been largely successful - I answer when someone calls. Most of the time I'm just surfing the internet or playing Civilization though.

I do not do telephone conversations. They frustrate me. Tell me the information I need, and then let's be done with this, eh? The problem with this is that I'm also FEMALE. And for some reason, other females seem to think that, like them, I will enjoy nattering on endlessly on the telephone with them. I DON'T. But no amount of trying to explain this to the other women in this world makes any difference. It is beyond comprehension to them. I guess this is especially the case with my own family.

I called my parents yesterday to tell my father I was thinking of him on Veteran's Day, but unfortunately he was not home. So what followed was an incredibly awkward 45 minute "conversation" with my mother (whom I dearly love, don't misunderstand me) who was trying to get me to be talkative. Every few minutes she would ask me another variation of "What have you been doing lately?", to which I would respond with some new variation of "Absofriggilutely nothing, momma." Our entire 45 minute conversation dragged out like this.

The irony is, from the outside, nothing IS going on. There is nothing going on in which my mother would have any interest, after all. Of course, had I been honest, I could have said something like this...

"Well, I wrote up this survey on my blog for other healers to get to know some information about other healer classes, and it just TOOK OFF and this big website linked to it, and now I feel all this pressure to actually write something decent on my blog (not that I wasn't trying to do that before) and every day there are all these comments, and it's super exciting! I would have thought by now I'd run out of things to write about, but I just keep getting all these ideas! The strangest thing is that I'm not even playing WoW as much as I'd like, because our raiding alliance was going through a rough time, and I've recently decided that perhaps 25 man raiding just isn't worth the effort for me, so I've been working on putting together smaller 10 man groups, but I'm thinking more and more that what I really need to do is just focus on leveling up my other two healers so that I can be more informed when I write about things on my blog, because that's quickly becoming my new passion, although I've been spending so much time on my blog, I haven't invested ANY time on my novel!!!!!"

My mother -> .....

She would be so confused and lost. As a matter of fact, I vaguely mentioned that Friday night we would be having our regular D&D 4th edition session, and that I was considering stopping by for my friends' Saturday night Pathfinder session to learn more about healing classes in tabletop gaming, and there was a stunned silence as my mother struggled to find something to say that would make it sound as though she had any idea what I was talking about. Actually, I think she was trying to figure out if D&D was somehow related to S&M and whether or not she should be horrified.

It's kinda sad, when you think about it, that the S&M would be something more easily understood than the D&D. Or... well maybe it's not sad. Actually maybe it's just creepy, since it's my mother. NAAAAAAAAAH *thinks happy thoughts*

I really did have a point. Somewhere.

Oh yes. Outside of the gaming universe, my life is incredibly dull. I work. Or rather, I go to a place and hope that maybe this time they will give me work. My fiance works. And we come home, maybe watch some TV together, and talk about our hobby, and maybe play some of our hobby - gaming. I suppose I'm a bit spoiled on having people to whom I can relate in regards to my hobby. My fiance is a gamer. All of our friends are gamers. There is never a shortage of people with whom I can discuss gaming.

But now I'm one of those people who, when faced with a non-gamer, has nothing to really talk about. Well, we could discuss politics or religion... two subjects I love that are simply not polite conversation - especially not with my mom. Perhaps if my job were more interesting, I would have more to discuss on that front. But I'm a hobbyist, I'm engaged to a hobbyist, our friends are hobbyists, and I'm left wondering, what do hobbyists talk about with non-hobbyists?

When speaking to a non-gamer, when they ask what you do, it's just "gaming". But that one word encompasses so much. Entire worlds are encapsulated in a two syllable noun. I suddenly have so much more sympathy for folks who play WoW a lot and are in relationships with non-WoWers. I'm really very lucky. I am off in my own little world, this alternate universe. I have likely abandoned all those who do not appreciate this world, or speak the language, and I'm blessed that so many people I *do* care about are on the voyage with me. I never realize how separate this world is until I'm forced to try and conversate with foreigners.

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This past weekend I was complaining in guild chat about how much I really dislike my job, and miss the days when I was just a lowly cashier at the home depot. One of my longest WoW friends piped in and told me something she learned a long time ago that has helped her get through a bad day in the office, and develop a healthy attitude at work.

Before I divulge the secrets of her genius, I'd actually like to start by pointing out why I like RPGs in the first place, and some of the ways I'm different than many other players.

I have a lot of respect for hard work and long efforts that may only reward small payoff. I've always felt the joy is in the journey, and as feel-good and hippieish as that philosophy may sounds, it's how I play. It's why I don't mind long reputation grinds. It's why I like leveling my toons "the right way". It's why I think people ought to be polite to one another. It's why I enjoy healing, and helping others - but it's also why I dislike giving people gold for no reason, or running lowbies through dungeons on principle. I translate my values from the real world into my game universe. I did this long before I ever started playing WoW, but WoW has definitely been the best reflection of my personal values. Think of it like Gevlon-gone-nicey-nice. After all, even Gevlon's action in game reflect his own personal values.

So in a strange twist, my friend-who-is-like-a-sister told me that she gets into a gaming mindset for work. It sounds kinda backwards, it may even sound like one of those things that gamers get harassed for all the time, the uber geek mentality. But it makes sense to me.

She gears up to go to work. She grinds faction reputation with her coworkers, clients, and bosses. She does her daily quests every day, and pursues various different achievements. Much like WoW is something she plays in a way to enjoy her life, work is a "game" she plays that enables her to enjoy her non-work life. All that reputation and daily grinding can be exhausting and tedious, but it enables her to pursue the other things she truly enjoys. Perhaps she can buy a fancy new mount. She needs a certain steady level of gold for repairs for raiding, and consumables of course. When she meets people that are rude and thoughtless, she reminds herself that she does not have to deal with these people outside of that realm if she does not want to. Much like rude people online, who you will inevitably have to deal with online, perhaps if we're lucky, we only have to deal with the work-jerks while in the office. 

I asked her if that meant if I ran over my boss I would get ten achievement points and a few epics, and she said I might, but then I might also get banned. Damn, there goes that idea.

So I started thinking about this in terms of my current hateful work situation. I am currently employed as an intern - stuffing envelopes, fetching coffee, that kind of crap. So I've decided to think of it like Naxx, or heroics. I strongly dislike both, to be honest, but in this analogy, I need them both to gear up for something better... like Icecrown. Maybe if I run enough stupid heroics and starter-raids (aka internships), I will be better prepared for the real fun, the real goal, Arthas (oh and a job at the US Census Bureau plzkthx).

The idea of going from someone who brings her real world values into a game changing into someone who brings her in-game values into the real world is something of a frightening transformation. Have I gone off the edge of gamer extremism and fantasy world inundation? Am I going to wake up tomorrow, single, unemployed, undateable, living in my mom's basement? No, I don't think so (and it's not just because my Texan parents don't have a basement). Perhaps it's just a coping mechanism. I'm not sure how healthy it is, but surely it's not healthy to go into work and leave work utterly miserable with your life because you hate your job so much, either.

So I think I'll give it a shot. What do you think? Have I gone off the edge? Is this the crowning moment of my avoidant personality disorder? Will the non-gaming faction of the world soon come with the whitecoats and toss me into a padded cell? Am I distorting my real life to accomodate a mere hobby?

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I took a lot of art classes in high school. I remember for one particular project, we were told to paint a self portrait, and I was having a very hard time painting my mouth and eyes. I finally panicked, and painted a big black stripe across the mouth, making it look like tape, and left the eyes black and hollow.

When I presented the painting the next day in class for critique, people asked a lot of questions. I quickly concocted a load of bullshit about how I felt "stifled by society" and something about a dark soul and other such artsy emochick nonsense. Everyone believed it, because in high school I was cast under the "gothchick" label.

After class, my teacher pulled me aside and asked: "Why did you really paint tape instead and black holes for eyes?" Since he confronted me about it, I fessed up and told him that I simply ran out of time. He promptly gave me an A, and told me that I had mastered the test of demonstrating "artistic license". Also known as "cleverly manipulating words and ideas to justify how much you screwed up something".

I am a master of this art. For an example of this, you can read the column I wrote last night over at SaveOrDieRadio.com. In the last SoDR episode (seriously, why aren't you listening to it?), they talked about gods, deities, and religion in gaming, and it happened to come up that I created a Dwarf Cleric character who essentially worshipped the wrong god. So yeah, I had to make up a justification for doing something that for all intents and purposes, I just really wanted to do. Take that, you silly rules! /poke /poke

Religion in World of Warcraft

To take this topic to the WoW level, religion and philosophies are my favorite part about WoW - I wish the developers would actually beef it up a bit. The "light" and the "shadow" are vague notions, and instead of being portrayed as some kind of divine presence, it actually comes off as merely a different school of magic. I prefer the D&D way.

The average player is perfectly happy being handed a backstory for their race/class combo. Even the small amount of individuality suggested through talent point allowances quickly becomes filtered into Elitistjerks-approved specs.

Light Versus Shadow

Religion and philosophy give the ultimate opportunity for individual character development. I'm fascinated with playing my new Forsaken Priest, because of the strange dichotomy between light and shadow amongst the Forsaken. Abandoned and literally forsaken by the Light, they can still choose to channel it - but why? Why would you channel a force, or a divine power, that has spurned you in the worst possible way? Or is that the ultimate in Light-endowed devotion?

Are the Naaru demi-gods of the Light? Where are the demi-gods of the Shadow? Shadow is different from Fel, so Burning Legion demons don't satisfy me. Does Shadow get paired so often with Frost simply due to the assumption that the absence of Light's warmth will leave a tangible chill?

The ultimate in Shadow for a priest is Shadowform - casting Holy spells drops you out. So, why is it that if you are channeling the Light, you can still cast Shadow spells? Juxtaposing the two different divine forces in one class makes it particularly interesting - and they should contrast and battle one another. How would this not present some exciting and challenging inner struggles for characters?

Though I probably do come off as somewhat indifferent to the Shadow side of Priestliness, I'm really not. I enjoy philosophizing about the relationship between the Light and the Shadow - in fact, the entire novel I've been writing in my head for some time is completely inspired by the idea of a Shadow priest.

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While I suggested earlier in this post that I simply made up the crap about purposely choosing Sehanine for a deity for my Dwarf Cleric, that isn't quite accurate. Religion, both IRL and in game, fascinates me and intrigues me. Juxtaposing seemingly counter-intuitive religions with classes that usually suggest a "default deity" is a helluva lot of fun for me. Since I never really get the opportunity to debate or discuss religion IRL, I suppose that gaming religion is my outlet. The ultimate fantasy - non-controversial religious discussions.

People don't get pissed off when I say Moradin is for lemmings, and Sehanine is for the clever - at least, I sure hope not. Yeah, don't mind me, I'm just over here embracing the holy shadow.