A Happiness Hangover

I will admit it, I am used to planning things and being in control  Putting it out there, not the best at letting the reins go. So this weekend when my husband, sister and friends planned a birthday shindig, I was going nuts. I wanted to know what was going on and have a hand in planning things. I am glad I did not. It was absolutely fantastic and I was genuinely surprised and touched by the effort that they put in to making me feel special for my 30th birthday. 

Long story short, they planned a cabin weekend (my family has a cabin up in northern Michigan) and about 11 people total were able to make it! Well, 11 people and like, 4 dogs. :)

DogCPK chillin on the couch up north

So as a result, I have a happiness hangover.

Similar to if you did some drinking (which we may or may not have done a lot of too.....), you have a great time, and then when it is over, you are sad it is over and that you didn't enjoy it more when it was happening. In this case, instead of a headache and an upset stomach after, I am exhausted, covered in bug bites, a small sun burn and a weird dread and sadness of having to go back to the real world. Too bad a happiness hangover doesn't have a "hair of the dog" equivalent to it. 

Upnorth, we didn't have internet or cell phone service. For a bunch of gamers, that was a little difficult, but the dogs and board games were a great distraction.That being said though, I am sure everyone is just as excited as I am to jump back in to Overwatch! 

Thank you to everyone who helped make my 30th birthday one of the best ever! Love you all!

Have some cake. It is not a lie. (but no, really, I had a ton of cake this weekend. Loved it)

It's My Birthday!

I am taking the week off from delightful insight into the geek-wife blog life (well kinda... obviously I'm posting this!) to celebrate my birthday. The big 3-0!

I have in the works a great Food Friday next week and tons of Overwatch PoTG and highlights by none other than yours truly. Who knows, maybe soon we will have a guest blog post.

But all that will have to wait. My delightful husband and I are going out to eat tonight and have a weekend full of plans (I asked that I not be kept in the loop as I would just end up taking over the planning...) Plus, this is halfway in to the second week of my employment at my new position.

Overwatch and New Beginnings

"True self is without form"-Zarya (Overwatch)

I have had a very interesting roller-coaster ride of a month. I had to make some life-decisions that effected my career. Long story short, I received two job offers within a few weeks of each other, so I had to make a decision as to which one to take, on top of leaving a job I helped create and that I had been at for over 6 years. 

There was a weird in-between part where I had a job offer from one place and a up-in-the-air tentative offer from the other. It meant I couldn't turn the first one down confidently as it was not for sure I was going to get the second. Ethical dilemma. I didn't want to start somewhere and then leave a few weeks or days later. 

Needless to say, I lost some sleep and was a bit stressed. Around this time, however, Overwatch beta was open. I cannot describe what a lovely break from reality this game offered.

One of the great things about Overwatch that helped me through this were the strong female characters. Female characters that are some of the most powerful characters in the game, but are strongly feminine. I grew up with books and TV that touted if you are a "strong" girl, you must be a tomboy and if you were feminine and got your nails done and wore high heels you were flighty and a ditz. Of course, I wanted to be the tomboy and be good at sports, solve mysteries and play video games, so I never wore my hair in a style that wasn't a ponytail and didn't really embrace makeup until college. In Overwatch you have a professional body builder who carries a huge laser cannon but wears pink nail polish and cute makeup. You have a professional Starcraft player who drives a big pink tank with bunnies on it. You have a scientist in an oversized snowsuit with an ice gun and a hairpiece with snowflakes on it. That balance is something that I had struggled with pretty much since high school and even today.

Playing and getting fully immersed also helped me take my mind off of the reality that I was going to have to look out for me, even if that means turning down a job offer in a field that is pretty small in a town equally as tiny. I primarily play Mercy. I enjoy playing Mercy for many reasons, but primarily I have always been about helping others. I also truly enjoy that character.



Ultimately, as fate would have it, I got a call just in time about the second job offer, which turned out to be the one I truly wanted. I was able to accept that job offer and had to turn down the other well before I would have had to start.

The day I started my new job was the day Overwatch actually released.

Oh, and another weird kind of coincidence? The job I now have is in the medical field. Healers for the win! 

My Journey Into Azeroth Part 2

Part 1 here

I'm sure all of you are just itching to get my part two of World of Warcraft stories.

Just kidding, you all are either playing Overwatch, Hearthstone or Doom. Let's be honest.

So, on to the next part of our chapter.

We got to a part where basically the quests that we "needed" to do to get me acclimated to the game and to get me to a level that would make sense to get to the next level, which was doing a "dungeon raid" (make note to ask Breaky if that term is right. So many damn terms)

My role would be that of the healer. A big "duh" on that one. That whole problem with figuring out what to bind to you? Doubled in a dungeon. I am usually running behind everyone just healing. Since I have to stand still as I heal, I was always way behind everyone else, just spamming heals. Healing especially Breaky. He was the "Tank" so everyone was attacking him first anyway. So that resulted in me running behind everyone and trying like hell trying to figure out what I should try to bind to me, while strangers yelling at me for "winning" everything.

So much going on!!

Not a huge deal though. Some of the fun elements I enjoy is when I am not in the action and figuring out what I ended up with. A lot of the fun customization elements are pretty nifty. Plus it feels really good when our team is victorious in a dungeon/(cave)


Plus side? I got to level 20! WHOO HOO! Despite my reservations about catching on to how everything works, I did enjoy my experience enough to justify paying for WoW to continue to level up and play.

One of the reasons I am glad I did? I got a mount! A horse! WWEEEEE Another? Got up to Level 29 before adult responsibilities made us stop for the night (IE our dog had to use the restroom), which isn't too bad all things considered.