Keeping with the Positiveness!

Tomorrow's my birthday. Yay! I don't really care about my birthday and getting older, but I am excited. I'm going home to see my family this weekend. I haven't seen them since Christmas, and I'm definitely ready for a visit. I really do need to go home more, but the hubby and I are already struggling as is with our finances so we've limited our visits to special times and holidays. I don't want to add the expense of more gas than we need to plus our food and such while we're up there to our already hurting wallets. Hopefully things will improve before summer hits and I can go visit more. I really want to take Kroff up there for Funfest and go see the dog show! Yea, I know, I'm a dork. So sue me! :-P

So in any case, Kingsport tomorrow. Excited. :-) It sucks cause it's supposed to thunderstorm tomorrow but it could turn out to be a good thing. Mom said if the weather's too bad then her and dad won't have to work. Yay! So here's hoping!

I'm also hoping I get to see some old friends of mine. I really need to catch up with everyone. It's been too long.

You know what else I think I really am in need of?

A vacation. A real vacation. Time away from work, our home, and this place. There's been waaaaayyyy too many stresses over the past three months and I really think I just need to escape for a while.

I'm hoping our trek to visit my family will provide a little bit of a break for me, but I'd really like to get away for a week. We haven't talked about it because we're still waiting to see if either of us or both of us stay employeed but I'm hoping that maybe this summer we can take a week and go somewhere...anywhere to just get away.

Maybe I can make it til summer without totally losing my mind! hehe

Last One! I promise!

I watched this some time ago and I happened to remember it this afternoon as I was thinking about a lot of things going on right now. It's a great inspiration for all of you who feel pretty discouraged like I do right now.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YU0aNAHXP0

Something Fun

So as a result of being upset today, I'm bored to tears at work. I swear I can't concentrate on anything long enough to do any good to save my life today. I'm just sitting here waiting for Nakar, Ize, or Jules to write me back...haha, what a day huh?

In any case, to take my mind of crappy things that have happened in the past few hours, I'm going to write about something positive! Something different and something not WOW related.

I'm going to write about the movie Twilight.

Oh boy! A movie review...well kinda.

Over the weekend Jules and her cousin came over to my house, we kicked Kroff out, and we ate dinner talked and watched Twilight. Now keep in mind they have both read the books and I haven't...yet. But I'm sure as heck going to now!

The movie, in my opinion, was freaking awesome! I'm sure my husband's going to watch it with me and go "omg that sucked" but I don't care. It was definitely one of those movies that I got sucked into. And that for me is a rare occurrence. I think the last movie I was this crazy about was A Walk to Remember. I read the book and was hooked, so when the movie came out, I saw it twice in theaters and bought it the day it came out. Yea...I love that movie.

So Twilight's probably going to be my next A Walk to Remember.

For those of you who don't know, it's a movie about a girl who moves to Washington from Phoenix to live with her dad when her mom and her step-dad go on the road. When she moves to Forks, she meets a strange boy at her new HS who ends up being her lab partner. When he disappears several days after she first starts, she realizes there's something different about him. Then the day he comes back, she demands answers out of him. He refuses to give any, but keeps asking about her and her life. She's telling him when she notices his eyes are a different color. She asks him if he got contacts and he said no it's the lights and walks away. He leaves her standing at her locker a little shocked. She's getting ready to leave school when one of her buddies comes flying around the corner in a van and can't stop. He's headed straight for her when out of no where, the mysterious guy jumps in front of the van and stops it from crushing her with his hands. He takes off before anyone else sees him and again, she's left standing there with no answers.

Other events take place and we finally figure out that this boy is a vampire. And he has fallen head over heels in love with this girl...a human.

Weird! Right? Definitely a different approach to a love story. But I'll tell ya, I'm a sucker for 'em and this one is right up my alley. There is a little bit of over acting in my opinion, but then again, we're dealing with young adults...it's to be expected. But overall, I loved it.

And I've been trying to figure out why I love it so much. Why does this movie spark something inside of me? I mean, I'm already married. I've found the love of my life so it's not like I'm sitting here thinking "I wish I could find a love like that."

But you know what I think it is? I think it's the very core of my femininity showing. I think it's the desire that all women feel to be protected coming out. There's part of my inner being that desires for a male figure to watch over me. And before I met my husband, I longed to have an older brother, or a male that would act as my older brother. I wanted someone like that to watch out for me and always be there to protect me. Then I met my husband and that desire for an older brother faded as I knew I now had a husband to fill that role for me. I have a man who loves me so much he would rather die than see any harm come to me. And really that was the essence of the movie. A man who loved this woman so much, he would do anything for her. Completely melting away the image of his maleness and the fact that he's a human killing monster. It was just a very cool way of showing the special bond between a man and a woman.

Now I just gotta get my husband to sit down and watch it with me so he can understand why I have been so clingy to him the past few days. :-)

Don't get me wrong

It was pointed out to me a couple of days ago that all I really write about on here is guild stuff and lately it's all been very negative. That's true, I guess I do use this blog as an outlet. I really feel like I have no one in my real life that I can lay everything on. I know there are people, but I really don't want to fuss every time I get upset about something. I know it wears on them as much as it does on me, especially my husband. So I come here and rant and rave and get it all out of my system and move on. :-) Something I've been doing a lot better at lately. Use to things would get stuck in my mind and on my heart and bother me and bother me and bother me. Now I get it off my chest and I can go on with my day.

There are sometimes that things get me down more than they should, or at least, more than I should let them, but over all I'm doing much better.

Case in point. Last night one of my husbands friends really disappointed him, well not only him, but me as well. There were two raids he was signed up to go on this week and he was a no show for both of them. Both of them. Can we say...jerk? Honestly, I expect that from people I don't know that well, people in my guild or on the server that I run into but don't know personally. Yea, those are the kind of buttfaces I expect to do that crap. But not my friends.

So yea, that was great fun last night.

And then...oh wait...it gets better!

And then I had a raid member...in the raid...in the middle of the zone...just leave. Just leave. We thought he was DCed but Kroff talked to his wife and she said no, he wasn't feeling good.

Time out.

I understand if things come up. I understand if you're puking your guts out and you don't feel like playing. I understand if a kid is hollaring "Dad I need you!" I even understand if you're so pissed off at someone you need to walk away before you start yelling profanities over vent. Dude, it's cool. But please for the love of all that is good in this world...TELL SOMEONE. Just say "hey, not feeling it, please replace me, I need to get off." That's all it takes. That's all. No big deal. I got it taken care of.

But do NOT just up and leave and not say anything. It's rude, it's disrespectful, and it really make me angry. And I expect better of you. I expect a lot better of you than that.

And then there's another kicker...dude that fussed at me the other day struck again last night! Started fussing about my second raid leader swapping out her priest for her druid. Both healers and both performing the same function in the raid. But he was pissed about it. Told her she couldn't roll on loot and she had no business being in Naxx. Umm...nooooo. I told her, last time I checked you're the raid leader. So she told him we'd sit down and talk after that raid.

He immediately logged.

How mature right? So here's yet ANOTHER guy showing his butt in front of the guild and my leaders. No respect, no nothing. Just being a prick because he feels like it.

Or maybe it's me. I mean is it me? Am I really that awful of a guild leader that I attact all the pricks in the guild? Do all of these jerks just migrate toward me? Do I have a sticker on my head that says "PLEASE COME TO SACRED PACK IF YOU ARE RUDE, IMMATURE, AND DON'T GIVE A FLYING FLIP ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE'S FEELINGS."

Hellfire, I know at least three people who should be in my guild then. HA! (Come on, I know you laughed a little :-P)

I don't know. It's just frustrating. I just want to go home, log on WOW and be welomed by what I consider my second family. I don't want to log on and get grief and rude jerks hounding me and my officers. It's a game people. We play it for fun. But you will be respectful if you're going to run with this Pack. End of story.

What exactly is "casual"?

Okay, so I have to admit, I was a little taken aback last night when a guild member approached me about not being included in the 25 man raid invites.

Let me set the scene first before I go any further.

Last night, a group of us went into the Eye of Eternity just to see if we could down Malygos since we as a guild have never done it. It was nothing formal, nothing we were all anticipating, just my husband throwing some folks together and seeing if we could get him. My goal was to actually get on a little before it was time for us to go and talk to some people about raids and make sure invites were on the calendar for Sunday's raid. However, real life happened and my father-in-law decides to drop in unexpectedly and help my husband with something. So much for getting on early. So we scarf down dinner since his dad's sitting there waiting on him and then I haul tail upstairs and get us set up. I log in and then get him logged in and just do a quick set up on the calendar with just me and him in it so I can do invites later. But at least I got it started.

Okay, now to chat it up with people about the ten mans. There's a couple on not in a group atm so I pst them and let them know we're starting raid three, here are the times, can you make it, blahblah. Okay cool deal, I've talked to most of them now.

It's ten minutes til raid and Kroff has made it upstairs and is sitting at his desk doing invites for the raid. I'm still chatting with a couple of people and all in all my head is not ready for Maly yet. But we get in there and start trying it out.

About half way through our raid time, a guildie pops on, reads the guild message which states that invites will be on the calendar today for the 25 man run. They state over guild chat that there's no invite, were they left out? I state "no, we just haven't gotten to it yet" and Kroff throws them an invite and so now there's three of us on the list. That guildie appeased we continue pulling and when we take breaks I start throwing in people I know that are on the list to go.

Over the course of about half an hour in between wipes, I'm up to about 20 people. There's still five spots I haven't put on the calendar yet. Five. Here's where the fun begins.

So a guild mate pops on and immediately whispers me "yea, so why am I being left out of the 25 man raids?"

Excuse me?

Seriously, I have been doing invites for half an hour in between pulls, there's five spots, and you want to know why you're left out? Are you kidding me?

So in essence, one of his friends has read the invites, seen his or her name and then ran and told this other person who's now questioning me. Nevermind the fact that there are still FIVE spots that haven't been filled yet. Hmmm...maybe, just maybe, you're in one of those spots. You want to give me two freaking seconds before you jump my case?

Yea, I was pretty peeved, but the whole "why am I not being included" question was not what pissed me off the most.

Let's continue.

So I quickly explain, "you're not left out, I haven't finished invites, please give me a minute as I'm doing this in between tries." So they apparently checked the guild list and saw oh hey, there's a group in Eye. You would think at this point a person would be like "maybe I shouldn't bother her right now, she's doing something pretty important." But no...nope, that's not what happened. I get a guilt trip. "Eye, oh dang, that's what I need for my achievement. Yea, well I just wanted to make sure I was raiding, that's kinda why we're here." (No, that's not exactly what was said, but what was implied.)

Now I'm getting angry.

Here I am, trying to tank Malygos and I've got this person whispering me complaining and 1. not being included in an invite list that's not complete yet and 2. basically telling me that my guild isn't raiding enough for him. I'm sorry, the last time I checked, Sacred Pack is NOT, I repeat NOT a hardcore raiding guild.

I will not make my guys raid 6 or 7 nights a week and I will not cater to the quarals of one person fussing about not raiding enough. I try my level best to do what's best for the guild as a whole. Hellfire! That's why we're raiding in the first place! Everyone's been asking for it. Everyone has expressed an interest in raiding and that's what we've been doing.

I don't mean to beat a dead horse but come on! Can you cut me a little slack? I've been running over numbers and classes and specs and people for the past WEEK trying to get three raids set up so my ENTIRE guild can run 10 man Naxx. I've been busting my butt for these people, and all I've gotten so far (granted it's only been one night that I've told we're doing three raids) is complaints. Complaining and mumbling and grumbling and this or that.

Please get over yourselves. Really, just get over it. I'm totally cool and totally open with taking concerns and complaints privately. I'm down with that. That's part of my job description as GM. But what I won't take is gripping about policies that this guild has set in place from the very beginning. We are NOT a hardcore raiding guild. We raid casually and we do it in the best interest of the guild.

When we start Naxx 25 next week, not everyone's gonna get to go. It's a fact of life. 30+ people will not fit into 25 man Naxx. It sucks, but that's the way it is. That's the way Blizzard made it and like or not, we have to adhere to that if we're going to raid. I'm sorry. I apologize now if you're not on the invite list. It's nothing against you as a person. We want to take everyone and I promise that we will get you in there in time. But the list that's in place was chosen to conform to the right specs and classes that are needed in a 25 man run. There are going to be times that people can't make it, then I will get those guildies not on the list in that run. We'll fill spots as needed and everything will work out. So if you're not on the list, just hang in there with me. You'll be in the ten mans for sure, please let that be enough for now. We're doing our best.

Back to where I was originally going with this.

Casual. Please define it.

To me a casual raiding guild is one that does not make raiding it's top priority. It comes in second to PVP, questing, instancing, or just general hanging out having a good time. Casual consists of raiding a couple nights a week but not being required to raid 7 nights a week. Casual also means you go with the flow, if a bunch of raid members are going to have to miss for whatever reason, we don't raid that week. We don't want our comrades to be left behind because of RL. It happens.

So if you are a member of Sacred Pack or interested in becoming one, get this in your head right now. Raiding comes second. We are a family first and raiders second. And that's not going to change as long as I'm around.

I better do this now...

After being bugged by a couple people over the weekend that I haven't updated, I figure I better do this now before I get too busy to do it later. :-)

What has Aht been into lately? Well not too much. I've mainly been logging on to do my daily cooking and chat it up with everyone. I've been trying to help gear Jule's druid when I can and get some of our other guildies into heroics to help them gear up for the raids. I have a ton of people hitting 80 and working them into the guild runs is going to be great fun.

I said last week we were really close to having three ten man runs, well I told Kroff this morning we were just one shy of being ready to go. And I'm a noob and completely forgot about one of the CM people that just hti 80 with both of his toons over the weekend...we're set.

It'll still be at least a week before we start that raid up. I need to discuss time and committment with everyone that's to be involved and make sure I do have ten committed people to take with us. We've also been talking about who to get to lead it and Kroff said this morning that I probably should. I brought up a couple other people that I would trust to lead a raid, but he thinks me doing it would be a better idea since so many people want to run with me. /rolls eyes I dunno about all that now, but I'm flattered that he still trusts me enough to lead raids.

I lead a raid in BC, but I was new to leading and we definitely had our downfalls along the way. I struggled to get people there and on time and ready to go. I had a hard time fussing at people when they slacked off and settling disputes. I hate dealing with the dirty work. I mean, I don't think anyone especially likes it, but I have a really hard time because I want to be the "nice one". I've always had this thing about me where people tend to run to me and confide in me. I dunno if it's an aura I give off or what, but I've always been very proud of the fact that people feel they can trust me and do trust me. It's something that I don't take for granted and try very hard to maintain my trustworthiness. I like it. So that makes me not want to step up when the occasion calls for it. Definitely a flaw I've been working on. So for Kroff to tell me he thinks I should lead the raid, it means a lot. It means he's seen some change in me. And I'm happy for that.

That being said, we'll definitely have to talk about it some more, but I'll probably be seperating off from my hubby in a couple weeks and taking my own team into Naxx 10 to get ready for Uldar. Oh boy.

It won't be that bad, if I end up leading, I'll have a good crew. A little heavy on the melee, but we definitely have a team for success. And I'm excited. Not about leading, but about getting some people who are fairly new to raiding in there and pounding face. I'm excited we're giving people the opportunity to do something they've never done before. It makes me happy that my guild is so open for those kinds of people. Yea dps may suck at first, but I tell ya, I have yet to see someone who isn't willing to listen and to learn and take advice. I like those people. And honestly, I'd rather have sucky dps or struggling healing or can't hold aggro tanking and them show up prepared and ready to learn and listen than someone who rocks and is stubborn as a mule. Give me the needs to work on my crap person any day of the week.

And just for the record, I by no means think that I'm one of those awesome people. I know there are things I don't know about my class. I know there are things I still need to work on and I know that I will always find someone who plays a Druid tank better than me. But I'm cool with that. I feel I play my toon to the best of my abilities and I'm satisfied with that. And that's all I ask of anyone else. Just play to the best of your ability if you're going to raid, and I'm happy with that. I'll take you to the training dummy and help you, I'll shoot you some sites to help you find gear, I'll take you dungeon romping to get that gear, and I'll even coach you if you need that. But if you're doing your best, then bravo for you. You are a true team player and I salute you. Thank you for being you.

Where are you going?

It's been a slow weekend. The hubby and I didn't do too much but lay around and play games. What's different from normal right? :-P Well I'm enjoying it while I can. In the next few weeks our lives are about to get a lot busier.

This coming up weekend we're going to a friends house to watch Twilight on Blue-Ray. Pretty excited about that, I've been wanting to see that movie for a while. The weekend after that is my birthday and we're headed back home to see my family for the weekend. I'm also excited about that. I haven't seen them since Christmas so this is a long overdue trip home. Then the following weekend is our one year anniversary. Yea, also excited about that. :-) I'm not expecting anything spectacular, money's really tight right now and we are saving up some for our trip to Vegas. So the weekend after our anniversary is Easter and I'm hoping we go to Kingsport again so I can go to my church for Easter. Then there's Vegas! I'm kinda excited, kinda nervous. My husband's going with me so I know everything will be okay, but I really hate big cities. I like my personal space and I feel really crowded in big cities. But it'll be something different and neither one of us have been there before. Actually, it'll be both of our first trips past the Mississippi.

So those are Aht's plans for the next couple months. It's going to be pretty busy but that's okay. All things I'm looking forward to. And lots of wonderful time to spend with the ones I love.

Okay, on to Sacred Pack.

So I spent the better part of yesterday going over raids in my head yesterday. I finally figured everything out and got it all written out. We are very close, two people shy actually, of having three full ten man runs. Three. Can you believe that?

Sacred Pack has been on her feet for almost three months, not quite, but almost. She's very young. And while I have actively recruited when we first talked about splitting into two ten mans, I have not done so in about a month. A months a long time for short attentioned spanned players right? Well apparently not. I've had a couple of people approach me about joining the guild who have seen my spams in trade chat. One actually did and so far he's a wonderful addition. He doesn't know it yet, but he's signed up as one of my healers for 25 man. hehe

As I wrote before, we've also had the merger with Coyote Moon that has brought in several wonderful people. And tomorrow, we'll hopefully get to know them all a little better as they join in on our ten mans. I also had two of my good friends from Wolfden join up with us.

Here's the strange part...I just had four people apply to join the guild yesterday. Four.

Does this not seem a little crazy? I mean, I know Wolfden got new applicants all the time, but come on...we were a guild of at least 50 active members and probably more than that. And I had also been in Wolfden for going on two years, and she'd been around longer than that. People had heard of Wolfden.

No one knows Sacred Pack. Well except my friends I keep in touch with from Wolfden that went other places. We're not a hardcore raiding guild. We're fairly small. I need to count up exactly how many active members we have, but I know we're way less than 50, like I was saying we're barely 30 for three ten mans.

But here we are. Growing like a weed with people crawling out of the woodwork. I'm not complaining. No way am I complaining, it just seems...odd.

A while back I was really worried about people tarnishing our reputation because of the hard feelings that Dero, Fen, and Floppie still hold against us. To this day I can not pass a single person from Maelstrom (well except Soulless the sweeteheart :-)) without a /rude or something to that effect. They all have made it very clear they do not like me. Thank you, now get over it. No one cares, least of all me. You made your bed, now lie in it. The truth of who you people really are and how you really treat others will show in time and I'm not worried about it. The only warning I give you is if you starting harassing my guildies, I will have something to say about it and things will not be pretty. Otherwise, you leave me alone, I leave you alone.

Okay, off my soap box.

It just blows my mind that that whole guild, for the most part, can't stand my husband and I and we STILL do not know why. But whatever, no big loss.

So back to where I was originally going with this...I was worried that the two of them would ruin our reputation on the server. Yes, I still have issues with the two of them, but that's between us, not anyone else. And no, I don't really think Flop would run his mouth, at least to anyone outside of his guild and most of them already know us anyway. I do think Dero and his crew would smash us into the ground given the proper chance though. They've already proven they are immature in how they handle things. And I worried for a while that they would try to do just that to get back at us for whatever the heck we did to turn their worlds upside down.

But it really seems just the opposite. Now I'm sure they've run their mouths to someone at some point and now people who don't even know us don't like us. BUT, I can tell you there are a lot more people out there that DO like us and do like and respect me. I'm seeing it. I've made friends with several new and wonderful people over the past few months and I'm extrememly happy with my guild and where we are going. I feel like our name is getting out there, but in a good way. Even those that will remain friends and allies and may never be guildmates, there are a lot of them out there now. There's a whole guild I still don't know that well, but I'm beginning to trust and I have a high opinion of the GM.

It's really amazing how things work sometimes isn't it? I guess that whole, treat others and you wish to be treated really pays off. ;-)