Still here

It's been a long few months. I've mostly been out for medical reasons and I even had my first and second hospital stays. So a bit of a convoluted explanation about what's been up.

I had mentioned two years ago that I had some pain in my side and at first the doctors thought the problem was my gallbladder and it should be removed but later decided that my gallbladder was fine. Well, this summer my side was hurting again but only if pressure was put on it and I also wasn't eating very well. There were quite a few foods I couldn't even think of eating without feeling nauseous, although I did regret that hamburgers were on that list of foods I didn't want to touch. I had touched base earlier that summer with my primary doctor and mentioned the pain in my side and she thought it could be my gallbladder and asked if I wanted to get it checked out. I declined at that time because it wasn't really bothering me. Unfortunately when I was at another doctor's office to get the ringworm my cat so generously shared with me checked out I threw up in her wastebasket. I agreed to go get checked out because it's not every day that I manage to have two nurses and a doctor all worried, although they did thank me for at least keeping my mess contained. Anyway, tests came back, and the doctor was confident that I had gallstones and my gallbladder needed to come out. Oddly enough, I think everyone else was more worried about this news than I was. I think it's because I had come to terms with removing my gallbladder two years ago. I will admit that I was skeptical about if it really would come out because I had been down this path before. Anyway, saw the surgeon and surgery was scheduled for about two weeks later on September 15.

 That was the rather ordinary news. As the date for surgery came closer I noticed that I was having trouble breathing at night if I shifted a certain way. Eventually I couldn't lie down without gasping for air, so my mom insisted I go to the emergency room on September 10. What they found was some swelling around my heart and a bit around my lungs. I was admitted to the hospital and at first they thought it was pneumonia but the other doctors quickly ruled that out and brought in my rheumatologist who keeps tabs on my Wegener's. But since my breathing became better after getting painkillers, I think it became less important than making sure I was ready for surgery on the 15th. That mostly meant keeping a watch on my vitals, vitamins, etc. My potassium, which I have had trouble with all summer, was rather low so they gave me some by IV, which stung like hell. Anyway, the surgery was rather anti-climatic. Went well, no problems, healed well, and since it was laprascopic, only had a few small cuts, of which only one really stung and of course it was that cut that the cat would insist on stepping on whenever he wants a cuddle.

I went home the 17th, but I was only home a few days when I began having trouble with my breathing again so I went back to the emergency room where they ran the same tests again and found the swelling around my heart and lungs once more. So I got more painkillers. Anyway, my rheumatologist told me that they suspect that my Wegener's was returning and rather than attack my sinuses and joints like it had before, this time it was after organs. So back on high dosages of predinsone and a new drug, called cytoxin.

But things have been pretty good since than. I did have to withdraw from school for the semester because I had missed so much class because of my illness but it's probably just as well, since I don't think I would have been able to deal with classes since I was on a large dose of predinsone. Basically the predinsone causes mood swings, lack of focus, ravenous hunger, among other things. I've basically haven't felt up to writing anything, or reading anything that requires too much attention, or really much of anything. I have been playing a little bit of WoW, mostly just logging on for raiding. My guild has progressed to heroics and killed about half of the bosses. I would really like to get Archimonde before legions. I know there's plenty of time, but I wonder if I should be looking for a group that would take me. I do worry about finding a group because my monk is a tank and I don't really know how to dps or heal with her, which could make getting into a pug group rather difficult. But I'm sure I could do it since I feel more focused since my prednisone dosages has been cut down quite a bit since September. I think I was on 60 when I left the hospital and I'm currently on 20. It's still quite a bit but I'm excited about having it cut back.

Raiding and Other Games

Last I wrote, I was a holy pally just starting raiding with a new guild. The guild has been a good fit for me but I found I was becoming more and more unhappy with being a healer. Luckily for me, we needed a new tank. Our guild leader took over tanking until the end of Blackrock Foundry but since he really didn't like tanking, so he was really looking for someone else to tank. I had just finished leveling up my brewmaster monk and was having a blast with her so I got permission to switch from my pally to my monk at the start of Hellfire Citadel.

 

We're working our way though normals but we have killed the first boss on heroic and we have plans to make the transition from normal to heroic.

Outside of raiding, I've found myself not wanting to play WoW that much. After a bit of thinking I decided that I just needed to play another game for a bit. I thought I could hold out until WildStar was ftp but I've been feeling really restless now. I decided I needed to try something that had caught my attention years ago but I've never felt motivated to actually play the game before. Now I felt a need for change and nothing seems like a larger change than to head into space with Star Trek Online!

I'm not very far along in the game but it's a beautiful game. I love all the customization options that are available. There's also two different kinds of combat, ground and space. Ground is pretty easy to understand but space combat is both really awesome and while it's easy enough to understand, the fact that you're battling in 3-D space while moving along at warp speed makes it difficult. I'm definitely looking forward to exploring more of the galaxy.

Summer is no time for rest

Summer vacation, should be a time of rest, relaxation, and fun, right? That's what I thought, but it seems Summer had some other surprises for me.

I started the summer with two classes. I think one of my professors compared a week of learning to a month from a normal class. After surviving my two summer classes, I figured I wanted to actually go somewhere for vacation and the only place I could think of that I really wanted to go to was Kentucky because of the Mammoth cave.

I have been wanting to see Mammoth Cave since I first learned about it in the fourth grade when my class was learning about the different states and my group had to make an alphabet book about Kentucky. Mammoth Cave is the longest known cave system in the world with over 400 miles having been measured and the end hasn't yet been found. I was really excited about finally seeing a small part of this cave.

It was definitely a memorable trip. I told my parents my plans and they wanted to come as well. The weekend we choose to go was unusually hot. Our first day in Kentucky we wanted to recover a bit from the drive so we choose not to tour the caves but instead went to see Dinosaur world. Dinosaur world has an outdoor walk with over 100 sculptures of life size dinosaurs. Even with the heat and the sweating, it was an amazing tour.

The next day we went to the cave. We had signed up for a tour the day before after visiting Dinosaur world so we knew that we would be able to see the cave. It was significantly cooler inside the caves than outside. Unfortunately, as the tour took us further into the cave, the worse I was feeling. I usually love cave and the Mammoth cave is one that has been well traveled, with stairs and paved paths. But by the time we stopped at a rock formation called the giant coffin, I felt miserable enough to ask one of the guides if I could abandon the rest of the tour. Thankfully, it seems that people have to turn back all the time and they were happy to lead me and my family back to the entrance and let me go at a pace that I could handle. Oh well. At least I got to finally see a small part of the cave and I have a new goal of one day returning to see more.

When I got back from vacation and still felt really tired and a tad bit sick so I went to the doctor and after some tests, it turned out I had a potassium deficiency. I was surprised at how much better I felt after just the first day of taking potassium supplements.

I currently plan for my next post to be an update about what I've been up to in WoW.

That Face

Zeetai's definitely not going to be winning any beauty pageants with that face. I love the Drakuru quests and figured I'd see how the ghoul disguise worked with the selfie cam. That's a face I won't be forgetting anytime soon.

Settling into the new guild

I've been pretty happy with my new guild so far. They raid two nights a week but they don't raid too late since they finish at 11 pm for me. It's not a hard-core guild and we've been working though heroic content. Currently 7/10 and have to finish Blast furnace, Kromog, and Blackhand.

It definitely feels odd to be a healer, there's so much stuff to watch out for, along with healing everyone! The other day, I actually thought about my raiding history and realized that I haven't had a main healer since Ulduar came out. There's only been one raid that I mained as a healer. Since then, I've either tanked or dps. I've done some dabbling with healing and I loved being a holy pally during dragon soul lfr but I mostly just stood still casting my aoe healing. I'll admit that I have quite a learning curve to adjust to healing raids now. It's also really different from healing heroic dungeons. I have to remember that I don't have to do all the healing. I can rely on those others healers, especially that disc priest. Ugh, Disc priests and their bubbles make my heals almost unnecessary. They are the only healers I can't beat up on the healing meters, except on the trash pull right before gruul when there's lots of aoe damage, the group pops lust, I use my wings, and just go to town with the aoe healing. Bwahaha, so much healing. I might be too competitive to be a great healer.

When I haven't been raiding, I've been working on my newest obsesssion. Zeetai, is a warrior. One of the only classes I've never had at max level in any expansion. There are several guildies with warrior alts and they have made warriors sound fun, so I figured I would try again. So I made Zee. Zee is currently level 75, the highest level warrior I've ever had. I've been having a lot of fun as a fury warrior.

I've also been spending gold. Not on tokens... although I probably should. But on things like mounts and pets. I didn't expect to ever have enough gold saved up for an onyx panther. I was planning to get the yellow or green one... but the onyx one was at a really good price on the auction house... and so I made it mine. I've made several rather large purchases lately. It seems whenever I start building up gold, I find something on the auction house that I have wanted for some time and can now actually afford to buy. Not only did I get the onyx panther, I also picked up a sandstone drake, and a crawling claw. No more crying because after finishing yet another tol'var artificate  I still haven't gotten the pattern for the claw! Nope, I broke down, I bought it and I have named it Thing. Sigh, I swear, the next big thing I'm buying is a token... possibly.

Finally Summer!

I have finally had my last final! At least for the previous semester. I can't believe that I made it. I had moments where I was convinced I would never make it though the semester, let alone do well. At least, I think I did well, I won't know for sure until next week when grades are finally posted.

I haven't done much with this blog for awhile because I have been obsessed with school. The weeks of classes that I missed because of dealing with my health required that I spend most of my time trying to catch up. I wasn't entirely convinced I could do it and I am so relieved to have this semester over with. But that now means I can focus on other things, such as getting some updates on my blog.

So what has been happening? I have recently changed guilds and this past week was the first time I have run with my new group. It's a trial period for both them and me. I had been contemplating leaving Spoiled Milk for awhile now. Everyone had seemed so excited about new content at the end of Mists but after the expansion released, people began to slowly disappear. This past month, I realized I was the only active player left in my guild. I suppose I could have tried to recruit, but to build a new team from nothing? I didn't have the time because of school, the energy because of school and dealing with other problems, and I didn't particularly want to lead either. I figured once school was done, I would begin looking for a new group.

That was my original plan but last week, I saw a casual raiding group looking for a holy paladin. They were partway though heroics and they sounded like a group that I really wanted to be involved with. I know by now, that I am not particularly interested in being in a top-end raiding guild. I just want to see the content and continue to improve. I had also noticed that while many groups were looking for healers, very few had been looking for holy paladins. I decided to take a chance and respond to the person recruiting. We had a great chat and I warned him that I wouldn't be able to start for two weeks because I needed dead week to prepare for finals. He told me that would be fine and I got a guild invite.

This last week was fun for me. I haven't raided in quite some time so I was rusty. I also had some internet issues Thursday night which caused me to eat more lances and bombs than I should have. I love my family and I love being on a farm, but, sometimes, the internet drives me insane. I suppose I should just be glad that I actually had internet because we had lost it earlier that week and it had been slow since. First-world problems and all of that. Anyway, they were pretty understanding, as far as I can tell, and I hope next week to show them that I won't eat as much damage when I have a better internet connection. Hopefully things will continue to look as good.

SELFIE!

Hortis got the quest for the selfie camera today. And she's already mastered the fine art of making funny faces. Her new Fragment of Desire doesn't appear to be approving.

I'm really happy with the new blood elf models for females. I didn't notice the change on my paladin at first. Which is awesome. She moves the same and it's not until I really look at her face and hair that I finally see the changes. I don't like the hair though. The colors all seem off. I spent some time with Tyle to see the changes for her and she now looks really pale... Ok... she's always been pale. Maybe I've just gotten used to my pally who has more color. But the hair really bothers me. It just doesn't look right on either of my blood elves. Oh well, Hortis thinks she looks great. She thinks being able to take on all the raids I'm sending her to for pet gathering means she's strong. I'd hate to disillusion her, silly healer.

Always Changing

Regular updates. I don't have them. I had some accomplishments that I was excited about. I finished making Shadowmourn on my death knight, I switched to playing a paladin for raiding because we needed healers. Raiding... well, the people who used to play stopped, the people who said they were coming back didn't, so the group slowly changed to entirely new people. Good people. I have peace with that but others didn't. I wonder what it takes to get a group to hold together.

From this point I'm mostly writing about real-life stuff. 

I've haven't been feeling up to doing much in-game. I raid but otherwise I haven't had any special projects going. But I also know I've been having some health issues. The biggest of which is the one I'm currently dealing with, a return of my Wegener's. Bleh. And it's also requiring some coordination with my professors at my school to try and keep current with my course work while still dealing with my condition. I'm supposed to take this week off of classes and just work my way though my mountain of homework and then it'll be spring break, so more time to work on homework. 

Overall, I'm just tired but I'm also impressed by the people in my life. I knew that the professors and my classmates were amazing people but they really surprised me this past week. I knew something had been off for weeks but this week was the worst for me. I had a hard time facing the idea of dealing with Wegener's again. I would say I was fine, but I wasn't. I stopped attending classes and missed my meeting with the counsilor and at the writing center. I got phone calls, emails, and visits from what started to feel like a million people all wanting to know if I was ok. Thursday I had a visit from one of my friends. I'm not sure how she got into the dorm, but she tracked me down and told me that everyone is worried and I needed to go home and let my family take care of me. She even offered to drive me home right then. And she told me she tried to visit again to make sure I did go home. I also talked to her with some text messages and a phone call. 

I wish I knew a good way to give her a thanks for such care. I shall have to think about it carefully.

I'm not sure what I wanted to do with this post. Just write something. Probably. I feel so passive today. It's better than the rage, the panic, or the sorrow. It's also so difficult to type with a cat determined to use my hand as a pillow. 

I still can't believe that I have Radar again. When my family told me he had escaped the house and couldn't find him last August, I thought I would never see him again. The day in Novemeber when I saw him standing outside, peering though the glass doors, I thought he was one of the new barn cats. But there was something about that long grey tabby cat that I had to check out, so when the cat ran off, I followed and called for my family to help me. It was Radar. We managed to catch him and bring him back inside the house and it's almost as though he's never been outside. Definitely my moment of good luck.