Things just keep appearing at our door…. It’s amazing. Last week this thing called a Vroom arrived. After a quick install, our kitchen is cleaning. Amazing. The other day, a terrific 16X20 poster showed up of the little wizards. Truly amazing. Before that, it was a Laptop Gelskin from Lenovo, in anticipation of the Star Trek movie that recently arrived in theaters. The wife received a cool charm bracelet not long ago, and there was the Bissle Green Machine, and a Flip Video Camera a couple weeks before… And, believe it or not, some KY Intense arrived, too?
It’s like Magic or something…
If this keeps up, we might have to get our own zip code or something…
While mining in non secure space last week, I made an error and left 5 drones in an asteroid belt and logged off. I’m assuming that’s what happened, since the next time I went to mine, the drones weren’t there. I was pretty tired that night and I’m sure I just flew off without them. Not too big a deal actually, except for losing the T2 drones.
Until the next mining day…
Now this Hulk that I mine with is a really good tank against the local rats. I can sit there all day without too much of an issue against 3 1.4 mil Isk rats (Raven class Battleship) and tank their damage. The shields will never drop below 25%.
So, when I went mining a couple of days later, when the rats arrived, I noticed I didn’t have the drones. At first I didn’t think anything of it since I can tank these rats just fine. They started pounding away, I kept mining, and the tanking was working OK. Then… a problem. One of the little rats started Warp Scrambling me. Under normal circumstances, this wouldn’t be a problem because like I said, I can tank just fine. But now, I couldn’t leave. I had no way to stop the Warp Scramble on my ship, so I could go back to the POS. If an enemy player were to come into the system while I was trapped, I would be unable to escape.
For the first 10 minutes, I wasn’t too worried, but as time went on I became more concerned, and after about 20 minutes, I started calling for assistance from the Alliance members. There were some that were up to 10 jumps away that said they could refit and come to help but 10 jumps would take some time.
30 minutes go by… What am I going to do? I can’t get immediate help, logging out will get my ship popped, I can’t run, I can’t fight…
So, I called my little brother, 2 time zones away and begged him to log in and save this noob. How embarrassing. He said he was almost asleep too. But being the good little brother that he is, and the good corp mate, he jumped online, and came to my rescue. It took him another 5 minutes or so to log in, and fly to my location and take out the Warp Scrambling cruiser flying with the 3 Battleships.
Whenever I fly out to an Asteroid belt now, I will make sure to remember: Never fly a mining ship without drones. Never. You might find yourself in an uncomfortable situation you can’t get away from.
I received exciting news today. It was just announced that Free Realms has soared past one million registrants in only 17 days, an unprecedented achievement for a new IP. To celebrate this accomplishment, Sony Online Entertainment will be rewarding all registered players with Free Realms gifts. Current players will receive a limited edition in-game t-shirt for their character and pet. Selected players will also receive 200 Station Cash along with the new t-shirt. And, the lucky one millionth person registered to Free Realms will receive a free LIFETIME subscription to the game, a one-of-a-kind in-game astronaut suit, and 10,000 Station Cash.
In Free Realms, players can customize their characters, explore, quest, battle monsters, and play a wide variety of minigames in a safe, online environment, packed with stunning visuals, distinctive environments, and social networking capabilities. Players are free to do or be anything: Fight like a ninja, cook a tasty meal, raise a pet, battle goblins, set out on epic quests or connect with friends through a safe, social networking site.
Also available is the Free Realms Trading Card Game: a full-featured trading card game, playable both digitally within the Free Realms online game and offline via physical card decks available wherever you buy trading cards.
Now on a personal note, Mr. A, my little 4 1/2 year old wizard in training absolutely loves this game. We have been in checking out all the sites and experiences available in the game. He has thoroughly enjoyed learning to be a brawler, a cook, a race car driver (demolition, even), and has figured out how to train a pet. I just asked him and he says he loves fighting the goblins the best, and earning money to be able to buy stuff to fight better. The only drawback for him is that I need to make sure and read all the text to him to keep him moving the right direction. But as long as he is following the arrows on the screen, he can usually find his way to where he needs to be next.
If you haven’t checked it out yet, signing up is free and much of the content is free, though you can buy a membership for a nominal monthly fee which adds more content .
Here are a few screen images from Mr. A in “Snowhill”, one of the quest areas in the game
I had a short conversation in game recently about mining etiquette. This was a friendly conversation in my corp with other corp members, talking about what they should do or can do.
I thought I’d bring this question up and see what kind of response I get.
In the Eve Forums, the topic has a lot of different points of view, from “there are no rules”, to the use of moral codes, etc. Basically, the way I see it, this is a MMORPG, that simulates how a real life situation might be. Some players play from the point of view of the Eve-Online game player, others as if they themselves are the pilots trying to carve out a living in the dark confines of space in New Eden.
Personally, I don’t want to make any enemies anywhere, in high sec or low sec, especially from mining. I guess I’m more of a relaxed player. Others, of course, don’t have that same attitude, and I respect that, though if someone is stepping on my while I’m mining, I might not like it. It’s just my point of view though…
—A winner has been chosen! Laurel D is the big winner of the Star Trek Laptop Gel Skin. She told me that she liked the Y530 laptop from Lenovo! Nice choice, I must say.
I used Random.org to help pick the winner. Out of 53 entries, number 11 came up and that turned out to be Laurel. She has 48 hours to contact me to acknowledge the win. So, a big congratulations to Laurel, and a big Thank you to all that participated.—
I have to tell you, I am a HUGE Trekker, and I can’t tell you how excited I am about the new Star Trek movie, Star Trek, which opens in theaters on May 8th. To celebrate, Lenovo has put its best laptops on sale.
In addition to the amazing laptop prices, Lenovo is also hosting an awesome sweepstakes! Right now, you still time to win a ride for 4 people in a Zero Gravity Flight. You and 3 friends could experience zero gravity the only way possible without going into outer space. Check out here for the official Lenovo Sweepstakes rules.
For all you Trekkie’s and Trekkers out there (there is a difference), Lenovo is letting me GIVE AWAY this Star Trek Laptop Gel Skin (sorry, laptop not included).
The Star Trek Gel Skin fits nicely on any 15″ Laptop and is a very cool addition to any Star Trek memorabilia collection.
My Mandatory First Entry:
To enter my giveaway, visit Lenovo and check out their terrific sale. Come back here and leave me a comment telling me which laptop you like the best. Window shopping is always fun and with these prices, maybe you can get that new laptop you’ve been wanting.
Bonus Entry:
Boldly Goand enter the sweepstakes for that zero gravity flight! Come back and leave me a comment and give me the same email that you used to enter that sweepstakes. You can enter the sweepstakes once per day until May 8th, 11:59pm, Eastern Time. So, you can get one extra entry here per day, one for each sweepstakes entry.
Extra Entry opportunities and contest rules.
The giveaway contest for this 15″ Star Trek Gel Skin will also end on May 8, 2009 at 11:59pm, Pacific Time. Winning comment will be chosen by Random.org. Winner will be notified by email and have 48 hours to reply before prize is forfeit.
Here’s kinda what I did during the week. The wife, kids, and I worked on keeping the new lawn watered. At least that’s what I want it to be, a new lawn. A couple of weeks ago I spent most of 3 days completely re-doing the lawn in the front of the house. We’ve been trying to get it watered in and growing quickly, because of impending water rationing due to drought in Southern California. But growing quickly it isn’t. Kinda disappointing. But we keep watering it, hoping it will hurry up and grow.
Putting in a lawn.
And another thing… part of the project included trying to slow down the gophers that keep intruding on my yard. The last yard was destroyed by them. While I was replanting the yard, I laid Avery Cloth down to try and discourage them from coming into the yard, and they found a seam, I guess, and have been again tearing up the yard. Any ideas how to get rid of them without using a Shot Gun? I’m open to suggestions.
Anyway… Wednesday, Earth Day, was beautiful here. I worked that day but it was beautiful when I got home and we all played outside until dark, enjoying the Southern California springtime. The kids went right to bed without baths that night ( I know… eeww…).
Thursday was a kick back day… I was off work and hanging out with the kids at home. Then on Friday, we went to the San Diego Wild Animal Park. There were 2 great exibits there that we saw, the Butterfly exhibit and the Lorikeets. Butterfly’s were pretty cool, but the kids went nuts over the Lorikeets. The pictures in the head of this post are from that. Cute, eh?
Then Saturday was recovery day, from all the walking at the Wild Animal Park.
So what did you do last week for Earth Week? I’d like to know. Drop me a note and let me know how you celebrated Earth Week.
I wonder sometimes whats acceptable for computer or console video games for my kids. I’m sure you have to wonder too. Mine are under 5 years old, so some of it is obvious… No blood and guts, no excessive language, those sort of things. But even with those obvious guidelines for the littlest gamers in my house, one of the 3 year olds will still run away from the computer when Mario is fighting “Monsters” in Mario Galaxy. We laugh because it’s cute, but he is still frightened a bit by it.
So, I was pleased to read the press release about Sony Online Entertainment LLC (SOE) introducing the “Let the Kids Game” booklet. SOE says it is a “parental guide that combines third party research, survey results and expert advice to share the benefits of video games and helpful tips for parents looking to buy or play games.” (Read the complete Press Release here). Additionally, the release says “Now available at SOE.com and WhatTheyPlay.com, the initiative reaches out to parents to help them understand the often-misunderstood benefits of playing video games like SOE’s upcoming free family-friendly online game, Free Realms. With the help of top experts such as John Davison of the online parenting resource What They Like, Inc. and Christopher J. Ferguson, Ph.D., the “Let the Kids Game” brochure demonstrates that games are an unexpected way to not only bring families closer together, but also form future leaders.
Parents can get more information on this at SOE.com and at WhatTheyPlay.com. What They Play is also giving parents an opportunity to sign up to receive early access to SOE’s upcoming family friendly video game, Free Realms. This will be a free to play game with something for every gamer, with “eye-popping visuals, unique and quirky quests and entertaining mini-games, customizable avatars and social networking”. They even mention exploring “the magical world”, so you know I’m in.
By the way, I hear from reliable sources that Little Big Planet, for the Playstation 3 is pretty fun for the family… I have yet to try it, and hope to some day soon, when I get my Playstation 3.
This is the Earth flag, and is not an official flag, since there is no official governing body over Earth. The flag holds a photo transfer of a NASA image of the Earth on a dark blue background. It has been associated with Earth Day.
Earth Week starts today, with “Earth Day” occuring on April 22nd.
After almost 40 years, what started as a grass roots celebration for the environment, Earth Day attracted an estimated 20 million people. This Wednesdays Earth Day celebration events are expected to draw more than a billion people worldwide.
Wikipedia defines Earth Day like this:
Earth Day, celebrated April 22, is a day designed to inspire awareness and appreciation for the Earth’s environment. It is held annually during both spring in the northern hemisphere and autumn in the southern hemisphere. It was founded by U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson as an environmental teach-in in 1970 and is celebrated in many countries every year.
There are countless websites with alot of information on how you can celebrate Earth Week and on Wednesday Earth Day. Here are a few that I found that have good information:
Get out and participate! Join in the celebration for Earth Week this week and especially Earth Day on Wednesday. If you don’t do anything else, get out and enjoy the nature around you and consider what you can do to help preserve it. Do it for our future generations!
Also, when you have a moment, stop by Mommy23Monkeys.com. She has a celebration going on and a couple of giveaways this week. You know you want to!
I’ve been driving myself crazy for the past week working on a project here on the BobTheWizard.com site. As you can see, I have an Ad for Eve-Online in the sidebar. I like the look of the ad, regardless of anything else. But, this is an affiliate ad, and when you click on it, it SHOULD take you to a page to allow you to sign up on Eve-Online. But, for some reason, I can’t get the link to work. I’ve been in contact with the forums for the Wordpress theme I’m using and got some help getting the flash movie to play but for the life of me I can’t find the reason the link doesn’t work.
So, for now, I’ll just keep the image there to let everone coming here know about Eve-Online, and if anyone has any ideas on how to get the affiate tag to work (actually the clickTAG function) please feel free to drop me a note.
Digg!
