Playing Dad

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Intervention?

I know it's been a little bit of a gap since I last posted...but things have been a little bit busier around here the last few days than I had expected them to be. It all started with a long online communication with my brother telling me that I needed to stop worrying my mother so much...followed by an unexpected visit from one of my wife's brothers, who flew in from out of state to have a personal talk with us...followed by an arranged lunch meeting with my mother that got a whole lot more emotional than I really thought it was going to.

Basically, our families got together without our knowledge and decided they needed to have a long talk with us. Some of them had been using my blog as their means of communication with us...in other words, they hadn't talked with us about what we were up to (on the phone or computer or in person)...and instead used my posts to find out what was going on in our lives. Obviously, this frustrated us to no end. Some might say that we should have been more communicative with them about what we we've been doing. But I don't think it's our responsibility to tell everyone what all of our plans are...and if any of them want to know what's going on, or what are plans are, we're more than willing to be open with them and tell them.

Well, so that's sort of what they did. I think we're just more frustrated with the method in which it was executed. Each and every family member that was involved had ample opportunity to contact us and talk with us directly. Not that we expect everyone to agree with our choices...but I don't think anyone expects everyone to agree with everything they do. I think our family is pretty used to the fact that we tend to do stuff outside the box.

We're okay with all of that...we're okay with the fact that we're living outside the box (obviously). Ultimately, the most important thing is that we believe that we're doing what's best for our kids. It's strange to see how much everyone is so concerned about us and our kids...especially knowing that every action and every change that we've made in our lives for the past 4+ years has been with our kids in mind, and trying to do what's best for them.

Even though I've made it a point to not use my blog as a means for family communication, I'm going to take this moment to direct a few comments at any family/friends who might still be concerned about our family situation. Please don't assume that we are not doing what's best for our kids...or that we might not have thought about what we are doing or where we might be six months down the road. Please don't assume that we are being foolish or that our finances are in trouble, especially when you don't know how much money we have, what we are spending it on, or how much money we are bringing in or might be earning in in the near future. And don't assume that we will run our family into the ground to the point that we will ask for assistance from our family, especially since we have never done that in the past, and don't ever plan on doing it in the future.

With all that being said, we're glad knowing that we have loving and caring family members who are concerned because they've been reading things on my blog that freaked them out a little. I would like to notify anyone that is reading this blog to not take these posts as the final word on everything that we're doing. I am not using the blog as a means to communicate with my family or friends. If anyone reads something and wants to discuss the subject further...please comment here or message/email/call me. I like that my family is interested in what we are doing, and obviously I feel passionately about it, so I would love to talk more about it.

I'm sure I will be talking more specifically about the things that were brought up in the next few blogs that I'll post, as it's all that I've been able to really think about these past few days...so thanks again for the additional material.

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Weapons of Amalur, Update 1

Here's a few updates to my original blog post...about the weapons I've found so far in Amalur. I've also received some pics from other players who posted them in the KoA forums...I'll add them here as well. I've updated the original post with these items as well if you missed the first round of weapons.

Daggers:

Atropos and Veshani

Longbows:

Hailstorm

Nature's Kiss

Faeblades:

The Dove's Wings

Demon Horns

Cydan's Faebades

Staves:

Coldspike

Chakrams:

Stormscythe

Allender's Edge

Sceptres:

Khleran's Sceptre

Longswords:

Cessblade

Fervor

Piercing Rapier

Greatswords:

Righteous

Kellerac's Sword

Scourgebane

Hammers:

Ward of the North

Friday, February 24, 2012

Playing Dad at PlayingDad

So when I created this blog (which has really been less than 3 weeks ago now)...I had no idea where it was going to take me. I wasn't even sure it would last more than one or two blog posts. And I know that maybe I'm still getting ahead of myself...but I just have a really good feeling about this...I'm thoroughly enjoying it. I want to actually be making more posts than I am...but I just don't have the time right now. So here I am, making another update...and I just want to tell everyone that I talk to (both here and in real life) how much I'm enjoying what I'm doing...it just feels great.

With that said, I wanted to share a little bit of good news regarding my blog...but first some back-story. Whenever I started this blog, it took me awhile to work out the name for the blog. My wife and I sat down one day and ran through a bunch of name variations...eventually coming up with the Playing Dad title that you see...it just seemed to fit really well. Of course, the problem was that I didn't actually research on Blogspot (which just happened to be the free blog-site of my choice at the time) which names were acceptable...and of course PlayingDad.blogspot.com was already taken. And not only that, but it was taken by some guy who doesn't even use the blog anymore.

Now...I'm sure there's a ton of similar blog sites out there with similar situations (hell, I have to two other blog-sites that I'm not using). But regardless...I decided to push forward with using Playing Dad...and went with the PlayingAtDad website that I have now. So just yesterday I was chatting with an old friend of mine...and we were talking about my blog and what not...and we started talking about the fact that neither of us were happy that I had to resort to the PlayingAtDad name. Well, without much further discussion, we decided to go ahead and get a new domain name for my site.

Hopefully soon, my blog will no longer be at Blogspot, and will be found at PlayingDad.com (no, don't go there now...it's not set up yet...but soon!). I just need to get all of my old entries converted over and a new blogging template created, and then I should be good to go! I'm pretty excited...it makes this whole blogging thing seem even more like a good thing.

So big thanks to my wife for helping me pick the original name...and big thanks to my friend Joey for encouraging me to get the new domain name. Muchos gracias!! And if anyone is needing any website help or hosting...I have a friend who's great with that.

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Weapons of Amalur

This post is going to be a log of all the unique weapons that I'm finding on my adventures in KoA: Reckoning. I'm going to start out posting just the pics of the weapons and stats. I'm working on some video and hope to have that up sometime soon. Enjoy.

Oh...and yes, my character is nude...so get over it (or enjoy it)!

Daggers: