@Gmail, WTF? I have to register my PHONE??

Maybe I’ve been living under a rock, but when did this happen?  I went to create a new gmail account today and voila! You have to enter your phone number to get a verification code sent via SMS.  What??  That’s ridiculous.

I appreciate your interest in curbing spam, but surely, SURELY there’s a better way than to make me register my phone.  Half the point of my gmail accounts is to keep spam down on my own.  The last thing I want is to have my phone number associated with an email account.

So now I’m stuck.  I’d like to register for a sweepstakes online, but want to use my typical spamwatch method:  create a new mail account for specifically THE site I’m registering on.  If I start getting crap in that email account, I know exactly who sold my info.

Sheesh, I guess I’ll bite the bullet, register the SMS, and thank all that is techie I have unlimited texting on my phone (the Nim plan, as it’s called by my friends.  Bite me, friends!).

*grumble, sulk, smash, stomp*

Summer’s achievement whore

Man, I knew moving sucked, but I didn’t know it would take me so long just to have a weekend in my own home.  Good thing it was a long weekend, or I’d still be crying about missing all of the Midsummer festival in WoW.  Yeah, yeah, I’ve got my own summerfest going on outside (see house and pool entries), but still.  When I want to really unwind, it’s in front of my computer and on the WoWs.

So, happily I found out that the festival ran til this weekend.  I thought I’d make Friday _the_ day for festival running, but that was not to be.  I got a shit-ton of work done at the house (pun on shit, cause my friends installed a new toilet for me, among other things) but sadly no nerdtime was had.  Saturday I spent a few hours running around before folks started showing up for a delightfully impromptu 4th party, complete with a friend showing up with a BBQ grill and housewarming gifts!  (Yay for basil plants and citronella candles.  I have a bit of a mosquito problem.)

I snuck in some WoWing when folks were out at the pool, but totally got busted and set it aside for later, knowing I had until 4am to do it.  So at last, around 10pm last night, I got some achievements good and done, after a very fun day with IRL friends (many of whom I also saw online later that night.  Lulz!).

*post temporarily paused as Seri [and later Twaz] delightfully drops by to swim! Hooray!*

So, without further ado, the Summer achievements, and a few I threw in because it feels so nice to get things done!

Thanks to the summer food rewards:

Then, just because it was an easy achievement:

And then, because it was the only key I was missing, Dire Maul:

Whew.  Now if I can just get that kind of thing done around the house.

Unsettled!

Can’t..get..unpacked!!

I just want to have a few days to buy a bed, unpack, and figure out exactly what I have and don’t have in my possession. I have yet to swim in mah pool!

However, Cupertino and San Francisco were fun last week and weekend! I even spent a day on the beach at Santa Cruz and a few hours driving up Highway 1. Oh, and I saw King Tut’s stuff at the delong museum. Woo!

House is officially broken in

Or: how my friends rule.

1) tested pool water for me scientifically and also anecdotally.

2) brought my fridge’s first beer. Aw.

I can has hows?

Kthxbai!

Druid cat skins: Thundercats, Oooooohai!

Well, on the one hand the Tauren bears don’t have chronic ear hair like the NE bears do.  On the other hand, we have no option but nosering for kitties.  Oh, and unfortunate neck beards on the bears, too.  Mamas, don’t let your Druids grow up to grow neck beards.  Neck bears.  Stubble.

I guess this is better.  The old cat looked really … spritely.  Happy to be alive!  Those aren’t spirit fingers!  These are spirit fingers! Too joie de vivre, even for me.  The new kitties are definitely more sinister looking, and certainly more leonid.

It’d be nice to have the cool Panthro cats the NElfs get, but oh well.  At least I won’t be looking to my Sword of Omen every time I shift to cat form as a Tauren.   New NE cat form:  Thundercats!  Hoooooooo!  Old Tauren cat form:  Thundercats!  Heyyyyyyy.  Thundercats!  Ohai!  Thundercats!  Hellohowareyoudoingtoday?

Aw, man.  The NElfs get glowy cat jewelry.  Aw, lemme have glowy cat balls, pleeeeese?  Hm, let me rethink that…  Second thought, I’ll pass on the cat form truck nutz.

New druid skins

Finally!  Now we’re good’n'girlie, too: makeup and jewelry!

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/druid-forms.html

WoW break dancin’

No, not me; not entirely. But if you go on a WoW break, consider doing so in this fashion. (NSFW printed words below.)

*pours out a 40 for Megan of Out of Mana; takes up the filking torch for a moment*

Flagrantly stolen and morphed from a WoW-breaking friend in my guild (whose also going to Blizzcon. Aroo?), to the tune of “On a Boat” by Lonely Island.

Ahhh shit!
Get your mouse ready it’s about to go down.
Everybody online get in the fucking raid.
But stay on your motherfuckin kodos
We running this, Let’s go:

I’m on a break and, it’s going fast and,
I’ve got a WoW themed ebonweave afghan.
I’m the king of world, on a break like Emo-demon.
If you’re online, then you’re sho’ not me-oh.
{get the fuck up, this break is REAL!!!}

Fuck loot, I’m on a break mutha fucka!
Fuck raids, I climb trees mutha fucka!
I’m at a pub with my boys, mutha fucka!
The raid leader makes noise, mutha fucka!

Never thought I’d be on a break;
It’s a big boozed day off of raids.
Yeah! Ulduar!
Look at me!

Never thought I’d see the day,
With a big break coming my way.
Believe me when I say
I fucked a murloc!

*It’d be great if I could embed the video for “On a Boat” by Lonely Island here. However, all their videos for this song are not allowed for embedding. Go look it up if you don’t know how it goes. It’s a funny song, but after searching through a few YouTubes for an embeddable copy, I’m too annoyed to keep looking. *

Crafting needs moar slitted tauntauns

Remember that sleeping bag back on April Fool’s Day?  No?  It was only everywhere, and so popular that the creators of the _joke_ actually are selling them now.  Anyway, here is a great plushie creator (I’ve shown some of her more hilarious works, like a high rocky mountain) doing what she does best.  I present to you:  MyPaperCrane’s Luke in a Tauntaun.  So awesome.  Looks like the show she made it for, Stitch Wars, is gonna be pretty cool, too.

Blizzcon sold out

Wow. 28 minutes this year, but at lest the server didn’t crash.  Happily, my guildies and I were all on Vent buying tickets together.  First two through the queue got 5 each, so yay.  I’m not making murloc hats this year, though.