Where Am I?

I-Don’t-Remember-When – April 2, 2008

I haven’t been Vana Logging lately because work truly sucks. When I’m depressed from one thing, other things get suppressed too. That of course is one reason I need to {Escape} from here pronto. One in-person interview and one phone interview since OCTOBER… >< I’ve had a few bites on various apps – email exchanges mostly – but noting more. Right now, Ape’s friend Kim’s husband Matt is trying to hook me up with a just-opened slot. We’ll see…

In any case, I haven’t stopped playing FFXI. I’m on almost every single night, only missing one or two recently due to illness and schedule conflicts. I’ve also had to work on other stuff like Ape’s cert class, science fair, updating my PSP to 3.90 M33-2 and trying web-enabled Remote Play, and the anime comedy goodness of Chobits.

I had an odd thought about working in a consultant/contract based I/T shop – what if they assigned an XP value to task items and based reviews, bonuses, etc. on level grinding? Poor performance would incur an XP penalty (bugs, missed objectives/functionality, etc.) while after-hours support could get an XP over time boost or something… It’s only a matter of time before someone does that in this MMO-crazy world!

Anyway, as for Vana’diel, I’ve been busy. I’ve only done a few parties but here are the highlights:
• Got BLM deep into 36 (1k tnl!) – May take to 53 vs. 41 to get Retrace
• Got DNC to 27
• Got NIN to 13 and finally got Norg fame to 3, allowing me to flag the first 4 Ninjutsu scroll quests
• WHM is still 65
• Spent nearly a week sorting out the Campaign system. Most of this was popping all the Maws from Jeuno to Windy (as well as the “Jeuno Ring” and Pashhow), and earning my first Campaign Ribbon.
• Once I had that ribbon, flagged all three Recall tele-scroll quests and have completed 2 of 3, and all 3 map quests
• Started BST! Went from 1 to 11 in a few days and am enjoying it. Learning hard and fast how BST works since all the guides I found were pre-BST solo boosts (no more XP penalty, tweaks to charming, etc.). Don’t know how far I’ll take it but it supposedly charms at full level even when subbed so it might do me well to get it to around 40 and then use it as the sub on DNC, NIN, RDM and maybe BLM to help me solo when I can’t get parties.
• Have been grinding decent XP in Campaign battles using Campaign Ops to boost AN gain. Nearly have 10k AN and will soon apply for another eval.
• Once I have the third Recall, I might figure out which is closest to a Campaign Arbiter and then move HP from Windy to Whitegate permanently, using a Recall>walk>CA tele path to get to Campaign fun.
• Finally unlocked the last two Runic Portals. This is partly what I’ve been avoiding WHM partying for – these levels tend to use some RP-accessed camps and I didn’t want to have any trouble.
• RDB had a group event on March 19th to get Rank 3 for 4 Brigaders. See aerinofsiren.googlepages.com for pics and details.
• Haven’t seen much of Fhox the last two weeks… RDB seems to be in a state of decline with Fhox, Chu, Mag Puma and Dex not being on regularly anymore. Despite Fhox’s new-year /lsmes to start working on missions/ranks/af, not much has happened…
• Skilled up club (~2) and staff (~6) on Fortifications during Campaign battles while *not* Tagged. Gonna have to keep trying this trick, and may try it on BLM for the Dark skillups