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Formal Apology Template

As I was browsing the interwebs via Stumble!, I ran across this handy little template.

This should make those annoying apologies much easier to do.

RS Behind the Scenes March & Elemental Workshop IV

Well, the past weekend has not been very kind to me. I skipped on Friday Night Magic so I could do some homework and clean house; Saturday I woke up feeling as though I had been stuffed full of and wrapped in dirty socks and then left to simmer in a hot air vent overnight. Since then, my weekend has been one chronically joyous cycle of fevers, extreme tiredness, racking coughs, and sleeping 14+ hours at a stretch. When I'm too tired to LoL, I know I'm not feeling good, but when playing RS tires me out, I have to be in a bad way.

I've been in a bad way.

I think I may be getting over it, though, as I didn't have to stop to nap while doing the Elemental Workshop IV quest, so I'm optimistic about finishing this post in one or two sittings. Admittedly, all this is only possible because I was intelligent enough to not try to go to school today; there's just no way I'd be able to get through seven hours of classes and four hours of work in one piece.

So, Runescape's BTS March is up, and it has a couple of decent-looking spots in it. Elemental Workshop IV
turned out to be not quite the brain melter it's predecessor was, and I actually found the first puzzle quite fun. The second puzzle was more of a grind, and I couldn't help but wish I could tell the creator of that machine that there are plenty of easier ways to tell a automaton what you want it to do. The rewards don't seem quite equivalent to the time it takes to do the quest (especially without a guide), but it's not half bad if you like smithing elemental gear.

Next promised update is called Artisan's Workshop, which is a Smithing update, although if it's THE long-awaited smithing revamp remains to be seen. It looks at though it promises some 70+ lvl training, which is good for me as my smithing is at 80.

Unless you've been living under a rock, there's another Bonus XP weekend coming up on March 11th to 13th. Check out this blog for rates and restrictions. My personal plan of action is going to be Herblore, crafting, and possibly agility/ summoning, in that order.

Ring of Wealth will be getting an update--about time! Finally we'll get to know when it actually activates, plus it will improve some standard drops. And it will be getting teleports! Not much else to say other than I might actually be making some D-rings for the first time in several years.

Trolls are getting some long overdue loving in the form of a graphical update. If they're anything like the trolls from the last dwarf quest (and they're supposed to be) they'll actually get to look more rocky and less like blocks of prehistoric Java programming.

Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life...A pirate quest? Must be an early birthday present for me! "A Clockwork Syringe"  promises zombies, seagulls, home insurance claims, and a first-ever Dungeoneering requirement. Hmmm...might be time to bring my Ex-ex parrot out of retirement for a little partying!

Well, this month looks good...two quests and a skill update...Bonus XP weekend...pretty sweet all around!

The Bacon Song

So I was thinking, "There's got to be a song about bacon, right?" It would be a travesty of the modern era if there wasn't.

I guess I'm not the only one that feels this way.

Here are a few I could stand to listen to:

The Bacon Song

The Bacon Song

Happy Bacon

...that should be enough to make you want bacon. I know I do now...

(...slinks off to the kitchen...)

Son of Loki

So I've come to a conclusion.

One of my geology teachers is a descendant of Loki.

I am basing this on what I perceive to be a Loki-ish sense of humor, this sense of humor that, to quote Terry Pratchett from The Last Continent, would "put a land mine under a seat cushion for a bit of a laugh."

So during our volcanology class last semester, towards the end of the semester, we were going to do a sampling project of some cinder cones, and we would be divided into three groups.

For those three people? The three quietest, least offensive, least leaderlike people in the class. You know, the kind who get picked last for a team or vanish into the woodwork because no one knows or cares that they exist.

And, naturally, those three people would be me and the only other two people I can actually talk to for more than three minutes without resorting to the weather or the homework assignment. Now there's a reason we never volunteer for leadering positions.

But it turned out to be sort of fun. I directed one person to take all the notes and another two to measure the height of the columns of the localities where we took samples (we were going up a gulch), while I took the samples. And people actually did what I told them to do!

But back to this teacher: he mentioned one time on how he was flying back to the USA from somewhere overseas and he had 70 pounds of rocks stuffed in his carry-on backpack. It was difficult to move like it wasn't that heavy (or so he claimed). He then chucked it into the first overhead bin in the first class section before going to sit down, because he didn't want 70 pounds of rocks sitting above him on the plane.

I'm just saying he's a descendant of Loki, is all.

LoL: Maokai and the Saplings of Awesomeness

Well, I wasn't intending to buy Maokai right away, since LOML said he would and I wanted to see how he played first.

What with the servers being down for umpteen billion fifteen hours or so and then the shop being down, LOML was not able to buy Maokai the day he was released, but he did get to play a game against one.

"Eeeeee"...BOOM!

OMG those saplings are so adorable! (A cynical part of my brain is going, 'It's just pixels, you dumbarse," but OMG soo cute...who cares?)

So I got Maokai. And I got the double bundle since I really wanted his Charred skin and it was less than buying the champ and skin separately.

Totem Maokai

Charred Maokai. My favoritist

Right now I'm actually going with Clarity and Heal as summoner spells, and building Doran's shield -> mercury treads/ninja tabis ->banshee's veil/frozen heart -> other one I didn't take. I haven't had a real game proceed after that point.

Plus, since I logged on while there was all that IP trouble, I got a free 10 win IP boost, making my First Win of the Day like 356 IP. W00t!

I haven't tried Ryze since he's been revamped yet. I wish they'd hurry up and release the Co-op vs. AI mode already.

Still, I'm quite happy with Maokai and find him very easy to play.

RS Prisoner of Glouphrie Quest & Pottery Update

Since I forgot to write a post about last week's Prisoner of Glouphrie quest I'm going to comment on the last two weeks' worth of updates today.

First, I'd like to say I really enjoyed Prisoner of Glouphrie. No combat? Puzzles? Cool! I will admit I had to retreat to RS Wiki to get some of the color combinations right, but otherwise I didn't use a guide. The scene at the end where the full-grown gnome daughter spends like 900 minutes hugging her long-lost gnome father was also touching.

Plus, I got to plant an extra spirit tree! So now I have a shiny new tree in Brimhaven, in close proximity to the fruit tree patch there. The gnomes now make we want to laugh, as they look more like garden gnomes than they did before.

Another update that I didn't notice at first was that now you can toggle off the profanity filter. So now you can say words like "Shit" in game as well as websites. I'm all for not having my speech starred out on a semi-regular basis, but I can't help  but wonder if this is merely another symptom of whatever rot made the wilderness and free trade return. I don't think the world is going to end, but I have to wonder if the real reason for these changes is "cha-ching!" rather than "we have a mature audience."

Today's updates were also cool. I'm not sure how the urns are going to pan out, but I'm glad we'll be able to utilize demon ashes for more pray xp and the hidey-holes are cool. I no longer have to carry a crossbow and grappling hook to climb the shortcut from Catherby to Taverly on my daily farming run.  Not huge or splashy, but cool.