Jennifer's 365 Project

Saturday is finally here, and that means using all of the various pieces purchased over the last few days (snowpants, jacket). So after running to the store one last time to find a decent pair of winter boots (and finding them), Chris and I headed out to Pando Winter Sports Park in Rockford to meet up with friend of his and another couple.
At first glance on their website, the hill looked massive and scary. I'm afraid of downhill skiing and the prospect of propelling in a tube down a snow covered hill didn't sound much more appealing. But, once we got there and I saw how much slower the tubes seemed to go down the hill, I was calmer. And probably a lot less annoying.
Passes come in three hour chunks, and we went up and down the hill about two and a half hours of that. We even stopped and ate some tasty cookies Angel made this morning.

All in all it was a good time. I'm really glad I invested in the snow pants and water proof jacket (the boots - meh - marginally warmer than my hiking boots would have been). I kept dry and they'll be really useful on future days when I want to wander through a snowy park. No more doubling and coming home in wet jeans.

Anyway, we took a bunch of photos so enjoy!

Nothing I did today tops this news.

Chris and I have some outdoor activities (tubing) coming up this weekend with some friends and it was discovered quickly that I don't really have any clothing for such an event. Usually I just wear multiple layers of pants and shirts with a wool coat. I guess it's easier if you have snow pants...something about not getting wet.

So we went shopping after lunch and found some pants on sale. We then quickly discovered I also don't have an appropriate jacket or boots. We hunted around a little for jackets but couldn't really find anything. Honestly, women's jackets can be a little much in color and frills (or fake fur). Unfortunately all the mens jackets that were awesome were too big. *sigh*

Hunting tomorrow, I suppose, for Saturday's tubing event.

Mid-morning at work some co-workers stopped by and dropped off some tasty doughnuts from Kalamzoo (Sweetwater Dougnuts) and a designated gallon milk, just from the doughnuts. There was a lot of flutter about the milk being vitamin D (and therefore too fatty and undrinkable) and the doughnuts being too large (and therefore too fatty and inedible) but I paid no attention. I'm not a fan of doughnuts and milk, so I passed on the milk, but I did scarf down a delicious glazed doughnut (which are my favorite and remind me of tasty doughnuts every breakfast in Florida - visiting my grandparents).
In the evening I checked out Battlestar Galactica Online - which is in open beta and a browser based game. Meh. Not really impressed - but the fighter plane style of game isn't really my game of choice either.

Pretty good graphics for a browser based game though.

I spent a big chunk of the evening playing around with the Kinect and getting it working with Lord of the Rings Online. More specifically, capturing video of the two screens for a brief introduction and tutorial over at A Casual Stroll to Mordor.

So here's just a screenshot (because it's hard to take a photo of yourself) of about 15 minutes of video I captured that I now need to edit down.

Hooray for progress!

Update (2/16/2011): Please check out my post on using a Kinect & LOTRO at A Casual Stroll to Mordor for a detailed introduction and video.

I spent a big chunk of the morning playing more Rift. I'm getting more into it, and it's a pity the beta closes Monday. I was enjoying the PvP!

In the evening after getting some chores done Chris and I snagged a pizza and settled in for the evening. Originally we were going to watch a movie since Chris had watched most of the commercials yesterday and neither of us care about football. The plans quickly changed while we were watching the Puppy Bowl and realized the snarkfest that twitter could be for the game.

So we set up the laptop with some tweetdeck searches going and let the game play in the background. Most of the evening has consisted with Chris fast forwarding through to the commercials (Thor and Captain America premiered during the game) and me working on the netbook, messing with FAAST keybindings and reading google reader.
As you can tell from Chris's photo, it was an exhausting night for Leki. Too much snark perhaps?

So I finally got into one of the Rift betas (beta 6). I didn't have a chance to start a character yesterday, so I booted the game up first thing this morning and dove in.
I picked the Defiant faction and a cleric. The majority of the time in a new game I create a healer. For one, there are usually a lot less of them in being played in a beta - making it easier to group up if you want. I also figure if your healer class is broken or useless, the game really wont be much fun to me once it launches. Plus, healers are typically my favorite PvP class.
The game is interesting enough, and it pulls a lot from other MMOs. There are rifts, which are essentially like WAR's public quests (complete with stages, leaderboard, and loot); instanced PvP which so far remind me more of WAR than World of Warcraft; achievements and titles for various in-game activities (which reminds me mostly of Guild Wars); and of course your typical MMO-type quests (gathering, slaying, delivery, etc).
Graphically the game is very similar to Guild Wars (and LOTRO, but not as cohesive or polished - but this is a beta). So it's a very pretty game, though nothing tops Final Fantasy XIV in my experience yet.
The biggest difference to me that Rift has over a lot of other MMOs I've played is the character class system. It has more customization than a lot of MMOs. You choose the areas you want to concentrate on up top and as you put points into each tree you open up additional skills and spells. Plus, if you decide you dont like one (or all) of a tree, you can remove it and choose another specialization.
Overall I like the game. I absolutely love the public quest system from WAR, so I'm glad to see it implemented in another game. I also like the instanced PvP so far. But the major problem for me is being compelled to invest in another MMO.

Rift has a lot of similarities to a lot of MMOs I've played and it mostly just made me miss WAR or Guild Wars instead of want to invest 49.99 in a new game and a monthly subscription. That's a hard sell when I already have Guild Wars, LOTRO, and Champions Online that I can play for free. Plus, I can activate a subscription on World of Warcraft or WAR since I've already purchased a license for the software.

No. This does not involve beans.

The day started out really crappy, so I spent most of the morning looking forward to lunch with Lori. And lunch was great. Tasty pitas from the Pita House, and good conversation. As an added bonus the musician who normally plays outdoors in the summer (and who we've seen in the Dog Pit next door) was playing away at his guitar.

When I first noticed this guy playing it was the summer and I was reading The Picture of Dorian Gray (and later 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea). Now every time I hear him I think of Dorian, the Nautilus, and summer.

Downtown Grand Rapids had a fair amount of snow piled around town. I decided to head out on lunch, knowing full well there might be untouched sidewalks I'd have to trudge through.

Luckily nearly every sidewalk I had to take was clear of snow, and those that weren't had only a little snow. Someone even cleared part of Veteran's Memorial Park (though as you can see from the top photo, not all paths were cleared).

In the evening we took Peppy to the vet to get checked out. She's got a small cyst on her foot and I just wanted to make sure all was good - it was. She's still crazy active and certainly doesn't act her 5 years old.

Ok, so there was some serious snowfall. Enough that the roads were kind of dangerous (and apartment complex not even cleared until late this morning) so we both worked from home. Yay for internet and electricity!
On lunch we took a walk around the apartment complex. As you can see, they were still clearing the roads in the apartment complex. Anyway, here's a few shots I took early this morning and on lunch of Snowpocalypse in Wyoming, Michigan.
Also, Chris shot some video of our foray out on lunch for your enjoyment!

Or is it snowpocalypse, snowOMG, snowtoriousBIG, or some other name being bandied about on Twitter? There's a coming storm, forecasted blizzard conditions, and all that jazz. In 2009 there was a lot of buzz about a snow storm that fizzled into virtually nothing more than heavy snowfall on a regular winter day. There was also a bit in December about snowpocalypse as well, but nothing happened.

So we'll see. We grabbed some gas since we were running low, and I brought my work laptop home just in case. This could be an epic, snowed in extravaganza, or just a crappy commute to work tomorrow.