Friday, April 23, 2010

iPod Gaming and Open Feint


If you haven't heard of Open Feint, it is a social network and ranking system that groups all sorts of casual games from all kinds of different developers together.  The best way to find them would be to either install the main Open Feint application or use the embedded system within one of the games you already own.  Here is a list of fun games I am using on a regular basis that use this system.

  • Word Warp Xtreme - an updated version of Word Warp, this free game jumbles a word of 7 letters and gives you a set time to find as many words as you can within those letters.
  • Bird Strike - This game may still be free on the App Store, as it was a free game of the day and a recommended Open Feint download recently.  This game uses the accelerometer to guide a bird you shoot from a slingshot through the air, missing obstacles and collecting rockets to zoom to incredible heights. Silly fun, my kids like it better than I do.  
  • Ms. Chuck - is a ball that you guide through an obstacle course.  I keep this on my iPod mostly for my toddler, but it can get pretty challenging in higher levels.
  • Radio Flare - I downloaded this game a long while ago, and it is still one of my favorites.  Using the accelerometer, guide your ship around obstacles while gathering flares. It has a great soundtrack, too.
  • Piyo Blocks - This is my guilty pleasure.  It's a match three game where the blocks are chirpy little square birds. You can play against the timer or without one.
  • Dunnit - Wait, this isn't a game, or is it?  I recently unlocked the achievement, "Better Late Than Never" for completing 5 tasks a day late. Silly me, this is a to-do list that is really easy to use (and it's free!).  With the added incentive of experience points and achievements, I am getting more household chores done lately.
This is a short list, I understand.  I plan on finding more games to add to my collection soon. For me, games have to be entertaining for more than 5 seconds and be free.  Tough standards, I know.  If someone wants to fund my gaming habit, they can send me an iTunes card!

Another nice thing about this system is that it integrates with Facebook and Twitter, finding friends that are using it and automatically adding them to your friends list. For instance, I have Leo Laporte and Darryl the Tip Giver on my list, thanks to my Twitter feed.  Yes, and my hubby, too.  But not many of you follow @theholyfallout (he's the strong, silent type).  The fun of this is, you can see what  they are playing, if they are online, you can chat with them (I haven't tried this yet) through an instant messenger embedded in the Open Feint dashboard.

So, point of this post?  LFM for my friends list!  If you own an iPod or iPhone and enjoy twiddling your time away between more important things like loads of laundry or random dungeons, follow me on Twitter and download an Open Feint application, and start browsing. I will happily let you step on me as you climb the ladder past my low user rating!  You can find me on Twitter as @Shawndra or on Facebook under the e-mail address Jeni at pamedia dot com.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Farming For Old School Glory

I remember years ago, before Burning Crusade was launched, a guildie used to farm the templars and lords out in Silithus for gear.  I think I went with him on Shawndra a couple of times, just for kicks.  In our casual, raid when we feel like it guild, he seemed an overachiever of immense proportions.  He doesn't play anymore, sad to say, but I still remember the fun out in Silithus, mowing down cultists to farm for outfits (he already had farmed endless hours alone for the signets and scepters).

With that memory of group fun, I set to my task of farming for quests in Silithus. The cultists fell faster than they respawned for me, filling my bags with cloth and robes, but seldom yielding the mantle or cowl needed to use the lesser wind stones.  Still, I slogged away, Delgada  tossing Shadow Word: Pain around like confetti.

It took 4 long sessions for her.  Abyssal crests turned into medallions of station, abyssal signets turned into a scepter, and more robes were funneled along with mountains of cloth and other random bits to Rowena to hopefully sell. I am still working on getting the third piece of the An'Qiraj quest set, because the set bonus rocks!  I may never use them again, but I can say I earned them, and that is all that matters, right?

Del still has roughly 40 quests left to finish out Kalimdor. I have lost interest in the grind to Loremaster, but I'm still working on it, in between gearing up Carlotta and twiddling with any of my gazillion alts.I want to finish the achievement, more because she is the character I play the most, and she feels incomplete.  Would I have been trying for this if achievements had never come to be?  I would probably never know what I was missing, but would want to try and find as many quests as I could find on my own.


I haven't been playing as much lately, due to a cold that is threatening to become the annual bout of walking pneumonia.  Wizard 101 has been commanding a little more attention, trying to get Rowan Trollstalker out of Krokotopia so she can bribe her way into Marleybone.  I am fast running out of crowns to open up new areas.  I think I have run out of areas to unlock in Krokotopia, though, so my meager stash of crowns might get me through the portal to Marleybone.  Might.  Darn 7-11 is out of game cards.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

Uh, What Do I Do With This?

Do I name it and call it my own? It's as tall a my 3 year old.  Or do I eat it, torturing it slowly. If I do that, do I start at the ears, stop and the head, and go back for the toes, or do I just nibble with abandon?

I will save the bow as a trophy for the kill, whichever I decide :P

Loremaster?

I have been busy trying to get Loremaster on Delgada. I could use that as my excuse for not posting, but to be honest, real life has been keeping me busy. My kids and step-kids are home for spring break, my father-in-law is in town, my cat is pregnant (again!), and the laundry is trying to take over more than the laundry room.

Last night, I twiddled around Blade's Edge, roping a few guildies in on my quest to summon a guardian of Simon (I love the mini game there!) while I hared off to do the bombing quest (which is my least favorite quest...skyguards and bombing...). I'm wondering if I can summon the guardian alone. It was rather easy with the four of us, smart and paying attention, hitting the buttons, and the kill was faster. I let them out of helping me with my other quests. I was having one of those nights where, even with a goal, "Oh, look, a shiny!" would throw me off for minutes. Even so badly impaired, Delgada managed to get her Loremaster of Outland achievement, finally finishing most of the quests in Blades Edge Mountains and getting the achievement for that, too.


Wednesday Delgada brought Thrall to Nagrand to visit his grandmother,and finished her list of quests out there.   Before that, we had another case of the shinies, tracking down books for the Well Read achievement.  I think we only have these to track down:

  • *The Betrayer Ascendant - 66.76 Darnassus City
  • *The Lich King Triumphant - Only found within Scholomance and Stratholme
  • *Old Hatreds - The Colonization of Kalimdor - 51.29 Tanaris and within Scholomance
  • *The Invasion of Draenor - Only found within Scholomance
  • *The Seven Kingdoms - Only found within Scholomance and Stratholme
Oh, if you're trying to track these down as well, the link to the achievement on WoWhead above has a list with locations in the comment section.


After finishing Outland last night, Delgada is left with the rest of Icecrown and 50 quests in Azeroth to become Loremaster.  She also wants that silly knuckle sandwich achievement and the other one with the weapon skills.  Who knows how long that will take? That last point in daggers and staves is just hanging there, taunting me.

I know a lot of you out there have ground out the Loremaster achievements.  If you have any suggestions for tracking down those last quests, I'd love to hear them.  I dreamt last night that I kept getting quest drop items.  If only!

Sunday, April 4, 2010

He Is Risen Indeed!

 This is one of my all time favorite hymns. What a great day to share it!  Enjoy your time with family and friends today!



He Lives

I serve a risen Saviour,
He's in the world today;
I know that He is living,
Whatever men may say;
I see His hand of mercy,
I hear His voice of cheer,
And just the time I need Him
He's always near.

####Chorus:

He lives, He lives, Christ Jesus lives
today!
He walks with me and He talks with me
Along life's narrow way.
He lives, He live, salvation to impart!
You ask me how I know He lives:
He lives within my heart.

In all the world around me
I see His loving care,
And tho my heart grows weary
I never will despair;
I know that He is leading
Thro' all the stormy blast,
The day of His appearing
Will come at last.

####

Rejoice, rejoice, O Christian,
Lift up your voice and sing
Eternal hallelujahs
To Jesus Christ the King!
The hope of all who seek Him,
The help of all who find,
None other is so loving,
So good and kind.

####

Saturday, April 3, 2010

Happy Easter!

We here are getting ready to dye eggs here at my house.In the spirit of the holiday, I have hidden one somewhere in my site for the Great Blog Noblegarden Egg Hunt.  There are at least 40 other participants, and the prizes are a fabulous character portrait from Mason Cole for the first place, and a montage of either Horde or Alliance races/classes for the second prize winner.

Good luck!

Thursday, April 1, 2010

Dinner And Hijinks At The Morton/Quinn Household




Mom, take my picture!











What's for dinner?  Grilled cheese sandwiches...











 ....and cupcakes!  Noah, you better eat at least three cupcakes.  No, really.  And the grilled cheese, only eat half.









 Yum! (They were really meatloaf with mashed potato frosting and pound cake with orange icing)












 What did you do to my computer?  And here I was nice and made you cupcakes and grilled cheese sandwiches.  Gimme back the sandwich.








Oh, right, even the murloc is wondering what is going on around here.  Both screens?  Yeah, you try selecting something with your mouse when it moves the exact opposite of what you meant it to.








Mmmmm, black cherry soda.  Wait, why won't it come out of the glass?




Because it's Jell-o !






April Fool's!