Keeping Busy – The Climb #226

Monday 4^th September 2017

The day job definitely seems to be the source of my current spate of stress. I’m still not exactly sure why though.
I actually wondered whether I should be starting another writing project just to take my mind off things. Perhaps this stress is all generated by the fact I have spare time now.
I’m not sure that’s entirely true but I’ve been putting World of Warcraft to good use. It’s a perfect thing for me to disappear into. It’s the only thing I know other than a really good box set or writing a book that has me blinking back into the world. Looking back over the game’s history, I’ve used it many times to escape the world.
I’ve been working on some of my alts today. By my calculations I currently have 5 level 110s. I’m currently working on my hunter and demon hunter. The quick levelling method I’ve seen suggested is to take them to the invasions on the Broken Isles and do the world quests with bonus XP rewards. If you have all your heirlooms then apparently it takes only a single invasion to get an entire level. Yeah, I really need to work on my heirlooms and upgrading the ones I have.
Reality shows something less than an entire level per invasion, but it’s still a lot of XP and they don’t show up that regularly, so I’ve taken to doing them and gained a couple of levels. I figure it’s passive levelling whilst I take a break from the main game.
It also looks like the old guild is breaking up. Someone posted that they’d joined another guild in order to raid, and whilst I don’t blame them, part of me is sad. We made the decision to move to another server come Warlords of Dreanor and decided, for a change to go alliance. I’m attached to my horde main, and moving them to a different race would have lost a lot of their identity, so I created a new character and levelled them up for the expansion. But, I’ve never had the same attachment, and so when people stopped raiding, I went back to the old horde server and have continued to play there.
I also can’t commit to a raiding schedule ATM. What with training with real swords, finding a free night is difficult. I reckon I’d probably be a good tank, so I might start looking at guilds on my old horde server and see if there’s any guilds raiding at weekends or times when I’m likely to be free. If nothing else I could do some mythic plus.
Speaking of swordfighting, I found myself trying to pull off some new moves at training tonight. After yesterday, I do feel like my fighting has stepped up and I’m now looking to increase my skills to match.
My biggest challenge is that I often move with the dexterity I had when I was fat. I’m really having to train my body to move more, not because I find it difficult, but because of old muscle memory.
I’ve got a bit of reading to do. I’m working my way through a friend’s film script. It’s actually been a fun process. I’ve only once tried writing a script, which was for a BBC sitcom competition with a friend. We got pretty far, but I never took it any further as my love and natural skill has been for the novel.
But reading this script, I’m actually pleasantly surprised by how well I have been able to adapt to the format, taking what I know about novels and applying it to scripts. There’s a different set of constraints and I thought that I’d have a hard time reading and making suggestions with those constraints in mind. Instead, I’ve found the constrainst have actually focused my mind a bit more.
I’m about a quarter way through and hope to do some more reading this week so I can send back some very detailed comments.
Kate has also asked me to read a short story for her. Of course, I said yes. Being a short story, it means I can go into a lot of detail and I hope to completely rip it apart, going very deep on it. I’m actually quite excited about it.
Perhaps the critiquing is just what I need to take my mind off the day job and the edits I sent back. Between that, training for tournament in a couple of weeks, and Warcraft, I doubt I have a lot of time left.
If you want to follow more of my journey, then be sure to check me on my social channels. Likewise, if you’d like me to expand on any point mentioned above, please say so in the comments.