Consider this my (apparently) yearly update. Well, to be honest, not so much an update so much as confirmation that I still walk among the living.

Shortest version: new house, new state, new jobs, new schools, and new members of the household (no, I didn't get knocked up again).My husband and I were granted guardianship of my 17 year old cousin and we adopted two more dogs (bringing our totals to 5 kids and 5 dogs). And the bestest was a dramatic ambulance ride to the ER where I found out that due to my anxiety and stress levels I had a minor heart attack. Yay me. I'll spare you all the messy, traumatic, drama-infused details though.

Needless to say it's been a long year that's been painfully short on game-time. That said, the past couple of weeks I have been bouncing back and forth between Fallout New Vegas and Fable 3. I may even be convinced to find my headset (during school hours, of course) if my co-op friends have hung in there hoping for my return....;)

What a crazy year it has been! I'll spare the details of my long absence and just share the highlights. My grandma (a second mom to me) lost her battle with asbestosis in early '09 which sent me into a tail spin. Upon returning from her funeral I found that our landlord of 5 years was illegally evicting us AND suing us for over $10,000 in bogus damages.What he didn't expect is thatwe're old hands at moving a lot thanks to the Army and I had enough proof-photo and written documentation-that not only did he lose his lawsuit, but we won compensatory damages. However, we managed to find a new place to live and move our household of 6 in just under 7 days (no small feat). This was all followed by two hospitalizations (psych, you'd think, but this wasn't the case), and a myriad of family drama that happens when the anchor of the family dies.

Needless to say, gaming-as well as most of the things I enjoy-were put on the back burner. I've spent a good portion of time just trying to remember to breathe. Next month we will be making another move that will take us back to my home state and a house that will be forever ours. In the meantime, thanks to the newest Splinter Cell, I'm finding my way back to my favorite past time one stealthy take-down at a time. With any luck, by the end of summer we'll be settled enough that I'll be ready to start writing a little more frequently about my love of gaming. For now, this will serve as my baby step away from self-imposed social seclusion.

Well, between my tirade at the end of my 3 hour ordeal with the MS rep, my mini-vent here and smerlus' bright side of leaving the stalkers behind--something worked. This afternoon I half-heartedly hit the 'try again' option to attempt to recover my gamer tag, and *gasp*, it started thinking about it! It took nearly an hour and a half to recover, but recover it did. Yay! (And smerlus, if you say it's just 'cuz I'm a girl, Imma gonna come to NY just to smack ya!! ;) )

So. I wake up this a.m. and turn on my 360, & try to log in to check my messages. It says I can't log in. I think, "Oh, yeah. System maintenance is today." I wait a couple of hours and try again. Still no go. I check & make sure my husband's acct can log in on our other console (which it does), make sure everything is connected properly to my console (which it is), & try again. Nothing. I reset my gateway and the 360 itself. Clear the cache & try again. Nope.

I break down and call customer support. Guy #1 says a lot of people are experiencing the problem. He gives me a reference # and says to try again in an hour and if it still doesn't work to call them back. An hour later I'm stll having the same problem, so I call back. Guy #2 keeps me on the phone for 3 HOURS having me do everthing I've already tried. Then we move to "Phase Two". He has me create a dummy account and recover that. That works.

Long story short. He puts me on the phone with Guy #3 who tells me that the problem is severe and needs to move to "Phase Three". MS needs to recover my account internally in order to figure out what the problem is. He then proceeds to explain that this process will take 3-5 business days and there is a good chance I will need to start a new tag and purchase a new gold membership, but they will "do their best to fix my current tag." In the meantime, he tells me to occasionally try to recover my tag and "...maybe you'll get lucky."

Needless to say, at the moment 'mad' doesn't even begin to describe it. If I have to start from scratch, SOMEONE is gonna pay! Over half a year left on my gold membership, hundreds of dollars in downloadable content, microsoft points still on my account, 75 friends on my list I won't be able to recover, not to mention over 22,000 gamerpoints and two years worth of gamesaves...

Yeah, I'm a bit miffed at the moment.

I don't have a lot of time this morning for a blog entry, but wanted to post a little update since I've had a few PM's inquiring about my absence.

There really isn't much new going on in my gaming life. I think I'm hopelessly addicted to Rock Band. It's been a great pick up and play game when I only have a limited amount of time. I also went back and picked up a small handful of Halo 3 achievements that I missed the first time around. Not because I suddenly had a Halo change of heart, but because my husband wanted to play. So I figured it was a 'two birds and one stone' situation.

There are quite a few games on the horizon that I'm looking forward to. Just a couple more weeks and you'll find me in Army of Two and R6:V2. It looks like 2008 is shaping up to be another great year for us gamers!

In my non-gaming life I've been pretty busy. An opportunity (nearly literally) fell into my lap. I've been pretty wrapped up in the process of starting my own business. I'm beginning working out of my home, but if things keep going the way they are, I may need to consider finding a commercial location and employees sooner rather than later. Once I'm established (read: figure out what the hell I'm doing) on the business end, I'll more than likely post another entry letting y'all in on my big "secret". ;)

In the meantime...happy gaming!!

Wow! This last week I think I discovered that hell may possibly be COLD! We had an ice storm that knocked out our power late Monday night. Power wasn't restored again until Saturday afternoon. Thank goodness for our fireplace! The average daytime temp inside during that week was around 45 degrees. With the emergency shelters over-crowded, we stuck it out here at home with my brother and his kids. The worst wasn't even the cold, it was the boredom. By the end of day two we were all (6 kids, 4 adults) ready to donate all board/card games to the fireplace. I'll spare you all the gory details, but I will say that we managed to make it through with resources depleted, a lot of storm damage to clean up, and a greater appreciation of modern conveniences. Needless to say, I haven't been able to do much gaming...

One final quick note: The 360 we received the day of my last entry turned out to be our own 360 that we had sent in for repair. No replacement system this time around, but it did sport a shiny new disc drive and works like a charm now, so I'm not complaining.

Mental note. Two and a half months is too long to wait in between blog posts. So where have I been? The simple answer is torn between gaming nirvana and my crazy busy real life.

RROD Update

The RROD system we shipped off back in Sept. was replaced with a brand spanking new 360 three weeks after our initial call to MS. The day before Thanksgiving, my 360 (not the same system) suffered from total hard drive failure--and possibly an identity crisis as it no longer recognized itself as being a 360. Today, nine days after my first phone call, the replacement is due to be delivered. I'll find out later today if I should be happy or concerned that it's coming back so quickly.

Gaming Nirvana

The past couple of months have been pretty good to us 360 gamers. I've worked my way through Halo 3, Guitar Hero III, COD4, Assassin's Creed, and Mass Effect. I also picked up and have played around with Guitar Hero II since I've had so much fun with III. Here's some quick thoughts on each:

Halo 3: Eh. It's another Halo. Loved the first one, hated the second, and the third hits somewhere in the middle for me. It entertained me reasonably well for my 4 or 5 hour play through on legendary, but it couldn't hold my interest for more than a handful of matches online. I almost feel like I'm having that talk--"It's me, not you"--when it comes to the Halo franchise. I think my gaming tastes have simply...evolved.

Guitar Hero II and III: I had not only never played a GH game, but I also playfully teased my close gaming friends who did play GH. I just couldn't understand the draw. I mean, come on. Where are the super uber bad guys to hunt down? Where are the cool weapons? What's the point? Then the GHIII demo went up on marketplace, and I had a few rare moments of boredom. I was hooked by the middle of the first song I played on the demo; didn't hesitate to buy the wireless bundle on release day. I'm now a convert. GH is currently one of my favorite games to play when I have limited gaming time.

COD4: I really enjoyed the departure from WWII and IW's jump into modern warfare. I'm also happy that the achievements are all attainable in the single player game this time around. It's crazy hard on veteran, but not stupid hard (e.g. COD3). I've really enjoyed the challenge and will be going back to finish my SP veteran game once I get ME out of my system. I'm not too much of a fan of the multiplayer, but I'm also not too proud to admit that in this case it's because I really suck at it. ;) It's looking more and more like I'll have to just be patient and wait for R6V 2 before I get some good MP action that I can get into.

AC: Had a great time with this game! The game felt entirely fresh from story, to mechanics, to the overall graphical feel, to the control scheme. High profile assassinations, free running, and leaps of faith just don't get old. Yeah, the investigations could have used some variety, and the camera could use a little tweaking, but over all I just can't complain. I've been wishing for something different, and Ubi gave it to me.

Mass Effect: What can I say? I've basically sold my soul to this game for the time being. I've got around 80 hours in so far and am a little over half-way through my second play through. For the first time that I can remember I feel like I am genuinely in control of the story and my character. I also really enjoy watching the other gamers in my house play--seeing how differently convos and the story plays out with their different character ****s (*Edit* what? I can't say ****s? OK, starts with a 'c' and rhymes with glasses--stupid filter), squad choices, and dialog choices.

So that's a relatively quick run-down of my gaming life of late. As for my crazy busy real life: it's been loaded with friends, family, and all sorts of holiday activities. I don't expect things to quiet down until after the first of the year, so just in case I can't find the time to get a blog entry in: Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Happy New Year, etc. etc...

I humbly submit my "ticket" to the RROD club. Today, my 360 decided it had had enough of this world--that it had done all that it could but just wouldn't be able to push on to "Finish the fight." So, it looks like I'll be joining the masses in an attempt to find a customer support rep who has a solid grasp of the English language and enough intelligence/common sense to be able to read through the scripts on his/her computer with enough accuracy to facilitate my 360's repair/replacement.

Luckily (knock on wood, fingers crossed, and any other superstitious act that can be thought of), we have two 360's. So I shouldn't have to suffer too many withdrawls. However, with 7 gamers in my home, I expect it'll be gamer's twist on "survival of the fittest" when it comes to deciding who's turn it is. ;)

I had to pop off a quick entry becauseI'm pretty excited right now, so I had to share :D . I scored a key to the COD4 beta this evening!! I've played a couple deathmatches and team deathmatches so far, and all I can say is: Holy crap this is some crazy fun! My R6V skills are of absolutely no use LOL so I'm spending most of my time getting schooled right now, but loving every second...

Apologies and Excuses

I know, I know. It's been more than two months since my last blog. So, a quick apology...I'm sorry I've neglected my blog. :|The majority of my summer I've been in a seemingly endless state of crisis management. Unexpected job losses, vehicle repossessions, threats of eviction, and especially news of potentially terminal illness all have a way of putting your life in perspective. So, forgive me, but gaming and blogging was quickly dropped to the bottom of my list of priorities! Now that each problem has been (or is being) solved, things are finally quieting down enough that I can focus on entertainment. Hence, y'all finally get a new blog entry.

What I'm Playing Now

It's not a huge secret that I have problems (read:get scared stupidly easy) with creepy little girls in video games. I played F.E.A.R, but only during the day, and only when someone was around to help keep me distracted. I don't even care if I go back to get any more achievment points in it (which, if you know me, you understand that says a lot about how much I did not enjoy feeling the fear of F.E.A.R.). So as I was following Bioshock's development, I was certain I wouldn't be picking up that title from the first clips that revealed more creepy little girls.

Then the demo hit. I decided to play through it so that if the topic came up, I would be able to carry on a conversation with my gaming friends. Needless to say, I was blown away. As the demo ended, I set my controller down, picked up my phone, and called Gamestop to change my preorder from Two Worlds to Bioshock. And I have to say, it's a decision I'm glad I made!

I don't want to spend too much time talking about the game right now, because I'm afraid of inadvertently spoiling even the smallest bit of the story for those that haven't picked it up yet. (Yeah, thanks to the 360 forum poster who ruined a major plot point for me in his/her topic title...)But I will say, that every single thing in this game has me ooh-ing and aahh-ing. From the story to every detail poured into the art to the voice acting and music. As much as I love Oblivion, even that game couldn't pull me in the way Bioshock has. I'm playing it on hard now, and though I refuse to look at even the achievment list until I uncover the story for myself first, I'm already looking forward to my next playthrough and planning how I can do certain things differently.

On a final Bioshock note, I managed to score the last preorder of the LE version of the game. I'm not generally into 'toys', but the Big Daddy figurine is pretty damn cool sitting on a shelf of my entertainment center acting as a bookend for my 360 games. I've also decided to embrace my inner nerd and tell anyone who will listen that all I want for Christmas this year is a hard-bound Bioshock art book for my coffee table.....yeah.....it's that good! ;)