Today I spent a good part of the afternoon in Everquest 2 on the Isle of Mara taking multiple screenshots of the scenery to use as a header for the character portfolio page I’m creating for this website. I wanted to capture the sky at just the right time, so I had to wait through at least one cycle of the night and part of the day, and took screenshots throughout those cycles. I was reminded of the time I… Continue Reading
Tonight, one of my Everquest 2 characters achieved 450 adorning, the maximum skill level currently possible for the adorning tradeskill. I also spent only about 15 minutes in the game tonight, but not because I somehow managed to gain all 450 points in one night. Adorning is actually a very time consuming skill to raise, particularly dreadful before adorning writs were available and players had to gather their own materials. Even with the writs, it is time consuming since a character can… Continue Reading
I attempt to be a reasonably diplomatic person most of the time (really, I do), but every now and then I just royally piss somebody off, and you know what? I’m okay with it. People may not like something I do or say, or the way I look, or that I may not answer the phone the moment it rings (or at all), or even the fact that I hate green peas. It happens. It even happens to people who literally stress and strain… Continue Reading
I’d bet that there aren’t many cats who hear this accusation, “Kumbaya! You just don’t get it!” That’s because cats get it just fine. I’ll explain. There’s this neighborhood cat that’s been hanging out on my back deck for the past few evenings. Yesterday evening the cat was there, loosely curled in one of the deck’s far corners. It remained in that position the entire time I made dinner. During dinner, I started watching an episode of Due South, a show from… Continue Reading
Earlier this year, I wrote a mini-paper for class about a business model called the Service-Profit Chain. The idea is that if a business starts off strengthening the first link in the chain, internal service quality, and then strengthens each successive link in the chain, then the result will be greater revenue growth and profitability for the business. You can see an exhibit of the Service-Profit Chain model here. So over the weekend when I was reading John Maxwell’s Thinking for a Change,… Continue Reading