I’ll go with the grim first and then go into the fun. The grim being Hurricane Milton has my entire (rebuilt) life in its iron sights. This hurricane is astoundingly frustrating as how it formed, how quick it formed, how strong it formed, and the direction – it’s absurd and feels like a natural comical satire. We’re hoping for the best, but planning for the worst seeing as it could land anywhere on our coast as a 3+. The good is that hasn’t changed much so we just need to know where ground-zero is happening.
We’ve done planning, and have started to get shields up, and we’ll have all the final preparations before this thing makes landfall. Just really hope this doesn’t go awful… While being a traveler, there’s an enormous amount of rough weather encountered out there, so certainly not unfamiliar to things getting turbulent.
Fun side, saw the family like planned on Saturday, and that was a very wonderful time; the usual catching up on things with a very lovely dinner with it all.
Guess there’s not really much to say for this one, shorter I know. Posts this week might be a bit on the thinner side with what’s about to happen. Just… don’t take what you have for granted, it could potentially be erased in a matter of moments.
I really draw a blank on naming these general ones sometimes, but weekend is coming up and looking forward to seeing family Saturday for a lovely evening. I was initially planning on doing so the past weekend but with Helene, I decided against it until that critter went through. I would love to work on some of the audio project as well, but really depends on if I have the spare time for it. The good on that is there’s no hurry as I’m pretty knee-deep in redoing the entire digital library right now. It’s a fairly big undertaking, but taking it a few steps per day has made it not too daunting.
With it being Spoopy Month, seeing family tomorrow might be our big ‘Halloween’ one for the month unless we get together again before the weekend of the 26th. It’s possible but not likely, and that’s perfectly fine. We’ll catch up early November before all the holidays kick into high gear and everything becomes bonkers then. If so I’ll grab my cute Halloween theme leggings, socks, and shirt to wear and be festive. I should look into some comfy Halloween tights too the more I think about it.
There are other things I kind of want to rant about, but 1) it’s not necessarily going to be helpful, 2) nothing to do with anything RL – but I could site the past as part of it though, and 3) I don’t know how to express it well enough to utilize only words. It’s really a lose-lose scenario overall and so I just move onto other things. It’s just… getting harder to do, I suppose. Eventually it may not or it’ll evaporate, and that’s normally what it does so dwelling on it or typing anything beyond this ‘blip’ is probably all that needs to be done.
No thoughts, just me being happy I can wear a hood as a Viera.
Final Fantasy XIV related, there’s two events the weekend of the 26th that I may or may not go to. One is Burgundy’s 6th Anniversary, but if I go to that, I’d just go as a guest. The more I think about how I feel about it, the more I really would just like to leave the old uniform in the Archives; it might come out for a charity event at the end of the year if it gets off the ground, but that’s still to be determined and not in my wheelhouse. Instead, would just wear a nice dress, possibly bring Aikirees, and/or anyone else who would want to come along for the show as well.
Aside from that, an old friend’s Free Company is having a pretty big Halloween event that same night. That I’m leaning towards going to as it’s been a couple of years since we were able to go last, and that was a lot of fun when we were able to make it!
Taking a break temporarily from Castlevania to partake in the F-Zero 99 anniversary event along with the new patch 1.5 that added the Ace League. This League was originally only on the Super Nintendo’s Satellaview and only in Japan, so being able to play these now with 98 other folks is both a blast and absolutely bonkers!
I think that’s all for this one, bit on the longer end. Y’all have an absolutely wonderful rest of Friday and weekend ahead!
Episode LI! – With the weather beginning to show signs of autumn, it would be a good time to bring out the warmer clothes, a nice hot drink or a book, and have a cozy night in near the fire with loved ones.
These two were continuing their escapades deep underwater on the First only to come across this big feller stopping them in their tracks. Miss Lizz’s take in this scenario would be to clearly leap into it not questioning the repercussions (if any), whereas Miss Laureine likes to take in her surroundings before proceeding with a plan of attack.
Their opposites tend to balance out rather favorably, even in scenarios like this one and to Laureine’s frustration sometimes. Now, the big inquiry to this predicament is who’s plan will they go with?
As I mentioned in the Monday Recap, Saturday evening we headed over to Crystal – Zalera to partake in the Aethercon Event. Specifically the Roleplay Market, which was all set up rather nicely within a section of the residential District in Mist. I really did not know what to fully expect upon our arrival, but thankfully their site had a little map with places of interest marked onto it. There was the feeling of precaution lingering in my mind about even going still, but that melted away fairly quick upon our arrival.
It was bustling with activity! Everything from some of the small little shops selling wares to passing customers, and a lot of discussions about! We really just enjoyed listening to it all as it was so lively. We didn’t really engage, but just listen to everyone along with the bard bands playing on the beach below us; however, Aikirees and I did wander off from time to time to see what else folks were up to. It kind of sprawled from this area and up the sidewalk leading to a few other places sprinkled in the vicinity.
I tended to wander a bit more, curious if I might run into anyone that I would have known in the past, but no one looked familiar. Some of the side paths branched off into little groups talking as well, and it all lead up to a house that was holding outdoor performances. One person that we did know was performing here, and it had been a very long while since I had the chance to see her perform. I don’t believe Aikirees ever hand the chance to even as far back as the Aether Event Center days.
Leading into that portion of the evening: April Cleo, a macro dancing performer who started out many years back. I first met her back in the incredibly early days of the Burgundy Room and the Aether Event Center. Regardless, she’s excellent at her craft and has been honing on it all these years. Part of heading to Aethercon was to see her performance since it has been probably about 3 or so years since the last time when she performed with the now long gone ESprit group.
While a bit on the shorter side to accommodate the convention’s schedule, she was absolutely stellar! It was a very enjoyable show that we were glad to have made. Afterwards she went around to say hi to everyone and thank everyone for coming to the show. After a little bit of mingling, since she was the last performance, everyone started to head back out to the rest of the convention area as did we to finish out the evening.
So we listened to a few more bard bands play, hear the talks of the area, and about an hour or so later, it started to clear out with folks either heading to rest or to the venues having live DJ’s. That’s really not our thing, so we decided to just pause, and decompress before heading back to Aether and HQ.
It really was a fun evening seeing everyone interact and enjoy a part of the community that I had stepped away from in an official sense (we’re always in character if you ever see us). Supposedly next year they’re going to host this again with it possibly being a bigger event, and if they do, we’ll be back and more than likely put the ‘RP’ tag up as well to let folks know that we can be approached to interact with as well.
~Spoopy, Scary, Seetahs have returned for more FRIGHTS!~
Happy Spoopy Month y’all! October is once again upon us, and we’re so ready! Aikirees and I got our outfits all set up for another All Saints’ Wake, and any/all spoopy festivities that happen to come up for the season!
We always get very excited for this time of year with everything that comes with it. Miss Lizz and Laureine are going to be sticking with their demon and other dem-… angel outfits this year (and probably for a while thereafter).
Y’all have a very fun and very safe Spoopy Season ahead!
I don’t really have this week planned as well as I would have like due to ultimately messing around with a project that while was a fruitful endeavor took a bit of time in the process. The project in particular is another sub-project with the audio overhauling. Trying to use what existing equipment and technology and recycle it into the new set up has been rather fun but is taking time. The result was something pretty fun involving an old PSP-3000 and a PS3 playing music across the network; however, tinkering with it was both comical and a learning experience though.
There’s of course better ways to do it, but since I have these items and really like to recycle older things into new usable items, this was right up my alley. The rest of the project is more time-consuming than it is materialistically costly: this is both good and bad. The bad being the time allocated means time away from planning other things but at least there’s a low-cost for it.
I did manage to squeak out both two more episodes of Fallout, and go to Aethercon on Saturday. The Fallout series is still really interesting to me and I still am looking forward to see where this all goes. It’s kind of rare where nearly halfway through a season I somewhat can’t see where this is going yet. I think once I’m done with this show I’ll bounce back to Doctor Who and finish the new season with the 15th before the holidays ideally.
I’ll go into more about Aethercon in a separate post, but I am very glad we went. It was a very wonderful time even if it was more on the shorter side. Supposedly they’ll host it again next year and if so, we’ll probably put up our ‘RP’ flags then and get a bit more involved. We’re always in character, but it’s better to put the flag up to make sure everyone else knows it too.
Patch 7.1 Live Letter came out, sounds like Mid-November for the release. This is good and we’ll be full ready by then to take it on. Very excited for the Final Fantasy XI raid in particular – it will be nice to see somewhat of Aikirees’ first incarnation’s world.
Just some quick thoughts on it: the new Expert Dungeon’s atmosphere looks incredibly creepy, and Nashu of Hildibrand fame being in Solution Nine is (hilariously) concerning. The Extreme/Unreal/Chaotic AR/Ultimates are not something we do, but for those folks who do, kick lot’s of tails! The housing interior adjustments and sizing changing options are nice, but I don’t think I’ll ever make HQ’s interior bigger than it’s supposed to be. PvP changes coming are nice, with hopefully the 4th Frontlines coming back as that’s been gone a long spell. The Hall of Novice changes have been direly needed, as there’s a few (Dorito and Dice) mechanics that a lot of folks don’t fully understand, so hoping that will help alleviate this.
I think that will do it for this one; tomorrow is October 1st! Spoopy Month so soon! We cannot wait!! Until next time, y’all have a wonderful one!
Episode L! – Welcome one! Welcome all to the spoopiest place in all of the Reflections! Oh, we certainly do hope you enjoy your stay, it might just be your last!
Kind of an addenda thought from the other day combined with current adventures. This weekend, well starting today in fact, is an in-game event/convention called Aethercon that is supposedly a big RP-oriented event over on the Crystal Data Center. I kind of want to go along with Aikirees, but Datacenter Traveling’s new system may make that a smidgen more difficult unless I head there really early or really late. It’s doable, but unsure if I really want to.
Part of me wants to as if it is really more into the Roleplay side of things, that would be right up our alley and could be a lot of fun. However, I’m not too keen on the social side of Final Fantasy XIV right now, as the venue space/modding community has really turned me off from it. Lore purists don’t really worry me all that much, but anyone who is and berates that sort of thing to another person is just being an absolute rude piece of trash and shouldn’t ever do so nor engage in the RP community in general.
Happening as well is another Burgundy Room performance that is on my Data Center, and I’ve kind of been wanting to go to another show as it’s been almost two years since the last major drama event happened. That one in particular was pretty awful and turned me off from wanting to partake ever again. I may decide to visit Crystal for Aethercon, I may decide to just go to the show, or I may decide on neither and relax for the evening instead, especially after Helene came through.
Hurricane Helene came barreling through yesterday. We were not in the direct path, thankfully, but just skirted it enough to be a bit windier than expected. No major damage or what-not, but still need to check a couple of things around the house. The city is assessing things, but aside from being wary for the amount of water use the next day or so, should be back to normal by the end of the weekend.
It’ll be alright though, and I hope everyone who was in the direct path is safe and accounted for. Hopefully the rest of the hurricane season is a lot quieter for us now.
Until next time, y’all take care, and keep kicking lots of tails. Lots of love.
Lizicus decided to assist Laureine with some excursions with one leading them deep underneath the Crystal Tower resting on the First. Finally reaching the depths of the Twinning unscathed, they were greeted by the massive Tycoon. One marvelous piece of Ironworks technology that poor Laureine loathed to have to destroy for the safety of everyone.
She could only wonder what other powers it could have been able to answer…
No, not that kind of Fallout; this is in reference to the game series.
Kind of a couple of days later than I wanted to get my thoughts out, but between RL being a bit bonkers and other projects, been unable to. The project I mentioned last week, speaking of, went almost near perfect in updating the multi-room audio with new hardware. There was one minor oversight and one technical failure, but it was part of the old set up so it wasn’t a major loss. I’m really happy with the final results though, and now have a road map as to what I want to do to enhance this whole thing even further.
Albeit this wasn’t technically a planned project, but cost-wise it’s not anywhere near a vast as the last one, and I play a lot of music regularly so having this all re-set back up before the next major project will definitely help things in the long run. There’s really only a couple of planned projects I want to do left before all of these initial ones will be completed. Then I can start to plan future ones whenever the feeling arises!
~‘They can be your Devil, or well, another Devil but disguised as an Angel.’~
I think those two enjoy their countering outfits a lot. The usual progress in FFXIV, slow and steady until 7.1 at least. There’s more things I’d like to say in regards to little observations that are occurring and reoccurring and even though it’s a little frustrating to see especially being around since late Stormblood, it’s not necessarily going to change anything. Just… be kind and patient with folks one doesn’t know what they’re going through. If things are going a bit slower that one would like, it’s very much completely fine. We’re all here to have fun, not a race nor a comparison contest.
I’ll probably delve a bit more into all that though once I finalize and get the EOCA story out; it was supposed to come out a year or so ago, but due to revisions and the size of it, I had to shelve it. Ideally by or before the 5th anniversary of EOCA (not the FC), but we’ll have to see.
Anyway, Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia is now on the last level at around level 40 as of this post. I think I beat the game originally at 45 or so, so we’re making pretty good progress. Still need to unlock the last two bonus places for goodies, and some hidden items once I get a smidgen further in said last level, but that should wrap it up. It’s been a blast going through it again, and looking forward to New Game Plus as well. Will probably migrate to Portrait of Ruin after this.
As for the Fallout call out (hehe~), I started the series that Amazon put out, and that has been a joy. Reminds me of my time in Fallout 4 from years back; haven’t gotten very far yet, only on Episode 3 as of right now, but looking forward to the rest of it.
That’s all I can ponder for this one, next Monday will hopefully start a new segment ‘Monday Morning Weekend Recap,’ with a header to match, depending on how the morning is going. Until next time~!
Feels almost like yesterday when we were here in this same attire practicing healing magics. It was shortly thereafter saving all of existence from being destroyed, so with said reality having been saved, we turned from our usual dark arts to its complete opposite for a time. Lest not to replace our fiery ways, but to keep our elements mostly in balance and not to forget doing so entirely.
Aikirees arrived there, on the Airship Landing at Radz-at-Han, just before daybreak. It was mostly clear and we were getting ready to visit with the Hippo Riders and see what we could do for them this day.
Rather than like the last time she was waiting on me, where she was a Miqo’te leaning against a few boxes with a wicked smirk across her face, she was looking off into the distance towards the East. It was calm, with just the slightest hint of a breeze passing over the landing, and I suspect she was focused on all of her surroundings. She looked so calm.
About the time I approached her to let her know we could head out, the sun broke the horizon giving us a gorgeous warm glowing view of a new day over Thavnair. We looked at each other for a moment, and then back to the horizon for another to bask in the morning light, and then headed on out like we have done so many times before and will here on after as well.
A little bit ago, a lot of us we’re able to finish up constructing our second airship! Sirena suggested the name of the Falcon from Final Fantasy IV, and it’s since then had several successful journeys into the Sea of Clouds. However, it never had a proper color scheme to represent it; that is until now. Once it returned to HQ the other night, we managed to get it all painted up in a similar fashion to that of the one seen in Final Fantasy IV – propellers aside being substituted for the zeppelin instead.
She’s so adorkable.
Aikirees being in pure awe I think made the highlight for the evening once it got all spruced up with the new colors. It was once again sent out on another voyage. Meanwhile, the U.S.S. Voyager has been steadily exploring far far into the Sea of Clouds having found some interesting sites along the way. That one is nearing almost max rank and we normally don’t see it for a couple of days now!
Safe travels, little Falcon! May the winds and your adventures out into the wild blue yonder be just as safe as they are full of new wonders!
Lizicus, on her way to the First, managed to get a gorgeous morning view of Mor Dhona while flying towards the Syrcus Trench. It always looks so strangely calm if the morning sun hits the region just right, kind of like a still-life in a way. Years ago, I came passing through there once and was able to see such a spectacle as well; something very much never forgotten.
Reminiscing aside, it’s another Monday morning upon us! Y’all have a wonderful day and week ahead. Y’all certainly got this and always will. Kick so much tail!
Episode XLIX! – Can take the Miqo’te out of her and into a Hrothgar, but certainly can’t take her spirit out of enjoying even the silliest of fashionable accessory moments! Once again, much to my chagrin, Aikirees takes another very enjoyable moment in the spotlight for this week’s Fashion Report.
~Two figures approach: one that looks demonic in appearance while the other is more angelic. The Angelic one ends up giving strange and odd suggestions with various uses of ‘rad’ in the process, while the demonic one gives good solid advice. They’re suggestions tend to either end up in self debate with the person they’re trying to help left even more puzzled. Is this the self-couscous, or something far more devious…?~
These two had a heyday after finally acquiring the Diabolos wings for 800 Hunt Nuts. The ‘demonic’ looking bodysuit Laureine wore was inspired by a cover from the band Shredder 1984’s ‘Nemesis’ cover. Lizicus just wanted to be the more angelic-like counterpart because she was amused by it. Their masks are the Ghost Barque Mask of Maiming from The Sirensong Sea dyed accordingly.
Whenever they have some downtime, they might appear here and their donning that outfit as they did very late one night – finding a spot in Gridania while also being silly ‘guarding’ EOCA HQ’s entrance gate.
They really do have a natural talent to be counteracting to each other in a playful way, and in this case far surpass something that Aikirees and I would have a rather hard time pulling off just as well. What will they get up to next? That’s anyone’s guess including my own!
Aikirees and I have seen this interesting little spot in in Il Mheg for quite some time now, but usually when the weather has been less than favorable or it was daytime. We managed to catch it on a clear crisp night, and decided to explore it more.
At the center is this well-lit flowery ring with rocks circling around it with bushmen nearby. Could this be a gateway to another Fae Realm? Will we get pulled into it if we stare at it long enough? W-will we end up switching bodies just by peering at each other through it long enou–… you know, l-let’s not tempt fate with this and just pretend it doesn’t exist…
I had a fairly large thing written about my multi-room audio set up needing a rework since it stopped working with my turntable, the obnoxious time spent trying to fix all this, the practical use for some (but not all) smart home devices, large conglomerate companies adding a bunch of ads and unnecessary ‘features’ to said devices, and spending more time researching how to course correct all of this. In the end I decided against it as it was just too long, and there’s so much else going awful in the world right now for this to be a big deal as it really isn’t. I will say I do miss the days when things just worked out of the box, instead of having to jump through hoops and/or update all of these things.
That aside, last week involved a massive work-related project that turned out great in the end. It was a multi-piece recognition wall for a client, and it was probably my biggest solo-project since I left my industry the first time. Had a lot of parts that I had to plan out, cut out, and get to our installers all within a week’s turnaround. Tired my old rabbit self out in the process, but was great in the end.
The other project was hitting a milestone on a fun one I’ve been working at the office too, building out a Connect Four board with just scrap materials around the office. Last week the legs got made for it so now the board sits very nicely into that as opposed to being flat on the ground. Just have to put the game pieces box together and get the pieces printed for it all to be finished out.
FFXIV-wise, still moving along with the usual weekly tasks right now. Last Sunday being with almost everyone was very fun and made for a wonderful way to end the weekend. Hoping to be able to do that a lot more going forward even if it’s just chatting or running around a place like the Gold Saucer.
Castlevania-wise, Order of Ecclesia is coming along. Kind of got stuck but I remember getting stuck here on my first playthrough too, and it just takes a bit of level building to get back on track, and that should be soon!
I think that’s all I can think of for now, so y’all have a wonderful Tuesday!!
We all got together last night for some more Heavensward bird hunting that went incredibly well, and then ended the night taking a relaxing moment to end the weekend. Ultimately atop the entrance archway to EOCA HQ.
It’s been an incredibly long journey to this point. Aikirees and I both started on completely different worlds at different times. Met some incredibly wonderful folks that became friends and helped kick start making maps for events and places. Grew even further from that into what would become Eorzea Cartographers, and the eventual Free Company once we both made it to the same world with the Cousins.
Even after all of the drama, darkness, leaving one social media for another, and meeting so many wonderful folks in the process, here we (almost) all are as EOCA. This being where we ended up, I honestly would not want it any other way.
~The last Fashion Report we ever did prior to Aikirees’ journey~ Episode XLVIII! – Y’all, I think I go that feeling again. You know, that feeling one gets where they feel eyes are upon them and at any moment if one turns one way or another, they’ll be nothing there.
I can’t quite put my finger as to why that feeling has returned, but I sense it all the way through the tufts of my ears. …It’s probably nothing, truly; w-why is everyone trying to tell me to turn around real quickly…??
