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When Getting Away Includes the Kids

My husband and I recently won a night away, our choice to take the kids or keep them home. Last year, we won the same trip and opted to go by ourselves. We learned a few things on that trip, our first away from our youngest on an overnight. (Our youngest is 6.) The first thing that we learned is that gambling really isn’t for us. We were more in awe of the food options and the pop culture store than anything else. We used our spending money as follows: about $50 on gambling and then the rest was spend on random junk food, treats for my parents who watched our kids, and the big chunk of money was spent on things to bring back to our kids.

We thought that the kids would enjoy the arcade and play area. Our oldest, who’s a swimmer, would love the pool. My husband, who doesn’t wake up early when he doesn’t have to, woke up at 9am so that we could hurry home to be back with the boys. We didn’t enjoy being away from them. The same thing happened on our honeymoon. We only spent a weekend away, because we missed our oldest. Vacations away aren’t fun to us. We look at the long game. You blink and suddenly they’re off to college. In just 2 years, our oldest will be potentially out of state in college. 2 years. A weekend away seems like too much especially when you’re that close to watching them leave the nest.

People think we’re strange. We get lectures about how we’re only weakening our relationship for not taking time to ourselves. That we couldn’t possibly have a close and strong relationship by only really going on a date night once or twice a year. But the thing is, every couple is different. Some people love going out, reliving their dating lives. Some people are homebodies that would rather be at home playing video games together or watching television together after the kids go to sleep. I always say that date night is every night in our house. I’m cheap and honestly, I don’t like people enough to be in a crowded room of them while I try to pretend that I’m not completely socially awkward.

I don’t need lectures about taking time for myself or time to ourselves to work on our relationship. Some couples need that and other’s don’t. I think when you’ve reached over a decade together and you still like each other and are still madly in love with each other, you don’t really need all of the extras. I need the little things, like surprise coffee during the day because he was driving around at work and just thought of me. I need little things like him surprising me with supper because he knew I was stressed or sick and he didn’t want me to have to cook and clean as well. He needs someone who lets him have that hot wing before bed even though we all know he’s going to complain all day about it. He needs someone that will let him play video games without harassing him about not paying attention. Luckily, I don’t require a lot of attention. In fact, I like the quiet.

So with the trip that we won this year, we are taking our kids with us. They are only going to be so little for so long. We have a strong foundation, a solid relationship, and we don’t want to miss out on experiences with them. We’d rather that than a night away where we keep talking about how we miss them or text our oldest to remind them both that we love them. Every couple is different and if they are working together, then there’s no need to judge. Their lives are not yours to have any say in.

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Overwatch League Season 2: Stage 1, Week 2

It’s hard to believe that we have already reached week 2 in the 2nd season of the Overwatch League. While there were a lot of exciting matches, these matches seemed to be overlooked by a league technicality that allegedly a lot of people didn’t know about. Which wasn’t a problem when the Boston Uprising had a problem with it, but the minute other teams started complaining about it a discussion began to happen. More on this and other worthwhile mentions.

Goats seems to be killing a lot of previously solid teams. Houston, a team that shows they have a good DPS lineup seems to have its own struggles in this meta. While they won on Saturday against the Spark, they had struggled against NYXL. Such a passionate struggle that the talk of the game was the producer’s cut to Jake hitting the desk in frustration. To me, it’s no big deal. He’s a passionate player who takes his job seriously. Other teams should wish that they were so lucky to have such a dedicated player. Goats is only temporary, as was every other meta. Things change all the time as patches get released.

Another notable game that was hyped up this week was the Dallas Fuel/Philadelphia Fusion game. This occurred because Jayne, who’s honestly an Overwatch competitive genius, mentioned that Fusion had a “trash goats” comp. To which a “war” of words took place between Carpe and Jayne, with Carpe eventually saying “if they lose, it will be to trash goats”. Shockingly, they didn’t lose. Then Jayne got his last say and that was that.

Arguably the biggest event worth mentioning this week was Fusions of the Boston Uprising being deemed “ineligible to play” by the league as he was setting up on stage moments before the match against Shanghai. Due to his 2-way contract, he’s only allowed to play 2 games in a stage after competing in the most recent season of Overwatch League Contenders. This was a crucial match against the Shanghai Dragons, a team with former player Gamsu and who was hungry to break their 43-game losing streak. They wanted their first win and they got it against a disjointed Boston Uprising. After some shaky plays, awful comp decisions, and Sombra being their biggest weakness, the Uprising fell 3-1 against Shanghai. Shanghai got their first win with our beloved Gamsu as their main tank. This was a story that trended on Twitter. It was beautiful publicity for the Overwatch League.

While I don’t subscribe to the believe that the league did this just to get the publicity, it was an awful situation. Per league rules, the roster was submitted at least 2 hours prior to the match. But yet they didn’t inform the team of their main tank’s ineligibility until just minutes before the match began? That was a disaster that they could have avoided 2 hours earlier. Other teams, like the Philadelphia Fusion also seemed a little confused by this rule. Does this taint the Dragon’s first win? Yes and no. Yes if you believe that Shanghai had no chance of beating the Uprising, though realistically they did. DDing was a great Sombra. Even a mediocre Sombra would have torn Boston to shreds because they have no clue what to do about it. But Brianne, they needed a DPS player that could play Sombra. Then I would argue: what about one of our DPS, namely Colourhex? If they can drop our star D.Va onto a Reaper, then they could take our DPS and actually put him on DPS. But they didn’t. Yet again, they just let Sombra walk all over them.

What should Boston do moving forward? I liked their setup of Axxiom on Zarya, Fusions on MT (except his awful Winston), NotE on D.Va, blasé doing what he’s been doing, and Alemao on Lucio. I think this could be the best chance against Sombra. Alemao attracted attention for some solid plays against Sombra. I feel as though Colourhex wasn’t as strong of a Zarya as Axxiom was and I think that there was more synergy between him and Fusions than with Colourhex. Granted, we didn’t see Colourhex with Fusions, so this could be an unfair analysis. Still, I wasn’t impressed by Colourhex’s performance. Maybe he needs time, but I think Axxiom is a solid player that deserves to play.

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Eventually, We All Go Down

This is an overdramatic title about illness in the family. I’m talking bad colds, the flu, whatever other god awful plague that enters into your home. I’m not sure if it’s just me or not, but this year is the worst year for illnesses as far as I can remember.

Around Christmas time, I got hit with probably the worst cold and eventually sinus infection that I had ever had. I couldn’t leave the couch. I couldn’t even look at food. It was great for losing weight but I’m still suffering from these effects. My husband, who honestly hardly ever gets sick enough to miss work, ended up missing 4 days of work from illness and the year just started. In one particularly awful experience last week, he brought strep into this house. To which I naturally took Clorox wipes (ignoring my allergy of these products) and continued to disinfect every inch of my house that he could have breathed in let alone touch. I pulled out our air purifier, which has a UV setting to kill bacteria. When in doubt, Purel was our friend.

My boys have been sick a lot too. There were even some cases where the illness lasted 2 days in my youngest, someone who also hardly gets sick and it never lasts more than a day. Every day I feel like I’m getting a new warning from my youngest child’s school about how strep is going around. Everywhere on Facebook, people are going down. It’s coming for us and I don’t even know what it is. But dear lord, has it been a rough one. The best way to avoid this: not have kids. In fact, not having kids is a solid bit of advice to help you avoid a lot of unpleasant illnesses. But they’re so cute, aren’t they? Until those little monsters puke in every inch of your house and you’re torn between dousing everyone in Lysol or just burning the whole house down because it’s been infected and you just need to let it go. (Just to clarify, I mean the actual house, not my children.)

This cold and flu season needs to stop already. I’ve had my fill. I say this as someone who feels like I just got hit by a truck, probably because I’ve spent so much time dealing with everyone else’s complaints of dying that I have finally been smacked in the face with the latest plague that these children have brought into the home. I don’t normally complain about this… but can it be spring already? As much as my allergies hate this, I would rather deal with that nonsense than this.

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The New Project Grind

The post-it notes are starting to get a little insane right now. So many projects that I’d like to do but am getting a little overwhelmed at my to-do list. I have my comic that I have been planning to launch in mid-March or early April. I keep debating on whether or not I should do a podcast. This blog is growing, which is exciting. Then there are other novels and books in the works as well. The list seems never-ending and I have no idea where to begin. Then roadblocks keep coming up when I do. The struggle is real.

The first project on my to-do list is the launch of my comic, which honestly should have been a lot easier than it has been to launch. I had one software that I really enjoyed, but then lost the key during the move and can’t find the receipt to prove that I had purchased this item. (ClipStudio Paint, in case you’re wondering.) That was the software that I used for my first adventure in comics. Then I bought Comicado, which is no longer in development and doesn’t work well with my Surface. Maybe this weekend I’ll reinvest in another program or I’ll just figure out how to make due with the software I do have.

Then there is my podcast. I understand that podcasts can help bring traffic to my blog and that there is a real SEO marketing reasoning for having one. I have the equipment for it due to streaming, minus the audio software. Fortunately you can get some nice options for free. But what would I do it on? Would I focus on gaming subjects? Would I discuss parenting? Politics? Do I just cover a random assortment of rantings like I do here with my blog? What would you like to hear from a BluishOblivion podcast?

Finally, there are my book projects. I do have 2 ideas for children’s books that I feel deserve my attention. Then there is my failed NaNoWriMo attempt. I partially want to wait to finish that until next NaNoWriMo, to put another 50,000 words into it but I feel that would be too long. I think my priority will be my children’s books since “Dear Child” seemed to be the most popular of my books. But can I follow such a well-received book?

I’m having difficulty balancing the time with my freelancing gig and all of these projects, as well as family obligations. I’m having a hard time prioritizing these projects. So I ask my readers: which would you like to see? A potentially weekly comic on Wednesdays? A monthly podcast? Would you like me to work on my next book? I’ll let my readers help decide.

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Overwatch League: Season 2, Stage 1, Week 1

It’s that time again: my Overwatch League recap. I have been waiting for this moment for a very long time, stalking every story in the off-season to keep me hyped about my favorite eSports league. He’s a recap of Boston’s performance and some notable mentions about Opening Weekend.

To start with, my focus will be with the Boston Uprising. As they are my team, I was far more attentive to their games. Word of Gamsu’s trade right before the season started was crushing. Sure, his Rein may not have been the strongest, but he was the team captain. He was the face of the team. I went into the first match skeptical. Then Fusions popped off like a madman. A game that I thought we were lose by a long shot was a lot closer than most people probably expected. With Fusions at the helm, they made New York work for it.

Unfortunately, the Sombra was the Uprising’s downfall. They had no answer to Meko’s Sombra. He disabled NotE and just wrecked the team. If they were going to stand a chance against Houston, they would need an answer for it especially since Danteh has a very deadly Sombra. And they did. Aimgod opted for a Moira pick instead of his typical Zenyatta. While Danteh’s Sombra did pose some issues on the first map, Jake’s Pharah was also very deadly. They lost on Nepal as a result. On Dorado, they figured out a solid strat against Sombra: blasé on Ana. They ended up losing the map, but I personally blame this on mistakes that Uprising shouldn’t have made. They ended up on a tie-breaker map in a nail biting faceoff on Ilios. Which they won. Aimgod and NotE were definitely the heroes of the match.

When it’s a pure goats comp versus a mirror comp, Uprising is solid. They went toe to toe with NYXL. Fusions, when he isn’t off in his hammer zone, is a stellar pickup. When you put them up with a weird comp, they get confused. For some reason, they stubbornly stick to goats even when it’s obviously not working. Is it because they don’t have that flexibility that a 2nd DPS offers with Colourhex suspended? Do they just not have any other strats? They will continue to struggle if they don’t start adjusting.

Other notable mentions for this first week. Dafran showed that he belongs on the big stage. Shanghai is still winless, but Gamsu’s hamster was solid. The duo of Gamsu and Geguri definitely worked. Bren and Sideshow were missed. The Spitfire struggled, while Philadelphia Fusion is starting off strong on their Redemption season. NYXL is showing that they are even better now. Are they the team to beat? Does the Shock just have too much DPS? The season just started, so it’s still way too early to tell what is going to happen.

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Overwatch League Season 2: It’s Finally Here!

The only sport that I wait this anxiously for other than Overwatch League is football. And my Patriots already won the Super Bowl. Now it’s time to watch my Boston Uprising overcome another underdog tale to show off the resilience of Boston and everyone else in the area. We do love our underdog tales in Massachusetts. Especially when it comes to showing people what we are made of. Never count us out. Let’s take a look at what I think will happen today and some ideas for the season.

The first game up tonight is the rematch between the London Spitfire and Philadelphia Fusion. The Spitfire beat the Fusion in last year’s Grand Finals, which I was happy about since they are my second favorite team. (Fury!!!) I think that while Fusion will want redemption, the Spitfire will want to show everyone why they are the champions. I expect this team to be even stronger this year and may even make it a repeat championship win. This will be an amazing match to watch.

The next match is between the rivalry OWL keeps trying to make happen: NYXL vs. Boston Uprising. Do I hope the Uprising will win? Absolutely. Do I think that this is their night? Unfortunately not. With the main tank shakeup of the Gamsu trade, you’re losing a lot of tank synergy with our offtank NotE. I predict that Axxiom will end up in the main tank role, but the 6th spot is up in the air since Colourhex is suspended for 2 games. Will Fusions get the start or will we see Alemao? It will be interesting to watch and not the game I want to figure it all out in. At least this New York team is likeable and I’m a big fan of Pine, SBB, and Ark. Still, I’m hoping for a major Up-set. (Har har)

After this, you can see the Seoul Dynasty take on the Los Angeles Gladiators. The Dynasty was the league favorite last year, only to not live up to the expectations that this solid team had. Adding the controversial but extremely talented Fissure to their roster, the team hopes that they solved their problems from last year. Expect Ryu and Fleta to still be powerhouses. Los Angeles Gladiators put up a solid fight last year, impressing a lot of people with how far they made it. I think that they might beat Dynasty, but I hope I’m surprised.

Finally, Shanghai Dragons will go against the Hangzhou Spark. The Dragons will be searching for their first win (inside of the league play), and the Spark will want to show that a cute color scheme doesn’t mean that they will be easy prey. As much as I want to root against Shanghai for taking our Papa Gamsu, I really want to see Gamsu and Geguri show that they can carry their team to victory. Especially with how strong Diya can be as a DPS when he’s on fire. If Diya is streaky, they’ll lose.

These are my early predictions. Monday, we’ll recap the games. I’m extremely excited to see how the All-Access Pass improves the viewing, especially as a person who writes about the league.

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Overwatch League Community Countdown: Part 2

Normally I don’t spend more than 1 day on the “Gaming” part of my blog. Due to the special event this week in the Overwatch League, it seemed appropriate to spend the week discussing things. Last night was the exciting 1v1 matches. I was excited to see that I went 5 out of 5 on my Ashe 1v1 picks. Surefour and Pine had an interesting match. As much as I like Pine, I had a feeling that Surefour was going to win again. Everything else went exactly how I thought it was, though I was worried for a bit during the Danye/Diya match, where I had pegged Diya as the winner. He did win, by the way. It was pretty intense.

The Ana 1v1 matches were not in my favor, but I still went 8/10 for the night. I really thought Neptuno would be the victor, and he wasn’t. I also had a lot of faith in Zunba, but that also didn’t pan out. Honestly, I though the Ana matches were far more entertaining, maybe it was because at some point they just started sleeping each other for the win. It was cheeky and fun and I loved every second of it.

Tonight’s adventure is the Capture the Flag matches, which I also think will be great. I’m really waiting for the Showmatch on Wednesday because I love watching the OWL talent play. I’m going to have to go for The Away Team because they have most of my favorite talent on there: Soe, Puckett, Mr. X, Emongg. It’s going to be a great match and I love watching them troll each other the entire time. I really hope that this one is live with video because it will be hilarious. Though, I will miss Reinforce carrying everyone. Both figuratively and literally.

The last thing I’d like to discuss today is about the Boston Uprising. This morning, rumors started circling that our beloved Papa Gamsu and his adorable puppers Uni has been traded off to Shanghai Dragons. The Dragons just recently lost their maintain Fearless to health issues. I can see how this would work. The off-tank Geguri is Korean, so having a Korean main tank would be a great asset to Shanghai since the language barrier wouldn’t be an issue. Both of them, already dubbed “GG” by fans, are solid hardworking players that have similar attitudes. This would be an amazing pickup for Shanghai.

At the cost of a huge hit to Boston. What does Boston get out of this deal, besides the heartbreak of losing the face of the Uprising? The morale hit would be huge and he had awesome synergy with NotE. Would we potentially get Diya in return? Diya is a solid player, though he does have the tendency to be a bit streaky. This may not be as much of an issue, considering that we mostly just need a DPS for 2 games while Colourhex is suspended. Honestly, I’m not sure that Diya and Gamsu is a fair trade. Gamsu is the face of the team. He’s Papa Gamsu. He was a leader that Uprising needed and he stepped up and lead the team. Boston will be losing more than just their main tank that we grew to love, we’d be losing the heart of the team. Axxiom is an awesome player, but he has some big shoes to fill to hold up to the standards we have for our main tank in the professional and emotional sense.

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The OWL Community Countdown

This weekend began the countdown for the Overwatch League Season 2. Of the listings, which have changed a few times since released to the public, it activated hype mode for me. My excitement of a fantasy league also happened, though I fear I’m too late and don’t have enough friends interested in OWL to do it this year. Next year, I want in on that. The most exciting events of the schedule were the Talent Showdown and the 2 1v1 matches. Surefour vs. Pine on Ashe? Yes, please.

I wanted to catch the Boston Uprising scrim, but honestly I thought it would be just like watching NFL preseason matches. You don’t watch expecting Brady, Gronk, and Edelman to play the entire time. You watch to get hyped that the football season is coming soon. So when I saw that Gamsu was Hanzo or NotE on Mercy, I got exactly what I expected. What I didn’t expect was the scathing response to the matches.

Of course they didn’t take it seriously. Last year when they offered a preseason, it was treated by the league as a real thing. They had the casters and analysts on stage. The matches took place well before the season happened. If the league didn’t take these seriously, why should the teams? Did I enjoy watching Jayne pull the analyst and commentator role? Yes. Did it look like an Overwatch League production? No, it looked like when he did one of those unofficial competitions. Great to watch, but something that you want to watch for fun.

Additionally, it took place less than 1 week before the start of the season. With the meta pretty much already set for the season’s first stage (::cough:: GOATS), teams didn’t want to give anything away with their strats. It’s one thing when the preseason start was in plenty of time for the meta to change, it’s another when the season is days away.

Then Nanzer changed it up, disappointed in the teams for not taking this more seriously. He gave us Mystery Heroes. Honestly, I watched more of the Mystery Heroes scrims than I did the “real ones”. It was fun and lighthearted and I wish they did the Mystery Heroes scrims to begin with. Consider it next year. And let’s be real, if you wanted it to be treated as a real thing maybe the league itself should have treated it like the real thing as they did last year.

The league experts and fans seemed torn on this. I think the outrage is nonsense. The argument that you can’t compare the two preseasons because “You wouldn’t see a QB play linebacker” is nonsense. You still don’t see their A game because it’s not in the team’s best interest from a strategic point of view. I’m more concerned with the new players and seeing what they are capable of. If you want your eSports league to mimic the major sports league, then that is exactly what happened this weekend.

I can’t wait until the Valentine’s Day matchup between NYXL and Uprising. It’s going to be great and I can’t wait for the Overwatch League to start back up again.

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Give Me My Zandalari

I’ve been patient. Since the Zandalari trolls have been introduced as an upcoming race in the then yet-to be expansion Battle for Azeroth, I have been dying to make one. This need only got worse when I saw the boom chicken form that resembled the Arrokoa from Warlords of Draenor, which I wished could become a playable race. Maybe it was those endless hours I’ve spent wiping in ZG. I don’t know. Whatever it was, I needed this in my life.

It was like a promise that will never seem to come. I know it will, but the wait feels like forever. I bought the Battle for Azeroth expansion as soon as pre-orders happened because then you could play the allied races. Except the ones that you really wanted. (Though to be honest I really really wanted to play a Nightborne, as I’ve mentioned so many times before.) What I wanted was the Zandalari and the Dark Iron. Then the next set of allied races came out. Nope. No Zandalari. I did get a really awesome Dark Iron though. She was awesome.

I know I could play the Zandalari on the PTR right now, but what’s the point? It will hopefully be live soon. I worry that I’ll make this race out to be cooler than it actually is, like my longtime obsession with the Pandaren. But they look so cool. Like more awesome looking Trolls. I want to look like the Princess, I think. I don’t know. We’ll see what my options are.

I don’t care if I’m in the minority of most people that I talk to about the game. I enjoy the allied races. I like having options outside of the standard choices. I especially love going through their storylines. My favorite stories have to be the Mag’har, Dark Iron, and Lightforged. In that order. I especially liked the overlap between the Mag’har and the Lightforged. I hope that the Zandalari have cool story that is worthy of their awesome race. I hope that the Kul Tiras have an interesting storyline, but I’m not holding my breath for that. It may be as lackluster as the Highmountain Tauren. I say, keep the allied races coming.

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The True State of the Union

The State of the Union address is finally upon us. This is the day that happens every year, where we listen to our president give his propaganda lines and let us know what agenda he thinks is the best approach to running our country. We give them extra air time to lie to us, while some will follow every word blinding or dismiss it without listening depending on your political affiliation. Then a select member of the other party tells us why the first party is wrong. Both are vague with no definitive fact checks. No one cares. I’ve even considered playing a drinking game where I took a sip every time the entire party stands up to clap, making the thing a lot longer than it needs to be. I like my liver too much for that game. It does remind me of those handful of times where I attended mass though.

That isn’t the actual state of the union. This is a perceived state of the union based on a specific agenda that they want to push. Fortunately, I’m here to tell you all about the real state of our union. How both parties are failing our country and we’re complacent to this. This is my perceived state of the union.

Democratic politicians are boycotting the state of the union. What ever happened to the “When they go low, we go high” approach that Michelle Obama so passionately spoke to us? Don’t boycott the State of the Union address. You can disagree with him without being blatantly disrespectful. Respect the office, even if the President doesn’t seem to. If you want to seem better than the President’s childish antics, fight on another day in a respectful manner. Don’t also be childish. Do not make the divide even more fractured.

And then some Democrats are discussing that Howard Schultz shouldn’t run for president because he will take votes away from the Democrats in the election. First of all, this is a democracy and anyone who wants to run for president should be allowed to. On the same token, the rumors of the President trying to work magic to deter other Republicans from running for president is also something that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I will again point out: This is a democracy and anyone who wants to run for president should be allowed to. If the Democrats are that afraid of losing, maybe they should put up a viable candidate that people will actually want to vote for. If you’re that afraid that another Republican will run against you, maybe do a better job so that people won’t want to replace you.

That is the state of the union. It’s a sad state. There is something that we can do about it. We can change it. We can stop blindly following career politicians that feign concern, passion, and ideals for votes. Then they forget everything that they stand for afterwards when lobbyists are tossing money at them. Educating ourselves is the best defense. That is the best way to make a change.