Hi all! I'm Anna, and I'm an engineering major. I picked this class to fill a gen-ed requirement to get my degree, and I'm already so glad I did! I am interested in learning about how social media has affected the way people interact with each other and how society as a whole has changed because of it (especially how it relates to the news media).
My passions outside of school are plentiful! I have a husband who is my everything and a toddler who keeps us on our toes every single day. My whole family enjoys watching hockey. And yes, the one year old is included in that! I just love how fast paced and intelligent it is! Our favorite team is the Chicago Blackhawks, and I am so excited to watch them defend their Stanley Cup title this upcoming season. I also do a lot of crochet in what little down time I have. I started shortly before our daughter was born and have come a long way in that small amount of time; I even got an Etsy page started and share some free patterns I created and general craft-like hilarity on my blog! I've had a lot of fun taking on projects ranging anywhere from potholders, hats and scarves, to blankets and stuffed animals.
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| Here are some dragons! |
And what's with all the gaming stuff?
What we've seen from the movie "Second Skin" so far seems mostly familiar to me. Since it is from 2007, right as the first expansion came out for World of Warcraft (from now on referred to as "WoW"), it brings back some fond memories for me. I feel like they did a really great job finding a diverse group of people who play the game, encompassing everyone from the casual gamer all the way to the people who go overboard and become addicts. I really liked how they showed the sense of community found within guilds from all MMORPGs, how people from the same town or even opposite corners of the world can come together to become friends in game - I have friends in Australia from it! I love that they showed the stories of people who met in game and become more than friends.
I, myself, met my husband while playing WoW - I know, I know "NERD ALERT!" Get over it. My ex was the one who introduced me to WoW and then left me to my own devices without knowing anything about the game. I was invited to a guild by a girl across the country who ran it with her boyfriend. The core group of people in the guild were all friends in real life, and just picked up a few strays to fill out the roster a little bit and to help out people new to the game. Life happened, and my boyfriend and I broke up, and a few months later (unrelated) our guild leaders' relationship came to an end as well. One thing led to another, and my friendship with the guild leader blossomed into something more. We were able to meet in person, and have been inseparable ever since. He moved to Maryland to be with me for a year, and then we both moved to Oregon where we have been for the last five and a half years.
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| Whaaaaat? That can't be me. Girls don't play WoW! Also, yes. My pet wolf's name is Lunch. |
I go back and forth between periods of time where I continue to play WoW, and take breaks for months at a time when we get bored (usually during the summer when we'd rather be outside anyway). My husband and I play anywhere from once a week to a couple hours a day while the littlest one is napping. It all depends on what else is going on, but the overall amount of time spent gaming was greatly reduced once our daughter came into our lives. Priorities! We both have tried other MMORPGs like Guild Wars 2, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Tera, Vindictus, Rift and several others, but always seem to come back to the one that brought us together. I like some console games as well, but am absolutely terrible at them. Halo is fun, but as soon as someone is nearby, I always panic and end up spinning in circles shooting at my feet. I die a lot. I love the stories that are told in the games. WoW has such a vast lore behind it, and each new character I make allows a little more insight to what happens within the world. Of warcraft. Every couple years, Blizzard brings out a new expansion with more stories and a higher level cap and it is always fun to get to the new zones and quests to see what happens. I really enjoy being able to spend some time playing with friends and family, and the endgame content is even more fun with someone sitting next to you, than playing "alone". Even with as impersonal as the game has become lately (that is a whole different topic), it is still fun to meet new people and get to know their stories. It is just as much a piece of social media as Facebook and Twitter, just for the slightly nerdier.
