Where are the MP’s you ask? Well, budget cuts are preventing anymore from being hired. You see, MP forces have been reduced due to the past and recent force reductions, and we depend on DoD police forces (contracted civilian position) mixed in. And they can’t HIRE anymore because guess what? Hiring freeze due to cuts in the budget.

I know cuts have to be made, but they can me made with a lot more wisdom and intelligence. I am a civilian, wife, and mother. I have no training in government, or economics. I’m going to college, but my first degree will be an AA in Liberal Arts. And even I can think of smarter ways to reduce spending. I can list three off the top of my head. Watch…

1. All the equipment that is issued at EVERY duty station, that sits in our closets and is never used even in combat deployments. Stop issuing that crap! And the stuff that is issued and used, that gets turned back in when we move from that station? Half of it gets written off and trashed. Even though we are required to turn it in in clean and useable shape or pay to replace it. Friggin RE-USE it!

2. Stop moving us around every two years! They’d save billions just by slowing down the PCS rate, since all packing and hauling is paid for by the DoD, as are travel costs. Either let us stay in one place for a careers length (not optimal), OR change the rate of moving us around to 4 or 5 years instead of two or three.

3. Stop tolerating and keeping troops that can’t pass their PT tests because they are just plain lazy, stop wrist slapping those DUI’s and troublemakers. Get them OUT and off the payroll. And on that point, stop taking 6 months to chapter out your soldiers that ARE being discharged for failure. They’re sitting there collecting a paycheck for NOT doing their jobs, and failing to adhere to standards. That’s pretty stupid.

So when you next hear about how desperately we need to cut defense spending. Please keep in mind, before you jump in with your support, what exactly you are supporting. They reduction in the safety and essential services for thousands of women, and children, who’s husbands are risking their lives for their country. The safety of troops that when at home, should FEEL safe.

We sacrifice enough, our safety shouldn’t be OPTIONAL. Does a family need to be murdered as a result before people actually get it? Me? I’m going to exercise my 2nd amendment right to bear arms. Walther .380 here I come. Don’t fuck with Mama Bear.

Another Rant on Defense Spending Cuts brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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Look at that, I gave you a new twitter to follow AND blog to read in ONE quote! Proving once again that Jess is Awesome. Yes? Yes! Right, anyhow…

Stupid Politics. Stupid Government. Stupid no pay check coming next week. Stupid bills due anyway. Stupid Congress. STUPID. –tweeted by myhomemadehappy

Jess has some rage today. This government shutdown bullshit. Holy crap. I looked at my husband’s pay for the 15th. Half. HALF! That’s not right. Now, before I go any further, YES I am just as pissed off about planned parenthood and Head Start! I’m a woman after all, I have daughters that may one day depend on planned parenthood for THEIR care when they are no longer military dependants. Believe me, I CARE! And my Mother in Law works for Head Start! My children both benefitted from head start as little darling girls. Not that you can TELL now that they’re *darling* teenage girls. (* denotes sarcasm in case you need to know).

But I’m A LOT pissed off at the president. YES. I know it’s not all on his head. Yes I know it’s party politics bullshit. BUT when he made his little speech last night, he mentioned those 800,000 Government employees living paycheck to paycheck.  He mentioned that a few times. He mentioned loan and passport problems. He mentioned other things, but not once did he mention the 2.2 million Active and Reserve military that are being required to report for duty without pay!

Let me repeat that. TWO POINT TWO MILLION TROOPS. Required to report for duty. Fighting the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. REQUIRED TO REPORT but only receiving HALF their pay on the 15th. Oh they keep saying they’ll continue to EARN their pay, but they won’t GET a paycheck until this is settled. That doesn’t put food on the table, or cash in the bill collectors’ pockets in the mean time.  “Eventually” isn’t going to cut it. it’s not going to bring comfort to troops fighting overseas now worried whether their families are making it when they shouldn’t have to.

I know how much I personally am going to be affected by this. I just blew my savings on my dental work, (not by choice but when your doctor says “this is bad, no more waiting your health is at risk” you don’t dick around) I have a little left of the pay from the 1st, and a call into my bank about my car payment. My kids are awesome and fully OK with eating Ramen and Mac n Cheese for a while if we have to. But what about these young, newly enlisted soldiers on a private’s pay trying to support a family of four? I can’t even imagine it.  Wait, yes I can, and it’s ugly.

What most people do not realize is it’s not JUST the troops and families affected financially. ALL of our support resources are govt run too. Our health care, Army Community Services which provides education and information to the spouses and soldiers. EVERYTHING on an installation is basically government run. And A LOT of those paid employees are being furloughed as well. Sure we have many volunteers, but these jobs are important, and often cannot be replaced by volunteers.  Child care centers, gyms, teen centers, are possibly affected as well. The doctors in our hospital and clinics, and nurses are not always soldiers, they are mainly civilian providers. I realize med staff is critical but we’re still looking at a slow down of a system that already takes more than two weeks sometimes to get an appointment. It took me 3 days of calling at 6-7am to get seen for illness this week.

And let’s remember the fact that my husband is off at school. He is waiting on the money to pay his room and board that’s due to arrive on the 28th. This is a payment (travel pay) that gets screwed up quite enough on it’s own, what happens to that? Am I to support his room and board (Roughly $1k just for a month in the room) along with ours on HALF of his paycheck?

I have so much homework due this weekend, and I can’t even think straight or read the texts.  So if you see me flailing on twitter. Don’t assume I don’t care about planned parenthood, head start, or npr. I do. Especially Planned Parenthood. But right now it’s personal, it’s survival, it’s my LIFE and my entire community, and support network, my friends…no my family. It’s literally my WORLD being affected by this right now, so maybe I get to be a little selfish yes?

STUPID is STUPID Stupidhead brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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On the other end of the spectrum, are the people that know we don’t make alot and base assumptions of of that, that we are permanently poor and should never EVER buy anything extravagant.

Every time I get something with a fairly high price tag this comes up.  It happened when I got my first digital SLR camera and had mentioned a few months earlier we couldn’t afford the Army’s monthly fee for family dental (which we DID start at the same time as I got said camera), and now with this computer combined with his Harley Down Payment, because SIX months ago, I used AER (Army Emergency Relief) to get a no interest loan for $400 car repairs. Oh and let’s not forget that because I don’t work I’m using “his money” and making no contribution to the household finances myself.

Yeah I supposed handling all of our finances, meal planning, cooking, cleaning. And of course the fact that I provide a ton of support so my husband can go and DO his job without worrying about a damned thing back home is no contribution either. When exactly did marriage start consisting of “his money” and “her money” rather than OUR Money? When did it start being a game of who does more, who provides more, and who’s not pulling their Lose Weight Exercise? Silly me thinking marriage was a lifetime relationship built on love, trust, and commitment in the eyes of God and each other, with someone you love for better or worse, richer or poorer. Apparently now it’s a business partnership, what happens if you’re poorer instead of richer? Do you like get fired now?

I would love to let some of these people walk in my shoes for ONE month. Just one. And I’ll even be nice and let it be when he’s not deployed, or away at training, or working crazy hours, or too tired to enjoy time together until the weekend. I’ll gladly hand over his normal monthly pay, and our bills, and watch from the background. Show them how anything more than what we can afford has to be planned out a year in advance, and show them just how to pray that nothing unexpected pops up before then.

They don’t take into consideration, that maybe these large purchases, happen once per year in a normal year. Or that every few years there are two times it happens.

1. We get a tax REFUND. That happens once per year. All larger ticket items are saved until that time. We have kids, and therefore get Earned Income Credit. It’s a nice treat once in a while. AFTER any major things are taken care of.

2. The Army pays pretty well when you reenlist…especially in a combat zone. And did you realize, when reenlisting in a combat zone, you get said bonus in a tax free lump sum rather than monthly taxed installments?

This laptop, his bike down payment, and his laptop are all coming out of those two things. And by God we have earned them. Him especially. But there’s always that person ready to throw in your face that you couldn’t afford such and such a couple months ago, but yet here you are with a new computer and talking about a Harley (did I mention he has been waiting 17 years for this??)!

This computer was not planned. Mine wasn’t supposed to go belly up on me. I just got damned lucky with the timing.

What’s even worse, is when they know the life you lead, and the hurdles you have to jump every day without landing face first in the mud on the other side, the sacrifices you have made to get here, and will continue to make over the years.  They know that you don’t dare get excited about the light at the end of the tunnel, because too many times it’s been the train. But the one time you’re so excited about something finally coming to fruition…they can’t be happy for you.

Rather than celebrate with you, they’d rather stew in the juice of their own sour grapes, or tell you that you have alot of nerve spending “his money” that way. Well excuse me for being excited about these things. They’re a big deal to us. And guess what Buttercup? He knows about every penny I spend. He has the ability, to say “please don’t” if he chooses, and I respect him enough to accept that. You know what happens nine times out of ten when I run this stuff past him? If the word Harley isn’t in the sentence, he asks why I’m telling him.

Now, about those shoes…

Here ya go. Have at it, walk a mile! On second thought no. I don’t want you getting grape juice on them. Besides, the awesome that is my Husband…is too good for you.

I’m Going On a Rant Here brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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Only for me, it's a laptop that I"m still waiting for. I'm actually waiting for ALOT right now. I can wait pretty well for one big thing, or one small thing. But when the list of things I'm waiting for gets to a certain point…I crack. I'm at that point. And you know what the stupid thing is? I am the worst about waiting for the "little things". Sure, I am excited as all get out for my Husband to be here for R&R, but waiting for that, I'm doing well. Same with the end of the deployment. BIG things here, and I can be patient about that.

But a laptop that I ordered? I want it yesterday!

My Nook E-reader? I want that now! (maybe to distract me from the laptop wait)

However, I am accepting no responsibility for my impatience at this moment. I'm blaming it solely on this computer. All of my hobbies, and mini projects are tied to it. Blogging, photography, scrapbooking (gotta print the photos!), gaming. And it refuses to let me do any of that. In fact, when I try to do more than simply browse, blog, and twitter, it totally turns it's back on me power off, ignoring my demands and pleas. It is the Mom keeping me from getting that lollipop! And I blame Dell for teasing me with purple glowing awesomeness then holding it hostage and making me wait.

I'm stomping me feet, and flailing about, and getting nowhere with it. I'm driving myself up the wall but it's not stopping me. Dammit, I want it all, and I want it now!!!

Oh, look there's my ride. It looks like a huff. I think I'll leave in it.

*Edited to Add: I no sooner hit "publish" and my status changed to shipped. Maybe I should have thrown my temper tantrum sooner eh? Yay for rewarding bad behaviour!!

I’m NOT a Grownup I’m a Princess!! brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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(There’s a video here. If you can’t see it in your reader)

You Want /Jessrage? brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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I went to our FRG meeting last night. Partly for the information, and partly because I know I need to step out and try and meet people. That is a big admission for me. I’m not good at it. I never have been. I got lucky in Alaska, my friends all came to me one way or another. So, I admitted to myself that I needed to make the effort. I took a deep breath, and off I went.

Things started out well. Before I knew it I was having a nice conversation about hobbies with one of the wives at my table. I got comfortable. Maybe TOO comfortable. When asked about hobbies and crafts I made the mistake of being honest.  I said I wasn’t crafty really, but I enjoy blogging, photography, image editing, and …playing World of Warcraft. POOF! she disappeared like her ass was on fire. It’s the same EVERY. Time.

WoW players, and Gamers in general tend to see this reaction alot. There is a false image of them as basement dwelling creeps with no social life.  And do you know what dawned on me? Well no wonder! Every time someone finds out that your hobby is a video game, especially an immersive one like WoW, they jump back like you might burn them. Sure as hell makes me not want to bother trying.

I don’t WANT to make the effort if I have to “lie” about myself. If I can’t be me, I can’t be bothered. And you know what? It’s THEM that will miss out. WoW is a game that thrives on social skills, critical thinking, and ability to work well with others. The things you would THINK you would want in meeting new people.

Yes, I play WoW, I blog, and you know what? I’m good at it, and I love it. I’m also a pretty good photographer, listener, and friend. I’m not going to “leave that out” in a conversation about “what do you enjoy?”. Anymore than I’ll deny having a kickass tattoo, or loving country music.  I don’t discriminate against any of them for being years younger than me, or less experienced with the army life. In fact, I could be a hell of an asset, being the kickass hooah army wife that I am, I have alot of knowledge and understanding to offer. I am friggin AWESOME as a matter of fact, and if my playing WoW, and blogging, and in general being a geekish redneckish woman keeps you from seeing it? Well your loss.

But I’ll always be the girl I am
And when Life comes falling down on me I do the best I can
And I never make make apologies cause I don’t give a damn
I guess I’ll always be the girl I am

Well Up Yours Too brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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Q: Can you describe for us what the intended identity and versatilities of the Tree of Life druids are supposed to be?

Ghostcrawler: This is a pretty philosophical answer here. If you only read one answer in this Q&A, you might want to check out this one.

The strength of the Resto druid is in heal-over-time spells. They can also do some decent single-target healing through Nourish or group healing through Wild Growth. The tree pretty much used to be a PvE mechanic since “rooting yourself” in PvP to benefit from ToL greatly limited the druid’s crowd control and escape abilities. We made enough changes to the talent to get trees into PvP in Lich King… arguably too well.

Druids overall have a strong niche. We are at a little bit of a crossroads with the Tree of Life however. We are currently wondering if druids sacrifice too much just to be as good as a healer as everyone else. What I mean is that if druids were good healers in caster form but great healers in Tree form, then there might be a decision there. However, we pretty much assume that healing druids are in Tree form nearly all of the time and balance around that. We don’t think it would be fair for them to be the best healers just for taking that talent.

In addition to having to give up utility in order to heal as a Tree of Life, we have become less enamored with druids locking themselves into one form. In fact, you really never see the basic tauren or night elf druid form (you know, the one that actually shows off the awesome armor art) because all druids are in cat, bear, tree, or moonkin form nearly 100% of the time. I’m not saying we would just cut Tree of Life from the game. It’s been around awhile and for better or worse, it’s part of World of Warcraft now. However, we could see taking the druid in a direction where shifting was much more common and easy to do. Maybe you only go into tree form for certain spells but leave for other spells — this didn’t work previously because of the high cost of shifting, but in the absence of power shifting, we’d love to get rid of the costs completely. Another way to go would be to make Tree of Life form a cooldown, more like Metamorphosis. You shift into tree when you need a healing boost, but you don’t stay in it all the time. Now, I am totally waving my arms here. This is not the kind of change you are going to see in the next patch. But it is something we’re thinking about long term, and the kind of thinking we’d love to have more feedback on from the community.

Note to other healers: this is why you are unlikely to see any kind of “Holy form” ever. Giving up healing to do damage works okay. Giving up everything to heal is lame.

No! Up yours GC, just NO! If I had wanted to be a night elf caster healer, I’d have kept my fucking priest!  I’m a druid, I have forms. I LIKE my forms. That’s WHY I rolled a druid. What do I care if I can’t friggin MOONFIRE in tree form??  What kind of stupid logic is that? Ok, priests can cast offensive spells in heal spec. Good for them! But assuming they’re in full healing gear how much damage are they REALLY doing? Huh? That’s IF they hit at all for Elune’s sake. I don’t see hit on healing gear! If I’m throwing moonfire and wrath as a healer, I’m wasting my mana. What exactly am I sacrificing in tree form? Ability to defend myself in PvP? Pshh, no. Even if I could DPS I’m still gonna die when I get jumped by any damage dealing class.

If I want to DPS…guess what?? I have another spec and form for that shit.

I am NOT a RESTO PRIEST!! And I don’t want to be!

Leave my Leaves Alone!!

We Interrupt This Hiatus For Some /Jessrage brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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/Jessrage

I am annoyed as hell with the Argent Tournament dailies these days. The thought of doing them makes me not even want to log in. And you KNOW that’s saying something considering there are five pets available and I’ve only gotten Jessmyn ONE of them. That’s right. I hate the dailies more than I love collecting pets.  And don’t tell me how fast they can be done, I know. Nor do I need to know how easy they are because that’s a subjective matter. No, this is NOT an “I can’t joust!!!” thing either, I can, and I do it well. It’s just a rant.

1. Adding a group daily. Chillmaw has always annoyed me. Just on principle.  I don’t care what class can solo it, there shouldn’t BE group requirements for a daily outside the normal and heroic daily dungeons.

2. Commanders. First off, this is a phased area. How hard would it seriously be to have the stupid commanders NOT appear when you aren’t on the quest that requires them.  Second, when you DO require them, you shouldn’t border on NEEDING a group. Oh yes I can solo it, but only in the perfect conditions. Those being:

A: When there’s not another group rounding up EVERYTHING for themselves.

B:  When someone doesn’t steal the mob.

C: When noone aggros everything, dies, and leaves me with a bunch of mobs and a repair bill.

D: When there are enough people there that adds aren’t a  problem, and none of those people are doing any of the above.

Other than that, the best way to get it done is in a group. Or skip it completely, and loseWeight Exercise seals.

3. The NEW changes in 3.2 annoy me the most. Requiring exalted with the Sunreavers or Windrunners. Ok thats not bad but…wait, what’s this?

Argent Crusader Dailies and Rewards
A new line of dailies and rewards for players who have earned the title of Crusader will be available with two random seal-awarding dailies.

• New Heirlooms
• New Argent Crusade Banner
• New Argent Crusade Tabard: Ports you directly to the Tournament grounds.
• An Upgraded Squire: As any good squire should, this upgraded squire now has a mount.
• New Mount: A new Argent Crusade paladin-only charger will be available.

That is the part that sears my bacon, right there. But it’s only a title right? wrong. It actually requires TWO titles. You don’t get “Crusader” until you are exalted with Argent Crusade and ALL of your faction cities (Ambassador title).  Ok, there are baby zone quests I could do to get that, cloth turn ins of course. Or…the Tourney, at 1k rep for valiant dailies and a potential 1k more from Writs, plus the gold that so nicely adds up. Which brings me back to wanting to GAG every time I think of doing them.

So the patch I thought would make for more variety in the doldrums of my dailies…well only if I get “popular” enough.  Meanwhile my Pally needs to do all of this to get 25 sels to  get her Axe of Epic Irony. My druid is the closest to exalted with everyone, so I try like hell to WANT to do them with her. So far I’ve failed. My rogue gets that handy rep bonus, but is further away with rep. And my pally…she’s only honored with the entire Alliance.  Clearly ‘m not little miss popular. Of course that’s nothing new. I’ve always been too geeky to be a cool kid and not geeky enough to hang with the geeks. Thanks for the nightmares from Highschool blizz!

/end Jessrage

Agrent Temper Tantrum brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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So, I’ve gotten alot done…and I’m in a slump. Both gamewise, and bloggingwise. It happens. I hope it goes away soon.

Seenah- Rogue

• Caught up with Jess gearwise for the most part.
• Exalted with the Alliance Vanguard
• Has learned the chopper schematic
• Exalted with Argent Crusade

Alt I said I’d never level, Sara the Shammy..

• Lvl 30
• has mount
• professions all expert level

Things I have to bitch about

• Lack of Elemental shammy gear in Azeroth. Seriously Blizz, I see drops in atlasloot that say mail (yay!) and have stam and intellect (ohh I’m getting excited!!)…and ATTACK POWER (Blast you!!). Seriously, it gets old. You pick a toon. Blizz says “look, here are three distinct playing styles, find one you love and play it. Whoops! Sorry wrong choice! sorry bout the lack of gear!” Wtf. And I accept that I’ll be wearing cloth. I’ve leveled a moonkin for pete’s sake. But Where are the decent caster stat ONE HANDED weapons?? Oh, that’s right I have to grind heroics for badges for that.  Oh, and badges of course aren’t BoA, so I have to make sure I do ALL my heroics on ONE toon. Because if I get tokens on another one, they’re useless towards my weapon goal.

I had something else to bitch about, but I forget what it is at the moment.

Slumpity Slump brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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Ok. So, I spent ALL day yesterday finding new hosting, getting royally screwed by 2 companies, finally finding one, and moving my site. Why? Because the host I have been with for the last 3 years was threatening to suspend lady-jess.com. I hadn’t been checking one of my email accounts, but did on Saturday. There was a notice that my WoW blog was moved to a “stabilization” server because it was using too much CPU. Not bandwidth mind you, and not storage those are both “unlimited”.  I was passing their 1% CPU limit. Frankly I didn’t even know there WAS one. You see, where dreamhost mentions this limit, Lunarpages does not. And they didn’t even tell me WHICH file was the problem until the 3rd day of tickets back and forth. I understand shared hosting has these limits no matter where you go but 1% is pretty extreme, and the ones i looked at did mention it.

No matter what I did, disabling my Featured Content Gallery on the front page (after they finally said that was the file), turning on WP Supercache as per their suggestion, it was still over their limit.  I did some googling this issue and found alot of angry Lunarpages customers with the same problem. The common complaint being sure you get unlimited bandwidth and storage, but if you have any real traffic you won’t get to use it before your CPU use passes 1%. Mind you this blog gets on average 200 unique visits a day. That isn’t much really. And I was passing that limit.

Here comes my next problem. I am paid through October with them. Because my passing their CPU limit breaks the agreement, if they shut me down, no refund.  That’s not good. So I decided to move JUST lady-jess, and leave my other two sites there. Since only this one was causing the problems. Cue the host shopping.

The first choice I made was justhost. That was a mistake. I ordered my package, paid for it, the transaction was completed according to paypal. I got no username and password. I got another email with my receipt, and one mentioning I should have my welcome letter. I responded that I didn’t. I received an email back saying my order wasn’t completed, but hey, I could click this link for 50% off and try again! Ok, thought I…they misunderstood, I tried explaining it again…same reply. Repeat that process 6 times.  They bounced me up to tech support, who then said I’d have a reply in the hour, but for faster service click this link for only $19.99 I could have faster support. /facepalm. I told THEM the same thing, and got bounced back to billing just to start ALL over again. I filed a complaint through paypal. Now I wait for a refund.

Then, I went to my second choice. Dreamhost. I had a promo code thanks to Siha (right column of her blog if your looking) for 50% off. Which made 1 year cost the same as the 1 month+activation I was looking at. Sign me up! Oh look INSTANTLY I have my ftp and log in info, access to my admin panel! Good first step right there. So, I set my domain to point there, I install wordpress. I drive myself and everyone in BA chat crazy trying to get this blog moved. Most of the time I couldn’t SEE my main page without a redirect to lunarpages. Til Fim told me how to dump my DNS cache from my computer. That helped for a while. At least I could see my dashboard for wp. Then came moving the database in. I used this fine tutorial for Bigdump but got caught in a horribad error that I couldn’t figure out. I don’t know SQL past “this is where my posts end up”. Matt asked me if I compressed it…which, I did not. So, I removed some unneccessary tables (twittertools, and an old gallery install), exported it again gzipped, and poof!  It imported. YES! now to set up my config to point at it. Done. WHY isn’t it working!!!! This is where I learned, that there’s an important line in there saying “prefix” The prefix for the tables in my new installation are different from the old. Fixed that, and my blog posts appeared.

Today…I got another message from the tech at lunarpages.

Hello,

We have noticed that your account’s average resource usage is now within the acceptable limits for a shared hosting package. We will observe your usage for next 24 hours and if usage is ok, we will move it back to production server.

Best regards,

Disha Kaur
System administrator team

Really? Might that have something to do with the fact that IT IS NOT THERE ANYMORE!!!?? I also ordered dreamhosts $15/month virtual private server, just to cover my butt. I’m happy to say everything worked once I figured it out, and once maintenance ends by Elune, I am playing WoW!

Here Comes The /Jessrage! brought to you by Lady Jess - (Have You Seen My Stapler?)

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