Backlog 2022

ryume · Post Posted: Dec 20, 2022 12:54 pm

Thanks for the welcome backs and congratulations! And hurray for a new family member, greensara

Mikodesu wrote: ↑Dec 17, 2022 9:10 pm Welcome back & congrats, ryume! You've been at this for at least the last couple years, iirc? Has to feel good to get your life back, finally.

And on a selfish note, can't wait to hear your thoughts when you've played more Harvestella. A few people here and there on the forum have played, but it's always nice to have one more. (Not quite done with the game, myself, but I'd bet I'm ahead of you if you just picked the game up.)

It was 9 semesters so about 2.5 years, but it took me 3 total because I wasn't able to take one of the classes I needed over this past summer, so I got delayed a bit. Just so glad it's behind me now, although now shelling out hundreds of dollars for the licensing and certification applications is going to be the death of me

Yes, you're definitely ahead of me in Harvestella, but not by TOO much. I'm currently in the first part of chapter 6. I have to say, when I played the demo I was like meh this game won't be worth $60 but I'll get anyways. Roughly what, maybe halfway through now, and BOY was I wrong lol. It's worth every penny! I personally feel a lot of disappointment I've seen on the internet comes from expecting an SoS or RF clone with flashy SE graphics, but instead getting a SE action RPG with farm/sim elements. I love it for what it is. The writing is surprisingly good and even side quests have depth, which I wasn't expecting, and honestly, the farming/crafting piece is pretty fleshed out IMO. It feels a lot like the original SoS to me mechanics-wise with the crafting system and whatnot tbh.

Kikki wrote: ↑Dec 20, 2022 8:54 am For now, though, I have SO MUCH to do that I may as well just keep at the MSQ. Dax is already level 54...he's definitely gonna hit 60 before I'm even done the ARR content, let alone the Heavensward stuff that follows within the scope of the free trial.

Honestly, it you ever get a full account, I usually switch between 2 jobs while doing MSQ. There's just so much experience being doled out that you easily can keep 2 jobs at the appropriate level with very little effort/wasting the MSQ experience points once you're at level cap.

Kikki · Post Posted: Dec 20, 2022 1:30 pm

ryume wrote: ↑Dec 20, 2022 12:54 pm
Kikki wrote: ↑Dec 20, 2022 8:54 am For now, though, I have SO MUCH to do that I may as well just keep at the MSQ. Dax is already level 54...he's definitely gonna hit 60 before I'm even done the ARR content, let alone the Heavensward stuff that follows within the scope of the free trial.
Honestly, it you ever get a full account, I usually switch between 2 jobs while doing MSQ. There's just so much experience being doled out that you easily can keep 2 jobs at the appropriate level with very little effort/wasting the MSQ experience points once you're at level cap.

Yeah, I was thinking about that. Thanks

Though I learn so slowly that I wasn't sure I should risk jumbling my head with two fighting styles. But I'll probably do it, as I'd hate to waste the gobs of EXP that are gonna go into the void once Dax hits 60, and before I buy. (I WILL buy...unless I find I have to do too much multiplayer, as I can't imagine I won't be really stressed by it, given how much I tend to screw up under pressure even once I DO know what I'm doing.)

Also realized that Dexterity is like Agility in XC1. It's way more important than strength, at least for an ARC BRD. TEE-HEE! In fact, it basically IS strength, for that class/job. I had really good high-strength, high-defence gear on and was also prioritizing DEX, DHR and Skill Speed secondary (and I always think Critical Hit is good, for pretty much anybody.) Now I know to forget about strength and defence and just go all-in on DEX. Fortunately, stuff with high DEX tends to be high in skill speed and direct hit rate, too. Sadly, I've left my lad as a bit of a dumb bunny, but he clearly doesn't need all that much INT. It's okay...he's pretty enough to get by on his looks.

Boy can this little bard pop arrows off at a ferocious rate, now, thanks to all that extra skill speed! I thought it was fast before, but it's gotta be 50% faster with this full bard outfit on. (Which I have glamoured, as he looks froofy with it on...puffy fluttery coat, long belt, spangled everything, split pants with silver high heels, and a musketeer hat...even more hokey than a bycocket! I love the stats and the colour of the outfit, but the style is criiiiiiingy!)

Anyway, I'll probably grab a melee job once Dax hits 59 and start bringing its level up. Lancer, maybe. If not that, then Gladiator. (I'm not fond of tanking, but since I'll rarely be playing multiplayer anyway...) Just thinking out loud at this point, lol.

EDIT: Done the Garuda fight.

Spoiler:

EDIT 2: So I just met this Foulques character from becoming a Lancer, and he could be Dax's kid brother! (I say kid brother because Dax has a somewhat broader jaw that makes him look older, imo. Even though I don't know how old Foulques is. Nor, for that matter, how old Dax is.) I noticed before that a large number of elves have white hair (I gave Dax Sanjay's colouring, so...long white hair, purple eyes, brown skin) We even both appear to have black hair tints (mind you, now that I've been playing a while, the hair tint is one of a few small tweaks I want to make when I get my free Fantasia.) He's a jerk, but I don't hate him. So far. And the clothes I've gotten as a Lancer are already SO much less froofy than what I got as an archer or a bard, so that's nice.

Kikki · Post Posted: Dec 21, 2022 2:36 pm

I don't understand the Palace of the Dead. I saw it recommended as a good way to level up secondary jobs when you're soloing, so I tried it. Got from floor 1 to floor 9 and then three things attacked me at once. DId okay, killed the first two, still had most of my HP left...and the last little bugger killed me in one shot. Dead on floor 9, exited.

I didn't gain even one single point of EXP while in there, though. I mean, IN SIDE, I leveled up like crazy, like...15 levels or something. But..well, I don't get it. It appears I just completely wasted half an hour on something very un-fun. The PotD save slot still shows me as level 1, too, though I was level 15 or so when I was killed and kicked out. I'm very confused, lol. Supposedly it's a great way to level up but it was NO FUN and it did nothing, so I don't think I wanna go back. The music was also horrible. (I really dislike how they always want to stick carnival music in anything horror-lite. Carnival music is so tinny.)

As a Lancer, Dax is level 29. I guess that's okay to have gotten him to in 1 day. Wish I had more unfinished quests hanging about. Guess I'll have to wait for a few more leve quests to become available to get him to 30. Wanna get that last Lancer quest!

Though really I want to go back to the REAL Dax and continue the story. But the longer I wait to get these two jobs to a similar level, the longer it'll take.

ryume · Post Posted: Dec 21, 2022 2:54 pm

PotD is good in the sense that the experience you gain won't cut into any rested experience you've accumulated. However, it will only give you experience for every 10 floors you clear successfully (each floor with a multiple of 10 will have a boss). It CAN be solo, but it's pretty challenging. Generally people will go in and match randomly with 3 other players to plow through floors 1-50 (you would need to re-queue and randomly get matched every ten floors you cleared without leaving the "in between areas" of PotD, which are the spaces immediately after exiting the boss room).

Kikki · Post Posted: Dec 21, 2022 2:59 pm

ryume wrote: ↑Dec 21, 2022 2:54 pmPotD is good in the sense that the experience you gain won't cut into any rested experience you've accumulated. However, it will only give you experience for every 10 floors you clear successfully (each floor with a multiple of 10 will have a boss). It CAN be solo, but it's pretty challenging. Generally people will go in and match randomly with 3 other players to plow through floors 1-50 (you would need to re-queue and randomly get matched every ten floors you cleared without leaving the "in between areas" of PotD, which are the spaces immediately after exiting the boss room).

Everything's gotta be solo, for me. Multiplayer gives me massive anxiety even THINKING about it. THat stinks that something randomly gobbled 2/3 of my HP on floor 9.

Oh well, back to...uh, leve quests, I guess.

Thanks for the explanation. I did wonder if maybe I had to finish sets of floors to get any benefit, but I don't remember the explanation.

EDIT: Re-ran Haukke Manor and gained 2 levels, so got to do my Lvl 30 Lancer quest, finally! And I have to say...NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Spoiler:

Oh well. Now I can go get my 'job' quests started, I think. Will have to go lookin'.

ryume · Post Posted: Dec 21, 2022 5:16 pm

You really CAN solo it, though, all 150 floors. It's a big badge of honor, also a really challenging one that I will never do myself

Love that you're enjoying yourself. It's always nice to see newcomers enjoying the game!

Kikki · Post Posted: Dec 21, 2022 6:14 pm

ryume wrote: ↑Dec 21, 2022 5:16 pm You really CAN solo it, though, all 150 floors. It's a big badge of honor, also a really challenging one that I will never do myself

Love that you're enjoying yourself. It's always nice to see newcomers enjoying the game!

Yeah, I quite like it, and as long as I finish the free content without having to do multiplayer too often, and it looks like I'll be able to complete the story without much of it, I'll buy the rest of the game

Bluie says it's pretty doable to solo ARR and Heavensward and Stormblood...maybe by the time I get there the next section after that will be largely soloable, too.

I had to go do supper and stuff but somehow with the dragoon quests and redoing, um...darn me and names in this game, but a level 32 dungeon. Anyway, I squeezed out enough EXP to get up to 35, so I can do my next class/job quest, whee.

I just need to get up to level 44 on Dragoon, and then Dax can start sharing MSQ EXP between jobs.

I don't remember what I was...oh yeah. Egglia. It's pretty dull compared to this, though. Gonna be helping out on construction tomorrow afternoon...maybe should do something more dull tomorrow anyway

cinnamon_yuki · Post Posted: Dec 22, 2022 4:52 am

Apparently more than a year of waiting for the final chapters of Errant Kingdom (which they decided supposedly to release at the same time differing from their original bi-monthly format), the devs have announced that they will be releasing the revamped Errant Kingdom (after porting from Unity to Ren'py) they will return to staggered release with two chapters every two weeks schedule until February 2023 (if it goes well that is.) This was the first Kickstarter I supported so this leaves a sour taste in my mouth as a backer. If anyone plans to buy the Early Access version, I would recommend waiting until February 2023 and seeing if they will keep their promise this time around. I really don't mind the delay but starting a new project while the old one isn't finished was definitely a red flag and I shouldn't have supported the new one either. I'll make sure to be careful next time with the same developer. /rant

In other news, I have exhausted my fun with Arcadie Second Born, and with three day weekend fast approaching, I have to decide what games to play. I don't have the motivation to play anything, to be honest. I suppose I should start on my interactive fiction backlog because some of the old titles will have a sequel this coming 1st Quarter of 2023 so I need to save some playthroughs and perhaps finish Stray and continue on Dragon Age 2? Still playing DDV for some reason as well... XD

Kikki · Post Posted: Dec 22, 2022 5:51 am

Spoiler:

As of last night, my interesting body has decided to start spasming in new and fascinating ways. I need to go help with construction this afternoon but had to get up take one of the prescription relaxants I was given at midnight last night due to...very interesting muscle clenching. New. Or maybe it just finally got bad enough for me to make note of it...the trembling/quivering has been going on for weeks full-body, and it's just that it's such a tiny thing, going on all the time...I only notice it when I go to bed, when there's nothing else my attention is on. But last night the area of most notable quivering decided to clench right up.

As a result, I'm tired and noodly and I had some interesting things to do in FFXIV today, but I find I'm too tired, and had better sleep some more instead, to try to recover some...some anything, before heading to help hand sheeting up to the roof. (I don't do skilled labour in construction. I am mostly an assistant who runs around and fetches things and hands them up to people on the walls or roof, so that they don't have to continually get down to get their own stuff. I haven't felt the need for a cane in the last two or three days so I'm moving around pretty well atm, weird muscle contractions aside.)

Plus...I think the stuff I wanted to do is locked until I hit Heavensward anyway, which is a fair way off. I'm thinking that I could just progress the story to the end of the core ARR stuff with the Bard, then switch to letting the Dragoon take all the EXP from every quest that comes before Heavensward starts (all the ARR patch content), so that both of them hit the level 60 cap before I get into Heavensward content. Though right now I'd only have to get the Dragoon up to level 44 to have him start taking part in the MSQ EXP. If I do what I'm thinking, I'd have to get him all the way to 60 before he could start at that.

So probably I should just wait on the Dragoon to reach 44 before continuing with the main story.

Well, I'm slop, atm, so I'm going to sleep some more and hope all my muscles stop this quivering thing before it's time to head out. I'm too tired to play anything, lol. Well, the relaxant makes you very sleepy so it's probably just still having an effect.

Oh...it's December 22 already, so...update for anyone who pays attention to this stuff. The new Backlog thread is coming up in about a week. (I'll put it up on December 30 or 31.) I don't know for sure yet if Bluie or I am doing the GotY/year-in-review thread, this year, but Kirie has not yet stopped by to see my message, so as things stand, one of us will be putting that thread up around the same time (if it's me, I'll do it on December 30 or 31, just like the new Backlog thread.)

Bluie · Post Posted: Dec 23, 2022 2:56 am

Gonna be real, I probably won't be able to do that thread. I am insanely scheduled until the year transitions 2023. The unusual Canadian-like cold has caused everyone to go BONKERS again in Texas. I cannot keep « Cow Poopoo » on the shelf at work and people are being a nightmare. If there's any complications, I will make time to make it, but if you have it all under control Kiki and Kirie is MIA again, please go for it.

Basically no gaming since my last post. The only thing that's relaxing me is writing a fic which has gained a little traction since I published three chapters (yay, validation~). I did participate in a costume contest in FFXIV and won 3rd place, so that was nice (250k richer) but each time I've booted Genshin it's to get my Welkin. I am sad Wanderer is going away in a few days and wont be back for literal months. After building team comps around him and leveling his character, I really would like to have some of his constellations - mainly because more power, but also because he's quickly become a big, BIG favorite for me. I envy the people who save their primos for TWO YEARS after his initial reveal in 1.1 and have full constellations - patient bastards lmao. I have no impulse control and pull for any character that makes my brain go 'ooo, shiny!' - which isn't actually a lot of the cast in Genshin, but it's enough looool.

Kikki · Post Posted: Dec 23, 2022 5:55 am

Bluie wrote: ↑Dec 23, 2022 2:56 am Gonna be real, I probably won't be able to do that thread. I am insanely scheduled until the year transitions 2023. The unusual Canadian-like cold has caused everyone to go BONKERS again in Texas. I cannot keep « Cow Poopoo » on the shelf at work and people are being a nightmare. If there's any complications, I will make time to make it, but if you have it all under control Kiki and Kirie is MIA again, please go for it.

That's fine!

I know you thought maybe you should take it up since my health is garbage now, but it rarely keeps me from using my laptop even on the worst days, and even on my busy days I tend to have plenty of free time. This isn't like when I was looking after my grandma and I was busy non-stop from 8AM to 6PM, and a mess of frazzle in the evening that I could only jitter, huddled away in a room upstairs...or the month after that where we were all watching over dad. I really don't enjoy this nerve pain, but I have to say...I definitely prefer physical stress to mental or emotional stress. (Both of which I feel are largely derived from human interaction, aka: work. And possibly family.) The greenhouse has been sold, so that part of the pressure/stress is largely gone now, so I'm mostly stress-free and have more free time than...probably anybody else here, I'd guess? Like today, I think the only thing I HAVE to do is clear the driveway of snow, since we had a snowstorm overnight that is still ongoing. (Of course, I SHOULD clean the house, as well...it got massively disarrayed with my sister bringing the office back from the greenhouse to install into OUR house. But I don't actually have to.)

I don't want you to push yourself to any more chores

If you've got a bit of free time, then play games or...do some colouring or something.

~

I wasn't up to it yesterday, but I think I will play some FFXIV today. I'm really hoping I can get Dax's Dragoon self up to level 44. I think I can. I managed to get him from level 1-30 within one day of starting that class, and he's level 36 now (thanks to running another dungeon, a few leve quests and 2 class/job quests, those 6 additional levels happened in about two hours.) I really want to continue the MSQ but I'm waiting so I'll be able to start doling the EXP from them out to the dragoon role.

Ahhh, I just heard the snowplough to by! There will be a HUGE drift of snow at the end of the lane, now, so...I'd better go see about getting some long underwear on and turning that snowblower on to clear things. I'll have to do it again later most likely, but I don't want to try clearning a foot of snow in one go...we've already got 6-8 inches, and that's enough to get started on.

EDIT: Aaaaand...we're outta power.

Spoiler:

A HUGE outtage. Typical of snow storms, here. A nice cozy snow-in can't be enjoyed because you can't DO anything. Won't be able to use the internet after a bit, laptop itself will run out of power in a few hours, can't use my consoles, so no gaming, etc.

EDIT 2: Thankfully my charge runs a while on low battery usage. The power outage is estimated to last about 5 hours in all, but they usually underestimate, unfortunately. If they're on track with their estimate for my area, I'll have power back in about three hours, but with widespread outages... (Most are due to high winds. We actually have essentially NO wind here, today. Most likely cause in our area is something like trees falling on power lines due to extremely heavy, sticky snow load breaking them. If that's the case, that does tend to get repaired a little faster...unless too many have broken.)

I wanna go level up Dax, lol. Though I always feel like we deserve it whenever we lose our power. We shouldn't be using so much of it all the time anyway; while climate change is a natural thing, we stupid, greedy, and/or short-sighted humans are drastically speeding it up and intensifying it. So I always feel like...well, serves us right...when the power goes out and we can't do our regular fun stuff. lol? (I already eat very little meat because I simply don't like it much and find it heavy on the digestion, but I sometimes consider going vegetarian officially...or even vegan...solely on environmental concerns. I'm not an animal lover, but I am a planet lover. Thing is, I could easily go veggie, but my sister wouldn't willingly go with me, and probably not the rest of my family, either.)

EDIT 3: THey budged the estimate out in a big way...added an extra 7 hours to it. They think they'll have power back for us at 9PM (so about 12 hours of outage.) *shrug* I want it back, I wanna play since I can't do anything else, but...if wishes were fishes or some weird saying like that. 3PM...power's back on. 6 hours off...not too bad. House temp only dropped about 2C (we keep it at 20C/68F...so it dropped to 18C/64F). That temperature makes your fingers and ears and toes and the tip of your nose feel cold but otherwise is fine. Not everybody in town has it back yet, though. Hopefully all will by dark when the temp outdoors goes down further.

Final Edit (for today): Took a while, and sister got grumpy and gripey around dinner time due to network issues (understandably frustrating, but 0% my fault AND not anything I can do anything about, either) but I did squeeze 4 more levels out of Dax this evening. It took for-ev-er. Got 2 via levequests, 1 via general fighting, and 1 via Fates at his current level. They're better EXP than I thought, though some of them are IMPOSSIBLE. One had this huge...bear ogre thing the size of a three-story building, and it one-shot killed me with every swipe of its club. The person who came by who seemed to be a higher level and a different class...they got kapowed by it too. Killing the grunts was easy enough but that big one, three times bigger than all the others...shrug. Well, didn't finish that one! (Nor did anyone else, afaik.) But at least I got to level 40 and got one more class/job quest done. It was boring, though...I think the most boring class quest I've done so far, including both classes/jobs I've tackled thus far. At least I've got one more skill, though. Also, I only realized just before I quit that I didn't have my Dragoon Soul thing quipped, lol, so I was fighting as a Lancer all that time. I wondered why my bar was different and my clothes had changed. I'm not sure when that even happened...I don't recall ever changing back to a lancer since Dax became a Dragoon. Musta been an accidental flub-up in button pressing, somehow.

Just four more levels. Four more levels and I can get back to the MSQ! It wasn't super interesting yet, but it at least had a bit more of a central theme to it last time I was playing it, iirc, which gets me more intersted. (A lot of the time the MSQ has felt like a random collection of quests that barely connect, and only once in a while does it seem to be pulling together into something bigger.)

Mikodesu · Post Posted: Dec 23, 2022 10:02 pm

Hope everybody is staying warm... It's like most of North America has frozen over. Yeesh.

Haven't played Harvestella all week and I get my first wipe of the playthrough. Did not feel fair, either. And it's leading me to level grind before I go back to the story. Which is OKAY, I guess, I knew I was going to have to before the next boss, but I didn't need an unfair death to let me know that...

Probably my biggest complaint with the game is how death is handled. Coughing up hard earned money (you can't corpse run back to) isn't something I like to begin with, but to force you to keep that save... I hate it. For sure on PC, I'm not sure about Switch, you can't quit out fast enough before the game auto saves...and you're just « Snuggly Bunny ». Maybe with a macro you could, but I don't think the game is hard enough to waste my time with one...

To make matters worse (late game spoilers)

Spoiler:

At least I'm not afraid of losing my no death run now, since it got ruined. GR.

Very much enjoying the current event in Genshin, but for whatever reason I don't feel like I have enough time to play right now and there's just too much to do, and I end up feeling rushed. Maybe a couple of holiday days will even things out... a little.

Daikon boy · Post Posted: Dec 23, 2022 11:44 pm

I ended up finishing trails from Zero a little later than expected having paused it to play Pokemon. And also because it took me nearly a hundred hours to finish the game, (but just far enough away from that that I couldn't get the 100 hour trophy and it wouldn't make sense to try.)

So I just need to save up some money for cold steel three and four and wait until March when Azure comes out to play that first. I would buy them now, or Utawarerumono since I don't know when any of them will go on sale next, or if it will be at the right time, but I only have 10$ on my playstation and I can't put any more or spend anymore. I would have bought physical copies but I missed my chance on that. I also want to buy Valkyrie profile, and ys memories of celceta, but I need to save my money for the other games and I don't have enough for the first.

I also have 10$ on Nintendo and I'm saving that and some points, and whatever money I can scrounge up in January for persona 4 golden when it releases. I really, really want to buy a physical copy of fire emblem in January. The only games I've missed since I started playing FE with awakening are the warrior spin offs, but I'm probably going to have to wait since I don't have the money. I'll still play it so I'm not actually missing it, but I want to play it when it comes out, not a couple months from then.

I've almost finished twenty five games.this year though. I think I'm one or two games away from hitting that number. Something like double or triple the games I finished last year?

I very badly want to play ff xiv, but I've never been able to really play online/mmo type games, no matter how much I want to. At the most I can play a few hours and nothing more. I don't know why it doesn't work for me even when I want to play the game. I would enjoy it if I could play it. I tried red dead online too and I could only do one mission. Even though I wanted to play more.

Kikki · Post Posted: Dec 24, 2022 7:36 am

FINALLY!

Ugh, I finally got Dragoon Dax up to 44. Level 36-44 were horribly slow, probably because I had no dungeons I qualified for. Fortunately at level 41 I qualified to re-run another dungeon, which if you're at about that dungeon's level, seems to get you 2 each run.

I hate Fates. They're fine when you're over-levelled for them, but if you're the right level...they often overlap your story and quest points and you end up having all the Fate enemies attacking you at the same time. It's stressy! Sometimes you find an easy fate in your level and it ends up giving you good EXP, but honestly...I wish they weren't part of the game. They're awful and they just add chaos and stress for me. Or I at least wish participation in Fates was completely optional...no Fate-specific enemies would attack you unless you chose to join.

Well, my dragoon fella is the right level to carry on with the MSQ, now! My original class/job is at 55 so I'll let the Dragoon take the EXP for a while. If I'd known what this'd be like, I'd recommend new players to start two classes off from the beginning, so you can keep them a similar level to soak up and spread out all the MSQ and side quest EXP right from the start.

Whew, this came close to making me want to just quit the game. Thank goodness I can get back to the main story, now. I'm off to the Waking Sands, then...in between cleaning. (I like that I can just walk away from the game as long as I'm in a sanctuary.)

EDIT: For anyone considering the (huge) free trial of FFXIV: You're capped at level 60, and you also have a 300,000 Gil (money) cap. I'm gonna go buy some nice stuff to make more room for money-making. If were starting again, I think I would from the very beginning choose THREE classes for my character...probably one in each major category, so that I could level them all up as I went along. But I would definitely start with two classes at least, if I didn't go for three. Just my view as a total newbie with this game and what I'd do differently if I knew then what I know now.

Mikodesu · Post Posted: Dec 24, 2022 8:44 pm

Why are there so many baby internet trolls out there...? Logging off of Genshin today I noticed an unfamiliar pop up and found out I got a "friend request" from an AR 17 "I probably made this account yesterday" with the username Hutao and the signature "I'd never become a toxic Hutao main"

I have had Hutao as my little...character card icon thing for probably more than a year now despite not having dragged her out for anything but Abyss in many months.... because as a grown up I don't care, and cannot be bothered to pick a new one. I've SEEN this sort of « Cow Poopoo » around (streams, mostly, a bit on social media) but never been randomly targeted? SUPER weird way to spend your free time, my dude.

In good Genshin news I really love the animation for the youkai event. Feels like somebody put a lot of love into it. It's the kind of thing that makes me sad that these things just up and vanish, never to be heard from again. There's always Youtube, but it's not the same.

Hope everybody is warm. We had a problem with our HVAC this morning (heat is a luxury here, since it basically never gets cold here. Last snowed 30 years ago, iirc) and had to crawl around in the attic while on the phone with a family friend that's an expert. So I didn't get a longer day with my grandma despite getting up at the crack of dawn, but it was a good day, nonetheless. She's having a rough time of it... to keep things brief, her long time boyfriend isn't doing well (physically). Things are kind of...coming to a head.

So it was a very good day to go down there, in spite of everything. The cats had to shiver a little today, but they'll live. It stayed fairly warm in the house with all the doors and windows shut all day.