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I see more and more are following my blog, the numbers in the statistics are rising. I like that.  Easiest way? Leave your e-mail address on the right hand side, and press submit. 

You will receive a mail the moment a new blogpost is published. Also, want to leave comment, hit the "no comments"or "# comments" below each post. A pop up window will open for you to leave a comment, I love getting them. This is also the way to see the comments of others. Make sure you tick the box for a follow up e-mails, you will be informed if there are more comments, possibly reacting to yours. 

So join my subscribers!  Follow the blog on the Oaks! 

Meet the kin...... old and new! - Kinship meeting 19-07-2014

Well, that was just a brilliant evening! Tonight was the evening for the kinship meeting of the Oaks. The last 6 weeks we have had a great influx of members, a lot moving from VUS to the Oaks, but also some individuals who joined. All in all some 10 members joined since the beginning of June.

A kinship meeting like we had tonight was a perfect time to enjoy some joint activities. To get to know each other, and in general have fun! There were four planned activities and 1 impromptu one. All of it enhanced by the newly set up Teamspeak environment, where you can even make your own Teamspeak subchannel, as was done in event 4 below. Great set up I have to say.  

1. Hide and Seek, homestead Thorin's Gate - kinship house
Try to find all the officers who had hide in and amongst the main house and rocks in the homestead. Me personally, I was awful at it. Balv was first, Jamie was second, but got disqualified for not having a "lamp" with him, so Louise was second, with Beth third. 

2. Cosmetic contest. - who looked best in their special attire
Feabretmoth won, ME, ME, ME. Peach was second, Lindy third. Yay for me! 

3. Spars in Bree - spawning point.
Several people joined in, I witnessed some interesting fights.

Spar: Soei-Chorin
Spar: Fatali-Soei
Spar: Dranwig-Yevad & Beth-Fatali
Spar: Jamie-Yevad
Spar: Spencer-Egalis

The all culminating in the final fight between Soei and Jamie: Mega Chicken versus Mega Hunter. Soei won, well done Soei!
Mega Chicken versus Mega Hunter (where yellow meets purple)

After the spars we all gathered for a snapshot. have a laugh it takes aaaaaaaaaaaaaaages:
Snapshot 1

4. Beacon run in Gondor
Object was to run from the beacon at Mon Lontir, from there to Nendath, to Maegond, to the Fallen Beacon. Four teams of two people made the dash for the beacons. Balv and Peach won that one. 

And another snapshot was taken: 
Snapshot 2

5. Impromptu kinship walk through Bree. 
As Soei generously provided lots of shrews as prizes, and Ook the giant kinship shrew, democratically elected I may add, faithfully hippetyhopped along in the kinship walk, this shrew filled event was concluded at the Prancing Pony fireplace. 


By the way, did you know that Ook is called Ook, because as a dutch word is sounds exactly as Oak in english. And it means "also". As Ook is also an Oak. 

So.....

Take a look here for the photograps: photographs for the kin event 19-07-2014
Take a look at the video for the victory walk through Bree: Kinship walk through Bree - Holy heck, a whole load of shrews!

As you can see from the photographs and the video, we had a great evening. A special thanks goes out to the officers of our Kinship, Phaedrus, Lindolwing, Fatali and Soei. It was a great evening, I personally had a blast! 

Bye bye for now or as Louise would say it "toodlepip"!

Feabretmoth now a member of..... the Purplehearts brotherhood.

Today, the long awaited kinshipmeeting featured an election for the best, most inventive, fancyful  attire for an Oak member. Feabretmoth won with 5 votes! The prize was a spotted shrew. 

Know then that my regal lady has also been allowed to become a member of the Purplehearts brotherhood as of July 20, 2014. The official text: 

Bringing Purple hope to sad souls so they too can bask in the presence of The Purple Light...

With fellow defenders of the Purple faith, Balvirine & Namarci renowned for their sheer raw unbridled power, Izanaki the jester to lift our spirits in times most dire and Bellaneth of elegance and grace so rarely seen they stand firm against the onslaught of the colourless.

19 Jan 2014 - 23:01
From the darkness of Angmar he arose wandering the burnt plains of this forsaken land looking for vision and purpose. It was at this time that the Purple Goddess came and bestowed upon him the gift of the colour Purple. We welcome Taldric The Shy, 6th in the Purple line to the Purplehearts brotherhood!

20 July 2014 - 00:17
A Touch of Royalty has graced the Purplehearts today, Feabretmoth, the royal's star jewel keeps an eye on the upper class  impermeating purple glory unto those that before now could not be reached. We humbly welcome the impeccably dressed 7th member to the Purplehearts brotherhood!

For the glory of The Purple Light... we fight.

Who am I?

My official game name is Aragis Hypogaeariel, but lets face it that is a tongue tripper, so all call me Moth.

Why? Well simple all my alts in Laurelin, LOTRO, end in -moth.

My name in everyday life is Willow, I was born in 1964 (you do the math, I know you can do it!) and fill my days with work, friends, family, radioplays and LOTRO.....and much much more. My work demands quite a bit from me, and my social life is busy too. With all that there is nothing I like best than listening to an Old Style RadioPlay and play some LOTRO. I guess to each his/her own! 

I started to play this game somewhere in 2010, on the USA server Brandywine. Soon, well after about a year I realised that is would have been wiser if I had started on the Euroserver, seeing I live in The Netherlands. So I took a deep breath closed the window on Brandywine and some 9 chars, some good friends and started a new character on Laurelin.

1. Iammemoth
My first alt is Iammemoth, a level capped minstrel as I felt most confident with that, I trained him to be a healing traited Minstrel, equipped for solo fighting, he has joined the Scholar's guild and has reached Tier 9 proficiency. Crafts: weaponsmith, scholar, farmer.

2. Floramoth 
My second alt is Floramoth, a cute yellow clad fiesty hobbit lady, a level capped warden. A challenge as a class, who has joined the cooking guild and has reached Tier 9 proficiency. Crafts: farmer, jeweller, cook

3. Feabretmoth
My third alt is Feabretmoth, a skinny gangly elf, who is somewhat of a bookworm, a level capped runekeeper. She has joined the Cook's guild and has reached Tier 9 proficiency. Crafts: cook, jeweller, farmer. All in all a quite worthless combination for gathering  things in the wild, but hey...you have to have a cook, right? 

I do have 4 other alts, Geishamoth (level capped), Kamashimoth, Moraeamoth, Shadowmoth

As you see all my alts end in Moth, makes it easy to spot me. I am part of a real small kinship (we call it friendship) with one of my alts, shadowmoth. But this is just a storing kinship, started, maintained by three friends who started this game almost at the same time. My real kinship is the Oaks. All my "working" alts are a member of it, and gladly so.

I am a VIP player, and do not mind spending money on the game. I view it like this, it is one of my hobbies, and most hobbies come with a price. As ever all within reason. Those who know me know I keep a tight reign on most things in my life including expenditure -grins-  

If you wish to find me, jkust look for a -moth in the game.

New Oaks..... everywhere

It's an epidemic....but the kind I like!

If you have not noticed yet, The Oak kinship has welcomed some new members. I say some, but with all the alts the new players bring along in their wake, the oak kinship is buzzing with activity. 

I love it, I have to admit. All these different people, all friendly, LOTRO enthusiasts, the new alts count 44 in total....with Suzy bringing in 10, count them THEM, ten, and Matt bringing in about as many.

Lani (also known as Beth)
Calemon (also known as Matt)
Suzy
Jamie
Hucro
Shy
Balv (also known as Lewis)
Baeto
Elizebetha (also known as Louise)
Brim
Ignotus
Seanog (also known as John)

And suddenly the chatrooms in teamspeak are teeming with people looking for some LOTRO fun, a LOTRO challenge, or heaven forbid, LOTRO deeding. Again, I like it, I love it. All kinds of different people, different countries and cultures, men, women, and I would bet you several incognito dwarfs posing to be either Dutch, English or Swedish. And with Soei’s recent purchase of a some costly kinship pets, I could swear I have seen a rather large furry rat and an ugly set of twigs running around.

Observing the colorful mix of people, some quiet, some very present, proverbial noobs and those much more knowledgeable, some driven to excel in LOTRO and be better or even the best, others pleased to just stumble through the game, like yours truly, I notice how chat sometimes poses a challenge.

I myself meet people quite different to me, and it challenges me to comform or simply accept. So this makes me wonder what would be a wise guideline to stick to while in chat with so many different people, dwarfs, shrews and stickcreatures?

I propose this one, which may sound all to familiar to you::

Treat people as you would wish to to be treated yourself.  The key words being respect and understanding.

In talking to all those people, I notice that we sometimes tend to forget the chatsites, and the game we play, both have an OFF switch. So if you feel irritation bubbling inside you or the game stops being fun for a moment, go do the dishes (yuck), take a nap, make a cuppa java or tea, or just do you finances (double yuck).  

I would love to see what you think about this.

Meet... Kamashimoth, errr I mean Boggeral

Friday July 4

An impromptu day off, and I find myself trying to get to grips with making a video of my lotro exploits. And what better subject than to take a budding alt, a lore master, which is total abracadabra to me still, and put her in the spotlight? Or better said put her pet in the spotlinght. I have always enjoyed seeing Loremasters fight, and finally I am getting around to running one myself.

The video below features Boggerall, my Bog guardian. Not much to say about him, except that he is a versitile combar critter.

Update 14 ....spotted!

Thursday July 3

Well, the cat is out of the bag. Hucro spilled the beans: 

Uodate 14 will go live Juy 14th. There will be new areas to explore, and level cap will go to 100. We will be moving into the triple digits, which is somewhat exciting. From heresay, there will be some PR on all this in the upcoming weekend. To be honest I will not be holding my breath but be patient like so many of us! 

click here

What I do notice is that more and more people are coming out of the woodworks chomping at the bits to have a go at the new content. Me personally I am the snail like player. I enjoy watching people head in racing to make the  new magic level cap first. I let these forward scouts deal with all the bugs, aggrivations, puzzles and impossibillities etc. Then when the coast is clear I blunder in and level enjoying the game thorouhly.

Meet the Oaks.....at your own risk!

Tuesday July 1
The alliance channel in Teamspeak is busy when I sign on. The collection of names makes me smile; lots of people I call friends are there, to be honest I count them all as friends. It promises to be an enjoyable evening. I see John has signed on as well. Finally after some weeks he has surfaced and I whoop whoop when he says he will join the Oaks as well. Very good, John is always good company.

The Oaks close their door....temporarily
And as it proves John joins just in time, because, but for a still straggling member of VUS who may want to join, the gate to the oak tree house is firmly locked by Phaedrus that same evening. A smart decision, as the Oaks have been blessed with a large number of new kinship members. Many I know, and have enjoyed pleasant Lotro, or non Lotro times, with. The ones I don't know, I am warming up too quickly. In short it all gives me a very good feeling.

Grinding for the bird
Of late I have been grinding for Rivendell reputation. I want to see my budding lore master Kamishimoth run around with a small bird (I believe a sterling). The bird you can trade for with Rivendell trader, but only when you are kindred with the elves. Louise told me she was still in Goblin city rearing to go and harvest the elves rep with me, as we had been doing the evening before. I then dragged Matt and Suzy into goblin town, because let's face it 4 people tend to get 4 times the rep items. Also having Matt in the team, who needs an on online map....sort of? In the end we also looked for buttons, Bilbo's to be exact. I may actually have enough rep items by now, so look out birdie, here I come.

The epic Twook/Ook controversy
The epic poll for the Oaks mascot still running for Ook (yay yay yay) or Twook (booooooh) things heated up on Teamspeak. 

Twook, reputedly of the male gender,  has been called to be seen as cute, scary, creepy, funny..... running around with open arms looking for his daddy (read:Soei), or some affection from others, even mobs! A debate ensued if Twook actually looks better with leaves. The little ent has also been reported to fall asleep on the job. In the middle of a battle you will find him zzzzzz-ing peracefully will blood globules fly fiercely around. 

Ook has been described to have big yellow teeth, gorgeous eyes, strange twitchy ears, and a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge nose. Her species.... how about Twookifant? In contrast to Twook you cannot miss her running around, she is bigger than most hobbits! Also Ook is the more calssy of the two, Soei paid over 2500 Gold to contract her, Twook was much cheaper, only some 300 Gold. me I will always go for OOK......big, visible, alluring eyes and a hippity hop gait which no one can overlook in any raid! If only we could dress her in purple tutu!

okK, click for a bigger view

With Louise and Matt known to have been casting their vote for Twook, we may be headding for a vicious witchhunt in the Oaks, the two actually running the risk to be outcast The hunt is still on for the remaining Twook voters.  

Soei's ringtone
It has been reported that Soei has requested Louise to record a ringtone for him. In her own beautiful voice saying  "bastards, bugger, and boobs". I can just imagine the surprised looks at a party or in public transport when Soei gets a call!