It's Nights of the Dead season in Everquest 2 and I've been spending some time in Norrath, working on special holiday quests. I've already mentioned that I'm absolutely addicted to picking up shinies. But once I complete a collection, I'm then stuck with a bunch of items I don't need. My second favorite thing to do is sell stuff on the marketplace. I don't know, I just get a dopamine rush when I see that something's sold. I'm not even really into it for the platinum! Everquest can be free to play and I thought I would go that route since I'm the most casual of players - and then I found out you can't sell stuff on the Marketplace unless you have a paid subscription. Damn you Daybreak Games! (I renewed my paid subscription)

I am an MR Technologist now but I came to that through being an x-ray tech (and realizing there was a lot x-ray techs did that I just wasn't interested in). I've kept up my x-ray certification all these years. It was a darn hard test to pass, I couldn't do it again and I always thought there might be some cool job out there that didn't involve actually taking x-rays but required the certification. Well, it's been 14 years since I last took an x-ray, that mystery job has never materialized and I think I'm going to let that certification expire since it isn't doing me any good and could, potentially, bite me in the butt. As far as an employer is concerned, they could see that I have that cert and then try to make me into a multi-modality tech. It doesn't matter that I don't know what I'm doing - possessing the certification implies you can do the job but I would need to be trained like a new tech all over again and I was never very skilled in OR (although way too skilled in fluoro due to how my clinical site handled their students). Having hung on to something for so long though, it's kind of scary to let it go because once it's gone, it's gone! But like I said, at this point it's more a liability.

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Some tiara news outside of the dedicated tiara posts: on October 22 there will be an auction of the Dowager Countess of Airlie's jewels and there is a tiara in the mix! If you have an extra £50,000 - £70,000 burning a hole in your pocket, this lovely piece could be yours! There are some other cool pieces in the auction - a malachite cameo brooch, a scarab bracelet, a bunch of cool rings - all way out of my price range but neat to look at.

Listening

Some podcasts I've listened to this week:

I had no idea who the singer Raye was until I watched an episode of Graham Norton where she sang this song. I just loved the song and her interview was adorable.

Reading

I have made no more headway into Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution by Caroline Weber because I've been busy reading the Sun Wolf and Starhawk novels by Barbara Hambly. Last week I had finished the first book in the series and this week I finished the other two, The Witches of Wenshar and The Dark Hand of Magic. I'm ready to start another book (or finally finish Marie Antoinette) but I'm not sure what will be next. We'll see!

Watching

I am almost finished with season 4 of Babylon 5. I watched B5 when it originally came out but I never saw any of the movies (except the pilot, In the Beginning) or the spin-off series, Crusade. I still have a lot more B5 in my future!

I only have one more episode of Big Cats 24/7 to watch. I was worried that things weren't going well for the cheetah mom and her cubs and I was right. This is a great show but nature is not always kind so as much as I love and recommend this show, if that's something you can't handle, don't watch it. Meanwhile, the 2 males from the Xudum pride, Big Toe and Madumo, are still in the southern end of their territory with their new family, the lionesses are fending for themselves and some of Madumo and Big Toe's daughters have set out on their own and at least one of them has taken up with one of the many male intruder lions and had cubs!

OK, that's it for this week!

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