Odd collection of successes, Shave Your Nugget

So yesterday I had several small successes in different areas.  I finally got one of my two fires at work put out, recovering from a two drive failure in one of our Network Area Storage devices.  When it first happened I thought I was dead in the water but thanks to some determination, a hardware disk duplicator and good support from Netgear, we got the unit back up and running.  I have to say the Seagate 3TB drives that we populated the unit with seem to be pieces of shit.  I have had at least 6 of them fail within the warranty period.

At home I  finally found a spot to utilize my mom’s old house phone.  It had been just sitting by the front door plugged into the wall.  Much like her old cell phone I don’t feel like throwing it away.  I had a phone in pretty much every room of the house except the hobby room so that is where I set it up.  I’ll try to make sure I use it now and then.

When I first got the Xfinity X1 hardware in my house you may recall that the guy that took a 15 minute dump in my house did not set up the remote correctly so it could also control the tv.  I had wanted to set it up but thought it would be sort of pointless since it wouldn’t be able to adjust the tv volume which is piped through my Yamaha surround sound system.  Well it turns out I was wrong..

The second generation X1 remote control does indeed allow you to control your TV AND your auxiliary sound system.  With about 5 minutes of work I had it all working correctly.  This means I should only need to use the more complicated Logitech Harmony remote when I am using the TV to display non-X1 content which isn’t that often.

My final success of the day was virtual in nature.  I finally 100% completed the Curse of Naxxaramas, the first expansion pack for Hearthstone, which is a turn based card game based on WoW. 

Inside the game there are around 11 bosses you have to defeat.  There are two levels of difficulty, normal and heroic.  For the last 5 or 6 days I have been stuck trying to beat one last boss on heroic level.  The bosses all have unique mechanics to them, most of them I have been able to take down after a few tries after looking up recommended decks and strategies online.  Well this one boss, Sapphiron, has been unbeatable for me, despite multiple trips to the internet looking for help.

I was so frustrated, after 60-70 losses in a row over those 5-6 days I was teetering on the edge of giving up.  Yesterday I did one more tweak to my mage deck and FINALLY, FINALLY beat the boss.  I expressed my relief at finally succeeding out loud.  Cindy congratulated me. She didn’t know just how many times I failed before.  Of course a 46 year old man crowing about a video game accomplishment may seem stupid. I prefer to focus on the mindset required to continue to try after failing time and time and time again, no matter what the task is at hand.

The rest of this week is going to involve getting things aligned for our road trip.  Cindy has been extensively researching affordable lodging options along the route which is very helpful.

If you are interested in taking place in my “Shave Your Nugget” challenge, a spin off of the thoroughly lemming-ized “Ice Bucket Challenge”, take a look below.  My challenge has more lasting impact than a brief chill and some wet clothes.