This PIRATES Thang...

I've got 34 seconds until I have one more energy point and am able to execute one more plunder mission. Then I'll have to wait for a long time to build my energy back up.

One second...

WOO-HOO! I made $76,469 worth of gold on that last plunder!!! :D

Now I have to bury it before someone attacks me. Be right back...

Cool.

I now have $510,486 of gold buried, and it'll be quite a while before I have enough energy to do anything. So I can explain about my addiction to this friggin' game, lol.

So Pirates: Rule the Caribbean!... It owns me.

I joined Facebook last Sunday night/Monday morning -- I finally bowed to peer pressure and decided to join, like, the 4th largest "nation" in the world. (That statistic is based on what my friend Lothar told me, not any actualy first-hand research.)

It's such a blur now, I don't even remember how I first discovered the pirate game. I think my friend was touting his beloved Mafia Wars game and maybe I had noticed that the same company that produced Mafia Wars had a pirate-based game, or something...

Anyway, before I know it, I'm signed up for Pirates and playing, and COMPLETELY ADDICTED!

My character is Peg-Eye McCootch (the game asks you to try to be more or less tasteful when creating your name, which naturally causes me to think of every creative inuendo I can imagine, lol) and I have a pet dolphin named Lungrin. (It's an '80s joke... you get it?)

As of this writing, I'm a Level 15 Swashbuckler (I jotted down some notes at the beginning of my shift because I knew I wanted to blog about the game, and at the time I made the notes I was a Level 13 Swashbuckler. THAT is how addictive this friggin' game is!) with an Attack Skill of 11, a defense Skill of 15, Maximum energy of 50, Maximum Health of 117, and Maximum Strength of 11. Every hour I make $33,480 off my 2 Treasure Stashes, 2 Ropemakers, 2 Docks and single Tree House, but I have an up-keep of -$12,805 because of my 2 Spanish Galleons, 3 Ducth Fleuts, 3 Merchant Carriers, 2 Sloops, Schooner and Row Boat. So all in all, I bring in $20,675 every hour... assuming another player doesn't attack me and win the battle. So whenever I think about it, I have this overwhelming desire -- wherever I am, whatever I'm doing -- to log into Facebook and bury whatever treasure I might have made in the past however-many hours.

It's an unreasonable fear, largely, because I often log in to find I've ammased hundreds of thousands of dollars of gold, which I promptly bury before doing anything else. I also often find notes informing me that I've battled and won or battled and lost to some other pirate (a real player, not a fictitious character created by the game) who got however-much as reward loot.

And the most insane part of this? It's a text-based game!!! Like in the early 1980s! I mean, there are images all over the page, but all the action takes place in the form of words! This is a step or two removed from playin D&D back when I was 12, sitting around a table with pencils and twelve-sided dice! (Except, you know, this lacks the human interraction, lol.) My addiction to SecondLife made more sense to me because it was a 3-D world. I'm addicted to words on a screen now! I've removed the human contact AND the cool graphics, lol!

I guess if you're reading this you probably know what I'm talking about, because you're probably addicted to Mafia Wars. (It seems everyone but me is.) So this might not seem so strange to you. But I'm a little freaked out, lol. I mean, these past few days, what gets me out of bed is the realization that I should bury my treasure before I get attacked.

I haven't dreamed the game yet, though. Maybe that's a possitive sign.

Although, pirate dreams wouldn't suck! It might be fun to be romp around the deck of a ship all night! :)

Speaking of which...

I've built up enough energy to plunder again. Wait here...

$80,286!!! Woo-hoo! :D

Dude, and I had to conquer 2 1/2 stages (13 levels) before I could score THIS MUCH from a mission. It used to be, like, $200. Which was aggrivating when I knew I was going to have to spend $400,000 to buy a ship. (And that's even before I discovered I'd have to buy MULTIPLE ships to complete some of the missions!)

Blah.

So, I'm a dork.

I need to go bury my treasure. And I m ight want to leave. I'm writing this from work and my shift was over 20 minutes ago, lol.

PEACE!!! :D