Oh God....

I installed World of Warcraft on my computer. I fired up James' guest account. I created two characters. I played with James and later with Ted. I'm pretty sure life as I used to know it is over. I'm seriously considering buying the full game. I'm seriously considering spending $15 of my money per month to engage in this timesuck of an activity.

The folks at WoW are pretty smart. I know nothing about other MMORPGs, but there is a very big social component to the game. You can group and play with friends. You can chat in game with just your group, or with just your friends. Lately James has been playing with two of MY friends. He talks to my friend Jackie WAY more than I do, and I was beginning to feel left out. To them, the solution was obvious: I needed my own account.

Uh, no. I hate video games, especially 3D ones, because I always run into walls. The utter pointlessness of games is never lost on me, even 12 hours into playing SimCity when I'm fretting over the gravity of my traffic control problems and cursing my Sims for not taking the damn bus. It's just not my cup of tea.

Except that it is. After a few hours of running into cacti, I began to get the hang of it. I begin to like it. I begin to run AROUND things instead of into them. I make plans to upgrade some of my computer components (thanks Ted!). It's all over. I'm hooked.