The thing about alcohol and drug addiction is that it's about escaping from yourself. Maybe you want to be a version of yourself that doesn't think so hard or worry so much. Or maybe you want to be a version of yourself that thinks they're really REALLY funny.
Or, you know, just oblivion.

Fact of the matter is my Real Life™ hasn't been very pleasant for a little while. Basically my worklife has been very busy and very stressful. Which made it seem really weird that I would want to play Warcraft in the limited spare time that I had.

Because there's a real work-like quality to WoW. Go here. Do this. Do that 40 times and come all the way back so that you can head off to do it again to a slightly differently named gnoll.

Yet somehow it's soothing.

I think part of it is just clarity. I've been saying at work (to anyone who'd listen) that any one thing would be fine it's just the whole everything at once effect that makes it suck. In Azeroth everything can wait. You can choose your mission. Do some or all of it. Stop if you want. It's all about freedom of choice.

So I rolled a new alt.
I had been wanting a BloodElf because I haven't played one. I also wanted to start a warrior to be the Tank that balances Gawdbovver the healer. My plan is to pug up all the instances. Especially now we have the new Dungeon Finder thing.

What I didn't know was that Belfs don't Warrior. So what did I do? I could have gone with my second choice class and Rogued it up. But no. I went all the way back to beginning and popped up a brand new Tauren.

Oh and it was so soothing. Back in Mulgore it was like being wrapped in swaddling and loved by the mobs. The association of my earliest WoW experience and the newness of a whole new class was just... therapeutic.

And I finally found a use for the Thunder Bluff Zeppelin. A quick hop to Ogrimmar. Onwards to the Undercity and then through the portal and I'm the tallest noob in Eversong Woods

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My main concern when Katyana and Mumphred formed their increasingly profitable alliance was that my alts would suffer. I still think of Paronymous as my main and he's closing on Lvl52. I'm thinking of picking up Burning Crusade for him some time soon.

Poor Grexel, on the other hand, was rapidly becoming my bank alt. She hadn't left Thunder Bluff since the Midsummer Festival. I couldn't even remember where her hearthstone was set.

In fact Katyana is now the same level as her. Apparently I can't be “Mr Know-It-All about Mages” anymore because I haven't got any higher. (I am still allowed to be “Mr Knows-Which-Way-We're-Going”)

So what do you do to make it up to an alt that's been neglected? I bought her a pony.
She'd been piling up the cash (to my noobish standards) and I've come to understand that the announcement of patch 3.2 doesn't mean it's going to actually arrive any time soon.

Turns out last thing Grexel had been doing was trekking around Thousand Needles and that, let me tell you, is so much more fun on horseback. I was a bit rusty on the Mage skills but I realised that I had learnt a thing or two in my other play.

This might make proper grown-up players roll their eyes but I had finally got into keyboards spell-casting. 1,2,3 then another 1 or a 4 if they're nearly dead. Lovely. This was making Druid play much easier but, boy, does it pay off for Mages.

Grexel was back, and better than ever.

Better and better she found some new content; The obvious thing to do with a new Blue Skeletal Horse is take her out on the Shimmering Flats and let her rip, right? Turns out I'm not the only one who thinks so.

Somehow when Paronymous came this way he just found the Sithilids and, to coin a phraze, bugged out. Missed the whole Mirage Raceway thing completely. A great bunch of quests for Grexel to flex her atrophying muscles on.

And a couple of extra levels so I can be Mr Know-It-All about Mages for a while longer.

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I've created an Alt.

That's a second character to the uninitiated. She's an undead Mage with purple hair and bondage studs on her face.

Not that I was bored with my Tauren but I felt like I had a little bit of a handle on how the game works and I wanted to see what I could do with a fresh start. New class, new race, new location.

It's pretty awesome and it's helping me figure out things that will help me when I go back to the Druid. Like the little number on my spells goes red when I'm out of range. Handy!

Structurally the opening seems pretty similar but the environment is utterly different. Where Mulgore is plains and mountains here is a haunted forest full of zombies and bats.
In fact I was starting to think the Undead quests were a little more linear than the Tauren... not so many choices... just one thing after another.

Then I met Gordo.

He's a festering ghost ogre thing shambling through the forest. Suddenly I've got things to do running in all directions and I can see Zeppelins silhouetted in the distance. Massive.

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