20 Days of Gold Making - Day 1 (Better Late Than Never)

Evening, gold fans.  Like many out there in the blogging community, I sometimes experience a shortage of that most important element:  topics.  I've lost count of the number of times I've been in the mood to post something here, only to realize I couldn't think of a particularly interesting topic.

That's not surprising.  Gold making is, in some ways, ten percent inspiration and ninety percent perspiration.  That is to say, the vast majority of my time in game is simply spent going through my routine:  buying my mats, doing my crafting, posting, maybe occasionally cancelling.  There are weeks at a time where nothing really changes.  Shockingly, those parts aren't very exciting.

So when I saw Nev (of Auction House Addict) post her "20 Days of Gold Making" post, I was intrigued.  Give me a topic, and I'm perfectly willing to ramble on until you beg me to stop.  It took me a while to hop on board, but I'm going to try my hand at this.  I certainly can't promise they'll be 20 consecutive days, but my goal is to get all 20 covered over the course of...well, however long it takes me to do this.

With that in mind, let's head straight into Day 1.

1. When did you start gold making & what triggered it?

I'd venture to say I'm a bit newer to the gold making aspect of WoW than most of the bloggers out there.  I'd been playing since mid-TBC, but the event that sparked my interest in gold making actually took place in December of 2011, not too long after Dragon Soul released.

I was taken with the holiday spirit, and decided to get presents for all my raid members.  It wasn't a gold making exercise in and of itself, but most of what I got everyone was Argent Tournament pets, which were going for 3-5k at the time.  Multiply that by ten people (I was doing it in a sneaky, anonymous way, so obviously, I also needed something for myself), and it was enough gold that I really had to work for it.

That taught me that I could make gold, and that it was actually pretty fun.  Around the beginning of 2012, I actually entered into a competition with my partner to see who could reach gold cap first.  It was fun, but I don't know that either of us were that serious about it at the beginning.

Things changed, though, near the beginning of February 2012.  That was when my mother, who had been battling with breast cancer for the last three years, decided that the last couple of chemotherapy options available to her were too riddled with side effects.  She decided to end chemotherapy, and began in-home hospice care.

I'm thankful for the hospice team's help, but other than nurse visits and bathing visits, the rest of the care pretty much fell to me (and to the amazing family and friends who brought food and things like that).  Surprisingly enough, though, I still had some free time, and was in desperate need of a distraction.  I had classes (mostly online, as leaving the house was difficult), but that didn't take up all my time.  Maybe it should have, but when you're averaging 4-5 hours of sleep and pretty much unable to leave the house, it's funny how the free time builds up.

There was WoW, of course, but the nature of my free time didn't lend itself well to traditional WoW activities.  I might have as much as an hour or two at a time between Mom's medication, but at any given moment, she could need something.  Of course that's more important than any group I may be in or even any mob attacking me.

That's where gold making and the AH really started to shine.  They were one form of play where if I needed to drop everything and rush into the other room, I could do so with absolutely no consequences.  It was the distraction I so desperately needed.  And when the couple of weeks the doctors predicted turned into a couple of months (a gigantic mixed blessing, if ever there was one), gold making is one of the things that got me through the toughest time in my life.

I realize that's a bit more personal than something one normally expects to see on a gold making blog.  I apologize if I offended anyone by being so open.  I just wanted everyone in this wonderful community to know that their blogs, podcasts, and videos provided me with so much more than just virtual currency in a game.