One week and counting!

Hello once again. The count down is on. One more week of life as I know it and then my world gets turned upside down. Next Saturday I will be leaving for Thatcher, Arizona for 11 weeks for peace officer training.

I've been experiencing a whole range of emotions in the last week and I'm sure they will only intensify over the next week. First is the fear of doing something totally new for me. Will I fail? Will I succed? Am I smart enough to soak up all the information that will be thrown at me? I can only hope that I have what it takes to become a good officer that will sway towards the spirit of the law and not the letter of the law. How will my family get along without me for the next 11weeks? Will I find the same people at home when I get back? Will I be the same person when I get back? I have always been the type of person who is not changed by those around me. I am who I am and that's all that I am. Yea I stole it from Popeye. I hope I stay true to that.

The second emotion I have been feeling is complete excitement. I love a challenge and I love new experiences. Fear and excitment, thats why people jump out of perfectly good planes. I really am looking forward to learning a lot of new stuff and meeting a lot of new people. I am also looking forward to the chance to accel in my career. I am planning on running for class president which will open a lot of doors for me in the future. I think I have a good shot at it since everyone who is going already knows me by talking to me an the radio and phone to get thier information. It will be great to finally but a face to the voices I hear all day long and make new friends.

I also feel a wonderful sense of pride. Pride knowing that I was one of the applicants choosen to do this job. Pride at serving my community to make it a better and safer place for us all. Pride knowing that my mom and dad are proud that their son is making something of himself. Pride knowing that my children are proud of their daddy. It is said that "pride comes before the fall", but pride can also be a wonderful motivater if it is tempered with wisdom and responsibility. I learned responsibility at an early age. Wisdom comes with time and trial. We all make stupid decisions and we all have failures in life, the mark of a wise man is the one who learns and adapts from each of those decisions and failures.

Time to go for now but I will try to write each weekend when I get home to chronicle the events I will be experiencing. I would also like to put out a few thanks with this edition. First off, thanks to doodi and the rest of the staff for this website. What a great place to get news, meet new gamers and express our feelings in this format. Next I would like to thank my clan, ART of WAR, for putting together the greatest group of gamers I have ever had the pleasure to play with. It is a true joy to game with each of you and get to know you. Last but not least, thanks to my clan members that post blogs and encourage me to do the same. Lusetti, Cottonking, Silver Dragon, Balek, Poltigice and all the rest I have forgotten to name. Great blogs all of you and keep it up. Until the next time, Snowolf7 out!

Short Hiatus

Hello once again. It's been awhile since my last blog due to lifes little chalenges. I just wanted to share with all of you the true joy I have had playing with all of you from this site. What a blast to find like minded gamers who just enjoy playing and socializing. It is great.

Now for the main subjet. I have been promoted from the Departmen of Moter Vehicles radio room to becoming an actual field enforcement agent. Yes that means a pay raise and 20 year retirement. Unfortunately it also means going to the peace officer academy for 11 months to learn everything I will need to know to get the job done. So I will be MIA from march through may except for weekends. The unit I got hired by is the mobile scales team unit. What that means is throughout the year we will travel all over the state of Arizona to set up mobile scales to wiegh and inspect commercial trucks so I will get to see all of the beautiful areas that Arizona has to offer and the state pays for every penny of it. I can't wait. Call me crazy but I actually love to travel and experience new things so this will be right up my alley. My wife is actually looking forward to it as well since she will get the 55 inch hi-def wide screen back for awhile to watch her shows on instead of me playing games on it.

I thought to finish off this blog entry I would put a couple of pictures up to show you all the diversity we have here in Arizona.

This first one is yours truely out in the desert with my new benelli 20gauge doing some target practice.

http://i148.photobucket.com/albums/s26/snowolf7/Picture_1071.jpg

Next is a picture I took with my sons at a lake in northern Arizona by a town called Williams.

http://i148.photobucket.com/albums/s26/snowolf7/IMG_0305.jpg

And last but not least a picture my wife took of the San Francisco peeks up in Flagstaff, Arizona.

http://i148.photobucket.com/albums/s26/snowolf7/IMG_0591.jpg

I hope these all turn out okay and I can't wait to get back from my training so I can enjoy more gaming with all of you. See ya soon.

DAMN PINIATAS

    As anyone who knows me and looks at my gamertag can clearly see, Piniatas have taken all of the free time I have plus a little bit of my GOW time. This game is addictive, addictive and addictive. Each time I reach a goal I am going for there is a new piniata that strolls by and catches my interest and there goes another 4 hours trying to get that one into my garden. I would definately recommend this game to anyone who liked the Sim games or Virtual Pets type games. Kids will love it because of the cute piniatas and bright colors and adults who like to be God and be challenged will love it for the huge amount there is to do in the game to master it.

     On to other things. Santa was good to me this year. DVDs of The Office season 1 & 2 (us version), The Office series 1( uk version), Pirates of the Carribean 2, and a $50 gift card to Best Buy which will either buy Viva Piniata or Rainbow Six. I haven't decided yet. If I don't get Viva Piniata though, I might just have to keep it as a rental until the end of time. My wife was happy with a DVD recorder and new speakers for her van, and all of the kids got exactly what they wanted. Great times with family and freinds all around. I hope each one of you had a great and rewarding holiday season.

     With the New Year right around the corner, it is time for my New Year resolution list. This year I am going to try to stick with them for at least a one month period, after that all bets are off. Okay here we go:

• I will lose weight ( same every year)
• I will workout (different from losing wieght)
• I will take my children on at least 3 camping/fishing trips this year
• I will try to reduce or quit smoking (notice I said try)

Thats about all I can think of for now but I might add more later if something becomes important to me. Thanks for reading the Wolf's Den and everyone have a Great and SAFE New Year!

The piniata's have come home

I'm still at work but i just called my daughter and Viva Piniata has arrived! Yes she is already playing it under my gamertag and No I am not one of those guys who will blame my daughter for getting Piniata points on my gamertag. I plan to ground my daughter when I get home so I can play Piniatas myself. My only problem is to find something to ground her for...............OH YEAH, I'm the dad. She's 14 years old so she must have done something wrong today. Hold on,,I'm the dad,, I don't have to have a reason,,but the wife will say something if I don't come up with something good,,I'm the dad,,I have to keep reminding myself of that. I hope my wife doesn't ground me.

Okay enough rambling for now, I have to finish my work so I can get home and chainsaw some piniatas.??..!!'"?? whoops thats GOW ,,oh yea I have to nourish the piniatas and chainsaw the locusts. Look for my review and impressions next week.

WELCOME

Welcome to The Wolf's Den. For my first entry let me start by telling you all a little about myself.

To start with, I live in Phoenix, Arizona. There are two basic temperatures here: HOT and DAMN HOT. But if thats not enough we do get an annual rainfall of about a thimble full of water each year to help cool you off. As Chrismas approaches I can't wait to get out to my desert landscaped yard in shorts and a t-shirt to put lights on our numerous types of vegitation all with there own assortment of inch long thorns.

Okay, okay, enough about the wonderful terrain I live in. I have two true joys in my life that constantly compete for my time. My family and my xbox360. My family consists of my wonderful wife, 14 year old daughter that boys are starting to notice (i'm glad I have guns), 14 year old boy in football and basketball (no they are not twins), and an 11 year old boy that thinks that dad is great and shadows me everywhere I go. I have been married for 9 years going on 10 and even though the road has been rocky, I can't imagine taking any other path then the one i've chosen.

Now on to the important stuff. GAMES! Since Gears of War has come out my life has pretty much been taken up with finding time to play more and more GOW. Unfortunatly I don't seem to be getting a whole lot better, but what fun trying. Prior to the release of this time consuming behemoth I liked to play Burnout, Texas Hold'em, Uno, COD2 and now 3. With so many good games coming out it is extremely hard to find time to play all of them but as I do I will blog my views and opinions, no matter how jaded, here.

Thanks for checking out my first entry and I look forward to sharing more thoughts, opinions and pictures in the next few weeks.

Good gaming all and to all a good night!