The rules are simple:

• Submit a comment to this post to enter! (Only one entry per person, please.)
• Include the word "GIVEAWAY" in all caps somewhere in your comment.
• Entries will be accepted until 12:00pm (noon) Eastern on Thursday, May 10. Entries submitted after the cutoff won't count, of course.
• Two winners will be selected at random, and they will be notified Thursday afternoon/evening via email and here on the blog post.

Next up:

One of TWO beta weekend access codes for The Secret World!

This key grants you access to the first public beta weekend for The Secret World. To register for a chance to participate in additional beta weekends, you'll need to register using the form on the game's website (right-hand column, just under the "Pre-Order Now Available" block).

PLEASE DO NOT ENTER if you've already pre-ordered The Secret World (pre-orders are guaranteed access to all beta weekends) or if you won't be able to play during this beta weekend. This beta weekend starts on Friday, May 11, at 9:00am Pacific through Sunday, May 13, at 11:59pm Pacific. Make sure to read the FAQ at the bottom of the official news post for all the details!

Remember, there are TWO codes up for grabs here, and there will be TWO winners. Good luck!!

=====

Woohoo, congrats to Arislyn and Copra!! Your beta keys are on their way to you both!

Stay tuned — even more giveaways to come!!

1. PAX East Loot Giveaway: TERA Beta Weekend Access & Mount It's time for a giveaway!! These are hard-won goodies plucked...
2. PAX East Loot Giveaway: Guild Wars 2 Beta Access It's time for another giveaway!! These are hard-won goodies plucked...
3. Day 1 Swag Report We had a nice day overall, going to the Future...

If I haven't mentioned in a while how much I love this game, allow me to remedy that: I love this game.

The last few times I've played, probably spaced out over the last year or two, I realized that I'd come to the "grind" portion of the game. I've finished the main storyline and now have to take guide, photograph, and salvage requests to build up the currency — Pelagos, in the game parlance — I need to return to the site of the story's climax and get access to the grandest treasures and rarest creatures in the game. Thankfully I can also now take dolphin show requests, and they're a nice source of fairly steady Pelagos, besides being pretty easy to do, with no travel required.

So I need 1 million Pelagos, and I'm up to just over 800,000. *pant, pant, pant* As I'm slogging through the requests, though, I'm earning a few little in-game extras like new diving equipment, decorations for my private reef (so posh!), or new functionality for existing equipment. One of the latest ones I've gotten is the ability to develop my photos in black-and-white instead of only color, and that's been pretty fun — and I got some incredible shots of grey whales while diving in the Zahhab Region.

The final expedition to the Cavern of the Gods is in sight now, and I'm pretty antsy to get in there!

1. AC:CF Update This week, I've been entirely addicted to Animal Crossing: City...
2. Anticipa… Today I'm expecting Animal Crossing: Wild World [Flash alert] for...
3. Capped Combat in Free Realms The other day, I finally got my character to level...

The rules are simple:

• Submit a comment to this post to enter! (Only one entry per person, please.)
• Include the word "GIVEAWAY" in all caps somewhere in your comment.
• Entries will be accepted until 12:00pm (noon) Eastern on Thursday, April 26. Entries submitted after the cutoff won't count, of course.
• Two winners will be selected at random, and they will be notified Thursday afternoon/evening via email and here on the blog post.

Next up:

One of TWO beta access codes for Guild Wars 2!

Ok, here's how I think this thing works, according to what I read on the GW2 site and my experience with my own GW2 beta code entry. You put the code in at the URL provided, which puts you into their beta access pool. You might get to play this weekend, or you might get into one, any, or all of the future beta access weekends. If this is incorrect, please let me know and I'll post the correction ASAP, but I haven't gotten an answer from the question I asked on Twitter,  so I'm making an educated guess and hoping I land somewhere that borders reality!

PLEASE DO NOT ENTER if you're already in the GW2 beta pool (pre-orders are guaranteed beta access at some point) or if you won't be able to play during this or any upcoming beta weekend. This weekend's beta starts at 12:00pm (noon) Pacific on Friday, April 27 and ends at 11:59pm Pacific on Monday, April 29.

Remember, there are TWO codes up for grabs here, and there will be TWO winners. Good luck!!

=====

Woohoo, congrats to Paul and John!! Emails containing your respective codes are on their way to you as we speak!

Stay tuned, guys — there are plenty more giveaways to come!

1. PAX East Loot Giveaway: TERA Beta Weekend Access & Mount It's time for a giveaway!! These are hard-won goodies plucked...
2. Day 1 Swag Report We had a nice day overall, going to the Future...
3. PAX East, here we come! Today we're driving out to take in day 1 of...

Mom isn't very technically-minded, although she has the hang of Solitaire, email, and Facebook (much to my chagrin! LOL). Dad, however, has always been pretty geeky and open to — even excited about — new technologies, so I realized today that I should ask him to start a blog. He wouldn't necessarily write about current events…I'm more interested in him putting down in his own words the stories of his life, and transcribing those seemingly random vignettes of memory that we all have from time to time when our brain isn't focused on anything in particular.

I suppose it would be a good habit to get into myself, actually; when my mind wanders, I recall the damnedest things — moments that, for one reason or another, are indelibly pressed into my brain.

For instance, the other day I was walking Lola in the bright sunshine, and I thought about getting sunburned. Then I remembered this time when I was a kid, maybe 8 or 9 years old…

It was a hot Southern summer, and I was out of school. I took this picnic-blanket-thing that was soft on one side and plastic on the other, and I laid it out on the grass in the backyard. It was so bright out that I folded up one corner and laid it over my face as I lay there looking at the clouds. Then, stupid me, I got so relaxed I fell asleep. I couldn't have been out for that long, since Mom hadn't come looking for me yet, but it was long enough. I looked like a boiled lobster, and just on one side! In the days after came the blistering and peeling — oh, the joys of being a fair-skinned redhead. That lesson was learned, needless to say!

Of course, as a kid, I was always upset that I didn't tan like the rest of my friends, so I tried whatever I could. My childhood felt like one failed tanning experiment after another, even including self-tanning lotion. I was probably in high school before I finally gave up and resigned myself to the fact that all I'd ever get were freckles or blisters. Typically, now, I love my skin.

1. A Few of My Favorite Things It's that time of year again, when we all look...
2. Ding! Well, it's been nice knowing ya. Tomorrow at 8:05am US...
3. A Nice Perspective Yesterday was my first yearly exam after the Cervical Cancer...

The rules are simple:

• Submit a comment to this post to enter! (Only one entry per person, please.) Include the word "GIVEAWAY" in all caps somewhere in your comment.
• Entries will be accepted until 12:00pm (noon) Eastern on Thursday, April 19. Entries submitted after the cutoff won't count, of course.
• Two winners will be selected at random, and they will be notified Thursday afternoon/evening via email and here on the blog post.

First up:

One of TWO beta weekend access and mount codes for TERA!

Please note that this beta starts at 12:00pm (noon) Pacific on Friday, April 20 and ends at 11:59pm Pacific on Monday, April 23. If you won't be able to play in the beta weekend, please step aside and let folks who will actually *use* the code have a better chance at actually *winning* the code.

Remember, there are TWO codes up for grabs here, and there will be TWO winners. Good luck!!

=====

Updated to add: We were told on the show floor that your beta character will carry over when the game is launched! You won't lose your progress — or the sweet mount.

=====

WINNERS!! Congrats to Dusty and DragonGem! Your codes should be arriving in your inboxes shortly.

Check back soon when I post more giveaways for in-game goodies and beta access keys!

1. Day 2 Swag Report Got back a few minutes ago from our awesome tweetup....
2. PAX East, here we come! Today we're driving out to take in day 1 of...
3. Day 1 Swag Report We had a nice day overall, going to the Future...