Too much time...on her hands

This is me:


No, really.

Ok fine. It's what my Halo: Reach character looks like. Bungie.net finally got around to making the character picture on my service record page look like the one I built in the game.

I wish it showed off the larger shoulder pad on the right side. Looks professional to have more armor on the leading shoulder.

Yes, I know. I've thought too much about it...


A couple of nights ago the matchmaking system paired me up with another player for some Firefight. (It's a certain type of game...in case you were wondering.) The system was acting up a little. There were 6700 players playing just that game. 6700 people either playing or looking for a game. Even with that many people the system was taking a long time to find people to match up.

Anyway, after waiting 15 minutes (way too long) the system paired me up with one other player. It was supposed to find 3 other players, to make a foursome, but the system recognized how long we had been waiting and just started the game with the two of us.

Both of us had our mic's and headphones on, which doesn't always happen, and we started chatting. Come to find out she lives in the same city I do.

You may not think much of that, but considering the fact that there were probably more than 100,000 players in Halo at that moment, 6700 in that gametype, and the city we live in only has around 60,000 people in it, it's fairly remarkable to get matched up like that.

I started the conversation with a "so where are you from?" She answered with the state she is in and I countered with the city I am in. She didn't say she was from the same city right away, but rather with a "No way!" She thought it was pretty freaky and thought I was creeping on her. Of course I wasn't and she eventually deduced that because she didn't have her location in her bio, it was highly unlikely that had I known her city beforehand.

It's like a 20 minute game so we had plenty of time to get to know each other. Found out a few things. One thing in particular that made it difficult for me to not stereotype her.

- She's married (no problem there)
- moved here 12 years ago from a little podunk town of less than 4,000 people about 70 miles from here (the way she asked her husband, it sounded like they moved together. Ok.)
- has a 3 yr old and a 1 month old (congrats)
- works part time at a local 2nd hand store for kids clothing (one I've been in a few times)
- lives in low-income housing (I was looking for that too)

So after learning all that I really have no stereotype set yet. There was one thing that kind of bothered me though.

She's a General.

Whahuh?

Halo: Reach has a ranking system, similar to the US military. To put it in perspective, I'll compare it to my rank, Colonel Grade 1. To get to Colonel Grade 1, it takes 960,000 points, which a player earns by playing.

It takes 2,000,000 points to get to General. Over twice as much. And she's probably not gaining any more points per game than I am. Maybe even less because she's not any better than I am. That means she's spending a lot of time playing Halo. A lot. How does she do that with a 3 year old and an infant?

Makes me wonder.