Wow. What happened?

Ding, I say. DING!

I started off the evening with Aeven in Ironforge. A nice, relaxing evening... a little dinner, a little shopping. You know, trying to stay fashionable. All the really hip Dwarven death dealers are packing a Morning Star with Crusader on it these days, after all! Sigh. Aeven's just a slave to fashion, I guess.

I decided that I really wanted to get Aeven Dual Talent Specialization so she can go retribution spec for leveling. Aeven's got the gold to drop on dual specs, but that would leave her with only a few hundred gold in the bank, and I'd rather keep that buffer large in anticipation of future expenses. So - that called for her to roll up her sleeves and get her hands dirty mining radioactive glowing ores and ripping the skin off of dead critters. Mmmmm, radioactive blood. What's not to love?

So, last night, I really just intended to take some time and run around Un'goro mining and skinning. Believe it or not, that's just what I did. Almost 20 stacks of thorium ore and nearly as many stacks of dense stone, gems, leather and hides are up on the AH now, waiting for eager buyers. Come on, sing with me - you know the tune: "Gold, gold, gold, gold, gold, gold, gold, gold..." The best part about the gathering was the skinning - there were a few non-skinner folks slaughtering their way through the dino and gorilla mobs, giving Aeven the chance to pick up stacks of skins without even having to try very hard.

Oddly enough, though, even without doing to much grinding, Aeven managed to pick up 120k experience, and another level. Sure, each mob was worth 300-400 XP, but she didn't kill anywhere near the 300+ mobs it would have taken to level. Oh, she completed a quest here and there, and stopped to turn them in when she had the opportunity. When all was said and done, though, the focus of the evening was gathering. The XP and new level were just a nice bonus at the end of it all.

Right now, I'm thinking that Aeven will spend the next couple of evenings in dungeons - there's the next wing of Marudon to do, along with Zul'Farrak, which is a tremendously fun instance to run. With more mining and skinning in between runs, I expect that the next couple of levels will come quickly.

After that, though, the next week may be kind of quiet. Sunday sees the start of Children's Week, and if my achievement-earning main wants her Violet Proto-Drake, she's going to have to get off her duff and visit the School of Hard Knocks... and fumbling around completely unknown PvP battlegrounds is going to require a bit of time and effort. So Aeven will be getting a short vacation. She'll probably spend it in Ironforge window0-shopping at the weapon shops. Got to keep up on those latest fashions, right?