This Week on Webkinz.com

Yes, I know I skipped last week. That's because I was busy preparing for a craft show last Saturday that I was involved in so I didn't get a chance to log in at all. I managed to get a few hours of checking out the site only on Monday (Martin Luther King Day). I did the daily Calendar Quiz only to find out that, for some weird reason, the site had me as not doing any of this month's quizzes, even though I had done some of them before. (The only thing I can figure out is that it must've been some server glitch.) So I ended up re-doing the quizzes for this month up until Monday.

I went back to the employment agency and did the burger job again. It's cool that I got a raise for that job so I'm able to bring home more Kinz Cash these days. I played a couple of arcade games. I did some shopping and I purchased a few yard chairs for the backyard.

The only new thing I really did was check out the Kinzville Academy. I was starting to get bored with doing the quizzes, arcade games, and jobs so I thought it would be something interesting. Basically you pick a pet then select a course for your pet to finish. You can try any course for free but you won't get credit and you're only entitled to three free tries total on the classes. When it comes time for paying for classes, I could take the class myself for 50 Kinz Cash or hire a tutor to take the class for me for 250 Kinz Cash. I was a cheapskate so I selected the lower cost option.

I had to select which pet could go to class so I picked Magic since she's technically older by a few weeks. I was limited to taking three classes for credit per day. On top of that, I had to do the actual required tasks but my pet got the credit. At times I felt like I was playing a glorified arcade game and there were times when I felt that this was the equivalent of having my mother doing all of my school projects for me during elementary, middle, and high school.

First, I enrolled Magic in a Fashion class where I had to memorize what outfits a poodle model was wearing while she was walking down the runway. I did pretty well on that.

Then I enrolled Magic in a Language class where I had to solve a series of word puzzles. I did pretty well at that as well.

For the third class I picked Weight Lifting because I thought that Magic should learn how to be healthy. I had to "lift" weights with a mouse while making sure that it stayed within a certain set of lines (which you can see in the picture above the "Lift" button). After a false start, I learned it quick and I also got Magic to pass that class.

Here is Magic's report card at the end of the day. It's nice to see that she did great on her first day. But, on the other hand, I have to wonder what's the purpose of giving my pet an education. Will it encourage my pet to be more independent-minded? Will I get free virtual goodies for completing a certain level of coursework? Will I have to enroll my other pet (Floyd) as well in order to have a well-educated household or could I get by with having Magic tell Floyd what she's leared at school? I'm going to have to read up more on the Kinzville Academy before I venture further because I really don't want to be throwing my hard-earned Kinz Cash at something that's not going to be a real long-term benefit for my pets.

Monday was the only day that I was on Webkinz.com because, that very day, I developed a scratchy throat that has developed into a full-fledged head and chest cold. At one point I completely lost my voice. I've been feeling extremely tired and I just didn't feel like having anything to do with Webkinz. Right now I go through periods where I cough like mad for several minutes. This coughing has started to affect my sleep and I hope this all ends for me soon.

This Week on Webkinz.com

First of all, I'd like to wish everyone reading this a belated Happy New Year. It took so long for the laptop to get out of the repair shop so I haven't been able to get on Webkinz.com since my trip to New York City last month, when I borrowed my in-laws' computer. (Yes, there was that time on Christmas Day when I made an attempt to log on from my dial-up account at home but it turned out to be an exercise in futility.) So I basically have a lot of catching-up to do since I added a lot to my home but I wasn't able to get screenshots until now (mainly because my in-laws' computer had no free USB ports so I couldn't plug in a memory stick to transfer any screenshots).

I finally got the computer back on Monday. The first thing I did was go to a local place with Wi-Fi and I was able to check out what I missed on Webkinz.com along with taking screenshots. The big hassle with getting on that site is that I encountered the same problems that I did when I was logged into the site during my New York City trip. I would frequently get logged out due to a system overload. For the first several minutes, I kept on encountering this message:

I ended up checking out various videos on YouTube then trying the site again. Just when I was about to give up after being logged out again, I gave it one more try and I was able to say on the site for an hour. The first thing I did was to figure out what Santa Kinz had left my pet Unicorn, Magic on Christmas Day. The only thing I found was this Christmas letter in my inbox (which is the first message I've ever gotten through Webkinz.com since I joined that site).

Since the Christmas season was officially over as of last Sunday (January 6, which is variously known as Little Christmas, Twelth Night, Three King's Day, and Easter Orthodox Christmas), I decided that it was time to put away all the Christmas related stuff. However, I did take a final look at both Magic's green Santa hat and the Christmas tree.

What was really cool about the tree was the fact that it lit up whenever you clicked on it.

On top of that, Magic's birthday is January 3. I missed out on visiting on the actual day itself because the laptop was still in the repair shop. However, Webkinz.com remembered Magic's special day because I got this message in my inbox.

Sure enough, there was a slice of cake in the dock. I fed it to Magic and she seemed to like it.

Monday was also the day that I finally registered my new Lil' Kinz Pig, which I purchased about three weeks ago but I wasn't able to register until now. I had to pick a name and gender. Since I chose Magic to be a girl, I decided to even things out and register my pig as a boy. In additon, I had named Magic after Bruce Springsteen's latest CD Magic (which my husband keeps on playing in his car CD player) so I decided to give a rock-themed name to my pig as well.

Yes, I named a pig after Pink Floyd because, well, pigs and Pink Floyd always seemed to go together. As I read Floyd's biography, I noticed something. He says that his best friend is a black Lab. In Magic's biography, she said that her best friend is a yellow Lab. I guess those two have one thing in common--they both love Labs.

I was then directed to my home where a small addition had already been built on to my home. Floyd has his own bedroom. I also got this welcome screen.

I opened Floyd's present and I got these things:

The first thing I did was to feed the mud burger to Floyd, which he ate it up. The second thing I did was to decorate his new bedroom. I purchased wallpaper and flooring that I thought would be suitable to a pig and I also purchased a bed that matched the room. Floyd seemed to appreciate it.

Of the three welcome presents that Floyd got, the coolest is the Fortune Telling Pig Statue. Whenever I got Floyd to come near that statue, it would tell fortunes, which are pretty cute.

The Fortune Telling Pig Statue works for other Webkinz pets as well. Or, at least, it worked when Magic went near it.

I got Magic and Floyd together in the same room and I tried to get them to interact with each other. I thought that it would be like Furby where if you got two or more Furbys in the same room to recognize each other, they would talk to each other for a few minutes. Well, it didn't quite work with Webkinz. Each pet seemed to be off in his/her own world mentally and they didn't seem to notice each other. In fact, they were heavily dependent on me telling them what to do via the top menu buttons. It's too bad in a way because I think it would be pretty interesting to see the Webkinz interact with each other for a few minutes.

A few days after I registered Floyd on Webkinz.com, I found this news items on Webkinz Insider about how they found out that the Lil' Kinz Pig will be the March Pet of the Month. Argh, if I had known that, I would've hold off on registering Floyd on the site until then. I hope I can still get something from Webkinz.com for owning a Lil' Kinz Pig during its upcoming reign as the Pet of the Month.

The only other major activity I did this week was answering all the back Daily Trivia Quizzes. I'm now as far back as August, 2006 and I hope to eventually finish all the back days. While answering trivia questions can get tedious after a while, I can rack up a lot of Kinz Cash so I can financially support Magic and Floyd. I attempted a job at the Employement Office but when I clicked on a job, the Webkinz.com site froze so I never reached that job. (I think I closed that browser window and logged in again but I didn't attempt another job.)

I'm going to end this entry with a tour of the expanded home. Here is Magic's bedroom, complete with a new bedside lamp.

Here is Floyd's bedroom with a cute bedside lamp added. (It's shaped like a cow jumping over a moon and it lights up when you click on it.)

Here's the bathroom with a lunar-themed design. It includes a bathtub, sink, and toilet.

Here's Magic sitting on the toilet.

Here's the main room of the house, which is a combination living room, den, dining room, playroom, and kitchen. I intend this to be the largest room of the house and it will be a common area where both of my pets can hang out with each other.

The large room includes a skateboard where the pets can glide around from one side to the other.

The room also includes a treadmill where a pet can get a workout and increase his/her health meter.

And, last but not least, here is the yard.

Not only does it include a vegetable garden but there is also a pool that a pet can use to either cool off or get some exercise.

The yard also includes a trampoline for a pet to jump up and down on.

Now that I got the laptop back, I hope to be able to spend some more time on Webkinz.com. However, it's going to be quality time rather than quantity time because I have a lot of other things going on in my life at the moment and I really can't visit that site every single day. I know my pets would prefer that I spend lots of time with them (I notice that Magic cops an attitude by saying stuff like "Where were you?" if I log into the site after spending too much time away) but I'm not some small child with tons of time on my hands. I have responsibilities that take precedence over Webkinz.com.

This Week on Webkinz.com

There aren't as many graphics for this entry as previous entries for reasons that will soon become clear to you. The end of last week seemed promising. I managed to find a local store that not only sold the Webkinz pets but also the harder to find Webkinz trading cards and even a charm necklace. I wasn't able to find any Webkinz charms but I hoped that using the code that came with the official Webkinz charm necklace would be enough for me to gain access to that Magical Charm Forest.

I even broke down and purchased a second Webkinz pet--a Lil' Kinz Pig. I haven't gotten around to taking this critter's picture yet due to a lack of time.

So just as last week ended on a promising note, this new week began with laptop problems. If you've been reading this blog from the beginning, you would know that I got into Webkinz because I was killing time at a mall waiting for my appointment at the Genius Bar in the Apple Store because our four-year-old Mac laptop had stopped recognizing its internal battery yet it still ran fine if it was hooked up to a power cord that was plugged into a wall outlet. The so-called "genius" at the Genius Bar suggested that the problem wasn't a dead battery but some major problem that he suggested that it would be easier to just buy a new laptop.

My husband and I decided that we would go to an independent repair place for a second opinion. But we had both put off on taking the laptop to that place mainly because we were both so busy with preparations for the upcoming Christmas holiday. So we continued to use the laptop connected to a wall outlet as a temporary stop-gap measure until we could find the time to take it to a repair place.

The only problem is that this week the laptop began to have more problems. The laptop screen would frequently freeze up after using it for several minutes and the freezing was so bad that you had to reboot the entire machine. This happened to my husband when he was using it at a local cafe. The same happened to me at a local cafe while I was logged into Webkinz.com. I became concerned about the freezes because that site frequently posted ads warning users to always log out because not doing so would cause your pet to lose health, food, and happiness points on its meter. I managed to reach the Webkinz.com's FAQ page and I found out that the system will automatically log you out after being inactive for 15 minutes. I felt relieved when I read that.

Since my husband and I had planned to go to New York City to visit his father and step-mother for a few days, we had to quickly get the laptop in the repair shop before the trip. Since I knew that my husband's parents have a high-speed Internet connection, I decided to pack the Lil' Kinz Pig, charm necklace, and the trading cards along with my USB memory stick for the trip to New York City. I managed to spend a lot of time on Webkinz.com inbetween socializing with my in-laws and checking out Fifth Avenue as it was all decked out in fancy Christmas decorations.

The only sad thing was that my in-laws' two computers did not have a free USB port so I had nothing to connect the memory stick to. I decided not to register my new Lil' Kinz Pig yet because I really want to have screenshots of the adoption just like when I took screenshots of Magic's adoption papers. So Magic is going to remain an only pet for a little while longer.

I did manage to enter the codes that came with the trading cards. I won about 2,000 Kinz Cash plus a Dice Kinz, a poster, and some clothes. That was pretty cool.

I entered the code that came with the charm necklace. I had hoped that I would gain entrance to the Magical Charm Forest but, no, that wasn't the case. Having an official Webkinz charm necklace is not enough to gain access to this place, I still needed to purchase the actual charms. I did get this display case for my virtual charms as a reward for entering the charm necklace code but I think it stinks that I still don't have access to the Magical Charm Forest. I've been trying to find those charms but I have yet to find a store in my local area that actually sold them. I tried looking in a few shops in New York City that carried Webkinz and I didn't find charms in those stores. I even looked in the two giftshops in Rockefeller Center that carried Webkinz and neither one of them had the charms. I don't know what's taking Ganz so long in shipping those charms to the stores because it seems frustrating that I can't even check out this place if I can't buy the needed charms because I haven't found a store that actually stocked them.

I managed to earn more Kinz Cash using a tip that I got from perusing the forums at Webkinz Insider. I've been doing the daily calendar questions for the past several months. I've managed to get most of 2007 finished (with the exception of the December questions because December isn't over yet) and I got at least half of 2006 finished.

I also played some more arcade games. I tend to focus on whatever game Webkinz.com has designated as "Game of the Day" because the payout tends to be slightly higher than the other games. While many of the arcade games are fun to play, the pay is pretty low.

I also did a few jobs this week. I focused mainly on the hamburger job when it came up (mainly because it's about the only job that I've been able to successfully finish) and I did so well that I got a notice saying that I'll get a raise the next time I do the hamburger job. Awesome!!!

I kept on seeing ads for the Alvin and the Chipmunks movie but I haven't gotten any more offers for free waffles. It seems like now that the film is actually in movie theaters, the offer for free waffles is now gone. I think the Goo-Goo Berry Festival is also over because I haven't seen any more goo goo berries float across the screen at random intervals. So I ended up having to purchase all of Magic's food this week. I really miss the freebies (sigh!).

At times the Webkinz.com system was so overloaded that I would get this dialogue box saying that I was being logged out due to a system overload. I was forcibly logged out at least five or six times during my stay in New York City.

It's too bad that I couldn't take screenshots because I managed to add wallpaper and flooring to the bathroom along with a toilet and sink. (I already had the bathtub installed there.) I added a lot of new stuff to the large room, which serves as a den/playroom/living room/kitchen. I purchased a treadmill, a skateboard, a countertop, a sink, and a refrigerator. I even managed to add something new for the outdoors--a pool. It's pretty neat seeing Magic exercise on her treadmill, skating around on the skateboard, and go swimming outside (despite the fact that there is currently snow on the ground).

While I was poking about Webkinz.com, there was a notice encouraging people to log in on December 25 to see what present Santa Kinz has left for your pet. The only problem is that my home desktop is on dial-up, the laptop is still in the repair shop, and my husband and I will be visiting my mother on Christmas Day and she doesn't even own a computer. Oh well.

I've been away from Webkinz.com since Friday morning (just before my husband and I left for home). I noticed that the front page of Webkinz.com has been changed to something that's Christmas-themed. (I took the screenshot on my own desktop after the New York City trip.)

It's pretty cute, isn't it? In any case, between the laptop being in the repair shop and the upcoming Christmas holidays, this will be my last entry to this blog for the time being.

This Week on Webkinz.com

This week I was focusing on building up Magic's living area and her array of stuff. I managed to snag another free plate of waffles for Magic when the Alvin & the Chipmunks movie ad came up again on my screen but that only happened to me one more time this week. (Since the movie opens this Friday, I have no idea how much longer this free waffles promotion will last on Webkinz.com.) For the past few days I have been getting free goo-goo berries for Magic because this week happens to be the Goo-Goo Berry Festival where a giant goo-goo berry floats across the screen at random. If you click on that berry, you get a free berry added to the Dock. I got at least four free berries that way, which Magic loved.

I kept on trying to get a new job with the employment agency only to frequently strike. I tried a variety of jobs with miserable results. At one point the burger job that I had mastered before was available and I flunked that one. The next day I went back to the employment agency where I picked the burger job and I managed to succeed this time while I earned 100 Kinz Cash. I don't know what's wrong with me regarding being able to finish a job. What's really frustrating is that I have to wait at least eight hours before I can try for a new job and I can't even re-try the jobs that I had failed.

I've been playing various arcade games but the payout isn't too great. Even on the Game of the Day, when you can get more Kinz cash than usual, the pay is pretty dismal. The only time I make a substantial amount of Kinz cash is when I play one of Quizzy's quiz games, where I have been known to get as much as a thousand Kinz cash. The only drawback to doing the quiz is that it can get pretty time-consuming, especially if you're trying to amass as much money as possible.

At first the main reason why I wanted a lot of Kinz cash is because I wanted to buy some more major appliances for Magic. I purchased a lovely television set that resembles Cinderella's coach. I'm serious--the cabinet of the TV set looks like a horse-drawn carriage complete with wheels on the bottom. It matches the overall fantasy theme that I have in mind for the home. This TV set also works. If you click on it, you this remote with a button menu where you can select television shows and actually watch them.

I also added a decorated Christmas tree for the home and I even purchased my first article of clothing for Magic--a green Santa hat. She looks incredibly cute in it and the tree is lovely as well. I even purchased a new toy for her, a jack-in-the-box.

Magic even expressed her opinion while I was shopping.

The only problem with my recent purchases is that Magic's room quickly became very crowded.

Well, I clicked on the Map button on the top left side of the screen and found a map of Magic's room along with room for expansion. I discovered that adding extra rooms requires extra Kinz cash. I decided to go with adding two rooms--a large room that would function as a playroom/living room/den/dining room/kitchen and a small room that would be the bathroom. Given the lousy luck I had with getting jobs and the low pay I got playing arcade games, I focused on spending much of my time answering Quizzy the Bear's quizes. I did very well at that, although it did get tedious answering trivia questions for long periods of time. Ultimately I managed to earn enough Kinz cash to add both rooms. I also managed to scrape enough money to add wall paper and flooring to the larger room.

Here is the playroom/living room/den/dining room/kitchen combination room:

I know it looks large and empty at the moment but I will gradually fill it with all kinds of stuff. Here is the new bathroom:

So far I managed to relocate the bathtub to the new bathroom. I ran out of both time and money before I was able to finish decorating it.

I also added an outdoor area. It's weird that when I first started my membership on Webkinz.com, Magic only came with one room and no outside at all. I found it pretty outrageous that I had to spend 1,000 Kinz cash just so I can install an outdoor area. At least there's snow on the ground so Magic can actually have a white Christmas instead of just dreaming about having one. I also bought two garden plots (a tomato plot and a carrot plot) for outside mainly because they were relatively cheap and I'm hoping that the garden will produce healthy food that I can feed Magic with for free so I won't have to pay so much for her food. It looks pretty weird to have tomatoes and carrots growing while the rest of the ground is covered with snow but if my idea of growing food works in the long run, I'm willing to put up with a certain amount of weirdness.

This is the current size of Magic's home:

I would like to buy more things for both indoors and outdoors, especially kitchen appliances. Recently I've learned that the reason why fellow Webkinz.com members have been trading recipies is that one can use them to create meals for a Webkinz pet using kitchen appliances. So I guess that means I'll have to buy kitchen appliances eventually and learn how to cook in a virtual world.

My ambitions will require lots of Kinz cash. I've been reading posts on Webkinz Insider about how to earn money and one answer is to adopt another Webkinz pet and enter that code. Apparently there is a big payout everytime you adopt a subsequent pet and, if you happened to adopt a certain pet while that critter is Pet of the Month, you'll get even more Kinz cash and other free goodies. One can save money by having two or more Webkinz share the same bedroom. The only thing they won't share is the same bed so you'll have to buy a separate bed for each Webkinz pet. Right now I'm still so busy trying to get a handle on Webkinz.com that I don't even want to consider adopting a second or even third pet until I learn more about this unique virtual world.

But, at the same time, I really don't want to spend all of my free time at Webkinz.com. It's just that whenver I spend lots of time playing videogames or hanging around one forum for hours at a stretch, I end up feeling tired and cranky. Last night, when I spent two hours trying to play Quizzy's quiz games just so I can earn lots of Kinz cash, I really felt like I was at the end of my rope. I really don't want to burn out on this too soon after purchasing my Lil' Kinz Unicorn. Now that I got the major stuff purchased (outdoor area, two rooms, bathtub, TV set, Christmas tree), I want to slowly earn Kinz Cash and accumulate stuff. I want to explore the features where you can chat online with other Webkinz owners. I hope that one day I'll find a store that sells the Webkinz Charms so I'll see what that Charms Forest looks like. But I also want to balance this with other things in my life. I don't want to be one of those super-obsessed people who spend long hours online at the expense of relationships and other things in the real world.