Perhaps we should have an idiot of the month award - and I'd like to nominate myself for the first award.

I set myself a target of getting myself at least one epic flying mount.

I read that mining and a zapthrottle mote extractor could result in lots of gold so I burned 1.5 - 2k of gold powerlevelling engineering. I also discovered that my normal mount was too slow to do the route and make decent dosh (I really need the epic flyer for that), So I read another guide.

Basic premise stratholme is easy (on this green geared fresh 70 paladin)... other classes should be able to do this from 65 on.

So off I went on my mostly purpled 70 hunter.

Epic fail. I posted here and found out that palaadins solo stratholme more effectively, so off I went powerleveling the pally (and a druid for other reasons). Run after run after run after run of SM followed. Thinking of all the fun I would have in the future, when I could use my pally to rip apart stratholme, and aoe lots of mobs etc.

I realised that for the last few sessions of play for hours at a time I have had next to ZERO fun. I had successfully turned a game into a job - and an unpaid one at that. How incredibly stupid!!!!!

And the only reason I wanted a flyer, was to make money faster so I could buy more flyers for my other 70's.

Please learn from my stupidity - ask yourself why you are grinding away for anything and if it's actually worth it.

(As a sidenote I've decided that boosting my team through instance after instance isn't my definition of fun, it may be the quickest way for me to get to 70 but I think I am going to take the slower route and enjoy myself along the way. I'll BG, instance with a couple of others if i can. I'll Not sweat it if i can't).