Fun With Explosives

I've been unsure what to do with myself recently. I've got lots of bases, plenty of non-diamond resources, a rapid transit system. What more do I need?
I tried multiplayer, but the problem seems to be that some other people are just jerks and enjoy killing and destruction which are totally counter to my goals. I played for a couple of hours to build and mine, only to come back the next day to find my house destroyed and my shit gone. meh. I know one of the upcoming updates has lockable chests so at least people won't be tempted to steal my gear. Maybe I'll give it another shot then.

While I was there though, I saw a lot of TNT being used. I've never even made TNT before so I was a little curious. I've seen it create some pretty impressive explosions so I figured I'd see how much gunpowder I had from creepers to make explosives. Turns out I could make about 10 blocks.

I picked a spot near the bottom of my sub oceanic mine that I felt had been pretty much exhausted. and loaded all the TNT into a little space and set them on fire. Good times ensued! But nothing very exciting. The hole it created wasn't that impressive.

So no matter what I do next, I'll probably also be building a monster trap to aid in the collection of much much more gunpowder from dead creepers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzAofFVTTGQ

$#@%#$%#

I discovered recently the joys of using diamonds for armour and tools. It's awesome. I survived a ton of creeper attacks wearing my diamond armour, and cleared away a ton of dirt with my diamond shovel. For example, I obliterated this hilltop. This is the before picture:

Anyway, I ran out of diamonds so I figured I'd head back to my beach front cave system. I was feeling pretty cocky in my new armour and wasn't finding any diamonds so I kept going deeper and deeper. I scored a lot of iron and gold and then I finally found diamonds. Not a lot, but a little. And then I trapped myself in a dark cave. I was trying to claw my way out and a zombie came up behind me and killed me. Boo-urns.

So now I've got to try to remember my way down to where I was and I've got to do it fast. I had my watch with me, my diamond armour and lots of raw materials. Miraculously I found my way down but too late. I lost my shit. So the next time down I grabbed a couple of signs to help me find my way down faster.

I was besieged by creepers and skeletons and zombies and everything. but I had fresh iron armour, I was holding out okay. So fuck you guys:

I dug deeper and deeper and found one piece of diamond. And then eventually a creeper caught me by enough of a surprise that I couldn't escape. I tried so hard to get down there fast enough but I got hopelessly lost. My shit was gone again.

So I rage-quit to write this blog post and now I think I'll go back and build a rail line down to where I was.

What do I like about Minecraft?

• Surprises. I was digging a tunnel from my train station to my beach front house this evening and I stumbled across several natural caves. One of them was enormous! Tons of charcoal, iron, and even a little gold without having to explore!
• Exploring! In a randomly generated world, I'm seeing everything for the first time. I have no idea what's going to be around the next corner or even under my front doorstep. Remember that expansive cave system under the lake in front of my house? I sure do... even if I'm too scared to visit much because of all the monsters still in there.
• Being afraid of the dark. When I found tonight's surprise cavern, the first thing I did was run away. When I was properly equipped I came back and proceeded to turn on all the lights. I placed torches like a  kid who has just gone home to and empty house after seeing The Exorcist. When I ran out of torches I built walls to prevent any darkness-spawned monsters from chasing me down and exploding. Good thing too.

This is as close as I like to get to creepers when I'm taking a picture

• My Frenemies. Sure, I curse every time a zombie horde kills me hundreds of feet underground when I've been trapped in a labyrinth for virtual days. And creepers blow up my shit all the time, but that just gives me something to fight against. In a world where you can build a skyscraper on your own in a couple of hours, it's important to have something to fight against. My achievements don't mean anything without adversity.
• Building shit. Obviously. =)

I hate creepers

Why do they gotta sneak up on me and explode like that?

What's going on?

Not a whole lot... I started building a massive castle out by my floating cottage. No pictures of the castle yet, but I did find an enormous hole in the ground that I've been adventuring in quite a bit whenever I'm working on it.

A creeper was waiting outside my train station for me. I couldn't run away fast enough to save my house but I made a quick temporary repair.

I built a portal into 'The Nether'. It's spooky as hell in there, and also kind of dangerous. I built another portal hoping it would take me close to my floating cottage, but no such luck. I wandered around for a while trying to find my way back home but eventually just took the portal back. Then I built a compass.

And then I finally finished my glass tower. by this point I was pretty sick of it and I felt it needed something... anything. I added a column of lava down the middle.