Another Goodbye

Tags

houses, Pandamonium 1850 London, RolePlay, roleplay

This was the gorgeous lighting in my Victorian flat just before I put my things back into inventory. The Pandamonium 1850 London roleplay build is gone now. The OOC and IC groups remain for future projects whatever they might be.

 

More Photos Edited; Roleplay and Dancing

Tags

Fallen Gods Inc, Fantasy Faire, Magnificat, Photos, RolePlay, roleplay

Sometimes the hardest thing about blogging is coming up with a title. This post has photos–raw and edited, some observations on roleplay and a little about what I’ve been doing. Maybe I should have titled it blah, blah, blah.

These first three photos were taken at Magnificat at Fantasy Faire, which is now over. I always enjoy Alia Baroque’s work; there are ongoing changes at Fallen Gods Inc which I’ve been checking lately. Even the “work in progress” looks amazing.

The first three photos I just snapped what I saw. I played with changing them and liked the results, shown below. 

I like dancing in SL because my avatar is such an amazing dancer 🙂 and I don’t have to pay so much attention. It’s difficult for me to dance in real life and that’s also why I like it. I once was at an event where someone said there’s nothing more boring than dancing in Second Life. I think listening to strong opinions is more boring myself.

Anyway, someone asked me to go dancing yesterday evening; it was a country place–which I usually don’t go to–and it was fun. I changed out of my Victorian Witch dress and found some jeans in inventory. My feet, chest and hands looked royal blue on my viewer for a while at first. It’s good to have good company in SL, someone who can carry on a conversation and has some patience.

I’m not a long-time roleplayer, been doing it for less than two years and only in SL but have noticed a few things different in my experience lately. I’ve been in meetings talking about roleplaying more than actually playing. I guess that’s fine–being proactive instead of whining and giving up because it’s so hard to get people together. I like that it’s becoming more about the story and that all people’s stories are important instead of having a few players that want to dominate everyone else. 

There are two rp sims that I’m focusing on at the moment and one I’ve seen a few red flags about. While I like that sim owners keep people informed, the information was a little sharp when it came to the reasons why they had to move location and also why they changed furniture from something that didn’t work so well. We all get irritated, I know. And I say “they” because I’m barely established in it and don’t feel like a “we”. The person who approved my bio didn’t send it along to the other admins which has been inconvenient. (Well, I can’t find my NC copy either.)

During my first rp, there was a group of us and some nudity involved. I admit I was horrified when I got an offline group message that photos would be posted. When I looked online, they were taken from a distance and they were just inventory snapshots; I was relieved. Yes, it’s only pixels and no one else seems to care. I’m just mentioning that I have a funny feeling about it and I’m going to possibly be a fool and overlook that. 

My uneasy feeling was intensified when there was a group message about some sex rp that had taken place. Yes, it was kind of amusing. Yes, these players are not at all shy. Yes, I’ve been called a prude several times. Yes, it’s been mentioned to me a few times that sensitive people shouldn’t be on the internet. (What?)

There are all different kinds of people in the world. I’m not even comfortable mentioning the name of the avatar I went dancing with–he’s not likely to ever read this post even. So, this isn’t important to anyone else–just a little conflict I’m having. I haven’t expressed my concern anywhere else but here and haven’t decided if I’m going with or against my better judgement.

I’m pleased with these photos though, and I like blogging and I like when my avatar’s hands, feet and chest are the same skin color as the rest of her.

Tea With a Mutant and an Upper Class Lady

Tags

Pandemonium, RolePlay, roleplay, Story Telling, Victorian, Wren Alcyone

Wren the Witch

Tea and Scones with the Ladies

The annual hula competition is over. The last three nights I watched it from 10:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. my time on the live stream, last night while talking on the phone  with a friend who lives in Hilo and was watching it too.

I haven’t had much sleep lately. Was I ready to get back to important, first life today? No. I had tea in 1850’s London instead.

What Would It Take Not to Change Outfits So Often?

Tags

creativity, LnL Square, Photos, RolePlay, roleplay, Shadowrun, Victorian, virtual destinations

The different activities I participate in require frequent outfit changes, which is all right when I actually get to do something but too often sims have nothing going on at the time to make it worth my while. I greatly prefer not to enter a rp sim dressed inappropriately and certainly don’t want to IM people or groups asking if anyone’s there.

Tending to think there’s a solution for everything or at least a perception to accept and live at peace with circumstances, I wondered how I might make this costume change thing easier.

A few weeks ago I attended an event where I met London Junkers and Lizzie Gudkov. Lizzie left to attend another party; London and I danced and chatted. When I mentioned that I enjoy Victorian roleplay, I was offered an outfit from their product line at LnL Square. It was only later that I learned more of the accomplishments and talents of these partners and by then I already felt comfortable instead of intimidated.

When I visited LnL Square, I took photos of some of the places to hang out, which I’ll post soon. I looked at all the outfits and chose one of many that seemed multi-purpose to me. The above photos were taken at New Gomorrah, with the time being in 2080. In the Shadowrun book I’m reading, there’s mention of the runners wearing dusters. I dress differently when I’m in the Tea and Bath House I manage of course, but this outfit works well for me especially now that my character is becoming more of a bad-ass. 🙂 

Then I walked around one of my Victorian roleplay sims and it worked there as well. This particular unisex outfit is LnL 0_91. They’re all numbered and all the same price. This one has a hat, scarf, collar, belt, cane and coat bottom which are all resizable. I tend to leave the accessories off as I also wear this other places inworld. I get more playtime and have less messing with appearance.

These photos are in low light, I know. I quite fit in, walking around a dangerous area alone at night.This is one of the rare times I ventured into the Vampire hangout. (No one else was around.)

It was fascinating to me to hear about how LnL Square began. It sounded to me like it was an organic process that kept including the next logical step and that it has sustainability, which is a subject dear to me.

It’s wonderful to have vision, to dream big and to bring amazing creations into any reality but I become weary when I feel there’s too much struggle and support needed from me to keep someone else’s dream going. I have my own agendas that need attending. This dynamic is something I’m all too aware of in my first life and I don’t care for it in Second Life.

I really like the new Vintage clothes and also the outfits I got at the Buddy Walk event which I’ve blogged about in the last few months. This outfit is very versatile  for when I log on at odd times and need to check out several places before I find something going on to engage with.

Playing for the Queen

Tags

Legacies 1891, Legacies Nexus, Pearl Grey, RolePlay, roleplay, Story Telling, Victorian, Writing, writing

March 7, 1893

Pearl played for the Queen in her new red gown. The Queen wasn’t actually in the room; Victoria was elsewhere in the world, England to be precise, if she were still alive. Pearl didn’t know for sure because there hadn’t been any news on the island for quite some time.  It was 1893 and Victoria would live for eight more years.

Glancing up at the photograph above the piano, Pearl played her best, which was only average but inspired and that may be more important after all.

Having been born and spending her childhood in France, Pearl hadn’t had Victoria for a Queen for most of her young life. That changed when she found herself in a weird, alternative version of London for what seemed to be an eternity but was actually less than a year. Having learned she had to create a sense of home for herself wherever she was, she’d looked to the larger-than-life Monarch for a sense of normalcy in the nightmarish world she’d found herself in.

London seemed long ago and so far away now. There was no one around to wear the gown for; she’d finally put it on to play to the empty room in the tavern and to the portrait of the Queen.  She’d found the dress packed away in one of her trunks months before, and was looking forward to an opportunity to wear it–an opportunity which had yet to arise.

She continued to lose herself in the music and this let her forget for a while one of the real issues at hand; the ships had stopped coming to the harbor. Not only had there been no news of politics, the theater and of ladies fashion, which she was sure was all changing, but there had been no supplies delivered of late.

There was plenty of liquor in the tavern and she had a fair amount of wealth but the ships had simply ceased arriving. She’d taken careful stock of her food supply, the chutneys she’d made during the winter and the dry goods in the pantry. She’d found a shovel near the open crypt, the one with the coffin and strange altar, nervously borrowing it to turn over some soil to plant a small garden.  There were still tea and scones to be gotten at the Café Serenity and Hester never seemed concerned about anyone starving, although she hadn’t been forthcoming with any details, being as efficient and brisk as ever.

It was likely that all was well; still Pearl could not help but wonder. There were signs that others had been about the island although she rarely saw them.

She sighed and got up from the piano to pour herself another brandy and then raised her snifter in a toast to the portrait of the Queen.

Virtual Lunar New Year Feast

Tags

Arcachon, Grey, learning, Lunar New Year, RolePlay, roleplay, Shadowrun, treet tv

Fried nian gao. Lu rou fan. Ramune and Blueberry cheesecake. I knew what blueberry cheesecake was but not the other meal items before I was treated to a meal for the Lunar New Year over a week ago in Second Life.

I’ve gradually made my own holiday traditions and I like to mark the Lunar New Year in real life but I wasn’t expecting the delightful roleplay I became engaged in. Many of the players on this particular sim have businesses as a sort of front and also for a sense of living in a community while most of our nuyen or credits are obtained through Shadowrunning. I manage the Golden Dragon Tea and Bath House. There’s a diner, a strip club, a pawn shop and also a bakery which usually just sells pastries. Most of the food is of synthetic ingredients in the year 2080.

But on this day when I went into the bakery, the manager made me a virtual meal of traditional Taiwanese food made of “real”, not synthetic ingredients. It came complete with Wikipedia and google links for info and photos of the fried nian gao and Lu rou fan. She described the textures to me and I very much enjoyed the roleplay.

I actually learned about ramune, which is a Japanese soda,  a few weeks ago when  the bakery manager requested it in the Golden Dragon.  It comes in lots of flavors and she requested kiwi. The internet is overwhelmingly full of information and this was a more memorable way to learn something new. It reminded me of the treet tv show about Arcachon which I viewed recently, having visited Arcachon myself several weeks before.

I’ve only recently discovered treet tv when one of the blogs mentioned the show about griefing. The sim Arcachon, like others, is in trouble. I found my visit there to be delightful with many activities to explore and the show really demonstrated the wonderful ways the sim is available to be used as a learning tool regarding language and the culture of the lovely French region.

I eat a very healthy diet and have been experimenting with ways to add a few more Asian foods into my cooking. It’s easier when something gently arrives unexpectedly on my radar instead of my trying to take in a bulk of information.

For me, it’s heartwarming when someone has the time and patience to share what they know in Second Life, which is oh-so-much-more than a game. When you do that, when you can, you might never know what that sort of kindness means to another human being behind a pixel avatar.

On Verbosity and Eating Like a Lady

Tags

Pearl Grey, Photos, RolePlay, roleplay, Second Life

Pearl sees gorgeous food set out for guests and no one else is around.

The above is a photo of Pearl visiting an Open House. There was an inviting display of food set out and if someone made a pig of themselves, I’m totally sure it wasn’t her.

She has also been playing in a Medieval world for small amounts of time and today I checked stats. Pearl is number one in verbosity of twenty four players active recently.

The thought on my mind when I woke up this morning was that if I suddenly discovered I have a British accent today, I would never shut up.

New “Medieval” (Fantasy) Roleplay Home

Tags

Darkmoon Isle, decorating, Medieval, Pearl Grey, RolePlay, roleplay

My room in the attic. There’s a communal bath tub behind the screen.

Most of the second floor is a common area for dining and sitting.

I’m shuffling things around to find time to join a Medieval role play. It isn’t an historically accurate Medieval roleplay; it’s just that we wear closer to Medieval looking clothing and the furnishings and weapons are way more Medieval than not. My female character is not illiterate and I’ll explain that by saying she fled a convent. Yes she traveled alone to another city, a city that has at least one dragon.

I love the sim build and have quite a few photos of it I haven’t shown here yet. It uses the LaRPs HUD and meter which I like and the sim owners are very kind, reliable and patient so far. I don’t want to get disappointed again so I’m not renting yet.

This will be my home when I begin. One of my buddies will be my cousin and he’s a Watch member; it’s his place. His office is on the first floor. I got to furnish most of the building, needing to keep it all under 150 prims. I find decorating very relaxing and it diminishes my real world compulsive shopping to nest my own home. (I have an interest in quirky art and antiques.)

I have several kinds of foods I can place on the table. There’s a pie on it now. I also have a bowl of apples, a jar of mead and some glasses and a plate of fresh baked bread.

While I was doing the shopping and placing of furnishings on Saturday, the sim builder brought in some foggy weather and it was very beautiful.

Meanwhile Back in Second Life

Tags

destinations, Medieval, Pearl Grey, roleplay

I’ve made several attempts to attend BURN2 and my laptop, drivers and/or viewer can’t deal with it.

Maybe it’s because I have too much I want to do right now that made my joining the Darkmoon Isle roleplay sim take longer than I expected. There were glitches with the meter and my trying to fix it got me in deeper. Somehow the typing animation got turned on in my AO and it took me awhile to figure that out.  As of now, I believe I’m set. Both my friend and the sim builder were patient and kind which is much appreciated.

It’s a medieval sim and I’m a peasant so I won’t have to be changing clothes a lot. I’ll mostly be my usual pleasant, friendly character. I just don’t feel like being mean although I’ve certainly had to deal with my exasperated feelings in real life. Many other people are feeling that same way too, I can tell. We’re being called to be more authentic which isn’t popular.

I see light at the end of the tunnel.

The photos were taken at Hobo Island during a visit Sunday evening. I’d been wishing I had building skills and quickly looked at a few areas listed in the destination guide as having resources.

S.I.C. ~ Part Two of Four

Tags

Photos, RolePlay, roleplay, Science Innovation Company, Second Life

I became so comfortable and unguarded walking around and then almost got hit by a bus that looked just like this one a few moments later. It was rather amusing at the time.

There weren’t any places to live that I could find except for this really trashed apartment.