Victory Dance

Last night’s dance raised around 11,000L (about $43 USD), including long-distance donations from friends who couldn’t make the dance itself.

Add to that $45 donated to PayPal so far.

Add to that the 10K lindens (about $40 USD) out of my own savings I’m cashing out.

Add to that the $36 in CD sales and donations from my RL workplace.

If I’m doing my math right, that’s about $161 raised so far. That’s almost enough to get him there, based on the discount rates Lelani in her Travel Agent Powerz has been able to find. That’s pretty friggin’ good for just a couple of days.

Of course we’ll still have to work out a return flight too (I DO want him BACK!) but that’s not as pressing an issue yet. I’m just very happy and thankful for what we’ve gotten from such wonderful people (except that one who’s an evil poisoned soul and don’t you ever forget it) so far.

RL Rears Its Ugly Head

I always liked that phrase.  Such good imagery.  “Rears its ugly head” conjures up images of a sleeping monster suddenly awakened, and as soon as you see that head come up, oh kids you know you’re in for it.

Well, the ugly head that RL has reared in our world is none other than The Big One itself. It’s not death that’s already happened, however; nor is it a death that’s preventable. It’s not a “matter of life and death”, no no, it’s a matter of just death.

Himself’s mother, in Ohio, is dying. I won’t go too much into the uncomfortable details except to say that she’s of sound mind and in such state has refused a feeding tube, and her power of attorney has made the difficult (but, I believe, right) decision to abide by that.

We’re struggling, and I do mean struggling, to scrape together the money to get him out to Ohio to see her in time. I can’t go with him, because we don’t know how long a period he would be there, and with my work schedule and the four-footed-kid to take care of, it’s really just best to fly him (and only him) out there and have him stay with his sister’s family for as long as is necessary.

At my RL workplace, I’ve been selling CDs I made back in ’06. Kids’ bedtime stories. Small glimmer of silver in the lining, it’s been motivation for me to start getting my work out. And, so far, I’ve sold a small handful. The type of people who frequent my workplace really aren’t the ideal audience for that CD, so knowing that, I say it’s done surprisingly well.

Tomorrow night 8:30 PM in SL I’m doing a DJ set at my friend Tel’s club, the Cat’s Meow, in the hopes of getting some more Ls to put toward himself’s travel fund.

And, I’m not comfortable with asking this, but this isn’t about my comfort zone. There’s a button in the right margin, where you can make a PayPal donation if you really want to, to help us out. I know himself would really appreciate this and so would I, so… please.

And thank you.

Edit: It’s been brought to my attention that something may be amiss with the button. Until I can get my ape brain to figure out what, the PayPal address is peaseblossomscloset (at) yahoo (dot) com.

Also, I want to take a moment to thank the people who have donated, who have given the message signal boost, and who have done some amazing legwork to put this in the realm of possibility, rather than just hoping against hope. I can’t say how much I appreciate the wonderful people I’m so fortunate to know. In no particular order: Lelani for her amazing Travel Agent Powerz, her generous donation, and for blogging about this; Honour for retweeting the link; Carrie for retweeting the link and her generous donation; Crap for both retweeting the link and for his generous donation; Tel for loaning me his club as a venue and for his generous donation; PJ for her generous donation and hugs; Wulf for his generous donation… I hope I don’t forget anyone, but if I do, please know it’s not my intent and I thank you more than words can express. I’m not ashamed to say I cried today, knowing what amazing people are in my life.

Humm Magazine

How to be a Terrible SL Cyberlover

©Humm Magazine March 3, 2011

Okay. Let’s say you’ve already taken care of the preliminaries. You’ve got your stock SL body adjusted for maximum sexiness: for women, boobs and legs at 100%, the rest of you as skinny as you can make her. For men: shoulders and muscularity likewise maxed out , over a tiny wasp waist with no ass, and your Av as big as you can possibly make him, because you know women find that lummox-on-steroids look absolutely irresistible. You’ve got on your found-in-the-gutter  freebie hair–for women, that shapeless Lego-like blob, preferably in red; for men, either He-Man shoulder-length locks or the newer, urban-hip, close-to-the-skull brown fuzz that makes you look like your head’s been flocked. You’re wearing your new sexy threads that look like they’re painted on because they are, and you’ve got that Super-Noobie spastic-bird-walking-into-the-wind gait down pat. You’re…

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July

Anyone who’s read my blog for at least one of its four years has probably picked up on a pattern by now. Then again I flatter myself, to think anyone really gives enough of a good god damn about my SL habits to look for a pattern. Anyway what I’m getting at is this: when summer, and especially July, comes about, the number of fucks I give for SL takes a nosedive.

A lot of that is seasonal, of course. Summer in Maine is very short. My one weekend of vacation occurs in July. My wedding anniversary is in July. My nieces are on summer vacation so we finally get a chance to hang out. As a result of all of these seasonal occurrences, RL not only comes first (as it always does), it plainly overshadows SL interests in ways that aren’t equalled in other months.

Consider, too, SL right now. The bubble has burst, make no mistake; the big crowds that were at the medieval faire I organized in August of 08 simply don’t exist anymore. Now I don’t buy wholly into the idea that SL is doomed and that the other shoe will drop at X date and after that SL will be Gone Forever. I think it’s more like when the “dot-com” bubble burst: it didn’t kill the Internet, obviously. I’m still here, you’re still here. It’s probably more like the Hype Cycle, and right now, SL is in the trough.

Add to that the fact that my most productive avatar, the one that I build most with and make most money with, still can’t log in. So, shop work isn’t happening. So my interest is waning more still.

And finally, back to RL a moment, I’m working on a book. More information on that another time. I’m trying to stay focused on it as much as I can, to keep it from becoming yet another project that I start and then forget about.

But, anyway, those who (I flatter myself to think) are worried about not seeing me much lately inworld? Don’t be. It’s just July is all.

Clover is MIA – UPDATED

I mean, no, she’s not the rapper, I mean she’s missing in action. Only that’s not a really apt comparison, in that she can’t log in and therefore there is no action in which to be missing.

It’s Day 4 now that I’m unable to log her in. I type in her name, her password, click login, the rainbow pinwheel spins, and then the viewer crashes.

But here’s the thing: it’s only when I try to log on Clover. Mistletoe, no problem. Petal, Piggy, any of the others, no problem.

It’s got me especially worried because guess who is the main income earner of our family of alts. I’ll give you a hint: not Petal.

So now I’m working out a contingency plan so that at least some of the income earned can make its way to avatars who can log in and pay for things like, oh, rent. I may have to split earnings on items sold at Marketplace with either Mistletoe or Piggy (Piggybank is, well, the money holding alt). It will completely mess up my sales records but it will help keep the doors open at least. I’m able to set up sales on my in-world vendors (I LOVE YOU HIPPO!!) to do the same thing if needed.

Who needs accurate sales reports anyway? I mean it’s not like I’m trying to run a serious business in Second Life or anything.

Let me state for the record that Secondlife.com makes asking for help an exercise in making the simple extremely complicated. I like their little dropdown menu system for filing a ticket, except it lacks a very necessary choice: “None of the above”. To even find where or how to file a ticket is a hunt in itself. What the hell do they expect new people to do? Suddenly I totally understand why people keep tweeting Rodvik with their technical issues: because what the hell else are we supposed to do? Still, I’m trying to go through the “proper channels”, even though I’m reminded of that line from The Train about normal channels existing to entrap the incompetent.

So I’m doing what I can, which is mostly walking the floor and logging on Mistletoe. I could put her face on her own milk carton*. Have you seen me?

*-Oh except I can’t because guess who built the milk carton in the first place…

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EDIT 7/12 – I went to the forums, did some looking around, and I suspect that something with Clover’s settings on the SL Viewer is causing the problem. I even discovered that I can log her on with Imprudence (first thing I did: gave all my Ls to Piggybank!). I saw some information on how to reset her setting if I had a PC, but nothing yet for us lonesome Mac users. But I’m working on figuring it out.

Oh no! Dramatic Woe!

I stumbled onto a small shop called SWAN Animations by way of the Marketplace.

So I went to check out some of their animations in person. Not a bad selection at all, and I can see some of them being very useful if I’m going to make machinima. Like this one, called Dramatic Woe. Nabbed it for 50L. I’m demonstrating it along with the classic YadNi Emoter HUD.

Most of their animations are no-copy, and as such, are pretty reasonably priced. Check them out for yourselves in-world.

I’ll likely pick up a few more of their goodies when I have more funds, especially their “carrier” sets, and their medievally geek-liscious Horse’s Bransle dance poseball set.

Bitten By the Bug

So yesterday, just for fun, I downloaded CaptureMe. It’s a free/opensource screen-and-video capture application for the Mac. Its video capabilities are limited; it will shoot up to 60 seconds of video, but no audio.

Well, that got me thinking about a medium that used images but no audio: old-fashioned silent films.

So, to familiarize myself with the process and to try it out, I made this.

I think it’s gonna give Citizen Kane a run for its money. It’s got a little bit of something for everyone, I think: cute burlesque moves and lots of leg for those who are into women; cute clothing for those who aren’t.

Well now I’m all bitten by the bug, as it were. I want to make an honest-to-goodness movie now, with plot and characters and everything. I don’t know WHAT said plot will be, right yet. I don’t need anything too epic, I’m not looking to make Birth of a Nation here or anything. But while I’m sorting that out, I’ve been working on the rest of the day-at-the-movies experience. I’ve got a burlesque short, done, bully for me, I’m almost done with a “newsreel” about the Great Fire of Antique Square (THIS IS MY NOTE TO MYSELF: ASK LELANI IF YOU CAN USE HER PICTURES KTHX), and I’m even dabbling with a short cartoon idea.

Thaddeus is toying with the idea of re-opening his movie theater, in Steelhead. I’m thinking a film festival, or at least picture show, would be a really cool thing to share there.

I might even do a tutorial on making silent movies, using CaptureMe and iMovie. Think anyone would be interested in that?

By the way, the music came from this excellent website. He’s got a ton of royalty-free music to use, including a suprisingly large silent movie score selection, that’s free so long as you give him credit for it.

Destruction at Antique Square

So last night was, as promised, my biggest and most explosive fireworks show ever. The opening didn’t go according to plan; I had a whole carefully programmed (pyreographed?) show to accompany Fanfare for the Common Man. And I was going to have the text spell out the well-known sentence from the Preamble to the Declaration: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,” etc. But the text launcher decided it would fire text when it wanted to, not when I wanted it to, so I finally took it back into inventory and just kinda winged it.

The downside to that was that I had way more explosives going than I wanted, that early in the program. I like to crescendo my way in with these. Start small, build up. It’s the pyrotechnician’s rule: don’t blow your load in the first two minutes. Lots of people, actually, could gain from this knowledge. I’m looking at YOU, ex-boyfriend. But I digress!

The upside to the show was, with the scope of the finale, nobody even remembers the opening number.

A Faster Way to Program Your Fireworks

So if you’re a pyromaniac– er, pyrotechnician in Second Life, like me, then surely you’re familiar with the DeCuir programmable launchers. They are, and rightly so, an industry standard for blowing things up artfully.

But, if you want to program your own show, it can get a bit time-consuming. You click “queue”. Wait for the menu. Scroll from page to page. Select your effect. Wait for another menu to load to select your delay, and so on. With the Big Night drawing ever closer, you want a quick and easy way to program those notecards to put in your HUD for the show.

Well today, after rigorous testing and observation, I’ve figured out that way. I’ve cracked the code that probably many before me also have, but I’m actually going to tell you how it works.

Fireworks: You Simply Can Not Miss…

Click to visit the site inworld!

I gotta say, I’m pretty freakin’ proud of how the poster came out for this Wednesday night’s boomy fun.

I used a historical example:

Click for source.

I originally did the crossed firecrackers, but it made the poster seem too busy. So I went without.

But, anyway! Wednesday night. I’m drilling this into your head. Come at 8:30 PM to Antique Square. See the biggest and most explosive fireworks show I’ve done to date. Things MAY get destroyed in the process. And by “may” I mean “will”. After the fireworks, the after party, I’m DJing. Lots of genres so everybody’s guaranteed to hate at least one song.

Come to this if you don’t hate America. YOU DON’T HATE AMERICA DO YOU?!