atomic-raygun

 
             

   
 
 
----------->vivian-oblivion<--------

Site Feed

www.flickr.com

31 May 2005

 
I just went to Faded Reality sim as I heard it was going - I was there at the moment they deleted Chicago - it all just disappeared. Unfortunate in that they hadn't intended for it to be so fleeting, had put a great deal of work into it, and it was enjoyed by the people who visited. It had a hat shop, too. I think I visited the hat shop 3 or 4 times.


 
I did the summer school flyer, and finished the invitations, etc. etc. Talked to B<3 who was embarrassed to ask me to do so many bazillions of graphics jobs at the last minute. Eh - I'd do almost anything for Wa He Lut. Talked to Tiff who is in a bad way with a broken tusk. Even in pain and with appointments she is concerned about making sure things go well for my yearbook and has put herself at my disposal.

In Second Life I went to Chase's Manhattan to race as a giant snail. I realise I almost always go when Bunny IMs me and I almost never go when he doesn't. I won by a mile even though it was an updated snail with "bouncy feet" and the track had a missing piece which had me stymied on the first lap. I won a lot of things including a bluebird avatar, so I put it on and flapped about for a bit. It has the unmistakeable Bunny stamp in its goofy demeanor.

I wrote this and Blogger ate it. I hate re-writing things. I wonder why the "recover post" button never works.


 



30 May 2005

 
The Grignano Bros. Circus is coming to town!

A munchkin from last year's Oz juggles brightly-colored balls.

A out-of-work pirate from Neverland has found a job as a strongman.

Osprey eats her candy floss at the circus.


 
Matisse said, "Only what I created after the illness
constitutes my real self: free, liberated"



28 May 2005

 
In Second Life I accidentally went on another enormously long walk - with the Zealots again. It was fun. We started out in Grignano in the Zealotmobiles, then after that didn't work very well we marched all the way to Arena. Then we all danced around for a while. We converted some Terrans on the way and wound up at the end with 10 or so Zealots and one persistent Terran griefer who turned into a snowman at the end and danced with us. I got shot a time or two and hit with a land-protection script that threw me and another Zealot a long way.

I'm the second from the left.


 
And here are some typical Second Life shoes.


 
In Second Life:
Someone asked me to make ninja duds yesterday so I did - transformed into Oz temporarily to adjust the fit. Color is what was requested, although it can be darkened.

Today I was in the Photography Gallery (upstairs from the Studio) and I found a transparent, invisibl;e prim that belonged to someone who had entered the contest. How did I find it? Well, just by accident. I couldn't see it. I asked TigerLady J. to come and delete it, which she did, and then very kindly demonstrateded the "pounce" anim that I was interested in seeing.

Very nice anim.

Enjah has made a theatre at her gallery, and is adapting A Midsummer Night's Dream. What she has so far is very funny - I can imagine it with all the Second Life accoutrements like hootchie hair, bling, and excessively high platform shoes.

We rented the other apartment across the hall from the photog gallery. We're making a weird shop. I'm just trying to have fun here, as I make money elsewhere by making clothing and things - my original idea was for a shop of artist-made quirky items.


 
Yesterday it was 95 degrees, and it was a completely bad day for reasons I'll encode thusly: cn7[muhj7;) 8@#$%^&*$# ^$%#$^ $&#&^(^% ye*&#&% ^ufy &*e%r^&$ %te yr & ^ger^@



24 May 2005

 
Actual Real Life
Had a really good and productive day today! Yay! I got the last pages of the yearbook printed, so it's ready to be collated and sent to the bindery. Kaylani conducted interviews with the 8th graders, made a page in Photoshop, and we printed that on the reverse of the back cover. The eighth graders -every year - get misty at the point when they realise they won't be coming back. They typically are extremely nice and helpful - this year was no different, and I had 8th graders everywhere all day. Michael told me he'd miss me, which was nice of him to say - I told him the plain truth, which is that he's one in a million and will go on to great things. It's true - his weaving, carving, drawing, love of all aspects of traditional Native culture will stand him in good stead. Although no one knows what he will wind up doing, he is sure to be a leader of his people in some way, at a time when leaders are needed. I delivered the poster to Skunkie, and B<3 emailed me last night wiith a "help!!!" to ask me to do the graduation program. I did two parts of the four part program last night and emailed them to her. The last two parts need the program and a quotation, which she'll email me so I can cut'n'paste (I hope). I have to do the graduation invitations and the pow wow program, and next week I'll finish up the binder kind of yearbooks (I let the 8th graders and art students make yearbooks with binders and page-protecters - because they want to be special and because I can use up my single sided copies that way). After school Rosanne met me at the body shop and drove me home. It was very nice of her.

In Second Life I wondered - if Enjah (who is sometimes a leopard) made her head big, and I made my head tiny could I then put my head in her mouth? It was not QUITE satisfactory so she made a cool lion head, then made a backdrop for it.
Os fearlessly puts her head into the lion's mouth in her death-defying circus act.



23 May 2005

 
Man walks in, I say, "Sit in the chair," so he does, then looks at me and say, "Mind telling me what we're doing?" He's brand new, and I think he's going to be just fine.



 



22 May 2005

 
65 Entries
There were people here all night.
I hung the show with Enjah in utter chaos. She kept crashing madly every two minutes, and the "given rights" deal that I thought would make it easy for us to create and move/modify the pictures seemed to result in things I made getting switched to being owned by Enjah, and neither of us being able to move or modify them. She had to delete them all, which was a bummer, but it certainly would've been worse if she hadn't been able to. People came up and talked to me, gave me things, IMed me, etc. the entire time I was trying to iron out the display problems, so I felt overloaded for a bit.

Note: It worked out fine, but as it turned out, I spent from Saturday at 11:30 am to midnight, Sunday the same, and Monday 7:30-8:30 and 11am-afternoon sometime getting it set up and judged, names displayed, and signs made, forum entries posted, winners paid. We were in "Popular Spots" on Sunday, which was unexpected. I had thought we'd get 5 or 10 entries if we were lucky.



21 May 2005

 
Second Life
I set up a contest in the Photography Studio in Grignano, and I hoped I'd get some entries. There are STILL two people there taking snaps. I got 26 so far today. There's tomorrow, then Enjah, Valdora, and I will judge. I offered 400L for first, then Enj up and funded 2nd-5th! There are some very good pictures. I didn't know my 12-1pm event would be an all-day job. Hope it's calmer tomorrow.

There was a LINE today, and some excitement when the sim was reset and took a few minutes to come back. Grignano is an old sim - that is, an old simulator=server. It's old in SL terms, that is. The new equipment is very much faster - greater computing power. Grignano is over a year old. Still, it functions quite well. I went to Bedford yesterday, and that poor sim must be broken or something - it was hideous. The time dilation was .01 - holy moley.



20 May 2005

 


 
Yesterday I parked, went up to jin shin, then as I was coming out of jin shin and going next door to get my hair cut I saw that some idiot had dented my car - it was the sidewalk side, above the door handle - so a deliberate punch or perhaps the hadlebars of a bicycle. Sean and Kevin came out and looked at it and said it looked like a prime candidate for the paintless dent removal. I had my doubts as it's a complicated area, there, but I hoped. Sean said, "At least it doesn't affect your driving so you don't have to get it fixed right away." I was horrified, "Of COURSE I have to get it fixed IMMEDIATELY." Sean said, "We're shocked that you are SO SHALLOW." Then every five minutes as he was cutting my hair he'd remind me about the dent and I'd scream - it was really funny, actually. I love those guys.

Today I went stomping about getting estimates, and the paintless dood said it was a bit beyond their scope (I figured). He mentioned body shop X, I said I usually go to Y, and he said Y is equally good. I hadn't been going to return to my body shop as I had overspray last time - besides, I had them because they were on the way to my mum's house. I did, however, return to them. It's always nice to have cultivated a car place so they know you, I suppose. They will drop my car off, which is helpful, and give me a ride if I need one when I leave poor Sha there. Sux to have to pay a huge amount of money because of some horrible asshat, but I don't have a choice - or, rather, my choice is to suffer the visual and emotional blight or pay a lot of money.



18 May 2005

 
Holy moley, long day at work, but it was very productive despite the fact that there were 10 people printmaking in my space all day. I have a headache from the ink and heat, and the printer needed a new drum kit and a cyan toner cartridge, but the Lushootseed page, traditional ways page, grade 3 and grade 3 activities pages, kitchen id cards, grade 6 (to finish the run), cover, back page, and autograph page all got printed. I have to do the art page, finish the staff page, and decide what I can do with the wretched sports -- I may make a page that has various highlights like the performance group, volleyball team pix, that sort of thing. Skunk came in and gave me another big project - ANOTHER (the third) poster. This one is double sided. I did the front just now. I MAY go in to school next Tuesday, as next week is the do-or-die week for the yearbook. Tiff (thank you, Tiff!) is going to collate it all and take it to wherever I specify to be bound. I know she doesn't want to go to the place I want her to go to, though, so I might go with the closer (but lesser quality, to my mind) place to which we have the Keys to the Kingdom... I mean a credit card.
I feel like my sinuses are going to peel off and explode.

I popped into Second Life for no reason. I just rented, in partnership with Enjah, the upper apartment at The Brownstone East because I had an idea or 500 and required it. I want to have space for the results of photography contests using the backdrops in the Photography Studio, and I want a shop selling weird artist's products, probably using temp-on-rez holographic vendors because it would save prims and look better than ordinary vendors (which look horrid). Selador came to see Enjah's studio the other day, and we wound up in Cafe Jack, having met a neighbor who is a storyteller. We twisted her arm to get her to write a 15 minute play for Eileen McTeague to perform on the stage there (actually there was no twisting involved, but it sounds fierce and tough to say that). Eileen will perform there in a month or whenever we get a play. I tried to enlist Sel as an actor but he became temp-on-rez and disappeared at the thought.

Last night I logged in for a moment, and was IMed by a woman who had asked me to make a custom outfit a couple of days ago. I'd sent it to her and asked her to acknowledge receipt, but she hadn't received the folder. She asked me what it was that I was sending, and I said outfitX that she'd ordered. She said, "OMG LOL" She'd forgotten in about a day. Time is odd in Second Life. A day is about a week, perhaps.

I then went to see Psi build his house - need to go back and check it out. His first build! I don't think he's taken a building class - that might've been useful.



16 May 2005

 
Oopsie
Today there was a general message sent out by Robin Linden to say, "Don't touch your inventory!" I think I broke Second Life. Spent time doing the staff page of the yearbook, missed jin shin as my battery was flat (door not quite closed). Made a new picture in the photo studio, saw Enj and was relieved to hear her swollen ankle that is a septic joint, gout, or a sprain according to the E.R. has been looked at by an orthopedist who ruled out the first two. She says it's a lot better.

Must go and lash myself a few times for making S.L. trouble.





15 May 2005

 
Last night I went into Project Entropia to run around until I got killed as I like the landscape. I wound up staying but a few minutes as I was immediately addressed by two players and I was having a hard time remembering the UI. I quit and logged into There and actually never even loaded - went back to Second Life, punched in, and it connected right away. I didn't do anything much, just wandered about.
This morning I logged in easily, then left, and now can't log in again - it would be better if it just made me focus on rl work, of which I have tons. Instead it makes me feel restive and I don't do much that could truthfully be called productive.

This is somewhere on the new continent. It's much more vibrant than it looks in this jpeg.



14 May 2005

 

A creative method of giving a message to LL by someone on the preview grid.
"Down with Pants" not "ants"
I was trying to see what the alpha situation would be - good, but in Ahern I could see grass through the cutouts.

I'd logged in to the preview grid as I (and 99% of the rest of us) couldn't log into the main grid. I'm pretty useless at preview testing, so I don't usually attempt it. There were a few people, then that became a handful. The forum is full of hostile people clamoring for blood, and the 1.6.5 roll-out is not supposed to happen until Tuesday. That update is the big fix, we hope, but no one wants to wait that long.


 
Yesterday I spent literally hours cleaning my inventory, which is the digital version of Fibber McGee's closet. I IMed Robin Linden and said Linden Lab should declare a Clean Your Inventory Day, with Philip cutting a ribbon on a trash compacter, and humorous speeches. I said our inventories are out of hand. She IMed back and said she loved the idea and would see if it would work. I know we were all waiting until 1.6 because we THOUGHT we'd have multiple-select in inventory - a sad delusion on our parts since there was nothing of the kind. I went to Goguen sandbox and dragged things onto the ground to see what they were, deleting like a mad thing. I deleted everything named "object," ALL the avatars and 90% of the clothes I hadn't made myself, duplicates of anything, things I hadn't used or had outgrown. I found a few things I'd lost, but I found neither my funny-nose-moustache-glasses nor my twitchy scripted tail that Enjah gave me. I will say that the fact that I've been looking for those two things for months says something about me...


 
There's some kind of problem with Second Life so that hardly anyone can log in. I had been in a snow sim with Psi, who had just bought some land and was starting to build a house ("How do you make a window?"). I logged out to go and drink some more coffee and couldn't log in again. Such is life. I had a look at the forum to see if it was widespread or just me - and holy moley people need to meditate. It's like a pack of dogs that is playfully romping, then suddenly begins fighting. The forum is horrid, anyway, as are most forums - but I get a lot of very good information from the forum that I know no other way of acquiring. Things like notice of new builds, Linden information, scripts, interesting events people are hosting, builds that are going away. My own opinion is that animosities generated by forum posts should never come inworld, and that the only way to decide if someone is worth bothering with or not is to meet that person inworld. Lately there's been a huge uproar related to a certain player's posts. One post in particular was literally the first post that ever made me angry. I usually take things with a grain of salt, but it wasn't possible to do anything other than bang things around in the kitchen after reading this post. On the other hand, the person, who I met a couple of weeks ago, has always been perfectly fine inworld, at least to me. This is interesting to think about. The forum can be the digital equivilent of a soap box, but why do some people become completely horrible when the attention of the forum is focused on them, while others maintain a light touch? Is it a matter of a sense of humor?



13 May 2005

 
This is the first year I've seen red-winged blackbirds here, and apparently there is a nest somewhere to my right as I sit here looking out at the lake, as I have seen - 3 times - the tiny but brave red-winged blackbird chasing a bald eagle, who is hot-footing it to my left. Twice it was full-grown eagles, and today I saw an immature one flapping away in an agitated manner with a speck-sized r.w.bb. chasing it. What bravery!


 
Finally the horrendous, noisy machines are gone! I'm 99% dead but may regenerate from that last 1%. I slept on the old, horrible couch last night - unable to face my bed. The couch belongs to my landlords, and first I asked them to move it before I moved in, then I relented and allowed it to stay. I never sit on it, but if someone is able to extend it (which I'm not) it's a hide-a-bed of a rudimentary sort. Samantha slept on it for 3 months, so I suppose it has its uses. It is, however, narrow, low, 45 years old, and supremely uncomfortable, and I never even SIT on it, let alone sleep on it.

I was delving into my inventory with an idea of organising things a bit, in Second Life just now, when Enjah turned up and we went over to LF's Coffee Talk or whatever it's called to shoot the breeze. I made a "Norma" poster last night - Eileen posing as Norma, with Oz as Pollione - and we want to branch out into movie posters.


I was in my photography studio last night when Salvador shouted, "Hi, Osprey." He says he has people interested in renting. There are 4 apartments in The Brownstone East, and I'm trying to figure out how to justify renting one to make another gallery.



11 May 2005

 
Psi

I told him I thought it would be fun to set up a vampire backdrop for a while. He told me he has a coffin and black candles... maybe the backdrop could be the inside of a mausoleum...


 
Well, day 2 with no rest because of the intense noise from the water-sucking machines. Earplugs, pillow over the head... I was so tired at work I was on the verge of making a mistake on the yearbook (which is a bit complicated). Happily, I managed to muster my 4 brain cells in time. Tiff was back from Australia and brought me a T shirt. Rosanne told me she is going to go to Italy next winter and won't work at the school, so I told her - to help her know she'd made the correct decision - that the board made her employment contingent upon me. That is, if I had decided not to go back they wouldn't have given her a contract. Since I'm not quite ready to starve to death in the gutter I'd said I was going back. The BIA is coming to meet with the school reforn committee, three-fourths of which have decided not to extend their careers in our direction next year. Tiff is running around shoring things up out of milk-horse conditioning, and I said to her, "Tiff! You don't work here!" I am being Zen-like as usual about the strange goings-on at school. I've been there since 1990 - I've been there longer than anyone else. School has always been very supportive of me, and it's been a very interesting experience. As I told Rosanne, though, that's my experience and others have decidedly different opinions on things.



10 May 2005

 
Yesterday there was a huge noise all of a sudden, and Jessica came to my door in hysterics. I'd determined that it wasn't in the garage, so Jessica called John to ask him where a spare key was so she could get in his place. She wound up having to break down the door. Once there, she saw it was to do with the water heater, so I cut off the power to the pump and the noise stopped. John's place and her place are flooded in areas. I think a repairman came out and mended the pressuriserer thingy. The carpet people got here and worked on the disaster part.

There are machines running day and night to dry things - it sounds like a jet plane on the runway. The machines are to be here four days. Sleep is... not exactly out of the question, but is only possible with earplugs, drugs, and a Zen-like adherence to calm. Today I officially feel like sh it. Only three more days to go! Jessica says it's worse downstairs. She brought me some nice young salaad greens from the school's organic farm. W00t! I trundled off and ate some as soon as she left.

Today is Family Culture Night, and we've piggybacked our virtual world open house onto it - so I have to be inworld and at least semi-concious from 6-8. Well, probably not all the way to 8.



09 May 2005

 
Firefox just crashed and my long post was lost. Why didn't Blogger's "recover post" work? You tell me.

I finally did the third grade pages for the yearbook - I'd been putting them off as the pictures R took were bad, mismatched, etc. - but now if I get one child's photograph tomorrow it will be done. I need to make a Language-Keepers page so I can print out a copy to give to Misty on Wednesday, spuring her on, thusly, to contribute a paragraph about her program and/or an example of Quilshootseed. One would imagine people would be only too happy to have a page about their work included in a color book that gets around as much as this one does -- Cornell has 'em, yearbooks go to coferences and workshops nationwide. In my experience, however, people thing THEY are doing ME a favor.

In Second Life I made a little sofa (my first upholstered furniture) this morning so people have more options for their photo-taking. I want to vary the backdrops every week or so. It's difficult sticking within the 50-prim limit. That means the sofa won't last long as it's 10 prims.

Count my prims in this picture:

Pictures on wall=4
Sofa=10
Table=1
Vase=3
Flowers=2
Picture on table=1
21 prims and that's just one part of the photography studio.

Enjah lost her Rosie dog last night. It was a 17-year relationship.

I hung out briefly with Psi and June last night which necessitated installing Teamspeak as June doesn't type. I hate voice.

I made a staff last night - my first attempt. I made it in ten minutes so I'd have something new to drag around at Numbakulla. I'd starting doing the quest then logged out. When I logged in all the quest objects were gone. Bummer.



08 May 2005

 
The Pot-Healers project on Numbakulla just opened to the public. It's a beautiful place with a quest for visitors, which I haven't done yet. Caliandris P. told me last night it would be up for two or three months. Numbakulla is Moopf M.'s sim, and this project was chosen from a group of project applications.

Reminds me of Saja.

I'm a sucker for giant plants.

I am getting maximum enjoyment out of my moth antennae - won't take them off.



07 May 2005

 
Moth swarm in Second Life
I made a new moth and some antennae a few minutes before the event at 7pm. I'd listed it and was running it - not my forte, but it was great. I was glad when Prokofy - whose idea this is - managed to come. We had around ten moths, and we flew around the temple then flew off to lay dwell eggs at various people's properties. One place was a fantastic build by DNA P., and I posted a shot from there to Snapzilla, prompting a stranger to IM me that very second.


Athena
Today was the opening of Athena, and I'd made a Hera avatar. It was fun, and I was tied for second place in their mythological beings contest. Enjah came briefly. Her poor dog is elderly, and having troubles lately. Enj has the right attitude, which is that she will pamper Rosie and let her eat people food, since the dog's days are dwindling.

Jase as Ares, Fallingwater was a fountain (she changed), Brace as Artemis, and Os as Hera. That's part of the line-up.



06 May 2005

 
Enjah had to pose as the child, then pose again as the mother and I put the two together. She's good at making avatars.


 
Eileen McT posed for these two shots. Enjah was very patient - It's not easy getting just the right picture.

I made her poke that wretched boy in the eye with her paintbrush.

I've announced the photography studio on the forum as a place anyone can go to use the backdrops and make screenshots. I think most people will want to manipulate the images themselves.
This is a place to start - if it keeps on being fun I'd like to branch out into, say, 1950s shots (snaps or glam), and faux paintings of medieval people. Dek suggested steampunk, which would be very, very cool.



04 May 2005

 
Photos I took today of the photography studio in Grignano I made yesterday. Man is Dek, who popped by before he went to work.

Looking in the doorway

Made yesterday

Made today



02 May 2005

 
Birds at Riverwalk

Feed them seed and they fly over, peck, then leave when the seed is gone.

 

.

Site Feed

vivian-oblivion

oblivionstore

firemist red

Combat Cards

Blip TV Rocks

So many things to do, so little motivation

Backpacking Burro

Salazar Jack

Lucy Sits Up and Blogs

Tina's Universum

Nova Albion Detective Agency

Playing Statues

Yarn Miracle

Baedeker

Don Carson Creative

Flummer, Flummel, Flummo

Elle Coyote

Painting Soul

Upload Video and Images - Putfile

Artists Union

Tempietto

2002-10 2002-11 2002-12 2003-01 2003-03 2003-04 2003-05 2003-06 2003-07 2003-08 2003-09 2003-10 2003-11 2003-12 2004-01 2004-02 2004-03 2004-04 2004-05 2004-06 2004-07 2004-08 2004-09 2004-10 2004-11 2004-12 2005-01 2005-02 2005-03 2005-04 2005-05 2005-06 2005-07 2005-08 2005-09 2005-10 2005-11 2005-12 2006-01 2006-02 2006-03 2006-04 2006-05 2006-06 2006-07 2006-08 2006-09 2006-10 2006-11 2006-12 2007-01 2007-02 2007-03 2007-04 2007-05 2007-06 2007-07 2007-08 2007-09 2007-10 2007-11 2007-12 2008-01 2008-02 2008-03 2008-04 2008-05 2008-06 2008-07 2008-08 2008-09 2008-10 2008-11 2008-12 2009-01 2009-02 2009-03 2009-04 2009-05 2009-06 2009-07 2009-08 2009-09 2009-10 2009-11 2009-12 2010-01 2010-02 2010-03 2010-04 2010-05 2010-06 2010-07 2010-08 2010-09 2010-10 2010-11 2010-12 2011-01 2011-02 2011-03 2011-04 2011-05 2011-06 2011-07 2011-08 2011-09 2011-10 2011-11 2011-12 2012-01 2012-02 2012-03 2012-04 2012-05 2012-06 2012-07 2012-08 2012-09 2012-10 2012-11 2012-12 2013-01 2013-02 2013-03 2013-04 2013-05 2013-06 2013-07 2013-08 2013-09 2013-10 2013-11


I want to ask for thoughts about improving the world -- what do people need? How can things be organised?