home, is this the quiet place where you should be alone?

The Second Big Bad Blogger Challenge post:

SL Bloggers - Write about three positive things going on in your Second Life.

RL Bloggers - Write about three positive things going on in your life.

I'm taking both of these, because it's never a bad thing to think of the positive things in any life.

So, three positive things going on in SL just now:

1. I got accepted to Operation Squeegee as a merchant. I have a couple ideas on things to do, and I have until the 1st of July to get them done. So it gives me a little time, and making new things is always a positive thing for me.

2. I have a new job. Finally, after months of not being able to pay rent on my parcels, I can pay rent on my parcels on my own, without help. This is a tremendous weight off my mind. Plus, I really like the people I'm working for--they are a smart, committed bunch of men and women who just want to enjoy good music and relaxing sims, with a lack of external drama. I'm all for that. I'm happy to be working for them.

3. I love my island in Winterfell. Luctus Isle is beautiful, and it feels very insular; it's got a small space to sleep, a place to write, a firepit with places to lounge and think and enjoy the twilight, and it's heavily wooded, with both natural and artificial trees. I have a mortar and pestle to grind grains for gruel or beans for coffee and a small clothesline to air-dry laundry. And there are a few other oddities, tucked here and there...

And three positive things going on in RL just now:

1. We found a local source for Greek yogurt. (Why yes, we do live in the sticks...sort of.) I have decided I really, really like Greek yogurt, because it reminds me of homemade yogurt, back when we used to make it. (At one point, we made practically everything we ate--either grew it, or harvested it, or traded for it. Eggs [chickens, doves, quail and turkeys], lamb [traded for], rabbit [some traded for the lamb], half acre of vegetables of various types, half acre of fruit trees, grapevines in the back for homemade wine and herb garden around the side in terraced wooden beds...we put everything up for preserves, practically, and made root beer and kim chee and harvested squaw tea and made our own mustards...Sometimes, I still miss it.)

2. We have the equivalent of a mobile lending library in the common room of our new apartment building. While the fare is weighted heavily towards spy novels and archeological horror, I've started reading more than occasionally again. Of course, that means I'm back to inhaling books--when I get going, I tend to read a book in five hours, so...I'm glad there's so many to pick from downstairs? I just wish someone liked sf more than they seem to--though if my tastes were weighted more towards the theological and government conspiracy angles, I'd be set.

3. Finally, I'm catching up (this month and last) with all the Doctor Who episodes I've missed. I am a hardcore fan of Dr. Who, but without cable, there wasn't much I could do. Then the episodes were picked up on Netflix, but I didn't have the time, ironically enough--until now. And now it's been absolutely marvelous catching up, watching the Doctor, catching all the little references...absolute joy. And I adore Stephen Moffat as a writer.

Just to wrap up, friend of mine linked me to the APB trailer , and all I can think right now is "Huh...privileged white kids looooove their ethnic gang violence." Still, technologically speaking, the level of customization possible is just insane; everything from skin color to scars and tattoos on that skin, age, muscle tone (or lack thereof), clothing, shoes, hair, eyebrows, expression, nail polish...all very, very well done. And if you don't like the color of the base layer? Change it. Pattern it. Flip logos on it; the program will fade them, age them, add wrinkles and shading. Just...insane level of work on the character creator for APB.

No interest in playing it, mind, but the game looks stunning as hell, frankly.