since I was no bigger than a weevil they've been saying I was evil

Bare Rose's third anniversary is this weekend, and my, but there have been a ton of things to do to celebrate. Dances, gatherings, contests, giveaways, new outfit releases, fashion shows, and, now and again, some quirky little oddments all their own.

Like the weaving machine in Black Cat.



One essentially sits and weaves, and at the end of the weaving, one is then given a random one of six different mini-kimono skirt sets. So far I've woven blue, green, dark purple, red and 'cian'--but apparently the pink mini-kimono skirt? Is the rare, or something, because I haven't gotten one yet!

(By the way, if you stop by the Mystical booth at hair fair, and pick up the Mystical Amazon headdress and hair box? You'll get several selections of one-prim hair. It's not perfectly pretty, but it's one prim, and it looks better than system hair, or being bald! I'm wearing it in "natural cherry" in the shot.)

Installment 379: Why I Adore Japanese Sims:



This was seen in Akiba in Nekomama's stall. That outfit, btw, that you don't quite see? Seventy Lindens. Just seventy Lindens! For skirt with glitch pants, bodice top, prim wide plaid tie, collar, cuffs, and weird legwarmer-y things. Seventy.

I bought one. :)

But the color text? Priceless.

On to more horrifying things, before my return to Avaria. Last night was a hunt over at Axis Mundi (no SLUrl, because it's long over.) Essentially, the hunt was simple: hunt out one (just one!) of three 'colors' of prize items: red, rose and turquoise. And it was fine, and surprisingly easy to find buttons of the appropriate shades, considering how late we started. But it did take us around and about the sim, and while exploring, I found....this:



THE HORROR! MY LITTLE GARGANTUAN PONY!!



And there was a saddle. A saddle on the horrific pastel beast. I found myself, fighting each step, drawn to...sit on the thing.



Thankfully, SubGirl found a disciple of Jesuslope one island over, or I would have fled screaming into the...balmy blue day. *coughs*

(Though I can think of someone that would properly appreciate this--I wonder if Lord Cymru's young daughter knows of this horrifi...."pretty"..."little" thing?)

At any rate, since you've seen an advance pic of SubGirl, let me show you our Aviator, as well:



There will be a full release entry on the store blog, because we're still working on them, but soon there will be two more Iron Tinies to enjoy, trust me. I especially adore the Aviator, I think Mr. Allen really outdid himself adding wonderful little details.

*hefts pickaxe* Okay, those quartz nodes aren't gonna dig themselves, now are they?

am I part of the cure? or am I part of the disease?

I would buy a camera from Miss Pinkney from this video. Is it just me?

And...somewhere, in world, someone is walking around as a bald Britney Spears. Now that scares me.

And Steampunk Princess Leia, anyone?

And an interesting little entry on Portal, GLADos, suffering and bondage. (Hee--thought that might get your attention.)

And a moving retrospective of space images--cities at night, found originally on Neil Gaiman's aetheric journal.

Finally--lest this become a link post entirely, and who'd want that--World of Warcraft weighed in with a very fun Aprille Fool's jest: a new console game, designed specifically for that solid power mover...Atari.

*laughs*

It's been difficult for the past few days on the grid. (She adds, unnecessarily.) Between new branding center restrictions driving a wedge between users and the Linden-powered, and over 500 regions having problems last night, it's a strange and dizzy time. Inventories which won't load; connections that don't; sims disappearing entirely; crashing and redmapping at a record high for most users...Let alone the 'usual' problems of high lag, walking equivalent to slogging through molasses, changing attire a complicated and inherently risky venture...

Honestly. Do other virtual worlds deal with these issues?

Random images from the past week (or so).



Miss Siyu Suen had protesters at her store; a trundling gang of baby penguins who told her most emphatically, they were tired of her mask-making ways interfering with the fish-catching lifestyle on the rest of her island. (No, I'm not sure how the two connect, either.) It was a tense standoff, but finally a compromise was reached--she would make a fish mask, and they would go away.



Vanishingly few of my images taken during Caledon's two-year anniversary came out. It's truly a shame. But I am glad I was part of it, and part of the day of formal balls at Cymru Castle. I believe this is from the second ball I hosted (I played hostess at the first and third formal balls).



And Rivula, the strange little southern continent sim that was my first home on the grid...continues to be strange. This is a new build for a new resident--it may, in fact, still be there--that quite literally towers over everything else.



Don't believe me? There's my landlord (with the halo), his lady wife, and myself (with the white hair) for size reference, on one of the arms of the ankh. This is a very large structure.



And finally...one of the odder things seen during the Falln Easter egg hunt. Trogdor, being chased by two non-burninated peasants.

Or perhaps he's the one chasing them.

In any case, they were going around in circles at the top of the castle. I had to stop and snap a picture, elsewise I wouldn't have believed it.

what do you do when the music stops?

Well you can do it all
Just don't let the music fall

It's cool down here, dark waters at night, brief dim glimpses of rippled moonlight penetrating from the surface on down. I swim beside the train, one eye on the deep ruby glow of the engines.

I lead with my left hand
I stop with my right foot
Well I just want to freak out
I just want to move

I look around, seeing bones of old construction, columns worn by deep water currents, once, half of an iron-sided submersible. Briefly I stop there as the train moves on, wondering if I can replate.

Dance with me baby boy tonight
Dance with me and we'll be all right

Train wheels churn through sand, creating murk impossible to see through. Briefly the glow rises, and I feel it like physical pain, old worries, old pains, fog of loss...and then with a hiss, the glow begins to die down.

Is there a drum beat
And is the bass beat
Well then the rhyme is complete
Then get up on the floor
It's time for you to move your feet

I wait, I watch, I swim left and right, peering at the melted engine compartment. It takes a while, but soon the metal's cool to the touch, and I climb in. Lots of restoration work here, but...nothing vital harmed.

Hmm. That's new.

Dance with me baby boy tonight
Dance with me And we'll be all right
It's a rough loving follows gasping with me
So follow my lead and we'll one two three

Coal scuttle's useless, nothing but what can't stop burning would light under the waves, anyhow. I consider, brief wicked thought tossed up in a moment, and swim swift through the air to Morgaine, holding my breath. I land on the floating mountain, search a bit, converting back to breathing oxygen but not changing the rest of the form.

Finally I find what I'm searching for, and head back to the train, with one brief stop at the lab. Spend some time craning under the control panel, wiring chips of cavorite into place, using the little power-generator I'm, err, going to "borrow" from Mr. Allen for a while. I stand back, flicking the new switch, watching as the dim green glow emerges from beneath the instruments.

What do you do when the music stops?

I turn the train, gasping in air as we surface, changing back to an air-breathing form as we move towards shore. Winterfell, Caledon, I don't know at this point and I don't care. We're landbound for the station. We have time now to fix, to repair, to heal.

What was I worried about?

I shake my hair, changing to green in honor of the death of worry, and seasonal festivity, smiling as we trundle onto land.



Well, glad that's over with. Now all we have to worry about is what happens next...

(Lyric selections from the Pipettes, "Pull Shapes".)

'cause it's a hell on earth

So much happened, yesterday. Good and strange. I miss my loves, it's going to happen.

I had started the day off by wearing FallN's Quills outfit in white, and when "Guvnah" Shang contacted me that I was up on the list, I just answered the port.

Imagine. There I am, standing in fluttery strips of white silk, tied to spring-steel pins shoved through my flesh, porcupine quills flexing from forehead down my spine....and, err, not much else.

To say I was embarrassed? Doesn't even begin to cover it.

To say he took the look with his usual grace and aplomb? Only reinforces why all of Caledon adores him.

Between one thing and another, I ended up in Victoria City, staring at a map of Caledon Penzance. It took some time to decide--I was worried, but Des kept saying, it was fine to be picky--but we finally picked a double parcel near the sea.

Turns out to be right next to Miss Gallindo's theatre, too. This could be good or bad.

(Also? The fact that it seemed half of Caledon trooped out to choose their parcels, or to look over the upcoming layout? Including Viderian, Lord Cymru, and Hotspur O'Toole? Did not exactly aid in relinquishing the embarrassment.

(Oh, well, at least the green fellow in the party hat did not succeed in pushing me onto the train tracks! Small mercy, that.)

My head still spinning from that amazement--I'm moving to Caledon! It's happening! I will be there within the next month!--we reported over to the Isle to help open Club Xanthas.

It's the first invitation-only club I've been involved with. For invitation-only events? Anyone in the club can invite others, but otherwise, the club is not open. The DJs can kick out anyone they like, for any reason. It's small but surprisingly spacious--you can see pictures over on Miss Qlippothic Project's blog.

All black space, lava rock and chipstone, steel and bone--it's surprising how comfortable I felt there.

Unfortunately, I had to leave the opening--a million other events called, and with limbo foisted upon me today--NOT by my choice!--I had to do as much as possible. So off Neome and I went, on various hunts, with the first stop being: zombification.



Neome and I decided to go to Bare Rose's J-school horror event as pseudo-matching Fatal Frame/Ju-On characters. Earlier, I'd found actual Grudge hair at Sirena's, and it's the most amazing look ever--you can wear it as a long, straight hairpiece, with wisp bangs, or you can wear it Grudge-style, with front attachments that hang over your face.



The front attachments are flexi, so they move with the rest of the hair. It's very creepy, wonderfully so.

Amazingly, I ended up winning the J-school contest, which I'm still astounded by. Apparently the pencil in the eye? Is my personal zombie clincher. :)



Meanwhile, the hunt at Bare Rose. Oh, for the love of all I hold holy--

Honestly, if I hadn't had the help of Fawkes, and if I hadn't helped Neome? We would have been full of fail. These things were tiny. I mean, tiny tiny. Not even rat-skull tiny--smaller!

But over the course of several hours, we found them all, and were weaving on our feet, exhausted, at the end. None of us wanted to go. All of us wanted nothing more than to stay and fall asleep in each others' arms. But each of us had places to go, other things to do.

I made my way off the grid with a heavy heart, that's only lightened today by the news that yes! We have a home in Caledon!

You can go to the map in Victoria City and see. You'll see my name in two places--one, by the theatre, and the other...

Well, let's just say Fawkes Allen Designs and Kartiny will finally have a storefront, and not just space on SLX.

This should be interesting...

now you know why I'm begging you to stay

I had an invitation two days back to attend Lady Amber's Mabon ball. It was semi-formal, emphasis on traditional, Celtic or fae, so I threw on my new crown and tinted my lace bat-wings red, and went off to the ball wearing Adam & Eve's Refined gown. I have so few chances to dress up, and adore dancing so.



(Revelers at the dance.)

Unfortunately, no sooner had I arrived and Lord Regent Kintyre had asked me to dance, than I took a step forward and was flung far in an opposite direction. I had just enough time to note I was at the cavorite mines before everything went dark.



(Wondering why I'm not dancing around the pavilion floor at the moment.)

I fought my way back from limbo, back to the dance, apologized to Lord Regent Kintyre, and summarily was asked to dance by someone I only knew from brief mention, Lord Cymru, first Sealord of Caledon, his Grace Viderian Vollmar.



(I hope I got that right.)

We spent many hours dancing. Several times the urge to be polite surfaced, and I wished to tell him that some other gentle lady could dance with him...but he made first formal ballroom dancing, then waltzing (after I was flung once more into limbo) seem so effortless, and I was so enjoying myself...I never actually let myself speak the words.



(It was a lovely, lovely evening.)

We danced until the moon left and the sun rose; danced until the sun fell and the moon rose again. During that brief patch of day I will admit to a fit of cowardice that I'm only mildly ashamed of--but be fair! The last time I saw a steam elephant I died under its mechanized feet! And the Mammoth is bigger!



(Not wishing to share a similar fate and be pulped by a Mammoth, I'm indiscreetly hiding behind Lord Cymru...when he's not swirling me closer to the entrance!)

Towards the end of the evening Lady Amber, Lord Cymru and I stood (and danced) talking. Apparently there have been eyes cast towards all the new Dukes and Duchesses that they are, perhaps, not up to their newfound positions. I have every faith in Lord Cymru, but he felt the urge to show us he was up to his obligations. He invited us to tour Cymru's premiere castle, his home.

Unfortunately, Lady Amber was called away just as we entered the grand hall--and it is quite the grand hall! Also at that point, Miss Neome Graves asked to see me, and I asked if I could bring her to meet the Sealord, and he acquiesced. Off the three of us went on tour.

It is a sprawling castle of thickly quarried dark stone, ancient tapestries, and iron-bound wood. Four towers surround the grand hall and the floors above, the towers and the walkways between rooms leading to balconies here and there. I had, I admit, evidenced surprise earlier on something he'd acquired for his foal.

He laughed, and showed us her room.



Sir Edward? I take it back. I did not believe you, I'm afraid. I stand corrected.

(Yes, it's true. That is a My Little Pony fireplace. In fact, his foal, ginger-haired charmer that she is, has decorated her entire room in the pink, lavender and white of My Little Pony memorabilia.)

He took us to the main balcony, told us to stand very still and concentrate, and as we did, wind swept the night clouds away, and revealed nearly the most breathtaking site I'd yet seen, touring the castle--other lands, other isles, spread out below his, a pageantry of structure and pines.



(The magnificent view from the main balcony--you can see all four neighboring sims to him, SteamSkyCity, Greystoke, Kintyre and Nova Civis.)

I turned, and had my breath stolen again--SteamSkyCity, which I'd toured while it was under construction, the sounds of hammer and the sparks of welding still loud and strong in the air--hanging like a jewel in the night.



(SteamSkyCity from the second balcony.)



(On a clear day, he says, the ocean goes on forever.)

We walked up, and up, touring rooms along the way--the master suite, empty as yet, is the most amazingly designed piece of architecture I'd yet seen, with cunningly fitted curved stones comprising the cross-shaped space--and then walked out along the parapet and around to another flight of stairs, for once, descending them. He said we should be prepared for a walk, he was taking us up into the towers.



(The four towers of Castle Cymru, each rising more than 97 meters high.)

Again, he asked us to stand and concentrate, and this time, I swear, I could nearly have reached out, pulling bits of cloud off in my hands to melt and wisp away. SteamSkyCity looked both near, and like a child's charm, its turbine rotors slowly turning. Even the crisp cold air of the heights tasted new and sweet.



(Clouds near enough to touch.)

After a brief moment to recover, he took us down the steps, which was considerably more fun than climbing up them, and toured us around the side of the castle. There we saw the partially decommissioned gunship, just out from where we stood. He may or may not rebuild it, but it was quite large.



The very earth on which he's built this towering edifice of stone and history is unlike any other isle I've seen--it glimmers, nearly opalescent, seeming stone but soft underfoot. I was as taken with that as with the entire tour.

And his dungeon goes on forever, it seems, small little rooms and inlets underlying the entirety of the castle.

And the trees are so very large.



(Miss Neome and I looking very small indeed, next to one of the monolithic shade trees surrounding the castle.)

After that, all three of us, deciding summarily we did not wish the evening to end, went shopping at Grendel's and at Hybrid's at Gnoma. I had spoken to the Sealord about being a (named, at least) phouka for the Unseelie, and he took me to the best place to learn the horse form. It will take some practice, but I now have my sable horse.

Black rabbit; sable horse; ebon goat; dark-skinned human (at least in appearance). I now have three of the four traditional phouka forms. Now all that's left is the goat...and who knows when I'll find that?

In the meantime, at Gnoma, Miss Neome sprung some truly unsettling news. Mr. Fawkes Allen, after a trip out to Miss Megg Demima's for hats, had mused on what the child of a mating between Sweeney, my black lobster, and his Dove, would look like.

I refused to consider such things, and went on my way, choosing to wear my unicorn Vincent for the next few days.

Apparently...Sweeney got bored, or amorous, and went off looking for the Dove. The terrible thing occurred.

And now...Neome has a Love.



(Well, what else do you call a dove/lobster?)

Oh, the shame of it...though they seem far from ashamed, our hats, at this occurrence.

I suppose all's fair in love and mutation?

Still...and now, the unholy spawn of such hybrid desires needs a name! What on earth do you name a Love??