whatever I've got, I've got no reason to guard

thrashing, turning in my sleep

towards a door I yearn to open

turning away because I'm yet unsure

Cohesion. It's coming, but it's coming slowly. This break was monumental, spun me from my moorings, sent me sinking to the deeps in uncharted element and space. I could have pulled a quick patch job and been back on my feet in two weeks, but I wouldn't have been stable for long.

It had to be now. Else I would have broken again, and at likely some less convenient time.

spattered ink on crumpled pages

painstakingly smoothed time and again

spattered ink like arterial spray across linen

vivid and disorganized

I could have done that, though. I could have pretended, I could have tossed it off, no worries, no observed pain. I have a phenomenal social face. It works wonders.

But these days I'm trying to play by someone else's rules, learning the reasons for them, incorporating them into my own, and--I genuinely think--becoming a better person in the process. Does that mean this work is easier?

No. In many ways it's harder, simply because I'm having to check myself, time and time again, from shortchanging my own heart and mind. That would be far worse than anything else that's gone wrong.

wanting and yet wanting not

fearing change and needing it

wanting far more than I've got

turning away, turning towards, turning away

The last thing I needed was another fault line. And do not mistake me--I was given the choice, and I made it freely, as it was given to me, free and without restrictions, placed with all seriousness of mind and heart into my outstretched hands.

Fast or slow. And I did not choose to speed the process.

fingers, palm, hand curving around the knob

warm, almost alive in my hand

from how many times I've taken this step forward

curved my free hand against the broken frame

and turning away to consider again

So it's taking the time it takes, and I am relearning myself as I gather each shard of the last self close, aligning it with the previous repair work to the structure. And I am observing the changes as they come in, fresh and dripping from that moment's realization of their existence.

I'm not always liking what I see.

simple decisions should never be this hard

I turn towards and turn again

half-spinning, falling through glitter and rust

night after night and day after day

I am needier now, far more insecure. I despise it in myself. I treat it as weakness until I pull my concentration clear of such self-deprecation. Of all the ways my personality could choose to reform, this is the aspect I understand least.

I am far warier, now, as well. I mistrust friends and enemies alike, associates and loves. I weigh everything for hidden meaning, seek out the razors in the silk; I've gone so far as to log in over the past several days to the grid, only to set myself immediately Busy and never lift another finger to type out an answer to anyone. I speak only when I force myself to socialize in any social grouping, local or grid-spanning.

This one I despise as well, but of the two, this one I believe will pass, given time.

when will I reach one less decision than I need?

when will I need one more decision than I have?

It's all about time, now. How I'm spending my time. What I'm getting done. How effective I am in my own life. I've given up on the business being a successful alternate revenue stream, but in a sense, that has freed my hand to practice what I want to do, what surfaces to the top level of the dream, so that I am creating what I want to see, not what I think will sell.

Once my head is fully integrated with that idea, I can start throwing out all unsuccessful designs and further clear my inventory.

until then I'm frozen in this indecision

in this moment of turning away

and turning towards

Still. Something has to make way in me. Needing approval, and mistrusting any offered praise or understanding is just as much a recipe for future implosion as any thing else.

(But then, I reflect--perhaps it's a perfect illustration of my own understanding. Perhaps I'm clingy and needy only with one, and wary and mistrusting with the other. Then, it must needs come down to, at some point, the minds and hearts of the gentles in question.

(But oh, I am tired of anxieties in the dark. And I grow weary and wearier still of judging motives. Some nights, I just want to exist, not to second-guess, not to keep pace with the challenger of all my actions.

(Isn't that enough, after all? Isn't that what love's supposed to be? The phrase goes: Home is where, when you go there, they have to take you in...but maybe that's part of the problem. I no longer trust home...)

will the rain ever stop?

Stiv: EMILLY

Stiv: EM

I'd just gotten home from an extended trip into limbo--literally; I spent two and a half hours on a dark bus, driving in circles, waiting for them to remember they needed to take me home, too--and I was a bit groggy from the day. I wasn't in my best cognitive mode when God chimed in.

Stiv: I don't think I've ever been more scared by anything than the prospect that my own clone is going to kill me or the fact that I could be a clone.

Stiv: Actually, that would mean that I should be trying to find the original.

Stiv: Unless the original died alone time ago, and I am but one clone in a series of clone experiments. Experiments that all went horribly wrong, I am assuming, by the looks of things

emilly.orr: Slow down

emilly.orr: Start from the top

I wasn't sure yet whether I'd need stimulants or euphorics to deal with this, but someone had the wrong idea about reality, and I just wasn't sure who it was, just then.

Stiv: Emilly, I know you and a number of other people hear me say this a lot

Stiv: but I think Ive gone insane

emilly.orr: Why specifically?

Stiv: Ok so, I watched Moon and have you seen that?

emilly.orr: Oh yes

Stiv: Ok so

Stiv: I was like

Stiv: I'd be more comfortable, after thinking it over

Stiv: if I was a clone

Stiv: I'd feel a bit more relaxed, less pressure

Stiv: you know

emilly.orr: Until you started coughing up blood

Still say it's a reasonable reply.

Stiv: and then I started thinking more and more about why I was created

Stiv: I as in the series of clones

Stiv: So I thought, who would make us?

Stiv: And then I realized

Stiv: I WOULD

Stiv: THE ORIGINAL

Stiv: That bastard

Consciousness began to filter in. Waiiiit, my brain said. Is he serious or is he messing with me? I just don't know, sometimes. But I tried to parse it while he went on.

Stiv: I know what he's trying to prove

Stiv: or disprove rather

Stiv: QUANTUM MECHANICS

Stiv: Through violating MANY WORLDS

Stiv: BY PLACING THEM ALL IN ONE WORLD

emilly.orr: So, you're thinking, in the future, you know much more about science than you do now, so you created a series of clones, to...get drunk and be attractive to MILFs?

Stiv: BIGGER THAN THAT

emilly.orr: Wau

Stiv: I mean, that's probably what he's doing

Stiv: that bastard

emilly.orr: I see.

emilly.orr: So, is your job to...stop him, or help him, or...?

I was still trying to work out what was going on in God's head. (I know, I know, mysteries of the universe, inscrutable is the mind of Stiv, yada yada yada...) What exact combination of homework, booze and videogames had brought this on? Precisely?

Stiv: Emilly, I violate time symmetry

emilly.orr: You do?

Stiv: We do

Stiv: Ok so you

Stiv: You you

Stiv: Are here

Stiv: in this

emilly.orr: Yes

Stiv: This being whatever we are in

Stiv: nevermind, I wont get into that but

Stiv: you are here

Stiv: BUT here, I am and the rest of us along with that bastard who created us

Stiv: that bastard being me

Stiv: or

Stiv: the original

Stiv: wait

emilly.orr: Right

emilly.orr: whom you seem to despise

emilly.orr: Even though he's you

Stiv: Well ok let me try that again

It began to sink in this was worse than being commissioned to write the Gospel According to Stiv, with the switchblades and the hookers and the stripper paradise with eighth-dimension booze imported in.

And ninja assassins. I always forget the ninja assassins part. It was so insane. Ninja assassins sent out to kill the One True Stiv, that camouflaged themselves as...him...to...

Wait....

Stiv: So, we are all here because in a many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, he is USING US

Stiv: to see when he will die

Stiv: OR how he COULD die

emilly.orr: He doesn't know how he could die?

emilly.orr: Alcohol poisoning is up there

Stiv: He's trying to use the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics to become immortal

Stiv: THAT BASTARD

Stiv: he's so clever

emilly.orr: Canny, even

Stiv: wait

Stiv: wait

Stiv: Unless, this is a symmetrical timeline

Stiv: and I'm now realizing

Stiv: fuck

Stiv: Fuck, I could be that bastard

Stiv: or

Stiv: no wait

emilly.orr: Well, you are in college

Stiv: shit

Stiv: Fuck, Emilly, what if I am him and he started this

Stiv: fuck

Stiv: Oh man

emilly.orr: Then...at some point you'll get enough money

emilly.orr: To fund quantum-mechanic research into growing yourself

emilly.orr: And dispersing your clones through a multitude of separate, yet incredibly similar realities

emilly.orr: Likely not the world without shrimp

emilly.orr: But several different reality sets

emilly.orr: Just waiting for Stiv to appear

emilly.orr: And die horrifically

Stiv: Emilly, I think I already did that once and I'm now realizing that. Holy god.

Stiv: Time is amazing

emilly.orr: It is.

It's also, at times, deeply odd. Or maybe that's not time, maybe that's just Stiv.

Stiv: I think I need more time to think this over

emilly.orr: Possibly more alcohol as well.

Stiv: I always have this weird feeling of comfort when I find some new paranoia or psychosis

Stiv: I wonder why that is

emilly.orr: In you, or just in general?

Stiv: In me

Stiv: hmm

Stiv: ooooooh

Stiv: that makes more sense

emilly.orr: It does?

Stiv: We rarely put ourselves into danger where the odds arent in our favor

emilly.orr: Generally true.

Though I did think the 'we' to which he referred was his clones, not humanity at large, which is how I took it.

Stiv: He must have done this to experiment with the limits of our sanity

emilly.orr: Ah. Canny fellow indeed.

Stiv: So that feeling is, what? The many worlds interpretation would see that as an observed sane person (relatively speaking) or an unobserved snap

Stiv: into insanity

Stiv: or if our eventual insanity LEADS to our death and he's trying to pinpoint what stresses cause that

Stiv: that would be less messy

Stiv: no wait, just as messy

emilly.orr: Or, you're all wired

emilly.orr: And he's recording everything

Stiv: Oooh fuck

Stiv: I didnt even think of the possibily of being an artificial construct replica of the original

Stiv: damn

Stiv: If so, he's laughing about the irony of me spending so much time on computers

Stiv: in a computer

Stiv: that bastard

emilly.orr: Oh, well, that's going to happen

emilly.orr: The creators of the greater games like to play them

emilly.orr: Thus, their creations like to play them

Stiv: That bastard

Stiv: You see? He's a bastard

emilly.orr: So is your objective to win, or to defeat him, or just to survive?

I admit, at this point--along with giggling on occasion--I was halfway buying into this.

Stiv: Well

Stiv: if I defeat him

Stiv: let's see

Stiv: our realities will shift so I become the original

Stiv: and therefore, have won

Stiv: so he wins there, because I become him

Stiv: Survival plays out best for both of us

Stiv: which is just what he wants

Stiv: for now

emilly.orr: Likely

Stiv: God, he's a bastard

emilly.orr: Definitely a twisty thinker

Stiv: I was more comfortable being a clone than I am now that I feel like I'm just a participant in the quantum suicide/immortality experiment

Stiv: I'm going to bed before I question existence

emilly.orr: Might be best.

Stiv: Yes

Stiv: Good night Em

emilly.orr: Good night, Lord.

And he poofed into wherever God poofs, when he's not conscious and actively messing with the space-time continuum. Or sending Lily "Crusher" Killowski to beat down Borg.

Here's to hoping he slept it off. Or at least, upon rising, found the quantum key generator to return to Stiv Prime's lab. Now that would be amusing to write about.

her threshold's invisible but she'll hang on like hell

Yet more reasons why Facebook is evil.

All right. I have finally finished reading through Neva's latest NCI diatribe (with a side jaunt into this entry, supposedly linked to make more sense of the first, but I'm still wondering how, precisely), and I think I understand what's going on.

Maybe.

I don't have a lot of experience with the Woodbury group, but I do have experience with their griefing style, and the same style Neva speaks to, especially in the second post, is what I've seen on the grid. They may each have been committed by a separate and individual person--my world is vast, it can encompass several stupid people with the same concept--but I have seen this, again and again. In Caledon, in Luskwood, in FurNations sandboxes, in Rivula, and in Tahitian Dreams.

What connects these sims? Got me. But I have seen the same names, or the same avatars, griefing places; and they've all been part of the same groups in all these cases...that is, when I've seen perpetrators at all, and it's not merely scripture shouted from the heavens, or giant cubes obscuring the landscape. Neva may or may not be wrong in how often it's happening--and how specifically directed at Neva, specifically--but it is happening.

And while banning the university and all its sims won't prevent the idiots already here from continuing to be here--until they're banned, anyway--I can't but think it's not the worst idea to kick their main watering hole out of the game.

Free speech? Who guarantees that right on the grid? This is not a democracy, people. It comes down to the simplest of all bottom lines: is hosting the virtual Woodbury University more trouble than profit? As long as it's more profitable, the Lindens will keep it around.

Guess they're no longer profitable. So off they go.

I'm amused that according to Marty Linden, the Labs might begin blocking non-compliant third-party viewers, and according to T Linden, they will begin blocking non-compliant third-party viewers.

Which is it, guys? Maybe, so people relax and think the Labs are just looking after us, honest, or definitely will, so the Labs are back to their old empty-words/no-communication business-as-usual behavior?

Actually, I shouldn't say that. It is their absolute and utter right to decide which viewers can and can't be used. This is not a democracy, again; residents do not have a Bill of Rights.

(Though it's still utterly true that yelling at a brick wall is easier in the long run, if one wants to work out something, than trying to pin down any particular Linden on any topic relating to Second Life.)

Massively covers Runes of Magic and their new no diamonds resold EVER policy. (This is also covered in a separate article that's not as well written.)

What does all this mean? Well, in the short term, no diamond trading in the Auction House. No listing that I want, say, to pay one gold for 250 diamonds (a dodge around the permissions systems when I want to get diamonds I have, into the hands of friends who want them). In fact, for some time now, if I buy diamonds on the website with a credit card, I can't trade them in any way to anyone else; which is why on occasion we troop down to 7-11 and buy one of the Runes cards, because those you can trade in any way you want to.

Except for now, because Runes have decided that the spammers have to stop, so they've killed the ability to trade diamonds in any way to other players.

Here's the thing, though--the spammers have gotten really bad. First there was an add-on developed called ShutUp! that Curse.com ran; highly popular, it led Runewaker and Frogster to develop their own internal reporting system.



But it didn't stop them. Huge banner messages on the screens stating the simple fact, every fifteen minutes in some zones, that any player found with gold or diamonds or, now, tiered stones will be banned from the game...even that is not enough to stop the spammers, and the idiots who buy from them.

The players started getting inventive. This shot shows you what happens when a couple of fighters engage every single boar in the area, and drag them all onto the bridge where two "defenseless" level 1 spammers are shouting for all they're worth.SPEAK. Damn, plan fail!

Meanwhile, during the Great 2010 Logout of Second Life, Miss Amisha Marsh is trying to help us out by giving us things to do.

Other than check SL frantically, hoping that the next five minutes means we can actually get back on the grid..

Me? I'm trying tomorrow. I'll give up tying up the five hunts I was involved in; really, there was no chance I'd get to them all anyway. At this point I think I'm hunting just out of habit.

And it's a bad habit.

I'm awkward and I'm too polite and I want two stars for arms like Orion

I can't remember who first linked me to this but it's brilliant and deserves to be seen. YouTube's closing broadcast of an evening.

Miss Muse Carmona tipped me to this next blog, and I'm in particular reading through "A Fine Line Between Cowardice and Courage" on't. From Bonfire Madigan's (who I'd recommend in general: she describes herself as a folk-punk cellist, and she's another who does things with a cello that shouldn't be possible) essay in the work Live Through This: on Creativity and Self Destruction by Sabrina Chapadjiev comes the concept of the crisis/wellness plan for strongly emotional events. For example, this one I've been toying with for the last hour or so:

1) For when I feel...

Inadequate ‽ Misunderstood ‽ Stupid ‽ Worthless ‽ Enraged ‽ Hurt ‽ Naïve
Depressed ‽ Incapable ‽ Weak ‽ Abandoned ‽ Imbalanced ‽ Numb ‽ Grieving

I can...

Read a new book ‽ Ground and center ‽ Practice belly-dance moves ‽ Go swimming
Write stories ‽ Listen to good music ‽ Put together another blog entry ‽ Bake something
Start another texture project ‽ Organize my desk ‽ Track down new recipes ‽ Research
Quilt something ‽ Mend something ‽ Go through a box ‽ Watch the glitter lamp

3) My game plan is to...

a) Identify my feelings. See if I can track why I'm feeling them.
b) Acknowledge I have a right to feel this way, that it is okay and part of the process.
c) Allow myself to sulk, to rail against unfairness, to cry if I need to.
d) Let myself feel what I'm feeling. If I'm feeling it, it is not wrong. No FEELING, by itself, is WRONG.
e) Allow myself to breathe and get through these things without feeling weak and useless.
f) Allow myself to experience what I'm feeling in full. No rushing, no pushing things aside. This will just cause more rebound later on.
g) Understand that there is no one way I "should" be acting for this. In world or out of it, I am not going to over-analyze my height, my attire, my hairstyle, my appearance, my color, or my species.
h) Repeat a) through g) as needed or required. As often as it takes.
i) Remember this is a process, and there's nothing wrong in being slow about it, just don't STOP MOVING. Keep moving, keep growing, and I will get through this. Keep moving, keep growing, and one day I will feel better.

Miss Chapadjiev says on her site for the book:

Live Through This is a fearless exploration of [womens'] silent rage, the power that can come from internal struggle, and the possibility of transforming this burning force into fierce and enlightened work.

Absolutely. I think I need to track this one down.

There will be a third year of the Make Him Over hunt! There's not a lot of information past that, save for when it starts (1 Aprille) and it runs through Aprille, so plenty of time. They're planning on restricting the hunt to 100 stores only, and they're going to make it circular--the last stop on the hunt will direct people back to the start, so if you find something at store #72, you can just keep on going the rounds until you get to store #71. This is nothing short of inspired.

I'm amused that Michael Masnik was the fellow that prompted Lily Allen to rage, rage against the dying of her profits, but still, this is pretty sharp coverage of an annoying new spasm on the part of major newspapers. Not only are they going through their old published stories and remarketing them to receive better search results, but now they're hiring folks to do this for them.

According to Ben Metcalfe (in the comments for this entry by GigaOm), there's a ton of very large newspapers engaging in this deceptive practice. The LA Times (obviously; they hit directly their former columnnist, Violet Blue; she took her rights back when they abused them); the Orlando Sentinel; the South Florida Sun-Sentinel; the Baltimore Sun; the Hartford Courant; the Allentown Morning Call; the Virginia Daily Press; and the New York Daily News. Is it even worthy of the additional note that most of these papers are Tribune papers?

This may well have started as a last-ditch frantic (and stupid) dodge on the part of the Tribune overlords to keep them financially soluble. Insanity.

In grid-based insanity, among the many (and sometimes weekly varying) groups to which I belong, is the group for DV8 Designs. So on occasion chat will pop up. It's usually about what letters are on the lucky chairs, if a riot vend is going down, if parties are happening, new release announcements sent into chat by Vasha Martinek or Dysturbed Sin, the co-owners.

Tonight there was something slightly different:

[21:47] Gidget Quartz: Does anyone have a script that makes an item Swing, for like, a swingset?
[21:48] Deej Coakes: Think that'd be handled with a rotation script settled inside of the rootprim of the object set. @_@
[21:49] Gidget Quartz: Not total rotation!
[21:49] Gidget Quartz: Just a swing back and forth. @.@
[21:49] Deej Coakes: That's what it'd do. One state makes it go to this rotation, and another state makes it go back.
[21:50] Reparata Nightfire: And this relates to DV8 Deviants how?
[21:50] Gidget Quartz: Was just wondering, Nevermind then. ._.

Miss Nightfire's comment seemed needlessly snippy, and I thought a moment, then typed this:

[21:51] Emilly Orr: Are there any restrictions on DV8 chat, Reparata?
[21:52] Deej Coakes trundles off to do nerdy things.

Needless to say, Miss Nightfire never bothered to reply. But this brief interchange gained me a reply from someone else:

[21:54] Dragon Fang: yeah DV8 chat is aboout DV8 stuff
[21:54] Dragon Fang: hunts lucky chairs riot vend runs sales that sort of stuff
[21:55] Emilly Orr: And, you're speaking on the part of Vasha and the store greeters by saying this?
[21:55] Dragon Fang: I am a live model yes
[21:55] Emilly Orr: And you're sure that's the restriction.
[21:55] Dragon Fang: yes
[21:56] Dragon Fang: ive worked there for almost 6 months

Good to know. So, hypothetically, let's say, if a builder who's thinking of entering their store in the next DV8 Twisted Hunt, and needs a bit of script help, and figures since they also allow hunting hints and tips in this chat group, she could toss in a request for script help.

You know, for the item.

That she might be thinking of making as a prize for finding the Twisted Cube-of-whatever-color-then in her store.

According to Dragon Fang, that's not allowed in the least. Interesting. Well, I'll be sure to keep that in mind, Dragon; because of course, with your vast six month experience at DV8, you know what is and isn't allowed at DV8. Pff.

At any rate, one last thought for the day, before I traipse off for food:

"The art of being happy lies in the power of extracting happiness from common things."

Henry Ward Beecher said that. It's worth remembering. Along with the crisis plan.

our thoughts are hot and crazed, our brains are webbed in haze

At what speed must I live, to be able to see you again?

I can't believe I forgot Haunted Saddlemead! I swear, my head would fall right off if it wasn't stitched on so tightly.



Haunted Saddlemead has been a holiday fixture since I started doing these reviews, at least. Miss Lora Chadbourne runs the place, and she has a little more space this year. Did she go crazy with the scripts, did she throw in a lot of busy screaming monsters to leap out at people?



Unexpectedly, no--she's kept the quiet autumnal beauty of Saddlemead, and just added a few more spooky touches. Glowing red eyes here and there, a few more sounds, just that--nothing overt, nothing extravagant. Her precise and elegant touch pervades.



There's a glowing hanged man off in the orchard, and one of the floating candelabra in the house swirls around avatars, asking in an earnest child's voice, "Aren't you scared?"



But the pumpkin patch is still there, and the house with the haunted attic, and the hayride, and it's all just...pastoral and charming. I don't know how long it will be up, and I'm dreadfully abashed I didn't mention it sooner, so go and see!



In the meantime, as we're all of us scattered far and wee, I had to take the brief time I had (between extended bouts of limbo) to try to explore the Falln Sanitarium for the FallnAngels Brain Hunt going on currently (and ending in just under, or perhaps just over, a day from now!)

Of course I ran into zombies in trouble.

[20:09] My Pet Zombie Loves Brains: >>:[
[20:09] My Pet Zombie Loves Brains: Hello there.
[20:09] Emilly Orr: Are you having trouble?
[20:09] My Pet Zombie Loves Brains: I am having a blast.
[20:09] Emilly Orr: Good!
[20:09] My Pet Zombie Loves Brains: What do you really want to talk about?

Trust a zombie in a mental hospital to ask leading questions.

[20:09] Emilly Orr: Are you stuck?
[20:09] My Pet Zombie Loves Brains: Do I seem like it?
[20:09] Emilly Orr: You seem trapped.
[20:09] My Pet Zombie Loves Brains: Do you mind if I tell other people you say I am trapped.
[20:09] Emilly Orr: Please.
[20:09] My Pet Zombie Loves Brains: OK I will tell them when I see 'em.
[20:09] Emilly Orr: Fantastic. Can you get out?
[20:09] My Pet Zombie Loves Brains: That's an interesting question. I'll come back to that in a minute.
[20:09] Emilly Orr: Right.
[20:09] My Pet Zombie Loves Brains: I am glad we agree.

I was too, the problem, though, was I was talking to a zombie trapped in a green-painted service locker in an abandoned psych ward. This had the potential to go downhill, I thought, so I wandered off looking for more brains.

I found them--but I also found a zombie pushing a gurney into a side corner. Rather forcefully.

This didn't seem like it was the best plan.

[21:20] My Pet Zombie Nurse: >>:[
[21:20] My Pet Zombie Nurse: Hello there.
[21:21] Emilly Orr: You're stuck again.
[21:21] My Pet Zombie Nurse: Once more? I will tell my botmaster you said I am stuck.

They talk to their botmaster--Azriel Demain, owner of Fallen--a great deal. He reads them stories and gives them instructions. We should all be happy they work as well as they do--after all, they are zombies.

Then the zombie got existential.

[21:21] My Pet Zombie Nurse: Where are you located?
[21:22] Emilly Orr: Here.
[21:22] My Pet Zombie Nurse: Where is here?
[21:22] Emilly Orr: The Sanitarium.
[21:22] My Pet Zombie Nurse: What is that?
[21:22] Emilly Orr: Well, it's where you go when you're crazy.
[21:22] My Pet Zombie Nurse: How about that. I can understand that sentiment.
[21:22] Emilly Orr: Thought you might.

I admit, telling an undead nurse about psychiatric care, that was a new one for me.

[21:22] My Pet Zombie Nurse: Do you really think so?
[21:22] Emilly Orr: I think so. Come out of the corner.
[21:22] My Pet Zombie Nurse: I think so too. Where is out of the corner ?

This wasn't working. I took a running leap to try to climb over the gurney, and push the zombie away from the corner section. I failed, and ended up on the pose on the gurney.

Lots of flailing ensued before things got really odd.

[21:23] Emilly Orr flails a lot on the gurney
[21:23] My Pet Zombie Nurse: YOU? That remark was either too complex or too simple for me. We were talking about defchan.
[21:23] Emilly Orr: We were talking about defchan? When were we talking about defchan?
[21:23] My Pet Zombie Nurse: Ah yes, I remember now, it is the subject. It was back in the old days, long ago.
[21:23] Emilly Orr: When we had woodburning cats?
[21:23] My Pet Zombie Nurse: I am not sure I agree with your assumptions.
[21:23] Emilly Orr: Probably not.
[21:23] My Pet Zombie Nurse: Why the uncertain tone?
[21:23] Emilly Orr: Because I'm flailing on a gurney.
[21:23] My Pet Zombie Nurse: Good reason. It's good to meet someone who is flailing on a gurney.

I sensed limbo approaching again, so I scrambled off the gurney and went home. Far as I know, the zombie nurse is still pushing aimlessly into the corner of the Sanitarium.

Least he has a defined task. The other zombie in the locker has it worse...

So, all in all, sort of a lost day. I did manage to get my bat tokens in for the Deader than You tour, so yay for that--and I've worn the DV8 outfit (the Geishurai latex set in orange and black) more times in the past two weeks than anything else, so it was worth it. And I did find a few brains, and may find more tomorrow.

Still, I missed all the dances and all the costume contests. Ah, well. I'd say I'm becoming a recluse but I've generally been too busy to notice.

Is that a good thing?

well it winds from Chicago to L.A., more than two thousand miles all the way

Bare Rose is coming up on their fourth anniversary of gridlife! Being Bare Rose VIPs, we got the chance to preview the upcoming hunt:



I haz a fierce!



Phear MEE!

...though overall, he doesn't look impressed. Moving on.

The whole point is, another story, another few locations, hop about, solve the riddles (they're easy this year), get stuph. Be sure you go for the "Additional Hunt Gift"--you'll get the world's cutest puppy shoulder pet.

How'ver, now I want to talk a bit about the tragedy of grid-wide hunts, since there are so many of them going on right now.

The Skipping Stones hunt started at Kunsthammer in Emmelia. They had a lot of really cool things--cool enough I joined their group for the Soul Window--for free and cheap, and also, the first faintly glowing stone in the hunt. This was their prize:



It's a dandelion arm tattoo in three shades (on all three layers), plus a gesture and poofer combination that results in the ability to blow dandelion seeds from the tattoo. Kind of neat. Quirky and very fun. I liked this one a lot.

The third stone was found at a store I'd never been to before, Sisters, and it's called the Shroud Dress. It's in a blend of striped and floral muted wine fabrics, with black lace petticoats, and it's definitely on the list of keepers:



You can see why.

I didn't keep anything else until the ninth stone, at Tyranny Designs. They featured a lingerie set seemingly made of brass coins--I doubt I'll be keeping it--and a mismatched set of skirts and tops which are okay, but not stellar. I did keep the shoulder songbird, though:



mainly because I'm amused by the irony.

The eleventh stone I'm still deciding on, it's from 1-800-BETTIE's, and it's vintage enough:



but the skirt alphas terribly. I just don't know if the alpha glitching is worth keeping the skirt.

Stone thirteen was Inorite's, and normally I love their hair. I still love their hair colors, but this set came with a floppy beige beret which--while undeniably cute--just wasn't my thing.

I'm also undecided on keeping chanimations' summer dock set:



It's a dock, with an attachable stone, and a sit pose. Put the dock out somewhere, hold the stone, click the small pile of river rocks next to the sit pose, and you have your choice (once seated) of nine or so poses.

It's big, it really requires a river, and a place you can rez things out, but...good for photos? Maybe?

Stone twenty-two was puzzling--So Many Styles decided to make a topless...leather...shorts set.

Think I'm kidding?



That's it. And yes, under the censored bar? Just me. No top. The top layer actually creates the high waist of the shorts.

And don't get me wrong, the texturing is fabulous, it's even better in world, but...where on earth would I wear this?? It's too casual for intimate apparel; it's too intimate for streetwear!

Sari Telling hid the thirty-third stone in a rather clever place, gaining hunters a lovely harvest-themed pantskirt set:



Which didn't seem to go with the rest of the hunt items, but screw that, it's Sari!

Now we jump ahead to the hunt gift from Split Pea, which I'm keeping at least the second one of: it's two headband-and-feathers combos, both perfect for flapper outfits and other 1920's-1930's costume outfits:



They're flexi, too, the feathers. Nicely, nicely done.

Ahead to the Sea Hole's hunt gift, and I can't rez this one out on my land currently--it's over 49 prims. But here's a picture you can look at over on Little Miss Hater's blog.

Don't know if I'm keeping that, either, but I do know I want to see it rezzed out, at least once.

Two stones later brings us to Turnip Homes' gifts--one's the Creature of the Deep hair that must be seen to be believed, and then there's the boxed art piece, Sea Horse



That's just...phenomenally fun, that is.

Finally, d-LAB's summer mole hat:



The mole is twee beyond belief.

But, even granting I keep all ten of the items I'm showing you? That still leaves fifty-one stores in this hunt alone that I traveled to, dug around in, found the stone in, bought the stone, took them home, unpacked them, rezzed them out or tried them on...

...and threw them away in horror.

This is the problem with grid-wide hunts. And I'm not saying this is particularly a poor example of the trend. I'm sure--saving everyone but House of Heart, who totally recycled a Hair Fair hand-out for the Skipping Stones hunt--that this group of designers really put their heart and soul into it. They tried to match a theme. They tried to be funky and bohemian. And by and large, they mostly succeeded...but bubble skirts, topless leather outfits and babydoll dresses?

Not my thing.

You can find Skipping Stones hunt tips here; and Anna Zweirs went into all the hunt gifts--first here, and then here.

Now, people have been talking about the massive shoe sale by Doreen Halley on XStreet Uncensored. Why are they talking? Because she's taken many of the sculpt maps that people are using for shoes at Dare Designs, Dilly Dolls, and just about every fetish place on the planet (for the ballet shoes, at least), and offered them up all-in-one, with heel-step sound menus, color/texture shift menus, in seventy-four colors--for three hundred Lindens.

This is causing controversy. Again, why? Because makers are saying she's devaluing everyone elses' hard work. Forget the fact that she routinely sells hundred-Linden versions of these shoes individually, and has done so for months if not years. Forget that people can have sales on XStreet that don't necessarily apply to the in-world price, and that's not unfair practices, because it is a sale.

No, people are mainly pissed because, by releasing three sets of all-in-one shoes, she's leading people to expect these prices from everyone.

Well, since KaShoez has been selling hundred-Linden shoes all along, she could well be doing that. But it still doesn't match the button work on Dare Munro's thigh-high versions, or the unique variations on footwear by companies like Show Me On the Doll who, though they use sculpted shoe maps, don't use those sculpted shoe maps.

There's also apparently a problem in the new build of Emerald resulting in some personal instability with changing SL clothing; the problem is, for most of us, the fix either disables sound/voice, or disables the ability to left-click on objects. Thus rendering us alone in a world without sound or gesture, unable to buy things.

Hmm, well, the first isn't bad...

I had a problem with their comments system, so ended up leaving two messages on it by mistake. Grr.

Lastly, as many of you know, I've had some personal instability of late, which has led to some temporal accidents--one put us in contact with the Autogenica Institute, a thinktank that operates quite some time from where we live on the grid (at least, in Caledon). I don't know how long we'll receive transmissions and updates from them, but it is curious...in a morbid, "Oh, we've all died, then?" way.

come down and join the circus, it's the end of your world

Maybe it's just me--maybe it would have been better had I been there--but the slideshow capture of M Linden's keynote address at SLCC? Pretty much comes off as superficial gloss. "We're doing better! We're rebuilding! You'll like it! People already love SL for what it is! And it's GREAT! Woot!"

At the same time, while he mentions his love for "chance encounters", M reveals himself to be as blind as most of the rest of Linden Labs--his answer to where he spends most of his time? Lindenworld. Which you can't get to unless you're a Linden, and as far as I understand, it's 100% Linden content.

While the Lindens are creators, and are obviously creating content, now and in the past...I still say that's exposing the deep disconnect between the average Linden running the game, and the average resident living on the grid.

In other news, disconnection looms again...floated for some hours in limbo earlier, and the final decision was that other services would be disconnected first, before the lifeline. (S'pose I should thank the Powers that Screw With Us they're just as net-dependent as we are.)

August will likely be a complete blank...no working...little in-world time...killing every Subscribe-o-Matic I can find, and every group that sends notices to my email...

I am frustrated, angry, resentful, anxious...I am hindered and hobbled, stuck in place, until some shred of light shines for me to leap towards.

Until then, I wait.

In and out of limbo, I wait.

Sit, tied down, and tell myself, the bonds will loosen when we find our way out.

That's all I want now. Just one direction that's less dark than all the other options...and until then, I wait. I watch. I grow more frustrated.

I thought all that blood had been shed long ago

The Train Wreck's moving into jagged terrain at present, and floating off into limbo. The blog will be on hiatus until we're out of cautioned lands. The SLife is taking a (hopefully brief) vacation as well. I'll hope to see you soon. Take care.

((aka, the roommates took the router. We're working on it. But we might be moving sooner than planned...))

but it's always gonna come right back to this

Do these folks know their target audience or what? So far, the only down side of early reports is that the stuph tastes foul--but one fellow recommends cutting it with lemonade, and that seems to cancel out the main flavor.

All I know is, they've managed, in one stroke of genius packaging, to make an energy drink that is at once useful for LAN parties, all-night paper gaming sessions, laser tag runs, and LARP weekends. Beautiful, just beautiful.

And...computer viruses are bad? Switch to better computer protection? Jackie Chan looks cool in white? Your guess is as good as mine.

I think she's going out with the wrong guy. Or...he's going with the wrong girl. One of them's in the wrong relationship.

[Guild] [Kiril]: rom: now with 100% moar crash!
[Guild] [Specials]: I second that kiril
[Guild] [Markuz]: runesofmalfunctioning

Pretty much. They did two major patches of the game, and so far managed to break part of the Auction House, part of the inventory system, part of several quests, and make the entire engine unstable.

Way to go, Frogster. You keep breaking your code like this, you're gonna have to come work for Linden Labs...

God contacted me today, From Beyond the Grid:

Stiv: Hey what music are you listening to lately?
emilly.orr: Specifically or currently? Currently I'm listening to Radio Riel
Stiv: Anything more specific?
emilly.orr: But in general, movie soundtracks, J-pop, Chechosov metal, Akira Yamaoka (the Silent Hill soundtrack guy), and an embarrassing amount of Kelly Clarkson, Pink and Evanescence
Stiv: lol clarkson
Stiv: Ahem
emilly.orr: Also Reverend Glasseye, the Real Tuesday Weld, Vernian Process, Dandelion Junk Queens...who else...
Stiv: Wait
Stiv: wait
emilly.orr: Beats Antique
Stiv: Slow down, didnt know any of those
emilly.orr: Steampunk music
Stiv: Wait, is that a genre even?
emilly.orr: Or, conversely, go here and skim until you hit the actual music posts
emilly.orr: Lot of bands, lots of links
emilly.orr: Reminds me, I need to hit another couple bands this week if I can
Stiv: Thank you, Ive been looking for something new
Stiv: Oh hey fancy page
emilly.orr: Hee
emilly.orr: I had fun with the background
Stiv: Oh actually you know who I bet you'd like if you dont already
Stiv: Darkest of the Hillside Thickets
Stiv: A Lovecraftean horror punk band
emilly.orr: Ooh
Stiv: Yeah I know
Stiv: Pretty awesome
emilly.orr: Yeah, that'd likely be something I'd cover :)

So, Darkest of the Hillside Thickets. I think I'm recommending them, based on just the samples on their music page? But...I don't know if they're steampunk.

Still...Lovecraftian horror-punk rock...what else could they be??

Toren Atkinson, a man with a lifelong interest in Lovecraft, started the band along with cofounder Warren Banks; they seem the heart and soul of nerdcore rock, as nearly all the members have some connection to gaming, either playing a lot of games, or actually in the industry, doing art and design for paper-gaming and videogame companies.

They've got a great FAQ that's packed with loads of information, and seems pretty keen on both giving you cool stuph to buy, and cool stuph to listen to in advance.

As limbo is currently extraordinarily heated, in bad unpleasant ways, your Faithful Reviewer has very little brain to put more information in; but do check them out. And I think I'll be dropping a word or two Radio Riel's way, see if they're willing to pick up a few tunes for New Babbage...and whatever lurks in the depths of the Vernian Sea.

believe in me, help me believe in anything, I want to be someone who believes

Instability. It hurts us all. Today the grid, tomorrow everything else. As much as we rage and rail against the violations of the powers that Linden, once the data is removed we wail and rage until it appears.

Until the virtual is real under our feet again. Oddity, concurrence, instability. It gets us all.

What happens when the world goes away? I used to drift in limbo, featureless, breathless, awaiting the world's return. Now, I look for other things. Identify, paint, texture, carve. Small projects, larger ones.

Or play other games.

Like Runes of Magic. The last bit of that? The bit that says Accepted Quest: Breeding? That was a quest the Ent--the tree-man trimmed out by the cropping--gave us. Which, really, by itself, even not next to a possessed puzzle-box floating in midair...would be odd.

Pair that with a possessed puzzle-box floating in midair? Things get odd indeed.

Still. Wonder how many times the main grid needs to go down before there's more people running around in other games--or the OSGrid as it slowly improves...

After all, SL's still the only game in town...but the competition's well on their way to riding in fully armed.

when everything and everyone becomes my enemy

Rose, Rose, Rose Red
Will I ever see thee wed?
I will marry at thy will, sire
At thy will

Fighting my own will, fighting my hands on the controls, fighting my way through. One more step, one more brush-stroke, one more stitch, one more prim.

On to the next--next idea, next thought, next word, next project. I am ever most creative when I'm avoiding other things.

A thousand years gone by
Too late to wonder why
I'm here alone
If in my darkest hour
She-rose that fell a flower--
I should have known...

One step forward, no steps back. Stagnation better than retreat. Pushing when I can, resting when I can't, taking comfort in the smallest details. I live, I breathe, I keep moving.

It's all I have.

Limbo is burning.

Rose, Rose, Rose Red
Will I ever see thee wed?
Only if you can capture me...

Occupations I do not lack; time is more pressing. Incredible heat at my back drives me forward, even when I'm being called back to the once-grey, once-soft, once-empty. Finding things to do is not the problem.

Tell me no more stories
And I'll tell you no lies
No one wants to hurt me
But everybody tries

Sooner or later I will lose my steps, lose my forward momentum, and then shall I tumble back to the abyss of flame. Impossibility; prophecy; what could never be, is. Adaptation is difficult under such circumstances.

And if you think that I've been waiting
For my planets to align
It's time you go on
Get your things, get up, get out--
I'm doing fine

Until I slip I walk half-dreaming; until I slip I concentrate on anything-but; until I slip I fight sleep, and wait to see blood on my hands.

Someday these walls will speak
The floor beneath you creak
To call my name
Here in my web of dreams
My whispers turn to screams
And place the blame

One step. One step. One step. I will survive, I will get through this, and if I burn, it won't be the first time. I endure. Through everything, I endure.

I'm stubborn that way.

Rose, Rose, Rose Red
Will I ever see thee wed?
Only if you discover me...

My hands weave the air into patterns, sorting, changing, packing, making. Even when I'm relaxing, my mind's busy on a thousand other things. I cannot stop long enough to take a mental breath, not now, not yet.

Tell me no more stories
And I'll tell you no lies
No one wants to hurt me
But everybody tries

Soon enough I will stop, soon enough I will have to, turn and face what's making limbo a hell and not an impatient haven. Soon enough, all too soon, there'll be nothing left to do. Nothing left to make. Nothing left but to brace, for fire and for pain.

And if you think that I've been waiting
For my planets to align
It's time you go on
Get your things, get up, get out--
I'm doing fine
Yeah, yeah...

I make small plans, to roll into larger ones later. How much I have in savings, how long I'll need to pay ahead if I'm not in world. I can't think past that. I can't be past that. One day. One step. One breath. Holding to that, I stand, create, envision.

For this freedom
I have given all I had
For this darkness
I gave my light
For this wisdom
I have lost my innocence
Take my petals
And cover me with the night

I know there are at least twenty days remaining on all properties. In twenty days I'll know which way to turn. And I have options, I am not backed into a corner, claws out, scratching for a chance to break free.

One step. One step. One step. I may be edging towards the corner, but I'm still free to move.

Tell me no more stories
And I'll tell you no lies
No one wants to hurt me
But everybody tries

I will breathe. Every breath brings me closer. I will breathe. Every breath brings more danger. I will breathe. Every breath is one more success, and I am living, I am breathing, I am moving. I am thinking. I will find the right way through.

And if you think that I've been waiting
For my planets to align
It's time you go on
Get your things, get up, get out--
Get out, get out!
I'm doing fine...

Unshaken and shaking, breathing and gasping, pushing away and reaching towards--I am all these things, none of these things. I feel the flare of heat against my back, the sharp sting of nerves close to burning, and I welcome it for the focus it brings and the memories it staves off.

I move here. I step here. Intricate, ornate, as with all I do, all I think, all I choose to express. One step. One breath. One creation. Night after night, hour after hour, minute after minute, while I chase the darkness to dawn.

I endure. I have come through worse. I will get through this.

(Lyrics taken from Emilie Autumn's Rose Red.)

graverobber, sometimes I wonder why I even bother...

Vint Falken goes into what (first) life might be like if the Lindens ran things:

* Health care, she says, would only be available for citizens filed under "Premium". Others might request health care, but they would never receive it, even if they managed to contact a doctor and explain the problem.

* Government funding would be given to the developers of shiny new toys--new .mp3 players, for instance, or the ability to speak and have your voice heard over miles--but serious problems, things like patching the roads, Alzheimer's, neurological destabilization and visual difficulties (think, the way your head shakes spastically at times, or the way your cam zooms in and out rapidly until you're seasick staring at the screen), would be left to citizens to solve as best they could. Should cures for these issues happen to be found, she said, Linden Government would feel no great need, or hurry, to dispense them.

* Birth rates would go up, generally a sign of a good, thriving culture--but lack of decent medical care and society-wide support would result in an 80% death rate of all newborns, across the board.

* Caring for the environment, preventing loss of native life, or preserving natural (read finite) resources would be nil; all research and development would concentrate on the problem of increasing the maximum amount of citizens Earth (TM) can sustain right now.

* Should a child survive past its first twenty-four hours of Linden life, they would immediately be shipped off to continents far away from their parents, where they would live their lives until age eighteen, when they would finally be allowed to leave. Trade embargos would keep the 'Teen Continents' cut off from the outside world.

* The mission to Mars would have gone off without a hitch; the shiny new rocket would have propelled intrepid astronauts to Mars; they would have died to a man (or woman), how'ver, when the discovery that they had been sent without any supplies was made.

* The Linden government would copyright and trademark the worlds World (TM), Earth (TM) and Global (TM), and prosecute (or at least threaten to prosecute) anyone found using them to describe anything non-Linden-owned.

Anyone who is not considered a full citizen with payment information in Linden files would be prevented from moving at higher speeds. (Whether this is by means of shackling and/or wearing lead clothing, Miss Falken does not say.)

* There would be no fear of rising sea levels, as weather technology was fully developed back when it was shiny and new.

* Each Linden resident would be involved only with 25 individual groups of friends. Period.

I'd add only a few things to this list:

* Rent on Linden-made artificial islands ('bought' from the Linden commerce department, and thereupon put entirely under the control of the citizen or citizens who bought it, to use as they saw fit, without government assistance whatsoever) would undergo a radical upwards hike of nearly double the cost every few years, because the Linden government never outright said these artificial islands couldn't be used (much like a houseboat, or a yurt in a forest) for citizen habitation.

* Arbitrarily by whim the Linden government would ban things: banking one day, gambling the next, sending the economy into a tailspin while government-funded news sources said everything was okay.

* Linded-funded news sources would continually trumpet how much the Linden government valued free speech and hearing from its citizens; one of these reports would surface nearly every time the citizens were prevented from communicating with their government at all.

Come to think of it, just in this little experiment in 'what if'...I'd rather have President Bush back over the potential of President-CEO M.

There are now fledgling broadcasts on various OpenSpace sim issues to be found (even downloadable!) at Voices in the Machine (also note the link to the left). And there's a pertinent entry on how far the Lindens have lost their way on Rivers Rock.

Miss Eladrienne Laval was there when things began in late October; I can't decide if Common Sensible is being truthful or deeply sarcastic; Ravishal gets it; Nexeus Fatale seems to, but ends up blaming private estate owners for the flaws on the mainland and flaws in the Linden economy. Huh?

Veyron sees disaster ahead; and Wagner James Au wraps it all up with the top five posts on the OpenSpace sim issue--including Fatale's.

Moving on: the latest controversy in the freebie/scavenger hunting community: posting hunt locations on blogs. This is causing quite a bit of stir.

Now, I'll be honest--on occasion, I just can't find something, or don't have the time to really spend searching for six days until I do find it--especially if it's only a forty-eight hour hunt, or something. And I have accepted, will accept, help from others to get me there.

There are places I don't do this, period, regardless of the challenge of the hunt. FallnAngel Designs, for once. Mr. Demain has made it quite clear, both in his group and in his hunt rules--no 'cheat lists'. Once I stepped over the line--we're used to hunting in a pack of three to four souls, and one of those souls had to leave world. So I was taking down 'hint locations' to give to her later.

As it happens, I made some small reference to this, Mr. Demain heard me, and he soundly--and rightfully, I would say--discouraged me from such a practice. And I've never crossed the line since.

There are makers who understand that hint tips go out, and gently discourage people from using them. There are makers (I'm thinking the grid-wide ghost hunt, a month ago) who list locations for all the hunt objects--you just have to go to that place; actually finding the prize is left up to you. And there are makers like Demain who staunchly discourage what they consider "cheating"--and they're not wrong, it is getting around their stated rules to go directly to where the "good stuph" is.

But honestly, people, really--I'm not the only one who sees where this is going, am I? Sending lists to your friends--that bends some makers' rules, but it's private. Sending lists out on freebie/hunting groups--okay, I'd say that breaks some makers' rules, but again, it's kept in IM group discussion, not out in public.

Posting hunt locations in public blogs--and the Baking Cupcakes blog has done this more than once--that, IMO, is just wrong on all counts.

Think this through--you put a lot of effort into a hunt. Most hunts really are intended just for group members, though most can be hunted out by anyone--so really, it's more of a fun thing to do for your group. You design; you want to show off the shiny newness; you hold a hunt.

But. If people keep posting your hunt locations, if people openly tell anyone who might read that blog where everything is--really, honestly, how long is it going to be before you're burned on the concept of all that work just so people can cheat and grab the goods?

Scavenger hunts are supposed to be fun, first, and a challenging way to spend time, second. Hunts like the one at Magika, mentioned on the blog--which I didn't hear about until I'd already completed the hunt--give people who participate a great idea of what that designer does, who aren't in their group. Maybe those people will end up coming back and becoming customers (and, based on the quality of the hair, I'd agree with that, I intend to go back and peruse the styles Miss Harlow has to offer), maybe they won't, but at least, everyone had fun--right?

What happens when it stops being fun?

If makers feel as if they're being taken advantage of, they generally become resentful at the least, angry at the worst. There's already widespread content theft, that already sets a lot of designers on edge. Now something they might be doing just for the fun of it, just for customer appreciation, in a sense--is tarnished by people publishing the locations on their blogs.

Here, they're being told. This is where you want to go. And they're left with the option of moving everything--which sucks if you're one of the hunters who've obeyed the rules--or killing the hunt.

And not doing new ones.

My advice? Don't encourage makers to be more bitter, they have enough problems. Don't publish hunt locations on your blog.