'cause we find ourselves in the same old mess singin' drunken lullabies

Found on a random profile:

1. dont talk to me in over a month
2. being perverted or rude
3. assuming you know me
4. coming between me and Daddy
5. pushing me to my limit
6. messing with my friends
7. assuming you can come between my friends family
8. drama
9. because you are an [a**hole] to me and those i love
10. because you pushed something i didnt like

Now, save for the one censoring moment, the grammar and punctuation are left unchanged, but this is making my brain giggle.

Mainly because if I'm removed for not talking to people in over a month, drama, or being a general bitter angry poppet on occasion, wow, I'd have zero friends in SL.

But I agree with most of the rest--I mean, no one comes between me and those I love but those I love, and occasionally me, and I have specific criteria for perversion or rudeness, but that does describe a lot of why I react badly to certain people in general. Assuming people know who I am is a big one, and has shown up on the blog several times in conversational snippets.

What I find truly odd about this list, though, and the reason I'm mentioning it: I rarely put people who fit most of these criteria on my friends list. If other people do, well, fine, that's them, but in general, unless it's just a business contact, if someone goes on my friends list, they got there for a reason. If I'm fighting with someone all the time, or if they're insulting me as often as they breathe...they're not a friend. So they don't get on the friends list in the first place.

Meanwhile, as I'd only covered half of the SL16B shopping area (and haven't even started on the rest of the SL16B sims!), I returned today to check out the other half. And this happened:

[15:09] licks Emilly Orr's hand.
[15:11] loves oxxxxxxxxxxxx Rxxxxxxx.

This is so unusual, because usually there's an avatar's name before the action, or at the very least, the named thing the avatar is carrying--be it baby, beast or bottle. In this case? No idea who actually owned the thing--or was the thing.

But first off, whomever you are: don't just randomly lick people. It's creepy. Secondly, I don't care who you love, you don't need to announce it to every listener in main chat.

That did give me something to search for, which was equally baffling. Mm. O has spent one year on the grid, and in that time, they've taken no SL bio picture, have put down zero pics, have only joined one group, and this is the sum total of their FL bio entry:

───--───▄▀▄────-─▄▀▄
────-─▄█░░▀▀▀▀▀░░█▄
─▄▄──█░░░░░░░░░░░█─-─▄▄
█▄▄█─█░░▀░░┬░░▀░░█─█▄▄█

Great, the world's most boring human's friend licked me for no reason. Ew.

over my path your song casts a light

Breathe. Recenter. Ground and stabilize. Find the foundation. Get knocked off it again.



Pattern of a life.



I should be used to this by now. This is what happens. I should be taking this in stride. I'm not.



But what I have done is, spend time yesterday working on holiday card concepts. And, tomorrow or the next day, I'll write the RL year's holiday letter.



There will be breathing. There will be grounding. I will find my center and do my best to hold it. I will hold the bright light in the darkness until Yule's early blue morning. I am making plans for the days to come, and they will involve laughter and feasting and joyous things, even if quieter ones.



But ultimately, I get through this. We get through this. Because it's what I do, it's what my family has ingrained in me, and while there were many bad lessons in growing up, that was one of the good ones.

Move forward. Move on. Tend to the wounds, feed the body, feed the spirit. Never stop moving. Endure. Survive.

I have plans to do that.

she may be transparent, she's got no defenses to speak of

Alicia Chenaux asks, Why did you become a blogger? How has it enriched your life?

I'm sure she means this blog, but the truth is, I've kept some form of online diary since at least 1998. I find I can talk about things easier in type than in person; while I am able, yes, really, to talk to other human beings on not infrequent occasion, I'm more comfortable in text. I always have been. I used to type out letters to friends on a manual typewriter--along with stories, poems, fragments of thoughts, quotes I wanted to remember--and send them off in envelopes I typed, as well.

I may not always be at peace with the machines of my life, but I've never feared them.

At any rate, from then to now, it's just been a process of evolution--typing things, then moving to Usenet, and the Nyx network, then FIDONet, then PODSNet, then GeoCities...and from then the World Wide Web was well underway, so it was a webpage here, a webpage there, publishing occasional articles and poems as I found space for them...to now.

One of my loves actually bought me a t-shirt that says Blogito ergo sum: I blog, therefore I am. Maybe that's my best answer.

And on the dark side of it, I've actually pointed loves towards the blog--or they've found entries on their own--where I deal with emotional instability, anger, hurt, confusion, that I can't adequately express to them. On more than one occasion this has caused hurt and confusion in return.

A friend once said she'd be hugely uncomfortable writing about her love life (though I cover more, now, than just love and loss) online; me, I always see it as...a radio station.

I'm broadcasting, yes, and anyone can retrieve the broadcast over the airwaves, but...the broadcast is still that: open air, just talking, occasional music, news of the day. It's still out there, it's still going out. Whether there's one listener, or thousands, it's the same thing.

So am I.

bloodhound and of no better pedigree than what you see

I've been having tremendous difficulty gutting out SL IMs from my Gmail spam folder, and for the first time in a long time, I've actually told people--and am contemplating adding it to my profile--that really, honestly, I may well miss peoples' IMs, send notecards.

Why is this happening? M'lady Sphynx Soliel tipped me to the unfortunate tragedy.

Now, I know, the Alphaville Herald is rife with hyperbolic hysteria on frequent occasion--by their own admission--but here's the hot points revisited from the article:

* SL IMs are now targeted as spam by most email services due to Spamhaus' ruling

That one's huge, right there. If this is true--and I haven't found anything saying it's not--then enough folks complained that one of the "big dogs" took notice to stop the whining. But, that is then followed by:

* Snapzilla picture hosting and email-to-Flickr hosting are broken because of this

I don't personally use Snapzilla--I use PhotoBucket or a friend's privately-hosted domain--and while I have a Flickr account, it's woefully underused. How'ver, many, many other people do, on both, and use them on both.

Now we're told they can't? Can anyone with active Snapzilla or Flickr-linked accounts confirm this?

* credit card companies are disallowing charges incoming from Linden Labs

Does anyone know if this is true? If this is fact and not hysteria, this is bigger than the blocked LL IP debacle.

I'm wondering if this--as well as the whole "Adult Continent" bother still raging on the forums--aren't all slowly converging from this initial report from May of last year that got virtually everyone running and screaming for a bit. (By the way, Second Tense has a lovely blog post on the former topic that anyone interested should read through. It's concise, to the point, and refreshingly rational.)

I'm hoping most of these allegations are just that, empty and without substantive content, but--I'm still gutting SL IMs out of my spam filter. That at least is true, and I'm not the only one to whom it's happening. So is the rest of it? I'm still searching for verification.

(A small side note before I wrap this post up--no, I haven't given up yet. I just got word that my Penzance parcel is approaching rent-due status, I'll be in to take care of that. I don't intend to lose my land and walk away entirely.

(That having been said, of late it's been one crisis after another. We just pull out of the death spiral of homestead/open sim loss, when Second Life manages to screw up its own internal voice and music controls. We get that fixed and now it's everyone on the boat, we're pulling out for adult seas.

(It's tiring. I'm tired. I'm tired of being more frustrated and angry than happy and intrigued. I'm tired of going into world and not even wanting to build because I hate the drama and the controversy. I'm tired of feeling like I don't have the strength to create and I'm really tired of getting in world, scanning through my friends list to see who's online, and just not wanting to even IM anyone to say hello.

(And I'm currently having more fun outside world, with my loves, my friends, and the rest of my life. It's not a good sign.

(So no--I'm not out yet, but--just as with the complete and utter mishandling of the homestead situation--I can see the exit sign from here. Whether it gets farther away again, I'd say is entirely up to the Labs.)

me, I was raised amid the trickle-down days

Oh it's such a drag, what a chore,
oh your wounds are full of salt.
Everything's a stress and what's more,
well it's all somebody's fault.

He growls in my dreams, and what he does after I do not speak of, even to my intimates, but it brings a smile to my face, warmth to my eyes. We talk of everything, some nights, and other nights we say nothing, knowing it's enough that the other is there, close enough to touch, close enough to converse with.

It's enough. It should be enough.

Hey! Get, get, get, get, get over it!

She cuddles close to me and I pull her into my arms. The scent of her hair comforts me, her smile enchants me, and she is the first one I've spent any serious time around where I can drop my guards and exist in that frustrating, and somewhat inconceivable, sphere of cuteness I generate on occasion. We speak in twee little kitten voices and it makes me smile, as much as it makes me shake my head at my own misbehavior.

Make you sick, make you ill,
makes you cheat, slipping change from the till.
Had it up to the gills,
makes you cry while the milk still spills.

He comes to me, perpetual lock of bistre hair falling over one eye, and I am charmed just watching him move. I adore watching him build, I'm fascinated with his mind, what he chooses to build, how he chooses to build. I am endlessly amused with his competitiveness--my strength is endurance, sliding around obstacles or away from them, but he, he must forge ahead, be better, be best, and his biggest competitor is himself.

I can say this now, to myself clearest of all: I am happy with my life.

Ain't it just a bitch? What a pain, well it's all a crying shame.
What left to do but complain?
You'd better find someone to blame--

But some nights, some days, I still shy away, I still look, I still angle and suborn as a matter of habit. The bulk of my life, I've been my own worst enemy. I don't let go of the past; I flirt as others breathe; I forget where the dividing lines are. It's not that I fall out of love; in fact, that's part of the problem. I fall in love deeply, and forget the trick of ending. As much as I hold to the changing of body and bone, shade and species, I am unchanging in how I love.

Hey! Get, get, get, get, get over it!

But I can learn. I am slow in lessoning, sometimes things just don't sink in, but what I learn, what I manage to remember, I retain. And this is the chief lesson of my life I'm facing, in this moment:

LET IT GO.

Got a job, got a life,
got a four-door and a faithless wife.
Got those nice copper pipes, got an ex,
got a room for the night.

Nothing is so very injuring, so tragic and damaging, that I need to divorce my life to get over it. And yes, I forget, yes I get distracted, yes, I make mistakes. Who doesn't? I'm learning. Who isn't? I evolve, I learn, I grow, and each failed attempt just teaches me what not to do next time.

Aren't you such a catch?
What a prize! Got a body like a battle axe,
Love that perfect frown, honest eyes,
We ought to buy you a Cadillac--

In the meantime, I practice what may be the hardest trick of all--recognizing that remaining connected to my past, doesn't mean I have to exist in that mix of emotions and reactions. Sometimes, people don't go away, and it means nothing more than they value my friendship.

And there it is, the chainsaw in the juggled apples: can I simply be friends with those who've seen me, bare and open, eyes wide with the wonder of what they meant to me, then, in that moment? Is it possible?

I touch the hollow in my throat where the locket lives, and I nod, slowly. Because if this is another mistake? At the least of it, it will be one more thing to learn. And learning is movement, at least of the mind. I keep learning, I won't stagnate, freeze in place, ossify into immobility.

Besides which...I keep moving, I'm a harder target to hit. That's part of it, too.

(Lyrics taken from OK GO's first single, "Get Over It.)

och, lad, I don't know where you been, but I see you won first prize!

It all started the day my vampire landlord acquired 85% of Rivula. He is very near to owning the entirety of the sim, and was considering a new security system.

He'd heard good things about...



(Aren't they cute? Three Turrets square off in the new empty section of Rivula.)

These things. :) (By the by, if you're curious and/or want to purchase one? You can find them here. They're very effective, surprisingly efficient, and yes--they speak.)

How'ver, he wasn't sure that they'd work. They were equipped not to target members of the land group, so--we were the only two in the sim--I dutifully took off anything that might get damaged in the crossfire, and changed my group. I took the first volley with some effort--they're surprisingly efficient--then ran behind them.

First weakness: if you run behind a Turret? They will not shoot you.

We needed to know more.

So, I called out to friends and companions in Caledon, and asked if there was a fairly stable land we could, erm, borrow for a bit.

Duchess of Middlesea, her Grace Gloire Thibaud, obligingly offered. So off we went.



(Setting up the field of combat in Middlesea. Mr. Bubba Daniels, Duchess Gloire Thibaud, Mr. Hassanov and Colonel O'Toole face off against three Turrets and Mr. Hank Rucker.)



(The fighting begins. Mr. Daniels advances as the Duchess and Miss Vi Paravane (just off the frame to the left) look on; Mr. Hassanov charges for another volley.)



(Sadly, your faithful correspondent does not remember the great bear of a man in that amazing cloak[[*]]; otherwise, Colonel O'Toole, Mr. Hassanov and Mr. Daniels firing; Miss Paravane has learned the wisdom of Not Being Seen.)

[[*Has been suggested that said bear? Is Mr. Exrex Somme. I plead distraction from turret fire if t'is, because I should have recognized him.]]



(An important discovery: the Turrets WILL NOT BURN. Also, Miss Neome and Miss Midnight Bohemia, designer of robot and Jaegermaiden skins, arrive.)



(MASS DEATHING. It was chaos. Dogs and cats, living together, CHAOS.)

After I stopped laughing so hard, and reformed in Penzance, I arrived back to the battle, and discovered things had taken a tern for the wurst:



(I'm terribly sorry. Considering the images about to be shown, those were two terrible puns. But onward. Mass deathing on the field of battle--of a different kind: pidgeons. Miss Merlot Zymurgy arrives and is appropriately perplexed.)



(The combatants take to the skies, the better to target the pidgeon soldiers.)



(The Duchess is under attack!!)

After I was set ablaze by Mr. Hassanov--light the bird, not the cat, light the bird, NOT THE CAT!--I ran in a cloud of kamikaze pidgeons. Straight into Mr. Hassanov. Terribly sorry about that.



(Oops.)



(The great Pidgeon War of '08 is OVER! Huzzah! We are saved! Also, Colonel O'Toole shows us his big metal doughnut.)

Which reminded us, whatever happened to his first food-based craft?



(Colonel O'Toole obligingly whips out his weiner for us. Then crashes.)



(We are so grateful for the assistance, we decide to award him...erm...first prize.)

[19:27] Merlot Zymurgy cursteys, well, thank you for letting me get covered in pigeon carcass... it was lovely
[19:28] Hank Rucker: Hmm. I dunno. Am I comfortable in boarding another man's meat... Hum.
[19:28] Iason Hassanov: I dont know where you been boy, but I see you won first prize!
[19:28] You: *facepalm*
[19:28] Hank Rucker: lol
[19:28] Hank Rucker: Hmmm
[19:28] Iason Hassanov: its just all in a days event at caledon
[19:28] You: Indeed.
[19:28] You: So, successful, dire, surreal. Yes, a typical day. :)
[19:29] Merlot Zymurgy: Iason, why are you always in the middle of these things?
[19:29] Merlot Zymurgy snerks
[19:29] You: He asked this time!
[19:29] Iason Hassanov: lol...yea..they said we could shoot things!
[19:29] Iason Hassanov: that always perks me up

I have been your faithful war correspondent, Emilly Orr, reporting live from the front lines.

*collapses in laughter*

what I learned I rejected but I believe again

I know it's hard to tell how mixed up you feel
Hoping what you need is behind every door
Each time you get hurt, I don't want you to change
Because everyone has hopes, you're human after all

There are moments we experience, moments that are set aside from the rest of our lives, defining moments. They vary in intensity--the birth of a child; the death of a friend; lovers leaving, learning new languages...signposts of a life. Moments we can point to--here, I was here, when it happened--

Whatever it was.

The feeling sometimes, wishing you were someone else
Feeling as though you never belong
This feeling is not sadness, this feeling is not joy
I truly understand, Please, don't cry now

Signposts of a life. Moments of definition. Moments we look back on later, and say here, here is where I saw the change. Here is where I noticed. Here is where I had to act.

Protests. Songs. Celebrations. Vigils. Hoping to hear good news, waiting for bad news. Raising voices in anger. Trying to understand.

Here. Here I was. Here I was when it first happened. Right here. This moment.

Please don't go, I want you to stay
I'm begging you please, please don't leave here
I don't want you to hate for all the hurt that you feel
The world is just illusion trying to change you

The one I was a year ago, even one year ago, would have watched me in this moment, watched what I did, understand to my ability to understand, when I lost everything I loved again. Because I knew that pattern. I knew what would happen. It had happened before.

Signposts. Moments in a life. Moments of confusion. Moments of understanding.

Please don't go, I want you to stay
I'm begging you please, please don't leave here
I don't want you to hate for all the hurt that you feel
The world is just illusion trying to change you

The woman I am now, could not do that. I could not stand by. I couldn't watch love die again. And I'd never fought for any love before, I never thought I had the right, I never thought I could.

All of my life. All of my signposts. Everyone I've loved.

But not this time. Not this time.

Being like you are
Well this is something else, who would comprehend?
But some that do, lay claim that
Divine purpose blesses them
That's not what I believe, and it doesn't matter anyway

Sometimes, the hardest thing is not suffering pain. Pain can be endured, pain can be accepted, pain can become familiar, after a while, known, quantified and categorized. Sometimes, the hardest thing is speaking about that pain. Sometimes, the hardest thing...ever...is simply...being honest.

This hurts. This hurts more than I want it to. And reaching out--to friends, to lovers, to the ones closest to the heart. How can we fix this?

Asking for help. It's something I have been, am, will be...very, very bad at doing.

Signposts. Moments of change. This was mine. Knowing I had to reach out. Knowing I had to speak of my pain. Knowing it would cost me--and cost me high--but...knowing the alternative was worse.

A part of your soul ties you to the next world
Or maybe to the last, but I'm still not sure
But what I do know, is to us the world is different
As we are to the world but, I guess you would know that

Fragments of the nightmare stay with me. Most of it's left. I'm blissfully grateful that I don't have every element perfectly concretized, because I'm having that one nightmare over, and over, and over again.

I just had the one. The one moment of heart-fluttering panic, and...then talking. Talking and talking and talking. Reinterpreting and explaining and nature of language and definitions.

--wandering around with a parboiled daisy dripping with spring water, through emerald grasses, knowing my friends were dying out of sight. Being walked back into the house past the corpse of a love, slowly being parted out on the butcher-block kitchen table. Led to a chair, curiously dispassionate, while they sat me down and took the flower and replaced it with knitting needles through my eyes--

And the thing is? That wasn't the part where I started really wishing I could stop dreaming.

Please don't go, I want you to stay
I'm begging you please, please don't leave here
I don't want you to hate for all the hurt that you feel
The world is just illusion trying to change you

Defining language. This is what it means when I say this. This is what I say when I feel this. This is what I say when I'm hiding. This is how I hide from you. Giving away my secrets, my heart's long-held defenses, giving entry points away. No way to change the locks and go on now.

This is me. And what you've done has hurt me. Just saying it, just saying that, instead of claiming all pain was my fault, and hoarding the rest. Just...speaking. Openly. Honestly.

Learning. Learning to speak. Learning to share. Learning to understand.

Learning to fight.

This moment. Right here. This signpost. Here, we begin to change. Here we change again.

Right here.

Please don't go, I want you to stay
I'm begging you please, oh please don't leave here
I don't want you to hate for all the hurt that you feel
The world is just illusion always trying to change you

They say the ultimate sacrifice is to die for love. They're wrong. The ultimate sacrifice is to live for it.

Now I can. Let's find the next signpost.

(Lyrics are from VNV Nation's Illusion. The link is not to one of their videos, but to a fan's tribute video, pairing that song to part of Andy Huang's Doll Face short film.)

the secrets that you keep are at the ready, are you ready?

wait
I'll be swifter
damn the speed of light
carbon on my body
a billion years of time



When will you listen? Will decades pass and stars descend streaming to earth, vibrant glitter of death across our skies, before you hear? What will it take? How long will you cling to this fanciful notion that your pain is purity and you must never let it go?

you'll wake
with the stitches
over both your eyes
and deny
me my body
and all earthly delights

By everything I hold holy, you sound like me, and that's not a good thing.

it's time
you are alight
I guess you are afraid of
what everyone is made of



Just a little breathing time, just a little foreknowledge, just a little hindsight--and it will make the pain more bearable. You do not hear, you do not believe me, but I know these things. Pain becomes twinge becomes ache becomes melancholy nostalgia, and if you still cling to it at that point, it will slip through your fingers like mist. You will not remember the sound of his laugh on the morning air. You will not remember how she danced under moonlight. You will not remember the possessive look in his eyes, over you, knowing you were his. You will not remember her embarrassed smile, the first time your hands touched skin, and how your heart leapt to see it.

You will not remember. I know you don't hear me, but you will not. It will fade, everything does.

time and light
I guess you are afraid of
what everyone is made of

And you are light and life and vibrancy, cast your net upon the waves and pull it back straining with new interest--I have seen you do this, never intending, and still you say you cannot be loved. It's inconceivable.

all of your brain
amounts to just one breath
please
keep your victory
but give me a little death



You say you're freezing, you're falling into the center of your own cold winter. I tell you we are wintered now, and I am in thaw, and I see more than you do from here. I tell you I have been where you are, frozen, cold, and growing colder, mourning and growing bitter, shut away where none could see me...and it is not the way to live a life. Not mine. Not yours. Not anyone's.

When we stop reaching out, we stop living. We might as well lay down and wait to die. Are you hearing me, at all?

it's time
you are alight
I guess you are afraid of
what everyone is made of

It's fear of future pain. It's fear of love ending. It's fear of giving up love again. It's fear of future risk.

I know this. I know this well. Do you think I never stood at your crossroads, wondering if it would be better to shut the doors of my heart? Do you think I don't know, even with them as open as I can make them, those I love still have to fight me to gain entry? My heart is still guarded and the thorns are sharp. I injure everyone I hold close. And I mourn their pain, and struggle to remove more of my defenses as I find them.

I'm not reinforcing. Someone leaves now I shatter. But I know I can put myself back together. You can too.

Listen. Hear me. Why won't you hear me?

time and light
I guess you are afraid of
what everyone is made of

And it's not just you you're hurting. As I had to see, when I finally looked around--all of my dear ones I hurt. All of my dear friends I hurt. By hurting and not letting them help. By hurting and holding them off. By falling, and insisting I could rise on my own, and not accepting their hands outstretched.

Accepting help, taking that risk...it's humbling, it can feel crippling, it can be the most terrifying thing...but you must continue to let it happen. You are not me...yet.

But I think you can see me from where you stand.



time
time
time
time

How much repetition do you need? How loud must I scream at the air you're stilling around you? How much will it take for you to hear?

How long until you close in to mirror distance, and realize whose face is embedded in the other side?

time time time
time time time
time time time

Tell me. Must I repeat it? Every second, slipping through your fingers. Every minute you're a little older, a little colder. When do you finally look around, and see you're not you, you're me, and the long hard road back you'll have then?

I'd spare you that, if I could. I'd spare you such pain. Because that pain you will have paid for dearly, in heart's red and soul's wounding, and you'll say to yourself, because of the price you paid, the cost excised from your living flesh, you must cling to it, make it yours, wrap yourself around its razor weight and hold it slicing tight.

And you do not need to do this. You do not need this. Do you hear? Can you hear? Am I just words on the wind, wailing past your ears?

time
you are alight
I guess you are afraid of
what everyone is made of



All I have to offer is where I've been. And where I've been holds joy and light, suffering and darkness. Would I do it differently, had I to do it again? I'd love to say yes. But I think I'm wrong.

All I can do is reinforce, guide, advise...I can't make you do anything.

But if I have nothing else, I have my standing as a bad example. At the least I have that.

And in spite of it, I have love. You can too. Do you hear me?

time and light
I guess you are afraid of
what everyone is made of
what everyone is made of

Or is your fear overriding everything else?

so take to the streets with
apocalypse refrain
your devotion
has the look of
a lunatic's gaze...



The fear that you will be the cold thing at the center of the thorns, unable to move...

(Song is St. Vincent's "Apocalypse Song".)

and as we lay in silent bliss, I know you remember me

This is interesting--a plan to recycle, rather than create, for at least a little bit longer? As a way to avoid raising fees? Gosh, how...alarmingly sensible.

Fuzzball Ortega tagged me again. THIS is going to be the last one. I will relate the rules, to future victims; I will not reveal anything else. Past this point? You'll just have to ask. :)

Rules, as explained in yet another reiteration by the Sheriff of Steelhead:

Here's the rules:
(1) Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
(2) People who are tagged need to write a post on their own blog (about their eight things) and post these rules.
(3) At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
(4) Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog

Well, then. This time? The 'eight random facts', they're a mix. Between the grid, and, y'know, that other place. :)

1. I had to invent a word to describe my hair. I call it 'piebald' if I'm feeling snarky, or 'mahogany' if I'm trying to be very very. From a distance? It's brown. Up close, though, or under sunlight, it's red/auburn/rust/black/brown/blonde/russet/strawberry blonde/nigh-platinum. Yeah, really.

2. I've never had a hairstyle on SL I haven't had at least for one evening in RL. (Those of you now remembering the Mohawks and the Liberty spike sets I own? Yeah, them too, at one point.) Same thing goes for colors, barring one significant one--I have never, ever, had pink hair.

3. I wasn't just an escort on SL. At one point, I was a professional dominant. I've also been a lay sex educator on health issues. I still have books on my bookshelves whose titles shock the hell out of guests. :)

4. I own over twenty different colors and styles of silks. (No, not Gorean. Still not, never will be. Beautiful Sins had this Hallows apple-dunking game and they gave away free silks, and I was there a lot with friends, so....I went from a few sets bought originally for dancing, and worn primarily by my merforms, now, to....so many I haven't even tried them all on, yet! But no, I don't generally wear them with any form not finned, and it's a rare day indeed they see the light of day even then.)

5. My eye color changes depending on mood. (Hee. You get to decide whether that's SL or RL.)

6. My very first build project, ever, I still have not completed, and may never, because it makes me laugh hysterically every time I flip it out to see it. It's an eight-pose water-patterned cushion, and, since I knew zip on positioning and editing, it's sort of legs-akimbo and arms-flailing when everyone sits down. Not to mention the two poses that completely bury people. (I've learned a bit in the intervening eighteen months.)

7. I originally joined SL to make art and build things. I've turned into something of a hobby photographer, true, but after I was hired for my first job...well, the stated Appollonian intent of "no sex" sort of...exploded. *grins widely*

8. And finally, on top of my computer monitor, right now, is:

* a stuffy Ebola virus
* a stuffed pink flamingo
* a wooden black cat cutout
* a moss-covered deer femur
* a white silk gauze and silk velvet beaded drawstring pouch (it was full of holiday gelt one year, it's not anymore)
* a pastel Beanie Baby seahorse (Lunar, don't look at me like that, the flamingo and the seahorse were both gifts!)
* a bust-version waist-up Catwoman coin bank
* a pine cone on a dried maple leaf
* a small piece of red/black/blue/green fleece stuck full of sewing pins (in case I need to mend something at the keys, and it has happened on occasion--the needle I use to mend things is currently stuck through the flamingo's head)

Hee.

I am tapping people this time, but not the full eight.

* Have to tap Turner, even though he's not around to respond. He did give me the idea, so it's his fault.

* What would Koen do if tagged?

* And, because of the (pink!) orange paisley/plaid shirt that long-ago night, if nothing else, and also, because finding out he's one of Miss Seraph Nephilim's long-standing friends? I have to poke Puck Goodliffe.

And that is it! Tapping no one else, answering with no more facts! That's all you get without asking! (Or, well, continuing to read. Hee.)

now I can't let go of this dream

What you, dear reader, are looking at, is the map of the forthcoming sim, Steelhead Harborside, in the new Steelhead Town Hall. TotalLunar Eclipse is funding it, to help with Steelhead's expansion plans, and he's not only the driving force behind the project, he's also its chief architect and booking agent. The wonders he and his partner, Tensai Hilra, have worked in that town are nothing short of phenomenal in their seven months in the sim.

It's about fifty percent booked, there are LOTS of openings. He just needs a few more people to commit and he can order it. He's functioning on the Caledon pattern, with much advisement from our beloved "Guvnah" Desmond Shang, so he won't order it from the Labs until it's at least 90% booked in advance.

It's not far from there now, just needs a few more willing souls to buy in. It promises to be a lush sim, with waterways, forested regions, and a stunning Sound...and it will, of course, abut Steelhead as a joined sim.



Steelhead is currently in the grip of midwinter, and is dressed for the coming holiday. All the streets are scraped, the snow pushed to the side, and this year's tree in Fountain Square features a little train that goes around in circles at the base. Faery-lights and wreaths, and gathered evergreen boughs, are seemingly around every corner.



This is the new Town Hall in Steelhead, a far cry from the old two-level wooden structure, with simple wooden benches and wood-slat walls. In fact, the whole town looks different, far closer to the dreams of the Gilded West than the frontier turn-left-at-tumbleweed construction Steelhead had in the past. This is a new future. This is a genteel and lovely sim, these days.



Everywhere I turned, it seemed, there was a new build, each more ornate than the last (well, barring the Town Hall--that place is very nearly grander than the Grand Hotel!). So much new to look at, to see, to enjoy, and nearly all of it crafted by hands that not only understand the mechanics of building, but bring all his artistry, passion and life to this work.



It's truly a new town, start to finish. Even the wood-slat streets have been replaced with paving stones, the fishing pier extended to a wharf with small elegant seaside shops, the train station rebuilt and the train refitted.

I admit, I miss it.



Though seeing a Nativity scene on the site where the Taiyou formerly stood was...odd...



You can drop by the train station and click the portrait with the dolphin for more information on making your move to Harborside. Or come by our shop in Caledon Penzance, Autogenic Alchemy, to get a notecard and a landmark. Or drop a notecard to Mr. TotalLunar Eclipse--he'd be overjoyed to hear from you, and take you to Town Hall to discuss where you'd like to live.



It's going to be beautiful. Share in the dream. Keep Steelhead the wonderful place it is, gaslamp fantasy, street oddity, performers and dignitaries, deep forests and tall trees. Make the move. You won't regret you did.

so if you're lonely, you know I'm here waiting for you

I'm here.

Simple words, to be so powerful. Nearly as powerful as speaking love to someone. Mayhap more powerful, being there, stating it. Reminding.

I'm here.

Something I've said at some point, to every love. Rushed, hurried, amused, concerned, loving, wanting...in all moods, in all different ways.

Shh, love, I'm here.

If you can't laugh, in love, then why are you there?

Yes, sorry, I'm back, I'm here.

My policy of getting distracted to the fore.

Hee, no, I'm over here!

Generally when I'm in some more unusual form, closer to the ground. Or in a form they haven't seen before, and the tag doesn't give it to them, right away.

Shhh, it's happened.

I'm here. I'm here now.

Said softly, urgently, sweetly....voice low, voice gentle, voice hushed.

I'm here.

Affirmation.

I'm here.

Confirmation.

I'm with you.

Blessing.

oh, you're one of those things I love, but you're bad for me

I had a feeling it wasn't going to be the best day.



I was trying to program a rug. (That's the rug below me, that round thing, ohhhh so far away.) It wasn't precisely working.

Mr. Allen came and tried to help me. At this point the conversation wavered between moribund and cumbersome; I did try to pay attention. Between moments of being flung very very high.

He said I had my rotations wrong...



I'll agree with him there.

He told me, always make sure my poses start with the rotations at 0,0,0. I misunderstood him at first and entered 0,0,1.0 on the rotations card. It flung me off the sim entirely.

[23:09] You: That flung me off the sim
[23:10] Fawkes Allen: Now Em, did we go over the making sure the Positional Vector was below 1.0?
[23:10] You: You said 0,0,0,1
[23:10] You: So I put that in
[23:10] You: It said not a vector
[23:10] You: So I put in 0.0, 0.0, 1.0
[23:11] Fawkes Allen: Noooo.
[23:12] Fawkes Allen: I said 0,0,0.1
[23:12] Fawkes Allen: Notice the .
[23:12] You: Oh.
[23:12] You: Aheh.



He's trying, I'll give him that. I think it's much easier to make something and use poseballs to make sure people are where you want them to be. I think it's much harder to try to get the rotations and positions right so that each prim in an object has a sit target.

Trust me, I'm not playing the typical girl "Math is hard, let's go shopping!" card here. I'm trying to learn it. It's just not making sense yet.

[23:25] Fawkes Allen: What was Pos at?
[23:26] You: No, wait, no, it made sense...
[23:26] You: N'mind ignore me
[23:26] You: Okay
[23:26] You: rot = <6.95, 356.95, 60.60>
[23:26] You: No no
[23:26] You: pos = <15.723, 202.131, 20.900>
[23:26] You: right
[23:26] Fawkes Allen: Yeah see.
[23:26] Fawkes Allen: Stop using any number higher then 1.0 ^_~
[23:26] Fawkes Allen: Fix that, we can try again
[23:28] You: Okay, then we're back to, I have no idea how rotation and position work



He made a handy little visual. I'll have to look at this more, but this may actually help

[23:35] Fawkes Allen: Notice the spiffy diagram here.
[23:36] Fawkes Allen: That Neome is in
[23:36] Fawkes Allen: The larger X/Y/Z is the Sim "Grid"
[23:36] Fawkes Allen: It's where you are in 3-d Space.
[23:36] Neome Graves gets out of the way before something goes off.
[23:37] Fawkes Allen: The smaller one? Is the prim. You want to be changing the position of the SitTarget (What the Config notecard is for) relative to the smaller "Grid"

I'd love to say the light went off at that point, but....it didn't, quite.

[23:41] You: Okay, so let me ask this
[23:41] You: Do the numbers under rotation in the edit window mean ANYTHING?
[23:41] Fawkes Allen: Yes.
[23:42] Emilly Orr stares at Fawkes
[23:42] Fawkes Allen: Rotation *and* Position mean something. It's just you can't interpret the data Raw.
[23:43] Fawkes Allen: You have to essentially reformat it to be relative to the root prim. Which is most easily done by taking away the X/Y/Z of the Poseball from the X/Y/Z of the pillow.
[23:43] Fawkes Allen: More or less

Maybe it's that I need to take a class or something. Go through the Ivory Tower tutorials again. It's almost making sense, but my brain is missing something.



But I tried using what he was trying to teach me. Every attempt at reprogramming the prim, I got a little closer. Even if it was getting harder to talk.

[23:44] Fawkes Allen: See this Sphere?
[23:44] Fawkes Allen makes it a sphere.
[23:44] Neome Graves: Hee
[23:44] Fawkes Allen: It's at 14.500, 202.500, 22.000
[23:44] Fawkes Allen: I want the pose however to be here.
[23:45] Fawkes Allen: Okay?
[23:45] Fawkes Allen: This is at 15.0,202.5,22.0
[23:45] Fawkes Allen: So I'd take the notecard configuration file.
[23:45] Fawkes Allen: And under Pos
[23:45] Fawkes Allen: I'd go
[23:45] Fawkes Allen: <0.5,0,0>
[23:46] Fawkes Allen: Which means the pose will be sitting .5 meters forward along the X axis.
[23:48] Fawkes Allen: Did that help at all?

And my answer is yes and no. It helps, it's just not how my brain is used to working.



I finally just plugged in 2.5 along the X axis, I was tired of being in the pillow! Which set me hovering above the rug entirely. But that taught me more about how rotation and positioning works than anything else had...and he had to tell me again to use Local edit settings, not World.

Hmm. Does Local edit settings give one different figures for rotation and position? As in, would they give the relative rotation and position of that prim in the edit window, not the rotation of the object being edited on the world grid?

Because that may make everything very simple.

Finally I cobbled something together that would work "for now"--I could finely-tweak later, I was getting tired. I decided to throw together the figures for the pillow in the middle, to make it a properly working set of three poses.



I give up.

I went off to fight some battle that I'd invented inside my head

Last night, I tried to make a dress. I got farther than I'd gotten previously, I still have the skirt to do, but...my concentration was flawed. I spoke with that one, and...we are not yet dead, we are not dead, we are...still postponing, but that still makes it hurt to breathe.

I needed to speak openly, something I can now not do with my friends, with those closest to me, something I cannot do with friends of his, and not because I fear tainting them, but because I have been bound from speech at all.

I thought it was time. I needed to return once more to the crypt of my fallen princeling, speak to his brittle bones, rant my pain to the universe...but he has been unearthed.

Literally.



When I arrived at the home of the Transylvanians, the Forsaken family crypt, I found myself standing on sharp dark stones, staring at a river of lava pouring from the mountains' heights. This was not the cool dark undertunnels of the family home I remembered, the Italianate manse built over the old pirates' smuggling bay, cool lapping of distant water in the subbasements, as I meandered my way to the bones of my lost love.

This was...frightening, in a way. Had the manse been moved? Was that it?



I descended, carefully hovering, from the heights down the side, where I could dimly see structures, and...now my heart was in my throat. They'd all been slain, I knew this now, because...those were palm trees, goddamn it. Palm trees and tiki huts and what in the seven hells was going on???



I descended further, following little pools of gleaming blue water over glimmering pink--pink! PINK!!--sands, to the largest of the tiki huts I could see. There were surfboards in front of it. My heart sank. I knew I was in the Forsaken sim. What on earth had happened?



Hovering further down the beach, flinching at the beach towels and the fishing competition rods and the pale marble wedding pavilion...I find something that resembles the Forsaken manse I'd known. Italianate...vaguely...and open-air, but...it was something. I made for it, intending to track down secret passages inside.



It was a ballroom. The stairs up led upstairs. There was...nothing else, nothing underneath, nothing but more sand and the foundation.



I looked. I sent my consciousness out, forth, descending below the level of the marble tiles, and stared in numb incomprehension at the blue blue water lapping at the pink sands of the foundation under the ballroom stones.



I tracked down a teleportation hub, and spent some time traveling to every location listed. My lost princeling's remains were in none of them. Finally, I took courage in hand and went to the cave I'd noticed under the river of lava. It was guarded by some dark creature indeed, and I had to narrowly edge past the burning brands of his eyes.



It was hot, in the cave under the river of lava. That's an understatement, really, but it's true--the floor was slowly cooling lava, the stereo system and furnishings scattered about on the burning stones mystically enchanted not to burn. I touched foot to floor once, thinking I was wrong, and quickly shot to hovering distance again.

I'll regrow that, but I do not like the smell of me burning.



I'd done everything I could to find him. I sent a mental message, resonating with shock, to the head of the Forsaken clan, the Transylvanians now ensconced in their cosy pink-sand abode. She sent back word to me that the current flavor of my lost prince had wronged her, deeply, and she had destroyed his crypt because she would never, never forgive him.

*hangs her head*

Seems to be a lot of that going around...

I still have his soul. I have some small few other items remaining. I may make my own reliquary, but...it will not be the same. It will not have the impact of scenting his bones on the air, the ash and the calcium slowly falling to dust. It will not be the same at all...