The sexiest boots in SL

What happened was, I found a marvellous outfit on sale at Serene Sensations — but it needed a pair of fab boots to go with it. I called up my fashion adviser Eidolon and asked her "Where would you go for a pair of knee-high high-heeled patent leather boots? I need some drop-dead-sexy boots, some You can't afford me boots."

She laughed and gave me a stack of landmarks, and we started a shopping tour. Found these at the third store we visited, Bax Coen Designs, and it was lust at first sight. They were on sale, marked down 50% to a mere L$700, but I'd have paid the full price without batting an eye.

Exogenesis

I seem to have become a roleplayer in SL. I went to see the Exogenesis "dark sci-fi" RP sim created by Aloxis Bellman, Rin Tae and others, intending only to have a look at the design and gameplay aspects, but got caught up in a storyline and have decided to stay and play it out.

What happened was this: I had introduced Rin to Tarmel, who is researching RP and immersive gaming, and Rin took Tarmel to Exogen to have a look. Tarmel then offered to show me around, but forgot to tell me a crucially important piece of in-character information: leaving the central zone (where new characters arrive) is free, but it costs you a power cell to get back. Now, new players can collect a free power cell for the asking in that central zone, but I didn't know to ask and Tarmel didn't think to tell me. So we went off to an outlying station, where she left me.

At that point, I was stuck. TPing is severely frowned upon within Exogen, to the point that repeat offenders are expelled from the game. As an observer, I could of course have simply TPed back to the starting point and ignored the in-world sanctions. I could even have had one of my alts sign up and fly out to rescue me.

But for some reason, I didn't do either of those things. I decided to join the RP and remain stuck on the station until I could find a "proper" way back. To which end I seem to have signed up to become a medical technician.

I'll keep you posted.

Own horn, blowing

The brilliant and wonderful and somewhat exaggerating Corvi interviewed me for the Play as Being Chronicles. My favourite sentence from the interview: "We are all approximations and prototypes and just somehow doing the best we can."

I must go and soak my head in the tub for another hour, hopefully it will shrink back to normal size soon.

Coincidence?

Standing in the kitchen just now, I had an impulse to log into Second Life and see whether Corvi was online. When I got there, she IMed me to say "I was thinking of you two minutes ago, wishing you would log in."

Freaky.

Not quite "ho ho ho"

If I could, I would tear up my airline tickets and beg the world* to leave me alone. I would bury my head under the covers and just cry until this festive season is over.

But doing that would only make it worse: as much as the world's attention seems like an unbearable burden, I am even less happy when the world does leave me alone.

I have no idea how to get through the next days, this season, the rest of my life.

* To be clear, this is a metaphorical "the world" consisting of obligations and responsibilities and duties and things that I contracted in good faith to do; it certainly doesn't include you. Your presence is very much desired.

Reading the coffee grounds

I realize that I have taken on far too much in SL (and in RL too, but that is another story: who can resist squeaky toys?)

A friend from the club where I dance IM'ed me last week to ask what was up, as I never come around any more. On consideration, she's right. It has been several weeks since I was there. Not a conscious decision, I just drifted out of the habit; because I was seldom there, the boss hesitated to call me at short notice to cover for her, which she often had done before, so that I didn't have that prompt to return either.

The Cushicle has been on hold for a month, though that was intentional. Another friend gave me some good advice ("Stop beating your head against the wall, take a break and return to it with fresh eyes") which I have taken. I'll be getting back to that mid-month.

The PlayAsBeing group is making unhappy noises about the autorecording system which I am supposedly ringmastering into existence. I have kickstarted that and assigned us a deadline of October 1 — yes, this year. It's tricky though: given that all participants are volunteers, all I can really do is encourage them to take their own promises seriously.

I have been dropped from Pulse because of a failure to communicate, which I can't really discuss here. It was at least 50% my fault, though, so no hard feelings from my side though I fear there may be such elsewhere.

I'm not sure how to go ahead with all this. I need to reorganize my life, but don't quite know where to start.

Playing

It's been a busy month. I have joined a meditation/discussion group called Play as Being and have been quite caught up in the conversation. And in working there too: I am Ringmaster of a small team that is implementing an automatic recording and publishing system, to simplify and speed up the process of logging discussions at PaB on their website.

I will probably have more to say about PaB in future, for now I am still feeling my way in and learning the peculiar ropes of Taoism- and Buddhism-based existentialist debate. (A recent example: "There is no 'I'." — followed in the next breath by "I'm reading the notes." How droll.)

The biggest perk of being a Guardian at PaB (impressive title which means that once a week I am greeter and recorded of notes for a discussion) is that one may claim a parcel of group land to build on. I found a lovely little sandbar with some palms and a few large rocks at the shoreline, and have built a tent there.

That will have to do for now, my dears, it's feeding time and after that is my exercise hour. I hope you are all happy and healthy, and that your collars do not chafe.