The dinosaur chronicles (Part 1) and Gaaaaaaaa Ga

So, I have this dinosaur on my roof.

(It sounds like the beginning of a bad joke.)

People started swinging by to snap pics on it. Now I collect them. (The pics, not the people.) And yeah, it's my lunch hour. I'm stealth-SL-blogging at work, so the creative process is a little stilted. Or stinted. Pick one.

I logged in the other day and discovered to my great delight that Deoridhe Quandry had been hanging out with my dinosaur. She snapped that pic up there, as well as this one:

Laugh out loud, Deoridhe! You rock. And I hope I'm spelling your name right.

Speaking of laughing out loud, I decided to give up "LOL" for Lent. Hey, you may think that's a stupid thing to give up, but you try not saying "LOL" for 40 days! TRY IT!

I found almost the exact same post proclaiming that I was giving up Second Life for Lent in 2009, so I already know that attempt would be total fail. I think I lasted 24 hours last year.

And as long as we're on the subject of total fail, if I would've known everyone and their grandmothers were gonna blog that ballerina dress down there, I would have never touched it. I swear!

Um, so . . .

"Dear Alexander McQueen, I thought you were cool. I'm sorry your life came to a tragic end. You will always be remembered fondly as an icon in fashion history. However, I'm done wearing weird shoes that were inspired by your designs. No offense. Love, Em"

I'm sorry, but they look like FRAGGLE ROCK FEET.

*ducks as the fashionistas throw things*

These aren't the ones at Pacadi Jasha (sorry if I spelled that wrong -- like I said, I'm at work). These are called GaGa Black Snake Heels from O! Bleak, which is a small store but SO DAMN COOL. I discovered it during Weekend Fever or on 50L Friday or on Where the Hell Have All My Lindens Gone Wednesday or during one of the other very rare sale days we have in Second Life (cough).

I think these shoes cost 250L. I bought them mainly so I could wear them in this blog and say "No mas!" But also because I'm a collector. (hoarder) I appreciate the thought behind them, I really do. And the fact that their SL creation was inspired by a fashion milestone, albeit a sad one, as well as a musical milestone, albeit kind of a WTF one. So I'm proud to have them in my inventory, if only for the sentiment.

(Who wants to buy them from me?)

But you're probably not gonna see me wearing them again . . . unless I break them out for a "Lady Gaga in a Bad Romance with a Dinosaur" portrait, which I start thinking about whenever I drink vodka.

Well, actually first I think about Naveen Andrews on "Lost" when I drink vodka. Then I kind of start fantasizing about the lawyer on Floor 11 of my office building. Then when all else fails, sometimes my mind goes to "What weird things can I do with my SL avatar?"

That's a roadmap of my drunk time for you.

(You don't have to tell me. Yes, I need to get a life.)

I also got these rockin' DNA Earrings at O! Bleak. I want to say they were 180L. Or maybe I want to say they were 200L. Or maybe I just want to say that I didn't write it down so I really have no clue. Sorry.

(Skin: Cupid, Crave 2 in Sundust by Curio; hair: Melinda in Cocoa by Troof)

Um, and you can get this GaGa Sparkler Bra there too. (/me prays that the IT Department at work hasn't flagged the word "bra.")

Set Environment to Midnight. Turn on nipples.

(Shoot, I just said "nipples" at work.)

The only thing I have left to say is about the store MEB. I'd never shopped there before last week. No offense to anyone who may get offended, but I've always kind of glanced at the stuff there and said, "Meh(b)."

HOWEVER, I stopped by there on the My Heart Bleeds Blue hunt and REALLY took a good look at the clothes this time and OK, now I'm a fan. I'm a texture fanatic. As such, I really love the work there. The clothes look so touchable, if not lickable.

I never want to take off this dress, called "prada skirt Lelie" (490L), and hey, I type it like I see it.

And that's one of my all-time favorite poses. It's called "Imma Just Stand Here and Look to the Side."

OH SNAP HERE COMES MY BOSS!

(bye)

We dress up our little dolls and take pretty pictures of them

I swore to myself that I wouldn't accumulate any dollie or lollie dresses this year because I have a million of them. And do you ever see me running around in them? No.

But when I saw this Withered Willamina dress over on the Second Life 24h blog, I decided that I needed it. I'm all about the rundown ballerina look, not sure why. It's free in the subscribo at The Dollhouse. And there are way better pictures of it over on that blog, obviously. :D

(Those boots that totally don't match that outfit are the McQueen Sequin Boots (450L) from the Heroes of Fashion exhibit. I'll admit that I put them on and said, "Uhhhhhh, I don't know." In retrospect, I should've gotten the Rose ones. R.I.P. Alexander McQueen. His Menswear Fall 2010 collection had us raising eyebrows and clapping at the same time, as always.)

Once I put on that dress, I finally got motivated to try out a Haunted Ballerina AO that I won (some time ago) from the lucky board (chair?) at ANA_mations. And yeah, that AO is beautiful but it skeeeers me! It sinks my AV into the floor and then pops her up in random places in various ballerina poses. I don't know if it's supposed to do that, or if it's just another symptom of "Second Life is Lame on My Computer." Hey, maybe that's why it's called "Haunted"! Um, so that's my best attempt at a pic up there. Hard to catch the action on camera.

So, I have this dinosaur on my roof:



And I want to thank the people who drop by, take pictures on it or of it and drop them in my inventory. They make me laugh:



Fricker is up there dressed as . . . a bear or an Ewok or something.



And that one's just DAMN COOL.

Anyway, I was planning to give up Second Life for Lent, but I keep pushing the date back, as in, "I'll start after I finish the Red Packet Hunt" or "I'll start as soon as I post pics from the Red Packet Hunt."

Yesterday I finished the Red Packet Hunt -- it's got a great Chinese New Year theme, the participating stores are fab and it's a MANAGEABLE 42 stops. I know you'll be crushed by this news, but I'm not going to post pictures of the prizes. Mainly because I haven't looked at them yet. But also because Tomoyo does a really great job of that HERE on the Free*Style blog.

So maybe I'll start the whole "sacrificing Second Life" thing now, but I'm not sure if I can give it up for almost 40 days, and I'm not sure what this sentence says about me. Um, but maybe instead I'll limit my logins to Fridays. Maybe I'll start next week. Or maybe I'll just give up chocolate for the 18th year in a row. (I'm weak.)

I meant to write this big long thing here about WHY I feel like I need to give up Second Life for Lent, and how I'm trying to embrace the whole Lenten journey to Easter this year, but seriously, who cares? I'm tired of navel gazing.

So anyway.

This new Truth hairstyle, Melinda (in cocoa), is one of my all-time favorites:



Yeah, I modded my hairy ear after I snapped that pic. And that's not a dead sock puppet around my neck. It's a scarf.

Profile:



Pretty. I used to wear my hair like that. (Sniff.)

And NO, I haven't been inducted into the Fangirl-Blogger Cult of Truth (still waiting for an initiation ceremony and the secret handshake) although I appreciate the fact that he deems my blog worthy of review copies.

Truthfully, pardon the pun, most of the hair I wear has always been either his or . . . TUKINOWAGUMA'S! (I have to check that spelling every time.)

But if I didn't like it, I wouldn't blog it.

Here are the two most fabulous AVs I've seen during the past week.

This chick at Tiny Bird:



Girl, WOW. That's all I can say. I wish I would have asked her if I could take her picture, like outside or something and not in the midst of 50L Friday chaos, but I'm pretty shy. Plus. . . she has a lot of guns.

Also on the list of awesomesauce is my friend Casandra, who was having a really bad SL day, with missing clothes, bizarre glitches, etc. etc. etc. When she showed up on the island where I live, she was RUTHED!!!! JOY! I didn't know we could Ruth-out like that anymore. I love! It makes me laugh! (Sorry Casandra):



You look beautiful anyway, Casandra!

(Gives her a standing ovation)

Meanwhile an ad on the Photobucket page is asking me if I want to order that picture printed on a coffee mug. Ha ha ha!!

No.

I don't have a witty ending for this post so . . .

"Maybe I'll take a blogging break now."

Cue Mary J. Blige

I'm trying really hard not to Disneyland-up my parcel this spring. I think I'm doing an AWESOME job at it so far.

My yard is so full of magic and joy that I really only have enough prim allowance left for the bunny, a pose stand and one piece of furniture, and that's this Requiem for Poe sofa (750L) from Alchemy's Attic.

It's got several poses in it. If you decide to read, click the book and it'll read "The Works of Edgar Allen Poe, Vol. II" to you. Well, not out loud -- on your screen in chat. And you'll most likely get a migraine if you really try to read more than 20 Edgar Allen Poe stories that way (she said, as she popped a Vicodin).

Yep, you can also get your Amontillado on while you're reading. This set includes Poe-appropriate refreshments. It also gives you the option of just taking the separate stories on notecards.

And then it wisely covers its ass by providing the link to Amazon.com where you can buy the actual book.

But anyway, if I could keep only one piece of furniture in my inventory (not counting the Bunny), I'd keep that couch. And you? Seriously, I'd like to know. 

I wouldn't be so brazen as to call that question a blogger challenge because only 12 people . . . wait, I guess it's 32 now!! . . . read this blog, but if you're scraping the bottom of your blog post idea barrel in the near future, there's one for you.

And HEY, I bought that couch myself, BTW! For those of you not-so-early birds who didn't catch the most memorable comment ever (now deleted) on this blog the other morning, just to clear up a couple of things: a) there are quite a few people out there who can attest to the fact that I'm not a giant va-jay-jay on legs, to put it in genteel terms and, b) hell no, I never ask people for review copies of anything. I know I'm prone to making an ass out of myself frequently, but I can't even IMAGINE how that conversation would go down.

"Hi, I have 12 . . . no wait, 32, according to my Followers widget! . . . readers. Would you like to give me some free samples of your exquisite designs so they can see your work portrayed in all its glory in my really, really horrible photos?"

I think good bloggers shouldn't have to ask for review samples anyway. I imagine if you're a good writer or if you have some kind of an appealing style, people will WANT their stuff to be featured in your blog. If you have to ask, maybe you need to spend your own lindens for a while until you build up a reputation and a reader base.

AND OMG I'M GETTIN' ALL PREACHY AGAIN! Sorry. :(

And that brings me to this point:

(Hair: Reese in Chestnut by Truth)

EnCore Mayne dropped this heart-shaped hole in my inventory today. And while I'd like to think she meant it as a deeply romantic gesture, I'm pretty sure it was intended to be an insult. But I actually think this thing is DAMN COOL!! That aside, I'm not a heartless bitch! I'm not! CAN I GET A WITNESS? (Sorry, I live in the South. We say that here.)

And to be honest, I've been reading EnCore's blogs for about a year now and I'm actually somewhat fond of her in a "thank you for at least writing something halfway entertaining and a little bit morbidly fascinating even though I don't understand most of it because I'm just a simple anti-socialite no-namer" kind of way. So in that respect, I won't approve any comments here that take shots at her.

In fact, I'm not approving comments that take shots at anybody anymore. And I took down those two controversial blog posts, but not because people were threatening to sic their lawyers on me or calling me horrible names or writing blog posts about me or using this mess as a blog challenge inspiration. I don't cave to threats or mob mentality or intimidation or whatever.

And I also didn't remove them because I regret anything I said. I still insist that the intent of those posts was to defend my friends, not attack someone for the hell of it with no rhyme, reason or factual basis. I knew if I spoke out, I'd probably be in for a bloody mess, and no, I wasn't eagerly salivating at the prospect of it.

Hey, speaking of bloody, if we're gonna have breedable pets in SL, why the hell can't someone make something like this:

I'd breed the Sam Hill out of those things. And if that's a Lycan, my apologies. I'm kind of out of that whole "Twilight" loop. My dark heart will always belong to Ann Rice.

Uh, anyway I never wanted this blog to get this ugly, as in, so ugly it makes me sick to my stomach now. So that's why I deleted those posts. I didn't feel right drenching my 12 . . . I mean 32! . . . readers in sordid gunk.

(I'm not removing the last post though, because I totally wanna trademark "Kiss my fatpack!" Sorry, it makes me laugh every time I read it.)

So I'd like to get back to my usual meaningless musings now, please. Thanks! And don't tell me there's no turning back now. That's just some bullsh*t that Vincent Price made up for the Haunted Mansion ride at Disneyland. You can always get back to where you once belonged. (Get back, Jojo!)

This post is long, but we still have time for some quickies. It's Valentine's Day weekend after all:

♥ If you like putting giant words in your yard that broadcast positive sentiments to any poor sucker who happens to walk by your house, I suggest you hop over to Just My Imagination and grab this Valentine's Day special this weekend for 50L.

Supposedly it has 11 poses in it. I was only smart enough to find four.

♥ And if you're doing the Weekend Fever sale thing, I'm digging these 50L glasses at Glow:

♥ The only Valentine's Day-related thing I'm wearing this year is Jori Watler's Keeper of Hearts necklace in silver (250L, includes matching bracelet) at alaMood. I used to say I was only loyal to three jewelry designers in SL. Make that four now. I like her work.

I don't even know if Jori reads this blog, but if so, sorry Jori. That pic sucks. It needed a black shirt behind it. And I'm lazy.

♥ And if you're on a budget but want to spread the love among your friends tomorrow, I have to tip my hat to Arctic Greenhouse, where you can buy this GAWD-DAMN GORGEOUS sculpted rose arrangement with trans perms for a special price of 10L this weekend. Like, seriously, I couldn't believe that price and maybe I should go back and check because I still can't believe it.

(If roses aren't your thing, there are a bunch of other arrangements that vary in price, all transferrable, obviously.)

My friend Aisu gave me this one. It goes really well with that Santa Muerte painting over my fireplace.

OK, I think I'm done. Maybe I'll take a blogging break now. (HA HA HA — or maybe I'll just start ending every post with that sentence in the hopes that one day it'll stick.)

Happy Valentine's Day! 
♥

love & Truth

(Updated to address the eloquently expressed concerns of a reader!)

I don't know Gala Phoenix, but she sent me a nice IM the other day that made me get a little teary. I was having a weird day and I don't think she'll ever know how much those unexpected kind words from a stranger meant to me. I won't forget it. (Yep, TOTALLY NAME DROPPIN'!)

So, sorry — I know they're all over the feeds right now, but I too got seduced by her Cupid 2 skins at Curio. (That means I BOUGHT them!)

Here are a few shots. They totally change my face, but sometimes change is good.

Oh, and hey there's new Truth hair! (Hell yeah honey, it was a GIFT! Watch me roll around in it naked!)



Skin: Crave 1 (Dark) in Sundust
Hair: Berry in Driftwood (You can change the color of that flower!) 



Skin: Pure 4 (Dark) in Sundust
Hair: Kirsty in Chestnut

The shading on these skins is gorgeous, and the details are awesome: the bellybutton, the elbows, cute little moles. Sorry I'm not showing you the nips. I'm shy like that. (But if you look closely at this gratuitous underwear shot, you can still see some nip fragments!)

Now try to guess when I got sort of sick of changing clothes, backgrounds and poses.



HA HA HA! It took a whopping two pictures before I said, "Enough!" I have to hand it to the hardcore fashion bloggers. It takes WORK to set up photos — even lame ones like mine. (OMG! Self-deprecation!)

Skin: Allure 1 (Dark) in Sundust
Hair: Peta in Night

I love that hair. I tried to catch it in motion because you need to see it move. I wish I could make my lame RL short haircut look like that now. I'm still mourning the loss of my locks. (Look! It's a shameless cry for attention!)

You get a lot of bang for your buck with these Curio skins: Each makeup comes in a day and night version — at least I'm assuming that's it, because Version 1 has pale lips and Version 2 has luscious lipstick. Here's Allure 2:



Hair: Peta in Blood. (Kiss my fatpack!)

And each one of those versions also comes with freckles or no freckles. And then each one of THOSE versions comes in a dark and light option. WOOOO! That's eight skins in one folder, if I'm doing my math right. (Doubt it!)

I feel like it took me 30 minutes to write that paragraph and I still don't think I understand it.

Each makeup is 1K. You might as well buy the fatpack for 3K. I did. (Because I can afford it!)

And the rear view is really pretty . . .



. . . too bad that picture sort of isn't. (Hey, look at my butt!)

Sorry, this is purely a vanity post. I just wanted to throw something meaningless up here. No matter what people are saying right now, I'm not a horrible person and this blog was never meant to be an ugly thing. (This blog reeks of drama and catfights!)

And now that I've filled up this screen with pictures I like, unless something truly extraordinary happens in my slice of SLife, I'm probably going to put this blog to bed for a while. I'm sort of sick of looking at it. (Banana!)

Peace be the journey. (Jamaica, we have a bobsled team!)

You never know when you'll need a good monkey

HEY look at my monkey!

I am blogging right now because --

1. I'm supposed to be writing a PR plan and I can't get started. This is not procrastination. It is terrified writer's block. So I figured maybe if I could just get some words down somewhere, they'll start coming out everywhere.

Kind of like taking a literary laxative.

2. I am so sick of seeing that fugly cow-suit picture in the previous post as the lead pic every time I come over here to scan my blogroll. I'm gonna admit that deciding to be a cow for a day was a post-oral-surgery Vicodin moment, and the LAQ Tasha2 skins on me are kind of a mistake. Tasha was the first skin I bought as a noob. I feel obligated to buy her whenever she's updated, as an homage to my SL beginnings. (laugh)

So along the lines of frivolous purchases:

3. I thought that since it made headlines, maybe I should say something about my inventory.



But first, I urge you to LOVE MY MONKEY up there. It is, hands down, the most awesome monkey I own in SL and that's saying a lot because I consider myself to be a connoisseur (wow, that word is a bitch to spell) of pixelated monkeys. It looks kind of flat and one-primmy in that picture, but it's actually a reasonable, fully dimensional eight prims.

So if quirky cartoon animal friends are your bag, I suggest you check out Duggy Bing's Cartoonimals store, which DELIGHTS the hell out of me. I got a pack of three monkeys for . . . yikes, I can't remember. Maybe in the range of 400 - 600L. They're animated and respond to movement around them. I have two of them out in my yard right now. I don't like the third one because it throws monkey poop at people. If that one were trans, I'd give it to one of my crude friends.

I want Duggy Bing to make a cartoon unicorn. Maybe I'll drop him a pleading notecard.

I guess discussing the cartoon animals in my inventory is a good way to lead into why my inventory is a newsworthy monster. I posted the above picture on Plurk and the next thing you know, BAM, 15 minutes of New World Notes fame. WOOT!

YES, my inventory was at 105K last week. And when Hamlet wrote a blog post asking "How does something like this happen?" I had to laugh at one outraged comment that said, "I would like to hear an explanation from this user."

OK, here's my explanation:

I could tell you that I'm a sentimental fool and that every precious thing in my inventory has a story, but that would be a fib. Granted, there *is* a folder called "the first dress I ever bought" and another one called "the first fancy dress I ever bought" and another one called "special gifts from special friends," but I'm not kidding myself much on the nostalgia front beyond a few select folders.

Of course there's also the entertainment factor. I have my inventory primarily divided into years with subfolders in them, and looking through those folders *is* a little bit like taking a journey through my whole SL, watching how my taste in clothes changed, seeing what things grew to hold more value to me, reading notes, looking at "favorite landmarks" and how they've evolved (from Club Chillaxin' to Life is Good, haha!) -- to me, my inventory is a little bit like walking through a museum and it never ceases to amuse me in that respect.

But that's no excuse for hoarding 105K items.

When your inventory hits six figures, your memory lane becomes the road to hell.

I guess "hoard" is kind of the key word. I approach things -- freebies in particular -- with a hoarder's mentality, as in, "Hey, I might actually NEED this nine-piece latex outfit someday" or "You never know when an occasion might call for a cupcake hat or a talking tampon!" or "Maybe one day I'll decide to go Neko!" or "Someday I'll wear this koala bear backpack. I will! I will!"

I don't think that way in real life, and maybe I stockpile things in Second Life because you never know where the day will take you. Anything is possible. One minute you could be slumming around your prefab house and the next minute you could be sitting on the moon with some new friends from Japan:



Bad picture, sorry. But would you expect anything else?

I am also at times a lucky chair stalker, but to be honest, I stalk lucky chairs not so much for their prizes but because I usually make friends around them. I feel blessed to be a member of Serenity Semple's Lucky Kitty Crew — they are all beautiful, interesting souls and we're sort of a very mixed bag of characters brought together by the alphabet and a fondness for staring at ugly chairs.

I like the fact that I can just hang out around them and sort inventory silently without feeling pressure to say anything entertaining, knowing that I don't have to be anything more than The Letter E if I don't feel like it, that they accept me the way I am:



. . . even when I'm not wearing pants. (That's me with the butt hanging out.)



There IS a long leggings option with this Scylla Bounty Hunter Outfit by Nardcotix (bought at the "2010 — The Future is Now" Rezzables exhibit), but why wear those when I can get all Apocalyptic Lady Gaga on yo ass? :D

(Shades were a group gift from Lelutka; boots shown in the top pic are from Anexx; hair is from . . .  TUKINOWAGUMA!)

Uh, so yeah, that pastime can lead to inventory accumulation. Add to that my former enthusiasm for gridwide hunts and the fact that 2009 was my Unemployed Year of Chasing Freebies and, well hell, before you know it, you've got a six-figure inventory.

Those are all lovely reasons, but if you want the bottom line, the truth is that I'm just DAMN LAZY. I love the thrill of the hunts, but I hate unpacking the boxes. As for group gifts, subscribo gifts, the fruits of many sales, the aftermaths of my shopping-addiction sprees and all the other stuff I manage to accumulate, I know I should be sorting them, wearing them and/or deleting them -- but I'm never in the mood.

Someone in the NWN comments said that I'm probably the type of person who lets her e-mail inbox fill to impossible proportions -- and that's actually true too. People like me -- and I know there are more out there -- lack the self-discipline and organizational skills to control things that build up on a daily basis. Am I proud of it? Nope. It's just one of my many flaws that I've come to know and accept.

I've heard that a huge inventory can cause lag. I would love to know if this is really true or just a myth. The aforementioned outraged NWN commenter said that I'm not only lagging myself with my monster inventory, but also any people around me. If this is true, I'm horrified. Because I'm loving! And caring!

Anyway, I'll have you know that I've been deleting things like a mad woman all weekend. My inventory is down to 82K today and counting. That's kind of a huge feat for two days.

YIP YIP! :)

Are we normal? Do we care? Look at my bellybutton with me.

My friend Fricker walked up while I was rolling around in the snow taking this picture. That's not embarrassing or anything.

Hell yeah, I got milk.

Camp for 15 minutes at Cutie Honey to get this whole cow ensemble, minus the shoes. The shoes are from Anexx. The cow (ACTUALLY, it's a BULL!) hat with hair is included though! So is the darling little purse. And those eyes on the hat are animated. Cutie, honey! That skin is in the Tasha2 fatpack at LAQ. And that's my bullish Look of the Day for you.

I love my friends because they tolerated me in this outfit for a whole day.



That sexy chick in green actually is a male friend of mine in his female alt. It irritates me to no end when a man creates a female AV that's hotter than mine -- with better clothes, nonetheless. Sheeeeeesh, I am a complete failure as a woman in all worlds. *weeps*

As long as we're on the topic of friends, I have one in real life who tends to drive me insane. (And I hate the fact that I have to distinguish "real life," especially in this particular post.) I'm not going to psychoanalyze her or anything, but I do think she's the type of person who can't be alone with her thoughts -- mainly because she calls me about 35 times a day. I can only take her in small doses because she's a little clingy and Never. Stops. Talking.

Even at our age, which is crawling reluctantly towards 40, she's still really big on going to bars and picking up men, and she'll pretty much go home with any guy who gives her the time of day. Then she wails all week about why he's not calling her. It makes me sooooooooo damn tired. And hell no, she doesn't seem to have any other friends. I wonder why.

The one thing she simply cannot compute is why, if I'm not doing anything on the weekends, I sometimes don't want to go out. And these days, "sometimes" is a lot of the time. It's cold outside and I'd rather stay home in pajamas with hot chocolate and goof around with my friends in world than go to a lame bar and sit around dork-watching. I'm perfectly content to hang out in Second Life, and when I do, I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything. I don't feel socially unfulfilled. I probably laugh harder at things in SL than I do in real life . . .

. . . like at my friend Soph and her creepy, creepy Zooby baby:



That thing is disturbing and expensive.

(runs and hides)

Meanwhile, I bought a cheaper one for 200L at a black-market baby store:



The stuff horror movies are made of: that baby and my ugly hand.

Back to my friend -- I finally broke down and came out of the SL closet one night when she was being annoyingly insistent in demanding an explanation about why I wouldn't go out. I gave her the whole "sometimes I hang out online with my friends who live in other states. We use this forum called Second Life. It's like a chat room but a lot more fun. I just feel like doing that tonight instead of the bar thing" spiel.

I gave her the Second Life Web address. I encouraged her to check it out. She did. Later she called me complaining about it. She didn't understand it. It stressed her out. She thought it was stupid. She couldn't figure out how to do anything. It seemed weird. Was I being serious? Why didn't I wanna go get sushi?

I started wondering if any shrinkish-type people have done any studies on what type of personality embraces and thrives in a virtual world and what type of personality shrieks in protest and runs from one. Demographically, my friend and I are the same: We're both single professional women in the same age range who are pretty much hanging out with each other by default in a land of married people. Almost everyone else we know here in suburbia is part of a couple. It can get lonely, so I choose to seek solace in a virtual reality while she strives to create one that looks like everyone else's. We both look at each other's recreational lives and balk.

When I first logged into Second Life, my initial reactions were those of delight -- "Oh cool, look what I can do!" -- and curiosity -- "How can I do this? What happens if I go here?" But meanwhile, the majority of my friends who have checked it out have reacted with "This is stressful" and "I feel stupid and weird." Even my younger brother -- a Sims fan who also worships his PS3 at age 30 -- "doesn't get it" and thinks "it's for losers."

My friend gave Second Life a whopping 15 minutes before she returned to doggedly plugging along in pursuit of her ideal reality, which boils down to some resemblance of a social life and a husband. If I don't go out with her, she goes out alone. Although I want fun and a husband too, right now I'd rather stay home in flannel pajamas than get prettied up and go out and hunt for them. I'm tired. At the moment my job is kicking my cow tail.

But notice how I described my very determined, no-nonsense, "Second Life is bizarre" friend in this blog -- I made her sound as dysfunctional, lonely and unappealing as possible. Did I subconsciously just do that to make myself feel better? Flip the scenarios around so giving it your all in real life is annoying and weird? She kind of is annoying and weird though. SHE IS! Maybe I'd rather be alone on my laptop in a fantasy world than plummet to that depth of desperation in the real one. Maybe WE ALL need help.

Does the fact that I'd rather hang out in Second Life these days mean that I'm lazy, scared, unmotivated, introverted, depressed, unable to function in normal society and/or a geek? Or does the fact that I take to a virtual world like a duck takes to water mean that I'm more open-minded, technologically advanced, forward-thinking, imaginative, a better communicator, a curious explorer and/or a creator by nature? Am I embracing a boundless and futuristic concept or am I hiding from the real world and its challenges? While I'd like to think it's the former, sometimes I worry that it's the latter. Truthfully it's probably a little bit of both.

I guess the bigger question is do I care?

Usually I don't, but occasionally when I witness such a visceral unpleasant "what the hell is this" reaction to the concept of Second Life, I worry that maybe I'm the one who's not normal.

Then I wander off to camp for cow outfits.

/me shakes off the emo and scares you with a big damn picture of my face

This'll be fast because I have to go to work!

Tasha by RaC was the first skin I ever bought as a noob. And since we've all been reflecting on our noobish looks lately, I'll admit that any time LAQ updates Tasha, I buy the skin purely out of sentiment. I actually liked the last update and I'm wearing it in my current profile pic (that really needs to be updated).

I just wanna say the word "update" again: Update.

I logged in this morning to find a note that Tasha2 is now out at LAQ, so I ran over there like Flo Jo and grabbed the demos.

Ummmmm . . . what do you think about that face?

Wow, the lips seem really huge to me. I'm not a fan of the big-lipped, blow-up doll look. (Oops, I just ticked off a bunch of big-lipped people.)

I love those free Aurora eyes by Poetic Colors (they're out now, go get them!) but I think they're also kind of distracting me from making a skin judgment. It doesn't help that I'm wearing the light prim that comes with them.

(Prims on my eyes! My eyyyyyyyyyyyyes!)

If I didn't have to jump in the shower right now, I'd act like a professional blogger and show you the rest of the Tasha2 skin and more makeup options, but I must pound coffee and fly like a briefly escaped parakeet returning to its dirty cage of captivity.

Apologies — as you can see from my post below, I went to bed feeling tired and overloaded with emo last night. I found out that they're probably going to shut down my account at work and lay off me and my team. We're kind of on death row right now.

Sigh.

I hate working anyway.

But I don't wanna get all mopey about that here! So here's a picture of something that makes me happy!



I got this Keytar for 100L (I think) at Miyoko Magic after I saw my friend Ali post a pic on Plurk. It looked like my kind of thing and it totally is. It has an animation that makes you look like a little Keytar star when you wear it.

That dress is the new release at Vita's Boudoir, called La Fenice, and I'm so not doing it justice in my Keytar star pic. As much as I love the dress, it's kind of a bitch to mod the skirt to fit my shape. I ended up giving up and modding my shape to fit the skirt, but it still looks a little wonky. I'm never buying a skirt made entirely out of feathers again. (No offense, feathers of the world.)

That cute (yet blurry) dolly-looking skin is the Tres Blah Hiccup skin from the Designers United 3 event. Everyone was talking about it so I didn't mention it here at the time, but NOW I WILL! I like how it makes me look like a character in a book.

I'll come back and edit in the name of whoever makes those shoes, but they actually are SO COOL in that they come in a prim-toe version and a non-prim toe version. Since I'm banning most prim toes from my life, I'm rocking my feet au naturel right now. Go ahead. Laugh at my ugly toes. I don't care. You have them too!

I have to go -- have a great day!

my apathy is killing me

Blue Song
by Tennessee Williams

I am tired.
I am tired of speech and of action.
If you should meet me upon the
street do not question me for
I can only tell you my name
and the name of the town I was
born in — but that is enough.
It does not matter whether tomorrow
arrives anymore. If there is
only this night and after it is
morning it will not matter now.
I am tired. I am tired of speech
and of action. In the heart of me
you will find a tiny handful of
dust. Take it and blow it out
upon the wind. Let the wind have
it and it will find its way home.