Bears!

Dear Lindens,

Hi. I'm probably one of your bigger fans. Heck, to read all the OpenSpace mess, I may be one of your only fans. But I love SL and I appreciate all the work that must go into keeping this place running at all. So I have a subject that we must discuss today.

Bears.

No, not this kind of bear.





But Linden bears. You see, I heard that all of you have your own bear. Today I was told to IM TrickOrTreat Linden and I got my goody bag and there were bears in it. Now I have a mission.

I want your bear.

Armed with a "Find A Linden" HUD, a semi-charming personality, and the ability to write about nothing, I am coming after you and your bear. Now you all can make this easy for me and just send me the bears. Or you can let me come and bother you when you could be doing something useful for SLociety. I prefer the first option myself, but I'm not above searching you all out. If you don't want to give me your bear, then I need to know why, so I can write about how mean you are just know why and not write about it.

No, my fingers aren't crossed.

C'mon, you know you want to be nice to one of your biggest fans, right?

Love,
Ali

PS: If it makes it easier, you can all just get together and throw them in one box and ship it over. I don't mind.

Happy Halloween!

I thought I'd be all sophisticated beautiful vampire for Halloween in SL. Then someone in a group said if you IM TrickOrTreat Linden, they'll send you a goodie bag. I squealed when I got my bag because it had Linden bears and other stuff in it.

So much for sophistication.

Happy Halloween everyone!!!!

Thriller Night!

Fabulous Halloween bash tonight thrown by everyone's favorite couple, Tymmerie and Jerremy Thorne-Darwin! :) They really went all out with decorating their place and of course providing snacks for the guests! I made sure I grabbed a little of everything, since I don't have a working kitchen and live off whatever food people are thoughtful enough to put out. I was eating off their wedding cake for ages!

I took pics, of course. :)












There are a few more, which you can see on my Flickr page.

Big thanks to Tymmerie & Jerremy for throwing such an awesome party!!! :)

Yay, party! *faints in tiredness* LOL

I say it every week...but that was a great party. :)

I don't usually make a set playlist for the parties unless there's a real theme [like the sock hop] but I do put a bunch of songs in a folder just so I'm not totally flying blind and in case there is a lack of requests. But the energy of the party people really defines what I end up playing, that's for sure. :) It's so much fun for me to be able to do this every week, and nothing makes me happier than when I pick a song and people start saying how much they love it.

Anyway, I took a bunch of pictures and ended up with 21 that I liked. Of course I'm not going to post all 21 here. LOL But here are a few and then head over to the Flickr set I made for this particular party. I'm not Flickr Pro, so eventually the set will be pushed away, but for now it'll work. :)








And once Leggy the Spider broke free... we took a ride.




I'm tired so I think I'm going to sit and work on my costume for the Halloween SLelebration tomorrow that Tymmerie & Jerremy are throwing! I'm so excited for it!!

Hump Day Party @ 8pm SLT!

Come in costume or come with all the Halloween junk you've picked up over the past week just piled on, but be sure to come to the party tonight!!! We'll be partying on Bluebonnet in the SPOOOOOKY ZONE!! Well, the newly updated Spooky Zone that got moved over and drove me crazy trying to figure out where all the parts went. LOL!

8pm SLT is party time, so we hope to see you there!!

The List

If you value your face, I don't want to be talked to about the following things for at least the next 3 days:

1. Open Space sims.
2. The upcoming election.
3. Halloween hunts.
4. "Omgwtf, I'm leaving SL."

However, the following things are still good:

1. Fun, awesome sims like the bakery sim.
2. Gifts or sales unrelated to Halloween.
3. Silly gossip, like the fact that Cen & Dyami are having a prim baby.


I don't want to be mean or anything, but heavens. I'm overloaded with this stuff and I don't feel like I should have to have it thrust in my face at every turn.

Baking and Fun!

So much went on today!

First of all, sympathies to those who were using their Open Space sims for the intended purpose and are now about to be screwed. It's as the old saying goes - one bad apple can spoil the bunch. BUT - don't get all crazy just yet. You all know as well as I do that LL has made some statement on the blog about what they plan on doing and then they change things around later. Hello, ad farming? Don't plan on the sky falling just yet, is what I suggest.

Cen and I decided to go out on one of our random adventures tonight. Well, it initially started out as just going to Zaara to get some jeans. But after that we headed over to Dreaming Alice to look around, and then we decided to walk around the sim. There were stores there that we'd never heard of before in our lives. LOL By the 3rd one, we decided to be on that sim you basically had to be an unknown. The funniest thing was probably this little hair store we wandered into. The hair was not our style, but it might be for someone else.






Then we took a little rest in a gypsy trailer thing.

The fact that there were beans & weiners in a plate on the table cracked us up. It's really only funny to us. :-p




After we got bored there, Cen had the idea to check the Showcase listings and we ended up at this SUPER cute place called 7 Days Magic Bakery. Oh my gosh, you guys. You HAVE to go see this place. It's not just this amazing build that will wow you, but it's just....CUTE! It helps if you have your sound on because sometimes things talk to you, and the little background music while they talk to you is just adorable. You get to eat things and then you get to MAKE your own food! It's so fun!!! Take a look at some of the pictures.













It was just too fun. We kept running back to the machines to make more food. LOL If you're looking for a cute way to spend some time that doesn't involve shopping and hunts or going to some club, I DEFINITELY recommend this place!!!

After Cen logged off, I hit up the Mudhoney hunt with 3 of my favorite ladies, Emerald, Sehra, and Nikki. I still haven't really looked at my items, but I did do a little posing on a stool that was out there. I think I look good! :)




Combined with an awesome long conversation I had earlier with one of my favorite people in the whole entire world, and the fact that I got new ETD hair, Monday was a pretty great day. :) But now I need some sleep so I can see what Tuesday holds!

Aw man, I got tagged.

1. Link to the person that tagged you. (Yeah, thanks a LOT, Merrick.)
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Share 6 non-important/habits/quirks about yourself.
4. Tag 6 random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs.
5 Let each person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their website.
6. Let your tagger know when your entry is up.


Just the quirks, ma'am

1. I rub my cell phone on my pants or shirt before answering it. Every single time.

2. If I make myself a sandwich, it must have one bite taken out of it before I go back to sit down. I don't know why this occurs. And it's only sandwiches.

3. After a shower, I always dry off in this order: Face, tummy, left arm, right arm, left leg, right leg, back, and then wrap the towel around my head. If for some reason I don't do it like this, I swear I'll walk out of there with one wet arm or something.

4. I like to smell makeup. Any kind, powder, blush, mascara, whatever.

5. Unless I'm really upset about something, I change my clothes in SL as soon as I log in. Even if no one has seen me in the outfit and I had just put it on before logging out the night before, I still have to change it. If you ever see me in the same outfit for 2 days in a row without changing, ask me what's wrong. LOL

6. Whenever I'm doing something I don't really like or want to do, I challenge myself to do it as quickly as I possibly can. That's why I speed everywhere I go [I don't like driving] and why I blaze through SL hunts as quick as I can.

Ok, well, see, everyone I know basically has been tagged. Sooo....

If you haven't been tagged yet, I TAG YOU NOW!!!!!

Take On Me

I know, I know, I know. I have things to talk about and I've been tagged and all kinds of good stuff. But I came across this and it made me laugh SO HARD that I couldn't help but share it with you all. :)

About Quality

I was thinking tonight about quality. As most people know, I'm not a huge fan of hunts. I think we're a bit over saturated in SL with hunts and they tend to get on my nerves. If I do one, it's either because the girls have raved about it [actually, that's how most of my shopping gets done these days - my hardcore shopping friends tell me something is fabulous and I go out to buy it] or because a designer that I really really like is in it. I'll go through a whole hunt just to find something from Long Awkward Pose, and I'm totally not lying about that.

So when my group started buzzing about that crazy ghost hunt, I figured since I didn't have anything better to do, I'd go ahead and do it. Besides, LAP was in it, and Katat0nik, so what did I have to lose?

The answer is - I lost a lot of time.

Oh, I'm not saying everything was bad. I picked up a lot of very good things, actually. Most of it will be boxed up until next Halloween season, I'm sure, but some of it will become part of my regular rotation. But it did get me thinking about quality.

You see, when you're new to SL, you don't know what's really excellent and what's just good enough. You pick up all kinds of junk that you think is fab just because you don't know any better and you're a bit awed that someone made a skirt and you're still working on not wearing a box on your head. But as you progress, you start to talk to people. You look at people. You find out about blogs and you start to notice changes in products. Those jeans that you picked up that you thought were so hot now look noobie and sad next to a pair of jeans with matching seams and sculpted cuffs. Those prim shoes with bling shooting out of them look crazy next to a delicate pair of heels with pretty little buckles and straps. You learn and you grow. And for a LOT of people, gifts are the way they learn about quality in SL. Anyone can go down to Freebie Island and pick up pants, shirts, and some jacked up shoes. You can be dressed. But you go somewhere that is offering a free gift that is quality work, suddenly you think, "Hey...this looks SO much better! I wonder what else is here..." It would not surprise me one bit that stores that give good quality gifts on a regular basis produce higher sales than a store that doesn't.

But then we have the people who participate in freebie days and gift hunts who are so obviously only wanting the traffic. And really? Who's paying attention to traffic anyway? Does it even matter?

While I was sitting on my posestand tonight looking through all 113 ghost folders [yeah, you know, this hunt was a BIT excessive], I was trying things on to make sure I wanted to keep it. And oh heavens. Mismatched seams, prim skirts that were crazy and huge and couldn't be resized, poorly fitting shoes... Heck, someone even gave an item of clothing she's been giving away since January, and the neck seams were STILL all wonky! The BIGGEST blooper came from a store that put a skin and an outfit in the folder. Now at first glance, it looked like they were being incredibly generous. But if you do a lot of shopping, you know that the RONJAS brand is pretty much a big ol' business in a box mess. So right away I threw all that out, knowing also that Ronjas is not my taste whatsoever. Then I tried on the skin.

It was a ripped skin. Granted, it was a ripped skin from a designer that has had the finger pointed at them for ripping off others, but holy cow. LOL It was a surprise!

But really, what was that about? Putting business in a box mess and a stolen skin in a folder and saying "O hai dere! Come to mah store!" is not a good way to market your crappy stuff. I went out to the store later and almost everything in there is ripped or from a BIAB. Nice.

After that, I was a little more ruthless as I went through the rest of my hunt items. I was looking for quality. The bed from Instinct? Fantastic! The pumpkin from LAP? So cute!! The dress and shoes from Katat0nik? Precious!!

It's all about the quality, folks. Free or not free, it's always about the quality.

Bleh!

*rubs her head*

I took yesterday away from SL. Didn't even touch the icon on my desktop. I thought a day away would do me good, and it did. I woke up today and I was excited to go back in. That excitement lasted about 30 minutes before one of my bigger renters on the island said they were moving out.

Ugh!

Not that I didn't fully expect it, really. The people who had moved out before are their best friends and they were getting an island, so you know, why pay me rent when they could move over there and be with their best friends? I can understand that.

But now? That leaves me with over 15,000sqm of land that I MUST get rented out. I've pretty much decided how much I need to charge on a monthly basis for the land. I can cut it into 4 sections, or halve it, or rent the whole thing. But I have to KNOW the people I rent to. It would be easy to just list it for rent and let anyone move in, but I just simply won't do that to myself or the rest of of the residents on the island. Whoever moves can't put up some crazy ugly building or totally screw up the look of the island. I don't want anyone who is going to act like a fool or get bitchy for no reason or use a lot of lag producing scripts. Basically I want renters like the ones I already have. Quiet, tasteful, fun, and sweet. And they have to not mind my little mountain. LOL

Ugh ugh ugh. lol This whole land owning thing kinda sucks a bit. But I won't let this island go. I just can't.

Back and gone again

Back early from our little excursion. It was ok. Not as fab as I wanted it to be, but it was ok.

There are so many blog posts in my head! I couldn't sleep last night so I jotted down a bunch of things. Now if only I can get them from my head & crowded little notepad to the blog. lol

But, no time today. I'm out until evening. In the meantime, enjoy Simon's Cat!

Broken

So things still aren't totally great on my end. I wish I could say it's all SL related but it's not. There are many things that just make me feel broken. But they say that a change is as good as a rest, and so that's what I'm doing tonight. RLBF and I are taking a small overnight trip just so we can both unplug for a bit. He's been under quite a great deal of stress with work, which then stresses me out because I'm right here with him. And of course he sees that I have been in a constant bad mood since Monday, which I know worries him. So tonight we're driving out of the city limits and staying in a hotel. I like hotels because there's just something luxurious about staying somewhere that you can leave your towels on the floor and not make your bed or empty the trashcans and someone else will come do it for you and you don't have to worry about a thing.

See you all later, have a great night. :)

Far Away

I am having a pretty bad day. So the big post I've been working on will have to wait.

grr.

Oh I swear I'm going to get this blog post done. The one I've been trying to do since Tuesday night. lol See? This is why I don't PLAN blog posts. I can't! But tonight I have a good reason. I have had a bad headache for probably the past 8 hours. Oh, I've popped pills, I've had water [dehydration gives you a headache, which is why when you drink too much alcohol, you get hung over], but I know the culprit. I'm sugar & caffeine detoxing and it SUCKS. Yes, I know I did this a few weeks ago. I felt fabulous not eating sugar and the no caffeine thing was helping me sleep better. But some stuff in my RL caused me to just...forget it. And I need to do this because I feel so so so much better...once it all clears from my system. lol Until then, it's super bad headaches and super bad moods.

I was in SUCH a bad mood today, I almost cancelled the hump day party. But I just couldn't see myself canceling when so many people said they wanted to come. So I sucked it up and did it. And minus a few not so good things, it was a great party and lots of people that I enjoy talking to showed up. I do have pictures, but I don't feel like cropping and resizing at the moment. But I will show this one because it's funny.




Laleeta wanted to come to the party, but of course the normal party time is not very Euro-friendly, so she sent us her picture instead. LOL! Crazy thing. :) But of course that means she was AFK and as anyone can tell you...you just can't be AFK around us. :)

So when I get up...I will finish the blog post! It's important to me because I really do want to hear everyone's views on the subject.

But for now...I'm taking my headachey, bad mood, tired self to bed.

Hump Day Party TONIGHT!!!

Our weekly Hump Day party starts tonight at 8pm SLT!! We're be in the new revamped Party Ball that some of you may remember from our days at the Viper Pit! A little different, but still mostly the same! :)

Tonight's theme is Lingerie but if you're not comfortable coming in your underwear, pajamas will do! Or just come however you are. :) You never have to dress the theme, we just want you to come have a good time.

See you tonight!!!

[Btw, might want to wait until around 7:45 if you want to come early. Before then the island will have its landing point set and you'll land very far away from the ball.]

Zzzzzzzz.....

We had kind of an interesting discussion earlier in the group tonight and I plan on blogging it, but unfortunately I'm extremely sleepy so I'll get to that when I get up tomorrow. I had pictures I wanted to take for the post, too, but I might have to grab someone to help me with that because it's going to take a certain look and since I think I deleted the fashion disaster outfit that I'd put together for that one party, I don't know if I could recreate it after so many inventory cleanings.

Hump Day Party will be going on at 8pm SLT and I'm HOPING to have it in the party ball from the pit, but unfortunately the new ball that was set up was just too big because when I put down the decorations, it was just not the right size. If we can't get the original ball up, then it'll take place up in the air in a room that I'll set up tomorrow afternoon.

Oh btw, Aisuru is competing in this fun Halloween contest, and I think all of you should go vote for her. :) It's a building contest, and so there's tons to look at out there. Don't forget to vote when you finish looking! It takes place right here and it really is a lot of fun. :)

Ok, completely exhausted now. goodnight. :)

So...what's new?

Ok, so some people have asked what's up with me lately. Why am I not online much and why am I not blogging much? Well, believe it or not, my RL has been a bit busier than usual lately. I've had a chance to put all the fashion knowledge I've learned in SL to the test in RL and have been helping out a friend of mine put together a fabulous outfit for a wedding she's attending this weekend. She's VERY picky, though [pickier than I am!!!!] and so far all we have of her fabulous outfit are the pants. After yet another unsuccessful trip tonight, I finally told her that I would get up early and go scout some stores that we've not yet been to in our area. I have no doubts that I can find her something that she will look and feel great in. After all - I am the one who chose the pants.

But of course that hasn't been taking up all of my time. The truth is, my SL is very quiet lately. I spend probably 98% of my in world time alone. And 95% of the time I look just like this:




Yep. I spend hours sitting there on my posestand, sorting inventory, chatting with the group, checking various websites, watching YouTube videos, and watching TV. I know, I'm totally boring. LOL I kind of justified it before with, "Well anywhere I go, I'm totally lagged out with all the people anyway, so I'll just stay home." But the truth is that I'm just down a lot, and have been for over a month. I won't go into detail on that. So yeah, most of the time, there I am.

The other part of my time is spent going to different lucky chairs. I'll admit that I have no real patience for the majority of lucky chairs on the grid. But sometimes I will set myself down somewhere and wait to see what I get while I group chat & sort inventory. Kind of my way of being social without being social.



Yes, the letters are P U. I laughed too.

Anyway...so that's the story here lately. Boring, quiet, and not blogworthy. I'm hoping to maybe get some of the group together to go hit some of the Halloween sims. We've all been collecting Halloween freebies like mad, so it would be nice if we could dress up a bit and go get scared. I am a grade A scaredy cat, but maybe if I'm with my friends, things won't seem so scary. :)

Who knew?

[This post is mostly me stalling on finishing up housework today.]

I've been exceptionally lucky in SL in that my computer runs it pretty well. I get lag and everything that everyone else gets, but I rarely crash and usually I can walk around. My FPS is kind of low in most places I go, but I figured that's just the way it works. If I've never mentioned it before, I'm not a gamer, and therefore have never really paid attention to things like video cards. As long as I can get in SL, and still use photoshop and all that, I just take whatever I get.

For some reason, RLBF and I were talking about it and he suggested I try SL on his computer. Now let me just say right now both of us are working with mutants here. He pieces together our computers with whatever parts just happen to look good or something. LOL But I know he has a better computer than I do because God forbid he not be able to download porn faster than anyone else on the planet.

So we downloaded SL to his computer and I hopped in.

Oh. Muh. Gawd.

I had NEVER had SL run so smoothly on my screen before!!!!! I mean, it was like playing a whole new game! I ran around, I went to Sn@tch because I'd been there earlier and KNEW it was laggy and it really wasn't this time!! Some lag, yes, since there were like 40 people in the sim, but nothing at all like it had been when I was there before! I was on the Ultra setting, draw distance was up, all that good stuff, and it was still just lovely!

So I logged off, pouted and started doing laundry. Then he said, "Let's see how it works in your computer." Ok, so, we slide it in [he does, anyway. I don't know a video card from a credit card] and I go back in SL. Yep, still just as lovely as can be. I go over to Rustica, a store that usually doesn't rez for me at all and I can never walk around in there without dying. Oh no, not this time. Things were rezzing quickly all around me, I walked in there with no problems!!! I just couldn't believe it! I kept telling him, "This is NOT how it is usually!" He just scratched his chin and said, "Huh. Guess Second Life is more of a game than I thought."

I pouted some more, played a song on Guitar Hero, and started cleaning again. He futzed around with my computer and then said, "Come here and try this out." So I did. And it was very nice! He had a spare video card that, while not as good as his own, was still loads better than what I had. Yay for nerds with extra parts lying around! LOL Who knew it would make SUCH a difference?

Anyway, I promised myself no SL until I finished cleaning and made a trip to the grocery store, so I guess I've procrastinated long enough.

One pose turns into another pose

I deleted last night's post. It really was more just for me to write to keep busy, and no one really needs to know about my down moods. lol

The other night I was out at Jaywalk stalking the lucky chairs when I cammed over into Celestial Studios and saw Torrid Midnight and Menno Ophelia putting up some new outfits. I guess they're more costumes than anything else, but I really really wanted the football girl outfit. So I went back yesterday and picked it up. Not just because I love football, but because I have a huge love for the Girls Next Door show and in one episode Kendra was playing football and Bridget wore a cute pink and black football inspired outfit to their big Super Bowl party and that's kind of what these outfits reminded me - minus the hooker boots.

After scouting out a couple of football fields so I could take pics, and being hit up for money from some n00b guy, I was sitting at home and remembered Kendra had done this cute little pose after she'd made a touchdown. So I opened up Qavimator to recreate it. When I was trying it out today, I realized it reminded me of almost every picture I have of myself in RL - that shot where you're holding the camera out in front of you. I took a few pictures while playing with the emoter on my Mystitool and the lip sync voice feature too, to see if I could give my mouth a different look. I think they came out kind of cute, and really kind of natural looking.








I really do think they're cute, and it's funny how one pose can turn into another pose with just a different angle.

It looks like my job today as a style consultant is about to begin soon, so have a great Saturday everyone. :)

Island Courtesy

I don't mind if people want to stop over at the island to hang out or anything. I mean, what would be the point of me having a sim if it was cut off from everyone? But I just have three simple requests.

If you're hanging out there, please do not ignore or be rude to anyone else on the island that you do not know. Just because YOU don't know them doesn't mean that they aren't someone important to me or one of the renters on the island. I have visitor counters scattered about, so I know who is there and at what times. Let me take care of the security, ok?

Please don't go into other peoples' homes or parcels if you haven't been invited over. Now right now there are only 2 parcels that you should probably stay out of unless invited. The people who rent are very nice, but those are their homes. Cen & Dyami may have their beach open for people to come in and hang out at, but that is up to them. Don't go in the 2 white cottages unless Emerald & Sehra are home and invite you. The adobe house near the landing point and the house up on the hill are free to chill in.

And please please please... If it's over 300 feet in the air, don't touch it. That includes my sky living area. Unless I've invited you in, please leave it alone. I love you guys, but I also value my privacy and that is nothing new to anyone who knows me. There is only one person who should ever be up there if I am not, and he knows who he is. :)

Really, if you know where I live, feel free to stop over sometimes. I'm going to be setting fishing back up and next month we'll start getting the island holiday decorated, so that'll be fun. Just don't be rude to anyone and leave my skybox alone. LOL That's all I ask. :)

A flash of GRRRRR!

Ok, so everyone and their mom has blogged that Minnu has free Halloween skins for women & men. But this one makes me laugh because it makes me look SO ANGRY.

Yeah, this is pretty much me in the morning. Minus the lipstick.

We shook, rattled, and rolled!

The Sock Hop tonight was awesome. Everyone seemed to have a great time, and I know I sure loved the music I got to play. I'm sleepy earlier than normal tonight, so I'm just going to post this batch of pictures and then head off to bed.

Hump Day Party Tonight! Sock Hop!!

We're taking it back, back, back in time tonight! We're having a SOCK HOP!!! It's going to be swell!!

If you're wondering what to wear to a sock hop, check out this page for ideas!! Remember, you never have to dress in the theme, we just want you to come and have fun!

The party tonight takes place in a special area I've created. You can't go see it yet, so you'll get the SLurl later. ;)

Hope to see you all tonight at 8pm SLT!!!

Pink While Blue

Do you ever hear a song and suddenly your whole evening is blue? That happened to me earlier tonight. It was just a sad song and made me feel blue. So I sat at home and started to just go through the gifts and camp items and lucky chair items I've picked up lately since I haven't bothered. In the middle of all the gifts I picked up from the Juicy birthday, I found a fab little sweater from a place called Riddle. It's supposed to be a dress, but since it came with different layering options, I made it into a tucked in top. It combines 3 of my favorite things - pink, argyle, and skullies. So although I was feeling blue, I managed to look pink.





I worked today and set up a place for our Sock Hop tomorrow. I was surprised that I was able to set it all up without buying a thing except for 4 texture uploads. I'm still not very sure on one thing that I've put down, but if I end up picking it up, at least I know what I can do for any more festive holiday party. I think the place looks pretty good. Kind of an updated Sock Hop type place, though. Not exactly old looking.

I'm sleepy, but I'll end with this little quiz I found over on Cen's blog. I don't think it's very me at all, except the writing part and needing to have artistic outlets in my life.

You Are the Innovator

You're the type of person who is always a step ahead of everyone else. You thrive when you're experimenting with new designs, ideas, and attitudes. You are a creative person with many talents. You have to have artistic outlets in your life. You need to create - whether it's writing furiously or redecorating your home. If not, your life becomes chaotic. You tire of doing the same thing every day. You change your job, friends, and personal style often. You are at your best when you have a focus. If not, you develop a flaky artist's temperament.

What Role Do You Play?

I had class once.

Today I decided to do something that I don't think any of the bloggers that I know have done.

I went to blogging class.





I've been in the group for The Learning Experience for a while, but never have attended any of their classes. Why or when I subscribed, I don't have a clue. But I get notices every day of different classes and events going on. The Learning Experience covers 7 sims and has about 30 employees who do research, teach, etc. The classes are free to go. If the others are like the one today, they take place in voice. Only the instructor speaks in voice, everyone else types.

So I went with semi-new blogger Tristan and after about 30 minutes, we were bored and we left. Well, I left because I was bored. She actually had an excuse. But we were both in agreement that the class wasn't really for us.

The problem I saw is that the class was not truly geared towards SL blogging. The instructor went on for over 5 minutes on how we should not expect to make money from our blog unless we get famous with something we've said and end up on TV. Well, no kidding? Do any SL bloggers EVER expect to truly make money at it? If you do, you might want to reconsider things. LOL

Some of the tips I got from the notecards provided were good, though.

* Write about what you know.
* You probably won't say anything someone else hasn't, so find your twist on it.
* Don't expect that just because you write, people are going to read it.
* Don't whine that no one is reading you.
* If you write it and you're right, back it up.
* If you write it and you're wrong, apologize.
* Find your niche and run with it.

Another thing he mentioned was commitment. Now, he was saying that you have to spend at least half an hour a day, but obviously most SL bloggers aren't going to do that. But you do have to have some kind of commitment to your blog if you wish to be read. You can't update randomly once every month or 2 and expect that people are keeping you on their blogrolls or in their heads. Unless you're popular and people love you just for being you, another blogger will come in and knock you off the radar.

I wish the class had been more for SL bloggers and not for just blogging in general, but what can you do? :-p

This was the first time I've taken a class in SL, and it might be something I do again for another subject. But for now, I think I'm going to just keep blogging without class. ;)

Now I want coffee.

Stolen from Tristan's blog. Do you all know Tristan? You should, she's pretty cool. :)

You Are a Cinnamon Latte

Deep down, you are a sensitive soul. You just want to be loved and appreciated. You may have a spicy attitude, but you're all sweetness on the inside. You are dependable and loyal. You have you life together, and you're able to be there for other people. You like nothing more than a warm, cozy house filled with friends and loved ones.

What Flavor Latte Are You?

Art Loving

I had a chance to go out to Nika Dreamscape's art showing tonight. I have so many talented friends!!!! She was good enough to put out one of her works for free, but I just had to buy another because as soon as I saw it, I knew it would be perfect for the living area of part of my sky...world. LOL

[If I've never mentioned it before, I don't live in a plain skybox. It's several areas stuck together. I love it because it's big, but I'm not overwhelmed like I am sometimes down on the beach. It's very special to me for several reasons, so I ask that if you all visit the island, you please not disturb that area unless I invite you up. :)]

Anyway, Nika's art gift, Fall Approaches, was just the perfect blend of colors for the bedroom. I couldn't figure out where on the walls I wanted it so that I could be sure to enjoy it. But I remembered back in our old skybox, I had this huge picture of me propped up against the wall. So that's what I did here.




Isn't it pretty? And totally matches!!

The artwork I bought is called Sunset Gazebo. It was just so pretty and I just knew EXACTLY where I wanted it. Above the fireplace in the living room area! I don't have any furniture in there really, except a table and a couple of chairs, and my posestand where I spend hours trying on demo skins and adjusting prims. But I'm hoping Nika's art gives me some inspiration.






If you look at the little fountain on the side, that was a gift from Emerald that I just love love love. It's from Jason's Angels, and the proceeds from the sale of these go to the families who are trying to find missing children. She also wrote me an incredibly sweet note, which I value more than the gift itself, but it does make this all the more special to me. I think it fits beautifully with the artwork and in my home. :)

So the goal for Tuesday is to get the Sock Hop area done since I doubt I'll have time Wednesday. I still don't know WHAT I want to do, but I have a vague idea of how it should look. I guess we'll all be surprised. LOL

There's a Storm a-brewin'!

I have finally found the love that is Storm Schmooz boots. After a 7 minute boycott, being yelled at by friends, and then dragged over to the store, I even got to meet Storm himself. He was quite gracious and gifted me with his latest creation that was not even up for sale yet - The Amazone Boots!




These boots are awesome! They were much too large around my legs, but he stood there and watched and told me how to adjust them so that they looked right. I hope I got it right!!

As you can see, these boots are very much the work of a quality designer. The texture, the details, it's all exceptional work. I absolutely adore how the boot dips down in the back. It's such a unique style! I think I wore these for 3 days straight, finding things in my wardrobe to match, and even running out to buy a sweater and a skirt to match! It's VERY rare that I buy my clothes to match my shoes, usually preferring to do it the other way around, so that right there should tell you how great I think these boots are! In fact, I liked them so much, I bought another style of boots while I was there.

When I ran out to the store today to get the SLurl, I noticed they're now for sale for $450L. A bargain, truly, as these beauties will look marvelous on anyone and are just perfect for fall and winter.

Storm Schmooz - SLurl

No title, too tired.

I had like, 5 blog posts in my head earlier. I've got pictures, I've got a boot review. I still have my Spooky Zone to finish up. I want to flatten out the land where Cen and Dyami are going to live so they have a blank slate to start terraforming on. [The previous tenants terraformed the smack outta their parcel.] I'm still looking for pretty & elegant furniture for my elegant living area and some office furniture for another area of the skybox. I have yet to get the creative bug in my head and start revamping my products. I have to begin building the room for the Sock Hop on Wednesday since I think I'll be going out that evening and won't get back in until just before the party will start. I have a lot to do.

But instead of doing any of it, I spent most of the day out of SL, playing online with my friend and having a much wanted chat with someone else. When I did finally get online, I hung out with Sam, his Army buddy who is new to SL, and a couple of girls I haven't seen in months, and then spent some time on the island, sitting on top of the mountain with Sam, just talking. That's the nice thing about family. They always listen to you even when you have nothing important to say.

It's definitely bedtime, though. I've been asked to go hang out with my friend and her kids tomorrow, and rest is a necessity before doing that! LOL

I wonder.

Uneventful Saturday. So, let's see some things I'm wondering about before I go to bed.

* I wonder...why there aren't more twins in SL. Considering how many times I've been asked for my shape & skin, and how many times people have tried to look just like me for no reason [get your own look!], I'm surprised I don't see more twins. I mean, how easy would that be to do, you know?

* I wonder...why designers think that making the "slender" miniskirts with the prim insert means they can use just one prim. I need to be able to adjust the front & back separately, thank you.

* I wonder...why it seems to be so freakin' hard for hair designers to make a decent blonde shade.

* I wonder...when people are going to stop charging so much for sculpted items.

* I wonder...why you can't sell 15 cents worth of $Lindens. LOL

* I wonder...what is going through some peoples' heads when they have been here for over 2 years and still look like they just walked off of Orientation Island. And not even the avatars of Orientation Island now. The ones from 2 years ago. I have a theory that it's because since everyone looked like a hot mess back then, and there weren't options to look super hot like there is now, so they don't think about it. But when they're looking around at other people, don't they ever think, "Wow. Why don't I look like that?"

* I wonder...if I'll be able to go to any of the Halloween sims without freaking out.

* I wonder...why "Mature" primtionary tonight ended up being so dull.

Ok, I've officially bored myself into being sleepy.

A tiny Halloween hunt

I took a little time today to go do the Loco Pocos hunt that I've been hearing so much about. I'm glad that I did because it really put a smile on my face. It was probably one of the cutest things I've done in SL in a very long time.




I'd never been to the Loco Pocos sim before. It's mostly for tinies, and although I do enjoy dressing up as such on occasion, it's a bit of a hassle for me to get redressed. lol But this was a hunt that you can do as a human. You go to the little Halloween neighborhood, hold your pumpkin, and start knocking on doors. Sometimes you get candy or baked goods, but other times...










It's random, but at some point you'll knock on a door that gives you a key. And when you get the key, you go to the treasure chest in the town center. Click on the chest and you get 2 Loco Pocos avatars! :)





I haven't put on the avatars yet, but I've seen pictures in some other blogs and they look wonderful.

I was only out there hunting for the key for about 10 minutes or so, but it was very fun. I tried to go and explore the rest of the sim when I was finished, but I was lagging a fair bit and actually ended up crashing. First time I've crashed in ages. lol

Anyway, head out there and have some fun. Yes, even you guys. You get a male & a female avatar, so it's worth it. :) And besides, sometimes someone else gets fire blown on them after knocking on the door, so that's pretty cool. :)




Loco Pocos - SLurl