I'm still not a gamer

So yes, I crumbled. After playing Rift's beta with my friends, I ended up buying it. I kinda love it right now. I know that I probably won't love it forever. It's not Second Life, after all. But right now, I enjoy playing it. One day I will grow bored of leveling up and doing quests, or time will just keep me from being there enough to warrant paying monthly for it. But for right now...

My main character is named Kaianna [pronounced KY-ahna, not Kay-anna], which is the name I used in a few other minor games I played years ago. She's a Kelari rogue on the Defiant side, with Bard abilities. [And a couple of others I've forgotten.] I think she's pretty good.




Yesterday's "Head Start" for everyone who preordered was pretty crazy. The powers that be had to add in more servers because they were so incredibly slammed when the doors opened. I was sitting there waiting for the shards [servers] to unlock, so I got in really quickly, but there were people in the queues waiting for HOURS to get in. They just didn't anticipate all the people who were going to come in. They probably should have known. I mean, didn't they look and see how many had preordered?

Not being familiar with this type of game, it never occurred to me that people would have to wait to get in. In my SL-mind, I had to break it down to it being like sim limits. Only so many people to a server, just like only so many people to a sim. But gosh, was it ever nuts.




That was at the first mailbox, which allowed those who got the collector's editions to get mounts and pets. You couldn't even SEE the people to talk to, there were so many motherfriggin' turtles.

The good part about there being so many people was that if you needed to just straight run to another area, there was a good chance people would be fighting off things that would normally try to kill you. The bad part was that most of the quests have you looking to kill monsters and stuff, and with so many people basically on your level and doing the same quests at the same time, you often had to wait for things to respawn and then try to get the first hit in. But it was good for big mob thingies like this.




Ulaa, bless her heart, stayed on Skype with me all day while we played, and she helped me out tons because I am such a noob at this sort of thing. She even got me into a guild and gave me money towards getting a mount. Yay for sugar mommas! :-p Later, when Aldwyn was able to get online, I went to a new character and helped him out since he is also a noob. [Sorry honey, you are!]

Today, since I had some time to myself, I decided to see what the Guardian side was like. So I picked a new server with a low population and started a new character.

This is Karianna, Kaianna's Guardian twin. Although she's an Elf, and Kai is a Kelari, they basically look the same to me. I dunno. LOL




Karianna is an Elf warrior, and I kinda love her. She's totally strong, which is fitting since basically she's a tank. But she has some elemental power too, so she has ranged fire attacks, which are totally helpful since she's on her own.

Of course, being alone seemed like a bad idea when I needed to get up that hill. LOL!




The Guardian side is pretty nice because it's not as overcrowded as the Defiant side, plus the people [at least today] seemed a little bit older. The quests are a little different, even at one point giving you a horse to ride for a bit, and the whole thing is pretty enjoyable.

So that's my Rift update for now. :)

Silence is sometimes the best option.

I'm awake far too late tonight. Far. Too. Late. But I think it'll be the last night I'll let myself do this. Tomorrow, hell or high water, I'm in bed before 2am. My time, I should say. Not SL time. :)

I spent a couple of hours in SL tonight, hitting up a few of the stores for Project Themeory and Spruce Up Your Space. I really like the sales that last for at least 2 days. One day sales make me anxious, like I'm going to miss something amazing if I don't manage to get into SL until late that day. But weekend 2 days sales are great and I picked up this fab chair from LISP Bazaar tonight. It's part of a knitting/sewing set. Really awesome, and it fits on the balcony of my house really well.




So while I was just hanging out on my balcony, I was watching a group chat that popped up. There are quite a few creators in the group, but it is a public group that anyone can join. There's an event happening soon in SL and one of the creators in the group started to whine about having not been invited into this event. The way she made it sound, it was as if she needed an engraved invitation. She even went as far as to say that she'd start a fair on her own sim for her own products. Oh hey, I'm pretty sure that's called YOUR STORE. But then she added in that others that had been "shunned" from this event could come, too.

If I liked the products that this person makes, which I don't, I would most definitely think twice before purchasing from her.

I think that creators in SL really need to watch what they say in public forums. Not that I'm saying they should completely censor themselves or not have fun or whatever, but think of the whole Kenneth Cole twitter debacle. PR is a big deal if you're attempting to get people to come buy stuff, you know? Not to mention it's just flat out tacky to complain about not being invited to events, or say that you're not making any sales, which I have also seen people do. It just makes people uncomfortable and feel like they have to go shop or have to invite you to events, even if they don't think your stuff is very good.

I think I'm finally sleepy.

Well heck, if Fonzie's there...

Not all my posts will have kitties in them, but today was a big day! Desi is big enough to cuddle!




I'm totally in love. Now he reminds me of my big beautiful cat that I talked about earlier this week. I used to hold him like this. ♥

My friend Terri told our group about the I Heart Art hunt that's going on. It's a small hunt, only 17 places to go altogether, so I figured I'd do it.

I'm actually not very into art, in any life. I don't mind going to art museums or anything, but quite often, I think most art is just a big mess and it doesn't mean anything to me. Art in SL seems strange to me because I think all of SL as being a big art exhibit. When I put on a beautifully painted skin, or a meticulously sculpted pair of shoes, or an exquisitely detailed piece of jewelry - how can that be anything BUT art?

But then again, sometimes Fonzie is art.


[At Tart Gallery]

Or wandering into an old castle and screaming when this is the first thing you see is art.


[At The Village & 13]

Or getting to actually sit on things and interact - that's art, too.



[At Project Z]

The hunt was relatively simple, although I have to say that I will most likely end up throwing some things away. Art is what you make of it, and some of it, I don't know what to make of!




It was really great getting to see some new places in SL, though. So if you like small hunts, and random things that you don't get to wear, check it out. :)

Oh, Pintar...

I may or may not be becoming a crazy cat lady. LOL! My little kitty family is finally complete, though. I received a gift of an orange kitty this morning, with the message that every Lucy needs her Desi. So... Desi 2: Electric Boogaloo!




Lucy looks pleased, don't you think?

So last night we introduced Aldwyn to Rift. He's not a gamer, even less of one than I am, so we got to be total noobs in there. Ulaa joined us, and she's a lot more experienced in the whole thing of online MMO type games, luckily for us.




I'm the one in the middle, the purplish elf looking thing.

We all started as new characters so we could stay together. The rest of the night was a blast as we ran around, did quests, and laughed and laughed on Skype.

Oh, and Aldwyn was the first to die on us.



Poor Pintar.

I have to admit, Rift is loads more fun when I have my two faves with me, but it's still not a game that I'll end up buying. It's not worth it to me to pay a subscription fee for a game that I might only play 2-3 times a month. But it's been an interesting experience, that is for sure!

And it sure wouldn't be a kid with cat ears!

So we had a little shakeup in my kitty world last night. Desi ended up having to be returned because of some technical issues. KittyCatS have excellent customer service and I was given a new kitty within a few hours of filing a ticket. I thought I'd get an exact replica of Desi, but instead ended up with a girl kitty...a PINK one!




Her name is Audrey, after Audrey Hepburn. I pretty much love her.

Yesterday on plurk, Tymmerie mentioned a place called T.Whore. Well hey, I like whores. So we headed out there last night and I was pleasantly surprised at the girly clothes they had there. I bought a few pieces that I really liked, figuring I could put them together with other clothes and make it not quite so whorey. We were there quite a while, but mostly because we were lagging and because I was busily looking at this woman.




She was wearing a body suit and jeans that were UNDER her butt. Why wear pants at that point? I don't get it.

I was going to do a fashion post on T.Whore, but I know the clothes there are mostly from templates, and I try REALLY hard to not showcase too much template work on my blog. This is probably why I don't blog all that often, huh? LOL! They had panties there that are pretty much exactly like ones that someone on my plurk list just released, and I know that person uses templates. But I love love love this little skirt and the little cardigan! The cardigan comes in 2 versions, a plain one like I'm wearing, and one that shows a bra.




While I was at the Sci-Fi Amusement Park taking that picture, I got an IM.

[15:34] Creepy Child: hey
[15:34] Alicia Chenaux: hello
[15:34] Creepy Child: be my mommie
[15:35] Alicia Chenaux: sorry, i don't do that.

Yikes.



It's not that I'm all that against kid avatars like I used to be. It's that I think if - BIG IF - if I ever chose to have one in SL, it would more than likely be someone that I already knew and was already close with. Some random person running around a sim asking probably everyone to be their parent - Hell no. LOL

Earlier in New World Notes, there was an article showning this YouTube video on how to do a "mirror" in SL. I wasn't able to take a high rez snapshot doing it because I have that weird water glitch where things just don't look right on the water, so the screenshot has it a little pixelated. But I think it's pretty cool and if you can do it well, then awesome!




If you decide you want to try it and need the mirror texture thing, just IM me. I'm happy to pass it along so you don't have to spend $10L on an upload for it. :)

Okay, I've written quite enough for now!

Total absence of humor renders life impossible.

So yeah, I totally love my KittycatS. Griffin and Sabine wander around my house and for some reason, I just crack up laughing when one of them asks "What's that smell?" I can't figure out what they're smelling but it makes me laugh.

My friend Bella got a bunch of the Valentine ginger kitties and she offered me two of them! I have a BIG FAT HONKIN' LOVE of orange and white kitties in real life so the chance to have them in SL is amazing. Looooook!




Aren't they just adorable?!

When I was 19, I got a huge orange and white kitten for free. He was gorgeous. He grew up to be an enormous kitty, grouchy to everyone except me, and he was my special baby. In October 2007 he was sleeping outside at my parents' house when 2 dogs came and attacked him. My mom called me in hysterics and we all raced to the 24 hour vet but it was no use. His leg had been ripped open, a lung punctured, ribs broken. If they could have saved him, he would not have had any quality of life. So we let him go. It was utterly heartbreaking and I still miss him every day of my life. If I could have another kitty, I would choose an orange and white one. Although I love my Holly kitty dearly and she's beautiful, if there had been an orange and white kitty at the pound that day, that would have been the one that would have come home with me.

But, having orange and white kitties in SL is almost as good. :) Griffin and Sabine don't mind sharing their bed with Lucy and Desi either.




I think I'll stick with just these four, although I would love love love love love love a pink kitty. If I ever see any for a decent price, I'm totally going to buy it.

When I was doing a restart of the island earlier today, I found myself at a place called The Trap. I love opening up the Destination Guide and just ending up somewhere random.




I've done mazes in SL before. It's usually pretty lame, or I just cam up and find my way out. So when I went in, I didn't really think much of it. I was just trying to kill a few minutes while the island was coming back online. But this was different! As you walk through, the walls change and move and I have to admit - I got utterly lost! I also made sure not to cam around or outside or anything just to get the full experience. I also broke out the noob run because 1) it makes me laugh, and 2) why not? I was noob running my ass off in there!




The textures of each level remind me of old Geocities webpages.

I didn't finish it because I had other things to do, but I only made it to the 3rd level and it took a while! I suck at mazes!

What I don't suck at is leaving presents on peoples' land. Like this lovely scene I made for Ulaa yesterday!



I'm awesome. :)

Ever need to talk about nothing? Me too!

I'm dancing out the last few hours of the weekend.




Earlier today, Sophia asked me to be in a picture with her for the "Bloggers We Love" challenge that's going on. If you haven't heard about it, it's mostly a fashion blog thing, although I'd love to see more of the non-fashion bloggers do it too. You pick a blogger that you like, whether you're friends or not, and do a post with them. Her post about me was pretty damn sweet, so you should go read it and see the pictures.

But this is the picture I caught while we were posing.




This is probably why I'll never be considered a real fashionista or a top fashion blogger, huh?

It occurred to me while she was doing our pics that I so rarely take photos with people anymore. And even more rare, I don't take advantage of my eleventy billion couples/friends poses. I should have so many pictures of me with the ones I love best, and I don't. I really need to change that.

I jumped on the bandwagon last night and got some KittycatS. You guys have probably seen them all over the feeds lately. I wasn't going to do it, but I am a total cat lover, and the fact that you can just keep them as a pet and not breed them really hooked me. So I ended up with two babies last night - Griffin and Sabine.




Griffin is the dark male, Sabine is the white female. I don't really know about the breeds or anything, but I know Sabine is a Diamond, which sounds pretty good to me. I'm not going to let them breed, although I am KIND of tempted. But the last thing I need to do is get into breeding these and have 84,000 cats running around. I just want pets. I kind of wish one of them would have been orange and white, though.

Okay, bedtime.

Are we there yet?

In my physical world, my house kind of sucks. Oh, it's big enough, and it's nice, but I've never taken an interest in decorating it. I have some items above the fireplace that I move out of the way when I dust. I have two small prints hanging on the wall in front of me. My bedroom looks like a Jersey Shore cast member lives there. I've just never had an interest in decorating, and I never felt like I knew what went together anyway.

But in the past year, I've REALLY learned to love decorating in SL. I guess maybe because the home & decor genre had gotten so good. Yeah, a lot of the time it's the same sculpts being used by many stores, but sometimes you come across people who use the sculpt kits in a very nice way.

A few weeks ago, I showed Ulaa a photo of a house I liked. She's been battling a pretty heavy flu, but managed to work on it, putting her own spin to the design. It came out sooooo amazing. I have never loved a house as much as I love this one. It'll be blogged over in my style blog when she's ready to release, so I won't show pics [although if you're on my plurk, you've seen pics here and there], but I was upstairs decorating and noticed just what a beautiful view I have from my bedroom balcony.




My island and my new house are exactly what I needed this week. It's been so freezing cold here, but spring is on its way, and soon there will be green beauty in both my worlds. And who knows? Maybe I'll even bring my SL decorating sense into my physical world.

If you lived here, you'd be home by now!

I'm sitting here killing time before I head off to zumba tonight, so I thought I'd blog some stuff. Aren't you happy?! LOL

As everyone knows, I have a residential island. I normally just rent parcels to my friends because it's easier that way. But, the last time I blogged that I had an open parcel, it turned out awesome because I got Lolita as a renter, and I didn't know her before that. :) So hey, why not try it again? I have an open parcel! It's 7936sqm and has 1816 prims. The island is fairly quiet, we change terrains for the seasons, and the neighbors are amazing! It is residential only, but I don't mind if you keep your Marketplace boxes there. Breedables are allowed as long as it doesn't get out of control and lags up the sim. :) You have terraforming rights for your parcel, and you manage your own access list. If there's someone you really hate, hey, let me know and I'll simwide ban. LOL

If you're interested, IM me in world and I'll be happy to show it to you and discuss money. :)

Whew, now that all that business stuff is out of the way...

I've been trying to get better at Photoshop stuff. I don't know, I just don't have the patience/talent for it, but I do try. Last night as we were winding down for the night, I was playing with shadows and stuff and I snapped a picture of Aldwyn and me. Then I photoshopped the SHIT out of it. Someone else could have done more, I think, but I used all my minimal skills to try to make it pretty. This is the unedited shot:




And then.........





Go me! LOL!

Maybe one day I'll get better at making everything all smooth and pretty. I see some of the work my Flickr contacts do and it is oh my God amazing. I want to ask "How did you DO that?!" but somehow I don't think that all of them would be willing to sit and teach someone who can barely use the curves function in Photoshop. If anyone knows any good tutorials [I like video tutorials a lot], please pass them on. It would be much appreciated!

Oh. And if you think Aldwyn and I are always sitting around, gazing at each other... it's not true. Sometimes he attempts to run me down with a bus.




Seriously - who WOULDN'T want to live on Bluebonnet with all this fun that goes on!?

Oh. Don't answer that. :)

Trying Rift

I managed to get myself invited to the Rift beta weekend. I love beta testing, beta events, beta viewers, etc. Even if I don't actually KNOW what it is, I sign up for many beta things because I like to see what's up.

Now let me preface this by saying that I don't consider myself a gamer. I got into Dragon Age, big time, because of the story. I love The Sims because I like the whole micromanaging aspect. I'm still nuts about Second Life because it's not a game, I can shop, and be beautiful there. But games like World of Warcraft or Everquest never never interested me. Partially because I like games where I can use a god mode or a money cheat, and partially because I don't usually enjoy playing games with other people unless it's like a board game or Wii game.

Rift is my first bigger type MMO. I was huge in Legend of the Green Dragon for a couple of years, helped run servers, coded modules, all that nerdy stuff. But that was browser based with no avatars and it didn't require much thinking. Within 5 minutes of Rift, I realized that this was going to take some work.

My main character right now is a warrior Elf. I chose the Elf purely because she was smaller and prettier than the other classes, although I'm pretty much not down with her purple skin. I tried, though.




I've been playing off and on this afternoon. When I get irritated, I log out. I'm logging out pretty much every 10 minutes. I'm unsure what weapons are really best for my elf. I don't know why people have pets and I don't. I'm following quests without any idea as to what I'm doing. I'm trying not to read chat because it's just exceedingly annoying. I think some people have been helping me out, but I'm not actually sure.

Is it pretty? I guess so. It's a little dark for my tastes. I like bright scenes where I can see stuff. I can't really take a look around at the scenery because there's freakin' things coming to kill me all the time. I move around easily enough, although I have seen people complaining that Rift's lag is much worse than World of Warcraft. All I have to say about that?

Honey, I'm from Second Life. If I can walk, it's all good.

I'm totally nice!!

I was chilling with Aldwyn tonight and he left for bed. However, he forgot to log out. It was a hard day for him, and I'm sure he just wasn't thinking. But...I couldn't resist the chance to decorate. :-D




If my next post is about how I'm SL single again... Well, you know what happened!

Mmmmm potatoes....

Oh hi, blog! Long time, no write! :-p

I've been busy in the physical world lately. Changing the way you eat and how much activity you get is kind of time consuming, you know? But things are starting to balance out, as I knew they would, and I've had more time to be in SL the past couple of days.

We were not going to go to spring on the island until next month, but I couldn't stand the sight of snow just one more minute. So poof - spring came to the island last night. I think we were all ready for it. I'm such a sunshine summertime girl, all that snow was getting to me.

Last week sometime, I asked Ulaa if she could make a house inspired by a dollhouse I like. She agreed and today she was going to start work on it, but her home has been transported back into the 15th century and she has the plague, so the work is slow going. I never felt QUITE at home in the house I was using because it was a little too big for just me, so I decided to just pick it all up until I get my new house.

But I can't just be totally homeless while I wait for my new house. So I made a makeshift house since I told Aldwyn I'd move to his sim for a while and he said he'd get me a cardboard box. Whatever! I can get my OWN cardboard box!




I think that box was for like...a fridge or a car or something.

OH MY GOD, I SHOULD JUST LIVE IN MY BELLE BELLE TRAILER!

Do you like my hat? Sophia made it for me because I was crying over the fact that I do not own a mashed potato hat. It's lovely!




The hat came because of this video. Watch it, you'll love it!