Torley Lives

There's a new photography contest in SL which I'm assisting in getting the word out about because I really believe in it, and it's been an idea that's been kicked around for several months but has finally come to fruition due to a meeting of the creative minds. And that's where you come in.

This contest has?been put together by Ariel Roentgen, Francis Chung, Nephilaine Protagonist — a trio of my favorite people in the gridverse. I have already checked whether myself entering (considering the possibilities) would be a conflict of interest, and thankfully, the answer is NO because the judging process is a fair one. These peeps have a solid rep, ya know. ~_^

The idea is simple: take luverly photos of you posing with your Seburo and Saedaku weapons and Seburo PixelDolls-line of clothing, and send 'em in! You could be towering on top of a, well, towering tower, guns-a-smokin'. Or maybe even?a more covert shot in the style of stealth infiltration. Go with what comes to your imagination! Of course, there are a few more bits which you should be aware of, along with the WHOLE LIST OF PRIZES,?and you can read about them at this official information link:

L$30K In prizes!!
Seburo/Saedaku/Seburo Pixel Dolls Clothing Line Photography Contest

There's ample time to enter, but remember, the contest ends in a month, so "the sooner the better the later you regretter" certainly applies. Get shooting — in more ways than one!

There continue to be so many wonderful places to explore in the everexpanding world of Second Life, or the gridverse, as I affectionately know it. From one point of interest to the next, I like to highlight my favorites, which usually consist of the weirdly eclectic, the wackily surreal, and some of the everyday as well. What would life — or Second Life, for that matter — be without such a tasty potpourri of enjoyable experiences? Come within, and you shall see…

This is Gypsy Moon, a private sim which has been created and operated by katykiwi Moonflower and Vade Blair. They were both present on the island when I visited, and gave me a tour of the works. There are many things to explore here: there is a sort of pirate theme running through the whole works, with such attractions as a shipwreck and even the contrast represented by a fiery volcano and an icy peak (with a pegasus you can ride!). One of my favorite things to do was go deep down below, into the caves which are not visible to the shallow eye… while spelunking, I got an Indiana Jonesey-kinda adventurer vibe, and shared this sentiment with katy. She confirmed that I was right on target, as Vade pulled out an appropriate object: a boulder that'll mow you down if you don't run fast! So, I ran. Fast.

Here are Francis?Chung and I, and oh yes, the honorable Bel Muse. First time I met her a few days ago. I wanted to call her more adjectives like "nice" and "polite" but she modestly explained about who she really was, in her own words. I somehow was not convinced! She soon brought out several of her stalwart creations, including her blaster and a bag of Doritos which you may have seen inworld. And an aquarium too, which as I understand it, was one of the very first "pet" type thingies in SL, if not the first. Not fully seen in the above pic because it is so ginormous, here?it is: the infamous Penis of?Grief (PoG) temple. It came out all rezangular and it was a real trip to walk along the slanted marble. Be sure to check out 2ndlook.org, Bel's website of Second Life Screenshots.

Thili Playfair makes cool stuff. She also likes to dance to Gigi D'Agostino's "The Riddle" for nine hours straight while building, which is a definite plus in my book. I once saw her in the Welcome Area surrounded by books… 653 textures uploaded or something like that? I asked her for my very own copies, and this is the result.

Siggy Romulus strikes again! Come check out the Chaos sim if you want to try this ride, which is being boosted to a v2 someday soon. It's called the "Chaos Looped Intrasim Transport ring", and I'm sure you can put together that acronym for yourself. Wheeeeeee!

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Before unwinding one night and heading to bed, I stopped by the Morris sandbox to chill with Shady Adamant and Thili (on the left, with her books and signature long hair). Apparently there is a new way to watch fully streaming videos in SL. It depends on a type of texturemapped?trick with?synced soundtrack, and while it takes?a long time to buffer, it plays at a reasonable 10 FPS. It's kind of?strange, seeing the evolution?of streaming video in this world-within-a-world. We enjoyed?the?1984 Macintosh commercial,?a trailer for?The Day The Earth Stood Still (if you're wondering, Gort lives at Chaos), and an old educational video teaching to "duck and cover" and featuring a jovial turtle. Good times.

Lee, a Linden who is hard at work. This picture, also taken in the Morris sandbox, is but one snapshot of what was?a busy day for him. I sometimes joke that "Morris is the new Jessie", and as the GREEFER KIN struck, Lee had to strike back and lay the smackdown of the law o' the land. From firebombers to orbit-cagers to rude language in a PG sim and even one fellow who marched up to Lee wearing a profanity-laced title, Lee handled it with composure, as if he had seen this RRL = Really Redundant Loop come before…… and verily, verily indeed he had.

Cheyenne Bliss has made my new favorite pair of shoes. I arrived at an opportune moment to not only watch her modelling herself for display pics, but to assist her with a technical problem which involved teh shiny. I got the Rubylite and Emerald shoes, and while the tones are a bit off from bona fide Neon Watermelon, they are pretty in the dark and match my poise alright. Thanks, Cheyenne, and keep it up!

Connections, connections… I'm back at Chaos with Siggy and Paca, with a towering Lee Linden cardboard cutout in the background. And along with connections, ah, what would Second Life be without praise? Can you guess who we're praising here? Hint: look to the object surrounded by the candles, as?it's symbolic of him. If you give up and wanna know, click here. BLESSED BE THE BOUNTY!!!

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The rippleshock of chaos continues to guide me through my adventures, time yielding like a potato chip yields to a semiautomatic pie-arquebus. Vivid colors draw forth as my jetpack punchily propels me through the "new sims", and I find myself again as Torzilla, making a comfy watermelon nest in the Radiks campus. Marinating myself in the sweet juices of the vibrant almost-triangles, I observe Jillian Callahan arrive in a futuristic Second Life Police Department vehicle. Ooops, I'm busted. As I turn to flee, she offers me gracious advice that I would exert less pressure on the sim if I turned off Physical on the melonslices. Opening my Edit dialog box, I try to comply, but find that some of the fruits are fornicating with one another in an act of prim-interpenetration, and so, I *shrug*. I snap a few more photos before quickly deleting the whole lot as to not cause a violation of the TOS.

Jillian and I chat for awhile. She has?a real knack for siren sounds, a whole collection, and so it's appropriate she informs me?about this particular obsession of hers. She, like myself, is an Aspie, and I can relate all too well.?We continue to converse as I hop in for a ride in her SLPD skycruiser, and along the way, we come across a collection of FOR SALE signs. Liltingly, she muses to me about the idea of a future museum featuring these very indicators of land that is yet to be bought. I figure it's relevant and indubitably important to SL history.

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We continue to zoom around, observing a variety of FOR SALE signs in our travels. Looking for the Anshe Chung ones — which are among the most?famous in all of the gridverse — we find ourselves at a loss so far. Jillian muses on the irony of the situation: when we're actually looking for them, they don't show up. Nevertheless, we come across one instance of FOR SALEosity after another: signs that spin so they can be viewed from any angle, signs that blink and change colors quicker than a drowning Pollock painting, and even signs that are oddly disturbing by their very lack of motion. Hmmmph.

At long last after surveying some other sights, we come across what appears of be a peninsula bearing the very mark of Anshe. Following getting tossed by a poorly-programmed home security script, Jillian and I fall to the earth below. I glide down with my jetpack's extended wings, cool virtual breeze feeling like nothing at all. Examining these relatively new version of the signs?closely, we soon approach one of them up close, and pose for photos.

I do hope that yes, one day, there will be a museum of FOR SALE signs in Second Life.

Perhaps further in the timeline,?it too would be FOR SALE*.
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*although, it'd be hard to tell.

Sometimes when I'm by myself, I wonder if this is the railway of life I'm supposed to be on. It's been over half a year since I stopped making techno music due to my hyperacusis problems, as I've shared in the past.?The situation?hasn't gotten better. It makes me sad to dwell on it and think about it too much, because I would imagine that in some other reality, there is a Torley (Sr.) who is actively composing and listening to sound alright: another me, who if I could stare out the windows of this maglev train hurtling down the tracks, I could envy very much for his continued committment to the art and science of electronic music. Alas, he's not in this universe. Those dreams of mine are a distant memory now.

But, then I think about how I've come to find Second Life, how I've found out more about myself and my follow humans — and those who would prefer to be thought of as non-humans — and about the experiences I have been blessed with from within the gridverse. There are new dreams: I reflect on the new friends I've made, the love I've found,?and the crazy day-to-day fun of this very emotional technology that I've come to be bundled in. It doesn't replace the sadness, but it does make me smile, in both my Lives. I don't think being sad will go away: however, I do believe that my happiness will continue to grow. And I hope I am making others happy too.

And maybe someday, just maybe,?I will?sit confidently in front of my synthesizers again . . . and play.

Damien Fate, a purveyor of creative excellence in SL?and a good friend of mine, has released his new product, a "mobile sales unit" by the name of the Mirada.go-shop.?I gave it a run-through earlier today, and as you can see, I even had to color-coordinate it. As the promo blurb says:

That's right! Be confined no longer to selling in one static place, no longer must you have to will your customers to fly 100 virtual miles to get to your store, now you can sell ANYWHERE, ANYTIME!

This was actually my first experience trying to set up a vendor, as I don't have anything to sell, but was sufficiently intrigued by this product to give it a go. After all, I?am on the move a lot.?Setup was awkward and both Dam and I agreed on that as he tech-supported me, but it's in part due to the limitations of the SL framework. And once it's done, it's DONE (unless you wanna put in more stuff later, hehe). I wonder if a Touch Menu would help in the future to configure certain options? Or even more drag-and-drop abilities in SL… there is an annoying bug that makes you have to?drop an Object?if you want to put stuff in it that doesn't have full permissions. Argh! Once I was set up, the holoprojector-style Vendor came into view, and I tested it for a few rounds, set to dispense watermelon slices to myself. It worked nicely. I look forward to future versions!

Ah, those nice-and-talented rascals in Team Bedazzle… oh wait, I'm affiliated with them. *waves to Foxy in the Foxymobile* Hehehe. As you may or may not know, but in any case should know, Unreal SL is opening soon, and one of the highlights of this digital amusement will be the Chinatown stage. My Jadey, who has taken it upon herself to write press releases, posted about it in the SL Forums if you'd like more info. Ya know what? Chinatown's even got a Torley Sushi Shop… and you can check out a sneak preview of that, featuring yours truely, right at the Bedazzle website.?For my new?place,?a gracious thankyou to?Jimmy "Texturemaster" Thomson, who has just put oodles and oodles of work into the environment. It really feels… unreal.

Major props goes out to the friendly Cid Jacobs, for being one of Second Life's prominent bugbusters and such a cool guy to boot. Just yesterday, a new copy exploit in SL was fixed, and it was because of Cid's assertive observation that got the hole plugged. He isn't mentioned in the Release Notes, but given his track record, he should be! I won't be surprised if soon down the line, Cid finds another one — he tells me he's already caught several. *clapclapclap*

Ah, it's good to hang out in my wee hours with my friends. There are the times when I'm involved in an engaging conversation and can spend 3, 4, even 5 hours in a single spot, listening and learning and feeding back my view. Here, from left to right, is Jauani, Chage, and Catherine Omega, all one-and-onlys. Of course, I'm listening… you know which one I am. We're at Cat's island — yes, those are scripts and creations-in-progress strewn around — and are talking about the future of Second Life.

Speaking of the future, Marcos Fonzarelli just constructed this lovely limey building in futuristic Miramare. Come and see it!?The color makes it so visible, yet isn't so loud as to distract from the cohesive whole of the surrounding landscape. I think it complements the cyan TigerTor apts well too. Plans for?Marcos's creation?are tentative at this point — it may be furnished soon.?One thing that really cracks me up are the Star Trek sounds that play when you trigger the sliding doors. The scintillating orb on the top of it all is a nice touch too.