Relay stuffs...

Got the impression Relay Rap happened inworld, only a location SLURL was not shared.  Wonder if it's all-audio from here on?

Joining RFL ADvocacy may have been a natural fit, as I use social networking to promote RFL happenings and events.  Many migrated friends are doing what they can in their own way as they feel comfortable with, and that's fine too.  A few are new to RFL of SL, having only heard of it in past years. Give them a taste of being part of a greater whole and get comfortable in it. Even that feels good :)

April 2010.  I'd just acquired an irregular patch of abandoned land I had my eye on for months when it finally went to auction.  Following a consecration ceremony I placed The Starship Diner, adapted from The Golden Yak Diner I built for that previous Second Life Winterfest season.

During the housewarming party, DJ GoSpeed Racer called out to RacerX Gullwing, who was checking the route for a cross-country Giant Snail Race for Relay For Life. Like many in Second Life I'd only heard about RFL, and at the time wasn't aware of Treet TV (or Metaverse TV) programs. I knew RacerX from Lummerland Show & Tell and his reputation for amazing fireworks. He was in the area because the snails were going to pass my land on Saturday!

I reached out to him the following morning after building an observation platform.  He sent me info, a Treet media screen, and took my LM for his master list of observation locales.  I contacted MamaP who provided me with a kiosk. 

Soon a crowd formed and the snails came winding down the road toward us. High up as we were, they were taller than the platform. It was quite a sight.

Snurky had the nerve to try them in May or June through Skybeam Estates.

That's how I was first involved with Relay For Life.  Snurky continues with the relays (see her March 23rd for this year's first one), and I sell annual editions of Snail Racing cartoon shirts under Racer's team.  Last year I also helped with some art for Racer's Bay City Giant Snail relay hunt.  You can always get Giant Snail Relay info at my diner. Look for the new styles of original Giant Snail Relay shirts sometime this month.

Last year I had a wall where I kept an accumulation of vendors. This year I'm not entirely sure of where to place these. There's a space beside the gallery where I can put a wall or little market I suppose. Not entirely sure yet. Wish there was something lowprim & Aley I could utilize that isn't too gritty and fits an inland theme... let me know if you have any suggestions :)

Thought We Got Rid of Him...

Sometimes I'd rather be fishin'...

Victor's convinced New Toulouse' estate management that he's god's gift to timelords and their authority over themed private estates. They can have him, the police boxes which rez outdoors against covenant, and the RP category he's placed them under rather than Social (that alone is a slap in the face of New Toulouse).  The management didn't ask their own people to provide these for the community, only accommodated someone's personal roleplay.

They should be very proud of themselves that a bully with no interest in the populace or theme chased out one of its own to assert themselves.  Nothing says disconnect like four rezzers with modern and British structures at the ready.  Gabrielle Riel added him to the resident group and he never left. No, I don't know what he was doing there. One of the things I liked about NT was that he wasn't there. Then he was. You don't think he's a stalker? Suit yourself.  Personally if we never crossed paths again I wouldn't object.

I let the meter run out.  Someone I know needed more prims anyway.  I tried to get a journalist to hold off on a review of Maison Bleu, but he was insistent on posting it.

I'll still be there for the community.  Those who share a bond and true connection with the culture and its music dominate the New Toulouse.  A few places offered for me to play tunes at their establishments, so I won't be gone.  And of course I remain their liaison for the Aether Chrononauts during Relay For Life season.

I've learned the Aether Chrononauts have a perennial logo.  I made some clip art of it available to team members so that they can include it in some form on events/vendor textures - in a corner of the graphic or something.

I have been this close to making my own team for Relay For Life but for 3 things:

1. If I hadn't gone to Wildstar Beaumont there wouldn't be an AC team this year. There's an accountability I cannot deny. In fairness though he should have said there wouldn't be one instead of plucking someone unfamiliar with RFL to run the team.  That's hardly fair to anybody incl them. What would have been the harm if it took a year's hiatus? Still it's done and he went through a lot to find someone. We have a team thanks to him.

I want to say though the captains are very sweet and helpful, but I think they try too hard. The unique thing about AC is that it is comprised of disparate cultures, who work out whatever according to their own communities while contributing towards a single total. The only real place we have to synchronize our schedules is for RFL hosted events where the team works together. But they're learning. I think once the intimidation of the whole thing fades and they get more comfortable, they'll be fine.

2. The campsite. I'm not making one. Don't even ask.

3. A friend reminded me that the end result is the most important thing.  I must not ever forget that. If they just leave me be to do what I do and help the team by keeping members informed and equipped plus coordinating Teams R Us weekends lineups then it'll be good.

I'm proud to have brought on so many people, some new to Relay For Life. I couldn't do it with my own team. The objectivity would be gone. We'll see how this season pans out. I have a lot to prove after my experiences last year.

The first Teams R Us mini-gig is this Saturday: Kick-off Day. Have some team folks planned to provide vendors in addition to myself. Look for new shirts and Second Line Umbrellas :)  I'd have signed on for Cartoon World Gallery to have a booth in Fashion For Life but I didn't have the money to register.

Here's to more good times and helping people leave their bad times behind. GO RELAY!

Bullies and Bums

What a difference two weeks makes in Second Life.

It's now springtime on Skybeam. Beautiful. I always whine and say that winter is too short, then I look and say "Ahhhh"

Cordova Level Griefing at Dat's Placezzzz

We were griefed last week at the beach.  For some time this jerk in an insultingly stereotypical gay cruiser avvie would shove between a hetero avvie couple and lean against the male and start sweet talking during fishing contests around the grid.  He seems to have gotten away with it enough (thanks to incompetent fishing hosts, who think that they're being paid JUST to click a START button).  First time this happened I contacted the site's owner, who was shocked & considered giving his hosts banhammer access.  I told its victims that the snert wouldn't last long at Dat's or my places. 

Finally he came to Dat's last week when I hosted. I IMed him immediately that if he approaches them he would be gone.  He did his usual shove routine and went up against the guy. I froze him, then kickbanned him. Then he replied to my IM that he was done and he'd be good.  I told it that he sure will - from 45m away.  The result was an accumulation of self-replicating griefer balls outside the property, raining  down "Yif off, fur fags" posters on a quarter of the beach. Yeah I know: infohub noob griefer shit.  I just let everyone know how to turn off particles.

He then started to sweet talk in group chat, something 7seas Sass had been waiting for.  They were careful up until then about keeping antics out of 7Seas' jurisdiction. After that evening he was never seen or heard from again in 7Seas Social... Btw I think it's a female and I think I know who it may be. Obviously nothing better to do with themselves.

Witchwoods... New Toulouse... Musical Sims...

It is winter in Gabrielle Riel's new community.  For a week Carter's World Music show was practically lag free before more renters came on the sim.

One of my friends has a cottage by the sea w/cable

My discombobulated friend left New Toulouse last week with little word. Rumor is she expected an estate manager position and took her toys and left when it didn't happen.  Sigh... Illusory power... Thought New Toulouse meant more to her as a community. Guess I was mistaken.

I know from unqualified estate managers.  As I was looking around last week at witchwoods to see where assorted friends landed, I was accosted via IM in a manner not unlike from a territorial redneck.  Clearly someone didn't want my kind there.  Note that I said managers and not owners. Owners: nepotism only goes so far sometimes.

7Seas' Women Under Siege?

So what is it about females who are being victimized in the 7Seas community?  Second friend in a year told me that a lunatic tried to bully her from out of the blue to be his sextoy.  Could it be the same one who chased a mother of two from Second Life in 2012?  For sure the wrong one left Second Life! 

Remember when there was a G-Team?  Remember when a Linden Lab CEO cared?  Wtf is this "be my sex slave or I'll hack your account" shit?  A crime's a crime and this person needs to be taken offline and either into an institution or behind bars.  I told her you should have said you were an over-65 grandma and your husband just saw his chat." She laughed. We haven't lost HER yet at least.

New Toulouse en Fluxe

New Toulouse in its recent incarnation

Change can be tough, no doubt about it.

When you're steeped in commitment but have lost the spirit, what do you do?

You may plod on as best you can with what you have and hope it doesn't show. Perhaps you get your friends to take on some of the tasks which once energized you and which now feel like a dead weight on your back. Suddenly there's gravity in a virtual environment. Once you thought it was doable with everything else in your life.
Hey, it happens.

But say you've become attracted to something else. Another genre perhaps? You begin to feel that old magic again. If only you could unload the current project and start this one.  With all that you've learned and all that's going on in your life, you're confident it could all work out if things were done on a much smaller scale.

But no, you can't let people down. They rely on you. They look to you not just as a landlord or landlady but for guidance and the occasional dance party. This project is sustaining itself, so why break what doesn't need fixing?

Of course I'm projecting.  I couldn't begin to guess Gabrielle Riel's RL beyond what she's shared with us as her residents, and that's already a considerable hand dealt.  Add to that the virtual: running a series of web-based radio stations out of RadioRiel.org and the New Toulouse estate. This includes coordinating the past few years of Mardi Gras and hurricanes and monthly soirees and then some.

New Toulouse is an oddball theme in the great scheme of things Second Life.  It is presently 1912 there, which is post-Victorian and pre-Jazz Age.  It doesn't really fit it into Edwardian because it isn't British.  I'd call it early 20th Century Americana, only a lowdown Cajun-Immigrant corner of it. No illusions within the illusion.

Many residents like myself were attracted to it by way of a RL connection.  I was born in New Orleans.  A neighbor is into all eras of Jazz and hosts live talents regularly.  There have been Ann Rice fans establishing another kind of nightlife in line with her novels, and they've maintained a full residence in their cemeteries.

Radio Riel provides the soundtrack for many Second Life genres with a gamut of musical styles, among them Baroque, Dieselpunk (between the World Wars), gothic and experimental (aka Steampunk channel), and more.  The Steamlands appear to be Gabrielle Riel's affinity, with a presence each in Caledon, Steelhead and New Babbage, as well as sidetrips to Winterfell and Seraph City. 

Many years back when the owner put the estate up for sale, she took the plunge and saved the day.  New Toulouse had not only a dance hall for Radio Riel, it was Gabrielle Riel's domain.  A stream was added to RR's repertoire, the only stream named for an estate; it has been the perfect soundtrack.

Did I see signs?  Of course. Several on many levels. The most prominent of them was her decision to turn a discarded NT sim into the epitomê of gothic New England for an HP Lovecraft festival.  I knew the sim would remain beyond the festival and Halloween.  In November there were plans to rename it to Witchport, open it up to rentals and attach it to New Toulouse via a homestead water sim.  Many Taloosters and post-Lovecraftians expressed interest in moving over to early 20th century New England with options to visit via boat.

Witchport on a chilly winter morning

About three weeks ago came the news that she would be putting the estate up for sale.  Witchport would continue as a separate entity from New Toulouse: a much smaller project and better suitable to work harmoniously with her other projects and RL. If nobody took the estate over by the first of the year, the sims would be sold off one by one.

Naturally there was panic. I think we all looked around for an alternative, but we already knew that there was nothing like New Toulouse on the grid. Anything claiming any resemblance to New Orleans looked like a Linden Labs sim with stuff plopped on it. New Toulouse has a look and vibe which instantly transports you to a place, and no one's come close to that with this theme.

I got to thinking: If nobody stepped forward - not just anybody of course - there would be no Mardi Gras, no hurricane, no Madhu's Café. The latter would continue somewhere else; I frequented Carter's place before NT so that will live on wherever it ends up.

I asked one of the vampires. When New Toulouse Jardin (what became the Lovecraft sim. This was previously NT's upscale garden district) was decommissioned over the spring/summer, they moved off-theme to Skybeam. I've never warmed up to Seraph City and don't know of any other 1920s themed sims with lax rules on dress code.

With the holidays came word that about three potential buyers were in discussion with Gabrielle Riel. An original resident had been notified and stepped forward and would take over two sims: New Toulouse and New Toulouse Bayou. NT Ponchartrain and NT Bourbon would be sold off; one has since been claimed. New Toulouse Algiers would be renamed Witchwood and join Witchport to the south. Two friends will be making the transition there, one of them Carter.

With so many people interested in staying and others having departed, there has been a fair exchange in parcel ownership. The new owners won't be lacking renters once they install new meters. There were many times NT as a whole would have no vacancies. Most of the time one or two parcels showed yellow on the map, maybe an occasional cemetery plot.

Naturally change affects people differently.  With word of the changes I was pleased. We had answers and saw a future. With word of Gabrielle Riel finding closure with New Toulouse and friends riding a landmass to her new world I'm happy.  She's handled this fairly and been helping the new owners as best she can. Gotta give her kudos.

I'm a little concerned though for a neighbor who seemingly expected everyone from four dense sims to want to squeeze into our two, so much so that she asked those not associated with New Toulouse whether they found their new parcel yet.  She hasn't spoken to me since that day.  The neurotic in me suspects that she interprets my laid back behavior as non-allegiance. We had previously discussed the pros and cons of places we had both escaped from before coming to NT.  I don't want to see her turn into another "us vs them" type, and I'm aware she may be in shock and just need some time. Hopefully she'll snap out of it and get back to her old self, welcoming residents and visitors (including ex-pats) with equal enthusiasm.

IMHO nobody should be judged because they choose to keep their parcel in favor of relocation. They weren't any more or less of a resident. Everyone has their reasons for being where they are, and if somewhere else suits them or they came to NT because of Gabrielle Riel and her events, so be it. She's a very good landlady and maybe some want to continue being somewhere she's in charge. At any rate they're all welcome to my place. Nobody switches off an interest in music or art because they've moved. If Gabrielle Riel wants to hang out when I play 20s tunes that's just fine.  And she knows I'll continue to show up wherever she has a party going. If Madhu's is in Witchwood then you'll find me there on World Music night.

The only thing likely to deter me from continuing in the revised New Toulouse is how the estate is run. Naturally a certain estate buttinski would be grounds to leave if he were added as a manager. While this is far from their genre of interest, power IS a genre of interest unto itself and he'd be attracted to with claims of experience. Happily he hasn't been in evidence.

I was invited to groups these past two days. K.I.S.S. I always say.  People sometimes think an event or place needs a group for each minutia of topic (RFL SLB and Burn2 all suffer from Group Diarrhea). I've only ever belonged to one group for New Toulouse: The residents group. They have a website with an events section anyone can see. If they officially choose to keep the NT renters group apart from a social group and we're no longer allowed to comiserate in group chat, I can understand the change. If all non-residents are effectively ousted from the rental group and expats benefit from a social group, I'll join ONE of them. UPDATE: The latter is the case, and all former residents should join Gens de New Toulouse ;) .

But for now, New Toulouse is saved, new owners are experiencing a steep learning curve while Gabrielle Riel brings them up to speed while the map will remain in flux just a little while longer.

New Toulouse as of this morning.

What grew on this year's Burn2 Sculpture

Here is a guide to all the influences which sprouted forth from my campsite Stream of Consciousness currently on display at Burning Man in Second Life...

Style Branch

	Art Deco Inspired by the architects of Ancient Egypt. This angular and asymmetrical style was an attempt to lend a modern eye to elegance during the 20s.
	Googie and Atomic Age Following Art Deco came Streamline Moderne, which took the soul out of its line and often gave buildings a "submarine" look. After WWII signs and structures tried to define themselves for the future with geometric shapes and odd color schemes, mostly pastel and primary. Some say this post-deco look was inspired in part by Disneyland and the conceptual art of Mary Blair. Others by the proliferation of prefab diners. Applying this to homes, drive-ins, restaurants, hotels, etc. went on well into the 1960s, where it set the style for the New York World's Fair. My builds on Hydrangea reflect this style, as well as my fishing marina The Retro Metro in Nova Albion.
	Tiki USA's involvement in the Pacific also introduced a Polynesian influence. Mix that with Googie and you get a campy cult, which also manifested its own genre of musical styles.
	Framed Storybook Cottages Something I saw a lot of when visiting my mother's side in Alsace-Lorraine. Strasbourg and Obernai in particular. I'd never seen such detail, not even in Big Ben jigsaw puzzles.

Movie Branch

Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans First soundtrack-on-film feature (versus playing a record in sync). Directed by Fritz "Nosferatu" Lang about true love reborn. You WILL weep I don't care who you are.
Back to the Future Trilogy After Buster Keaton's The Cameraman - a perfect comedy - comes the perfect epic adventure trilogy, in which everything happens for a reason and everything falls into place by the end.
Singin' in the Rain A perfect account of Hollywood at the dawn of the talkies. This has a little bit of everything in it, and beats American in Paris by a long mile.
A Matter of Life and Death Brilliant and clever tale of an RAF airman who survives his jump from a burning plane in a way no one would expect. It's refreshing to see foreigners depict American stereotypes.
Jean Cocteau He had a way of making Orpheus look like a waking dream and La Belle et La Bête like a walking Doré engraving. The moment the poet plunges into the mirror is nothing which has been replicated on film in that way before or since. Not even Eddy Grant...
Flesh and the Devil Two performers fall in love while shooting a movie about forbidden romance and scandal. You don't think that shows up on film? Hell yeah!
Random Harvest Okay so this nurse falls in love with an amnesic soldier at the end of WWI and they fall in love, start a life, live in one of those storybook cottages... until one day he remembers who he is and forgets his new life. ARRRGH!
The Forbidden Zone Danny Elfman's brother made this low budget softcore cult film with Hervé Villechaize, Susan Tyrrell, Oingo Boingo, The Kipper Kids, an obsession with Max Fleischer cartoons, old 78s, chickens, and hardly any budget, The result was a very bizarre but intriguing concoction with surprisingly successful special effects.
North by NortwestWhat do you mean you've never seen this?!

Music Branch

	The Beatles *watching Ed Sullivan* Mommy Mommy why are those girls screaming? They can't hear the music!" "Because they're crazy Dear." Even today there are very few music acts from any genre who were not even indirectly influenced by The Beatles. Which was your Beatle? Mine's always been Paul McCartney. I heard the Uncle Albert / Admiral Halsey and thus started my listening the radio. He was big stuff at the time with his band Wings, and less interested in making social statements than putting out appealing pop tunes. On a trip to the UK in 1977 I acquired the single "Give Ireland Back to the Irish" which we'd never heard in the States.
	The Carpenters Sick at home and stir crazy I listened to a LOT of pop hits in the summer of 1971 when pursuing the radio, and it was a big year for The Carpenters and their multi-layered sound, which was great in headphones at my friend's house. My parents were pleased that I'd taken to someone they liked as well, and we included a concert as part of a road trip through Pennsylvania.
	Electric Light Orchestra Influences come and influences go, but I always come back to ELO. Still doing AM Radio in 1973 I caught the syndicated weekly AT40 where I got to hear Can't Get It Out of My Head once a week. By 1976 and having owned each single of theirs since AND listened to all their B-sides, I figured it was time to move on to albums. Simply this: Electric Light Orchestra picked up where The Beatles left off. And Jeff Lynne is God.
	DEVO i didn't think much of them until Oh No! It's DEVO! In 1982. That and a dream set a short distance from an atomic test site.
	Dave Edmunds High octane rockabilly strait ouda Cardiff.
	Paul Whiteman Orchestra You've got your kind of Jazz and I've got mine. It's just that most of mine are Foxtrot with Vocal Refrain

Art & Animation Branch

Looney Tunes Who doesn't love Looney Tunes? Funny imagery for kids and shrewd humor for adults.
Thomas Kinkade There are those framed cottages again, only mostly English. But still that cozy light inside. This man's work was always one step away from total kitsche, but he always maintained that distance.
Disney moment in Cinderella I knew I was going to be an artist, at least a cartoonist, but a moment of a scene from Cinderella in which the character ran into a darkened room so realistic had me hooked into majoring in animation while in High School. Yeah so what if the character was rotoscoped in the shot. This was my destiny and I had to follow.
Busby Berkley As you may suspect, Busby Berkley was in fact a drill sergeant at some point. Then coming back to the states after WWI he found work on Broadway choreographing reviews. It made sense to move on to movies, where his formations and patterns became legendary. Try the formulaic "Dames" for some of the best musical sequences.
Osamu Tezuka My earliest recollection of anime - at the time called Japanimation - was that of Astroboy aka Atom. From there was Kimba aka Leo the Lion. And Amazing Three, about aliens disguised as animals riding in a tire. Picking up my first manga in 1971 found me a host of new characters to follow, but opening a Yochiyen got me all my Tezuka favorites plus MamaChan, Magma, Black Jack, and more. He had the first anime studio and was a pioneer to Japan akin to Walt Disney.
Go Nagai Don't think I'd ever seen naked characters in a kids comic before then. He got parents in Japan furious in the 60s and 70s. But truly he did some amazing work. His original Devilman series was very sophisticated.
Ishinomori Shotaro For action, adventure, and again cyborgs and robots with hearts of gold. Much of my timing in comics came from him. At a time when I found American comics cluttered and messy, I found an appeal with simple character design yet perfect poses and amazing embellishments in manga (explosions, etc), mostly from this artist. Kamen Rider, Wild, Cyborg 009, Kikaida... these practically became a part of me.
Speed Racer Who would have thought? An animated series without talking animals or aliens etc? It was an animated version of an adventure spy thriller, and for the time it worked. When you grow up with Trans Lux' low budget dubbing you can't see it any other way and you wouldn't want to.
John Romita Sr A clean simple line, perfect poses... these are what I liked about Johnny Romita when he took over Daredevil. The only reason he left was to cover for Ditko on Spider-man. Thus a legend was born.
Gene Colan My key American inspiration stands right beside Go Nagai and Ishinomori Shotaro with yet another unique storytelling style. A man with a knack for realism straight from the hand with cinematic angles. He was like I am: see things in tones and very difficult to ink. I had resolved to pursue inking in mainstream comics as a result. We were eventually on a first-name basis but I never expressed to him my desire to ink is art and work on a project with him. I suppose somewhere up there he now knows.
Brian Bolland His inking style is unsurpassed. I wish I could do what he did, and he did it with a brush.
James Montgomery Flagg An amazing illustrator and cartoonist from early 20th century. What he could do with a few lines was just incredible. While he is known for his Uncle Sam Wants YOU poster it's the black & white cartoons and spot illustrations from an earlier time that I admire most.

Shordurpersavs
Shordurpersav is SubGenius for "Short Duration Personal Savior". It's those things which hit you hard with influence and advance you into a new phase of your life until the next one comes along.

	Tin Man Fascinating. An empty structure with a soul. I felt he had the most heart...
	Speed Racer I saw this during a visit in 1967 to NYC. I obsessed over it once back in Chicago and had to keep drawing it and singing the theme song so I wouldn't forget. Two years later we'd be moving to NYC and that's all I could think of.
	Dr Strange As long as one can go, there's always a path to redemption. I was impressed to learn that in the 60s there were college courses analyzing this Marvel comic series. I boast an impressive collection of original Dr Strange page art, and always wanted to do a piece for Marvel.
	Captain Hook There comes that moment reading the book that you realize that he wasn't the bad guy. In the original version he gets so sick of being tormented by Peter Pan that he climbs down from the ship to kneel in the water before the crocodile.
	Eddie Cantor The original King of All Media. Started impoverished in an immigrant family and became one of the greatest celebrities of his time and a great philanthropist. He also founded the Actors Guild.
	Buster Keaton Easily the best filmmaker. Director and producer AND screenplays. His Rube Goldberg engineering skills were also how he approached his plots.
	Danny Elfman Is he the devil? Is he a manic lead singer? Is he a soundtrack composer? I know him for more than Jack Skellington.
	Errol Flynn He might not have reached his full potential. Flynn was a dysfunctional genius with a great skill for the written word. He also had rage issues which turned him into a monster under the influence. Admitted that he wondered how his life would have been if he weren't so pretty and gotten away with so much. Looked 80 when he died at 50, but lived three times that. Was inspiration for the Tasmanian Devil. Many things written about him since his passing were not true.
	The EMH My adoptive persona since 2000 has been the Emergency Medical Hologram or Holographic Doctor. To interact realistically with people in a medical environment the EMH was configured with heuristic subroutines which resulted in a sentient lifeform. The story of the EMH is not just a study of an aware creature finding his place in society but ultimately the story of humanity's future and the question of whether we have truly evolved when mankind creates simulated scenarios for killing and war on the holodeck. People online don't always get that they are ALWAYS evaluated based on whether their values off the computer remain when they interact with strangers online.
	Doctor Who Damn I hated that show in the 70s. It was some crummy low-budget thing on before wrestling Saturday mornings (in NYC it wasn't on PBS). There's a different first impression between being a 3 yr old hiding behind the couch or being regarded by a film major (case in point Speed Racer, which appears on two branches of my sculpture). My first roomate made me watch it a decade later and it was painful. Something happened along the way, and now it's the best show on TV anywhere. I jumped on with series 5 in 2010, when most of that year's episodes could hold up in the movie theatre over anything out at the time.