GA Winterfest - The Opening

Saturdays in SecondLife have lately meant a lot of strange problems for me. All my remarks in Instant Message and local chat are repeated, any tip I give get repeated also until I leave the sim and my HUD´s and AO´s turn themselves off anytime I try to use them. Frankly it´s more than a little tedious!

If I weren't the most patient man in SecondLife I would complain and rant ferociously, as it is you just get this whimper instead.

Today I had one of my "have-to-go"-events lined up, the opening of the Gay Archipelago´s Winter Festival. My son Guyke was a grass widower (Ziggy was away in first life for one of his hellish weekend work shifts) so I forced the boy to accompany me.

Well, once I thought I was ready dressing and teleported to the party I landed in snow, which really shouldn't have been a surprise to me considering it was a winter festival duhhh! As a trendsetter and fashionista extraordinaire it was of course impossible for me to go to this particular party in a tee and capris, so back home I went to change a-g-a-i-n. I choose to blame it all on my bad cold and my fever, although I should think others will have alternative theories on the matter.

Mitch and Garth, the happy couple

We got there a bit late and missed out on George Michaels and Ricky Martins appearances, but were in time for DJ Avacar´s great set and in time for the two most thrilling events of the party, the northern lights show and my buddy Garth Raleighs proposal to his beau Mitch Underwood.

Luckily - and to Garth´s and the party guests great joy and relief - Mitch immediately and happily accepted whereupon heartfelt congratulations to the happy couple ensued, totally against the rules of the Winterfests ban on chat spam, but no one really cared about rules at that point.

Guyke and I

Friday with the Boys

Yesterday I had a prearranged meeting with Ziggy Starsmith at The Rainbow Yacht Club. He was going to pick me up there to show me his new home in Second Norway.

Even though I was a bit nervous about his typing at the same stime as he was driving everything went well and we soon docked safely at his new home. The house lies directly by the waterfront and you only have to get out of the boat to be there.

I was relieved to hear that his next door neighbor was Mialinn Telling herself. She probably wants to keep an eye on him, quite understandably, even if he has calmed down considerably during the time I have known him.

Although Ziggy only moved in a few days ago he had already gotten a new house in place and had finished furnishing and decorating it. That usually takes me a couple of weeks or months. We had a great time inspecting the new parcel, the house and just talking.  All the time I was secretly looking at his wonderful hairy calves.

Then I got an IM from my stepson Guyke, inviting us both over to take a look at the work he and his husband Janttu had been doing in remodeling their homestead. The results so far is great I can tell you and a immense change from earlier.

When I saw the new privy they had installed I felt the need to try it out, and I can tell you it was very comfortable.

Although it seems as if I am alone on the picture, I had an audience of three watching me so it was not my most restful moment on the loo.

I tried to get a picture of the four of us together in front of their beautiful new green house, but the two young ones both had their irritatingly fidgeting cruising Animation Overrides (AO) on. This is the best I could do with Janttu showing himself from his best side. (Well, I did actually get a good picture of all of us facing forward, but this was still my favorite.)

We finished the visit with some ballroom dancing in the boys wonderful new dance area, a gazebo with a stunning fountain in the middle. It was very relaxing to dance and talk among friends and after awhile I felt the Friday coma set in and had to leave for my beauty sleep.

 

It Ain't Cheap To Look Good

Bock as a noob dancing at Badboy Plaza

My buddy Eddi Haskell has a new poll running on his blog Eddi Haskell´s Second Life, asking How Much Do You Spend To Look Good in SecondLife?

Take the poll, please, I am so looking forward to see the final results.

I will not share with you how much I spend, but if you look at the picture above I am sure you can guess it took some hard work, many cosmetic surgeries (with shape and skin changes), AO´s to get rid of the "duckwalk" and a more than a few Lindens on a decent wardrobe and accessories to make that hideous noob look as halfway good as I do today.

The picture above shows me in my third or fourth month in SecondLife. I had just managed to buy the Pride Flag after about 25 hours of "camping". Soon afterwards I plugged in my credit card to SecondLife and the ugly duckling turned into the swan you see today, or close.

This is the only snapshot from my early days that I have found in my Inventory yet, I know there should be some more but I haven't taken the time to go through my 2,000+ snapshots and textures yet. Unfortunately I also remember how I at one point started deleting things from my early days (I will never do that again), but I am hoping there may still be some I overlooked

How My Soul Was Saved

Let me start by saying that both Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise can go jump in the lake, because my own personal vampire is far sweeter, more stunning and cleverer than the two combined!

I am now at liberty to share his name and true appearance with you all. You may remember I told you about his coming out as a vampire to me in my earlier post My Soul Is Intact (url). At that point in time I had not yet asked for his permission so I showed you a picture where he was masked. Here is the unmasked version.

I and Drey

Some of you may recognize my darling brother in-law Drey Messmer after his makeover, and you would be correct. Well, my BIL is these days an out and proud gay vampire and I support him thoroughly.

As some of you may remember, we did some tests that I reported to you in the post mentioned above and concluded that my soul was safe. However, my BIL is no dumb-ass so he discussed my case with his vampire liege - the guy that had bitten him I am guessing  - and they reached the conclusion that my soul could still be in peril and further testing was needed.for a correct diagnosis to be made.

Drey, my personal vampire

So my BIL came over for a new visit and we started the testing. Before the testing could proceed I had to wear  the garlic necklace again and deactivate it and I also had to deactivate my Animation Override (AO)

"The Garlic Necklace: Your Garlic Necklace Vampire Bite Ward has been deactivated. You are now vulnerable to Vampire bites".

It felt a little scary to do this in the presence of a cute vampire, but I trust my BIL implicitly and of course I was never in any danger. Following the deactivation Drey made a new scan of me after first assuring me that if there should be a problem there was also a cure.

"HUD [Thirst::Bloodlines] 3.4: Bock McMillan's soul is in Limbo. To rescue it, they need to drink the Wormwood potion. If they register, their soul will go to Titania Bracken."

When I saw the result of the scan and the name I remembered the incident where I had been attacked by this awful Titania woman at a concert where we had been dancing in some obscure place. The bite was sent under the guise of a farewell hug and as any decent Swede I never deny I a hug (we are all bad that way) whereupon she bit me and stole my soul.

Drey told me that the only thing that had prevented my soul from being lost was the fact that I never joined Bloodlines. If I had done so at any point after the my soul would have gone to Titania´s soul-count.

Now for the cure Drey teleported to the sim Liquid (SLurl) to purchase the Wormwood potion and send it to me. He told me not to use it until he returned.

Drey, my savior

When my BIL was back and I had unpacked the potion he had sent me, he told me to wear the bottle, hit it and then choose "Drink" on the dialogue window that appeared.

As soon as I had drunk the potion I received this message "The Wormwood Potion: Your soul has been rescued from Limbo".

Drey made a new scan of me and got this message; HUD [Thirst::Bloodlines] 3.4: Bock McMillan's soul was in Limbo, then they drank the Wormwood potion. Once they have registered for Bloodlines and been bitten, their soul will go to the next person to bite them.

Yeahaw!!! My soul that had been in peril had now been saved by my beautiful, wonderful BIL.

The next thing I did after giving Drey a hug was to activate my garlic necklace again!