It´s time for a confession

I need to come clean with something to you all, because I want you to read it here first.

There is a person whom I have told about this. At the time when I told her I thought of  her as a friend, but we have since parted ways and broken all contact. Still she keeps on baiting me on almost a daily basis and I am just waiting for her to "spill the beans". I do not wish to be afraid anymore, so here goes.

After my husband Ars passed away I was diagnosed with clinical depression.

Clinical depression is a serious medical illness that negatively affects how you feel, the way you think and how you act.

I was unable to function as I used to and lost interest in activities that were once enjoyable to me. I felt sad and hopeless for extended periods of time. Clinical depression is not the same as feeling sad or depressed for a few days and then feeling better. It affected my body, my mood, my thoughts, and my behavior. It changed my eating habits, how I felt and how I thought, my ability to work and how I interacted with people. In short I did not "feel like myself" anymore.

Clinical depression is not a sign of personal weakness, or a condition that can be willed away. Clinically depressed people cannot "pull themselves together" and get better. In fact, clinical depression often interferes with a person's ability or wish to get help. Clinical depression is a serious illness that lasts for weeks, months and sometimes years. Mental health counselors and psychiatrists are trained to diagnose and treat clinical depression. With the right treatment, most people who seek help get better within several months. Many people begin to feel better in just a few weeks.

I am grateful to my boss for forcing me to seek medical help at an early stage already in May 2010, and for the support I have since received from her, from my co-workers, from my true friends and family in real life and in Second Life. I have been receiving medical treatment for this since May and mostly I feel much better and stronger although not quite my old self yet.

I am relieved that I have now come to the decision to tell you myself rather than wait for it to be hurled out on another blog.

"Swedish Cinnamon Bun Day"

October 4th was declared the official "Swedish Cinnamon Bun Day" in 1999 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Swedish Homebaking Society. 

The Cinnamon bun, was chosen because it probably is the most undisputed symbol of homemade baking in Sweden. 

Here´s a recipe, enjoy!

Traditional Swedish cinnamon buns 
Time: 2 hours 
Serves about 25 pc 

Ingredients:
Dough:
    * 25 g of yeast for sweet doughs
    * 75 g butter or margarine
    * 2 ½ cups milk
    * ½ cup granulated sugar
    * 1 pinch salt
    * 1 teaspoon ground cardamom
    * About 7 cups flour
 
Filling:
    * 50 g margarine or butter
    * ½ cup granulated sugar
    * 1 teaspoon cinnamon
 
Glazing:
    * 1 egg
 
Garnish:
    * Pearl sugar
 
Equipment you need:
    * 25 pc bun dies
 
Equipment that is good to have:
    * Kitchen machine
 
Follow these steps: 
1. Crumble yeast into a bowl.
2. Melt the butter and add the milk and let it become lukewarm, 37 degrees centigrade.
3. Dissolve the yeast in a little of the dough fluid and then add the rest. Add salt, sugar and cardamom and stir.
4. Use electric mixer with dough hooks or appliance to incorporate all flour in the dough. The dough should be soft and smooth. Let rise 30 minutes uncovered.
5. Make the filling. Stir together margarine, sugar and cinnamon.
6. Roll out the dough into a rectangular plate, approximately 20 x 50 cm. Spread with filling and roll up. Cut about 1 ½ cm thick slices and put them in the bun dies, cut side up. Let rise about 30 minutes.
7. Beat the egg with plain whipped and brush carefully on the buns (do not press hard). Sprinkle with pearl sugar.
8. Bake in oven at 225 degrees for 8-10 minutes or in oven 200 degrees for 10-12 minutes.

Au Revoir Grenouille Inn

Photo courtesy of Belze Fraker

Well last night was wild and crazy. Almost all the Swedish glitterati had assembled at Grenouille Inn for a send-off party before the establishment was moved to a yet undisclosed location (or I may just have missed that piece of info).

I was busy talking with two prominent members of the Norwegian SL-community, Mialinn Telling and Starry Sweetwater, most of the evening.

The beautiful couple Apollon Allen and Iendi Laville gave us all a wonderful party, with loads of beer and music from the 80´s.

As has become my (bad) habit at Grenouille I immediately jumped up on the bar to dance, and was followed by Ikaros String and Maffe Carlberg. We were soon joined by some of the other guys, Frosty Muggins, Frostland Beornsen, Jesper Prinz, Bejiita Imako, marcuz Palen and Sunshine and perhaps some more.

My conversation with the two charming Norwegian ladies distracted me greatly. After all I am a man and have very limited mutitasking capabilities. I can really only do one thing at a time. Suddenly I noticed there was an impromptu contest for "Best Male Avatar" going on and hurried to join and we were all losing articles of clothing to attract attention and votes.

Unfortunately I could not manage to get my darn computer to obey me, so I got no pictures on my own.

My modesty prevents me from telling you who won ... to his own surpirise, but Frostland and Frosty got up on the bar after the voting had already started otherwise I am sure one of them would have won, both of them seem to have been woring out a lot lately and they were gorgeous.

On Blanche Argus blog I found a picture which I show you a detail of here. I wonder where my hair went - LOL.

Pet Peeves

A pet peeve is a minor annoyance that an individual identifies as particularly annoying to him or her, to a greater degree than others may find it. (Wikipedia)

I have quite a few pet peeves but two - that both are among the top ten - happened to me yesterday, so I´ll tell you about these today.

Persons constantly complaining about lag when at a crowded event.

Face the fact that it is a natural thing in Second Life, just deal with it. You could try to change your settings for the occasion, but for the love of mankind don´t bitch about it, it gets boring for the rest of us and really fast too.

If you know you cannot stand lag go sit by yourself at the bottom of an ocean somewhere. Have fun!

A wise man - me, myself and I - once said "Lag is a state of mind, don´t blame Second Life!

Homophobes that think being gay means you are halfway a woman or want to be one.

Hey buster, educate yourself. There is a difference you know, between gender, gender identity and sexual orientation. Do your homework and don´t clutter up my life with your ignorance and intolerance.

I took someone off my friendslist yesterday because of this. I told him, if he cannot accept me, why would he want to be on my friendslist anyway?

Otherwise yesterday was a great evening, but I´ll tell you more about that in my next post!

BMcM Corp + Microsoft + SecondLife = TRUE

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh my God, the plot thickens! What a busy afternoon it has been. This is an account of what happened when I was celebrating my nieces 2nd birthday in real life today.

I, that is Bock McMillan, Laird of Southern Charm, Second Life fahionista and business tycoon (interim CEO och Chairman of the Board of BMcM Corporation) etc. etc., was joined there by my bosom buddies Mr William "Bill" Gates, businessman (Microsoft), computer geek and philantropist and Mr. Philip Rosedale (a k a Philip Linden), stunningly cute non-fashionista, computer geek and interim CEO and Chairman of the Board of Linden Lab (owners of Second Life).

The three of us have a long-standing and very close friendship, although both Mr Gates and Mr. Rosedale hastily implored me to add that our friendship is "of course of a totally non-sexual nature".

Between eating birthday cake, drinking excessive amounts of black coffee and singing birthday songs for the lovely little girl, we had time to discuss the upcoming merger of our three companies. I am happy to inform you we are letting our minions close the deal before the end of the coming week.

After all this name-dropping I hope you all realize it´s high time to start sucking up...

(And then I woke up and discovered I had to hurry to get to the party in time!)

Tonight - Tear down the Grenouille Inn

I kväll river vi Grenouille Inn med hjälp av DJ Apollons galna 80-tals musik

Festen börjar kl. 23 och pågår så länge vi orkar.

TAXI - Special price only for you my friend!

Breast Cancer Awareness

"October breast cancer month. 

The pink that is coloring our lifes during the month of October. whether commercial or sincere, shouldn’t cover the reality of breast cancer itself. Worldwide, millions of people, women and men are suffering from breast cancer every day. And each and everyone of them feels the pain, the fear, the guilt, the uncertainty, the responsibility, the loss, being thrown back to the core essence of life. And let us not forget our loved ones we lost. May all of this being represented by this vulnerable appearing color.

However, the brightness of pink at the same time stands for hope and strength of each individual to fight its personal fight. It stands for the community making this personal fight a community responsibility. It stands for all the efforts of people; fund raisers, medical staff, researchers, students, and volunteers worldwide, working together to find the cure. It stands for the industry proving its mature responsibility towards manufacturing processes, ingredients and products. It stands for equal fundamental rights for all breast cancer survivors whether born in richness or in poverty anywhere on mother earth.

Pink Ribbon stands in my view for one thing that makes Pink Ribbon unique, a world wide solidarity of people and breast cancer organisations to stand together. We therefore dedicate October 2010 to the solidarity of all people. Let’s fight together!" 

Mr. Drs. Walter Scheffrahn MBA MBI
Founder & Secretary Pink Ribbon Inc.

Pink Ribbon International
....

As I said yesterday, if it´s been said well use it!

I hope you all have your pink ribbons on, otherwise it´s time to get it - in both your first and second life.