Another Post, Another Meme

No, no, no, I haven't been blogging much. No time, thanks to Real Life. Serious stuff, but I won't bother you with it. Suffice to say I've found some time today and wouldn't you know, I learned about a new meme-challenge from Strawberry Singh: 10 SL Firsts. Read her's here but first check out mine ...

My first best friend in SL is Threshin Barnett. We would get in synch so much that often we'd meet for the day and find that we were dressed alike.

01. First SL Friend: To keep things simple, I'll stick with the current Uccello Poultry "character" on the Main Grid. Really, I started SL on the Teen Grid and remember quite a few people from there, few of which, however, actually transitioned to the Main Grid.

CC Columbo, my brother, in Nangrim waaaayyyy back in the day. Graphics were so bad that the grass wouldn't rez as green. This was probably 2008 when we had about 1024 square meters or so between us – enough for a nice pond. Eventually, we owned about 3/4 of the region before selling out to a Brazillian casino days before gambling was banned. But we are back and you can visit us any time (SLurl).

Of course, I met up with my brother, CC Columbo, right away and begged him to let me have a Premium account so I could have my own land. No dice, but he did let me let me set my home to his land in Nangrim (this spot, to be precise). I met a few people there including Dusty Jamberoo whom I still know today.

02. First SL Kiss: That would be Kala, my brother's SL girlfriend at the time. Yes, I know *facepaw* I had taken her to the Isle of Lesbos to show her around and she kissed me. We didn't go any further than that, but it was a funny parallel to an RL situation that won't ever be discussed again.

Wow ... didn't think I had any pictures of Mary left since the PC crashed and we switched to Macs. Sadly, the backup discs won't work with the Mac so everything is gone.

03. First SLex time/place/partner: Mary. I think. It was so long ago now. The first opportunity I had though, was with a gay male neighbor in Nangrim. Long story made short ...

I started my Main Grid existence as a male because I didn't want to deal with men hitting on me. Actually, at that point, I still hated (yes, hated) almost all men (family excepted) in general due to my RL experience with them. So I was chatting with a guy with land next to ours when he invited me into his gypsy caravan and tried to make out with me. Yep. He was gay. I didn't even have an AO at that point. I was less than a week old. Very next chance I got I flipped the "gender" switch in the shape editor and went shopping.

04. First SL Partner/Girlfriend/Boyfriend/Wife/Husband: Mary, and I'm sure now. She left me without telling me, having started up a relationship with someone else. That lasted about two weeks and she tried to come back. HA! Fat chance. Still, she was special.

Angela and I go steampunk now and then.

Today, I'm married to the wonderful Angela Seale. We've been together since September 2007.

05. First SL Job: Modeling, what else?!? Back in the day, one's first job was either modeling or dancing (read: Hooker). I didn't get paid as I modeled stuff for my brother's shop. I've done some modeling since for Bare Rose (I won a contest where the prize was to model one outfit), LapGirl, and various art photographers (read: nudes!).

Many regular readers know I also worked at the Isle of Lesbos. As I joke I used to run about with a "Threshin's Secretary" tag as if I was the Isle manager's 2nd banana. One day Threshin Barnett gave me the Isle Secretary role. To that point I had been a Jill-of-All-Trades for the Isle, though my first real work there (and my first for-pay work anywhere) was as an event hostess.

06. First SL Creation: A cube. It is a tradition I started ... rez a cube and date it then stuff it away somewhere safe ... whenever I create an avatar. After that? The first real thing I made was a set of earrings.

Meeting with Zed Linden about blogging for The Lab.

07. First Encounter with a Linden: That's hard to remember. I really don't know, but I am happy to say I have a few as friends now. And Moles!!

I was so excited to "meet" Vint Falken once though she wasn't really there. I sent this pic to her and she sent back a nice IM. We conversed once in a while but never became friends. She's the first SLebrity that comes to mind when I thought about point #08 below but she wasn't the "first" well-known resident I'd met to that point.

08. First Encounter with an SLebrity: I guess everyone is a SLebrity in one circle or another, but if you define it as "a big name most people know" I'd have to say Janeforyou Barbara, the owner of the Isle of Lesbos. She was one of the forces behind the early LGBT community in SL having created the first resort for women in SL.

I see Miss Jane, Shilo, Eveie, Threshin, Me, Mousra, Aryon, and many more here.

09. First SL Sim you fell in love with: Really hard to say. I've always been a Mainland girl, but the Isle of Lesbos was the first Estate-type sim I fell in love with .... relaxing, beautiful, no male pressures, and wonderful women who became my SL family.

10. First SL Blog Post:

I've had many blogs prior to this one. In fact, I just finished deleting one so I could start afresh. What i would like to do with this blog is report on things i do in what seems to be my primary life, the Second Life™ world (*SL). So this won't be so much about me as about who I am through what I do and where I go.

That is how I started "Another Attempt," my first post on The Poultry Report on April 24, 2008.

SL Names Meme

Strawberry Singh is back with another meme this week: SL Names. I find this challenge interesting because of the on-going push by residents to bring back surnames and the battles I've had with my own name.

What’s your SL name? Uccello Poultry.

What made you choose this name? When I came from the Teen Grid I gave up that avatar and thought that I could get the same surname as my brother, CC Columbo, but it wasn't available. My next goal was to be funny and Poultry fit the bill (pun intended) out of the otherwise lame set of choices. I thought about using my Real Life given name, Caitlin, but decided to extend the humor and looked up "Bird" in several languages. The Italian "Uccello" was the prettiest and I remembered from Art History that there was a famous painter by that name, so I went with it. So I'm Bird Bird, if you think about it hard enough. I have an alt that uses the Bird Bird scheme, too, and I locked up Uccello Resident when surnames were dropped.

What’s your SL nickname, or what do most people call you? (if applicable) Most folks call me Uccie or whatever happens to be in my Display Name at the time. I've been called Cell and several unprintable things. My wife calls me Kitten and Pet.

What’s your SL display name? Why do you choose to have one? (if applicable) Right now my Display name is Uccie Poultry-Seale. My wife has Angela Seale-Poultry set as hers. See? Cute married couple stuff.  Don't ya hate cutie couples? For special occasions I'll change so on St. Patrick's Day I sometimes go by Caitlin O'Mgosh or Caitlin O'Really or something-else hopefully amusing. Halloween, Christmas, and other holidays see some fun, too.

Do you like your SL name? If you could change your SL name, what would it be? Oh, would I ever like to change my name. I've asked often and vociferously, even offering to pay a fee. As 99% of Italian residents point out to me –– even when I beg them not to do so –– uccello is an uncouth slang term despite what all the dictionaries read and 99% of the Italian residents don't have the decency to just shut up about it. Otherwise they are lovely people and the language is beautiful, but get out of the gutter sometimes, huh?

Anyway, I envy the names that some of my alts have ... Zyx or Xandah or even Caitlin. I'd still like the surname Columbo. Right now my brother uses the Display Name CC Poultry so we can be family. I also envy the names of a couple of his alts.

What’s the craziest/funniest SL name you’ve ever seen? and What’s the coolest (your favorite) SL name you’ve ever seen? Here is a list of "Really Cool Avie Names" that I've been collecting over the years ...

MEN
Chekout Lane
Cut Wiener and UnCut Wiener  (Twins I met shopping, really!)
Crow Diesel
Des Gruntled
Dred Looming
Elvis Presley
Euclidean Surface
Frigid Cryotank
Glucose Sideways
Grim Thespian
Harry Potter
Hiro Protagonist
Manure Sack
thisnamewassurprisinglynottaken Resident
Too Yootz
Totally Unsustainable
Wrong Wright

UNKNOWN GENDER 
Eph Yue
Imnada Waffle
Missing Person
MyBrains Gottfried
Ooo Ah
Station Vhargon

WOMEN
Accountant Adzebills
afterhours Parkin
Alaska Loon
Alittle Lunasea
Alluring Fairey
Always Leakey
AprilShowers Becloud
Barbie Princess
Bendand Stoop
Bohemiann Rhapsody
Bunsons Burner
darkNtwisted Dreamscape
Card Holder
Comes Nitely
Coupon Clip
Delicate Quandry
DitaVon Theas
Downlovers Lane
Eaten Gumbo
Erie Waffle
EveryOther Thursday
F3ckme Babii
Fence Stradling
Forbidden4 Males
Fukmi Sideways (Fukmi got hassled by the lab about a year after getting her account because one resident objected despite Fukmi being a real life name. She got her account back, but the frustration was too much for her to take Second Life seriously anymore.)
Good Chemistry
GoSpeed Racer
Holland Antwerp
Honest Waffle
Howmuch Decosta
Iamin Love
Icy Wiener
Immm Back
Imnotgoing Sideways
Incoherendt Randt
iwannadou Later
Jealous Rage
Kantbe Thursday
Keen Salamander
LargeScreen Television
Lickmelikea Lollipop
Loving Fairey
Makits Oh
Malfunctioning Gynoid
Manefest Destiny
Meying Prantis
Milf Acronym
Much Later
My Onlyone
Never Later
NothingBut Magic
notso Bleac
Now Moo
Nut Case
OfeelMe Nitely
Ohhh Mai
Ona Waffle
Oonariannabelladavoratrelundara Chronometrist
Parallell Parks
Perkins Trenchcoat
PR Etzel
Raeleigh Liotta
Rainy Thursday
Really Ordinary
rogue camel
Rumour Mills
Sandie Harbour
secondlifename Resident
GossipGirl
Seenknot Hird
Shesnotmel Memel
Shoobe Doobie
Sleepy Harbour
Speghetti Ragu
Spoon Nestler
Suffa Jetcity
Taste Honi
Tender Littlething
Time Guardian
Tiny Runningbear
Twist Easley
UwillLuvmethe Dayafter
Vende Latte
Very Adamant
Weebit Offcourse
Whatcha Eaton
Wife Stepford
Woody Yue
Wouldyoulike Mayo

Notice how most require a surname to work. Very few "Resident" names are that clever, really. I mean, anyone can write something funny, but it takes brains to look at a selection of surnames and be witty. Many of the Linden Department of Public Works (LDPW) Moles are very, very witty. Check out some of the Past and Present Moles of the LDPW here.

Got some comments? I'd love to see them.

What Changed in 8 Years?

Don't adjust your sets. CC Columbo is, indeed, orange. Thank the saints that our Irish-Catholic father can't see this. Coming back from visiting mom in Hospital today I took a wee nap after enjoying a Double Whopper and small fries and CC was at the computer. When I woke up, I found him tweaking his SLink hands and ears to match his new skin. Why the change, you might ask?

No change, really. This is the CC Columbo that I met up with when I logged into the Main Grid for the first time at very nearly the same spot in Nangrim. He was orange, wearing women's hair from Juicy La Jolla, free Linden clothes, and a dragon from Wynx Whiplash. This was known as his Eddie Izzard Period. Shortly after this picture was taken he transferred the dragon to me, gave me L$2000, gave me 16m² of land, and sent me off into the world.

As you can see, he's got a new(er) dragon, better clothes, men's hair, and that new orange skin. Same old CC, though. Best. Brother. Ever!

The Google Meme, Courtesy of Strawberry Singh

Having thought several times about blogging in the past week I've thought more often about avoiding it and thus a lackadaisical and slothful attitude prevailed. That changes today, though, as Strawberry Singh has another of her weekly blog challenge series with a twist by Emily: The Google Meme.

Meme instructions: Google your SL name and answer the following questions. Don’t forget to leave a comment with a link to your post so we can all drop by, read and be nosy. Optional: click over to Emily’s blog and do her Google challenge as well. Don’t forget to leave a comment in her post if you end up doing it, so she can come stalk you guys too!

Google your Second Life name in “quotations” and share your results.
What is the first link that comes up?
Which link were you surprised to see?

In 0.37 seconds, our friends at Google turned up about 99,300 entries for "Uccello Poultry." More show up if one doesn't use the quotation marks. The first link that turns up is my blog, not unexpected as it is likely the one source on the Interwebs that contains my name most often and it is hosted on a Google-owned property, Blogspot. The Slow Poke Post entry was a surprise I can't say I've ever seen that site before, though I guess I did subscribe to this syndication service at one time.

Click on the “Image” tab and tell us where the first 5 pictures listed are from.

Each of the first five pictures (and quite a few thereafter though not all) are from my blog. Some will also be found on my Flickr feed. Google probably favors my blog images as they are the storage site for same.

Click on the “more” tab and then click “news” and share your results

No news is good news because there are no News search results, I suppose, so I thought I'd share my Patent results instead. Similar results for Books, but I do appear under Discussions and if you search for my name without quotation marks I'm mappable!

Not precisely, though. That's not me. Uccello is a reasonably popular name. It means bird in Italian and that's why I chose it to go with Poultry in SL (I tried to get Columbo, my brother's last name iSL, but couldn't).

Searching via that twist mentioned earlier is another matter ... Can I find the real Caitlin?

How did the two digital footprints compare, and did that surprise you? I searched with my full name and just my first/last name with the same results ... I'm Interwebbily Invisible. Normally I show up once, on a NASA page that lists names engraved on a teeny plaque attached to a planetary probe, but with the US government shutdown in effect, that page is not available.

Does anyone interesting share your name? No, however, when I search with my first, middle (my birth mother's maiden name), and surname several pictures of Sarah Palin pop up amongst some seemingly random dross. Since I know my middle name I can understand why, but I'm still creeped out and you are more than welcome to be creeped out, too.

Are you happy with the size of your digital footprint, or do you wish either one was larger/smaller? Being invisible to the world. Pretty darned cool. My name does show up in some pretty specialized and not-really-public databases so you might get to them eventually, but more than likely you'd need some skills to find me. Since I have a gun permit, though, I'm rather shocked that I don't see me on the Interwebs for it. Isn't that stuff public knowledge?

If you woke up/ logged in one morning to discover over night you had suddenly gained rock-star status, and everybody knew who you were and wanted to know what you were doing… what would you do? Panic. Or try to figure out why I'm still broke. Maybe both at the same time. Eventually I'd have to sit down and wonder what I did for said status. The only musical instrument I can play is an iPod, I can't act my way out of a paper bag, and I don't think rock star status is conferred upon people for being expert with a pistol unless they go rouge in a bell tower or something. And I'm pretty sure that the Real Life me doesn't hold any patents, either.

Happy Birthday, CC!!

CC Columbo: The Man, The Myth, The Hyena. At our home in Nangrim (SLurl).

My Real Life and Second Life brother has a birthday today! Happy Birthday, CC!! You do so much to make my life happy and I want you to know I appreciate it. This is your special day, and even though you have to take the cat to the vet, buy a shirt and tie for a funeral, and make all those calls mom wants you to make ... well, sounds kinda crappy. Sorry. But there will be ice cream cake later and breakfast at iHop is on me this morning!! Now bring on the pix!!

The oldest known picture of CC in Second Life. He's at Rainbow Tiger in his first week some five years ago.

Our current treehouse sits on this very spot. The pond was deep enough for swimming. Graphics quality was so low that you couldn't tell the grass was green. I had a couple dates with the girl that lived in the little house to the right.
So did CC, we learned later, and that was awwwwkward.

CC is also an elf, thanks to a relatively recent makeover. The facial hair is new, though he usually sports it iRL.

The Drax Files: World Makers 7 - Rod Humble

Right. Skip all the stuff with Drax and Rod Humble (AKA Rod Linden; AKA Fearless Leader) and zip up to 4:49 where you'll see ME, all close-uppy and personal with my wife on my head.

Seriously, it's a nice interview and well worth five minutes to watch or ten to watch it twice. I am in the video and the bear that Rod is holding is my bear... hay! He owes me a bear! Dang you, Rod! I want my Rod Linden Bear!!!

Speaking of bears ...

Hit up the Marketplace (here) to get your FREE SL10B commemorative bear avatar. It uses new texture technology to look extra realistic when you use the Materials Beta Viewer now and future viewers with the new tech installed. No need to be a Premium member so grab this freebie now as it goes away at the end of June. My brother, CC Columbo, was playing with the new viewer this morning and you can see his pictures here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

New Memorial Park

When my brother, CC Columbo, started his Second Life^® one of his activities was building a parkland with a memorial for his daughter. At one point he owned most of the mainland region called Nangrim and when I came from the Teen Grid I added to it, helping to form a sprawling landscape where people could relax in a "natural" setting. Over time it had many forms but it always featured a focus point about my niece, usually pictures and an info signboard. Eventually we sold some land when CC minimized his time in-world and then sold the balance when a pre-gambling ban casino kept the sim full, completely locking us out.

Not too long ago I used nearly the last of my Christmas gift money to get a premium account for my regular Alt and then had her buy a 512m² plot of land (SLurl) to use as a home and to re-create -- if only in part -- the Memorial Park. Since then I sometimes wander by the computer while CC is using it for something and spot the SL viewer, open and showing his avie sitting at the grave.

If you visit, please click the stone for information about the disease that took little Lydia's life.

Happy Christmas!

Whether you say Merry or Happy or Christmas or Holidays, Angela and I wish you the best for this time of year and all of next. Come by CC's Pouloco Station in Bay City - Dennis (SLurl) to take a copy of the Christmas card near the gas pumps. Inside you'll find some special seasonal bunny slippers. And look for CC Columbo, the station manager. He's a festive polar bear cub.

CC says "Free Popcorn and Hot Dogs through the holidays at Pouloco!"

Lydia Rose Memorial Park

Too many things happening in Real Life to even notice that I've neglected my blog. To rub more salt in the wound, the pictures in this post aren't mine. Sitting down after folding some laundry, I found these ten pictures on the computer desktop. Looks like my brother, CC Columbo, has been busy, not just rebuilding the Lydia Rose Memorial Park in Nangrim (SLurl) but taking pictures, too. As well he should. He has artfully decorated some 1536m² of land and added a home for himself, the first in years (he lived in a cave for a while). I hope you enjoy these while I attend to even more Real Life tasks.

The land is also our family home, only a portion of it being labeled as the park.

It seems much larger at ground level. To the left is the park proper, but this layout blends it with the family land. Cleverly hidden like all other skyboxes in SL is our family apartment.

When I saw the barn I figured it was a good place to put out my hay stacks cuddle and one of my unscripted horses. I need to find a nice mesh one to save prims.

The Full Bright trees in the distance belong to a neighbor we've had for some six years.

My pixy alt, Zyx the gardener, snuck in some plants and pots.

A fairy statue for Lydia, letting a bird fly free.

I have to ask about the Celtic knot outside the cabin. Probably just decorative.

CC's cabin. My wife (Angela) calls it CC's Study. This is exactly what he'd have iRL if he could, I imagine. He's always favored this sort of setting when building in Second Life.

Books, a fire, and comfy furniture in a rustic cabin. 

The rare picture of CC himself. He almost never snaps his own image.

New Home: Teaghlaigh in Bay City

With the generous assistance of Marianne McCann and Marx Dudek, my brother (CC Columbo) and I were able to purchase some land in Bay City, that wonderful part of mainland that is more than just a place, but a community, as well. Every parcel we've looked at in the past year has been outrageously priced but fortune and friends smiled on us so we now have Teaghlaigh in Bay City (SLurl), a home and a "coming soon" garden shop.

Teaghlaigh in Bay City is a simple home and an empty garden shop. Well, there is some furniture in the back and a few plants, but right now it's status is "Coming Soon" as a store getting ready to open. Actually, we may not have enough prims left to have an actual shop, but you never know. I'd like to start making plants to sell.

The greenhouse end is very nice with a  great view of a very unkempt lawn. Originally, my brother had a lovely gazebo and garden set here, but Bay City is an urban landscape and as much as we liked what he had done, it just didn't fit. That's when CC got the idea of "opening a business" that would allow us to keep a lot of greenery.

My contribution to the decoration was finding this nice desk for CC to buy (I was broke) and coming up with the backstory: Teaghlaigh is a small remnant of an old family farm with a city growing up around it. The family (CC, me, and my wife, Angela Seale) still live at the farm and are going to use what is left to make a go at a garden shop.

Our land is right on a canal with ferries regularly passing under a drawbridge. The canal wall and a fair chunk of land on the dry side is Linden-owned so technically we can't build on it, but the ground prims we put down are anchored on our side and will likely be overlooked by the authorities. I sure wish I could extend the grass over there.

With this land acquisition, CC is selling his land adjacent to the Memorial Park in Nangrim (SLurl) — two 512m² lots and a 1024m² lot. Each is only $L1/m² and that's cheap. I also have a 384m² lot that I should put up for sale, too, but I promised some friends that they could set their Home there, though no one has taken  me up on it as far as I know.

The land in Nangrim, my first home in Second Life. The Memorial Park remains, of course, but some 2048m² of land is up for sale, cheap. Wanna be a neighbor with free run of the Park? Actually, you can just come visit, if you want, either at Bay City or Nangrim. Everyone is always welcome.

Pouloco

When I get busy building in Second Life, I don't think about much else. Like blogging. Sometimes eating. I've been known to dream about building. If you've been following my SL microblog (here) you've probably seen that I've been building a gasoline station. Well, its done and here's the back story.

My brother, CC Columbo (in SL), tried to convince me to start a garden shop when we moved into Bay City. He bought a lovely shop structure and even helped with the landscaping. It didn't take. For some reason the idea was met with apathy so he came up with something he wanted, a good Irish pub. However, while I was mucking about with avoidance, someone built a neighborhood pub not a block away (SLurl). Plan B was required.

And Plan B was a hotel! CC worked on this himself, actually, and had a rather clever one going. He then started working on several variations and was generally having a good time. In the meantime, he pushed Plan C, a filling station/convenience store. He asked me to make the garage for him and often hovered over my Real Life shoulder to point out features he wanted.

Really, I think that Plan B was a ruse since he's wanted a filling station for at least a month (see here). Afterall, our eldest RL brother owns a repair garage, our middle brother used to manage a filling station, and about once a month I don my personalized coveralls (Name tag: Juggs) or garage shirt and earn a bit of extra cash cleaning up the eldest brother's garage (not ashamed to admit I get paid more if I loosen up a couple buttons during hot weather so the boys kick in a few extra bucks).

CC gave this picture to me to use as inspiration, but with the shape of the lot we had, swapping the design end-for-end was required. He also gave me several pictures of other Sinclair Stations from the period on which Bay City is based (roughly, the 50s-60s).

Come to CC's Pouloco Station in Bay City - Dennis (SLurl).

And this is what I came up with ... a bit more modern and with a different brand. I pegged the design as a rehabilitated structure in the mid-1960s so I could mix in some of the newer-appearing convenience store machines I found in-world and on the SL Marketplace. Until the day the whole thing was installed it was still going to be a Sinclair station, with my partner Angela Seale working on some retro-chic gas pumps based on some Sinclair units I found on the Web. It always nagged me, however, about using a prominent brand name so with that and on the advice of others, I came up with a new brand, Pouloco (Nothing Runs Like A Chicken, Cross the Road with Pouloco, and Put a Chicken in Your Tank), for the Poultry Oil Company, and changed all the Sinclair graphics I had already uploaded. Then I had to shift the whole build several meters in two directions because I had totally mismeasured and hadn't noticed for several weeks.

The pumps you see are temporary as Angela is still finalizing the permanent ones. She'll sell non-branded versions to help cover her expenses and to pay for all the rent CC has to be charging her for to leave her car at the pumps since Day One. By they way, Marianne McCann found some nice garage coveralls (and has a great pic of the garage here) so Ange, me, and CC can all dress alike now. I might work on little name patches sometime.

I created a number of custom pieces and graphics, mostly signs, and will sell some of them inside the convenience store portion of the build. Mostly, though, this build was a labor or love. I balked at the job at first as it seemed like I was back in school. CC was an RL teacher and I had his classes for years (pretty much grades 8 through 12) so it was almost like he was giving me homework. But I enjoyed the challenge as it had been a while since I had built something on this scale. And if it is true that "the devil is in the details" then this build is sin-on-a-prim because I had a great time tweaking and sweating and tweaking some more on almost ever detail, even after the garage opened.

Sure the soda and Slurpee machines are a bit modern, but they are fabulously detailed and I make L$1 from each sale. Hot dogs from the more retro unit are also L$1 each, but you get a custom-made, animated frankfurter in a bun. Popcorn is free despite the L$5 sign. Either I have to find a way to erase that sign or find a way to charge for the stuff. CC bought the L$300 cash register but the decorations and machines in this room set me back about L$1000 ... hopefully I sell a lot of sodas and dogs. CC also bought a really, really nice set of fixtures for the restroom. Much better than the stuff I made and adapted.

I had also made some sculpted garage bay equipment such as a lift, tool boxes, shelves, and more. Then I found everything I had made but in mesh from a shop that that wasn't charging much at all. Fewer prims and much, much better looking? I had to drop the bucks on that stuff. Now I need to get up some girly pictures, slop down some oil and dirt, and take pix to my eldest brother for a critique.

CC made a lovely headstone honoring his real life daughter and Angela left some beautiful lilies.

Saving prims is always a good idea, especially as Angela and I still have our home on the lot, right behind the privacy wall (like there is any real privacy in SL). And CC had me build a cemetery (Web) in the roadside corner.

Of course, I still want more prims. Sometime I'll look at the house and the garage to see what can be trimmed. I found an animated mole in a hole I'd like to put in the yard and the shop needs more signs. Still, though, the Pouloco property really has a great feel. I'm as pleased with it as anything I've built in Second Life to date.

Exploring Second Life Meme

Alright, it's Wednesday and the ever talented Strawberry Singh was far more punctual with her Monday meme challenge this week: Exploring Second Life (original post here). Sue me. Regular readers of this blog know that  I often write about places to visit (heck, explore and exploration are among the mess of post tags I mishandle). After a hectic start to the week I've finally found some time to dig into my Landmarks so here goes ...

Meme Instructions: Share 1 to 5 of your favorite places on the grid. I feel like exploring and discovering new places. Share places you think everyone should visit and also tell us why they are your favorites.

Cripes! How to choose? My Cool Builds, Recreation, and Really Scenic Places landmarks folders have so many great locations. Here is a more or less random list because some I'd like to recommend are down for maintenance (The Calas Galadhon regions, for example), private access only, or no longer exist (I miss the Isle of Lesbos).

The Lydia Rose Memorial Park - SLurl

One place I often write about (like here) is the wonderful space my brother built in Nangrim, The Lydia Rose Memorial Park, one of my homes in Second Life. With just a few gaps, The Park has been here since before I came to the Main Grid, my brother (CC Columbo in SL) having set aside a space to remember the passing of his Real Life daughter. Today, a simple flowered cross is the only indication of the land's purpose. As I mentioned, it is our family home. CC lives in the cabin, my pixy characters live in the gardner's barn, and there's a family apartment not-so-cleverly hidden well up in the sky for all of us to use.

The "Las" Islands - SLurl

This simple archipelago of five regions represents what I believe to be the best tropical islands in all Second Life so I visit often and have frequently featured them in this blog (like here). Goodness knows that Our World is rampantly populated with tropical spaces, but these are executed so well and feel so natural, I'm drawn here with great regularity. Well worth a visit if you haven't been here and if you have, it's time to go back. Today.

Mhindepinde Rez Zone - SLurl

This location outside Bay City is a surrogate for all those wonderful Linden Department of Public Works "Mole" builds that fill Our World. Search my blog for LDPW and you'll see post after post of such places. Whether you want to launch a boat, fly an airplane, have a thrilling adventure, relax on a beach, explore a seaside village, or most anything you can think of doing, our Mole friends have built something for you.

And with that all-inclusive entry, I'm going to end this post so you can stop reading and get out exploring! I'd love to read your recommendation in the Comments sometime.

Second Life Advert in the Wild

Seen on the Interwebs 23 May 2013 at 23:10 US Eastern time.
The featured resident is Apple May of Apple May Designs,
a shop for women's clothes and skins.
Kudos to CC Columbo for the find and screen cap.

Home Changing Home

Every now and then my brother, CC Columbo, gets an urge to play in Second Life. Usually it is with strange avatars or flying in some WarBug airplanes (SLurl), but lately he's been buying land in our home region and doing some landscaping. Yesterday he tore out a recently added pond and added a beautiful pre-fab gazebo and meadow, building some steps to connect it to the land with our treehouse. He asked me to add some particle stars at the gazebo and some Linden trees to my 1/5th of the whole parcel. Just now I finished up that request so I took these pictures as I relaxed on the steps:

You can visit the new area with this SLurl.