Tree of Second Life and Begger of the Week

As I arrived in Murray I spotted an unusual sight.  There hovering in the sky was a magical tree, quite beautiful and intriguing looking. 

I recognized the name of the av on the tree, it was Thirdeye who had built Nazna’s temple for her.  He asked me to come up and sit with him and there was also another av called henry already there.  It was really a cool place to sit, peaceful and nice sitting looking over Murray and out to sea.

Captive had joined us and then Rubi popped on and we tried out the various sitting poses that Thirdeye had installed there.

Thirdeye rearanged the poseballs as we tried them.  The girls looked great, Rubi had a new outfit from my favourite shop BareRose and looked fantastic.  Captive looked very sexy and stunning in a daring paw print outfit.  Henry, for some reason had turned into a dustbin av, he did keep changing though, into some interesting shapes.

I tried one of the poseballs near the bottom of the tree and found it was for meditating.  Made me think really, it would be a nice idea to buy one of Thirdeye’s magic trees to travel through Second Life with, as you could find some of the more beautiful sims to sit in the sky and just chill, even take a friend ….

I had been shopping again yesterday, chatting to newbies and helping them with some stuff, then out of the blue someone IM’d me.  One of the things that happens quite a lot while I’m out and about, someone thinks they can go begging to get their money, true twisted logic, you earn it and they spend it, pure thick skinned cheek.  I frequently give money to newbies, but no way to these leeches.  Anyway thought it might be a laugh to print the different techniques and chat they use to try to cadge peoples money from them.  Here is the dialog from the one yesterday:

[2008/05/12 8:20]  Jason : Hey whats up… I made a noob mistake I was cleaning out my inventory to get rid of the freebie stuff I use to own and then deleted my only pair of black boots I contacted the owner and they said they cant do refund… all I have is 148L left can you please spot me 258L so I can get my only pair of boots that I want back? Again, I feel like such a bum asking but Im sooooo pissed right now.
[2008/05/12 8:21]  Janey Bracken: well yes one thing we both agree on is that all beggers are bums, so bog off somewhere else and find another mug
[2008/05/12 8:24]  Janey Bracken: by the way I’m doing a begger collection of notes for publication and yours has been added with your name

I haven’t printed your second name Jason, hoping you might be ashamed and change your ways, If I see you doing it again though, I’ll print it and get your picture as well!!!!

Bay City, Exploring the Asylum, creepy!!

Love joining Headburro on his travels,  he invited me over to look at the new SL sim, Bay City.  He was riding Frank his shire horse, so I took Derrick, my new horse, as well.

We travelled round a little when we came across an ominous looking building and saw that it was an asylum.  We decided to leave the horses outside as we approached the entrance.  We met a girl called Teagan at the door, who was also exploring.  She turned out to be Teagan Linden, and she joined us to look around.

Teagan had already seen quite a bit and told me that she had taken lots of photos.  She told us to turn up our sound so we could hear the haunting whisperings and childrens’ voices in the wards, it was really creepy.

I split up from Head and Teagan and had a look at the padded cell, which had a blood stained mattress and insane scribbles on the wall, sent the shivers through me and thats for sure.  I then found the others in a room which had some sort of drainage system going on, the sound of the water echoing round the room made it seem even more depressing and you could really feel the heavy atmosphere of the place.

Teagan said goodbye, and we were joined by Pinkie, who had a good look round with us.  It is well worth a visit, watch they don’t find out you are a Murray Maniac though, and keep you locked in, think we came close!!!

Outside in the fresh air again and nice to see the sun after such a gloomy, creepy place!!  Nice to meet you as well Teagan, don’t forget my teddy bear, can’t wait to see what style you will make

New Horse and Good time at Ruskin’s

Funny thing, when you write a ‘citizens’ report for CNN, you can never tell how popular the story will be in respect of hits.  The counter on the CNN pages has a bug and many more hits are coming in than showing, in fact the latest story I did on the Second life Police, the PDSL, has actually got over 20,000 hits (on the reckoning of what the CNN staff told me before about the counter) and I am amazed that it has attracted so much attention.  CNN have actually put it on the proper CNN main news page now as well, so I suppose lots of people are interested in the Police side of things in Second Life.  It’s true what journalist Nicole Ireport told us at the meeting this week, that we are recording the history of Second Life and it’s quite a nice feeling to think in years to come they will look back on the way we lived ‘in world’ and think how primitive things were.  It’s very exciting to think what 3D technology will be like in even 5 years!!

I’d had a lovely time looking round Zephyr Pennell’s Lone Star Ranch yesterday (my horse Colin’s birthplace) and because of my devotion to Colin, Zephyr has given me a beautiful black stallion to ride.  He is truely elegant and I have named him Derrick (full name Derrick Trotter Bracken).

I’d been riding Colin on the hills above Murray yesterday, as there is a lot of open space there for horses.  I sat on Colin as I answered all my outstanding IM messages.  Suddenly in the distance someone put up a giant poster with ‘Noobs’ written on it, with a ban sign across it.  Hope none of the poor newbies arrived and saw it, not a good start to their first day in  Second Life, how unfriendly that anyone would go to the trouble of making it anyway!!!

Later in the evening Pinkie and I got an invite over to Ruskin’s place, where we were joined by Treasure, Stef and Gunter on Ruksin’s glitzy new dancefloor high in a tree. 

It was a great evening and we danced around till the early hours having a brilliant time, the colour particles were fantastic and it was really nice to be with such good friends.

SL Animals are Amazing!! Spaceships too!!!

Saw some more awesome sights in Murray again the other day, Alphonso Pidgeon, a great builder and scripter of the group Genius Inc bought another great spaceship over to show us, really impressive as well!!  Headburro and Stef, at the same time were trying out some new avs, as you can see Head is some sort of hermit crab (I think!!) and Stef turned into a colourful mushroom, the other hooded little av was equally as interesting.

Just as there are some nasty people who travel to Murray there are some really nice ones too, luckily most of them are nice and go there for a bit of a chat and some fun.

I headed over to see Pinkie and Charlie her dog.  Headburro, Ruskin and Treasure joined us and for some reason Charlie took a dislike to Head and started chasing him round the sim, growling and snarling.  Head was sensible and took flight.  Got a feeling Pinkie (Destroyer) Delcon, Charlie’s beloved owner may have given Charlie the nod!!! poor Head!!! 

Well, bored with chasing Head, Charlie thought he would sit right in front of me giving me the evil eye, I thought I might be next on his list of victims, those teeth looked really sharp.

Think Charlie was being friendly, he didn’t attack but just stared!!! Thought I’d better move slowly away, saw Treasure’s little dog hanging onto her leg, (dirty little dog!!) so thought Charlie might get ideas too!!

I had an invite from Zephyr who owns the Lone Star Ranch (where I got my horse Colin), to go over and see the re-vamped ranch.  I have accepted Zephyr’s kind invitation and hope to meet him there in the near future, but decided to have a quick look today.  He has a lovely selection of horses and I met a little foal on the way in who was really sweet.

I decided to get the Lone Star Demo horse out, she is a beautiful dappled grey horse, and go for a ride around Murray.   Certainly a nice ride and a lovely looking horse, nice temprement too, have to keep quite though, as Colin may get jealous!!!

 

 

Police Story on CNN

Kenyo Lykin arranged for me to interview Nickie Docherty and Eddie Hagoromo, both commanders of the  Police Department, Second Life (PDSL).  You can catch the report at http://www.ireport.com/people/JaneyBracken

Pictured below taken at the interview, Drax kindly came along as he wanted to put some questions to them as well.

Head’s new av’s and Dee Dee joins Cher

I had decided to write my story for CNN about getting booted out of the GossipGirl sim, as I think the film crew should remember there are people behind the keyboards, not just avs that should be ejected if they are in the wrong place.   I had many irate fans having a go at me, but I like to hear their comments, its what writing is all about, to get peoples points of view.  One fan was speaking straight from the heart, so much so that I assumed she worked for Warner Bros and answered her as if she represented them.  I really thought it was funny when I found out that she was a fan.  You can’t knock her loyalty to the show she loves though.  Amazing the amount of them that assumed that I got an apology, when in fact I didn’t, only a tetchy excuses for their actions in the IM they sent me at the time when I contacted them, no reference to me being evicted in the IM, no sorry at all.

StormyWest from Gossipgirl did try to put things right in the comments, so hats off to Stormy, for at least trying to resolve issues.  Anyway, Gossipgirl fans enjoy the show and the sim, but don’t put up with rude treatment from the crew there, you are paying their wages remember, by following the show, so they should have respect for you.

My mate Headburro has been buying some avs’ lately and me and Pinkie had a preview, didn’t like the ant much, looked creepy and real, but the bee was cuddly and the turtle cute.  Head is practicing hard for the new show, he is really getting into it and is doing really well.  Will he still talk to me and Pinkie when he is a big star, we hope so!!

Went over to Cher’s to meet her new dog Dee Dee, who is a very tough looking little hound, but cute as well.  Cher told me that Dee Dee can attack people at command and next thing the dog was chasing and snarling after Cher, as she showed me what the dog could do.  Pinkie has a dog as well and they are really lifelike, think Cher made a good choice with Dee Dee, just as Pinkie did with Charlie, she is really nice.

Met up with Drax later and we went out for a coffee, found a nice little coffee shop overlooking the ocean, it was a lovely evening and we sat and enjoyed the view.

 

Gossip Girl Boot and Nice Time at Cher’s

Sometimes I like to go back and visit some of the places I have written stories about, bumping into the people I had met before and seeing how they are getting on. Well yesterday I thought I would go back to the Warner Bros sim for Gossip Girl, as they had always been friendly and they put on quite a few events for the residents there.  Well I could see something was going on in the park so went round there.  I had my horse Colin with me and thought I nice trot through the park would be ok.  Suddenly without by or leave I got a warning message saying I was being ejected.  A few seconds later me and poor old Colin had been booted out of the area.  I was both shocked and horrified at the rudeness of this very publicity seeking site and sent an IM to the lady in charge.

I asked her why I had been booted and she said that they were filming and they could not contact all the hundreds of people to tell them.  Well I had looked on the map and besides the few in the park area there were hardly any people in the sim, how inpolite of them just to throw up the area ban without a word to people.   I told her I thought it was bad policey for Warner Bros, but hey, I’m only a passer-by, may have been a fan of Gossip Girl, but she will never know.  I certainly won’t be covering any more of their stories for CNN and thats for sure!!!  Unless I report on this one……maybe!!!!

(P.S.) Thought it would make an interesting CNN story after all, catch it on http://www.ireport.com/people/JaneyBracken

Went home to reflect and chilled out for a while, silly to get annoyed over peoples’ bad manners I know, but you would think sometimes people would know that its only because of the public that these shows exist.

Later on Cher, the proud new owner of virtual land, had a few friends round in the new garden area he had built. It was great, we all sat chatting and drinking into the early hours and it was a really nice atmosphere. Love Cappy’s red hair by the way, real vibrant colour, really nice.

Someone had popped into Murray and said it was empty, wonder if they missed us!!!

 

Nazna’s little temple and Colourful Murray

Met Nazna and noticed a sparkling ring on her middle finger, caught the light really prettily.  I asked her about it and she suddenly rezzed a little temple into view with a couple of places to sit inside it.  So we both sat for a chat.  She said that the ring controlled the temple and she showed me as it burst into pink lights all around us.

The temple was beautifully built and had pictures of Naz and the builder on the roof.  She told me it was a boy she had just met and he had built it especially for her.  She seemed to like her new friend very much, she is such a sweetie, hope they get along very well together, looks like they had a nice time dancing anyway.

It was nice meeting the gang in Murray last night, Natok was testing one of his inventions and waiting for someone to try it out.  He had a box in the middle of the group and anyone sitting on it would have been zoomed away somewhere.  Dayvid being a good sport had a go, and was sent flying, ending up in the water.  Drax joined the group and was wise enough not to touch the box as I had warned him ages ago about things in Murray.   A newbie who came over with a gun wasn’t so lucky though, one touch and he was gone, he never did get a chance to fire at us!!  Think it was Dayvid then who set off some colourful lights all round us, then some bubble particles as well appeared. 

Haven’t a clue what that white round thing was around Kamen though, but next thing he released some oil drums all over the place, so things were getting a little bit crazy.  Drax and I decided to leave for somewhere more peaceful.  Good old Murray, never quite for long!!!

 

 

 

Cher’s Murray Rehab, CNN Pancake and Great Bike

I do things on impulse quite a lot and usually they work out ok, but when I was looking for virtual land I did look round for a while before deciding.  I cannot say the same for my pal Cherish, I went with him to look at a piece of land and within a minute he had bought it!!!  Was a good choice though, is a beach front property and very nice location.  I could see how excited he was and I left him as he started to build stuff there.  When I came back the next day I was met by a completely different landscape complete with trees, grass, campsites and a lovely furnished house.  He has called it Murray Rehab and wants all his friends to hang out there as a change from the sometimes chaotic Murray.  Congratulations Cher on your first home, its super.

Murray is the same mad place, I decided to see what I have in my inventory and found a giant Hamster wheel, God only knows why I would have bought that, must have been at the Budweiser again before I went shopping.  Anyway, Stef was game and ran round in the wheel while me and Roach sat down to watch.

Great builder and scripter Alphonso arrived and gave us all free motorbikes, best thing ever, all different colour ones and they really get some speed up, I really loved zooming up and down Murray, even if I did land in the sea and couldn’t move at one stage.

And finally it was an odd CNN meeting tonight, all about food in SL for the first half.  Well I handed cans of Budweisers round to everyone there.  Only thing is I didn’t warn them that after three swigs they would stagger and fall over, oh dear!!!   Someone bought a giant pancake along so there was plenty of food to go round.

Best news of all though, is that my mate Headburro Antfarm is back and well.  He was stuck in one of SL’s strange half in and half out logging bugs and could not log back on.  Well wonderful Lindens have sorted it and he even made it to the CNN meeting to share the giant pancake!!!

 

Mysterious HBA Disappearance and Rude Guy

Strange things happen in Second Life and yesterday was the strangest yet.  I had a call from a pal Ryne (a very close acquaintance of Headburro Antfarm, my buddy) telling me that the sim Head was at had crashed taking Head with it and leaving him high and dry.  Head was no longer able to log back into SL and was stuck half ‘in world’ and half out.   The funny thing is that you could see him as a green dot on the map, spot his exact location, but not actually view him.  I flew over and had a look.

I have my radar which displayed his name as being within feet of me, but there was no Headburro hovering there, how odd!!  By chance I bumped into Osprey who was doing the same as me, looking for Head.  She thought that she might be able to bump him back into the system as well.

Nothing seemed to work though.  I met Ryne later and he too had a look, hopefully the Lindens will be able to sort Head out, as he has sent a bug report in.

 Had quite a large gathering at Murray the other night and we heard someong taking lots of pictures.  Turned out to be Nazna and what a good photographer she turned out to be.   I had not known it, but she took pictures of me, Captive and Treasure, putting them on giant posters by the group.

Captive looked very glamerous with her platinum hair and red dress.  Well next thing a guy teleported into the area and went straight up to her and said ‘yo bitch’.  Captive stood for a moment speachless and then said ‘you calling me a bitch?’  He went on to be very insulting and rude and I can’t go into his comments here for obvious reasons.  He was being flash and none of us were impressed, the guys were getting angry and Gil challenged him to go over to the scripted area of Murray to sort him out, but he ignored Gil, being the coward that he was.  I had a bit of a go telling him that no one wanted him here with that attitude and the guys gathered round him showing their support for Captive.  He gave up in the end and left, not the best way to make friends is it!!!

Finally heres just a couple of pictures of the bears I got from the Lindens the other day.  I collected quite a few and they are all really nice.