No: of witchy things bought: 8 (good); No. of Halloweeny items already in inventory: Numberless (or possibly, 666); Hysterical witch accusers encountered: one (awkward)
In a couple of weeks is HALLOWEEN which is always fun time in SL as great opps for becoming ghost, creating spooky haunted houses etc. etc. After a couple of days away from SL due to physical world travel arrived back just in time for Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable meeting, which was v. interesting talk from Greg Prumier who has been teaching in SL for 7 Years (that was in fact title of talk). When got to VWER he and a couple of others were variously standing/sitting by circle of cushions on one side of VWER area. Greg asked where to put presenter and so told him and then set out more of Dustbunny's Darling Sectional Cushions (which are indeed v boho and cute) in orange and red to match autumn theme of sim. Realised afterwards that didn't ask Beth (organiser and host of event) if she already had plans about setting up area, so hope didn't offend.
Anyway, next week am leading discussion on "Halloween and other festivals - can we use them for education in Virtual Worlds?" which is basically an excuse for me to drown VWER parcel in witchy stuff. Had not yet visited the Salem event, so tped over and had happy half hour trying out gallows props, deciding how many new mirrors I needed (answer: lots) and musing over whether should buy Besom hair with stylish witch hat (answer: of course). Snapped up sparkly spider webs, village stocks (with tomato giver for throwing at person IN stocks), pumpkin cookie-giver, sinister cloaked form holding moddable poster and a few other items.
During tour of event came across sign (see above)which said that Abigail Williams (famous accuser at Salem witch trials) was hidden on sim. After Black Dahlia hunt assumed that this might be challenging e.g. with small effigy of Abigail hidden up a tree somewhere, but in fact proved to be v. easy as simply followed path in wood and there was real avatar dressed as Abigail, pointing and muttering wicked, wicked under her breath. Was all very nice, but immediately felt like awkward situation, since this was an actual person (though presuably an actual person who was going afk a lot). Was not sure of appropriate behaviour. Should one say "Hi, I'm Sheila I believe you have some issues with witches?" or shout and point "Evil liar evil liar"? or was one expected to interact in order to learn fun facts about the Salem Witch Trials? In fact did the British thing of pretending hadn't seen her and scuttling back down the path. Am shown in pic hiding behind tree when crept back later to see if she was still there.
When got back to VWER had fun time setting out a Halloween setting that was spooky but not too gruesome. Am not sure if got level right e.g. felt that guillotine and people in nooses might be going to far for educational area, on other hand flying skeleton holding lamp and coffin with skeleton hand curling round lid somehow seemed ok. Set out cute rustic table with assorted Halloween food givers including cauldron of poisoned apples (when you accept one and wear it you fall over dead - see pic, am sort of slumped under table).
Might be challenging for newbies as have to detach apple to become not dead (as opposed to undead) (see pic). On other hand would give people someone else to throw rotten fruit at, when got tired of pelting miscreants in village stocks. Am sure there are educational life lessons there.
So, came across some publicity for Digital Writing month and thought that should contribute, as any excuse to do pics and write stuff is welcome. Am pondering in what way this will differ from all writing that normally do, which is mostly clickety-clack on some keyboard and screen as have almost forgotten how to use pen and form legible words. Would probably have found this out if had read blog about Digital Writing Month rather than just thinking, hey, cool idea and bookmarking it.
Through this blog, discovered pic that had been Thinglinked (or was it other way round, discovered DWM through Thinglinked pic? oh well) and so below is first ThingLink. Not sure whether this is any more digital than usual writing, but gave excuse to do more pics of kittycats which is always welcome.
Meanwhile have been doing halloweeny stuff as halloween in SL is THE time of year, since ghosts, suppurating wounds, zombies, graves that drag you in, carniverous trees, haunted mansions etc. etc. etc. are all SO easy to do. Had to abjure SL for some weeks as was a) swamped with work and b) away some of the time with no SL-enabled device, so have had a bit of an orgy of SL-ism the past few days.
Did the WHOLE of the tag! gacha tour, in which you click the tag gacha HUD and get whirled to the next destination. Each destination is of course a shop, what else, with a gacha but also an urn which you click to mark that you've been at the store, plus it gives you a freebie trick or treat. Since wanted to get round it haven't yet opened most of the trick/treats nor indeed most of the items snagged from the gachas. The starting and finishing points to the gacha hunt were v.v.cool including a mortuary and graveyard, so have shown a couple of pics.
First one shows the Bonus Room which was a mortuary (it was unlocked once you'd been round all the shops). You can play "spot the witch" (i.e. me, was pretending to be the forensic expert inspecting the corpse in NCIS or Body of Proof, though if their mortuaries were in this state think that environmental health would have been called in by now).
Second pic is arty photoshopped view of the Redemption Graveyard that you could go to at the end. Called Redemption because you redeemed any Mystery Bonus Tickets and also think there is pun there about being redeemed, but not sure that spending oodles of lindens on virtual halloween items is actually path to redemption. Was interesting to see little arrangements of pictures and flowers that each creator had put by their tombstone, sure there is ample fodder there for psychologists, should any such be SL gacha addicts. In the meantime, enjoyed wandering round graves feeling pleasantly melancholic.
(Is this enough digital writing for now? (Think it might be. (Ed.) Next episode: installing haunted piano in the twisted greenhouse: or by the time get round to doing the post may be: removing haunted piano and twisted greenhouse, together with zillions of candles, pumpkins, gravestones and ghosts)
Stuff done: lots (good/bad/indifferent) In terms of blogging have to award self mark of C double minus. Is more than whole month since last blogged. As have noted before, when v.v. busy in SL, then blogging tends to slump. So as a quick catchup: No. of new student sky homes created: 1 (good) No. of new autumnal trees bought: 10? 12? (who knows) No. of halloween houses created: 1 (good) No. of sessions done with first year students in SL: 4 (good? only they can tell) No. of 3D versions created of information behaviour models developed through empirical research using a grounded theory approach: 1 (v. good) No. of times Opinionator repurposed for specific exercise: 2 (good) No. of Infolit iSchool events: 3 (good) No. of fashion blog postings: 4 (good) No. of houseboats bought: 2 (floating) No. of tops bought: who's counting? (not me) No. of unwarranted and surprise price hikes by Linden Lab: 1 (v.v.v. bad) & so forth & so on. Last item is one which has cast pall of gloom over proceedings since announced a few weeks ago that educator's discount was being removed, thus doubling price of island. Consternation, anger etc. followed. was then announcement that people could buy up to 2 years in advance at old price (which am trying to do) but still is bit gloomy in long term. Apart from anything else seems like Community of educators, librarians etc. will get fragmented. Reacted by attending meetings and buying a lot of clothes. Also pumpkins. Creation of halloween stuffage seems to have escalated to insane proportions, can scarcely go inworld without being bombarded with message cards about cute new pumpkin lights/seats/decals. Was tempted today by 50% off on cauldrons from What Next, but in the end got free Wizard cosi from NRD and 1 Linden staff from Tekeli-li and then wasted, ahem, ahem, spent hour or so flouncing round Immersiva taking pics. Choose first one as looked vaguely apocolyptic e.g. SL disintegrating because of ill advised customer relationship management on part of LL staffers.
Sculpty halloween cave mountains installed: 1 (good); No. of coffins installed: 2 (good); no. of gravestones installed: 3 (good); no. of funky multi-time-zone chronometers installed: 1 (v. good); No. of pumpkins installed: countless (v. orange) As a break between serious work with students (3 sessions so far) and numerous education meetings, have been installing and decorating Halloween cave mountain. Discovered basic mountain (2 levels of cave complex, plus 2 layers above with one cave room each, plus assorted waterfalls and paths) I forget how, but anyway was designer whose work hadn't really explored before and his/her sim turned out to be filled with exotic sculpty cave constructions. Had seen some grottos made out of Scupted Prims, but this takes to whole new level (literally), with apartment blocks of caves. Buying finger was itching to purchase, and v. soon thought of excuse, namely that had not yet determined form of the 2009 Infolit iSchool Halloween celebration, and a cave complex seemed just the ticket. Think, with all those rushing waterfalls (which cover cave entrances BTW, so is actually Secret Sculpty Halloween Cave Mountain) is probably also v. v. laggy, so waited til after 1st student session. Then positioned carefully in what is normally the empty corner of Infolit iSchool and have proceeded to stuff with accumulated Halloween Fun, as collected in Halloween 2007 and 2008, with several must-have 2009 additions. My 3 favourite items, in no particular order are: 1) Aina's Grave and Prayer, consisting of a grave and a patch of ground. In each you SIT and then cycle through 3 poses by clicking the item. In the Grave the positions are: Buried (invisible); One hand sticking out of grave; Leaping Out of Grave. In the Prayer object the positions are: Praying, Startled and Running Like Hell. In the pic you see Ishbel as the dead person, and me as the mourner. Ishbel had just bought a free pair of wings from an ajoining cave, which think adds to the effect. Creator: Aina Yoshikawa (I've also put her Chair That Drops A Flowerpot in the caves) 2) Halloween pumpkin chronometer. This has time in various places of SL and RL, and it whooshes out steam and bats, also there are spooky noises. It is thus the only item in the caves that has some vague kind of utility (the time function, rather than the bats). I started by putting it outside the cave and then moved it to be the piece de resistence in the innermost of the ground level caves. Creator: Greene Concept. 3) Pumpkin hanging lights. These do not do anything apart from hang there, but they are v. cute and colourful. Creator: Oddment
PS am thinking of adding recording of me reading entries as another way of wasting own time and possibly yours. Below is the recording of this one. Am too close to microphone in some places, but frankly can't be bothered to record it again, but, anyway, there it is. Will do better next time. URL is : http://www.archive.org/details/SheilaYoshikawaBlogEntry21October2009
SL = Second Life, the virtual world; RL = Real Life; IM = Instant Messaging in SL; Prim = Primitive - the basic unit of building in SL. Sometimes used as synonym for box, as in "he needs to think outside the prim"; Noteboard = text document in SL. AF, IH, PB, HD, MB, PR, AM, CH, MK, LK, NF(etc.) = initials of avatar names of Friends in SL;
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