Odd Fellows & I don't mean the service org.

Wondering if it's in the water ? Please don't let me drink it!

I'm talking about some of what goes on in Secondlife....actually it goes on everywhere I guess...just here people think they are totally anonymous. Btw...and you can trust me on this or not... if someone wants to find you in real life, and if they are a lot smarter than I am (that's a low bar } they can find you. Just for kicks (and ego =^..^=) I googled brinda Allen. There are eight pages, many sites keep track of IPs...that's how you get ad offers. OK...where I'm going with this. Recently my friend Boyd Doghouse posted about some one that is/was borderline illegal (no I don't mean he's in the country illegally}. Take a quick peek at Boyds post here http://parktownprogress.blogspot.com/2010/06/secondlife-cops.html. I said borderline illegal 'cause I'm not sure whether it's legal to impersonate a law enforcement officer here or not. OK... that's one, here's a couple of images of his Secondlife profile... nooblet... and off on wrong foot? Here's number two... Now as a personal issue I find this one the more dangerous of the two. Number one is going to meet supposed adults here, and as adults we could reasonably expect them to do as Boyds friend did and ask for advice. Number two plays a much more devious game.

This all started when I landed at Morris. I saw a nooblet there that, as usual for people with a zero for days, was just standing there...turning slowly around and around. My nooblet radar kicked in and I sent her my usual IM greeting.... re: Hi! :=) Welcome to Secondlife! After the obligatory "This is confusing" etc., she told me she was supposed to find some one. I asked her if she had searched for the person and she said, of course, " How?" She gave me his name...I searched, found his profile... {see image below} and.............. continued after the images.

I contacted this, "wonderful man". Now as you can see...while I was attempting to help the nooblet, I wasn't very thrilled with her choice of people, and I guess it shows =^..^=

This is an edited IM history of our long IM session! Yes, I could have been more patient....and polite. NOT! I absolutely despise the men that play this dominating bullcrap.

As you can see, I've edited all his personal info out. I refuse to help advertise his perversity. That's also why I edited his name out of IM log...{btw, it's legal to post IM and chat logs as long as they are off Linden servers.}

I realize that everyone has the choice of the role they choose to play in any venue...even in real life venues. And I also realize that my thinking is colored by a situation of virtual slavery and mind control that occurred here at Benares. Role play of equals is fine...but it's not for me...and sometimes those that seem to be equals really aren't.

And so it goes

I'm supposed to love all...yeck! Some just won't go down

brinda

Namaste

नमस्ते

Yak & Yeti.....and men!

Thought about this post a lot over night... A couple of things have gone on in the last couple of days that all seem to be connected...well, connected in that sometimes strange world between my ears. =^..^= *** A day or two ago Sabre sent me a landmark about an Indian and Tibetan shop. I swear, I have no idea how this woman finds these places... seems as though I always see her at her cliffside home in Benares West. The images below come from the Yak & Yeti shop... http://slurl.com/secondlife/terrano/167/10/22/?title=Yak%20%26%20Yeti While all of these creations are free... a donation is appreciated I'm sure... that will help ensure that her shop is there for those that don't have resources.

Small shop... don't miss up the ladder to second floor... Lots of womens clothing.... and yes, there are outfits for men as well (More about that below} There is a small stupa worshiping one of the Hindu gods...Ganesh. Such a cool dragonfly...scripted so as to face you often. I asked Lori to join me... of course she had to ride the resident Yak! The owner, Annapurna... I thought I recognized her first name....be sure and peek at her first life picture. We are so blessed with such cultural diversity in Secondlife. I found some great Indian outfits.

***

The other thoughts that have occupied me recently....

The differences in male and female avatars.

So many of the females have been aptly described by my friend Lou Netizen as six foot Barbie dolls... totally unrealistic. Now few of us would want to have all of our real life attributes or our perceived defects imported to Secondlife... certainly at 68 I'm happy with my tall skinny butt here. But the females do, as a group, dress so much better than the males.... and there are real life females that approximate Secondlife avatars.

Benares is blessed with having reasonably normal looking guys.... rarely do we get the "Incredible Hulk" looking ones... (maybe there's just enough estrogen here!). Recently I've noticed the guys don't seem to take criticism about their clothing choice well either...(surprise). I had thought that having a perve camming me gave me a leg up so to speak...not so.

Picture this... We are at a music venue, it's a beach setting.... "GI Joe" {not sl name} shows up dressed in military desert camouflage. He stands at a far edge...I see an open chat line ..."xxxx cams brinda"....hmmm....OK, been here, done that, all done. And then I thought "Hey, give the guy the benefit.... maybe its just a nice icebreaker". I find him via camera... read profile... and send him a teasing IM about his choice of dance/beach ware. No response. A bit later, I see he's changed into a lot more casual wear.... teasing still, I send an IM that applauds his clothing change and tell him that no matter what the girls said, I knew he could do it. About thirty minutes later after I've left I get a terse IM saying that desert camouflage goes well with a beach. And the guys wonder why I'm generally very cool to conversations. Of course the best cutoff line is...I'm 68.

And so it goes

I want to love you all, brinda

Namaste

नमस्ते

Places to take a stand...

I started thinking a couple of days ago about Secondlife in general {actually I spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about Secondlife}, and particularly where I stand in this wonderful world. Originally my thoughts were about my responsibilities here. I have a responsibility to my residents, to those I meet in-world, to myself, and to the Secondlife platform its self. The resident responsibilities are easy to see...pay our tier (people have paid me real money for their share of our operating costs). Provide our residents with a safe trouble free place to enjoy this world of ours. Either watch for activities that induce a lot of lag or hire people to do that...(I do both), and watch for those people that occasionally visit and become a pain. My stuff is all the above...plus keep a sense of ethics. I learned a long time ago that ethics is the stuff you do when there's a choice...............and no ones gonna know! To those I meet in world...... act polite, act ethically, act kindly, and try to remember how I felt when I was new. Acting responsible to the Secondlife platform is something that's taken awhile to figure out. It occurred to me after a few years that handing out stolen content to nooblets and justifying it as, "Well it was given to me by and oldbie"...or "What's the harm?... there's hundreds of people doing it", just won't fly. A lot of this is stuff most of us never think about. Only in these last few months have I become aware of the script problems here. We all get a little upset at the lag we so often experience. There's a post from Ann Otoole about lag http://annotoole.wordpress.com/ {search her blog for info about "resizers"}. Resizers are scripts that literally resize hair or shoes, or boots etc. Yes, creators need to just use one script in root prim instead of a script in every prim (one hundred in hair easy...or more in those classy, hot, come do me boots you just bought). They don't use one script...I don't know why...lazy? You're gonna buy 'em anyway? We all have a responsibility to minimise our rendering costs... it's not just "all about me"...it's about us. You could put 50 avies on an empty sim with almost no lag if they were dressed as texture haired nooblets! *********************************************************************** OK...'nuff philosophical "stuff".... *** Places to *stand* in world....I went out this morning looking for the edges of our world.

This is the farthest North west sim I could find. Roses of Love. What I did find rather interesting...there was one avatar on that sim...{in that house bottom right}. She had no idea she was on the edge of the world she said...and she had ban lines up! {just seemed incongruent}

Oh...interested in land? Quarter sim lower left for sale.... 4001 prims, 15L$..........

Tier? Only a measly 6,000L$ a week. (and the empty shopping mall just above...hmmm, maybe that's why the ban lines?)

*** This may be the oddest of my finds today...there are three of these sims located at the far Southwest corner of the world. All three are owned by Morgan? Linden... not certain now of first name, and all three are flat, green, and totally empty. *** The far Southeast corner....=^..^= *assisted living*. Aka Linden homes...all the 512 meter 117 prim house you can use. Lori and I were in that upper left corner...I thought the girl was gonna have a heart attack when she clicked a house..more...more..derender...and it did! (Only on her screen)

*** Beautiful estate center east side of the world... For some our first thought is, "That's what I want!". So much for a social Secondlife huh? {It was so very well done though}

*** And lastly, the Northeast corner....University of Potsdam...a scientific sim.

You kno, one can stand on the corner of any island and see nothing.... but here it felt different.

Advanced for Fun

A little fun today.... and be careful... there's a reason the advanced menu isn't visible by default! If you've never used it...Cntrl/Alt/D... *************************************************************************

This is the one that we use most often, rendering, types,.... contact patch will let you find that rug that just went under the land . =^..^= Above and below are the ones that kinda scare ya.......(Consoles). Wish sometimes I was bright enough to know why/what these are used for.

***

The following images are of our home in various renderings....

De rendered all....(you can see Caros tag center right)...she was home. Contact patch & water only....all volume, alpha, trees missing.

All three sims complete...

Cammed from what would be a couple of sims south of us if they registered....There are Western role play sims just south of us...{dreamers, they have come to me twice asking if they can place sims on our south shores...that will never happen!}

***

If you have questions about the advanced menu feel free to come ask me...I know how to use most of the ones that we commonly need... and I know who to ask for a lot more.

Here's a handy piece of info you might can use someday. You find yourself on a parcel with a music stream you just love. You can find the owner and ask them for the URL to the stream... or you can go to advanced.... near the bottom you will see "View Admin Options" {Cntrl/Alt/V} that will allow you to click the land you're on...choose about land, media...you can now see the media url playing on the land. {Btw...Admin also allows you to fly in "No Fly" areas, doing that can get you banned from a sim that has "No Fly".......so user beware}. If you do play around and really screw up your screen, all isn't lost... First remember exactly what you click, everything reverses. If all else fails you can log out...un install the viewer you used and reinstall. You may well lose your IM and chat logs...if those are important to you, you can copy all that info and back it up before you remove the viewer. I know for a fact you will lose all logged info by removing 2.0. but your inventory will not be affected. ************************************************************************ This weekend in the United States is a holiday...Memorial Day is Monday. This is the day we remember those that died in our single worst war. Our civil war...a war that cost us over 600,000 of our own...a war where sometimes brother fought brother and father fought son. Someday there will come a time when we can stop fighting and killing ourselves.... Sadly I don't see it in the few years I have left.... But someday... Secondlife could be a start... And so it goes May you all have love today, brinda Namaste नमस्ते

Secondlife...why?

This image and its text were created by Andor Diechter November 2009. Thank you again Andy...I too feel so fortunate at having found Secondlife and it's people. **************************************************************************** What does Secondlife mean to you... Is it a place of escape, a place to create, a place for friends, a place of discovery, a place to grow, a place to love or be loved, a place to learn, a place to teach? Is it all of these... or none of these? *** I spent much of today thinking about these questions. My friend Deanna came last evening, she's recently had to re evaluate her ongoing education and the stresses that go along with higher education. Deanna has shared with me how she has come to feel about Secondlife... about what it means to her... the why she comes. A day or so ago my dear friend Andor stopped in for a few minutes... I didn't get a chance to chat with Andy in world then, but we did swap Emails a day or so later. Andor and I have had a couple of meaningful conversations over the better than a year he stayed at Benares. I believe I know a lot about why Andy comes back ever so often even though he isn't active in world just now. My friend Kattie is unable to come in-world often...what with house hunting, family, job, and the everyday things we all have to handle, there just isn't time. She and I also share emails, and I know what Kattie found here. Bubbles...She was missing for a few months, we chatted today about the whys for that. I understand the need for some of us to attempt to keep members of our real life close, and how often those real life members feel that they are closed off from us in world. *** All of the above stories are reasons to come to Secondlife... I won't share the intimate details of exactly why those people come here or any of the others I know. They aren't my stories to tell. I can tell you why I come. In my case it's all of those reasons I listed above. I didn't know those were the reasons when I first came.... when I first came, it just looked like a great adventure. What I found here was a life... a life like I guess I had wanted for a very long time. I've mentioned before about the invisablity of our older generation... while the older generation often can be hidebound and rigid in our thinking we also have so much life experience. I want to believe that I'm not one of those that has a rigid mind set...and this past year particularly has proved me right. I imagine all of you have heard of my Secondlife daughter Lala, we came to Secondlife at about the same time and Lala kinda adopted me. In some ways she has become the daughter experience I missed with my own daughter. I have become Mom to a few here, and you know... I take the projected responsibility both gladly and seriously. I love Secondlife... I get to mentor so many and I know that one on one mentoring is a key to allowing new people to remain. I am occaisionally asked to share my spiritual views and to answer those questions many of us have...you know, those questions of... Who am I? Where are we? Where are we going? Why? *** I think I understand that for whatever reason this experience in Secondlife was the impetus for my recent pilgrimage to India... It just seemed like something I had to do. Today I see it predetermined that I named our home here Benares. *** I would be interested in why you are here if you choose to share that...either here in comments, in world, or via Email. I hope everyone would understand that your responses to me would be private unless you asked me to publish. Brinda.Allen.SL@Gmail.com *** And so it goes My love to you all, brinda Namaste नमस्त

Thinking about Mice =^..^=

My friend Deanna dropped in to our public area last evening and during our chat and sharing Baz Luhrmans, "Wear Sunscreen" video, I had mentioned to her that in these last few months my psychological life has undergone a dramatic change. My visit to India is certainly a part of that change...I'm not aware enough to know if the trip was cause or effect. I went out to get the mail this morning and found the latest issue of the "Shambala Sun" magazine waiting for me. So often there is such a jewel waiting just inside the back cover and today was no exception. This months jewel is a poem by Billy Collins...see footnote, and it says much about my thought processes I suppose...{maybe I think too much?!} While on the surface the poem below has absolutely nothing to do with Benares or Secondlife it spoke to me in a way that most poetry doesn't. Enjoy...life is so short.

***

(Click on image to view)

And so it goes My love to you all, brinda Namaste नमस्ते Poem copywrite by: Billy Collins (born March 21st, 1941) an American poet and a former Poet Laureate of The United States from 2001 to 2003.

News...

East sim today...Lori's place in foreground... Ravens new digs... This is her first place also, she was a renter on another place 'till she found us.

***

I don't seem to have a really current picture of Lala! (note to self, work on that).

Lala's back! For those that don't know, Lala is my Secondlife daughter... we started this journey 3 years ago when we met at the Ahern welcome area. Recently we kinda think she was falsely abuse reported as underage and *The Benovolent Monarchy* takes allegations like that seriously enough that they banned Lala's account until they did verify her age {no idea why it took a month!}. ***

It's likely a good thing I'm a little short of time this morning 'cause the thing running through my head could have me sitting here for a long time.

Secondlife relationships!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

One of my newer residents IM ed me last evening wanting to know about sharing a parcel with another. OK...you guys know how this works... your land, your rules {as long as covenants adhered to}.

Knowing a little of the back story my return IM just said, "Please be so very careful"... because while there are relationship success stories in Secondlife... they are few and far between.

In this case I was told that the real life partner is OK with this Secondlife relationship..............hmmm..Ok.

I hope it works out well....this world leads to incredibly intense feelings... real life perceptions change as they see our involvement...and in world....let's just say Secondlife men tend to stray.

As far as real life connections? No way, I've posted about this before...and I'll stand by that.

***

Sadly, I saw Smithy leave our island...well, really what's more sad is that I didn't "see" him leave. As so often happens many people just don't bother to say anything.

I often have new people come and see our place and instantly want to get a house and land and..and...

My advice is always to maybe just wait a bit...find out what you really wish to do in Secondlife. In Smithys case he was very new and borrowed a house from a friend and I suspect that after a couple months he found other interests...I sent a notecard thanking him for being here and wishing him well.

***

OK...I sat and thought about this for a few minutes. I want to say something...but as I've learned after many years of sayin' stuff and wishing I hadn't...it's easier to stop and think than to just blurt stuff out.

Andy, if you still read this know that you will always have a place in my heart as well as a place in our history. A day or so ago I logged in and as usual I was bombed with "stuff"... and it was a total surprise to see you log off...I hadn't taken time to look and see who was on line yet.

My hope is that you return someday...I do understand how painful it was for me to return to my place on the mainland and delete the shop Twinkle had...and I do understand your love of our home. nuff said