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I had been having some problems with one of my neighbors at the new house.  Not a nice person at all.  Last night I got so frustrated, I took my house off my property and all that fun stuff.  Dropped my dogs and my desk for my Onrez box @ my little sister Bri’s house.  I even considered leaving SL.  I had reset my home to her front porch.  I didn’t plan on going back to my old place.

When my husband called, I asked him to set the property up for sale.  Being that it was grouped under the band group, one of the band members had to do it.  I am just a band spice, I don’t have that ability, not that I would want it.

Tonight, I logged into SL to check the market and see if things are going ok, expecting to log onto my sister’s front porch.  As things start to rez, I notice I am not at my sister’s.  I am in a sim where she holds rental property.

As it continues to load, I do the typical, check email.

“Sissy, I am not letting you leave SL because some bitch wants to be petty for what ever reason.  I am not going to let you do that, and you know as long as I have it, you will never be with out a place to go.  I built you a new house, Andy put some of your stuff into it, you need to go to my house and get your dogs. They have more room to run around now. We decided to let you do the kids’ rooms and set their stuff up because being a mom, I know how important that is for a mom to do.  I hope you like it.  I love you.  — Spawn”

There was more to that email, like how she hadn’t slept in over 72 hours and hoped all the prims aligned properly, and if not she sold it to me for 0L and full prims so it didn’t have to be moved and replace it and so that I could fix or change what ever I wanted to, Andy helped, Kyle came online to help, etc etc.

It’s a beautiful house. It’s the house I wanted to build before but didn’t have the room. I also wasn’t sure how I was going to keep it low prim. She did the whole house and front awning and deck in 48.

This particular property was supposed to go to the art museum she wanted to build. That project was important to her. In this gesture, I see that I am more important to her. I always knew she loved me, but this reminded me how much. It also reminded me that not only is she my sister, but my best friend.

Maybe later I will come back and edit this post so it makes more sense. Right now I am being overly emotional. If you knew about the ups and downs of the last 2 years of all of our real lives, it would be easier to understand the why.

There was quiet a hub bub recently when Linden Labs posted that in January they were increasing the price of the open space sims due to many people over loading them and pushing the intended use far past their limits.

I just read the post on the Second Life Official blog entitled “A Letter to Second Life Residents”.

I am very impressed with their decision on the open space pricing. Those who followed the rules are not going to be punished because of the few idiots. Here is the new ammendment in case you missed the post.

“Here is how we are amending the price change:

1. We are going to retain the Openspaces product at its original price point and its original intended use (forest, water, etc.). We will have technical limitations to help regulate their use, initially avatar and prim limit restrictions, eventually event, classified and script limits. Those of you who chose to use the Openspaces as intended may stay at the US$75 rate, but will need to contact the concierge team to do so.

2. If you want more than an Openspace, we will offer you the choice of moving to a new product called Homesteads that is intended for light use such as low density rentals. For existing Openspace owners we will phase in the price increase for this new product over the next 6 months. Homesteads will also have technical limits for avatars and prims, and eventually script limits as well.

* January 5, 2009 – non-compliant Openspaces will transition to Homesteads and the maintenance fees will go from $75 to $95 per month. We will offer an educational discount to qualified educators on the new Homestead product. The discount amount will be the same as Private Regions, roughly 30%.

* July 2009 — the maintenance fees for Homesteads will go from $95 to $125 per month”

If you haven’t read the full post yet, go to the link up at the top, and read it over.

Sash N Me riding at Halloween Island

The baby sister of the group, she is hard to keep up with so we put her on a horse to keep tabs of her, still didn’t work. :P  We had a good time that night, arial horsey doughnuts, horse tag in the air… well, that was once I caught up to her.

A lot of you have wondered if I had moved or not since my rant post about finding the perfect land and stuff. I have. Here is a snap of my new house. It’s a two story house, with an entery foyer, open kitchen, dining, sitting and living room, with a study and a guest room off to the side. Upstairs is mine and Andy’s room and a room each for our kids. Its big enough to have house parties and I just might do it sometime soon. I was shocked when after I built it, it only had 56 prims!!

My New House

Me and R7 hanging at Misty Acres

My favorite lion on SL, always makes me laugh no matter how crappy i am feeling. HAKA LOL

As it got closer to the Halloween Bash, we had so much to do, that we almost forgot to get our own costumes ready.

I had made a Magenta costume for a Rocky Horror Picture Show party that no one showed up to. I decided to wear it anyway at the party. Kyle decided he would be Dr Franknfurter to my Magenta, so I made him a skin, and he got the wig and lacey stuff. Ain’t her perdy??? LMFAO

Ain't he hot?? LMAO

Dr Franknfurter, Sab getting her vampire together, and me as the living dead flapper girl.

And here we are still getting costumes ready.

Later that night, Dead Magenta, starring ME!! :)

Scary Story Night @ My House.

Busy day in SL today.  First had a day of texturing and getting things out for the party and Sab made more new stuff for the trick or treat trail going on over at L’Quen.  Had an interesting visit by two ppl who… well lets just say don’t need to be around. :P  That is being nice…

Jenna Heartsdale and I are beginning to work on a Family Readiness center on SL.  The area it is housed at was generously donated by Kent Outlander.  Thank you, Kent, you are a very kind and generous man.  We plan on offering all kinds of information for military families, some of it will be things that your local FRG or KV might not tell you about.

Went to a party my friend and SL DJ, Zigi Jishnu was djing @ prim whore.  Was a lot of fun, Sab, R and I danced on the poles together. Zigi will be djing the second 2 hours of the up coming party over at the Nevemore on the 24th.  She has some really great mixes she has created.

3 on a pole ;)

To end the night, we all went to my house and hung out and told scary stories.  Not saying the night is over yet, I haven’t gone to sleep.

Halloween time on SL… so much to do and see.  Many people on SL go all out every year and decorate their homes and businesses and invite the public into share in the fun.

Some of the best places I have seen so far this month are:

The Devil’s Labyrinth

This has changed a bit from last year.  Hard to believe that something so awesome could be made even better.

Halloween @ Antiqua Paradise

This place is well done, very impressive! It’s all done in the setting of some of our favorite movies like Psycho, Halloween, Rosemary’s baby. Just watch out for the pod ppl.

Toxic Tunnel Maze and haunted grounds

This was great! Wasn’t easy getting out of, lots or riddles in places to escape from, but once you get out, enjoy your death certificate.

Carnival of Doom

You really have to check this one out. GO NOW!! LOL

Haunted Castle Ruins

This place is beautifully done. Castle is gorgeous, the maze is not easy and is very well done. While you are there, pick some pumpkins around the place.

BURN, WITCH, BURN

Sab being hung

They even got Sash...

You search forever to find the right piece of land to build your home on SL, a place where you and your significant other can call your home away from home.

You find the perfect spot… you decide on a private estate because with all the problems SL has, you don’t want to renew your 72 USD a year payment for a premium account. After all, with the issues, is it worth it anymore? Besides, you can buy on a private island and just pay the owner the tier fee with out paying the price to LL for membership plus land tier…

You find the PERFECT place, you set up your house and other things so that when your husband who is deployed can manage to go to the MWR tent and come online to see you, you have your house already to go and he has a home to come to.

Everything seems perfect…

You have ppl who just walk on into your house when ever they want like they own the place. You could be naked and getting it on with your significant other, you could be just watching a movie, but in they walk, no asking hey can i come in… etc some of them are friends of yours… show up and walk on into your house with out asking. I think that is the time I get pissed off the most.

Some of you may say door locks… in SL those are a joke, those wanting in will get in regardless. It’s kind of like having windows that darken for privacy, doesn’t stop ppl from panning in to see anyway. I am not going to list all the ways door locks can be worked around, I figure if you have been in SL long enough, you already know, plus if the new ppl don’t know yet, they aren’t hearing it from me.

Ban lines and security orbs can be use, or can they?? Most private islands do not allow ban lines to be used, sure, black list ppl so they only get it but, how do you always know who to black list before they screw you over?

Security Orbs work but on a private sim, when SL isn’t lagging so bad the scripts work. Also, in many private sims, you can only use a security device when you are on your property. Ok, fine, but what do you do when you show up to your plot to find some hooker in your bed fucking her client of the day?

Anyway, after a couple months of searching, I found the perfect place to build a house on…. at least at the time I did. I get a nice sized plot, big enough for a house with all the decor, a cabana beach, and another place for a garden. I do a lot of work, it’s perfect…..

Perfect until the island owner starts redoing stuff. He tells you your spot is getting made a little bigger but won’t cost you extra, ok fine TY I would pay extra, I am happy with the area… what he forgot to tell you is, he also readjusted your prims… you now have 100 prims less then what you paid for…

Ok, no biggie, you arent even close to your prim limit and your house and everything is done; you are happy with your SL get away.

Then the day comes…. the island owner constantly redoes everything. Every day you go to your happy little place and have to fix something with the terrain because the island owner has done stuff again. You sweep the dirt out of your house, clean up your porch, pull pose balls out of the ground… no biggie… doesn’t take much effort until it starts happening DAILY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You stop enjoying your home away from home because you can no longer just hang out and relax. You have to fix something EVERY TIME you show up…

You finally say enough is enough… you decide to let it go. Look around to move. Reanalyze your way of thinking…

You search for a new place on another private sim, ask questions, read the covenants… then look at the prim count to price… umm yeah, ok…

You find yourself once again rethinking that LL membership and their tier fee… is it worth it to own mainland where you don’t have someone telling you what kind of house you need, and having to always fix their mess ups and get your prices and prims altered with out warning?

For me, YES IT WAS! In this case, my husband decided to reup his premium account. We now have mainland… moved the house over to it, was happy… UNTIL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yes, folks there is an until in here…

The other night, I was looking on the LSL wiki, I am trying to learn scripting… I click back over to SL from good old firefox, all ready and excited to try out what I just read, and as I do, I watch half of my house disappear…. POOF into thin air. Course, half of my furniture disappeared in the process. I look in my inventory, not there.. I search it, look into the trash folder, and the lost and found… GONE!

I relog, clearing cache. Look for my stuff again, still gone… THREE TIMES I DID THIS!! STILL GONE!!!!!!! The rest of the house looks like a semi hit it… I start to clean up the mess, preparing for my rebuild. As I click to take things, a message pops up from SL “asset server error, item is being returned to parcel”…

Didn’t they tell us this issue had been fixed a month or so ago? Does it explain why my house disappeared and the rest of it is mangled… so I wait, then finally, get things cleaned up, leaving my server boxes for SLX, Hippo Vend and Onrez where they were… after all, if someone is able to make a purchase, I need to make sure they get it…

Finally, rebuild in progress. I drop a prim, resize it, move it, just to watch SL resize it and move it back to the original rez position and size that they come out of the builder at… it also rotated it off by .002 on the Z axis… great wonderful, I am expecting my hubby to come on this weekend, and NO HOME FOR HIM TO COME TO!

What’s a Marine wife to do? She does the same as always… she presses on.. nothing but a thing. House looks good, I am almost finally done.

On conclusion to this rambled mass of babble, there are actually points to be taken from this:

1) SL, as messed up as it can be at times, is worth the time and money. For me its been a place to keep in touch with family who live far away, get time with my deployed hubby, and make friends from around the world. It is an addiction, if you don’t have it, I guess you won’t understand this point.

2) There is no such thing as privacy on SL, suck it up and deal with it. You can give your self the false sense of security that its there easily. Do that if it makes you feel better, but just know, even with your blocked shades, ppl can see you having sex if they want to anyway. You could if you wanted to, charge for the Peep Show.

3) Security orbs are helpful when you are on your place and have some weird gorean guy trying to force collar you while you are in your house, or the asshole who thinks that all women on SL are there for sex and no other reason, yes, the kind who you say no to then they say how much will you charge me….. turn that on and watch them bounce. It’s poetic justice and I HIGHLY recommend Hippo Secure…

Now, if you will excuse the interruption on your happy SL day, I am off to try and log in. I have a few things to finish before my husband comes home this weekend.

Privacy… think you have it on Second Life? Think again….

I would like to point you to this:

“Disclosure
Residents are entitled to a reasonable level of privacy with regard to their Second Life experience. Sharing personal information about a fellow Resident –including gender, religion, age, marital status, race, sexual preference, and real-world location beyond what is provided by the Resident in the First Life page of their Resident profile is a violation of that Resident’s privacy. Remotely monitoring conversations, posting conversation logs, or sharing conversation logs without consent are all prohibited in Second Life and on the Second Life Forums.”

——– Second Life Community Standards Item Number 4.

As you can clearly see, giving an item with a spy script in it masked as a bling script or what ever is clearly against the rules. This also applies to an item left laying around on property to do the same thing.

It was recently discovered that a person I know pretty well has been doing this very thing… monitoring where we go, who we are with, who we are talking to, what we are saying… Load of crap in my opinion. As my almost 4 year old niece, Tara would say, “I am SHOCKED and APPLED!” (It saddens me that even a 4 year old has the sense to not spy and eaves drop when people in their 30s don’t.)

Why is it being done? Afraid they are missing something? Afraid they are being talked about behind their back?

It doesn’t matter the why, what matters is that there is a clear invasion of privacy going on. On doing a search for spy scripts and items to spy on people, there are MANY out there. Why? Who cares what people are doing when you aren’t around or people you don’t even know… If that kind of thing is what you have been reduced to, BACK SLOWLY AWAY FROM YOUR COMPUTER NOW!! GO OUTSIDE AND GET A LIFE!!