Vacation - June 2009

I haven't been very good at keeping this blog up to date, but I did want to share with you some pictures and a brief video from a recent vacation to Charleston, South Carolina. This is a beautiful area and I would love to go back someday. Links below are to my Flickr page and a video on YouTube. This is my first video from real life that I have posted. I am learning Adobe Premiere Elements. Hope you enjoy!

Flickr pictures are here and a YouTube video here.

Valentine's Day Gift

Because of some RL commitments, I had to miss a GREAT party at Union Passage on Valentine's Day. Chad, Aislin, and Mark carried on and made sure that the 40+ people who came had a great time. Thanks!

When I finally was able to log in to Second Life, MTW and I went to OUR hill in Hollywood. Mark gave me the most wonderful gift: he had commissioned a song especially for me. Listen to it here. Thank you so very much.

Black Monday, the USS, and the Blake Sea

On Monday October 27th, MarkTwain White and I were relaxing in Union Passage when an old friend, Chase Speculaas, sent us an IM asking how the new OS Policy from Linden Labs would impact us. We had not yet seen the blog post and immediately went to the LL Blog to read. After digesting the news, I felt sick to my stomach. My initial reaction,to be honest, was to just abandon the vast majority of my sims and move the remainder away from the USS-SL. It felt as if Linden Lab had kicked me in the stomach. THEN on November 11th, I was walking in the Garden in Holly Kai Estates admiring the art exhibit, when out of the blue I got a "ping" from Jack Linden. After some short pleasantries he indicated that he had been thinking a lot about all things sailing related, and thought that would be good to get MarkTwain and me together for a chat. He had some ideas to bounce off of us. A LOT has happened since then. Today (Feb 17th, 2009) I am standing on the bluff in Union Passage Sim overlooking the BLAKE SEA. Water as far as I can see!

It has been a long and sometimes unpleasant process. Tempers have flared and we have had to work hard to keep the process moving forward. But now we see at least a part of the results of the community effort. The USS-SL (United Sailing Sims) have been relocated around an open expanse of Linden owned water named the Blake Sea.

A stroll down memory lane....

Jane Fossett posted an article on SLSailing.com about me (Art and Architecture of the Medici - header of the article is Monday dockside). I want to thank Jane for the article and it caused me to do a stroll down my SL memory Lane. FYI, I was "born" into SL in February of 2004. My first passion in Second Life and the reason that I joined was to help build a reconstruction of Myst Online. Fairly soon after I joined SL and found the group, I was asked to help build the reconstruction of parts of that fantasy online world on Telador Isle. Woody Blair and Rizpah Galatea taught me how to build. The picture here is from those days... I am the avatar in the red dress and MTW is sitting to my left. He appears to have not changed much from those old days. I'm not exactly sure of the date of this picture...but I believe it is in early 2005.

My passion for building meshed with my interest in Frank Lloyd Wright to lead me to do a build of Fallingwater and another of the Allen Lambe house (a much less famous FLW build). My version of Fallingwater was orginally on my property in Hooper as was my version of the Allen Lambe house. When MTW and I became partners in Hollywood, I moved Fallingwater to Hollywood (approximately where the Holly Kai Golf Club is now). The Allen Lambe House was then built on my property in Hooper which I have now sold.




NOW for something you might have more interest in... and that would be photos from old sailing events. Including ONE which actually has MTW SAILING!! Yes it is true. This photo is September of 2005... it was probably one of the very early SYC Regattas. I believe that I am flying over the end of the startline. The building behind the boats on the right was the original SYC clubhouse. Some of you may remember it. The building to its left is the Admiral's Daughter Pub. In the sky on the far right side of this picture, you can see the floating MarkTwain Manor. I have rebuilt this and it is now our home in Union Passage. I have more pictures that I will post here as I have time.

"Nuking" in Santa Rosa

Yesterday evening in Santa Rosa sim, a "nuking" party took place. MarkTwain and I had determined that the small island in Santa Rosa was hampering starts at the new SYC startline. Santa Rosa Island tenant Rikk Lovell moved to Santa Cruz sim. With an empty island and a suitcase nuclear bomb the rest is history. Read the full story here.

A fun... although radioactive... time was had by all. Thanks to Delinda for taking some snaps.

Trudeau Twenty

I started sailing in Second Life (as many many others have) in the venerable Flying Tako. I loved that boat and loved even more the Wee Tiny Tako. Since then I have tried out almost every boat that has come on the scene and have enjoyed most of them. But none has captured my heart like the Trudeau Twenty. The picture to the right was taken after an informal series of races that we held at Starboards Yacht Club on Sunday night (September 14th). It was a wild and wacky ride as folks were trying to learn how to sail a new boat. We decided that it might be fun to have a race in which you had to sail BACKWARDS to win. I think that this might be a fun thing to think about but I don't want to encourage bad sailing habits. I like the Fizz, I still love my Wee Tiny Tako, but my heart is being stolen. Kudos to Jacqueline Trudeau!!

9/11 Memorial in Second Life

On September 11th there was a memorial service in Second Life. The names of all of those that died that fateful day were read. This is the memorial to the first responders that was unveiled after that service.

The text on the relief reads "Dedicated To Those That Fell and To Those Who Carry On....May We Never Forget".

If you want to visit the memorial inside Second Life, use the SLURL here.

None of us will forget Sept 11th, 2001.