Vehicles of Transport, Etc. November 11, 2009

After discovering a most probable link between Hucka D.’s so-called Uniko language and Unicode, Baker Bloch heads back over to the Okinu sim on a hunch, only to encounter, upon beaming in randomly, what looks like a question mark without the completing dot. Wasn’t Hucka D. just talking about the key character string “2E2E” being Unicode for a backwards or reversed question mark? I know it to be so.

More glyphs found that same visit.

Nothing happening yet in the Aotearoa sink. No surprise there, though. Still luving the view in the meantime.

Karoz is still over at Mos Ainsley, attempting to find further clues about the link between Uniko, Petemond and his possible alien origin. Here he’s hiking on the circular ridge surrounding the moon base, looking down the other side, away from the base, at some sea patternings there as well. Without the sharp angles of the quite unique Okino glyphs, though. Still pretty neat.

Also on this visit, Karoz finds an abandoned space shuttle in the waters of nearby Byeulddongbyuel, west of Quark star which is, in turn, just west of Mos Ainsley. Karoz immediately recognized it as a Moon Base vehicle which you can freely rez there and ride around. Karoz had also heard stories of people flying the vehicles to the mainland. Apparently this one didn’t quite get there. Karoz was further very pleased to find out, after some adjustments, that he himself could resume the flight of this wayward vehicle, and set out not back to Mos Ainsley to return the ship, but further west instead. His idea: see if he could fly it all the way to Chilbo (!).

Now the first try (yes, there were two that night), he made it about 1/2way to Chilbo from Byeulddongbyuel, still a considerable distance. All was well until he found himself automatically rejected after entering a parcel requiring age verification to continue further. The space ship kept going without him. I assumed it derezzed somewhere along the way as well.

But Karoz had the “bug” by then, and enjoyed the only partially successful flight so much that he immediately returned to the Moon Base of Mos Ainsley itself to rez another, identical shuttle. His idea this time was to make it to the protected Korean Channel and then fly more south to reach Chilbo. He almost reached the channel before something went wrong again: as my computer locked up at that instant I was unable to pinpoint the problem, unlike before.

As I said, though, Karoz had some kind of vehicle bug by then, and also decided that night to head over to the Arcadia Asylum library in Cheonma, not far from Chilbo, and purchase whatever drivable/flyable vehicle he could find, all of which he knew would be absolutely free thanks to AA’s full perms/no-profit policy regarding her many builds. He subsequently went to a rez zone on Highway 10 just north, and after some experiments (forklift, etc.), found what he considered a *perfect* complement to the space shuttle’s look and feel in this simple bike, which you wear and ride instead of sit in and ride. He tested it out all the way to Chilbo and then even beyond a bit. My guess is that you’ll soon find a series of Karoz related posts on a bike tour of the continent in one form or another very soon (!). Unlike my other experiences with vehicles, this one — actually both — turned out to be much more satisfying. I certainly don’t expect the focus to be taken away from SL exploration on foot, but biking/shuttle flying (or whatever comes next) may make for a nice kind of complementary way of exploring. And it’s just a lot of fun, which is the ultimate point, I think.

Then shifting back to ol’ hiking Baker, a new structure was found in the Moa sim of Big Sink last night, but one quite familiar in another setting. For it’s the water part of the water/fire temple from Little Robert Plant Variant’s Nowtown, an exact copy sans the steam of lava and resulting steam when it meets the interior water, it appears. And the yoga place is gone, along with the tent just below it as described in this post from only a couple of weeks ago. Shouldn’t be surprised that SL changes so quickly but I always am for some reason.

Kahruvel Forest > Chilbo November 4, 2009

Karoz attempts to get some shut eye in the tent and await the morning light for further exploration.

However, he couldn’t settle in, and quickly arose to look over the ruined tower base…

… and reexplore the airport itself more, with its nifty blue neon trim leading him through the various spaces.

Then it was back to lands further west, even beyond Rosedale this time to Georgean, the site of a Vehicle Sandbox according the land description. In fact, the sandbox and sim appear to be one and the same.

And over the mountain to the south is a “sandbox sandbox”, 4 adjacent sims worth, in fact. I remember Baker Blinker sitting on this high vantage point at times and viewing the various builds being executed. She also use to sit on a smaller, wooded ridge just north of the Cowell lighthouse and watch the flying vehicles coming and going from Abbotts Aerodrome. All this happened mainly before I started this blog about one month into my SL existence. By the time I started the blog, I had mainly left the forest behind to explore other areas of Sansara, and also beyond. But I’ll never forget finding Kahruvel — also a nighttime event. I was amazed, in flying west through sim after sim, that such a large, relatively natural area existed so close to the oldest, much more built up areas of Second Life just to the north. How could such a chunk of land remain protected all these years? Kudos, once more, to Mr. Jack and his immediate family for the idea of a Kahruvel trust.

But, as it turned out, Karoz quickly got homesick, and returned to Jeogeot even before dawn could arrive in Second Lyfe. What a home body; even worse than The Bakers! Below he sits on a bench in one of his favorite Chilbo parks, soaking in the warmer air, as Karoz later put it. Was it really warmer? Perhaps to him it was, and although SL has no defined equator that I know if, Jeogeot is considerably south of Sansara. Hmmm… have to think about that warmth issue more.

Big Sink > Kahruvel Forest November 4, 2009

Hopefully I’ll have more to say about Big Sink very soon. For now, I’ll leave you with this waterfall picture taken in Craggen Maw once more, but on what was clearly private property according to a prominently placed sign.

Moving on to a more recent night of exploration, then, this time through the eyes of my green friend Karoz Blogger. I believe this might be his first visit to the oldest SL continent, Sansara, but not sure of that. Oh… of course not… he’s visited the Healy gallery a number of times. But this is definitely — I think — his first teleport into the *older,* old continent, the Forest of Kahruvel in this case. He finds the location very, very attractive, and wonders why Baker Bloch doesn’t spend more time there. Just before he takes the below pictures, he wanders around Salazar Jack’s famous seaside village in Cowell. Nice to see Headburro still has his digs there.

Below is an overhead shot of the great waterfall in Rodeo (Rodeo Falls?), a 25 meter cascade originating from a spring about 25 meters further up the mountain. If you haven’t been to Rodeo during your Second Life existence, then you’ve been missing something. Don’t wait; go now!

I don’t remember this giant stone head being there when Baker Bloch and Baker Blinker use to visit. But as Baker Bloch is checking behind Karoz today (for a change), he finds that it is over 3 years old. Probably just missed it before.

On a nearby cliff overlooking the sea, Karoz clicks on an open book, which turns out to be a “linking book” taking him to another well known location in the forest: Phyneas Jack’s Lookout, also in Rodeo. Karoz is standing in front of Phyneas’ portrait below. More on his story here. That’s Salazar Jack’s great grandfather, in case you didn’t catch it, and the namesake of the trust that protects the forest, spreading out not only over Rodeo but neighboring sims such as Cowell, Stinson, Noyo, and even others.

On a whim, Karoz teleports over to the narrow strip of land marking the western boundary of Rosedale, one sim west of Stinson. He’s not in the great forest any longer, but he can dimly see the cliffs over the intervening sea. Admittedly the dark and jagged distant silouettes in the two pictures below rather gave him the creeps, because he wasn’t sure what they were at first.

Karoz also took the time to visit Abbott’s Aerodrome, another famous site of the area. Again, this is not in the Forest of Kahruvel proper, but it’s just west, and the huge airport sits on the same mountain range running through the center of Kahruvel.

More on the Abbotts Aerodrome from the Second Life Wikia.

Very interesting that it’s supposedly built on top of an older airport now in ruins. In fact, it was an area around some of those very ruins that most attracted Karoz’s attention last night, in particular a camping site near of the base of a dilapidated tower, still in Abbotts but very near Kahruvel indeed now, a mere meters away.

The campsite included a tent w/ sleeping bag, a log fire, and also several stumps to sit yer rump on. What wonderful stories must have been told around this campfire down through the years now, he supposes. Could this make a good base from which to explore the forest and general area? Could Karoz actually spend a night or two or three away from his precious Jeogeot?

Chat… Vortextra? October 21, 2009

“Dig something hard enough and you will fall into it.”

~ Chesaw to Saw-chee after an especially heated game of Trivia Ratsuit

“Hucka D., I think the Pudding Hole 1024 parcel still up for sale was the site of Vortextra. *This* is how Mythos and Second Life linked up, perhaps. Common *black hole*.

Hucka D.:

Pie hole. Good night to you.

bb:

Same to you. Let’s insert the picture of the tv from Long Island Sound, still around and now in the Blake Sea region.

Hucka D.:

Go noob or be cube.

bb:

What?

Hucka D.:

Go there or be square.

bb:

Oh, ok. Here’s the picture anyway. Hey, we were just talking about Baker Bloch’s father, weren’t we?

Hucka D.:

I think we called him unfit to eat because of his ghostly paternity.

bb:

So back on track…

Hucka D.:

Let’s look at an interesting picture of a wormhole.

I have a riddle for you, baker b. Which came hunt, the fox or the egg?

bb:

Hucka D., I have no idea.

Hucka D.:

Make your joe, Joe.

*****

bb:

Back. (sips joe) Maybe Brouwer gives a cue, er, clue, Hucka D. The many stairs of the Gas N’ Glass. Like the Escher print I found in Alice on the protected land. Yes, it was at the bottom of this post. I wonder if this represents a way to seal up the wormhole. It can be a cube, spinning on the x, y, z axis all at once.

Hucka D.;

This is Third Life inside the Second. That’s a dangerous place [to be].

bb:

Alice is Chilbo, isn’t she?

Hucka D.:

Chilbo needs Korean Channel needs Sunklands needs Chilbo.

bb:

You were just waiting for an opening for that. (Hucka D. smiles)

Hucka D.:

How do you control a widening portal when opened? It is a coffee cup. It is a blue blox. The Blue Box. There’s your Chilbo automatons way out in King’s Beach, Chromex, which is caddycorner to Crowston. You should noob cube.

bb:

Go back, you mean. To King’s Beach.

Hucka D.:

To CHRO. 12 or 13. Teu e teu e.

bb:

Back to this Vortextra idea for a moment. Was it in the central Pudding Hill parcel?

Hucka D.:

It’s still there. That’s why it’s for sale. Haunted, they say. Not fit for resident or robot, they whisper. And of course they remember the Trivia Ratsuit contest, at least on an unconscious level. Like Dark Side… Darkside. Go back. They remember The Rat.

bb:

This is his *hole*.

Hucka D.:

Vortex, yes. Opened during the contest. Piehole. Flaming. Ask Marty.

bb:

Is he around tonight?

Hucka D.:

He is buying bird seed for his several parrots tonight, unfortunately. He’s very helpful and informative, though, don’t you think. We’re lucky to have him around, wanting to be a part of all this runny mess that might not be satisfactorily sealed up in the end [and all].

bb:

He’s really McCartney.

Hucka D.:

A McCartney variant. Like spam for ham.

bb:

You’re full of rhymes tonight, Hucka D.

Hucka D.:

Golden.

*****

bb:

I have a feeling campers camped next to the widening hole — sink hole — in tents like the one in the tiny Alice park. Chilbo.

Hucka D.;

Chilbo, da. Chilbo was there.

Otherland 3d; Atoll Continent; Egan Sim August 19, 2009

http://spinmass.blogspot.com/2009/02/terrain-sculptor-12-fixed-web-map.html

Thought I’d give out this helpful link (see under “helpful links” to right as well) because it gives a 3d rendition of Otherland Island #1 (right picture), where I lived this past winter. I don’t see my shack at the bay I lived on (just to the left of avatar’s left hand, the one standing on the map), although the map seems to be made at the general time it was there.

The Verloren Castle (larger structure surrounded by moat near the middle of the picture) is no longer on Otherland Island #1, but instead located within a 3 sim island nearby. It’s still in the Verloren sim, though, and you are still free to visit it. As I mentioned in this earlier post, Otherland was recently sold by the original owners/creators. Shame.

Some of the older posts from the Spinmass blog also give some interesting glimpses as to how the Atoll continent developed in 2005. Such as this one.

Well, here’s definitely one of those SL “aha!” moments, because unbeknownst to me beforehand, the very next post helps to explain the mysterious glyph I found in Egan which I recorded here last fall. So it was the phrase “Ben Wuz Here”, and did connect to Ben Linden, as I speculated at the time. Amazing! And another thing that’s now gone from the grid.

Hope the owner of SpinMass doesn’t mind me posting one of his images here, but it was too good to pass over the chance…

Origin of SL? July 23, 2009

As I was telling my friend Flynn, I’m admittedly having a hard time getting re-interested in the Atoll continent, despite being quite pleased with my Horisme property and the remodeled Sylver Forest Galleries there (Gallery at the Temple of TILE and Edwardston Station Gallery in the main). Found myself just teleporting around the edges of the continent in an effort to get pumped up about it again. Beautiful underwater scapes, admittedly, but most look just like the other from water sim to water sim.

An exception to the same same pattern is this strange semi-circular ridge found around the center of the Piegler sim on the north edge of the continent.

It’s always fun to pop over to the Okinu sim to see what the mysterious glyphs there might have to “say” about any given, hot topic. Here we see Baker Bloch has teleported directly to 2 glyphs that might represent a square and right triangle respectively, which happen to be the 2 shapes or modules that the old Ubertemple (enlarged Temple of TILE) in Neith and the following Otherland temple were built with. For the new version of the Temple of TILE, I’ve replaced the right triangle design that comes from the old b_hivia of Gliese with the circular dominated design of the new gallery tower (formerly a separate but empty gallery in Noru).

Does this mean I should rebuild the Ubertemple soon? Simply don’t know yet.

Then when Karoz (there’s Karoz!) teleports to a pool with an interesting looking island in the “Lake District” of Maebaleia, he finds a hen sitting upon it. So many hen/chicken sightings in this district already! The Bill *must* be involved, somehow. This would be on the upper edge of Mabenogion.

Then just to the north, after crossing over into Lycanthorpe (a name I subsequently learned is another word for werewolf), Karoz gets his first view of what we are presently calling the Bluedrake Sea*, for the sim it partially lies within and whose name obviously resonates directly with the nearby Blue Feather Sea in my estimation (and Hucka D.’s and Plant’s as well). In short, I think Hucka D. is going to soon propose that, even though the Maebaleia is actually the 4th completed mainland continent, this particular area is even older than Sansara itself (the original SL continent according to the Linden timeline). How can this be? It has something to do with, again, master explorer and storyweaver Salazar Jack’s idea of a pre-Linden grid called Urtahra. I haven’t given a link to his blog in quite a while, so here it is again. To me, he’s a kind of father to all this SL-mythology stuff, and someone you have to deal with and know about and fully grok before moving on into your own theories on the subject, as a number of people have now (thinking of my friend Headburro Antfarm in particular — again a blog link if you’re not familiar with the tall, orange, horned dude yet).

But I’ll save more of that most interesting story until Hucka D. has a chance to unveil what I know is some kind of packet of information. We’ve already chatted a bit about the idea of a rebis, and that the sea is a rebis in itself, divided into light and dark regions, or male/sun, female/moon halves. I know this also might have something to do with the twinship of Baker Blinker and Baker Bloch (or what Headburro has called “The Bakers”, which I think takes in all of my extended SL family actually, in his way of putting it).

Not yet knowing the importance of this Bluedrake Sea yet, Karoz is still impressed with the surrounding landscape, with its nice, forested hills. Most of the land in the area appears to be owned by one group, offering rentals. Baker Bloch actually now rents from them — more on that coming up…

… Yes, here Baker is standing in the front lawn of his new rental, a small cottage. He has 100 prims to work with, but doesn’t plan on opening a gallery or anything, except maybe inserting some kind of pointer to the Sylver Forest Galleries and perhaps the Something To Chro About Gallery still in Healy as of this writing (going on 1/2 year, actually!). No, he just wants a base of exploration. I was impressed with the nice vantage of the surrounding region the property gives here — a specific selling point for me.

A nearby gazebo providing an excellent view of the small inland sea partially in Bluedrake. As far as I can tell, the lake is wholly owned by the same rental group that I rent my cottage from. Might be important.

A long, cascading type waterfall dominates the west coast of the sea, below the lookout gazebo.

An overhead view of the cottages/houses on the north side of the sea at dusk.

*****

* Hucka D. has now indicated to me that the name of the sea is actually Rebisee, particularly indicating the ending letter is “e” and not “a”, as you might imagine it should be.

** Sorry for the continued updates. Hucka D. states that he picked up on the wrong letters, and that it may not be Rebisee but Rubisea (one word), pronounced Ru-bi’-se-a. And now he thinks the sea was actually the color of blood at one time, hence the inference to ruby. May have had the nickname “Sea of Blood” at first. That’s all for now… stay tuned.

Loose Thoughts, Chatting??? May 27, 2009

“Hello Hucka D.”

Hucka D.:

Hello baker b.

bb:

I wish to ask more about Karoz, Rubidoo and also Rooster. But we’re calling him Ruuster now… is that correct?

Hucka D.:

We need to call him something.

bb:

Is Ruuster the male counterpart to Billina, the talking hen of SID’s 1st Oz?

Hucka D.:

*Yes*.

bb:

Alright, good. Emphatic yes there, I see.

Hucka D.:

Yes.

bb:

Ruuster can talk, unlike other, normal roosters.

Hucka D.:

Yes. Pixellation.

bb:

So Ruuster is sort of a lego creation.

Hucka D.:

Yes.

bb:

Will Ruuster’s story be continued in the Beehive of Truth in the near future?

Hucka D.:

Yes. *Yes.*

bb:

Good. *Now*… is Karoz, then, like a male Dorothy?

Hucka D.:

Karoz takes Ruuster to Rubidoo on Granddaddy Mtn. Grassy is the link between you and Klutzy Kamper still. You still have a link. But the Appalachian Trail is beyond you, he thinks. He is naive. He is still a child.

bb:

That’s hard to take.

Hucka D.:

You are as well.

bb:

But I’m an older child.

Hucka D.:

True enough. You are an artist child. You know what you need to do now. That makes it worse in ways.

bb:

So… R110, Hucka D. Karoz was a part of this secret organization to eliminate or else tame the Linden Grid.

Hucka D.:

This was pre-Linden Grid, actually. The idea was to stop the grid before it was released as SL.

bb:

Does Karoz presently understand he is a member of R110, Hucka D.?

Hucka D.:

Karoz checks into this blog at times, so yes, he’ll know shortly. He’ll start to remember. Already he’s getting gleanings of what the Fuchsia Diamond really is, as you yourself understand now.

bb:

It is the Lyran configuration of Dark Side of the Rainbow.

Hucka D.:

More than that. It is The Wizard of Oz as a whole. Rainbow Complex.

bb:

OK, I can see that I suppose. What must show up, then, is a blue feather. Can I say that?

Hucka D.:

Yes, Karoz discovered this feather. It is the same, perhaps, as the insight how to divide or cut up the rough version of the diamond.

bb:

At that point he became Oliver. 1st man.

Hucka D.:

Karoz takes Ruuster to Rubidoo. *No.* Ruuster takes *Karoz*…

bb:

I know something. Sirius. Lyra.

Hucka D.:

Take to Alice now.

Alice:

I am Chilbol.

bb:

Hi Alice. Should I camp in you, or Karoz?

Alice:

Karoz lived here. In me.

bb:

Are *you* his mother?

Alice:

I am not allowed to say that.

bb:

But you could be, I’m taking that. Hmmm…

Alice:

We made a bed together. A place to sleep. We incarnated as human avatars in order to create a new entity. Karoz was born.

bb:

Did Hucka D.’s father found Chilbo? I know Fleep Tuque founded the present Chilbo, Alice.

Alice:

Yes, she did. Hucka D.’s father, Kelley I believe, worked for CUBUS. It was CUBUS that commissioned the diamond. There are several realities involved. Synchpatch is coming up baker b… Baker Beach.

bb:

CUBUS is The Bank?

Alice:

Yes. Maybe. Probably. Perhaps.

bb:

How’s Kerchal doing?

Alice:

We will miss you. Noru is a good place for you, though. You and also Karoz.

bb:

Karoz is me as well, Alice.

Alice:

Well…

bb:

So you’re saying… you’re implying… that Karoz was concieved in Alice, in you. How does, then, The Moon figure into that?

Alice:

Gypsy Purse. Blue feather then purses. 1,2,3. Where is the 4th?

Hucka D.:

Alice is helping so much with our blog progress, baker b.

Alice:

I’m not quite finished.

Hucka D.:

Yes. You will return another night.

Alice:

He is almost to the point of realization.

bb:

That’s fine, Alice, you…

Hucka D.:

Alice, he is not ready quite yet.

Alice:

Yes, he needs to know his mother.

bb:

Oh, you’re talking about when Karoz reads…

Alice:

He knows about the diamond now.

Hucka D.:

He knows about the Lyran origin of R110.

Alice:

He will soon go to Rubidoo and find Ruuster.

Hucka D.:

He must. He has to. That’s what he’s designed for.

Alice:

Why did you lie about CUBUS and The Bank?

Hucka D.:

I didn’t lie. Powerman. Power. Man.

Alice:

I remember something happening in that tent, at that picnic table. A vision. A tunnel. Tunnel.

Hucka D.:

That doesn’t mean you are the mother. The Mother.

Alice:

I have been touching Kerchal for a long time. 5 years maybe. Things happen. Things progress. You touch, you feel. Feelings.

Hucka D.:

baker b. is moving away from Kerchal, though. Its job is done.

Alice:

There’s always the future.

bb:

Guys…

Hucka D.:

Well, we’ll see what Ruuster has to say about that.

(to be continued?)

More red (Cardinal), then Fuchsia… May 10, 2009

So I teleported once more to Extasia. Here’s a direct quote from Nish’s Fuchia related post about it:

If you look Fuchsia up on the web you can find out that it apparently shares a server with an island called Extasia. (my note: Nish then provides a picture of where Extasia is in relationship to Fuchsia and the Sansara continent as a whole here). I teleported over to the Extasia sim to take a look at Fuchsia’s twin. The Extasia sim at first glance did not appear to have any connections with Fuchsia as it is for the main part snow covered and privately owned, but on closer inspection the Sim possessed three small islets roughly the same size as the ones on Fuchsia. As well as this there is a narrow water channel splitting two of the main landmasses. This feature you can also find in Fuchsia.

Yes, it was indeed that narrow water channel now drawing my attention. For one thing, it’s exactly this same channel that you land in upon selecting a generic teleport into the sim (that is, just selecting Extasia in the SL map’s search box and hitting “enter”). You are suppose to teleport into the center of the sim. However, since that particular location is banned you enter at the nearest unbanned region, which is in this body of water. The red band lines will be immediately to your south when you teleport into Extasia in this way.

In following this central, narrow water channel to the east, then, after several turns one runs into a dead end, complete with what I thought was a turkey upon my initial visit to this sim. However, in checking the description in this follow up visit, Baker Bloch finds that it’s actually what’s called a chocobo, described in the wikipedia article on the subject as a large, fictional, and normally flightless bird that can be ridden. Indeed, the strangely stranded bird in front of me advertised itself as being both ridable and cuddleable. However, I found when Blochs attempted to ride it he merely bounced up in the air. Apparently only the owner can ride it, I’m guessing, although the chocobo itself didn’t say so itself.

In turning around and heading the opposite direction in the channel, one more turn past the entrance point brings you to this larger, more open waterway with that furiously spinning redbird I give a close up of in the previous post to this. He is flying around the extreme west side of this water body, as the chocobo is on the extreme east end of same, if you count the whole as one interior stream or system. All other water in the Extasia sim lies along its edges, in contrast. But what is overlapping this extreme east-west position for the 2 birds is the fact that one is *flightless* (emphasized by it being pinned at the end of the waterway, unable to fly up and out), and the other is *flying too much*. That is, its flight is overexagerated. The redbird is spinning so fast that it seems certifiably insane, in fact. No sane bird would fly in that manner, and in the same tight circle. I would assume, for one thing, that any non-virtual bird would soon get dizzy and fall out of the sky if doing so.

In the below picture, you can see a frozen shot of the cardinal near the lower left corner. The redness (and also “cardinal-ness”, perhaps) is emphasized by the fact that the bird continually, rapidly spins in and out of another banned area on the island marked by *red* lines. I thought this fact odd too, and also that this means the ever orbiting bird spends about 1/2 its time above (unbanned) water, and 1/2 the time above the banned, red bordered land.

I’ve never seen a bird fly that strangely in SL, but in visiting the next sim up (Fantasia) found a doppleganger cardinal spinning just as rapidly in a tight circle above a garden space there. Upon inspecting each, discovered that both are named “Cardinal” with the added description as follows: “Merry Xmas from ArchTx Edo and Jemma Flora”. It’s a rather old creation also, from late 2005, and weighs in at a hefty 27 prims, quite a waste considering that it appears as only a blur due to its rapid orbit.

I’ll have to quickly summarize my other Extasia finds as I’m running out of time for this paticular post. Just wanted to note that on the turn closest to the entrance point is this 3 prim object rather mysteriously termed a “water balloon” even though it looks as little like an actual water balloon as, well, a motionless giant turkey does a insanely spinning, small redbird.

Not far to the west of the “water balloon” is a Philip Linden created bullet, from 2002 this time. There’s another, PL bullet near the channel as well. I mention this in particular because Nish states she found a Philip Linden creation on Fuchsia during her time there — a cylinder in that case. And owned by an *Easter*ling (remembering that the redbird description mentions “Xmas”)

Moving back to Fuchsia, then, I also rather flippantly mentioned something in my comment to Nish’s post about the web color fuchsia having official rgb coordinates of 255, 0, 255, which means it is exactly 1/2 red and 1/2 blue. I noted in this comment that one could translate this to a sim coordinate, given that you can move an object underneath the surface of the sim to SL “sea level” (“0″ elevation), but admitted that the coordinates would have to be shifted a bit to read 255, 255, 0 if so. It would lie at almost the northeast corner of a sim as well (256, 256, -) I thought, what the heck, I’ll find out what’s at 255 north and 255 east at Fuchsia. I knew that Nish mentioned a hole where you can peek under the land into nothingness at this northeast corner.

Upon finding the location of the 255, 255, 0 coordinates, I was surprised to learn that a bend in the land occurs at this exact spot. I couldn’t help but place a tiny, *fuchsia* colored cube to mark the spot — one probably has to enlarge the snapshot below in order to see it. It is at this very point that the land seems to kind of veer into the 4th dimension, if that’s a good description of it. I don’t know — maybe this is really a stretch. But I was just very surprised to find *something* at these exact coordinates. Hucka D. has since advised me (unrecorded up to this point) that this indeed does represent a kink in or, perhaps better, into the 4th dimension, calling the Fuchsia Point or Point Fuchsia. He says he’ll speak about it in this blog very soon. He also highlighted the 1/2 red and 1/2 blue component for this point, saying, yes indeed, that it is tied to the cardinal at Extasia, as well as its “opposite” of the non-flying chocobo. My guess is that he’ll state the chocobo stands for the opposite, blue color of the fuchsia composite, and perhaps even tie it back into the heart-diamond combo of the Okinu sim that’s part of this whole flow of examination. We’ll soon see if my guess is correct.

More coming up, then, I suppose!

Red cards… Redbirds… Cardinals May 10, 2009

When I first got a chance to fully absorb Nish Mip’s most excellent Fuchsia sim post, one I think should become a model for all future single sim examinations anywhere, I immediately hopped over to both Fuchsia and also Extasia (possible “twin” to Fuchsia, according to this post) to see with my own 2 virtual eyes the various mysteries and otherwise observations she had written about. I quickly summarized my follow up finds in 2 identical comments on both this blog and Nish’s own Big Orange blog.

Nish also mentioned the Okinu sim glyphs in her Fuchsia post, and compared them to the shifting textures she also found in Fuchsia. As a more concrete attempt to build upon her wonderful research after making my aforementioned comment, I decided to trek the ne-sw diagonal of that sim, as I had previously done in other locations, especially the Rubi sim that I use to live in with its mysterious TILE resonations. My idea was to walk this diagonal at least every couple of days, and to take snapshots of what had changed or perhaps even remained the same. However, let’s talk about a discovery I found on what I envisioned as only my initial walk in this study…

First I should mention that, just prior to this, I had Baker Bloch teleport around the interior Nautilus continent water sims to see if any were worthy of a similar study. I knew from my visits last fall that the underwater scapes of these sims contain interesting texture patterns; each sim also has its unique style of patterning. The closest to Okinu in this respect seems to be one called Quidd, at least among the ones that I checked (there are many). But still they’re not as sharp nor distinct as the ones in Okinu. So having retested the, er, waters out in another spot, I decided to give the Okinu sim all my attention in this direction. It still seems unique.

So about 2/3rds the way down Baker Bloch’s subsequent walk of the Okinu ne-sw diagonal he found this glyph that you just skirt the edge of to the west. This one attracted me more than the several others also seen from the diagonal because of 2 proximate, smaller glyphs off its southern end.

Somewhat surprising me (and Baker Bloch) in this area was a heart shaped glyph Baker Bloch had notably stumbled across before in this sim (recorded in this post), but with the color switched with the ocean floor backdrop in respect to that one, the heart being beige against a blue-green background now. Then next to it was a somewhat larger, regular diamond pattern. I immediately thought: hearts and diamonds — the 2 red suits of an ordinary deck of cards!

It was at this time that I began to think about that dizzily spinning bird in Extasia that I mention in my comment re Nish’s material, not only because it was a *red* bird but because it was also a particular kind of red bird according to its description: a *card*inal.

More to follow.

More Roamings, Misc. Stuff… May 7, 2009

The SL inspired abstract work of Bau Ur , who I met upon my first visit to Yapland. Very beautiful and moving. This is from Twilight’s Peace; her paintings are also found at the Palais du Gouverneur, Bourbon

Wilsonia was pleasantly surprised to find that the waterfall next to the Okinu sim was still there, with the inclusive parcel now providing a free inner tube ride that propels one over the end of a conveyer belt and directly into the waters of the Okinu sim some 30 meters below. Wilsonia quite enjoyed the ride!

Then she had to jump off at a certain point and take a gander at the glyphs she knew would confront her when reaching the bottom. Hmmmm… this one has an interesting sawtooth shaped jag to it.

Then it’s on to the Linden Memorial Island with Baker Bloch once again. I neglected to advertise in this blog that the island is now open to the public (!). More info can be found in this post from the official SL blog.

The same night, I believe, Baker Bloch visits some old stomping grounds in the Cecropia sim, namely the very green pool of water called the Grief Containment Pond, complete with a pipe that heads all the way south to ANWR. You can find out more about the latter here. Like ANWR, the Griefer Containment Pond is also listed as a Point of Interest for the Atoll Continent (Heterocera), but, as yet, doesn’t have any text on its particular page.

Anyway, back to Baker Bloch’s personal experiences with the pipeline that connects the two. Well, it does and it doesn’t. I’m pretty sure that Baker Bloch has walked in this pipe before, and I know Baker Blinker has. Before today, the Bakers were able to walk maybe a third of the way south toward ANWR before reaching a dead end. This day, Baker got stuck almost at the beginning. I’ll have to remember to send in the shorter Hucka Doobie to see how far he can now go. But at any rate, it seems that the pipe is narrowing, at least in places. More Sansara-Heterocera strangeness?

I don’t usually like to jump ahead of fellow explorers to areas they’ve advertised they wish to explore in the near future, especially to take pictures. But I did make this one exception. I’m sure fellow Sansara trekker Nish’s snapshots of the Fuchsia sim will be much nicer than mine, and the accompanying text will be much more journalistic.* However, I was struck by a *slight but perhaps still distinct* resemblance between this oddly shaped Linden created rook (chess rook, that is) structure near the western edge (left side of photo below) and my Darkside’s Temple of the Moon. I’m pretty sure I’ve been to Fuschia before, but I don’t remember this object at all, nor the forest that covers the much of the western part of the sim next to it. Hopefully Nish’s promised blog post concerning the sim will provide more light on this “mystery”.

Maybe it’s just the same combination of looking up through a crack in gray matter toward a blue sky. More research needed, perhaps.

Then it’s on to the “Something to CHRO About” gallery in Healy, but not with Baker Bloch this time, nor any of the familar, extended family. No, this is someone different: it’s the highly anticipated snapshot debut of *Karoz* that Hucka D. and I have been chatting about recently. As you can see, he’s very green. More on him later. Hucka D. has said several times that Baker Bloch and Karoz will be best of buddies in SL.

“Hey, I have pink hair now!” (Great… another comic in the lair.)

Moving on yet again, this time to Nova Albion, although I don’t think Edward Manray will be able to help me much with my examination of Sansara continent mysteries (thanks anyway for the im, Edward!), I decided on a whim to visit his office in a Grignano brownstone apt. building. There I spotted this prettily framed photograph hanging beside the front door. Judging by the appearance, this must be an ancestor of Edward Manray himself — is this gentleman, in a kneeling position, perhaps proposing to the queerly expressioned woman in the photo? Why is she looking directly at the photographer with such an expression? Luv to know the story.

On second thought, maybe Mr. Manray can help me out in some way. After all, I do know that Myst may be involved.

* Yes, indeed! Read here.