28 Seconds

Posted by Ace on October 28th, 2010 filed in letters from Ace
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The 3, 6 and 9 keys are all broken on my microwave.


Sometimes You Gotta Do That

Posted by Ace on October 24th, 2010 filed in letters from Ace, music streaming
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Halloween music program went well, despite a few technical glitches.  If you were listening to the program between midnight and 1 AM EST, and wondered why all the Halloween-themed music was suddenly replaced by metal and classic rock:  we had a number of insistent floor requests from the partygoers to hear Led Zeppelin, such that I felt compelled to acquiesce.  Keep the home team happy!

When we did finally get back around to the Halloween music, though, I wound up playing more cuts than were included on the original list anyway.  So it worked out.


Halloween Music Program

Posted by Ace on October 21st, 2010 filed in letters from Ace, music streaming
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Will be streaming for the aforementioned Halloween party this Saturday, October 23rd.  Pre-roll will start at approximately 5 PM SL-PST/8 PM EST;  the official program begins at 6 PM SL-PST/9 PM EST and runs for just a hair shy of 4 hours.  Not gonna post the playlist here, but it’ll have a lot of what you might expect, plus a few surprises.  Link in the sidebar will tune ya in.  Cheers!


Well, Yes

Posted by Ace on October 20th, 2010 filed in game geek, quotes
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“She speaks English!”

Jack, on being addressed by Queen Elizabeth I in the diplomacy screen of Civilization 5


This is Halloween?

Posted by Ace on October 18th, 2010 filed in letters from Ace
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I am revisiting the world of BitTorrent this morning, in an attempt to find music for our SL Halloween party.  I had BitTorrent on Heart Reborn way back when, and several years ago, I used it to get music for our Amber Horizons Holiday Party, so successfully that I haven’t really had to do much in the way of acquiring holiday music ever since.  Not sure whether or not I can achieve the same level of success this time around, but as long as all my virus shields are in place, it certainly doesn’t hurt to try.

These are the invitations I did for the party:

The latter of the two is actually the first one I did, but the bulk of its content consists of a mash-up between a cemetery photograph taken by a man named James Cowie, and a figure shoot done by a London student who goes by the single word tag of Elne, so I wasn’t terribly comfortable distributing it without those attributions.  And besides, D likes gore.  The top invite uses my own art, and that’s the one we sent out.  After Halloween has come and gone, I’ll probably strip the text off it and see if there’s something else I can do with it, like make it into a virtual t-shirt.

Speaking of which:  Dragonia and I have opened a storefront in the Second Life Marketplace (as opposed to an in-world store, a location where you can take your avatar and examine and purchase the merchandise directly.)  There were a few steps involved, but it was sufficiently straightforward as to make me wonder why we didn’t do it some time ago-  except of course, that we haven’t had anything to sell until now.  As of this writing, our inventory consists of a grand total of 2 items.  It cost us L$20 to upload the two Targa textures to make those items, and L$40 to upload the textures to make a stock shipping crate (a one-time expense, since we can copy the crate as much as we want, and use it to send everything to everyone;  it could have cost less, but I was having fun making it.)  We have made one sale, of the book, for $L50.  L$3 of that went to Linden Labs as commission since it was through the Marketplace, leaving us with L$47.  So for the moment, we’re L$13 in the hole.  Hooray for commerce!

Meanwhile, in the so-called “real” world:  the giant house flies here in my apartment have been replaced by minuscule fruit flies.  They’re sufficiently minuscule that they avoid my notice under most circumstances, but every couple of hours one will drift lazily between my face and a light source, such as the bathroom light, or the computer screen, making me toss my head.  (The effect is nearly identical to that created by the floaters inside my eyes, which would be disheartening, except that I can kill the flies, and I can’t kill the floaters.)  I have yet to find their source.  I’ve washed the dishes, taken out the garbage, taken out the recycling, checked for rancid veggies.  They appear with equal frequency in each room.  I wouldn’t be too concerned about it, except at some point, I’m going to want to make this year’s batch of hard cider, and even one fruit fly hanging around in here could conceivably bork the entire process, if it manages to lay eggs in the cider.

And Jack has entered the “Legend of the Boneknapper Dragon” Draw Your Own Dragon Contest.  And is busily redecorating his Club Penguin igloo to try to win the Club Penguin Halloween Igloo Decorating Contest.  Good luck to him, on both counts.

And, um…  I might have made some friends.  Like, off the computer.  People who live close to my actual physical, geographical location.  Worth mentioning, but I don’t want to say too much about that.  I don’t wanna screw it up…


Gotcha

Posted by Ace on October 12th, 2010 filed in photos
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And Also

Posted by Ace on October 12th, 2010 filed in letters from Ace
1 Comment »

Hey! It’s Aliester Crowley‘s birthday! ;)


SL: FIN, Jet Lag sim (135,87,28)

Posted by Ace on October 11th, 2010 filed in Second Life
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I love good graphic design.


See? Not Dead.

Posted by Ace on October 10th, 2010 filed in photos
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From the Comments: Derivative Work and the Purpose of Art

Posted by Ace on October 9th, 2010 filed in from the Comments
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Gosh, I’ve been meaning to get to some of this forever:

Yoko:  On the subject of derivative works: I’ve attempted to make peace with that in the field where I work. Part of me feels like I have no talent because I’m not creating anything original, but what I create are new interpretations of other people’s work. I enjoy doing it, people seem to like it enough to want to pay for it. So it goes. I have a post about it in my (newer) blog somewhere, if you care to look at it.

Not that you emphasized this point in your comment, but I was reminded how in an extensive series of discussions with Neuro, I pointed out that whether or not other people like your work and are willing to pay for it has nothing to do with whether or not YOU, the artist, like your work:

I will never forget having the guy in charge rip the project I worked so hard on– a piece that was just as good as or better than any other one I’d ever done for him– to shreds, because he’d just returned to the City of Mists and had a shitty flight and then got stuck in traffic. Nor that the week I submitted the work on which neither of my two supervisors had any notes– a feat widely considered to be impossible– was also the same week that my divorce became final, when I was an utter vacant shell, totally on autopilot. Or that I’ve watched my associates win awards for their contributions, while the work I’ve slaved over and been intimately involved with on every level doesn’t even get nominated. I don’t know exactly what that means in aggregate, but it certainly points out some kind of fundamental disconnect if the goal of my artwork is to communicate with others, or gain recognition, or if I’m viewing my art as in any way representative of my Self. Read the rest of this entry »


But It’s Better Than Nothing

Posted by Ace on October 6th, 2010 filed in letters from Ace
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Since Helena budgie died, Astrid budgie has been intermittently mopey.  She’ll squawk furiously if she hears another bird outside, and she perks up in response to normal room activity.  But she no longer has any interest in leaving her cage (Helena was always the one who lured her out), and she mostly refuses to sit on your finger, either with both feet or just the one.

What she will do instead, though, that she didn’t do before, is let you pet her. And when I say “pet”, I mean literally:  she will let you rub her belly, her back and her wings, and even her head if you’re slow and gentle, with your finger.

It’s fairly bizarre.