I never imagined I’d be a blues club hostess. I was genuinely surprised when Magi McBride offered me the job about a month ago. I had seen how good and bad hostesses behave at various clubs I have visited, and I developed an attitude that if a host or hostess didn’t greet me in the first couple minutes or so of my arriving at a club then that was a bit of an insult. Greeting friends and guests, and making them feel comfortable has always been something I like to do at all the clubs I attend. So, I suppose I am a good candidate to be a hostess. Anyway, I like the job and am glad it is now part of my Second Life.

Yesterday, I didn’t have a hosting gig of my own but I made a point of showing up at HOT WET BLUES during the day to help out if I could. Later in the evening, DJ Ali had a gig over at the new DreamCatchers club and I tp’d in for the first hour of her show. WT arrived and tp’d in to join me and we both grabbed a beer and began celebrating his vacation. And later I tp’d back to HOT WET for part of DJ IornGut’s gig.

Magi and I had a long chat about how there are now more blues DJs and blues clubs and they are all competing for the same basic time slots. However, the blues crowd is more or less fixed at least at this time and each DJ’s draw is not as big as in the past. We talked about some other issues like fundraising for Autism research, and I think Magi is cooking up a great idea. More on this later.

Late Night: Expedition #5 Continues

I couldn’t sleep. So, I teleported to where expedition #5 came to an end. I sent a message to the adventure group but almost everyone was offline. I didn’t even change out of my skampy little club dress. I just started hiking toward Clara.

Once again, Clara was part of the Luskwood theme area, and I entered the forest and further south into Freelon, continuing south into a clearing where I found a heard of cattle. And continuing south further still, I hopped over a deep creek to a lovely little island which was connected by bridge to a plot where Chip Midnight’s Fine Fashions store was located.

CMFF was an impressive architecture and I simply had to do some shopping. However, once inside I was confronted with what I can only describe as a warp in the SL space-time continuum. I was going to try and describe what I mean, but instead I snapped a picture of a product that was on sale. I mean, selling L$1000 skins with noob hair models? Maybe it’s just a girl thing? Anyway, aside from the really nice architecture, the store featured overpriced and forgettable everything.

Again, continuing south I climbed a hill into the Da Boom sim, and from the hill and to the west I could see the huge lake on Smith sim. A few meters further and I came across a most interesting store, The Landchick, Robin Ivory. It was a land store but it also contained the first map I’d seen of the sixth continent (below). It also contained a map of what must have been the original world of Second Life (more on that in the future, as I learn more about it). Fining maps like this is what makes the expedition process interesting to me, and I was very pleased at this point.

I continued a little further south and came across a piece of land for sale by a one, Rockwell Ginsburg (24 years old). He was selling a nice 1024sqm lot for a mere L$307,200. I read-up on Mr. Rockwell and his enterprising and it seems that he is one of those entrepeneurs that buy-up land methodically. Perhaps he is a rich guy because, if he has as much land as I’m assuming he has, the tiers must be extraordinary. I mean, we are talking about mainland land. Anyway, his scheme might make sense if the sim itself had something special going for it, and it did not.

After musing about Mr. Ginsburg’s land holdings, I continued my trip into the what was a disfunctionally designed sim, infested with “I can do this” objects and landscaping. At the southern edge I came upon an otherwise lovely beach overlooking a huge lake on the Kapor sim. I say “otherwise” because the owners of the beach use it to demonstrate their design skills and in essence use the property as a huge advertisement for their website (Web Page Design & Foxgloves Store & Garden.. got all that?). I took a picture, clearly the owners have talent but lack taste and I say this because I found their objects scattered around the sim in every ill conceived spot they could find.

After the Da Boom south beach experience I made my way back up the eastern half of the sim. I was generally disappointed with everything I saw and to make matters worse I came across the first NOT ENTRY region I had encountered so far on the expedition, a cemetery of all things. There was a relatively nice temple then a store/club thing that sold M-16s and other assault weapons, skins and the usual assortment of clothes, etc. Along the way, the Café Da Boom popped up, a refreshing change in a sea of confusion.

I was feeling pretty much on a downer when I crossed back into Clara, but there it was, a most wonderful contraption! Of all the useless “I can do this” junk I had seen during the expeditions, there finally stood in front of me a most magnificent flying machine (see below)! In fact, if it had been for sale and if it would actually fly, I’d immediately adopt it as the official touring vehicle of Yordie’s Adventurer group. What better place to end Expedition #5.