Today I was using the map to explore. The map shows where people are, so you can looks for clusters of people and then go there.




Everytime I'd zoom in on a place, it would turn out to be gambling or "adult entertainment". It was actually pretty depressing - given the limitless opportunities in Second Life, the only intriguing activities are gambling and porn???

Just as I was about to give up using the map and go back to using search, I stumbled upon the Chicagon soccer stadium. There were a few people on the field kicking a ball around, so I sat on the sideline for a few minutes to watch. Several os the people nearby found the catsuit amusing, and they asked if I wanted to play. You pretty much just run full speed at the ball and hope that you make contact. It was actually pretty fun, except I didn't know which team I was on and kept having to ask which way to run. I wish I had some video of it - maybe next time.

I found scuba gear!

A quick search in Second Life brought me to Hinkley Engineering. They sell all kinds of transportation things - like jetbikes, hovercraft, and scuba equipment.



Buying things in Second Life is much easier than buying them through one of the catalog sites (like SLExchange). You just right click, select buy, the funds are deducted from your SL account, and the item is added to your inventory.

Once the item was in my inventory, I tried dragging it to the main Second Life window, but it wouldn't let me. I figured it was because I wasn't allowed to add items to the Hinkley Engineering island, so I went back to the New Citizens Area but it didn't work there either so I went to one of the Sandbox areas.

When I dragged the item from my inventory, a big box appeared.



Right-clicking didn't do anything, my only option was "Take" which put it back in my inventory. How about "wear".



Nope, that clearly wasn't right either. My first thought that was that it was all a scam and I just bought a box of junk. I'm so trusting :) There weren't any instructions anywhere, but I was clearly missing something obvious.

I searched the support forums for "box on my head." I was pleased to learn that it's a common mistake, a newbie right-of-passage, if you will.



Now that I had the gear on, it was time for some diving. I searched for "scuba diving" and found Cave Cult.



It essentially replaces the walk action with swimming. He even blows little bubbles! Too bad there isn't much underwater development yet. If you know of some, please let me know.

In an effort to find things to do in Second Life, my latest searches have been related to sports. So I searched for skydiving and came across Abbots Aerodrome.

There's an info kiosk that explains how it works. First you have to go inside and get a parachute. There are a few different kinds, I went for the freebie. Even though it's free, you still have to buy it (for $0) for it to be added to your inventory. Once it's in your inventory you right-click and select "wear" - I had to temporarily remove my tail for it to work, since only one item at a time can be attached to a given bodypart (now THAT sounds weird).



Then you sit on the skydiving pod, where you can specify the altitude from which you want to skydive.



On my first attempt I chose 4000 meters, and other than the moderately entertaining freefall, there's not much to see for the first 2500 meters or so.



I also didn't pay attention to the instructions and forgot the command for deploying the parachute, so it deployed automatically when I reached a certain height. I wound up entirely too close to some wind power generator things.



The next time I deployed the chute on time, but didn't steer and wound up landing in the water.



Which made me think - perhaps there's scuba diving somewhere in Second Life. I'll have to search for that next time.

I'm experimenting a bit with gestures - nothing fancy, just learning how to initiate them using keyboard shortcuts and creating new gestures that are sequences of gestures. I know, I know - pretty basic stuff, but I'm still learning. I'm also still learning how to use Premiere :)



These are all in the default gesture inventory - so if you know of places that have good gestures, please leave as a comment.

Today I found a nice garden called Tranquility Island. There's a relaxing gazebo area and ambient sounds such as wind chimes, trickling water, and cricket chirps create a serene environment. And the yoga pose ball is entertaining too.





While I was exploring, a coworker found an interesting location and offered to teleport me. Teleporting is a quick way to move to a new location, regardless of where you are or where the new location is. I forgot to "stand up" (remove myself from the yoga pose ball) before accepting the teleport, and now I'm stuck in the yoga pose with no "stand up" option. I can still move around by flying, and a levitating cat doing yoga poses is somewhat comical.

The Family Fun Place is gone! Good thing I have the screen captures to prove it ever existed. The land is now vacant and for sale (incidentally, listed with Anshe Chung who you might have read about in this Business Week article).



I'm a bit disappointed because it was a great PG place (although it is listed as "Mature") to show people different types of things you could do and different ways to interact with objects, pose balls, etc. Maybe it's still out there somewhere, just renamed and on a different island. Maybe there's a blog or forum that tracks disappearances.

I guess that's the point of the Second Life Historical Museum. Here I am checking out some exhibits on the second floor.



Elements of Second Life appear and disappear constantly, so digital preservation is the only proof that something once existed. (I figured out how to make SLurl's - which is a way to link into Second Life - so if you use Second Life, here's a link to the SLHM.) The SLSM is worth a visit to learn about events and phenomena in Second Life's short history - and there's also a waterslide nearby.

Today we held a work (yes, work) meeting in Second Life. I acted as tourguide and showed my coworkers the balloon tour and the Family Fun Palace.



I learned that if you use IM instead of chat, random people in adjacent areas can't hear you. We had one random person come over and start talking to our group, and another person came up to our group and started doing weird karate moves. More later on "gestures".

I figured out how to capture video :)

Trampoline

Waterslide

Landmarks are to Second Life what Bookmarks are to internet browsers. The list of interesting places that I found at the New Citizens Plaza included a landmark to the "Family Fun Place". I learned that if you right click and "touch" something, you can add it to your inventory (kind of like "save"). Here I am having a fruity cocktail.



Unfortunately I had to detach the cat paw in order to hold it. This was a great place to discover because I learned a lot about the types of things that you can do (other than wander around). For example, you can right click and sit on things. Here I am floating in an inner tube.



Some places that you sit have action associated with them. For example, in addition to sitting (as exciting as that is!) I could swing.



This was also my first encounter with pink and blue pose balls. If you right click, a menu displays and lets you do an action appropriate for the space. For example, I "sunbathed" which made my avatar lay one way, and then flip over every once in a while.



Video captures it better.

I still wasn't too happy with catgirl, so today I tried on the male version of the catsuit. The default version was too muscular, so I played with the appearance settings and added some meat to him. And now I'm wandering around as an overweight siamese cat.



At New Citizen's Plaza, I found a notecard that described some interesting places to visit. The first one that I tried was the balloon tour of Linden Village, an island developed by employees of Linden Labs. Here I am in the balloon passing over a marina with some boats in it.



More later on the list of interesting places.