I am sitting here and thinking: How many people do I know that I can trust? In the true sense of the word? Who, in their turn, trust me and would therefore stick up for me and stand by me, no matter what? Answer: One. The Boss.

I think it is in the nature of the beast which is now spilling out all over the pavement as social structures are breaking down. There are no more tribes. No more extended families. No life long friendships. People move around too much. Living has become far too complex a matter for those things to still be affordable. Some people do better at it, of course. But there are masses of others out there that are exactly like me. They live in the absence of trust.

So, why the boss? She comes from a rural background where social structures are still in far better shape than they are in big cities. And trust has been bred into her. Mind you, it is an emotion reserved for her huge extended family. We have a word in Turkish which is quite untranslatable: “El”. It denotes people that are not kin. Somewhere along the line, the boss decided that I was kin even though we are not related. Will her kids inherit her values? The boss will see to it that they do. And if they do not she will whop them on the head with a skillet until they learn! She is that type of a person. Someone to be reckoned with. But she is a complete oddball and not many other parents will achieve what she does. The social fabric is in tatters and one has to be a person of extraordinary fiber to withstand the blast.

And who wants to anyway? It is so much more fun to be footloose and fancy free. To no longer have to worry about commitments. I have a cat who for the past 2 years has had chronic diarrhea. It is really bad, it happens wherever she sits and walks. Otherwise, she is a happy, alert, affectionate little animal. Eats voraciously, the grub goes in on one end comes straight back out on the other. When she wants to sit on my lap I first have to spread down paper towels. I cannot think of one person amongst my acquaintance who has not suggested that I have her put down. Only exception: The Boss. Of course.

All this is hitting me with the force of a 7.8 Richter scale earthquake. And, I do know what they are like, we had one here 10 years ago. 50000 people died. Only thing to add is that I am completely amazed that it is happening only now, so late, so many decades into my life. What was I thinking until now? Playing Pollyanna? In the face of social landslides! Like as if this is a matter of personal goodwill? I used to lecture this friend of mine about his lack of trust. Boy, was I wrong and was he right…

So… What do I do now? With the rest of my life, that is? The spot where I seem to have been all along, and that I am looking at quite dispassionately for the first time now, is horrifyingly bleak. And I am not at all sure that I want to continue being here. Somewhere along the line I must have screwed up very badly, gotten all of the rules of survival upside down. Not sure when or how. Probably a very long time ago. Now, how do I get out?

This is quoted from an email conversation with a colleague where we were discussing Second Life artistic endeavors.

And it is an understatement if ever there was one – when you consider it solely from the vantage point of “objects”, that is. You cannot export objects out of Second Life at the moment. Well, yes, there may be complex, esoteric means of doing so. But the results fall far short of expectations. And what is more, you also cannot import objects into SL. Yes yes, sculpties, I know. But come on people, let’s face it: That is a half measure at best! And not even… Which would be the reason why professional architects tend to avoid the place like the plague – outside of a handful of visionary pioneers who (correctly) regard it as a testing ground for architectural concepts. I mean why waste time on building stuff that you cannot send to a 3D printer to create a physical architectural model to show to your clients? Surely AutoCad works better for that?

When it comes to art however, you have an equally big, if not even bigger, problem. SL-Art will not get you RL shows. Other virtual art work will. Create something in OpenGL or VRML and the world is your oyster. Every art & technology oriented venue, biennial, curated international art event, juried show, museum, gallery – you name it, it is yours for the taking. Do the same exact work in SL – no one wants to know. I know this from personal experience: I have tried. It won’t work. On one occasion I even had the reviewer own up to their prejudice: Kicked off the rejection paragraph with “who would have thought that work like this could come out of Second Life!”, continuing to tell me in something like 300 words how they loved what I had submitted, only to end the paragraph with “sadly, the work has been created in Second Life and as such is not suitable for this event”. The work in question was Anatomia. And no, I am not going to tell you the event that I had applied for (I may yet do so again one day, after all… ;-), but it was one of the biggest art and technology exhibitions globe-wide.

So, as my colleague says, the output to RL is very tiny. A host of aspiring individuals, who have rezzed just one phosphorescent glow object too many, have seen to it that the place has acquired an unbelievably bad name for “serious” art. So, unless you are Cao Fei, you suffer for the misdemeanors of others. It is unjustified, I know. There is good art in SL. Few and far between, it’s true. But it is there. And what is “good art” you may ask? Well, I talked that one into the ground a few months ago and in case you missed it, here’s the link.

For me at least, art in SL has absolutely nothing to do with the creation of objects. It has to do with the construction of identities for which “objects” may or may not be utilized. I am going to dare and take this one step further even: I would dare to suggest that the creation/investigation of identity (as opposed to the creation of objects) is one of the very few routes left to explore for “serious art” in the year of 2010. Where there is a big question left unanswered. The quest for which involves wandering down the abyss of who you are and coming face to face with the complexity of “you”. And bringing that quagmire of “you” back to the surface of your consciousness. And sure, this may involve the creation of objects. Objects as signifiers of identity.

It could be argued that when it comes to the creation of objects human ingenuity is endless and what is wrong with wishing to create even more of them? For me, what is wrong with the practice is that unless you contextualize what you rezz (SL or RL, I am using the word rezz in a broader context here) within some deeper quest, you will inevitably end up with silliness on your hands. And the silliness may even look good! Not at all the point – how good it looks! It will still be vapid, a pretty soap bubble which cannot sustain its own existence. Anyway, we have always contextualized our creations within deeper quests, up until the last 30 years or so. What happened here, of late?

What happened (I believe) is that we hit a wall. As a species. Not where science and technology are concerned, mind you. There we flourished. Or design. Again, we went from strength to strength. But in art we floundered on the same rock of materialism that aided creative progress in those fields. Quests that dared to address unanswerable questions became very “uncool” in the modernistic/post-modernistic world of materialism… And so all art was left with was a bunch of PC clap-trap, social awareness, bla bla bla bla… And of course, objects. Just that. Objects.

You cannot take objects out of SL. What you can take out is a mindset. A mindset wandering down the path of the self, or of novel perceptions of the self. One that is constantly testing the borders of consciousness and metamorphosing them into art. Art, very likely, created outside of Second Life – art that feeds on the mindset of the synthetic world from whence it arose, however. Just to give one tiny example: I reviewed a paper written by Gregory Garvey for a special edition of the Journal of Consciousness Studies the other day. Garvey points at a number of strong analogies between the Second Life experience and clinical dissociative identity disorders; particularly focusing on the default “over the shoulder” POV of most virtual worlds and similar perceptual shifts in clinical DID patients. Fascinating subject, fascinating paper. Artwork based on a query of this “over the shoulder” POV and how it affects identity and consciousness would, in my mind, not be a “tiny output to RL”.

There is an “artistic” migration to RL from SL in progress, even as I write. And quite inevitably so, I fear. However, as Castranova describes very beautifully in his book, unlike a discrete, one way migration (as is the case with population shifts in the physical world), this migration may (hopefully!) be of a continuous nature, with migrants switching back and forth between the physical and the synthetic world. The mindset in one world, the output in another.

Curioser and curioser… As Alice once said…

I am not sure if is at all OK for me to be putting this here. I should have asked for his permission before doing so, which I would do in a heartbeat, except I am so bloody shy about contacting him.

For me, this is the exact definition. Exact! Verbatim. Every syllable of every word! And then the way he sings it… So, I am going to risk the wrath of all the IPR Gods and even more importantly of Bob Dorough himself (as well as lyricist Fran Landesman), should they ever stumble upon it, and post this here nonetheless:

If you talk about a musician who is special to you, are you (in the end) (again!) talking about yourself? Well, yes. I suppose you are. But, no matter – I do want to talk about Bob Dorough, for whose music I placed a big order at Amazon last week. Apparently they manufacture one of the items I wanted only on demand, so I am still waiting for the whole shipment to arrive; but this is my Syncretismas gift to myself this year. You can listen to the samples if you are not familiar with the man’s music here.

I had not thought of Bob Dorough or listened to him in a very long time. I used to have his stuff on audio cassettes. Then when that technology became extinct I tossed out the whole kit and caboodle which I had accumulated during one of my major clean out sessions some years back and Bob Dorough’s music went out with the rest. And then lately I started hearing his songs in my head. Why I hadn’t done so in so long I have no idea. Anyway, the real music should be arriving in a few weeks and I cannot wait!

For someone who adores The Who, Bob Dorough may appear to be a somewhat bizarre choice but nevertheless I love his music – and I love Bob Dorough. He does “vocalese”, which means he adds lyrics to jazz standards that are essentially conceived of as instrumental music. And then he also sings quite a few regular jazz standards that others have in their repertoire as well. Like Polkadots and moonbeams, after which I named a whole alpha.tribe outfit. I do not really care for any of the other versions of this song sung by other vocalists, but his I love!

And much the same also goes for Devil may care and even Midnight sun (although admittedly Sarah Vaughn does a pretty mean Midnight sun as well).

He sings almost like as if he is talking, even maybe whispering. And yet there is still the melody. But he sort of teeters on the edge of melody, doesn’t seem to make a big deal out of it almost and yet it pours out perfectly of course. Off the cuff he is. Naughty. Mischievous. The voice of the refusal to grow up. Sticking to your guns of childhood as you plod through your boring old grown up life. And it carries both the joy and the sadness embedded into that state of being, which would inevitably bring with it humor and idiosyncrasies. And somehow Bob Dorough sings all of this, brings his psyche through in his vocals: Very tongue-in-cheek, very mercurial, very tough to pin down. Almost impossible to categorize, almost impossible to put a label onto.

Like I said – I love Bob Dorough. I love the music itself  of course, it is awesome. But I do more than just love the music in Bob Dorough’s case. I hear the one who sings it and love what the voice tells me of its owner

I just rooted around online a bit and Bob Dorough is alive and well at the age of 87. He has a page on my-space and I am almost tempted to sign up and become his friend there. Bloody shyness stopping me of course. In any case, although it is extremely unlikely that he will ever hear me doing so, I wish him all the very best of health and longevity and good spirits in the upcoming decade!

And!!! Major discovery: I have been desperately trying to find one of his albums which he recorded together with Bill Takas called Beginning to see the light in 1976, particularly for the track called Better than anything, the lyrics of which can make me chuckle on even the lousiest of days – but really the whole thing from one end to the other. I was willing to pay whatever anyone was asking for it but it seems to be extinct. And then voila! Here it is! What a find! What a blog! What generosity! YAYYY! Thank you Cat and LauraDoe!

My PhD professor and mentor Roy Ascott, to whom I owe far more than just this one word is the one who coined the term “syncretismas” a few years ago when he sent out a syncretic season’s greeting. It fits what goes on here, an essentially non-Christian society, to a tee and I have thus embraced it wholeheartedly in describing the occurrences around this time of year in what I think of (mostly quite fondly but sometimes also critically) as the land of the shapeshifter. Today I went to a cut-price hyper-market to stock up on household utensils, cleaning things and so forth. And then later I took a stroll around Kadikoy market. And since the preparations for “Syncretismas”, which is celebrated here on New Year’s Eve in the shape of a completely secular, non-religious “Christmas”, are well under way I took the opportunity to document some of what I saw, to share with people who do not know my culture.

So, without further ado, we kick off with what would have to be the all time symbol of Syncretismas: The alem tree ornament, needless to say hugely favored by the more devoutly religious Muslim crowd:

The “alem” is the metal part at the very top of a minaret. Usually there is a sickle moon at the tip, sometimes there isn’t. The ones with the moon are of course very popular and sell out very quickly. So, what is left over today are the regular ones. The good news is that this year they also seem to be selling separate little moons and stars which you can screw onto the thing if you wish to. This goes on top of the tree, where you would normally have the angel or the star on a Christian Christmas tree.

Efes is the Turkish Budweiser (so to speak). However, Raki is the thing which really puts a smile on our faces… Rivers of it get consumed on Syncretismas!

Bit of a traffic jam in the ornament aisle?

The city decorates the main avenues and streets with fairy lights and shops (no matter how modest) do their bit to add to the season’s cheer as well.

Every segment of the population celebrates Syncretismas. The well heeled at fancy restaurants along the Bosphorus or at elegantly catered home affairs, the modest folk with a home cooked meal. There is a traditional Syncretismas dinner with turkey (yes! you heard right!) where families and friends get together. However, we have replaced the stuffing with a special Turkish rice dish. And we have traditional Turkish meze (tapas) before. And for afters: Baklava and Yule-log? On the same plate of course!

Santas are very popular. Last year we had this little drummer Santa all over the place. If I catch him being sold again this year, I will definitely add a picture of him to this post later since he is really hilarious. This year we seem to have a mountaineer version, complete with backpack and rope ladder. Does any other country have this? Or are we the only lunatics on the planet?

Gifts are exchanged. Again, each to his own means: The glitzy types swap Bulgari’s, the modest folk go for  – well, modest stuff…

One thing about Turkish Syncretismas is that once the grub has been demolished at home or at the restaurant it is also big time party time! Istanbul has literally thousands of night time entertainment venues and they all dish out the goods for the disco crowds. However, what almost everyone, young and old and rich and poor alike, does is go out to a street party at least for some part of the long night. The major ones are organized by our (avowedly Muslim!) city administrators. The biggest one is at Taksim Square and I believe well over a million people attend it every year. There are live bands who perform until nearly daybreak on multiple stages, Efes gives away free beer and at midnight there is a huge fireworks display over the harbor. And then there are scores of street parties on all the smaller squares as well. Some organized by the municipalities and some by neighborhoods. Although the amount of drinking is phenomenal there are hardly ever any incidents. This is one night when people want to celebrate together in joy.

Haci Bekir is the place for traditional Turkish sweets, specifically the lokum i.e., Turkish Delight (which in no way resembles its British namesake by the way). Please click on the image to get a closer look at the “Turkish” parachute of  Santa, decorated with sickle moon and stars. Very nice samovar too, on the left…

And finally: The red knickers! I am not sure if other cultures have this as well, however here it is a long held belief that if you are wearing red knickers at the chime of midnight, you will have lots of money in the new year. Never tried it, so I cannot vouch for it’s working or not. What I do know is that shops and markets fill to over-spilling with red underwear at this time of year…

?

Don’t ask. I live here. I am from here. And I love it here. Do I understand this totally bizarre culture which seems to be achieving such an unexpected synthesis between religions and cultures? How could I possibly? One thing though: Apparently, historically Turks celebrated the winter solstice during the long millenia of their nomadic/shamanic sojourn, only to be interrupted briefly during the past few centuries of Islam. Today Turks are Muslims, but mostly, if not indeed invariably, Muslims of a very strange melange. The shamanic thing survives somewhere deep inside, I think. And “Syncretismas” may well be yet another manifestation thereof.

…

This year I will be spending Syncretismas, aka. the Turkish New Year’s Eve (Yilbashi as we call it), with my aunt who recently lost her husband, with whom she has spent the last 50 “Yilbashi”s. She also has an orthopedic problem for which she will have surgery early in the year. So, we will not be hitting the streets, but spend a quiet evening together at her home. Which I am really looking forward to given the funny, charming, intelligent companion that she is.

…

I am so glad that I can post this now, right after the last post. After having completely let loose about how I am so fed up with the mediocrity, the banality, the cliche ridden existence of contemporary art in general, it feels so good to be bowled over and wowed by this! Truth be told I am at the point where I no longer even bother, no longer go to art events, avoid biennials and such. I no longer want to be subjected to so much ado about nothing, to endless loops of grainy video with no tangible beginning and no end. I have had it!

And then along comes somebody and grabs you by the scruff of your neck and frog-marches you into the Haus der Kunst in Munich and you stand there gobsmacked, not to mention thoroughly ashamed of your all-encompassing big mouth from just a few days ago!

Well, maybe not straight off the bat, I have to admit. The first piece is gigantic and impressive. As I subsequently find out the massive construct was shown at Documenta where it collapsed during a storm and what I am looking at here is the relic corkscrewing onto itself in gigantic cylindrical segments. A relic assembled out of hundreds of doors and window frames torn out of old Chinese houses. Poignant, shocking. It is really quite stunning and I am duly stunned – and yet, and yet, I cannot help but feel that I am still facing “a problem solved”, the spectacular output of a master designer commenting on the “rape” of antique artifacts, in other words. Then come a number of three dimensional Chinese maps, delicately constructed wooden towers that are maps when looked at from above. Truly beautiful, but again, smells very strongly of a designer’s mind to me. Not that anything is wrong with that at all – I am one myself after all and have nothing but the deepest respect for my own trade. But art? Hmmm…. I wonder… I mean, I really am trying to co-operate here but at this early stage I am not yet convinced…

And then, we make our way into the central hall of the exhibition where a petrified forest awaits us and there I am totally blown away! This is certainly no master designer but an artist – a genius of an artist, in fact: This is the brink between order and chaos, a visual response to the question with no answer – presenting you with even more questions, even more riddles.

I am difficult by disposition (in the unlikely case that this might have slipped your attention somehow) and so inevitably some few details, such as the photos of the 1000 or so Chinese citizens whom Ai Weiwei brought to Documenta and which provide a background texture to the forest and especially the tent displaying their accommodations next door keep on niggling at me. I really do not want to see them. Why? Because again, they seem to bring in some kind of a “problem solved” thing which is so insignificant next to this sea of gigantic trees. Or to all of those heavy beams driven into those delicate antique tables on display in yet another room. And then there is a single table and a single beam in one other room and suddenly the whole exhibit, tree trunks and all, does a huge perceptual flip for me and I see Eros. Not Eros the cute little cherub equipped with bow and arrow but Eros the primal force. As in Eros the roof beam. But also the table. Many tables. The couplings of roof beams and tables. And then next door, huge chunks of trees, almost fossilized, arranged like the soldiers of the terracotta army. And also neolithic urns, thousands of them, so many in fact, that he has ground them into dust and placed them in glass jars. Some colored with aniline paint. Metaphors I almost understand and yet do not. There is a fight with human culture here – maybe. The insignificance of it – or maybe the significance – or maybe a contradiction grounded in culture. Really, I am not sure. But, am I glad I saw this! And at the height of my hatred of “contemporary art” at that!

So, who was it that dragged me kicking and screaming into the gallery in the first place then? It was none other than the human of Selavy Oh! There are very few people that I really seem to hang out with in SL, and Selavy is one of them. We first became associated while I was writing up the NPIRL blog post last June. Emailed back and forth about the work, met in-world a few times and so forth. After the post went up we made a pact: We would say hi to one another once a week. It seems that we are both very shy (yes, despite my loud mouth I am in fact very very shy and so apparently is Selavy), therefore unless we had had an agreement of this sort we would undoubtedly have gone our separate ways. But we have in fact kept up this pact and have hung out, mostly via email it seems. So, a month or so ago when I knew that I would be going to a conference in Munich, Selavy’s home town, we arranged to get together and have a coffee at least. Coffee turned into an almost 5 hour session, during which we first wandered through Ai Weiwei’s show and then through various streets and quarters of Munich, in and out of underground trains, punctuated by cups of coffee, a lunch during which I demolished 3 gigantic weisswuerschtl and Selavy’s human half a roast duck; more wandering, quite a few cigarettes (turns out we are thoroughly nasty old smoke stacks, both of us). During the entire time, I do not think that we stopped nattering even for one minute – or at least I didn’t for sure. And somehow Selavy’s human also managed to get a word in edgewise every so often, I guess. Which is highly commendable, of course: Shows persistence!

Not to worry. I am not going to go into any kind of a discourse over RL and SL and their respective merits and shortcomings now, would be very inane to still be doing so after 3 years of full time SL Residency anyway. Only one thing to say really: Human beings can smile. And avatars cannot.

Fact.

Here I am! About to be flayed alive!

These people are all cream of the cream, top of crop researchers from places like the Fraunhofer Instititue, talking about stuff like 3D streaming video resarch and mega-scale bandwidth optimization! I think I am the only one who will walk up there and talk about something that is not cutting edge telecommunication R & D! I feel like a total dunce!

Oh God! My derriere is totally totally fried!

…

Update: 4 hours later and it is over. How did it go? hmmm… Crash and burn would about some it up, I suppose. Not to mince words, they didn’t care for what I had to say one tiny little bit. Also, the fact that I read my presentation hasn’t helped much: What I talk about can be classified as research based in Arts and Social Sciences and with that type of stuff one always reads, since one is quoting most of the time anyway. With engineers this goes over like a lead baloon since they usually present their personal research output and therefore can just go ahead and talk. Even the lectern was not set up for giving a “read” presentation so I had to look sidewise/down at some kind of prompting screen set up at my foot!

It was a disaster. Pure and simple. Not even a hhh to soften the mood, I’m afraid… ouch.

The new academic year is into its second week and I have just come home from a full day’s teaching. Usually this is a moment when I only want to crawl into bed: The campus is located 60kms outside of the city whereas I live smack in the center of it. The traffic is horrendous pretty much all day and particularly so in the evenings and my last class finishes at 19.30. On a bad day it can take up to 3 hours to get back home. So, really one is entitled to one’s bed when one walks in the door, but I am in such a good mood about this years crop of students that I am actually still sitting here dashing off a post.

My new graduate class: Usually I only have one or two at the most, but this year I have 5! And that is great in itself since a group always creates its own synergy. And this group seems to be a good one on top of that: Naz, who is no stranger to this blog anyway, a very feisty chick and oodles of talent to boot. Sinan, who wants to know everything – Mr. Inquisitive he is – hhh. Not a thing gets mentioned without him immediately pricking up his ears, wanting to know more. Which is great! Curious people! The world needs more of them! And a spectacular designer/illustrator he is too, I should add. Onur, an architect who may want to work on virtual/generative architecture: A very imposing figure, he had all of us examiners spellbound during the entrance exams last June, not only by his presence but also by his grasp on his field. Barbaros, shy to a fault, a charming young cinematographer who looks to be very promising in what he wants to work on, which is visual narrative (broadly speaking) – as indeed does Naz, I should add. And then, of course, Deniz, who was my student last year as well. Not immediately obvious, but actually he is a riot. Comes across as cool as a cucumber and then knocks you sideways with laughter. He is already quite advanced in his Master’s project which is a graphic design generator working along the principles of evolution, that is a system whereby the result is derived at through a coded design interface working along the principles of variation, mutation, selection. Towards the end of the class he showed the group his work and we were all duly impressed. The 4 newbies obviously do not yet have a completely clear idea of what it is exactly that they want to work on, which is only natural. Early days…

Anyway, I have no idea where the 3 hours that I spent with them went to. It was so entertaining chatting with them that one minute the class had just started and the next minute we were running for the shuttle. They did want to know about Second Life and I did tell them of course. I doubt any of them will be working there, with the possible exception of Onur the architect. I think I will take them in next week and show them around a bit anyway. But whatever they do and wherever they end up doing it, it really does look like as if I will have a really good time with this bunch.

It is time to talk about alpha.tribe.

I am spending a lot of time working on the output – to the extent where sometimes I have a hard time falling asleep because there is some new thingy floating around in my head and I get up in the middle of the night and fire up photoshop to do things. Wander into the shop in the early hours of the morning and start rezzing prims. It is a full fledged obsession. And not only the work but all of it. Sometimes a few days go by and no one buys anything and I feel low: Instead of checking emails  (as one does), I first look at the transaction histories of the 5 avatars on their SL accounts pages when I get up in the morning. It isn’t about money obviously: I would need to be selling thousands of items to talk about any kind of a tangible income. And, of course, I do not. I make enough to cover my day to day SL expenses and a bit above that perhaps. Maybe, in time, it will be enough to cover the fee of the new homestead. Certainly not what I pay for Syncretia as well. Not anytime soon anyway… So, the obsession is about something else.

…

Bettina asked me the other day about Syncretia, that she was concerned that I was no longer so interested in “building”. I have been a multi tasker for as long as I can think; so no, I have not given up building. I will do that as well. But, the thing with Syncretia is that it is finished. And there really is no reason whatsoever for me to hang out there, to go back there even. The new sim, yes… Of course. I will be building that – eventually. It will take a couple of weeks, maybe 3 or 4, but probably not even that and then that too will be done, finished. I will be putting an alpha.tribe store there as well, I should add. I can do that, it is not educational land.

The thing about designing avatar apparel is that you can just keep on doing it, over and over and over again – infinitely. Each outfit is a novel design system which you need to tackle all over again, from scratch. And it is an imaginative process. So, on the one hand it calls all of my previous design know-how into question, but then you can use that design know-how to really take an imaginative leap of fancy. I am my own client in a way, I write my own brief and then I implement it through the 5 avatars. And while on the one hand one does need to pay a lot of attention to inherent design restrictions such as those odious avatar templates for instance, the total nightmare of getting one’s head around that little problem right there; on the other hand it is a truly liberating process. You need not worry about RL design issues such as “function” or “usability” or “specifications” or “legibility” (a very big one for the work of a graphic designer, this last one). You can play – really and truly. So, it is a designer’s paradise. No wonder I am so enthralled with it. And like I said, it is endless…

…

But is that it? It is quite a bit of it, true. I really am preoccupied with the creative process. But that is certainly not what makes me run and check my transaction pages every morning. What it is is that alpha.tribe is giving me a purpose. It is giving me the illusion of having a valid reason for carrying on my existence in SL. That I am needed somehow. The illusion that I have clients who look forward to my producing something new. It is, like I said, a huge illusion and of course I know that it is anything but true. No one needs me or particularly wants me or cares if I am around or not. But, when I click on the transactions page and see the names of avatars that have bought this or that, that have valued the stuff that I make enough to actually pay me for it, it gives me that illusion of being needed. And, I need that sense of purpose to carry on. To justify my continued existence in SL. To myself.

…

And no, even though it may sound like it, I am not sad. Just trying to formulate an explanation to an obsession, that’s all.

…

Just thought I would write down what I am doing these days.

So, summer is here, which means vacations for people in my line of work. Not so this year for me: They have offered us a week in mid-August at the museum which is affiliated with my university and so we are supposed to be exhibiting our student’s work there. The fact that Istanbul is dead (and I mean dead!) at that time and that a week is a joke to begin with doesn’t seem to faze anyone and so we are all working for that. I have done a lot of this type of stuff in the past and told everyone that I would be keeping clear of the grunt work this time around. But of course, in the event it doesn’t quite work out that way and so I have been trecking out to the uni every then and again. grrr…

…

It was very hot earlier in July, but right now it is actually OK. We somehow seem to be getting a bit of the northerly summer wind which this place was famous for until about 20 years ago when the greenhouse effect put an end to it. But, in any case, the past 10 days it has been very pleasant.

…

I have a new sim next door to Syncretia called Syncretia Annex. I got it last month when they had that reduced offer for homesteads going and so this is, in fact, a homestead with only 3750 prims. I have not really done anything substantial there yet. I just dug some underwater canyons (the big idea is that almost the entire sim will be underwater) and piled a few things on this underwater plateau where the canyons meet up. I have a few ideas but I am letting them simmer on the back burner for a while, which as I remember, is what I did with Syncretia also. That place too sat around for a couple of months before I really started the big work there.

wolfie and me testing the canyons for submarine access at Syncretia Annex

On the other hand I have been very busy with alpha.tribe. I really enjoying making the stuff. And although we are not breaking the bank or anything like that, for a new business I guess we are doing OK. Obviously, the stuff is mostly totally bizarre and wouldn’t be to everyone’s taste. In fact, I have gotten some hilarious comments, like people telling me that although our things are quite well made they are totally impractical! What exactly are they thinking of doing whilst wearing them, I wonder? Wash the windows? Do their ironing? Run up some Excel charts? hhh… Well, at least they tell me that the clothes are well crafted. Something too I suppose.

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Other than that? No, I am not doing the cruise! What was I thinking even? Me and a ship-full of fat-cat types? Thank you, but no thank you! So, I am not really sure what I should be doing in the way of a vacation – if anything… I will be going to a conference to present a paper in England in September. Cyberworlds. Good conference, tough to get in, so I am pleased about that.

Oh and I am getting the house painted. Work is to commence next week. And then I am still dieting my hiny off. Almost all of it is gone at this point but I am not giving up until my favorite jeans are a perfect fit – again! And that is probably another couple of pounds away…

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