At the end of the long road of a “dreadful” 2013 and nearing the coming of 2014, I can say it’s been a cool period, at least in my SL. It’s been far from perfect, but cool nonetheless. It hasn’t been a year of innovations or new discoveries, but several significant changes has taken place. Let’s review some of my doings in 2013.
January arrived while I was having fun in Lionheart Estate. I stayed there until the sim where I built my “home, sweet home” vanished at the end of the month. Nope, I didn’t do anything to provoke the closure: the estate simply needed to adapt to the times, and that situation called for the “amputation” of two sims to make the rest viable. That’s what’s been happening to most estates since the end of SL’s golden age several years ago, when the promising flow of new explorers gave the wrong impression to land barons that they were coming to stay, and in the rush they stretched their simdoms too much. Since then, the world has been shrinking, at a slow pace. During this month, I also tried a parcel in a homestead for the first time since 2008, and thought I liked it for its excellent landscaping potential I eventually gave it up because of cost factors.
February went blank in the blogging arena, not because I was lazy, but because I was pretty busy landscaping. Back then I was holding two homestead parcels in different sims at Glenxi Estates. I may have done a hundred landscaping jobs that month (and the two that followed), but only a few got finished. That’s a “strategy” I’m perfecting (roll eyes): doing things and keeping it to myself because sometimes it’s hard to find the time to sit and write something coherent, seriously. I don’t know how other people do it, but I can’t. That’s the kind of blogger I am (roll eyes again).
In March I switched themes and went for a beach. I just wanted to experiment in the cool spring sun before the blazing summer arrived, to see what to expect. It didn’t last long, though; I went back inland after a short while, though I secured the usual humidity levels staying close to a body of fresh water.
And so I kept playing in my quarter homestead parcel in April. Oh, seven hells: I should consider going back to paradise again… but I’m not in the stage of isolation anymore. I need space, but not in standalone sims; I’m sure about that.
May was the highest month of the year in terms of blog productivity. That was due to the Home & Garden Expo. I also moved back to Lionheart Estate after they reopened a now refreshed sim they had closed in February for remodeling. The redesigned sim looked pretty, with its cobblestone streets and mesh trees and all. I got two small parcels (one is never enough, is it?). It was a pretty good-looking suburban neighborhood for mixed purposes, so it had its residential lots, a few shops, an actual church and at some point even two libraries. It also had a large train station and an out-of-place wizard’s tower of a monument that nobody visited, but well, it was there too.
June was a chaotic month. It started quite well in SL, but my real life went berserk since day 1. I just went through one of those turning points in life I guess, when you say, “Alright, this is it; see you in the afterlife,” but I managed to survive… both the illness and the medical experience. I’ve been trying to adapt to my third life since then.
Because of June’s happenings, I spent July in recovery mode, both from illness and from the shock of having a significant part of my SL inventory lost for mysterious reasons. In a sense, I got almost all my “memorabilia” of the last six years transported to uncharted oblivion, from where I managed to recover only a few things. Thankfully I “discovered” SL sailing and the pleasures of continental vastness, which became a nice soothing therapy that helped to lower the stress levels accumulated so far. Because of that, I started to consider moving to mainland for the first time.
In August I eventually rented a parcel in mainland after pondering for a while. SL sailing requires access to the sea, and though it would have been a matter of just tping to a rezzing zone or renting a small slip in a yacht club to have a boat out, I chose to build my own, as usual. This new real estate phase has brought with it a long period of questionings of how things work or should work in SL, since it’s a different experience for a private estate parvenu.
After that initial renting period, I decided to “go ahead” and buy a mainland parcel in September, becoming a premium subscriber for the first time in my six-year SL “career”. I still question myself why I did it, but I guess I just wanted to experience how it is to live under LL rule. I also wanted to save some money (if possible) because tier in mainland is somewhat cheaper than in private estates due to the land being less costly to maintain. Nevertheless, I also discovered how outrageous land prices are in mainland if you want to live in a convenient place. It took me two whole months and then some to find an affordable protected waterfront parcel not very far from Nautilus, the capital of SL sailing.
October was mostly sailing, sailing and more sailing. I learned how to maneuver SL sail boats and was willing to join in the fun of SL racing. Of course, I wasn’t expecting to win any race at all, but to have some fun trying. There’s a lot to be learned yet, though, since I know nothing of RL sailing either, and all the terms in there apply in here as well. I will have to confront my ignorance before taking things more seriously.
In November I started my current cranky mode, which has spread to the month of December, and doesn’t show any signs of subsiding in the immediate future. I think that’s what you get when you live in the real SL: Mainland. I also confirmed why private estates are actually the idyllic places their owners make them to be. If you’re living in one of them, don’t dare to leave just yet: hold on to it. Mainland is like living in the streets of a grotesque metropolis, fighting for your life everyday… well, not in a literal way of course.
In December I went back to renting parcels. This time I moved to Bay City, where life feels like living in one of those exclusive (even –semi– luxurious) neighborhoods you only see in the pages of Prim Perfect Magazine. This is the community in which Lionheart Estate is based on, so adaptation took no time. I was actually looking for a place where I could get more prims for the buck, and this was the place I found that met the criteria. It isn’t a place for landscaping, but it has an active community unlike any other mainland area. For the time, I may stay here for a while… and welcome 2014 in the comfort of my humble abode.