Wow, it has been a long time. Covid has been and (mostly) gone, and much has changed in my Second Life since 2020.
I am still busy, more so than ever, really. To begin with, Grevile Oh, the Prince of Chiaroscuro, passed away in October 2021, leaving the regions without an owner and without any means of payment. We managed to hang on for a few months but inevitably the regions closed. The community lives on, with the help of a friend who is letting us have some cheap land with a very flexible prim allowance; not a full region but a parcel big enough for our needs. The Saturday parties still continue, 2pm every week.
We also lost Eth Tedeschi, one of our DJs, who passed away a year later, which left us with only Bailey as our sole DJ. So I rather urgently learned how to do it myself, (thanks, Youtube) so now it’s Bailey and I who alternate each week. I am really enjoying it; putting together a themed playlist is as much fun, if not more so, than putting together a themed costume. I’m also co-ordinating all the events, hosting when I’m not DJing, (actually when I’m DJing I’m doing both) and building the sets, many of which are in unique skyboxes, frequently inspired by the ones we originally had on Chiaroscuro.
But the Spirit of Chiaroscuro lives on, you can find us now here: maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Badger/98/171/113
My avatar has also changed a great deal over the past two and a half years. The biggest change is, yeah those two big puppies.
It’s funny how the change over time has mimicked a RL transition from male to female. It’s taken aout the same amount of time and has been a gradual process. I no longer exclusively use the Maitreya body, I’m using it about half the time, with most of the other half in Reborn, and occasionally Freya or Erika. I love Reborn but it still lacks any kind of fantasy or historical clothing. I’ve also switched heads (about half a dozen times) – I stayed in Catwa Queen for a good while, but recently took the EVO-X plunge and went with Lelutka Inez, which I think looks more like my original Justin male head than any I’ve seen since.
Despite appearances to the contrary, I still think of myself as genderqueer and male-leaning; you’ll often see me with facial hair and rarely with makeup except when it’s part of a costume. I don’t think of myself as a trans woman, shemale or anything of the sort. I’m not a “chick with a dick”, I’m a “dude with boobs”.
I’m currently not living in Bellisseria; I decided that I needed to curtail my expenses and for now I’m on mainland only, split between a parcel I bought for livng in, and the one I’m renting for Chiaroscuro. I’ve also kinda got bored of Belli houses; I went through all of the themes, finishing with Victorian which was the last one I hadn’t really tried before. When I let it go, I browsed the land page and there wasn’t any that really inspired me to roll again, so I think for now I’ll stay out in the sticks. If I change my mind later, it might be worth bumping my alt up to Premium instead of raising my own tier.
So that’s it, in a nutshell. I came back because I needed an external page on which to publish the Bonniebots post, but now I’m here I may as well use this again.