You know what? I seem to have started longing for the end...
More than one month already I am locked in this tight rubber pony suit, and at this moment I have no clue ow far I am from the end. It's not the suit or its restrictions anyway that bother me, it's - I know I am repeating myself - the laps. It all goes fine as long as I get some RL time and lag is not too bad, but you know... this isn't always the case.
And for the lag, no one apparently ever succeeded in creating an SL viewer that gets a decent frame rate on Mac OS X. Believe me, I try every viewer I can get my hands on, as long as it has RLV support of course. I'm putting my hope on Exodus now, I've seen a beta, but there were still some annoying bugs in it.
It's also scripting that causes lag, and this is a touchy point, as it's the scripts that enrich our SL experience. Without scripted objects, SL would have died long time ago. But on the other hand, I have shoes that are scripted, and there are means to measure the lag something causes, and they cause a lot of lag and to do what? To allow me to change the color or the size, or to make a clicking sound when I walk. And those are my most expensive SL shoes, and I like their look a lot. But the scripts in them are ridiculous, and so is the fact that they are "no mod" so I can't take them out. Ad there is plenty of stuff like this, plenty of useless scripts and lag worsening our SL experience.
But okay, I didn't want to blog about scripts and lag, I wanted to write about my being a huMare, and why I realized I'm looking forward to the end of all those laps...
I think I already told about the boards with the highest laps of the last 24 hour and the last week? Seeing my name on them gives me an indication how much laps I did, and helps me to estimate how long I still have to do. It also gives a motivational boost to see I'm doing well in the herd. I don't need to be the best or the first, it just helps me to know I'm "getting along".
But then there are those mares with too much time on their RL hands, who have time to run as many laps in one day as I can run in one week. I keep telling myself that I have a RL at least - and a pretty busy one - and as long as there is still place on those "score boards" for me I'm cool. But there's only 4 places on this board, and there seem to get more and more mares. There's often running five simultaneously nowadays!
So... when running, I nowadays find myself purely concentrated on the running, not my usual social self. The trainers I know might get a nuzzle less, I won't talk to other mares while running as I can't type while pressing the arrow up key, even if they say something like "get out of my way, I'm older than you!" what I seriously doubt, BTW.
Get me well, I'm not jealous or mad at those streber mares - as I'm the one with a RL - but a score board with more than 4 names could make me feel better in this growing livestock number. And yes, it might as well be my busy RL that's been working on my mood lately..
But well... I better get running now, instead of weaning.
whinnies!!
Friday, March 23, 2012
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Whinnies
Yay, just got another ride outside!
The drawback of course is I far from reached my preset goal of laps today...
It was Madame Elizabeth who decided me and another humare out on a cart ride. Only, we were not the ones pulling the cart, we just had to run behind it. But Madame Elizabeth's ponies are nice, their names are Anna and Storm, and they look like twins.
Did I mention before pulling a cart is fun? I have done it very little times, but I liked it. And the way it was done here, seems even more exciting to me: both the pulling ponies were blindfolded!
Ohhhhh, I'd love to try that myself! Imagine not seeing where you are going, and having trust the driver fully and pay attention to the whip commands very well. Marine Kelley sells a device for that, maybe I should check it out one day... if someone wants to be the driver?
Exciting, huh? And not, since I was only a spectator... wanting to get back to the court to run my own laps. I heard I am almost halfway. For how long am I a huMare already? Maybe it's better not to pay too much attention to it, and be surprised when it's over? But on the other hand it's good to get an update every now and then...
Did you notice I mentioned names? I wrote before you sometimes catch (part of) names. I think this is due to RLV only filtering out full names, thus letting first names pass through. But that's not how I learned the ponies' names! HuMares, and some ponies, like Anna and Storm, can talk to each other. And no one else can hear it ^^
Of course, it's not that easy to have your RL avatar type and have you run at the same time, so no: mare are not chitchatting among each other while running. I'm not even sure all mares know they can talk to other mares. But when not running, like when waiting in the stall for someone to take us out, or when dragged behind a cart pulled by other ponies, we can talk a little.
That's how Anna and Storm told me pulling a cart blindfolded really is exciting, but requires full attention. I think it requires some skills and full attention of the driver too. But of course I could not ask her, as to humans we mares can only whinny, snort, sigh,... and nuzzle them (if we know their name)
Ohhhh please Mistress, can I try that some day?
Whinnies ;-)
The drawback of course is I far from reached my preset goal of laps today...
It was Madame Elizabeth who decided me and another humare out on a cart ride. Only, we were not the ones pulling the cart, we just had to run behind it. But Madame Elizabeth's ponies are nice, their names are Anna and Storm, and they look like twins.
Did I mention before pulling a cart is fun? I have done it very little times, but I liked it. And the way it was done here, seems even more exciting to me: both the pulling ponies were blindfolded!
Ohhhhh, I'd love to try that myself! Imagine not seeing where you are going, and having trust the driver fully and pay attention to the whip commands very well. Marine Kelley sells a device for that, maybe I should check it out one day... if someone wants to be the driver?
Exciting, huh? And not, since I was only a spectator... wanting to get back to the court to run my own laps. I heard I am almost halfway. For how long am I a huMare already? Maybe it's better not to pay too much attention to it, and be surprised when it's over? But on the other hand it's good to get an update every now and then...
Did you notice I mentioned names? I wrote before you sometimes catch (part of) names. I think this is due to RLV only filtering out full names, thus letting first names pass through. But that's not how I learned the ponies' names! HuMares, and some ponies, like Anna and Storm, can talk to each other. And no one else can hear it ^^
Of course, it's not that easy to have your RL avatar type and have you run at the same time, so no: mare are not chitchatting among each other while running. I'm not even sure all mares know they can talk to other mares. But when not running, like when waiting in the stall for someone to take us out, or when dragged behind a cart pulled by other ponies, we can talk a little.
That's how Anna and Storm told me pulling a cart blindfolded really is exciting, but requires full attention. I think it requires some skills and full attention of the driver too. But of course I could not ask her, as to humans we mares can only whinny, snort, sigh,... and nuzzle them (if we know their name)
Ohhhh please Mistress, can I try that some day?
Whinnies ;-)
Saturday, March 10, 2012
Counting...
I'm a humare for 2 weeks now... no, almost 3... and I ran... I have no idea whatsoever how many laps.
Does it matter? Seems I lost count. Just like I thought I would. I'll see when I get out.
The only indication I have about how I am doing is trying to peek at the 24 hours and week charts. And that still requires some math to get out any useful information. If I even get on those charts, that is.
In the beginning that seemed easy, I was like the only mare actually doing some laps, so to my own surprise I was first on both charts. But meanwhile some mares have entered with muuuuch more time on their RL hands apparently, doing laps and laps and laps.
It's not really motivating me. But do I envy them? I don't think so. I have a RL at least!
But this RL is preventing me from doing laps on the other hand. If - I say if - I would be able to log on every day in the week and run like I have been running the last 2 or 3 times I have been on, I would easily get to those 1000 laps a week. But I'm not.
So when I'm on and I am lucky enough to have someone let me out of the stable to run, I think I do pretty well. Even though falling asleep sometimes makes me run over middle of the court instead of following the fence, so the stable Mistress thought I was trying to cheat. I'm not. I'm fighting sleep, and lag, and sleeping and hurting hands and fingers. I'm not even fighting boredom, surprisingly.
Good subs don't get bored?! Or they can deal with it?!
It's weird anyway how any distraction in the silent, restricted world of a humare becomes entertaining. The mare hearing doesn't let me understand any chat, except for a very few words I "learned", like "mare" and "good", but I hear people are talking around me. And emotes... emotes are exciting, since we mares get most of them!
Mares also don't get names, but some parts of names slip through this RLV restriction, and you learn to recognise your folks on sight. That's important. Mares can "nuzzle", but for that you need to know at least a part of the name.
Of course while running around a mare hasn't got too much time to gaze around. The eye holes and blinkers take care of that. A mare wouldn't be a mare without them.
And of course the mouselook plays its role too in restricting perception. Like lots of people in sl, I used to not like to be forced to mouselook. And depending on how it's implemented, this might be still the case: it's the chat spam some implementations generate that I can't stand, as I need to leave mouselook to switch to another window on my computer (RL sometimes happens!) and when I return to sl then, I would like to be still able to follow conversation. So for me, a good mouselook enforcer just blocks sight when not in mouselook, without producing endless chat spam.
Same for cam restriction, which is, in my eyes, a soft form of mouselook. Or better: mouselook is the strongest form of cam restriction. I think - and I know I'm not alone - an avatar is not really imprisoned in a cage or cell, if they can still cam out of it.
But... I need to stop now.
Just this: seems next week my RL will even be more busy than last week.... sigh
whinnies!
Does it matter? Seems I lost count. Just like I thought I would. I'll see when I get out.
The only indication I have about how I am doing is trying to peek at the 24 hours and week charts. And that still requires some math to get out any useful information. If I even get on those charts, that is.
In the beginning that seemed easy, I was like the only mare actually doing some laps, so to my own surprise I was first on both charts. But meanwhile some mares have entered with muuuuch more time on their RL hands apparently, doing laps and laps and laps.
It's not really motivating me. But do I envy them? I don't think so. I have a RL at least!
But this RL is preventing me from doing laps on the other hand. If - I say if - I would be able to log on every day in the week and run like I have been running the last 2 or 3 times I have been on, I would easily get to those 1000 laps a week. But I'm not.
So when I'm on and I am lucky enough to have someone let me out of the stable to run, I think I do pretty well. Even though falling asleep sometimes makes me run over middle of the court instead of following the fence, so the stable Mistress thought I was trying to cheat. I'm not. I'm fighting sleep, and lag, and sleeping and hurting hands and fingers. I'm not even fighting boredom, surprisingly.
Good subs don't get bored?! Or they can deal with it?!
It's weird anyway how any distraction in the silent, restricted world of a humare becomes entertaining. The mare hearing doesn't let me understand any chat, except for a very few words I "learned", like "mare" and "good", but I hear people are talking around me. And emotes... emotes are exciting, since we mares get most of them!
Mares also don't get names, but some parts of names slip through this RLV restriction, and you learn to recognise your folks on sight. That's important. Mares can "nuzzle", but for that you need to know at least a part of the name.
Of course while running around a mare hasn't got too much time to gaze around. The eye holes and blinkers take care of that. A mare wouldn't be a mare without them.
And of course the mouselook plays its role too in restricting perception. Like lots of people in sl, I used to not like to be forced to mouselook. And depending on how it's implemented, this might be still the case: it's the chat spam some implementations generate that I can't stand, as I need to leave mouselook to switch to another window on my computer (RL sometimes happens!) and when I return to sl then, I would like to be still able to follow conversation. So for me, a good mouselook enforcer just blocks sight when not in mouselook, without producing endless chat spam.
Same for cam restriction, which is, in my eyes, a soft form of mouselook. Or better: mouselook is the strongest form of cam restriction. I think - and I know I'm not alone - an avatar is not really imprisoned in a cage or cell, if they can still cam out of it.
But... I need to stop now.
Just this: seems next week my RL will even be more busy than last week.... sigh
whinnies!