Wherever Wednesday - Insilico

Last week I started my new blog idea - Wherever Wednesday. You can read more about it back on that blog page. I just wanted to make clear though, because people have asked, I may not blog about it on Wednesday and I may not even go though on a Wednesday (although I will try to go when it is still Wednesday in at least one timezone around the world) - all I promise to do, following my own rules, is make a note of the SLurl of the Emerald loading page picture thingy the first time I log in to SL on a Wednesday and then visit that place as soon as I can.

So on to this week's trip. Wherever Wednesday edition 2 takes you to Insilico. The loading screen image is dark and kinda futuristic, so me and my travelling companion for this trip, Lysi, donned appropriate clothing before tp-ing off.


The big overview-type picture shows what sort of place we're dealing with here. It is futuristic, as I said. A stark, black, cityscape.


Upon landing the first thing I noticed was movement behind me. As I turned around for a better look I wished that I hadn't. Mechanical spiders don't make for friendly-faced doormen. We hurried off down a tunnel opposite, hoping the spider would be too busy to want to follow us and devour us. Mechanically.


The first stop on our trip was a diner in an old train carriage. There were no staff so Lysi had to step behind the counter and rustle us up some travelling food. I was tempted by the quiche down the counter from me. Until I saw it was green. And it wasn't a spinach quiche.


Our tummies filled with futuristic food and Pepsi we carried on down the tunnel until we reached a sort of factory pod-filling type room. I am not sure what the pods were for, and what the blue gloop in them was. There were no tourist-information signs.


Insilico has a transit system with wall transporters dotted around the place. In some ways I am against using this sort of thing when exploring a place as it kinda seems like cheating to me, but in other ways it does allow us to skip to the highlights without getting too lost.

One of the first places we headed, were the apartments, mainly because we figured that's where the people on the map might be and it would be good to be somewhere with people, rather than empty, shadowy tunnels and alleyways.

It turns out we were right next to the apartments so we didn't tp far. We walked up floor after floor of spiral rampway finding the door to each apartment locked. Ok, so this isn't where all the people on the map are. Camming around, all of the apartments looked empty apart from one. To be honest, I wasn't surprised. I think living here instead of a nice sunny beach would lead to me doing myself some harm. It's not exactly a cheerful sim.


Take this bedroom of the one non-empty apartment as an example. Now, I am all for tying in your decor with the theme of the sim, but would some decent lighting go a miss? Maybe a plant or two, a painting of a mountain landscape, a bookcase, and more of a bed than a dirty old mattress?


The next place we found ourselves, quite accidentally, appeared to be some sort of church that appeared to be a place of worship to the colour blue. You had to join a group to make a donation. Seems a bit cultish to me...


Eventually, after some more wandering, and TP-ing we found ourselves in a skybox high above the skyscrapers. As you would expect with this sim though, it wasn't your usual skybox. Now correct me if I'm wrong, and I don't live in a skybox so I might be, but they don't usually come with cyborg justice pods as a standard fitting, right?


Just upstairs from the pod I got plugged into, on the mezzanine, if you like, was something much more homely - a couple of sofas and a tv. After wearing ourselves out we decided to rest our weary feet. I wish we hadn't. The Japanese advert for 'Fruity Oaty Cakes' will follow me to my dreams...


So overall them, it is sims like this that blow me away. The sheer scale and imagination that goes into something like this. The level of detail and the time needed are phenomenal. Take for example the fire in the pic above, or the moving shadow on the floor of the rotating ceiling fan. The pic doesn't do either of them justice.

It was a dark and brooding place, very Blade Runner. You wouldn't want to come here for a bit of light-hearted sunny frivolity. It is a beautiful place in it's own way but not exactly cheery.

Again the random gods of the loading screens seem to have picked a place for me where there is little to do, but in some ways that doesn't matter at a place like Insilico. You just need to walk around and look.

A battle of wills

Do you ever have those evenings where banter turns into sticking tongues out at each other which turns into flicking the v's at each other and where, before you know it you're stood toe-to-toe, eyeball-to-eyeball, refusing to be the first one to stop an animation?

No,....erm.... me neither.... ahem.

Missing out

No, that's not really me there in the middle. I'm not Mr Popular. My cut-out is. I was at work.

Boss decided it would be a good idea to rez a cut out of me at his club. At least he kept the Marnix cut-out under 50 feet tall. This time...

Soaring

Sometimes you just gotta dance, y'know? And when a friend TPs you to head on over to the new club her friends have set up, sometimes you just have to put on your dancing shoes and hail a taxi.


I'd not been there before, given it only opened last week, but the Mile High Club looks like a pretty cool place. Especially since it has the twirly sky dancing platforms thingies me, Lolita and Boss first saw while watching Starflower play a while back. I don't often frequent clubs in SL, mainly because anywhere with more than four people in the sim presents a high probability of me crashing, but this place seems like fun. But of course half the fun of any place is the people you're surrounded by.

Even if I was there on my own, to be honest, this place would still get a thumbs up though. Any club where the DJ will play me Axel F (the Harold Faltermeyer original of course, not the Crazy Frog version!) on request is alright by me.

Home sweet home (again!)

I thought it proper, given I moved home a while back, to give you a bit of a tour. I have been busy getting things right, so I delayed until I has happy to take visitors. It is almost there now, but is probably about ready so take a wander round while I put the kettle on.


The house is a prefab. I wouldn't even consider building myself. Are you quite mad? It's by that well-known bloke who sounds like a cross between a Second World War spitfire pilot and and Egyptian god. The house is called Angolo, which means 'angle' in Italian, factfans.


If we start outside you can one of my favourite parts of this little island. This hammock is just awesome and has some cute little poses in it. I love lying here taking it easy.


Wandering through the door you come to the living room, complete with dog corner and open fireplace. I love my gorgeous new bonsai tree. I killed a bonsai I had once in RL so it is good to have a second chance with one that won't die.


I've gone for quite a minimalist look with the decor as it seemed to fit well with the house style.


Up and round the corner is the bedroom. La boudoir de Marnix, if you will. Actually. it might be le boudoir. I don't remember. Excuse my French. The bed comes complete with 'jump' animation. There really is nothing quite so good at erasing the worries of the day as jumping up and down on your bed.

By the way, how much of your own artwork can you put up around your house before it can be classed as self-indulgent?


And just up from the bedroom we come to the bathroom furnished with a brand new hot tub.

I 'built' and textured that floor myself. I was so proud of the achievement :)


And now a few gratutitous night shots, just because they looked nice. And demonstrate how long it took me to take all these photos. It was daytime when I started!


So yeah, house complete. Apart from a few little finishing touches. Any time you're free, stop by for a chat. The coffee pot is always full.

A big claim

Close by the Beaumont sim I noticed a sign.


Sadly the structure had banlines around it so I couldn't get any closer but a little camera ninjery allowed me to view all the way to the top. So the answer is....a platform and some flags?


While I'm here, this sign makes a bold claim. But is it true? Can anyone beat the height of this column?

Wherever Wednesday - Beaumont

I've been thinking for a while now that I need to explore more. But where to go? That's the question. Then, while loading up SL the other day it came to me - my new bright idea - Wherever Wednesday. My idea, which natch I'm gonna blog for your delectation, is to tp to wherever the Emerald loading screen is showing, and do it on each and every Wednesday. Can you see where I got the name from perchance? At the very least I'll end up in some places I've not been before. I'm just hoping there isn't too much water to photograph. My graphics card doesn't do water.

So, Wednesday. Time to explore. The very first Wherever Wednesday. And the loading screen suggests..... a sim called Beaumont. Now I have never heard of Beaumont at all but on landing it seems to be a workspace for Lindens.


Of all the amazing places I could have tp-ed, the random gods of the loading screens effectively chose an office. I apologise. At least the dancing frog was welcoming though.


There were some interesting looking 'workspaces' though. Not your usual glass box. On, and in case you're interested those big white boxes above have a pic of a rat on them and say "Lindens want you! To be their rat! Tell em to slurp your butt!" Er, ok then...


There we no Lindens in sight while I was there but there were some pretty important looking posters. I think the one above me here shows how LL plans to take over the world.


And there may have been no Lindens in person but there were plenty of Linden bears around the place.


Now this is my kind of workspace...


To be honest, I felt a little like I was trespassing as I wandered from one office to another, eating their left-over pizza. I hope the Linden whose communications tower this is wasn't saving that for breakfast. Can you get banned for eating stray pizza, d'ya think?


I felt very important sitting in all the chairs of these clearly very important people. I too want a laptop with a squirrel on it.


Overall, the sim was a very eclectic place. It did feel like lots of different buildings and locations dumped on the same sim rather than having a consistent flow. But I guess this is exactly what it is, to be honest. It's not meant to be pretty and flow-y and consistent. And there's not an awful lot to do.


Up on the hill, by the observatory, you get a great view and more interestingly, there is a cannon.


Show me someone who cannot resist climbing into an empty cannon.


It's very tempting, you know. READY...


AIM....


FIRE!!!!


"Six point oh" for a perfect landing. I have to say, travelling by cannon is a great way to get to meetings when you're running a little late.

In summary then, this was not the best ever start to Whatever Wednesday to be honest. I hope future excursions will be a little more riveting, with a little more to see and do.

Oh, and just a final disclaimer - the Wednesday in the title refers to the day I explore, not the day I blog :p