I wanna live a vibrant life, but I wanna die a boring death

This is the..."Ham Tree"...at LORE. It's a group gift.

Mesmer's love of meat where meat should not be is spreading...

Anyway, it's been...void stars, the 30th of March. That is a long time not to post. There's been...a steady uptick in head pain. And, I think, two falls? Not sure. Maybe just one.

*Em goes to check...*

So, I did mention the concussive episode. Right. So the fourth fall...eh, let me just grab what I said, it'll be easier...

[10:39 PM] Emilly: I made a snappy little graphic earlier.


[10:40 PM] Emilly: Apparently that was too subtle for the rest of the court. Ah, well.
[10:42 PM] Emilly: Ranked from least stupid to most, I'd say this was just slightly less stupid than trying to put on a coat and falling instead. This was me trying to stand up, but being too far forward on the chair, when I reached for stable surfaces, the gas lift in the chair supports engaged, and I slipped right off.

[11:04 PM] Emilly: There was profanity. One of the girls came in and pointed out that my legs were not, precisely, oriented as legs usually were. And then began the debate, between saying hello to the EMTs again, and just going about the rest of the day. The lynchpin for this being, can Em get off the floor by herself?

Should I have just nodded and gone to the ER? Maybe. But at what point do I just accept that fragility is my state of being? That, I don't know.

[11:07 PM] Emilly: It was...a struggle. There is a fear of falling developing, and I'm not even sure it's worth heading off, because it's in the places where I think I can just move through it, do things I used to do, overreach to get something that seemed necessary at the time...So, it's going to be a great deal of second-guessing myself, which will be annoying. But, maybe necessary too.

And hoo boy, am I being careful now. Of course, the screaming back and left leg pain--must've been the left leg that took the brunt of the latest fall--is helping me considerably to be careful.

I'm just...I'm getting so tired of falling. I have seemingly gone from my current age to 197, and that's hard to deal with.

Anyway. Want to get this done...er...

Damn it. All set to go through Emmation City's haunted house, and...now I have to log off. Gah!

Okay, fine, one image, and then we'll be in the full review. So part one, I guess.



...or not, because I can't remember which sim I took this in, and--beyond being from Madame Noir--what's the name of these insane clompy plats. Even better, now I can only find two images of the original (brief) run of eight! ARGH!!



But here's the second shot for this post, I think...the third? That I took this night. Can't find the other two. That is deeply bugging me, but onward we stagger. So part one coming...I hope soon.

I've got a three day headache and it's all in my head

It's the 30th of March. One day before Ostara. And there's been a lot of...well.



Conversations like the one below.

[18:43] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr) hugs you
[18:44] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): I was just starting to pack things up for dinner. Though I don't know if I'm going to be in tonight--the pain of head and the head pain and did I mention the head? It's kind of distracting.

Which was followed soon by:

[18:43] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr) smiles, tilting up her face for a kiss. Dinner's dragging its feet--or, well, his or her feet, depending on driver. I was going to go check on progress.
[18:46] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr) will see how she feels, she may be taking the night off. The head is...bad. I feel like I should tuck a "Bridge out" sign behind one ear.

Yeah. It's been...it's been a day.


All of it, all the mysterious fatigue, the odd tremors, the patches of growing nerve damage...the headache that occasionally tries to kill me for funsies...it doesn't look great.

Though, I should say, anyone new pops up with a diagnosis of somatoform disorder, I'm just going to full-scale bite people.



At SOME POINT, which I'm hoping is today, but may need to be tomorrow--I'm putting out the rabbit monster from Ever Green. Even if it stays out after Ostara, because damn it, I bought it to put out, I AM GOING TO PUT IT OUT.

And...then decide on the rest of the night.

Time for Em to faw down again, maybe.



No, not really.


(And why yes, Noah Finnce's "3 Day Headache" was the song playing...very, very, *very* low as the background for writing this. Why do you ask?"

hide away, they say, 'cos we don't want your broken parts

Yeah, so...remember that thing I was recovering from? You know, last year?

Yeah. I did it again.



So this is Em Faw Down Go Boom part III: Return of the Back Issues. Or something. I didn't outright fracture anything, nothing in the spine was broken or out of place, no cracks in the skull--just brain sloshy and pain.



Okay, no actual dying. Dying would hurt less--er, I mean...Rephrased, I have a concussion, I'm in a ton of pain, because I fell back and hit nearly full-on (some fun new muscle knots in the left side notwithstanding) to the back and the back of my skull. And while I would adore having the freedom to just get effective painkiller, the US is still reeling from the opiod crisis so everyone's scared to prescribe much beyond a leather belt to bite.

I didn't even injure myself in a thrilling story-type way--I was on my way out of the apartment, I hit the elevator button, then tried to throw my coat on--and felt myself falling backwards. And failed utterly to stop the fall.

I remember swearing, loudly, and hearing someone on the second floor say they heard a thump--next thing I know one of the attendants is looking at me, saying "Call 911!"

Like, don't get me wrong, I like the fact that we live so close to a fire station, I like the men and women who work there--I just don't like looking up at a ring of them, from the floor, for the third gorram time.

So. WILL do the shoes. Will also work up a thing for the latest tattoo release. But my time at the keys for anything--SL, computer, or straightening out the desk--is limited right now. I will get better, but I think the universe is tired of playing at this point. So yes, I will be more careful and yes, I will rest when I need to (which right now is many hours at a time), and I will do my best not to let this happen again. This month.

(Because I'd love to promise "until next year", but void stars, it's been three falls already, and I was still recovering from the first two!)



I'll get there. It's just put even more time between me and recovery than I had before, and I had a lot of time before this trip to the ER!

he cried and said, "She's crazy", and showed off all his burns

I may, in fact, have too much color for the ShuǐMò Gallery, but they're very inviting:

[21:37] Shui Mo Entrance: Welcome to ShuǐMò Gallery! This space is an art installation created in the style of Chinese ink brush (ShuǐMò) painting by FionaFei. Initially designed as a stand-alone art installation is now also used to house Fiona's other artworks. Follow the scrolls to the giant red double doors to head inside! Please feel free to roam around the space and sit on the artwork. :-) Enjoy your visit Emilly Orr!

And then six days pass...(Also the above was written six days ago...)



Four of those days were spent unpacking shoe demos. I wish I was kidding, that's how many I pulled down. (Never let it be said I don't commit fully to the bit.) One day was spent starting to pick the best ones to compare with the geta set, so I wouldn't have to stand around at the gallery forever going through things.

And yesterday...all hell broke loose.



And then today, I find out that essay is under "official review" for violation of the site's rules. Which strikes me as shutting the office after the whistle-blower's gone...

Unfortunately, the problem's not going to just disappear, and while I fully grant, fracturing a leg--after passing the year mark on the Never-Ending Headache--distracted me enough not to notice last November that this was starting to become known, and folks were scrambling to invent stopgaps to prevent child avatars from accessing their adult sims...

The mere fact that I have to type that should be enough to give us all pause. Because...why would a child avatar want access to adult sims? But also, at least one of the SL children I know--and for the other three, one's deceased and one's mentioned in that article and one went to Zindra opening day...only spends part of time in SL as a child, and the other part as an adult avatar. So--how do we deal with those cases?

Plus, the Gearhaven estate comprising sims who want to fully lean in to that adult branding...discussion arose on the essay, and what we, as an estate, wanted to do, and Hiro said--at least for a while--zero tolerance. If it's even slightly iffy, bounce.

Considering the Duchess of Gearhaven had the habit of running around as a Dinkie, or in the Kemono avatar, to build or landscape...that zero tolerance policy means I can't. Which means we have to give severe side-eye looks to Tinies who wander in, or anyone wearing the Tweenster avatar...it's going to be a mess. It already is a mess, considering the Linden accused was responsible for firing a well-known security specialist...and the optics on that are so, so bad. Because even holding the assumption that that particular Linden is innocent of all charges, he did, essentially, fire a security specialist for asking questions. AKA, you know, doing her job.



Ooh, yeah. Get ready for forty-seven miles of barbed wire. Soooo much fun.

it's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me

I know. I know, okay? The last...if I'm being honest with myself...month has been...difficult.



Well...no. For a variety of reasons, including my brain's not useless, just hobbled, but mainly that if I actually hit my head on the desk, I'd scream and pass out.

Soooo. Part of the absence was, I got far too focused on finding high heels in SL, to compare them to the Daitengu all-but-stilts--(seriously, they pass so far into ridiculous that they circle around again into perversely amusing) and forgot that I didn't actually need to get (or demo) EVERY single fetish-height platform spike on the grid.

That's on me, I fully own that.

And there's--slowly, laboriously, I hate that building is so hard right now--rebuilding the Duchess' Garden in Tannhauser Gate--the new "origin" point to work out from being a set of giant redwood trees LOVE put out last week.

And last, the physical situation in RL...it is getting better, the upper tibial fracture healed, and at this point the dual hamstring injuries are, if not healed, substantially better...but there are still problems.



So yeah...lots going on, and I both need and want to get back to regular entries...or, well, entries at all...but it was becoming an overload condition on its own, the more days went by.

So, I am cutting my losses and will work on covering the stilts this week, and will pick up semi-regular coverage from there.

Including two AOs which I promised to cover...Yeah.



I'll get there. Everything's a process, right? Right.

starting 1st May, no bus will go here anymore

I can't find the thing.

Let me say that again, as it's vaguely important: I CAN'T FIND A SINGLE ONE OF THE PICTURES OF THE LAST THING I WAS GOING TO REVIEW. Worse? I CAN'T REMEMBER WHAT IN THE NINE HELLS IT WAS I WAS GOING TO REVIEW.

Add to that the frustration that I'm not already healed last week, getting a slight cold from the girl, local temps crashing, my own current dissatisfaction with my ability to Em...

Anyway. If nothing else, I needed to just get away from it all.



And tossing out the original review I had been planning entirely, whatever it was, and since I still haven't changed out of the outfit I was wearing two or three days back, I decided, we'll just pick something at random. Which turned out to be the "Elemiah" Illuminated Glass Halo from /Vae Victis\.



Also om nom nom broken bits.

I'm currently at the Snowbound hunt, looking for various baubles (in world, there's a glass ballroom with all the keys where you rez, or you can jump to Flickr for each maker's bauble color and number of prizes), and--of course and always--mourning my inability to buy Lindens. (Why is this such a constant state, Em? Oh, right, depression.) It ends January 21st, so a bit ouch if I don't get to things in time. Still. It's a pretty (and pretty crowded) build, overall.



And there's a train, so you know I'm happy. (Wrote that as "appy" first--and no, no, definitely not appy.)



But now I'm out of gingerdead coffee. Darn. Pepperminthe it is!

(Oh, by the way, if anyone feels like getting a belated gift card for coffee for yourself or a friend, or buying coffee for future me, even, Death Wish Coffee is a good one [I adore their Pumpkin Chai, it's just straight-up good spiced coffee, but their Dark Spirits Chocolate Rum Ball is also amazing]. If you're more into just good, unflavored coffee, Top of the Mornin' Coffee has a lot of really good blends--for dark roast lovers, I can't recommend their Midnight Oil blend enough. For fans of lighter roasts, give their High Noon a spin--that one's responsibly sourced, and organic! Also Dungeon Brew Coffee. [Looks like they have some of their Minty Magic blend still in stock.] I have a friend in Chicago [where one year his cat froze to his apartment window], so that tipped me to Hero Coffee, which bids to serve really excellent cups and donate to charity at the same time. And Many Worlds Tavern--they're not as stellar as Deathwish or Top of the Mornin', but they're good. And they're gamers, so occasionally they throw in dice! And I can't fail to mention Bones Coffee, because OMG, their White Chocolate Peppermint Bark is sooooo good, and I'm dying to try Sweet Tater Swirl, because--sweet potatoes? In COFFEE?!?)

(I'm not sponsored by any coffee company, just FYI. And I am far from a dedicated Q Grader. I just like coffee.)

Just for fun, I decided I wanted to see the minimum and maximum sizes in the halo. Here's the min:



And here's the max:



And it was so big I had to cheat a bit and raise my hover height to the absolute maximum, and then pull the camera way back, just to get it all in frame!



At any rate, I think that's about it. Grabbed a cup of hot chocolate from the next coffee shed I found, and have now found all five of the Winter Edition "Marbas" furs put out here. I'll be reviewing those soon, though at this point, with only one day left AAAAAAAH--you may have to hope to find the Marbas furs as a group gift later on!

made your mistakes and make me hurt

yes it's been forever since I've updated and my blog has been broken longer and I GAVE UP finally and went back to the old layout and I'll probably change my mind again and aaaaaaaahhh--

Reviews coming of very many things. No, really.

Stop laughing.

In injury news...



The orthopedist tells me the bone healed clean. Now, I just have to deal with the double hamstring injuries, which...now that we know what's going on...are s l o w l y starting to heal.

(I, of course, am being my usual relaxed, accepting, fully meditatively serene sort...which means I'm not resting as often as I should, pushing to walk more often than I should, and only elevating the legs at night, so...THAT'S going to work, yeah. Go me.)

So--things are going well! Or horribly. Maybe horribly well! Who knows?

I can't fix you

Drumroll please, the Duchess is BAAAA--

--wait. What's that word that means "back but only occasionally and Em still has to limp around once an hour and make whimpery sounds until likely January because no one's going to be doing physical therapy visits over the holidays"?

Oh, English doesn't have a word for that?

Well, damn.

In the meantime, let me present to you the horror.



The two footrests, while I was in residence, at least, never moved. Other footrests did. At one point we had four separate wheelchairs and ten separate footrests in various spots in the room.



A better close-up. Several of us swear these have to be the original curtains, because no one makes that shade anymore.



And one night, when it was exceptionally cold due to the big bay windows behind said gold curtains, I asked for a blanket...and they brought me one in avocado green.



I rest my case.

Off for walkies.

I am brave, I am bruised, I am who I'm meant to be

Hey, kids? Wanna know what's better than trying to human with a headache that never leaves? I'll tell you--trying to human with that headache and a fractured tibia!

It's...something, I guess.

Right now Em-beyond-the-screen's reality consists of:

1. Trying to put weight on the leg;
2. Trying to move and/or walk on the leg;
3. Trying to put weight on the leg AND walk on the leg.

Thrilling stuph, lemme tell you.

The lack of a computer, where all my graphics live, is also starting to make me twitch. Which also makes the leg hurt.

So...yeah. That's where we are. I am so, so tired of the original 1970s everything here, too. You think I'm kidding, but the curtains are Harvest Gold, the striped wooden seats--one in gold pinstriping with teak-stained wood, the other a wine, gold and black wider-striped affair--that chair looks like cherry wood, and who knows, it might not be staining, but actually teak and cherry wood!

And I don't remember the pattern name--it was something like Sunshine Meadow or Meadow Gold--but it's covering the floor, authentic sheet linoleum.

Don't get me wrong--I want to be here. I want to get stronger. I want to do the work. But everything hurts, and walking feels like knives stabbing my feet, and even laying down is a challenge, because at some point, the leg with the fracture will move, or shift, or muscle fibers will pull....just...Argh.

Or maybe auurrooolllgh... One of those.

But onward through the frogs, or something.

who by high ordeal, who by common trial

<i>(Obviously, this is going to be more RL than most blog posts.)</i><br />

<br />

You want some solid, white-knuckle action? We're talking high stress, low coping, chewing fingernails to the elbows insanity?<br />

<br />

Break a bone at the end of a holiday month. Extra points for the month following to be December. A <i>savage</i> amount of points additional if you're also an internet addict and nearly everything you like to <i>do</i> online involves the computer you no longer have access to.<br />

<br />

Challenge rating impossible if all the advent calendars start tomorrow.<br />

<br />

<img src="https://i.ibb.co/8rwm5gt/goddamn-it-intensifies-Danny.gif" alt="goddamn-it-intensifies-Danny" border="0"><br />

<br />

So...<i>obviously</i>...I'm not going to be around in SL until this thing resolves. I'm on official hiatus from Vae Victis until net presence increases. I may have to reschedule a surgery because I'm stuck in physical rehabilitation.<br />

<br />

I am just having <i><b>SO MUCH FUN Y'ALL</b></

I>...<br />

I'll post updates when I can, but "not a happy bitch" seems to be the steady state.<br />

<br />

movers sulk like gravediggers, while you hug at the door

"Is this AI trying to learn?"

This also strikes me as AI work (and there is mild nudity, so potentially NSFW), but the song is moody, and atmospheric, and the animation is at the least fascinating to watch.

(Bit on Kiki Rockwell in general, because I hadn't heard her before--this article was written in January of this year, so she's relatively new, and from New Zealand.)



So! The 'Atropa' Parasite Flower, another iteration of an earlier work. It needed to be covered. [[Insert from the Editrix: I am being *very honest* in dating...sort of...in that the Necropolis Aether Salon occurred on 18 October, I started seriously working on this entry ten days later, on 28 October...but it's getting dated November 5th for final publishing.]]

It's a new library site, as well. No idea why, though it could have something to do with the current absence of the Baron, but--overall, it seems a much more warm, comforting space.



And yes, that is the Chartes Cathedral labyrinth in the library. I don't know if it's always there, or if that was an addition for the Salon on the Necropolis, as understood through a few eras. Either way, it's a lovely thing to see in a library.



And Sir Edward definitely was in his element for this one, comparing various cities of the Victorian and Edwardian eras, how they dealt with body disposal as a whole, as well as side jaunts into places like the Paris Catacombs and the Sedlec Ossuary in Kutná Hora, Czech Republic.



Basically, I wanted to attend--not only because I wanted to hear the Necropolis Salon, but because I thought it would be a good way to capture some still pics of me wearing the Atropa flower.



So as seen in the first pic for this entry, there are fourteen different options for the metals, fourteen for the petals, and I think seventeen different options for the vines?

If I'm counting correctly.



It was a pretty piece before, without the trailing vines, but there's something...extra...added with that addition.



I like it, though. I can easily see this being an oft-used accessory.



This was an exclusive release for Hallow Manor, which opened October 13th and closed November 1st. Now, it's in the mainstore, and if you want a direct beacon to the accessories wall, then click this. It's L$400, post-event.

Also, apparently it's Second Life Annual Cleanup Week. So, uh...go do that, I guess.