Conduit (not) for sale

March 23, 2008 by Leave a comment

Weeks pass. Did I tell you that I was a slacker?

I’ve not been on the grid much this month, but I did manage to make up with my neighbour, the guy who overshadowed my little house with two big rocky outcrops. He owns a big estate that completely surrounds my patch, and he has offered to buy me out, though I declined, since I like the view, and I can’t be bothered to look for a new place.

He was a bit pissed off with me because I had restricted access to my land to just me, which meant that there was a “No Entry” zone right in the middle of his property, which I can see would be annoying. I’m not sure why I had done that, since it is impossible to steal things from people’s houses in SL, so there is no reason not to leave your place unlocked, and I have nothing worth ripping off anyway. Some atavistic territorial instinct I guess.

Anyway, he responded by banning me from his property, which meant that I couldn’t step outside my own front door without running into a big red forcefield, and couldn’t go anywhere without teleporting. Again, there is no logical reason why this should bother me, since, at the end of the day, SL is just make-believe, but annoy me it did. I briefly considered starting a proper feud by putting up a big billboard with abusive slogans about him and his girlfriend, but good sense prevailed, and I compromised by buying a lockable door for my cabin, and opening up my land to all-comers. A day or so afterwards my neighbour gave me free access to his property, and now we live in perfect harmony.

Or almost perfect harmony. I’m still a bit cross about the big rocks, so I’ve retaliated by painting my house bright blue, which clashes with the rustic theme he’s trying to create. I’ll probably get tired of it before he does though.

blue_house.jpg

Filed under Psychology, Second Life Tagged with ,

(In)decision time

March 5, 2008 by Leave a comment

I’ve been sticking by my prediction that Senator Clinton will win the Democratic nomination, though for the last couple of weeks that has been based more on faith than reason. The results in Texas and Ohio are positive, and it does look like Hillary will pick up momentum in the next month or so, and probably win the last big state to vote, Pennsylvania, but it’s clear that this race is going to go all the way to the convention.

The Florida and Michigan delegates have become a big issue – I can’t see how the party could maintain the position of excluding them when the contest is this close, but Obama supporters could legitimately cry foul if they are seated, since Hillary ran more or less unopposed in both states. Still, plenty of people were predicting that these delegations were going to end up being crucial, so Obama has only himself to blame for his no-show.

Even if the Florida and Michigan delegates count, it is probably still going to come down to the superdelegates. Just following the popular vote, or siding with the delegate leader, would be a cop-out. They have to take responsibility, and ask themselves this question: who can beat McCain?

It would be easy to think that Bush has made any GOP candidate unelectable, but that is over-optimistic. The Democratic nominee is going to have to be able to stand up to the worst the right-wing noise machine can generate. Hillary has been under fire from Republicans for the last 16 years and is still fighting, and winning in the big states. Obama has had an easy ride so far – maybe he’ll be able to take the flak, maybe he won’t. Is that a chance worth taking?

Filed under Politics Tagged with

%d bloggers like this: