Still More on My Home & Garden Contest Entry

So a frustrating few hours today trying to get Media on a Prim to Work -- for the simple reason that the houses here aren't parceled, and I couldn't put in a jazz stream (my original idea) although Saffia said she didn't mind jazz -- still, for the entire sim, it seemed an imposition and anyone could of course change it. I could have tried to get house parcelled -- they may do that next year, but I was actually more interested in trying to get MOAP to work.

After all, I have it working so well here in Graphica, where I have my hacienda house, courtesy of ionic, with two flamenco dances and a Kieszca dance. They work fine. It's one of the more popular sites. People take the free dance machine and tip even. I found today that one of the flamenco youtubes had been removed leaving a black hole. So I put in another one. There was no advancing to any other songs or anything like that. They stayed put. You could click them on and off -- but then, these MOAPs clearly showed the dashboard so you could click "off" on one and "on" on another. 

I studiously keep "autoplay" off on my own browser on YouTube -- I HATE that it defaults to that it is even a "thing". I don't to have autoplay and a zillion youtubes playing one after another. 

I thought the problem might be yet another need to turn that OFF (it seems to drop out when you switch Google accounts) or that the video I chose was a playlist, one of those YouTubes set up to play like 16 songs at once. But it wasn't. So it was a mystery HOW it was playing a playlist of that singer, because it WAS.

Whirly Fizzle, who is always helpful and constructive and curious on the forums, unlike the legions of annoying idiots there who are far from scientific, so I decided to risk contacting her inworld -- when I saw a thread on the MOAP subject from the past she was speaking on (since lost but Google it). I didn't want to go through the chore of putting it on the forums and wading through piles of insults and stupidities.

First, Whirly found a "surgically clean" version of the song, at least, it seemed to be, i.e. not automatically advancing, as my first version did, although for the life of me, I can't see how. But she cautioned me I'd have to get the "off" button turned off on the dashboard to prevent advancement -- and she was right -- it advanced to a random Harry Nilsson song (!) and there was no way I could do that. Sure enough, I couldn't get the "off" turned off. There was an ad in the way. I couldn't get it to click when I saw it appear now and then. I doggedly pursued it with an enlarge form of the MOAP and finally nabbed it. And I hope it works because the other version didn't. I was going to be resigned to putting my first MOAP out, but that turned out not to be a thing that looped through 12 or 16 songs and started over again. It advanced through a few, then stuck on one, then kept playing that one. Sigh.

HOORAY it seems to be working -- we'll see. It has made it through two rounds of the song and started again. [UPDATE: Oops! I spoke too soon. I just came on the site and it was playing "You're So Vain." Ugh. How did that happen??? These are videos that are not on autoplay to advance, and not on a playlist.

Why do I want this song which I completely randomly came across? Because it's sad, and about someone who had to leave Cuba with his parents, then his parents died -- it seemed like it might fit the story of the writer in the house. 

 

I actually bought a gramophone with the Internationale on it, which MIGHT have fit him as he apparently fought in the Spanish civil war. Except it was the COMMUNIST version of the Internationale and there is NO WAY I am putting that out -- with a hammer & sickle to boot!  -- in this writer's house. He reads Orwell, for God's sake.

So on to the "working hunting corner" which is unlike the "aesthetic hunting fireplace." Here you have binoculars from the Ex Machina Livingstone Gacha set by Hattie Panacek. They're a bit too cartoony and shiny (they fit with the other Ex Machina set better) but I didn't have any other binoculars that weren't a zillion prims or that had a strap. So I went with this. The hunter's cap is Saddle Ridge logo Cap - Duck Hunter and "only" 7 prims so great! The table is [IK] Craft Room - Bureau - that may have even been a rare.

I actually found a hat that was EVEN MORE PERFECT but not only was it 39 prims, you really couldn't put it down so gracefully.

///BENJAMINZ/// HUNTED CAP - RED - from a gatcha.

Isn't it WONDERFUL! I will have to content myself with wearing it my sometimes, it was only 50L.

So as you can see I fixed up the deer rugs by tanning the cream one in keke's series. I tried out the group gift from Dragon's Magickal Wares but it's Celtic, and really, as I said, no fairy/magic/shaman/Beltane/Celtic stuff in this story, really, and it didn't quite work. It can't be too fancy, this is Camp, you're wiping your muddy boots. So again, the little grim ensemble here has FAC Deer Trophy And Rifle Display and rifle in chest 4 prim complete by Laika (who BTW has a great mainland store) as well as {CdB} Japanese Cabinet.

Why isn't the deer head above the the fireplace? Well, the girlfriend had banished it to this corner so she didn't have to look at it, and there was the more aesthetic (if you will) skull and driftwood. Also, this FAC item is all in one -- you couldn't very well put a rifle above a hot fireplace, even if not loaded.

So let's look inside {CdB} Japanese Cabinet -- and here's where we get STORY!

So on top, you have two books from keke's weird "study collection," one says "7 secrets" and the other says "Psychopath" -- and really, gun owners and hunters tend to be in that category in my view. Please, spare me the gun nut propaganda, you won't persuade me. I'm all for more gun control. Both my father and my son had the terrible experience as boys of shooting a bird and then feeling bad when it died, and then never shooting a gun again, and that's fine by me. 

You see the writer has put a pistol in a hollowed-out book -- this is ionic's Absinthe Safebook, which fortunately was on mod so I could remove the absinthe props and put in a pistol from Bamse - :BAMSE: The Poet - Gun. What is a poet doing with a gun, you ask? Well, this is sort of Hemingway stuff, and that's all our writer to a "T". Why is our writer doing this? I don't know! Creepy, huh!

Then you have a Russian prop that actually says "Sniper's Ammunition" on the box -- awful! This guy isn't a murderer, however; he's just an adventurer. He just got this from a yard sale or something. Still. I couldn't find any other ammo boxes that fit in my inventory so it it what it is. Then there is those wonderful cowboy boots - ::GB::Western boots /  Black - it's rare that you can put accessories and shoes out (see above re: hairpin and hunting cap!) and not use gadzillion prims, even hundreds. This pair is only 2! Then there is a suitcase with books from the Concept set with the raft, Concept} 02. Escape. Suit case + books - the blue fabric looks 1950s to me.

So now back to the hallway set -- only 1 prim! I do like it. But it's a little bit too sculptyish. And a little TOO nautical perhaps when my story isn't nautical. So I decided to swap it out. I will put it in the Mermaid Tavern in Iris, however, I'm glad I found it.

AND....I just found a second copy of the 7-prim hunter hat rezzed so hooray, I have 7 prims now to work with! Or 8, even. So now I will substitute this. I like it, and it tells a story -- the raincoat is there, the Navy cap is there, but her coat is gone... and I put the flower press on top, to show that she was taking that with her, and put it on top while she was buttoning her coat, then forget it... But now I will try THOR's...

I wasted a BUNCH on THOR's nautical gatcha trying to get the Captain's Pocket, which was a leather travel purse but failed -- and now I have enough of the other knick-knacks for the study shelf and some giveaways in the land preserve. Still, $647 for this hallway set (there's two other pieces in it) was a lot for me, since I like to pay only 50 out of a gatcha for decorating items (but then spending $2000 on that gatcha sort of defeats the purpose!). 

This is a great piece of THOR's, but you'll agree, the wood texture on this is ass. THOR is the undisputed MASTER of wood texture in SL. He makes all his own stuff, no full-perm Katy and Bad Katz models with him. He makes BEAUTIFUL textures (I will show you more) and exquisite wood works. But here, he caved to that prevailing "shabby chic" ethos of SL and put this awful white grey-green shabby stuff on this piece and it HAS TO GO. The hat and everything is perfect. It has a stupid candle on it AND a hurricane cover -- more stupid SL conventions -- I mean who puts a candle on a WOODEN HALLWAY SET in your HALL! NO ONE. I mean, even in the 19th century. It might catch fire. At least it lighted up the scene, which is more than you can say for so many SL lighting attempts but it had to go. Sadly, it left a sooty mark from the shadow that every creator feels they now have to add. Some of them make that be a prim so you can remove it, some of them bake it in. This one is baked in, so it's a good thing that the flower press was going to go there anyway!

So I put "reclaimed wood" texture off the Internet on it which is my favourite this week for everything, I found it when I was trying to match the floor in the Storyteller's Burrow -- and it's nearly the same. I'm not even going to RISK re-tiling it because it may become hopelessly muddled and take ages to line up. It's good enough. Inworld it's crisper even than these photos. And I think retexturing really brings out this mirror better, which is wonderful, it gets eaten up by the grey-green shabby chic version.

Obviously, travel books, a blanket (because it's Upstate, and because I had to take out the blanket basket by the fireplace as it was too many prims) and the travel magazine -- all good. The pillow? I don't know where he's going with that. Like, you always sit on a pillow on your hall set? I guess you could to put on or take off your boots? Ok then. This piece has loads of strange poses, part of that culture of making everything a fashion blog photo session which I definitely do not like. But I suppose decorating rooms to rent out that you won't live in is from the same opera, so I can't really complain too much. I just find all those fashion shoots so "not lived in" I can't stand them.

So basically I am now happy with this entrance hall. You may not be, the judges may not be -- can't you picture them with their clipboards, shaking their heads, marking off points not only for those indoor onions (!) but a tacky recolour job on keke's deer rug. And deers, wow, too obvious! And -- who knows. BUT I LIKE IT.

Di'Cor Harriet Mirror - chunky, but I like it. Solid.