Being involved in The Show Must Go On is wonderful for a great deal of reasons, not least of which is I get to meet some incredibly talented, creative, generous and funny people. I’ll be featuring more of TSMGO crowd over the coming months, but for now I’d like you all to meet Alba Uriza.

I met Alba at the rehearsal for mini-show in Dreams a few weeks ago. As we were not showing a full set of acts, there were gaps we had to fill creatively and I’d mentioned to Osprey a while before about having a sort of ‘Rodeo Clown’ act that any free performers could do to entertain the crowd in between acts. I forgot to take this further with her and knowing how busy she is assumed she’d forgotten too – oh me of little faith! When Alba asked if there was anything she could do to help, Os right away got her entertaining the audience with her tiny acrobatics and all round cuteness and the crowd loved her!

During shows, Alba and I tend to end up in the same spot in the wings and we always have a great giggle together throughout the show – I hope we have lots more shows together

Can’t write much now - off out in RL, but Bay City is open!

Explore! Photograph! Blog!

The hunt started one month ago and there have been many exciting discoveries since the ragtag bag of explorers, hunters and inventors set out across the grid to find the missing explorer par excellence. Our first task was to leaflet drop Linden village with publicity - a task that is significantly harder than one would imagine!. But soon we had a break-through when, on the newly raised landmass of Gatea, Natacha Chernov saw the great man and even managed to get a snap!

There was an understandable flurry of activity - Osprey and I found his camp where wreckage suggested yet another crash (my gods, don’t let him fly another craft!)

Osprey even wrote to her one time lover (the lucky cad! She deserves better!) and left him a wee letter in a bottle (there were plenty of empty ones to choose from!)

Since then, despite a couple of other brief sightings, it has become apparent that Magellan has left his makeshift camp and returned to exploring. Speculation about how he achieved this and where he headed to was rife until some photos came into the possession of Natacha. How Jeska Linden came by these she isn’t saying… but one thing is for sure - Magellan is airborne once more and possibly in the soon-to-be-opened Bay City. Hmmm, time to get some air crash insurance, I feel…

Salazar Jack is organising another meeting at the secret explorer’s base in Bode… opps! Err, the secret base in somewhere secret (drop him an IM if you’d like to join us)!

Here are some more useful links:

• The SL Forum
• Salazar’s blog

The recent performance of The Show Must Go On took place at the third annual Dreams Fair, an amazing event that gathers together health-based groups for a two-week fair celebration (you can read more here). One of the final events of the fair was an open Linden Dunking and it was great fun with the Lindens there being great sports. I know I moan about “The Lindens” but I’d just like to say a big thanks to them for taking part and giving me and my friends a great giggle

p.s. You can read more about this night on Janey’s blog here.

There are some very exciting plans afoot (or in my case, ahoof) for the new and improved Eleanor theatre in Phobos with wild talk and speculation about mooring for boats and airships and a coffee shop for folks to relax and chat in. There is also some crrrrazzzy talk about a gift shop – an idea I think is a bobby dazzler.

But what would a mirth-maddened audience member do in the meantime? How would they sate the fever in their brain pan to own a little piece of The Show Must Go On (after all, there is only so much Raoul to go around after Margaux has had her wicked way with the poor simpleton)?

The answer, my friends, is simple. The theatre may not have an official and approved gift shop yet, but there is a small range of take-home goodies on sale in the foyer. From snake chow (for hungry snakes) to human chow (made from real humans) you too can own a piece of your favourite show AND help pay the rent at the same time. And if any of you are looking to experience the magic that ripples between Margaux and her Boy Friday, then why not pick up an officially approved pair of rubber gloves as modelled by the big man himself? Go on, get scrubbing you dirty devils…

Ever since I became half-gazelle that fateful day I found the backpack in Kahruvel I have been alone. Before you all burst into tears and organise a benefit concert for me, I don’t mean lonely, just alone. Apart. Singular. The Only Gazelle In The Village, if you will. I’ve longed to meet another of my kind, to have the chance to chat about being part gazelle but long ago feared it would never be. So imagine, dear reader, my delight when I received a pair of hooves and a lovely message from Nica Pennell who, although now a satyr, was once a half-gazelle like me!

The very next chance we got, we met up in-world with Nica TPing me to a lovely rock on the plains under the hanging palaces of delight that make up the amazing stores of Grendel’s Children. Unfortunately I was on my poor, tired old laptop so couldn’t take a great deal of photos (I crashed out at least twice and frequently had FPS of 1-5).

Nica had made the hooves a while back and I think they look pretty darn good on the end of my feet – although I won’t be adding them to my gazelle body but rather to my posh black talbuk-in-a-tux body to replace my smart shoes… after all, hooves are much better than shoes for dancing in

Nica is, as I said, a satyr and if you meet her, you must ask about her family and tribal history as it puts my efforts to write a convincing back story into the shade, I can tell you – it’s riveting!

I hope to go back to the Avarian lands soon, this time on my PC so I can take some snaps and hopefully spend some less crashy time with Nica. After all, we horned ones simply must stick together – there are wolves out there, you know…

I’m back! Well I think I am… I haven’t actually been able to check yet, but at least my support ticket is marked as “Solution Provided”. If all goes well, I’ll see you back in-world later today - thanks to Janey, Osprey and Ryne for trying to help

Edit: Here is Janey’s post on the matter.

Edit 2: Salazar Jack managed to get a shot of me trapped in limbo

Tho old indoor and outdoor theatres in Phobos that were the home of The Show Must Go On have gone…

But fear not Shindig fans, the home of TSMGO has only moved over the hill to the bay next to the excellent SL History Museum in Phobos where not only does it have a new base, but also a new name - The Eleanor Theatre! This is a shot of the new look theatre and although it’s not finished I think you’ll agree that it looks great

Pop on over and take a look round - Osprey has added a fun water slide to help folks get down from the road and Salazar and I are going to be adding various parking and mooring options soon. Hope to see you for one of our upcoming shows (dates to be announced, but I’ll let you all now).

I was in Rodeo to re-taking a pic for the blog header so I could have it all in windlighty glory when two things happened. One I bumped into Doug who flew by in an amazing dive, loop and landing, and two I had the idea to replace the blog header more often with windlighty goodness

Here is Doug:

Here is the full pic for the blog header:

I’m on the look out for more so stay tuned

p.s. here was the old pic:

The question of how to get five people across the water to the small island of Mohrr was, in the end, easy to answer. Speedboat! I had one that comfortably took seven people so I started the engine and we all hopped in*.

The water behind us spewed white foam as we sped off towards the ever burning spaceship embedded in the small tropical island. Once on land, we circled the smoking craft and examined the crash site – it turned out that it belonged to Harry Linden who crashed here back in early 2006.

He must have survived the accident though as his tent and campsite were still there, along with his luggage… which we riffled, of course! Such wonderful freebies he’d thoughtfully left behind for visitors!

After we had relaxed in the sun loungers, my fellow explorers had to leave and as the sun set over the horizon, I found myself alone.

I made camp for the night and resolved to explore the small islands dotted around in the morning before returning to my car.

The sun splashed rose petals across the new sky as I woke and started the motor once more. I took a far more leisurely pace and headed over to the lighthouse I could see rising from a sea in Kremer.

I swung my boat over to the stone steps and set off to explore the small island – all I could find was a few seats and some information screens that told me this was an Linden office where public meetings were held. As I climbed back into my boat, I couldn’t help but think that this was one office with a far better view than mine…

I headed over to the only other small island I could see and found it was deserted but for an empty Linden tee-shirt and collectors card dispenser – for what purpose, I could not tell.

The inland sea offered a myriad of possibilities – the huge lighthouse to the south, the forest to the west, the rivers and inlets to the east or the buildings to the north. I had to choose one and I decided on the architectural temptations of the north and headed across the empty water of Rechleff towards Clementina. The only problem was that I had left my car parked in Bodgea far across the sea in the south…

Yours in Travel. And a speedboat!

HeadBurro Antfarm.
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* Well, in truth, while the others chatted on the roof of the Bodega Explorer’s Base, I did a quick search for speedboats, teleported to a few marinas until I found one I liked, bought it, teleported back, discovered I could not rez it up in the water there, spent five minutes flying around for a place where building was allowed, sped back to my friends and hollered for them to leap from the three-storey building into my new boat below. What followed was the amusing spectacle of five people shouting “Where are you?” “Down here?” “Where?” “In the water! Jump!” with avatars blindly leaping off and missing the boat completely. But none of that sounds as romantic as “I had one that comfortably took seven people so I started the engine and we all hopped in…”, now does it?