Blogging in Second Life

And why not?!

I blog in RL (real life) so it's no surprise that I should have a blog in SL (Second Life). Commonly known as Digital Femme in my RL blogs I am a bit disappointed that I can not use the same name in SL but I do indeed like my SL name, Maxine Montale.

You can choose your first name in SL but you will have to pick a last name from their list, and their list is quiet extensive almost covering most nationalities. It was not difficult for me to chose the name 'Maxine', as I have always for some reason found that name intriguing. Perhaps because the first and only Maxine I had ever known was my neighbour in Sunny Glenway, whose father was an architect and had totally revamped their townhome interior so that it did not look like all the others. She was older than me and was a ballet dancer and whenever I happened to be in the kitchen looking out at the Don Valley Freeway, I would see her walk by, so straight and elegant like, with that bun on her head. I also really like my last name Montale! It sounds French, no?

It is in the wee hours of the morning in RL as I sit here blogging, similiar to my first SL photo of me sitting in my bedroom blogging on my powerbook by the moonlit sky.

I was introduced to Second Life (SL) by my then neighbour Jerry Villareal of Tumundo.org November 2005. It was confusing at first and I wasn't sure what the whole purpose of SL was, other than to walk around their virtual reality land and change your appearance. Back then, I didn't even know you could fly!

So, after getting really bored oneday I decided to go back to SL and further explore its world. I'm glad I did. As it stands now, SL is at the forefront of a paradigm shift, in the way people interact, get educated, do business and even carry on relationships? Yup, it's true! As easy as it is to find your soul mate thru online chatting, it is doubley more easy to meet up here in SL. But no, I have not encountered any of that type of 'connection' in SL. Actually, I am in the verge of realizing that I may have met my own here in RL. But that's another blog entry some other time.

Making 'connections' is one of the reasons why I decided to create a blog about my experiences in Second Life, actually. For in the past few weeks I have met avatars, (lingo for SL figures, people etc..) that I could swear were placed in my SL path for a purpose. More on that later, as you will soon read about. Also, I thought it a grand idea to document my experiences on SL as proof to my friends that I am still alive and well, and actually going out and socializing ... just more in SL than RL!