The High School Meme

Yep, it's another meme. I don't usually tag people for these as some people don't take kindly to that (and also because I don't know enough bloggers to tag), but feel free to consider yourself optionally tagged just because you read this far!

1. Who was your best friend?
I had various different best friends during different phases that I went through. There was the swot, the popular girl, the geek and then the genuinely friendly ones.

2. Did you play any sports?
Not if I could help it! I hated Physical Education and quit it as soon as I could. I think it may actually have been the only class I ever failed.

3. What kind of car did you drive?
I didn’t pass my driving test until I was in my first year at Uni (I started Uni at 16) so the only thing I drove was people up the wall.

4. It’s Friday night. Where were you?
At the ice rink skating my teenage heart out. I still have the speed skates and they still fit!

5. Were you a party animal?
Not really although in my last year I did go to quite a few parties. I was probably the first one to leave every single one though. Including the one I hosted!

6. Were you considered a flirt?
Not at all. I never had a boyfriend at school and I wasn’t particularly interested in any of the boys there.

7. Were you in the band, orchestra or choir?
I was in the junior band in my first year but I gave it up after that when I realised it wasn’t very cool. Also cause I sucked at playing the flute (probably because you’re really supposed to blow).

8. Were you a nerd?
I don’t think I was ever classed as anything to be honest. I was more one of those people that just kinda fits in anywhere.

9. Were you ever suspended or expelled?
Nope. Only ever had two punishment exercises – one from a Religious Education teacher for not covering my jotter and one for supposedly smoking on school grounds. Worst thing was, I wasn’t even smoking!

My Celebrity Look-alikes

I am fortunate (or unfortunate) enough that IRL, I don't really look like anyone famous. Unless of course my parents are famous and I don't know it! So when I saw on a few other blogs that www.myheritage.com allows you to put in a picture of yourself (or your avie) and use their facial recognition technology to come up with a list of celebrities which you most resemble, I was intrigued.

I tried it about 5 times and couldn't work out why it wouldn't work for me, but then of course, then penny dropped. They obviously weren't expecting me to have big black ears on top of my head. So after the painful experience of parting with them long enough to take a snapshot, I set off on my mission of celebrity lookalikeism.

So I look like Tyra Banks, Nikki Cox, Madonna, Avril Lavigne, Daniela Pestova, Scarlett Johansson, Christina Aguilera and Mariah Carey.

So now that I know who they are, what do they do? Although in this day and age you don’t appear to have to do anything in order to be famous. Um, Paris Hilton? All she ever does is moan apparently! Oh, and get arrested. I know who some of them are, obviously, but in the interest of thoroughness, I shall research them all (bring on Wikipedia!).

Strangely enough, among the list is Avril Lavigne, the object of Tenebrous’ secret dreams... No wonder he fell for me :)

Tyra Banks – supermodel, talk show host and actress. Most famous for judging the reality show “America’s Next Top Model” and hosting her own self titled talk show.

Nikki Cox – actress most famous for her appearances in “Unhappily Ever After” and “Las Vegas.”

Madonna – alternative name for Mary, the mother of Jesus. She is also the Michigan born “Queen of Pop” responsible for such hits as “Like A Prayer” and “Ray Of Light”.

Avril Lavigne – Canadian pop singer who has also turned her hand to fashion designing and
acting. Voted 7^th most powerful Canadian in Hollywood by Canadian Business Magazine in 2006.

Daniela Pestova – Czech supermodel who has appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated three times, as well as modelling for L’Oreal and Victoria’s Secret.

Scarlett Johansson – childhood star of “The Horse Whisperer” who has gone on to star in such movies as “Lost in Translation” and “Girl With A Pearl Earring”.

Christina Aguilera - singer-songwriter best known for her single “Beautiful”. Recently she has also been the face of jeweller Stephen Webster’s exclusive “Shattered” collection.

Mariah Carey – the first artist to have her first 5 singles top the US chart. It is rumoured that Mariah will appear in the newest Adam Sandler Movie “You Don’t Mess With the Zohan”.

So there you have it! I look like a whole bunch of famous women. What a shame I don’t share their talent....

How Do You Make Friends In SL?

If you’re anything like me that answer is: not very easily. Sure, there are lots of people that I know and that I will talk to if I see them around, but as for close SL friends... well... I can count them on one hand. I just don’t seem to be the kind of person that makes friends easily. Some people only need to appear in a room and all of a sudden people flock to them and wham! Before you know it, they’re BFF! Me, I will join in the conversation and add my tuppence worth when I can, but as for the next phase in making friends, I seem to be at a loss. I have in the past employed various techniques such as IMing them, or asking questions, but I always came out of it looking like a deluded stalker, or one of those annoying noobs whose first words (or rather letters) are the ridiculously out of date “ASL?”.

I despise people who are overly nosey – don’t ask me where I live before you’ve even introduced yourself, or I’m liable to hit that TP button before you can say “male or female?” (not that it really makes any difference in SL anyway). I have offered to share a bit of myself with people in the past, something I have in common with them, but it seems to a few lines of IM chat and then that’s it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not the best person in the world for keeping in touch, but I will IM a “hi, how’re you doing?” every so often and pop over for a coffee once in a while, but it’s that first step on the friendship ladder which seems to totally elude me.

Maybe it’s me, maybe I try too hard. I always wanted to be one of those people that walks into a room to a chorus of “Dakota! Hi! How are you?” and gets the first invite to all the hottest parties. So maybe when I do meet someone I could be friends with, maybe I go over board and suffocate them with friend-making attempts. There’s a fine line between asking enough questions to be friendly and asking so many that you become that annoying person no-one wants to talk to.

Or maybe it’s because I’ve never really had to make my own friends before. When I first started playing SL, it was through an RL friend and most of her friends became my friends. Then, when I met Tenebrous, I adopted some of his friends also. So the friends I have now were never really ones that I made on my own and they never required that initial relationship building stage, they just went from stranger to friend with (quite literally) a click of the mouse.

There’s also the chance that it could just be me. Maybe I don’t have the kind of personality that draws friends, but rather I’m the “plus 1” on the invitations. After all, someone has to fulfil that role. Someone has to be the person greeting the popular people with an enthusiastic “Hi! It’s great to see you!” from across the room.

And of course there’s always some other reason that I haven’t considered. I have no idea. But if you see me wandering around and I try to start a conversation with you, I promise it’s not cause I’m a stalker, honest!

5 Things Meme

I’ve already done the “4 Things” meme, so here’s the “5 Things” one.

Can you tell that I like these meme things?

Five things in my bag:

1) Carmex Lip Balm

2) Neutrogena hand cream

3) Hair brush

4) Keys

5) Purse

Five favourite things in my room:


1) Cards and presents from Tenebrous

2) Tom and Jerry teddy bears

3) Purple Colorado Rockies foam finger

4) My cowboy hat (yep, it’s a custom shaped Stetson)

5) My book collection (ok, not all of them, just my favourite ones)

Five things I have always wanted to do:

1) Scuba dive

2) Buy a house

3) Watch a thunderstorm at sea from a beach (yeah, cheesy but true)

4) Go on a cruise

5) See Alaska in the winter

Five things I'm currently into:

1) Second Life

2) Blogging

3) Flickring SL snapshots

4) Gardening (ugh, I’m getting old!)

5) Super Mario Kart

The Ipod Meme

(or in my case, The ATMT 256MB MP3 player Meme)

Instructions: Go to your music player of choice and put it on shuffle. Use the song title as the answer to the question. NO CHEATING.

1) How would you describe yourself?


“Lips of An Angel” by Hinder

2) What do you like in a boy?


“When a Woman Cries” by Joshua Kadison

3) What is your motto?


“Never Again” by Kelly Clarkson

4) What do your friends think of you?


“Beau’s All Night Radio Love Line” by Joshua Kadison

5) What do you think about often?


“Songbird” by Kenny G

6) What do your parents think of you?


“Bobby’s Girl” by Marcie Blane

7) What do you think of your best friend?


“When You’re Gone” by Avril Lavigne

8) What do you think of the person you like?


“Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?” by The Shirelles

9) What do you want to be when you grow up?


“Greatest Story Ever Told” by Oliver James

10) What do you think when you see the person you like?


“You and Your Hand” by Pink

11) What song will they play at your wedding?


“America” by Razorlight

12) What will they play at your funeral?


“Just Say Hello” by Rene Froger

13) What is your hobby/interest?

“Right Here Waiting” by Richard Marx

14) What is your biggest fear?


“What a Wonderful World This Would Be” by Sam Cooke

15) What is your biggest secret?


“Twistin’ the Night Away” by Sam Cooke

16) What do you think of your friends?


“Bring On The Wonder” by Susan Enan

17) What is your theme song?


“Rule The Wold” by Take That

18) What do you think of your family?


“In This Diary” by The Ataris

19) What is your best friend's theme song?


“Over My Head” by The Fray

20) What is your mood right now?


“Your Love” by The Outfield

21) If your heart could talk what would it say?


“Life With You” by The Proclaimers

22) What do your co-workers think of you?


“Face Down” by The Red Jump Suit Apparatus

23) What does your future look like?

“Face For The Radio” by The View

Things You Never Knew About Me

(and probably didn't want to!)

I like my "All About Me" things, so here's one for you!

1. What time did you get up this morning?
6:45am

2. Diamonds or pearls?
Definitely diamonds - pearls are boring

3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema?
Iron Man with Tenebrous :D

4. Favourite TV show?
Top Gear

5. What do you usually have for breakfast?
It depends what kinda mood I'm in. Sometimes sausages on toast, sometimes poached egg on toast and sometimes Coco Pops

6. What is your middle name?
I don't have one in SL or in RL

7. What food do you dislike?
Cheese or anything overly cheesey. Also anything that looks icky.

8. What is your favourite CD at the moment?
Joshua Kadison – Painted Desert Serenade

9. Favorite sandwich?
Chicken New Orleans from Greggs

10. What characteristic do you despise?
Subconscious liars - like people who say "I've got no money" then go buy something stupid

11. Favourite item of clothing?
My crocs (sorry Tenebrous)

12. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would it be?
Alaska. Preferably in Winter.

13. What colour is your bathroom?
Pale blue

14. Do you make friends easily?
No

15. Where would you retire to?
Anywhere peaceful

16. What was your most recent memorable birthday?
Dinner with Tenebrous to celebrate both his and mine :D

17. Favourite sport to watch?
Skiing (and sometimes I like a bit of Rodeo)

18. How many towns have you lived in?
3, although 1 of them only had a population of 22

19. How many do you think will send this back?
No-one cause it’s on a blog! Silly!

20. What’s on your bedroom floor right now?
Clothes and probably a cat

21. Favourite saying?
“cool”

22. When is your birthday?
January 24th

23. Are you a morning person or a night person?
Neither in particular really, probably more night than morning though

24. What is your shoe size?
7

25. Pets?
4 cats

26. Any new and exciting news you'd like to share with us?
Nah

27. What did you want to be when you were little?
A lawyer

28. Which talent would you most like to have?
To be able to sing

29. Which words or phrases do you most overuse?
“cool” “whatever”

30. What is your favourite flower?
Snowdrops and daisies

31. What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to?
Friday and every day thereafter that i see my Tene

32. What colour are your eyes?
Blue

33. What was your favourite toy as a child?
Sylvanian Families and Teddy Ruxpin

34. Summer or winter?
Winter

35. Hugs or kisses?
Both. At the same time :D

36. Chocolate or Vanilla?
Vanilla

37. Do you want your friends to send this back to you?
They can do it on their own blogs

38. When was the last time you cried?
Saturday

39. What is under your bed?
Old diaries

40. Who is the friend you have had the longest in SL?
Tangletwigs Fairymeadow

41. What did you do last night?
Played some SL, chatted to Tene and then went to sleep

42. Favourite smell?
Frying breakfast

43. What are you afraid of?
Drowning, gas and fire

44. Plain, sweet, or salted Popcorn?
None, but salted if I have to

45. How many keys on your key ring?
5

46. How many years at your current job?
Just over 1

47. Do you have any scars?
Loads

48. Favorite day of the week?
Saturday

49. How many people will you be sending this to?
None, only posting it on here.

50. Who's answers are you looking forward the most?
Everyone’s cause I like these things!

SL-Twitter Meetup

It's always nice to put an avie to a name, especially when it's people you talk to quite a lot. On Saturday May 3rd, at Jack Rabbit Slim's I attended a meetup of peeps from Twitter. The theme was "Your Favourite Movie Character" and there were some awesome avies there! Tenebrous and I went as Alien v Predator and my alien avie was well complimented, although to be honest I think people were just being polite in an attempt to stop me emitting green, er, stuff, all over the floor...

Take a look at the pictures here.

4 Things Meme

I found an interesting meme on Timothy Lilliehook's blog, so I thought I'd take part.

4 Jobs:
- bar maid
- wrangler
- financial adviser
- recruitment consultant

4 Favourite Movies:
- Sweet Home Alabama
- How To Lose a Guy In Ten Days
- St Elmo's Fire
- The Prestige

4 Places I've Been:
- America
- Canada
- Portugal
- France

4 Places I've Lived:
- Glasgow, Scotland
- Birmingham, England
- Vail, Colorado
- Mornington Crescent, Laland, Second Life ;)

4 Favourite TV Shows:
- Nip/Tuck
- Grey's Anatomy
- Top Gear
- Pushing Daisies

4 Favourite Radio Shows:
- Bowie at Breakfast (on Clyde 1)
- Randy in the Morning (on Jack FM)
- I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue (on BBC Radio 4)
- Gonna have to pass on a fourth I'm afraid....

4 Favourite Foods:
- Chocolate (does that even count?)
- Vanilla vienetta (sensing a theme here?)
- Home made steak pie
- Spaghetti Bolognase

4 Places I'd Rather Be:
- Alaska
- Egypt
- Vietnam
- anywhere so long as Tenebrous is there too