We have in Caledon the superlative broadcaster Radio Riel, who provide the music for many of the events held in our blessed nation, but they also play gigs outside of Caledon.
It was advertised that Her Grace Gabrielle Riel, Duchess of Carntaigh and creatrix of Radio Riel, would be playing a Gen X set at Timeless Underground in the RavKom sim. As my wife and I both love the music of the 80s, we decided to go and let our hair down outside the confines of Caledon for a change.
Kacy wore a stunning little black dress, and I put on my leather pants and a blue shirt. I think we look quite the couple, with my beloved looking as beautiful in modern dress as she does in her period outfits. 
We arrived early to be sure of getting in, and found TU to be quite an amazing build. Her Grace welcomed us warmly, as did the club's owners, and the music began to play. It was a special set of 12" editions of 80s pop classics, many of which I recognised from my teenage years, happily spent in the Golden Age of British Pop.Miss Emily Orr was hostess for the evening on behalf of Radio Riel, and soon there was quite a crowd of our fellow Caledonians getting their groove on, in a most un-Victorian way! 
One feature of the club that has to be mentioned is the incredible dance floor, which provided an amazing display of light and colour throughout the evening. Once again, SL surpasses 1L! Indeed it is events like these that make our Second Life together so much fun, for how else could Kacy and I go dancing at a club on a Thursday night?Her Grace will be playing a Gen X set at Timeless Underground every other Thursday night, so if you want a fun nights entertainment dancing to 
the best of pop, I urge you to check it out. We shall see you there!
----------------
Now playing:
DJ Tiesto - Tears From The Moonvia FoxyTunes
A new age has dawned in Caledon! The Age of the Railway is at last truly here.
Caledon has always had a rail network, with lines from Victoria City to Loch Avie, Carntaigh and the older sims, but it never really worked and was not widely used. With the recent expansion in the national land mass, an upgrading and expansion of the system was sorely needed.
Thanks to the efforts of Mr Barney Boomslang and others, Caledon now has a railway to be proud of. The engines run well, and one can actually sit on the carriages! Something I was never able to do with the old system. Testing was carried out over the holiday period, and we now have a line from Tamrannoch to Kittiwickshire.
My love and I decided to see this new marvel for ourselves, and so boarded the train at the Kittiwick station. A train is rezzed there every hour on the half hour, and correspondingly at Tamrannoch station every hour on the hour. We sat down with some trepidation, as sim crossings in Caledon using any sort of vehicle can be a bit hit and miss, but we were presently surprised when we moved into Tanglewood without a hitch.
The train moves a quite at clip, which did prevent some of the scenery rezzing for 
me as we passed by.The journey follows the northern side of the Firth, through Stormhold, Wellsian, Morgaine and Penzance, then turning south through Mayfair and Carntaigh to Victoria City, where it turns west to the Moors and Tamrannoch. 11 sims in a little over 20 minutes, very smoothly too!
At the Tamrannoch terminus, a train of the old variety soon rezzed for onward destinations, but it was still beset by the old bugs, although my wife did manage to board it. The new system will soon be replacing the old, I am informed by the Caledon National Railway Board, so soon more of our happy nation will be accessible by this mode of transport.
We only had to wait a few minutes for the return train, and were joined by a Mr Contempi, an Italian visitor to Caledon, who seemed most impressed with our technical innovations. Mr Roy Smashcan also boarded on this leg of the journey, catching the train at the Mayfair halt.
I think Kacy and I will be using this train in future for journeys around Caledon, it is a wonderful way to get "in theme", and offers the 
perfect opportunity to see Caledon at leisure. if you have yet to try this new marvel in our lands, I heartily urge that you do so. I can quite happily scotch the rumours that it travels too fast to allow one to draw breath, also!
The holidays are over, the Christmas decorations all packed away, and the spring thaw will soon be here. Before the winter wonderland departs for a year, I want to share some images with you of how Kacy has dressed them for the season.
The first picture shows our cottage in Kittiwickshire. The snow piled against the steps, the icicles, the jolly snowman are all the work of my incredibly talented wife. Who wouldn't be warmed by the site of this welcoming haven on a crisp winters morn?
Our pond in Tanglewood has been the place where my love has let her creativity and sense of fun truly rip! Inspired by Calvin & Hobbes, Kacy has set out a collection of snowmen that depart from the norm in a wonderfully joyful way.
Top to bottom, a pair of snowmen chillin' by the well. A snowman giving himself a shock! A very happy snowman skating on our pond. In the background you can see another snowman swimming for his life from some snow sharks, and another trapped in a Gulliveresque style.
A close up of our snow Gulliver waking up to find himself surrounded by snow Lilliputians. This tableau is my favourite, and really shows my darling wife's sense of fun! Blogger won't let me upload more than 5 pictures at a time, so I urge you to visit Kacy's Pond in Caledon Tanglewood (just off the telehub) to see her snowmen before they melt, in about a weeks time. They are sure to make you smile!
Happy New Year, everyone! 2008 is here at last, may it bring all good things to you and yours!
Last night was a whirlwind of revels in Caledon, centred on the Gaiety Theatre in Caledon Penzance. A New Years Eve Ball ran nearly all day, with countdowns to the New Year for Australia, Europe, the East and West coasts of the US, and all points in between! This epic celebration was put together by Her Grace Gabrielle Riel of Carntaigh, Radio Riel and Prim Perfect Magazine, and also included live and silent auctions in aid of Gardens of Hope, a charity working to help people in southern Africa create and manage a variety of green spaces. I was lucky enough to attend both the London NYE Ball in Penzance, to see 2008 arrive with all my fellow UK residents of Caledon, and then later on the New York NYE Ball, attending the Carntaigh side of it as Penzance was full, to raise a glass to my darling wife Kacy, who was celebrating the year's end and beginning in RL. Sadly I have no good pictures of either event, but I enjoyed a dance with my sister Cheyenne and her Sweetie at the Penzance Ball, and a waltz with Her Majesty Kamilah I, Vicereine of Caledon, at the Carntaigh Ball.
The Balls were masques, and the variety and complexity of the dancers costumes was once again a testament to the creativity of Caledonians. My good friend Hotspur O'Toole won the Best Dressed Gentleman prize at the London Ball, quite rightly so, and promptly crashed in amazement! Just one of the many moments of fun that was had.
And so now to 2008. What does it hold in store, I wonder? To be sure, 2007 will take a lot of living up to! I have had so much happen, I hope you will forgive me a few moments of recap. I have made it through a year now of living alone, and have passed through and out the other side of a health issue that saw me in constant pain and heavily medicated 365 days ago. I have moved from unemployment to recently starting a part-time job with an international courier firm. I have lived through the worst flooding the UK has ever seen, certainly in living memory. I have walked away from crippling debt by taking the step of being made bankrupt, and I have had a diagnosis of Aspergers Syndrome. Not an empty twelvemonth in RL by any means!
And my Second Life too has seen major changes. I started 2007 owning half the mainland sim of Huchu, with a Garden, a concert hall, a Tea House, and a home atop a 750m chain! Then the lag arrived, carried in by porn cinemas, yard sales and casinos, so I sold up and moved to Caledon, where I became a Founder of Tanglewood, SteamSkyCity and Kittiwickshire. I took part in Roleplays for SLRFL, not always an easy experience! I am the Colonel of an all-but-defunct Cavalry regiment, I build airships and other items both as a hobby and on commission for my fellow Caledonians, and I have many dear friends and a Second family who gladden my heart and enrich my life. And of course I went from being a Half-Elf to a Fur, with a spell as a Djinn along the way!
The biggest change crosses the boundary between Real and Second Life. After a couple of affairs that left my heart shattered, a woman came into my life who showed me that love, real as any in RL, could be found in SL. By allowing me to be me and love her as I do, by giving me such love as I have never known before, delivered patiently and with such care and understanding, Kacy and I have weathered many storms together, and enter 2008 as husband and wife following our recent marriage in SL. Whilst there are many opinions on the validity and merit of such unions, to us it is as real a commitment as any taken in RL, and is the one event that tops all others in 2007 for me, truly defining it as a year to surpass any that came before it. Looking forward is always a perilous business, and on this first day of a new year, it can be even more scary. A whole year before me, however am I going to fill all that space and time? New routines to work out, unknown changes and unforeseen events to reconcile and adjust to. It can all seem too much for this cat to take on alone. But I have one thing in my favour, one piece of knowledge that can take away all the fear, one certainty that the Year To Come will be filled with love, and joy, and wonder.
And that is the fact that I am not alone, for I have the love of an incredible woman, my beautiful, incredible wife Kacy, to guide and support me, to cheer and comfort me, just as I do for her with my love, to take us into whatever the future holds one day at a time, hand in hand and sharing all the wonders we will find there. Truly am I blessed to have such a partner to share all of life with. And we have our friends and family with us also, each and every one a reason to view the New Year with hope and excitement.
The ramble is at an end, thank you dear readers for your indulgence! May 2008 see us all experience as many amazing and incredible things as we are able to, and may it be our best year yet, each and every one of us!
We have in Caledon the superlative broadcaster Radio Riel, who provide the music for many of the events held in our blessed nation, but they also play gigs outside of Caledon. 
the best of pop, I urge you to check it out. We shall see you there!
