Arriving on Berkman Island, I met some people who were not enrolled in the CyberOne class. They were just standing around, talking, and did not seem offended that I asked a lot of stupid questions about how to play the game. One of the girls offered me some free clothes, which I gratefully accepted. The package included some cute items, like a “wet” T-shirt that reveals the breasts and a diamond ring.

Unlike the Harvard Girl uniform that I had designed myself out of the default settings, the clothes that the others were wearing were more detailed. I checked out one of the girls from behind, admiring how the dress curved over her buttocks while mine billowed around me like a cylinder cut in a half. I will have to design my own things and put my “queen of Photoshop” reputation to use in Second Life, if only I find out how to apply it to the clothing templates.

Later, I tried to do some scripting in the sandbox, but I found that it was just too difficult. It was quite a disappointment, because I had always thought I had a very good sense of three-dimensional space, but clearly it was not the case. I thought what a relief it was that I never became an architect – I truly love and appreciate art and architecure, but at this rate, I’d probably be making buildings and objects that look like unproportional pieces of crumpled-up metal. But then again, Frank Gehry has become an acclaimed architect from doing that very thing, so maybe I shouldn’t be so discouraged.

Using a free spaceship I picked up from the demonstration island, I tried flying, which also proved to be a difficult task. Instead of flying at a moderate speed, I ended up hurtling up into the sky, where I took a nice snapshot of the clouds and the white sun before plummeting down back to earth and crashing through the roof of a library. No bones broken, but my spaceship was stuck and I could not get it to move forward or backward in a horizontal manner, hence, retracing my entry as I exited butt-out again through the roof, again skywards, and then somehow flew around the island before skidding back into the sandbox,where I knocked over several people who were scripting objects. Fortunately, there were no casualties and everyone was very understanding. Or seemingly understanding (and cursing under their breath).