Genome Island visit - Let's learn genetics!

Tdobs Artemis and I travelled to Genome Island. This place was phenomenal We got a free tee shirt upon entry. Then I went on a scavenger hunt. I learned about genetics or at least I tried to. 

There were several levels to the building in Genome Island that is run by Texas Weselyn University. They are teaching science here on the island and during the scavenger hunt I was given many notecards that gave me lessons in genetics. It was very interesting. What a great way to teach students.

Each area I went there was a place to click to get another task. These tasks end up teaching us about the subject matter. The first notecard told me where to visit first. I was to click on that orange question mark to visit the tower.

Then the task cards were found along my travels. Here is a copy of one notecard:

Task 2. 

The chromosome models in this room represent the 24 different chromosomes found in the human genome.  You have also been offered, OMG, ANOTHER T-shirt, this one based on the banding pattern of the largest human chromosome. 

Which human chromosome is the largest?   Hint:  the human chromosomes are arranged by size, in descending order, with the two sex chromosomes at the end.   The label for each chromosome is ABOVE the chromosome, not beside it.

Send me a Second Life IM to tell me the answer (see the instructions below). 

How to send an Instant Message in Second Life. 

            1.  Find the People tab in the bottom menu bar.             

            2.  Open the People listing and click on the "FRIENDS" tab.

            3.  Find my SL name on your Friends list:  Max Chatnoir

            4.  Click on my name to highlight it. 

            5.  Select "i" icon from the icons that appear to the right of my name.  Then select the "IM" button to open a message box. 

            6.  Type "The largest human chromosome is .... " + your answer to the question. 

            7.  Hit Return to save and send your message.  I will get your message even if I am not in world when you send it. 

           After you send the message, walk up to the 10th level of the tower for the next task. 

Virtual Hallucinatios

This week several us got together on Monday evening and went traveling in SL. Tdobs, Artemis, and I  first visited Virtual Hallucinations. As soon as we got there things started happening. I could see lights floating around Tdobs so I knew she had stumbled on to something. I was busy taking pictures and waiting for Artemis to teleport. Once Artemis arrived we all entered Hallucinations. We first got our badges and then traveled through. We saw some very disturbing items here. WWe first needed to select a male or female patient. As I turned the corner there were laptops flapping open and closed upon and a note saying that people with schizophrenia see visual distortions and to see the red poster. That post transformed from saying something appropriate to saying something inappropriate. When I snapped this pic this is not what I saw.

I met another person name Casia who joined us on our travel through. She was pleasant and found this place disturbing as well. You can see the badge we got on Artemis as well in this picture.

Believe it or not in this next pic which also did not capture what I saw a man’s pic kept appearing on the wall and the voice kept saying ‘your dead’

I left there quick and then saw a gun on the table in the next room and a voice saying you got 5 seconds to grab the gun and shoot yourself... scary trip...

We learned some things about schizophrenia and hallucinations during this trip. As I mentioned it was a bit disturbing so we left here and went to Genome Island. See my next blog post for that adventure...

More Exploration in Second Life

Well lets see now I've done so much exploring this week it seems I need a SL rehab already. I think I went somewhere almost every night this week.

I went Wednesday evening to Brasil Rio with Lourdes, Carmita, and Linda. We saw some interesting things a bit of nudity for one and other avatars/people who wanted to coax us into a club of some sort. I sent emails/postcards to Esme but looks like I forgot to save a pic of that trip to my computer so I could post it here.

So lets move on to Thursday we met up at Esme's house. The room was filled. So many classmates showed up to see what Esme had to say. That's me CabanaDiLuca in the Red leather jacket.

Esme explained to us that we can open websites with Second Life. But better yet Esme gave us $50 Linden bucks!  I spent $10 so far but more about that later. Esme then took us shopping for some free clothes so we could fulfill our change our appearance assignment for this week. She also gave some pointers on changing our body structure which I could not get to work earlier this week. See me now in the print dress and my nice glasses.

Then Esme took us to ISTE for an educational venture. We saw many things and all gathered around to talk and ask questions. 

Muffle looks great above here doesn't he. And GBuzzy is a dog but seems I do not have a picture of him.

Now today I went exploring on my own (well my 4 and 6 year old grandson were with me). I went to the Visual Pioneer Educational Site that was suggested in our Blogs and Other... document.

Right about here is where I spent my $10 Linden bucks. I gave a donation to this area. I then flew upstairs for a new change of clothes. This place had some free historical clothing.

After changing I went out of this building and started to look around and found Artemis working on her appearance. Nice to see you Artemis!

I then went over to a diner to see about getting something to eat. I didn't get waited on but there was some information about getting a menu that I chose not to get.

I also saw SIGVE building outside of here this was my last pic of the day.

More travels lie ahead. Lets see what I can find next.

Above is one of the videos I explored this week as well. Duke University's Second Life nursing school.

Our first exploration in Second Life

We started out at Esme's house, then tried to find a place to explore that would give us some educative value. At one point Djang/Linda found some type of fair we could attend so David and I attempted to go there with the map coordinates. When we put the coordinates in they (the coordinates changed I noticed so we did not end up at a fair). Not sure where we were. David and I went back to your house.

Artemis/Heather and Madeline/Kristen came up with us going to explore Stem. At first when we all landed we went off looking around and I went through a passage which I ended up dropping like a hot potato. For me I just keep dropping instead of trying to pick myself up with the fly button I wait til I land and then try to figure out where I am. I felt so lost and it seemed liked I fell in a black hole and I could feel myself falling.

Finally I got on my feet and started to explore when I ran across Nasa. I looked around a bit then started flying to see if I could find the others. I felt a sense of loss not knowing if they would make the same mistake I had coming through that passage.

Finally I saw Djang/Linda and felt relief. David showed up shortly after and we went on exploring. We found a big ship and I had a hard time getting on that.

We then started on further exploration and we ended up in a place that kept telling me I wasn't supposed to be there. David showed up there to and I told him that if I fly around I get stuck at a certain oint mid sky and told "You are not allowed to be here".  Once I got near the planet there it stopped me. When I turned there were several barriers saying under construction.

We left there and found National Space Society NSS where we met our new friend Ariel. She allowed up to join her group. We may go back for Wednesday evening meeting.

I had an awesome time thank you to all of you for allowing me to explore with you!

Diana/Cabana

Working on that community...

I have to mention that last weekend several of us tried to get in to our island in Jokaydia and were transported to other areas. I ended up in Ajax it looked somewhat prehistoric. I plan to take some of my classmates here for a visit soon.

This week I have met up with several different students or groups of students. I started the week by joining Second Life®. That was an adventure and I am eager to go and explore with Esme and my classmates. I tried to get some new clothes but quickly realized I needed some type of monies in order to get them. I am sure I’ll find out more on SL soon.

One evening this week Daed and I worked on our couches and had some laughs at some of the things we did or did not do. We learned a lot and realized that learning together was beneficial. 

Last night before our meeting with Muffle (he was helping us learn some scripting), I met up with Artemis, Aurora and Muffle and we all built different things. While I was building I saw someone’s floating rotating big metal thing in the sky.

I was trying to create a simple picture frame and here behind the bush (above photo) Artemis was building a plane. I need to step up my game. She's really talented. Check out her plane (below).

So then it was time to meet up with Muffle and build a tic tac toe game. He let me play the game first but we could not find the X’s and O’s right away. We all learned a lot about scripting. Esme was there and helped Muffle help us.

And lastly for this week thus far I finally worked on my deconstruction assignment. I took a flag out of my furniture box and started deconstructing then reconstructing per our instructions. Well low and behold I tried to deconstruction or decode the texture for the flag itself and I lost the red, white, and blue :(. So I decided to customize my flag by adding the picture of my grandsons that I made into a texture earlier in the week. 

Here is hoping for more time in Jokaydia over the weekend! So I can build more items and more relationships!