Joe Essid directs the Writing Center at the University of Richmond, where he teaches courses in writing and literature. He is a Richmond native who attended the University of Virginia and earned a Master's and PhD at Indiana University. His research interests include technology in the classroom and Southern literary humor. His academic writing has appeared in Computers and Humanities, The Writing Lab Newsletter, and anthologies about technology and writing. He is a contributor to Style Weekly and has appeared in Eighty One and RVA. Ignatius Onomatopoeia is the "avatar" who represents Joe in the game-world Second Life. Ignatius will be wandering the virtual terrain of Second Life while his creator writes here about what may be either "the next big thing" for the Internet or the latest darling of the cyber-hip... the reader can decide.
E-mail contact: jessid@mac.com | Web address: writing2.richmond.edu/jessid

Location: Lost Highway, and not asking directions

Well, the joy is back…oh yeah. Driving like a nut and racing Tenchi, my black Dominus Shadow against her pink (!) Mitsubishi Lancer Evo. I may be an old-school racer-boy, but even in pink, that Lancer is HOT.

We decided to begin a Ross sim and do a closed course. This was our map, which we quickly forgot as we got lost: 

My driving is better these days, but Second Life® still has a few problems when you really kick a premium vehicle (one with gears or a supercharger) into high speed.

Still, some of the fun means driver error and crashes. I hope “Hugsy Penguin” forgives us for smashing up in front of his/her shop…

Both of our cars feature multiple gears, so we could “kick it up” into third or fourth on big straight-aways.  With my sound cranked I could almost imagine that we were racing real vehicles.

Until, however, we hit the borders between a few busy regions. Then the car would disappear and my avatar would assume a driving position without the car at 10,000 feet.  Needless to say, I had crashed in an SL™ sense, and I had to restart Second Life.

Even that glitch added to the fun, because while I was logging in again, Tenchi was adding to her lead…until she dove into the water and her car became a submarine.

“Hah!” I yelled, as I raced past her, her Evo trying to run along the side of a wall.

Later I rode shotgun to get some great snapshots while Tenchi did the driving.  Finally, Linden Lab® is getting the experience of the open road good enough to lure us out.  All we need now are some signs!

Now that Linden Lab is building major new roads, I am so ready for the challenge of a SL road rally.

Next up: Tenchi and I gun our machines around the big oval.  And wreck horribly. I will never make fun of NASCAR driving again.

Be sure to check the “In a Strange Land” Archive for old posts