Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Avatar shells: 2015 list

Everyday, the avatars practice making shells of all types. My goal is to identify what is not normal about the shell. If need be, a quick record is used to check. Pictures are hard to obtain due to our quick timeline crossings. 

"Even if you know it's a shell...common courtesy is to wink and nod." Clueless Wonder

2015 December:
30th - Ben and I are at Target to purchase gifts for the Sacramento 2nd Xmas.  A cute blond with long straight hair cuts in front of us before we enter the store.  She is wearing a wool hat, scarf, long sleeve top, jeans, and fur boots. She looks and walks like a normal human, though she hesitate when inside. To avoid me, she and her avatar immediately turns right for the bathrooms to disappear. The Crow maiden begged the editor to be called cute.

29th - An old white-hair woman is crossing Park Street in Alameda with a three wheeled rear-basket bicycle. It seems normal, though she continues to stare off at an angle away from me. In the record, the bike is a bright green shell.

26th - At Echo Lake's parking lot, a Subaru hatchback car has a red retriever, a blonde cross country skier and brunette wearing snowshoes. I leave the lot but they catch up to me on the trail. I ask if the lake was ready to ski on. The blonde says the lake was not frozen yet. They are the three mountain maidens of Echo Lake. They did a great job of making their human and dog shells lifelike. Looking at the timeline, the car and ski poles are bright green shells. Also, the blonde's speech was a little off, as though she was thinking of the words versus just talking.

26th - Neighbor Al is in the opening of his fence, not moving, looking away from me. Ubol's try at a shell.

25th - Sacramento neighbor, Al, is walking his dog away from the cul-de-sac. We wave to each other as I drive up to my Mom's house in the sac. I did not suspect anything. Ibol and her friends make amazing shells. In the record, no avatars are on the man or dog.

23rd - Crossing the Marina Village Parkway are two young girls, pushing a shopping cart and a stroller with a leashed dog. It looks weird. In the record, the dog is a shell.

22nd - I am riding the bike back home on Walnut Avenue in Berkeley. I see a squirrel eating a nut sitting on a rock like a person. Usually they are on the ground scavenging.  I missed identifying it and was told that it was the shell of the day.

21st - I am at work, looking out the front lobby watching the rain come down. I see a squirrel out in the rain going under the cars out front. No squirrel would be out in this hard rain especially since there are no squirrel out front.

20th - A man with an umbrella has a small dog on a leash.  The only give away is that they crossed Shattuck Avenue away from me in front of the house. I look at the record and see the dog is a shell, which means they are both shells.

18th - I am bicycling home from work on Independence Drive in Alameda. A crow was hopping across the road which stops both a van and my bicycle. I checked the record and the crow looks real. In the record, I zoom in and see that the crow has no internal organs.

15th - I turn on the living room lights and see a deer's face in the window. Later I turn on the porch light and see a the same deer with legs. Both appear deer like.  The deer is a shell because it was too close to the window.  The deer are usually farther down the yard away from the my basement flat.

11th - In Berkeley, a red Fiat 500 is driven by a red hair man down Eunice Street while I bicycle up Walnut Street to go home. Before, at, and after the stop, the man never changes his head or body position which looks away from me. A normal person would have change body position to do a stop. Double checked the record and the car is a bright green shell.

7th - In the Posey Tube, a bicycle rider has a bag of soccer ball on his handle bars. I squeak by and end up hitting our bikes.  I look at the record and the soccer balls were bright green shells. 

5th - That morning I meet the Russian Mum avatar and her two daughters, a blond and one with black hair. Later that morning, I am putting away the shopping bags in my car's hatch which is by the garage. I look toward the street and notice blue eyed blond female jogging North on Shattuck Avenue. Before I can look away, I see black hair jogger going the other direction. After they are gone, I realize they were the daughters. They are practiced at doing shells that are lifelike. In looking at the timeline, neither has an avatar on their shoulders.

3rd - I am walking down Shattuck to the store, there is a doe and three fawns in the middle of the street. I ignore them since they are deer, but in the record, one of the fawns is a shell.

Before December, many shells have happened. Below are the ones that stand out.

I barely miss a bicycle rider who leaves the Posey tube sidewalk as though the lines were perfectly timed. The records show a bright green bicycle shell.

I am bicycling home on Independence Drive in Alameda. A man with a cane crosses the street shaking a bag up high. I think the situation is bizarre and ride on. The shell was shaking the small bag telling me that it is a gift, I do not have to guess if it is a shell.

I am attending my first BAHVN meeting in Berkeley. The facilitator mentions that it was unusual for the janitor to be still working. I feel the tap of the janitor's mop on my couch. Later I look at the timeline, the person has an avatar on his shoulders, but the mop is a bright green shell.

It's before dawn, I am bicycling down Shattuck to work. Under the street light, I see a deer standing behind a little free library stand with it's head hiding behind the book house. Deer faces are hard to do.

It's before dawn, I am bicycling down Shattuck to work. Under someone's driveway lights, I see a doe and two fawns standing like plastic animals. Making lifelike animal is hard.

I am sweeping the front sidewalk of the house. On the sidewalk on the other side of the street, a young woman walks towards the house. When she is close, she turns her hat brim down to conceal her face. I think it's weird and I realize later that faces are hard to make lifelike.

September 13th: I am at the crowded Solano Avenue Stroll and a female jogger cuts in front of me. I approach her to talk but my avatar steers my body left  to avoid contact with the shell. The record shows me as the Blue Crow maiden which almost touched the Red Crow maiden, the jogger.

I have just enter the Selby Trail off Wildcat Canyon Road. A man close to the street says, "You need to do something about the weather."  I point and give him the thumbs up saying, "Working on it.", as I go down the trail wondering what was that about. This shell is unusual because it talked to me and did not hide his face. He reappears months later on another hike as a squirrel after the house attack. He is one of the four dragons of the 12th Earth, this one, the last one.

It is night, as I stare out the basement window. I barely make out something happening just off the deck. It finally comes into view and I see this big deer. As it walks to the front, I hear it's hoofs clack on the brick pavers. Details on how a shell is made will be in the book since I got to witness it.

I walked to the Solano Andronico's Market to purchase a few groceries. Outside the store, I meet a white haired lady who asked me to purchase her some kale. I agree and we both enter the store to aquire the leafy greens.  At the checkout stand, in a soft voice, she stated the kale was for services rendered. After the purchase we part our ways. She is the Marin Circle avatar that monitors Marin Circle. In the record, her avatar convinces her to relax and that David will oblige her wishes. Remember she is a tree avatar who recently learned mental thought talk, but now she acquired vocal speech which is amazing.

Updates:
2016 January 11 - added two old ones: Solano Stroll and the Century Oak, corrected the 12th Earth, finished with the 30th entry, I will start a new one for 2016.
2017 November 11 - Grammar corrections
2018 February 7 - changed oak to circle, used thread and needle to see it 
2021 March 20 - moved comment to updates, changed font

Saturday, December 19, 2015

Ant Avatar: The five day plan


"Boys, don't kill any pantry moths...they're here to keep an eye on me." Clueless Wonder

 

It's Monday morning, I enter the kitchen and I see a trail of ants across the floor, up the cabinet side, and in the kitchen scrap bowl. My first instinct is to orange spray the uninvited guest. I can't, I need permission from the ant avatar.

I mentally ask, "How long do you plan on staying?"
The young boy's voice mentally replies, "five days".

After some talk, I agree to step over the trail and not use the kitchen counter top. On day two, thousands of ants are now scavenging when bones are added to the bowl. Friday night, the ant boy instructs me to remove the scraps. I recycle the scraps and add the bowl with the dishes in the dishwasher. I agree to clean up the remaining ants Saturday morning. Next morning, the thousands of ants are now just a few hundred. I am instructed to spray the trail and opening to kill the remaining ants. I do as told and resume my usual kitchen activities.

I share my space with various flying and crawling insects. I use to capture and release them outside, now I leave them alone. My patience is always tested with mosquitoes.

Updated: 
2020 November 10 - changed structure, font

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Avatar process: Avatar of the Day

"Remember, you got one day to be David...and action."  The alarm rings to wake up.

An every growing number of avatars, golems, and dragons want to help humanity. In order to help, they need to become human for a day. Every week a different avatar group are invited to the house to be me for the day, a.k.a avatar of the day.

Everyday, they practice their various abilities: hack, substitution, catch, force thought, shells, timelines, viewing bubbles, speak, hands, dream worlds, and process improvement.

In avatar hack, they get to hack some electronics I use.

For substitution, the avatars become me for the day with a friend along on the shoulders.

With hold, a.k.a catch,, I allow the avatars to trip, pull, or shove me without injury. This has moved from me to other object. Part of the reason are injuries that had occurred to me. The catch was moved to hold for the benefit of everyone. The food containers are a good example of avatar hold.

I am constantly being hammered by the force thought at home and work.

Timeline practice happens when I game online with the avatars. The game is TreadMarks. The goal is to see the timeline to plot the best possible line for the greatest benefit.

We have computers, while avatars have a viewing bubble that allow them to interact with a human at a distant.

For speak, an avatar insert their face in a view bubble, which forces the shoulder avatar to insert their face over your face to talk.

In avatar hands, they inserts their hands into the view bubble, which forces the avatar on your shoulder to place their hands over your hands to move them.

When I am asleep, I enter one of the dream worlds and meet folks of this world in those worlds.

At work or at home, they implement a process improvement to always get better.

At bedtime, a soul tether is practiced. Slowly the avatar of the day pulls out of my body and wonders about with a tether still attached my body in the bed. I know it works because the body is immovable when tethered.

With each substitution, I notice slight changes in my signature, memory, tone, hold steering wheel, etc...they all vary, but only slightly.

Also, Box man is directing the imps to test the avatar of the days.

New skill: items disappear, sounds are created.

It has been decided that the avatar of the day program will continue indefinitely, until something drastic happens to me. 
 
Cross training is the exchange of energy between avatar of the week and David. 
 
Well, it moved to many hands and now it is show pony.
 
Update:
2016 January 11 - added process improvement
2017 April 29 Change the Q&A to avatar of the day 
2017 May 16 - added soul tethering 
2017 May 21 - added spacing 
2018 January 23 - added golems 
2018 February 2 - added slight changes and Box man test. 
2018 March 19 - updated Avatar catch
2018 May 2 - changed catch to hold
2018 May 12 - Added timeline goal 
2018 September 21 - added program and new skills
2020 June 14 - added avatar talk a.k.a. telepathy
2021 March 20 - Moved comment to update, changed font, added dragons
2023 December 17 - added cross training and many hands, and show pony

Thursday, December 10, 2015

Avatar Hacks: 2015 list

Each week, a different groups of avatars are at the house. Everyday, I allow them to avatars hack a piece of electronics I use. The hacks posted are things that should not happen. So far, all the hacks have been temporary. The format is date, the hack, my try to undo the hack, and "my angst" comment at that moment.

"And people wonder why I don't have an smart phone... "Hello AAA, my self-driving car drove into the Bay. Do you have a barge for a tow?" Clueless Wonder.  
In the record, I own 6 smart phone for Pokemon Go and pay phone disappeared.

2015:
December:

29th - At work, I am condensing and renaming Excel files. The mouse arrow show a loading circle though nothing is loading. "Thank you Crow avatars."


27th -  At my Mom's house in Sacramento, I am watching taped episode of Dr. Who. At the menu, I click on  "recordings" which list the taped shows. After the show list appears, the screen refreshes and list the descriptions though some do not appear. Going out to the menu resets the descriptions which ends Ibol's hack. Above is a mock up of what I saw.

23rd -  The dashboard's tire pressure icon will be a future post.  To sum it up: The 1st time its on, nothing needs fixing. The 2nd time, the spare tire needs air though it has no sensor. The 3rd time, nothing was wrong but i tried to be one with the machine which failed. More homework.


22nd - I go online to check my jury duty status. I fill out the form and go to the next screen where there is nothing to click. I hit the back arrow and get the HTTP Status 500 error. Redoing the form does not clear the hack of the Court avatars. I end up using the phone to check jury duty status.


21st - I come home and the boys are already playing online music.  The playlist is long and I notice the load icon, round dots in a circle, is on while playing the music. All online stuff loads then plays, especially on my XP computer. The court avatars hacked the load icon and the boys don't see it.  "So, don't you want to know why that's happening?" "No Dad, it's just loading..."

 20th - The lights flash off then on. The phone flashes on then off. Now my monitor screen blanks out then on. I want to play an Xmas song for the court avatars to keep a beat. "Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle bells rock...."

20th - The light turns off for a long second.  I begin to think that maybe the bulb is loose.  I start to play with the bulb and realized I've been had. "Gotcha..."

19th - I do a quick look at the potential timeline of the views. There are hundreds but only 55 primary line.  I say, "Let's do it." while my avatar start to click off the 55 lines. Out of the corner of my eye I see another avatar undo the offs. Both I and the court avatar stop, knowing it will not work. *I say nothing...in shock at how fast it was undone.*



18th - Jon, Ben and I finished watching episode 5. The next button reveals episode 6 has over a million views which is 6 times the count of the previous anime. Later when the boys are gone, I check the counts of episode 5, 6, and 7, in which 5 and 7 are in the 200K range. I decided to report the hack, mysterious none of the report links work in any of the episode, but works fine outside of this series. Thanks to the CA cities avatars, I can practice undoing both the view count and the report link hacks. When I succeed, I will post my findings. "Nuts...I have homework!"

14th - It's Monday, I get to work and login on the computer. I mentally hear the CA cities avatars say that there are lots of bugs to play with. "Oh joy...it starts again."

10th - At work, I have email rules to sort the clutter in my inbox. Lately, some of the rules have not worked, so I make the rule again. Then the final straw happens, the ".QA inspection ALA" rule is broken. I make a new one then contact IT, who info me that the rules have not been touched. Once again, I apologize to IT and hang up to view the avatar hacks. One was to uncheck the rule box for ".QA inspection ALA". The second hack had incoming email by-pass the rules, in which I make the rule again, several times. "Oh my...this has been going on for months."

10th - I always double check the post in the preview mode. I click the preview button and get a "Service Unavailable Error 503". I try again and get the same error. An Eastern Europe avatar tells me that if I take the picture and post it, they will let me proceed. I do it and I am allowed to preview the post. "Really...you want credit for this."

9th -  I use Adobe at work to sort PDF pages. In the page list, the page being viewed has a red border. I was viewing page one but page two was also red. No matter what I did, it would not clear until I restarted the program. "How...the..."



8th - The shuffle and repeat icons are missing in YouTube. The function still worked even though the icons were invisible. "I got you now...I got a picture."

7th - On YouTube, the Eastern Europe avatars prefer GMV, game music video, versus AMV, anime music video. No matter where I started the 1000 video play list, the GMVs would shuffle to the top. "You know...those aren't real people" 

6th - I am shopping online and using the keypad for number entry. The site starts to page down even though the keypad light was on. I finish the purchase using the numbers above the letters. "Oh yeah...those keys have dual functions."

6th - The Eastern Europe avatars wanted to watch "The Heroic Legend of Arslan", not my selection of "Samurai Girl". The online play button did not work for Girl, but did for Arslan. I relent and watch their selection. "Ok...I'll ask next time what to watch."

5th - The LG direct drive washer was hacked. To add clothes to the wash cycle, press the pause button, which blinks then chimes. Once the chimes ends, I open the door to add the laundry. Unfortunately, I press the paused button and the light continued to blink without chiming which meant the door would not open. I tried to have my avatar counter the hack which failed. I continued the wash and the washer works fine now. "Not the washer...I need that!"

Before December, many hacks have happened. Below are the ones that stand out.

The Blog gets avatar hacked if they don't like the post being written. The hack happens at the picture insert and is not fixable. I delete the post and restart a new one after we have the talk. "Is everyone happy? I am about to insert the picture..."

YouTube full screen was half the monitor display. I restarted the browser and it cleared.  "How is that possible..."

Tanya Luhrmann's smartphone browser was hacked during her interview of me. I told her about my blog and she decided to stop the interview and look it up. It never worked. Tanya said that sometimes it does an auto correction of the name. I checked with her avatar and he decided the blog would be viewed after the interview was done.

Dictionary.com's left side of the site was gibberish the whole day of blog writing. "It still works...I am good with it."

The resistivity meter passed the check of the bench mat to ground, but did the exact opposite reading on the bench to ground, which is impossible because the mat is on top of the bench. I tell Liwei the bench is certified.  A mental voice says that it did not pass.  I mentally reply back, "How do you know that?", which called the avatar's bluff.  

The ESD event meter's touch-screen power button stopped working, though it worked a minute ago. I waited a few minutes and tried again and it worked just fine.  "Really...I just want to turn it off...must you..."  

MP3 player and YouTube are in shuffle mode all the time for the avatars to pick what to watch and listen to. 

My cubicle's fluorescent light flickered twice though the other lights in the immediate area had no problems. I asked if they were doing a poltergeist hack, which the avatar said yes. The lights were fine for weeks afterwards.

Updates:  
2016 January 12 - I will start a new one. I think the hacks are interesting though I will shorten my comments and just explain the hack. Positioning pictures in the blog is touch and go. I will be simplifying that also.
2021 March 20 - Move comment to updates, changed font, added in the record by quote