..oh my goodness, blimming heck, lawks-a-lawdy and any other relevant exclamations you can think of! Thirty thousand hits on this site!?! MADNESS, but an amazing number and as you can imagine I’ve been transfixed watching my stats increase towards this benchmark figure over the past few days. 

I thought that I’d perhaps hit the mark around Yule, and thought what a wonderful achievement that would be, but to hit it in November has seriously delighted me! The blog is certainly achieving more than I ever expected. I’d have been happy to have just a few hits, so to achieve 30k is just utterly astounding to me.  I’m very humbled, but also chuffed to pieces, because there are some absolutely stunning blogs related to all things metaversal out there, so to think I have a regular readershipwhen there is such superior competition out there is a real mind-boggler!

As regular readers know, this blog exists purely for me to witter on about the wonderfulness that is our happy little metaverse, and I do so like to witter..you’ve probably noticed! Despite all the pixels and prattle the blog has developed in a strangely organic way as time has progressed…Kitty has developed too. For a start I’ve developed a skin fetish that I never thought possible when I first started ( “What’s the point of different skins? Why make yourself look different? Shouldn’t you just stay as one character?) and don’t even get me started on hair!  Who’d have thought that the words ‘prim’ and ‘flexi’ would have become permanent fixtures in my vocabulary? It’s utter gibberish! Would I have even considered that one day I would be staring wild and goggle-eyed at my screen as a virtual fashion show takes place, or dancing like a loon down at the pub, in a virtual world but with MY REAL-LIFE DAD! ( Which is let’s face it, completely crackers…)

I’ve often said that Kitty is me and I am she..but it’s more than that.  I studied Journalism at college and like most good ideas it fell by the wayside when I discovered the mediocrity of real life, so writing the blog has provided me the opportunity to vent all my pent up creative juices.  It’s enabled me to enjoy clothing-something which may sound crazy but it really isn’t. In real life I am a complete slob…I’m not materialistic at all and think it’s utter madness to spend more than a couple of quid on a T-shirt, but Second Life allows me to unleash my inner goddess and wear couture gowns and designer threads that Gok Wan would cream his tight pants over. I’ve always been excited by haute couture, daft as it sounds for a Northern lass I’ve always had an Issey Miyake/Yohji Yamamoto fetish ( I blame the PSB’s for that though..)

In second Life I go to sleep on pretend Egyptian cotton sheets and I live in my house of virtual dreams, with amazing furnishings that have funny coloured balls on them that make you do all sorts of rudeness when you sit upon them.  To an outsider it sounds crazy when I explain that I write a blog about my exploits in a world that only exists on servers and microchips.  It’s not tangible; I can’t reach out and run the fabric from my virtual hemline through my fingers and I can’t smell the coffee brewing on my virtual stove, so why is it so enthralling? So utterly addictive?  For me, the answer is simple-I finally feel like I’ve achieved something, and it makes me happy.  I have never been an achiever, but now I feel like I have at last done something to be proud of, and people may scoff but you know what? I care not a jot.  I write this blog entirely by myself and it’s funded from my own somewhat threadbare pockets, but I’m not complaining because the pleasure it has provided me with is priceless! Here’s a thought to blow your noggin; if I’d had a pound for every hit I’ve had on this blog I’d have been able to quit my real life job (seriously!) or at the very least go part time,  and spend the remainder enjoying real-life and blogging the metaverse.  What a mad bonkers thought! But if Wagner James Au can do it, then why can’t I…?

So, what about the next 30,000 hits? What will Kitty be doing then? I have no idea.  I’d love to be able to earn some sort of living from my writing, that is certain, a pipe dream I know..but something to aspire to nonetheless! In an ideal world I’d host Kittywitchin on my own server which would allow for selective advertising, but there’s more to life than Linden dollars….honest!

My Second Life aspirations are to keep enjoying it, increase my enthusiasm, rather than curb it and avoid all the dramas. I want to keep loving the clothes and discovering talented new designers, as well as worshipping at the altars of the established in-world  superstars.  I want to go to tons of events in world,  I want to see more real-life celebrities here (I hear Stephen Fry is a regular? I bloody love him!!) and using the metaverse as a way to connect with the people who keep their careers afloat by buying their books and records. I want to log in to a world that rezzes relatively swiftly and doesn’t crash that often.  I want to be visually excited by what I see and thrilled to be a part of it. I want to see how M Linden and co fare, especially as the global downturn really kicks in , and I wonder what our metaverse will be like in 6 months time. Will Second Life even exist? (God-can you imagine? what the hell would I do if it didn’t? Perish the thought!) 

I want to make my mark on this metaverse and revel in my 15 minutes of virtual fame, and each time I power down my PC I want to do so with a smile on my face, reflecting upon the wonderful time that I’ve just spent in world with all the friends that I’ve made from all corners of the globe..and most of all dear reader, I want to do this with you tagging along for the ride….I truly hope you’ll stick around and see where Kittywitchin goes from here. 

Thanks for reading, thanks to all the amazingly generous content creators for the wonderful freebies and words of encouragement, but most of all thanks for sharing this amazing experience with me:)

/Me raises her  glass of dirty Vimto in the air and says “Cheers, here’s to the next 30000 hits!