Benie's General Blog

So this is going to be a mixed bag of news for you guys. First off, a week ago I got
my Index working again! ..How? Turns out they never asked me to check the power adapter.
Basically it was Friday night and I was prepping my ‘dead’ Index, putting it on a box. And I remembered they wanted the power adapter. So I remove it from the UPS, and was preparing to wrap it around then.. stopped myself.

In my head: “Wait.. this isn’t an Index plug…”, and opened the drawer I put all my spare power adapters. One of them looked like it was designed for the Index. Untangled it from the mess of wires, grabbed the breakaway cable of the Index and did a test fit.. and it went in very snuggly, like it was specifically designed.
No WAY! This… this couldn’t be the reason why my Index isn’t working. It just couldn’t. That would be too ridiculous! But I tried it anyway, and booted up SteamVR.
…It came BACK TO LIFE!!! Solid green lights, and getting an image on my lenses. Started laughing, couldn’t believe just how… how easy of a fix that was. I tried everything, but this. Then I started yelling OMG IT WORKS!!!! IT WORKS!!!!
…Wow. Weeks, not knowing what the hell I did to my Index, and it was all because it wasn’t the right power adapter. Quickly told Steam Support I got it, and didn’t need the replacement anymore (and then closed the ticket). Such a silly person I am.
–
Now in my defense, back then I was just trying to get my computer operational again. I wasn’t sure what I was plugging in at the time, and didn’t even think I would need the adapter for the Index as well.

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Moving on, gotta talk about these god damn FPCs, or Front Panel Connectors for short. I have lost count how many damn times I couldn’t turn my computer off by the button on the top (as I usually do) by the time I go to bed. Having to take the side panel off, grab a flashlight, put my hand on something metal for 5 minutes to ground myself, and then very carefully try to push the damn connectors back in their pins.

Getting really sick of having to do this. I have never had to do it so frequently when the room was back the way I originally had it. Like there’s just so much damn tension on those wires that even typing on my keyboard like I’m doing now, causes them to slowly slide out of their pins. And I won’t know if I have to do it again until I try to turn it off by the
button… and it won’t turn off.

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And now finally, the 3rd thing. Even though I got my Index working again I haven’t been on.. as honestly there’s really nothing to do without Jero and/or Kovo being on. Guess I’m feeling that burnout again that nothing I have really interests me.
That doesn’t mean I haven’t been doing anything. I’ve completed the campaign
of PowerWash Simulator as the game came out of Early Access. And I must say the ending was very interesting, but also predictable. And the achievements… the achievements are more like lengthy challenges that honestly aren’t worth achieving as of how ridiculous they are. For example, an achievement that tasks you to get 95% cleaned… without completing anything. To me, this is nearly impossible.
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I also was playing Phasmophobia solo, and last night I played with Kovo (who got on desktop). And from what he saw VS what I saw looked quite.. buggy. He was constantly being ‘hunted’ while the ghost didn’t even give me a single ghost event (or a hunt). It felt like a classic ‘what‘ moment with the Earthbound music.
—
Outside of that, I’ve been watching various Youtube videos. But out of all of them, there’s one guy who.. I gotta say, honestly makes me wish I can fucking move to Amsterdam and leave the US behind. His channel, called ‘Not Just Bikes‘, is a guy from Canada who has gotten married yet wants a better life for their kids to grow up. And after going over all the options, they left Canada and moved to the Netherlands. And his experiences, he shares with them.
And he, has SOLD me time and time again!! Don’t have a car? Don’t wanna learn how to drive and wish there was a better way to feel independent!? No problem! In
the Netherlands, you can bike or walk to work, get groceries, or whatever you need!
Like.. oh my god. I was born in the wrong country. He said their kids bike to school, and are happy they have some level of independence… instead of America and Canada where you have to have a car for anything.
He just, every time he nails it just how bad our infrastructure is here! How badly we rely on cars instead of trains or bikes. ..Can you imagine just how much of a better, happier and healthier life I would’ve had if I was raised there? Not having to use a school bus. Just use my bike. Not have to deal with the damn Stroad that is my city’s main route, and nearly getting ran over trying to walk to Waffle House by dumbasses turning right who don’t see (or don’t give a fuck about) me standing there waiting at the crosswalk?!
I fucking hate it here. Wish I could move. ..It just sounds so awesome. So calm and peaceful instead of this concrete jungle we live in that’s America.

But I shouldn’t really bitch about living here. It’s actually quite peaceful (outside of the sirens of emergency vehicles) compared to actually living in a big city (or even in a poor country). However I’m reading Americans are actually moving to Europe due to ‘The American Dream’ being too expensive. Good on them. I’m sure their lives will be so much better there. ..Just don’t go to the UK right now over how hot it is and the ridiculous premium pricing of a AC unit (according to Jero).
All the video series has really done is pushing me to learn how to not fall off my bike again. With the price of everything going sky-high, and also the real chance of Doordash and Grubhub going belly up… using my bike to ‘be my own delivery driver’ might be my only option (including getting groceries).
I mean.. I have had multiple dreams of this (in the past), as if it’s a sign of my future. But that can happen really well if Southern Indiana would redo their infrastructure to support
cyclists. Except the cities around us… are covered in Stroads. Clarksville alone
uses three Stroads due to shops and malls. It’s very dangerous if you don’t have a car.

Though I’m very fortunate the Stroad that makes up our city’s main route, allows bicycles. Not all sidewalks allow this. But looking at Google Earth Pro, the sidewalk doesn’t go all the way to our ‘local’ Kroger. Planning out the route from my house, I would have to go through a few parking lots (or a large suburban neighborhood).
But hopefully in the future they will extend the sidewalks, as the images on Google are quite old (maybe they have already).
They also should make this extremely busy intersection, bike and walking friendly. Notice there’s no sidewalk on the bottom of this Stroad intersection.

God damn car dependent city…
What’s bad is there’s not enough push to really do anything in congress. The government and oil companies will always be in it for the money.
I’m just glad Louisville HAS taken steps to try to make their city friendlier to cyclists and walkers. Now if only Southern Indiana would follow suit.. instead of do Stroads like the picture above.
—
Finally, there’s this video talking about what if America had a nationwide high speed transit system. While this has been a huge want for me… I don’t see it happening in my lifetime. America loves cars way too much to even start the groundwork on this.
And that’s extremely depressing. Never did we ever in the 1940’s think about “you know not everyone has/wants a car, we should make cities accessible for bikes and walkers.. so they won’t have to commute 5+ miles to the grocery store.” 😔
I also blame our mayor for only caring about Amazon and not about bikers and pedestrians. Like I said before, I’m glad 3+ years ago they redid the highway to have sidewalks. But more could be done, like having a designated bike path (to make it safe to commute when you don’t have a car).
But I guess I shouldn’t really bitch. It could always be worse.

.
Anyway, that’s me done ranting and talking about other stuff. Sorry I haven’t really been blogging that much. Really losing interest in it, but I’ll still occasionally blog when I feel like doing so. I’m still OK, just bored out of my mind honestly.

You folks take care of yourselves. And if you have a city in America and Canada that actually is starting to care about the future (to lessen our carbon footprint on this
planet by not fully depending on cars), I’d love to hear from you.
Also please subscribe to Not Just Bikes (and all other Youtubers trying to raise awareness to this discussion) if you found what I was talking about entertaining and inspiring.

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Holy shit it works
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Off and on this day, I thought of the WMR HMD. The phrase “just try it” kept going through my mind. As much as I really wanted to get back in VR, was it really worth going through the hell of doing the playspace again?
Eventually I had enough of it nagging me and finally tried. Ohh how much I ‘missed’ this.

“Hold your headset infront of you and then use your mind powers to click on the Center button, without moving the headset.” Because humans totally have mind powers. But I did my best and managed, even trying desperately to draw my boundary (aka playspace). It took two attempts but I finally had something that was ‘OK’.

Alright, now to finally bind my Index controllers to this thing. …And I was getting the same exact results as before. What the HELL! Chase, I listened to you. I set up a damn playspace. WHY is it STILL HAPPENING?! The controller (my left controller) was nowhere where my hand actually was. Thankfully for me, the program has a Discord server I can ask for help, which I did.
One of the admins linked me this video, saying it’s likely the motion I’m getting
wrong. Now Chase suggested to do a ‘figure-8’ movement and that’s what I’ve been doing. But after watching the video, I clearly wasn’t doing it that way. So I did it exactly as the video showed (but with the HMD and the controller). Though I had to do it very carefully due to exposed wires of the HMD’s cable. And much to my surprise.. it WORKED!! 😃 My left Index controller is now exactly where my left hand is! And it also worked for my right controller as well! YES! Finally!! Finally some good vibes for once!

Now to just fix the HMD’s speakers and mic to be compatible with Voicemeeter. This took quite a lot of time, and one time I thought I was never going to get it. The speakers were working, but not in SteamVR. That was until I clicked on something in SteamVR and I heard a sound. Freaked out saying “OMG IT WORKS!!”
Got on VRChat, in VR. Glad to finally use my arms again. Only problem is I couldn’t move my playspace. OVR Advanced Settings was uninstalled and I got that undone, but that didn’t help. I forgot how I did it (yet again).
I won’t talk about what happened in VRChat as it has nothing to do with the current topic. Plus.. I’m getting tired blogging about the game. Like, physically tired just thinking about it when it’s the same ole thing of “I went here and saw this person”. It’s just boring nowadays.

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Steam Support’s late night good news
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I stayed up trying to work on blog posts and noticed Steam Support got back to me. I’ve been waiting almost two days for them to respond and I’m glad they finally did, but knew it would likely be bad news. So I went to bed and grabbed my phone, readying myself for being told “we only use FedEx SORRY!”
When I saw the message, I stared with huge eyes. …I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

They’re. willing. TO WORK WITH ME!!! 😲😲😄😄 Ok, this is truly a God given miracle!! Messaged Jero with all caps. However I still remembered they sent me that FedEx shipping label. In the afternoon I’ll call around and see what I can do.
–
The afternoon came. I hardly got any sleep due to staying up so late (try not to do that again). Tried to call my ‘local’ post office (at least I thought it was local at the time). Finally got to speak to a human, who told me it’s “not really likely” then putting me on hold. Then she says it is possible “in certain post offices” and tried to look it up. I never got a red flag until she asked for my city. “Is that in one word?” she asked. “Uhhh… I thought this
was the {my city} Post Office,” I said. “No sir it’s not. This is the west coast”.
The FUCK?! HOW in the… whatever, I tried to look for my actual post office and found the correct number. And the computer was all “thanks for calling the {my city} post
office.”
Ahh. Finally. Now to wait to speak to someone about this. And I waited.. and waited.. and waited. The phone kept ringing, and ringing, and ringing. …Noone wanted to pick up the damn phone. Eventually I got a busy signal.
I called again.. again the phone rang off the hook. I yelled “PICK UP, DAMNIT!!”, but I still couldn’t get ahold of noone. Oy!! So much for calling my post office, Kovo. I then looked up my UPS Store’s phone number. Got to speak to someone, who flat out
said “no, you have to have a UPS or USPS label. We don’t accept FedEx.” Felt pretty damn burned and pissed after that.
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Ok Steam, can I do this?
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Calmed down eventually, then thought “actually wait. Since Steam’s willing to work with me, why not just use the address instead and have UPS or USPS print their own label? This should work, right?”
I asked Steam Support and to the date I’m typing this (the 15th), I am still waiting for them to get back to me. It has been nearly two days. But something tells me they assume I got this under control and don’t need to respond, even though I specifically said “please let me know if this will work”.
Kovo feels I should take an Uber up to my post office just to ask if it’s possible. I told
him “that’s one expensive way to find out, dude”. So, nah. I’d rather wait for Steam Support to give me the green light.

EDIT: They finally responded. But it’s not really ‘supportive’. Basically they say “if you choose not to go to a FedEx Store (which doesn’t exist here), you are on your own.”
Wow. Way to show your ass, Valve. I totally feel like a valued customer after that response.
They didn’t even answer my damn question if I can use the address!!
I told Jero and he said “you can still do it. You don’t need them to tell you. They’re hinting at it already”. Hmm. Alright then, guess I’m going Saturday. I was going to go Monday but figure if I do it earlier, they’ll start shipping it to Valve by early Monday morning. And I can’t do it Sunday because they’re closed, and it’s going to rain that day.
So Saturday it is. Jero also highly suggests I put a piece of paper in the box with
my name, address, and RMA number. Said it’ll help expedite the replacement.
—
In the meantime, I wanted to use my FBT again. Trying to look up Steam controller dongles isn’t possible. Infact I’m told it’s not possible to find them “at a reasonable
price”.
And Amazon doesn’t sell just the Vive tracker dongles either. But I found someone that does: iFixIt. Huh. Aren’t these the guys I keep hearing about from tech Youtubers who get sponsored by them? They should be legitimate then. So I got two of them (for $100 as they’re $50 each). To me these were reasonably priced, but later I read “$50 for one of them is ridiculous”. Whatever. I got the money.
I also got (from Amazon), another USB 3.0 Hub that’s exactly like my current one. I wanted to find a 5-port version but they don’t exist. It’s either 4-port, 7-port, 10-port, and so on.
Now I can daisy chain them where there’s still only one plug going to my computer. But incase I can’t I got another 3FT extension cable. Always good to have spares anyway.

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RIP Valve Index HMD.. 2021-2022
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Continuing from the last blog post of surviving from a really strong smell (and my computer being OK from the whole ordeal of having kerosene inside of it), I thought “I should see how it can handle VR as well”. I found my Index HMD (I will refer ‘headset’
as ‘HMD’ (Head Mounted Display) for the purposes of this blog post) lenses up that had fallen on the ground, between two pieces of my furniture. Didn’t think much of it as it showed blue lights at the time.
After starting up SteamVR, I saw this error.

Huh. The HMD’s cables are ‘securely connected’. Wait.. uhhhhh. Oh shit. The lights on the front of the HMD are solid red! I’ve never seen that before! ..FUCK!! Don’t tell me I.. I killed it!! I’m not sure if the kerosene got into the HMD or not, but it was covering the cable. It could’ve been from everything from the top shelf falling down that knocked it
off, as I always have it sitting next to my computer.
When I smelled the HMD, it didn’t smell (at all) like kerosene. So it definitely wasn’t that. Whatever it was, my HMD is dead.. I think? When using VR View, I saw an image
of SteamVR (as if it was working perfectly). But I saw nothing in the lenses.
I remembered what Malice said how he was able to get his working: “beat the shit out of it”. Though I didn’t do anything like that, I smacked it several times but it didn’t
help.
Then I tried to look up this ‘208’ error and did everything I read, including updating
my GPU drivers. But I noticed the red lights of the HMD weren’t going away with a clean install of the drivers. And when it was all over, I tried it again. Still getting Error 208.

When clicking the ‘Reset Headset’ link, the lights go blue on the HMD. My monitors go black and then display at 1024×768. At this point the HMD shows green lights. Then a few seconds later I get another black screen and the displays go back to 1920×1080, and I see the solid red lights again.
Well shit… so much for VR. Began to think the kerosene fucked with either my GPU’s display ports, the USB 3.0 extension card, or both. Then I remembered I still had
my Odyssey+ WMR HMD. I’ll be able to test to see if I really fucked up. After unplugging my Index HMD and plugging the O+, I saw the lenses light up. Ok! So this proves
my Index is dead, which is bad. However it also proves there’s nothing wrong with my computer. …Thank God. That would’ve been a whole lot worse!
Knowing this, it made me wonder if it’s possible to use my Index controllers instead of
the WMR controllers, as I threw away the battery chargers I used (thinking I’ll “never need them again”). Not a smart move.
–
And at this time everyone was on VRChat. So I got on in desktop mode, slowly walking over to the mirror feeling ashamed of myself not having VR anymore. Nearly to the
mirror, Jero stops me and notices I’m in desktop. I told him “my Index died”. He couldn’t believe it. I can’t even believe it myself. This shit shouldn’t be happening to me.
Nova and Jero tried to give advice to fix the HMD. I tried all of their suggestions but nothing worked. Jero then suggested I try to replace the cable (by actually taking it out of the HMD) and managed to find an area on the Steam Store a way to buy a new one
for $130. So this is what Malice meant by they “aren’t cheap”. Jero felt ‘85% sure’ it was the cable, but I had my doubts. Still ordered it as I was desperate for a miracle.

Cue the ‘FedEx trolling the delivery date’ montage!!
Started that evening…

OSHI–!! Gimme gimme! That’s TODAY!!

Saturday afternoon…

Wait. “‘Initially expected WEDNESDAY’?! You said I would get it TODAY!!” Meh whatever. Guess I’ll wait till tomorrow.

Sunday afternoon…


I hate FedEx even more than I ever did. But.. I finally got it that Tuesday. And after replacing the cable and booting up SteamVR… nothing. It didn’t help. Now, I don’t wish to say I “wasted $130 for nothing”. I’ll explain why in a bit.
But I knew it wasn’t the cable. Infact my O+’s cable is even worse. There are very exposed
wires that need to be sealed up, yet it still works.

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Going through the BS of Steam Support
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Jero was upset with himself he gave the suggestion that didn’t help, then suggested I contact Steam Support. And I told him 1,000 and 1 reasons why that would be even MORE wasting my time (over what I went through with my controller several months ago).
“Hopefully you might not have to return the defective headset” he said. And I said “How am I going to tell them? ..If it’s my fault because of what happened last week (that it broke because I mishandled it)?! They aren’t going to do shit. They’ll say it’s my fault.”
He wanted me to lie to them, to say I was wearing it and it froze then the screens went black. Absolutely hated this idea. It felt so wrong to lie to a company. But after he convinc0ed me its OK to do so, to tell them “I was wearing it and then it froze and went black”, that telling them the truth will screw me, he tried to help give a convincing lie. This included saying ‘I have tested this on other PCs and got the same results’.
So I submitted my ticket and waited to see how they would respond. I followed all of their troubleshooting requests.
—
As the days went on, the thought of using my O+ with my Index controllers kept going through my mind. Jero claimed they “patched it out”, but I knew someone who would absolutely know the answer: Chase (aka GamerNit). And sure enough he said it’s still possible, through a program called ‘OpenVR-SpaceCalibrator‘. It will allow you to use other VR devices (such as my Index controllers).
However I ran into a plethora of issues that really killed my mood of trying this. Two things he forgot to tell me;
1. I cannot use my FBT, as the Index controllers require two Steam controller dongles or two ‘spare Vive tracker dongles’. And I only have three Vive tracker dongles. Two of them are being used for the controllers.
2. I have to set a playspace to properly calibrate the Index controllers.
This second thing is the true pain in the ass, remembering the pain I went through in the past. Even though I’m in a bigger room (my father’s old room) which has much more lighting above me, I doubt I’ll get any improvement. And calibrating the controllers was a real pain in the ass. I’m not even sure if I’m doing it right.
Think I’d rather deal with broken arms, than deal with the playspace shifting on me. And this has been my mindset since then. Though the thought to “just try it” has come and gone. However I want to see what Steam Support says first.

Going back to Steam Support, I’ve been in talks with them for over a week now (past the date this post was made). Kept feeling they’re going to see through the lies. In total I have sent them three SteamVR System Reports, and two MS Info 32 reports.
The last troubleshooting request they gave was a doozy, and to me asking way too much. They wanted me to uninstall every single VR related tool I had. In addition which
had nothing to do with the HMD, they wanted me to uninstall iCUE and Voicemeeter. Couldn’t lie my way out of it as they wanted an additional SteamVR System Report and
a MS Info 32 report (to make sure it was done). Jero suggested I do a System Restore point that I can undo all the forced changes. So I did everything they asked, including giving them a detailed explanation of what happens when I boot up SteamVR (and click the Reset Headset link).
With all the required info sent to them (as it too didn’t work), I use the System Restore point. This took a lengthy 10+ minutes. Though it restored Voicemeeter and iCUE, the others I had to reinstall (they were showed as installed in the registry, but not physically). And also since then I have a missing program on my quick launch.

The missing icon in the lower left. I’ve had this but finally figured out what app it is.
It’s iCUE. Seems the System Restore corrupted the install, as the app wouldn’t launch. Had to do a complete reinstall to fix it.
Anyway, back to Steam Support (again). Their next message was very promising. They offered to give me a refurbished replacement for free, even though I’m outside of my
warranty (bought the full kit on what would had been my father’s birthday (May 11th)). So yeah, two months outside of its 1-year warranty. And at the time, they never asked for the old one. Things were looking good.
…Until, the next day after I agreed to accept it and gave them my address.


DAMNIT!!! They gave me hope I didn’t have to send the old one back.. and then take it away from me.
Plus…

And that my friends, is what I call..

Just. like. they. did to me, with my controller months ago. They will refuse to accept that I don’t have a car/printer/FedEx Store in my city. That ain’t their problem. They see it
as “well if you want a replacement, you better cough up those things!”
Buying a replacement headset isn’t possible…

This is the first time having more money isn’t going to help me. A friend believes they’re making a lot of money with the Steam Deck, so why bother making more Index headsets?
Jero felt asking them ‘nicely’, that someone would show up to help me. At the time I didn’t know what ‘being nice’ felt. All I felt was defeat. But I did try to calm down and listen to him, and wrote something to Steam Support in hopes Jero was right.
And the next response, while they didn’t say “we only accept FedEx”, felt (to me) they should had.

It took… a day until I finally calmed down to see what they were truly saying. So they completely misread my message. I asked for a QR Code (like what Samsung did) that I can take to a UPS Store to have them print out the label for me. They also didn’t read that I don’t HAVE a FedEx office.
Kovo got involved, and he actually gave very good hope I can still do this. He suggested that I send my Index to him or Nova, and they will send it to their FedEx Store. But then the next day, he turns an about face and tries to pressure me in buying a printer, saying it’s worth it. I feel it’s not. It isn’t going to pay for itself with how infrequent I’ll use it as I don’t do RMAs that often to need it, and the ink will dry up. So yes it’s useful.. but not all the time.
He also thinks I can just go to my post office and they’ll do it there. I did try to call but they were closed at the time. My mother feels going there would be a waste of my time
as “they don’t work with FedEx”. But I’m still going to try to call tomorrow, just to see for myself.
He then told me Nova would be willing to do the whole ‘send it to a friend’ thing. But I’m going to wait to see what Steam Support says first.

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A small break from VRChat
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As the title goes I’ve been taking a small break from VRChat, hence why you haven’t really seen me post much since the last time. There’s no real reason, though kind of tired
seeing Jero in a public instance and just.. whatever man, do what the hell you want. I’m not mad, just a bit frustrated at him. And I guess the other reason is due to this
heatwave.
Besides, I’ve been meaning to play other games besides VRChat that I haven’t in awhile. Since this isn’t the Games blog I won’t talk about them, but I’ve been playing PC Building Simulator and Planet Crafter. Two games I’ve been putting off of continuing them. And I need to fix that.

But let’s discuss the reason(s) why I decided to make this an actual blog post.
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F****ed by Amazon (without lube)
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To start this off, if you’re a parent reading this section of my blog post and you have underage kids, do NOT let them see this section!! This has highly adult content and it’s only to be seen by ones who are 18+!
I take no responsibility if you fail to adhere to this warning, as this is your only warning.

Now then, I’ve been putting off needing to buy some Microfiber Cloths for my Index’s lenses (to finally get rid of the fog and smudges I see). But due to a letter in the mail that I can get a $20 Amazon gift card just by putting in a 5-star review with a
picture, and my mother asking me to look something up on Amazon, then I finally went on and got some.
I also looked up.. something a bit more.. *cough* totally safe for work ‘toys’. I had bought one months ago but the silicon has really ripped up since then, so I tried to find a replacement (or a better version). I had to look for a long time as I kept getting results that were getting mixed up with non-NSFW stuff. Quite odd as I remembered back then they had plenty of sellers, now not so many.. what’s going on?
But I finally found one at a reasonable price and purchased it, and it was supposed to either arrive today or tomorrow. However, I’ve noticed something pretty wrong.
When I tried to track the package, it didn’t show who was shipping it and it continuously showed “Carrier picked up the package”.. what’s going on? There’s been no movement since then, only the bar getting closer to ‘Out for Delivery’. So I hoped everything would be fine and I’d get the order tomorrow.
3 minutes after dinnertime, I got a message about an “unexpected problem with completing your order”. Didn’t actually see this message (or even know I had gotten
it) until two hours later. Assumed it was another scam email but checked it anyway and saw the picture of the order. “Oh no…” I said as I read further. The seller got ahold of me and told me something very shocking (and disappointing), that “Amazon doesn’t allow selling adult products”. Due to this, the seller’s account was closed and their account assets have been “permanently frozen”, but says they’ll refund me.
I couldn’t believe this. Again, several months ago Amazon was OK with this, and now they’re NOT?! WTF, AMAZON?! ..To be fair they can and do update their ToS with little to no warning, and do state this… and it’s not their fault you choose to not read their fucking lawyer speak.

Decided to tell Jero this to see what he thought, and he.. seemed almost against me. He was more appalled by Amazon not caring about this in the first place, than Amazon not warning anyone that this isn’t allowed. I wanted to feel sorry for the seller, as they probably didn’t know either. But he felt the seller “violated the ToS”.
No, you don’t get it!! I explained my side of the story and… saw him go offline. SHIT!! He’s going to unfriend me! I was forced to rewrite in a way to ‘suck up to him’ by almost constantly saying “I respect your opinion” in various ways. When I was done I went back to my game, feeling burned by this whole thing but also worried Jero was going to unfriend me anytime.
Later he responds. Tell myself not to be scared of his responses and just read them…
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…That was close! / What the fuck happened, Amazon?!
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“I see what u mean” -Jero
😌 Ohh thank goodness!! PHEW! I can breath easier now. Don’t have to write “…It happened again” as the title for this. But yeah, he understood, telling me he finds it very odd that Amazon in the UK still allows this (finding this for himself). Ok, that’s even more odd over this whole thing.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Why does Amazon in the UK allow it, when Amazon in the US doesn’t? What the fuck happened?! Why are you guys being assholes?!
My only guess is the fact the device is mechanical (and the one I got last wasn’t), so it didn’t ‘pass by a safety inspection’? There’s more to this, but.. but I’m not going to ruin any remaining respect I have to find out by asking Amazon directly. I still feel bad for what happened to the seller. I have to. On the other hand, yeah I can see where Jero’s coming from. The seller probably already knew and did it anyway.. hoping to get away with it, and its their fault (not mine).
But what if the seller didn’t know…? All I know is Amazon was OK before, and now they’re not. And there’s no fucking reason for it. So I’m going to ‘keep my head down’ and
hope Amazon themself doesn’t come up to me and is all “why didn’t you know this was against our ToS?” I’d have no excuse, for failing to read it.

Even if I asked “why were you guys OK with it before?”, they can say “we weren’t paying attention back then. The selling of adult toys have always been against our ToS.”
And if you (the viewer) were to ask me “how come there are still sellers around if Amazon has completely banned the sale of adult toys?”.. that’s a simple answer: they don’t pay attention to who puts what in their marketplace.
If this has been always against their damn ToS, okay then. I can’t do shit about it. Period. I can help by ‘white knighting’ (aka reporting) the sale of all adult toys to them since they want to be fucking pricks.
Guess I’ll be getting a Love Sense toy afterall. Jero keeps asking me if I “have one”. So why not do so? 😉 It’ll definitely be interesting, for sure.
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“Sorry Scooby, I can’t help you”
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Woops! I forgot about this one. While I was working on this blog post, Scooby suddenly messages me. “Can I call you?” he asks. Umm.. what’s going on, dude? Need dating advice or something? No, he needs help with ‘Unity’. There’s a reason why I put this in quotes.
Fired up OBS originally thinking it was going to be drama related, and I wanted to remember everything word for word. But I remembered enough already.
Three minutes of waiting for him to fix his mic, he started explaining his issue. At first I couldn’t quite understand what he meant (something about the Awtter). But he wanted to literally rip the hair off of the Awtter model and put it on his Kangaroo.
Thought about it and said “I don’t think you can physically remove the hair, without going to Blender”.
Then I saw him pop up the Blender window, and I cringed so hard…

“Ohhhh… ahhhhh. I wish I could help you dude, but I don’t fully know much about Blender” I said. But he seemed to not understand this, continuing to ask how to do it. From my barely limited knowledge I told him to “select the mesh” and “find a tool to cut the hair off and then save it as an .fbx”.. that’s all I could tell him! Dunno what tool he could use, but I did state he “have to worry about Weight Painting”. I also asked if he asked the VRChat Discord for help. But again, he wasn’t getting me. And this lasted for a
good 10+ minutes until he finally got it.
I asked him “if this was about Unity I might be able to help you”. He still needed help
in Unity though, to get AudioLink working. Looking at what I saw, asked him “what shader are you using?” He said “oh, Poiyomi”. Well fuck, I can’t help you there either. 😑
Wished him the best of luck finding something that can help him and stuff, and that’s it.

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Well, it looks like we WON’T be working together (VRChat Discord)
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Okay, VRChat Discord. Okay. You’re sick of my shit. Dunno what happened but it seems as if catboy told all helpers “whatever you do, do NOT help Benie with his project! He WILL USE YOU for his own personal game!!” Likely overreacting, but it seems to be the most logical thing as I’ve been waiting for three days and noone wants to (or maybe can) help me… forcing me to fix the issue myself.
The issue I’m having is grabbing the pose. Though I have a hard time explaining said
issue, I will try. Typically, when I do a fist with my left hand at the grab point defined by the Receiver’s transform, my fist will ‘teleport’ into the back of the pose’s head
and be ‘glued’ to it, using the rotation of my arm and wrist for position and rotation.
Now this is what I expect to happen. But what’s actually been happening is… this is where I have a hard time explaining (and a maybe possible reason why I’m not getting help).
–
Instead of the fist ‘glued’ to the back of the head, it ‘floats’ behind the head. It’s still attached but not fully. Think of if I’m grabbing an orb that’s also attached to the pose. The orb moves with the hand, but it doesn’t move with the pose. It ‘rolls’ around, especially if I use playspace mover to go up. My fist will go up and above where the grab point is. Also when I turn my head I can see the pose moving on this ‘orb’ (not actually turning but rotating on an axis).
That is the best I can explain the issue. But despite my attempts to explain I can’t get anyone to help me. I have made some personal progress, but two pose types are seriously kicking my ass to show absolutely no sign of even being close to having the issue mitigated. Reason why I’m not listing the pose types is I figure you folks are tired of me talking about this project (as it doesn’t benefit anyone but… myself). So that’s why I stopped. But the reason why I’m talking about it now is its part of what happened yesterday. Being on Red status, Jero couldn’t join me if he wanted to.

So I gave up trying and moved the changes over to the main version, got my trackers on and tried to see who’s on. Saw Frost was joinable, and remembered he ‘has power over Jero’. “This might work in my favor” I said as I was joining.
There were quite a few people here. Kat was here, but she very tired from drinking. But that was the only friend besides Frost who was there. I layed down next to the two and just chilled for awhile.
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“Jero, get your otter ass in here!”
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I was debating if I should say “it would be nice if Jero was in here”, thinking Frost would say something like “well let him be where he wants”. Eventually I came up with “you know it would be nice if Jero joined us. Too bad he’s with his otter friends.” Frost says “let me fix that” and spams him 30 invites to join. Five minutes later, Frost actually calls Jero and tells him to get his ass in here. I’m muted, laughing my head off. Finally I see him joining us. BAHAHAHA!! You won’t join me, but you will listen to Frost. 🤣🤣
This almost feels as if Frost was my ‘big brother’, and I’m all “big bro! Jero doesn’t wanna join me!” 😭 And Frost would be like: “is that SO?! 🤬 I’ll make him join.” 😈
And then I’m all (in the background);

It was too funny. I said to Jero while trying not to laugh “glad you could join us”. Apparently he was planning to leave anyway, due to drama within the otter community. I didn’t ask what happened as I wouldn’t really know what to tell him (don’t know anyone there). Though Jero did ‘get his revenge’ by trying to lick Frost’s feet over and over. This was just as funny, hearing Frost’s responses and Jero saying “I’m sorry that you invited me here”.
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There was also this random person in full body that both of us assumed was one of Frost’s friends, who was moaning. Jero started doing very lewd things (such as licking the guy’s ass) where I felt “ok this is too much” and left the couch for a mirror. OML, Jero.
He however was chuckling over how Frost and Kat had left for another area of the world to avoid him. With him near me, I tell him how I’ve been working on JeroWorks and was going to show him the issue, when the person comes over.. gets in my face and says “did you come over here because I was moaning?” I said “no”. And they said “good, you better not be against it” then saying they were joking. Look, I don’t even know you. Get out of my fucking face. Didn’t say this (obviously).
They ask where Frost and the others went, and I pointed around the corner. Finally they go away. Ok, that was uncomfortable. Jero asks if I want to head over to where Frost is and I said sure.
We try to find the others and eventually do. Jero sees the two are having an alone moment and decides to leave them be. We go over to another mirror, where Jero tells me he needs to go deal with their dog.
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Wait WHAT?!
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He was gone for quite some time, so I switched to my JeroWorks 3.0 version to show him when he gets back where Unity has been kicking my ass. But when I picked the pose that did it… it was WORKING?! What?! ..HOW?! In the test version it wouldn’t work, but it works NOW?! “Could it be the world?!” I wondered.
Was VRChat not properly updating the model when it claimed ‘Test Avatar built’? I..I don’t understand. But, I’ll gladly accept it. Jero (when he came back) said Unity is “a broken program” (or something like that). He also likes how JeroWorks has progressed.
I then tried the other one.. and somehow it’s better than it was too. This is great! It actually worked out in my favor at the end. Now I can go to LS Media and watch what I want without this being an issue anymore.
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Wish I never met Jelly (and Malice)
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We went back to see Frost (and Kat). Don’t remember everything that happened. Just casual conversation and the like, and Tempest coming in wanting to release his frustration over more drama. Meanwhile, Malice messages me on Discord saying “can’t join” and “RIP”. For once I’m thankful of his inability to join due to his wifi. And I want to dedicate this section to talk about something that’s been bugging me since.. well literally two days ago when Jero had said “I almost joined lol” when I told him Malice was going to join the instance.
Like, literally right now as I type this, Malice is on but Jero isn’t. It’s safe to assume he’s going to want to hang out with someone (likely me). Yet I would rather watch movies by myself with JeroWorks (the actual Jero would be nicer). And if I could once again figure out how to make the poses invisible to others but visible to me, there wouldn’t be an issue of him hanging with me.
Though I wish Jero himself would drop his anger against Malice, so I could hang out with both of them. But no.. I have to be careful of who joins me (all because I’m friends with
a ‘racist’). It’s very annoying. Almost makes me wish I never met him or Jelly if I knew what I knew now.