Exasperation

My virtual life is a total time-suck. Two dear friends seem to have figured that out at about the same time. I'm drawing back and doing more art and writing. Not to mention job search. Can't forget about that.

Death By Cliche

Why is it that so many people participating in vr insist on constructing an avatar that's a dreary melange of stereotypes. Yes, I've become an AvSnob. Men are the worst offenders of course, but how many female toons do we need to see with absurdly long skinny legs topped with a bubble butt and two liter capacity boobies before we throw down the penalty flag?!

Vocalizing Desire On Both Sides of the Looking Glass

So many of us have a really hard time vocalizing physical desires. "Will you lick my toes?" has kind of a weird ring to it when you've been on your third date and maybe fooled around a little on the couch.

People all have buttons that make them go 'weeee', but it seems they are easier to find in virtual environments where we can type up a little screed that floats above our heads telling everyone we like to be tied down and tickled or whatever.

This seems counterintuitive to me, because we live in a culture where most people will divulge their innermost sexual quirks to any grad student with a clipboard. In Portland, Oregon whence these pearls of wisdom derive, there is a free publication called the Mercury. Currently there is a sex survey. People routinely fill this thing out by their thousands and dutifully turn them in to be tabulated, compiled and printed. And then, of course perused by their friends, coworkers, lovers and bitter enemies alike. So if you can tick off a box saying you love to give oral pleasure to people of the same gender, why can't you tell your spouse about this? Just let it out there and, acting on it or not, let it not fester and gnaw.

That's where it all breaks down. Most of us are, I think eager to share. With someone. Anyone. Everyone. But with the person who one shares a bed with regularly, be it a monogamous marriage or a shack up, we clam up. Especially when it matters most.

Not always of course, but all too often. Culturally based repression of even seemingly innocuous acts leads people to respond automatically and neurotically all too often and everyone ends up feeling cheated.

Now on the other hand, we have our online worlds. Multiple partners, kinky turn-ons, BDSM, gender bending to the point of breaking all conventions completely. Relations with man, woman, beast, extraterrestrials, elves, vampires. You name it. If it turns you on, you'll likely find a kindred soul in Second Life. And at the other end of the spectrum, you can find simple talk about things, which is at root what's turning us all on anyway in virtual space. And what makes this possible is that we can have our affinity groups etched onto our avatars and toons.

So in virtual space (including the most unsexy seeming things - you'd be surprised if you think that sex can't creep into just about any computer meeting place), if you're not getting what you want it has more to do with your partner's inability to articulate clearly ('emote') than you not getting what you signed on for. This can be unfulfilling surely. But you can't say you didn't give your partner a good shot at it.

The Corporate State Has Too Many Alts

This is worth a read. A satanic perversion of the concept of alts if there ever was one!


http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/02/16/945768/-UPDATED:-The-HB-Gary-Email-That-Should-Concern-Us-All

Virtual Sex (such a seemingly inexhaustable topic)

How often in reality do you climax simultaneously with your lover?

How often in virtual space do you?

Now that I have you chuckling to yourself, think on how often do you climax at the same time as your partner during a virtual sexual encounter? Or...since we cannot know, how often do you think you do?

I usually will roleplay ("RP") an earth shattering orgasm, though my real life ones are very often nice happy little ones. Not to say displeasing, or disappointing. Just not the ones that make me yelp out loud for the neighbors to hear over their TV.

Also, I often as not (that's half the time, kids- keep up with me) will RP climaxing simultaneously with my partner(s). This is just me (or us- it takes two or more) falling victim to a trope out of bad romance novels.

Second Life Fighting

I have tried to get involved in a couple fantasy sims on Second Life. I come from Neverwinter Nights so battling is just built into that game. It's the sine qua non of the experience from the designers' perspective in that case.

I don't know if Second Life was originally built for battle, but a lot of people are trying various methods of making it work. The problem is that so much of Second Life is take up with making the world look pretty- and the way they do that is very taxing to your internet bandwidth- that when things like bombs, light-sabers and machineguns get involved, you really run the risk of serious lag.

A lot of people solve this problem by engaging "LARP" type systems..which means you resolve how a fight or any other contentious activity comes out by a set of rules which employ randomizations to simulate chance and modifiers for applied skill points and that sort of thing. These systems sometimes utilize animations or not, depending on those who set up the sim.

Each time I've tried to get involved in any of these sims/settings, I get frustrated because either the mechanics dont' work the way they're supposed to... ("We've been having trouble with the meter today...") or gizmos don't cooperate. (I was using my six gun to blast away at zombies but nothing happened...then I punched one and it fell apart. Talk about frustration!)

I've been totally preoccupied lately with dancing and shopping in Second Life, but I plan to devote some time to working on Second Life ass-kickery that I may report my findings to my audience. Stay tuned!