Hard disagree on body wash vs soap. Soap always leaves a weird filmy feeling on my skin no matter what brand I use. Plus having to lather up the bar is annoying and I don’t want to deal with wet washcloths in the shower. Give me a poof and a bottle of body wash any day.

If it came down to it, I would take an extension to turn the video black, mute it, and click the skip button for me. Better than having to pull my attention away from what I’m doing to click the skip button or else have an ad that legitimately can play for hours on end. Having the pauses would be annoying but less so than the ad.

The older you are, the more effort I expect. A kid can get away with a cape and a mask. If an older teen comes, I expect full costume, not everyday clothes. Adult? You better be rocking a great cosplay. Not that I’d refuse anyone, but I’ll be happiest giving treats to young children or people showing off really amazing effort in the costume department.

Welp, reading this thread caused me to make a cup of tea.

It freaks me out. I hate how they’re making it so we’re pretty much dependent on these corporate-run networks, which then in turn make it so you can’t discuss topics that advertisers dislike, and then you have nowhere else to go to talk about those topics online. Inevitably, minority groups are the first to lose out. There was an absolutely chilling article posted a little while back about a leaked plan from a US conservative group to make is so allowing any discussion of LGBTQIA stuff online would be considered pornographic and disallowed. There are very dangerous people who want to control what we’re allowed to say in online spaces and they are scary smart in how they’re trying to go about it.

And I crossdress (might boost me with socdems but halt momentum with undecideds and old people.)

Depends how sexy your crossdressing is… 🤔

In the winter, 68, 69 if I’m particularly cold, In the summer I don’t turn on the AC unless I’m absolutely dying, and then it only goes to 77. I’m a lizard, I love the heat, but I also hate paying high gas bills.

Hi fellow lolita! It’s such a pain trying to discuss the fashion with people who aren’t already into Japanese fashion. I feel weird every time I try to mention it because of the book. Also it’s so much deeper than people on the outside think! There’s tons of nuance in the brands and sub-styles and it all sounds so pedantic to outsiders. Have you been watching Tyler’s new videos?

Dang, old school! I only got into WoD in the last few years but it’s been so much fun and I’ve met amazing people through it. Spooky nerds are best nerds.

I’ve never heard of Daniel but looking him up, he seems like the sort I’d avoid. A lot of people use SL as wish fulfilment, making their avatars the way their idealized self would look. You can get really creative with an avatar but it’s less common than big burly biker dudes and girls with giant boobs. I mean, I play a femboy half the time, so that probably says something about me.

Sex is a thing you can do and it’s part of the world, but it’s as focused on as you make it. You can go your entire SL without having sex or engaging with sexual content if you choose. I know people who are family roleplayers and live their SLs as kids, and people who are just into art, or just into fishing and sailing. Sex is part of my SL but not the entire thing, just like RL.

Please talk to me about Mage. I’ve only gotten to play it once and really enjoyed it.

I’ve been playing Second Life for almost half of my life. I used to run a blog about it and often spend a few hours every day online chatting with people. Mentioning that I know anything about it inevitably triggers people to either ask “wait that still exists?” or “isn’t that a sex game?”

It gets better. Seriously. You will find your people and be happy. It’s just gonna take about seven or eight more years. I promise, life is worth living and you’re gonna do great.

I was kind of disappointed they didn’t make me count backwards like you see on TV. Just one minute I was laying on a table with a squishy pad under me, the next I was groggily waking up with an oxygen canula up my nose.

My experience fainting was much more interesting. Woke up in the early morning with my leg hurting. I had a roommate who heard me moving around and said that I probably had a charly horse. Her recommendation was to stand up and slowly press down on my leg until it released. I did. Then I slowly became aware that the light in the room had changed. Then that I was very cold. And then that I was laying down. Apparently I straight up passed out for ten minutes from the pain. Fortunately I didn’t hit my head on the way down but my roommate was very concerned and immediately gave me a glass of water because according to her, she’d only ever seen someone faint from heat exhaustion and they needed water.

I’ve had a few experience with this and each was drastically different.

On one end, I reconnected with a friend I hadn’t seen since high school and invited her out for dinner. We met and just picked up right where we left off. Every time I see her now, it’s the same. I invite her to all my parties by default because she’s a great person to hang out with. We’re very much similar people and really enjoy each other’s company.

On the other, I reconnected with an online friend I hadn’t spoken to in a few years. It was nice to chat with him again but the more we talked, the more it was clear to me why we stopped talking in the first place. He was sort of controlling and jumped to a lot of weird conclusions and never communicated what he wanted clearly. We stopped talking regularly and while we’ll say hi if we’re online at the same time, we don’t seek each other out for long chats.

Just in time!

There’s no single uniform answer because they’re people and unique. I’ve dealt with some powertripping gross mods who only use their positions to further the benefits to them and their friends. I’ve also had selfless, kind mods who take hits in order to further their communities. Most are somewhere in between. When I’ve been a mod, I’ve not been a saint, but I’ve also not tried to actively create harm.