Mistress Strangelove: Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life

Mistress Strangelove or : How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Kinks

The (Mis)Adventures Of A Reluctant Mistress

Chapter 1 : A Shopping Addict Is Born
Chapter 2 : My Inner Bimbo
Chapter 3 : If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew
Chapter 4 : With Bells On
Chapter 5 : Would You Dance With Me?
Chapter 6 : Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum
Chapter 7 : One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research
Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life

Having resolved to use more dirty talk in Real Life sex to see how it improved my sex life, I set about practicing it in Second Life. Over the next couple of weeks, I had some more cybersex experiences where I continued to experiment and see what worked and what didn't. By holding post-coital critique sessions of my cybersex techniques, I must have frustrated numerous guys who only wanted a quick cyberfuck.

I sat there afterwards grilling them for information, "Did 'licked my luscious pink lips' turn you on or would 'ran my tongue over my pouting pink lips leaving them glistening' have been better?" I was taking the new found information from reading online porn and watching porn video excerpts and turning that into 'descriptive text'. In Real Life, I was attempting dirty talking a bit, but it still embarrassed me and I found myself floundering around trying to find the right things to say and the courage to utter them. Before this, I was the usual moan, groan and "oh my god" type of sex person, interspersed with the occasional "ow" as my head bounced off the headboard. No more though, men in Second Life seemed to love it and I was determined to try it out in Real Life.

Halloween was rapidly approaching and I was looking around for a costume for a huge Real Life party I was going to. I loved my new jewelry in Second Life with the bells that tinkled every step I took. It disappointed me that I couldn't wear something in Real Life with bells on it everyday, but I think the other people in the office where I work would complain. Also, I was definitely didn't want to mimic the Second Life bells since they were attached to nipple clamps - that would be an amusing story to tell at work, "Yes, every time I jiggle my boobs, they ring because I have nipple clamps with bells on them." Not the picture of a modern professional woman, my advancement at the company instead of being on an upward tragectory would turn into more of a horizontal, couch-based career path.

I eventually hit upon a costume that was a rousing success. During my first couple of weeks in Second Life, I purchased a dark, tiger-striped cat suit that I loved. I had also purchased neko ears and a tail that went with it. The tail and ears were excellent, moving around on their own and picking up on key words as you typed. Those words would change your neko "mood" and suddenly the ears or tail would perk up and swish around depending on what you said. What sealed the idea was the realization that cats sometimes have bells on their collar, so all I needed was to go as a cat, wear a collar with a bell, and a tail that swished around. Simple as that.

Assembling the costume turned into an adventure itself. I already had a mostly opaque black catsuit covered in gold glitter I could wear. Needing the cat portions, i.e. ears, tail, and the collar, I went to the costume store. The ears at the store were good, also being black with glittery gold, but the tail, well, it just was a tiny little bit of limp fabric. No swishing around, no raised up and bobbling around over my head, in general it was a lousy cat tail. Second Life's potential was already corrupting me, "This is awful, it should be simple to throw together a simple tail and script it so it... oh... scripting... hrmm... animatronics... errr... gah... Real Life sucks."

I had hit a big, Real Life quandry, how to make a tail that stayed aloft and moved around. Thankfully, my father prepared me in life, while my mother taught me to sew and knit, my father taught me how to use tools and provided me with a little used tool box that I've always kept around for sentimental reasons. Mostly, I just get one of my Boy Toys to fix anything I need. Changing light bulbs, mowing lawns, carrying shopping packages, opening jars, and sex - the five things men are most useful for, although not necessarily in that order.

I manufacturered my own tail out of some stout wire and furry fabric - thereby pleasing both parents by using both wire cutters and needle and thread in the construction of the costume. Although, the uses I planned for that tail would not have pleased them anywhere near as much. I took an old, black, leather mini-skirt threaded the tail through a hole in the rump I made and I was finished with the ears, tail, and body suit. In a previous chapter I mentioned that I have 2" platform, 6" heel black patent leather hooker boots that I mostly only wear on Halloweeen. This was Halloween and I was planning on wearing them.

Next came the collar and bells. The costume store didn't have a decent looking collar, so I decided I had to go to a pet store to get one. I went off to the pet store to purchase a collar for my neck, eventually finding the cutest pink collar that would be perfect. But, I realized that I had no idea if the collar would fit. Glancing around I began to try on various sized collars to see which ones fit. At any second I was afraid someone would walk up behind me and ask me what I was doing. But being the comsummate shopper that I am, I had to make certain it both fit and looked good. I tried on collar after collar, looking in the mirror I carry in my purse to see how it looked and wishing there was a bigger mirror right there in the store to model in front of. Although, I bet that the demand for mirrors so that the dogs and cats can see how they look in their new collars is generally pretty low. That was one of the more strange moments in my life, standing in the middle of a big petstore, trying on collars and hoping no one noticed.

Finally, I found a collar that fit perfect and looked just righ, I turned to go purchase my illicit goods when I thought about the matching leash on the hook next to it and the line, "I'm just a naughty little kitty that has run away from my owner, would you be my owner?" popped into my head. I giggled as I mentally saw the look on my date's face when I would say that to him, so I grabbed the matching leash and went to assemble my costume.

The final state of the costume was a black catsuit with gold glitter all over it, a black leather mini-skirt, the aforementioned hooker boots, black cat ears, a black cat tail long enough to curve up higher than my head and wobble around adorably on its own, and a pink collar with a big bell and a leash dangling from it. I topped it off with pink bows on wrists and tail adorned with more bells and long pink ribbons streaming from them.

Later, while walking down the street, if people didn't initially notice me, the bells drew their attention and the rest of the costume held it. At the party, my tail wobbled around, tapping people on the shoulder and meeting them all on it's own. Everyone was having a fun time with my costume, most of all me. I'd never dressed as a Real Life neko before and it was incredibly fun having a tail and leash to play with, flirt with, and in general draw too much attention to myself with. My Boy Toy was mesmerized the whole time and I'm certain I saw him staring and drooling on more than one occasion. I had a blast.

This exhibitionist streak continued throughout the evening and it prepared me for my first major Real Life foray into dirty talk during the after-party sex that night. As the party wore on, I kept walking near my date and whispering dirty little phrases in his ear. Tempting him, teasing him, and giving him a prelude as to the wild, uninhibited sex to come later that evening. I used tried and tested lines that I'd critiqued and honed with my impromptu Second Life focus groups. He didn't stand a chance and couldn't wait to leave the party all night, but I kept him in suspense the entire party.

When we did leave, he couldn't keep his hands off of me and when we made it to the car he wasn't prepared to wait for the drive, so I had sex in a car for the first time since I had my own apartment. I didn't even take off the costume, there was no need, it was a crotchless catsuit. Yes, I was utterly shameless. We ended up doing it 'kitty style' because the tail made it difficult for any other position, all the while I was using more and more of my well-practiced cybersex phrases to drive him even more mad with lust. By the end that was some of the most vigorous and empassioned sex I'd had in a while, all due to a little bit of inspiration from a Second Life neko costume and cybersex.

One of my favorite pop-culture references to dirty talk comes from Friends, where Ross is learning how to dirty talk.

Ross: I was the James Michener of dirty talk. It was the most elaborate filth you have ever heard. I mean, there were different characters, plot lines, themes, a motif... at one point there were villagers.
Joey: Whoa! And the... uh-huh?
Ross: Well, you know, by the time we'd finished with all the dirty talk, it was kinda late, and we were both kind of exhausted, so...
Joey: ...you cuddled.
Ross: Yeah, which was nice.

I prefer to think of myself more like Shakespeare - a true artist, rather than the over-wordy Michener. Which is also why we had time to get to the actual sex. But the 'villagers' line still makes me giggle and a number of times while at the party that 'villagers' line would pop into my head and I would giggle as I thought about more and more creative things to tease my boy toy with.

Chapter 9 : An Unexpected Audience While Defiling An Altar

Happy Blogiversary To Me!

Happy Blogiversary To Me! Happy Blogiversary To Me! Happy Blogiversary Dear Tiessa, Happy Blogiversary To Me! You look like a Bimbo and you act like one too!

Today, March 6th, is the one year blogiversary of me getting first post to this blog and essentially dominating it's content since then. I bet you've been anticipating this as much as I have and planned a huge surprise party for me with cake, balloons, and male strippers. Plus, plenty of other presents, of course. Yay! Send in the strippers and let me start to pig out on cake, ice cream, and, well, strippers... ;)

I have a present for all of you out there who have read my blog throughout this past year, a big thank you for showing such good taste. Or whatever excuse you want to give for why you read my blog...

My next post will also mark the 100th post to the blog, in addition to being my present to you for being such great readers. A nice milestone at a perfect juncture. I'm bursting at the seams to give you your present, so, without further adieu, I give you the next chapter in the Mistress Strangelove series...

Mistress Strangelove: Chapter 7 : One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research

Mistress Strangelove or : How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Kinks

The (Mis)Adventures Of A Reluctant Mistress

Chapter 1 : A Shopping Addict Is Born
Chapter 2 : My Inner Bimbo
Chapter 3 : If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew
Chapter 4 : With Bells On
Chapter 5 : Would You Dance With Me?
Chapter 6 : Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum
Chapter 7 : One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research
Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life

After my introductory weekend in Second Life, I was eager to return. I was astonished at how much I learned during my first weekend and wanted to learn and see more - I was addicted to it already. In a number of places I encountered the word Gor referring to some sort of group, I was curious as to what it was. My "performance" during my first cybersex frustrated me; I knew I wasn't that good. Not being good at something annoys me.

Another key to my personality is that I am very self-competitive. I dislike doing things at less than my potential best. Sometimes this translates into competitiveness with others, and some of my friends may quibble with what I am about to say, but I am rarely, truly competitive with others. I will play at being competitive, joke about it, and do my best, but I don't really take it as seriously as to whether I thought I did my best. Losing to others in a fair (or not so fair) competition doesn't irk me too much at all. No, my only true competitor is my own expectations. Its far more devilish a rival than anyone else could be.

Like many people, while I'm at work, I browse the web periodically; it's one of my stress relievers and I often find that a small break from a task allows me to come back to it and approach it in a new and better way. During one of these times, I remembered my curiosity as to what Gor was. As I write this, I recall I was wrong in my previous chapter, I hadn't learned about the word kajira or Gor's relationship to slavery from that man I met who had a slave, I had merely read it in a few places.

Imagine my surprise when I turned to the Wikipedia article and finally read what Gor was. It was a fantasy world that glorified the enslavement of women. I read the whole article about Gor - it was a series of fantasy novels set in a world called Gor. One of its central features was women as slaves, it talked extensively about the proper behavior of slaves, it had names for slave positions, and it had a small, but devoted following of people who practiced its "tenants". I find that as absurd as the people who learn to speak Klingon.

I was angry about slavery. I disliked the abasement of one person to another, the whole concept of domination and submission mystified me, and the fact people would willingly do all that astonished me. Realizing that in Second Life, it was all shared fantasy similar to cybersex made it easier to tolerate. However, I still thought it very unhealthy that someone would sublimate their own will and I thought it would just reinforce emotional instability and prevent people from taking responsibility for their own life and becoming better.

Then, I reached the part of the Wikipedia article that talked about Gor in Real Life. Evidently, some people live the Gorean lifestyle, with slaves who do their bidding, practicing all the mandated positions, and subjugating themselves on a permanent basis to a master. The Gorean masters prey upon emotionally disturbed women and keep them as slaves by breaking their wills. Through links off that page and other articles, I read stories of women rescued from those situations and how mentally crippled they were by the experience. I had read about the Stockholm Syndrome and the proclivity of institutionalized people to be unable to function outside of that environment and knew how evil enslavement and captivity could truly be. Now, I was truly angry, fantasy is one thing, but taking advantage of people in Real Life was intolerable. I couldn't do anything about it in Real Life, but I didn't have to tolerate the Goreans in Second Life - their mimicking of the Gorean practices seemed to trivialize the Real Life problems.

The final revelation about Gor that surprised me was that the concept of silks, those pretty, flowing clothes I liked in Second Life, originated as the clothing of the slaves. Darn, my favorite outfit was a set of silks. I realized I had been walking around in an outfit that broadcast, "I am a slave" and right now writing this, I realize that not only did the Gorean guy walk into Paradise Lost probably looking for an escort and saw me but that he also saw someone who he thought to be an escort who was also wearing silks.

During that week, at other times during my web browsing activities, I looked for blogs and other sites dedicated to Second Life. I discovered a number of them, but what really grabbed my attention were slboutique.com and slexchange.com. Now, I was even more dangerous, I could shop while at work. My wish lists instantly grew to gargantuan proportions and I spent far too much time and far too much money browsing those sites. In Second Life there were things to distract me from shopping, offline; the only change I could effect in Second Life was the purchase of things. Which I did while at work and then excitedly logged in that evening to try out.

One thing I still immensely dislike about Second Life shopping is the inability to try things on before I buy them. In Real Life, part of the fun of shopping is trying on all sorts of clothing to see which ones you like the best, in Second Life you had to go on the pictures provided. I never liked shopping for clothing on the web before for similar reasons, but now, with Second Life's prices being so cheap; I could afford to buy things just to try them on.

While at work, there was one thing I was not going to try to improve and that was my cybersex skills :) I hit upon the idea of looking for online sex stories to see what the characters said and how they said them. Swallowing my pride, I did something I had never done before, except by accident, I went looking for porn. Those spam messages describing all sorts of sexual activities, I quickly found out, were only the tip of the iceberg. Website after website of porn existed to cater to every conceivable type of proclivity; while I intellectually knew before that time that they existed, I had never experienced them except through a mislabeled or deceptive link on a webpage.

It took me many tries to get over my embarrassment long enough to do, what I like to call, research. With the offer of being an escort hanging over my head and my own disappointment at my virginal performance, I was seeing what it took to be better. Eventually, via the suggestions of a few folks at Paradise Lost who must have thought I was obsessive, I also began to look at online porn movies.

My god! The dialog was execrable in the ones that had dialog more sophisticated than, "Oh god! Oh. Give me that cock. Oh. *moan* *mumble* *slurp*." Is this what guys liked, I wondered? These women, in my opinion, were acting like trashy whores, had they no pride? No dignity? People didn't act like that in Real Life, did they?

Slowly, realization dawned on me that *this* was the dirty talk people had referred to all along and my few attempts in the past, I now realized, had been pitiful to say the least. In Real Life, I've always enjoyed sex and I began to wonder if trying this out would improve things. My personal goal of doing my best at anything I try kicked in and I knew I had to try out these ideas in Real Life. However, I didn't want to make a fool of myself, thankfully, Second Life came to the rescue and I had a handy place to practice before my Real Life dirty talk debut.

Not only was Second Life accelerating my learning and discovery of new things while I was connected to it and wandering around, it was also doing so while I was offline.

Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life

Mistress Strangelove: Chapter 6: Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum

Mistress Strangelove or : How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Kinks

The (Mis)Adventures Of A Reluctant Mistress

Chapter 1 : A Shopping Addict Is Born
Chapter 2 : My Inner Bimbo
Chapter 3 : If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew
Chapter 4 : With Bells On
Chapter 5 : Would You Dance With Me?
Chapter 6 : Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum
Chapter 7 : One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research
Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life
The third day dawned and I was excited to talk to my friend and tell her I was asked to be an escort at a club, especially since we had just talked about it the night before. I hadn't even had cybersex yet, how could I become an escort? Dancing made no sense to me either, why would anyone watch someone's avatar maneuver through the same set of repetitive motions over and over - let alone pay money for it?

I spent most of the day wandering around Second Life doing a little shopping, but my major spending orgy had subsided and I was merely window shopping in most cases. Also, my credit card was threatening to kill me if I didn't slow down. As it was, buyer's remorse had set in a few times, but I kept getting compliments on my appearance, which helped to mollify the tiny, fiscally responsible Tiessa inside. Poor thing, it was always outnumbered and ineffectual, I sympathized with it, but not enough to listen to it and stop spending money.

Each day in Second Life had resulted in numerous discoveries; little did I know that today would be no different in that regard. Second Life brought out more learning in a shorter period of time than I could have ever expected.

Eventually, my friend logged in and I told her all that had happened, including the fateful offer of employment as a dancer and escort at Paradise Lost. We both rejected doing that but we talked about it for a while. She eventually made some comments that egregiously generalized the people I had met, lumping them in with the same general class of people I originally thought worked in the sex trade. As you can tell from my previous writings, I am horrible at detecting prejudice and bigotry in myself, but I think I am still decent at seeing it in others. Being fairly hypocritical, I couldn't let her misconceptions continue, so I told her in greater depth about the conversation I had with the wonderful folks at Paradise Lost. We had discussed literature, philosophy, and science; they weren't unintelligent people who couldn't do anything but spread their legs and moan.

She had to leave and I wandered off to Paradise Lost to dance and talk. That was when I found out how dead Sunday nights in Second Life can be. This was still when there were frequently less than 10,000 concurrent users of Second Life.

I was alone, when a man walked into Paradise Lost. I thought, "Yay! Someone to talk to." I invited him to join me in the really nice dance animation I shared with Helena the previous night. We talked about lots of different things, what he liked about Second Life, how I was a newbie and was still learning a lot about Second Life, and, in general, just learning about each other.

It isn't until now, when I am writing this, that I realize he was probably showing up to Paradise Lost to find a dancer or an escort and I was the only one there, dressed as I was. I'm blushing in retrospect for what he thought I was. Does my cluelessness know no bounds?

He eventually told me about the house he was building. It was a rustic cottage among trees he was proud of and had been working on. I hadn't built a thing in Second Life yet and was impressed that someone could build a house - I thought it would require a lot of effort, technical knowledge, artistic skill, and special tools. He offered to show it to me and I accepted while making the prescient comment, "Is this the Second Life equivalent of asking me back to your place to show me your etchings?" We both laughed at my clever bon mot and teleported back to his place.

Second Life is incredible in that I could go back to a complete stranger's place within minutes of meeting him and feel perfectly safe - thank you Linden Labs for introducing me to a world I never knew existed, a world of safety. I have numerous friends who've been raped in Real Life and I have been in some situations that I thought were creepy and dangerous; one thing I am always cognizant of is the potential for being overpowered. It takes a while for me to feel comfortable enough with a guy to be completely alone with him. Meeting a guy in a club and minutes later going back to his home all alone is something that never would occur to me in Real Life. Second Life has introduced me to a feeling of safety and security that is unachievable in Real Life, thank you again Linden Labs - that experience alone is worth every penny I have given you.

He showed me around the cottage, it was very nice and he had spent time and thought into making it very cozy. This is the first time I saw sex pose balls in someplace other than a display at a shop and I also saw pictures of an attractive avatar in a collar and silks. I innocently went around asking questions about everything.

To reinforce with you how I act, I'd like to point out that I flirt constantly, with nothing more on my mind then enjoying a good laugh. I make frequent double entendres, fascinating myself with my own clever word-play and seeing if I can make better, more subtle, or more amusing ones all the time. It's a game I constantly play with myself and others just happen to be in the room providing the raw material for my fun; the world is my straight-man. Consequently, I have been accused on numerous occasions of being a tease. Not necessarily in such nice words either. Get used to it guys, just because I make a ribald comment or pun does not mean I immediately want to hop onto a sex pose ball with you.

I mentioned how it was nearly impossible for men to not hit on women, especially when they were alone together. He demurred, stating that he was happy with the love of his Second Life. Considering all the pictures of her around, curiosity got the better of me and I asked him how he met her.

"I met her in a rape room."

Startled and uncertain what to say for once, I floundered while all sorts of thoughts streamed through my head. Eventually the story all came out. He went to a place where people pretend rape scenes. She wanted to be raped and was turned on by it, he was turned on by raping women, and he reassured me he would never do that in Real Life. Yeah, right guy, I've been to the Brooklyn Bridge and I didn't see any 'for sale' signs on it. I may be blonde, a bimbo, and a ditz but I am not stupid. Now she was his kajira and he was thoroughly in love with her. Not knowing what a kajira was I asked further and that was when Gor was introduced to me.

So many things about this situation offended me on so many levels - rape, slavery, and the total abasement of one person to another. Here was a person who seemed very nice, perhaps a little strong and forceful, but confidence is a sexy trait, and he was telling me that he was turned on by raping women and owning them as slaves. So very matter of fact as if it was something the local church group would approve of. Visions of mousey men in dull suits sitting around talking about where to rape women, the best rape positions, and the correct whipping techniques crossed my mind. Ward Cleaver coming home from a hard day in the rape rooms to find June chained in her silks to a post in the kitchen where he gives her a light whipping and a kiss hello.

Normally, I'm pretty much "whatever floats your boat", but some things are just patently offensive. This situation started to creep me out, but the guy still seemed completely normal. And then, despite all his protestations to the contrary he did the thing I expected all along, "May I kiss you?" came the query.

As I predicted earlier and which he denied vehemently, he ended up hitting on me. I told him I was still new and had no idea how to kiss someone - I was still reeling from the whole rape and slavery thing and was just stalling while thinking. He showed me his kiss pose balls and we kissed briefly, mainly because I was curious and knew I was safe. I wanted to get out of there quickly. Finishing the kiss, I complimented him on his building skills and his choice of such a beautiful slave, but stated I had to get up early the next day and had to go.

I teleported back to Paradise Lost, the closest thing I had to a sanctuary and home at that point. There were a few people around I had never met and I started to talk to them. Eventually, they all left and I was left alone in Paradise Lost when another man entered.

We started up a conversation and began to dance the nice dance animation; I figured he couldn't be worse than the previous guy. Boy was I wrong :) [Edit: I know he will be reading this :P] Carl was a thin guy with a beard and, interestingly enough, a collar. This was the first time I'd seen a collar on someone besides the picture of that slave, so I asked him about it, why he wore if, if he too was a slave, etc. He stated he wasn't owned, but had been for a while, and deftly deflected most of my other questions about the subject.

Carl was far better at verbal banter, and far more interesting than the previous guy. We started by talking about chess, since he just lost a match to someone from Paradise Lost and seemed miffed by it. He was far more my type of guy, articulate, slightly geeky, but in a cute and adorable way. We talked about me being a newbie and, as in most conversations with guys, the subject eventually turned to sex.

After I expressed my lack of knowledge of cybersex and why it would be interesting, Carl tried to demonstrate a few lines he would type. I still didn't get it, I found it very hard to "get into" the head of the avatar and pretend like those things were happening to me. I laughed a lot, I giggled, and many times I unconsciously changed the subject to something besides sex. However, the subject always quickly returned to sex because of my continued joking about it.

At some point in this conversation with Carl, I made the decision to have cybersex if I could figure out how to do it properly. Carl was going to be my guinea pig. Further talking with Carl came up with an analogy to dirty talking, something I had always been too embarrassed to do in Real Life, but finally, I hit upon the idea that seemed to work for me, the shared creation of a fantasy. Using the descriptions of actions like a play direction for actors or writing a story about the characters from a first person perspective. It still seemed pretty pointless, but at least I had an idea of the verbal mechanics. If I got it out of the way now, I could put a checkmark next to it on my constantly growing list of things to do in Second Life, then, I could proceed on with more productive ways to spend time.

My intentions established, it still required Carl to be as patient as a saint and a Herculean effort on my part to remain serious for more than twenty seconds at a time for anything to happen. After a few hours of this (I never said I was rapidly successful in my effort, did I?), Carl finally mentioned which time zone it was for him and I realized he was three hours ahead of me and it was getting close to midnight for me. That sobered me up enough and I told him I wanted to try it but had no idea where to go. He had a place and we teleported back there.

One of the things Carl and I kept returning to in our conversation was high heeled shoes. I was wearing my color changing stripper heels I purchased the previous day and Carl liked the look of them. One of Carl's turn-ons was women in high heels and we talked about it for a while. When we got back to his place, he wrote lines about what he wanted to do with my high heeled feet, meanwhile I made observations about his room and was joking about non-related topics for a while before I settled in and realized I was going to have to do something "appropriate". I wrote back lines about how sore my feet were from dancing in those high heels all night and how I appreciated the massage and the toe sucking. It felt very unreal and my attempts were not that good - I had no experience with online sex and it showed.

Eager to show off my new purchases from Xcite and thinking that was "the way it is done in Second Life", I put them on and told Carl about them. Knowing Carl he probably made some remark about how "good girls like you pretend to be, don't immediately purchase that much Xcite gear." If he didn't say it, he probably thought it.

Carl also removed his clothes and "put on" his cock. He showed me the "up" and the "down" positions. It felt like we were both showing off our genitals as if they were fashion statements and discussing their features as if they were cars or computers. I was about to make a joke here about cocks and measuring their performance in horsepower, but that would be tasteless. And besides, a man's cock just can't measure up - okay, let me take that back, I have now seen cocks in Second Life that are nearly as big as their owner. If they had that in Real Life, the first time it got hard, they would die due to lack of blood to their other brain.

One of my "good girl" purchases at Xcite had been a blow job animation that I had installed in my "clit". I wanted to try it out, so I activated it and my avatar went down on her knees, grabbed an invisible cock in mid-air, and began to bob her head and stroke this non-existent penis. To say the least, I was disappointed, Carl was half-way across the room and my avatar was no where near him. Yet, there she was giving some ghost the blow job of his afterlife. It took a while to maneuver both avatars into place so that it looked nearly right.

The little green text that kept displaying was nice, but it quickly got repetitive. It took me forever to describe the actions I would do in Real Life without thinking, but now I had to translate them into words. This was definitely unlike Real Life sex; I'm not a big 'thinking sex' person :) It was like learning to write good descriptive text in a story - I have problems in writing descriptive text because, after all, *I* can picture it perfectly in my head, so, I unconsciously concentrated on the action and dialog, devoid of the setting. No one wants to read a story like that, this was the same, I automatically pictured it in my head but failed to translate a lot of that into useful text.

Around this time, my avatar had an orgasm, followed shortly by his avatar having an orgasm. Was I done? Was he done? How did this work? I'm used to more warning of an impending orgasm. In Real Life it would be time for him to roll over and go to sleep, but how did this work in Second Life? Still not quite getting the purpose of cybersex, I asked Carl if this was the end. We talked some more and discussed the problems of the animations, the Xcite gear, and I learned that the "arousal levels" were controllable. Carl had to go to bed; it was very late in the morning for me as well, so off to our respective Real Life beds we went.

I've contemplated this question some over the ensuing months, what is the ultimate purpose of cybersex and what is the ending point? In Real Life, the shared experience, the physical demonstration of an emotional bond, the mutual pleasure, and the culmination in orgasm by one or both partners all contribute to the purpose and "when it's done". I've since had many cybersex experiences where my partner had Real Life orgasms and that seems a natural ending point for them and their avatar. However, I have also had numerous experiences where it became almost a competition to create more and more inventive text. In the end, only through "out of band" communications via IM were we able to agree on an ending point.

This ended my introductory weekend to Second Life. I learned *a lot* about myself and this new virtual world that I was already addicted to. Thankfully, Real Life work was at a low point allowing me to plan more nights in the upcoming week that I could spend in Second Life. I already wanted to spend as much time there as possible, the exploration, the shopping, and the people were all major draws for me.

In the end cybersex was an interesting experience. Trying to coordinate typing creative text, activating animations, fiddling with Xcite attachments, and removing clothes was a far more complex and involved process than I thought. It was even more difficult than walking and chewing gum, which as a blonde ditz, can be pretty trying at times. I'm not joking; this simple activity has caused numerous problems in my life. I'll be walking along, my mind will wander, and the next thing I know I've walked straight into a brick wall. I have had the scraped nose and headache to prove it.

Next Chapter: One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research

Mistress Strangelove Is Running Behind

Darn RL and its incessant demands - I'm sorry the chapter is running behind, but RL is really slowing me down this week. I will publish it as soon as I can.

Mistress Strangelove: Chapter 5: Would You Dance With Me?

Mistress Strangelove or : How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Kinks

The (Mis)Adventures Of A Reluctant Mistress

Chapter 1 : A Shopping Addict Is Born
Chapter 2 : My Inner Bimbo
Chapter 3 : If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew
Chapter 4 : With Bells On
Chapter 5 : Would You Dance With Me?
Chapter 6 : Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum
Chapter 7 : One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research
Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life

In Real Life I was tired and my eyelids were drooping, but I wanted to go to one more place, Lost Dog, the store with the good, but expensive animation overrider I was looking at earlier. I wandered around their store looking at all the other animations first, trying out the dances and poses. And that's when I heard the five words that would change the course of my future in Second Life, although I didn't realize it at the time.

"Would you dance with me?" came the query. "I'd like to test out this dance animation for my club and it would be easier if I had a partner," a beautiful blond in a little black dress named Helena Kirkorian said. Helena has a particularly ebullient chat style, I won't even attempt to replicate it or imitate it. You have to experience it yourself. I will instead stick to the essential things that were said.

"You mean me?" I said looking around and finding out I was the only one standing nearby.

"Yes, it won't take long and it would help me out a lot."

"Sure," was my answer, the word that most defines me, and will probably be my epitaph.

As I mentioned before, I am usually game to try out anything once. I dislike the 'contempt prior to investigation' attitude, even though, if you've noticed I've practiced it a lot in the first two days of my Second Life existance.

I clicked on the pink portion of the duet dance and quickly began dancing a nice, solo dance.

"That's not usual," the pretty blond said, "usually the avatar stands still until the other one is clicked on."

I was willing to take her word for it, having never used a two person animation yet in Second Life. She clicked on the blue portion and we were quickly dancing a very well done dance.

"I'm not used to leading," she joked as her avatar twirled mine about in a complex tango. "Those silks look really good on you, I can tell you've spent a lot of time making your avatar look good."

I blushed. Here was someone with real Second Life experience complimenting me on my choices. I realized I must have been doing something right. After finding out I was a complete newbie, she stated she was even more impressed. All worries and regrets about spending all that money on my avatar melted away.

We talked and danced for over an hour, while a series of friends of hers teleported in, chatted, and then went about their business. She told me about the club she ran, Paradise Lost, and that she was outfitting it with some more dances and this one seemed very good.

Paradise Lost! That's one of my favorite works of literature. Milton packed more insight, characterization, and story into that one piece than most writers could possibly produce in their entire lives. I've read it enough times that I can't accurately count them.

One of my favorite excerpts is the following:

Is this the Region, this the Soil, the Clime,
Said then the lost Arch Angel, this the seat
That we must change for Heav'n, this mournful gloom
For that celestial light? Be it so, since hee
Who now is Sovran can dispose and bid
What shall be right: fardest from him is best
Whom reason hath equald, force hath made supream
Above his equals. Farewel happy Fields
Where Joy for ever dwells: Hail horrours, hail
Infernal world, and thou profoundest Hell
Receive thy new Possessor: One who brings
A mind not to be chang'd by Place or Time.
The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n.
What matter where, if I be still the same,
And what I should be, all but less then hee
Whom Thunder hath made greater? Here at least
We shall be free; th' Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:
Here we may reign secure, and in my choyce
To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, then serve in Heav'n.
But wherefore let we then our faithful friends,
Th' associates and copartners of our loss
Lye thus astonisht on th' oblivious Pool,
And call them not to share with us their part
In this unhappy Mansion, or once more
With rallied Arms to try what may be yet
Regaind in Heav'n, or what more lost in Hell?

Note that within the space of such few lines, are introduced three phrases that are still well known in English.

We talked about Paradise Lost (club and book), literature, religion, and philosophy. She invited me back to the club to see it and to meet a few people. In Real Life, I love dancing in clubs and having found out there were clubs in Second Life, I was anxious to see one, especially one themed after my favorite piece of literature. In Real Life, I've never seen a club with such a bold theme, they pander to the lowest common denominator, throw in a dance ball, a few lights, a fog machine, and let the DJ play some bland tracks and you have yourself a club.

I quickly bought the AO I was debating about and we teleported back to Paradise Lost. Worries about how much it cost disappeared, I was energized about meeting people that I could talk about literature and philosophy with and I just wanted to get there quickly. The concept of listening to good music, 'dancing', and good conversation had a strong allure for me.

At that time, Paradlise Lost was located at the end of a mall in a three story building. It was decorated as a cathredral with stained glass, a huge pipe organ, and an altar. Thankfully, in Real Life I had been to a brew pub set in an old cathedral where the brewing apparatus was on the altar, so a dance club in a cathedral didn't set off the Catholic blasphemy sense pounded into me and honed by years of instruction by nuns.

It was gorgeous. I hadn't been in Second Life long, but this place was tremendous and I started to finally see what I assumed Second Life was going to be like - fantastic places brought to life in a virtual environment. It wasn't just about sex as I was starting to think from my trip to Xcite and and all the trollops I'd seen standing around and blinging. I oohed and aahed appropriately and commented about all the nice touches I noticed.

I met Helena's friends, Dakota, Rob, and Brianicus. Some of the core people who ran the club. The place was empty except for us. Helena and I showed off the new dances to the others and we all joined in dancing and talking.

I don't think I've had that much fun in a club in ages. We danced for hours more that night, talking about literature, science, philosopy, and religion. We made endless amounts of jokes based on religion, sex, and heaven and hell. This was truly the moment I became addicted to Second Life. Shopping is great, building is great, scripting is great, but finding people you are this comfortable with and have so much in common with is priceless. Mastercard could make a commercial about it.

Where else could I talk about everything from cosmology, to literature, to Tao philosophy, make jokes filled with innuendo and sly puns, and listen to great Euro dance music? And better yet, have others talk about the same thing? I could go to any other club and hold a monologue on those subjects, but at Paradise Lost, I learned from the people around me. Here were people that could contribute to a conversation like that and seriously challenge my knowledge of them. I still haven't found a better place in Second Life and at that point, I resolved to go there as much as possible. This was incredible.

After a few hours of this, came the next line that would change my Second Life for good. Helena had a streak going that night. Helena asked, "would you like to work here at Paradise Lost? You would fit in perfectly."

Finally, here was the job offer I was looking for in my first day in Second Life and it was only my second day. Things were looking up for me. Paradise Lost seemed to be a great place to be, with wonderful people who had similar interests and tastes as I did. In Real Life, I'd ran raves, I'd worked in clubs, and I still went to them regularly - I was very suited to working in a dance club.

"What would I be doing?" I asked excitedly.

"Dancing and escorting," Helena replied and then added with a sly smile, "Although, you will have to interview with me before you can be an escort."

Dancing! Escorting! I was in a den of the sex trade! How could that be? These people were well educated, fantastic conversationalists, and in general the complete opposite of my mental pictures of what escorts and people who worked in the sex business would be like. And worse, they saw me as someone who would be good in the sex business. I may be dressed like a hooker, I reassured myself, but I was nothing like one, okay, after meeting these people, perhaps I was similar to one, but I continued to cling to my resolve, I wasn't going to do it.

The pieces of the puzzle began to click into place. The dance poles scattered about the place, took on a whole new meaning. They are not completely unusual in Real Life clubs nowadays where stripper chic has infiltrated the culture of acceptable behavior. Also, a few of the comments before started to make more sense. Yet again, I had been clueless and blond and couldn't add two and two to get a reasonable four.

What was I to do? I couldn't insult these people, they were great and I wanted to spend more time talking with them. But, me, a stripper and escort? Never. Maybe I could just hang out here and talk with the people and not work here. Somehow, I could ignore what they did.

"Thank you for the generous offer Helena, I'll think about it," I replied.

We danced, talked, and laughed some more before everyone had to go to bed. My second day in Second Life had been a long one and I learned a lot and changed a lot. I went to bed with the whole concept of escorting and dancing running through my head. I was definitely not going to do either, but I definitely wanted to report back to my friend who had first mentioned the idea to me. Now I had tales to tell her of my own.

My ideas about escorts had to shift, Helena and Dakota were wonderful and completely opposite to what I originally thought of as an escort. Evidently they could deal with their situation and reconciled it in their mind. But I was certain I would never do it, it was wrong, it was dirty, and it just wasn't for me.

I may be a bimbo, I may be loose, and I may be easy, but I knew I wasn't so easy that waving a little money in front of me would get me into bed. I had my pride. Before going to bed with a guy, I had to like him or at least find him cute or be drunk. A momentary flash of what it would be like to be an escort crossed my mind and was instantly dismissed. As I drifted off to sleep, I knew it wasn't going to happen, I was adamant about that.

Next Chapter: Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum

Mistress Strangelove: Chapter 4: With Bells On

Mistress Strangelove or : How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Kinks

The (Mis)Adventures Of A Reluctant Mistress

Chapter 1 : A Shopping Addict Is Born
Chapter 2 : My Inner Bimbo
Chapter 3 : If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew
Chapter 4 : With Bells On
Chapter 5 : Would You Dance With Me?
Chapter 6 : Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum
Chapter 7 : One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research
Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life

My second day in Second Life was a Saturday and I spent all day logged in, I was addicted already and I hadn't noticed. I went to the Xcite store and looked around. The blushing and the laughing in Real Life continued as I saw clits, cocks, and more exotic accoutrements. I was constantly surprised at each new thing I discovered. I noticed the BDSM section and gave it a wide berth, I may be looking at pierced clits and cocks that erupt virtual semen, but I was not one of *those* sickos I reassured myself.

You may be wondering how I could be continually surprised at each new discovery. That, at some point, I would actually "get it". I have thought about it a lot and my only explanation is that I have terminal naiviety, a short-term memory like a sieve, and an attention span that makes a hyperactive gnat look like a Zen Master.

In the end, my shopping addict took over and I bought "one of everything". Well, one of everything that a nice, wholesome, normal American girl would buy. You know, a clit, nipple clamps, belly piercing, hair, butt, lips, sounds, a HUD, and animations for all occasions. The type of things your mother would approve of, you know, normal.

Somehow, I was purchasing all of these things without the slightest conscious intention of using them. Probably a subconscious part of me was intrigued and thought trying out cybersex once would be informational. And I couldn't disappoint my future cybersex partner by not being fully "accessorized", could I? Besides, I'd always said to myself I'd do most anything once, I dislike the "disdain before investigation" attitude. Rationalization, your name is Tiessa.

Having completed that shopping spree, in which I bought *more* Lindens, I was now fully outfitted. Proper Second Life sex was expensive and I still had no examples of how it worked or what occurred. You may wonder why I didn't go about cybersex in a more cautious, learn as you go, and incremental purchase method. If you scan back over the preceeding paragraphs, I'd like you to notice the words blond, ditzy, naive, and shopaholic which are all important parts of the answer. Also, if I tended to be that type of person I wouldn't have a life reminescent of a Lucille Ball skit, I wouldn't have any of these experiences, and you wouldn't be reading this from me but rather from some other occasionally self-reflective blonde ditz.

I am a perfect example of Santayana's "doomed to repeat it" comment as it applies to personal experiences and history. I don't usually commit the same mistake twice, but I do make similiar mistakes by not properly generalizing what happens to me or carefully considering my actions in light of previous incidents. In the end though, I don't really want to "fix" that about me. I enjoy being me to no end and only when my mistakes harm others do I feel motivated to change.

My personal philosophy is pretty simple, approach everything as if you were a child seeing it for the first time. The continual wonderment over the marvelous universe where each tree and blade of grass is unique and deserving of hours of examination is central to who I am. Its why I became a biologist and why I have an abiding love for cosmology. I frequently say, "I may grow older, but I will never grow up." In the end, I don't want to lose that fresh view of everything. Perhaps I'm an experience junky who enjoys the continual rush of newness.

That's also how I approach people - I like meeting people and experiencing them the same way I do everything else. I love the uniqueness and differentiation between individuals, what motivates each person and why they do what they do. Unfortunately, I am also an inveterate meddler when it comes to other people. I like to "help" people, where "help" is often defined as "what I think they need." You'll see numerous examples of that in the coming tales.

The one Xcite gadget I purchased that I was squeemish about was the nipple clamps. However, given the choice between an invisible "no jewelry" option for boobs and a "with jewelry" option, I had to go for the jewelry, didn't I? It was a bargain, functional jewelry for only a few Lindens more than the base model. Besides the model I chose had bells on it and when I walked they jingled. After that discovery I wore them everywhere, polite company or not, I loved the sound of them jingling. And it was easy to cognitive dissonance away the fact that the jingling was actually bells clamped to my nipples that shook when my boobs wobbled as I walked, in fact, until I began to write this sentence I never really realized that. I'm blushing heavily in retrospect for many months of cluelessnes.

When I was buying my blue silks at the beginning of this shopping spree, I noticed a couple of trashily dressed girls who must have been hookers. They were blinging from every attachment point on their body and dressed in skimpy, sexy clothes. All I knew was that I was not one of those types of girls. I had style, sophistication, and class. Somedays I wonder how I never saw "normal" clothing during that first day in Second Life, no t-shirts, jeans, or sweaters. The first few shops I went to had silks and it was all downhill from there. Besides, its 'warm' in Second Life and I had no need of wearing jeans or sweaters for weather purposes. I wouldn't wear them to the beach would I? I'd wear a skimpy bikini like I do in Real Life. Second Life was one big opportunity to wear beach clothing as far as I was concerned.

At the beginning of my second day in Second Life, I was dressed in newbie clothes I created myself. At the end, I had platinum blond hair, blue silks, stripper shoes, big boobs, and all the Xcite toys my poor avatar could carry. I was fully kitted out, but I kept rationalizing that I may be a bimbo, but a bimbo with class. I was not trashy or even worse, a prostitute like those other women I saw today, I just happened to dress exactly like one.

Next Post: Chapter 5: Will You Dance With Me

Mistress Strangelove: Chapter 3: If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew

Mistress Strangelove or : How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Kinks

The (Mis)Adventures Of A Reluctant Mistress

Chapter 1 : A Shopping Addict Is Born
Chapter 2 : My Inner Bimbo
Chapter 3 : If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew
Chapter 4 : With Bells On
Chapter 5 : Would You Dance With Me?
Chapter 6 : Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum
Chapter 7 : One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research
Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life

It was getting late and I ended up talking to the same people that destroyed my credit card by telling me how to buy Lindens. The discussion eventually turned to money and how to make it. We talked about building, designing clothes, scripting, land sales, rentals, and a myriad other ways to make money. The first big name companies had just started to make islands in Second Life and the future looked bright - how were we to divert some of that money into our purses?

Mostly though, we just socialized, telling a little about ourselves and sharing in the excitement of hanging out with new people. I was fascinated by the interpersonal dynamics of Second Life, the fact that people had boyfriends and girlfriends and lived together in virtual houses. They had fights, drama, and all the tropes of Real Life, only transplanted into the virtual world. It was my first virtual world experience, I didn't know what to expect.

I laughed at the concept of giant, cartoon penises having relationship issues. It was only the first time of many that the fundamental absurdities of Second life would make me laugh so hard my sides hurt in Real Life.

Finally, only two of us were left talking and she offered to show me the house her and her boyfriend shared. We teleported over there and she showed me the place. It was nice with chairs, bedside tables, and everything. Very cosy looking. Its very normalcy was surprising.

I asked about her relationship with her boyfriend and that's the moment when the word, cybersex, entered my lexicon. A lot of discussion ensued while I tried to puzzle out this strange concept. I asked questions, laughing and blushing in Real Life as the details unfolded. She was great, telling me all about it and giving me examples of what she typed. Earlier, she alluded to something I might find interesting, but only when we were in private. Now that we were alone, I asked her what it was and the concept of Xcite genitals was introduced.

More discussion and more Real Life blushing and laughing ensued. Then came the demonstration. She showed me her clit, a very personal thing, and told me how it worked, about arousal levels, about the green text and animations. Then came a demonstration of the animations which ultimately resulted in her avatar screaming out an orgasm and sparks erupting from her clit. Laughing and giggling ensued as I talked about how absurd I thought it all was. My Real Life clit felt somehow deficient - fireworks never erupted from it no matter how good the orgasm.

We talked about how she once thought about being an escort, but ultimately rejected the idea. She asked me if I ever thought about being an escort and I told her I hadn't realized cybersex existed until she told me about it. Internally, I noted that I may be a bimbo, but I was not a prostitute, I had my pride.

Cue smugness over being a morally righteous person.

You may be wondering how I got to that point without knowing about cybersex and the sex trade in Second Life. Let me explain. In the articles I read, it did mention escorts briefly. In walking around I did encounter cyber-doxies with their blinging jewelry, sexy clothing, blond hair, and Playboy shapes. I knew about it in an abstract sense, but knew nothing of the mechanics of it, about cybersex, about the animations, etc. The concept sat in the back of my head, but I spent no time thinking about it and how it could possibly be accomplished. I thought it possibly meant arranging assignations in Real Life after meeting in Second Life.

When reading about Second Life, I never thought I would run into any of the sex trade. In Real Life, I've possibly seen a prostitute walking the streets once or twice in my life. I thought it would be nearly as rare. And certainly discussing being an escort as a viable option in normal conversation never crossed my mind as possible. I just asssumed, naively it turns out, that given all the potential inherent in a virtual world, people would do something more productive with it than have sex. I continually overestimate and underestimate humanity.

Already the cracks were appearing on the comfortable, naive shell I'd built around myself all my life. Growing up in a small farming community in the Midwest, going to a Catholic grade school, and, in general, thinking of myself as a 'normal' person had insulated me from thinking about the bulk of humanity.

I pride myself on my perspicacity, but, now, I realize my obtuseness is vastly larger than I ever suspected. I'd always thought that sex played a minor role in my life and I assumed others' lives. The realization that cybersex was common and that sex played a dominant role in other's lives began to dawn on me that second day. Finally, in writing this it hit me that I spend most of my time engaged in quasi-sexual activities. I spend inordinant amounts of time worrying about what men think, I spend a lot of time fixing my makeup and hair, I shop for sexy clothing, I go out a lot and flirt with guys, I had lots of sex in college and afterwards, and in general, I now realize, I spend a good portion of my time focused on activites centered around the human mating ritual.

Second Life has been very good for learning about my self. I always believed I was open-minded and tolerent. Now, reviewing all my thoughts and attitudes coming into Second Life, I realize I was as close-minded and intolerent as anyone else.

My friend had to go to sleep at that point, but I was too excited about Second Life to go to sleep. I decided to check out Xcite, looking couldn't hurt could it? The journey to Xcite was purely for informational purposes and a certain amount of morbid curiosity. I had no plans to ever have cybersex, it made no sense to me. Besides, I was too normal of a person to ever do that.

I was surprised that my friend considered being an escort. I *knew* I was never going to be an escort. Superficially, I recognized that I looked like one, but I knew I wasn't one of them. I was a nice, normal girl with a taste for sexy clothing. Escorts were dirty; I was clean and pure. Granted, for some, "'normal' American sex with lots of guys" definition of the word pure. Okay, maybe not always so 'normal'.

So, off went this clean, normal, and pure girl to the store to look at virtual genitals and sex gadgets as I mulled over the concept of cybersex. I may be easy and I may be slutty, I reassured myself, but at least I don't take money for sex.

Cue smugness over being a morally righteous person.

Next Post: Chapter 4 : With Bells On

Mistress Strangelove: Chapter 2: My Inner Bimbo

Mistress Strangelove or : How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Kinks

The (Mis)Adventures Of A Reluctant Mistress

Chapter 1 : A Shopping Addict Is Born
Chapter 2 : My Inner Bimbo
Chapter 3 : If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew
Chapter 4 : With Bells On
Chapter 5 : Would You Dance With Me?
Chapter 6 : Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum
Chapter 7 : One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research
Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life

Festooned out in pretty, blue silks with scripts for removing them (How cute! *blush* *giggle*), blond hair (only a few shades more bimbo than my real life hair), stripper heels (they were a bargain - they changed color *and* had sexy walk. I *saved* money by buying them.) In no time, I was a walking, talking, undulating advertisement for sex. I was out shopping for clothes, and I was affronted when some guy walked up to me and instant messaged, "Wanna fcuk [sic]?"

"How dare he say that to *me*?"

"Who does he think *I* am?"

"I'm not some cheap hooker that can be treated like that!"

"He didn't even talk to me first. I am used to dinner at the very least before guys work up the courage to say that to me. Okay, maybe just drinks sometimes."

"Oooo, look at that sexy outfit - I'd look *hot* in that!"

I was shopping at the time and I noticed an outfit I'd overlooked before. Righteous indignation has no place when confronted with pretty clothes - a girl's got to have her priorities.

In Real Life my blond hair acts as a superconductor - common sense and critical thought flow out of my head without resistance and ditziness enters unrestrained.

The epiphany happened later that day when I was adjusting a newly purchased shape that had the cutest face. I was giving it the correct body proportions by trying to recreate my real life appearance. After all, I'd seen those sex-pots walking around and I didn't want to end up looking like a trashy slut.

Looking down in real life...

"Hmmm, bigger boobs, I've always wanted bigger boobs."

Adjust.

"Maybe a bit bigger than that."

Adjust.

"Guys really like big boobs."

Adjust.

"Doesn't this darned slider go any higher?"

"Oh well, take *that* Suzie for developing earlier, filling out your cheerleader uniform better than I did, and beating me out to be prom queen all because your boobs were bigger than mine, now I'm bigger than you!"

"Hah! I showed her."

Cue smugness over winning a moral victory.

"Hmmm, now for the waist. Darn, I haven't exercised enough lately. Don't want it to be *too* real."

Adjust.

I promised myself, "When I get done with playing Second Life, I'll go back to exercising more..."

Adjust.

"Doesn't this darned slider go any lower?"

"How about the butt? I have a great butt - or so I've been told. I have that nailed."

Adjust.

"Perfect. Hmmm, you know those chicks that can stick out their butt and stop traffic? That'd be nice. More, god I abhor the word, bootilicious. Why is that word stuck in my head? I have to find a more refined word for it - I'm not trashy. A little more *that word I won't use* couldn't hurt - guys like that, don't they?"

Adjust.

"Maybe a bit more."

Adjust.

"Perfect."

I sit back and I look at my handiwork - a "slightly" idealized version of myself.

"God, I look like some teenage, wet-dream version of Barbie. Okay, the boobs are too big, I have to reduce the boobs. Smaller boobs will make it all better."

Reduce.

"Sheesh, that slider really reduces the boobs a lot for a little move down. Okay, maybe a little bigger."

Adjust.

"Hmm, they still don't look *too* big."

Adjust.

"Doesn't this darned slider go any higher?"

"Okay, maybe a less bimbo shade of blond will fix it. Back to the one like my real life hair."

Rez.

"That's a bit drab. A little lighter won't make me look like a bimbo."

Rez.

"Still a bit too dirty blond. One more shade lighter."

Rez.

"Perfect, now that's better and I don't look too much like a bimbo."

"Hey, isn't that the one I started with?"

The light finally dawned on me because my superconducting blond hair finally brought in a little, rather than draining it all away.

"I *am* a bimbo! No, that can't be right, I'm respectable, I have a corporate job and an office. I am *not* a bimbo."

Visions of being a cheerleader in high school entered my head. Scenes of abasing myself in short skirts and falling all over cute guys abounded. I recalled dumbing down my words so they wouldn't feel intimidated, a fact which always shocks me.

"That's not enough to make me a bimbo, is it?"

Visions of super-short, tight mini-skirts and high heels going to dance clubs to tease men entered my head. What about all the cleavage I show and the big hoop earrings?

"Darn, I am a bimbo."

An inner dialogue ensued where cognitive dissonance debated with my inner critic who decided to make her voice heard. She saw her opening and was attacking with a vengeance.

"But I like to dance, I took ballet for years. The skirts keep me cool in the hot dance clubs, they're *practical*. The heels make my legs look sexy. I can't be a bimbo for liking dancing and wearing 'practical' skirts, can I?" I reasoned like Socrates.

"What about the high heels?" my inner critic observed.

"A *little* sexy isn't enough to make me a bimbo, is it?"

"The big hoop earrings?" came the retort.

"Everyone likes hoops." I gamely try to counter.

"But, that big?"

"Okay, a little trashy, but definitely not a bimbo."

"All the cleavage?" The stare from my inner critic was palpable.

"Okay, okay, but only a little bit bimbo."

Visions of the 2" platform, black patent 6" heeled hooker boots sitting in the back of my closet entered my head. The uses to which I've put them made me blush.

"But they're only for use in the bedroom or on Halloween, you can't be a bimbo for being sexy in the bedroom and for wearing sexy outfits on Halloween, can you?"

My inner critic remained silent. I raced to fill the silence with excuses.

"Look, I was in sports in high school, I was on the math and science teams, I can program a computer, I have geek cred. I was more than just a cheerleader. I can't be a bimbo if I was on the math team, can I? I majored in science in college, I work in IT, I can't be a bimbo." I pleaded, desperation entered my inner voice.

"You drank a lot and slept with a lot of guys in college, you had numerous one night stands," came the accusation.

"That makes me slutty, not a bimbo." The illogic of that statement escaped me at the time, I was grasping for anything at that point.

"One word, 'thongs'." My inner critic snapped.

"No panty lines?" I offered up, whimpering and realizing that I don't own a pair of underwear that covers any portion of my butt. Which made me blush. Then, came the realization that I don't wear underwear under a couple of outfits because even my skimpy underwear is too much. The red deepened.

My inner critic glared at me. I withered under her baleful stare.

"Define bimbo," I cried using the last, desperate refuge of a pedant.

"You." The word gently, quietly echoed from my inner critic.

A few minutes of uncomfortable self-reflection passed, about all my attention span could handle, but I had the answer.

"Okay, I'm going to be the *best* bimbo ever." I resolved.

Day two on Second Life was nearing an end and I finally realized that deep down I was a bimbo. Being comfortable with the fact that I *enjoyed* being that way would take a long time; I still struggle with it and somehow feel its wrong. Thank you Catholic school upbringing and women's lib for making me feel guilty for living my life the way I want. As always, when confronted with the truth and finally made to accept it, I decided to dive completely in and revel in the consequences. A pattern I have repeated many times in my life.

I am still abasing myself in short skirts and falling all over cute guys, but now I won't compromise and dumb down my vocabulary, I have standards.

Cue smugness over winning a moral victory.

Next Post: Chapter 3: If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew

Mistress Strangelove: Chapter 1: A Shopping Addict Is Born

Mistress Strangelove or : How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Kinks

The (Mis)Adventures Of A Reluctant Mistress

Chapter 1 : A Shopping Addict Is Born
Chapter 2 : My Inner Bimbo
Chapter 3 : If The Nuns From My Catholic Grade School Only Knew
Chapter 4 : With Bells On
Chapter 5 : Would You Dance With Me?
Chapter 6 : Its Harder Than Walking And Chewing Gum
Chapter 7 : One Woman's Porn Is Another Woman's Research
Chapter 8 : 'With Bells On' In Real Life

I joined Second Life during the great media hype-fest of Autumn 2006. Intrigued by what I read, I signed up for an account, downloaded the client, and logged in for the first time. It was free and all I had to do was provide a credit card number to get L$250 - what a deal! I had lots of cash and was prepared to spend it.

Logging in for the first time, I walked through the basic tutorial but lingered for a long time at the 'customizing your avatar' section. Entranced by the number of options, I proceeded to spend over an hour tweaking my avatar's shape and look - all the while getting more frustrated that I couldn't make it look exactly the way I wanted. I learned a lot about objects, copying, inventory, and finally how to add textures to clothing. One hour into Second Life, I had a blue satin dress and was a budding clothing designer - this place was awesome.

Finally, declaring my look 'good enough', I wandered out into the broader Second Life world and was astonished at the variety of avatars I saw in the first few minutes of standing around with the other newbies. People walked by with flowing hair that actually looked good. Then I saw my first silk. Wow! clothing that moved as you walked. I was itching to find out where to buy these things because I had L$250 and it was burning a hole in my purse. Soon, I too would be dressed to kill, I thought. Anger over the wasted hour of adjusting burned away in my fever to begin shopping. Any notion of sampling the art, culture, and activities of Second Life had to wait until I looked decent, a little shopping and then I could go do 'worthwhile' things.

Discovering search, I began to wander around looking for hair, shoes, and clothes. I reasoned that with L$250 I should be able to get one complete set of everything. The first place I looked was selling hair for L$250 - I was shocked, how could they get away with charging so much money? So, I looked some more and came to the realization that L$250 was chump change. Shopping some more, I found hair and a pair of color change high-heeled shoes that totalled L$250. Now, I was ready to find out how to make money in Second Life. All the news articles I read about Second Life seemed to indicate the streets were paved with gold and the taps were gushing hot and cold running money. In no time I should be raking in piles of cash and be able to shop all I want. Not ready to start my own business yet and believing I needed some seed money, I went to find a job to pave my way to Second Life riches.

"What! you make L$18 per *hour* of dancing?"

"You make *how* much helping others?"

"I won't do that for all the money in Second Life!"

The realization was dawning that you had to be in Second Life for a while to qualify for just about any 'real' job. Even then, they all paid trivial amounts of money. It appeared I would have to work for most of a day just to afford a decent pair of shoes, hair, or set of clothes.

Day one of Second Life ended on a low note for me, but I didn't forget all the fun I had customizing and exploring.

Day two dawned and I was still fascinated by the possibilities of Second Life, but the daunting task of making enough money to really enjoy it was dragging me down. I wandered around despondant until I ended up talking to some people with *real* Second Life experience - they were born over *two months* before me. Then came the moment that forever changed Second Life and my bank account for me...

"You can *buy* Lindens!? I wish they would have told me that before."

"They did, where?"

"Oh, I didn't read that, I was too excited about getting started to read the directions."

Remembering the number I provided to get my first L$250, I realized my credit card was already hooked up as the IV to my Second Life purse. All I had to do was choose "Buy L$..." A brief curse went up to the clever, sneaky bastards at Linden Labs as I had a vision of my future credit card bills laid out before me, but then a rush of crass consumer euphoria swept away all resistance. I voluntarily sacrificed my credit cards to the idol of conspicuous consumption and felt admiration for Linden Lab's well-played business move hooking me into spending money with them. That cleverness deserved a reward I reasoned; I could spend some spare money with them and help them out. I could stop anytime I wanted. Now, I realize the L$250 was exactly analogous to the "first hit is free".

"L$1000 ought to be enough to tide me over until I start making money," I believed. "One or two nice outfits ought to be enough for a few days until I start to make money. With my programming experience and obvious good taste, I should be cranking out products in no time. I can give up Starbucks for tomorrow."

"Okay, one more thousand, Starbucks will have to wait two days."

"Skins cost how much? A decent animation overrider? Fine, *five* thousand more and that's it. That's a lot of money, it ought to be enough. How could I spend that much? I was meaning to give up coffee anyway."

I was hitting the 'pay' button like a crack addicted rat allowed to control its own drug supply.

A few hours later on my second day in Second Life, L$10,000 had flown out of my hands and into the pockets of merchants with pretty clothing, shoes, shapes, skins, hair, animations, and various and sundry things that spoke directly to the shopping addict deep in the core of my soul.

Next Post: Chapter 2: My Inner Bimbo

Mistress Strangelove

I'm about to begin posting my Second Life memoirs. My life, in general, resembles a sitcom, and I thought others would appreciate some of the anecdotes. The story begins on my first day in Second Life.

The title of this series is:

Mistress Strangelove or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love My Kinks

The (Mis)Adventures Of A Reluctant Mistress