Social persona test

[Every now and then these tests come up and race through the blogs. Sometimes they are insightful, some times they are annoying, but usually they are fun to take. I am not sure if I am particularly pleased with the result this time, but - oh well...]

The Snowball's Chance in Hell (QTBM)

Quirky Traditional Beta Male

Welcome, friend, to this lonley little club of mine. You are doomed to wander the earth alone and unloved. Okay, not really. But you are kind of a dork. However, your combination of interests, values, and personality is so rare, that it will draw females to you if you just put yourself out there. Work on the confidence a bit too.

You are more QUIRKY than NORMAL.
You are more TRADITIONAL than LIBERAL.
You are more PASSIVE than DOMINANT.

When picking a date, consider: The Rarity (QTAF), The Renaissance Faire Wench (QLAF), The Librarian (QTBF), or The Emo Girl (QLBF).

Avoid: The Man-Eater (NTAF) and The FemiNazi (NLAF)

You can take the test yourself here.

Dreaming of Paul, George and Ringo

It was a small room, more club-like, not one of the large concert halls. The audience was great, sang along, they knew all the songs by heart anyway. I was improvising with Paul, bouncing the ball back and forth. He started a riff on his ridiculously tiny bass and I picked it up, added a twist and gave it back to him. Ringo hammered away at his drums, looking as if he were a little out of place, following his usual routine, a tad bored. John was missing, obviously, since he's dead, but I never liked him much anyway. But George was there despite being dead, and he somehow reminded me of Bob Dylan. I'd always thought they looked quite similar.

The audience kept applauding while I gushed down a bottle of water behind the stage. "Let's do 'While my guitar gently weeps' as the final encore," I suggested.

"No, not another encore, and especially not that one!" Paul replied.

I glanced at George, who simply shrugged - being dead gives a certain peace of mind, I assume, and he knew the others had never liked his song.
"Don't you hear how they're applauding - we owe them another encore!"
"No, they've had enough. I certainly won't play another one," was Paul's final reply, ending the discussion.

Reluctantly I handed my guitar over to the roadie and started to unbutton my uniform coat. We've been on tour for so many years now, but I'll be damned if I ever figure Paul out.

6:15am. My alarm rings. At least it's Thursday.

Declaration of Independence

This blogpost has been waiting 4 months to be written. I never got around to writing it, and for the longest time had not even any idea how to write it. Today, finally, I had time and inspiration to make this important addition to my profile.

I partnered with Gina Glimmer in January 2007, and we had 3 wonderful months together, until her RL partner forced her to quit SL. She was eventually allowed back in, and even though we are still very close friends, we were never able to re-establish the partnership bond. I met Skinkie Winkler in summer 2008 and we had a great relationship. After Christmas she offered me official partnership. Three weeks later she dissolved our bond. I still don't understand why and have not had
a chance to speak with her since then.

My longtime friends London Spengler and Nadine Nozaki encouraged me to rethink my positions on friendship, affection, intimacy and love. The process took a while, and was a radical paradigm change for me. But I finally am able to declare my Independence. As of today, May 12 2009, this has been added to my profile:

Relationships - I had two wonderful relationships in SL, and both ended in pain. In January 2009 I therefore decided to not enter any exclusive partnership anymore. I love to flirt, and I love to flirt open ended. This does NOT mean I am reckless with other people's hearts, that I fool around or am an egomaniac. The people I allow close to me are close to my heart, and I protect and adore them. I have a lot of love to give, and the people I decide to share it with get a part of my heart and of my soul.

This is me. Take it or leave it!

A letter to Martin, who does not "get" SL

[This is a letter written to the webmaster/friend of my friend Rheta, who brought us the news about her death yesterday. In my email exchanges with him he persists on saying "playing SL" and similar phrases, so I tried to explain SL to him.]

Good morning,

I hope you found some sleep after the shocking day yesterday. Let me give you a big thank you again for your help. You rendered an important service to the friends of Rheta. Even if this may sound bizarre to you, for us the "parallel world" as you keep naming it is very real. Unfortunately it happens frequently that someone vanishes, leaving friends and also lovers behind you martyr their brains and hearts not knowing what is up. We even have a special word for this, the "Big Quiet". Even though the message you gave us was heartbreakingly shocking, nevertheless it brought closure. Doubts and tormenting was ended and made room to healing suffering.

If you allow I would like to tell you a bit about Second Life. I googled you and even though you seem to be a "normal" person, your business has to do with dream worlds and fantasy worlds as well. I hope you might understand a little bit what I tell you.

With very little exceptions I have only met people in Second Life who have more or less severe issues in the "atomic world" as we call it. In my case it is a son with a mental condition overshadowing my whole family. One of my SL friends is confined to a wheelchair and has to hear on a daily basis that she ruined someone's life. Two of my friends suffer from autism and can only communicate freely with people in SL. One of my friends is a pre-op transgender and uses SL to be the woman she can't be in the atomic world yet. Another of my friends is the victim of multiple rapes and barely leaves her home, not to mention have social contact with men - in SL she can. I could continue this list endlessly. In Rheta's case it was probably the D/s lifestyle and her bisexuality she could not live in the atomic world due to respect for her family/husband or social norm or job repercussions or whatever. For each of us - as well as for Rheta - SL is the way to live things we could not live in the atomic world, or an escape from pressure and hardship. SL is our oasis, in which we find 1-2 hours peace and happiness a day.

One might think this is pathetic. One might think we are people poor on feelings, seeing no other way than an artificial surrogate. Maybe it is true. And surely there are people among us who lose themselves in this world, who don't find the balance. But for us residents of Second Life, for us who we LIVE in this world, it is an extension of our reality.

Thank you for listening.

Rheta Shan is dead

There is not much more to say - she got run over by a truck and got killed right away, the unborn she carried died shortly later. I don't know what to say, and my thoughts are with her RL husband and her SL partner Thaddy.

Take a look into her world on her Flickr stream.

Au revoirs, Rheta!

Please don't comment here but on her blog.
Update: I see comments have been disabled at her blog - I asked the webmaster to reenable them.
Update 2: Comments are now enabled on the post. Her friend/webmaster is not in SL and I asked him to not hurridly delete anything as her digital legacy is all that is left.

The Western Culture

My close friend London Spengler raised the issue To Nipple or not to Nipple on her blog. What started as my comment to her post turns out to become a post of its own. It often gets claimed that we are all part of "The Western Culture", and while you or me seem to have a sufficiently similar background to our friends in the US or Canada to make us seem alike, we are - in fact - not.

Our friends from Northern America come from a completely different culture, with different values and different ethics. Probably the largest area where this manifests itself is the issue of decency/sensibilities when it comes to nudity. For you or me seeing naked breasts or full frontal (female) nudity is not a big issue. We are confronted daily with it, magazines and TV is full of it. A naked breast is not considered harmful for a kid. And even in daily life and language a certain amount of innuendo does not meet raised eyebrows.

For our friends across the pond many of this might seem bizarre. What we consider banter among colleagues or even friends might constitute sexual harassment for them. What we consider a sexy advertising might seem smut and filth for them. As much as we tend to smile about it or openly state it is silly, we should accept it as the cultural background our friends have.

But there is more difference. Not only do North Americans and Europeans SEEM alike at the surface, but show discrepancies when you dig deeper. Also we Europeans are not as homogeneous. Despite Italy, Spain and France being seen as the countries of hot (latin) love, in fact the Southern countries of Europe are more prude and conservative compared to the more Northern and Scandinavian countries. An Italian woman might play with symbols, but at the same time perceive a Scandinavian woman as ferociously sexual.

This world - atomic or digital - is about variation and versatility. We have all strong sides and weak sides to add to the mix. We are all different - and that is very good. The key is having respect for everybody else. I love to see a naked female body, but I respect if a friend from the US feels uncomfortable with that, and I try to avoid confrontation. At the same time I expect that they respect that I see the issue more relaxed.

Thus said, and getting back to London's original post, when I chose to read a skin review on a blog, I should be prepared to see nipples.

Ego boost

Discussion with a new client, and towards the end the obligatory question:

[08:11] New Client: I'm excited about this - thank you for your time. I'll get you the text soon :)
[08:11] Peter Stindberg: OK, how did you hear about me?
[08:11] New Client: oh Peter - I've been reading your blog for ages :)
[08:11] Peter Stindberg blushes
[08:11] New Client: links from friends blogs etc. :)
[08:12] New Client: when I realized it would have to be in multiple languages I just assumed I'd contact you :)

That made my day :-)