pantoum's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- LIFE IN LIGHTS 278. Christina Hopkinson�s debut novel IZOBEL BRANNIGAN.COM is about a woman who Googles herself and discovers that someone created a website about her and that it depicts her leading a fabulous, extraordinary life.As a joke, my ex Ginger and I once created an alter ego for her best friend Suzanne Baptista some-other-unusual-name-I-won�t-cite-here. Not a name you�re likely to run across twice, but Susannah bought the prank for a few days and emailed all of her friends in fascination to wonder how her cool alter-ego could exist. The created Suzanne taught kindergarten in rural Ohio. She collected Precious Memory trinkets and glass unicorns (we got that from a Parade magazine ad) and taught Sunday School at a Presbyterian church. She read Harlequin romances and her favorite TV shows were Wheel of Fortune, General Hospital, Little House on the Prairie, and Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. She had an extensive collection of Broadway musical LPs and liked to sing along to Camelot as she washed the dishes. In a similar vein, my pal Zulu created an Internet alter-ego named The Scourge of the Piedmont. She is incredibly witty and was famous in local dyke chat rooms for a while. In fact, once chatting at a party, a woman referred to some witty tidbit that Scourge had said online that morning and Zulu and I just smiled at each other knowingly. The Ginger spent most of her spare time participating in live-action role-playing (LARP) games�an activity that seems popular with the under-thirty-five set. They create characters who have specific traits and specific flaws who weave through an imaginary world in accordance with these traits (which sounds a little like predeterminism or creating a world through your sense of privilege to me). These virtual worlds have specific norms and customs too . . . and boy do they have some elaborate costumes! And then there�s the Sims.... Those kinds of games bore me real fast�I am, after all, an ADD grrrl who is always looking for a new adventure�but I am fascinated by the notion of creating yourself whole cloth and wonder if keeping a blog somehow satisfies that urge in me. It certainly gives me a place to contemplate and vent and process and ponder my failings and be at least occasionally creative while nevertheless choosing what I do and don�t reveal. Sure, only my pals and a few other bloggers read this blog But still, you never know. I could be a 350-pound straight man who hasn't seen his dick in years but who has played with it constantly since being laid three years ago and who is right now fantasizing about climbing the stairs with his 22 lab rats in tow and a prize from his medieval sword collection strapped to his side and offing his poor diabetic mother. So I�ll leave you with a good idea. If those blow-in cards that always fall out of your magazines�I call them magazine seeds�annoy you too, then leave them blank and mail them back to the publisher. This sticks them with the postage and, if enough people do it, maybe they�ll get the message and stop blowing the damn things in.
See ya. 9:22 a.m. - 2005-12-13 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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