After the Calling

My upcoming schedule is pretty much promising to destroy all hints of happiness in my life, so… I’m gonna be taking a mini-hiatus. Yes, the deadly yatus.  I will be updating but not nearly as frequently. I think this is an improvement, as last summer I just fluffing disappeared for three months into a cloud of nothingness (also known as Europe. ).

This update will mark the end of the chapter, and the halfway point of the story.

I will try not to disappear completely, but give me a second with emails, especially live journal (though those who have contacted me there pretty much know that I suck at it), and comments.

And on a smaller, tinier, not important note… can you guys keep me out of sims secrets? Please? I appreciate that it’s complimentary, but… cringe cringe cringe… I already had issues with the lurv scene in the last update, and only just got comfy with it. I’m feeling a bit heebie-jeebied over those pictures showing up just anywhere without my knowledge, especially now that there is linkage going on.  I don’t know that I would have cared if it was any other picture, but the one that was chosen… cringe cringe cringe… Seriously, just comment. I don’t follow the secrets. I don’t even follow live journal, really. If it weren’t for incoming links, I wouldn’t have even known it was there. So if it was for my benefit, I have to say the ‘fap’ was lost.

 Just. Comment. I love me some comments. I’m not trying to come off as bitchy, because I probably would not have cared with any other picture… but oh gosh, I’m cringing so hard my teeth hurt. I swear, just comment. Or continue lurking. I have a shit ton of lurkers and I love them just the same. But just… no secrets. Please. Please?

And, by the way, refrain from googling ‘fap’ if you don’t know what it means. You’re better off not knowing.  I learned the hard way.

UPDATE!

This? Is a ramble.

Okay, so I know I said there was only one more update to this chapter, but I had to break it in half. I took so many pictures, it would have been massive. And I promised no more torture, so there will be a Part XI B sometime next week (not to mention this will help me keep from using words like “hiatus” for at least another few days).

I had some real problems getting through these shots. Not like last time, where I was just a technical failure at life, and took a billion technically failing at life shots that just wasted time. This time the problem is that… well, to say that this update has sexual themes is like saying Burt Reynolds is hairy. For those of you who do not know who Burt Reynolds is, he’s a very hairy man.

Somewhere between the time I took photos for this update, and this weekend, I became a massive prude, and I’m trying to balance my feelings of awkwardness with my feelings of triumph over pose boxes. So far the awkward is winning, but all in all, I made a somewhat believable love scene and I’m on the fence about discarding it.  It’s not at all illicit. Despite the unintentional similarity of my title and that of a particular vampire smut fiction series, I’ve yet to go the way of the airport novel. And I controlled nudity much more than I did in Part X, but I’m still a little iffy.

Being that I make a living bottling/boxing/plastic wrapping sex and shipping it across the world, you would think I’d be a little more at ease with this. But its one thing to negotiate with British porn stars (which is hilarious). It’s another thing to see your brain child growing up to be a massage parlor prostitute (AtC is such a slut bag). It’s an entirely different thing to pose shots, and then actually see the manifestation of something like this in the resulting pictures (pffffttt).

I KNOW that there are 18+ pose boxes out there, and other stories that have sexually charged themes, but 1) I have yet to see anyone use these pose boxes, 2) I don’t use pose boxes at all which means that I was actively, purposefully creating this anxiety attack, 3) other stories are rarely accompanied with real deal shots, and 4) in terms of posing this one… well, I’ll say I did a good job, which, in any other situation, would be awesome. In this situation, it’s just weird.

So, I leave it to you… for now. I might pansy out and delete this by the end of the day. :O

That said… this is my favorite update so far (HA!), and of the less scandalous pics, I have a lot of favs that I couldn’t fit in context, or just had nothing to do with anything and I wonder why I even took them. I’ll do an outtake dump later before I completely flake out. Consider yourself overwarned. Now I have to go to work and have a conference call with one of Europe’s biggest wholesalers of dildos. Because I totally need that at 8 in the morning while I’m arguing with myself over the story merits of sexuality. Totally need that.

Done rambling.

It took me a minute to get through the pictures for this update, not only because I took so many, but because when I took them I must have been tired or brain damaged or something. Half the pictures had either an animbox or a freezer clock in the frame. And most of the time, it was so bad, I couldn’t edit it out (speaking of editing… I didn’t. Sorry). Not to mention that there is some serious nudity in this one that I don’t remember authorizing. Like, I was nipple blind or something. And the whole time I going through pictures, I kept saying: “I’m going to punch Jax in the hair.” He’s so annoying. Oh and the discontinuity? I don’t even know what’s going on. Decor is missing or jumping across the room, outfits are changing, Jax is randomly deciding to wear eyeliner in some pictures. I don’t know. I don’t remember what was happening when I shot this, but it must have been exciting.

So I really had to take a minute and weed through my options. That said, I’m not impressed with this update, but I have no time to reshoot it, and sadly… I’ve posted worse.

Deceiving the Lie has one more part after this one, which I’m aiming to work on tommorrow and have up on Sunday or Monday, because next week, the job is going to start digesting my face (it ate my face last week, and the week after next its going to crap my face out in a stinking turd behind a tree in a poison ivy bush), and I’m going to have to be super flaky for an undetermined amount of time. 

Chapter 5: Betray All will begin on a random, unannounced, impossibly unpredictable day. Because, I’ve taken not one picture for it.

Part IX (B) almost didn’t happen. Penelope saved it. She listened to my nonsensical ramblings about NOTHING and replied with logical logicness.  And that is because she is awesome.

I promised ten pics, but I fleshed it out some, and wound up with almost 20. Typical. And I kept the haze, kind of. It fits better with these pics.

If it feels like I’m rushing the story with all my updates… I am. I’m coming up on a season where my work load at my job is really picking up, so I’m trying to get as much in as possible before I’m totally swamped.

Next weekend I have bizniz trip to suffer through, so I may not be able to update, so let’s pretend that this Friday. TGIF!

I’m releasing Part IX (B) tommorrow, hopefully.  It’s really short, like 10 pictures, but I need to reshoot them or I’ll stab my computer with a shoe horn. If not tommorrow then during the week while I’m at work. Post, I mean. Not stab my computer.

Technical stuff. I’m still getting used to the new layout and I’m just testing out the idea that I have space for ginormous pics. JUST THIS ONCE!

I edited these pics very differently, so they’re strange looking (especially since they’re fluffin’ huge). I don’t like them. It will never happen again. I add lighting to my pics in editing, not in game, because maxis brand is poo.  I was trying to do a sort of dark, fuzzy background and focused foreground sort of thing, It absolutely did not work.  Absolutely did not. I mean, I can get with bright hazy pics, but this story was meant for hard, dark, offensive edges. Not that my comp provides those, but, this doesn’t fit.  Just this one time, because I can’t bring myself to reedit.

I really like this new layout but… I kinda miss the old one. There I said it. 

I’ve been Distracted McGee lately, and I can’t sit still long enough to finagle this how I want it, because it’s really an interim piece.  It’s more informational than anything and I can’t do much with it. I ended up just chopping it up, and I will figure out how to reinsert the abandoned portions later. I just hope the potholes aren’t obvious.

AND… I have a request. I just found a pose box that has a pose of a sim sticking his finger someplace where the sun rarely, if ever, shines. Someone PLEASE tell me if there is a story that is using that pose, under what context, and where I can find it. Because why else make a pose box with that pose, if you are not putting it on display for everyone in the known universe to gawk at, namely ME.

I am now completely resolved to find an in-game replacement for that pose, which I will feature in my next tutorial. Posing Without Pose Boxes Part III: Sh*t That Is Sh*tb@lls Insane.

I happen to be the queen of self-sabotage. I sabotage myself like it’s my job.  ALL THE TIME. Like I get paid to be a self-sabotagologist. I just completely JACKED my Aeryn. Her file is so corrupt it could be the government of a third world country. She won’t let me clone her, and she’s crashing everything around her. And I didn’t back up my files. Because I am a buttmunch.

I’m hoping this won’t matter in the short term because I take pictures way in advanced and then occasionally do a reshoot. I have all the pictures for this chapter pretty much done, and although I haven’t looked at many of them, I’m hoping I can go without having to redo anything. In the meantime, I’ll have another go at Hadrian and try to remake her. The only reason why Hadrian got to be “Hadrian” is because he looks like Aeryn as a girl. I mean he’s cute and all, but Aeryn is where it’s at. I’m just gonna stare at pictures and try to remember how I tweaked him to make her.

That news out. Part VII is finally over with (C). It’s a short one for me, and I should probably use it as an example for future updates.  It also a big, giant advertisement for angled OMSPs. Enjoy.

This is a smidge early because I just got back from a business trip and per usual, jet lag has destroyed me. 10 hour flight for a two day trip to arrive back at home at zero in the morning. Business trip planning fail. I’m going to bed now, and hopefully I’ll be awake by Monsundnesday, but I don’t want to risk falling behind. I’ve been doing sooo well. I’m also posting a lot of side stuff next week (a couple of background stories, chapter synopses, etc.) and I don’t want it to feel like a free for all with so many updates. So, I figured I’d post now so as not to worry about it later.

New subject: I’ve never avoided sexuality in my writing, but I don’t think I’ve ever approached it as directly (or with possibly unnerving implications) as I have in this update and in upcoming updates. I would never be overtly graphic, or obscene, but I’ve decided to completely commit to the 18+ness of 18+. That said, this is 18+ with strong sexual themes. 

I would actually still like to hear the opinions from my readership about the line between squicky and sexy, edifying or terrifying, but I am so fuzzy right now, I can’t really create a coherent foundation for discussion, so I’ll come back to it.  But I will say, this may be leaning toward the squicky side of things. Edit: My readership is awesome, and I think too hard. Nevermind.

Me: Complain. Complain. Complain. My chapter parts are too long.
Boyfriend: Shorten them.
Me: I CAN’T.
Boyfriend: Why not?
Me: Because I can’t leave anything out. Everything has to happen or nothing can happen!
Boyfriend: Okay, then break them into smaller parts.
Me: I CAN’T.
Boyfriend: Why not?
Me: Because I’m on a schedule and I told myself that this specific part would happen by this specific time!
Boyfriend: Why’d you do that?
Me: …
Boyfriend: …
Me: … …
Boyfriend: … Okay… so, then… break them… into… smaller parts… ?
Me: … … Go walk my dogs.
Boyfriend: I already did. And I put gas in your car. And I bought you more avocados.
Me: *blink blink* I’m gonna go break my chapters into smaller parts.
Boyfriend:  You go do that. Have fun.

Oy. I’m just so out of it. I have some pretty outrageous food allergies, and I let my sister buy me some gluten-free, dairy-free, ice cream a few days ago. But I was a jackass and didn’t read the label. Turns out it had soy and processed sugar in it, and about 30 other things that I’m also allergic to. So I’m pretty much down and out for the count. And I’ll probably be feeling like poo for a few more days. For that reason, I’m kind of iffy about updating, because I really couldn’t pay as much attention to this as I wanted to. I seriously phoned it in. I was too busy cursing the ice cream heavens.

<complaining>It’s really long. I know I said I’d be sticking to shorts, but I lied to myself. It’s also very sit-and-talky. Sit-and-talky things always suck. It’s a law. 

Not to mention, I hate stretch skeleton, so I’ve been using alternative methods to make some of my guys look enormous, but apparently I haven’t been using the same methods during all my picture-taking sessions, because Chauncey goes back and forth between being a pipsqueak and a humungoid.

To make matters worse, Lacuna Coil and Depeche Mode both released their albums this week, and I couldn’t be more unimpressed. Especially Depeche. I mean, I could really smack them. Hard. Don’t disappear for 3 years and then pop back in just to say hello, you technotronic-abusing buttbags. Dammit Depeche, you’re worse than ice cream. </complaining>

On the other hand, the idea of working on this later is sooooo unappetizing, so I’m just gonna post what I have and deal. Sorry.