Annnnndd… free!

Right
Out of my Maid duty for a while thank goodness. Not out of latex yet though…by choice this time! Also I’ve had time to evaluate some of the DHB toys I mentioned.

Firstly that Armbinder. Now not everyone likes them so it is not for many, maybe not you, but for me it is the best I have tried for a mesh body. The various styles of straps are good and the fit, being rigged, is spot on. Customisation of the colour scheme is quite easy once you are used to the DHB system, which I admit takes a bit of getting used to. So does the nomenclature and scripting, even allowing for language awkwardness. But it works and works well.

The Hood is a somewhat different matter. The Bento hood needs some alteration to your head-shape and that is not particularly good, in my opinion. The unrigged “Customised Hood” is actually better for me in that it needed no shape alteration and while the fit needs you to remove your ears if you edit it a little narrower, that is easy on the Catwa Master HUD. With a bit of tweaking I have achieved a very satisfactory fit. It acts much like a posture collar (logical for a non-rigged item) and the blindfold function is via a HUD, which while it could be better scripted is restrictive but not overly so. Suits a fetish bunny like me! (NB: I have removed the stiff-necked animation from one iteration of the Hood and while it briefly shows a script error on locking and on login, that soon vanishes. This is a customization that you do entirely at your own risk, needless to say).
In conjunction with the Meow Fetish hood (which is actually a Catwa head skin) and the skin gloss turned up fully, the Hood looks fine.  My #RLV folders are now burgeoning. It’s worth mentioning that if you are reasonably adept at editing linked parts or selecting faces in edit, you can do a lot with DHB gear.
I have already edited my Hood to hide the red band, but that is a personal modification. I’ll include a photo when I get around to it, worn with some of Erik Hugo’s latest mesh and DHB Ballet Boots. Watch this space (if that’s your kink!).

Edit: OK as promised some pictures:

Armbinder, just with shoulder straps shown

Arminder with all straps shown

Close up of Customised Hood, with RR gag

View using the HUD

Overview, no HUD

Maid updated

Nothing massive, but I had NOT expected the huge increase in the DHB range! The Maid now has some rather nice lockable ballet boots, these are as good as I’ve seen in SL so far and while they owe a nod to Salid Sewell’s KaS brand for their style, they are not copies! One thing I have not seen before is a scripted hesitation in the walk, especially going up or down slopes and steps. If you have ever tried to walk in ballet boots you will know just how hard that is and striding out as one does in most AO walks in SL is just not realistic, so this is a bonus. By the way it is not a silly walking animation and it does not conflict with the Maid AO.

I found a nice moddable Maid cap/headdress on Marketplace for 50L$ and together with Narya’s upadated NGW mittens, the Maid looks quite good, I think.

Those using Maitreya’s Lara body and a Catwa head may find DHB’s mesh latex Hood good, though I am in no position to test it as yet! There is also a good-looking but rather expensive armbinder for Lara, if you are feeling flush!

Beware that which you wish for…..

in case your wish is granted!
I will now spend a week as a Maid to my partner who reverts to her role of Domina after over a year. This may not be as pleasant or as easy as I had thought…I am out of practice at submission, I must learn quickly or this week may be tougher than I expected!
To those who regularly see me around SL, I may be gone for a short spell but I will soon be back…I hope.

All in a Maid’s day

So…I got the Maid outfit fairly well sorted out. It was soon put to use. Tomorrow I have a lot of housework to do before I have any chance of getting out of this outfit. Beware what you wish for…you may be granted your wish!

Maid and Domina 1

Maid and Domina 2

Maid and Domina 3

Maid and Domina 4

Well it was intended to be a photo-shoot, but it just carried on a bit afterwards!

Maid to work?

A while ago my partner and I were musing about forms of roleplay, and the subject of Maids came up. My partner had somewhat different ideas than mine but I determined to see what could be done within the concept of a latex-clad Maid.

The results so far have been interesting. There is not a wealth of material suitable for a Maid with a mesh body, but DHB do a fairly good latex maid outfit complete with long latex boots. That, combined with a black latex applier catsuit from Marine Kelley’s MdlM brand seemed to work well. The only potential roadblock was my Catwa mesh head. fortunately we found the Meow Fetish black latex skin applier for Catwa heads. That. combined with full gloss on the Catwa Master Hud looked promising. One word of caution – either clear or blend out any blusher or other make-up you might use, it WILL show otherwise and spoil the effect rather. It should be added that a little judicious editing of certain items to produce the deepest gloss has been undertaken, you must work THAT out for yourself!

With all that I use the Daisy Creations Maid AO which links well with my Happy Undead (sorry I think it is no longer available even on MP) latex collar which is currently fully up to date using FireFlower’s Peanut 9 scripts. I have no intention of going into the Fireflower/New Opencollar row. I know how I feel about it and that’s my business!

Your choice of restraints or none is your business, I use Marine’s Restrained Elegance, Deluxe gag and Blindfold (the gag is one of the few that work well with mesh heads by the way) and the NGW mittens. Since Firestorm can still not use vision spheres I use the Virtual Disgrace Premium Blindfold which I now am quite confident in using. The most recent cherry has been Dark Elf’s renamer which while by no means new is still working well. Yes, I know that’s a lot…that’s just me!

The end result you can see for yourself below.

With (almost) no visible Restraints

Restrained

Close up

Same Old same old, should’ve guessed!

I thought I’d try to re-create Pony on my new account, just in case, sort of thing. Well thanks to some help from Salid Sewell the creator of KaS toys, it is done.

I had a look round SL ponyplay and guess what? Despite a two year absence, things seem just as disorganised and drama-ridden as before. It’s sad. Somehow, since I know one or two folk in the SL ponyplay scene, I had hoped that their common-sense would prevail. From what I have seen it hasn’t and there is still as much bitching and back-biting as there was when I threw my hooves up and left.
Some folk are being reduced to emotional wrecks by this and while I admit that it MAY partially be their own fault, it does not excuse the thoughtless nastiness that has been perpetrated by one or two idiots.
I am and always have been ambivalent about the way D/s is applied both in SL generally and SL ponyplay in particular, but one thing I cannot stand is the duplicity of some individuals. No names will be mentioned, looking back at past notices and comments I have seem made in some well-established SL groups, it is always the same individuals, sometimes masquerading as alternative accounts but always with the same MO. For goodness sake, people, act like adults (which we are all supposed to be) not like petulant children!
There ARE some creative and inventive individuals around in SL ponyplay, but I get the impression that some derive more pleasure from stirring up confusion and angst that they do from ponyplay itself.

Firestorm 5.1.7 is here

I’ve waited a few days to see how it actually goes in full-time use before I say anything. Well after three very busy days, I can safely say the this is a great improvement on its predecessors.
There a re several new toys and the most useful for many is the LL-given ability to parcel ban avatars for specific periods. This is a boon to admins and security officers (such as me at Street Whores in my “Alt” account Aishagain).
The Wearable Favourites function is very useful if like me you change your outfit frequently but always use certain items (AOs and Body HUD etc.) but the uses are many and varied. We have the FS devs to thank for that.
RLVa has been updated and while we still don’t have “Vision Spheres” for Restraints, Kitty has explained that the original project has grown into something far more complex, and we will hear more of that later this year, I gather.
There are innumerable tweaks related to the LL 64-bit “Alex-Ivy” code and frankly in the end that is more Firestorm than LL. Having been involved in the testing of Alex-Ivy I speak from some experience there. The LL devs have finally swallowed their pride and accepted that the FS devs actually DO know what they are doing!
Stabilty seems very good and the viewer communicates with its cache rather better than the recent releases, it seems to me. Whitelisting (in my AV) of the executables or the whole folder as well as the cache seems to confer a great deal of extra stability and rezzing speed to the render-engine.
All in all this is definitely a change worth making and I heartily commend it. I know there will be those who dislike the extra code the makes up Firestorm and in some circumstances it is not the best viewer to use if you want the fastest responses. I find FS fulfils all my needs extremely well.