Inflate123's Inflatablog

Moving to AiryTales.net

2009-06-27T11:02:00.000-07:00

This blog is being relocated to my own site. It's about time I had a permanent home!

And the first post explains what Airy Tales was going to be and will still become!

Prose That Blows 500 - NOW!

2009-06-24T08:05:00.000-07:00

Carnatic's "Prose That Blows 500" short story contest is underway! Entries are being taken for just one week. The full guidelines are here, in Carnatic's post on bodyinflation.org:

http://tinyurl.com/proseblows

And the actual mechanics of how to enter are a little later in the thread. It's fun, we're doing it anonymously so everybody's story can stand on its own. Exactly how to do that:

http://bit.ly/11EyIF

You only have until June 30, so get to enterin'! This is a great idea and I'm proud to support Carnatic's initiative.

Cyndi Irresistible: The Lost Recordings

2009-06-06T12:22:00.000-07:00

Spotted a few questions about Cyndi Irresisitible lately -- namely "Where is she and is she still doing inflatable voice work?"

She's fine, and she is still doing voice work, but on a professional local level, and she's not currently taking inflatable commissions. However, she's promised to lend her talents to a portion of Airy Tales, whenever that gets off the ground. AOL deleted all the user webpages last year without warning, including her site and my site, so her samples have been offline for several months. A thread at Expansion Mansion caught my eye, but the link they offered no longer works, so I figured I could post them on Airy Tales.

But when I went looking for the files, I found more than I remembered. Only three sample files/public projects were ever released on her site, but I found three more that simply never made it out very far.

So, here's a six-pack of Cyndi MP3s for those of you who might like 'em.

THE ORIGINAL FREEBIES - released 2004-2007

CyndiIrresistible_Sample1.mp3
Improvised inflation progression. This is how the "raw" files will sound when you get them.

CyndiIrresistible_MsWonka.mp3
Aloziller has given permission for me to release one of the Wonka-themed projects I recorded for him. Imagine that Ms. Wonka was half as patient and twice as malicious as Mr. Wonka was with Violet Beauregarde's gum accident and...well, download and hear for yourself! Warning: Explicit/graphic content.

CyndiIrresisible_SelfControlRedux.mp3
This is a recent completed project (with effects) that the anonymous client has given permission for me to release. This is inspired by Inflate123's short story "Self Control." Please note that I did not do the post-production sound effects and sound effects are not part of my services.

THE RARITIES - released 2009

CyndiIrresistible_Sample2.mp3
Recorded in 2004 along with sample 1, this was never released because we were afraid people would expect to hear sound effects with their orders, and we weren't offering that by default.

CyndiIrresistible_SelfControlFanRemix.mp3
An unknown fan sent in this funk remix of Self Control. I never posted it; don't know if the remix producer ever passed it around.

CyndiIrresistible_ValerieRemix.mp3
This one's released but rare. Korg Fal still has this posted in his Yahoo group, Korg's Kaboom (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/korgskaboom/). It was his dialogue, recorded one of his original projects that (if memory serves) was supposed to feature two women, but I think only Cyndi's half was ever recorded. I took the parts and remixed it into a solo story.

Enjoy. I consider Cyndi the inflation community's first and best "audio pin-up girl" and still get a charge out of hearing her work. I hope you do too.

500-word story contest

2009-06-04T23:00:00.000-07:00

Just a note to promote the Prose That Blows story contest, which challenges all willing writers to create a complete and compelling inflation story using 500 words or less. I think it's a great idea; it ignited some sparks for me, and I wound up writing more than one story. Now I'm trying to figure out which one to submit. The other one will be posted anyway, just not part of the contest.

Writing with a strict word count is something I do every day, but I'd never tried to apply it to my pervy stories. It was a positive experience all around. The deadline is the end of June, so you've still got a few weeks before time is up, and if you're interested at all, I'd strongly encourage you to enter.

And if you don't enter, of course, you'll at least have several little stories to read in a month or so!

The problem with InflateChan

2009-05-10T00:49:00.001-07:00

I've always been big on the word "community." That's because I really believe in it. When I got involved in this stuff, it was to find other people who were into what I was into so I could discuss it and feel better about it. It clearly wasn't going away, so I wanted to find a way to come to terms with it. Having no options in real life, I turned online. The rest is history, and it's kept me sane.

As a result, I am pretty serious about the network of people that has evolved over the last several years. Some of us need the community (and the human beings in it) more than others. But that, to me, is the point -- people having discussions and interacting with people who understand this weird thing and don't judge. The fetish stories, drawings, and morphs have all cropped up around that community; the sites began as mailing lists and discussion forums, and the galleries appeared later. That's like dessert to the meal, in my mind.

I try to support and post in as many inflation communities as I can. If I have nothing to say, I won't post until I do, but if I can add something constructive to a conversation, you'll see my name. The return of InflateChan struck me as one of those opportunities, a community that was making a fresh start. I posted several images from my 25GB of inflatosmut to help the cause.

I was wrong to do that. I have come to see that InflateChan is not a community; it's just a porn dumping ground. In a community, you pick a name and stick with it. There's persistence of the members so conversations can happen. On InflateChan, 90% of the posters are named Anonymous and the only words exchanged are retarded shorthand quips like "MOAR" (for "keep posting free stuff so I can leech it") and "sauce?" (for "where did this come from, for I am too lazy to Google it or participate in any other communities"). The site is a one-way door of content flowing out. And a lot of time, the anons posting the content don't have the right (legal or ethical) to post it in the first place.

Mind you, I made that same mistake. I posted a bunch of stuff from an artist that I really like, but foolishly I'd completely blocked out a pretty dramatic situation ending in "don't post my stuff anywhere." I went back and deleted it all, but the damage was understandably done. I posted a few more things before someone said "Hey, that's also from a private archive, dude." Stupidly, I'd mixed up my files and lost track of which stuff was not to be distributed publicly. I deleted stuff again.

And then I started to think...why am I trying so hard to be part of this site anyway? I don't have anything to gain from it. It's not a discussion board; there's no discussion going on. New content is expected, not really appreciated, and it's not generated by the people posting it (that obvioulsy includes me). There's not much respect for the actual artists whose work is being posted, there's a huge sense of entitlement, and several content creators that I really like (Johnny Swell, Bambi Blaze) have had to fight to protect their basic artistic copyrights. Bootleg stuff shows up as often as legit freebies, and more and more (and MOAR) artists are coming out, expressing displeasure that their stuff is distributed in this context.

A site like that goes away when people stop posting images for the people who anonymously and immaturely demand them. So that's my plan. It's kind of a shame, because in theory, I think a site like that could work, but there is so little respect among the users that this one never will grow to be more than it already is. It makes DeviantArt look absolutely brilliant.

I tried to repair my mistakes by deleting the sensitive stuff I posted, and while even that was likely too late, I'm not going to be part of the problem going forward. I have close to 15 years of really good smut on my hard drive, and InflateChan pretty much convinced me to lock it down.

But we can always have a good discussion.

Slow for a Saturday Night

2009-04-26T13:54:00.000-07:00

I've found that the same triggers hit me over and over again. I tend to like the same scenarios (mad science! spies! magic! revenge!) and as long as the description of the inflation is interesting, I can forgive everything else -- silly plot, bad plot, no plot. But that doesn't mean I don't like to see people trying new things. Artistically, it's nice to see people taking a different road, even if that road is bumpy.

I think that's why I'm so intrigued by Slow for a Saturday Night, the latest BE inflation vid from TaylorMadeClips. Even they describe it as an "odd" clip that didn't quite turn out the way they thought it would. It's atmospheric, it's got a guy boring a bartender to death, and it's got low lighting. It's also apparently got sound effects from a water cooler and it turns hardcore in a hurry; the ending seems tacked on.

But you know what? It's a short movie with atmosphere and characterization and and implied history and all that stuff we always look for in inflation stories, and for a while there, I was sucked into its world. It's a noble experiment and it made me stop and think about what people could or should be doing with the medium.

It's tricky because the only people currently making inflation/expansion videos are doing it for a profit, so on one hand I think it's wise to stick to the formulas that work or simply base their work on the requests of their paying customers. But on the other hand, I like surprises and respect artistic attempts.

And now a rant about piracy

2009-04-14T00:18:00.000-07:00

It's 2009 and I still see stupid shit like this posted on inflation community forums:

"Sorry, but I'm a personal believer of, 'If you don't want your stuff stolen, don't put it on the Internet.'"

Do I even have to explain why that's fucking moronic? Attitudes like this are what kills communities like ours. It certainly demotivates anybody who

It always starts with a bedrock of amateurs following their bliss, nice enough to publicly post their private fantasies as stories or drawings or morphs or renders or what have you. That's awesome; it's the lifeblood, and the main investment is the creator's time. But every so often you get someone who wants to take it a step further. What about animation? How about video? What about actors? The desire is there; the ambition is there. But the costs are there too.

So, more sophisticated content means higher costs. The obvious answer is to charge for the content and help defray the costs. There's a difference between a backyard camcorder movie and an art-house film, even if the spirit that drives them might be the same.

The logic behind the "don't post if you don't want it stolen" is beyond asinine. Similarly, "If you don't want a bullet in your head, don't walk outside when I have my gun in my hand." Or "If you don't want to get run over by my car, then don't leave your house when I happen to be driving on your sidewalk." The suggestion that personal responsibility no longer counts because the delivery medium is digital is staggeringly stupid.

I've seen both Bambi Blaze and Johnny Swell fight leech communities to have their paid material removed from public postings. I don't begrudge BB and JS for charging for their work. But if they can't win against pirates, what does that say to the next person who would like to aim their content-creation sights a little higher than average? There's no motivation to even try to raise the bar, because jackasses will beat them to death with it if they so much as try to ask for compensation for that effort.

It's 2009. For fuck's sake, we need to grow up.

Heliumgirl77's "Photo Enlargement"

2009-03-28T11:31:00.001-07:00

This is the best story I've read since...well, since "Nozzle." It's well crafted. It's creative and clever, a riff on something that until five seconds ago seemed tired and played out. It's intensely erotic, and the expansion scenes are described with gently insistent care. I wish I could write like this; I wish I could plant such rich scenes in people's minds.

I'm a little short of breath.

What's up with Airy Tales?

2009-03-14T14:16:00.000-07:00

A quick update about Airy Tales. It's still a going concern, but we have hit a few snags. I had kind of hoped to have the whole site launched by now, but a few things set the plans off the rails.

First, the creative team behind the project had to swap some members around. I know I haven't said much about that team, but it was not just me and a crazy idea; it's several people working together. Real life got in the way and one of the people had to bow out. So that was an adjustment.

Second, a technical/artistic issue hit the project, and we've had trouble navigating around it.

And third, of course, the good old economy. Frankly, most of the people involved (myself included) have had to focus on real-life work that pays instead of putting time into the fun side project. I am not upset about that -- disappointed, but not mad. I mean, c'mon. Airy Tales isn't paying anybody's rent.

So, Airy Tales is still happening. But the schedule, which I never wanted to discuss publicly anyway for fear of things beyond my control changing it, has to remain flexible.

This week in Jessica Rabbit news

2009-03-11T00:41:00.000-07:00

When it rains it pours. Here I am, sitting at home, thinking that everyone had forgotten the world's most voluptuous fictional redhead, and wham, she's suddenly back in the zeitgeist. At least for a week.

It started when folks in the UK who participated in a Cadbury survey voted Jessica Rabbit the sexiest cartoon character of all time. Please note that the news article says that Jessica beat off several other characters. Way to go, copy editors.

That news snippet led to a Saturday Night Live sketch with a retort from Cathy and a guest appearance from Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel. The video is below or you can see some stills here if it's not loading right below.

Frustration squiggle! LOL.

Also? Yum.

Violet (a chemist's view)

2009-02-16T12:38:00.000-08:00

I love the web. It brings you to weird things like this page for a physical chemistry class at the University of Illinois.

Of special note is the page of homework helpers, where it would appear a teacher's assistant with a dark humor streak created a series of chemistry problems set in the world of the candy magnate/munitions factory owner/brutal murderer Willy Wonka and the chemistry behind his various ways to eliminate the sweet innocent children who visit his factory. (There's also a series of Hellboy problems in there, not to mention Robert Browning. That that, English department.)

They are posted in reverse chronological order, and as it happens, Violet is first and provides the setup for the series. Problem 3 on her page asks -- and answers -- the question, "Does Violet keep expanding till she’s no more or does she return to her normal size and live?"

I am not a chemist so I did not understand a word of it. However, all of them are funny and I recommend taking a few moments to poke around. He also tackles such burning scientific questions as the nitric acid content of a chocolate river and how many children Wonka does in every week.

What happens when you die?

2009-01-25T12:50:00.000-08:00

I know what happens when you die -- you become worm food. I mean, when you live a secret life online and you have surrounded yourself with a community of friends who do not know your real identity and have no way of contacting you outside of a web forum or an anonymous email...how will they ever know?

I got to thinking about this because someone in the community that I know pretty well suddenly went silent for a month. This was someone who I talked to every few days, maybe every week, in e-mail. They aren't much for forums, but they are also kind of busy in real life and it was the holidays, so I wouldn't usually freak out. But we were talking about an active creative project back and forth, and then, nothing. There was a lot to talk about and they're usually pretty gregarious.

So I started assuming the worst. The person lost their job and had to restructure their life for a while. The person got "found out" and has to manage their face-to-face relationships with people who now think they're an online pervert or predator. Maybe they took ill, got hit by a bus or something, and have been laid out in a hospital bed. Maybe they had a death in the family and were grieving privately and didn't want to focus on such frivolous stuff as this.

Or maybe it was both of the last two combined -- maybe they got hit by a bus and the death in the family was their own. Oh fuck.

I care about this person, so after a month of emails and a few phone calls -- a friend of a friend had their number -- they wrote back, which seems to confirm that they are alive. I don't know why they've been quiet, and perhaps it's not my business -- but I'm happy just to know that they are still here, which is all I was trying to learn.

My wife knows about my fetish; she knows my alias, she knows my password, and she knows who I know in real life. When I snuff it, she can log in to my account, write to one or two people, and tell them to spread the news, so the community doesn't endlessly wonder "What happened to Inflate123? Why doesn't he post any more? When is the next story coming out? And what about Airy Tales? He's such a slacker." She'll be able to say, no, he's not a deadbeat; he's just dead.

Do you have a death plan for the community? Is it even feasible in your situation? Or do you not even want people to track you that much?

Videos by Violet

2009-01-19T00:02:00.001-08:00

We know Bambi. We know Taylor. And now here's Violet, another inflation video actress with clips for sale who went online earlier this week. Hey, the more the merrier. I'm personally not a fan of the messy food or traditional BBW stuff, but the body inflation does interest me. However, I'm not sure what to think about the inconsistent pricing -- one clip is $9 for five minutes, while other is $8 for seven minutes, and a few other seemingly random pairings of price and length.

The worst part is that I do not see links to a sample; both Bambi and Taylor have always been good about showing both short teasers/trailers of clips as well as multiple still frames from the film. I suppose some people will just download the stills but they help me figure out if a movie is my cup of tea before I buy it.

What it boils down to is that I'm interested in that button-bursting one called "Violet Pops," and I might cave and buy it -- but at a costly $8.99, if those five minutes don't utterly knock my socks off, I probably won't ever come back to buy another clip. And that makes me wonder which of us is taking the bigger financial risk.

2008: The Year of OMGDRAMA

2008-12-29T00:11:00.000-08:00

2008 was...quite a year.

My personal highlights include being interviewed by Forum and, after several years of talking online, I finally got to meet Sievert when business brought him to my neck of the woods. We went out for lunch and it was the most bizarre thing to talk about our fetish through codewords and euphemisms in a public place. I wrote a new story ("The Corset") in a rush of inspiration, which felt good, and I got to announce Airy Tales after working on it behind the scenes for several months, so that felt very good.

I think the lowlight for me was being banned from Bambi's sites for differences of opinion that have already been amply discussed. It was also the year where we saw Bambi accused of horrible things that she didn't do...followed by everybody pointing fingers, which didn't help. Actually, between not having any useful information and not liking how people publicly made baseless accusations, that left me feeling helpless on multiple fronts.

On another down note, I tried to rebuild the Video Vault on YouTube, and got mysteriously shut down (even though other people have posted plenty of clips from my old site and they're fine). I tried to rally behind a friend on TopHeavy, and she was getting great votes...until suddenly her feedback went all negative in a matter of hours. I have my own suspicions on both of those, too, but since I can't prove either theory, I'm just taking the experiences for what they were and moving on.

Then again, we saw some interesting new folks emerge on the scene -- TaylorMadeClips and KinkyKingLatex really made a positive impact on our scene this year with (respectively) new videos and latexwear aimed at inflationists.

For me, the Story Of The Year award goes to "Nozzle" by heliumgirl77, hands down. I'm still impressed with the narrative skill on display there.

In 2009, I hope we have more of that and less drama. More creation; less politics. Less negative competition; more positive communication. I sound like a broken record, but the community is whatever we make it. And next year, as always, I'm determined to keep trying to make it a good thing.

The Corset: The follow-up

2008-12-13T01:36:00.001-08:00

I am only slightly disappointed that my latest story only rated a 6.3 out of 10 at ExpansionStories.com. No, what I am really disappointed about is that out of 400 downloads, only six people rated it at all, and of those six, nobody bothered to explain why they rated it the way they did.

I really do want that kind of feedback. How can I figure out what that number means without a few words to support the score? Was it something that I didn't explain well that I could have done better, or just a matter of "it wasn't a pregnancy story" at a site where there are a lot of those highly rated?

Maybe I was wrong when I said good things about the site being a home for open feedback. Has the system broken down already, and it's just another story archive full of leechers?

The Corset - new story

2008-12-01T20:00:00.000-08:00

I don't write stories often because I'm not inspired often. I sadly admit that to be inspired, I generally have to be intensely horny, leap on a vaguely novel idea, and then sustain that feeling until I type "the end." It requires a bit more discipline than I'm usually willing to exercise.

So...last night, the planets aligned and through the magic of delayed gratification I suddenly found myself writing a short story. I was somewhat embarassed to find that it was my first in something like three years. Time flies when you're busy doing other crap. It's called "The Corset" and I've posted it at Expansion Stories and DeviantArt, and it will show up at BodyInflation.org in time, too.

Feedback is always welcomed.

The Forum story, downloadable

2008-11-28T00:17:00.000-08:00

The folks at Forum UK have decided to be uncommonly awesome and they have granted me permission to post the body inflation article from Forum 42.12 -- so much so that they sent me the files so I didn't even have to scan them. I can only assume it's a promotional effort, so...remember the nice people at the magazine who gave you something for free when they totally didn't have to! They don't make money giving away content for free (there are no ads in this PDF) but hopefully they'll make some friends and fans.

I'm really happy with the article. I mean, all I did was answer questions, but it's a nice, fair overview, with lots of direct quotes from CV & me. Anything people don't understand is therefore our fault! :)

Thanks to our old pal Pixel Prevert for the file prep!

Forum UK is out...with a tease

2008-11-21T22:47:00.000-08:00

The issue of Forum (UK) I talked about last month is out -- Volume 42, Number 12, as stated -- and the "little article" on body inflation is significantly more than little. When I did the email interview, I expected it would be a 250-word piece in the "here's a whole bunch of little articles" up-front section that most mags have. Maybe 300 words, tops. A cartoon, pinup, or illustration, with any luck, to drive the point home.

What we got was an eight-page feature and a line on the cover. See it there on her ankle?

Holy shit.

Most of the article is from my e-mail interview with the author, but Critical Volume supplied illustrations as well as added his experiences as a member of the community, how he got into it, stuff like that. It's a very non-judgmental piece; it's more "look at this unusual interest" and not the "look at these sicko freaks" approach we sometimes get.

And if you read the article, you'll see a note about an upcoming project I'm working on, and have been for over a year now. It's pretty ambitious (for me, anyway) and involves several people working together. I expect it to go live in early 2009. I'll stop short of announcing it just yet, but the project is going to happen -- and if you buy the magazine, the project's URL is right there on page 61.

Did I mention Volume 42, Number 12 of Forum is currently on sale at fine British smut purveyors everywhere?

The risks of creating quietly

2008-11-19T23:11:00.000-08:00

In early 2008, someone in the community that I have known for years and respect greatly kinda hurt my feelings. The gist was that he felt I didn't really deserve to call myself part of the inflatable fetish creative community because I didn't really generate enough content.

He had a point. I'd been the curator a video website, and even though I'd captured and edited (and even morphed) some of the clips that appeared there, I'd chosen to pass the site on to someone else several years ago, in part to chase some new ideas. I was involved in Cyndi Irresistible's voice-over projects, but well, even though I instigated that whole thing, I was just the engineer and editor, not the performer or writer. I don't have the Photoshop skills to do photo morphs. I clearly can't draw. And when it comes to writing stories, my output has been very weak, maybe one new tale every two years. And I've worked on a few projects that were never announced or released -- one was a collaboration with LVKane that I still hope to revisit -- but you know, nobody knows you're creating stuff unless you actually release it, so I don't get any credit for those half-done attempts. Ditto for all the private edits I've done for writers looking for direct feedback on their incomplete stories. A good editor is, by nature, invisible, and doesn't get credit for their work.

So, looking at my visible output over the last few years, his point was, maybe I shouldn't offer criticisms to other people who were actually making new inflation content, since I'd clearly stopped making new stuff myself.

What he didn't know -- and what I didn't feel comfortable saying -- was that I was already spearheading a large project that had taken several months of development and would take several months more. But what if the project got derailed? Multiple people with different schedules are involved. I wouldn't want to have talked up a project that was so far away only to have it dissolve and have his accusations basically come true.

But I think we're out of the woods. A website has been purchased, it's now being designed, and the content to go with it is in development. I'm happy to say that I will soon be talking more freely about this mysterious creative project. And maybe I'll earn that creator title after all.

The Bambi Investigation

2008-11-19T18:57:00.000-08:00

Remember last post when I suggested that Bambi's lack of response was weird, and might be a sign of the economic hardships? Um, wow, was I wrong -- and I've never been so sorry to hear the truth: Someone reported Bambi to the authorities -- falsely -- for child pornography. Bambi explains.

This is not even remotely amusing. I don't know if someone did it as a prank, as revenge, as a way to kill her business...doesn't matter, really. Actually, it matters in that the motive might lead to the culprit. But I think the authorities are already on that.

Every so often the words "inflation fetish" and "child porn" get lumped together, and it's usually because of the Violet scene in Willy Wonka. "Eew, they're into little girls!" they cry. No, you're wrong; we're not into little girls, we're into the expansion and transformation. You're being disgusted by the completely wrong thing. And we've always worked hard to nip that in the bud when people try to make the connection, since it's so wildly off-base.

But Bambi? I mean, look at the videos. There are no kids in there. There are no suggestions of kids in there. There are no mentions of kids in there. There is nothing at all to do with children, childhood, underagers, NOTHING. All of the fantasies are of an adult nature and they have never even flirted with the things they were accused of doing. (The authorities now know this, as Bambi cooperated and was cleared; the investigation into who is wasting the sheriff department's time is now the focus.) It's a claim without any merit whatsoever -- and it horrifies me to think that someone made that baseless allegation, came close to ruining someone's life (thankfully, she's not giving up or giving in), and might actually get away with it. They are currently looking for the anonymous tipster with the spoofed internet phone call who started it all.

It's not fucking funny. If you know who placed the internet tip call, please, come forward and tell them. This isn't the least bit acceptable. This is not what our community is about.

But at the same time, I want to remind everybody that it's not a witch hunt, Please don't throw around more baseless allegations in the form of hunches; only come forward if you have information that can legitimately help. I'm sure they're already up to their eye teeth in "you know who I bet it was" and "I wouldn't put it past this person" stuff, and I'm sure they have a list of suspects. But what they need is the perpetrator.

If you can help, I implore you to do so.

Inflation, recession, and videos

2008-11-10T01:19:00.000-08:00

The economic downturn is a matter of public record now. I figure the first thing to go is luxury purchases like custom pornography. I know I've had to adjust my habits and be pretty critical of how much I'm spending on things that aren't rent and gas. I would not be surprised if we see an upswing in bartering between storytellers and artists and whatnot -- the "let's swap cheap thrills" approach has always been popular, way back to the mid-90s when I got involved. But while people can swap text files or JPGs with just personal effort and basic gear, the original video content in our community isn't something that's usually traded that way -- it's traditionally been pay content, and for good reason, with all the production and editing and props and equipment that goes into making that stuff. So I got curious as to whether that relatively new aspect of the community is established enough to make it through, say, a year or more of hard financial times. I visited both of the main purveyors of inflation video to find...very different situations.

Things look pretty healthy at TaylorMadeClips lately. Every two weeks or so there's been at least one new inflation clip, and usually more than one. They've got a belly prop now and they're using it often; it's not quite as slick as Bambi's gear -- you can see wrinkles in the belly prop in the early inflation stages, so it must be built differently -- but it's a pretty big jump from where Taylor was even a few months ago in regards to inflation vids. The close-up camera work is still a good trick, I think, and it helps sell the scenarios. I hope to see less food-oriented vids (and more logic -- why are Doritos a source of inflation?); I still don't like the mixing of weight gain with inflation. I know some folks don't have a problem with that, and there was certainly imagery and phrasing in those clips (like "Bunny Will Not Burst" and "Roly Poly Irresistible") that made me happy as an inflation fan. I still haven't seen the scene of my dreams from Taylor but I'm not sure what that clip would or should be, so I can't complain. As has been stated many times, they're open to ideas, so maybe I should get off my ass and offer some. But at least they're still in business and showing healthy signs.

Meanwhile, Bambi Blaze's network of sites have been quiet to the point of being worrisome. The clips have been infrequent (one BE clip and one belly clip in two months' time -- and since they appeared on different sites, that means there was an entire billed month with no content in each arena) and worse, no information is coming out as to the source of the delay or an ETA on new content. It's starting to get a little heated in the forums at bambiblazebelly.com. I was asked not to link to her sites so I will respect that, but you can find it yourself if you are curious -- it's the thread called "Goin on a month now...." I hope the economic downturn isn't to blame -- she'd just set up a new studio, which had to be an expense, so I wonder if that turned out to be bad timing. Maybe it's time to consolidate all the subscriptions into one site. No real insight here, as very little has been said. I hope it gets resolved soon. The good news is that there are new props in her videos -- a butt/thigh apparatus that makes for some killer hourglass shapes in the previews -- and that could spark some fun new creative stories. I don't think the slowdown is intentional; I'm betting it's some unfortunate circumstance. One forum post suggests that it may be a computer problem combined with a move into a new house. Certainly plausible, but still -- why not call someone and ask them to post on your behalf? Seems like the customer base just wants to be updated.

[EDIT: Good news. Bambi released a new video on the belly site on November 12. There still wasn't any posting to suggest what the delay was or if anything is wrong. With any luck there isn't, and I hope it's one of many regular releases in the works. But the lack of communication is still weird.]

Meanwhile, I do encourage people to keep circulating new content; if you make or write something original and release it, that can in turn inspire someone else to do the same thing, and the free cycle of smut continues on. I spotted several new stories at BodyInflation.org this weekend, which made me happy. I haven't taken my own advice, mind you, so I have no new stories to share, but I conveniently have excuses. I have been stupid busy with work and a second job, but I've got something unusual in the queue that will hopefully see the light of day next year.

Inflation in Forum UK

2008-10-20T09:07:00.000-07:00

Notice to UK folks: Keep your eyes peeled for the next issue of the jolly ol' edition of Forum (as in Penthouse). There's an article in there about inflatable fetishism. Seek issue 42.12 when it comes out, and I believe I'm quoted in it from an interview I did recently. I'm trying to figure out what the cover will look like, but the article won't be in the US edition, so -- those of you with access to British smut, report in!

Inflation Holiday 2008 - today!

2008-09-21T12:36:00.000-07:00

It's here! The Expansion Holiday is this weekend, and there's a lot of content that's already been posted. You don't have to contribute to enjoy it, but you also shouldn't feel like you can't contribute if you missed it. I wasn't able to do much; I just re-released an older work that's been offline for a while, but hey, it was something. Happy holidays...

Helia's latest blog

2008-09-20T03:05:00.000-07:00

It's here, if you'd like to check it out. I suggested she might have been gone but she's just been lurking. Yay.

The Inflation Holiday

2008-08-25T01:45:00.000-07:00

When I suggested an inflation fetish holiday three years ago, some said I was crazy. Well, actually, some said it was a waste of time and nobody seemed to have much interest in the thing once we actually discussed it.

But someone picked up the ball and ran with it, or had the same idea not long after, or whatever. And they finalized a date. Countdown to September 19.

Fuck, I'll celebrate it.

UPDATE: A reminder that this is coming up next weekend. If you can contribute to the merriment by releasing a new story or piece of artwork or merely offering words of encouragement to the creators you appreciate in your community...do so!

heliumgirl77's "Nozzle"

2008-07-30T08:51:00.000-07:00

I read Nozzle last night and it blew my mind. I woke up thinking about it today, which rarely happens. I think it's the best inflatable story I've read all year.

It starts out with a setup that doesn't need to overexplain itself; the "huh?" factor is part of the appeal and keeps it fresh (if not waving to Kafka from across the room). The author used first-person brilliantly and the word choice throughout was extremely vibrant; I was there with our heroine in the scene. Even the "mundane" elements of the scene are lovingly described. heliumgirl77's stuff is very subtle and lyrical -- clearly erotic by design, but never vulgar. It's all very beautiful and human, yet totally fantastic. The scenes unspool with perfect pacing.

I'm having a hard time explaining because it's not often that a story hits so many positive points at once. It's not that it pushed personal fetish buttons or anything, it's not like she wrote "my" story -- it's just incredibly finely crafted as fiction. This is a brilliantly WRITTEN story.

Combine this with the early Remnants and we're seeing a legitimate style emerge. Good lord, I think we've gone beyond inflatable stories and we're inching toward inflatable literature.

Some thoughts on the community

2008-07-26T00:11:00.000-07:00

This month marks my 14th year in the inflation community. I'm proud of that. And now I will probably ramble.

The best thing about the community is that nobody owns it. I know I've told the story about how I set up the first inflatable fetish mailing list on AOL for a whopping 12 people; even that, I don't really get too much credit for, because, well, how about those other 11 people? It was my list but it was never more "my" community than it was anyone else's. That's kind of the point of a community -- it's a group thing.

Voices and sites have come and gone. I've met some spectacular artists and writers and thinkers; some have stuck around, some have passed through. I've got evidence of most of them on my hard drive in one form or another. I remember when it was all about ACotto's FTP site. Then the BE Archive appeared and -- gasp! -- charged money. Soon it was all about WrenSpot. For a time, my Video Vault was a happenin' place. And ultimately, LVKane set up BodyInflation.org. There are others, too -- whatever happened to DanielSan and the IC/B2E? Where did Ylandra and Champagne Moon go? And why can't Helia come back for good? Ah, well, There's always tomorrow -- anybody could resurface at any time.

The point is, people come and go, variations on our common themes take new forms from time to time, projects appear and disappear...but the community remains. That's because the idea remains. That's more powerful than anything -- and the idea that we're all into the same weird idea is even larger. We're not alone because, at the very least, we have each other. That's kinda sacred to me.

Nobody owns us. Nobody runs us. And while I sometimes sound protective, I don't mean to claim ownership; nobody can actually take credit for the community. In fact, the only time I really get angry is when I see people trying to suggest that the community cannot exist without them, or they are indispensably important to it and/or primarily responsible in some way for it. Sometimes it's just immature outbursts from people looking to belong; other times, I think people really believe it's true, or at least want to make it appear true for egotistical reasons. No; you're nothing without everybody else. We're all shareholders in your stock in the community. Get in here in the soup with the rest of us.

See? I told you I'd ramble. Anyway, here's to 14 years.

Inflation stories as Wordles

2008-07-13T15:53:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting idea that my wife suggested. First, go to this site:

http://wordle.net/create

She said, "You've got to put some of your inflatable stories into this thing and see what happens." So I did -- I cut and pasted stories from my collection.

I ran a few of my stories through it and found, if nothing else, that I repeat certain words too much -- like "said." I should work on more creative attribution of dialogue! Main character names come up a lot too. It's actually a pretty analysis of your story after you've written it, to show you what and how you wrote from a completely different perspective.

It's funny, because stories with a greater vocabulary will not come up with the most titillating layouts -- the stories with less change in language will arguably make more exciting Wordles. I expected lots of "balloon" and "swelling" and stuff like that, but it turns out those words are the money shots in stories and generally aren't overused.

Try choosing "Maximum Words" under Layout and changing it to 75 or 50 words for a few stories; it gives the main words more impact.

By far my best story as a Wordle was Eating Light, which was my first and worst story.

Try it with your favorite stories and post your results.

ExpansionStories.com - a positive example

2008-07-12T19:01:00.000-07:00

It should be no surprise to hear that I think constructive criticism is the key to, well, just about everything. I try to live it every day in my real-life job as an entertainment critic. Bitching about problems you find in a creative work doesn't help, but identifying and deconstructing those problems in an organized and positive manner truly does offer insight to the creator. The spirit of the criticism has to be true; it's worthless if it's "I hate you so I hate your work." I want to see more people willing to give well-considered feedback to creators who are equally willing to accept it as the positive force it should be.

That's why I'm stoked to see this happening over at ExpansionStories.com. You have to register to download and comment on stories, but I've noticed that the comments are moving beyond the expected "do a part 2" stuff and are starting to address when things went right and how they went wrong in each story. I'm not sure what's fostering this environment but I'm thrilled to see it evolving naturally and I hope it never stops.

Most if not all of my crap is posted on the site, and I still check the comments on my stories there. (Do an author search if that link doesn't take you to a list of my stories.) By all means, chime in with your considered thoughts and keep the good vibes going.

Vixen: The Tampering

2008-06-22T12:10:00.000-07:00

Well, that was interesting. I've been keeping track of the numbers on Vixen's TopHeavy submission every few days and the voting was pretty good -- it was about a 2.5 to 1 ratio in favor of Vixen. Then magically, this weekend, the photos got nothing but No votes. Like, 400 in the span of half a day, all to No.

Vixen was doing it partly just to see what would happen -- she's been wondering that classic "am I hot or not" question and has been thinking about plus-size modeling -- and for two weeks the numbers moved naturally and organically, a few yes, a few no. This latest shift is clearly not natural; it reeks of an organized movement. I wonder why. Who would feel threatened enough to actually rally against four photographs? Strange.

But it was encouraging while the feedback remained honest, and it kind of served its purpose. So thanks to anybody who liked what they saw and said so.

By the way, did you see Kymera there? Wow! Get that girl a hose with which to pose...

YouTube go boom

2008-06-13T20:16:00.000-07:00

Just logged into YouTube to find my account has been disabled. That's a drag -- maybe the stuff I was uploading to the Video Vault was deemed too adult. I had a few clips rejected due to copyright, but most of them were original videos. All Ylandra's stuff...I was really glad to have that, and I intentionally put it up first because I was always a big fan.

I can always create a second account, and I probably will. But it's not my main focus right now, so I figure, this is a sign. I've got my fingers in several projects at the moment, both pervy and non, and I've been wondering if I was spreading myself too thin. Even trying to throw a few clips onto YouTube every weekend was a time commitment. So I'll focus my energies on one less project. For now, anyway -- I would like to bring those clips back online.

However...if you were going to play the conspiracy game...I know that Taylor's video clips were all yanked from the service too, about a week before my entire account was suspended. So this is either a system-wide crackdown on adult material...or something nefarious.

Frankly? I'm not ruling anything out.

Vote for Vixen!

2008-06-12T22:59:00.000-07:00

A friend has been put up as a potential model over at TopHeavy.com. Top Heavy is a site full of photos of clothed women with big boobs -- lots of cleavage, quite a bit of swimwear, nothing nude, but always tight 'n exciting. At least, it is to those of us who like the concept of clothing leaving something to the imagination.

In any case...if anybody else here digs that stuff too, I'm calling for a little vote help. Top Heavy has only recently reinstated user submissions for new models and you can vote without registering or anything. Just click Yes or No based on who you see. There are some other...interesting choices as well that you will likely want to check out if you like busty gals.

The page is here and the model in question is Vixen (the one with no face -- she's stacked but she's shy). Thanks.

In my element

2008-06-04T00:32:00.000-07:00

I hear that phrase a lot. "At work, I'm really in my element." "I'm really in my element when I'm on the soccer pitch." Well, I realized...I actually am in my element most of the time.

I live in California, not far from water, and in an exceedingly windy area. I'm talking 25 miles per hour most days, and when it gets stronger, the windows in my office creak. My front door has burst open thanks to 50 mph gusts, and it's just the natural state of my neighborhood. The hills and the water and everything sort of combine to create an atmosphere where the air calls the shots.

And while I see friends and coworkers complain about the high winds, I love them. I just totally feel like, yeah, world. Behold the power of air. I find the intense winds extremely relaxing. I like walking to the car in the late afternoon when the air currents get more intense.

Because I'm in my element.

I met Sievert

2008-06-02T22:32:00.000-07:00

If you felt a small tremor in the earth this weekend, it was the momentous face-to-face meeting of Sievert and Inflate123. Sievert was one of the first people in the community I met -- actually, his was the first Usenet post I read and that gave me hope that there was someone else out there who felt the way I did. He was asking about a video he'd seen featuring a corset with inflatable cups and hips that also got rigid as it inflated. I'm still fascinated by this concept and want to see such a garment made. I wrote to him immediately and didn't get an answer for several months -- he was in college and it was his school account. For me, it was a long three months.

Over the years we got to know each other very well...but never actually met. We talked about it, we found ourselves traveling in similar areas of the country here and there, but never actually made it. He was in my neck of the woods about six months ago and a disastrous work schedule prevented me from seeing him throughout the entire week that he was in my zip code. It sucked.

He gave me a month's heads-up this time and, sure enough, my schedule sucked again. Three days away for a business trip, followed by another event three hours away the day after I returned, followed by an intense deadline push at the office. But in that slim window between those events -- literally about five hours -- I realized we could meet for lunch.

So you can imagine how pissed off I was that he showed up two hours late!

But what's two hours when it has taken you 14 years to get that far? In real life, Sievert is as he seems to be online -- polite, quiet, intelligent. We had a nice lunch that was, for me anyway, surprisingly frank. It felt kind of exciting to be talking about and around taboo topics in public; I rarely articulate any of my fetish verbally. It's always in an email or a forum post or a blog -- I say a lot but I never talk. So it was a little surreal to discuss inflatable fetishism in a crowded restaurant. Nobody cared what we were talking about. My wife just rolled her eyes as we went over inflatable community names, events, and history like two old war buddies.

I had intended to get a photo of the two of us together, then post it here...with our eyes covered with black bars, to protect the guilty. After all, the internet is not a crowded restaurant. But we had to cut ti short and I forgot. Maybe in another 14 years.

Tattoo?

2008-06-01T11:11:00.000-07:00

I've considered getting a small, non-flashy tattoo for several years now. (I generally follow pop culture trends about 10 years late...) The permanence is the biggie: What am I willing to get on my skin that I will want to live with forever? What defines me? What will I find funny or empowering 10 years from now?

If I get one, I'm getting it for me. I don't necessarily need it or want it in a public place. So that made me realize...you know, this inflation thing, it's not going away, and it does help define me, to me.

I haven't been able to figure out what to get. I don't want balloons; I don't want Jessica Rabbit (while it's true that she's not bad, sometimes she is just drawn that way...forever). I don't want anything vulgar either, and I don't really want a bike pump or an air compressor.

I have considered a simple perspective line drawing of a valve -- like the one you'd find on a beach ball or vinyl inflatable. I've also thought of just having a PSI rating, in text. Simple, secret, cheap.

Any suggestions?

Helia: She's back again

2008-06-01T08:11:00.000-07:00

Yay, a new blog, since she apparently no longer had access to the old one. My link on the right has been updated.

Any update from Helia is a good update in my book.

Big things for Bambi

2008-05-17T10:44:00.000-07:00

Here's some cool news. Looks like Bambi's going beyond just physical special effects and is moving into digital special effects as well. According to matching posts at DeviantArt and BEArchive:

Please bear with me for just a bit for this new vid production because we're in the process of moving into our new studio and manufacturing complex! The studio facility will contain multiple sets and a dedicated green screen set which will allow us to greatly expand our special effects capabilities so that we can produce more diversified inflation & expansion content. And...our new prop manufacturing and R&D center will significantly improve prop design and production. This has been a year long undertaking that was temporarily delayed due to my surgeries and illnesses occurring in 2007.

Sounds like a major upgrade. Digital effects are a totally different realm but the technology is much closer to consumers than it ever was before. I have a little experience in it (and a few friends with lots of it) so I've always sort of kept a geeky interest. Seems like a natural evolution of the fetish, though -- if we've got homemade movies, why not homemade special effects movies?

At the same time, look at both Wonka films -- the first Violet scene was all physical effects and the second was all digital. Fans liked the first, but a deft blending of both techniques? That could pay dividends.

Inflatable BE from China

2008-05-16T00:33:00.000-07:00

Props to The Process forum for turning up this one from a film called Millionaire Cop. Give it time to load -- China's answer to YouTube is halfway around the world. The BE scene resolves at around the four-minute mark.

Some things, like glasses being visual moviemaking shorthand for characters who are nerdy and uptight, are apparently universal. As for the rest, your guess is as good as mine.

Working on something

2008-05-06T23:58:00.000-07:00

Had an idea, kicked it around with an old friend, and we gave it a mutual green light. We've already bought the most important part.

Should be fun. No ETA, though. But lest anyone think I'm no longer creating stuff...I am.

History of BE

2008-05-03T17:54:00.000-07:00

Amazingly, someone wrote down a brief history of how the BE/inflation community got its start. The first stories I read were written by Dr. Enlarge; the first two people I met were Buster (who now runs BalloonBuddies.com) and Sievert (who retains a quiet dignity). I think we might actually meet face to face soon, after all these years. I have only done that with a handful of people in the community, by choice -- I met Dr. Enlarge, and I met Lucky and didn't realize I was meeting him at the time! -- but I've always wanted to meet Sievert, the one person who always felt like my brother from another mother. I'm a bit nervous.

I have always wondered what happened to ACotto; did he get bored? Did he get scared? Did he pass away? His creation of a common file archive really did establish the foundation and we really owe him a debt of gratitude.

New content: Taylor, Big Horse

2008-05-02T11:27:00.000-07:00

Taylor has put up a new expansion clip called Age of Expansion. It's $12. It's worth it, I think. Keep in mind that I like the clothed stuff, so this scratches my itch. I also enjoyed the light tone and sense of humor going on -- doing both sexy and funny at the same time is often tricky, but I think they pulled it off. The actresses are pretty good at improv and running with the ad-libs. Also, by the end, you can tell they're having a lot of silly fun. While I was happy to see a new face on the scene, the first few clips they released didn't grab me but it looked like they were ramping up. I'm hoping this is the first of a second wave.

Also, now that I unexpectedly have a little more money in my pocket, I've commissioned a few clips from Big Horse on my favorite topics -- inflation, hourglass shapes, redheads -- and he delivered two cool images for the money. With his permission, I'm sharing them with everybody. I don't know what they're really called but I have been referring to them as "The Witch and the Hourglass" and "Boob Tube."

I will upload both images to the gallery at bodyinflation.org too, where many of Big Horse's pieces currently live. Enjoy!

Inflate123's Video Vault on YouTube

2008-04-27T20:03:00.002-07:00

After years of scavenging for hosting space and relying on the kindness of strangers, I gave up hosting my Video Vault in early 2004. But a lot has changed with the internet and video since then, and I'd like to bring the archive back and make it available to everyone easily.

So, I am rebuilding my original Video Vault on YouTube. You can find it right here.

I should have done this a long time ago, because now that I am, it seems easier and quicker than I thought. I have all the clips backed up to CD, so I'm just restoring from those, for better or worse (some of them are noticably low-res). And some of the clips that I used to offer on my older site have already appeared here so I will try to focus on the stuff that isn't already represented.

Tell your friends. Hopefully we won't get hit with a lot of copyright violations and the collection will only grow. Hopefully you'll see some old favorites as well as new ones!

Give me an H! And anoither H!

2008-04-26T23:06:00.000-07:00

I just got a verbal agreement from my wife that she's going to buy this top with matching shorts:

My wife, you may recall, is a 38HH. I'm having trouble concentrating today, just from the potential of what this will look like when it's finally delivered.

I don't know what I did right but I'm going to keep on doing it.

My letter to Dr. Curvy

2008-04-26T13:22:00.000-07:00

A few people have asked me whether I tried to make direct contact with Bambi's folks, or if I'm just being petty by assuming the worst. It's an understandable question -- the internets are known for being the greatest communication tool that people don't use as a communication tool, right? But the first thing I did when I thought something was amiss was write to Dr. Curvy. For the record (and I'm surprised so many people are still talking to me about this whole thing, but maybe it struck a nerve), here's the complete text of that letter, sent April 14. I have not received a reply:

--

Heya...I got a note this morning that my subscription to bambiblazebelly.com was canceled; CCBill says it was terminated by the webmaster. I didn't request it, so I went to the site...and it seems I'm frozen out of the forums. When I attempt to log in, I get the following message:

"Sorry Inflate123, you are banned from using this forum!
linking to the EM & bambiblaze.com to spread disinformation & negative propoganda in order to promote his own agenda."

I got a similar message when I tried to get into ExpansionMansion.com tonight:

"Sorry Inflate123, you are banned from using this forum!
The user Inflate123 has been banned for linking from M & L Productions websites to his blog where he spreads disinformation & negative propaganda regarding M & L Productions in an effort to promote his own agenda."

That took me by surprise, so much so that I thought...is this a bug in the forum update? I saw a note that said it was tougher and more frustrating than expected so I figure anything is possible.

On the other hand...I don't want to jump too far in my logic but is this because about six weeks ago, I said on my blog that there were things I liked about Bambi's videos, and other things I'd like to see improved? If that's the case, it's just my opinion, and was not intended as "disinformation" or "negative propaganda." I honestly think the appearance of a second outfit willing to make inflation fetish videos is a good thing. I've been helping to build this online community for well over a decade -- I sure would like to see it continue to grow, including commercially. I really hope this interpretation isn't what's happened, because I link to my blog from most of the forums I frequent as well as emails -- it's just part of how I like to stay active in the community. This was not some sort of targeted attack or attempt to discredit your efforts. Plus, there are exactly zero comments on that post, which means that the few people who did read it didn't care enough about it to reply. If this is a reaction to that post...it's the only one.

But again, I don't want to overreact to something that might just be a mistake, and we've always been cordial, so drop me a note and let me know what's going on when you get the chance. Thanks.

Dan

Kinky King Latex

2008-04-21T02:01:00.000-07:00

Well, it's been a week, and there's been no reply to my direct email from the Bambi camp. I guess my version of the story was correct after all and that's unfortunate. But hey -- if I'd done anything wrong, I might feel sorry about the situation, but I really can't say I regret anything I said or feel I was mistaken in posting my opinion, so...well, that's that. I don't really think I need to say more; actions have spoken louder than any of my words.

I've ordered some commissions from inflation artists (without those two subscriptions, I do get some money back in my pocket, which I'd still like to spread around the community) and I'm very curious to see what Taylor comes up with; like it or not, the inflatable fetish video production community just doubled. I'm looking forward to the day when it triples or quadruples. I still maintain that more options and high quality from every content producer is a good thing, both for the community and for the people who stand to make profit off their creative efforts serving that community. The internet is a meritocracy; good content wins, plain and simple, and there can be multiple winners. I think it was only a matter of time before more people noticed we existed, so to all those new creators, I say, hello and welcome. There's room for everybody here.

One such new face: Kinky King Latex. The owner of kinkykinglatex.com dropped me a link to request a link from my main website. I don't even have AOL installed any more -- my original page there is basically a static billboard. So I said I'd blog about it instead, and then promptly forgot.

But then I came back around to it from some discussions over at bodyinflation.org, and checked out KKL's YouTube channel, and I have to say...this is pretty smart. First of all, videos are going to show off the products better than stills. Most of the latex online stores show images that are too small to make a good purchasing decision, because large images would simply be downloaded/linked to and the origin forgotten. With YouTube vids, Kinky doesn't even have to pay the hosting fees.

But more than that, by showing clips of the suits out in "the wild" of downtown Chicago -- in mundane places like a bookstore and McDonald's -- it taps into the viral thing. All you need to be is brave and you can stir up a little attention.

I particularly like the incredibly brief video next to the cop car. There's nothing illegal about being in rubber in public -- but it's clearly deviant and pushing a comfort boundary.

I should note that this is not an endorsement of KKL's products; I haven't bought a scrap of stretchy stuff from the store. It's just an endorsement of one guy's clever, cheeky bravery in order to make himself a name and make himself a buck. I really do respect that.

Banned by Bambi!

2008-04-14T10:31:00.000-07:00

Wow. Nothing like a good e-drama to get your blood pumping.

This weekend I got an email informing me that my subscription to Bambi Blaze's sites had been canceled. I contacted the billing company and they said I should talk to the webmaster. I went to the websites and couldn't get into some of them, but found a message on ExpansionMansion's forum login page:

"Sorry Inflate123, you are banned from using this forum!
The user Inflate123 has been banned for linking from M & L Productions websites to his blog where he spreads disinformation & negative propaganda regarding M & L Productions in an effort to promote his own agenda."

My initial reaction was disbelief -- there was some server maintenance going on this weekend, so maybe something got mixed up. And maybe my credit card ran out -- we've been consolidating our cards and bringing down our debt, so maybe I forgot and canceled the card that was on the Bambi subscriptions.

Um, nope. I've been banned for the reason stated above. And I don't really know what it means.

Well, I do now, or I think I know now. I started looking at what I have done or said that would have been taken as "disinformation" and "propaganda" and I found it -- it was what I call "opinion" and "constructive criticism." I wrote this blog entry six weeks ago, offering my take on the state of Bambi's videos and the appearance of a new actress on the scene who might give her some healthy competition, and therefore give the community more and better options. This isn't even the first time I've suggested that Bambi could improve -- I did it in an earlier blog post, too.

Surely they wouldn't find my opinions so offensive that they'd just close my accounts and ban me from the forums? There had to be more to it. And since I didn't get any direct communication from Bambi's crew, I kept thinking, and I think I figured it out.

I created a decent-sized library of original inflation sound effects while working with Cyndi Irresistible. After Cyndi's vocals were done, I went looking for sounds and didn't find ones I liked, so I set up a microphone and grabbed some pumps and balloons and pieces of rubber and made my own, to better suit the stories. It's not much but I've always been very proud that I was able to get the sounds I wanted, so I've been kind of protective of the library. I planned to share some of it on the Yahoo group dedicated to this niche topic but I ultimately never undertook the Herculean task of uploading 700MB of audio files individually and didn't want to get trapped into the "that's great but can you make one like this" thing that often happens.

When Taylor posted on bodyinflation.org looking for input from the potential audience, I chimed in and even offered use of my sounds. (Bambi's videos traditionally use "wild sound" -- the hissing and the stretching sounds of the actual costume props, which is one aspect I like -- and not post-production effects...though I notice that the most recent one I saw -- "Enchanted Garden," released March 31 -- was specifically promoted as having custom sound effects.) Taylor's team said yes to my sounds and offered me some of her existing work for as a license fee. In essence, "We'll take your sounds, you take some videos." Sounds good to me.

Here's what I'm guessing caused the problem. Taylor's producer asked if it was okay if he gave me an on-screen credit for use of my sounds. I said sure -- I own the copyright on those files and there were no legal problems surrounding their use. Why not? I put effort into them and with Cyndi currently on extended hiatus, I was glad to see them used again. A credit was a nice gesture, especially considering I'd already been compensated with porn. You can see the evidence here.

I think the combination of the blog post six weeks ago -- one nobody even commented on in that time, so I didn't think it was particularly influential -- with my name appearing in "the competition's" video made the Bambi camp think I'd chosen sides. Since I linked to my blog from her forums and my blog contained something a mix of praise and negative feedback, and the blog talked about Taylor, and my name then showed up in a Taylor video...that I must be using Bambi's forums to spread -- what was it? -- "disinformation & negative propaganda regarding M & L Productions in an effort to promote his own agenda."

Okay, then. Time to come clean: My compensation for letting Taylor's team use my sound effects library (I simply FTPed my recordings and that's where my involvement ended -- I didn't record anything new and I didn't help with the video's production at all) was about $25 or $30 worth of complimentary Taylor video downloads and a thank-you line in the opening credits of one of them. I guess I'm a cheap date -- it's not like I'm seeing profit sharing or something. It was a content-for-content swap, which is kind of how this whole community started.

By contrast, I was paying $28 a month to see Bambi's stuff (a total of $600 to date), which, um, I'm apparently not paying any more. I have no problem with money-for-content swaps, mind you, and I do remember thinking about writing a script for Bambi, and maybe even bringing that up with Bambi, but even if I did articulate it, I never actually got around to doing it. I think it's the false assumption that I'm "working for the competition" that caused the problem. But I'm not really "working for" either side -- I'm just a customer. I suppose it's a little telling someone they can't buy Coke any more because you spotted them drinking a Pepsi.

So, that's that -- the long version, so I never have to tell it again. I haven't heard directly from Bambi's camp; I wrote to Dr. Curvy but I haven't heard a reply yet, so this is all conjecture until (if?) I get a response. But what's done is quite obviously done and the choice has been made for me.

I'm going forward with the following stuff in my head:

1) A business has the right to refuse service to anyone, and I really do support that. If they wanna kick me out, that's their right. I am not going to fight it because I am not actually entitled to anything. The internet is not actually a democracy, even though we all like to think it's at least a meritocracy. The people who pay the server bills do make the rules, and that's not an injustice.

2) I'd sent in direct feedback to Bambi on her videos last year, with ideas and suggestions for improvement for some of the same deficiencies I called out in my blog post. I didn't get that same courtesy here, and I wish I had -- if I could have explained what I just explained here, it probably would have worked out fine. By not knowing there was a problem, I wasn't given the opportunity to solve it.

3) Banning me doesn't actually change my blog post, the areas where I'd like to see Bambi's videos improve, or my desire to offer constructive criticism to the creative community. I'm a critic -- I mean, I'm really a critic in everyday life, I write entertainment reviews for a magazine -- and that's not going away. I don't feel that what I said was unfair. It's not "disinformation" -- it's just editorial information. And I have the right to post that as much as they have the right to refuse me service. I think my banning actually caused more people to read that blog post than if they'd just left well enough alone.

4) Every time I write a review on my day job or a story in my other life, I expect to hear negative feedback as well as hoping for positive. Any and all content creators who release their work publicly (especially commercially) should be prepared for the same. If you feel threatened by customer feedback, you will not succeed. This is a song I've sung before. Twice.

5) What a drag.

Bambi vs. Taylor?

2008-03-01T18:35:00.001-08:00

This should be interesting. Bambi has been the only actress brave and enthusiastic enough to shoot inflation videos on a regular basis. But Mistress Taylor just showed up on bodyinflation.org to check out the community and announce her intent to cater to our fetish. (She currently caters to many others.)

This can only be good. Fresh content from a fresh perspective is always awesome. It's clear from the sample clips that Taylor and her team are semi-pro, and while they don't have Bambi's expertise or excellent costumes/props, even the creative workarounds in the BE trailers proved pretty effective. I'm eager to see what they wind up creating. And, like Bambi, they were eager to talk to the community and find out what they wanted to see. That's a good sign.

To be honest -- and it pains me to say this, because of the family feel I have always preferred in our community -- I've been wondering how long I'm going to keep paying for Bambi's work. It seems like the videos are posted less frequently, contain more filler (I felt last year's experiments with the second actress was a mistake), and aren't getting better in quality. I've always accepted that Bambi's films were humble homemade productions and more about use of cool props than the improv acting -- I knew that when I signed up and I have paid for it because, well, there's nothing else out there even close to what I'm looking for, and she's certainly dealing with the right subject matter. I'm still paying about $30 each month for access to her two sites. But I really did think by now that the performances and productions would have naturally improved, but they've kind of stayed the same -- a ten minute film opens with the same credit treatment, spends a long time setting up a disposable story (which is often hard to hear -- no mics are in use), and when the inflation comes around, the film is abruptly cut off as "part 1." When part 2 is posted (which used to be the following week but now has become unfortunately a lot more...flexible), the remaining four minutes of the scene are basically Bambi moaning. Meanwhile, there's oodles of dialogue in story archives just waiting to be read for inspiration, several common recurring phrases that really do have power. I download the next video and the next video hoping I will hear some of that stuff, but I rarely do.

What Bambi does is hard. It takes effort, it takes planning, it takes time, and it takes money. And it's not personalized content -- I certainly don't expect that every film is my personal fantasy scenario. But am I the only one looking critically at this stuff?

So if someone else is coming to town to try their hand at it, I say, good. If we get one good new outlet and one existing outlet breaks out of its ruts as a response, everybody wins, and I'll be happy to give my money to both camps.

The past never goes away

2008-02-14T09:39:00.000-08:00

I have told three people about my fetish in real life. The first was a girlfriend in high school. I was a a geeky sophomore; she was a well-endowed freshman. Young love and crushes are awkward enough but for some reason I played the "what turns you on" game over the phone with her. She said the usual stuff -- romantic music, candlelight, soft touches. For some reason when it was my turn, I didn't chicken out. I told her the truth.

She had a sense of humor (or else I wouldn't have been dating her) and she teased me about it a little bit later, but our relationship was very chaste and no urges were ever acted upon. I also played the villain, initiating an abrupt breakup. No more about my unusual turn-on was ever discussed.

This was 20 years ago. We've remained friends as adults and we play Scrabulous on Facebook. We're both happily married and she's thrilled to have several kids. But I realized that we'd hit the anniversary for the dumping, so I sheepishly apologized again. She said I'm forgiven but the fact that I'm still apologizing must count for something -- "Power to the boobies! Long live HC!"

HC? I asked what it stood for. Apparently I'd articulated a nickname for her -- "HC" for "helium chest" -- back in the day.

All these years, I thought she had forgotten -- we'd had plenty of discussions about all kinds of other things since, but my deviant desires never came up. And besides, it sounds so silly...maybe she played it off as a joke?

I trust her with this secret. This ain't going nowhere; this is not e-flirting. We are both happy where and with whom we are today. I have since learned that this is part of who I am, but I do not feel the need to make everybody aware of that part.

But I sure was surprised to realize that she's still got blackmail on me after all these years. :)

The power of the blueberry, indeed

2008-02-04T23:37:00.000-08:00

My real life and my fetish life don't intersect often -- but I was laughing all the way through this note I got recently, and for all the wrong reasons:

--

Hi there! Have you heard of TrueBlue yet?

With all the recent studies just released on the incredible health benefits of Blueberries, I wanted to send you some info on our juice brand, which Nielsen’s ratings have shown is among the fastest growing juice brands in North America! Ours is among the best in the world, and a great natural source of daily blueberries. Mom’s and health nuts alike are really taking to our product, and we want to talk about it!

Our resident Blueberry expert was hoping to talk up the new product and all the health benefits – any interest in an interview or recipe session for our health smoothies?

Our product is available North America wide now and we’re seeing a HUGE demand for it ever since CNN’s Dr. Gupta and Oprah both started praising the power of the blueberry……. I’d love you to hear our story, we’re competing right alongside big US brands like Coke and Pepsi – and doing well!

Please let me know, and thanks!
www.trueblueberry.com

--

Any takers? I'll be there's a market segment that reads this blog that these folks have never even considered.

Biggest mistake I never made

2007-10-13T09:40:00.000-07:00

Usually you identify your mistakes after you've made them. I was on a flight recently for work and remembered a mistake I didn't make that would have been pretty catastrophic if I'd made it.

I was on a trip in high school, and was still pretty confused about the whole inflatables thing. I hadn't learned to cope with it, hadn't really embraced it, and certainly hadn't told anybody about it. So I'm on the plane and I realize...there's an inflatable vest under my seat. You know, like this:

And I remember thinking...wow, free inflatable. Because in high school, you're often stupid.

I spent the whole flight wondering, can I take this with me? Is it like the magazine in the front pocket? And then I started thinking, you know, what if the plane goes down on the next flight? Someone wouldn't know it was missing. And what if they did do a safety check and realized it was not there? My name is on that ticket for that seat...they'd catch me. And it's probably a federal offense. And that would mean I would have to explain why I stole an inflatable item when my parents came to get me.

It wasn't worth the risk, but I remember being INSANELY tempted to take it. Just because, you know, it was something inflatable.

Juliekat!

2007-08-20T21:26:00.000-07:00

Hey, you didn't leave me any way to contact you. I don't check the old email, but I'm inflate123 at gmail dot com now...drop me a line if you see this!

Guys and Dolls

2007-08-03T20:19:00.000-07:00

Wow. Just finished watching a British television documentary on Real Dolls. It's interesting to see different owners with different reasons -- one guy takes photos with them and creates his own family, another guy sees sex as his hobby and the dolls as an extension of that passion. Some of the owners are honest with themselves, some of them look like they're not in touch with reality. All of them see their lives as enriched by being a RealDoll owner. The main takeaway: A fake woman is better than no woman at all. Made me appreciate having someone, let alone someone who understands my kink.

Maybe I'm just sympathetic because I have fantasies that are outside the realm of normal human relationships -- unless, of course, you know of a real-life inflatable woman -- but I found this program incredibly fascinating.

I could have sworn that there was a BE version of the RealDoll as a custom order, but I don't see it as an option on the website.

Wither Cyndi?

2007-07-20T23:59:00.000-07:00

Some folks have been wondering what happened to Cyndi Irresistible. She's still around, just not really in a position to take private commissions anymore. She keeps trying to make time but her real job makes it almost impossible.

But we got to talking and we have some ideas that may or may not make it to reality. There are other ways to stay active and yet not do things the way she's been doing them. I think if we shook things up she'd even have more fun, and that always shows in the products.

I can tell you that she has sent me some of the mail that people send her, and asking for her photo doesn't help. She's got a photo:

So then seeing that and asking her for a topless photo is...well, optimistic to be polite, and fuckin' rude to be honest.

Cartoon pervs, unite!

2007-06-28T20:09:00.000-07:00

If you're reading this, it's time to accept a fundamental truth: You've probably found yourself turned on by a cartoon. I'm not ashamed to say that my avatar -- created with what little Photoshop skills I possess -- was inspired by Jessica Rabbit's famed cleavage. I've got a well-documented thing for redheads, so Jessica's outrageous dimensions is a no-brainer. That doesn't mean I don't also have naughty mental images of Ariel, Josie McCoy (you know, leader of the Pussycats), and Kim Possible.

Sick? Not really. When you're turned on by something that doesn't and can never really exist, you take your perverted thrills where you can find them. Anything can happen in the cartoons, right?

Jessica's a rarity in that she was created with the sole purpose of being outrageously and unrealistically sexy. But I hereby challenge those who count themselves among my fetishy ranks not to find this image of Mrs. Van Dort from Corpse Bride practically bursting with subtext:

Yes, she's matronly and rather villainous. No, she's not supposed to be sexy. Yes, that's an amazing bottom-heavy hourglass and holy shit, she looks like she's tightly inflated. When I went to see Corpse Bride in the theater, I had trouble thinking about anything else. I still want to get it on DVD for this reason.

Feel no shame. Cartoons are kind of all we have.

Inflatable dreams

2007-06-10T09:07:00.000-07:00

I had a long one last night that suddenly went inflatably erotic. I won't bore you with the details, because everybody likes to tell their dreams and nobody likes to hear them, but it was a bit like an ARG or the Michael Douglas movie The Game, except my wife had created the adventure just for me. And since she had creative control, she added a bit where one of the contacts I had to meet in the middle of the night happened to be a hot redhead...and she started inflating, breast & belly, right in front of me, as part of the plotline. It was a "oh, they found me out! You've got the information I shouldn't have given you, so go now and use it, you don't have a lot of time" type thing. But naturally, I was thinking "Screw the game, I don't care if this is just props and special effects -- I'm staying here and enjoying this!" And I woke up shortly thereafter, because that was clearly a "Cut! We're off script" moment.

I don't have inflatably erotic dreams too often, but when I do, it messes me up for the following day. Understandably, I don't want to leave that mindset.

Medical miracles

2007-05-31T09:14:00.001-07:00

A friend recently injured his leg. I spotted the label on his anti-inflammatory meds during a visit:

"Take 1 tablet orally every 6 hours for swelling."

I damn near stole the bottle. I have some ideas that involve a redhead, some swelling, and if I play my cards right, it would take about six hours.

The artists vs. the audience: we have a verdict

2007-05-28T15:28:00.001-07:00

Much ado about manners lately. Some artists in the community don't feel they are getting enough helpful feedback. That's a fair thing to express; after all, a true and solid community is there to support its members. And if the artists would like feedback, they should be able to get it. It's appropriate for them to step up and say "Hey, help me get better here."

Instead, they're saying, "Don't give me feedback unless it's detailed, in the following manner." A few folks have actually posted nasty rants complaining about people noting their art as among their favorites, but not expressing why that art is a favorite. For some, saying "I like this work" is a strong vote. But that's not enough for some of the artists, so they're not really asking for more detailed critiques so much as demanding it.

Hold on a fucking second.

The community is always changing; there are always people flowing in and out. I do notice that the age range seems to spike young, as people are just getting through puberty, just figuring out their sexual identities, and while they have a fair amount of free time in school.

So what we have is a bunch of young artists, and a bunch of young consumers, and neither one is mature enough to know how to express themselves in an effective manner. Better still, we've got a charge of audience immaturity that's being expressed through a tempter tantrum. Zero credibility there.

You can see the answer, can't you? It's "grow up." To everyone. Here's the truth:

Consumers, realize that the artists in your community are not vending machines set to dispense product for free. They are living, breathing, human beings with creative drive, neuroses, busy lives, writer's block, passion, and everything else both good and bad that comes with being an artist in any form. Encourage their work; give the artists your support in constructive criticism. The more detail the better. But you have to be willing to do that because it's simply the right thing to do; you will not get an extra-special personal picture of exactly what you personally prefer to see when it comes to burnishing your bishop. The artists are not your personal playthings; you have to respect their processes. And if none of what I've just said makes sense, you're too young to be looking at sexually explicit material anyway, and you should leave. The community will be here when you get back.

In short: You simply cannot demand things from your artists. It's not your place.

Artists, realize that when you put your artwork out there, the double-edged curse is that it may affect someone. You would be miserable if people did not know you existed and ignored your art; this attention is part of what drives you, whether you choose to accept that fact or not. But in seeking that reaction from outside sources, you cannot control what form that reaction takes or how deep it goes. Ask for feedback, encourage it, but don't lash out at the audience because they didn't see your art the way you intended, or they don't understand your delicate nature as a unique creative flower, or they just didn't give you something you can act upon. Hell, some of them may not even be able to verbalize what it is about your art that makes them all tingly down there; if they can't express it, they're not going to leave you a comment. Take what you can get when it comes to feedback, or you'll wind up getting nothing.

In short: You simply cannot demand things from your audience. It's not your place.

Class dismissed, kids. Now stay off my lawn.

How not to commit suicide on the internet

2007-04-16T05:01:00.000-07:00

It's an online classic: Goodbye, cruel world, I'm logging off...for the last time!

How amazingly pathetic and embarassing, not to mention poorly written. I call melodramatic 19-year-old, too-much-Radiohead-and-Nine-Inch-Nails, nothing-better-to-do-so-let's-see-what-happens bullshit.

I've known people with terminal illnesses and constant pain that took their own lives after long struggles, both physical and emotional. I still wish they hadn't. But the one constant in those siutations is they had a) expressable, specific reasons and b) none chose to reveal those reasons with a fake farewell pity party. "I will be too dead to judge your entries?" C'mon -- with listed influences like Silent Hill and Lovecraft, that's the best you could do? And of course, there is absolutely no way for his "death" to reach us in the real world, so it's all a safe, sick joke. On you. Let's hear it for respecting the community.

This is neither an original idea nor an effective one, and I can't wait to see the insulting "social experiment" explanation when our hero comes back to his senses after realizing all he has to live for and/or "just to see if anybody cared." If you'd like, I'm betting we can all write it now. (Alternate ending: Dire-Wasp is dead, so "here's my new online nickname.")

Seeing juvenile soap-opera nonsense like this is the ultimate insult to anyone who ever did have a legitimate reason. And Dire-Wasp doesn't, so don't let yourself be emotionally manipulated by the amateur hour.

That's all the attention I'm giving this failed piece of performance art, and more than it deserves. Please press play on your MP3 players; "Hurt" by NIN should be properly cued up.

Meet TheSainte

2007-02-11T01:15:00.000-08:00

There's a lot of inflation posted on YouTube, but much of it is male belly inflation. Rarely do you find a female fetishist, let alone one who shares video of her fetish.

Well, today's a rare day, then.

OMG, I have a legacy

2007-01-28T10:12:00.000-08:00

So like a dork, I just realized "Hey, I didn't tell the world that my email address changed from aol.com to gmail.com." AOL dumps your old mail pretty quick if you don't get to it, but in the last month or so of mail that it did archive, I found a few interesting notes.

One was from the BEA, asking rather forcefully when I was going to reactivate my gallery there. Yeah, funny thing about that: I've never run a gallery there. When I stopped being the webmaster of Inflate123's Video Vault, it moved to the BEA full-time under someone else's care. I posted very clearly about this at the time and have not revised the page since, but for a good 18 months, I still got angry emails from people wondering where their free porn went. (Hint, folks: Update your cache.)

When the site went to the BEA, I asked that my name be removed so people would not be confused or think I was still in charge. So it's a little funny that even the BEA thinks I'm in charge and just being lazy/negligent. I pointed them to the same page above and said "I think you gotta ask the webmaster, which isn't me, and in this context, never was."

I am glad to be fondly remembered for trying to bring some video perviness to the inflatable community, but the downside is people still expect me to do it, apparently. I think YouTube has trumped the Vault in the meantime anyway.

By the way, I had fun reading an old rant on the subject too. Grrr!

Hi there, Helia

2007-01-13T18:22:00.000-08:00

You can't keep a good girl down--especially when her breasts are pumped with helium. Shortly after expressing my sadness at Helia's disappearance, she changed her mind and launched a new Yahoo group. As one of the only enormously endowed women in our community, I'm certainly glad to have her back. I'm curious to see the conversation evolve.

38HH

2006-12-28T20:07:00.000-08:00

That's my wife. She thought she was a 44DD, but today, she went and got a proper bra fitting. The correct answer is 38HH. She's got a killer hourglass, but I guess I never knew just how awesome it was until it was properly quantified.

She said the store only had one in her size. Turns out she's too big.

I think I just won the breast lottery.

Airy Christmas

2006-12-26T18:14:00.000-08:00

I was glad to have offered a story last year for the holidays and I was hoping to do one again this year. All I've got is the title, and honestly, I don't think I'll get further. I have a lot of real-world work to do.

But I'm so horny, dammit.

So long, Helia

2006-12-12T00:15:00.000-08:00

Ya gotta appreciate her while she's around. Unfortunately Helia dropped a note to let her friends and fans know that she's going offline again for an unspecified time. Gotta assume the worst, that it's forever. If not, yay, we count ourselves lucky.

I'm sad but I'm not crushed. It's the natural cycle of the community. People latch onto it very intensely for a while, then need a break. Sometimes the breaks are longer than the latching. Somestimes they're forever. You can't do anything except hope they're not.

Helium shortage?!

2006-11-13T09:31:00.000-08:00

I would not have thought it was possible, but there you have it. And what's more, we knew it was coming--that Wired story's from 2000!

I'm sure our detractors will find a way to pin this one on us. :)

On Bambi

2006-11-11T19:35:00.000-08:00

So I gotta give it up to Bambi Blaze and her support crew. Granted, the acting is not too good, the editing is merely okay, and once we get past the inflation shot, it's basically a lot of moaning and groping...but I think they're among the best and most focused in our community. Bambi is a good sport who seems up for just about anything; she respects and responds to her fanbase; they've actually invested some coin in some custom inflation costumes and effects, and they offer not one, not two, but three websites, the last of which is free and gives some very talented artists a home. Plus, I don't hear anybody over there having temper-tantrums or posting emo comments about how unloved or unpopular or desperate for attention they are and how they may never come back to the community; they just celebrate what we're all into and provide it for others.

I bring this up because I recently said I wasn't sure if I was going to stay on as a subscriber, but I realized I'm getting more than just the movies for my money. I really want to support what they're doing for everybody, and since I know some people can't always help out financially, even though my funds are a bit lower than usual, I am setting aside enough to support the cause. And of course, I get off on seeing the lady blow up like that.

Wikipedia doesn't get it

2006-10-22T09:18:00.000-07:00

The inflatable fetish entry in Wikipedia has been removed. The official reason is that it was not verifiable information. The resulting discussion, complete with a few "I'm just too disgusted" quips, is here.

I know Wikipedia is fighting a constant battle against bad information and vandalism, and as someone who turns to it as a resource fairly often, I definitely respect that--but when you're a fringe group, the only thing you have is new media to back you up. My website has been going for about 10 years; that's not enough (in fact, I'm super offended by one person's suggestion that everything on the Internet about inflatable fetishes was copied from Wikipedia--no, buddy, it was quite definitely the other way around). Several of us were interviewed for Deviant Desires; that's not enough ("one cranky author's book," said one detractor). Oddly, the page on fetishes for physical inflatable fetishism, such as balloons and pool toys, was deemed keepable; I think many of us wtihin this community realize that Helia Melonowski and Xydexx are working in two different realms. And despite those who say they were disgusted, there are far worse things on the Wiki, but they're more easily verifiable with, say, psychological research cited.

So, I suppose if we had a backlog of media interviews and whatnot, we could establish our existence. And isn't that ironic for bold new informational space of Wikipedia: The only way to prove to new media that we are real is to prostrate to old media first.

No, that's not ironic. For Wikipedia, that's actually just embarassing.

The money crunch

2006-10-06T22:21:00.000-07:00

Yep, some shifts in my personal finances have led to my needing to cancel one of the pay sites I subscribe to. I had to say goodbye to the Latex Lair, which really does have some of the best fetish photography I've ever seen. Latex + redhead + DDs is my kind of equation. But hey, something's got to give, right? I can always come back when the money situation gets a little more comfortable.

My subscription to both of Bambi Blaze's sites are still active, for now. Content has been light and not terribly inspired lately so I'm going to have to really look hard at what I'm getting.

I know a lot of the people in our community don't have tons of money to throw around. Lots of the consumers are students. I'm glad that I've been able to enjoy the stuff this long. I don't think I got ripped off by either site and I'm not crying poor (well, I am crying "financial adjustment"), nor do I think that all content should be free or any of that nonsense. Artists and creators need to be rewarded--well, why use euphemisms? They need to be PAID. No crime in that.

Inflatable porn storage

2006-09-25T23:56:00.000-07:00

I recently upgraded my hard drive (because I upgraded my iPod and you know how that goes--gotta have enough room on the HD for the data to live before you copy it to the portable) and carved out a nice slice of space for my inflatable fetish data in the process. It was always sharing space with something else. This time, I had enough extra meggage that I gave it its own drive--"Smut"--but was somewhat horrified to find that, after a dozen years collecting stuff online and hosting the Video Vault, I only had about 7 gigs and change. That's it? That's not even two DVDs. What the hell?

I've been fairly selective. I decided some time ago not to be a completist or an archivist; I'm generally just grabbing things that tickle my Elmo. On occasion I'll snag a photo with a good facial expression that could be used for a morph later on, but even then we're talking, what, 50K? 100K? Even the Vault clips don't take up a ton of space since so many were created with short downloads and scattered hosting in mind. A few MB here, a couple hundred K there.

I'm betting that most people's porn collections dwarf mine. But it's quality, not quantity, people!

The Tomorrow People

2006-09-24T00:51:00.000-07:00

Wow, flashback to being a kid and watching this British TV series on Nickelodeon. Picture Doctor Who for kids--low-budget sci-fi with bad green screen technology and a lot of little telepathic kids jaunting around the universe. I remember watching one episode where a bad guy kidnapped one of the kids and, after demonstrating what a leaking airlock would do to a balloon, threw her in there as a way to make the other kid talk. The episode ended on a cliffhanger of the girl looking nervous and starting to swell.

The next day I had to be somewhere in the afternoon and I begged my mom to rush home so I could see what happened next. I couldn't tell her why, of course, but I couldn't think about anything else that day and it was vitally important that I make it home in time! We were slightly late and I missed the first few minutes of the program (This was in the days of VCRs but before TiVo, and I hadn't had the chance to set it to tape.) For years I wondered what happened. Eventually fansites for The Tomorrow People helped me identify which character, which season, and which episode--and this week, thanks to BitTorrent, I snagged the actual episodes.

Memories are better than reality, of course. The cliffhanger of her "swelling" was nothing more than her raising her arms a bit, and the resolution wasn't even that--she was sweating and, when the kid instantly said he'd tell the bad guy what he needed to know in order to save her, all she did was collapse on the floor. No inflation after all.

It took me 20 years to realize I missed nothing! :)

Careful what you ask for

2006-09-13T00:30:00.000-07:00

I don't have a ton of time to spend in the community lately--stupid real life, I hate you--but whenever someone asks for feedback on a story, I at least read it and try to come up with something specific and constructive to say. I have offered generic and unsolicited advice to writers in the past because of my career and experience, but that's not as good as "I wrote this" followed by me saying "Okay, here's what I think about that specific thing you wrote."

Years of being on deadline have taught me one thing about copy: If it's broke, fix it. Lose the ego, lose the hurt feelings--if you've come to me and said "Here's work I've done, tell me what you think," I will tell you. You will get feedback. You may not like it. Apparently, some people are even shocked by it. Welcome to the world of Other People's Perspectives. Welcome to the world, period.

Short version: Do not ask for feedback on your work if all you really want is a compliment. I give those too, sometimes at the same time as the criticism. But don't take me or anyone else with relevant experience to task for actually trying to improve your output. Don't blame me for giving you exactly what you asked for.

Art: The good and the bad/ugly

2006-08-15T00:48:00.000-07:00

Yay, looks like another one of my favorites has a permanent home now too. CattyN seems to go through vicious mood swings and has a short fuse sometimes, but his work is always creative, pleasantly cartoony, and pretty varied when you step back and look at it as a whole. I'm glad he's got a stable place to show off his formidable talents.

CattyN's success reminds me inversely of another artist, who shall remain nameless. I rarely point out bad artists in the community because I truly feel that anybody who wants to contribute should be encouraged to do so; if their work needs improvement, they can only get better with practice, right? That's what I thought, but there's one particular artist who has officially proven me wrong.

This person is sort of CattyN's evil twin in that all the things I like about CattyN's work are the exact opposite with this person. Their work is rarely creative (there's no depth to what they draw, no approaching the subject from multiple angles the way so many other artists in our community do), unpleasantly cartoony (doesn't matter which cartoon they're borrowing characters from, all the pictures look rather crappy), and never, ever varied (characters are always drawn in the same pose).

When this person discusses their work, they quite honestly sound mentally challenged. They certainly were when they tried to have a conversation with me, which really was more of a non-constructive accusation by them about my work. I replied only by suggesting how this person could grow as an artist based on patterns and tendencies I'd noticed, and what they could try in order to shake themselves out of their established habits. They didn't/couldn't/wouldn't understand my point. Why change, why try to improve? The DeviantArt hit counter speaks for itself, right?

So we've got someone who isn't good at drawing, isn't good at writing, isn't so hot on the offering or the comprehension of constructive criticism, and might be retarded. And the only reason this personally bothers me is that I'm afraid this person is somehow going to represent the fetish to the outside world someday, and when the world one day finally finds out we exist, we will all be assumed to be mongoloids.

Unwanted relics

2006-07-30T19:40:00.000-07:00

Visiting my wife's parents, we found an old letter I'd written her that, luckily, only she saw when cleaning. It's very detailed, downright annoyingly anal semi-blueprints for an inflatable bra and an inflatable jockstrap that I'd apparently designed and sent to her. They never got made (though the letter certainly believes they were about to be made) and I feel ridiculous seeing them again. I really wish my new apartment had a fireplace so I could dispose of this properly.

The return of Helia

2006-07-11T00:47:00.000-07:00

Hey, cool, look who's back. Good readin'. I got really pissed off last year when I saw someone using her pen name, slightly misspelled but clearly trying to ride her coattails.

I admit I felt a bit big-brother protective because she was one of the first (if not the first) females to come forward and actually say "Yes, I have this BE fetish too." She embraced it and, naturally, got all the good and bad attention that comes with being the living embodiment of a million male fantasies. But I was fascinated just to hear her take it on all; I knew my perspective but was dying to hear what it was like on the other side of the gender fence. And she was nice enough to tell me, honestly, amusingly, friendlyly.

Just goes to show you, folks: you can meet a girl with 44G breasts and fall for her great personality.

Ford vs Chevy...but, like, inflatable

2006-07-04T00:11:00.000-07:00

In talking with some friends, I've recently been reminded of the gap between various fringe fetishes. It's easy to lump them together, but the lines are rather clearly drawn. Most of the time it stays civil--until someone assumes that group A is the same as group B, or feels that group A should be a member of group B.

I don't necessarily disagree with these friends who reminded me of this schism. As has been documented, I was here at the beginning of inflation fetishism online; there were 12 of us with AOL, Prodigy, or CompuServe accounts. Through Usenet, I'd made contact with Buster, who had already been seeking out fellow balloon fetishists via classified ads for years, and Sievert, who'd spotted a porno tape in college featuring an inflatable corset and he wanted to know if anybody could help identify it. We were so small then that one mailing list was fine and we were all happy to have found someone, anyone, with a similar interest. But about a year later, we'd hit over 200 and the more specific interests started to show themselves. Some people were into pool toys; others more into balloons as objects; still others were into BE and not all of those people were into other body inflation. It was for the best that we split off--it wasn't an angry thing, it just became clear that the seeds we'd planted did exactly what they were supposed to do: they took root and grew!

Now, however, it's not nearly that insular. The web, Wikipedia, YouTube, bearchive, you name it--there are tons of ways to see inflatable fetish content, and I'm happy for that. But the "hey, whatever you're into is fine with me" has devolved into more of a "blueberry vs. helium vs. fat" type thing.

Is that separation for the best? Maybe. I think beggars can't be choosers, but clearly, with the explosion of the web, nobody's begging any more; it's okay to be selective. And with so much content out there, I am surprised that people assume one is the same as the other.

For the record? Weight gain, not so much. Yes, I see some nice shapes and pleasing curves out there, and I've read some stories that I liked, but I don't generally gravitate toward the feeder/feedee community, and I'm not into WG in general. Blueberry girls don't do it for me either, though again, I sometimes catch something there that sticks with me. (The original scene is still awesome.) And I certainly like seeing what the various artists are up to in each community--Pixel Prevert was a strong supporter of the blueberry girls, and man, his stuff was over the top in terms of quality and special effects. I wouldn't want to miss his stuff, no matter what the topic.

I guess I'd like to see us respect the differences without judgement. It strikes me as very much like Ford vs. Chevy--maybe it doesn't matter if you drive a Toyota, but to some people, it's how they identify themselves, and to say "American-made car" without distinguishing is, to them, offensive. I can't say I'm any different.

I'm an inflatable fetishist. Weight gain and blueberries just don't have the same effect on me. But they can have a wild effect on you, and I don't feel threatened by that. I can still celebrate it.

It's not a dress

2006-04-24T19:41:00.000-07:00

For Christmas, my wife got me a really expensive watch. It was very cool, but it was not really something I would use. (It was a very specialized, nerdy watch.) With her permission, I returned it and used the money for something...a little different.

I had an inflatable suit once. It ripped and I sent it out for repair, at which point I never saw it again. Since then I've wanted to get a latex garment of some sort. My wife suggested latex sheets, but we both realized they would be a nightmare to clean and care for, plus they were super expensive. She does not want to get latexwear right now, but we both realized...well, if it's my fetish, why don't I do it? What could I get that would let me feel that lovely sensation of pressure and stretchiness that only latex provides, particularly around my midsection, but something that could still be worn during The Act? The answer, I was rather surprised to learn, turned out to be a dress.

Now, because I am a straight male and feel I am already sufficiently strange enough, the concept of buying and wearing a made-to-measure latex dress is something that immediately makes me want to change its name. It's...a tunic. Yes, a latex tunic. Or perhaps a very long t-shirt, because that's what I was thinking of and realized, yeah, that's what ladies call a dress.

I contacted Nimue of NimuesLatex.com after seeing her amazingly reasonable prices, wide color variety, and noting that everything was made to measure (which, when optional, is always something you should get--while cheap, off-the-shelf latexwear is usually ill-fitting and therefore not much fun). And so, four months later, this arrived:

That's a Short Tank Dress in .43/.50 weight Pearlsheen Purple (color selected in part by spouse). The custom color and weight meant the order took longer, but it's worth waiting for exactly what you want, right? And with two custom elements (color and thickness), it was still only $140. Hot damn. I was expecting a rounded neckline instead of a V but I don't really mind, and I don't think I specified.

It doesn't look like a dress, right? It kind of reminds me of the new style of NBA jerseys. And Iverson don't wear a dress.

Work with me here.

Protoblog

2006-04-16T12:52:00.000-07:00

You kids and your computers. Imagine my horror when I recently located my old journal (which was the boy's way of saying "diary" in the early 80s) and realized, wow, I'd been blogging since before there were blogs. It's all incredibly embarassing, filled with song lyrics, self-doubt, things that happened at school, geeky outbursts that I thought were cool, girls I had crushes on and weird, melodramatic self-assessments. But it was interesting to see me dance around the inflation thing because I only spoke of it vaguely. I was always afraid of someone else finding the thing and reading it, so I never wanted to give too much away (but wow, look at all the other embarassing stuff in there...would anybody have even noticed the inflatable stuff?). There is one reference to a "fetish" and one reference to an "ultimate turn-on" and that's about all I could find. The rest was just pure growing-up-in-the-suburbs nonsense, no deep thoughts or shocking revelations.

I'm going to destroy this journal, probably by fire. It's a big reminder of the awkwardness that everybody has when they grow up, but I have the experiences; I don't think I need the document anymore. It's one of those things I never wanted to keep but never wanted to get rid of. But it's just time to move on and stop beating myself up about what a dork I have always been.

I am taking back the block I gave you for Christmas

2005-12-26T14:25:00.000-08:00

You know how when you take your car start acting up, the moment you take it into the shop, it suddenly start working perfectly? And when you want to show someone else how this frog you found on a construction site can sing and dance while wearing a top hat, the minute you open his cigar box, he does absolutely nothing and makes you look like an idiot?

I posted that I had writer's block. That fixed it.

I tend to write PG-13 stories, whether I intend to or not. Happy Holly Days is akin to a sweet coming-of-age romantic comedy, like a pneumatic John Hughes movie. It's randy, but it's chaste. It's flirty, but it doesn't show everything. Much is left to your imagination at the story's conclusion, but it's definitely a happy ending.

I don't know if that makes it particularly exciting, or exciting enough compared to the other stuff out there. I have read some tense, scary revenge inflation fantasies that really thrill me. One of those was Plowboy's "JH-12," one of the first dark stories I'd read, and one that really made me feel naughty when I enjoyed reading it. I don't know if he wrote anything else, and I've tried to contact him to no avail--he wrote that story years ago and has since abandoned that e-mail address. But when I needed a name for my mystery chemical, I couldn't shake that strong memory and decided to co-opt it as an homage.

Otherwise, the stories have nothing in common. His is a series of unapologetically vengeful vignettes that caters to several audiences at once--no matter what kind of inflation story you like, you'll find something there to make you happy and horny, and it has three different climaxes. It also has a lot of the hallmarks of my favorites: Characters who overstate the obvious (often ridiculously, melodramatically, and unrealistically), stretchy clothing like spandex or rubber, and lots of detail of the expansion.

By total contrast, my story describes the expansion lyrically, tries to keep all the emotions and reactions somewhere in the ballpark of reality, and ultimately pulls its punches when it comes to a big payoff.

So I guess what I'm saying is, go read JH-12, it's a better story!

My holiday gift to you: Writer's block!

2005-12-23T13:46:00.000-08:00

So I thought last week, man, I haven't written a new story in well over a year. I'd like to put one together as a little holiday surprise for the community. Not that anybody is eagerly awaiting my next piece of crap, mind you, but I feel happiest when I'm releasing projects into the community instead of just maintaining a few message boards and whatnot. I can't draw, and most of Cyndi's projects remain private affairs, so other than coughing up a few bucks to commission pieces of art to share with everybody, all I've got is my writing.

So I started thinking about the various idea fragments sitting on my hard drive. I have a few paragraphs here and there that need a story built around them. I have a stray concept here, a story name or a character name over there...nothing concrete. Might as well start from scratch.

And then it all went black, when I slammed into a giant writer's block.

The reason I write so infrequently is twofold. First, I write and edit stuff all day long--I'm a writer/editor--and I always seem to be spending time in front of words, trying to make them better, one way or another. And when I do write at home, it's more likely to be on the book I'm writing instead of the dirty stories. Either way, it's work.

Second, and more importantly...I just don't have any more good ideas. Those fragments lying around are fragments for a reason. Everything that comes to mind has been done. Magic? Science? Fizzy lifting drinks? No explanation? Hardcore? Software? Clothing? I get a been-there-done-that feeling, because I can think of great stories on each topic that other people have already written, and I don't think I'd be able to do any better. I like bringing something fresh, even if the expansion sequences often use the same words.

I have considered taking one of my existing stories and doing a sequel, so as to remove that problem of coming up with an original idea. I already took that shortcut once with Cindairella so that's out. I don't really know where to take Self-Control, because it's self-contained. The whole story kind of exists because it plays on that first-thrill concept. I suppose I could do the next stage in Everything but that's a dark one and I'm kind of surprised I went there in the first place. I like Remote Possibilities and Sievert would likely grant me permission to work on a sequel, but I don't know what the next stage in that narrative would be anyway. And while I could do a second part of Liquid Helium, because it's practically gift-wrapped with the ending, I haven't really figured out where I would want that story to go either.

I don't know about other creators, but I also find I have to be ridiculously horny in order to write an inflation story. I kind of have to commit everything to the build-up and payoff--I kind of have to be there, mentally, in all those stages all the way through. And I don't think I have to explain that those exciting moments are hard to prolong for 45 minutes while you go back and edit every line for maximum impact.

So I guess what I'm saying is, happy holidays, everybody, I got you nothing. But it was the thought that counts...?

Okay, enough with the identity theft already

2005-12-12T20:51:00.000-08:00

Here's a disturbing trend in our community: Identity theft.

I've been proud to call Helia Melonowski a friend for some years. Like a lot of folks in our community, she's been really active sometimes, not so active others--but she's never really gone away--in fact, she still has a small website. That has not stopped someone from using a very minor variation on her name under the guise that it's a furry role-playing thing. Um, no. You don't just take someone's online identity, change a letter, and borrow it. There's no excuse for it, and there's no reason, other than simply not being creative enough to come up with your own idea. Helia's reputation is her own--she created it. Make your own mark on the community with your own name.

And speaking of which, my name is...known enough to get me some attention now and then, both good and bad. The latest is bad--a webmaster who runs a forum has apparently dipped into his registration records to fish out my password so he can go post as me on another site, from which he was personally banned.

What the hell is going on? When did this even become remotely seen as acceptable? Does our community really think so little of ethics that this is deemed an okay thing to do?

This is not enough to scare me away--but has anybody considered that shit like this DOES make artists and writers lose interest and log off?

We Need a Holiday

2005-11-17T20:57:00.000-08:00

Secretaries have Secretaries' Day. Working mothers have Take Your Daughter to Work Day. Federally observed holidays, like Veterans Day and Presidents' Day, plus all the religious or ethnic holidays like Easter and Kwanzaa and Yom Kippur...they all serve one purpose: They call attention to an event or a cause or a community.

As the end of the year rolls around, it occured to me that we, as a community, do not have a holiday.

Let's make one.

Now, this is not something I expect to see marked on national calendars alongside Boxing Day and Talk Like a Pirate Day. But I think an arbitrary holiday would...legitimize us, in a way. Gives us an excuse to celebrate, a reason to create new content for an annual event, an excuse to come together. And it's better than a convention, because none of us has to show our faces or fly anywhere.

So, that leads to two questions:

What do we call it? Inflation Day is likely to be confused with an economic event, so that's out. BE Day or B2E Day don't speak to everybody's interests, nor are they terribly self-explanatory. Blow Up Like a Balloon Day is too silly, even if it is what we'd all like to see happen. Inflationists Day makes people ask "What's an Inflationist?" And Inflatable Fetish Day does the job for me, but that's me. I think the title should define itself. When you hear Inflatable Fetish Day, most people would say, "There's an inflatable fetish?" That's a good reaction, you know?

When do we celebrate it? Here's a few ideas:

June 5 - In 1783, the Montgolfier Brothers flew the first balloon.

June 30 - This was the day Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory debuted in theaters in 1971.

Thanksgiving - Name another holiday that features a parade with giant balloons--not to mention the one time of year where people say "Any more and I feel like I could pop." Still, this one's kind of taken.

Any day in August - There are no federal holidays, and it's toward the end of the summer, before the wacky fall back-to-school time and the resulting holidays.

I'm open to other ideas. (July 3, 1994 was the day I first made contact with other inflatable fetishists--specifically Bill from the Balloon Buddies and, shortly thereafter, Sievert--and those conversations led to the first online group of inflatable fetishists, just a dozen people strong, later that year. I'm proud that pretty much everything else grew out of that. But July 3 is clearly a personal milestone and a little close to another existing holiday!) I'll probably post about this over at BodyInflation.org and see what happens. But comments are welcome here, too.

So I Married An Inflatable Fetishist

2005-09-10T00:29:00.000-07:00

This month marks a double-digit milestone wedding anniversary for me. Statistically, that puts me at 51% right there, simply for not ending in divorce. Now factor in the number of happily married couples where one person is an inflatable fetishist and the other isn't--and both people are still somehow able to stay happy and fulfilled--and I think the number would plummet severely. Unfortunately I don't know of anybody who keeps statistics on a pervy niche within a niche, but let's assume it's pretty rare.

On this milestone, someone asked me what our secret was, and I had to be honest: Communication. I have always been very straightforward with my wife and vice versa; we don't hold grudges and we don't play mind games. It just so happens that she knew about my fetish very early in our relationship. I sort of let something slip in the throes of passion, which caused her to giggle--and then I had the awkward task of explaining, "Well, yeah, okay, it sounds funny, but actually, um..." It was difficult to say, but instead of dodging it or repressing it, I said it. I told her the truth.

Imagine my surprise when she did not run screaming.

After it had some time to sink in, I asked her how she really felt about it. To which she famously replied, "Well, I see it as a personality quirk. It doesn't hurt anybody, it makes you happy, there's a lot of really bad stuff out there by comparison, and it's pure fantasy. What's wrong with that?"

It should be stated that she does not share this fetish. She just accepted it. That alone helped me resolve all sorts of misplaced guilt and confusion I had been holding on to, and slowly, over the years, we wound up exploring it together--finding out what my triggers were, laughing about how silly some of them are, and even finding what ultimately gives her the upper hand when she wants it. We've done some roleplaying, but rarely use props, and often, she's not the target of the roleplay anyway. I'm literally just happy to explore it on any level and not be thought a total freak for it.

I have spoken to a lot of other people who are fetishists and are married or in long-term relationships, and more often than not, they have said things like "Oh, no--she has no idea. I could never tell my wife." And as I've suggested in this blog before, if you cannot tell your life partner, who can you tell? I think that's literally one of the saddest things I can hear--a fetishist who refuses or does not feel they trust their spouse enough to share their deepest desires, particularly since the spouse is the only person who will ever help you satisfy or realize them.

For those of you out there who find yourself in that position, I beg you: Be honest with him or her. Tell them the truth, or analyze why you don't feel you can, because it may be a symptom of a larger problem. You've made a life commitment here. That's gotta be worth some understanding and open-mindedness, no matter how weird they might think it is at first.

And for those of you who are single and fear you will never find the right person because "the right person" is a fetishist, all I can say is, don't assume that. Widen the net, go for a person who you like and respect in all other areas, and when the time is right--or in my case, when the moment presents itself--introduce it. There is going to be more to your romantic or sex life than your fetish anyway. But take heart that there are people out there who will understand you for who you are and what you like and even what turns you on.

Thanks to my wife's generosity and understanding, I've had tangible fun with this fetish for longer than some folks in our community have even been aware of their own perverse interests. Trust me on this one--build it into your relationship, and everything gets sweeter.

Yahwho? Part Deux

2005-07-21T01:06:00.000-07:00

They're out to get me, I tell you. Seems my alternate ID has been removed as well, so I am, for whatever reason, totally locked out of Yahoo groups twice. I don't know if I will try again. It's clear they don't want me there, but at the same time, I never get a nice note telling me why. Maybe they don't owe me that, but okay...I generate traffic and I don't hurt anybody, so if that's how you want it, I can only rage against that machine so hard.

However, the far more insidious development is the appearance of a smut directory/links page on--get this--www.inflate123.com. On one hand I'm horrified, but on the other hand, I gotta be happy. This means someone, somewhere out there looked around for a name important enough that it would be worth buying, and they chose mine! Hot damn!

I guess I should really take these events as signs that it would be okay to change my online nickname.

But I won't.

Hot sheet!

2005-07-12T00:08:00.000-07:00

There's a fair crossover between inflatable fetishists and latex fetishists, and it doesn't take a genius to make the connection. (Hint: Starts with the letter B.) So while I collect stories and images of BE and B2E stuff, I also have a directory for latex pictures that I come across. Latex is more part of the bondage world so I have seen a little more than I bargained for on occasion, but it's worth the risk: A nice photo of a snugly filled latex dress is a fine reward.

I used to have an inflatable latex catsuit from Cocoon in the UK. You may have seen the photos online with the prefix B70 on the file name. It was not cheap and it was a really important purchase for me--the first real tangible proof I had of my fetish. Short version: It didn't give a good sensation of pressure, so I put clothes on over it. With a zipper. I nicked it. Embarassed, I sought someone else in the community to repair it and he said yes, no problem, that's what this community is for, support, I'll fix it and we'll settle up later. Then, for lack of a better explanation, he stole it. He claims it was damaged in a hurricane, I got a story about a sick child, I got a promise of a check in the mail...I still hold hope that one day he'll do the right thing and reimburse me, but I don't hold much hope. It makes me angry to think about it, actually.

So, for years, I sort of denied myself any more latex stuff. Holding a torch for this magical insurance payment from a total stranger in Georgia gave me just enough to think that, hey, I will be able to replace this. My wife didn't take a strong interest in latex, but she was interested enough that we talked about getting her something (non-inflatable) to wear instead. That plan fluctuated with her weight, and I understood. Latex clothing is still pretty expensive, and you definitely get what you pay for--there are some real artists selling true wearable artwork, like The Baroness. But with pending money mentally earmarked for the plan, I wasn't going to rush into anything anyway. We could be ready, order the right garment in the right size, because in a few months, the money would return to us.

A few months turned into ten years.

My wife is still not really interested in wearing latex, but she's no fool and understands is wacky power over me. We think we have found a suitable compromise: Latex bed sheets. You get the feel, you get the smell, you get the intimacy, and as long as your partner is on the same wavelength, you have a hell of a good time together. And again, it's not cheap, but the price on something like this doesn't really change. I am planning to order from Nimue's Latex Fashions, as they've answered all my questions, they've got a great selection of colors, they really seem to know what they're talking about, and they're reasonably priced for what I'm looking for.

The only downside will be the hassle of care and maintenance--this isn't something you can just throw in the washer. You gotta store it in the dark, you have to keep it talced (and not just any baby powder will do, you have to watch the chemical composition), you gotta be able to have a place to hang it up if it needs to dry where it's not in the sun and the neighbors won't look at you funny.

I don't know if it will be worth the trouble, honestly--again, I have tried talking her into a nice latex top, which is much cheaper and I know will result in that nice twin balloon look, but it doesn't seem to gain traction, no matter how often I bring it up. :) So if that's, um, a bust, we're going to check our budget and see if the sheets fits into it.

At this point I'd like to say how nice it is to have a partner in life who understands my deviant side. Guys, if you've got this fetish and you can't tell your wife or girlfriend because "she wouldn't understand," find another. If you can't be yourself, you can't be happy.

What's in a name? Embarassment.

2005-06-26T01:30:00.000-07:00

The Yahoo thing got me to thinking about my online nickname, which I've never liked, and now find myself in the odd position of trying to protect and reclaim.

I first got involved with inflation stuff online in 1994--I'd just moved into my own apartment and it was the first time my PC was away from prying parental eyes. All my friends in college said they were signing up for AOL upon graduation because they thought it was going to be big. At the time, it had a whopping 300,000 subscribers--things were looking up! So I joined too, and then realized I could have an alternate screen name. This, I realized, would be good for trolling Usenet and message boards, as I looked for somebody, anybody, who shared this interest.

I wanted the name "Inflatable"--at the time, AOL gave you 10 characters for a name. It was already taken, by a stage performer named Fred Garbo. The odd part is I'd seen Garbo's act onstage and enjoyed it long before I considered getting an online account. I don't know if Fred still uses it, but it was unavailable, and by the time I finally got the chance to enter the online world as a fetishist, I was desperate and wanted to get started right away. So, since I couldn't find anything else, I exchanged creativity for expedience and went with "Inflate123." The 11-year anniversary of that will be next week, first week of July.

Now, there is nothing inherently wrong with the name; it's just completely devoid of imagination and I have never been proud to own it. It's as vanilla as it gets--name followed by numbers, and the world's most obvious number string at that (barring "69"). Why not, say, "Infl8able?" I think I tried some of those and they were also taken, and this was in the days before l33tsp33k. But I still regret not coming up with something more distinctive.

And in the time since, I've thought about changing my name to something a little better, but let's face it: I'm stuck with it. My high activity rate over the years, culminating in the Video Vault, sort of cemented my fate. Sure enough, when I got a gmail account, guess which name I chose? Besides, other friends have done this and not fared too well; nothing's worse than asking person A, "Whatever happened to person B?" and have person A say "Dude, that's ME. I changed my name four years ago."

If anybody knows a really good way to transition from one online persona to another, I'm all ears. I'd also love to hear suggestions on a better name than "Inflate123" because, after 11 years, I still haven't thought of anything better. I tend to channel my imagination into more enjoyable tasks. :)

Yahwho?

2005-06-15T00:02:00.000-07:00

Bit of an identity crisis--I just went to log into my Yahoo Groups account and found that my Inflate123 ID has been deactivated, and I think breastinflationgroup has been shut down as well. Odd, considering how many years both have been running undisturbed. I wonder if a spammer complained about me deleting their posts!

Oh well. I'm Inflate123_too on Yahoo now, but I would love to find another community site to replace it altogether.

Is it time to seek inflatable help?

2005-05-21T08:55:00.000-07:00

One of the things I like about the inflation community is that it's a haven. We are all freaks, but when we are freaks together, it feels better. I take that seriously and, since I've been active and visible for so long, I try to help any newbies who send me mail or look like they're just coming to terms with their fetish. Sometimes it devolves into "Can you send me pictures and videos?" but sometimes it's heartfelt, someone who's just looking to make that connection with a like-minded individual for their own sanity.

But what if that person turns out not to be sane?

A few months ago someone came to me with a shy email intro; we'll call him Joe. The email was articulate, polite, a little too supplicant, but clearly someone who was happy but scared to come out of his shell about his BE fetish. Cool, said I, and I did actually send him some photos and stuff. In a fit of generosity, I even went so far as to loan him a login to one of the pay sites, which I'd never done before and will no doubt never do again. But I was really moved at the time and felt it was the right thing to do.

Within two days or so, Joe started posting in the community, using my name in a way that, to me, looked like an endorsement, like he was my protege. And suddenly I realized, hey, maybe I don't want this complete stranger to take his enthusiasm down the wrong path. So I changed my paysite login, figuring he'd had plenty of time in two days to download material for his own use. I think I was too quick to give that much support, and he was too quick to take advantage of it. We had some awkward emails, but it seemed smoothed over.

Joe is an author, so he started discussing his stories with me. I suggested he post them to one of the established Yahoo groups, like Inflatality or one of the writing groups, where he was likely to get established quickly and get more of feedback. No, said Joe--he wanted to start his own group. It was that same intense enthusiasm at work, and I couldn't dissuade him. The group was created, a few stories were posted, only about 100 people joined, and then nothing appeared for three or four months. Oh well, I thought. Joe's gone.

Suddenly, Joe resurfaces in email asking why I haven't written to him. The mail turns dark, talking about how confused he is and bringing up religious concerns about his fetish and...let's just say it's clear Joe is enduring lots of inner turmoil, big-league issues that weigh on his psyche; he may have been looking for acceptance from the community, but it doesn't look like he's given it to himself yet. The mail sounded a little crazed, a little desperate, and frankly, a little dangerous. Now the "enthusiasm" I've mentioned seemed to turn more toward mild mania. I felt very uncomfortable.

I knew he was writing me because he had nowhere else to turn, but then I realized, he does have somewhere else to turn. So I said, quite clearly and firmly, that this was out of my league, and he needed to talk to a real counselor--a therapist or a clergyman--to work out his issues, because they were deeper than someone like myself could or wanted to handle, and he should do it right away. It was hard for me to say that, because I DO want to help people who are confused about their fetish, but I also know when I'm out of my depth. It's the first time I've ever written to someone with this kind of advice, but it's not worth risking someone's actual mental or physical health over cartoon boobs.

A month passes. I figure Joe has either taken the advice or has simply walked away to clear his head. But then a mail shows up that says I'm the one that missed the boat. "We BE guys have to stick together" and "If that's how you took it, you should be sorry" and similar phrases. (Not "I'm sorry if I came on too strong," but rather "you should be sorry.") Throw in some swearing for emphasis and some further expressions of core insecurity, and you have a mail reflecting anger, guilt, and fear of abandonment that I know I can't answer, because it seems like an abusive relationship already. Am I in over my head? Did I encourage the wrong kind of behavior? Was I too open too fast, and did that set the wrong tone?

Regardless, I have not felt comfortable with this since day three, so I've blocked Joe's emails and removed myself from his Yahoo group. I'm not a therapist and I don't want to be. But this kind of stuff doesn't strike me as normal behavior. Joe's articulate mails reflect really intense highs, really intense lows...isn't that what they call bipolar disorder now? That's not for me to diagnose, frankly, but I'm playing it safe in the meantime, and I'm not up for being manipulated. I stand by my final comment to Joe--seek help from someone more qualified than strangers on the Internet. I don't think it's about BE.

I'd like to think that we're all just a little wacky, that we are a community of deviants but not dangerous individuals. But stuff like this reminds me that everybody brings something unique to the community, whether it be good or bad or both. Sometimes, you can help your community members. Other times, you can't.

Expanding the art of expansion

2005-05-21T07:43:00.000-07:00

It occurs to me that much of the artwork in our community is stylistically similar. It makes sense, because the vast majority of it has a specific purpose: wanking material. As a result you get images of women who are struggling for control at the point of explosion, or presentation/beauty/cheesecake shots of exaggerated curves, sort of like inflatable versions of Playboy model shoots.

Now, there's nothin' wrong with either one--I have an embarassingly large collection of these types of images--but I'm a little surprised that so few artists have explored other styles. Several have gone the comic book route and created multi-image storylines, but what about less literal interpretations? Abstract images. Close-ups on stitches ripping around cleavage. Maybe not giving the viewer the full image, so they have something to play with mentally, something to interpret. Or maybe even an image that's drawn as a commentary on inflation itself--the state of the community, the nature of the attraction, the feelings that come from being in an erotic fringe group.

While the cartoonish art that is the current standard can be quite good, it strikes me that a lot of the art is not really taking advantage of the power of visual art. Take a look at any museum to see the wide range of artistic expression that exists outside of our realm.

I think one of the influencing factors here is that the bulk of the inflation art community is young and endures a high turnover. It seems like the prime time to draw dirty pictures is in and around puberty; high school and college let you indulge your sexual fantasies by doodling in your free time (hey, that's when I started writing my stories). When you get a girlfriend or move on to the "real world," you tend to leave your youthful pasttimes behind, whether by choice or circumstance. The result is a constantly changing pool of artists without much stylistic experience outside those absorbed for entertainment. That means you wind up seeing a lot of anime-influenced work, because that's what the community's artists watch on Cartoon Network. Alas, until Renoir or Warhol or Magritte gets a TV show at 3:00 in the afternoon, we're going to be treated to endless interpretations of Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi, with an accent on the puffy.

Can we move beyond this trend of seeing the same poses with new anime characters? Maybe, if people want it. I have seen some artists begin to challenge these norms a little, and that's exciting to me. However, the community has always dictated "good" art from "bad" art and frankly, it's hard to see the non-wanking stuff winning out. Truth be told, I don't really want the wanking stuff to go away; I'd just like to believe that this community can evolve and incorporate multiple styles of art on the same topic.

Also, I have to acknowledge that a museum represents hundreds of years of work and change and inspiration, so maybe our collective output suggests that we're only just beginning.

Old sites are new sites

2005-04-23T11:37:00.000-07:00

It's great to see this site back up and running again. LVKane has done a great job of building the back-end, so there's a healthy photo gallery, an active forum, and even a few BitTorrent streams for inflation clips. It took a while for LV to get it the way he wanted it and relaunch, but BodyInflation.org is proof positive that good things come to those who wait.

On a similar note, all the Yahoo groups have gone through a transformation too. I am admin/mod on about six of them so it's nice to see that they are less clunky and frankly prettier than they were before. They're certainly easier to maintain. Check your old faves to see if they got better.

And Cyndi Irresistible tells me she might have time to do some work again this summer, now that real life has stopped taking up all her time...

Should You Stay or Should You Go?

2005-03-24T21:10:00.000-08:00

The current topic 'round these parts seems to be the comings and goings (and threatened goings, and considered goings, and variations on that theme) of high-profile members of the inflation community. I was honored when Indiana Jones noticed I'm one of the old-timers still here. I haven't been producing much lately, but I do take an interest and I do try to keep my Yahoo groups tidy. I'm still active because, well, I want to be active.

But I don't blame anybody for getting burned out, really. It's an unbalanced community with a lot more takers than givers, and the takers, for some reason, turn into harassers quite often. I suppose it's a little like a drug--man, you never thought something could make you feel this good, and you never thought you'd have this kind of access to something so special, so it's tempting to want a whole lot of it at once! That leads people to write begging e-mails or start expecting content that, just a few months prior, was treated more like a gift.

So that makes it hard if, say, you have a few weeks where your mind is really on the inflatable stuff, and you create a lot of pieces or stories in that time, and then...poof, your attention changes or your inspiration runs dry for a bit. People out there expect you to produce at the earlier pace.

I don't think it's fair to expect anything. I look forward to every checkup at DA (and I check it every few days, not daily) when I'm in the mood, and I wonder what little gifts may have been left. Sometimes it's a lot of art that really resonates with me, sometimes not. Sometimes it's a lot of discouraged and discouraging journal entries. There's no telling. And honestly, no course of action is wrong.

Ylandra is one of my favorite artists in the community. I made a smart remark about Poser animations always looking like crap on the Vault back in the day; he sent me his work and boy, were my words tasty when I ate every last one of them. He was busy working on some amazing stuff and then, poof, just disappeared. He said "I need to spend some time in real life doing stuff" and promptly logged out for a long, long time. But then, I think almost a year later, he resurfaced and said "Yeah, the break did me good--I learned a lot of new techniques and played with some fresh ideas." And wow--night and day difference. He wanted to do it again, and it showed in his work.

I say, let people leave. It's healthy to shift focus, to get away from it now and then. This is an unusual and passionate interest, and you should be able to spend time not thinking about it rather than let it consume you. This goes for the givers as well as the takers.

A lot of times when people have left in the last 10 years, they come back reinvigorated. And if they don't return, maybe they've given all they have to give, and we should all just be thankful for that.

Expecting/demanding too much from your artists or yourself will only cause both sides frustration, disappointment, and resentment. In ten years of participating in this community and experiencing all its unusual, ever-changing forms, I've felt a natural flow. Go with it.

Advice for Writers

2005-03-08T00:40:00.000-08:00

Several folks already know that, while I am a pervert by night, during the day I work as an editor, and have for several years now. I fix copy, I write copy, I work with new writers. A lot. This doesn't make me infallible, but it does make me cringe at some of the inflation fiction I read and some of the choices I see writers make, both in terms of their actual writing and their choices for or against doing certain things with their work. If I may, here's some free advice for anybody doing the story thing:

Yes, you are good enough to write a story. Self-doubt is the first hurdle. A bad night of surfing for inflatable porn is better than a good day at work. Even if your work sucks, I still want to read it.
There are no new ideas. Don't let that stop you. Pick magic or science or wishes or aliens or accidents or whatever--it's been done. But do it again anyway, because you are all we have in this community, and we really appreciate your efforts.
You don't have to have a fully formed epic at the start. Write what interests you--write the money shot, if that's all you have in your head--and release it as a vignette. Short and solid is better than huge and pointless.
If you're stuck for inspiration, try writing a sequel to an existing story, or write a story about one of your favorite morphs/drawings. It's best to ask permission in these cases, but more often than not, the original creator will be flattered that you like their work enough to expand upon it.
If you are writing a story based on some obscure TV show or anime or comic book, very few people will "get" it. You must explain everything as if you were not using those characters--this can't be a shorthand to "oh, good, I can skip character development," because you can't. At the same time, don't bore the snot out of them with backstory, either; if they wanted to watch the series or read the comic, they would. I know anime has a big following in the US, but it's a generational thing, and the older folks don't get it. But they would still like to enjoy a well-told story, and you need to fill in the gaps without trying to get them to buy the videotapes of your favorite series just to understand who's blowing up whom.
Spell check is good. Use it, but it's not foolproof by any means. It's better to read the story out loud to yourself; anything that is awkward will jump right out at you. I do this all the time with my non-pervy stuff and it is the ultimate fixer-upper. If you can read it to someone else, all the better, but given the nature of this stuff, it's understandable if you can't exactly find a pair of willing ears.
Use www.dictionary.com and www.m-w.com. There is absolutely no shame in using reference works and nobody remembers all the rules all the time. The dictionary is there so you don't have to memorize it.
Don't forget the payoff. One of the first big mistakes I made with non-pervy writing was neglecting to actually write the key scene that tied everything else together. I see a lot of inflation writers spend forever setting up characters and dialogue and place and stuff, all of which is to be commended--but then there's no payoff, no really detailed expansion scene. It's like, describing the room and describing the hairstyles is easier than describing the inflation--and I really don't think many people are reading inflation fiction for the hairstyles. Spend time tweaking all your adjectives and make sure that the most well-illustrated part of your story is the climax. It should probably be the first thing you write and the last thing you tweak, with lots of editing passes in-between.
Post your story where the people are. Especially if you are a new writer, release a few of your stories (with requests for feedback) to the popular Yahoo groups (Inflatality, etc) and the usual places like The Overflowing Bra. This is where the audience already is. It's foolish and arrogant to create a Yahoo group in your honor before you even release a story. And yet...people have done exactly that. Don't.
Don't expect a ton of feedback on your work. Our community is a quiet, greedy bunch, and they often only speak up to complain. One note of thanks is worth about 20 pairs of eyes. And if you are writing something that isn't one of the Stories That Have Already Been Written, expect even less feedback, because you may not find the other people who appreciate the topic the way you do right away. It may take time for your story to get out there.
Do it because you want to do it, not for the praise. If you liked writing it, that is really all that matters. I do not recommend writing inflatable fiction to get "famous."

That's all my brain is dumping out for the moment. Go for it.

Pervert At Work

2005-02-26T01:50:00.000-08:00

Got an idea. Got some advice on that idea. Looks like the idea might work.

Needs some planning and some grunt work, both by me. And you all know my glacial pace.

You'll see.

Propped Up

2005-02-13T19:36:00.000-08:00

I've just noticed a trend. When I first started exploring this fetish, I was into "props"--stuffing balloons in clothing especially. Even really young, I remember having a big inflatable football, like two and a half feet long, and wrapping that around myself, putting on clothes, and blowing it up. I linked drinking straws together and jammed the end into the nozzle to get it to inflate. I did this on summer afternoons when nobody was around.

When I got old enough to buy my own stuff, I wound up getting this huge five-foot beach ball and doing much the same thing, only by then I'd learned that you could get cheap plastic tubing at the pet store, from the aquarium department...and a $50 air compressor from Sears. I would goof around with these things when my wife was away for extended periods of time. She knew I was a fetishist and that was fine with her, but that kind of stuff simply didn't interest her.

And over time, I've noticed...it doesn't interest me nearly as much, either. It might be her influence, but she never really liked props; she much preferred just using imagination. It certainly keeps you closer in a physical sense.

I just realized, as it's her time of the month at the moment, that it's around now that I would often turn to props, and now I just don't. I use my imagination now too. Well, that and a wealth of images, stories, and videos that I've collected over the years, some of which are of my wife. I don't really miss the convoluted physical prop aspect. I'd experiment again if I had a really cool idea, but I haven't in a while.

Thought Drops

2005-01-25T21:06:00.000-08:00

Thought Drops is longtime community member Sturm Brightblade's little chunk of the world. Make sure you check out his "Size Matters" series of posts--they offer nice insight. I've also linked to his blog permanently over there on the sidebar.

Somone Better Look Up The Word "Deviant"

2005-01-23T20:01:00.000-08:00

One reason I decided to start a blog after all this time was in reaction to what's been going on at DeviantART lately. It's a free artistic community designed for amateur and semi-pro artists to upload their work, have it critiqued, share it with friends, what have you. And as you might expect by the name, it's not just still life portraits and sunsets; according to the site's own FAQ, it's pretty much anything goes. Naturally, there's a staff that helps keep things organized and occasionally brings down the hammer when users get out of line or content is deemed inappropriate, for whatever reason. But usually, if it's a valid artistic expression, it's left up to the community to judge.

And oh, what judgement was handed down by that community when a bunch of inflation fetish artists set up shop at DA. Some of the best known names in inflation put their wares on display--Critical Volume, CattyN, Wren, Dwarfpriest, Indiana Jones, Sickstar...I don't mean to leave anybody out, but it's a veritable rogue's gallery of roundness over there. I posted my stories over there as well to sort of help the effort, since fiction writing is considered an artistic endeavor too (by most people, anyway--I did get one note of complaint that I wasn't posting drawings). But the point is, it was a good cross-section of talented folks in our community, with my crap thrown in amidst all the quality.

When I think of the word "deviant," I think of the dictionary definition of "outside the norm," which may not necessarily mention but always allows the modern application of a sexual context. Some reference works call it a synonym for pervert. It's hard to think of an inflation fetish as anywhere inside the norm, frankly. So I figured, hey, in DA, we belong because we don't belong.

Not so, said some very vocal people on DA. Not the admins, but the users! The inflation artists were savagely attacked, bludgeoned with closed minds over and over. You name a moral judgement, it was applied--"This is sick and wrong," "I hope these people get kicked off DA," "I hope these people get hit by a truck," yadda yadda. "Wow," said many people, "I didn't know any of this stuff existed--and I wish I didn't! This should be condemned!"

I think I should point out that they found us. There was no campaign to spread the gospel of inflation to the unwashed artistic masses of DA. One of them actually sought out my page and posted comments just to elicit a strong negative reaction. (Perhaps it was better for that person to be hated than ignored--because hey, on the Interweb, there's little difference between famous and infamous, and page hits are page hits.) But a handful of people there took great offense to inflation art and its varying forms (preg, weight gain, breast enlargement, etc) and boy, did they raise a stink.

I have a few theories as to why they were so upset:

1) They felt threatened by this new body of work that would take attention away from their wholly derivative pictures of anime-influenced goth catgirls--instant insecurity!
2) They found this art personally offensive, forgetting that in so doing they were instantly nullifying their own artistic integrity and freedom--instant hypocrisy!
3) They secretly found it intriguing and didn't know what to do--instant sexual confusion!

I think #3 is highly unlikely, personally, but it's fun to dream.

At least one of the artists with an opposing viewpoint to the inflation community drew a satirical cartoons about what they found so distasteful. That's fine--that's an artistic expression, and everybody's entitled. I don't have to agree with your sentiment to see the value in your artistic statement. What was really chilling in a witch hunt kind of way was how many people then jumped on the bandwagon with publicly posted comments about that cartoon, saying all the aforementioned burn-them-at-the-stake-but-not-in-my-backyard stuff.

I find it amazingly ironic that true deviant art was rejected by the community at a site called DeviantART.

Some people kept an open mind. "Hey, art is subjective, let them be." But as always, the loudest voices were the most ignorant, and it spread easily, like loud ignorance always does.

Since I am something of an eternal optomist and a fool besides, I attempted to honestly answer some of the charges by one of the more fervent screamers, at the same time questioning why one artist would question another artist's right to free expression. I tried several times before giving up--the person in question simply was not interested in an exchange of ideas or examining other viewpoints. They made up their mind and they were going to stick to it--inflation art was sick and wrong and unrealistic (unrealistic! This criticism from someone who drew people with cat ears and enormous eyes?), and it was therefore invalid. I knew when to fold 'em and when to walk away. I know better than to sit and argue with someone who isn't even listening.

I am happy to report the the folks who were actively harassing the inflation artists for no apparent reason were, in fact, punished with temporary suspensions and whatnot. DA's staff has different interpretations of art as some of DA's clientele. But the resulting kerfuffle has put a lot of inflation artists on alert--and we're not exactly having parades in our honor to begin with, so such a public smackdown of a rarified, embarassing interest really hurt a lot of people who simply didn't see it coming.

Me, I'm not hurt. I'm not looking for mainstream acceptance of this interest, either. But I am not going to sit back and let some people tell the rest of the world what this inflation thing is really all about--not when I've been deeply involved for ten years and they're making snap judgements after ten minutes. What the blind critics don't know or care about--and what I want to protect--is the time and effort that it has taken our community to come together and find some comfort and understanding among similarly minded outcasts. We are, after all, deviants.

So if you're reading this and you are new to the idea of an inflation fetish, I strongly encourage you to drop me a line and ask a question. I'll be happy to answer them here and protect your anonymity.

See, the witch hunters only carry torches. I'm bringing actual lights.

Pieces of My Mind

2005-01-23T10:35:00.000-08:00

I'm Dan and I am an inflatable fetishist. Yes, really. A vague, more-or-less work-safe overview is here. I've run or helped run several small websites and groups dedicated to this admittedly odd and often funny kink, and I'm proud to have been interviewed by Katherine Gates for her book Deviant Desires. If you're new to it, all I can say is this: Yes, it's silly, but it's not a joke.

I'm sure we'll get into more detail as this blog develops. This is here just for information, as well as a place for me to rant and muse--in other words, just another blog, but with a weirder topic than most. Hit me with any and all questions about what this is all about. I'm Inflate123 at aol dot com.