#weren't they noncorporeal?

[mozart-the-meerkitten]

So I was trying to remember stuff about Battlestar Galactica because I haven’t seen it since I was like 15 and most of what I remember from the episodes are the pilot (which we just rewatched and I’ve seen several times), the Fire in Space episode because I thought it was cool (?!?) and that episode where Apollo gets sent to Terra in disguise to try and prevent a nuclear war or something.

Anyway I was thinking about that last one and trying to remember how Apollo ended up disguised and on Terra in the first place and accidentally unlocked a core memory of the show which was THIS WEIRD THING:

the FUDGE was this thing and what were these people on about. why weren’t they more helpful. why does their ship look Like That. why is it glowing?! why did they keep kidnapping people?!

[techtakesoff]

How do you think dream selves would work for species with atypical sleep cycles? Like for example, an AI that doesn't really need to sleep at all if they were the main player instead of just a supplement for an actual player, or something like a dnd elf where they don't sleep but do have to consciously rest for a few hours a day.

Interesting question! I think the existence of the lunar kingdoms and dream selves are essential to the function of Sburb, so they would still exist in some form unless the game was extremely, fatally glitched, even if they didn't really make sense for the species playing it.

For a player who doesn't need to sleep at all, I imagine dream selves would function as an alternate state of consciousness that they could more actively shift into.

For some this could be like how pre-Sburb Dirk is awake as both his normal and dream self at the same time, but focusing heavily on one plane results in zoning out and losing awareness on the other. For others they could only be able to manage one consciousness at a time and whichever one they weren't using would be left "empty" in a sleep-like state.

Someone who is very observant, probably a Light or Mind player, might be able to access the senses of both consciousnesses but only move the body of one at a time.

A Breath or Void player, or anyone who often feels like they don't have control over their own life, could find themselves thrown from one consciousness to the other with no warning and have to come up with creative workarounds for suddenly dropping off in the middle of a conversation or even a battle.

For these players the process of awakening would be more like gradually becoming aware of one's existence on another plane, like experiencing déjà vu, recognizing symbols from the lunar kingdoms when they appear elsewhere, or getting distracted and "daydreaming" about another world.

For a player who doesn't experience sleep but still has to meditate or enter some other kind of low-energy state, the dream self would be something akin to astral projection -- being able to send one's consciousness into another body while resting in the normal world.

If they were startled out of their resting state, they would lose control of the dream self. The dream self may become totally inactive or it could continue to "sleepwalk" and act in accordance with the player's subconscious, which could potentially get them into a lot of trouble.

The process of awakening would be similar to that of totally sleepless players, with awareness coming on gradually, a vague recognition of another body on a different plane that progresses to conscious control.

For a player who totally lacks a physical form, like an AI, I feel like the dream self would still manifest as a physical entity. Sburb must create *some* kind of representation of the player to fulfill the functions of a dream self; if the player actively wants to have a physical body, then the dream self will take the form of that imagined body.

This is basically the same as how corporeal players' dream selves can manifest with different physical traits than their actual body if said player doesn't consider those things part of their "true self." If a noncorporeal player conceptualizes their true inner self as something that would be better represented as a physical thing, their dream self will appear as that thing.

On the other hand, if the player *doesn't* want to have a physical body, their dream self's body may appear as more of a "perfectly generic entity," like a featureless doll, or as a form of energy or matter that is non-literally representative of the player.

For example, a Light player may manifest as a physical being made out of pure light, a Void player as a living shadow, or a Life player as a person-shaped assemblage of plants. Being revived via dream self would work somewhat differently for these players; if the death of their main self doesn't leave behind a physical body to kiss, the transfer of consciousness to the dream self might involve something like another player saying a particular "magic phrase."

If the dream self is a physical body, then the deceased player's consciousness enters that body. But if the dream self is not physical, things are more complicated. If the player is an AI who exists as a decentralized computer process, being revived would be like using the dream self as a one-time backup to restore their consciousness to wherever it was originally stored.

If it was limited to one particular location, such as Hal existing only in Dirk's shades, a new copy of that object may magically reappear somewhere and the consciousness put inside it. If the player exists more as, like, a personified concept or some universal force given sapience... I don't really know what would happen? If "the physical process and force of gravity" played Sburb, died, and was revived... I guess they would just go back to existing however they did before.

[little-cereal-draws]

I know it's not pride anymore but I wanted to make a post abt my reaction to the NYC pride parade

This was my first pride parade so everything I knew abt stuff like this was from the internet but it really wasn't what I was expecting. It honestly didn't really feel like much of a celebration to me tbh

There weren't very many floats; most groups were either walking or were up on double decker buses. The floats they did have weren't every decorated and looked like a bunch of ppl blaring music on an empty metal platform behind a truck. I know that's technically what a float is, but I thought they would decorate them a more.

It stared out with government officials; the mayor, the governor, a few different people from congress. Then it got into the corporations. It was just group after group of different companies. Car insurance, beauty products, airlines, almost every type of business you could think of. Target was there. That was weird. It felt like two hours of advertisements. A lot of them were giving out free products/merch/promotional stuff too. And maybe these companies really are trying to help queer people or maybe it's all performative but I thought that pride was supposed to be about the people. I'm not kidding when I say it was hours of corporate sponsors.

There were noncorporate groups too tho. Lots of unions, support groups, a few museums, public schools/colleges, hospitals, and religious groups. There were a lot of ethnic groups as well; Ireland, Italy, Mexico, the Caribbean, an indigenous group, a bunch of east African countries marched together, a bunch of Arabic countries marched together, a bunch of eastern European countries marched together, and I'm sure I'm forgetting a lot more. That's who pride's about but they were far and few in between compared to the corporations.

There was also not as much kink as I thought there would be. Everyone's raging over the debate on if kink belongs at pride so I was prepared for something that would actually warrant a debate. There was a group of leather daddies, several drag queens, and a few magnificent costumes but like 80% of the people there were in a t-shirt and shorts. It felt very... normal. Like I could see any random person in the parade on the street and not bat an eye. I thought there was going to be more of a reason to have this kink debate in the first place.

There were three marching bands, two flag twirling groups, a running group, a cheerleading group, and a roller-skating group. Two different groups dressed up like the new Barbie movie, a motorcycle gang made of elderly lesbians, a motorcycle gang made of elderly gay men, and a group of Black lesbians. They decided to put the parade route right outside the Harry Potter store for some reason and a few people from the Jewish group that was marching stopped to take a picture of them flipping it off. There was an ambulance (that was more decorated than some floats) that a hospital brought but it had to leave halfway through bc there was an emergency lol It left the parade, sirens blaring, and zoomed off to go help someone. The Playbill company who runs all the Broadway shows had a float playing Disney music. Idk why they chose Disney but it was interesting to hear thousands of people singing together.

The people in front of us had clearly had a lot of experience with coming to the parade because they brought chairs. They were opening snack after snack and must have got there hours early to stake out a spot. They were pros at this. My legs went numb from standing in one spot for four hours and I was so hungry afterwards, I ate one and a half Chipotle burritos in one sitting. Clearly, I'll have to take my cues from them if I go back next year lol

Everyone came out to see it too. The streets were packed, people were climbing on top of garbage cans and crosswalk signs. People were sitting up in the windows and roofs of the surrounding buildings. People were climbing up the construction scaffolding and some of them even figured out how to get on top where only the workers are allowed to go. That's all very illegal but by gay, do crime ig lol

There was only one moment where I felt any happiness or pride in being queer. A trans support group was walking past and everyone cheered. One kid, they looked ~13-14, grinned at the crowd and started jumping up and down with joy. They looked so happy and supported and free. It was infectious. Idk who that kid is and I'll never see them again but I'm so glad that they feel that proud of who they are.

It was a good experience and I'm glad I went but except that one brief moment, I didn't feel any pride or community. Like I said before, it was mostly corporations and I feel no loyalty to them. I was surprised by how big and diverse the rest of the groups were, but I didn't know any of them and I'll never see any of them again. Maybe it's my autism but I only felt mildly happy. Idk, I'm disappointed in myself. It was my first pride parade after being out for six years and I felt nothing. Oh well.

[surrealisthells]

I keep in my notes app a list of things that I think about and want to tell my mom. Because it feels like they should go somewhere even if it's nowhere, and even if my dad weren't still using her email to finish sorting out medical records and such email wouldn't feel right because she never read it when she was alive either. Anyway, it's somehow exactly the same level of waffling as always between totally mundane stories that aren't really interesting enough that you'd purposefully tell anyone but your mom and passive aggressive accusatory insinuations. Except rather than being things like why would you take that tone with me, the latter is directed at some kind of noncorporeal entity that may or may not have any sway in the universe so it's stuff like, "Did YOU throw a rock into my windshield directly at my face level last week? Explain yourself!" So in some small way your relationship with your mom is always your relationship with your mom completely regardless of whether she's actually there.

[emeraldeyes23]

Fictober/Fantober2020 -

Day 23 - Angels And Demons

Ash was dead, which was alright with him. He deserved death and had chosen to die. He wanted to free himself from all the pain and suffering, from his trauma and his nightmares. Death had taken all of that away. He had assumed he would set Eiji free as well. So everything should be over now. But somehow, it wasn't. When he came to, Ash was neither in heaven nor hell. Instead, he was standing at a beach in Izumo. At least that's what he was told. A strange voice echoed through his mind. 'Ash, your case is much more complex and complicated than that of most humans. You have only experienced pain, violence, and abuse in your short life, except for Eiji, who taught you friendship, comfort, compassion and love. To be honest, we weren't sure if you belonged in heaven or hell. You did some evil deeds, more than most humans, but you also led a much harsher life and suffered much more than most humans. So your case is unique. You look like a demon at times, but your soul is that of an angel, kind and good.' Ash wondered what he meant by that. He belonged in hell, wasn't that obvious? People even called him a demon or a devil. He was a mass murderer and a ruthless gang leader. The decision should be simple enough... 'Eiji's love towards you runs so strong and unconditional within him that it didn't stop with your death. He still loves you; his heart belongs to you forever. That's why he can't move on. He's still waiting for you to come back. Eiji is an angel with a kind heart and doesn't deserve his fate, either. Your case is special. So we decided to give you another chance. To change your fate. What would you do if you were given a second chance? A second life?' "Simple, I'd spend my life with Eiji. If he still wants me..." Look ahead. Don't you see him? Eiji was taking some photos at the beach and walked around barefoot in the sand. "Eiji! He's back and safe in Japan. That's a relief." Then Ash moved closer, scrutinizing his face. "Wait, this isn't Eiji. Why does he look so sad? He was supposed to be happy, to move on. Where's the light in his eyes I so loved? His eyes look so sad, and he forgot how to smile. This isn't what I wanted for Eiji. His eyes look dead, and his soul is suffering and in pain..." 'Ash, you were Eiji's light, his hope, his reason to live and smile. You were soulmates, but by choosing death, you broke your bond. Eiji suffers because of that. If you don't do something, he'll soon follow you. Soulmate's fates are also connected, and often the second one dies soon after the first one.' "No, I don't want that. What can I do?", Ash exclaimed in pure horror. "I didn't know we were bound like that. If I had known I'd hurt Eiji, I'd have never done that!" 'You have another chance to become human and save Eiji. Stay with him as a ghost or a noncorporeal entity. Try interacting with him. If he believes in you and can feel your presence or see you, you'll get another chance and become human again and can spend the rest of your life by Eiji's side.' "Where's the catch? There has to be one. It sounds too simple." 'You have three days. If Eiji hadn't believed in you by then, it's game over. Please remember that you're invisible, but if your bond is strong enough, he can see you eventually. But for that to happen, he has to know you're still with him. Good luck. If you succeed, you'll automatically turn into a human again and start a new life. ____________________ Ash stood at the beach and looked at Eiji. He hated the devastatingly sad look on his face, his pale skin, and his empty, emotionless eyes. He wanted Eiji to heal, but now the truth slowly sank in that Eiji wouldn't be happy without him. Ash had always loved Eiji, platonic friendship turning into romantic feelings over time. Yet, he hadn't realized that Eiji loved him as well, that their feelings were mutual. That's why he had firmly believed that Eiji would get over him with time and return to the life he had been used to in Izumo.

Even so, this Eiji standing in front of him wasn't what he had in mind. He hadn't realized that his death would destroy Eiji and would only leave an empty shell behind...

Ash looked at Eiji, sitting there at the beach and looking out to the sea. The loneliness he gave off was hurting more than any stab wound ever could. Ash clenched his hands and finally made a decision. He had to show Eiji he was there and set things right.

As if on cue, Eiji had turned his head and looked directly at the direction he was standing. That wasn't possible, right? He couldn't see him... or could he?

If you're dead, why does it always feel as if you're standing next to me? Sometimes I think I can feel your presence like now. Ash just stared at him. Could he really feel him?

He wrote a message into the sand right in front of Eiji. The sun was slowly setting, and they were alone on this beach by now.

I'm always with you. I'm sorry, Eiji. You were supposed to be happy after my death. I thought my death would set you free.

Eiji's eyes widened in pure disbelief as he stared at the words, then looked around in confusion.

"Ash?"

I'm here. I've missed you.

Tears streamed down Eiji's face while he sobbed, "I missed you, too." Then suspicion ran over Eiji's face. "How do I know you're Ash, and this isn't a sick prank?"

Ash smiled at that. Eiji had learned to be suspicious and wasn't that naive anymore. Good. Two sentences appeared in the sand.

You're not alone. My soul is always with you.

At first, Eiji covered his face with his hands and broke down crying. Yet, when he removed his hands, he managed to smile through his tears. Ash tried to put a hand on his shoulder, but, of course, it went through him. Still, Eiji reacted as if he had felt it and got calmer, wiping his tears away.

"Where are you, Ash? I can feel that you're here."

I'm standing directly in front of you.

Eiji reached out with his hand, and Ash reached for it with his until their palms touched. It felt like electric sparks flying around them. He saw in Eiji's surprised look that he had felt it, too.

If there was a chance you could see me again, what would you do?

"I'd do anything to see you again.", Eiji answered firmly without any hesitation.

Ash couldn't help but smile when hearing that.

I can only come back if you believe in me. In my existence here and now.

"I've always believed in you, Ash. I can feel your presence. But this time, it's stronger, so I know I don't imagine it. I just wish I could see your face again, those intense green eyes and your golden hair."

Then, even though Eiji couldn't see him, he hugged him. This was the moment where Ash could feel how his body turned solid, and he became visible. He was human again.

Pure astonishment ran over Eiji's face before the innocent and radiant smile dawned on Eiji's face, speaking his eyes sparkle with happiness. He held him more tightly and looked up at him.

"Ash, please tell me I'm not dreaming.", he said while tightening the grip around him.

Ash stroked the back of his head and pulled him closer.

"You're not dreaming. This time, I'll stay. If you still want me. Forever?", he asked while a hint of uncertainty resonated in his voice.

"Forever."

[cryptid-science]

Shadow People

They usually come at night. Maybe you're reading or watching TV or just lying in bed. He's most often a man, and may be wearing a hat or a hood. A lot of times you'll only catch a glimpse of him out of the corner of your eye, as he flits across the wall or disappears through a doorway. Sometimes he's just a shadow, a flat projection sliding across the wall or ceiling; but other times, especially in the dark when you least expect it, shadow people appear as a full-bodied black apparition, jet black like a void in the darkness itself, featureless but for their piercing empty eyes.

The foggy Santa Lucia Mountains run along the central coast of California, and for hundreds of years, the Chumash Indians and later residents have told of the Dark Watchers, shadowy hatted, caped figures who appear on ridges at twilight, only to fade away before your very eyes. A visit to the Internet reveals hundreds and hundreds of stories from people who saw shadow people in their homes, on websites such as shadowpeople.org, from-the-shadows.blogspot.com, and ghostweb.com:

I opened my eyes and looked towards the middle of the room. I saw a large shadow in the shape of a person. It had no facial features that I could see and it wasn't moving. It was just standing there looking at me... I blinked and then it was gone.

I felt like someone was watching me so I turned to look toward the hallway and there it was in the doorway... It was a black figure. I could only see from the torso up. I felt it was a male and could feel that it was looking at me... I started to walk towards it and it disappeared back into the room.

There, at the foot of my bed, was a tall dark figure like a shadow. It appeared to be almost 7 feet tall with broad shoulders and was wearing what seemed to be an old fashioned top hat and some sort of cape... I watched as it glided past me and out the door of my room.

Correction: Further research suggests that the Chumash did not necessarily have any legend that reasonably corresponds to the Dark Watchers, and thus this link is probably the invention of 20th century ghost story tellers. - BD

It goes without saying that skeptics have long-standing explanations that, from the comfort of your armchair, adequately rationalize all the stories of shadow people. These explanations run the gamut, all the way from mistaken identification of a real shadow from an actual person or object, to various causes of optical illusions or hallucinations like drugs or hypnogogic sleeping states, even simply lying and making up the story. I think that probably everyone would agree that these have all happened, and therefore they do explain some people's experiences. But here's a fact: Try to offer any of those explanations to someone telling you about a specific sighting, and it will likely be immediately shot down. "I was not asleep." "I know the difference between a regular shadow and what I saw." "What about my friend who saw it with me?"

The truth is that it's probably not possible to explain most sightings. If it was some mysterious supernatural noncorporeal being who flitted through the room, no evidence would remain, and thus there's nothing to test or study. It's so trivial to fake photos or video of something as vague as a shadow person that when these exist, they're interesting but practically worthless as far as empiricism goes. Only in the rare case where an actual physical cause can be found, and you're able to consistently reproduce the effect at the right location and the right time of day and in the right lighting conditions, are you able to provide a convincing explanation. Most of the rest of the time, all you have is conjecture and hypothesis, and the eyewitness is likely to reject these.

When I was a kid we once lived in a house where if you walked up the stairs and one of the upstairs bedroom doors was open a crack, you might see a flash of movement inside the room from the corner of your eye. I saw it a number of times, and other people in my family did too. I thought it looked like someone threw a colored sweatshirt across the room. But: I never saw it whenever I walked carefully up the stairs and kept my eyes on that crack; it only happened if you weren't looking right at it and weren't thinking about it. The more you learn about how the brain fills in data in your peripheral vision and blind spots, the less unexpected and strange this particular experience becomes. I have no useful evidence that anything unusual happened, and I have good information that can adequately explain what was perceived. I personally am not impressed enough to deem it worthy of further investigation, but others might be, and that's a supportable perspective. But unless and until some substantial discovery is made, the determination that it must have been a shadow person or ghost is ridiculous. Nothing supports that conclusion. And yet my story is at least as reliable as 99% of the shadow people stories out there. I was not on drugs, I know the difference between a shadow and what I saw, and other people saw it too.

Enthusiasts of the paranormal offer their own set of additional hypotheses about shadow people. One proposes that shadow people are the embodiments of actual people who are elsewhere but engaged in astral projection. This is not an acceptable hypothesis. Like shadow people themselves, astral projection is an untestable, undetectable, unprovable conjecture. Explaining one unknown with another unknown doesn't explain anything, and the match itself cannot be made, since neither phenomenon has any known properties that you could look at and say "What we know of shadow people is consistent with what we know of astral projection." We know nothing about either, so there's no logical basis for any connection.

The same can be said of another paranormal explanation for shadow people, that they are "interdimensional beings". Let's make an outrageous leap of logic and allow for the possibility that interdimensional beings exist. What characteristics would they have? How would we detect their presence? What level of interaction would they have? How would they affect visible light? Since these questions don't have answers, you can't correlate interdimensional beings to the known properties of shadow people. Neither one has any.

But there are phenomena to which we can correlate these stories. We know the details in the eyewitness accounts, and we know the psychological manifestations of conditions like hypnogogia and sleep paralysis. A hypnogogic hallucination is a vivid, lucid hallucination you experience while you're still falling asleep. You're susceptible again eight hours later when you're waking up, only now it's called hypnopompia. But this seems such a cynical, closed-minded reaction. When you suggest hypnogogia as a possible explanation to a person who has witnessed shadow people, many times their reaction will be understandably negative, if not outright hostile. "You're saying I'm crazy" or "You're saying I imagined it" are common replies. Hypnogogia is neither a mental illness nor imagination, and to dismiss it as either is to underestimate the incredible power of your own healthy brain. Too many people don't give their brains enough credit.

I had a dramatic demonstration of the power of hypnopompia — the waking up version — when I was about 10 years old. Early one morning, the characters from Sesame Street put on a show for me in the tree outside my bedroom window. It had music, theme songs, lighting cues and costume changes: A full elaborate production, and it lasted a good hour. To this day, I have clear memories of some of the acts. I even went and woke my parents to get them to watch, but by then the show had gone away. I knew for a fact that I hadn't been asleep. I'd been sitting up in bed and writing down some of the songs they sang. Those writings were real, on real paper, and even made sense when viewed in the light of day. It had been a completely lucid, physical experience for me. But it only existed inside my own brain in a hypnopompic state. My brain had composed music, performed the music, written lyrics, and sang them in silly voices for some director who must also have come from within me. The skits were good. The actors were rough-sewn muppets, independently moving and climbing about, even swinging through the swashbuckling number, on tree branches representing the lines of a great pirate ship. Yet through it all, I'd been conscious and upright enough to actively transcribe the lyrics. That's the power of a brain.

But many believers reject the idea that their brain has such capabilities, and instead conclude that any such perceptions can only be explained as visitations from supernatural entities. One such believer, Heidi Hollis, has gone on Coast to Coast AM radio a number of times with suggestions to defend yourself from shadow people:

Learn to let go of your fear.Stand your ground and deny them access to your person.Focus on positive thoughts.Use the name of Jesus to repel them.Keep a light on or envision light surrounding you.Bless your room with bottled spring water.

Interestingly enough, such actions may actually work (although it's not the techniques themselves that are responsible — plucking a chicken or beating a drum could work just as well, if you think it will). Sleep disorders in the form of disruptive episodes such as these are called parasomnias, and the primary treatments for parasomnias are relaxation techniques, counseling, proper exercise, and the basic lifestyle changes that contribute to better sleeping habits. True believers who reject any notion suggesting their experience was anything but a genuine visit from a supernatural being, but who apply any such remedies as Hollis suggests, do indeed have a good chance of finding relief, when the process of applying the remedy brings them some peace of mind. Even though these remedies are rarely going to be as effective as professionally guided treatment, the fact that they can sometimes work only reinforces the true believers' notion that the shadow person was in fact an interdimensional demon, and that sprinkling holy water around the room did in fact scare it away.

These experiences are weird, and can be scary. But they're also fascinating, once-in-a-lifetime opportunities to experience the true power of your brain. To conclude that it's a supernatural being is to rob yourself of the real wonder of what's probably happening. Fa

[fierceawakening]

Yeah.

That and... I could just be typical minding and not aware of how rabbis do things, but just from my own experience of going to a Christian church where most people lean lefty social justicey, there's a LOT of "well, the words say this, but what if we think about them that way instead?"

Which, if Judaism does that too, then it's very possible that what I read as "and we slaughtered them all and brought back their foreskins and the one true god was pleased for a little while so it was cool" is taught at the altars of people who say "don't call Hashem mean" as, like, "well, it wasn't really FORESKINS, what would a noncorporeal being do with lots of little wang bits? The idea is that He was mad at people who weren't caring for the poor and showed no mercy to them. It's bad to be merciless, but... maybe we should be a little more like that to, I don't know, Elon Musk, because he's not going to treat the poor as he ought unless we threaten a few wang bits."

By which I'm just saying that... if you're a part of a close-knit religious community and you're left-leaning, you likely don't take your religious texts jot and titter literally.

Which means you're probably aware of a whole LOT of retcons that make perfect sense to you that other people haven't even seen because they weren't with you last week at service.

Those posts that go around that say, like "Do not read the Old Testament in any way that leads you to think 'holy shit this guy was mean wtf' or you're an evil supercessionist" frustrate me so much.

Y'all REALLY think I'm judging YOU for reading a book and going "huh, my disabilities would mean I'm not allowed in sacred places, fuck this guy?"

Like I AM a practicing Christian, but I highly doubt I'm a supercessionist because I STILL think that's bullshit.

Some of my religion's texts are bullshit. This is... unavoidable? They're all like that? People are bigots and groups of people often like making traditions that justify their bigotry?

They just... do?

Like, it's REALLY hard for me to look at those posts and see anything but "ignore the ways you are oppressed because we are too"

nah man ANYONE is allowed to be uncomfortable with ANY text they read, and to say so. it literally DOES NOT MATTER if you see it totally differently because THEY'RE NOT YOU

if it bothers you that much just unfollow

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

I have one dating story, in fact two dating stories, which I could tell you about this.

(This post is going to be self-indulgent and rambling, sorry. Let me know if you want to read anything in particular.)

The first date: we were on a train, having some conversation. She commented about the fact that someone in the nearby car-seat had been crying, and began questioning if it was maybe her, maybe someone else in the car? She was very tentative about asking me out, and asked me if I had a girlfriend, and if not, what would I say her?

I responded by saying that I had just been talking to this noncorporeal person who was also me on the internet, who was about to be married to a person, and who didn't have a girlfriend. I told her I was "terrified about asking people out" and asked her out on a second date (!).

(This was back when I was on a lot of antidepressants and anxiolytics; I was very talkative and loquacious and not very reflective of my internal state at that time, though I suspect that made her like me more or not like me as much. I'm not sure which way the relationship would have gone if I hadn't been prescribed SSRIs.)

The second date: she invited me up to her apartment for tea. She was much more at ease by this point, and had clearly decided I was a nice person, both because I had mentioned social networking the previous date and because after spending some time around my computer, she'd said, "I don't think he's really him." She told me about how her previous boyfriend had told her that they weren't "compatible" – he'd asked her if they'd have "the sex," and she replied, "yes," but later she discovered he didn't actually, like, want to have sex very often, which was not something she'd have realized if they hadn't actually broken up. She'd said, "I don't want to have the sex," and he said, "me neither." And "I know why," she said – she'd decided to give him the sex instead of finishing the relationship.

I went up to her apartment, but she seemed reluctant to go inside, and we sat out on her balcony, talking for hours.

Tell me about your worst sexual experience

Not really a “sexual experience,” but I had a date once with a girl who kept asking me what I looked like naked, which was awkward