This newsletter is to tell you about what's been happening on my web site, and some of the reasons for the way I've done things, plus a few of the things that Diana the Valkyrie has been up to.
Members of my web site have given Sandra the Librarian a warm welcome. Sandra searches the Library for words or phrases that you give her, like "scissors" or "arm wrestl" (they don't have to be entire words, and "wrestl" picks up both wrestle and wrestling). And I've put up a few pre-defined searches in appropriate places.
It all started when one of my members sent me an IM while I was logged into AOL. "I'm bored" he said. "I've looked at all the scissors pictures, when will you be getting more?" Well, the answer is, I don't know; I depend mostly on what members send me. But then I had a thought. "Have you read all the scissors stories in the Library?" I asked him. "No, which are they?" was his very reasonable response.
Well, I don't know. I've read each story, at least once quickly, to decide if it's appropriate for the site. But I don't remember what's in each one. But I know how to search a text file.
As you can see, the stories are mostly sorted by author, rather than by subject. That's because each story might be about several things - in one story, there might be scissors and arm wrestling, for example.
I didn't want to do the search just for him, though. I thought, let's make it more general. And that's how Sandra the Librarian came about (Sandra the Barbarian when she gets back from a search, Valkyries love plays on words).
You'll find her in the Library, of course.
She's also started a bit of a reorganisation there. She's moved the big list of stories by miscellaneous authors into a separate area. This makes the Library a lot tidier.
At the end of March, I added a load more stuff. F/f wrestling, more Valkyries, boxing, scissors, lifting. And Becky Rampey, Meryl Ertunc, Linda Bevlander, Kim Chizevsky, Kay Baxter, Juliette bergman, Kelly Tuff, Lora Ottenad, Rene Casella, Yolanda Hughes, Phyllis Padur and a mass of stuff from GMasterE on Fitness.
I keep adding things, not just once per month. In the Galleries, I put the date that I added stuff (a lot of people ask me "what's new?", and the answer depends on "since when". Just look at the pages, you'll soon notice new stuff.
The chat sessions are working well, in the sense that they give people an opportunity to ask me things. One of the commonest questions I get asked (apart from measurements, and I tell people to read the bio file) is "Who are you." Well, there was a great discussion about this on the Message Boards, but no conclusion was reached.
My favourite suggestion was that I'm a group of four elderly ladies in a retirement home in Brighton, having fun on the internet.
Most people have had no problems downloading and viewing the videos, as far as I know. A couple of people have reported a problem with downloads aborting in the middle.
I think it's inevitable that people will have more problems with big files than small ones, because there a longer time during which something can go wrong. I don't think that the problem is at my end.
I am listening to your ideas and suggestions, though. Some of them I've already done, and the man suggesting it just hadn't noticed. Some of them aren't possible technically. Some of them get onto the wish list.
One chap suggested that I put up a piece of music called "The ride of the Valkyries". What a good idea, I said, that's why I did it a couple of months ago.
But a few people are having problems with their browser, and I have a notion that it's the music player they have. So I'm taking music off automatic for a while for some pages, to see if that helps.
Almost smoothly? Well, all the information that you put in, is processed by a computer - computers are very obedient towards Valkyries. I just tell them what I want, frown at them, and they tremble and do it as quickly as they can. But they have absolutely no common sense, I have to explain every little thing, like you do with a man, except at least they don't forget what I said.
Some people put in their details twice. They must have got the welcome screen telling them they were successful, but they went back and did it again. Some did it a third time. One did it four times, I guess he thought it hadn't worked? But I bet none of those guys want to be debited twice. So I check the input for duplicates before feeding it to the billing program. I'm going to tell the computer to do that, soon. You probably saw my routine for checking member's input and spanking them if they get it wrong? I'm thinking, I'll do the duplicate checking there, and tell him.
A few people joined, then a couple of days later wanted to upgrade membership. Well, that's fine, but it hadn't occurred to me that this would happen, so I didn't tell the computer how to handle it. I think I'll do a form for upgrades.
And a couple of people joined, then immediately cancelled. One of them was because there's some problem with his computer that means he can't use the site, and the other one was joined by a friend as a prank. Well, that's fair enough, but I have to admit, I wasn't expecting to need a cancellation routine for a couple of weeks, at least! So I had to explain to the dumb computer how to handle that.
I think the key is to minimise the number of exceptions.
I was contacted by Amazonfan, the author of Beach House; he has a whole bunch of stories for the site, so watch out for a new section in the Library.
Rambler has done the fourth installment in the love story between Larry and Donna. I think it's the loveliest, most tender love story on the site, and although he doesn't say there's any autobiography in it, I really hope that at least some of Larry is Rambler himself.
Montrose continues to astonish me with the scope of his creativity. With most authors, you can see a common theme in their stories, and on of them even told me, he feels that many of his stories are the same story retold again. Montrose's latest story, he tells me, was inspired by a couple of the pictures in the Gallery, so I took his story and linked those pictures in. It's about a big bully called Mike, who takes delight in beating up men and taking their girlfriends, until he meets Grizzly, who casually rams him into a chair, sits on his face until he stops struggling, takes him home with her, punches him into submission, crushes him in her arms breaking his ribs, then buggers him. You have to read it. I can tell you, a Valkyrie would never be so cruel to a man, that can really hurt. Besides, I don't even own a strap-on. And if did, it wouldn't be that big. Still, it was nice of her to grease him up first.
Dreadnaught has done his longest story yet, Tara's Dilemma, in which Tara and Donna break up a drugs gang. But in the course of doing so, Tara has to beat up an old friend, and she feels awful about it. Dreadnaught is now working on a new Suzie story, which looks like it'll be another great tale.
Mike Shoemaker and Al Harder have done the second book in the Amaflix series (and I used some artwork that Mike sent me to illustrate the first book). This is the ongoing tale of a company that makes mixed- fighting videos. Recommended.
And Al has done a few solo stories, you'll see those in the library.
DanboyII has been working hard, also. Check out his section of the library for new stories.
My own story-writing has had to slide; looking after this web site is taking all my time. Oh well, I'm enjoying it.
The library has become so big, I'm starting to think about how to re- organise it. I thought maybe on the main Library page, I'd just have the Author names, and a link to just one story per author, plus a link saying "More stories by so-and-so". If you have alternative suggestions, let me know.
I might have to reorganise the Main Gallery too, for similar reasons.
I don't put new stuff up every day. It's more efficient for me to do a whole batch of new stuff, then make it all appear at once. When I get a bunch of new stuff, I could put it up dribble by dribble, so there would be new things every day, but what's the point? So, I put it up as quickly as I can, all in one clump.
The File Uploader works great (it's in the Office). You need Netscape, but then it's a very easy way for people to send me stuff. If you want to see a new Gallery, the best way to get me to do it, is to upload everything you have that would go into it. That will spur me into making a search, finding more of the same, and putting up what you sent, plus the extra stuff I have already got, but haven't sorted.
The most active board is Lift-and-carry, which is getting a couple of hundred messages per month. I changed the way it works, so when you go in, you get the list of messages instead of getting the first message. Well, I prefer that.
A big controversy sprang up on the Fighting Females board when someone opined that no female could beat him. Well, I'm used to that, a lot of people seem to think that's the way to persuade a woman to fight with him. The argument is still raging there.
Kasie Cavanaugh has some staunch fans there - William and Tony each visited her and came back thoroughly impressed. Oh, and we have a biography of Laura Vukov, the Python Princess, with an explanation of how she uses her legs to effortlessly crush a man into submission - it's just like a python, except she didn't break all their ribs.
The originator of the first several dozen pictures in the Gallery of Bigger Women has contacted me, and he's said that he's going to do more. He's already sent me some, and he's still doing a very good quality of work.
And I've got contact with Dr Otto, author of the Andrah pictures. Andrah was originally on a site which is not currently working, but Dr Otto (who is kind of like her pet) has said we can have her on the web site, and furthermore, he has a lot more stuff that he's going to scan in. In case you haven't notice her, she's nearly eight feet tall including the mohawk, blue, wears very little, eats 20,000 calories per day, is built like a Valkyrie, and likes men.
Ihcoyc Xpictoc is still doing excellent work - the "Damsels not in distress" series continues, and I've taken two of his Valkyries to be part of the logo banner for the site.
Another artist has started to send in some very aggressive art, which I'll have up soon. So far, he's sent me Valkyries in battle gear, and very good work it is too.
Larry (LH Art) Heller's artwork is simply superb, and we're very fortunate to have his work. Obviously, we don't have it all - his very best material is on sale, and you can contact him via his web site or street address.
A few members have scanned in some of Larry's work, and you'll find it scattered all over the site. But especially, of course, in the LH Art Gallery. Thanks to Larry for permission to display it, and thanks to the members who scanned it in.
By the way, I'm getting a top quality scanner myself, to replace the cheap hand scanner I use. So if you have a quantity of suitable material on paper that needs scanning, email me, I'll probably do it for free.
I've been asked if I'll be sending unsolicited mail to your address. Absolutely not! In fact, I would hope that after the welcoming email, you'll hear nothing from me ever, unless you email me with some question, in which case you'll get an email back. Or if there some problem with your membership, like if the credit card company queries me about something.
Even then, I know some people have given fake (or mis-spelled) email addresses - I know this because a few of the welcomes bounced. Well, I'm not bothered, I respect your privacy the same way you respect mine (in fact, I've called the company Internet Privacy). I only send the automatic welcome, because before I did that, I got a regular stream of people asking when their membership would be valid, and it means they don't have to ask now.
I use it mostly for fun, and to talk to people online. I prefer to get any email at valkyrie@diana.announce.com, because AOL can be a bit awkward with email sometimes. Unreliable, even. Anyhow, I'm DValkyrie there, and if you see me online, you're welcome to come to the room I'm in (click Member, Find or Locate, then join me). Or you can IM me, but I get a lot of IMs, so might not answer at once. I don't have a schedule for being on AOL, and sometimes when I'm on, I'm answering email and don't have time to chat, but the best time to find me free, is early evening EST (but remember I'm on GMT, so 8pm EST is 1 am GMT, and I do sleep sometimes).
AOL is a good place to interact with people, and surely they'll sort out their current system problems.
By the way, if you're an AOL user, in the Gallery you'll find a whole bunch of hints and tips on how AOL users can get more out of my web site than if you don't use these tips.
If you want to write an entire story, that's great, and I'll consider it for the library (I have guidelines if you're interested) But there's quite a few anecdotes people tell (often on the Message Boards) which are too short to go in to the Library. This newsletter will be a good home for those.
I believe that most people can write, they just haven't tried. This will be a good way to get started, and telling a tale, whether true or fiction, is a good skill to have in your professional life. And great fun.
You'll find a link to it in the Library, under Newsletters.
I'm also acting as the archive site for a wrestling newsletter called The Mat, by Jack Day, and the link to that is in the same place.
My favourite stories in March were Grizzly and Tara's Dilemma, my favourite pictures were the ones I'm using in the site banner (you can see then full size in the Galleries). My favourite video clip is Carmen demonstrating how to knock a man out with her scissors, with commentary. My favourite newsgroup posting was the guy on alt.sex.fetish.wrestling offering to trade his Adult Check for a Silver membership of this web site (I offered to trade him a Make Money Fast scheme instead, I guess it didn't occur to him that I could read that newsgroup). We've got a few artists working for the site now and over a dozen story authors.
This month has just been *so* busy!