Embracing your Retail Deity

I am not a collector of many avatars and the few I have I am still coming to terms with. Avatars occur at the intersection of Creepy Puppets and Insane Robots, and like the toile people run through your house at night and whisper behind your back.

I have 2 avatars in my possession at present:
My IM avatar lost its human face a few months ago when baseball season opened and I changed it to the Red Sox logo from Alfred E Newman. AIM provided a Mad Magazine theme, but most of the Alfred avatars were animated, which I think is annoying to your IM recipient. I had chosen the only one that was static.

Mwtyger IMs: "Your avatar is vomiting," which it was, into a barf bag stenciled "Mad." Classy.

I have a friend whose boyfriend designed an Avatar for her Yahoo IM. Yahoo has a wizardy sort of tool which creates a human figure of your design in a hip animation style partway between Kim Possible and the Bratz. He also designed his own, and enjoys dressing it every day, and changing its attributes (another word for "accessories" preferred by people who say "avatar").

His girlfriend is dumbfounded by this interest of his. I believe she had her time of playing Barbies, and he did not, which is why boys are drawn so late in life to D&D, WOW, and SCA.

Which brings me to my other avatar, pictured here -- hilariously dressed in an outfit I would never buy.

Land's End provides a model that you can dress in their "separates," presumably to encourage you to buy them, though that doesn't seem to happen. I have met no one with a Lands End model who says, "why yes, once I saw it 'on,' and turned my model 360 degrees, I had to have it."

By entering your measurements, and some other physical information (face, hair, build, etc), you create this mannequin of yourself. You could lie to your Land's End model, but it won't help. It can help you choose a hair style, though, and commit to losing those 20 pounds, or 12 inches. It can not convince you to try the Land's End turtleneck jersey dress and wool mocs if you are not already from New Hampshire.

Some important things to know about your Land's End model:
1. you can not cross-dress at Land's End.
Trousers are for men, and slacks are for women. This took a great deal of the fun out of it for me, until I used my same measurements to build a male model. I am afraid that, especially from the rear, it looks a lot more like me.

2. always choose the "younger" setting for your facial features.
The "older" setting goes immediately too far, like kids in drama club playing the grandma. Same principle for "build," where you should choose "less muscular." Disregard this rule if you are Hillary Swank.

3. Land's End will suggest "things that go with what you are wearing."
Keep in mind you are shopping at Land's End.