Sdtrk: ‘Дом’ by Утро

Yes, I know, finally. You’ve read Part I and Part II beforehand, I’d hope? Excellent! Let’s begin.

SATURDAY, 27 JULY
That morning, instead of joining the lads for our customary 8.30am brekky at Foxy’s, I declined. For one, between the leftovers I’d had from Katsuya and BJ’s, it’d be silly for me to spend additional money on food for breakfast, and furthermore, Amber Hawk Swanson and I were due to convene there at 11am, to catch up and discuss more details for her upcoming project. So I got to sleep in! Any opportunity to get some extra Zs in is one that can’t be missed.
She arrived a few minutes before I did, and grabbed a table on the patio, which is something none of us have ever done there before. That’s due to the fact that there’s usually a minimum of five of us, and the patio tables are for smaller groups of one to two people. And speaking of people, Amber mentioned that when she got to Foxy’s that morning, one of the staff had told her that she had just missed ‘the boys’, meaning our crowd. We’re practically regulars there now!

Without giving too much of the game away, Amber and I spent nearly the entire time developing further ideas for one of her major projects; unofficially, I’m a consultant. Not much I can talk about at this stage — even if it were my project and not hers, I wouldn’t give away details until things were closer to completion. And no, it wasn’t the Sidore Mark II / Heather > LOLITA project; it’s similar but different — but while we were bouncing ideas off each other, a waitress popped round our table and mentioned that I looked familiar. Amber told her that I’ve been on television a few times with my wife Sidore, and the waitress seemed to make the connection, particularly when I showed her a photo of my Missus. The waitress asked if Shi-chan and I got paid for our appearances, and I replied that I did; Shi-chan’s my Doll. Then it struck her that yes, I was the bloke on telly married to his RealDoll, yes yes. ‘That’s really interesting!’ she exclaimed, finally getting it. I love when stuff like that happens…
Also, I fed a sparrow part of my bagel! He was down by my feet, chirping earnestly, so I dropped a couple of fragments for him. It was a successful breakfast for everyone involved!

After popping back round to my room to make sure my Target bag was concealed from sticky-fingered room service, I tagged along in Amber’s car to hit the day’s DolLApalooza event, Syns@Sins, which started at 1pm. We were the first ones there; Bronwen was putting finishing touches on things, so we were invited to take a seat in the livingroom. Shortly after, we were joined by three blokes none of us had ever met before, as well as HiFi-Man, who’s an iDollator our crowd first met during DolLApalooza 2011. People were familiar with who Amber and I were, but only in parts, particularly with her, so she spent a few minutes explaining how Amber Doll went from Synthetik lover, to artistic muse, to scale-model Tilikum.
Mahtek, Incrediwagon, littluvr, Jesse1965, and Z-Dr materialised about half an hour later. After their breakfast at Foxy’s, they drove out to Trashy Lingerie of Los Angeles, which specialises in custom lingerie. Due to my personal meet-up, combined with the fact that neither Sidore nor Elena are really ‘lingerie types’, as well as Trashy’s custom stuff being a bit out of my price range, I’d passed on it. But they do make delectable bedroom funtime apparel, as Mahtek’s own Roxaen will attest to! (Totally NSFW.) But the lads were late, mainly because LA traffic is a unique artisanal blend of rage, tardiness, and retardedness.

As the lot of us were pretty much assembled at this point, proceedings began in earnest. Bronwen and Matt K debuted two videos: one was a sort of an introduction/summary as to what Sinthetics is all about that was created for a Spanish channel, and following that was a rather sexy featurette, starring an Alicia-type and a Gabriel-type. Through the use of various poses and creative editing, they appeared to move of their own accord, much like a silicone version of ‘La jetée’. You could always take a bit of a break from reading this and watch the video yourself, I suppose (also NSFW).
Over the course of several hours, the attendees had the pleasure of hobnobbing with other attendees, as well as meeting the various staff members of Sinthetics. In speaking with Johnnie, one of the staffers, I was pleased to learn that he used to do occasional stunt acting, and in fact, was in a number of American tokusatsu productions, most notably the 1991 film ‘The Guyver’. Impressed? Yes! Also, we got to watch an actual demoulding later, where Jesse and I helped staffer Datig remove some of the C-clamps from a Body 2D mould. That’s the closest a lot of us will ever get to midwifery, and that’s perfectly fine.

An Alicia-type and a Tawny-type (with Snuggles the bear), greeting visitors.
Photo © by Incrediwagon

As the eve went on, we helped ourselves to snacks and a catered table of comestibles, and generally wandered around, with the same awed looks that Violet, Augustus, Mike, Veruca, and Charlie had on their faces upon first entering Mr Wonka’s mind-blowing factory. Thankfully, there were no instances of chunky kids getting stuck in chocolate pipes, or spoiled brats plunging down rubbish chutes. It’s funny; we’ve visited the studios in the Valley of the Dolls on several occasions — that’s the part of SoCal that contains Abyss creations, Ruby13, Mechadoll, and Sinthetics — but no matter how many times they allow us to step through their doors and take time out of their days to let us see what goes into making our beloved silicone companions and witnessing new developments, every instance remains as amazing as the first time. Which, it should go without saying, is fantastic.
Later on, fellow iDollator CrazyJose appeared, and we got to catch him up on things. Also I’d noticed, much like at Mechadoll, there were many instances of Amber fondling the various Sinthetics, in whole or in part. There was a bit where a number of us were speaking with Matt K, and I was absentmindedly playing with a silicone foot, as I do, and I’d put it down to inspect a head; I’d mused to myself that my wondrous Target bag could probably accomodate four or five heads with no problem. By the time I came back to that foot, Amber was seated with it, caressing it quite naturally. There’s something about Synthetik people that draws both the eye and the hands…

It also helps that sometimes, the Dolls can’t keep their hands off of us

Unfortunately, we couldn’t stay at Sinthetics’ studio forever, making pillows for ourselves from the inviting rubber bosoms in the workshop upon which to rest our weary heads, as Matt K & Bronwen had to move on with their lives. Their kitties required feeding, for example. So after several false starts in which we’d say we were leaving, then end up chatting for an additional half an hour — this happened twice — Matt whimsically put us in headlocks and led us out. That statement is only partially false. Needless to say, every minute there, just as it was at Mechadoll, was enjoyable! As I was too busy vacillating between taking critical notes for this exact series of posts, speaking with people, and fondling silicone breasts and feet, I didn’t take as many pics as I would’ve liked, but I knew that others would be taking up the slack. (See, this is one of the avowed things I’d do if I had a Google Glass or equivalent: bring it to DolLApalooza.) But if you’ve got the time, why not check out the gallery that Incred’s posted to his site here? (Yes, completely NSFW.) Also, Bronwen did a write-up more concise than mine here, which is worth peering at.

It was an unexpectedly brisk eve when we’d left; AHS had said her goodbyes and returned to the house she was sitting at, and the other Syns@Sins attendees who we weren’t familiar with had gone their separate ways. As the rest of us were still peckish, HiFi-Man, Mahtek, CrazyJose, Incred, Jesse, littluvr, Z-Dr, and I decided we’d hit BJ’s for dinner one last time.
While not as necessarily cosy as Foxy’s, ordinarily BJ’s, as mentioned before, is a great restaurant. This time round, though, was… not as good. While the food and drink were excellent, the waitress we were assigned was… I dunno, maybe she was speeding or something, as while she did try to make herself personable and get our orders sorted, she was a bit too personable. Like she was working for an exceptionally large tip. In fact, she was so personable, telling various anecdotes and ingratiating herself, that it was kinda preventing her from delivering our orders to the cooks so they could prepare them. She was very excitable, and when she wasn’t excitable, she was practically hiding from us when it came time to request our cheques. Memory fails me at this point, but I estimate it was roughly forty-five minutes to an hour between the time we’d finished eating, to the time we’d received our cheques. It was the first time I’d ever seen Mahtek get angry, and he’s a more forgiving individual than most of us, so there’s your barometer. Out of the eight of us, I think two people left tips, and they were pretty insubstantial. Say no to drugs, kids.
One of the more amusing and spot-on things that happened there, when we weren’t boiling with rage, was when I had offhandedly mentioned at some point that I’m not a people person. Z-Dr, who was sitting across from me, astutely replied, ‘You are if they’re silicone… or silicone-once-removed.’ Truer words never spake!

With the exception of Jesse1965 and I, everyone else was staying in California until Tuesday morning. As Jesse was going to be departing first, we wished him well before we headed towards our beds. As I was to later learn, he, like a handful of other iDollators, also lives in Ohio, so he’ll be meeting with us during our tri-state Doll Congresses! Good bloke, that Jesse! Very tall. It probably took him all of ten minutes to walk home, so mighty is his stride.

SUNDAY, 28 JULY
Sunday had me up at 6am; surprisingly, I managed to cram all of my stuff, as well as the clothes for my rubber troublemakers, into my carry-on. It might’ve been more efficient and stylish to put my carry-on inside my capacious Target bag, rather than the other way round, but I was pressed for time. Mahtek and littluvr got me to LAX at 8.30, and I was released from the TSA cattle-herding an hour later. Our flight departed round 11.50am, and four slightly uncomfortable hours later — I’ve no idea why, but with the past three flights I’ve had returning home, either the trip is bumpy, or I’ve got a crap seat, or both — I was back at Metro Airport, where fellow iDollator Euchre picked me up, and I recounted to him the same strange and wonderful tale that I have just told you! The end. *closes hardcover, lights meerschaum, relaxes in armchair*

And this, dear readers, would be the last post on ‘Shouting to hear the echoes’ for 2013! They said I wouldn’t finish this series, but I proved them wrong, by god. As always, Happy hols, hope your New Years’ celebrations are carnage-free, and best wishes for us all in 2014!

You all thought I was kidding about that Target bag, weren’t you?