From the MPSIMS Secret Santa thread:
It’s too funny, because I can so relate.
Have you ever had a hard time explaining to a IRL person what a message board is? And they just don’t get it? Share your story. (If you don’t have one, feel free to share your story of explaining FRPGs to granny.)
Years ago I was a member on a well-known urban legends board. We had one forum that we affectionately called The Pool, being that it was both a betting pool and a virtual summer lounge. I had made plans to fly to another city for a get-together. (A snopefest, if you will.)
A few days before I flew out, I was on a date with a career blonde. We were doing some window shopping, and wandered into a book store. I saw Brunvand’s The Vanishing Hitchhiker on the shelf.
“Omigod omigod omigod! I’m totally into urban legends and I’m on this message board and I made these great friends and I’m flying to DC this weekend to meet them and we call it The Pool and it’s going to be totally rad I can’t wait omigod omigod omigod!”
“Huh?”
“I made friends at this message board, and I’m meeting them this weekend.”
“Do they live around here?”
“No, they live in DC.”
“Why do you need to go to DC if they all live here?”
“They don’t live here, they live in DC.”
“So you, like, talk to them on the phone?”
“No, over the internet.”
“You use your phone over the internet?”
“No, you type messages.”
“On your phone?”
“On a computer.”
“Is this like one of those porn things?”
“No!” (I tactfully omitted the fact that two of the people I was meeting were self-described Pool Sluts.)
“So you sit around a pool and make hitchhikers vanish.”
“No. And there’s not really a pool.”
“So you sit around this non-pool on your phone and make hitchhikers not vanish into porn. And that happens around here, right?”