So, I was just poking around the website and saw that I have not chosen an Avatar yet.

I stopped thought, what actually does avatar mean anyway? And do I want to have one? (In elementary school was told my epidermis was showing and got so freaked out I hid in the bathroom until my teacher came and got me....didn't want to make the same mistake with avatar)

Wikipedia helped me out:
"Avatar or Avatara (Sanskrit: अवतार, IAST Avatāra), often translated into English as incarnation, literally means descent (avatarati) and usually implies a deliberate descent from higher spiritual realms to lower realms of existence for special purposes. Descents that are of importance are mainly those of the Supreme Being which are plenary and marked with superhuman qualities. Other types of descents are limited expansions of Ishvara, and some that are descents of lesser empowered divinities. The term is used primarily in Hinduism for descents of Vishnu whom Vaishnava Hindus (one of the largest branches of Hinduism)[1] worship as the Supreme God, a distinctive feature of Vaishnavism."

So, I thought, well I guess I could be from a higher being, but if I have super human qualities, I haven't quite figured them out yet. Unless of course you call taking out the trash for my wife without her asking one.

Then I was creeped out by the literal interpretation of the word "avatar". It's meaning "descent" reminded me of one of the more scary movies I have seen in the last couple of years (The Descent). Those creatures in that movies had super human powers...they could walk on the ceilings in complete darkness (in a cave) and though they were extremely ugly, apparently they had super human ears too. Did I mention they could chomp your head off in one bite?

But what really got me was when I decided to see if there were any cool avatars to choose from. There were 22. And out of 22, there were 9 females. Not that I was going to choose a female avatar, but I realized that 33% of the avatars for women are of Paris Hilton. I mean really? I think the only other two I even recognized was Ali Larter and Bettie Page. So there it is ladies, you can either be Bettie, Ali, Paris (with long hair), Paris (with short hair), Paris (showing a smile), or generic picture.


Sincerely,

A disgruntled avatarist

I want an avatar of Eric Browning....j/k. Eric I believe you can import an avatars from thousands if not tens of thousands on the web.

how do you use a custom avatar? there's no option under "edit avatar"

In elementary school was told my epidermis was showing and got so freaked out I hid in the bathroom until my teacher came and got me....

Oh...sorry. My friends and I used to do that to the kids in our school, too. We didn't mean to hurt anybody. We just like weird words. In about the 3rd grade, a buddy and I asked his high-school aged, nerd of a brother to teach how to say something in "science" talk. He thought for a bit, then taught us to say, "Dichloro-Diphenyl-Trichloroethane". We practiced it religiously until we had it down pat. This little piece of useless knowledge finally came in handy during my freshman science class when our teacher asked, "Does anybody know what DDT stands for?" Little did he know, I'd been waiting 6 years for someone to ask that question. LOL Seein' his mouth flop open in amazement was worth the wait.

Seems to me that the custom avatar thing is down. Mine is a custom, but I've had this one for quite awhile. Maybe if you PM a mod, they might be able to help you.

Oh...sorry. My friends and I used to do that to the kids in our school, too. We didn't mean to hurt anybody. We just like weird words. In about the 3rd grade, a buddy and I asked his high-school aged, nerd of a brother to teach how to say something in "science" talk. He thought for a bit, then taught us to say, "Dichloro-Diphenyl-Trichloroethane". We practiced it religiously until we had it down pat. This little piece of useless knowledge finally came in handy during my freshman science class when our teacher asked, "Does anybody know what DDT stands for?" Little did he know, I'd been waiting 6 years for someone to ask that question. LOL Seein' his mouth flop open in amazement was worth the wait.

That's a cool story.

I had a favorite avatar once, then HBO went and killed further production of the series after only two seasons.

The Descent is one of the scariest movies I've ever seen in my lifetime!

But, yes, we are trying to work some bugs out with the Custom Avatar. Hang tight.