Sistergirl At Home--About Sistergirl

First of all, let me explain the word "Sistergirl" because the name is being used every 
where nowadays, often for a reason, but more often without much thought.  But you see, 
"Sistergirl" has been my nick name  since I was born over forty years ago. I was the first 
girl and my mother explained to my older brother, who was only three-years-old at the 
time, that I was his sister and that I was a girl. My brother (being cute and precocious) 
started calling me sistergirl. 

And the name stuck. My parents, aunts and uncle (who are all in their 60's and 70's) still 
call me Sistergirl--if my siblings and cousins want to be very personal, they call me 
Sistergirl.  If my grandparents were still alive, they would call me, lovingly, Sistergirl; 
and,  therefore, that's why I use it today as my on-line user name.

I'm a painter who loves to print, or a printer who loves to paint (just depends on how 
I'm perceiving myself at the time), and my art has been displayed  in national and 
international galleries including Berlin, Germany, and Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. In 
case you're wondering, I enjoy painting in water base paints over oils, and I prefer to 
create expressionistic images over realistic. And, I don't like to draw. Sketching to 
begin a painting is one thing, but drawing for the sake of drawing? Why bother? I say, 
let's just go straight to the color!

More recently, since being without studio space, I've turned to digital art and have
been displaying both fantasy theme and expresionistic images at a web base art
community. This helps fill that need to create.

A little bit about me :

I am not your typical video game player. I am an artist, Art and English teacher, and a longtime single mother. I was born 
and raised in California, but have spent fifteen years of my adult life in Fort Worth and El Paso, Texas.  I have no Texan 
accent, but I love to use the term "y'all", "you guys", "dude", "sweetie", "homegirl", "yo", and "dawg"  in the same paragraph 
just to keep people on their toes.

I once had the trip of a life time to China, Mongolia and Thailand as an invited art educator and delegate with the Citizen 
Ambassador Program.  In other words, this wasn't a typical tourist trip, but a visit as an honor guest; we had  our own little 
entourage of interpreters, accommodations in the best hotels,  free access to some of the most remarkable sites in the world  
(such as The Great Wall, The Forbidden City, and the Stone Forest) and seeing no other Westerner or European for days and 
days.  Really, it was quite an experience.

My history with electronic games:

Well, my adult son has been playing PC and video console games for over twelve  years now, even BEFORE  I  was willing to 
spend  any of my own hard earned money to buy him any of the systems,  games or peripherals.  As a matter of fact, he now 
has over 100 PC, PlayStation and PS2, XBox, Game Cube, DreamCast, Nintendo 64, and  GameBoy games.  Envious?  Well, 
understandable.   But, you see, for nearly three years before he had a family of his own, his pay check didn't have to go 
towards any major bills,  and he's no fashion  setter,  so  he only buys clothes when it becomes absolutely necessary. And he
has gotten somethings as gifts, plus, it does help to work at a department store where you can purchase a "reduced priced" 
game for ten bucks or less!  Believe me, he'll play just about ANYTHING!

Still, he is a big time game player, therefore, even after starting a family, he continues to buy the
next generation of consoles, their games, and sequels to the games he loves (and here is where it
helps to have a very understanding wife who also loves a game or two or three or...well, you get
the picture).

Then, when he finally bought his own PlayStation, I really fell in love with Techmo's Monster Rancher and Sid Meier's 
Civilization.  Oh, and I just love using MTV's Music Generator to create my own arranged music  and simple graphic videos!

It only made sense when it was time to purchase a new PC, it was also time to purchase some games of my own. Some of
my favorites are Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, American McGee's Alice, Bullfrog's Dungeon Keeper, and Hasbro RollerCoaster
Tycoon. Uhmmmm?? I've never noticed this before, but three of those four games allow the player to create a place that they
control, and at times even repress a large group of people by force. Does this say something about my psyche and my
unconscious need to be in control?

Who knows.

Well, it was my son that turned me on to Will Wright's game, The Sims, which is produced by the very energetic group of people
at Maxis. Even now, I can't believe I had hesitated to buy the game one week after it had been released; to say the least, I have
been hooked ever since.

Truthfully, being hooked on a electronic game shouldn't be too surprising for me. I was a closet Space Invaders and Dig/Dug
junkie in the early 80's. No one knew that I was buying a couple of rolls of quarters once a week, not only to do the laundry,
but also to play. No one was even the least bit suspicious that during those "emergency" runs to the supermarket to buy
something that I "claimed" I really needed to finish dinner, was actually spent at Taco Bueno and Shakey's Pizza Parlor honing
in on my video skills.

Writing The Tales of The New World Sims:

How I came to write my fantasy story on the web is really part of "Sistergirl and The Sims" story; to read, click HERE.

Now and then, over the years, I have also found a game that I enjoyed playing.  
One of the first was the shareware version of Wolfenstein's Castle, and I had 
gotten very good at it. I would actually make the game more interesting by 
just getting the enemies' attention, then seeing if I could out run them to the 
exit, instead of shooting my way out.  I also  remember a game I really enjoyed 
called Sim City (the first time I had heard of this series of games). This was the 
SuperNintendo version (where Bowser would show up destroying areas of your 
city that you worked very hard to build!) and I could only play it when my son 
borrowed both the system and the game from a friend.