This week marks the two year anniversary of sexymunro.com, where it all started. I had been promoting myself through what was New Zealand’s primary escort directory Sexinnz, using the forum and general listings. Sexinnz will always hold a special place for me. Through the forum I linked to a profile at myspace.com. Myspace didn’t last long, they pulled it down once they realised what I was using it for, but it gave me my first taste of personalised online marketing. I loved it. I was also spending a lot of time looking outside New Zealand at International sites as something to aspire to.

Feedback on myspace had been good and it wasn’t long before I was frustrated by the limits of it and thoughts moved to a full website. I had no idea where to start. People suggested popping into Whitcoulls for a webdesign ‘how to’ book but I knew I wouldn’t get passed the first page, not my style. One friend piped up saying he knew a little and offered to show me some basics. He explained what ‘web hosting’ meant and helped me find and set up a provider, then came ‘html’ .

Armed with computer I sat on his couch as he gave me the option of using what he described as a ‘drag and drop’ program called dreamweaver, or to do it the hard way with a simpler program and learn code, the latter being a better long term option. He literally squirmed as I opted for code. I was worried! Arachnophilia 4.0 was installed onto my computer, freeware still available, and Smartftp for uploading files. I’d had Photoshop 7.0 for awhile and this was fired up for the first time.

After 4 days of focus and frustration my website was ready to go live. Friends couch wasn’t very comfortable and he was occupied with other projects so I limited my asking of questions to bare essentials not wanting to wear out my welcome. Code aside, Photoshop was a challenge in itself and despite ending up with a completed site I had little understanding of what I’d actually done! I headed home and immediately started, and launched, sexymunro.com number 2, the screenshot above (I seem to have lost my original site files). I had my first photoshoot with StudioX in Newmarket shortly thereafter. My next shoot was with Evan at my motel in Greenlane where I worked for the first 9 months of my career.

I wasnt long before I offered webdesign to other escorts and Victoria was the first to put her hand up. She was launched during October later that year. Poor Victoria, shortly after hers went live I made the horror discovery that not only did different browsers read sites differently but different screen resolutions needed to be taken into account too. Id never viewed the sites on anything other than my own computer in Internet Explorer. Terrible! I built both myself and Victoria a new site each then a fourth for me followed fairly quickly and my second request came along.

Naughty Melissa, since moved on, was born early in 06 followed by Chanel Delecroix a month or so later. Chanel’s site came down about 3 months ago after making a few changes to life. During April last year I spent 2 weeks at a friends apartment, complete peace. It was here my fifth sexymunro.com was created and has remained as you see it today. Escort Ana was also introduced to the world. Ana’s site is due for an overhaul. I have maintained it behind the scenes applying CSS that I now use and other tricks, but the design is very outdated. Victoria’s third and current site was launched a little while later.

Never before in my life have I remained in a full time position for more than 9 months. After 6 I get itchy feet and move on shortly thereafter. The sex industry, incorporating web design and my other projects, is my first experience of an occupation that keeps me challenged, interested and inspired. I will be around for a long time yet, so much left to do!