I figured that I should lighten the mood with this meme I stole from several of my friends.


visited 10 states (20%)
Create your own visited map of The United States or determine the next president

I don't travel much. I'm kind of a homebody.
Ellen

Current Mood: amused

Well, it looks like most people think I should go, especially Sarah. LOL When I mentioned to Melissa about my ex's girl not allowed to talk to us, Melissa seemed confused, so maybe this is another incident of this all being in my head. When I mentioned an event last year where Melissa brought up the fact that she wouldn't speak as they passed in the hall, she remember vaguely saying something about it, but it doesn't seem to be as a big deal to her or some others in the group as it is to me. Maybe my ex is right, and that I'm just too insecure. *shrugs* Who knows?

For those that think my ex's girl is being childish, I need to defend her by stating that she and my ex are in a Dominant/submissive relationship, so if there is a rule of not speaking to me, it could be something my ex has ordered her to do. I'm not for sure if this is the case. It could be that we're uncomfortable around each other, so that is why it appears that she doesn't want to speak to me. I sometimes brush my ex off, when I'm feeling uncomfortable. So, if her girl is being childish for not wanting to talk to me, then I am too at times.

Now, I feel stupid for making a big deal about it. I emailed my ex to ask what the proper leather etiquette is in this situation. I sure in the hell wouldn't want someone in my house that I've been ordered to not speak to. Would you? Not speaking to someone and being the host of a meeting seems to contradict. At least it does to me. I probably won't get a response, but I've tried to bridge this issue. Now, I wonder if no response means I'm being silly or if that would mean I'm not welcomed to the meeting at her house.

GOD, help me to quit making life more difficult than it needs to be. LOL

I MIGHT go, but I'm not sure.
Ellen

Current Mood: contemplative

when not pondering global warming, the general ghastliness of it all and just how the hell I'm going to fit 500 hours work in 80 hours or so-why the hell is the following so fricking popular around here?
Went to a reading recently (names and times frames changed to protect the guilty since this is a general not specific rant) by some of the local literary type writers. In these parts, they likes their memoir, even if their lives are really pretty bloody dull. But they likes it anyway, lots and lots. Especially the following scenario: earnest white person brings lover/partner/spouse/whatever from exotic category X - African, Asian, Latino, disabled, same sex, transgender, Jewish, Wiccan, narcoleptic, actually from another planet, etc., etc. and if the audience is really lucky, a combination of all of the above! - home to meet the parents.

Dear goddess, where to begin? I have heard a few other variations but this seems the most common. If I had a dollar for every time I've sat through this 'memoir,' I might have a car payment by now. At thsi point, there are no new spins on this. Really. The object of desire is nearly always...the object of desire. They seldom get to break out of the little description box with airholes that they inhabit. You don't get to hear them complain about meeting the memoirist's boring family while their supposed beloved has attention-getting histrionics in the foreground. Even the finale is monotonous. This scenario almost always has one of the following outcomes: 1. family freaks out in ugly way or 2. family takes it all more or less in stride. And yes, it is nearly always dinner. Not lunch, not coffee. Dinner.

Okay, so the writer has gotten lots of attention, positive or negative, from their families, which appears to be the point. And what about the exotic other? Well, they're nearly a literary device anyway. Besides memoiring about the almost inevitable breakup when they get tired of being treated like a weird pet will make for a great chapter or two. Can you tell that I find this icky and annoying? Honestly, people, if this is the best you can do for the story of your life that's so terribly unique everyone should want to read it, perhaps you might want to try actually living a bit first instead of worrying about the possibility of your parents retroactively aborting you for your choice of partner. Hrumph...

Well, I'm not sure what to do, so here's a poll for you to help me out. My ex's new girl is hosting a meeting for an organization that all four of us are members of. They are more active than Melissa and I. My ex's girl doesn't speak or acknowledge Melissa and I. She did when she dated another butch, but now, she doesn't. I think my ex's has told her not to. So, Melissa and I feel awkward around them, even though my ex always comes over and speaks to us. I don't blame her for not speaking to us because it's an awkward situation for all four of us. (Is this screaming bad break up? LOL) Well, I suggested a topic for discussion on the email list. The group decided to do it, but now, I don't know whether to attend, since my ex's girl is hosting the meeting that night. What do you think?
Poll #1229202 Etiquette
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

How do you handle going to a meeting at your ex's new girl's house?

Current Mood: confused

So, went to see the Dark Knight tonight and I was very very impressed.  ( Read more... )

So who's your favourite Batman? I think I have to go for Keaton.

Recently single, nice guy from my office is out at a bar frequented by a lot of local softball teams. He sees an interesting young woman across the room who reminds him of someone. So he approaches her and says, "You look like Uhura".

To which she says, "What did you just call me?"

Despite his denials and explanations (you know, Star Trek!), it did not end well.

And not the game...

http://www.wboc.com/global/story.asp?s=8724440

In my Readercon report, I made a brief mention of seeing and enjoying The Dark Knight.  But this movie deserves its own post.  I've now seen it twice, once in Readercon and again yesterday (I'd promised my best friend I'd see the flick with him first, and since he avoids the blogosphere like the plague, he'll continue to think I kept my word--ha!)  This is only the second time I've seen a movie twice in the theaters.  The first time was for The Matrix Reloaded, when my second viewing also happened to be my first IMAX movie experience.

Honestly, I think I'd like to see The Dark Knight again, this time in IMAX.  It's that good.

I'm not a major comic guy, but I can hold conversations about the major Marvel & DC characters.  And Batman also happens to be my favorite superhero.  A couple of years ago my friend started a comic store and convinced me to read all sorts of stories.  Obviously, I gravitated toward Batman.  I read a lot of the best stuff--The Dark Knight Returns, The Killing Joke, Batman: Year One, Batman: Year Two, and a lot of the issues from recent years, during which time the writers have been doing some excellent work.  All these works are dark, riddled with twisted psychology, and carry the suggestion of a better tomorrow if you are willing to endure the heavy cost.  This is when the mythology of Batman is at its best.

Jonathan & Christopher Nolan (writers & director) understood that.  They also understood that movies like the abortions known as Batman 3 & Batman 4 must be avoided at all costs.  Joel Shulemacher relied on campiness with those movies, drawing on the Batman of the later 1950s & 1960s that inspired the tv show with Adam West.  But this version of Batman only existed because of the Comic Code Authority.  These versions are Batman at his most uninteresting, which is a big reason (among others) why these movies were awful.

When Batman Begins came out, one of the smartest things that movie did was using Batman villains not seen before on the big screen.  The franchise was rebooting, and new villains would prevent the audience from being reminded of the previous movie franchise.  Scarecrow & Raz al Ghul (sp?) were both great choices, as they're integral supervillains to the Batman mythology.  There was definitely some reinterpreation of Ghul, but I thought it worked.

Regardless, I can't recommend The Dark Knight highly enough, and I'll be curious to see what comes next.                            

 

Awhile back, I added Harper1817 as a friend on MySpace. They had a promotion. If you gave them your address, they might send you an advance reader's copy of one of their upcoming or current books. I'd completely forgotten about it. Then a couple weeks ago, I received How Beautiful It Is And How Easily It Can Be Broken by Daniel Mendelsohn. Beautiful book. And just today, I received the new Phillip Margolin thriller, Executive Privilege. I think it's pretty damn cool that this publisher is reaching out to readers this way, establishing good will and all that. Seems like a class act company to me.

I'll tell you what -- this summertime schedule is kicking my butt BIG TIME. I just can't find a good rhythm. But that's OK because school starts in 41 days!!!!

I was wide awake last night thinking about Michael Savage and his commentary on autism. I find myself feeling really bad, because in part, I can see where he's coming from. (The fact I hate M. Savage does not help this feeling) While he was completely obnoxious about children who DO have autism (which clearly is NOT caused by not having a father in the home) there is a strong trend for every kid who has behavior issues or who is just a kid to be slapped with a label/diagnosis.

There have been years where Harmony has been the only child in her class to not have a diagnosis. You should hear the kids talk:

"What are you? I'm ADD, ODD, OCD, and bipolar."

"Oh, I've got ADHD and Aspergers."

Pediatricians are incredibly fast to recommend medications and offer up diagnosis: I've had Harmony offered Ritalin because she had trouble settling down in the first days of kindergarten on the basis of a 5 minute conversation with the doctor. I think the doctors are responding to parental demand: people want easy, quiet compliant kids, and if you drug a child enough, you get that.

The physician was SHOCKED that I did not want to medicate Harmony.

I feel very strongly that there are some diagnosis that are trendy and popular, and kids get slapped with these labels when there's hardly any cause for this. Autism is the latest trendy diagnosis.

I don't say this lightly. I do realize that autism awareness has increased, and that there has been a positive and relevant rise in accurate diagnosis of children who do have autism.

I have also seen children who have been diagnosed as autistic before they were born. I have several children in my family who have been diagnosed as autistic within days of delivery.

Explain to me how that works.

What I see -- and what lots and lots of people like me see -- is that an autistic child, or an ADD child, or an ADHD child -- is a way to secure financial assistance for families that live on the fringe end of the economy.

(Where I live. Is it classism if I'm looking at my own kind?)

If you don't have a lot of assets, you leverage the ones you have. Children are an asset. Make no mistake. If you've got the disabled kid, you get a bump in food stamps. You get a larger EIC. You get a bump to the head of the HEAP line. You get a Medicaid driver.

You get sympathetic treatment from a school system that would otherwise look down on you for having more children than you can afford.

You become a victim, rather than a parent. It's a hell of a lot easier to be a victim than a parent.

This makes me furious, because it draws time, energy, and most importantly resources away from parents who are raising children who do have the disorder and not just the label. It trivializes the real struggles parents face on a daily basis to secure what their children need. It puts strain on a system that can't bear it.

It creates the perception that apparently I and Michael Savage share.

I realize this raises a boat load of questions: who am I to determine who's 'legitimately' disabled and who is not?

It's not my role. It's not my job. My opinion isn't worth squat here, frankly. But the current system is broken, broken badly.

And the break is hurting the children who need the help the most.

Meanwhile, it has also created a culture where every child expects that they're flawed and broken from the get-go. That they're born with an inherent flaw. That they need medication to be whole.

That the solution to every problem is to be found externally.

We will regret this later, I think.

As I sit here, watching Date My Ex; a reality show I have absolutely no desire to know anything about or ever watch again--I am waiting for the midnight showing of this week's Project Runway, as I had to work this evening--I saw my earlier post and had this mental image of Lisa dressed in her superhero outfit as Night Nurse, and it made me smile. I wish we could make that a challenge for Runway Monday; design an outfit for Lisa to wear as Night Nurse; and then tried to imagine what our intrepid designers beckycochrane, timothyjlambert and markgharris could come up with, and that made me smile so large that it made my face ache. How about it, Heidi Gunn? Imagine the challenges we could come up with on our own!

I wish I could write about my experiences on my job, but alas, it is a confidential research study and I can't tell you anything about that. I can tell you that spending such an inordinate amount of time in gay bars makes you realize how tedious gay bar music can be. I hear that damned Bleeding Love song by Leona Lewis, which I used to love, every night when I go to work and I am heartily sick of it. I am sure by the time Southern Decadence rolls around, I will know the words to every song I will hear on the dance floor by heart--and will be totally sick of them. Sigh.

I did go to the gym today and worked out pretty hard; I was so pissed off at being sore and tired this morning I decided to just beat the hell out of my body--and weirdly enough, it actually worked. I worked all the sore out of my body. Who knew? One would have thought that I be even more sore than I was before; but we'll see how I feel tomorrow morning, won't we?

I find myself wondering why I had such horrible nightmares last night. They were so vivid and real; I actually woke myself up once because I was whimpering in fear so loud. Of course, now I have no recollection of anything I dreamt; all I remember is the feeling of fear. I am sure I dream every night; given my imagination, it would be weird if I didn't dream. But every morning when I wake up I have no memory of the dreams; unless of course I had nightmares. I haven't had nightmares in a long time, but it is quite unsettling. I certainly hope it doesn't happen again tonight.

Damn, this show is horrible, absolutely horrible. It's a spin off of Real Housewives of Orange County, apparently--a show that is a train wreck and doesn't have the decency to be at least a fun one. WHY it has inspired two spin-offs is beyond me.

FINALLY, it's over. And now, for Project Runway...

Current Mood: cranky

 For 2 days, it has POURED rain here on the Canadian prairie. Partner phoned to ask me to bring her lunch at work, and it was hard to find intersections not completely flooded. Booming thunder! Flashes of lightning!

If worldwide food shortages don't effect this year's wheat crop (i.e. if there is still bread in the stores in Sept.), thank this rain.

I wore a little top & shorts under an umbrella because more fabric would just be like a soaked sponge on the skin.
Best way to go out in the rain, IMO, is be naked under something waterproof.

Clothes still sopping - put them in the old dryer that runs all day & all night. That should work.

Current Mood: content

( You are about to view content that may only be appropriate for adults. )

Current Mood: happy

I had heard of him, but none of his stuff. This has a nice, Jamiroquai feel to it. Hard to imagine him being the son of Alan Thicke and Gloria Loring!

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( You are about to view content that may not be appropriate for minors. )

The Sarah Jane Adventures comes to Region 1 DVD this fall

 Back in the day when I used to go out on dates with young men, they all advised me to adopt a policy of "innocent until proven guilty." This meant that if a guy invited me to his place to look at his etchings, I MUST NOT assume he wanted sex -- until it became clear that he did. Then I had no right to say no because 1) any girl naive enough to believe that line about the etchings deserved a hard lesson in reality, and 2) no one could really be that naive, so obviously I was a hypocrite who came home with him for the purpose of getting laid, but played coy to avoid being perceived as the slut I really was.

In the year when I was 21, living in my own apartment for the first time & earning my own living, my social life (to use the term loosely) felt like a mess. I kept meeting men, they kept inviting me out, and the same thing happened over and over. Sex or no sex? If yes, I was a piece of trash who didn't deserve to be taken seriously. If no, I was a prude who wasn't worth the effort. Approximately half of them were married anyway.

I complained about this situation to men and women who didn't seem interested in me as a date. They all agreed that this problem was personal, and it required a personal solution. I had to change so as to stop bringing disaster on myself.

My mother kept asking why I didn't just find a nice guy who wasn't interested in "all this sex business." She was convinced that gentlemen like this existed in large numbers, and I was perversely avoiding them. She knew this because her "boyfriend" in high school had been very interested in her thoughts, her feelings, her philosophy of life, and vice versa. He had not been a lech. It had been a relationship made in heaven.

At some point, I learned that mom's "boyfriend" had "come out" as a gay man (at least to his closest friends) at a remarkably young age for the period (1930s). By almost any standards, he was a remarkable man. He edited a glossy magazine for years, and wrote the definitive biography of Isaac Bashevis Singer, of which my mom was privileged to get a free copy, hardcover.
I agreed that I would be lucky to find a man like this. But as husband material?

I learned later that the relationship of over 50 years that mom's "boyfriend" formed with another man started as a pickup in a "cruisy area" in Central Park in New York City. At that time, apparently neither of them expected the encounter to last longer than a day. It seems that it took a long time before the mattress cooled enough for the 2 of them to learn each other's thoughts, feelings & philosophy of life. 

The advice I got from various non-relatives as to how I could attract a man who was strictly heterosexual but strictly a gentleman, with charm, culture, wit, tact, responsibility & a solid salary, all had to do with trust.

According to some, my fatal flaw was a very ugly lack of trust in men. As they told me themselves, I had to have faith! Most men, I was told, have a lot of deep-down goodness, an almost medieval Sense of Honor. Doubting a man's word was incredibly insulting, a blow to his self-esteem and a sign of perverse bitchiness. I had to stop doing that. If necessary, I should seek a male counsellor to help me with this.

According to others, my fatal flaw was a childish gullibility, a dangerous tendency to believe whatever I was told. Of course guys wanted to use me! Who wouldn't? How could I ignore clear evidence of dishonesty, manipulation, shiftiness in general? Was I really that stupid?

I was told a lot about the nature of "most men," even though no one on earth knows most men. This would be billions of people - it just isn't possible. The best tools I know of to determine IF males have a "nature" which is different from that of females, and then to determine what that is, are surveys in various forms.

On the ground, away from the intellectual rigor of intellectual tools, "most men" are either honest or they are not. Either "most men"  believe in gender equality (in the sense that it already exists or in the sense that it would be a good thing). Or they do not believe in any of that hooey.

Either I am appallingly cynical or I am appalingly naive, but not both.

I suspect another round is coming at me after lo! these many years. Some things never seem to change.
 

Current Mood: calm

Alison Tyler, who is on my favorite-people-for-the-day-list, just sent me the link to this fantastic review of Open for Business: Tales of Office Sex

Here's (she says modestly) my favorite bit: I'm a sucker for good conversation, as in the CB Potts tale of a headhunter going the extra mile to land the hot-shot executive. In "Headhunter," the exchange of words is just as crisp and hot as the sex that follows. It's a surprisingly short story for all that you learn about the characters, and even the carefully crafted sex scene has no distracting surplus. Beautiful, it is. And hot.

You can get Open for Business here

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Now for something completely different: Free Patterns for all kinds of crafting stuff. You do have to give them your email, and they want to sell you magazines, but woo hoo for all kinds of downloadable free PDF patterns!

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Now I need to get back to work.

Okay, someone want to explain to me how it is possible that I did not go to the gym yesterday, but woke up sore and achy everywhere this morning? Grrrr. Even the forearms ache a bit this morning; which is even more annoying. (This sounds like a question for Night Nurse, my favorite member of the Legion of Super Heroes.) I also had some horrific nightmares last night; one so bad it woke me up. I haven't had nightmares in a long time, which is just weird (weird that I had one; not that it's been a long time). Go figger.

Okay, so I woke up this morning achy and sore, paid bills (an odious chore if ever there was one) and have to go to work later on today (an even more odious chore). I was planning on going to ye Olde Gymne and Melanoma Center this morning, but this tired and sore and achy thing has me rethinking the whole concept. I do have to run errands today, including the post office (must...mail...bills...) and go to the bank (blech). I am feeling singularly unmotivated this morning, which is even more irritating. My, what a whiner I am this morning! But at least I have my work schedule figured out for this week; and I know that I have a day off on Sunday to look forward to. Whee! Next week is going to be a fairly light work week as well, which is even nicer (I do so enjoy light work weeks). Then, the week after that we actually start the research project, and I will know my schedule for a month at a time, which is even nicer. Whee!

I haven't been writing, which bugs me to no end (but apparently not enough to actually make me write anything) and I seriously need to get with it on that regard. I tried working on the Kansas book, but for some reason I just look at what I've already written and feel nothing; no inspiration, no nothing. I have been doing research, though, but I suspect that all research and no writing will get me nowhere. Heavy heaving sigh. I hate that for me, seriously.

Okay, best to get started on the day, methinks.

Current Mood: cranky