Comment to be added.

for anyone who was planning to see 2012, uh, maybe you should avoid that (review contains spoilers). Apparently it features several things we all know and love, including:
1. Bad Dads.
2. Everyone knows divorced women still love their husbands!
3. Women! STAY IN YOUR PLACE.
4. White people are awesome.
(these are all from the original review, she has awesome subheadings!)

( spoilery quotes from that review, completely out of context )


So, wow. I know what I won't be paying to see!

so you know that shirt, "And then Buffy staked Edward, the end"? Ever wanted to see that happen?

( now you can! )

Edit: man, I always manage to screw up cut tags.

Does anyone know someone in the Portland area who would be looking for a kitten? Someone on my friends list has acquired one and, unfortunately, can't keep it. Further details here.

The first 3 songs in MTV's VMA nominee playlist annoy me SO MUCH, and are all horribly anti-women to boot. (Eminem's We Made You, Asher Roth's I Love College, and 3Oh!3's Don't Trust Me.) The Eminem song is...well, let's just say the video and lyrics match his track record. I Love College talks about Asher Roth's magical ability to get women naked at frat parties, and the chorus of the 3Oh!3 song is "don't trust a ho." The 3Oh!3 song is at least catchy--good or bad? I don't want a horrible song stuck in my head, but I can at least understand why it's made its way onto the VMA nominee playlist.

The fourth song is Cobra's Good Girls Go Bad, and, while the lyrics aren't amazing, they're at least not *horrible*, and the video is full of girl secret agents kicking ass, so.

I just got two Dreamwidth invite codes. Anyone have ideas for how I can get rid of them?

I just watched an amazing, feature-length animated film by Nina Paley. You can read a review, go to her blog, or download or stream the movie yourself.

It's about Sita and Rama of the Ramayana, and it's about Nina and her husband. And their cat. And it's funny, slightly sad, and gorgeously animated.

On the responsibility of people who use hate speech when someone takes it beyond speech:


Now if only people like O'Reilly would listen. Or the many conservatives coming out of the woodwork over the hate speech/anti-immigration protests at UNC and claiming that people have the right to freedom of speech, and that includes hate speech. I can see that it's a slippery slope, of course, and hate speech could be seen as difficult to define, but any speech that incites violence, or seeks to dehumanize, is not acceptable, and this is why.

From Slacktivist via truepenny, as part of the ongoing discussion surrounding the murder of Dr. Tiller.

I have 2 Dreamwidth invite codes. If anyone would like one, comment & I'll send it your way.

Authors whom I would really like to continue to support:
Please, please, PLEASE stop writing horrible things on the internet. Or. Just. Stop writing on the internet. I have read and loved your books, and would like to continue reading and loving your books without feeling HORRIBLY GUILTY about it.

tipping point, AKA Mammothfail/RaceFail: Colonialism

I just lost all of my everything on my laptop. Most of my pictures and all of my music were on an external harddrive, so they're safe, but all of my documents (every paper I've written since highschool, everything ELSE I've written since highschool) are gone.

All of the pictures I took in Ireland are gone. That's the worst part. The rest of Europe is still safe on its memory card, but I deleted the Ireland pictures after I moved them onto my computer. I sort of REALLY feel like crying right now.

I reconfigured my C drive and, SOMEHOW, my computer reconfigured ALL of my drives. I have pretty much no hope, but...is there any way I can get any of it back? What should I avoid doing so there's a higher chance?

I'll be gone for most of April starting tomorrow, so any attempts to contact me will probably not work. Where am I going? Well, a lot of places.

I start with a week in Ireland, where I'll see the Ring of Kerry, Dingle Peninsula, Cliffs of Moher, and Dublin. Then on to France, where I'll spend a few days in Paris (and see Versailles) before going to Colmar, a town in Alsace. Then I'll be going to Switzerland to Gimmelwald, a very small town above Interlaken. Then Germany, where I'll hit up Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Füssen for its awesome castles, and then Berlin.

I'm really looking forward to it, partially because this is a big opportunity for me to Be An Adult. I'm doing all the traveling and booking for the traveling by myself, and such milestones as First Rental Car and Sleeping In A Train Station await me.

So! I'll be gone, and when I get back there may or may not be a ridiculous number of pictures.

Translated Japanese interview with Fall Out Boy

( re-posting from ICH because I'm proud of it )

This past weekend I took the bus down to London and saw Fall Out Boy at the O2 arena (as well as doing my tourist thing).

( concert report, video, and pictures )

EDIT: I forgot to show off the shirt I made! I designed it, cut the stencil out of freezer paper, and used spray-on fabric paint and bleach with the stencil. The original design has a lot more text and looks like a movie poster--beneath 'America's Suitehearts' I had 'DOING LINES OF DUST AND SWEAT JUST TO FEEL LIKE YOU!' in smaller text, and under 'BOYCOTT LOVE' I had 'CHANGE WILL COME/03.06.09' in smaller text. At the bottom was 'Mr. Sandman*H. Shoe Crab*Mr. Benzedrine*Donnie the Catcher' in the style of movie poster acting credits, with the first names stacked above the surnames. Alas, it was not to be--I didn't have the time, and I thought the text was too small to stencil well, anyway.

( pictures )

14valentines is a project started by rageprufrock several years ago to bring attention to women's issues through fandom and Livejournal. I've always really liked the project. I thought I'd be able to participate more this year, but severely underestimated how much time moving to another country would take up.

Today's theme is Arts and Entertainment. There's plenty of meta out there about the portrayal of women in bandom, and even fandom in general, and I think others have been more articulate than I can be right now. But I will say that the sheer hatred I've seen addressed toward the wives and girlfriends of band members, and the way women in and surrounding the bands are ignored or turned into stereotypes, is sickening. It's not unique to bandom, but "she's not good enough for him" &c is that much more shocking to me when it's real people.

Anyway! I think that women are, have been, and will continue to be awesome musicians and artists, and today is a great day to celebrate that.

Here is a picture! It's on 22 by 30" Stonehenge paper, done in Prismacolor pencils and blended with their marker blender. It's part of an unfinished diptych dealing with fannishness/obsession in music, and how being at a concert can sometimes be like being part of a cult. It's heavily inspired by a Cobra Starship show I went to in November and references pictures I took there. There's some discoloration due to glare, especially in the lower right corner.

( full view is best )

( detail shots )

Here's the deal: I hate the so-called official lyrics on FOE. They're clearly inaccurate in places, and, as someone who pays attention to lyrics, it really bothers me that they're being presented as the Gods-honest truth.

When my roommate, who is not a Fall Out Boy fan, or even really a fan of newer mainstream bands at all, told me that she had bought FAD after hearing it and liking it before the semester ended, I wanted her to have a lyrics booklet which I approved. Egotistical, I know. I made her a (pretty sweet, if I say so myself) version that combined the FOE lyrics, where I thought they were accurate, with my own interpretation, both when they were obviously wrong (e.g., the ____ in w.a.m.s) and when I thought my version was more correct.

Now, I can't promise these are 100% perfect. But they're sure as hell better than the FOE version, even if that's the one that enjoys official status.

Fair warning: my choices of where to break lines and of punctuation at the ends of lines are largely arbitrary and follow no set rules.

( Lyrics )

tipsofpencils and suiteheart helped when I was originally figuring out the lyrics to Headfirst Slide, and alternatending helped with Pavlove.

EDIT: changed all the "son"s in West Coast Smoker to "sun" based off of this twitter exchange:
@ztnewetep question: what does the line "knock once for the father,twice for the son,three times for the holy ghost" means? (link)
@DiyanaRazinah its "the sun". i dunno sometimes when you overmedicate you find some closeness to something bigger than you...(link)
@DiyanaRazinah ..but the truth is the closeness is false. its faux pa(u)s(e)e. its time to hit the reset button and start the gameover.edit (link)

I'm watching Superstars of Dance on NBC, because I'm a dork like that, and they keep playing Fall Out Boy during the dancer introductions. It's sort of freaking me out--one song would be a coincidence, but multiple is just sort of weird.

Of course, I've heard NBC play them during their football coverage, too, so maybe they're just huge secret fans?

OT: If you're doing a dance style called 'cabaret,' I expect upbeat music. No, really.
Also: I'd forgotten how ugly some dance costumes could be.

from ignipes:
1. OPEN PAINT
2. CLOSE YOUR EYES
3. DRAW A CAT
who also said, "What's with the all caps instructions? Maybe Death started it. He is fond of cats."

( also into cats )

Clearly, I am terrible with staying inside the canvas when my eyes are closed. Too bad this is not a problem when my eyes are open.

Every year, we make these cookies. They're a variant on sugar cookies. It's an old Pennsylvania Dutch recipe that exists in a few variations--this particular one is my great-Grandmother's. They're delicious, but take a little time to make due to the decorating.

4 egg yolks or 2 eggs
6 oz (1.5 sticks) butter
2 C sugar
1 t baking soda
4 C flour
2 T sour milk

350˚ 10 min

Make the sour milk by adding 1/2 t vinegar to the 2 T milk.

1. Cream the butter
2. Add in the sugar
3. Mix the soda into the milk
4. Beat the eggs into the butter-sugar mixture
5. Alternate adding the flour and milk
6. Roll out super thin (really, really thin), cut with desired cookie cutters, and brush with egg yolk. (Be careful to not handle the dough too much, or it will become too tough.)
7. Decorate! We use cinnamon sugar, raisins, chocolate chips, red hots, nuts, and various sprinkles.
8. Bake at 350˚ for 10 min

Makes a lot of cookies--more than 7 dozen, but I'm not sure how many more.

Hope everyone's having a good week!