The Chipper Orange Shoe
May. 7th, 2009
04:00 pm - Busy Week in bullets:
-Read Lousia May Alcott's Behind a Mask on Sunday. I liked it a lot, surprisingly. Turns out that LMA preferred writing "blood and thunder" stories, it's just that sentimental Little Women-type stories sold better. We've been discussing Behind a Mask all week in Gothic Lit, and Wednesday's eighty-minutes of class was spent almost entirely on whether or not it was offensive to feminists. Basically, it was everyone in the class verses this one guy, who insisted that, because the character was manipulating people for her own ends, she was a villain. At least, that was my impression of his argument. I felt it was mitigated by the fact that, if she DIDN'T succeed, she was destined to wind up in the poorhouse, assuming life as a prostitute didn't kill her first. Also, in the end, the worst harm was that the Coventry family was embarrassed, and several of them were actually better off for it. I'm not saying that Jean Muir is a shining example of goodness and sparklies, but I don't think she's particularly villainous.
-Wrote an 1000 word paper on the symbolism of a uterus shown independent of a woman's body in a mental hygiene film made back in 1966. That was...interesting.
-Went to Rowan's place for drinks on Tuesday. Got a back massage from Josh. His girlfriend is soooooooo lucky :)
-Got a bunch of books for my Gothic Lit project on Runaways. Hopefully I'll find something helpful.
-Watched Eraserhead for Trash Cinema. I really, really did not like that movie. I'm not fond of the abstract-y stuff to begin with, and all of the background noises were magnified. I do not need an entire scene where the actors have to speak loudly to be heard over the sounds of puppies suckling and squeaking. Nor do I need five to ten minutes of steam-from-a-radiator noises. Also, there was imagery that made me want to upchuck my snack. So I wound up with my fingers in my ears and my eyes closed in a dark room, and thus nearly fell asleep in self-defense. Conclusion: Do not want. So glad I didn't have to write on this one.
-Got put in groups for my Editing and Publishing project. My group is me, two other girls, and a guy (who also reads Terry Pratchett), and our unifying theme is Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Playing With Gender. I think this is going to be fun :D
And now I'm going to do homework before CSI. Theoretically.
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/smile.gif){kind=small}
calmApr. 3rd, 2009
01:07 pm - Yay, Friday!
Man, I'm going to LOVE Fridays. All done at 11.20AM, on top of the usual "Fridays are awesome"? Winzor.
My Gothic Lit. professor now has the first trade of Runaways. And she apparently has a kid at home who is devours graphic novels/comic books. Mwahahahahaha, mine is an evil laugh!
Also, I think Susan Sto Helit in the Discworld books might have an allusion to Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The BirthMark", sorta-kinda. Granted, the titular birthmark disappears when Georgiana blushes, and Susan's appears when she blushes, but the blushing and appearing-and-disappearing makes me wonder. Or maybe I have no idea what I'm talking about. That is always an option.
In other news, let's hear it for Iowa legalizing gay marriage. It's officially time to get with the program, everyone!
Dan Savage is doing a talk on campus tomorrow about Prop 8. I am SO looking forward to it.
happyMay. 8th, 2008
09:32 pm - this week
So yeah, I suck with updating.
The obnoxious G.A.P. asshats showed up again. But they were only here for two days this time, yay.
This is made of awesome. Video games for curing diseases! Harnessing the free time of the internet for SCIENCE!
I had my phonology midterm on Tuesday. I think I did okay, but then, I also thought I did okay on the previous homework. We got that back today, and I got 65 out of 100. Gahh. Fortunately, we can redo it for up to half the points back. We will also be able to do the same thing with the midterm. And the professor promised to try not to go into labor while she was teaching.
We've been getting a lot of applications for ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small}
trans_9, the multi-fandom RPG that I'm helping run. The game itself isn't kicking off until June 16th or so, which means I still have time to decide the point of the timeline I'm yoinking Ax(imili-Esgarrouth-Isthill) from. Yes, I know, I stopped reading Animorphs years ago. I just suddenly wanted to play him. I'm also playing Paco, from Blue Beetle. We have exciting plot! :D
I'm doing a skit of The Paper Bag Princess in Japanese tomorrow. I'm playing the princess, and I have the most amount of lines. I think I have about half the lines. Fortunately, the most complex is "Anata ga kyuujo suru tsumori desu!", which hopefully means "(I will) rescue you!"
My roommates and I had to go and sign a new lease, since our building is now owned by a different company. Or something, we're not quite sure what the story is there. Either way, this new company actually sends people out to fix crap in a reasonable amount of time. It's very exciting. Anyway, we worked out a few more rules -- mainly "clean up after yourself in the kitchen". Yes, this was a bit of a problem, sadly.
Also, some of our spoons have gone missing. It's utterly bizarre.
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/working.gif){kind=small}
busyDec. 17th, 2007
05:48 pm - Back
Back from vacation! It was glorious and wonderful. The place we stayed was utterly gorgeous. Also, very windy. But I like windy, especially when it doesn't fuck up the power.
We were there with my parent's work; there's usually a big trip at the end of the busy season -- sort of a combination "yay, busy season's over!" and "good job everyone!" There were some people that I hadn't met before, since I'm not in and out and underfoot there anymore, but there were a lot of familiar faces. I hung out with my voice teacher and her husband a lot, that was fun. Also, I had some awesome conversations about sci-fi. Dana did my hair and make-up for the big dinner night. She did a really good job on it too.
Most of the time was spent mooching around, as vacations are supposed to be spent. I got a massage, which was really nice, and this time I didn't have to go to the airport and have a mini-break down afterward, so there was all sorts of win. Mom felt kind of icky, but her room was really nice with a gorgeous view, so at least there was that.
Sharing a room with my sister makes me want to thump her over the head. Mostly because she's very loud in the morning and wakes up about an hour and a half before I do. Gahh.
Aaaaaaand LiveJournal just ate a chunk of my post. Thanks a lot, LJ. I hate it when it does that.
I read some of the books Dad lent me. Here's what I've concluded by about two and a half books in:
1) the Protagonist is far too smug for an amnesiac tricking his way into what is clearly a dangerous situation. Fortunately, he becomes less so when he fails and has to spend four years regrowing his eyeballs.
2) Of the handful of women who have appeared, only two of them have distinct personalities. One of them is evil. The other one is introduced and killed within a hundred pages.
3) Nope, still don't care about the protagonist.
In other news, we have a cover for the third issue of the Young Avengers miniseries. here is the scans_daily post with the cover.
Tell me that, at first glance, the beige-ish part of Wiccan's uniform doesn't look like bared flesh. And make it look like he's wearing thigh-high boots.
Aside from that amusing bit, though, his uniform is beginning to look rather busy. I'm trying to decide between a Saruman Billy the Many Colored joke and a Joseph Billy and the Technicolor Dream Coat Uniform joke. Or maybe just comment that we know how to make a stripper version of Wiccan's costume now.
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/blah.gif){kind=small}
hungryAug. 1st, 2007
02:31 pm - Jenn's Birthday!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JENN! *maul, huggle*
Got a call from the laptop repair people yesterday. They said that the problem was with the fan and the replacement parts are ordered, so I should have it back by the end of the week. I pointed out to my parents later that "Um, duh it's the fan. That's what we told them was the problem, that the fan was making distressing whining noises." A week and a half to tell us that we were right. Fantastic. Shut up and fix my laptop, dammit.
In other news, the Wankpocalypse (ie the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows) seems to be less of a bang and more of a whimper. I'm kind of sad, I was looking forward to a fandom 'splosion.
I also called my old voice teacher and set up a time to go by and do some more singing. I think I'll bring a tape to get some voice exercises recorded for when I'm back at school. Yay.
cheerfulJul. 20th, 2007
07:17 pm - Awesome stuff of today
So I went to Bellevue Square to meet with ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
astridsdream today. It was way fun :D :D :D We wandered around and looked at swords and electronics and other awesome stuff and discussed ideas about the upcoming Harry Potter book.
Thanks for the invite, Laura! *huggles*
Speaking of the Harry Potter book, I'm going to visit Jenn down at Top Foods instead of going to the Barnes&Noble party. Top Foods has the book, after all, and Jenn's been scheduled in to work until 1AM. *tries to remember if she brought the invisibility cloak home*
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/bouncy.gif){kind=small}
excitedJun. 26th, 2007
02:54 pm - Razor Girl
So, I did my "leading the discussion" assignment today. We're reading Neuromancer, a cyberpunk novel. One of the main characters, Molly Millions has retractable/extendable razor blades under her fingernails, and a souped up nervous system. She also has occular implants that look like mirrored sunglasses. She's a street samurai, and fucking kick ass. Due to the razors under her nails, she's called a "Razor Girl".
So I jumped on the excuse to dress up. And I took pictures!
( Under the cut to save your friends lists/because I don't know what I'm doing )
Fun was had by all, and the teacher thought it was awesome. Go me! *dance*
Also: False fingernails are REALLY FUCKING ANNOYING. I would go insane before they got anywhere near the length pictured. I couldn't freaking type with those on.
Also, I discovered that face paint doesn't taste anywhere near as nasty as lipstick. This was good, as we don't own any red lipstick, but we do have red facepaint. That's what's on my lips to make them red.
accomplishedApr. 30th, 2007
07:32 pm - Discworld Day and gorilla testicles
Happy Belated Discworld Day to everyone!
Okay, so I've never mentioned Discworld Day, but I was trying to figure out when Towel Day was (May 25th, in memory of Douglas Adams) and decided that I ought to have a Discworld Day too. A check at Wikipedia shows that Terry Pratchett's birthday was April 28th, and that seems like a good day as any to celebrate the fantabulousness of his stories.
Also: OMG! Possible Wee Free Men movie! *flails with delight*
In other news, I kidnapped Angela after Theatre 101 and brought her back to my room for tea and discussion. I also apparently wigged out a random girl during my conversation with Angela, the statement in question being "Gorillas have relatively small testicles" or something along those lines. I read about this study experimenting with the whole "women are designed to be monogamous, men are designed to be promiscuous" stereotype. Female gorillas don't tend to sleep around, so male gorillas have evolved smaller testicles, but there was this other species (I think it was Bonobo?) where the females did tend to sleep around, and the males developed comparatively large testicles. Something about having to shoot their semen further or something. Apparently humans have testicles between those two extremes, relative to their size. So while human females are not quite as likely to cheat as female bonobos, it clearly could still be an evolutionary asset for us (for example, if none of the male bonobos know who the father is, they all pitch in to help, just in case it's their genetic material goobering around).
So I need to find that study and send it to my Psychology of Gender teacher. She's awesome, so I don't think she'd mind the debate.
chipperApr. 28th, 2007
03:46 pm - Stolen meme
Ganked from dorksidefiker.
Give me a pairing, a character or a general fandom and I'll tell you what song I associate with that.
Instructions
1. Be sure that I know the fandom. And it would also be better if you gave me a character/pairing that I like - after all, I don't usually tend to associate songs with pairings or characters I don't like. :D
2. If you're wondering whether you should choose general fandom, a character or a pairing, I say you'd go for the pairing. Because...
3. If I don't have a song for the pairing you have given me, I'll give you a song for either of the characters in the ship. If I fail to do that, then for the fandom. If I don't have that, either, I'll ask for a new pairing/character.
4. You can ask the same pairing/character that has already been asked by someone else. I usually have more than one song at hand. You can also request multiple pairings/characters, if you want to.
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/blank.gif){kind=small}
blankFeb. 17th, 2007
01:48 pm - Meme Answer Time!
All right, fine. Since no one else seems interested in posting questions, this is what I have:
( Fun below the cut! )
chipperSep. 12th, 2006
06:32 pm - A good book
My therapist, Nancy, had a book for me to borrow today when I went in. It was called The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You. It's a really good book and OH GOD does it finally help me to make some fucking SENSE of my life.
The book isn't saying that other people aren't sensative, or that the five senses of a highly sensitive person are any more acute. The image that Dr. Aron used to elborate was that machines that sort fruits by size; most people's machines sort into two or three sizes whereas a highly sensitive person (referred to as an HSP) sorts into more along the lines of ten. Things that most people can handle are simply overstimulating to HSP's, which leaves them exhausted and in need of quiet time to recharge.
One of the great things about this book is that being an HSP isn't treated like a problem to be fixed. HSP's are not somehow "wrong" because they spend a lot more time alone than the average person.
Anyway, it's a good book and I recommend it, even if you think that you fall into the HSP range, it's a fun read.
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/up.gif){kind=small}
relievedAug. 19th, 2006
02:16 pm - Longmire Fic Challenge
( You are about to view content that may not be appropriate for minors. )
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/determined.gif){kind=small}
determinedApr. 20th, 2006
05:21 pm - Drabble-meme ganked from cheesygirl
( You are about to view content that may not be appropriate for minors. )
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/idea.gif){kind=small}
creativeApr. 2nd, 2006
07:17 pm - The Destroyer
My dad has this book series called "The Destroyer".
It's your pretty basic spy/martial arts fusion - guy learns martial arts to pwn the asses of everyone, girl-of-the-book, all sorts of fun death, sex, death, death, sex, and a ass-kicking old (Korean) martial arts master who (obviously) kicks ass and mocks the merry hell out of our protagonist while teaching him to be kickass as well. Absolute bubblegum books; they have no social redeeming value but damn aren't they a fun read. If I recall correctly, they were originally written by two guys, then one of them died and the other kept writing, and then that guy's daughter started writing them, and now they're co-written by the guy and his daughter. Or something. While it was just the daughter writing, there was less death, but apparently they've gone back to killing people again. There are over one-hundred fifty books (I've only gotten through...ten, I think. They all kind of run together. I said they were bubblegum!).
Apparently, back in 1985, they made a movie based on the books.
I giggle. Madly.
laughing hystericallyJan. 8th, 2006
04:57 pm - More Fannish Behavior
...Once More With Potter!
( Not Mine. J.K. Rowling's )
ETA: Again, the site in question can be found here
boredishJan. 6th, 2006
11:38 pm - Fannish Behavior
Look! Good Omens doll-things!
( Standard Disclaimer, of course, applies. The characters belong to PTerry and GNeil. )
The site I used can be found here
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/snore.gif){kind=small}
sleepy03:46 pm
I talked to Jeron during Linguistics. Apparently, we have that class together.
He didn't remember going all stone-y when I introduced my sister or when Erin and Joey came to sit with us. He didn't seem too interested in changing it.
So...he's firmly in the "aquaintance" class. I expect my friends to, at the very least, play nice with each other in a face-to-face situation. Meh.
I've finished my math homework for the weekend. I just have some reading for Linguistics and Liberal Studies (Chapter Four and up through book 15, respectively). I like reading. But I'm playing right now, so nyah.
I think I want to do my "presentation" in Liberal Studies on Adam and Eve and the fruit of knowledge thing. If they don't know the difference between good and evil, then how to they know that disobeying God is wrong?
Along that train of thought, it's kind of funny listening to everybody reading into the Bible so much. Like the whole "apple" thing - it probably wasn't an apple, since apples don't grow in that area of the world. And the fact that it was fairly obviously written by multiple different people.
Although I had to work at not giggling during class today. There was a brief discussion on metaquotes awhile back (specifically, here) that mentioned Genesis. So I spent the class trying to repress the image of God "seeing that it was ^_^".
But, back to the apple as the fruit of Doomy Death ((hi, doctorv!)) -- Does anyone wonder if there's a connection between that apple and the one in Snow White? What is it with evil and apples? I mean, I know that apple seeds have cyanide in them, but who eats those?
If I could juggle anything besides scarves I'd bring apples to class for the discussion/presentation thing. At the moment, I'm considering finding a toy snake. I'd dress flashy and speak with a British accent and call myself "Antonia J. Crowley, but I don't think anyone would get it. And the professor might send me to the school psychologist.
I wonder if we're allowed to have pet snakes in the dorm. I mean, they say "fish only", but snakes usually live in a terrarium and they don't shed (hair, at least) or anything. I wouldn't get anything poisonous. I'd name it Abella or Serpet because I'm a dork (the former being Latin for "apple" and the latter being Latin for "it crawls" (as far as I know, at least. I can't remember where I found it, so I wouldn't quote me on that)). And snakes don't make noise like a frog would.
Although feeding it live mice might be a bit wiggy. It seems a bit cruel too - unless snakes will also eat dead ones? Or, I don't know, snake kibble? Is there any such thing as snake kibble?
Yeah. What can I say - snakes fascinate me.
bouncyDec. 25th, 2005
12:03 pm - OMG Christmas, yay!
I got SO MANY BOOKS!
*squee* *dance* *attempts to read all of them at once*
One of these books is 20 Master Plots and how to build them by Ronald B. Tobias. Reading (or rather, scanning through) this one accidentally unleashed a little bit of rage that I shall expurge below:
(warning: swearing, frothing, and a general "you")
( I think I can tell you where you can stuff your 'true love conquers all'... )
Oh, and I'd just like to say that I fucking LOVE Terry Pratchett. I got a copy of The Art of Discworld, and he mentions at one point that he learned words through reading too, and it took him the longest time to find out that the monsters that everyone fights in fantasy stories weren't pronounced "ogrees" ^_^
PTerry, you rock my socks.
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/angry.gif){kind=small}
dangerousDec. 13th, 2005
02:26 pm - lazy-butt and Beastmaster
Ahh, hooray for Lazy-Butt Days!
Now, I know what you're thinking - "You're on winter holidays; that pretty much assumes that you're being a lazy-butt!" HOWEVER, today was particularly lazy.
As in I just changed out of my PJ's about fifteen minutes ago.
Yup. I didn't get dressed until after 2 in the afternoon.
Okay, so I did help sort laundry before getting dressed. But still! Lazy-butt!
I also finished the (more interesting) book that I checked out of the library yesterday. It's called The Sense Of Being Stared At and it's about telepathy and the "extended mind" and all sorts of fun stuff like that. It was pretty interesting, although I remain somewhat skeptical, since this book was treating the speech of parrots like the speech of human children; and I know from my Linguistics class that parrots (and the great apes) cannot communicate above the level of a young child. But it was an interesting read nonetheless.
Oh, and then I watched TV while I was sorting the laundry. Bad TV. Bad, bad Sci-Fi show called Beastmaster. It started out with genetic heroism - you know, the "my daddy was a big hero and I have his sword, so I'm a big hero too" sort of thing. Bland characters, gaping plot-holes...I was thinking of printing out a list of things from Television Tropes & Idioms and playing a drinking game or something (probably with tea. Mmm, tea).
Bah! I mock genetic heroes! Bah, I say!
lazyDec. 6th, 2005
09:49 am
Look, I wrote a continuation!
It's from a Good Omens fic, so those of you who haven't read the book may be confused.
What do you mean you haven't read Good Omens?! Go and read it right now! It's Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman! Go! Read! NOW!
ETA *cough* Of course, it helps if I actually post the link, doesn't it?
The Fic and my continuation of Said Fic!
![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/growf/dwaggins/blush.gif){kind=small}
lovedNavigate: (Previous 20 Entries)