Saturday, July 30, 2011
Frank Sinatra (via funiculi-funicula)
There are things about organized religion which I resent. Christ is revered as the Prince of Peace, but more blood has been shed in His name than any other figure in history. You show me one step forward in the name of religion and I’ll show you a hundred retrogressions. Remember, they were men of God who destroyed the educational treasures at Alexandria, who perpetrated the Inquisition in Spain, who burned the witches at Salem. Over 25,000 organized religions flourish on this planet, but the followers of each think all the others are miserably misguided and probably evil as well.
Friday, July 29, 2011
I know this is long but please bear with me Facebook conversation.
Tesk: I am happy. I just realized. I mean really happy, not the yay! pie! happy but the full to the brim of love and productiveness. Yeah, I've got some troubles now and some coming but I know I'll come out better than I go in because I have confidence in myself and love for myself.
Michael: Good work, nigger broheem.
Tesk: That is just not alright, Michael. Don't use that word.
Michael: I won't use the 'B' word again, sorry, Niggz.
Tesk: Seriously, man. Don't say it in any form. It's offensive.
Michael: I don't see anything offensive about it. If someone called me 'cracker', I'd be fine with it, because it's just a skin color. Nothing more. I think you're just light-hearted.
Tesk: I think it's a word that represents generations of oppression and senseless hatred. I think that It's a word that is more disgusting than any other in any language I have heard before because it represents the worst humanity has in itself. I think you just don't fucking joke about how terrible it is to be hated just because of the way you were born.
Cracker doesn't compare. It's not the same. It's not even on the same league as that word. Cracker still wears a bib and scoots around on its diapered ass. That word is inconceivably awful and it's impossible to fully empathize with how it can make the person it's directed at feel.
Michael: I stand by my argument that racial slurs are only offensive if one makes it offensive.
Same with any kind of discriminative word. 'Faggot' for example. I don't see the point of any of these words being taken offensively, they're just words. Racism means nothing, because skin colour means nothing. So, black people were taken into slavery a while back. So what? If anything, it's white people who should get offended by such a word for their massive ignorance and greed.
Tesk: I've run out of words for the stupid in that sentence. Is this a sticks and stones argument? Words will never hurt you but sticks and stones will? I suppose that lynching disproves that, hm? That's sticks, stones, and names! Wow, gee. What a dealy, yo?
Michael: *waits*
Tesk: If you honestly think you're on the level about what it's like to be discriminated against, to be the victim of prejudice, or to feel the full brunt of someone's irrational hatred then you are far too ignorant to function properly. If you think you have even remotely "trumped" me then you are far more a fool than I thought you were. Get off your fucking horse and look around. Racism isn't gone. It's alive and ugly and no little boy talking about words he knows the definition of but has no comprehension of the meaning behind them can ever think to so much as come close.
Michael: I know what it's like to be discriminated against and I know what it's like the be the victim of prejudice. No, I never, ever used the word out of irrational hatred. There is no reason for hatred. If black people can so freely use a word that is so discriminative of themselves, why do they do it? Because they don't actually care. The word was never offensive and never will be offensive, unless heard by stuck up prudes like yourself. People need to learn that if a word is used as a fun loving greeting or title, it's not meant to offend and it shouldn't. No matter what the word. Don't take life so serious, niggz.
Tesk: You really will never get it. Just as much as I won't. You just refuse to understand that there's a difference.
They don't use the word because they don't care. Some of them use it to make it hurt less; to make the sting of it less harsh when others say it. The word is offensive and has always been offensive and no matter what you do it won't make it any different. Because that word is a scar across society. Now, a scar. Think of it as a barely closed wound, still red and swollen and hurting because it is.
I am not stuck up and I am not a prude; I just have respect for the people I love. And I can see it in faces I pass and in situations that come up that it is in no way a fun loving word or title.
What you're doing it sterilizing it in the most crass and offensive way possible. What you are trying to do will make the word lose meaning and make people forget and that's not what needs to be done.
We should never forget what happened to those people. We should never paint over the pain and oppression they suffered just to make ourselves feel better. It was there and it happened and now what we have left is hatred personified in that word. Racism isn't over. It isn't even nearly there. That word you say should be used in a fun way is still used in a derogatory way.
This isn't some long past word that's no longer used is a slur but a still present and living beast that strikes out at others.
And it is never, ever oh-fucking-kay to use it.
Michael: It's pretty hilarious sometimes.
Tesk: This isn't a joke at all. Not even a little bit. And I want you to think about how un-funny it is. You've never tried to console a teenage girl, sobbing her eyes out because of that word before. You've never seen a woman stand to the side and watch a black girl get arrested and laugh like it's the rightest thing in the world. You've never seen what sort of destruction that word and its sentiment can bring.
Michael: Yes, but people are assholes.
Tesk: And you're definitely a people right now.
Michael: You know it.
Tesk: Indeed. I'm de-friending you now. This idiocy is not something I want to associate with.
Michael: Good work, nigger broheem.
Tesk: That is just not alright, Michael. Don't use that word.
Michael: I won't use the 'B' word again, sorry, Niggz.
Tesk: Seriously, man. Don't say it in any form. It's offensive.
Michael: I don't see anything offensive about it. If someone called me 'cracker', I'd be fine with it, because it's just a skin color. Nothing more. I think you're just light-hearted.
Tesk: I think it's a word that represents generations of oppression and senseless hatred. I think that It's a word that is more disgusting than any other in any language I have heard before because it represents the worst humanity has in itself. I think you just don't fucking joke about how terrible it is to be hated just because of the way you were born.
Cracker doesn't compare. It's not the same. It's not even on the same league as that word. Cracker still wears a bib and scoots around on its diapered ass. That word is inconceivably awful and it's impossible to fully empathize with how it can make the person it's directed at feel.
Michael: I stand by my argument that racial slurs are only offensive if one makes it offensive.
Same with any kind of discriminative word. 'Faggot' for example. I don't see the point of any of these words being taken offensively, they're just words. Racism means nothing, because skin colour means nothing. So, black people were taken into slavery a while back. So what? If anything, it's white people who should get offended by such a word for their massive ignorance and greed.
Tesk: I've run out of words for the stupid in that sentence. Is this a sticks and stones argument? Words will never hurt you but sticks and stones will? I suppose that lynching disproves that, hm? That's sticks, stones, and names! Wow, gee. What a dealy, yo?
Michael: *waits*
Tesk: If you honestly think you're on the level about what it's like to be discriminated against, to be the victim of prejudice, or to feel the full brunt of someone's irrational hatred then you are far too ignorant to function properly. If you think you have even remotely "trumped" me then you are far more a fool than I thought you were. Get off your fucking horse and look around. Racism isn't gone. It's alive and ugly and no little boy talking about words he knows the definition of but has no comprehension of the meaning behind them can ever think to so much as come close.
Michael: I know what it's like to be discriminated against and I know what it's like the be the victim of prejudice. No, I never, ever used the word out of irrational hatred. There is no reason for hatred. If black people can so freely use a word that is so discriminative of themselves, why do they do it? Because they don't actually care. The word was never offensive and never will be offensive, unless heard by stuck up prudes like yourself. People need to learn that if a word is used as a fun loving greeting or title, it's not meant to offend and it shouldn't. No matter what the word. Don't take life so serious, niggz.
Tesk: You really will never get it. Just as much as I won't. You just refuse to understand that there's a difference.
They don't use the word because they don't care. Some of them use it to make it hurt less; to make the sting of it less harsh when others say it. The word is offensive and has always been offensive and no matter what you do it won't make it any different. Because that word is a scar across society. Now, a scar. Think of it as a barely closed wound, still red and swollen and hurting because it is.
I am not stuck up and I am not a prude; I just have respect for the people I love. And I can see it in faces I pass and in situations that come up that it is in no way a fun loving word or title.
What you're doing it sterilizing it in the most crass and offensive way possible. What you are trying to do will make the word lose meaning and make people forget and that's not what needs to be done.
We should never forget what happened to those people. We should never paint over the pain and oppression they suffered just to make ourselves feel better. It was there and it happened and now what we have left is hatred personified in that word. Racism isn't over. It isn't even nearly there. That word you say should be used in a fun way is still used in a derogatory way.
This isn't some long past word that's no longer used is a slur but a still present and living beast that strikes out at others.
And it is never, ever oh-fucking-kay to use it.
Michael: It's pretty hilarious sometimes.
Tesk: This isn't a joke at all. Not even a little bit. And I want you to think about how un-funny it is. You've never tried to console a teenage girl, sobbing her eyes out because of that word before. You've never seen a woman stand to the side and watch a black girl get arrested and laugh like it's the rightest thing in the world. You've never seen what sort of destruction that word and its sentiment can bring.
Michael: Yes, but people are assholes.
Tesk: And you're definitely a people right now.
Michael: You know it.
Tesk: Indeed. I'm de-friending you now. This idiocy is not something I want to associate with.
There's a reason I keep my opinions to only about fictional characters
It has to do with the fact that what one sees in the media about a fictional character is what there is to a character and what one sees in the media about an actor or artist is what the media wants us to believe about that particular person.
I’m putting in a page-break because I doubt anyone wants to see me up on my soap box. I’m hoping that at least a few people will take a moment to at least skim through a paragraph or two.
A lot of people like to pretend or are possibly ignorant to the fact that “celebrities” (for lack of a better word) are defenseless to the slander painted against them no matter what Congress has to say to that. Just because these people’s professions put them in the lime light does not mean they asked to be called a slut or anorexic or an addict. It seems to me as if people forget that Lohan, Winehouse, Bush, Parker, even Stewart are people. They have (or had in the recently deceased Winehouse’s case) feelings and lives, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers and other people they care for. All of these stories about slutting around town, shooting up, raging incompetence, and lack of a soul are hurtful.
I honestly can’t believe in an age where we en mass cry out against cyber bullying and rage against terrorists that we can support or condone what the current day media do. I just wished that once people would really, really put themselves in those “infamous” celebrities positions and actually think about how it would feel to be nominated for “Villain of the Year” and win “Worst Dressed Performer” or third worst dressed British Woman. I want people to take a moment and think of how they would feel, honestly feel to be ranked number two on Richard Blackwell’s 48th annual “Ten Worst Dressed Women” list.
Take a moment and think about how your parents, siblings, grandparents, or whomever you call your loved ones would feel about hearing stories of you doing smack from People Magazine or having an affair from the evening news. Imagine everyone who you care what they think of you finding out about a completely fictitious evil that you purportedly did and never looking at you the same way. Imagine the stress and shame at not being able to defend yourself, lest you turn into another “Charlie Sheen” or “Bill Clinton”.
Take a moment to think about people using your name as a slang way to refer to the most horrifically embarrassing and stressful moment in your life so far.
How fun does that sound?
Do you think you asked for it?
Do you think you deserve it for being a smacked out anorexic whore?
How much do you think these perfectly normal and privacy wanting people deserve it?
And on to a lower level of this gigantic one woman soap box comes something else I wonder rather a lot. I always sort of feel hot under my cheeks and embarrassed when I look up in the grocery store and am greeted with somebody else’s private life that it makes me wonder how people can enjoy prying into someone else’s life like that. It makes me wonder how someone can read about Pitt and Jolie and not feel ashamed at being entertained by someone else’s traumatic love life. I’m wondering how many people would truly revel in knowing that out there are people snickering and pointing at their picture and talking about how their relationships are falling apart.
Maybe this stems from my utter lack of curiosity about a celebrity’s private life. To me all that matters is their professional front. I want to know what movies they’ve been in, where they studied their art, what awards they’ve won… Things pertaining to their career. I don’t care who they marry or how much they weigh or what they do at clubs because that’s their business and not mine, thanks.
Which brings me back to my original point. I’ll talk all day and night long about fictional characters. I’ll holler about Sherlock’s asexuality or Blake’s whorishness because they’re not real. At the end of it I can point to passages or scripts and point and define and explicate from there because that material has been put down so that I could. I can point out out-of-characterness if someone says Sherlock would tip tap in pink dance shoes and lay a smooch on Moriarty’s naughty bits because I have diction and history and that entire character laid out before me. Fictional characters are there to be dissected and fought over. They are there so that I can. I can’t hurt their feelings or make their mama’s cry because their mamas are made of paper and ink and a suspension in disbelief.
Actors are mediums to a fictional character; they give shape and sound to a nebulous idea and create a solid organ that we can conceive but they are not ours to dissect or deconstruct. Actors are people who are generous enough to lend us their bodies and skill so that we can distill our imaginations. Yes, some are better than others at it and some of them don’t have their life all that well together but that doesn’t give us the right to turn our noses up at our fellow humans and ignore the fact that they feel and that they can see our disgust.
That’s the difference between a character and an actor, really, right there. Characters don’t know we exist. They can’t. They’re not real. Some creative man or woman or many men and women sat down and dreamt them up. They are fake; make-believe. But actors aren’t. They are flesh and heart and dreams and hopes and families and histories and laughs and hands that reach out into the night to hold our empty palms because they are human also and because they know; they understand and want to give us a brief reprieve from the isolation that is so intrinsic to the human condition. And to touch us and give us this break from reality they put on ways and means and wigs and make up and stand under lights and call out words that aren’t theirs and pretend with all their might to be this make-believe person so that we can pretend to know this make-believe person and find company in their stories.
So how can we hate them for lies and gossip when they do so much for us? How can we not thank them (of course, from a healthy distance) for all that they do for us? How can we not respect their humanity and give them the respect and privacy that we find such a self-evident right?
I’m putting in a page-break because I doubt anyone wants to see me up on my soap box. I’m hoping that at least a few people will take a moment to at least skim through a paragraph or two.
A lot of people like to pretend or are possibly ignorant to the fact that “celebrities” (for lack of a better word) are defenseless to the slander painted against them no matter what Congress has to say to that. Just because these people’s professions put them in the lime light does not mean they asked to be called a slut or anorexic or an addict. It seems to me as if people forget that Lohan, Winehouse, Bush, Parker, even Stewart are people. They have (or had in the recently deceased Winehouse’s case) feelings and lives, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers and other people they care for. All of these stories about slutting around town, shooting up, raging incompetence, and lack of a soul are hurtful.
I honestly can’t believe in an age where we en mass cry out against cyber bullying and rage against terrorists that we can support or condone what the current day media do. I just wished that once people would really, really put themselves in those “infamous” celebrities positions and actually think about how it would feel to be nominated for “Villain of the Year” and win “Worst Dressed Performer” or third worst dressed British Woman. I want people to take a moment and think of how they would feel, honestly feel to be ranked number two on Richard Blackwell’s 48th annual “Ten Worst Dressed Women” list.
Take a moment and think about how your parents, siblings, grandparents, or whomever you call your loved ones would feel about hearing stories of you doing smack from People Magazine or having an affair from the evening news. Imagine everyone who you care what they think of you finding out about a completely fictitious evil that you purportedly did and never looking at you the same way. Imagine the stress and shame at not being able to defend yourself, lest you turn into another “Charlie Sheen” or “Bill Clinton”.
Take a moment to think about people using your name as a slang way to refer to the most horrifically embarrassing and stressful moment in your life so far.
How fun does that sound?
Do you think you asked for it?
Do you think you deserve it for being a smacked out anorexic whore?
How much do you think these perfectly normal and privacy wanting people deserve it?
And on to a lower level of this gigantic one woman soap box comes something else I wonder rather a lot. I always sort of feel hot under my cheeks and embarrassed when I look up in the grocery store and am greeted with somebody else’s private life that it makes me wonder how people can enjoy prying into someone else’s life like that. It makes me wonder how someone can read about Pitt and Jolie and not feel ashamed at being entertained by someone else’s traumatic love life. I’m wondering how many people would truly revel in knowing that out there are people snickering and pointing at their picture and talking about how their relationships are falling apart.
Maybe this stems from my utter lack of curiosity about a celebrity’s private life. To me all that matters is their professional front. I want to know what movies they’ve been in, where they studied their art, what awards they’ve won… Things pertaining to their career. I don’t care who they marry or how much they weigh or what they do at clubs because that’s their business and not mine, thanks.
Which brings me back to my original point. I’ll talk all day and night long about fictional characters. I’ll holler about Sherlock’s asexuality or Blake’s whorishness because they’re not real. At the end of it I can point to passages or scripts and point and define and explicate from there because that material has been put down so that I could. I can point out out-of-characterness if someone says Sherlock would tip tap in pink dance shoes and lay a smooch on Moriarty’s naughty bits because I have diction and history and that entire character laid out before me. Fictional characters are there to be dissected and fought over. They are there so that I can. I can’t hurt their feelings or make their mama’s cry because their mamas are made of paper and ink and a suspension in disbelief.
Actors are mediums to a fictional character; they give shape and sound to a nebulous idea and create a solid organ that we can conceive but they are not ours to dissect or deconstruct. Actors are people who are generous enough to lend us their bodies and skill so that we can distill our imaginations. Yes, some are better than others at it and some of them don’t have their life all that well together but that doesn’t give us the right to turn our noses up at our fellow humans and ignore the fact that they feel and that they can see our disgust.
That’s the difference between a character and an actor, really, right there. Characters don’t know we exist. They can’t. They’re not real. Some creative man or woman or many men and women sat down and dreamt them up. They are fake; make-believe. But actors aren’t. They are flesh and heart and dreams and hopes and families and histories and laughs and hands that reach out into the night to hold our empty palms because they are human also and because they know; they understand and want to give us a brief reprieve from the isolation that is so intrinsic to the human condition. And to touch us and give us this break from reality they put on ways and means and wigs and make up and stand under lights and call out words that aren’t theirs and pretend with all their might to be this make-believe person so that we can pretend to know this make-believe person and find company in their stories.
So how can we hate them for lies and gossip when they do so much for us? How can we not thank them (of course, from a healthy distance) for all that they do for us? How can we not respect their humanity and give them the respect and privacy that we find such a self-evident right?
Thursday, July 28, 2011
ORS: Otherwise May be Referred to as A Summer Night, Contemplating the Powerlessness of Youth and the Natural Strength Therein
There's the rush; the feel of air so solid and free rushing through hair. Then the pacifier; the calm and tingling cold that stays the place of air. A total feeling of inebriating freedom as bare legs are whipped by the tall brown grass that has dried up to hibernate through summer. Come the first good rain and the field would be alive and moist with green leaves and brown grass life. Then the feeling of dry dirt and uneven trails under old sneakers. The ground still whispers at the heat of the day, lightly hinting at stale hot and petrifying light. It's the quiet that happens in a full house of sleeping people. The noise of a city turning over in its sleeping and sighing out in wait of the coming day.
Pale eyes look up and up to the stars, swirling and still and stiff as a statue of a famous dancer. There's no motion but the memory of a great dance in the sky. Messy hair drifts out and settles for tip tapping little brushes against shoulders and neck. Still on Earth. Still living. There's the air again but not from running. It isn't the fast rush and desperation of moving just so it feels like the oppression is suddenly leagues behind instead of three blocks to the left and one block down. It's the slow and gentle touch of displaced atmosphere running through hair to remind but not push.
Long, strong palms stretching into bony tapered fingers wrap around a shaft of grass and grip loosely, pulling steadily and carefully until the plant is uprooted and hanging like the death of thousands off the youthful hand. The plant is lifted to young frown lined face and examined under the brilliant and nebulous lunar light.
Indifferent fingers grip tighter for a moment as elbow extends and wrist flicks then palm unfurls and the plant is flung off and out of sight.
Round, childish legs pick dodge carefully through the grass back to the small black and uneven bike path. An old soul sits on the asphalt and leans back on strong arms with elbows flexed back.
Pale eyes don't see the stars nor the moon; they settle on black cuts on air and brown pikes in earth and follow the lines of power out of sight but never out of mind.
Pale eyes look up and up to the stars, swirling and still and stiff as a statue of a famous dancer. There's no motion but the memory of a great dance in the sky. Messy hair drifts out and settles for tip tapping little brushes against shoulders and neck. Still on Earth. Still living. There's the air again but not from running. It isn't the fast rush and desperation of moving just so it feels like the oppression is suddenly leagues behind instead of three blocks to the left and one block down. It's the slow and gentle touch of displaced atmosphere running through hair to remind but not push.
Long, strong palms stretching into bony tapered fingers wrap around a shaft of grass and grip loosely, pulling steadily and carefully until the plant is uprooted and hanging like the death of thousands off the youthful hand. The plant is lifted to young frown lined face and examined under the brilliant and nebulous lunar light.
Indifferent fingers grip tighter for a moment as elbow extends and wrist flicks then palm unfurls and the plant is flung off and out of sight.
Round, childish legs pick dodge carefully through the grass back to the small black and uneven bike path. An old soul sits on the asphalt and leans back on strong arms with elbows flexed back.
Pale eyes don't see the stars nor the moon; they settle on black cuts on air and brown pikes in earth and follow the lines of power out of sight but never out of mind.
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
THe Rest of That 30 Day Challenge I Forgot To Post
Day 03 – Your favorite series
1. Harry Potter
2. Vladimir Todd
3. Pendergast
4. Pendragon
5. Artemis Fowl*
*I read it as a kid and I liked it well enough but I never finished it.
Day 04 – Favorite book of your favorite series
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
Otherwise known as: When shit really starts getting complicated and where Snape is no longer a two dimensional character.
Day 05 – A book that makes you happy
Hamlet—I love that his inaction has more dire consequences than his actions ever could. I love how he toys with madness to get leverage. I love the moralistic issues present in the book and I love the humor the book has.
Day 06 – A book that makes you sad
Atlas Shrugged—It just does.
Day 07 – Most underrated book
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
So what if most of it takes place somewhere that isn’t Hogwarts? That doesn’t mean the plot didn’t happen. What happens at Hogwarts does not stay at Hogwarts.
Day 08 – Most overrated book
Macbeth—I know, I know, technically a play but whatever. It was terrible. The entirety of it. The only part of it that made it worth reading was ONE quote: (“Out damn spot, out!”)
Day 09— A book you thought you wouldn’t like but ended up loving
Hamlet—I thought it was just going to be another shit Shakespeare book with fun language and a bunch of sex jokes but nothing else of merit and it really wasn’t. It was such a great read and I loved every word of it.
But a book I thought I’d absolutely hate but instead absolutely love is Pride & Prejudice. It was so fucking entertaining and silly. It was basically just a ye old rom com and everyone loves a good rom com. I love how painfully shy Darcy is and how much of a dick he was. I love how Lizzy is just as flawed as everybody else. I love how there wasn’t a single perfect character in the book and that they acted realistically given the situations. I found the character’s interactions to be fun to watch and Lizzy’s thoughts to be amazingly relatable. I loved the tone of the narration and I especially adored how ridiculously Lizzy and Darcy acted with each other.
Day 10 – Favorite classic book
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. It was fucking brill. Like seriously one of the best books I’ve read to come out of a non-modern era. It was so rich and complex but simple at the same time. It was an amazing book to read and kept me entertained throughout.
Day 11 – A book you hated
Bullet by L.k.Hamilton—I used to love her series but they went so down hill after she divorced her first husband that they’ve become sort of novel length PWPs instead of stories. I used to really look up to her. It wasn’t often I came across a female author as a kid and when I did their stories wouldn’t be about the struggle between preternatural and man. Sure, it would be there. “Oh no I’m being haunted,” but the plot’s main focus would always be romance. I hated that—still hate that. I just get so sick of reading romantic stories or stories where women can’t be strong without men or where a man doesn’t have a healthy life without a lady by his side and that’s just BORING. But LKH’s books weren’t like that. Anita was a strong, snarky and independent woman who was perfectly fine that way, thank you very much. She didn’t have a “sweety” and that was no sweat off her hot ass. She was good at what she did and a bit quirky. She wasn’t perfect, no, but she wasn’t meant to be. And I loved that. I looked up to that. When I was a teenager LKH was my hero. And I guess that’s why I feel so betrayed by her works now. They are everything I absolutely hated about other female author’s books except exponentially magnified.
/rant
Day 12 – A book you used to love but don’t anymore
Again, just sort of see day 11. I used to love her books but now they’re all tainted by disappointment and betrayal.
Day 13 – Your favorite writer
Neil Gaiman—Hands down one of the most creative and amazing authors that I have ever read. Ever. He is just so damn fabulous. His prose are original, insightful, and fun.
Day 14 – Favorite book of your favorite writer
My favorite book of Neil Gaiman’s is Good Omens—A fantastical witty novel about the coming of apocalypse and how it’s stopped by an angel with a book fetish, a demon with a car fetish, and a small gang of children lead by the antichrist. Yeah, it’s pretty damn amazing.
Day 15 – Favorite male character
Favorite male book character has got to be Aloysius Pendergast. He rocks like rocks rock. Followed by Sherlock Holmes. Because he is also amazing. Batman is not on this list because he is not from a novel.
Day 16 – Favorite female character
Hermione Granger. Because she knows how important it is to study, is loyal to the point of risking everything, has a head on her shoulders the likes of which most can not compare. Because she is a badass motherfucking witch and you best check yourself before she destroys you.
Day 17 – Favorite quote(s) from your favorite book(s)
Oh fuck no. Oh fuck fuck fuuuuck no. This would be a project not some witty short reply. Fucking no.
Day 18 – A book that disappointed you
Every book after Narcissus in Chains By LKH. (See book 11.)
Day 19 – Favorite book turned into a movie
Fight Club—Because everyone needs to learn that what you have is not what you have to lose. ‘You must lose everything before you can gain anything.’ Because we have to embrace our baseness, our savagery before we can truly become civilized instead of shaved monkeys in clothes. Because we all have two sides and we need to learn to give in to that other side sometimes and because we need to learn when not to give in to it. Because the ending scene in Fight Club is the most romantic fucking scene I have e’er clasped my eyes on. And HBC is fucking rad.
Day 20 – Favorite romance book
Pride & Prejudice—Because they had to overcome their pride and their prejudice. Because the relationship was realistic and organic. Because it grew slowly over time through talking and watching. Because Darcy is adorable and because Lizzy isn’t perfect.
Day 21 – Favorite book from your childhood
I don’t remember its name but my grade five teacher read to us this book about a ship of people (pirates?) whose captain dies and they have a woman take over and she comes so fully into the role that they flourish under her hand. But when she gets back to her home country she is forced back into the shackles that are skirts and bodices and she is so trapped. Then she breaks free and returns to her crew to sail the sees in freedom.
Day 22 – Favorite book you own
I only own books I have yet to read and am interested in or books that are favorites of mine. So… sort of all of them.
Day 23 – A book you wanted to read for a long time but still haven’t
The Art of Possessing Joy by Alice Walker. My BFF reaeaeaeally wants me to read it and I love AW’s other book, The Color Purple so I don’t think I can really resist. I will once I get it.
Day 24 – A book that you wish more people would’ve read
Anything. I don’t care what people read or when they read or even how they read so much as they pick up a book and read it. I really don’t give a flying fuck on a hog in a tutu what people read, that’s up to them, I just want them to read regularly and like it.
Day 25 – A character who you can relate to the most
Sophie from Howl’s Moving Castle—because she thinks she’s cursed to an average and uneventful life because of who she was born as but in the end she ends up happy and successful and special and so do all of her siblings but it’s still a struggle and it’s still hard and she’s still not perfect and that is fantastic.
The Troll/Jack from Troll Bridge ( a short by Neil Gaiman)—because he has spent so long underneath that bridge and he wants to live a life and Jack’s imperfect life is exactly what he wants but he’s still afraid of it. And Jack because he spends his whole life stuck in the past and his regrets, forever on that bridge between the future and the past and he keeps choosing the past until he ends up the troll under the bridge, eating away jack’s life.
Day 26 – A book that changed your opinion about something
Fight Club—refer to day 19.
Day 27 – The most surprising plot twist or ending
Howl’s Moving Castle—because like woah, where that portal leads. Really? Holy shit… Because that isn’t a fetish of mine. Haha.
Day 28 – Favorite title
Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch.
Day 29 – A book everyone hated but you liked
Their Eyes Were Watching God. Because it was a good book. Catcher in the Rye. Because the protagonist is my generation. The Giver. Because freedom, choice, and diversity are what make life so worth living and if you remove them then we might as well be dead.
Day 30 – Your favorite book of all time
Hamlet, Fight Club, Please Don’t Kill the Freshmen, Howl’s Moving Castle, Good Omens, The Color Purple, Harry Potter, Sherlock Holmes, Pride & Prejudice, The Picture of Dorian Gray… I really could go on.
1. Harry Potter
2. Vladimir Todd
3. Pendergast
4. Pendragon
5. Artemis Fowl*
*I read it as a kid and I liked it well enough but I never finished it.
Day 04 – Favorite book of your favorite series
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
Otherwise known as: When shit really starts getting complicated and where Snape is no longer a two dimensional character.
Day 05 – A book that makes you happy
Hamlet—I love that his inaction has more dire consequences than his actions ever could. I love how he toys with madness to get leverage. I love the moralistic issues present in the book and I love the humor the book has.
Day 06 – A book that makes you sad
Atlas Shrugged—It just does.
Day 07 – Most underrated book
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
So what if most of it takes place somewhere that isn’t Hogwarts? That doesn’t mean the plot didn’t happen. What happens at Hogwarts does not stay at Hogwarts.
Day 08 – Most overrated book
Macbeth—I know, I know, technically a play but whatever. It was terrible. The entirety of it. The only part of it that made it worth reading was ONE quote: (“Out damn spot, out!”)
Day 09— A book you thought you wouldn’t like but ended up loving
Hamlet—I thought it was just going to be another shit Shakespeare book with fun language and a bunch of sex jokes but nothing else of merit and it really wasn’t. It was such a great read and I loved every word of it.
But a book I thought I’d absolutely hate but instead absolutely love is Pride & Prejudice. It was so fucking entertaining and silly. It was basically just a ye old rom com and everyone loves a good rom com. I love how painfully shy Darcy is and how much of a dick he was. I love how Lizzy is just as flawed as everybody else. I love how there wasn’t a single perfect character in the book and that they acted realistically given the situations. I found the character’s interactions to be fun to watch and Lizzy’s thoughts to be amazingly relatable. I loved the tone of the narration and I especially adored how ridiculously Lizzy and Darcy acted with each other.
Day 10 – Favorite classic book
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. It was fucking brill. Like seriously one of the best books I’ve read to come out of a non-modern era. It was so rich and complex but simple at the same time. It was an amazing book to read and kept me entertained throughout.
Day 11 – A book you hated
Bullet by L.k.Hamilton—I used to love her series but they went so down hill after she divorced her first husband that they’ve become sort of novel length PWPs instead of stories. I used to really look up to her. It wasn’t often I came across a female author as a kid and when I did their stories wouldn’t be about the struggle between preternatural and man. Sure, it would be there. “Oh no I’m being haunted,” but the plot’s main focus would always be romance. I hated that—still hate that. I just get so sick of reading romantic stories or stories where women can’t be strong without men or where a man doesn’t have a healthy life without a lady by his side and that’s just BORING. But LKH’s books weren’t like that. Anita was a strong, snarky and independent woman who was perfectly fine that way, thank you very much. She didn’t have a “sweety” and that was no sweat off her hot ass. She was good at what she did and a bit quirky. She wasn’t perfect, no, but she wasn’t meant to be. And I loved that. I looked up to that. When I was a teenager LKH was my hero. And I guess that’s why I feel so betrayed by her works now. They are everything I absolutely hated about other female author’s books except exponentially magnified.
/rant
Day 12 – A book you used to love but don’t anymore
Again, just sort of see day 11. I used to love her books but now they’re all tainted by disappointment and betrayal.
Day 13 – Your favorite writer
Neil Gaiman—Hands down one of the most creative and amazing authors that I have ever read. Ever. He is just so damn fabulous. His prose are original, insightful, and fun.
Day 14 – Favorite book of your favorite writer
My favorite book of Neil Gaiman’s is Good Omens—A fantastical witty novel about the coming of apocalypse and how it’s stopped by an angel with a book fetish, a demon with a car fetish, and a small gang of children lead by the antichrist. Yeah, it’s pretty damn amazing.
Day 15 – Favorite male character
Favorite male book character has got to be Aloysius Pendergast. He rocks like rocks rock. Followed by Sherlock Holmes. Because he is also amazing. Batman is not on this list because he is not from a novel.
Day 16 – Favorite female character
Hermione Granger. Because she knows how important it is to study, is loyal to the point of risking everything, has a head on her shoulders the likes of which most can not compare. Because she is a badass motherfucking witch and you best check yourself before she destroys you.
Day 17 – Favorite quote(s) from your favorite book(s)
Oh fuck no. Oh fuck fuck fuuuuck no. This would be a project not some witty short reply. Fucking no.
Day 18 – A book that disappointed you
Every book after Narcissus in Chains By LKH. (See book 11.)
Day 19 – Favorite book turned into a movie
Fight Club—Because everyone needs to learn that what you have is not what you have to lose. ‘You must lose everything before you can gain anything.’ Because we have to embrace our baseness, our savagery before we can truly become civilized instead of shaved monkeys in clothes. Because we all have two sides and we need to learn to give in to that other side sometimes and because we need to learn when not to give in to it. Because the ending scene in Fight Club is the most romantic fucking scene I have e’er clasped my eyes on. And HBC is fucking rad.
Day 20 – Favorite romance book
Pride & Prejudice—Because they had to overcome their pride and their prejudice. Because the relationship was realistic and organic. Because it grew slowly over time through talking and watching. Because Darcy is adorable and because Lizzy isn’t perfect.
Day 21 – Favorite book from your childhood
I don’t remember its name but my grade five teacher read to us this book about a ship of people (pirates?) whose captain dies and they have a woman take over and she comes so fully into the role that they flourish under her hand. But when she gets back to her home country she is forced back into the shackles that are skirts and bodices and she is so trapped. Then she breaks free and returns to her crew to sail the sees in freedom.
Day 22 – Favorite book you own
I only own books I have yet to read and am interested in or books that are favorites of mine. So… sort of all of them.
Day 23 – A book you wanted to read for a long time but still haven’t
The Art of Possessing Joy by Alice Walker. My BFF reaeaeaeally wants me to read it and I love AW’s other book, The Color Purple so I don’t think I can really resist. I will once I get it.
Day 24 – A book that you wish more people would’ve read
Anything. I don’t care what people read or when they read or even how they read so much as they pick up a book and read it. I really don’t give a flying fuck on a hog in a tutu what people read, that’s up to them, I just want them to read regularly and like it.
Day 25 – A character who you can relate to the most
Sophie from Howl’s Moving Castle—because she thinks she’s cursed to an average and uneventful life because of who she was born as but in the end she ends up happy and successful and special and so do all of her siblings but it’s still a struggle and it’s still hard and she’s still not perfect and that is fantastic.
The Troll/Jack from Troll Bridge ( a short by Neil Gaiman)—because he has spent so long underneath that bridge and he wants to live a life and Jack’s imperfect life is exactly what he wants but he’s still afraid of it. And Jack because he spends his whole life stuck in the past and his regrets, forever on that bridge between the future and the past and he keeps choosing the past until he ends up the troll under the bridge, eating away jack’s life.
Day 26 – A book that changed your opinion about something
Fight Club—refer to day 19.
Day 27 – The most surprising plot twist or ending
Howl’s Moving Castle—because like woah, where that portal leads. Really? Holy shit… Because that isn’t a fetish of mine. Haha.
Day 28 – Favorite title
Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch.
Day 29 – A book everyone hated but you liked
Their Eyes Were Watching God. Because it was a good book. Catcher in the Rye. Because the protagonist is my generation. The Giver. Because freedom, choice, and diversity are what make life so worth living and if you remove them then we might as well be dead.
Day 30 – Your favorite book of all time
Hamlet, Fight Club, Please Don’t Kill the Freshmen, Howl’s Moving Castle, Good Omens, The Color Purple, Harry Potter, Sherlock Holmes, Pride & Prejudice, The Picture of Dorian Gray… I really could go on.
In which I try to find what has been troubling me lately
I don't know what I'm going to write about so I'll just sort of... let go and write.
I haven't been able to pay attention recently. Like more so than I'm known for. Like I don't know what it is but something has taken up a lot of space in my brain and I can't figure out what it is. I've been extra spacey, especially at work. I've misread like three names a day and that NEVER happens to me. Respondents usually like me because I always say names correctly but I've been saying Mike instead of Mark, Bill instead of Will... and while they are close to the original name the point is that this never used to happen to me.
I'm actually feeling a bit unsafe because my driving tonight was really outrageously dangerous and not on purpose. I just wasn't noticing the things I should be. I want to figure out what is going on and get it to stop.
I feel like I'm paralyzed and unable to do anything productive and it's making me even more distracted by being stressed over being so distracted. I hate the fact that my attention span never stays no matter how much I want it to. I don't like the fact that I space out so much all the time (and now I'm talking about my normal space cadetting and not my superspacing that I've taken to recently).
I want to be able to sit in a room with my friend and not have my mind wander while they're talking. I hate that it takes so much energy for me to concentrate on anything at all. I... I want to be able to focus. I think I know why it's going on but I still just wish it would stop.
I mean... yeah, I do have this huge fear of being insane because it's possible and that terrifies me. I don't want my capability to make good judgement calls to be impaired. I don't want to not have the ability to make the right choice when it comes down to it and I know I've been stressing more and more recently that there is a possibility that I might be schizophrenic, however remote it may be.
It's just... I know the symptoms and I know the signs and I know that I'm about that age when it makes its first showing but at the same time I am sort of terrified that it will happen. I've become so hyper aware of the symptoms of it that I sit there and worry every day what if this means it's going to happen what if that means it? But at the same time I'm going: Tesk, don't be daft. You don't have it. You're fine; safe. Everything will be all right. But I can't stop being afraid.
I am consumed by a fear of losing my mind. But at the same time I am terrified of finding out there is something wrong with me and I can't conquer this fear. I am too afraid of finding out I am, in fact, crazy, than I want relief in a clear bill of mental health that a therapist could give.
At the end of the day the only thing that is of any comfort is the fact that I am completely terrified of being insane and that I can say to myself: Self, you're over-reacting. There is nothing wrong with your brain.
Because that scares me. I could live with arthritis, asthma, anemia, diabetes, or one of the other multitudes of illnesses that are possible but I am paralyzed by a fear of something being wrong with my brain. My body is my vehicle but the brain is who I am and I don't want to lose who I am. Especially not to my brain. I don't want to be the thing that destroys me.
I haven't been able to pay attention recently. Like more so than I'm known for. Like I don't know what it is but something has taken up a lot of space in my brain and I can't figure out what it is. I've been extra spacey, especially at work. I've misread like three names a day and that NEVER happens to me. Respondents usually like me because I always say names correctly but I've been saying Mike instead of Mark, Bill instead of Will... and while they are close to the original name the point is that this never used to happen to me.
I'm actually feeling a bit unsafe because my driving tonight was really outrageously dangerous and not on purpose. I just wasn't noticing the things I should be. I want to figure out what is going on and get it to stop.
I feel like I'm paralyzed and unable to do anything productive and it's making me even more distracted by being stressed over being so distracted. I hate the fact that my attention span never stays no matter how much I want it to. I don't like the fact that I space out so much all the time (and now I'm talking about my normal space cadetting and not my superspacing that I've taken to recently).
I want to be able to sit in a room with my friend and not have my mind wander while they're talking. I hate that it takes so much energy for me to concentrate on anything at all. I... I want to be able to focus. I think I know why it's going on but I still just wish it would stop.
I mean... yeah, I do have this huge fear of being insane because it's possible and that terrifies me. I don't want my capability to make good judgement calls to be impaired. I don't want to not have the ability to make the right choice when it comes down to it and I know I've been stressing more and more recently that there is a possibility that I might be schizophrenic, however remote it may be.
It's just... I know the symptoms and I know the signs and I know that I'm about that age when it makes its first showing but at the same time I am sort of terrified that it will happen. I've become so hyper aware of the symptoms of it that I sit there and worry every day what if this means it's going to happen what if that means it? But at the same time I'm going: Tesk, don't be daft. You don't have it. You're fine; safe. Everything will be all right. But I can't stop being afraid.
I am consumed by a fear of losing my mind. But at the same time I am terrified of finding out there is something wrong with me and I can't conquer this fear. I am too afraid of finding out I am, in fact, crazy, than I want relief in a clear bill of mental health that a therapist could give.
At the end of the day the only thing that is of any comfort is the fact that I am completely terrified of being insane and that I can say to myself: Self, you're over-reacting. There is nothing wrong with your brain.
Because that scares me. I could live with arthritis, asthma, anemia, diabetes, or one of the other multitudes of illnesses that are possible but I am paralyzed by a fear of something being wrong with my brain. My body is my vehicle but the brain is who I am and I don't want to lose who I am. Especially not to my brain. I don't want to be the thing that destroys me.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Shot music
I love listening to music. Especially through headphones. Headphones make it so much easier to seperate myself from the world around me and just focus on the one thing. Just the music and that's it. It's so hard for me to think about just one thing that it feels wonderful to slow down and let the notes consume me.
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