sundries

[rm]

Beach beach beach. Just a day trip, but Patty and I are excited.

In many ways I truly, deeply loathe the transitory nature of the Internet. Because one day a story is there, and then one day it's not.

Currently, Wimbeldon is host to the longest tennis match in history. Which sort of sucks for the guy with the job live-blogging it. But that's okay, he's writing about the zombies. (If you don't care about tennis the hilarity starts around 4:30pm).

azn_jack_fiend has an important post about taking kids to Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Australia has elected its first female prime minister. Are we talking about what she's wearing yet?

NYC'ers: Planned Parenthood Fundraiser at the Museum of Sex. bethynyc will be reading tarot at it.

sparkindarkness explains when homophobia is okay. (Note: this is called a teaser, kids).

The gay Brady Bunch.

It is now raining oil in Louisiana. Maybe. The problem if you Google around on this is that you have a bunch of people, all with agendas arguing about whether this can or can't happen or whether the video is adequately sources (what should people do? interview the fucking oil). Nearly everyone interested in the subject has an incentive to lie from BP to the government to anyone impacted by the oil spill. So maybe it's raining oil in Louisiana. Maybe it's not. But the idea that we're even having this conversation should be enough to terrify you.

A small fandom auction has been organized to benefit dr_is_in. Check it out; she could use your help.

I am in the process of organizing an LJ auction to benefit theotoky. If you know her and are willing to help mod it, please let me know.

Last night on Angel: "Apocalypse Nowish."

What I was perhaps most struck by was the degree to which you don't know what the end of the world is going to look like -- one minute, everything is fine; the next? fiery death is raining from the sky. Even in a world without demons, this is a true thing, isn't it? Fireworks are just gunpowder; and 9/11 was the most beautiful day of the year. I was incredibly moved and chilled by this. There's a lot going wrong structurally in Angel for me right now, but this truth was significant.

The Wesley/Fred/Gunn drama is both too overt and too unpleasant to watch, which I suppose means there is a certain realism in its execution, but I'm finding it grating on some level. Similarly Connor/Cordy is a situation I find revolting, although there's truth there too.

Best line delivery, ever: "My throat was slit, and my friends abandoned me."

Speaking of the end of the world, check out Chicago.

Also speaking of the end of the world, from @Paul_Cornell: have you been affected by issues surrounding Horse Boy?

Comments

[bethynyc.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much!!!

[bitsyrant.livejournal.com]

Maybe this makes me awful but, when Wes delivered that line, my response was "Don't kidnap your friend's son next time and deliver him to his enemy and maybe that whole throat slitting/friend abandoning thing might not happen".

[rm.livejournal.com]

I didn't think Wes was going to deliver him to Holtz/Justine, more that he was just deluded enough to think he could bolt and no one on either side would find him.

[bitsyrant.livejournal.com]

I'm not so sure that's the case, although I fully admit to not having seen Season 3 in a while. As I recall, he was talking with Holtz before that and was being surprisingly influenced by him.

Also? Why not tell someone, *anyone*, about that prophecy? I get keeping mum with Angel but, really? Couldn't confide in anyone else? Being all butt hurt because the girl of your dreams is with your best friend is not a very good excuse in my book. Plus there's Lorne who is kind of psychic and good with the reading of destinies so, you know... there were options.

This is just an occasion where Wes seemed to be looking for pity and I just don't have any for him. He has to accept at least some responsibility for losing his friends.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, Wesley failed big time, but I view it as less "drama about Fred" (although fuck am I sick of that) than I do as "irrevocably broken" and "Watchers are more trouble than not" which is all ridiculously interesting to me.

Wes fucked up, but the aftermath everyone, including him, seemed to be doing their best to make everything much much worse.

[bitsyrant.livejournal.com]

I never thought of it that way. I've always seen it as "I should tell somebody about this prophecy but, oh, I'm so heartbroken and isolated". You're right, though, he's obviously influenced the Watcher's Council (which damaged him) and his relationship with his actual family (which damaged him even more).

Everyone does make things worse in the aftermath and there are moments when each of them say and do things that make me want to throw sticks at them (Fred's behavior in "Supersymmetry" is a fine example). This particular line from Wes made me go from feeling sympathetic to thinking "Oh, fucking get over yourself, Wes".

[rm.livejournal.com]

Oh, no question the bastard's in love with his own pain and always had been or he never would have gotten himself into this mess (or be having an affair with Lilah).

[bitsyrant.livejournal.com]

I know this has been said elsewhere, but Wes and Lilah is possibly my favorite relationship in the entire series. They are too perfect for each other in the best and worst ways.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's TOTALLY the care crash I can not look away from. Narratively, they make each other way more interesting; their dynamic screws with gender roles in some really strange ways; and in spite of the evil and the stupid I totally find myself wanting them to work out, but since Angel is all about Life Sucking For Everyone Ever, I actually assume one of them will murder the other in the end.

[bitsyrant.livejournal.com]

If this were any other show (that isn't something created by Whedon) they would totally save each other from their respective bullshit. Alas.

[sevendayloan.livejournal.com]

I have no idea why, but this is the funniest thing I've ever read. The italics just make it for me. Only in the Whedonverse... xD

[smirnoffmule.livejournal.com]

Angel is all about Life Sucking For Everyone Ever, I actually assume one of them will murder the other in the end.

That just made my head explode.

[tdanaher.livejournal.com]

In many ways I truly, deeply loathe the transitory nature of the Internet. Because one day a story is there, and then one day it's not.

I've gotten into the habit of leveraging the use of a pdf printer (CutePDF Writer) and Evernote to save things. When something appears on the web that makes my eyebrows go up for whatever silly or serious reason, I just clip it to an Evernote notebook, or print to pdf and stash it in both the cloud and a local drive.

[brewsternorth.livejournal.com]

I *love* the print-to-PDF facility. (It's native to Macs, and unexpectedly also a boon on my Asus Eee PC running Linux, since I don't have a working printer.) I tried saving actual webpages before that, but the amount of stuff I had to save along with it hardly made it worth it.

[lefaym.livejournal.com]

Are we talking about what she's wearing yet?

Not that I've seen, but the first comments I got on my Facebook update about it was one assuming I like her only for her genitals, followed by two "jokes" about periods and hormone replacement therapy. >:(

I'm feeling very disheartened by that.

[eumelia.livejournal.com]

In many ways I truly, deeply loathe the transitory nature of the Internet. Because one day a story is there, and then one day it's not.
There are so many stories gone now :(

Does raining oil count as a sign of the apocalypse? Talk about an incentive to smoke in doors...

[berric.livejournal.com]

Are we talking about what she's wearing yet?

I haven't seen anything about clothing yet but I did see a news segment talking about her many different hairstyles.

There has however been a lot of "She's not married and she has no children"

[airspaniel.livejournal.com]

That tennis liveblog is one of the funniest things I've read in ages. I salute that poor, dear man.

[emily-shore.livejournal.com]

In many ways I truly, deeply loathe the transitory nature of the Internet. Because one day a story is there, and then one day it's not.

I'm really glad I got into the habit of saving stories that I wanted to refer back to. Even so, this doesn't help with broken links and stories that other people have recced. Internet Archive only goes so far.

[tsarina.livejournal.com]

That tennis live blog is a thing of wonderful and terrible beauty. That writer deserves a prize! (It reminds me of my last year of high school, running the newspaper and we realized none of us liked sports so we were completely fucked in terms of what we might do. Some of the writers just started trying to write the most melodramatic football stories ever and ended up winning state medals for them.)

[awils1.livejournal.com]

We didn't elect her!

What happened was a leadership spill - not enough of Rudd's MPs supported him for PM, and thus Gillard was voted in by said MPs. The public had no say in the matter.

[sanat.livejournal.com]

This. My Kiwi flatmate felt obliged to point out that her "election" was more like Jenny Shipley's than Helen Clarke's (the latter being NZ's first elected female PM). (I don't know, I just started living down here...)

[sanginmychains.livejournal.com]

Much the first Canadian woman to be PM, then. The current PM retired as head of his party, and so the next to be elected as head of the Conservative Party got to be PM. Not womankind's proudest moment, exactly. But as I keep saying, bureaucracy has a power that in many ways supersedes the apparent power of elected officials, so maybe it's okay to call it a "real" election after all.

[beccaelizabeth]

zombies still goin
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2010/jun/24/wimbledon-2010-isner-mahut-live

[hab318princess.livejournal.com]

Loved the blog on the tennis... I caught the last few hours of it on BBC2 after work (with a detour to the soccer as my home team - Germany - kicked off at 7.30)...

Isner won 70 - 68 after another hour today!

[thought-ribbons.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the mention for the fandom auction! You're Fantastic!!!

[sevendayloan.livejournal.com]

Ah, I love Apocalypse Nowish, though I have to fast-forward the Connor/Cordy bit every time. Wes gets some of the best lines in this episode! Some of them (My throat was slit, and my friends abandoned me.) made me cheer, and some of them (Leave them on.) made my gut twist all uncomfortable like, but they were all brilliantly delivered. I think Alexis Denishof really shines as an actor this season.

As for the Wes/Gunn/Fred thing, well. I'll admit, Fred isn't my favorite character. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate her or anything. I think she's adorable and sweet and all that jazz. But I don't really like the effect she seems to have on other characters. Wes and Gunn had the MOST EPIC BROMANCE in season two, and watching them fight tooth and nail over this girl just sort of bums me out. Plus, Wesley kind of crosses into obsessive territory there for a bit, and that's just no fun. (I may also be the slightest bit jealous. :P Fred's so perfect! Gorgeous, brilliant and universally loved? Damn!)

... aaand in other Angel news, I love the visuals of the apocalypse, and my bizarre Lilah love cemented itself this ep.

[semisonicstar.livejournal.com]

The Avatar racebending makes me horrendously sad. I was so excited when I first heard there would be a movie... I have 0 desire to support it though, however casually. meh. Disgusting.

I do really feel for any parents who have to try and explain this to their children. That takes a lot of strength, my best thoughts to them all.

[sanat.livejournal.com]

azn_jack_fiend's talk with her son reminds me of a random remark from my 7-year-old cousin. She's adopted from China, her mother/my aunt is Japanese and her father/my uncle is Euro-American, like moi. She loooves playing with me whenever I'm over, and last time I was there she claimed me as her new mommy. I said you have a mommy, and she declared, "I want a tall mommy!"

We all laughed, cuz kids say the darnedest things, eh? But on reflection I really hope it wasn't the beginning of something worth worrying about.

Hopefully the awareness raised prior to Avatar's opening will cause more discussion, at least.

[usullusa.livejournal.com]

Not related to anything, but xturncoatxiii and I have just come to the conclusion that you are, in fact, the 12th Doctor.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Hahahahahaha. Why's that?

[usullusa.livejournal.com]

The time stamp on sparkindarkness's entry is a good four hours later than the time stamp on your entry. Ergo, you must be a time traveler.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Ah, hahahahahahaha. The power of edits!

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

heh, possibly time zones? :)

[usullusa.livejournal.com]

I like my theory best.

[bugeyedmonster.livejournal.com]

lol! Or maybe RM has a vortex manipulator?

[phaetonschariot.livejournal.com]

She wasn't actually elected - she took over the Labour party from Rudd and by default the PMship, but there was no election.

Interestingly the first confirmation I had that she'd got it was in a random dungeon in WoW with a group of complete strangers. One of them announced that they had their first female PM and we had a brief discussion about her vs Rudd which was very complimentary and didn't mention her looks at all. (Though she was described as "having balls".)

[chaos-by-design.livejournal.com]

I felt really bad for Connor himself, but I hated the way his story ultimately turned out. They didn't really know what to do with that character, imho.

I hated the Fred/Gunn/Wesley triangle because first off, I hate love triangles. I think they're way, way, way overused. If nobody ever wrote another love triangle again for 50 years, 50 years later it would still be overused. That's how overused it is. Instead of having drama that naturally results from two personalities interacting and conflicting you get 'drama' artificially inserted through the triangle. And it's always so painfully obvious who's going to 'win' in the end. And yet you have to sit through it anyway.

It also made Fred into a boring plot device that broke up a well-written and interesting male friendship. And she was already a fairly boring character anyway.

[bugeyedmonster.livejournal.com]

Love triangles are over used, and no one very realizes that the sensible solution to a love triangle is a theesome.

Just my opinion though...

[chaos-by-design.livejournal.com]

Hah, that's awesome!

[tommx.livejournal.com]

Similarly Connor/Cordy is a situation I find revolting, although there's truth there too.

Keep watching. :-)

[calanthe-b.livejournal.com]

Are we talking about what she's wearing yet?

No, we're talking about the colour of her hair and the fact that she's a non-closeted atheist.