Monkeys and keyboards aside, one Random + CSS still doesn't make poop.

People who know me or have seen pics know that I have floofy curly super-fine Crazy Irish hair that is about five inches longer when straightened, will stand straight up with little provocation, and will 'fro if it's cut too short. It's usually impossible to deal with--it floofs with hair spray, it floofs without hair spray, it floofs within hours of having been relaxed, it floofs with or without special shampoos, and if I beat down the floof with gel? I look like a drowned rat.

So when I tell you, dear internets, that I've come across a shampoo that can tame the infamous Crazy Irish hair, I need you to know that this is akin to a light-from-the-sky chorus-of-angels miracle that blatantly and completely defies the laws of physics.

And it's even hippie-friendly, too. :D


I really wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't tried it myself--but now that I have, I'll probably never buy normal shampoo again.

Re: Paranormal Activity

Thingie: *goes bump-tap-skritch-thunk-screech-"O hay thar" in the night*

Guy: I am a big manly man and, armed with my camera, I will handle this wtfery on my own with my cunning plan! What plan? Who knows!

Girl: I AM FREAKING OUT AND WILL CONTINUE TO FREAK OUT AND WILL STAY RIGHT HERE AND FREAK OUT LOUDLY.

Me: You guys are so not good at this*.





*Perchance I've run into a few too many things that go bump-tap-skritch-thunk-snore(yes, it snored)-"O hay thar" in the night . . . But I've got the feeling this movie will be to people who've actually dealt with ghosties/poltergeists what "Let's split up and hide from the axe murderer in different rooms of this creepy old house!" is to most normal people.

Yesterday I decided I'd be healthy and go for a run/walk with Oni. Okay, so it's less a "be healthy" and more a "In a month I have two back-to-back workshops with Rachel Brice and Mardi Love. If I intend to survive and/or not have the workshops close with me laying on the floor crying and them toeing me every so often and telling me to STFU and deal, I need to severely up my cardio."

So on my good-intentioned adventure I turned my ankle (again) and ended up hobbling two miles home, and Oni got a tick that ended up partially embedded in his ear, requiring a $50 vet visit. FML. :P

He talked to the vet too much and she muzzled him. I can't really say I blame her--he does have angry eyebrows, a jaw that hinges at the back of his head, and a tendency to sound ferocious. After it came off, he seemed mortified (and thus was silent) for almost ten minutes.

Almost ten. Then it was back to normal . . . well, as normal as he can get.



A hop on the vet's scale showed that Oni now weighs in at sixty-eight pounds--almost twenty-five pounds up from when we got him at the shelter back in '04. This information prompted me to be insensitive--"Damn it, you giant fat hairball, stop stepping on me!"--and prompted zen_of_nihilism to tell terrible jokes: "He's not fat, he's husky! Ba-da-dum-ching!"



One week until Nekocon. I have way, way too much stuff to make--though the steampunky rings have come out fairly interesting thus far. :P So we all know what time it is . . . Bulleted list time!

To do:

Clean not-made-by-me merch from merch wheelie

Check bank balance, mail etsy orders, make byz and half Persian bracelets for local store

At least fifty hair forks: 5 purple/silver, 5 purple/orange, 5 blue/silver, 5 blue/orange, 3 bronze/geary, 4 silver/gold, 4 green/orange, 3 green/silver, 4 fall, 3 calico/geary, 3 gunmetal, 3 gold/geary, and whatever else I turn out.

Hair sticks. Lots. Like 100+ lots. This might require a

trip to Lowe's for a new dremel drill bit.

Finish flower & steampunky rings

Figure out how many supplies I really need to take--I'm tired of lugging an Oni-sized wheelie around.

Paperwork things

I was finally starting to be completely past my Law & Order SVU-induced depression--taking two or three or five seasons in a row apparently does a number on one's mental state--but found myself thrown right back in via cnn.com's front page today. So a poor teenage girl got gang-raped outside her high school's dance by at least four guys and ended up having to be flown to the hospital in critical condition. Further investigation showed that this wasn't just a gang-rape, it was a show--at least fifteen and possibly twenty guys stood around and watched and did nothing to help for the two hours plus duration. Some even joined in.

Wow, I said. It's like Crank, only--oh, wait, Crank wasn't fucking funny either.


For reference: In the Jason Statham movie Crank, Statham's character needs to keep his heart rate up or he'll die. At one point he decides to up his heart rate by having sex with his girlfriend. Against her will. In public and in broad daylight. As a crowd of mixed ages and genders stands around and watches and does absolutely nothing to help her, despite her screaming and shouting no and trying to get away/fight the guy off. Of course, she magically decides she likes it mid-rape (to the cheers of the onlookers), and of course the female witnesses are more concerned with Statham's character's sex appeal and the size of his cock than they are with the woman who was just assaulted in front of them.

It's nightmare-fuel rape played as humor. It's without a doubt the worst movie scene I've ever watched. And now it's come to life, with a resounding shout of, "Silly female! Did you actually think anyone around you would come to your rescue?"


So . . . Do we really wonder where some people might get the impression that this behavior is appropriate?

I'm not advocating censorship here; just awareness. Here's a movie clip where the ditsy blonde girl has her clothes ripped off and is violently forced to have sex in public, despite her struggles. Not one of the onlookers tries to stop her rapist from carrying out his assault. You the viewer are supposed to see it as comedy.

Here's the real-life reflection: teen girl, possibly drunk or drugged, is violently gang-raped in public. Not one of the onlookers tried to stop the rape. What did the guys standing around think? That it was funny? That putting the girl into critical care was a good time? That this was a good chance for them to get off as well?


The area's police haven't released any explanations yet--though I'm sure no explanation given could ever hold water for the victim or victim's family.







In slightly more lighthearted news, a French court convicted the Church of Scientology of organized fraud because of their high-pressure "spend money on us and be saved!" tactics. Scientology spokespeople responded by comparing the ruling to the Inquisition--which, while a step up from shrieking and throwing poo, still goes to show that they Just Don't Get It.

Being fined for victimizing people: It's like being horribly tortured and burned at the stake, in a way. Only not.

Sad when throwing things at Scientologists registers as braincleaner.

Our Bella got the flu, so we only got half the movie filmed. The rest should go fairly smoothly, though . . . well, as long as Oni continues to behave. He's mis/behaved wonderfully so far, and only managed to eat the toe out of a sock.

Don't ask. Yet. :D

~~

I finished Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book and am pretty sure I'm obligated to make the man cookies at some point. The end is a little sudden, but the writing is high-level for a kids' book and overall is one of the better ones I've read in a while. I recommend it.

~~

I finally finished Chelsea Cain's Heartsick. The book's main murder mystery plot seemed eclipsed by the side(?) plot of the insane yet beautiful female serial killer and the suicidally depressed cop she's Stockholm syndrome'd, tortured, and brainfucked into a scarred, divorced, and drug-addled shadow of his former self. I'd say this is probably because the latter is a pretty new concept, while the mystery/thriller section is overflowing with the former.

Either way--the book got off to a somewhat slow start, but once it started moving (and the WTF-y interplay of Gretchen & Archie actually got going) it was interesting. If anyone wants my ARC that I've been hoarding for the past couple years, let me know.

~~

I started reading Captain Blood, too--what can I say, I wanted something out of the ordinary--and was pleasantly surprised. The main character is a near-radioactive Marty Stu (an Irishman who's the best physician around, was an awesome soldier and is still an awesome fighter, speaks perfectly accented Spanish, is oh-so-physically appealing, plots the best & sneakiest plots to ever be plotted, repeat any of those a few times over, so on and so forth) but the story rolls along really well for its originating time period, and it's written on so much of a higher level than what I've been reading lately that I'm frequently astounded. I'm not mentally tripping on the sentences because the language is archaic, I'm tripping because it's such heavy-duty wording that I as a reader have to pay close attention to in order to properly get the feel and description of things. I still don't expect much from it storyline-wise--I'm willing to bet dollars and donuts that the titular character will break hearts, defeat everyone, find treasure, get the girl, and possibly fart roses by the time it's all over--but I'll probably keep with it for a little while longer. Or at least until I find something else entertaining.

We're shooting New Moon Over My Wereheiny tomorrow. God help us.

http://whywomenhatemen.blogspot.com/

I don't hate men. I believe in not discriminating; I hate everyone equally. This site, though, makes me lol for hours and hours on end. Also, it makes me overwhelmingly glad I'm not in the dating pool any more.

Seriously, try it. The commentary on these guys' personal ads will slay you. It's better than fandom_wank in its heyday. (It's also incredibly NWS, but this thing will eat so much of your time it's best to not touch it at work. Ever.)


Seriously. SERIOUSLY. Srsly. I am so srs rite nao.




I'm not sure what's worse about this particular entry: That the poor piece of furniture wasn't suspecting a thing, or that there's more than one of them.

I set up the fishtank again, after a few years of being without. I salted and scrubbed it to kill any remaining unhappiness; I lost main components for the filtration systems and re-purchased them; I bought 50 pounds of pond stone at Lowe's and spent a half hour washing it in the bathtub.

I nabbed the single goldfish from the pond (which has a broken filter and will certainly freeze solid this winter) and tossed him in the tank. He's there to make sure nothing's going to go terribly wrong. I named him Canary.

I'm a bad person. >.>




~~

Bella Sara's pinot grigio is a little more dry than my usual favorite wines, but it's still exceptionally tasty. I have a large bottle--ph34r for those who get in my way tonight. :D (This means any more people who start trying to tell me what I can and can't copyright/own the rights to. Shit never stops. Srsly.)

~~

I need to figure out what I should make more of for the etsy. Any suggestions, dear friends and lurkers?

Me: almost blinded myself too
had the copper spray paint
it got clogged
pushed the button a few times
didn't work
turned it around to look at it
you know how this story goes.

zen_of_nihilism: :-/
is my baby copper finished?

Me: Nah--your tv was safe inside :D

Justine Larbalestier's book Liar is the antithesis of the current YA/urban fantasy/paranormal romance werewolf novels.

I can't go into it very much because the pathological liar narrator creates so many WTF moments, and you as a reader have to pay so much attention, that to start explaining it is guaranteed to start spoiling it. Hell, I've thrown a bit of a spoiler in with my intro sentence here.


I kinda get the impression it won't do as well with younger readers because it does require you to weigh and think and pay attention and make your own decisions regarding the ending . . . but fuck them anyway, I thought it was kinda neat.



Also: Angry owl will eat your face if you say "Orly?" one more time.

Jesus Christ, I lived there. I found a pigeon that'd flown into a window on that stairwell--I brought it home so it'd be okay. I've used that over-street bridge any number of times.

It's like a fucking war zone.

I've found that an interesting thing to do to a storyline is gender-swap it--make the male characters female and vice versa--in order to gain a different perspective on the work.

With the WIP, I picked the genders of the main characters based on society's standard perception of gender roles and with the knowledge that they're both going to have to buck them to grow. Switching gender there, I feel, only serves to lessen the impact.

I went a step further, though--was my decision a right one? Did the girls of this day and age really need yet another female-centric story about our need to fight past gender constraints in order to make our own decisions and mistakes?



A few days ago, I ended up having an enlightening conversation at Kurokirrocon with two girls in the bathroom. The one girl was upset that her boyfriend wouldn't let her go to the dance. His reasoning? The dance was slutty. Also, he was afraid she'd cheat on him.

For reference, the dance was drum & bass (about 180 BPM), hardcore & HHC (about 200 BPM), and gabber (inching up to around 250 BPM). The air conditioning was off, the con funk was so thick it could almost gag you, and the heat probably made it up to 110-115 degrees Fahrenheit. The people dancing there were not slutty; if anything, they more resembled a nest of ants with glowsticks--if you doused the nest in bleach.


Ever helpful (and more than a little overheated), I tried to explain a very important phrase/idea/way of life to the girl: "Fuck him if he can't handle it."

The girl was still upset.

Her friend tries to make things better: "Well, if you wanna talk about slutty, there's someone selling bras in the dealer's room!"

"Yeah," I said. "That's mine."

I did explain to them that yes, it's a costuming thing, and yes, it makes me happy to not have a naked mannequin--but overall I couldn't even bring myself to be offended. They were both obviously too stupid to be let out on their own let alone understand anything beyond their own little worldviews.

Which happened to hinge on boys & on what's "proper" or "slutty," and in no way shape or form draw focus to their own supposed/stunted independence.




Fuck it, I said--it seems this song needs sung at least a few more times.

The G-20 summit has brought the protesters out of the woodwork, and the protesters inevitably bring the police--approximately one thousand of which are newly deputized in order to deal with this event--as well as the bored people with nothing better to do than be angry, and the end result is the tear gassing of CNN reporters in the Strip and students at my old college, the breaking of windows and setting of fires blocks from where I used to live, the arrest of Greenpeace members who'd taken to dangling from Pittsburgh's bridges, and general destruction and mayhem.

newageamazon got a new camera, and has been getting some awesome shots of the protesters--whether or not what they're protesting makes sense.

And now zen_of_nihilism, at work a few blocks from the center of the latest riot, tells me that some students are being dicks awesome awesomely dickish and throwing the canisters of tear gas back at the cops.



I . . . kinda want to be there to see it. :P

Making Friends
WIP
Dog help us.

Clock parts shipments are starting to arrive, so tiny tiny (very tiny) gears are starting to end up . . . well, underfoot. And in jewelry.

The screwdriver set I need to properly take apart some of these watches is on the final leg of its journey to my house, a good chunk of my craft stuff is boxed in preparation for the massive house shift (zen_of_nihilism's gaming stuff & the tv to the old bedroom, the bedroom to the old bunny room, my craft stuff to the old TV area as a semi-office/workspace), and I have too much stuff I need to make.


Also . . .

If something is created with the ability to reason and choose, and that ability is stripped from them, may it still be considered alive? Is stunting free will stunting the development of life itself?



(I'm scared. You should be, too.)

To do:
--Finish & package up 4 orders by tomorrow

Make one set of crackle glass & shell sticks since the old set sold at the last show

Make two forks & 1 barrette set in bronze + red Done!

Find (or make) autumn leaves flower hair fork

Locate & pack up rainbow flowers earrings
--Finish more steampunk resin pieces so they can be de-molded & photographed tomorrow--because if I can get some steampunk stuff done, I'm in as a vendor @ Tribalcon.

The fact that most of my parts for planned pieces are still in the mail isn't lost on me at all. D: D: D:

Panic/flail. Then drink. Then listen to extremely angry techno and get over it. Then get resin everywhere again. Only this time I outwitted it by putting down a plastic sheet! Aha!

OH FUCK. I'M PROLLY GOING TO TRIBALCON.
--Clean the computer area some more. Hey, I didn't say it had to be spotless.
--Strip the rocks out of the one garden, black-paper the entire mess, and re-cover it.

There's currently three vampire/werewhatever authors I can stand.

Charlaine Harris, since she doesn't tend to take herself seriously (despite style problems early on in the series and varying problems later on).

Kelley Armstrong, who writes messed up (if tending towards Sue-ish) characters and who's put some interesting work into her world-building.

And now John Lindqvist, whose book Let the Right One In took everything I hate about the standard human-meets-vampire novel and threw it out the window. There's no heavy-handed vampirey seduction here: the main characters are twelve and twelve-going-on-230. There's no epic "ZOMG I R MONSTER" angst. Hell, there's not really even gender. Eli, the vampire, goes about as a girl, then reveals s/he was once a boy who was genitally mutilated before being turned and goes about as a boy, then puts on a sundress and is a girl for a bit again.

And though the prose is a bit simplistic at times, and the ending doesn't exactly blindside you, the characters are all so staggering, show-stoppingly messed up that I wanted to huggle the book and carry it around with me. Oskar, the twelve year old main character, is bullied at school, accidentally wets himself on a regular basis, and wants to be a serial killer when he grows up. Eli, beyond gender, is also frequently beyond hygiene--but not beyond picking off the neighbors. Who, by the way, are all messed up. There's the young delinquents, the aging, dreaming alcoholics, the desperate divorcees and the edging-into-abusive cops they want to be with, and oh yeah the pedophile who lives with Eli, who kills people for blood so s/he can live, who steals the money from his victims' bodies, and who gives it to the kids he can't bring himself to molest because they're not Eli.

Strangely enough, even with the pedophile and Oskar's vague interest in porn and the eventual rapacious zombie with a permanent hardon, the underlying 'ship story, of a young boy and the genderless monster who really may or may not eat him one day, comes off as strangely pure. They play with Rubik's cubes, they tap secret messages to each other in Morse code, they snuggle, they wrestle, Oskar has to explain to Eli that when he says he wants them to "go out" that he doesn't mean they have to do anything besides what they're already doing . . .

But when Eli starts acting more like a little kid and less like an extremely old being in a little kid's body, and the pedophile starts to freak out because it's harder for him to justify lusting after an extremely old being that just happens to look like a child, and by the way the crazy cat man in the next building saw something that looked like a kid kill one of the local alcoholics . . .


. . . I think I have to buy this one now. :P

The entire house smells like resin, the stuff takes forever to set, it's all over my nails, it's taken over my countertop, (did I mention it smells?), and until recently I'm pretty sure I wasn't measuring it properly.

I also made some pretty nifty pieces thus far. I think I have to wait until they're fully cured before I go after them with sandpaper or a drill, but (aside from my first two creations, some less than jewelry-grade paperweights/garden rocks) I'm pretty happy with what I'm turning out.



Now I just hope I don't FUBAR 'em once they're completely cured and I decide they need sanded/drilled.

I finally decided to go through with the "Let's give up and make some steampunky jewelry" idea. Luckily for me, this coincided with the "Let's make resin jewelry!" thing. Or unluckily--now I have a billion ideas to play with and not enough hours to the day.

So tonight or tomorrow I'll hopefully get to experiment with resin casting, embedments, and so on. (I say hopefully because Borders borked my schedule again without telling me, resulting in my happy ass getting to work the just-announced Dan Brown midnight release party that no one'll care about. Dog knows what else they've screwed up.) I'd like to have the basics of resin work down before I start throwing in a few hundred clock or watch parts.


I got this broken clock movement off ebay because I wanted decent-sized gears and, well, what better way to get 'em? The thing arrived today. I pulled it out of the box, grinning with destructive glee--I don't know how to take it apart nicely, but I'd figure something out--and the little bastard started running.

It makes absolutely no logical sense, but now I'm gonna feel bad killing it. For at least a few minutes.

ETA: Well, that was entertaining. And alarming. I started picking at the thing with a screwdriver and pair of pliers, zen_of_nihilism started helping, the damned clock kept ticking, and eventually he hit one of the springs and it went completely ballistic--falling apart, skittering across the table, and scattering all the pieces I'd managed to take off, all at once.

We've since managed to get all the spring coils out, de-pinion the majority of the gears, and disassemble pretty much the whole thing. I've got a massive pendant-in-process here that'll probably be resin-filled tonight, if I can just find the right round thing for a proper mold. Wish me luck! :D

newageamazon linked me to a Stephenie Meyer quote where the woman says normal girls won't defend themselves against attackers. I responded as I usually do and ranted for a little bit. My rant ended up on Buzznet's front page.

I'm currently waiting for hate mail from twelve-year-olds. The macro collection is ready--even though so far it looks like my commenters are the grrl-power types. :D