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Saturday, October 11th, 2008
drewshi
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10:42a
GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!
GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!
current mood:  frustrated
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gsa_lj
[ sassafrasolivia ]
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10:29a
Happy Coming Out Day!
40% of homeless youth in the United States identify as LGBTQ. This is an epidemic that impacts all of us. For too long the needs of some of our youngest and most vulnerable community members have been ignored. Current homeless youth feel disenfranchised by the gay community, and adults who left home as teens worry about the ramifications of being open about their past. Saturday October 11th is National Coming Out Day. This year we are challenging the LGBTQ community to join the Come Out, Kicked Out movement.
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lonemagpie
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3:26p
Light Of Heaven blurb
http://www.abaddonbooks.com/coming_soon.php
"TWILIGHT OF KERBEROS: THE LIGHT OF HEAVEN
By David A. McIntee
Do you see the Light?
The Final Faith does, and so does Enlightened One Gabriella DeZantez, Sister of the Swords of Dawn. She sees the Light of God. She sees the Light of Truth. The Order of the Swords of Dawn have been the bane of heretics and apostates for as long as there has been a Final Faith, but when an assassin strikes at the heart of the Faith, it signals both a new threat, and an ancient one. Gabriella must eliminate the danger to the Faith, but what is the connection between shadowy assassins,fleeing refugees, and an ancient legend of an island made of diamond? The answers can only be illuminated by making everyone see the Light of God, the Light of Truth, and ultimately the Light of Heaven."
February 4th, £6.99
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kvaadk
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8:46a
Palin and "Troopergate"
Okay, as everyone in America knew ten minutes after McCain named Palin as his running mate, the Governor of Alaska has been under investigation for various abuses of power, most notably "Troopergate." (What would we be calling political scandals if Nixon's hench-people had broken into the Ritz-Carlton or the Four Seasons instead of the Watergate?)
Recap and commentary behind the cut to spare those who are not really interested in USofA politics.( Read more... )
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angevin2
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1:14a
John Bale hath a blogge
And it is here:
http://biliousbale.blogspot.com/
If your response to this statement is "Who?" -- and this is a fairly likely thing -- start here. Google will give you the impression that he played for the Kansas City Royals, which is a pretty hilarious mental image, but a sadly inaccurate one. Rather, he was an English Reformer and historian, and is probably best known for being the author of King Johan, the first history play in English (it is kind of like a morality play only with historical figures in it). He was cranky and staunchly interested in sodomy (writing about it, not engaging in it, though who knows what he got up to in his spare time. NB also that he thought that in the right circumstances not having sex could also be sodomitical).
(He also has an RSS feed at ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/syndicated.gif) biliousbale.)
Also, ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) kip_w is writing Toon River Anthology (part two is here), and it is awesome. Possibly funnier if you read the Comics Curmudgeon, but if you have any familiarity at all with the dreck that blights comics pages across North America, it is worth a read. The pastiche is spot on.
current mood:  amused
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boywhocantsayno
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2:10a
Gaylaxicon Day 1
Just a quick post before bed... I've had a fantastic day, catching up with some folks I haven't seen since last year, and some I haven't seen since, oh, a month ago at Dragon*Con. I know I'll leave out some people, but so far I've seen robgates, drewan, rvrjoe775, esprix and Quincy, troystar and Chris, wananga, andyhat, lsanderson, ashoemaker, cplpunishment, dracut, qvamp, robdamnit, and my fellow Torontonians Drew and Colin, who run the Gaylactic Jeopardy game. Plus a couple of dozen other people who either aren't on LJ or whom I'm not thinking of right now. (I'm a little surprised at who isn't here, too.)
About a dozen of us went for dinner this evening at a Persian place called Javan near the hotel. I'd never had Persian food before, but I had a fantastic dish - the name of which escapes me at the moment - which was a beef stew with pomegranate and walnuts served on a bed of basmati rice. Yum.
I then came back for the "Meet The Pros" event where the Guests of Honour were introduced and chatted with some more people, then attended round 1 of Gaylactic Jeopardy, a Trek panel, spent some time in the con suite and then kibitzed the first round of a game of Werewolf before deciding to call it a night. And, of course, I answered some questions about the 2010 bid for Montreal.
I'm not quite sure how it got to be 2 in the morning so quickly. Considering that I have to be alert in less than nine hours, and I got up at 7 this morning after getting three hours of sleep, I'm also not sure why I'm posting this today (except for the fact that I paid for a day's use of the wifi in the hotel, and dammit, I'm going to use it :) ).
current mood:  sleepy
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jere7my
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1:52a
Dust-up
After a few hours of over-caffeinated reflection in Diesel (I got the Accelerator, plus a peanut butter brownie), I'm feeling more sanguine about the course of the book. I remembered why the relationship between these two particular characters is interesting and fraught, why they have reasons to hate each other and fail to understand each other and sympathize with each other all at the same time. I remembered the awesome gravity of the situation Scrutiny and the other fellow find themselves in, and remembered that I needed to convey that, instead of slouching into the easy "This happened...and then this happened...and then that happened" event dumps I'd been boring myself with. (All this despite the sacrelige Diesel committed in their renovations — the second squishy black leather chair is gone! This distresses me more than I can say. We are left with one awesome squishy chair, and tonight it was occupied by a wastrel with a laptop who did not purchase any Diesel yummies to justify his presence.)
Then I came home and, still hopped up on caffeine, spent two hours sweeping the entire upstairs. This was the full deal — the moving-the-bed, dusting-the-tangled-cords, cleaning-behind-the-desk kind of sweep, which turned up a ball of cat-fur dust-bunnies the size of a melon. In the process, I figured out that one wall in my office is just a giant cork-board, which means I can pin things to it. (Yes, I am slow.) So I've got some LP sleeves up there now — splashes of color, much improved.
Caffeine ftw.
current mood:  awake
current music: I Want Your Sex by Big Daddy
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(comment on this) Friday, October 10th, 2008
mental_workout
[ kagomeshuko ]
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11:31p
Riddles
I know, a lot of these are old riddles. Just some I collected today while I was working.
Two brothers we are
great burdens we bear,
all day we're bitterly pressed
Yet this will I say
We are full all day
and empty when we go to rest
What has roots as nobody sees,
Is taller than trees,
Up, up it goes,
And yet never grows?
A box without hinges, key, or lid,
Yet golden treasure inside is hid.
As light as a feather, but you can't hold it for ten minutes.
Has a mouth but does not speak,
has a bed but never sleeps.
Runs smoother than any rhyme,
loves to fall but cannot climb!
You feed it, it lives,
you give it something to drink, it dies.
I go around in circles,
But always straight ahead
Never complain,
No matter where I am led.
My life can be measured in hours,
I serve by being devoured.
Thin, I am quick
Fat, I am slow
Wind is my foe.
I have legs but walk not
A strong back but work not
Two good arms but reach not
A seat but sit and tarry not
I run through hills;
I veer around mountains.
I leap over rivers
and crawl through the forests.
Step out your door to find me.
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paladincub21
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11:06p
Oh New York cabbies
Howbi I've missed you and your propensity. Towards reckless driving.
How I have missed the thrill if clinging to the seatbelt as you cut
off a measly little limo. How I will miss the smell of patchouli and
soap. Ans the turns! G force against the walls, an intoxicating
headache How I will enjoy telling the story of zero to sixty in what
felt like three seconds but was probably a lifetime. A thrilling
exciting scary welcoming lifetime.
The best part? The people sharing my cab/van and the casual fun and
joy and fear in our meeting gaze. NY us about many people in one fast
moving space.
I miss new York already And I just got here.
Sent from my mobile device.
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(2 comments | comment on this) Saturday, October 11th, 2008
(comment on this) Friday, October 10th, 2008
steve_mollmann
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10:46p
"He will not refuse one who is so blithe to go to Him."
Last week, a chance comment from a classmate clued me into the fact that there was a performance of A Man for All Seasons running on campus.
A Man for All Seasons!
I read this Robert Bolt play in Mr. Downie's class during my junior year of high school and thought it was fabulous. We watched the film, starring that man among men, Paul Scofield, in class, and it was not much later that I purchased the film for myself on DVD; it remains one of my very favorite movies to this day. It also sparked off a haphazard interest in Sir Thomas More, though James likes to point out that my understanding of More is entirely based upon his film portrayal, not so much the historical record. Though I did read Peter Ackroyd's biography of More once.
Anyway, I was excited. But tickets for the performance were $11. At Miami, student prices to plays were a mere $5! And I felt lame going to a play by myself. I still would, of course, but I was dragging my heels on the ordering of tickets.
But then, this Monday, a rare useful e-mail materialized out of the English Department listserv, informing me that if I called a phone number and left my contact information, I could obtain a free ticket to the Tuesday performance.
I felt very "secret agent" doing this, leaving my information on a voice message. I never heard anything back, but went to the performance regardless, where surprisingly a seat was waiting for me. I still do not know why these free tickets existed or why I was permitted to have one.
The play was pretty good. The staging was a little awkward at times-- there were a few lines I could not hear because they were delivered by an actor whose back was to me-- but overall the direction seemed good. It was cool to see the role of "the Common Man" in effect-- for the film, Bolt delted that theatric device and made all of the roles he filled into separate characters. Greg Webster did a pretty good job as him, being humorous in all the right parts.
A standout in the supporting cast was John Windsor-Cunningham as Thomas Cromwell. In the film, this character comes across as a bit of a one-note villain, but he was played here with some subtlety, which I think only enhances what is going on. Cromwell was no evil man; like all the other characters, he is simply doing what he thinks he has to do. Admittedly, he has to do it for selfish reasons, but a couple scenes not in the film give him some moments of self-doubt and reflection. I was surprised at how old the actor was, though. (Ditto Jerry Krasser as the Duke of Norfolk, who very nearly played him as a doddering old man! Neither of these is necessarily "wrong" per se; they just weren't as they were in the film.)
The weak link was definitely Peter Mutino as Richard Rich, who had a tendency to overplay some of Rich's more desparate moments, turning what should have been minor social worry into seeming paranoia.
But what of the eponymous man for all season himself? Michael McKenzie (who actually appeared in many episodes of Babylon 5 as several different minor alien characters, including Minbari, Drazi, Narns, and Markab) is not Paul Scofield, but that is hardly an insult. He did quite an excellent job with the leading man, showing us someone with superhuman reserves of strength, yet also someone who simply loved his family and wanted to do right by them and by God. Especially effective was the scene where his family visits him for the final time in the Tower. McKenzie was able to carry off More's many witty lines without sounding forced, something I'd suspect to be difficult-- indeed, all of the cast did a good job with the language of the play. I got chills during More's great speech to Will Roper:
MORE: What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?
ROPER: Why, yes! I'd cut down every law in England to do that!
MORE: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down--and you're just the man to do it, Roper!--do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil the benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
The rest of the cast also did a good job, though the fact that the woman playing More's daughter was built much larger than the one playing her mother was a little disconcerting.
The differences from the film were interesting, as it's been so long since I've read the play. I'd forgotten how short the scene on the river with the boatman is-- in the film, it's much longer. And the frankly somewhat camp character of the Spanish ambassador is not in the film at all! Perhaps somewhat fortunately, to be honest. And I'd forgotten how (even in the film), Henry VIII is such an offstage presence, only appearing in one scene. It's very effective, given how much of the plot rests on the supposed friendship between His Majesty and More!
Overall, a strong performance of a fabulous play. And one I will no doubt be quoting obnoxiously for the next few days.
Steve
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(comment on this) Saturday, October 11th, 2008
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