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| Wednesday, May 23rd, 2012 | | 2:12 pm |
Hey, ya'll! Long time no talk! I'm doing hat's been weighing me down all season is finally beginning to lift, which is defdef a happy! Plus, I'm almost done writing a fantasy cosmogony in the form of a didactic poem (well,get it to the point where I'm editing and revising rather than writing). This is a project that finally feels like I'm hitting a next level as a mature writer, which is also a happy! Alsoalso, this week is being a craycray social week, as I have my father's birthday, one love in town this week and another getting in the 31st, a friend rolling through for a couple of days that I have to try to see, another friend who'll be here into July, the subZERO festival on the 1st, Glitter's art show on the 1st, and I need to leave for the Naraya on the 5th at the latest!!!!! May is just flying by! | | Tuesday, April 17th, 2012 | | 9:38 am |
| | Tuesday, April 10th, 2012 | | 11:09 pm |
The past several days have been interesting. I headed down to San Jose on Friday night to get some hang in with Barrett and David before the rest of my South bay visit transpired. This goal was achieved and the grand conversation was had (there was an interlude in which, as an inveterate button-masher, I learned the joys of attacking people with Princess Peach's ass in one of the Smash Bros. games). I did fall into an interesting little trap when talking to Barrett. He began discusing life issues and I began stepping in to a role I've done many times, of counselor, confidante, and listener. Turned out he really just wanted to chat; the deeper work I was trying to provide was stuff he'd already done. It was a bit alienating for a hot second for that role I have treasured so much with folk like Barrett to not be what was called-for in that moment. No, for me to start calling up that role and that find it unnecessary. It passed quickly, but it was quite the interesting moment. Saturday was the Temple of Inanna and Dumuzi's Descent of Dumuzi ritual and it was WONDERFUL. Felt just like the old days in Ivan's apartment in Mountain View. The weather was perfect, the folk were perfect, the food (of course) was perfect, the ritual was crazymagickal. I'll be helping with someone's Earth mystery this Thursday, which will be fun! I've also been studying Lady of Largest Heart, which has a brief and not-very-descriptive summary of the head-overturnng rite, which turns man into woman and vice versa, and initiates pili-pili, kurgarra, galatur, asinnu, et cetera (all of which are trans* priest/esshoods). Since I am seeking that rite and that initiation, this is helpful! Sunday was Easter dinner with mia famiglia, specifically a rather small dinner with both my grandmothers, my parents, my siblings, my unborn nibling (if my brother and my sister are my siblings, then my niece and my nephew must be my nibling, right?), my maternal great-uncle, and myself. I didn't catch exactly why my aunt, uncle, and cousins didn't come. I think they were probably in SoCal, where my aunt's family and (now) two of my cousins live. Dinner was ok, even if I was disconnected from folk for almost all of it. I find it sadly easy to just be in my own little writer's/dreamer's world when I'm around my family and sadly difficult to be real and connect. Old habits die hard, I guess. 's a little easier with other folk, but only a little. I spent Moonday catching up with my ex-roomie Shiaw-Ling, who is now living and working in China! There was also time spent with Dave and Barrett, which was cool. I was also instinctually femming out in a very fun way and even flrted a bit with the person working at PsychoDonuts, which was awesome! We finished off by painting our nails, which I did super-sloppily, and watching Max Headroom. By that time it was omething like 2 in the morning, so I slept over there . . . which allowed me to visit Ducklings Pagan Lunch in Palo Alto today. It was geat to see all of those folk again. There was one new person there I hadn't met, an all the old regulars were there. I have missed those lunches. I might try to get out there again more often, now that I am funemployed again! There's a power in that community for me. I was never able to integrate it into my life a a whole back then (and I think that integration is in a square aspect with the South Bay's magick, if I'm using some newly-acquired astrological terminology aright, as I experience it), but I might be able to do so in the context of Chaos Cabaret. The Lunch, however, caused my therapy session to be all of 15 minutes long, which was a bother, but *shrug* what occurs is what needed to occur. Speaking of astrology: Rob Breszny says:Cancer Horoscope for week of April 12, 2012 Verticle Oracle card Cancer (June 21-July 22) For a white guy from 19th-century England, David Livingstone was unusually egalitarian. As he traveled in Africa, he referred to what were then called "witch doctors" as "my professional colleagues." In the coming weeks, Cancerian, I encourage you to be inspired by Livingstone as you expand your notion of who your allies are. For example, consider people to be your colleagues if they simply try to influence the world in the same ways you do, even if they work in different jobs or spheres. What might be your version of Livingstone's witch doctors? Go outside of your usual network as you scout around for confederates who might connect you to exotic new perspectives and resources you never imagined you could use. and AstroBarry says:CANCER (June 21-July 22): The phrase 'going on record' is a built-in wake-up call that what you say—or don't say—about a given issue, initiative or project will remain etched in the archives of public memory. And this critical moment in your personal history, Cancer, is not a time to take the expression of your opinions lightly. What's specifically at stake is whether excessively diplomatic remarks and/or sheer silence on your part end up serving as an implicit endorsement of something somebody else in your life is doing, which you may in fact not agree with and/or which may behoove you not to be associated with. In other words, you cannot plead Switzerland if you're simultaneously drawing comfort or advantage from an alliance with an individual who has clearly taken a side. Otherwise, you could be seen as a co-conspirator… or, worse, a weak-willed lackey. I tell you this now not because I expect you to issue a statement right away, but instead as a warning against mindlessly uttering generic niceties that could later prove to hold a noxious undercurrent. Come next week and beyond, you probably will have to say something definitive, knowing your path forward may necessitate individuating yourself more distinctly. Well, THOSE certainly have an interesting resonance! | | Tuesday, April 3rd, 2012 | | 1:27 pm |
HELP! I need to someone to scan these lines for me!
Writing in meter is HARD! I'm writing a poem in a specific meter, and I don't know if I'm succeeding. Ergo, please, any of my poet and/or Englishteacher friends: scan these lines for me and tell me what you get? Please and thank you! Fell I in love with American Sign Language long before we met. I do remember the day quite clearly – D.C. in Spring. Their fingers too fast flew forming words I didn't know. | | 12:35 pm |
National Poetry Month 3/30: "Áath: door"
O heavy wood slamming of sound thankfully silent of hinge O regnum Iani I do summon stir and call you up O door you of the permeable boundary you of the crossable line you of the division of people into guests and hosts I do summon stir and call you to account O beautiful gate carved and windowed or plain and stark you are my first face I do summon stir and call you by my name O knockéd surface resonating loudly with gorgeous staccato O drum of welcoming O two-faced kingdom! I do summon stir and caul you Upon you I inscribe the ancient symbols face to face with you I request old servantgods to guard you throughout the ritual you are closed at close of ritual we throw you open I do summon stir and call you friend You hide things close you echo sounds contained you hotbox smoke you microcosm, door, are the parent of secrets and freedoms I do summon stir and call you away You it is who makes this home You it is who makes that not-home You it is who allows the two to miscegenate You it is who shrinks my world when closed I do summon stir and call you before the court When open, you welcome When closed, you shun When open, you allow thievery When closed, you are my faithful guard I do summon stir and call you. O door, all that you are, I am too. O door, be here with me. O door, go away. O door. O door. O door. We deserve our gods. | | 12:31 pm |
National Poetry Month 2/30: "Áana: sleep, to sleep (synonym: ina)"
have you ever tried to go to sleep and you couldn;t and no thoughts came and tou thought you;d go cray ao you type so fast that you get alots of typso and no one can read your poetry? Empty times pen one up to the world the world which fills you the rest of the time full tmes open one woup yo the world they al flow through your mind right before sleep hypnogogic going in and hypnopompic coming out the crazy bedtimes before and after sleep Sometimes the emptiness slows and ii can type carefully and people can read my poetry and ii can tune my brain into the radio that flows through the air carbon dioxide comes in most goes right on out again but some gets metabolized becomes part of you, becomes part of your cells, and eventually gives itself up to your exhalation ii can hear the voices in those moments the thoughts that come with the carbon arguments that have nothing to do with anything ii know in my sunlit life ii am waiting for Hypnos to come for Hypnos to gogic me to take me to sleep ii am not journeying there yet ii am on the train platform of my bed the airline terminal of my pillow and sheets and the radio in my head plays does this mean that ii actually am human? ii cannot ask myself this question, because then ii'd never get to sleep so ii listen to the human radio in my head and wait | | 12:27 pm |
National Poetry Month 1/30: "Áalilomáan: sound of rhythmic waves"
When I was young and we would visit the beach, I invented this game my brother and I would go out into the shallowness where the waves over-reached themselves and toppled into the waiting grainarms of the sand (I never went deeper) we would turn around and topple ourselves butt in the air face near the waiting pillow of the sand waiting for the saltwater to slap us propel us forward a foaming rocket at our backs we flew in water always we rested after our short freedom twice or thrice our length not even controlling our path (apart from pointing ourselves in the right direction and choosing our propellent as carefully as anyone with a one-digit age) once my family went to Hawai'i where the sea is the sky only richer sapphires below instead of powderblueblanket above I remember trying to swim in the cruise ship pool during roughwaters not even controlling whether I went up or down confined in a tiny bluetiled pool and I also remember the day I stopped playing my game breath at the end of my fingers as I trailed them through gorgeous sand lying in the last remains of waves that would sneak up behind me faces already on the waiting ground slithering and then drain away my eyes musthave glittered like salt catching the light as it floats in water as I had my shining moment with the beauteous sand (no: that was Tahoe's water with sand not Hawai'i's with salt) at first I thought it was funny the ocean pulling my barely two-digits-old body I laughed and called to my siblings both younger to see then I realized: the ocean was pulling me away or maybe home I screamed my father waded twice or thrice his length panicked to pluck me from the water my short freedom did not end with me clutched to Yemaya's breast I'm told I'm Oshun's anyway and she's a river I am however Susan's miraclechild she was told she could never have and my short freedom ended resting clutched to her breast maybe it was away maybe it was home but most definitely it was | | Wednesday, March 28th, 2012 | | 3:35 pm |
So, yesterday, and a good chunk of today scared me. Nothing dramatic;on fact, that was rather the point. I went to therapy yesterday (my 4th weekly appointment). It seems like we're moving out of the introductory and into the work. Afterwards, I went to see my friend Suzi, who happened to be rolling through the Bay and specifically San Francisco, and had an amazing wonderful time visiting an amazing, wonderful person. And then I came home and did . . . nothing. I mean, I suppose I should take some comfort that, for me, doing nothing entails engaging the creative side of my brain in some way (I generated some details for a star system using some old MegaTraveller stuff and played with creating a D&D setting by kitbashing together a bunch of stuff from D&D with Pornstars), but I did nothing that was on my little rotating Errands list on my iPod and is supposed to keep me focussed on what I want to do and be. No writing, no studying, no basic life practices (like brushing my teeth). Nothing until checking LiveJournal and writing this post. I've spent years in that state, which is why this frightens me. Even worse, a certain love of mine recently broke up with me over, amongst many other things, not having done "the work" (the selfwork, the presence practice, et cetera). Part of the fear is that I'll end up slipping into that uselessness again. Part of it was that my ex-sweetie is right (which would mean everything I thought was me doing the wok was an illusion). Part of it is . . . something else. I dunno, maybe I just needed a break (from what?) and am giving myself too hard of a time . . . | | Sunday, March 25th, 2012 | | 10:18 am |
So, it seems that the writing craze has morphed into a bit of a study craze, which is what I've spent most of my "worktime" the past couple of days doing. I'm stuying Texeira's book on Pomba-Gira, an early-60s U.S.-edited collections of the essentials of Marxism, and a book called A Buddhist in the Classroom. It's been a joy reading Texeira; it's been nearly mpossible for me to find information on her in English and it's also the first techy book on magick I've read in like 6 years. Though my brain is itching fo a bit more occult/religious theory, I'm still learning oodles and oodles about her. I'm also having crazy mup ideas :-D Specifically, I've been thinking about a giant sigil that would create mup temple space, possibly utilizing theGate of Inanna from the Simon Necronomicon (thoug anythingthat book relates to Sumer needs to be super verified with research; I'd prefer it to be tied to Azathoth, as there is no historical tradition there to fuck up), and epanding it and filling it in according to a Greco-Roman temple floorplan, using the rond sigils of Pomba-Gira wher there would have been colmns. This is just the beginning of an idea, though on a mre theologicl (and possibly serious) note, I have been thinking that Azathoth, Antinous, and Pomba-Gira (and, of course, the tzaddikim shel haShem) are the space-related deities of mup: Azathoth for the space, Antinous as the crosroads of many gods, and Pomba as the proprietress of the establishment at the crossroads. Still consideringthis, though, and looking forward to houghts. Re: Marism. I've finished the introduction which helped me understan some of the philosophical underpinnings of Mar much better, but was also clearly written t the height of the Cold War. Just got a few pages into the Communist Manifesto. Tell yo more as get further into it. Somewhatthe same as the Buddhist teaching book. So far, I've seen some interesting quotes, a good self-evaluation tool that can be re-purpsed for magick,a nd that's about it. I return to the writing today, though, with my friend ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1) mayamaia! I looks like I will be returning to the graphic fiction and the poetry I was writing the last time I wrote, so yay! The emotional stuff has been a bit of a roller coaster, but maybe a bit more of a stable one. I'm surviving. Sorry abut all the typos, my computer is just being a major bother this morning! | | Thursday, March 22nd, 2012 | | 7:23 pm |
2½ new poems! Looking for comments and edits!
A: love (for inanimates only); to love (inanimates only)Sometimes I think the furniture in my house whispers to me. It's usually around 2 in the morning that I think this, on nights where sleep catches me in its jaws despite my computer's attempt at besting the sun's light. Sometimes I think the furniture in my house whispers to me. They do not tell me they love me, but they tell me that they love. The fridge longs for us to slide magnetic poetry tiles across its face. Each chair and desk and cabinet has its favorites, its people to love. The kitchentable speaks movingly of its forbidden love for bare pounding asses. The stovetop tells me how hungry it is, and the Stockholmsyndrome love it has for the messiest of cooks living here. The couch is a slut. It loves everyone who sleeps on it, grateful to see another side of people for a change. The coffeetable in the livingroom? It's strange; its love isn't for one of the housemates. It loves the various bits of bric-a-brac and random things that get placed upon it, some with no remembered human origin. Sometimes I think the coffeetable in my house whispers to me. When everyone else is sleeping, it quietly breaks down, shamed sobs buried in the hardwood floor, unable to look me in the eye. “I'm a pervert,” it say. “All the other furniture says so! No one here likes me, because I don't love people. I'm a clutterphile!” And it wails, its hand in its panels and game cupboard. Only I can hear its muffled tears. And all I can do is pat it on the back and say, “I know; it's ok. You'll survive.” Áabe: book (The ½ poem) I am become a mole, backwards. No, I'm not blind. I'm burrowing my feet into the ream of blankets and sheets and undefinable, un-word-able things on my bed. The flicked-off bulb sends invisible light to rainbowsplit through the shelves of prisms surrounding me. Ink and paper and sentences all take this light and twist it, bend it, give the world all its color. I cannot sleep in the open. I cannot sleep trapped in walls. I can only sleep surrounded by books, buried in bedclothes. Please, understand. I haven't even read most of these yet. Sometimes, I don't think I need to. Sometimes, I think osmosis will work. Sometimes, I think the ideas are a sickness the books have come down with, and it's catching. I want to catch it, this knowledge-illness. It will save me. But I know that's not true. Knowledge is no contagious Messiah; it does not save and it does not catch. And yet, I cannot sleep without them, these inert tomes, doing nothing because they are not being used. Sometimes, I think we are too much alike, the books and I. Sometimes, I don't think. Sometimes, I think sleeping so near them is a kind of narcissism. Áada: smile“you have something in your teeth,” my mother says; “you should brush them.” “they're not food, mother,” i say; “they're holes and you knew that.” “how would i know that?” she asks. “cuz i told you last time i came home,” i say, “and we had this same conversation!” sometimes i don't smile because my dental hygiene could be described as hellish, but i tried selling real estate in my teeth prime real estate, with a clear view hot tub and a balcony to the devil and he didn't want any called me a slumlord the bastard. so i don't smile cuz it's got to the point even i'm embarrassed and my words no longer sound the same, whistling through cavities echoing with the sound of dying nerves. if the world can be created when some animalheaded egyptian god spills semen in his mouth and i have rotting teeth and all my semen goes into an old undershirt: what kind of god am i? Sometimes i don't smile because my teeth are bad. | | 5:49 pm |
Wrote this as a freewrite recently; looking for comments/edits
The middle of the flower, inside the petals, where the reproductive organs usually are, was a giant pearl. Hard and slick stuck bulging out from soft and velvet. The musicians playing somehow achieved the wild moment of bebop while maintaining the necessary pace for the torch singer's voice to sew lingerie from everyone's favorite baby blanket. Mixed-Metaphors Tony stared at the flower, certain that e had waited too long to write this, struggling with an urge to stick eir index finger, extended and bent under the weight of working to not tremble, to aim properly, into the center of the flower. To see if the pearl was empty. To crush and pop the pearl beneath eir fingerprints and see if anything dripped out. Mixed-Metaphors Tony knew e was in this story. Mixed-Metaphors Tony knows your name. And your face. Mixed-Metaphors Tony likes you. If e didn't like you, well . . . . The walls hummed with a slow vibration. Almost a beating, almost a breathing. They shimmered with a pearlescence. A pressure came upon those seated in the upper balconies, in the poor seats, a pressure borne by the stale air like influeza. Mixed-Metaphors Tony made a symbol with eir hand, a mudra for a magick e did not know. Mixed-Metaphors Tony knows your magick, though. Eir hand formed the number 1. E did not know why the number 1 was so important, only that it had shaped all of history's time. Mixed-Metaphors Tony also knew that this was not the story e had signed up for, not the story e had auditioned for. What story can you write? Mixed-Metaphors Tony will finance it, for the lowlow price of a future favor. The future has not happened yet, so it is a powerful coin, and cheap too! The future is an excellent investment, an excellent scam. Mixed-Metaphors Tony is tired of waiting. E throws the flower on the table and turns. Mixed-Metaphors Tony walks away with only a single glance quick enough to fool those parts of eir body that weren't either eir eyes or eir hopes that the glance never happened. The glance was in the direction of the flower's center. The pearl had not broken., Was it hollow? Mixed-Metaphors Tony disappeared into the swirl of music. Mixed-Metaphors Tony will never rise very high in Our Thing; eir name is too cheesy. Are pearls pearls if they're hollow? Are histories histories if they sit in one's mind, thick-walled and shimmering, round and without the imperfections of living things, no blood in and out, no breath in and out, strange and unreachable. Is that a history or is that a tumor? Is it hollow? Mixed-Metaphors Tony doesn't think about these things. E can't. E's too busy sucking on a big thick cigar, letting eir addiction breathe deep. Addictions have breath, have blood, have movement that doesn't involve rolling or falling down a wire or draping across a neck. Addictions are not pearls. Breathe deep, Mixed-Metaphors Tony. Mixed-Metaphors Tony is smoking a new cigar, a Clinton-Freud e thinks its called. Mixed-Metaphors Tony is thinking back to the morning when a silvered-skin mirrorgirl greeted em with a paidfor genuine smile and political pellets from a shotgun of a voice. A voice like that could go far. Careerwise, anyway, and not with a pun for an entry ticket. Mixed-Metaphors Tony, while squidhiding in a cloud of words like cigarsmoke, recruited the mirrorgirl right then and there. She was scheduled to start tomorrow, waiting tables and running drugs and filming old episodes of I Love Lucy and stuffing fortune cookies with secret messages from Chinggis Khan. Mixed-Metaphors Tony wonders if she is eir destined heir, worries about the fate of the Family should it be so. For her part, the mirrorgirl is peeking out from the dressingroom where she is donning the official non-profit-branded skimpy showgirl outfit. She is watching Mixed-Metaphors Tony and she is mouthing the words e mouths as e backs away from the lighter's bonfire like the Catholic Church running away from St. Brigid (they never really did). The mirrorgirl is worrying that she reflects unimportant bits of life, that she reflects too much, that noone can know what is shown in her silvered skin unless they can see the whole world and if they can see the whole world then what the fuck do they need a mirror for and who cares anyway about whether or not the Catholic Church fled from St. Brigid and what does that all have to do with a two-bit mafioso puffing on some sort of faux phallus dried leaf wrapped in dried leaf burningburningburning anyway? The mirrorgirl trembles. Kerouac spits the chewedup driedup flavorless old pieces of grammar out of his mouth onto the floor. Both Mixed-Metaphors Tony and the mirrorgirl bristle at this sight, both put one foot forward, start to move to clean, stop, chide themselves for not cleaning, dance forward (almost a step this time), and don't do it. Kerouac laughs, big burly Frenchcanadian chest like a lumberjack straining in (flannel groans) and straining out (ribcage groans). This is the man who just erased a sentence though he had no desire to erase. No, this man did not erase. This man wrote, anything that went through his memoriedmind, anything the drugs gave him. Catch the moment. Catch the moment. It's all this, Jack, a finger wrapped in a fist, it's all this. Mixed-Metaphors Tony and the mirror girl lock eyes. The universe resounds the deep and ominous click of a locked key. “It's all what?” A yell that is all three and none, the mirrorgirl's shocked wide eyes like UFOs, Kerouac's lip curled back on itself until it was a cursive letter, Mixed-Metaphors Tony's Dada Viking Sagas face. More things occurred and they got their answer and the three became another number by some strange math but this story has gotten so far from its origin that I think I should take it to mean that I am to tell you no more of it. | | 10:55 am |
Steampunk Film Festival--on the road!
Anyone wanna go? :-D Originally posted by lupagreenwolf at Steampunk Film Festival--on the road!Hey, West Coast steampunk fans! The Rose City Steampunk Film Festival is headed out on the road! More information is available here, but the tour dates (as of right now--more to be added) are as follows: 5/20 - Seattle, WA 5/22 - Eugene, OR 5/23 - Ashland, OR 5/25-28 - San Jose, CA 5/28 - San Francisco, CA 6/1 - Long Beach, CA 6/2 - San Diego, CA TBA - Portland, OR Head to the site to get more information about each stop, as well as preorder your tickets! AND if you're a local artist whose work may fit into the steampunk aesthetic, you may be able to get your work displayed at the event, too--you can contact the coordinators for more info. | | 10:02 am |
All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012
Originally posted by ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/user_ontd.gif?v=92.1) blindwebster at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Never have I found a more appropriate subject for this icon. Originally posted by unknownbinaries at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by gesundyke at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by rainflowermoon at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by miintikwa at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by heartbreakangel at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by atalantapendrag at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by ericadawn16 at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by hoperomantic at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by southrnbygrace at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by ![[info]](http://l-files.livejournal.net/userhead/503?v=1321864323) ultra_fic at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by jesco0307 at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by sheryden at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by meridian_rose at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by brontefanatic at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by philstar22 at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Originally posted by lk737 at All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012Please repost this? I have never begged for one of my posts to be boosted. I am just so worried for my friends and want you to know. According to this article, dated March 15, 2012: http://www.digitaltrends.com/webnews/major-isps-turn-into-copyright-police-by-july-says-riaa/"File-sharers, beware: By July 12, major US Internet service providers (ISPs) will voluntarily begin serving as copyright police for the entertainment industry, according to Cary Sherman, chief executive of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). The so-called “six-strikes” plan is said to be one of the most effective anti-piracy efforts ever established in the US." The article goes on to give details. After six notices, internet providers will decide to throttle a person's internet speed, or cut it off altogether. I don't know if they will crack down on torrents only, or if it is up to the internet provider. I get the sense it is up to the internet provider. So some people could get away with downloading non torrents, while others might get their internet service cut off. I urge you to click it and read, as we all know people who download. No more downloading eps of your favorite shows for vidding, gifs, or fanfiction art. No more downloading screencaps possibly. I'm so sorry my friends. I don't even know if BT Guard will work to protect you, but I would google it if I were you. It is a professional service that supposedly can protect you from the invasive eyes of your internet provider. Just, my friends, please make each other aware. Please be aware of the date JULY 12TH. Mark your calendar and double check with your internet provider by then. If you start receiving notices of downloaded activity, this is why. And your internet service could be throttled or cut off. Fox news confirms this: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/03/17/us-isps-become-copyright-cops-starting-july-12/Youtube video explaining this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5OG0R-yS-cSIGN THE PETITION! http://act.demandprogress.org/sign/backdoor_sopa/?source=fb | | Monday, March 19th, 2012 | | 10:14 pm |
So. Time. I haz it nao. Cuz I gots fireded. Yep. Didn't make quota for too many weeks in a row, so I was fired. I'm oddly not too crazy torn up about this. With the unemployment, the last paycheck, and my travel reimbursement I am just now turning in, I should be able to just be around the house for a few months. I'm planning to write. And do magick. And write. And see you! Please come visit! Now's the time! | | Friday, March 16th, 2012 | | 9:17 am |
You know, I WANT ya'll to comment on these horoscopes . . . .
Things aren't necessarily getting better, but they are changing. I'm no longer spending most of my time disappeared in my room, but still doing so more than before. It's just a completely different kind of hard with a triggery external landscape than with a dangerous minefield of a head. Nonetheless, what does Rob Breszny have to say? Cancer Horoscope for week of March 15, 2012 British writer Kenneth Tynan asked a movie director about how he'd film an advancing army. Did it matter whether the action went from right to left across the frame or left to right? "Of course!" said the director. "To the Western eye, easy or successful movement is left to right, difficult or failed movement is right to left." The director showed Tynan an illustrated book as evidence. On one page, a canoe shooting the rapids was going from left to right, while a man climbing a mountain was headed from right to left. Use this information to your benefit, Cancerian. Every day for the next two weeks, visualize yourself moving from left to right as you fulfill a dream you want to accomplish. Thanks, Rob. I don't know if that's anywhere near useful. What about you, AstroBarry? CANCER (June 21-July 22): Graciously welcome the conspicuous assistance of friends, colleagues or teammates, Cancer, rather than putting forth an impenetrable shell of self-sufficiency and politely declining. Perhaps you're under the false assumption that, by accepting any help at all, you will also surrender any legitimate right to specify exactly what kind of help you actually need (and don't need)… as if you somehow can't show gratitude and be discriminating at the same time? On the contrary, I believe part of your learning how to better behave on the 'receiving' side of such exchanges—since we both know Cancerians are typically more comfortable with the 'giving' end—is getting yourself okay with explicitly communicating your needs (and don't-needs), in plain unconditional language. Folks who genuinely support you will be happy to heed your guidance, should you provide them detailed directions… not affronted (or whatever else you fear) by your directness. You must get used to teaching people how to best assist you, as it's not as easy to anticipate your needs (and don't-needs) as you may imagine. We're not mind-readers, you know. OK, somewhat useful, AstroBarry, but I think you may be focusing a little overmuch on the wrong piece of the pie. I need to do much better and receiving and at vocalizing my needs and don't-needs, but I don't know if you understan the reason . . . | | Friday, March 2nd, 2012 | | 9:17 pm |
I'm not doing very well. I'm working on it. Nonetheless, my little "to-do" list tells me I need to post one more thing here on LJ and that's on the list for a very good reason (I've historically been shit at keeping in touch/reaching out) and I really don't want to go into detail in a blogpost about what's going on (in person and in private only, if folk wanna talk) so I'm posting astrology! I am meeting someone who's likely reading this on Sun's Day/dies Solis to talk about shit, though I thought it was different shit when I set up the meeting. *shrug* Oh well, that's the way things go sometimes. I also have a therapist appointment on Tyr's Day/dies Martis. Rob Breszny: Astrologer Antero Alli theorizes that the placement of the sign Cancer in a person's chart may indicate what he or she tends to whine about. In his own chart, he says, Cancer rules his ninth house, so he whines about obsolete beliefs and bad education and stale dogmas that cause people to shun firsthand experience as a source of authority. I hereby declare these issues to be supremely honorable reasons for you to whine in the coming week. You also have cosmic permission to complain vociferously about the following: injustices perpetrated by small-minded people; short-sighted thinking that ignores the big picture; and greedy self-interest that disdains the future. On the other hand, you don't have clearance to whine about crying babies, rude clerks, or traffic jams. Wow, Rob, I was expecting you to hit hard on my current situation. While this may or may not be appropriate to some of my reactions to what's going on, I also don't trust those reactions right now, so mostly this seems orthogonal to the big event in my life. Maybe it's one of those incredibly important slant/tangent things you only notice years down the line . . . . Also, Cancer seems to be straddling my 4th and 5th Houses, which would be family/household caretakers and pleasure. OK, maybe relevant. Shit. AstroBarry: CANCER (June 21-July 22): The likeliest obstacle to your being heard and seen, in full stereophonic and technicolor brilliance, for that sentiment which you uniquely bring to the table? Not believing you are a worthy vehicle for the message. Which is kind of silly, Cancer, considering you do affirm the importance of the message itself. The doubts you're harboring are more personal—that is, they are criticisms of your own personality and/or carriage and/or credibility—than about the mission itself. And when put that way, it becomes clear that, if you let these doubts obstruct you from attracting greater attention to your overall message, you are allowing relatively petty ego concerns to trump what's really important to you. Though they may not feel petty, your worries about others' perceptions of you as mouthpiece and visual-symbol are not such a big deal in the grand scheme of things… especially when you ought to be throwing yourself, un-self-consciously, into spreading the good word. Vanity is an indulgent distraction. OK, AstroBarry, you're the one I have to tell to fuck off. This one hits hard. I might argue that, as little as I believe in the word, my concerns are "objectively" very not-petty. I'm dealing with some huge shit. (For example, I think I just got used as a cautionary example, though thankfully without any identifying information included). Nonetheless, AstroBarry, you're the one that hit hard. Congratulations. | | Tuesday, February 21st, 2012 | | 7:57 pm |
Posted this comment when someone said that trans inclusion was a 21st century problem . . .
. . . in response to the Z Budapest kerfluffle at Pantheacon: People have been challenging, playing with, and ignoring the two-gender system quite literally since before we have written or possibly any records. Take a look at the recent discovery of not one but two skeletons which display mixed-gender burial customs dating from more 10 kiloyears ago! The media labeled them "gay", but the burial indicated nothing about their relationship status, only their gender. The word "transsexualism" was coined in 1953 by Harry Benjamin, the doctor for whom the relevant standards of care were named until recently. Magnus Hirschfeld performed the first modern "sex change" surgeries in 1930, and Christine Jorgensen became the first world-famous post-op transwoman the same year Benjamin coined the term! Finally, Janice Raymond wrote her hateful and bigoted book (much of which Z seems to believe) in 1979. As a point of comparison, Z was born in 1940 (10 years AFTER the first "sex change") and published her first book in 1975 (22 years AFTER Jorgensen's surgery and fame). Much of the powerful work in feminist academia has been the hard and difficult work of uncovering the place of women in history, which had often been ignored and written over (for an example in recent history, let me just ask who discovered the chemical details of DNA? Wasn't Watson and Crick . . .) Doing the same to transfolk . . . well, it hurts. Evidently moreso than even I thought, since I have spent so much time writing out this reply. I identify as genderqueer, not as a transwoman, and so have never had any real interest in attending any women's-only rituals. Well, OK, there have been a few I was mildly sad I couldn't attend, but I also knew that they weren't for me. I am personally of the belief that you get to have whatever circles you want, excluding and including whoever you want, and that these rituals not only deserve but need to be publicly recognized by being in con rooms and in the program. But not when accompanied with invalidating language ("women-born-women", "genetic women", "real women", et cetera) or with inflammatory comments in the media (as Z has definitely done in the past and as I have heard but not confirmed she did this year). I will stand for your right to be recognized. I will spread the story of your achievements and experience throughout history. I will grant you the respect (what a phrasing we have in this language!) of a past. Please do so for me, too. | | Wednesday, February 8th, 2012 | | 10:38 pm |
Salvete, omnes! Been a long time since I posted. The last few months, if not season, have been full of relationship drama. No need to go into details here, but suffice it to say that I have been dealing with a lot of confusion, new boundaries, anger, depression, self-hatred, and old patterns of thought that are in no way useful. I seem to have no luck making progress with this damned inertia that has been defining my life for a good half of my 20s, if not longer. I do not know if I will ever be able to hook philosophy with action, to walk as I want to walk in the world, to build the world I want to see. OK, so maybe I'm a bit dramatic and emo right now :-) I won't bore ya'll, but I will say that a good confidante might be useful. I'm bad at both reaching out to and utilizing confidantes, so if you want to volunteer, know that it might be difficult and you might have to pull me kicking and screaming into actually talking to you. Just giving fair warning! On the geek side, I have returned to one of my favorite perennial projects: a timeline bashing together all or most of my longtime favorite RPGs! I'm starting with just combining the old World of Darkness, Exalted, Scion, the Trinity universe, Human Occupied Landfill, Earthdawn, Shadowrun, In Nomine, Call of Cthulhu, the Deadlands trilogy, and World of Synnibarr. I'm thinking of starting a blog with stories and details in this universe (cause the timeline is actually kind of working out!) It looks like I will have my busiest Pantheacon yet! I'm in 5 events (two Ekklesia Antinoou events, one Temple of Inanna and Dumuzi event, the Circle of Dionusos's Modern Dionysian Initiation, and the Oracles of the Living Tarot) AND I'm working the Info Booth! It's kind of intense! However, before the Con, there is the Oversocial Mofo Revue this Friday at 20:30! This is the show where I cut my hair in August! Want details about the upcoming show? Here ya go (don't say I never did anyting for ya!): San Jose's one and only variety show and poetry slam is coming back at you FRIDAY FEB. 10. Main acts include sword swallower "Molotov," poet "Wonder Dave" and opera singer "Alexandra Sessler." Also, spoken word sensation Seth Walker joins us fresh off the heels of his latest album release. If you've never seen the show, check out our youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/SeeingEyeBird/videosPOETS: If you want to sign up for the slam, know that you need a 1-minute poem, a 2-minute poem, a 3-minute poem and 3 haiku. And, we do head-to-head, not traditional scoring. | | Wednesday, January 18th, 2012 | | 10:34 pm |
Astrology
First, from Free Will Astrology, we have the fairly basic and already known: Cancer Horoscope for week of January 19, 2012 If you were a medieval knight going into battle with a full suit of armor, the advantage you had from the metal's protection was offset by the extra energy it took to haul around so much extra weight. In fact, historians say this is one reason that a modest force of English soldiers defeated a much larger French army at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415. The Frenchmen's armor was much bulkier, and by the time they slogged through muddy fields to reach their enemy, they were too tired to fight at peak intensity. The moral of the story, as far as you're concerned: To win a great victory in the coming weeks, shed as many of your defense mechanisms and as much of your emotional baggage as possible. And from AstroBarry, we have the much more challenging: CANCER (June 21-July 22): Before you pointlessly limit yourself based on an imagined understanding of what someone else expects from you for their peace-of-mind, you should probably discuss with them this opportunity you're being presented with… and then give them a bit of time to think through, beyond their first response, their feelings about it. Never mind the obvious problem in you automatically rejecting a prospective journey to some new frontier just because you're more comfortable pandering to another person's 'peace-of-mind' (or controlling 'it's-all-about-me' tendencies), Cancer. Maybe you are using their presumed resistance as a cover for your own fears: of trying something different, of putting your own interests first, of fostering an identity beyond that of being others' dutiful supporter. And while you may be correct that they'll initially be upset or threatened by your proposal to aim your enthusiasms elsewhere for a spell, your willingness to respectfully talk it over—more than once, over a period of time—could be the decisive move that helps them open their mind to what else is possible. Dare I state the obvious, but you don't actually need their 'permission', by the way… MY INTERPRETATION: There are numerous relationships in my life (of course) that AstroBarry could be talking about it. The one with my sweetie, though much more complex than what Barry describes, is just the most immediate and obvious one; as a housemate just put it in regards to herself: Controllicorn. In many ways, I think the two are talking about the same thing, though not in the way you might think. One of the big issues facing me in this Saturn Return is the shield of oblivion that I have built up around myself as a defense mechanism. Hell, I've even flat-out said it: I couldn't have lived my life the way I wanted to (particularly around gender) if I gave even the smallest shit what others thought. This was useful at a time, but I think much less now. Not sure I'm succeeding at dismantling it yet, though. Still not sure how. Any ideas? | | Saturday, January 14th, 2012 | | 9:09 am |
Wikipeda
Originally posted by mountain_hiker at WikipedaPlease share and reshare all over the social networks! Encourage Wikipedia to go dark next week! Wikipedia Blackout: Urge Wikipedia To Protest CensorshipQuick request: Wikipedia is considering going dark to protest SOPA and PIPA, the Internet censorship bills.
It'd be huge news, jar rank-and-file Internet users out of complacency, and serve as a turning point in the effort to beat these bills.
Several sites are considering going dark next week -- Reddit's already pledged to do so, but to have the impact it'll take to kill SOPA and PIPA, we need much broader support. A blackout by Wikipedia could be what finally kills these bills.
Will sign you on at right to urge Wikipedia to go on strike to protest censorship? (You'll also generate an email to your lawmakers, with the language at right.)PETITION TO WIKIPEDIA: We encourage Wikipedia to "go dark" to proest the Internet censorship bills pending before Congress. Millions of Americans would take notice, and it could be what finally turns the corner in the fight against SOPA and PIPA. Please sign at right to urge Wikipedia to go dark, and to generate an anti-SOPA/PIPA letter to your lawmakers. |
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