A Painting My Brother Did

 

It now belongs to me.

A Beehive State of Mind

 Each morning, shortly after I wake up, I wish I were in Utah.

Sometimes while I'm peeing. Sometimes while I'm showering. Sometimes while I'm brushing my teeth. Always withing twenty minutes of rising out of my bed.

During the rest of the day, thoughts of Utah intrude. Over and over again.

I wish I were in Utah as I turn off the lights and close my eyes.

As I've written in the past, I have not plans to send myself to Utah, but many times a day, I wish I were already there.

Dear Critics,

Please stop using words like "you," "we," and "us" when describing how a book/song/movie/TV show/whatever makes you feel.

You are not me. You do not know me. You do not tell me how things make me feel. (Sometime I have trouble knowing how things make me feel and I'm me.)

You are you. You know you. Tell me how the things make you feel.

Then take the time to explain why the thing makes you feel the way it makes you feel.

The delicious prose. The rocking riff. The color of the lighting. Why do they make you feel what they make you feel? Help me to understand why creators make the choices they make through your lens.

But don't say that the things make us feel the same. They may, but they may not.

*hugs*

ticknart

Over and Over Again

 I think I've listened to "Conventioneers" more than sixty times today. It was the only song I listed to as I drove from work to the house.

A lot of my favorite songs are the ones that sound contradictory to their lyrics and/or ultimate meaning. And "Conventioneers" is one of those songs.

The tune and the way Mr. Page sings are pretty darn sexy. And the first part of the lyrics are all about coworkers being attracted to each other and sneaking off to screw. The speaker (singer?) even says "I'm already thinking marriage / I know that in the past it was something I'd disparage" and "As we danced, I could see in your eyes / You and me as senior citizens in love." Clearly imagining something beyond the one night.

After sex, though, he sings, "Then you slept, and I dressed, and I left."

To make it worse, when they get back to work after the convention the speaker asks "How can I just avoid a conversation?" and ultimately decides that "It'd be great / If you transferred out of state" to solve what he sees as a problem.

He wants her to move. To. A. Different. State! Because he feels awkward now.

So unsexy and cruel and awful and against the tone of the music and voice.

So delicious to my ears.

Also, I really like this image: "You stationed in the warm glow of the TV / Too patient as I'm playing L1 O1 V4 E1." (The point value is important, even if the number aren't sung.) In my mind, the light flickers and changes colors occasionally as whatever they're watching (the hotel's info channel probably) cuts from scene to scene while the extra small tiles are placed.

And this bit as the emotional transition of the song: "Before all the fireworks exploded / Our conversations were so loaded, innuendo flying / Now what can we say?"

I want to hear it again.

A Moral Quandary

I learned yesterday that The Dresden Doll are touring again and will be with a couple of hours of where I live this fall.

On the one hand, this band was very important to me in the mid-2000s. I remember the good radio station playing Coin Operated Boy just enough that I kept the station on all the time so I could hear it again. The music is a fun tune with lyrics about loneliness and, I'll say it though many disagree, self pleasure. I'm a big fan of when the music is counter to message of the lyrics.

Then one night, while I drove home from work, after 11:30, the station announced a new song by The Dresden Dolls and played Girl Anachronism. Something in my brain shifted that night. The rawness of the emotion. The brutality of the lyrics. The wonderful piano bashing to emphasize frustration. The song was exactly what I needed in the moment and I had to buy the album. If vinyl had been the order of the day, I would have worn the grooves flat listening to the album.

On the other hand, even if the direct allegations against her aren't true, she was complacent in the sexual abuse her ex-husband performed while they were married. An open marriage is one thing, good thing, but not warning the women in your life, the women you bring into your home to care for your son, that your husband is a sexual predator and then not working to remove them from the situation is something else entirely.

Do I want to give my money and my time to a person like that?

Dear Fanfic Authors,

I have a request. It's a simple request: Please stop apologizing when you post a chapter.

I understand the impulse to apologize when you do something that you think is later than it should have been or when the ginger snaps you make aren't as snappy as they should be or the fire in the woodstove heats the house too well. (Yes, these are all my experiences.) It's an impulse (habit?) that I've been working on for several years.

I also understand that the apologies hit differently when a fic is read as the chapters are posting.

But it's annoying when the fic is complete(ish) and every other chapter has an apology attached to it. It's cool with me you acknowledging that the chapter is later than you'd hoped, but there's no need to apologize. Your fic is a gift that you are giving to all of us. We are not paying you for it. Fanfiction is not (and should never) be transactional. You do not owe us the chapter. People should be thanking you every damn time you post a chapter.

Please remember, your fic will be around for a long time. (Unless you get filled with a stupid, craziness and erase everything.) More people will, hopefully, read and enjoy your fic after you are done with it. If there's no reason to apologize to the people reading as you post, there's even less of a reason to apologize to those of us reading it later.

I enjoy your fic. I'm glad to have read it. I want you to enjoy writing the fic and I want you to know that it is appreciated.

Be well.

Maybe... Different Genders?

I've been (obsessively?) listening to the Maybe Happy Ending soundtrack. I'm looking forward to seeing it when it's in my neck of the woods in 2027.

For those who don't know, the the main characters are robots. One presents as male and the other female. They fall in love. Well, love-ish.

But I wonder, since they're robots, will they be cast presenting as the same gender or agender or non-binary? I think the show would be just a beautiful if they did. And since they are friggin' robots, gender presentation shouldn't be built into the script. Right?

I hope it happens soon, but considering how long it took to get a gender swapped version of Company...