Dr. Horrible, Joss Whedon, Alternative Media yada yada

So on the heels of my last post, I just want to say how strangely awesome it is that i cannot watch Dr. Horrible's first episode. I've tried so many times tonight, honest. I just keep trying over and over. Then I realized from the io9 posts that a) it was temporarily broken due to demand and b) that I could buy some sort of season pass on itunes (see comments).

I got desperate, which you can go ahead and consider fan-crazy but fuck you (did you see the musical episode of Buffy, Once More With Feeling?), so I went to itunes. First off, tried to investigate the season pass option and when I clicked on that, nothing came up. It was there to click, but there was no option to buy once you got there. I looked up Joss Whedon on google and got to his Whedonesque site, which I'd heard of but not often had occasion to visit. I believe it's his official site though, and this was the message when I got there:

Grrr argh... Whedonesque has met its nemesis.

Due to a traffic spike caused by today's release of Dr Horrible, our host has shut down our database. We are working hard to move our site elsewhere. In the meantime, the forum at Whedonesque.org is still up and running:

Visit whedonesque.org.

The Whedonesque forum gave no insight. I went back to itunes and chose to buy the first episode for $2 (supposedly the "season pass" is $4 but I don't know what that means in terms of how long the season pass lasts). And I was told that my purchase would have to be tried again. I tried to watch the itunes sample song (also shown on the io9 link), but even that stops after 30 seconds. As far as I know, the best place you can (legally) watch even just the clip is the io9 website, which doesn't have nearly the quality of the itunes version.

What I'm trying to say is that demand for this particular endeavor broke the fucking internet. Whedon, you wanted to explore new ways of delivering entertainment and it worked. It worked too well. I'm frustrated that I can't watch Right Now Immediately, but I can't actually be mad. This is fucking exciting. What I assume was quite a monetary risk is clearly paying off. I mean good god, fucking itunes is even broken. So a big fat congrats. to Joss Whedon, and alternative media.

If anyone else is jonesing really hard (which I totally have been), I'd like to try to distract you with something else that is awesome. It has nothing to do with Whedon, science fiction, comics, etc. but it's Michael Cera (aka George Michael from Arrested Development), the intro credits are crazy hilarious on their own, and the later episodes were just incredibly fucking funny (although you may have to watch the first episodes to build up to "getting it").
Read more!

New and Old TV, and also some other stuff

I am catching up on my io9 reading this evening and have some things to say about TV.

First off, I was pissed that The 4400 was canceled. It was good, I was invested, and now I have no answers to the greater questions. So I guess it's cool that they're putting books out now, but why did they have to start with something early on in the series? Does this mean it will become a serial that never dies? Will I get my answers, and after how many books (if at all)? Grrr...

Secondly, ZOMG Dr. Horrible's first episode is out today!!! I imagine everyone is going fucking crazy for it, because I cannot get through to the website and have been unable to watch yet. This may get it's own post after I've watched it, but do read the i09 link for the Joss Whedon quote. I'm really excited that he's trying something new in part to see what other ways Hollywood can do business. Last year's writer's strike really proved how limited artists/ writers/ etc. are in how they can reach us consumers of pop culture. Others have certainly done this, but perhaps not on this scale, at least when unaffiliated with a major studio.

Weirdly, I was just talking about the movie Battlefield Earth over the weekend. It is supposed to be that level of God-awful that makes it unintentionally hilarious, as the clip amply demonstrates. I'd like to watch under the influence with friends sometime this year.

Yay! More people joining together to circumvent established bureaucracies for better products, this product a freaking ROCKETSHIP. Seriously, government regulation seems to exist just to bolster established corporate power, and we need more endeavors like this, public efforts attempting to prove that there are better ways to do what needs to be done. I know many people would say that it's not necessary to go to space but I'm a sci-fi lover who's always dug the space program, and every time I hear the argument "that money could be so much better spent elsewhere" I think of corporate wealthfare and wonder why said critics don't focus on that. Plus I hear from my science geek housemate that in terms of physics, the cutting edge breakthroughs happen in one of two places: NASA or weapons research. Which would you prefer we pour money into? And in which place do you think the breakthroughs that could lead to significant medical/ environmental/ scientific advancement will be public vs private? (I honestly don't know here and can't find anything on google, but my understanding has been that our government funds private weapons companies for this shit rather than our own agencies, so the private companies get the patents for their own profit rather than the greater good - hooray for runaway, state-funded "capitalism" and "let the market decide" my ass!)

Yeah, dudes, The Middleman is totally fun and good. I haven't managed to catch each episode, but the ones I've seen have been everything the post says - funny as hell, and a great mix of camp and realistically flawed (albeit quirky) characters. In last night's episode (minor spoiler) there were trout zombies. Not fish zombies, human zombies who wanted trout. I so wish I could find a clip of a physically restrained zombie groaning "troooouuuut," but I cannot so you will have to make do with this PSA instead:


I can't believe how much I'm enjoying that show, and I have to say that ABC Family is an interesting network. I always thought of it as this family-oriented station that was willing to show relatively dirty Whose Line is it Anyway reruns, but bizarrely followed them up with the 700 Club. A few years ago, though, they put out a bunch of pretty good female-centered TV movies that I was shocked to enjoy. Yes, they were fluffy entertainment (wait, I love fluffy entertainment, why am I apologizing?), but the Christian Network moralizing I expected didn't really happen. The one I remember best was See Jane Date, starring Charisma Carpenter from Buffy fame, and I remember loving how all the women drank and the she was sometimes hungover without it being turned into a Big Problem. Plus, this was Charisma Carpenter post childbirth. I really appreciated seeing a former super-skinny actress with just a little heft, and how refreshing it was that weight-loss or guilt or body issues in general did not seem to factor into the plot. It was mindless entertainment, but the characters were surprisingly realistic and the movie avoided playing into standard female tropes in a lot of important ways.

Cross-posted. Read more!

Canada is Awesome

This kicks ass. I wonder what the repercussions will be from the current administration, though. Read more!

When blogcrushes crush

Two of my favorite blogs are Jezebel and Shakesville. Along with i09, these are the blogs I check for new posts frequently throughout the day while I should technically be working. So for some reason it was double crushy to watch Megan at Jezebel cover one of Jeff Fecke's posts from Shakesville. The two blogs have feminism in common, but Jezebel is much more pop culture oriented than Shakesville. They share a certain sensibility though, and the Jezebel comments urging Megan to ask Jeff for a date were just killing me with teh awesome. Plus, a lot of those comments were very much in the vain of, "feminist men are hot, let's go out with them," whereas I know from Jeff's past writing he gets accused by men of being a feminist only "for the pussy." He always responds in the best way, stating that he's a feminist because women deserve equal respect, not because of his personal gains, also managing to admit that he's had to struggle occasionally to recognize his own privilege, but he keeps trying because it's right, dammit. I think you just have to read his beautiful takedown referenced above to see what he's about.

Augh, both of them pissed me off occasionally during the primary season, but now that it's over I've rediscovered my love for them and this shit is just fun to watch. It feels like when you introduce two separate friends for the first time and watch unexpected sparks begin to fly. Part of you feels excited for them, part of you feels proud for introducing them (obviously not applicable), but a lot of you is happy to have witnessed what may just be history in the making. Not that I think these two will date in real life (they live in different states and all), but Jezebel could learn a lot from Shakesville, and I've been noticing Shakesville writers referencing Jezebel posts the last couple months. I feel a wholly unwarranted sense of personal connection here. Internet world is so weird like that. Read more!

Made of Awesome

Via i09, the trailer for the new Joss Whedon internet experiment, Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. Nathan Fillion AND Neil Patrick Harris, I cannot wait. Be sure to read the opening ratings warning:


Teaser from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on Vimeo.

Cross-posted. Read more!

Glossary and Links

Hopefully someone other than myself will eventually find this useful. On this page I’ll post the words I read a lot on the blogosphere which could reasonably be confusing to people, and/or on which I have gotten my concepts mixed up, and just definitions I think we should all check ourselves on occasionally. Vocabulary tests were always my favorite. I will also post links to advice/instructions I've found helpful re blogging, commenting, writing, etc.

Words are in the order I find it most helpful to have them in, rather than alphabetical. Links go to the source I based and/or copied my definition from. If there's no link, I went to a variety of sources and wound up explaining it in my own words.

feminist: “anyone who favors political, economic and social equality for women and men.”
conflate: "to combine or mix (two variant readings into a single text, etc.)" I've seen this word used a lot in the blogosphere - here are some good critiques / examples from some of the blogs I read regularly.
deductive: reasoning from the general to the particular.
strawman: argument based on a misrepresentation of your opponent's position.
framing/reframing:
essentialism: “the view that, for any specific kind of entity, there are a set of characteristics all of which any entity of that kind must have ... Essentialist positions on gender, race, or other group characteristics, consider these to be fixed traits, while not allowing for variations among individuals or over time ... Contemporary proponents of identity politics, including feminism, gay rights, and/or anti-racist activists, generally take constructionist viewpoints.”
nihilism: “a philosophical position which argues that the world, especially past and current human existence, is without objective meaning, purpose, comprehensible truth, or essential value ... often more of a charge leveled against a particular idea, movement, or group, than it is an actual philosophical position to which someone overtly subscribes.”
sex: “the property or quality by which organisms are classified as female or male on the basis of their reproductive organs and functions.”
gender:
irony:
sarcasm:
satire:
parody:



Read more!

Underpants!

OK, this has been all over the feminist blogosphere, but I cannot resist posting it here as well. Via Kate Harding, here's a good article on Sarah Haskell in Salon.

I think my favorite part is the intro, in which the voiceover says "Underpants!" with such glee. You'll understand when you watch it.



Cross-posted. Read more!

The correct pronunciation of angst is totally bullshit

I have always pronounced angst as "Ayngst," - long A - not "ongst" as it is supposed to be said. I feel pretty strongly that in a better world my pronunciation would be the correct one. "Ongst" rings of ennui, or depression. "Ayngst" evokes that feeling of suppressed frustration that the word itself represents to me.

This is a rant about spelling, not pronunciation, but though I loved learning to read in elementary school, I became frustrated early on with the way we spell things in English. All the niggling rules seemed so counterintuitive (I before E except after C or when sounding Long A). I became obsessed with the idea that we could use the existing alphabet and just start spelling words phonetically, which of course made me feel like a total genius. I often find myself practicing the spelling game even today. So for the record, my pronunciation of angst spelled phonetically is eyngst. More spelling and alphabet geekery is below and probably tedious, but I haven't set up "folds" in blogger yet, so I can't hide it after a jump.

Here are some more random re-spellings:
media = miydiyu
midnight = midnoyt

I had to come up with some new letters to cover some sounds. One, representing the "sh" sound, also made the "ch" sound when prefaced by a t. Let's say that letter is represented by %, and here are examples:
shame = %eym
peach = piyt%

Another invented letter represented the "th" sound as pronounced in the word athlete. Let's use the symbol * and athlete is spelled a*liyt. Cathartic would be ku*ortik.

There's also the "th" sound as used in words like "the" and "that". Let's say that sound is represented by ^, and the word though would be spelled ^uw.

In my superior 2nd-grade invented alphabet, the letter c would no longer be necessary, you'd just always use the letter k. The letter q would also be unnecessary as you'd always spell it "kw". Example: quite would be spelled kwoyt. X was also unneeded as you would just use "ks." So c, q and x could be reclaimed to represent the different sounds shown above as %, * and ^.

I can't believe the degree to which I had this figured out at that age - no new letters even necessary! I was so much smarter before I started drinking.

OK, so I'm going to try to catch myself up by spelling a bunch of words from my horoscope today. I will use the following letters to symbolize the following sounds:
x = sh
q = th (as in thanks)
c = th (as in the)

aspiration = aspureyxun
irresponsibly = iresponsibliy
possessive = puzesiv
freedom = friydum
influence = infliwens
disquiet = diskwoyet

Some more at random:
odious = uwdiyus
tradition = trudixun
author = oqur
educated = edjywkaytud
important = impuwrtunt
correct = kuwrekt

I feel like I'm overlooking something important, and am up for any challenges (txalinjuz) in the comments. I could probably play this game all day. Read more!

Dicke Cheney Hunts People!

Via Annalee Newitz at i09 (I have such a blogcrush on her), these shirts are super awesome. My favorites:
heaven is boring
Look on my shirt, Ye mighty, and despair
DICK CHENEY HUNTS PEOPLE (Want!)
I bought this shirt on the internet! (so simple, so silly) Read more!

Name-calling in the blogosphere

This post by Jill at Feministe, a follow-up to her previous post, was interesting to me. I've been annoyed by the liberal blogosphere's reliance on labels like "crazy" and "nutjob" for the rightwingers and pundits they disagree with, but for very different reasons. I just don't think it's as effective as it should be, and misses the point. People like Bill O'Reilly and Jill Stanek don't argue their oppressive positions because they're insane, they argue them because there are powerful organizations committed to the status quo eager to support them with both money and fame. Rightwing punditocracy is immensely profitable, even when the pundit is not directly profiting their corporate benefactor.

This thread, (found via this post) with substitute words was instructive, but the substitutions don't do it for me quite yet. The problem I'm having is that there is no effective shorthand for these accusations, and shorthand terms are very useful. The rightwingers we argue against certainly aren't going to start limiting their language out of concerns of privilege and exclusion, and bypassing complex truths has always worked in their favor, especially now if our internet-trained attention spans are shortening daily as I keep reading.

I'm going to be thinking about my own list of effective shorthand, and it begins with the words corrupt and liars. Read more!

I am Giddy with Green Porno

The internet kicks my ass once again!

I read about this Green Porno thing a couple months ago, I can't remember where but it might have been the print copy of Bitch Magazine. It sounded fantastic, and I duly searched the internet, but it quickly became clear that it was not available yet. There is no way to adequately explain what Green Porno is, so I will just say that Isabella Rossellini made some (very) short films demonstrating how certain insects mate. They are all of the following: bizarre, hilarious, to the point, graphic, slightly anthropomorphized, impressively costumed, and minimally set. They are exactly what I hoped and dreamed when I first read about them, and watching them I felt a euphoria similar to that I felt when I saw the Spock Impersonator Oil Paintings of Professor Snape and Company.

I really cannot explain how random and amazing this is, so will just urge everyone to enjoy them here.

It's super cool that the Sundance Channel would fund something like this, and especially that they would then make it available on the internet, where it rightfully belongs. Isabella Rossellini is obviously beautiful and accomplished, but it took watching The Saddest Movie In the World last year to make me realize how truly interesting she is. I didn't love that movie - it was quite strange and the black and white vaseline lens is not my cup of tea - but I appreciated how much she seemed to enjoy playing a legless beer baroness, and that her presence in the movie added a certain legitimacy to such a singular, abstract and artsy work. That she would create (write, direct and star in) Green Porno is inspiring, and her obvious glee playing the male insect roles makes me happy for myself as a viewer and her as the agent of these one-minute shorts. I tend to like anything gender-bending anyway, and I feel like I should say something about that aspect here, but the shorts are so far outside any frameworks I already have to work with that any sort of analysis would require too much thought process for me at this time.

As with the Snape oil-painting post referenced above, I feel the need to end this post thanking the internet at large, and Isabella Rossellini in particular, for the existence of Green Porno. My definite favorite is the Bee, so if you're only going to watch one, click that when you get there.

For the record, I owe somebody a hat tip for the link but cannot for the life of me figure out who. Where did I see this last night when I was stoned roaming the internet? I've gone through my internet history and searched some of the websites I frequent, I really can't figure it out. Sorry whoever you are.

(Cross-posted at You All Everybody!) Read more!

My Cats: Gobble and Amelia

I am experimenting with using flickr to upload photos, so here are some pictures of my cats.

This is Amelia, looking regal and uncompromising, which is how she expects to be treated at all times:


Amelia's about six years old and I've had her since she was a kitten, which makes me feel aged. I got her after a a break-up with a long-term boyfriend who'd been allergic to cats. A friend's neighbor found a box of abandoned kittens and brought them home, where they would wander over to frolic in my friend's backyard. Amelia was clearly the runt of the litter, but also the kitten most likely to start shit with her larger siblings, and i was charmed. I had planned to name her Sexy, sheerly for my own amusement at the idea of coming home to call, "Hey, Sexy!" When I went to pick her up, though, I found that the eight-year-old whose fingers she nibbled to wake up every morning had named her Amelia Earhart, which was too cute to deny.

As cats go, she's fairly demanding. She expects an immaculate litterbox, all doors to be open all the time, and me to remain immobile on the couch so she can sprawl across my belly in comfort. When these are not options, she complains. She's very vocal - I'll post video eventually. She's hissed at me just for closing the closet door, but she can also be very sweet and demonstrative.

This is Gobble, who I've had for a year and a half now:


I got her at the local county shelter, where she was waiting for a home after being fostered by a relative of one of the shelter workers. She was a little older than I liked to introduce to Amelia, but she had all her shots, etc. and came highly recommended by the shelter workers, so I set her up in the pending-new-housemate extra room for a couple days before the Amelia introduction. She was extremely skittish for approximately one hour, after which she did a complete turn-around and loved on everyone present then ate her body weight in kitten kibble. The Amelia introduction is another story.

Gobble is still skittish about a lot of things and does not like to be petted in passing. If you try she'll give one warning paw smack before she starts biting. If she knows you, though, it's simply a matter of time before she'll approach. Then she is ridiculously sweet, butting her face into your hand for rubbing and gazing open-mouthed into your eyes with adoration while you stroke her.

As the photo may indicate, Gobble loves the sink area the most, and will rub against the back of your calves while you wash the dishes. She's not very vocal, but when she does make noise it's unexpectedly strange, including a fast clicking noise from her mouth when extremely excited by birds outside the window. I named her Gobble in part for her style of eating (she dive-attacks the food then jerks backward so it flies upward through the air to land in her mouth), and in part for the turkey gobble sound she makes occasionally when playing by herself in a cat freak-out. Gobble deserves more attention than she gets because Amelia is such a me hog, but as she's gotten bigger she's taken her place more and more.

A typical day's interactions with my cats include Amelia sprawling across my belly on the couch, head resting on a bosom, and Gobble on the headrest next to us, stretching down just enough for her paw to rest on my arm. When I go to sleep at night, Amelia goes to her cat pad on top of a hight bookshelf across the room looking down on me, and Gobble resting in the hammock of the cat tree above my bed, also looking lovingly down at me. At those times especially it somehow feels like family, and I can't imagine my life without them. Read more!

All About my Mother. OK, Also my Grandparents and a Whole Bunch of Other Relatives.

So it's Mother's Day, and as such it seems to be expected for Moms to get breakfast in bed, treated like queens, etc. etc. The last three or four years that has not happened for my Mom, and I think our Mother's Day tradition is the perfect example of how totally awesome she is. This year, my Mom organized brunch for almost 50 people, in honor of all the mothers in our family, and particularly my grandmother.

My mother's parents died a number of years ago, but she is very close to my Dad's parents, and in fact they moved in next door to said grandparents, which is a whole other story. Both living grandparents now have Alzheimer's, and have really deteriorated the last couple years, to the point that they can't be trusted home alone for too long or simple things like making toast turn into kitchen fires. My grandparents had ten children (Irish Catholic, represent!), and all but one live in California, most in the immediate area. All have married and had children but one, and he re-married and has a stepdaughter, so in essence every single one of their ten children has children. I honestly can't keep track of all the kids in my extended family, but my grandparents have approximately 30 grandchildren and at this point more than ten great-grandkids in addition to that. Side note: It's reassuring when an aunt or uncle whispers "who's that kid?" to me while a toddler crawls around on the carpet. I am the least likely family member to have that answer except the out-of-state unlce and family, and it's a total bonding moment.

I grew up somewhat isolated in the country and we didn't see my grandparents and family nearly as much as they saw each other, so I was never as comfortable with the huge extended family network as they clearly were with each other. I have chronic outsider feelings in most situations and family gatherings - Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, etc. - are arduous and feel interminable. Wailing kids, packs of wild young cousins running underfoot, polite and uncomfortable conversations with well-meaning but obliviously ignorant or fundamentally catholic aunts and uncles I have nothing in common with, this is what family holidays are to me (here's a small sample from my old blog). I'd like to avoid them altogether, but these things are important to my very excellent parents so I go to every fucking one.

Today I arrived at my parents, as requested, at 9:00 AM to be put to work. My mother asked me to go next door to borrow knives, then immediately decided she should go herself since my grandparents may have forgotten about today's event and she would be better to explain it (my grandma continually mistakes me for one or another cousin, but they are with my parents all the time, are aware to some degree of how much they lean on my parents and don't have a problem remembering them). They'd told my grandparents about this all week, and my grandmother at least three times yesterday. As my mother tells it, this morning she wished grandma Happy Mother's Day and reminded her of the brunch today. She explained that almost all her kids and her grandchildren would be there to honor her for Mother's Day, and grandma put her hands to her cheeks and exclaimed, "Oh, my goodness!" like it was a surprise party just for her. Obviously, grandma was thrilled.

My mother made orange scones with strawberries and whipped cream for dessert, bacon, a vegetarian egg-strada (vegetarian for ME, the only vegetarian in the family, because she is thoughtful like that), and fried potatoes. Other relatives brought quiche, ham, sausage, and a variety of coffee cakes and cinnamon rolls. We served coffee, tea and mimosas, which was my responsibility for all new arrivals. My other job was to give every single mother, including my great-grandchildren-producing cousins, and two sets of parents-in-law from one aunt and another uncle, one of the freaking ORCHID CORSAGES my parents had bought to make the day even more special. My mother was worried she may have miscounted and there might not be enough corsages, so we saved one in the fridge for her to put on only after she was sure all the other mothers got one (they got exactly the right number, so she eventually did get to wear her corsage).

To make this event happen, my parents spent the last two days cleaning their house, readying the outside garden area, borrowing a couple tables and a bunch of chairs from an uncle on my mom's side, and setting up one table in their enclosed patio and five outside tables, replete with tablecloths, vases of flowers from their garden (on every table - my dad is adorably into flower arranging), glasses, and all of the silverware they could get from their own stores and my grandparents. For smaller gatherings, it's always my job to set the table, but they had most of it done before I got there so I just had to fill in the blanks.

Because my mother likes to entertain people "right," in a way that my very alzheimered grandmother more than anyone else would appreciate, she was awake until 11:00 PM last night ironing napkins. Her biggest regret today was that my uncle's in-laws, a friendly and vivacious couple of sixty-odd-years, ended up sitting where she thought just kids would be, at the end of the row of outside tables where there were plastic instead of real glasses and some of the tableware was plastic.

They still had ironed cloth napkins, though!

My Mom spent her Mother's Day cooking, organizing, worrying about people getting enough food/drink, generally running around finding serving spoons, etc., and trying to make a very special holiday for everyone else. I think it's nuts for her to do this on what is ostensibly "her day", and freely say so, but it makes her happy so whatever. When I arrived she squealed and gave me a huge hug, told me how happy she was I was there, talked to my brother on the phone, hugged me again and told me how happy she was that I was helping, went next door to spread the word to my grandparents, came back and put the eggstrada in the oven and started cooking bacon and readying the potatoes and onions, opened my present and told me how thoughtful I was to get the Juno soundtrack, spread some family gossip while taking out the crystal glasses for me to place, spared a moment in the kitchen to chat with almost every newcomer, and on and on and on.

When the extended family finally all left - a full five-and-half hours AFTER scheduled brunch time, it was clear that this is pretty much the pleasantest holiday gathering my family has. Which is due entirely to my Mom's vision and preparation, and to my Dad's assistance. Point of this whole thing being: my Mom is teh awesome. I'm very impatient with most extended family stuff, but somehow when I'm involved in a way I know makes her very happy and I have a role that keeps me busy, I'm happier too.

After everyone finally left, we finished cleaning the big stuff and looked for a movie to watch on pay-per-view. I convinced them to go with Death at a Funeral, which my Dad nearly fell off the couch laughing at. So I guess it was a pretty great Mother's Day.

In about a month we get to do it again for Father's Day. I will suffer through it and be grateful to my parents too, again. Read more!

Earth Day 2008

I'm pasting this from my old blog, where for some reason I made it into it's own page rather than a blog entry. Why yes, I am new at this.

Some interesting Earth Day-related posts I read today:

1. At Shakesville, Shaker Rana posts on the ways gender is embedded in the environmental and green movements. I liked it as food for thought. My housemate, who liked it also, had one criticism in that she thinks some of the stereotypically feminine focus on personal, consumer changes have more to do with generational differences than gender differences.

2. At i09, Annalee Newitz writes about futurist Jamais Cascio’s theory that Earth Day, when framed as a discussion on saving the earth, should really be termed Human Civilization day. Since the planet will eventually recover no matter how much damage we do, what we are arguing for ultimately has more to do with human civilization surviving. This one I also liked as food for thought, although I was grateful to see someone in the comments catch that this perspective overlooks all the species humans wipe out in the meantime.

Read more!

The Story of Stuff

I just would like to recommend this, a short video called The Story of Stuff about what goes into creating and getting us the myriad things that we consume, found via Jack at Feministe. One thing that stood out especially is that 99% of what goes into making something is thrown out within six months of receiving it. Holy shit, our system/way of life here is so broken. I'm not even sure what system I'm decrying, except to say a lot of them, or maybe the greater US system of irresponsible, unbridled capitalism all our smaller systems contribute to. Read more!

Moved to Blogger

So I've just moved to Blogger from Wordpress. Here's the link to the old blog, which I want to state up-front is totally lame.

I thought about transferring the old posts here, but there's so little to the blog anyway that I don't think I care enough for it to be worth it.

After I started that blog, a friend started another blog that she invited me to post on, so now I've gotten used to how Blogger works, which I like. I'm going to try to do some actual blogging. I have no idea why I feel the need to announce some sort of intention here, but apparently I do.

I intend to blog, everybody. Read more!