Miscellaneous

In which fashion pimps for pedophiles

Moriah

Yo, New York. Milan. Bentonville.

Roman PolanskiI’m tired of having to tart my 5-year-old FEMALE Tax Deduction up like a 63rd & Prospect streetwalker. There’s this thing called a waist. There’s this other thing called a waistBAND. The waistBAND should come up all the way to the waist.

A) I do not have the time nor inclination nor money to sew my TD’s jeans. I know how. Sorta. They’d look homemade and I don’t want my TD to come home crying because she got laughed at about her homemade jeans.

B) It’s not like I don’t want her to be fashionable. I just don’t want her to be Lindsay Lohan or Britney Spears at 5 or until she can pay for her own damned clothes and the laundering thereof.

C) This is not out of some outraged sense of modesty or affront to church standards, either. She’s FIVE YEARS OLD. She’s a target just by being five. I spose the gender doesn’t matter much these days.

D) I’m not even saying get rid of low-rise, but SHIT! Give me an alternative, eh? You give me boot-cut and straight-leg and bells, but you don’t give me a choice on rise?

E) If she does want to tart up like Lindsay Lohan or Britney Spears in the future, I could deal with it better if I could point my nightmarishly teenager-girl-ish Tax Deduction to her contemporaries who have a waistBAND touching their actual WAIST and tell her where she needs to shop. And, oh, the thrift stores are no better because they’re backing up on the last 5 (that I know of) years of other little tax deductions who outgrew their 4- and 5-year-old skin-tight, low-rise skank makers.

Every time I go clothes shopping for this kid I get pissed off about this and then I forget about it–right up to the point I have to take her shopping again. I can find modest blouses, no problem. It’s the jeans and khakis that are giving me fits. Or not. If anybody has a source for high-rise jeans/khakis online, I’ll take it.

When does a blog stop being yours?

Moriah

In romance [well, in other genres also? I don’t know], sometimes authors strike such a chord with readers that the characters the author created seem to belong to the readers (aka fans). When an author does something bad to one of her characters, much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth ensues. Well, you know, you write romance, you know that there needs to be a happily ever after (HEA) or at least a happily for now (HFN) ending. (We will parse the romance “formula” later.)

Well, I can see why there’d be some legitimate reason for distress here. The author created these worlds and people and they belong to her, true, but the public pays to read about them. Do they have an expectation to get the story they want/expect/hope for or not? Hell, I don’t know. I’m going to write my Imaginary Friends the way my Imaginary Friends tell me to. [Uhm, I’m independent. I can do that.] But I have to expect that some people are going to cry foul if I just completely make one of them [insert horribleness here].

But now over at one of my must-stops for blog cruising, Dear Author, apparently the blog has ceased belonging to the person who built it, maintains it, and pays for it–which is a far different matter from creating books that you then persuade the public to buy who then eats them up and feeds your bank account.

I’m watching this train wreck of a thread and wondering: Why, if people don’t like a thread, a blog, don’t they simply stop reading? This isn’t Usenet, people (darn it). It’s Jane’s blog. She can post what she wants to and expect reasonably that people will remember that fact–without having to confront people who feel betrayed that what she said in her own house didn’t exactly fulfill their reading expectations that day. The sense of entitlement running through the thread is kind of…interesting.

Yo, all you gotta do is not go there. Or not read. Or sumpin. When did Jane’s blog become yours?

Abolish marriage

Moriah

“Marriage” is an ancient artificial construct that, in modern US society with no property rights attached to the female (i.e., dowry), has no real place.

As I said on chosha’s blog A Little East of Reality, what’s going on with California’s Prop 8 and the LDS church’s involvement with that, is one of defining the term. What needs to happen is that the underpinning law defining the term needs to change and then let linguistic evolution take over as to what is and is not marriage.

Here’s what needs to happen:

You and your intended(s) go to a lawyer and draw up a contract (people already to this for prenuptial agreements). You specify things like kids, power of attorney, healthcare decisionmaking, who does and does not have access to your healthcare information (thank you, HIPAA), and other things that heterosexual couples just…get…legally because they’re married as defined by law. In this case, the contract becomes the law. The lawyer files it with the court (like a divorce decree, only it’d be called something else like, oh, a companionship contract), the state collects its data, and everybody’s good to go.

If you and your intended(s) then want to go to your local ecclesiastical entity (whatever it is) and have a rite performed, you do that. Or don’t, if you don’t want to.

Or…do none of the above and after X number of years, you’ve converted from cohabitating to common-law “marriage” and that could apply to whatever living arrangement you have.

Here’s the thing. You change the labels and the populace will decide what marriage is based on their vocabulary.

Since I’m a libertarian, I have no investment in regulating what people do with their bodies as long as it doesn’t endanger me and mine.

I also have no investment in helping the church attempt to define “marriage” in California (although thankfully I haven’t been asked because then I’d be forced to be rude) because marriage has historically been about money and alliances.

What I find hypocritical is that the people who are most invested in re-defining marriage to include same-sex couples then turn around and vehemently protest polyamorous unions, which should have the same protections under whatever law gets passed.

William Saletan goes to great lengths to define why this should not be allowed and I find that simply ridiculous. Two people know what they’re doing, but three or more don’t? Let’s protect you from yourselves!

Here’s the answer. The number isn’t two. It’s one. You commit to one person, and that person commits wholly to you. Second, the number isn’t arbitrary. It’s based on human nature. Specifically, on jealousy.

Ah, okay. There’s a good argument.

In an excellent Weekly Standard article against gay marriage and polygamy, Stanley Kurtz of the Hudson Institute discusses several recent polygamous unions. In one case, “two wives agreed to allow their husbands to establish a public and steady sexual relationship.” Unfortunately, “one of the wives remains uncomfortable with this arrangement,” so “the story ends with at least the prospect of one marriage breaking up.” In another case, “two bisexual-leaning men meet a woman and create a threesome that produces two children, one by each man.” Same result: “the trio’s eventual breakup.”

Let’s protect the women and children!

Then he resorts to quoting the Bible, so he loses credibility with me right there.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: What’s good for the homosexual goose is good for the polyamorous gander and I defy any same-sex couple to give me a decent argument why that isn’t so…

…but that’s not my main point. My main point is this: You make it a civil contract between consenting adults, then let society’s usage of the word “marriage” define the word “marriage.”

The cold-blooded murder of the English tongue

Moriah

I am resigned, although I have yet to make the official transition.

I have finally, irrevocably, inexorably decided that I cannot stem the tide of the use of “to raise” in reference to human beings. Much like the law of chastity, the use of “to rear” in reference to humans versus the use of “to raise” in reference to animals was beaten into my head from an early age and, well…

…I give up.

But I swear, they’ll have to waterboard me before I’ll give into “alright.”

The perfect purse

Moriah

The last time I had the perfect purse, I was 20 and on my way to Europe. Got it at Jones on sale and it was a tan leather saddlebag-looking thing, tall, thin, boxy and with my number one requirement, a very long strap. About the size of a glass block, only longer and narrower.

Yesterday, I took the Tax Deductions to the Liberty Fall Festival where TD #1 indulged her type T personality on all the carnival rides (although there was nary a roller coaster to be had). TD #2 consented to go on the merry-go-round, but he clung to me the entire ride.

Anyhoo, I found the perfect purse made by Journey Leather (their link is under construction, dagnabbit). It’s a black leather saddlebag-with-pockets-looking thing with a very long strap and is obviously designed to hold every electronic gadget ever made.

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Except…my ebook reader. Or a paperback. It’s not that big. So I can do one of two things: I can fashion a strap to go on my ebook reader’s leather pouch or I can go get a Blackberry, which will not only allow me to carry my library around in my hand, it will also hold my brain, let me talk to people (verbally or writtenly), cruise the net, buy stuff, do business, listen to mp3s, and take pictures.

Yeah. Don’t tell Dude.

The springtime song

Moriah

Tax Deduction #1 is 5 and can’t read much yet. Bad Mommy! Bad Mommy! Call social services.

Okay, well, I keep a CD player in her room so she can have music (“lullabies”) and we’ve been doing this for about 7 months, I guess, givvertake.

CD #1 was Kenny Loggins’s Return to Pooh Corner. That lasted about 4 months.

CD #2 was Tina Malia’s Lullaby Favorites. That lasted about 3 months.

She wanted the Nutcracker next (took her to the ballet last Christmas), but I couldn’t find my CD. (Must be in another case somewhere–I hate it when that happens.)

So we’ve been on CD #3 now for about a week and a half. It’s just one of those compilation samplers of baroque (you know, the musical equivalent of the bathroom book of quotations to make you seem really smart at cocktail parties).

She says to me, she says, “Mama, there’s a springtime song!”

Oh, really? I mean, I know which one she’s probably talking about, but where/how does she know it’s the “springtime song”? Did she learn that at school? (Cause, wow, great school!) Or does it just magically say “Hey, I’m a springtime song” to a kindergartner?

So she’s on me about this, right? Tonight I turn on her “lullabies” (she had a meltdown when I told her it was really called “baroque,” so we’re back to “lullabies”) and she says to me, she says, “Number 9 is the springtime song.” So I look and why, yes, it is, right there, #9. I asked her a bunch of questions about how she knew this (well, I guess interrogated would be a better word), but she didn’t cough anything up.

I decided to go on the theory that a 5-year-old, when listening to Vivaldi’s Concerto No. 1, automatically knows that that’s the springtime song.

Because to think otherwise would take away the magic.

I wouldn’t be a member of any club…

Moriah

…that would have me as a member.

I spent all weekend with my Netgear wireless router trying to figure out why I couldn’t get into my own website. I could connect direct from the cable modem, but not through the router. I will spare you the details of the acrobatics Dude and I did to get back up and running. (It included editing the registry, so I am now completely traumatized.)

This morning I contacted my host to say, “Hey, I know it’s not you guys, but do you have any advice?”

It was them guys. My IP addy got blacklisted somehow.

Got you on my mind

Moriah

Here’s to me and Dude, who got married 6 years ago in the LDS Nauvoo, Illinois temple (very soon after it re-opened). Yeah, we got married on a Friday. The 13th. On purpose.

Dude likes funny ties, but Serious Ties not so much. I’m not keen on the Stooges and I thought Spongebob Squarepants was hilarious–but he didn’t. We have been at a tie impasse ever since. Until today.

Happy anniversary, baby.

Too much of a good thing

Moriah

I have an addictive personality and for years, I lived by the motto: If a little’s good, a lot’s gotta be better. It’s taken me years to get that pounded out of me. There are only 3 things where, as Madonna put it, “any number is fine with me/as long as it’s more”:

sex
money
books

And there are 2 things I have learned, to my everlasting detriment, where less is best:

salt (way to ruin a perfectly grilled slab of cow)
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

See, Christmas for me usually starts in late September/early October, when the autumn rains start and the leaves begin to mat on the ground. Well, this year, the autumn rains are coming early (though the leaves haven’t even begun to whisper that they’re going to turn). The first sign I’m getting itchy? I crack out the Christmas carols. Okay, so I’m a bit ahead of schedule right now, but then I decided to do a bit of Mom Stuff (that would be mending) and went digging for the Rudolph DVD.

The Tax Deductions don’t appreciate Rudolph for the wonder and magic that he is and I have to admit, in September, there’s not much magic
there for me, either.

The magic of Rudolph, I’ve discovered, is in knowing that it will be shown on X date, probably early December, on CBS at X time and if you miss it, you’re just shit out of luck and you have to wait until next year.

I have a DVD and a VHS tape up for sale.

Pretty women

Moriah

Disclaimer: I can’t stand Hillary Clinton. At all. But… I find her very attractive in this picture. I’m not even going to chalk it up to the hair (very nice) or necklace (meh—not a fan of chunk jewelry). Perhaps the smile? Yes, that’s it. It looks…genuine. Happy. Even as much as I despise her, I didn’t like the constant yammering on her looks. On the other hand, if she’d let this side of her show more often, would she have gotten farther?

Then there’s this picture of Dame Helen Mirren who, at 62, is totally rockin’. I wouldn’t have posted it because Karen already did, but it’s stuck with me for 3 days. To me, it’s an illustration that Mother Nature doesn’t necessarily punish us XX types for having the audacity to turn 40. Or 50. Or 60.


And the last 2 ladies in today’s lineup are Alfre Woodard (56) and Diane Keaton (62). I don’t guess I have any commentary because, well, look at ’em. Obviously, I don’t know which ladies have had what work done, if any, but still.

Over at Teach Me Tonight, Laura Vivanco discusses the topic of older women in romance vis a vis Charlotte Lamb’s novels. She also points out RfP’s post at Access Romance and about young heroines who don’t really seem young and Robin Uncapher’s post about the time warp in romance.

Well, I’ll tell you. I didn’t really feel like writing an ingenue because at my age, it’s just silly and I was never an ingenue when I was that age. I wanted to write people who had some experience with life. Now, Susan Elizabeth Phillips writes older romance, but always within the context of having the older couple as a secondary love plot.

Mine aren’t 50-ish, but they are 40-ish and as the series progresses, they age. In book #2 (Stay), the hero and heroine (Eric and Vanessa) are youngish by my standards (late 20s and early 30s, but this is a challenge I set for myself). By book #3 (Magdalene), the oldest of the original characters are on the wrong side of 45 and still going strong. Mitch and Cassie, the hero and heroine of Magdalene, are on the wrong side of 45, with grown/almost grown children and possibly a grandchild or two.

So along with my other crimes against romance, you can add major characters in their 40s. Gee, how many other ways can I bend this genre?

More steampunk, please!

Moriah

I read a lot of Neal Stephenson’s stuff and the only thing he’s written that I cautiously suspect might possibly could be classified steampunk is Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer, but I still don’t know if that makes it steampunk because it’s set in the future with Victorian aesthetics instead of in Victoriana with modern technology. (Great book, BTW, but I really really liked The Big U.)

I’ve been meaning to get into it (really!), especially after looking at sites such as Steampunk Workshop and Kit Stolen‘s site (and oh, isn’t he a beautiful man; you know I had to make a character out of him).

But this limits me because to me, steampunk is eye candy, as in goods: Pretty clothes and pretty things and gorgeous textures–all DIY. I mean, really. Look at this stuff. It begs caressment.


And oh, various steampunk keyboards are for sale at Datamancer, FYI.

Anyway, I’ve been reading a short story by Eva Gale, which is post-apocalyptic for one and steampunk for two (steam engines? of course it is). The story is from Phaze anthology Fantasy IV and is called “Scorpion’s Orchid.” And now my appetite for steampunk fiction is whet and I want more, but SF/F is a foreign land to me. Obviously, I’m going to take suggestions off of Steampunk Workshop’s site, but help me out here, folks. Good steampunk (with or without utopian/dystopian elements) suggestions being solicited.

“Mormon” as its own genre

Moriah

Well, so I’ve been through the whole “LDS fiction” genre discussion here and here and here.

But not here. I’m not late to the party, as I’ve been stewing about this for a while, but the LA Times article gave me something else to throw in the stew pot.

Richard Dutcher, the regrettably monikered “father of Mormon film,” has released his latest film, Falling, in a limited number of venues. As of last year, he also released the moniker and the church. In a statement made last year, he said he was “leaving Mormon moviemaking to the Mormons.” Which is sad because as far as I can gather, his work was seen by some as “so very supportive of both our community and its faith.”

(Psst: Mr. Dutcher. Call me!)
Read more →

Sassing back

Moriah

I’ve been on the hunt for a blog feed I like. I’ve used various Firefox plugins and only tried Google reader as a last resort.

While I don’t exactly love it, it’s the best thing I’ve tried so far. Problem is, I don’t get inspired to comment very often because I read, move along. I have too many blogs of interest: romance, LDS, Kansas City, politics, diet/nutrition, traditional and independent publishing, other artsy fartsy craftsy type things (you don’t want to know how many of those I follow), and healthcare industry-related things.

I know I read a blog post/thread a while back commenting on lack of comments all over; someone suggested that this situation was part of the problem. I didn’t understand it then (most of the readers I’ve tried listed how many comments a post had and it would prompt me to check them), but I do now.