I still love you guys and will try to post again soon - just have some stuff going on.

♥!

D:

So my last entry got metaquoted and inspired a community, peoples. lolpoetry - go check it out. Y'all rock. *blush* Thanks to everyone who commented.

In other news, my fish's weekly menu:

SUNDAY - fast day. They pout a lot.
MONDAY - half a frozen, thawed pea, 2x. Gobble gobble.
TUESDAY - 2 pellets per fish, 2x. Note that Grendel's pellets are pre-soaked in vitamin water out of consideration to his digestive troubles.
WEDNESDAY - Pellets in the morning, frozen, thawed brine shrimp in the evening.
THURSDAY - Pellets in the morning, frozen, thawed daphnia soaked in vitamin water in the evening.
FRIDAY - Pellets.
SATURDAY - Frozen, thawed bloodworms.

Any of those pellets can be swapped out with Omega brand flakes, but I'm ordering Omega brand betta pellets when I can ... flakes suck, but damn, Omega has awesome ingredients. (Halibut? Cod and salmon? Seriously?)

Why do my fish eat better than I do?

Further note: world's best dollar store purchase for owners of a betta fish - a laser pointer. Comedy gold. "WHY IS IT NOT FOODS?"

O Hai Just FYI

teh cookiez
i eated them
they was there
in ur kitchin

teh onez
u mebbe wanted
fur snackz

Very srry
they was delishus
srsly sweet
and so omnomnom.


(-- after "This is Just to Say," by William Carlos Williams.)

Apparently, in Berlin, the New Year must be ushered in with the Pirates of the Carribean soundtrack.

Stan Lee was born on December 28th, 1922. You probably know him (if you know him) as the creator of characters like Spider-Man, the Hulk, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, Iron Man, and of course many of their supporting cast members - like Spider-Man's girlfriend and later wife, Mary Jane Watson-Parker.

It was Stan's idea to have MJ and Peter get married in the Spider-Man newspaper strip, a brainstorm that was hastily but, given the characters' strong friendship and long history of on-again off-again romance, strongly followed up on in the main comic. This was in 1987. In the twenty years since, Peter and Mary Jane Parker have quite simply been the coolest couple in comics.

Today, enacting a storyline which Marvel's E-i-C has been wanting to put into place for years, but the current Amazing Spider-Man writer hates so much that he repudiated it on Usenet, the Parker marriage has been dissolved. Not just divorced, no; their romance has officially never happened. Apparently E-i-C Joe Quesada thinks that Peter Parker being married to Mary Jane makes him too old, and that he should be free to have a swingin' single life and download porn.



Well, shucks, Stan. Happy 85th anyway?



ETA: Comments now contain spoilers for upcoming issues of Spider-Man, besides the obvious.

As covered here.

Today at the New York Anime Festival, Marvel and Del Rey announced a joint project which will see their most popular properties produced as Original English Language manga: X-Men and Wolverine - the manga. [...]

X-Men - Written by Raina Telgemeier and Dave Roman with art by the Indonesian artist, Anzu.
Wolverine - Antony Johnston was named as writer, with the artist to be named later. [...]

X-Men will be a shojo style manga, where the Xavier School is still a mutant academy, but it's a all-boys school – with Kitty Pryde, the heroine of the story is the only girl in the school. Kitty is torn between the popular Hellfire Club, led by Pyro, and the school misfits who she eventually bands together as the X-Men.

Okay, I have to admit I am NOT thrilled with some stuff Marvel has been doing lately hands off MJ, damnit! - but as fusions go, this is pretty inspired. I mean, that's the crackiest of both worlds right there. I do hope they can work in other female characters somehow - probably as teachers.

Oh, and Wolverine will be starring in a shonen manga, in a move that surprises no one. Only one question in my mind: will Nightcrawler be making an appearance as a bishonen? Oh, you know you were wondering, too.

Deeply pleased to see Raina Telgemeier and her husband Dave Roman getting high-profile work - I like reading her comic SMILE - a Dental Drama and have actually contemplated reading the *shudders* Babysitters' Club graphic novels to check out more of her stuff. Yes, really, she's that good.

HAPPY BIRTHAMADAY, TERANAKINS! WE WUBS YOU SO MUCH WE FORGETS OUR ENGLISH!

So, tonight John Oliver on The Daily Show was trying to divide small children into groups of liberals and conservatives.

JO, to small boy: What's your position on stem cell research?
Small boy: *blank stare*
JO: All right, what do you think of Spider-Man?
Small boy: *eagerly* I like him!
JO: Okay, to the left!

XD

E-mail LJ by 5 PM pacific Monday, get 30 dollar certificate for children's education charity.

It's legit, folks! Go check it out!

Haven't decided where to use mine yet ... possibly telophase's manga for literacy initiative.

Okay, I am officially not sleeping tonight. YEEP!

On a more cheerful note, this is pretty awesome. No idea how it works, but it's cool.

This is why I love comics. Seriously, if you hadn't been told, would you have known that was from 1955? Me neither.

It shouldn't have taken me so long to figure out how to write it, and finally I decided just to keep it simple.

So, on Wednesday I did not talk much like a pirate, because I am not very good at it, but I did dress like one with a bandana, peacock earrings and fake pearl bracelet, a black tank top and tiered peasant skirt over my badass black boots. I got compliments!

Alas, I did not get anyone asking on Thursday why I was dressed all in green ... perhaps I should have worn all black, but my black pants were packed away and I thought people might think I was feeling randomly goth rather than realizing I was wearing colors in support of the Jena Six. I saw several people in black, but didn't really get the chance to ask any of them whether they were just wearing black or doing so to support the cause. Hmm - it's a bit of an awkward thing to ask, since if they are just wearing black for the heck of it, you'd make them feel guilty...

Hopefully most of you will know who the Jena 6 are by now. If not, the main website summarizes it quite aptly:

The Jena Six are a group of black students who are being charged with attempted murder for beating up a white student who was taunting them with racial slurs, and continued to support other white students who hung three nooses from the high schools "white tree" which sits in the front yard.

That doesn't really bring in the sheer outrageousness of the case, though, which you can read about at the site above. Here's another good timeline (Thanks, homasse!), and a list of links I totally ganked from [Bad username: brown_betty"]: Friends of Justice, Angry Black Bitch's post, a Washington Post article</a>, Seattle Pi, Louisiana ACLU press release.

Many of the above links should talk about actions you can take in support, particularly the Friends of Justice link, for the record. For updates I've been keeping an eye on the mainstream press as the situation gets more coverage, the occasional post on Feministe">, and brown_betty's journal. Er, you know, maybe I should just ask her how she keeps up with this stuff rather than just stealing info from her all the time.

I just got my first Mormons!

*feels all grown-up now*

So, ah, maybe not much point in making a work tag when today was my last day of work. (This was as scheduled - my first day of class is Tuesday, and it was a summer internship.) But why do I have homework a week before classes even start? And why does it entail Second Life? The injustice, people, the injustice!

Books recently read: Mouse Guard: Fall 1152, by David Petersen. A graphic novel about mice with cloaks and weaponry, which sounds kind of like Redwall. It isn't, very much, except where that's actually complimentary. Definitely if you've ever read a Jacques book and thrown it down twitching over why all the herbivorous animals are pure of heart or how on earth the hares and the mice can ever look at each other in the eye without squinting, you'll like this one.

Also, in issue #1 of the sequel, Mouse Guard: Winter 1152, Sadie the Guard mouse has a great fight scene, but you can't read that unless you read Fall, so go read it.

I was recently informed that favorite book of my teen years The Thief and its unexpected sequel The Queen of Attolia, both by Megan Whalen Turner, had recently acquired yet another sequel, The King of Attolia, so I got it from the library and devoured it this afternoon. It was difficult to put down and brain-satiating in the way that only a not strictly necessary but narratively broadening sequel to a much beloved earlier novel can be. Technically, that's two earlier novels, and the second did the same for the first - I didn't think she could pull off that feeling twice, but there you go. Oh, but now I need a sequel, damnit. The possibilities are spooling out everywhere, and this series is built on plot twists.

Obviously, for the full effect you need to read the first two; check the teen section of your local library. Highly recommended, particularly for those who like unreliable narrators, swashbuckling, political hijinx, and Greco-Byzantine mash-ups.

Also saw Stardust, which I greatly enjoyed. Mostly I wanted to wear Trist[r]an and Yvaine's awesome outfits, though. Seriously, that coat? The satin dress? Mmmmm.


terana: *gnaws on your lucious brains*
rabican: owwww
* terana makes a note to devour the pain centres first next time.
rabican: how considerate, your zombieness

Co-worker #1: That sounds like dinosaurs.
Co-worker #2: It's an autistic child, actually.
Co-worker #1: ... What?!


Co-worker #2 was listening to a podcast about autism on her ipod, and it had just gotten to a part where a child being interviewed/profiled was having a breakdown or attack, apparently.

So, this past week I did, in fact, actually want to post to my livejournal, but then our entire university's network went down! And then when it came back up, I forgot what I wanted to write about. However! (Dun dun dun.) Last night, I went on an emergency fish heater/not-my-local-grocery grocery store run and discovered ... that the grocery store near Petco has U.F.O. instant yakisoba!

Seriously, that stuff is awesome, for the definition of "awesome" which means, "if it did not play a significant part of your childhood, you will probably find it disgusting and MSG-filled." Also expensive, but I was desperately in need of some comfort food after something went wrong with the steak I cooked on Friday (I suspect the auto-defrost function on my freezer is the culprit), and I have never seen this stuff available anywhere outside of Japan before, so - U.F.O.! Nummy instant chukasoba with dehydrated meat and grated seasonings! Mmmmm.

I apologize to anyone who has lost their appetite after the previous paragraph. It's okay, I'm probably having lobster bisque soup (from a can) for dinner. I'm normally better about cooking, but everything I know how to make isn't very good for fragile stomachs and damnit, I am sick of waffles and cereal.

Hey! I have a work tag now!

A few nights ago, I found Grendel sprawled flat on the bottom of hishospital tank. I was pretty sure he was just sleeping, but I stopped and took a closer look just to check.

After a few moments he veeeery slowly lifted his head just slightly off the bottom, rolled his eyes back in his head to look at me - it could not have been a more blatant, "What NOW?" expression. I cracked up laughing, it was so perfect.

Poor, poor baby - but what a smartass. Oh, well, I just spent 50 bucks buying him pig dewormer and shipping it next day express, he can deal. (Put it in last night and I think, I think it's working, too! We'll know in a few more days.)

So, it's the last day of International Blog Against Racism Week as I write this, although probably by the time I post the entry, at least everyone on the east coast will have moved on to another day ... that's all right. During all the heat headaches, random insomnia, continual pet health crises (latest update - buying pig dewormer for a betta fish!), and of course continual dithering over whether I should write about BLUE BEETLE and why it is a great anti-racist comic book everyone should buy or something more personal that might require, like, coherence, I did come to realize a couple of things:

1. I don't really need to have a central thesis to write about my experiences, at least not yet, and at least not if my purpose is only to let people know these experiences exist;


2. while I am writing to an audience, now this post is for me - so it's okay if this ends up late and not in the giant IBARW linklist (which y'all should read), really.

BLUE BEETLE is, in fact, a great superhero comic book about a Hispanic superhero living in El Paso, Texas, maybe the best comic DC is producing today, and you should definitely read it - but this post is about passing. Not all kinds of passing, because dear lord, that's about twenty sociology theses right there, but just about passing, not passing, and related topics as my family has experienced them in my lifetime, and how that's tied in to our acceptance in the communities we've lived in. Mostly stream-of-consciousness anecdotes until the end, so prepare for some rambling. I'm deliberately saving off on fully explaining how my family actually "works" (if you don't know; some of you do) until the end, which may or may not confuse the heck out of everyone. It's a midnight experiment, my apologies.

( Looking exotic. )

( Aside. )

( Speaking exotic. )


( Her kind of white people. )

( Aside II, but a little more important. (Much.) )


( Even Asians think all Asians look alike? )

( The art of using stereotypes as a weapon. )

( If there is one anecdote you should read: me and my brother, profiled by the TSA. )

( I don't know where to put this, but... )



And if you (holy crap) made it this far, you get e-cookies, and me wibbling a lot. Oh, and an actual explanation of family history.

( Whee, questions. )