Sounds Passing Through Sudden Rightnesses

A Note from Me to Me

2010-05-20T23:30:00.004-04:00

More on the room-cleaning front. While clearing my desk, I found a small, folded note I wrote myself. I vaguely remember writing it-- before college, clearly, or maybe a month or two in. Anyway, it's at least two years old, probably more.

It says:

Less complaining-- less WORDS-- more action. Send letters. Give. And try. Hiding and bitching won't fix it, and TRYING CAN'T HURT ME.

Worst case scenario: I go out, I don't have a very good time, I run back to Scones having proved myself right all along.

But.

But maybe it can be different. And asking and trying and talking and talking BACK cannot hurt me. And it may just help someone else.

Don't just find nerdfighters. CREATE THEM.

I am a good person.
I'm an attractive person.
I am a talented person.

TAKE THE ADVICE I GIVE EVERYONE ELSE.

All I have it what I give myself.

I don't even... these are all really good things to remember, of course. But I'm so far away from that now. I don't need to hear that from myself. I don't even recognize that person.

And I suppose that can only be a good thing.

Relics of a Me I'm Not.

2010-05-14T18:25:00.003-04:00

Hey, Sounds. Long time no post.

So I'm cleaning my room right now (a laborious, unending process that will occupy me all summer, I'm sure) and I have to say, it's a bizarrely nostalgic experience. Unproductively so.

One of the downsides of an obsessive personality is that you're convinced, in the midst of your obsession, that nothing will ever change. That whatever you love right now will be the thing you love forever, just as passionately. And unfortunately that's just not the case. Do I still love Harry Potter? Hell yes I do. I always will. But I wasted a fortune on decorative pins at conventions, and they stayed on my purse until the fasteners broke. And now I have a bunch of broken pins that say things like "You had me at drink this" and "FREE STAN SHUNPIKE." They're adorable, I guess, but, like... what do I do with them?

Or, another example. Several years ago, I bought "Martial Arts for Dummies." I was big into anime at the time, and writing fanfic, and I thought it would be a good research tool. (In my defense, this was in the days before wikipedia.) I can always donate it, of course, or sell it on amazon or to the half-price bookstore in town, but that goes against my nature. I'm a packrat at heart, first of all, so any plan that ever requires me to actually get rid of something is always going to make me balk, but it's more than that. As if by getting rid of this stupid book I don't need and will never read again, I'm betraying my past self. Calling take-backs or something.

It's highly irrational. But so are my spending habits. I mean, seriously. I have a DESK GONG. A little gong, about the circumference of a silver dollar, with a twig-sized metal rod as a mallet. Why? Well, I bought it in my senior year of high school-- picked it up at Borders, from those shelves of Hey Buy One Last Thing Before You Check Out! chain bookstores set up on line before the register. I was directing a short play for drama class at the time* and also competing in Duo Interpretation on the Speech and Debate team with my friend Will. Will's a fantastic actor, and we both loved "Sure Thing" by David Ives: another student had put it on for THEIR senior-directed play a few years previously, and so we decided to use it as our first Duo piece, in Junior year. We were never happy with our interpretation-- it was too static-- and while we loved our Senior piece, a cutting of You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown, we never quite got over our love of "Sure Thing."

Being the youtube enthusiast that I am (well, was) and aspiring director that I'm still not quite comfortable being, I had a brilliant idea: we'd revisit "Sure Thing" over the summer, with me behind the camera and him appearing again as Bill. Some other friend of ours would play Betty. I'm still proud of the idea; if you're unfamiliar with "Sure Thing," the basic premise is that a guy and a girl try and work their way through a stereotypical romcom meet-cute. The twist is that every time one of them does something wrong, a bell rings and the scene starts over-- they get a second chance to make a first impression. In my hypothetical film version, every time the bell rang we'd cut to a new location-- some other restaurant, with Bill and Betty in different clothes. A sequence of alternate realities.** And that's where the mini-gong comes in. I was going to use it instead of the typical concierge bell, with a white-gloved hand doing the ringing. A cut-away between each scene, instead of just the sound effect.

All of which is interesting and kind of cool, except for the part where the film never got made. It probably will never get made. And yet the desk gong remains, gathering dust on my shelf next to the anthropomorphic garlic clove plushie Amanda got me when she went to California.

I mean, honestly. I have a lava lamp, for fuck's sake. What does one do with a lava lamp? Why are they sold? What purpose do they serve? But I was on the cusp of teenagerhood and I thought they were the coolest thing, I put it on my Hanukkah list, and that was that. Another useless thing to add to my collection.

I have a corkboard covered with post-cards from friends I've long since lost touch with; a desk drawer filled to the brim of all of my AP US History notes from sophomore year, because I was convinced I'd grow up to be a high school history teacher, and I didn't want to forget how Mr. Hand had done it; a book of Celtic runes I bought in England, just because it was a book of runes from England; an action figure of myself.

I feel like my room would be a sociologist's dream-- or perhaps their worst nightmare. And it all boils down, I think, to the tension between what's important and what matters. These things all mattered to me once--does that make them important? Should things that were once important to you always matter, at least in some small way? They set me on the path, after all. I wouldn't-- couldn't-- be now-me if I hadn't been then-me first.

I'm sure I could dig up a more useful and fitting quotation if I tried, but all I can think about is a rather throwaway line from King Lear. Lear gets pissed off at Cordelia for snubbing him, he banishes her, and Kent speaks up-- saying what an injustice it is, etc etc. He gets chastised for failing to observe proper court decorum and speaking out of turn, to which he bursts out "Anger hath a privilege!"***

Does the past have a privilege?

* a hilarious little one-act called Jimmy the Antichrist, the script of which is also around here somewhere, cluttering up my life.
** In the interest of not repeating myself, I've relegated this to the footnotes: GOD I still love that concept. Maybe some day...
*** What a great line. Oh, Shakespeare, the things you do to me.

The Regional Expressions Meme

2010-05-01T11:41:00.003-04:00

Age: 20

Where you grew up (Ages 0-18): Central New Jersey

1. A body of water, smaller than a river, contained within relatively narrow banks: A creek or a stream.

2. What the thing you push around the grocery store is called: A shopping cart.

3. A metal container to carry a meal in: A lunchbox. (though actually, if it's metal I'd probably think "lunch pail" and imagine construction workers. Lunchboxes are made of plastic and have cartoons on them.)

4. The thing that you cook bacon and eggs in: A frying pan. The word 'skillet' doesn't seem weird to me, but it wouldn't be my first choice.

5. The piece of furniture that seats three people: Couch in general, sofa if I'm feeling fancy. 'Loveseat' if we're talking about that one specific couch in my living room, but that's because of Mom.

6. The device on the outside of the house that carries rain off the roof: Gutter.

7. The covered area outside a house where people sit in the evening: Porch.

8. Carbonated, sweetened, non-alcoholic beverages: Soda. NOT POP. NEVER POP.

9. A flat, round breakfast food served with syrup: A pancake.

10. A long sandwich designed to be a whole meal in itself: Hoagie if it's cold, sub if it's hot.

11. The piece of clothing worn by men at the beach: First instinct is to say "bathing suit," but I might also say trunks. Speedo if it's a speedo.

12. Shoes worn for sports: Sneakers. "Trainers" slips out sometimes if I've been reading too much British fiction.

13. Putting a room in order: Cleaning.

14. A flying insect that glows in the dark: Firefly or lightning bug. Depends on usage. "The fireflies are out" versus "I caught a lightning bug." I suspect this is only me.

15. The little insect that curls up into a ball: Rolly-polly.

16. The children's playground equipment where one kid sits on one side and goes up while the other sits on the other side and goes down: A see-saw.

17. How do you eat your pizza: Tip first, two hands. No folding.

18. What's it called when private citizens put up signs and sell their used stuff: Garage sale, maybe yard sale.

19. What's the evening meal?: Dinner.

20. The thing under a house where the furnace and perhaps a rec room are: A basement.

21. What do you call the thing that you can get water out of to drink in public places: Water fountain. NOT A BUBBLER. NEVER A BUBBLER.

12.1 "Robot" Reaction Post

2010-04-02T23:16:00.002-04:00

Starting stats: 12.1, Robot
Doctor: Four
Companions: Sarah Jane, Brigadier-General Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart, Harry Sullivan (barely)

The first thing I must say about Robot is that it's certainly the best-paced Classic episode I've yet seen (out of, y'know, two and a half, including itself.) Better plotted than Ark in Space, but not as quotable, I fear. Which leaves me a bit lost, as I'm not Jacob and I still don't know how I want to write these things. But ah well.

The regeneration sequence was a bit of a non-event--just a bleeding of one face into the other, no muss no fuss. I kind of like the modern Golden Light of Goooooold way of doing it better, I think. The Brig just mumbled "well, here we go again" and that was that. (I LOVE the Brig, by the way. His mustache is magnificent and his sense of humor is so wry and dry and... Iiiiiiii love it. [parentheses within parentheses to groan about how not-clever I am with the rhyming.] Anyway. He reminds me a lot of Martha, sometimes-- or, I suppose, Martha is an awful lot like the Brig. And not just for the UNITyness. They've just a way about them.)

Four sits up, babbling nonsense, and he's clutching Sarah Jane's arm so hard she's probably bruising under his grip. Sarah's plenty empowered and all, but every time I see her, I react the same way I did when I first saw Amy Acker as Fred on Angel-- which is to say, I repeatedly gasp, "but she's so small! look at how LITTLE she is!" every time she comes on screen. I don't mean it to be mean-- in fact, it's terribly endearing. But the point is, she really is just a slip of a thing, and the Doctor mustn't be so rough with her.

Oh my god the special effects are amazing. It's relatively easy, this time around, to get pulled into the story and kind of gloss over how awful the things you're actually seeing look, but if you pause it and come back to it? Oh my god, that robot. It's terribly impressive considering their budget and time period, but... oh, show. (They actually pull a Nosferatu with the cheapy-ass robot claw, too. I realize it's a classic suspense/horror technique, but... faaail.) (Oh, and THEN it steals a plain manila envelope stamped, in big letters, "TOP SECRET." Oh, show.)

Brig: "You realize, Miss Smith, that all of this is top secret?"
Sarah: [amused] "Then why are you telling me?"
Brig: "Well, be-bec--because there's no one else I can tell."

They're SO CUTE.

LOL FOUR. His face when he sees the TARDIS for the first time. A++++, I wish I had a screencap. And he snuck away from the Med Bay when he wasn't supposed to, of course, so he's in a dressing gown. Striped, obviously, as that's the way the Doctor prefers his jim-jams.

[Lis Sladen, in the commentary: "Very good lurking, there, Tom! Solid lurking."]

Harry Sullivan (a navy doctor, which they discuss more in Ark in Space) comes in to, y'know, apprehend the runaway and remind him he's supposed to be healing and all, and then the Doctor uses his still-canon extra regeneration energy to karate-chop through a (clearly balsa wood) brick and then SKIP ROPE, WITH HARRY. I cannot describe this scene with mere words. Just know that it is awesome. The two of them, face to face, maybe three inches apart, hopping to the time of the Doctor doing some creepy-as-fuck children's rhyme. Amazing. Oh, show.

And then, knowing Harry will only get in his way, the Doctor stuffs him in a closet. (Sarah finds him later. She walks into the empty lab, hears a vague muffled plea for help, says "Cupboard!" and finds him straight away. Doesn't even stop to think. Love that girl.)

[picking a new outfit: viking attire]
Doctor: "Do you think I might attract attention?"
Brig: "Just possibly."

(love. him.)

There's plot stuff and sneaking about stuff and blah, Sarah uses her reporter cred to get a visitor's pass to some sekrit military base... science... thing. "HEYA WHAT'S IN HERE?" she basically asks, barging right into a door that, I swear to god, is marked "Positively No Admittance." Oh, SHOW. While in the garage/lab where the phlebotinum was made, she notices a musty smell (and later, an oil spill) right off. She's such a good companion. (Also later off, she brushes the oil with her hand and gives it a sniff, and I have been watching too much Ten because I was terrified, for a moment, that she would lick it.)

Also also (I'm rubbish at linear thinking, apparently, so do try and keep up) later, she has to sneak back into the Lab. Her visitor's pass is about to expire, so she drives up to the gate guard all "I've forgotten my notebook-- I still have ten minutes left on my pass, can I pop in and get it?" and when he turns his back to phone a superior, she ABANDONS HER CAR, then HOPS A FENCE and RUNS ACROSS SEVERAL LARGE LAWNS to her destination. In a skirt suit and terribly absurd boots. LOVE THIS GIRL.

And then, just when I thought she couldn't get more awesome, she channels Rose. The crux of this story is a robot (big surprise) but it's a surprisingly adorable one, which doesn't want to hurt people can gets all conflicted and wobbles when confused. (Like a pokemon.) And Sarah's all "How can you be sure it doesn't have feelings?" and then asks the robot if it's alright, and pets it. And it's all very Dalek and god I love companions. They are the best.

[the Absent-Minded Professor is babbling about solar energy and pollution]
Doctor: "I know; humans. They can't see that what's under their noses is over their heads!"
[A-M P babbles on; Sarah Jane, in the background, laughs appreciatively at the Doctor's joke and then, realizing her faux-pas and seeing the Brig's poker face, half-heartedly tries to turn it into a cough, still smiling]

There's a wonderful moment, later in, when the Brig, the Doctor, and Sarah sit around in the Doctor's lab talking through the clues together. Not only do Sarah and the Doctor totally have an "Are you deducting?" moment, but I just... I love what an odd yet efficient little team they make. It's one thing to SAY Sarah's an investigative journalist; it's quite another to give her the mind of one. (In the commentary, the producer says "We very deliberately didn't make Sarah Jane an assistant--we made her an investigative journalist so she could, you know, start things on her own." To which Terrence Dicks replied "Yes-- assistants are for tying to train tracks!" and oh, that was so close to being inspired. But then Lis Sladen laughs and says "I never got that one-- it was the one I wanted!" which only further proves how awesome she is.)

But anyway. Sarah goes home to get some sleep (and change into an UTTERLY RIDICULOUS outfit, involving a scarf tied around her head for no reason) leaving the Doctor and the Brig to flail around and be useless in her absence:

Brig: "Doctor, what are we going to do? Or shall we just leave it all to Miss Smith?"

And later, when the Doctor types a note [a) on a typewriter and b) with super-speed] and tapes it to the TARDIS, explaining where he's run off to and what he's doing, he addresses it to Sarah Jane, and not the Brigadier. Even though he's parked in the UNIT lab and he has every reason to think the Brig would find it first.

"Please do not resist" says the polite, morally conflicted Robot. It's starting to become clear that he's adopted a King Kong style crush on Sarah Jane. Later, he will get hit with a ray gun and grow many stories high, and then he picks her up and carries her around. Well, a terrible doll of her. The SFX at that point at quite appalling.

[A-M P and Sarah want to sneak into a Sekrit Meeting of Bad Guys]
Soldier: "But the Brigadier would go spare-- so would the Doctor!"
Sarah: "Well, one's away and the other's asleep!"
Soldier: "Then I'll go wake the Doctor and see what he says--"
Sarah: "--DON'T YOU DARE. He had a nasty knock on the head and he needs to rest."
Soldier: "Well in that case miss, it's just not on. I'm sorry."
Sarah: "Oh, I--" [pause, then: epiphany] "MISter Benton,* are we members of UNIT?"
Soldier: "Well, no, of course not."
Sarah: "Are we under arrest?"
Soldier: [seeing where she's going with this; defeated] "No, miss."
Sarah: [beams the smile of Triumphant Feminine Wiles] "Well then, what we do and where we go is none of your business, is it? Come along, professor!"
Soldier: "Now, wai-"
Sarah: "No, you just go and [something british that I absolutely cannot interpret but is quite clearly a double entendre so I laughed] your rifle or something."

(... yeah, it kind of got away from me at the end, there. Moving on!)

WOOHOO Four drives Bessie! And it's awesome.

"James Bond" Sarah hisses derisively at a caught undercover Harry (having just been caught herself.)

Four uses the sonic screwdriver for the first time. Lots of things explode. It's fun.

[mutually trying to untie each other's handcuff bindings]
Harry: "How're we doing, Miss Smith?"
Sarah: "Ooookay?" [it's all in Lis's delivery, really.]

Robot kills A-M P and then laments, loudly, in his robot voice: "ohhhhh! I have killed the one who created me!" and then he drops to his knees before collapsing completely in a pathetic heap. [my hand-written notes for this section read: 'LOL LOL LOL LOL FOREVER']

[upon noticing Sarah Jane is missing]
Soldier: "Well we thou-- we thought she'd gone home."
Doctor: "Gone HOME?!" [I adore Baker's delivery on this. one part "are you fucking crazy?", one part "lol, have you met this girl?" and one part "because now, Detective Inspector Bishop, there's no power on this EARTH that can stop me."]

(It is at this point that the Lis Sladen stand-in dolly does its Fay Wray impression.)

After it all, Sarah feels pretty down about the death of the robot:

Doctor: "Sarah? Sarah...? ... Would you like a jelly baby?"

It's the first time he ever offers. (Of course it's to her.) Initially, she refuses.

[on the robot]
Sarah: "It was so human."
Doctor: "It was a *wonderful* creature. Capable of great good... and great evil. ... yes, I think you could say it was human."

Then he paces and babbles and offers her a trip in the TARDIS instead, and my god, nothing ever really changes, does it? He whines about staying, and the paperwork UNIT would make him do, and he says "I won't I won't I WON'T!" and goes to karate chop another brick... only to practically break his hand. (Sarah Jane does her best not to laugh at him, bless her.)

Sarah: "Doctor, you're being childish."
Doctor: "Well of course I am! There's no point in being grown up if you can't act childish sometimes." [pauses, lets his hat cast a bashful shadow over his eyes as he looks away, offers the white bag again] "Are you coming?" (he won't look at her.)
[She breaks into a wide grin and eagerly pops a jelly baby into her mouth, as if he'll rescind the offer if she doesn't eat it fast enough. He grins at her, and she laughs at him, and it is quite possibly the cutest thing you'll ever see. Rusty owes a hell of a lot to this relationship, I'm starting to learn.]

And then, of course, Harry wanders in. Bah! He offers Harry a jelly baby, and he takes two.

Doctor: "We're taking a trip!"
Harry: "Wot, in that old police box?"
Doctor: [snatches back the other jelly baby, offended] "YES in that old police box!"

He doesn't, unfortunately, say "it's bigger on the inside" but we do hear his incredulous "I say," and Sarah giggles.

God I love this show. Even when it's bad, it's good. And Sarah/Four is SOCUTE.

Ending stats:
Jelly baby offers: 3
Displays of unrestrained physical affection: 0 (closest facsimile: when Four comes back to his right mind, he shakes the Brig's hand and then Sarah's. Then he gets distracted, but keeps holding Sarah's hand in both of his own as he talks. Cute, but not a hug.)
Speeches by the Doctor about how awesome humans are: 1ish.

* totally reminded me of Roses's "MISter Jefferson, SIRRR" from Satan Pit, but I didn't have a handy way to link to that. So, you get a footnote!

Interlude: Sound FX

2010-04-01T23:55:00.000-04:00

[11:53:16 PM] Marlena: in second grade, we did a play, and some people hid under desks and banged cans together and whispered and stuff. they were the "sound effects crew." I really wanted to do that, but I had to be the sloth.
[11:53:51 PM] Leah: ...
[11:53:59 PM] Leah: that is the best story you have ever told me.
[11:54:30 PM] Marlena: well, y'know, I've been saving it for a special occasion.

A Spencer Addendum

2010-03-21T21:03:00.003-04:00

So today we were in Boston recording for UTO some more. Over the course of the afternoon, we got on the subject of annoying encounters with Brandeis 2-- and so of course, I got to tell my Spencer The Prat story.

Only when I told the girls his real name, Julia burst out with "oh my god, that kid is EVIL! I hate him SO MUCH!" and told me about how he's a cheating douchebag (color me unsurprised) and, get this-- he claims to have slept with Lady Gaga.

Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead and try and process that. I'll wait.

Still laughing? It's okay. Took me a minute, too.

At any rate, it makes me happy to know that I'm not the only person to have been on the receiving end of his particular brand of terrible.

Fun fact: Today I learned, via Pandora, that I really don't like Simple Plan. This doesn't surprise me in the least, but it's nice that I can have a proper account of these things.

In other news, my laptop monitor has stopped functioning. As such, so have I.

So we'll see how that goes.

Meet Spencer

2010-03-17T18:11:00.006-04:00

I am not generally the kind of person who tells funny anecdotes at parties. My stories rarely end with an apologetic "I guess you had to be there," and when they do, it's probably because the punch line is a nerdy reference and my fellow conversationalist is not a geek like me.

Today, I have a crazy story. TODAY, I-- for the first time-- have encountered a person so absurdly fictional that I actually need to *come up with a codename for him for use on this blog.*

He is in my assigned Short Stories group; he grew up on Fifth Avenue, went to an exclusive all-male Academy for high school, and is (as I learned today) a male model. For the purposes of this blog, we will call him Spencer the Prat, as he is both EERILY REMINISCENT of his forebear, and is, inarguably, a complete prat.

As is true of all "been there" moments, this kind of loses something in the retelling, so I'll do the short version:

The story my group is doing comes from something called Godey's Lady's Book, which was a monthly journal in the 1830s which published short stories, articles and advertisements relevant to women of the day. Our particular story is about (among other things) lovers who die of plague. The project, in brief, is to "re-publish" this story. Our idea was to reformat our meta stuff around the story as if it were a modern women's magazine, like Elle.

One of my suggestions was that-- seeing as we're allowed to put in illustrations-- we could add thematically relevant ads... one of which could be an anti-plague skin cream, as satire.

Cut to Spencer the Prat. Spencer, who has not yet read the story we're doing this project on, completely failed to understand what I was getting at. So I tried explaining it several different times, in several different ways. "But why is it skin cream," he demanded.

Spencer, being a student who clearly goes to Brandeis 2-- oh. Wait.

SHORT INTERLUDE: Chef has a theory where there are two versions of 'deis: there's Brandeis, which is populated by smart awkward jewish kids who are generally sweet and well-meaning and want to change the world... and then there's Brandeis 2. Brandeis 2 has frats, and jocks, and people who spend their weekends throwing up and then tell stories about how epic it was after. The reason so few people realize there are, in fact, two Brandeises (Brandeisi?) is because the two so rarely overlap.

Sometimes, however, they're arbitrarily placed in the same group project, and the whole system falls apart.

So ANYWAY. From the way he was talking, I was starting to get the feeling that Spencer fancied himself a bit of a manly man-- that he'd never picked up an issue of Elle in his life, and would be offended at the mere suggestion that he had. Which would explain why he wasn't getting where I was coming from at all.

Me: "I-- look. Have you ever, y'know, looked at an issue of Seventeen, or Elle, or-- because they have these, these ads for--"
Spencer: [coldly] "What do you mean 'have I ever.'" [disconcertingly sarcastic now] "Noooo, I've NEVER picked up a magazine before."
Me: "No, sorry, I didn't mean-- I just thought that--"
Spencer: "Look, I've been in magazines, so you can just drop the attitude, okay."

The more polite and rational I tried to be, the more offended and defensive he got. He then informed me that he's not sure why I think I can get away with my "snotty attitude," but that I need to "wake up" because it's "not gonna help [me] at all in the real world."

Oh, right. That would be the real world where you grow up in a luxury penthouse on the Upper East Side, take family vacations to Morocco, and plan to be a model when you graduate. No, I suppose my attitude won't help me at all in the real world.

Because I don't go to this school because Daddy can pay for it and it has a good reputation. I go to this school entirely on scholarships because I'm fucking smart, bitch.

Now run along to your photo shoot. I have an essay on schizophrenia and family dynamics in Hamlet to write.

GYAHH.

2010-03-16T21:33:00.002-04:00

Okay. So. Hi.

I have a 5-6 page Hamlet paper due on Friday. I have not started it, on Thursday night I'm busy from 7-god knows when with UTO (rehearsal, gig, party) and then I'll be... well, drunk, and not useful. So I have to write it before then. Which would be fine, except my life is exploding.

Wednesday night I'm supposed to have dinner with my hypothetical new roommates before our housing appointment. But it's possible that Steph will have to skip it, which means I won't actually know anyone there. Which would be fine, except that I won't, y'know. Know them on sight. Which could lead to some problems.

On Monday I have a 5-6 page paper due in German Cinema. NEXT Friday, my big Short Stories group projecty thingy is due.

Also, I need to declare my major before I leave for spring break.

Also also, I need to get bus tickets so that I CAN leave for spring break.

Next Friday is also (also also) my meeting with Kosta about my big science paper. So I should probably, y'know, find a topic for that.

OH. AND. On Sunday we're doing more album recording with UTO. (gotta do the CD graphics.)

I got 2 hours of sleep last night. Well. Morning. From 9:20 to 11:20. Which means I missed Science. I was kept up all night by the leaky roof.

I just. What. I don't even.

(If I can make it to spring break, I am golden. Until then.... YELL AT ME, DON'T LET ME PROCRASTINATE. NO FUN IN LEAHTOWN, GOT IT? OKAY.)

Interlude: Billie Piper and Pokemon

2010-03-14T04:27:00.001-04:00

[4:13:30 AM] Marlena: god, I love Doctor Who
[4:13:44 AM] Leah: what's that?
[4:14:44 AM] Marlena: oh, nothing. some show about England and aliens.
[4:15:14 AM] Leah: oooh. do they fart?
[4:15:21 AM] Leah: not interested unless they fart.
[4:16:36 AM] Marlena: duuuuuh. and that awesome pop star, Billie Piper, is the musical guest at the end.
[4:17:04 AM] Leah: ...
[4:17:41 AM] Leah: do you think her real name is, like... Wilhemina?
[4:17:48 AM] Marlena: ...
[4:18:04 AM] Leah: just. cuz. "Billie."
[4:18:12 AM] Leah: I dunno. she named her kid Winston.
[4:18:14 AM] Leah: it's possible.
[4:18:24 AM] Leah: (baby Winstonnnnnnnnnnnnnn)
[4:18:38 AM] Marlena: sayeth Wikipedia: "Billie Piper (born Lianne Paul Piper;[1] 22 September 1982, in Swindon, Wiltshire) is an English singer and actress."
[4:18:50 AM] Leah: Lianne Paul?!
[4:19:10 AM] Leah: lolwuuuuuut
[4:19:16 AM] Marlena: "Piper was offered a record deal at the age of fifteen, and in 1998 became the youngest artist ever to debut at number one in the UK singles chart with "Because We Want To", released under the stage mononym "Billie"."
[4:19:30 AM] Leah: *dies*
[4:19:37 AM] Leah: what I don't even
[4:20:07 AM] Marlena: I love Billie Piper's life. Everything about it. So good. I almost don't want to read her autobiography.
[4:20:25 AM] Leah: somehow, I have the feeling that the mystery will remain
[4:20:34 AM] Leah: it'll just get deeper and more intense
[4:20:58 AM] Leah: I just.
[4:21:01 AM] Marlena: HAHAHAAHA WHAT
[4:21:10 AM] Leah: how does a song like "Because We Want To" DEBUT AT NUMBER ONE?
[4:21:15 AM] Marlena: "She recorded a song for Pokémon: The First Movie titled "Makin' My Way (Any Way That I Can)".[7]"
[4:21:23 AM] Leah: I mean, I'm sure that in '98 our singles weren't much better
[4:21:25 AM] Leah: but
[4:21:25 AM] Leah: WHAT
[4:21:26 AM] Leah: WHAT
[4:21:27 AM] Leah: WHAT
[4:21:28 AM] Leah: WHAT
[4:21:28 AM] Leah: WHAT
[4:21:29 AM] Marlena: I KNOW
[4:21:30 AM] Marlena: RIGHT
[4:21:55 AM] Leah: IS THAT THE ONE WHERE MEWTWO TURNS ASH TO STONE AND PIKACHU CRIES?
[4:22:02 AM] Leah: BECAUSE I HAVE SEEN THAT MOVIE
[4:22:04 AM] Leah: MANY TIMES
[4:22:40 AM] Marlena: I THINK SO
[4:22:45 AM] Leah: OH MY GOD
[4:23:01 AM] Marlena: YES. IT IS.
[4:23:11 AM] Leah: I can't remember the song, but the litl'un in me KNOWS I KNOW IT.
[4:23:29 AM] Leah: WE NEED TO WATCH THE POKEMON MOVIE, MARLENA
[4:23:34 AM] Marlena: YES.
[4:23:40 AM] Marlena: OBVIOUSLY WE DO
[4:23:46 AM] Leah: and... never tell twitter about this

BORG highlights

2010-03-10T21:02:00.002-05:00

I do quite like these kids. From Session 2 of Apples to Apples card-making:

"Gaming tonight! You should come."
"Can't. Gotta clean the suite."
"And that means you can't come?"
"Not if I'm cleaning my suite, no."
"CLEANSE IT WITH FIRE!"

"Okay, your adjective is: Yummy."
"Oh, damn. I've already made too many Doctor Who cards."
"Also, we made a Banana card last time."
"Who said anything about bananas? I was going to put down 'David Tennant.'"

"Tegan's not here? I guess I get to sit in the President's chair, then, as I'm her... concubine?"
"I think you mean 'consort.'"
"Yet somehow I think we're staying with 'concubine.'"

"Every action does have a consequence sometimes."

"Your word is: Scary."
[later]
"Ewoks?! Whoever said that, they're adorable!"
"Wait. Are you saying they're adorable, or...?"
"Ahhhh, the magic of comma vagueness."

"Can I get a ride?"
"Yeah, sure, of course."
"Well I just wanted to make sure there wasn't a... a giant inflatable rhino in your backseat."
"Well the nice thing about giant inflatable rhinos is that they can be deflated."

"Your word is... your word is... argh. I'm stuck in a direction and I can't think of any adjectives in that direction."
"East!"
"Eastern?"
"Easterly?"
"YOU'RE NOT HELPING."

"... and finally, The Neverending Story."
"Y'know, I never finished that book."

Interlude: Loving Puppies

2010-03-10T15:21:00.002-05:00

[3:19:32 PM] Leah: *clings to Angel*
[3:19:35 PM] Leah: I STILL LOVE YOU.
[3:19:48 PM] Leah: THIS DOCTOR WHO THING. IT'LL PASS. IT'S JUST A PHASE. YOU'RE MY PUPPY.
[3:19:58 PM] Leah: (lies.)
[3:20:10 PM] Marlena: why can't they *both* be your puppies?
[3:20:19 PM] Leah: oh! they can!
[3:20:21 PM] Leah: I meant the phase thing.
[3:20:31 PM] Marlena: man. you better not have more than one kid.

In other news, I may end up rooming with Steph from UTO next year, in a Ziv suite. I'll have more info tomorrow.

A Short Stories short story.

2010-03-09T20:54:00.006-05:00

Something interesting happened when I was walking out of Short Stories today. We're on the brink of starting this project where we (split into groups too large to be productive, imho, but that's a blog for another day) take a short story published before 1860-- and only ever in one addition-- and "re-publish" it (possibly reworked, or with footnotes, or a foreword, or whatever). Because of the nature of the assignment (the source text can only have been published once before, and in the 19th century) we're using stuff from the Archives and Special Collections sections of the library.

Items in Archives and Special Collections include a Shakespeare First Folio and an Oscar (which I've held! with gloves.)

Anyway. So after class today, Professor Plotz pulled me aside and asked me an interesting question. Apparently, at one of the sessions in A&SC, a girl found a bunch of dried flower petals in the book she was looking at, and after the meeting, she went back to the library and asked if she could keep them. She had "medium-length brown hair," and so Plotz asked me if it was me.

It wasn't. But I'm kind of really touched that he thought it was something I'd do. We agreed it was really sweet and cute.

In other Brandeis news, my play is going really well! Housing, however, is a nightmare. The problem is that while I have a lot of friends here at school, none of them are in my year. And while juniors and seniors can room together-- which is why I wasn't worried about this before, because I thought I'd be rooming with Talia-- Talia and Becca and their friend Marissa want to live in the Foster Mods, and juniors can't live in the Mods. And I don't know if my lottery number is good enough to get me into one of the (I think) 12 singles in Ziv, which means there's a fair chance I could be living in Grad-- which is off campus, across the commuter rail tracks and past a business park. Those of you who have visited me at school know how fucking far of a walk that is.

I really don't want to live in Grad. But the alternative is crossing my fingers and hoping Talia and Becca don't get the room they want, so I can benefit from their misfortune and we can get a suite in Ziv together, but that's a terrible thing to think. So. I just... I don't know.

Over on livejournal, I've posted a picspam about Journey's End.

Also, I've decided to change my sidebar quote. The old one:

"Everyone suspects himself of at least one of the cardinal virtues, and this is mine: I am one of the few honest people that I have ever known."
- F. Scott Fitzgerald, "The Great Gatsby"

Doctor/Rose squee linkage

2010-03-08T03:41:00.003-05:00

So I've started to get involved over at LiveJournal, of all places, thanks to my uncontainable adoration of Doctor/Rose.

To keep Sounds cleaner and to better service what I intend to use lj for, I'll be posting on both blogs. Unless you're as obsessed as me, don't bother clicking the linkydoo.

Anyway. A shippy thought about New Earth.

1.1.1 "An Unearthly Child" Reaction Post

2010-03-05T19:24:00.005-05:00

Amy informed me that the whole first season of Doctor Who was on youtube. Naturally, I couldn't leave that well enough alone, so I thought I'd start at the beginning...

Starting Stats: 1.1.1, An Unearthly Child
Doctor: One
Companions: Susan Foreman, Ian Chesterton, Barbara Wright

So... whoa. I'm watching the first ever episode of Doctor Who.

I love that we meet the companions first, before we meet the Doctor—or rather, I love how RTD kept up that tradition in Rose. Human connection! Fantastic.

"Susan Foreman—she your problem too?" Oh, of course she'd be a troublemaker. But I won't say that's my girl just yet.

Ian: "That's your problem, eh? Whether to hand over your class to her, or—"
Barbara: "No, not quite."

I already really like Ian.

Barbara: "I asked if I could work with her at her home, and she said that would be absolutely impossible, as her grandfather didn't like strangers."
Ian: "He's a doctor, isn't he? That's a bit of a lame excuse."

Awwh, come on, Doctor! PARTY IN THE TARDIS! It could be fun!

Hee. The address they gave the school is a junkyard.

Ian: "Hmm. That's a bit of a mystery. Well, there must be a simple answer."
Barbara: "What?"
Ian: "Well, we'll... ah, have to find out for ourselves, won't we?"
Barbara: [biting back a smile] "Thank you for the 'we.'"

I LOVE COMPANIONS.

... AHAHAHAHAHA THAT'S SUSAN? She's not at all how I imagined her. Hair done up in a beehive, listening to that newfangled rock and roll music. I thought she'd be all petite sweetness and light, like Sarah Jane. But she's clearly got a bit of a bite to her. Love that.

[Barbara lends Susan a book]
Susan: "Thank you very much! I'll return it tomorrow."
Barbara: "Oh, that's not necessary—til you've finished it."
Susan: "I'll have finished it."

And now Susan is... hand-drawing a Rorschach blot? I don't even know.

Hee! Barbara—or rather, Jacqueline Hill—flubbed a line but they kept it in. It's so cute and low-budget!

... okay, now I'm starting to get annoyed. They're just listing all the ways Susan's freaky and smart and... well. It's making her come off all freaky. xD Get to the point, show! And let me love her!

[watching her enter an empty warehouse]
Ian: "She is fifteen, you know. She could be meeting a boy. Did that ever occur to you?"
Barbara: "I almost wish she were. It would be so normal."

(Teehee Jimmy Stone. And now back to your regularly scheduled Classic episode).

They've found the TARDIS!

Ian: "Feel it! Do you feel that?"
Barbara: "It's a... faint vibration."
Ian: "It's alive!"
Well that's an interesting conclusion to jump to, Ian. Nice to know you earned that degree in science.

And there's the Doctor! In a funny hat and a funny scarf. Ohhhh, Doctor.

Okay, One's a grumpy curmudgeon. Which I knew, but... come on, Doctor, where's your sense of wonder?

And ohhhhhh, welcome to the TARDIS. Go on. Go on, then. Say it. Someone say it.

Barbara: "Is this really where you live, Susan?"
Susan: "Wh—yes."
Doctor: "And what is wrong with it?"
Ian: "It... it was just a box—"

Come on. One of you has to say it.

IS NO ONE GOING TO SAY IT'S BIGGER ON THE INSIDE?

Susan: "The TARDIS can go anywhere."
Barbara: "I don't know what you mean, Susan."
Susan: "Oh, I made up tardis from the initials-- Time And Relative Dimension In Space. I thought you'd both realize when you came inside and saw the different dimensions from outside!"

Close enough. (Also: Susan named it? Awwwwwwh.)

Susan: "Why won't you believe us?"
Barbara: "We just want you to tell us the truth."
Doctor: "You have heard the truth! We are not of this race. We are not of this Earth. We are wanderers in the four dimensions of space and time, cut off from our own planet and our own people by eons and universes and a power beyond the reach of your most advanced sciences."

I like the "I can feel the Earth turnin'" speech better, methinks.

... oh, shoot. Is he going to KIDNAP Ian and Barbara? Is that how this goes down? Susan's begging for him to let them go. This is not okay.

"I was born in the 49th century," says Susan. Good to know!

Oh, come on. Really? The Doctor just laughed an evil laugh. Oh, show.

This is... really upsetting, actually. The Doctor zapped Ian, and Susan's all upset and crying, and it's all... argh. This is not what I signed up for. Where are the speeches about how awesome humans are? Where's the sense of adventure? One is so not My Doctor.

There are three more parts to Unearthly Child, but I honestly don't think I can get through them right now. Eesh. I guess I'll just have to take One in very small doses.

I need some dancing Bernard Cribbins to cheer myself up.

That's better.

12.2 "The Ark in Space" Reaction Post

2010-03-05T03:40:00.009-05:00

So because I'm totally obsessed, I'm going back and watching Classic Who on Netflix, to widen my knowledge. I could go in order, but that would require a whole lot of effort, because One and Two stories are terribly hard to find... so Netflix instant play it is. (And to be honest, I'm a hell of a lot more interested in Four anyway.)

Anyway. I'm documenting my watching experience here mostly because I just like talking about stuff, but partly so that I can eventually go back and put all my thoughts in order, re-arranging all of these posts to the way they should be, so that I can get a proper sense of narrative arc.

This is going to be a running commentary, as I'm writing down my thoughts while I watch. It'll be some quotation-collection, some character analysis, and some MST3K-style sarcasm, I'd assume. But I'm not Jacob, so don't expect, y'know, mentions of the other side of grace, or any kind of coherency. I assume it will be disjointed at best.

A warning: this has spoilers (duh) for the episode in question, as well as New Who.

Another warning: I'm doing this—going back and watching the old series—not because I really love cheesy contrived plots and bad special effects, but because I'm terribly interested in the Doctor's past, and because I freaking love Companions. They are my favorite type of people. So this "recap" (if you could call it that) is going to be very Sarah Jane-centric, because that's where my focus was.

Starting stats: 12.2, The Ark In Space
Doctor: Four
Companions: Sarah Jane Smith, Harry Sullivan

(This is, perhaps, a bit of an awkward place to start. It’s the second "episode" in Four's first season; I maybe should have began when he did. Too late now. In any case, it makes certain things much clearer: for example (and by that I mean "the only thing I care about stemming from that statement is"), the Doctor's relationship with Sarah Jane would obviously be, if not strained, then a bit uncertain. Which makes me feel better.)

We open on a long shot of a space station, which is quite obviously a miniature on a string in front of black felt with holes poked through it. I will never complain about the CGI in End of the World again.

Doctor: "Not a lot of oxygen… still. Nothing to worry about." [starts playing with a yo-yo]
Sarah Jane: "Suffocation is nothing to worry about?"

Awwwh. He was using the yo-yo to test for gravity.

Doctor: "We're obviously on some kind of satellite; now isn't that interesting?"
Sarah Jane: [has done this before] "Not very."
Doctor: [delighted] "Well I think it is!"

(I already adore them.)

*a door opens*
"Hey, Doctor--"
"Hold on."
"But, Doctor--"
"In a MINUTE, Sarah."
*Sarah wanders through door while the Doctor is distracted*

Three guesses what happens next, first two don't count.

Aaaaaaand now she's suffocating. Well done. (And he called Rose jeopardy-friendly?)

Doctor: "Where is she?"
Harry: "In the TARDIS?"
Doctor: "Couldn't be; I've got the key."

Oh, Doctor. You've got to share your keys. Keys are trust and keys are affection. And keys are also a way home. Let her in.

Moving swiftly onward.

… Well, on the bright side, they've found her. The downside is that now they're all trapped and suffocating. Oh, show.

And now, something I loved. Four is amused. He smirks and says: "heeeeee." It was so very Tennant. Or, I suppose, the other way around. But I love continuity like that.

[3/4/2010 5:31:37 PM] Leah: so Sarah Jane is kind of whammied right now—in a trance—and the Mysterious Voice was just like "greetings, lower being!" and she waved. and it's SUPER CUTE.
[3/4/2010 5:31:41 PM] Leah: *snuggles classic who*
[3/4/2010 5:33:31 PM] Leah: meanwhile, the Doctor is crawling around under a plastic box.
[3/4/2010 5:35:38 PM] Marlena: of course he is

Doctor: "Don't you realize what this is? I—aren't you feeling better?"
Harry: "No, I'm not."
Doctor: "Well pull yourself together, man, this is FASCINATING!"

Awwwwh, Harry is starting to ask Excellent Questions! And the Doctor is proud of him! ...almost. ("Your mind's beginning to work!" he says. "All my influence, of course, you mustn't take any credit.")

[upon finding Sarah Jane "dead" for all intents and purposes]
Doctor: "Sarah—oh, Sarah Jane..." [stands completely frozen]
Doctorrrrrrrrr.

By this point, Sarah Jane is most definitely my favorite part of the show. Lis Sladen is reallysupercute. (Though she kind of has to be, in order to balance all the wtf and the cheese). Admittedly she's kind of all over the place, but in a rational, "do I contradict myself? Well then I contradict myself. I contain multitudes" human, sense-makey way. Scared of a giant bug one moment (and who wouldn’t be?), poking about and showing it to other people the next.

Also, yeeeeeeah, Sarah's definitely totally in love with the Doctor. *pets her* And I give her lots of credit for putting up with him; he was so much more rude back then.

...Oh my god is that bubblewrap? It is. The villains of this piece are rapidly-mutating insects (Wirrn) that… can turn humans into members of their species? Or perhaps just need to lay their eggs inside living flesh? They're a bit inconsistent on that front. Anyway, slime and membrane is depicted via dark-green bubblewrap. Oh, show.

[Random Engineers gape as the Doctor spews technobabble]
Sarah Jane: "He… he talks to himself, sometimes, because there's no one else who understands what he's talking about."

[Harry has been ordered to stay behind. The Doctor exits.]
Sarah whispers: "Good luck!" and scoots, but then, from off camera:
Doctor: "and Sarah? You stay behind!"
She huffs.

Unrelated note: I love Tom Baker's hair. The swoops and swirls of those curls… wonderful. I also highly approve of his eyes. He's not a looker in the conventional sense, certainly, but he's not without his bit of pretty.

Wow. The ray gun/particle gun effects are particularly awful. I could do better on iMovie. (But not, to their credit, MS Paint.)

Awwwwwh Sarah saved the Doctor! Several times. She also has quite a set of pipes on her. She's got Rose's devotion but only a fraction of her cheek—she lets him intimidate her. But... the way she always looks to the Doctor, the way she always finds his eyes... her hyperawareness and silent support may not be as adorable as the hand-holding, but the essence remains. (Unrelated: she must weigh, like, two pounds, because both Four and Harry are able to pick her up like it's nothing.)

There's a moment where the Doctor has to go off by himself, and Sarah Jane stays behind. But Lis Sladen does a very clever thing—she takes one step forward, as if her instinct is to follow, before pulling back. It's a tiny moment, but it gives Sarah a little bit more spunk. I doubt it was in the script.

(Heeeee. But then after the cliffhanger before Part 4, he's saved by a shot from Vira's gun. Sarah made her follow him. That's my girl.)

Harry Sullivan, by the way, is sweet but unmemorable. And also a bit of a chauvinist.

Harry: "Something must have happened to them."
Random Engineer: "And if we go out there, it will happen to us."
Harry: "Well I want to investigate!"
Hee. Okay, two points, Harry. I love companions.

"Anyone for a jelly baby?" It took almost an hour and twenty minutes for the first offer! Good job, Doctor.

AHAHAHA and then Sarah Jane figured out the mystery. Again with the "Doctor—but Doctor, LISTEN—" stuff, which could get old fast, but I like that she's clever and I like that he has to be reminded. It makes me think of The Idiot's Lantern—how Rose saw the solution to the problem (the TV aerials) straight away, and mentioned it to the Doctor, and he wasn't paying attention. Of course, then she had her face stolen and he guilt tripped like crazy, but it's a nice bit of character continuity. And the fix Sarah suggests—rerouting the separate power supply of a shuttle into a fried system—was used again by the Captain in The Satan Pit. Oh, show.

However, while in Satan Pit the process was as easy as a flip of a few switches, in Classic Who it's all analog—the cables need to be connected by hand, through cramped ducts. But how? Well of course:

Sarah Jane: "Why don't I take the cable through, I’m about that wide." Oh, that's my girl.
"That's hardly a job for you, Sarah—" shut up, chauvinist Harry.
Angle on the Doctor, eyes widening in a bit of surprise and no small amount of pride: "Good girl, Sarah."

Harry: "How're you doing, old girl?"
Sarah Jane: "How do you THINK I'm doing, twit?"

(See, some of Sarah's lines—she said "vamoose" earlier—well. She could choose to be a lot harder than she's coming off. It all feels like good-natured ribbing, which I like.)

The piping is miserable, by the way. It’s a good thing Lis is teeny tiny. I wouldn’t be able to slip through.

Sarah Jane: "I don't think I can go on much longer—I keep getting stuck."
Harry: [to the Random Engineers] "That's the thing about old Sarah. Terrific sense of humor."
[Sarah rolls her eyes]

She hears the Doctor at the other end, gets stuck. Whimpers. And then Four does something I expected, but wished he wouldn't:

"Stop whining, useless girl!"
"Oh, Doctor!"
"'Oh Doctor,' is that all you can say for yourself? Stupid, foolish girl. We should never have relied on you, I knew you'd let us down. That's the trouble with girls like you: you think you're tough, but when you're really up against it you've no guts at all. Hundreds of lives at stake, and you lie there blobbing."
"You—wait—till—I—get—out!"
He's grinning now, moves to help her out as she emerges. She flails. "I CAN MANAGE I DON'T NEED YOUR HELP."
(He's never loved her more.) "Yes you do. Yes you do. Yes you do." Smiling widely, he wraps her arms around his shoulders and yanks her down.

"You've done marvelously, I'm very proud of you."
"What?!" [realizing] "Conned again. You're a brute."
"Brute? Don't be ungrateful, I was only encouraging you. Come on."
(And here's where they should have hugged, but didn't.)

I get why he does it. Nine might've, too. But I wish he weren't so abrasive.

"Your resistance is useless!" Oh, villains. Oh, Britain. Oh, show.

Sarah Jane: "I dunno if it's my imagination, but it's getting a bit stuffy in here."
Doctor: [dismissively] "It's your imagination."
Sarah Jane: [muttering] "You'd say that anyway."

[And then there's a whole business with getting the Wirrn onto the shuttle and setting it off, and it requires the Doctor and a Random Engineer to be in the blast zone:]
Doctor: "No point in both of us being killed. Get back inside!"
Random Engineer: "You'd get in trouble with the Space Technician's Union, Doctor. That's my job!" [knocks out the Doctor, puts him in safety lock, finishes flipping switches]

Awwwh, human beings.

Vira: "They must have both died instantly..."
[Sarah just shakes her head.]
Harry: "Now come on, Sarah, he'd have wanted you to be brave."
[She tries not to cry; a helpless twitch of the mouth that’s trying to be a smile.]

And then the Doctor stumbles in. It's all very Satan Pit.

"Doctor, you're safe—" she goes to him, ecstatic, clutches at his arms, but... still no hug. Why no hug? This very same situation made for the most adorable hug in series two of New Who, observe:

But here... nothing. And it's not about shipping, not at all. It's about intimacy. (DAMN I promised I wasn't going to do that.) I know Four and Sarah are still kind of new to each other, so I hope this situation improves over time. I miss the physical affection. Without it, the Doctor seems that much more alien.

Doctor: [hands Sarah a key] "Fetch me a coat from the TARDIS, will you?"
She beams.

(That's more like it.)

[Three to beam down ala Trek, all in adorable coats and hats:]
Doctor: "I don't remember inviting you two."
Sarah Jane: "Ah... no. You didn't. But here we are." [beams at him. As we recall from Rise of the Cybermen, the Doctor is helpless against feminine wiles in the form of adorable smirks]

Oh, show.

All in all, this makes me very curious about Sarah Jane Adventures, and also makes me rethink some of the things that happened between her and Ten in School Reunion. I think I'll have to watch it again, after I've seen a bit more Classic.

Ending stats:
Jelly baby offers: 2 (and a third reference by Harry)
Displays of unrestrained physical affection: 0
Speeches by the Doctor about how awesome humans are: 2.5

"Guys! God just tweeted!" - Amy Snow

2010-03-02T06:06:00.003-05:00

via Twitter:

jk_rowling

This is the real me, but you won’t be hearing from me often I am afraid, as pen and paper is my priority at the moment. 4 minutes ago via web

OhmygodohmygodOHMYGOD.

Sometimes I love my pathetically awful sleeping habits, because it means that at 6 AM on this random Tuesday, I was awake for this. I was watching the sun rise over Boston through my window, back-reading some fanfic author's livejournal as they fangirled Doctor Who, and... and while I was doing that, somewhere across an ocean Jo Rowling opened up her twitter and spoke to us.

I...

I can't explain why this affects me so much. Maybe I'm just tired. (Sure as hell don't feel it. Not after that, at any rate.)

I don't know why it's important to me that I was here when it happened. I mean, waking up to a Jo!tweet would have been exciting, too. But... I dunno. I was THERE. She's however-many-hours ahead, but we're both, like... existing right now. In this moment. And she's on twitter, too.

And I know that that's the frickin' novelty of Twitter, no matter who's talking. Whether it's me or my mom or Marlena or John Green. But she NEVER DOES, and... and she's JO ROWLING.

I... wow. I just don't even know.

Also: she's writing.

ohmygodIdon'teven.

Interlude: OH WAIT, LOOK, IT'S DANCING BERNARD CRIBBINS

2010-03-02T01:33:00.005-05:00

[1:27:54 AM] Leah: speaking of YA
[1:28:06 AM] Leah: have you ever read anything by Jim Hines?
[1:28:20 AM] Marlena: I don't think so? Should I?
[1:28:27 AM] Leah: I dunno.
[1:28:43 AM] Leah: but one of the DW lj people linked to his blog
[1:28:51 AM] Leah: and so, our world being so terribly small
[1:28:55 AM] Leah: I figured I'd ask
[1:29:21 AM] Marlena: hmm. nope. never heard of him.
[1:29:31 AM] Leah: http://jimhines.livejournal.com/490897.html
[1:29:35 AM] Leah: that was the entry she linked to
[1:30:53 AM] Marlena: oooooh. so, maybe I *should* read his books.
[1:31:04 AM] Leah: you want to read All The Books.
[1:31:09 AM] Leah: so you'd find him eventually.
[1:31:15 AM] Marlena: *resists urge to look him up on the library website...resists..resists...*
[1:31:19 AM] Leah: NO DON'T DO IT
[1:31:21 AM] Leah: um
[1:31:22 AM] Leah: um
[1:31:27 AM] Leah: *distracts with shiny thing*
[1:31:47 AM] Leah: OH WAIT
[1:31:48 AM] Leah: LOOK
[1:31:49 AM] Leah:
[1:31:54 AM] Leah: IT'S DANCING BERNARD CRIBBINS
[1:31:58 AM] Marlena: HAHAHA
[1:32:01 AM] Marlena: that works
[1:32:15 AM] Leah: I still don't understand *why* he's dancing
[1:32:18 AM] Leah: but I love it
[1:32:54 AM] Leah: (I think "OH WAIT, LOOK, IT'S DANCING BERNARD CRIBBINS" should be our new response to everything.)
[1:33:09 AM] Marlena: (Motion passed.)

...

[1:56:40 AM] Leah: we need to watch Psych, too.
[1:56:52 AM] Marlena: do we?
[1:57:00 AM] Marlena: I know less than nothing about Psych.
[1:57:33 AM] Leah: it stars two very hot guys and has a running gag about pineapples.
[1:57:45 AM] Marlena: sold.

Does it say "sick?"

2010-02-28T23:11:00.003-05:00

When I was little and I didn't feel well, I would--as one does--have my mother take my temperature. Only I wasn't entirely clear on how a thermometer worked, because when she pulled it away to examine the readout I would ask her, quite seriously, "Does it say Sick?"

The point of that little anecdote was a little segue into the fact that I HAVE A COLD and IT IS NOT PLEASANT.

I had to walk up the hill from rehearsal nursing a cup of tea ("sick tea," which is Apple & Cinnamon tea with honey) and I couldn't DRINK the tea because it was too hot and my throat's killing me from singing (bass on so many songs, holy crap how do I even manage?) and it was cold outside and it was just... miserable. Can't breathe through my nose, so when I got into my room I just kind of stood there woozily and panted.

Rehearsal was a mess. We have our first performance on Tuesday, and we're not exaaactly prepared, and everyone was just... hmm. Amanda has a name for it, from her Shakespeare group. They call them the jauns-- like, everyone has Major Issues and Shit Went Down. It was a jaunful evening. That's honestly the only way I can describe it. Several girls burst into tears. We all perked up again a bit at the end singing Lights, but that's because Lights is our soul and it fixes everything.

I was meant to do laundry on Saturday but I forgot. I am very seriously running the risk of Actually Running Out Of Clothes, Like For Real. Something will have to be done, and fast.

In other news, we blocked the entire play at H2G2 rehearsal today. Everyone seems super psyched about it, and kept bringing up promotion ideas... so at least one thing is going right.

I'm sorry for all the bitching. Life is good, really. I'm just better at handling all of this, I think, when I'm within the momentum of the week. Jumping back in after a lazy Saturday is just a bit of a shock.

My room probably smells lovely thanks to the birthday roses I got from Hayley. If I could inhale through my nose, I'd tell you for sure. My new Spock bobblehead says "Fascinating."

Imma stop rambling and randomly capitalizing That Which I Deem Important now. Ttyl, blog.

omgwtfbbq

2010-02-23T23:54:00.003-05:00

I am only a teenager for five more minutes.

Today in class, Kosta told me-- and these were his exact words--"You ask good questions. I like you." It kinda made my life.

In the past year, I have:

Been a bridesmaid in a good friend's wedding
Had a boy tell me he was in love with me
Gotten drunk for the first time
Finally figured out-- mostlykinda-- what it is I want to do, and who it is I want to be, for the rest of my life
Gotten in a very minor car accident

Um um um. Two minutes to go. I can't think. I'll talk more about this tomorrow, I guess.

One minute. Oh my god.

Interlude: Slankets and Doctor Who

2010-02-23T00:13:00.001-05:00

[12:08:40 AM] Leah: slankets are awesome.
[12:08:50 AM] Leah: how did we survive without them?
[12:10:00 AM] Marlena: I actually don't use my slanket that often. I mean, when I do, it's my Favorite Thing Ever. But I'm not cold that often.
[12:10:31 AM] Marlena: ...that was too many that oftens
[12:11:02 AM] Leah: I bet the Doctor took Rose into the future and got her a slanket and it blew her little 2005 mind.
[12:11:21 AM] Marlena: right. totally.
[12:11:42 AM] Marlena: because what's the destruction of your planet and species as you know it when there are BLANKETS with ARMS?
[12:11:58 AM] Leah: watching the earth die in the year five billion? nothing. defeating the Gelth with Charles Dickens? meh.
[12:12:07 AM] Leah: A BLANKET WITH FUCKIN' SLEEVES, MAN.
[12:12:09 AM] Leah: SLEEVES.
[12:12:12 AM] Leah: ON YOUR BLANKET.

Success Is Not a River In Egypt (or anywhere else)

2010-02-22T20:45:00.006-05:00

God, I don't know where the names I give these things come from. Just ignore it.

ANYWAY.

So today I got up EARLY to a) finish my powerpoint for German Cinema and b) finish my Short Stories essay. Both of these endeavors were SUCCESSFUL.

Then I went to German Cinema and we got back our first essays. And the professor was all, "these are just first drafts, second drafts due on the third. Some of you did so well that you don't need to revise. ... don't look so hopeful, it was less than a handful." And then she talked for like 15 minutes about how to interpret her responses and markings, and what she wanted out of the revisions.

And then I got my essay back and the only things she'd written on it were "Excellent," "nice!" and "you can revise if you want, but this is clearly an A paper."

SUCCESS.

(And then I did my powerpoint and I got a little tongue tied for a second but it mostly went well.)

AND THEN AND THEN. Sorry. Very repetitive today.

Anyhow. Just now, we had the first play rehearsal. And I don't want to jinx it, but I think Everything Is Going To Turn Out Okay.

And now, for something completely different.

You may remember a while back that I was going to write an essay about Dollhouse for that SmartPop Books contest. Well, I missed the deadline, and so, like I promised, I'm posting what I got down. Here we go:

Over and over again, the purposes of the Dollhouse are made clear to its clients. “It’s not about what you want,” says Adelle, “it’s about what you need.”

Truer words could not have been spoken not just about the Dollhouse, but Dollhouse itself—a bold move on the part of Joss, an unexpected gamble into utterly new territory.

We who worship at the alter of Whedon are used to certain things: well-developed characters, powerful yet subtle messages, and a good ensemble. We like liking people, and we like getting to know our ensemble as people: when Jayne Cobb walks into a room, you know exactly what you’re going to get.

But Dollhouse is profoundly different from Buffy, Angel, Firefly and even Doctor Horrible in one key sense: for the first time, we are not being given a character-driven show. We are being given an idea-driven show.

This was a profound thing to get used to, and was a steep learning curve on both sides of the camera: just watch Season 1 and you know exactly what I mean. We are used to Joss shows that wear their hearts on their sleeves: Buffy is a story of female empowerment—discovering that you have power and learning how to use it responsibly. Angel is a story of redemption—that actions have consequences, and that both the greatest good can come of the most disgusting act, and that unspeakable horror can result from the best of intentions. Firefly is a story of the frontier—of people on the edge, of the little guy’s survival in a world of cold bureaucracy. These are stories of powerful emotion.

But Dollhouse is different. Rather than being “genre first, meaning second,” the meaning is the genre. Whereas all of the other Whedon shows have worn their hearts on their sleeves, Dollhouse wears its brain—which is exactly as messy (and interesting) as it sounds. Because for the first time, Joss is making us think just as hard as he’s making us feel. Dollhouse is something greater, something cerebral. It is A Brave New World, it is Fahrenheit 451…

It is Star Trek.

(Bear with me.)

This revelation didn’t come to me all at once. It started as just an inkling, a powerful sensation I started getting in the middle of season 2: “I kind of wish this were the Enterprise—Adelle DeWitt would make one awesome starship captain.” Over time, this evolved into “DeWitt isn’t just a good hypothetical captain, she’s Jean-Luc Picard” which has now fully developed into a kind of solid surety: in many unexpected ways, Dollhouse is the modern mirror of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Put down the rotting fruit (or pitchforks, depending on your level of offense) and hear me out.

Star Trek: TNG is set in a utopian future, whereas Dollhouse is set in a borderline dystopian present. And yet… and yet they both tackle story from the standpoint of philosophy, rather than emotion. This is not to say that the characters on either show are stand-ins or cardboard cutouts or pawns; they are just as fully-realized as any other character on any other show.

But it explains a lot. How we can trust DeWitt despite her dubious utilitarian thinking, because she gives off an aura of moral certainty so strong that you cannot help but take comfort in it. Why we were able to bond with Victor and Sierra so early—as they both gave off the aching sentimentality of the manmade made real as Data did—but were sometimes faintly annoyed by Echo, who was marked early as special and different, and always came through with just the right thing at just the right moment, like a high-heeled Wesley Crusher.

We did not want a show like Dollhouse—but it is very much the show we needed, and luckily Joss had the presence of mind to understand that.

We live in a confusing age, which is why Star Trek, as a franchise, has always had such broad appeal. It shows a future in which there is equality across all gender and ethno-religious boundaries, where a Prime Directive keeps people like those behind Rossum from fiddling where they don’t belong, and where money is a thing of the past. (“But what do you invest in?” asks Ralph Offenhouse of Picard in The Neutral Zone (TNG 1.26). Picard’s answer was simple: “We invest in ourselves.”)

People invest in other people all the time on Dollhouse, but far purposes far more insidious. Audiences have gotten more cynical, and stories grittier and more jaded, to reflect a changing world. The Dollhouse is a place where Data would have been sent to the Attic immediately—a place not where things can learn to become people, but where people are stripped down to the status of things. There is no room for a Deanna Troi or a Guinan at the Dollhouse—because it’s not a question of what the dolls feel, but what Topher programs them to feel.

Star Trek: TNG went, Dollhouse boldly goes one step farther. Captain Picard occasionally used the holodeck to role play as Detective Dixon Hill; a mostly harmless exercise to relax and relieve the burden of command. DeWitt, on the other hand, must dig deeper and risk more: becoming the often-mocked Miss Lonely Hearts, taking comfort in the arms of Roger, a man who does not exist, in order to experience a few cherished moments of vulnerability. Highly-advanced medical science begat the visor which granted Geordi the power to see; Topher’s fiddling with Echo’s brainwaves just as easily made her blind. The Borg is not a powerful, distant foe: it is a product of our own creation. On Dollhouse, we truly are the Borg, and our greatest enemy is our own ambition.

And to have a show on television that discusses these things: what it means to be a human, what happens to your soul if you’re not in control of your body, whether or not we have free will… we need to be asked these questions; we need to search ourselves, be challenged, far more than we need to be entertained.

As dark as Dollhouse becomes, it will still stumble upon certain universal truths. So when DeWitt stands up to Mr. Ambrose and his “anatomy upgrades” in Epitaph One, and says, “You cannot have that body, Mr. Ambrose. It belongs to another soul, and I will not sell these people off at any price,” we cheer, because it is just as much a triumph of the human spirit as when Picard quotes Hamlet (with conviction, rather than irony) at Q.

It is a contemporary method masking a sentiment as old as our species: Star Trek shows us the bright light of the future; a world as it should be, so we aspire to be all that we can be. Dollhouse takes us through the darkness, wallows in it and drenches even our greatest heroes in the shadows of doubts and murky waters of ethical dilemmas.

Something to think about, in any case.

And while you ponder that a while, I’ll amuse myself with the notion that the tea Adelle served every client is Earl Grey (hot), and listen hard in case she said “make it so” and I missed it.

head explodey

2010-02-21T23:19:00.003-05:00

HI GUYS. LONG TIME NO SEE.

I just got back to school after a week-long break, which I also used as a break from this blog and higher-level brain functioning and, um, going outside. My stress levels have been at epically high... levels... and so I really needed the time to sit around and do nothing but draw and sleep and write Doctor Who fanfic. It was nice. Relaxing.

Anyway, I'm back now.

My life is already a bit easier because UTO as a whole decided that recording every weekend in March is a) expensive and b) insane. We're limiting it to three days over the course of the spring, which means the CD release is pushed back until fall. Also, my solo-- at least my Straight Lines solo-- won't be on the CD, because we don't have the time or money to record it. Which sucks. On the other hand, there are two more songs whose solos haven't been auditioned yet that we're doing later this week, so there's still a chance I'll have *a* solo on the album.

Also: we're going to be selling UTO "up YOUR octave" boxers as a fundraiser. I expect you all to buy a pair. They're gonna be supermegafoxyawesomehot.

(No, seriously. We need the money. Buy boxers.)

As it stands, I have an essay due tomorrow at 4, and an oral presentation in a class that starts at 3:40. Also, I need to show the prof my oral presentation during her office hours, which are from, like, nine to noon or some shit. So tonight and tomorrow will be busy with the work. And then tomorrow night is my first H2G2 rehearsal, and probably also more homework-doing about which I've forgotten.

Related: could someone, at some point, remind me to go actually declare my film major? If I don't do something about it soon, a minor it will stay. Which I do not want.

ANYWAY. The ultimate good news here is that I'm not losing every single weekend to madness. Which is a really big relief.

I *can* get through this semester. I am strong and capable and clever. It will ALL WORK OUT.

(Also also: someone make me do my laundry and clean my room. Because I can't put it off forever.)

OH RIGHT ALSO I TURN 20 ON WEDNESDAY. SO THERE'S THAT.

I Love (Gratuitously Stealing Hayley's Ideas)

2010-02-09T02:27:00.004-05:00

Hello, blog reader people. Real life has been a COMPLETE bitch, lately, in the best of ways, which is why we haven't spoken in a while.

I wasn't gonna blog tonight (today? I don't know what a 2:30 am post counts as) but then I read Hayley's wonderful blog entry and was, as many were, just a little bit inspired.

So, then. In no particular order, certainly missing a great many things, and not quite as pretty as Hayley's--a list of things I love:

-- I love how Amanda and I can manage not to talk to each other for a month, totally by accident, and then converse as if no time has passed, finding each other--as always--uniquely hilarious.

-- I love taking a whiff of the packet my Earl Grey tea bag came in before I throw it away, because it smells like Saturday mornings and Awakeness and Home.

-- I love coming home from a long day and changing out of my jeans and into pajama bottoms.

-- I love that I can talk to Marlena for hours every day about everything spanning from literary theory to zombies vs unicorns to "What if Angel and Tara opened a bed and breakfast together" to our most personal and private hopes and dreams without once tiring of each other or disagreeing. (Well. Aside from the zombies and unicorns thing. ZOMBIES RULE.)

-- I love singing in my car at the top of my lungs, because that's what cars are for and that's what songs are for and it all just perfectly fits.

-- I'm sorry, I'm gonna have to steal this one, word for word: "I love how a line in a poem can strike a part of your brain that you hadn't noticed was asleep before, and you can't rephrase the line or explain why it makes sense, because it's perfect and beautiful in that it says something that's never before been put so well." Because that's what this blog is all about, and Hayley said it better than I could.

-- I love how all the writers/artists/creators I love-- Jane Espenson, Joss Whedon, Jacob the Recapper, John Green-- end up connected to and inspired by each other in ways I never dreamed, which in turn inspires me. Also, all of them have J-names, and what's up with that?

-- I love wearing my Missing Piece around my neck and my dad's high school ring on my finger every day, because I'm telling you who I am and where I come from without even saying a word, and no one really seems to notice, until they do. Which is how getting to know someone always works.

-- I love making my sister laugh, because I have to earn it.

-- I love that when I have Big News (like I did yesterday, but is a bit too personal to share with you, blog readers) and I have to call my best friends, my mom is on that list.

-- I love intricately structured narratives.

-- I love watching heavy snowfall through a window, when I'm warm and comfy indoors, preferably with hot chocolate.

-- I love the way autumn smells, how the leaves get brittle and beautful and change the air; how I can use words like "brisk" and "crisp" to describe the mornings and even though the world is dying it feels so much more like starting over than spring does. (Spring, to be clear, smells like allergies and feels like death, but this is not a list of things I hate, so.)

-- I love the thin rim of blue around my mostly green eyes.

-- I love loving things to death-- wearing holes in the canvas of my Converse, dog-earing my favorite pages of books, knowing lines of movies so well I can quote along with them as I watch.

-- I love how I've finally found my passion and a bliss to follow; how taking classes in my majors just sets my brain on fire.

-- I love connecting with strangers over a mutual love, and how at the end of the conversation you're not strangers anymore.

You may notice, I've changed the sidebar quote to a (admittedly slightly arrogant) Fitzgerald line. Blog Reader Morgan requested that I share more quotations with you, so I think I'm gonna try and change it every month or so, from now on.

I honestly can't remember what the old-old one used to be, so in the interest of keeping a record of Things I Like, I'll post the previous one in my blog entries when I switch them. Here's what it used to be, which is also One More Thing I Love:

"It's not about my joy, the relief of burden. I like to see people reunited, maybe that's a silly thing, but what can I say, I like to see people run to each other, I like the kissing and the crying, I like the impatience, the stories that the mouth can't tell fast enough, the ears that aren't big enough, the eyes that can't take in all of the change, I like the hugging, the bringing together, the end of missing someone."

- Jonathan Safran Foer, "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close"

Amimetobios

2010-02-03T20:56:00.005-05:00

First of all, briefly: Marlena and I just watched The Shakespeare Code, and yeah, I love Martha Jones. I shouldn't have worried.

Second of all, and still speaking of Shakespeare: That podcast we were hoping for? It's UP AND RUNNING. You can use this link here to get to its iTunes page, or just search for it yourself. It's called Amimetobios, which... well. Take it away, Professor Flesch:

("Amimetobios" is from Plutarch's Life of Antony, Shakespeare's source for Antony and Cleopatra: it's a Greek word describing their "peerlessness:" no [a-, as in asexual or ahistorical] life [bios] like [mimeto] theirs. It has nothing to do with anime. Well, almost nothing.)

Okay then!

So. I found out that we got the room we were hoping for for the play after all-- at least for the performances-- and I'm feeling much better about life in general. I'll feel BEST after auditions on Monday, but... well. When we get there.

Tonight I went to this letter-writing party that the financial aid department has, where kids who got scholarships write thank yous to the specific people in charge of the specific endowments that each student received. (Wow, that's some sentence.) ANYway. Writing about what I'm doing at school, and following my bliss, and how Brandeis has turned me into such a passionate person... I should count my blessings more often. Have I mentioned that I love it here? Because I really, truly do.

After that, I went to BORG, where we were writing our own Apples to Apples game. Some highlights:

“And bioluminescent—oh. Lakes.”
“What did you think it said?”
“…latkes.”
“Next time we play a game that requires teams, shotty Bioluminescent Latkes.”

“Sorry, I’m thinking.”
“Well, stop that.”
“Yeah, the Hive Mind should be thinking for you.”

“For unappreciated, I can’t decide between the Riders of Rohan and Bananas.”

“Spelling out loud uses two different brain parts that oughtn’t be used together.”
“What, Speaking and Thinking?”

“So for addictive, we have: Spice, Spice, Spice, Melange, human children, power, and… cinnamon buns.”

AAAAAAH.

2010-02-01T21:06:00.004-05:00

Hello, blog people!

So I do this thing where I stress and procrastinate and put off and have a merry old time, and never sleep-- seriously, I've watched the sun rise two nights in a row now-- and I don't blog because, well, it would just all come out like this: "a;oroihgaekbrjxlpiygqvkehgeytcramt!!!"

As it were.

I've just found out that I probably won't get Schwartz auditorium for the play performances, which really fucking sucks, because the play as written-- or rather, as is still being transcribed-- was kind of custom-made to go there, because that's the space we always use. I'm still typing the damn thing, and auditions are (hopefully) a week from today, and it didn't even occur to me until now to freak out about whether or not we'll get enough people. This show demands like 10 highly committed actors-- there are HUGE monologues, like all the time, and it's Douglas Adams so they have many myriad big words but rarely any kind of point. Oh, god. If I manage to pull this thing off it will be a miracle.

Oh, also? My classes have started assigning papers. Hahaha. Ha ha. Ha.

On the bright side: we have two new girls in UTO, who seem to be coping relatively well. I have rehearsal three nights a week, and BORG on one of the off nights, leaving me kind of just Mondays and Saturdays open, unless I want to start piling things on top of each other. Which I'll probably have to. We're recording every weekend in March.

Also, we're having our first UTO party/initiation on Friday. Which should be fun and I'm really looking forward to it. (I never thought I'd say this, and don't expect me to repeat this sentiment any time soon, but... I could use a drink, anyway.)

Which leaves us with one very stressed out Leah, who is still just slightly sick enough to be annoyed by it. A GIRL CAN ONLY DRINK SO MUCH TEA, UNIVERSE.

In other news, I finally caved and bought myself the Next To Normal album on iTunes, and we're starting in on Midsummer Night's Dream in Shakespeare tomorrow. So that's all nice.

Gyahhh. I don't know. I'm going to stop writing now. I'll feel better when the play is sorted.

I was gonna make a soul/sole pun, but palms are not called hand-soles.

2010-01-28T21:37:00.004-05:00

Today has been an interesting day.

So I got up relatively early (considering it's a Lazy Thursday and I have no classes) and went to the campus Copy Center in order to sort out my Hitchhiker's script. While there, I learned two important things: one, that the Copy Center only uses WhoCash (a kind of Brandeis-only debit currency), which I don't have, and two, that they don't do scanning. Well. This left me with two equally annoying and time-consuming options: either go to the library, try and find/figure out their scanner, input the entire thing by hand and then farm out the picture files for printing, or type up the damn thing myself-- which will make for a cleaner, better-edited script, which the cast can print on their own time, but is a huge bitch for me. So I have to do THAT at some point, and won't that be fun?

Then I had to e-mail Lena and respectfully withdraw my application for Final Battle. I'm only now feeling well enough to record all my audition stuff, and so I hadn't looked, since I've been here, to see if I'd packed my camera charger. Which, fun fact, I didn't. So I'm stuck with two days until deadline, a still-sore throat, and a paperweight instead of a camera. Adding to that how incredibly busy I'm going to be this semester, I just... something had to give. However, there's still a possibility I can perform with them in the chorus or something, because Lena is AWESOME and is giving me a chance. But any thoughts I had about being, for example, Ginny Weasley... well, it ain't gonna happen. Which is fine; just a bit sad.

Then I found out J.D. Salinger died. I... I'm very zen about it; it hasn't made me want to cry or anything. He was a hermit, and very old, and all in all it was a good life. But the world is just a little more phony, perhaps, now that he's not in it.

So there are all these tiny things that add up to misery put together, even though I'm actually in an excellent mood and having a WONDERFUL time at school so far. When I'm in the thick of it-- hearing Professor Flesch lecture about Shakespeare; or meeting the COOLEST MIDYEAR IN THE WORLD named Rachel tonight at BCBC and talking with her for an hour about how fanfiction leads to better writers and readers when done right; or singing with my girls in UTO (we added two to our family last night!) I feel like I'm on top of the world. I'm engaged and learning and so, so happy to be here. But when I come home to catch my breath, and I start thinking about it all-- the stuff still looming in the distance, the homework I haven't yet done, how many directions I'm throwing myself in this semester-- it feels like I'm drowning.

So I called Hayley. And we bitched and moaned at each other for a while, sounding thoroughly wretched and cleaning out all the tiny nicks and cuts that add up to so much more. It's funny, because, like, we're both in a really great place... but sometimes, you just need to whine and complain.

Anyway.

My palms are on FIRE right now because the weather did this weird snow-rain-wind-blizzard-snow thing in the course of, like, an hour and a half, leaving a very fine coat of ice on the ground, which I then proceeded to slip on like a Stooge. Not my proudest moment.

So where do I stand? I have homework to do tonight--reading more stories from Arabian Nights, and studying up on Richard II for my first quiz tomorrow. Reading for Kosta's class, for the first time, which I'm sure will go over my head. I still haven't unpacked my suitcase. I have 70 some odd pages of script to transcribe asap, and a UTO meeting on Sunday that will dictate my schedule for the rest of the year. Have I mentioned we're recording a CD? We're going to pick our normal three nights a week to rehearse, then set aside who knows how many Saturdays to go to the studio and record. We're also selecting a date for our Spring Concert. Which would be fine, except I'M DIRECTING A PLAY THIS SEMESTER. I don't have a script yet, which means I haven't planned auditions. With no auditions there's no cast, and with no cast there's no schedule. Once I have that, I need to find the times where we can rehearse THAT, that won't interfere with the rest of my life, and cross my fingers and HOPE that Ryan didn't schedule a play performance for whatever night UTO chooses for the concert.

I'm sorry. I don't even know if any of that was coherent. The moral of the story is that I'm very stressed, and for good reason. So many tiny things. And the only thing that will solve it all is time.

Eep!

2010-01-27T17:18:00.003-05:00

I know I know I know. I said this was going to be a daily blog, and now I'm starting to get lazy about the skipping of the days. I know. And I'm sorry.

I have been busy, my friends. Due to the courses I'm taking, I have a huge amount of reading to do for homework. UTO has been holding auditions, and tonight's the first night of BORG with the newbies, and, like, there's still the massive looming monster that is the play I'm supposed to be directing. Which is terrifying. All of this would be a handful on its own, but I'm also watching Doctor Who with Marlena, and as most of you know... once you start daydreaming about the TARDIS, it's incredibly hard to stop.

Anyway. I have a little two-hour window here to blog and get shit done before I run off to club administration stuff for the rest of the evening. So I guess I'll tell you an anecdote.

The other day, Kosta told us the story of how he met Rudolf Peierls, also known as one of the Manhattan Project physicists, and the guy who discovered that plutonium is even more susceptible to splitting than uranium. "It was in the 1970s, when I was just a Little Tsipis" Kosta said (which I love, because it reminded me of how Maureen Johnson refers to her past self as "a little mj") "and there was a conference about nuclear energy in the Balkans. Everyone who was anyone was there. Everybody important, and also Little Tsipis. I was freshly married, and so of course I brought my wife. Oh, she was a sexy thing! One of the nights of the conference, there was a dinner party. And my wife, well, she always wants to be noticed. So she came outside wearing this little skirt, probably as big as a, uh, like a napkin. And we hear a grouchy old man voice shout 'Go put something else on-- you're going to catch your death!' ... and that's the one time I met award-winning scientist Rudy Peierls."

I love Kosta.

And, oh. Because this is Sounds Passing Through Sudden Rightnesses, after all, I'll leave you with this excerpt from my Film textbook:

"The experience that art offers us can be intensely involving. We say that movies drew us in or immerse us. We get absorbed in a book or lost in a song. When we can't finish a novel, we say, "I couldn't get into it," and we say that music we don't like "doesn't speak to me," as if it were a sluggish conversational partner.

All these ways of talking suggest that artworks involve us by engaging our senses, feelings, and mind in a process. That process sharpens our interest, tightens our involvement, urges us forward. How does this happen? Because the artist has created a pattern. Artworks arouse and gratify our human craving for form. Artists design their works-- they give them form-- so that we can have a structured experience.

For this reason, form is of central importance in any artwork, regardless of its medium. The idea of artistic form has occupied the thinking of philosophers, artists and critics for centuries. We can't do justice to it here."

Take that, indie snobs who slather ideas to film like that makes it a movie. Yeah, I'm looking at you, Jim Jarmusch. Stop hiding behind that tree, Richard Linklater. I see you. THREE-ACT STRUCTURE RULES.

... I'm sorry. That went to a place. It won't happen again.

Bye kids!

Love, Today

2010-01-24T18:13:00.005-05:00

To catch you up: I spent most of the weekend in bed, being sick. It's getting rather tiresome.

Last night I stayed up until an ungodly hour trying to help Marlena delete a virus from her computer, which wasn't very helpful for anyone because I had to get up early for UTO. We had our first rehearsal, and then sang at the Activities Fair, and then aggressively recruited for an hour and a half. Then, after a brief break, we went dorm-storming for the midyears. I haven't even THOUGHT about my homework, which is bountiful.

But I've been keeping myself entertained.

If you've never read them but love Doctor Who, PLEASE look at the Television Without Pity recaps. I mean, first of all, TWoP is a wonderful website full of very clever people-- Strega's Angel recaps are smart and stinging, highly critical but also very accurate... and they're the reason I call Angel's team the Ministers of Grace, which is fantastic. (Everyone needs more Hamlet references.) And hey, I still to this day think of Melinda Clarke as Lady Heather because of Joanna's work on The O.C. But the Doctor Who recaps-- done by a guy named Jacob-- are just... I do not have the words.

"Indescribably wonderful," I'll go with.

It's like taking a college course in Doctor Who-- or at least, the first two seasons. Things get sparse for three and four (but that suits me fine, because a) I haven't watched them yet and b) I'm a Rose fan) but from what I've read so far... wow. The close readings are so analytical on every level... it transforms a show that I dismissed as merely "cute and clever" into something far more cerebral, far more valuable. Jacob goes off on philosophy, on Campbell's Hero's Journey, on Milton, on grace. This guy is SMART, and he makes me see the series in a whole new light. Excellent, thought-provoking reading. If you like Doctor Who, or are an English major-- or, like me, are both-- this is can't-miss. Or if Doctor Who isn't your thing but you're a television buff, search the site. See if it has your favorite. I guarantee you'll learn something new.

For now: I have so, so much homework. I try not to think about it, but I'm going to have a SHIT TON of reading this semester... and until I get the script photocopied out of my Hitchhiker's radio play book and into a workable format, my hands are totally tied-- as well as the hands of my potential cast and crew. I've bitten off a lot for the spring; here's hoping I can chew it all.

[Edit: reading the series 1 finale recap, and Jacob just went literary alchemy on my ass. OH MY GOD HE'S THE JOHN GRANGER OF DOCTOR WHO. SO HAPPY.]

Oh, hello.

2010-01-22T23:41:00.006-05:00

Weird moment... it's currently 20 to midnight, and I was staring at my computer, trying to figure out why I was feeling so restless... I'd kind of forgotten, today, that I had a blog. Like, at all. So I didn't plan anything to say.

Ummm. I'm still sick, which sucks. Getting really tired of it hurting to swallow and not being able to breathe through both nostrils at once and not being able to decide if I'm chilled or overheated. Sick blows. Not to mention, I still need to record all of my callback materials for the Final Battle, which are due by the end of the month, but I can't so long as I have no voice.

I had class today, which feels like a million years ago. Let's check in my notebook for interesting facts, shall we?

Oh man, Global Warming and Nuclear Winter (which, for the purposes of brevity I'm just gonna refer to as "Science" from now on) was such a brain-killer. Kosta is still adorable, but the thing is, his cute Greek accent isn't exactly a help when he's trying to explain Pauli's Exclusion Principle (which I still don't entirely understand). Not to mention, he fell off a ladder and broke his leg and shoulder over the summer, so his handwriting is uncharacteristically poor. I get why he wants us to have a rudimentary understanding of physics before we plunge into our actual discussions-- I mean, if we didn't, then this would be a politics course. But at one point he stopped and asked "How confused are you?" and one girl blurted "Remember when you said you wanted to make us NOT afraid of science? It's not working." I walked out of that classroom with a MUCH deeper appreciation of Leonard and Sheldon... because fictional physicists on CBS sitcoms should really be my benchmark for scientific knowledge.

But it'll be okay.

Shakespeare was awesome because Professor Flesch is super amazing awesome fantastico. He said he was considering posting recordings of the lectures as a podcast-- if he does, I'll be sure to link you. I dunno how many of you would want to listen to an hour and a half Shakespeare lecture when you didn't HAVE to, but believe me it is so totally worth it. We discussed Sonnet 73 and the first two acts of Richard II, which I kind of don't like so far, but whatever. At least the in-class analysis is interesting, even if the play itself isn't my favorite.

Short Stories with Plotz is also still fun... and I'm also still a total nightmare to have in an English class. I mean. I'm sure my professors appreciate it, but I'm also sure my peers can't stand it-- I just can't. make myself. shut. up. Granted, I'm at Brandeis, so I'm hardly the only overeager know-it-all in the room itching to contribute to class discussion, but... god, I even annoy myself sometimes. Some highlights from Professor Plotz:

"I dunno how fresh Moby Dick is in your mind, but-- well. I hope it's at least slightly fresh; there's nothing worse than rotting whale meat. Anyway--"

"The key to a lot of these fables is looking for two separate lines of interpretation. For example, is Oedipus the story of a-- oh dear lord, I almost said 'motherfucker.'"

"Right, see, it's like that dance movie, with the British boy... what's it called... Dance, Billy, Dance?"
"I think you mean Billy Elliott."
"I like my title better."

Stay in school, kids. College is fun.

An Uncommon Hobby

2010-01-21T16:56:00.005-05:00

If you follow me on twitter, you may have noticed that every once in a while I post these little cartoons; model sheets for things that I like. Outside of people I met through doing this, I've never heard of anyone with this odd little hobby-- so I was thinking I would explain it to you.

Around probably 2002 I found a wonderful website called Superbuddies, a forum where people talked about nerdy things in general and comic books in particular. Around this time, the animated series X-Men: Evolution was getting very popular. What a lot of the artists on Superbuddies did-- and what I then learned to do-- was take the model sheets of the characters, and "frankenstein" them. That is, mix and match parts, take things here and there from screenshots, to create new art from the old. It's not quite photoshopping and it's certainly not freehand art, but it does require a certain amount of skill. For the past near decade, it's a skill I've been honing, on and off.

Often, the mark that I really like something is that I'll end up creating art for it. Superbuddies is a really great community, and they were my only online friends for most of my teenage years. However, once I found the Harry Potter fandom on youtube, I kind of drifted away from 'buddies, which I still feel guilty about. Not to mention, my interest in art waned as I focused more and more on my writing. However, I'll sometimes still get the itch to make something-- especially if I know I have the "right parts," coming from a huge collection of cartoon art I've amassed over the years on my hard drive.

To make a long story much shorter, that's how come you've been staring at what is hopefully recognizable as an animated Rose Tyler while you've been reading that.

While working on her, I listened to the album Subcontrario (In Stereo) by my sister's friend Trevor Giuliani probably twelve times on repeat. If you're looking for new music in your life, here's a taste of his:

In about an hour, I'll be off for dinner with the UTO girls and our secret santa gift exchange. And I promise a slightly less media-heavy blog post tomorrow.

Witty Blog Title Goes Here

2010-01-20T20:40:00.003-05:00

Hokay! To start off with, I’m going to talk about Bridget Milhokovich so Hayley will stop calling me a bitch. (As with yesterday, beware spoilers.)

First of all, a thing you should know about me: I tend to like the same sorts of characters, as everyone does. For reasons that are completely beyond me, though, my favorites tend to be either spunky little sisters (Phoebe Caulfield, Ginny Weasley) or vulnerable popular girls (Cordelia Chase, Quinn Fabrey). Hayley and I share a mutual, rare but deep love of Parvati Patil, for example. So it surprised exactly no one when I said that Bridget was my favorite character in the Jessica Darling series.

But it also has nothing to do with my personal preferences and everything to do with the masterful way Megan McCafferty wrote the books. I’ve read each exactly once—I’m hardly as good an authority as Hayley or Marlena, so bear with me if you don’t agree or if I get something wrong. But you know? I don’t think I am. Wrong, I mean.

Jessica, as a person, is… well, very interested in people. She very rarely likes them, but she’s highly observant, if highly opinionated. As narrators go, she’s not always the most reliable… but somehow, McCafferty’s hand bleeds through in really surprising and wonderful ways. Jessica will often fail to imagine others complexly… but even though Jessica refuses to see it, we as readers get the sense LONG before she does that Bridget is a worthwhile individual. We start paying attention to her, Jessica’s brief mentions and off-handed remarks, and we see things Jessica doesn’t. And it works for everyone else in the story, too. Do you think it’s an accident that Hope’s name is hope? Come on, now. Hope is the epitome of idealized friendship, far more of an idea than a person. And by showing us these things by using Jessica’s voice, McCafferty establishes her books as some of the most nuanced and rewarding reads I’ve ever had.

Anyway. Today is 01/20/2010, and a hearty congratulations to Bridget and Percy.

On to other stuff! How was my German Cinema class, you ask? Well. We spent a good half hour playing a Get To Know Ya game, which was all kinds of fascinating, I can’t even tell you. … well, no. To be fair, there was one pretty awesome moment. One of the things we had to say was our favorite movie, and a girl in the far corner finished her little speech not with her favorite but by declaring “And my LEAST favorite movie is Avatar. Bring it on.”

I love this girl, and want to be her friend.

We spent the second half of class watching, Black Rider, a 1993 short film about, well, a black dude ridin’ a bus. In Berlin. Next to a racist old lady. We talked about the Nazi-era undertones (a silent crowd, no one speaking up against xenophobic comments, the prejudices of the old versus the tolerance of the young, blah blah blah). It was pretty interesting, and I’m sure I’ll enjoy the class.

Because Adam was curious, here’s the list of films we’re going to see:

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
Pandora's Box
The Blue Angel
Maedchen in uniform (Girls in Uniform)
The Wonderful Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl
Aimee und Jaguar
The Marriage of Maria Braun
The Murderers Are Among Us

Of those, I’ve only ever seen Caligari; yay for learning new things!

*returns to computer hours later*

Hello! I just went to my first BORG meeting of the year. We played Werewolf, which is my least favorite game, and people asked me when auditions for the play will be, to which I had to reply that I don’t know, because the play isn’t cut and I don’t have audition materials or a casting list or a room. Oops! Here’s what you missed:

“Man, now every time someone says ‘doctor’ I look up. It’s a problem.”
“Oh, have you been inDoctorinated?”
- Me and Matt

“So either Shannon is the werewolf, or she’s being very sneaky and has a devious plan.”
“It’s okay. We’ll be lynching her next round anyway; possibly for fun.”
- Katie and Mac

“By the way, guys, we’re gonna have the Dune discussion on February 10th.”
“Can we call it the Dunescussion?”
- Me and Matt

“See, I like Doctor Who because it’s the only world where Mal would make a better Companion than Inara.”
- Me

(Provided we remain entertaining, I may post BORG best-ofs every week. We’ll see!)

School is awesome!

2010-01-19T15:17:00.009-05:00

QUICK NOTE: there are spoilers for Perfect fifths in the first two paragraphs of this blog post. Read at your own risk. (HAPPY, Marlena?)

Okay, so when I twittered earlier about TARDIS-related daydreams, Hayley texted to yell at me for not marking today's occasion: as it is January 19th, today is the day Jessica Darling and Marcus Flutie cross paths for the final time in Megan McCafferty's novel Perfect Fifths. I promised her that I would blog about it so she wouldn't be mad anymore.

Well, I lied. But I have good reasons! First of all, the thing I want to actually discuss-- that is, Bridget and Percy's marriage-- doesn't take place until the 20th. So I can talk about it tomorrow and have it still be relevant. And for another, today was my first day of classes, and I would really like to talk about that while it's still fresh in my mind. So, sorry Hayley. But I'll get to it.

In any case!

Today I had three of the four classes I'll be taking this semester, so let's just tackle them in order, shall we?

My first class was Global Warming and Nuclear Winter, which I'm only taking because I need a science class. Luckily, the professor is very well aware of this. "I know why you're taking this course," he said. "It's because you want science credit. But I'm here because it's fun! So, you'll just have to suffer with me while I have fun." Hee! On the board, he'd written his fully notated name: Doctor Professor Kostantinos Tsipis. And yes, he is just as adorably old and Greek as his name suggests. One by one, he started crossing off parts of his name until we were left with just "Kosta," which is what he wants us to call him. Cuuute!

Anyway. 70% of the class is the final research paper, and he emphasized over and over again that he doesn't care about our grades: he just wants to make sure we learn something. This is so refreshing I cannot even tell you-- not to mention reassuring, given that this is a science class and that's scary. But he knows that! "I want you to become unafraid of science. Humanities majors are PETRIFIED of science-- they're allergic to it. I want to cure that!" The emphasis of the course will be on understanding the importance of numbers and why we quantify things; we're meant to ask questions. This is a class about humanity: the problems we face as a species, and our tendency to learn by experience.

(And in a perfect My Big Fat Greek Wedding moment, he handed out a scientific notation cheat sheet that had the etymological origins of the number prefixes. Like, for example:

Million = 10⁶ = mega- (from "μέγας" ["big"])

HOW. CUTE. IS. THAT? Also, he makes his lowercase "a"s like lowercase greek alpha: α, which is very confusing to read but also extremely endearing.)

My next class was Shakespeare, which is in a huge lecture hall. That's nice, though, because I really got a feeling of Brandeis community in there. Margaret, one of the girls in UTO, sat behind me; Tal, this one guy who ALWAYS ends up in one of my classes, because we're on the same academic track; Ian, the president of the Comic Book Club, and at least three members of Hold Thy Peace, the on-campus Shakespeare performance group... they were all there. As was the hot TA from my Indie class last semester, we'll see if I get him this time. The professor, Flesch, was highly recommended to me by Talia, and I can see why: he's dynamic and interesting and so, so passionate about his subject matter.

He's also a huge nerd. He talked about Star Wars when describing how Shakespeare's intentions towards his histories are evident in that he didn't write them in chronological order, and what his thematic treatment of Henry V's life said about him as a creator. And then, when we were discussing our Shakespeare's Complete Works copies, he talked about how radical an idea it was-- and still is-- to make a Complete Works for plays. In the Elizabethan era, "works" were treatises by Aristotle or Plato. They were not just ordinary plays. The first person to compile such a thing was Ben Johnson, a contemporary of Shakespeare's. "You have to admire the audacity of it," said Professor Flesch. "A lowly playwright publishing his own material in an anthology of 'works.' This is almost as if Joss Whedon would go and collect Buffy scripts and publish them... oh wait." HEE!

Oh, and later, when he was talking about the importance of iambic pentameter, he used not the example I was expecting ("My chest of drawers divide amongst my friends," thank you John Green) but one from Total Recall: ("You know how much I hate this fucking planet!" which is an example of a feminine ending) and one from regular life at a diner: ("I'll have the special and a glass of Coke," which is masculine. "Or 'diet Coke,' if you're worried" he amended.) In any case, we'll be reading Richard II, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Merchant of Venice, Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, Antony & Cleopatra, and A Winter's Tale, which is pretty much a play per week and a half. I have to say, I'm excited to read A Winter's Tale, and I'm not sure if it's because it's the origin of the name Hermione, or because it includes the stage direction "Exit pursued by bear."

Tal followed me to my last class, Birth of the Short Story: Gods, Ghosts, Lunatics. It was immensely gratifying, because that class was filled with what I'll call my English Posse-- the kids I took the 100 intro course with, who will stay with me as we all fulfill our majors. Talia, Chef, Rebecca, Tal... it's really awesome that we have our own little corner of the room. We read three pre-genre short stories, and argued over what defines a short story and what makes them effective, and I've missed English classes. I love film studies and I'm glad I took two film classes last semester, but balancing them out with two English courses this semester feels right. I really love analysis and critical thinking and class discussions and defending interpretations. It's too bad one can't make a career out of it.

But hey, that's what this blog is for, innit?

Anyway, I think I've kept you long enough, Gentle Readers. Tomorrow I have my German Cinema: Vamps and Angels course (which I did NOT select purely for the name, but I'd be lying if I said it wasn't a contributing factor) and then I'll be mostly settled in for the spring. As for now, I'm off to check up on my favorite web comics and then probably rewatch the World War II episodes from series one of Doctor Who. Later, kids!

LADIEEEES!!

2010-01-18T20:38:00.004-05:00

Firstly, a note: to those of you who wandered over here from Hayley's blog, welcome! Glad to have you. She's a pretty awesome girl, huh? (Edit: Oh, my god. I didn't even mean to make the joke. It just came out like that. THAT WAS NOT A REFERENCE. Anyway.)

I'm sorry for the obnoxious title, but I've just got back from my first UTO meeting (that is, for those just joining us, Up the Octave, the all-girls a cappella group I sing with on campus) and, well. We kind of just shout "ladiiies!" a lot at each other. They're an absolutely wonderful group of people whom I never would have met if I didn't sing, and I'm really lucky to have them.

See, like. I've known about a cappella music since I was just a little girl. My older cousins were both in groups, and my high school had two groups (which expanded to four over the course of my being there). For me, it's always been a sign of the musical elite. They're fun and talented and, just... being in an a cappella group MEANS something. It means a) that you got chosen, that you're worthy and wanted, and b) that you kind of get a new family, especially when dealing with college groups. It's a wonderful little subculture.

My first semester, I didn't get into any. I hadn't in high school either, but I'd always chalked that up to high school groups resorting to blatant favoritism and popularity contests (which is true). But college was supposed to be different, and better, and... well, frankly, I'd wanted to go to Brown, and I hadn't gotten in there, and I just wasn't looking for or expecting any more rejection in my life. It kind of ruined the first half of my freshmen year, because after that I stopped trying: I basically lived like a hermit in my dorm, except for going to class.

It was a dark time in Leahland.

Anyway. A lot happened over my freshman year winter break, which resulted in me coming back to Brandeis extremely focused on building a life for myself here. I'm now the secretary of two clubs (one of which is UTO), and I'm directing a play for the other, and I have friends here (imagine that!) and I just...

I suppose the moral of the story is that things are never how you expect them to be, but that's no excuse not to try. My first semester in UTO (which would be spring of last year) I was the only newbie in a group that was very upperclassman-heavy. It was a little isolating. But then, due to a lot of circumstances, we lost more than half the group. And things have changed SO MUCH for the better-- even though, for a few dark moments, the few of us left actually considered just ending the group. The newest group of girls are engaging and silly and sweet, and I am more fond of them than I can describe. I'm not a particularly average person, and so I've kind of gone out of my way to make a non-standard life for myself here at school, with my nerdy little nook of friends. But UTO is my bastion of normality; my one genuinely pure college experience. When I party (which is not often), it's with these girls. I can gossip with them, and we're recording a CD together... it's just pretty all-around wonderful.

Anyway. I didn't intend for this entry to be about my history with a cappella, but it just kind of happened. Tomorrow I start classes, and then it's BAM into the thick of things. So we'll see how I do, shall we?

Well this is odd.

2010-01-16T22:56:00.003-05:00

Hello, readers!

Tonight I'm coming to you from a guest location-- my mother's desktop. I've relinquished my laptop for the evening, to be defragged and backed up before I go back to school tomorrow. Shana's gonna drive me, and then Monday I suss out where all of my classes are (I have to try and find my way around the new science building, eek!) and then Tuesday I start classes. Exciting! And a little scary.

(I still don't have an ending for my play. I should probably work on that, huh?)

So, what's new in my life, you ask? Well. Aside from a sinful amount of Doctor Who (which is absolutely adorable in every way), I had a nice hour-long conversation with Hayley. Which is always a good time. Aaaaaand. Um. I ate some cheesecake? It was good.

I don't want to talk terribly much about Doctor Who, because a) I'm only just at the start of season 2, and I don't want to contradict myself or be proven wrong or say anything I'll end up regretting, and b) I don't want to spoil anyone, and by Anyone I mean Marlena (Hi, Marlena!) but there is one thing I want to note. I really appreciate all of the hugging. And not just between Rose and the Doctor. It's everyone. Which is, to borrow a phrase, fantastic. I dunno what it is, but now I feel like American television is, like... afraid of non-intimate physical contact. Which is ridiculous and counter-intuitive and inane. Friends hug. They high-five, and get giddy over stupid things, and... even though it depicts a world of fantasy, filled with aliens, it's a profoundly human experience, watching Doctor Who. And I love that about it.

Sorry!

2010-01-15T23:58:00.002-05:00

So Dollhouse was crazyinsane and I've just started watching Doctor Who (series one, with Nine) so... yeah, sorry, no post today. Because my brain is exploding. You understand, don't you?

The Doctor: [opening Rose's phone] Tell you what. With a bit of jiggery pokery-

Rose: Is that a technical term, "jiggery pokery"?

The Doctor: Yeah, I got a first in jiggery pokery, what about you?

Rose: [playing along] Nah, I failed Hullabaloo.

I already love them. So much.

As and Bs

2010-01-14T19:44:00.005-05:00

More reading of Jane Espenson's blog, more thinking about Keeping Faith... the days, how they do bleed into one another.

That said. For a while I've been thinking about entering this contest, which is for Dollhouse essays, the best of which will be judged by Jane herself. I've been brainstorming since they announced it, but today I finally figured out what the hell it is I want to say-- stemming from a realization I had a few weeks back when I thought about how DeWitt would make an awesome captain of the Enterprise. I won't tell you anything else, because it is a contest, after all; if I a) don't get it in on time, or b) am not among the winners when they announce in April (a veritable lifetime away), then I'll post it here. I think it will turn out really well with some aggressive editing and a bit more research, even if it is a tad exoteric.

In the process of writing the first draft, I went downstairs to tell my mom about it-- because she knows a little about Dollhouse and a lot about Star Trek and I figured it would amuse her. In doing so, however, I ended up drawn into a conversation with my grandmother about why Dollhouse is an important show and how come it's a shame they canceled it, what "dystopia" means (though it shocks me she'd never heard the word before, as she's an extremely intelligent woman), and the importance of smart entertainment. That questions of philosophy are valid no matter what medium they're presented in, and why that's why I'm so keen on getting into the industry myself, and making a product that a) I can be proud of, but mostly b) that I myself would want to consume. We ended up talking about what a Kindle is and why it was a scandal when they removed 1984 from the system without warning anyone, and how irony is awesome, and it just... it's having conversations like that that make me confident in my recent career choices. I'll catch myself in the middle of a sentence, deeply analyzing something, or making connections to other sources, and I think-- "oh, damn. I actually know my shit. I sound smart." But that's not why I keep doing it, y'know? I talk about this stuff because I'm passionate for it. Which makes for a very nice cycle.

In unrelated news, I've also been listening to Next to Normal a lot (yay, youtube.) It's a brilliant show; while I don't plan on doing this often, in the spirit of a perfect punctum I want to share one of the songs with you-- again, if you don't want spoilers, you probably shouldn't listen:

Oh, man. When Gabe comes in with that first "catch me, I'm falling?" That's a punctum. A sudden rightness. It's not much about the line itself, though it is catchy-- it's all about its placement within the song, and thematically within the show. Out of context, it's unremarkable-- but in context, it makes you gasp at how perfect it is. Definitely my favorite moment of the show.

Catch me, I'm falling-- faster than anyone should.

Do Minears Decieve Me? (sorry. that was bad.)

2010-01-13T16:54:00.005-05:00

As I mentioned yesterday, I've been rereading Jane Espenson's blog. And in order to make my life easier, I've started a Word document entitled "Jane Go-Tos" for when I'm too busy to search through her whole blog and just need a tiny boost. She's the most brilliant person; here's an example I just added--

"Anyway, I'm certain the makers of Little Miss Sunshine looked at this film [Living Dolls]. In addition to pageant moments that are captured perfectly, I spotted the most lovely overlap. Both films feature a character working on one of those little handheld slide puzzles. In both films it's the same one: when solved, it forms a picture of a happy face. Nice. Isn't that a perfect symbol? "Want to be happy? Then work it out."

"And the thing that’s best about this little puzzle-symbol? You don't notice it! I didn't remember seeing it in the movie at all until I saw it again in the doc. The effect is subtle to the point of invisibility. Anything more obvious than that, and the artifice of the script will jump out at you and then you’re in trouble.

"So use symbols if you want to, but use a light touch. We've all seen torn photos, empty shoes, empty picture frames, wilted flowers... and they tend to smell like... huh... what is that? Oh yeah, writer."

So, so true. Subtle symbolism is hard but poignant, and she makes a good point: you should put effort into using the right one. Because going for tired visual shorthand isn't adding depth; it's sheer artistic laziness. (A fun sidenote: the blog entry I took from is entitled 'The Crash of Symbols,' which I think is sheer awesomeness.)

So while we're on the subject of scripts, I wanted to talk about the other thing I've been doing today-- reading through my Firefly Official Companion: Volume Two. It contains a second handful of the original scripts of the series-- I've owned the first volume for a while. It's incredible to have access to these scripts, especially considering that Firefly was on the air in 2002 and that, like, they're so... different. From each other, that is. They're remarkably similar to the final shot products (which is not always true on television shows like this). But the different writing styles shine through in script just as easily as they do in prose; the personality styles of, say, Jane, as opposed to Joss Whedon or Jose Molina or whomever... it's as clear as the differences between Hemmingway and Fitzgerald.

And to make a long story shorter: I fucking love the way Tim Minear writes scripts.

Who's Tim Minear? Only the god king of failed TV shows. He was a co-executive producer on Firefly, Wonderfalls, and Drive, three wonderful series that were canceled by Fox before they had the chance to grow. He got his start working on Angel, and has since done many wonderful things-- including write several awesome episodes of Dollhouse, which were made available online after airing.

And the way he writes is brilliant. He actually makes use of the script not just as a reference document for the director, cast and crew, but as its own written medium.

Take for example 'Belle Chose,' Dollhouse episode 2.3. You remember the one. With the killer and the living dolls? And that great open? (If you haven't seen Dollhouse and would like to avoid spoilers, skip these next indents):

CLOSE: a BEAD of SWEAT trickles from Aunt Sheila’s hairline. The mannequin is perspiring? And now she MOANS.

TERRY (CONT'D)
No use in moaning about it.

Now WE SEE that these aren’t mannequins. They’re real women being used as mannequins. Paralyzed. Horror.

God. Just, the way he captures that moment. What a perfect tone set for the director and actors. A simple "horror." That's all you need. And at the end of the teaser--

Terry eyes the crowd. He spots a PROFESSIONAL WOMAN. She’s roughly the same look of “Aunt Sheila.”

WE SEE Terry has the loaded syringe at the ready, hidden at his side. He takes one step off the curb -- BASH-CRACK! He’s HIT by a CAR. Yeah, you heard me.

CREDITS.

"Yeah, you heard me." That kills me. Or take this example, from his Firefly script "Out of Gas" (regarded by many as the finest episode in a series of fine episodes):

BOOOOM! A horrific EXPLOSION from the back of the ship, at the engine room.

Zoe is on her feet in an instant. She lunges for Kaylee as --

-- a giant BALL OF FIRE roils from the back of the ship, filling the aft corridor. Zoe shoves Kaylee clear of the doorway, but the big ass FIREBALL bursts at the doorway. Zoe is knocked back hard by the concussion of the blast, her body glancing off the dinner table, then hitting a wall -- god-damn hard.

Minus several points for saying "the doorway" twice, but plus several million for sheer economy of language. There is later in that episode a moment where Simon restarts Zoe's heart with a shot of adrenaline. And rather than tiptoeing around the obvious homage, Minear embraces it-- the script reads simply, "Ready for the big Pulp Fiction moment? 'Cause that's always funny."

In the script, it says that.

I don't expect everyone else to share my mad love of script-writing, but I hope you can see why that's so effective. There's more to writing a good script than constructing a good episode of television-- though certainly that should be first and foremost in the writer's mind. But Minear goes that extra step. He writes like how he talks, peppering the stage directions with "goddamn" and "fucking" and "maybe." Like how you'd tell a story to a friend.

Ultimately, it makes his scripts pop, make the stories more real and visceral, and gives you a deeper connection to the characters.

... Whooo. So I think maybe I'm getting the hang of this. Imma try to balance my new Daily Dose blog schedule with the original "Sounds Passing Through Sudden Rightnesses" mission statement-- that is, talking about art and what affects me as a creator. You'll probably see a lot more posts like this one. Hopefully.

I'm TIRED. Can't we just be Death Eaters?

2010-01-12T21:15:00.005-05:00

Things I did today:

Got an Amazon package that included Five Seasons of Angel, which I proceeded to begin to read.
Signed up on http://www.wreckamovie.com/thelegendofzelda, which you should do if you know Bre Melvin or are interested in amateur filmmaking or like Zelda or, preferably, all three.
Reread Jane Espenson's blog some more (http://www.janeespenson.com/) for Keeping Faith inspiration, and because it's awesome. You should read that no matter what you like.
Got a callback for Lena's Final Battle musical, which is tremendously exciting and a little intimidating.

Things I did not do today:

Read Dune, which I'm supposed to have done before I go back to school. But Dune is boring and endlessly complicated. So.
Find an ending for Hitchhiker's, which I should also do before I go back to school. See above.

I fear this is tremendously boring to you all. Which is why I've never kept a diary-- I'm boring to me, too. Unlike Hayley (or Sarah Vowell or Maureen Johnson or any number of other people) I'm not incredibly skilled at the art of anecdotal non-fiction. So you'll have to bear with me. (Bare with me? No. That's probably something quite different.)

My dad shaved his beard this morning. It's the first time he hasn't had facial hair since his wedding, and it's incredibly disconcerting. He looks like a stranger.

(Isn't your life so enriched by knowing that?)

Urrgff. Blogging is HARD.

In which I try my hand at daily blogging.

2010-01-11T19:14:00.005-05:00

Hi, kids!

Now, don't get too excited. We all know I can be a terrible liar when it comes to blogs. But I think I may try and update this thing like a normal person for once... just to see what it's like.

So, what have I been up to in the past, oh... six months or however long it's been?

Well. I watched Angel for the first time and it became one of my favorite things, ever. I was elected director of the BORG play-- we're going to do selections from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy radio plays, and I'm cutting them now. I've read a few books.

But two or three days ago, I figured out how to turn Keeping Faith from the novel that's always been a part of my soul into the movie in my head and my heart and my hands. Which is amazing and feels like fate and I just...

I've never thought that I had the ability to write a full novel. I think in terms of characters, and not in terms of plots-- I've never been the kind of person who can start a story from a premise.

But film, I think, provides a fantastic cure for that: the clear-cut three-act structure. One valuable thing I learned from taking Screenplay with a rule-abiding Hollywood school writer at the same time as I took American Independent film is that... I hate independent film. I don't like experiments, I don't like vagueness, I don't like surreality. I like clean setup and payoff, and snarky banter, and happy endings.

Perhaps you're less surprised by this revelation than I was.

In any case. Keeping Faith, close as it was to me, has always been about my deep knowledge and love for Faith and David as characters... I've never really had a plot to go with them. I know certain circumstances of their lives, but events alone do not a plot make.

But thank you Syd Field, thank you Marc Weinberg, thank you Joseph Campbell-- I have a beginning and an end, now, and they came to me when I was least looking for them. I haven't even thought about Faith or David in months. So all I need is a middle and a few thousand dollars, and the movie's practically done already.

Oh, yeah, that's something that's... happening. This story is my baby. And I'll be damned if it never gets produced. I'm too much of a crazy control freak about them not to write/direct/cast the thing myself, so I guess it doesn't matter how little regard I have for traditional indie film: looks like I'm gonna be a part of it. It will take me years, but... this feels right. I can't not do it.

And hey. There are plenty of people who make three-act indies that subscribe to formulas. I'm not breaking new ground here. Just look at Imagine Me & You.

No, seriously. Go look at it. It's a good movie.

So... how'd I do? Crazy and random enough for you? I can't imagine why you'd want a daily dose of this, but it promises to be interesting, if nothing else.

On Buffy and Harry Potter, Heroics, and why BtVS should have ended at S5

2009-08-23T19:10:00.003-04:00

A PREFACE: This is only the first draft of what could be a much longer and much more in-depth essay. My thoughts will be disjointed and I’ll probably repeat myself a few times. I’m an English major—if I wanted, I could probably expand upon my argument here and make it into my senior thesis. I don’t say anything here that I don’t mean, and I hope you’ll bear with me.

I am having many thoughts.

First of all, it must be stated: Buffy Summers and Harry Potter are practically the same person. Not just their missions, their titles—the Chosen One, both—but personality-wise. If Harry had been born a girl, he would have pretty much been Buffy. If Buffy had been a boy… well, then she never would have been the Slayer and there the analogy falls apart, but you get my point. The closer one looks, the more similarities one finds—their tendency to use dry humor, their conflicting desires to depend upon and push away their friends (the obvious Xander/Ron and Willow/Hermione comparisons notwithstanding, but equally convincing), their superiority complexes about which they harbor inferiority complexes and, of course, their ultimate self-sacrifice stemming from an overwhelming feeling of responsibility. They do their jobs not because they were called to, but because they would have chosen them anyway. Even their responses to authority are the same—Buffy and the Watcher’s Council, Harry and the Ministry.

So here’s where I get controversial: I contend that Buffy should have ended at season five.

A Hero’s crowning moment is, I think, when they choose to sacrifice themselves for those they love, without reserve. Buffy for Dawn, Harry for the wizarding world… despite their fears, they faced the darkness and let it take them. They both chose death, serene if not content. Neither expected to come back. And yet, both survived.

Here’s the problem: while Harry’s story persisted for a mere two chapters after his resurrection, Buffy’s lingered for two more SEASONS. Harry was only gone a moment, but Buffy was dead for several months. And most importantly, Harry chose to come back; Buffy was forced. These key differences cause a massive splinter in what, until that point, had been nearly identical stories.

Buffy should not have been brought back.

It doesn’t matter which way you look at it—from within or outside the narrative. First of all, Buffy: The Vampire Slayer itself was up for cancellation. The end of season five was a viable end to the whole series, and if UPN had not bought the show from the WB, it would have been. And as much as I adore Buffy (which is a lot,) I’m not entirely sure the network move wasn’t a curse disguised as a blessing.

But more significantly, Buffy’s resurrection—her second, in fact—caused more harm than good. There is a reason a new Slayer is called when the old one dies: so that you don’t need to keep friggin resurrecting the old one in order to keep the demons at bay! When Buffy died the first time, in season one, Kendra was called. Brought back within a few minutes by Xander, Buffy found herself still endowed with Slayer powers. In fact, she was even stronger than usual, thanks to her connection in death with The Master, which was never truly explained. Her ability to retain her Slayer abilities and status can be excused, if only barely, by the temporary nature of her first death.

When Kendra was later killed, HER Slayer abilities were then passed on to Faith. Buffy felt no shift in power, but clearly the transfer happened nearly instantaneously.

So what, then, of Buffy’s second death?

By my reckoning, this should have gone two ways. Either Buffy’s no longer magically considered the legitimate Slayer, and therefore should not have had her Slayer powers restored after her second resurrection, OR if she’s just as much the Slayer she’s always been (along with, as opposed to instead of, Faith or whomever next carried the line) then yet a THIRD Slayer should have been called after her death at the end of season five. And if the latter were indeed the case, shouldn’t season seven have focused less on finding Potentials, and more on tracking down the other girl who could actually MATCH Buffy and Faith in strength?

But this didn’t happen. It cannot be excused by the secretive nature of the Council, nor the writers’ attempt at hanging a lantern on the problem by having Beljoxa’s Eye assert that Buffy’s resurrection put the Slayer line out of balance. If anything, this only confirms and reinforces their error: that despite what they, and admittedly we as viewers would like to think, Buffy is NO LONGER the legitimate Slayer. That title truly belongs to Faith at this point, whether or not she deserves it.

The result? We had to watch Buffy punish herself by entering into an abusive relationship with Spike and, over two seasons, despite all her fears she would and repeated affirmations that she would not, pull away from those she loves and lose her humanity. All the doubts she voiced to the First Slayer on her vision quest in season five—that she was drifting out of touch with her friends, was too involved in her job and was losing her ability to love—end up coming true. This is proven near the end of season seven when Giles asks if she would be willing to sacrifice Dawn this apocalypse around, despite her previous actions, and she affirms that she would. In a twisted development, the only person she’s not prepared to lose is Spike.

Who IS this girl, and what has she done with Buffy Summers? I thought death was supposed to be her gift; not her mandate.

Which brings us back to Harry Potter. Unlike Buffy, who was brought back to fulfill her duty which was no longer hers, Harry comes back because he knows there can be life BEYOND the duty. He finishes the job he was destined to do, and then retires to a life of quiet obscurity and normality, with a wife and three kids. Buffy never gets this chance. Despite Joss Whedon’s assertions in the DVD commentary of the finale, ending the series on a close up on the beginning of Buffy’s smile doesn’t really end on a sense of hope. It’s too late for that. Buffy has already unlearned her lessons, and grown past her Hero’s status into an anti-hero. Again: at the end of season five, Buffy was willing to let the whole world go to hell so long as she could remain loyal to Dawn. If keeping Dawn alive meant everyone had to die, then “the last thing [Dawn] will see is me protecting her,” Buffy had said.

By the end of season seven, that Buffy is gone. The woman that stands in her place is cold and detached. Everyone tells her she must be a leader, a general, prepared to make sacrifices. That person is no hero. A hero not only will not, but cannot fathom sacrificing anyone but themselves. They honor their friends, and those friends’ choices. They do not make ultimatums or demand anything. They certainly don’t say “I’m prepared to lose you” and offer up the people they’re supposed to love most as cannon fodder—they offer them the choice.

Again with the parallels to Deathly Hallows—Ron and Hermione finally get together, just as Xander proposes to Anya not because he’s certain the world is ending, but because he’s certain it won’t. Just as Neville finally asserts himself and stands up to the Dark Lord, Willow pays Glory back for hurting Tara and is able to rescue her. And just as Buffy refuses to destroy Ben even if it means destroying Glory, because he’s an innocent human, Harry challenges Tom Riddle to show some remorse, and prove that he was something more than a monster.

These stories were over. And yet Buffy carried on. And for what? So we could watch Xander leave Anya at the alter? So we could watch Tara die and Willow try and destroy the world? Or hell, even before that—so we could watch Willow succumb to “magic addiction,” the most desperate, hackneyed and unnecessary plot development EVER?

WHY? What FOR?

What lesson does Buffy learn at the end of season seven that she hadn’t by season five? How did she grow as a person?

It breaks my heart to say it, but… I think the answer is clear: she didn’t.

END NOTE: This doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy the last two seasons. It has some of my favorite moments, and the acting was superb, and I have just as much trouble letting go of things I love as the rest of you. And, hello, musical! But even so, I’m just not sure it was the right call. Feel free to argue with me on any or all of the points I raise here. Comments are lovely.

A Small Change

2009-06-16T14:09:00.003-04:00

I realize that, after all this time, I really owe you an actual blogpost.

But first, a minor diversion.

For the next little while, this blog will be set to GMT + 3:30... that is, Tehran time. So hello there, Iranian officials looking for bloggers and trying to shut down those demanding their rights. Do I offend you? I really hope I do.

The thing that makes this vaguely relevant to my blog is the people who alerted me to this quiet form of support are, in fact, YA authors. They're the cavalry when it comes to censorship in all forms, and their pursuit of justice makes it that much more admirable a career path.

After all, as a great man once said: "We are only as strong as we are united, as weak as we are divided. Lord Voldemort's gift for spreading discord and enmity is very great. We can fight it only by showing an equally strong bond of friendship and trust. Differences of habit and language are nothing at all if our aims are identical and our hearts are open."

"But what I really want to do is direct..."

2009-05-05T03:20:00.000-04:00

The title of this blog post is one of the most cliched lines I can think of. I'm not sure of the origins, but it's practically a gag now: the actor who fancies herself an artiste decides that directing is where her heart truly lies.

Which is funny because, for the longest time, I didn't see the point of having a director at all.

Granted, I was young and naive. I would go and see a play, and having a vague awareness of how such things were produced, I thought, "What a waste. Actors learn lines. They say them. Why do they need to be chaperoned?" As if actors are self-sufficient beings. As if a group of people are capable of producing something cohesive without a bit of vision (and, admittedly, supervision).

Like I said. I was young.

The thing about directing is that it really plays to my strengths. I love discovering a character and figuring out how they tick and who they care about and why they're there. When you're an actor, you get to do that for one person. When you direct, you get to do that for everyone. All of a sudden, you're the one who decides what the emotional core of every scene is. I cannot count how may times I've had to bite my tongue at a rehearsal because either I had an idea, but it wasn't my place to interfere, or because the director was making a choice that didn't make sense, or because an actor was ignoring direction and no one was putting them in their place.

I want that. I want to be that person. I want it to be my vision, my baby, me getting the final word in.

There's also, of course, the fact that memorizing lines makes me acutely anxious and while I love rehearsal and production, I kind of hate (non-musical) performance. Directing allows me to have a key role in the parts I love, and kind of disappear for the part I hate.

And yet.

There's something really... not sad. Annoying? Irksome about the... invisibilty of the director. When the audience waits at the stage door after a show, they compliment the actors on a job well done. There's no way to have a floating label that reads "This was Leah's idea!" every time an actor makes a choice that came directly from one of my notes. There's no way to tell if I was great at my job or if my cast and crew just managed to get by without me.

And that bothers me.

It's not that I'm a gloryhound or an attention hog. It isn't even that I just want credit where credit is due. It's that... how do you invite your parents to see a play you directed? They don't get to watch you. It's like you aren't even there.

I love the intimacy directing affords; when you do it well, the appreciation you get from your actors is unlike anything else.

But I just wish there were a way that I could share it with everyone.

Harry Potter is like chat history

2009-04-03T04:43:00.000-04:00

Yes, you read that right. Bear with me-- I know it's very late at night/very early in the morning, and I have homework I really should be doing, and I'm tired (in fact, I had typed that earlier request as "bare with me" which is TOTALLY A DIFFERENT THING) but I had this mini-epiphony (minipiphony?) on the phone with Hayley earlier tonight and it occurred to me that it would make a nice, short blog post.

So yeah. Harry Potter is like chat history.

To understand that statement, you need to understand skype and my friends. Skype saves the transcripts of every textual conversation; as such one can easily go back and reread old chats when one is feeling nostalgic or lonely. While this can be fun, it can also be kind of painful and sad.

Enter Potter. This is like the third blog post I've written here about my suddenly wishy-washy sentiment towards the books. It's not a question of loving them-- of course I do-- it's more a question of how. And I realized something.

It's not just (or not exactly) that Potter was an event, and that we were participating in the storyline actively as each book came out. It's not just about surprise plot twists. And as much as I adore having all the books out and having them memorized word for word and engaging in deep analyses, it's just not the same. It's not the way I want to love them. Because no matter how great the Potter books are, as novels, that's not why I read them. I read them because I care desperately about those characters. They feel like my friends. I want to spend time with them.

And experiencing the series now, knowing I'll never get to see anything new with them... it's like I'm stuck reading chat history.

THOUGHTS?

Emancipating Beauty

2009-03-16T14:08:00.000-04:00

Well I guess that your parents
must have raised themselves a strictly pious daughter
cuz you move through this crowd just like parted water.
Oh, you dress so nice—you dress to kill;
they drop like flies, but who’s the funeral for?
- After Hours, Phantom Planet

It’s happened to all of us. We’ll be reading a book, or listening to a song, or watching a movie, and a line will jump out at us. And it’s not necessarily that it’s funny or poignant or well-put. It could be all or none of those things. But they stick with us… perfect metaphors, executed perfectly.

Sometimes they’re short and to the point, like one of my favorite lines from Panic! At the Disco’s Northern Downpour: “You clicked your heels and wished for me.” There’s a whole world in that one sentence; it tells an entire story in eight words.

Other times, they’re rather longer, and considerably more famous. An obvious example:

“ Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter—tomorrow we will run faster, strech out our arms farther. . . . And one fine morning—
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”
- The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

These passages impress us, inspire us, become a part of us… and as authors, they frustrate us to no end.

I want oneeeeeeeeeeee.

These little gems are products of our own talents, but unfortunately, our own talents are fickle, easily distracted creatures. One almost never gets poetry out of a first draft—it can take two, three revisions to reach a manuscript that manages to tread water as legitimately good, let alone great or inspired.

So how do they—the big They, all those other authors out there whom we want to emulate and wish we could be/be friends with—do it?

The answer is so stupidly simple that I kind of want to throttle it with my bare hands: they do it the same way we do. Hard work. Editing.

Which isn’t to say that just anyone could craft the next Great Gatsby if only they’ll revise enough. The good news is that editing is a skill, and that writing is a talent. Unfortunately, the bad news is that, y’know… editing is a skill, and writing is a talent.

And I think that’s what separates the good authors—or those who will become good authors—from those who aren’t. That they HAVE something to say… even if they don’t know how just yet. I keep thinking about that story about Michelangelo—how he said that his sculptures were trapped inside his marble, and all he was doing was freeing them.

We take our chisels to our word processors and we chip away at unnecessary phrases and ugly blocks of prose and then, eventually, we find out whether it was worth it: either we find a work of art at the center, or we keep cutting away until all that’s left is dust.

And so, like Michelangelo, I’ll keep at it with my hammer and chisel until I get to David.

[Yeah, I can’t do it. I can’t just end a blog with a conclusion. Tell me what you think! Agree? Disagree? Comments are excellent!]

The Right Place for Love

2009-01-27T20:35:00.001-05:00

It’s when I’m weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig’s having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth’s the right place for love:
I don’t know where it’s likely to go better.
- Robert Frost, “Birches”

I love this passage. Let it be my litany.

I acknowledge that everyone has a breaking point. When I reach that place—the place where I’m a little too stressed, a little too busy, a little too worried and worn out and tired and hurt and I snap, forgive me. Never take me at my word, for my actions will always speak louder. There is nothing you can do that can change the way I feel. There is nothing I can say that cannot be taken back and replaced with the truth, if I am given the opportunity. I am in the right place, I am at the right time. I will love now, I must love now, because I will not be granted another chance. This is it. And I can handle it.

It’s what I was put here to do.

The Voices In My Head

2008-12-27T00:10:00.001-05:00

When Marlena finished reading The Jubilee Express, Maureen Johnson’s story in Let It Snow, she texted me to talk about it. “I liked it;” she said, “it was Maureen in a way that most of her books aren’t.”

I agreed.

But now I'm wondering why.

One of the biggest difficulties facing a young author—both creatively and for essays—is finding their voice. This critique (“lacks individual voice”) often prompts complaints and uncomfortable musings, because it’s a bit disconcerting, obviously, to be told you don’t sound like yourself. Doesn’t everything you say, write or do have your voice? Isn’t that the point?

I understood what Marlena meant. Generally, I enjoy MJ’s personal blog a lot more than I enjoy her books, because I love MJ as a person: her humor and quirkyness and eloquence. The problem that comes with people you love writing books, however, is that they aren’t writing as them. They’re writing as their narrator, or as their protagonist. The Jubilee Express was exemplary because Jubilee was the closest a main character has gotten to Maureen’s personality; as such, the prose sparkled (as MJ loves sparkles) with what I can only describe as “honesty.”

Cue uncomfortable thought number two: are writers dishonest?

I wish I could remember who said this, but I remember being told once that someone preferred non-fiction to fiction because they “didn’t like being lied to.” Well, first of all Mr. Person-I-Can’t-Remember, your grammar sucks. And second of all, as an author, that kind of scares me.

I like to think of my characters as real people. Whole, separate, different from me. Obviously, we have to have few things in common—everyone on the planet has a few things in common. But if I imagine myself as a source of light (say, the sun), then my characters are mirrors (or moons): reflecting my own light back at me. Shining with light and life—real—but only if I write them so. After all, they need me to exist in the first place. So if I, as an author, need to start with my own personality as a template every time, then every change that I make is a bend in the mirror: twisting and altering it until the funhouse image looking back bares almost no resemblance to me at all.

But does each warp in the mirror rob my writing of a little bit of truth?

I can’t be sure, because the problem seems to go both ways. As I said, I was familiar with Maureen Johnson, her blog and her personality, before I read her books. But what happens when it goes the other way around?

So let’s talk about Sarah Vowell.

I read a few of Vowell’s books for the first time two years ago, knowing nothing about her. They were her latest, and so she came off not only as hilarious, well-informed and brilliant, but as seasoned. Practiced.

For those of you who have never read Sarah Vowell, here’s an excerpt from one of the essays in The Partly Cloudy Patriot:

…there are few creepier moments in cultural tourism than when a site tries to rewrite its past. Once, I took a boat tour up the Hudson and visited a seventeenth-century Dutch farm. At the farm there was a different tour guide at each station—the bridge, the mill, the manor—and to a man (they were all women actually) they described the farm’s slaves not as slaves but as “enslaved Africans.” As in “The mill was worked by enslaved Africans.” Or “Over there were the cabins of the enslaved Africans.” Or “That was the job of the enslaved Africans.” After a while I couldn’t stand it anymore and cornered one of those shawl-wearing tour guides and asked point-blank why on earth nobody used the world slave. And in that sing-song dialect of teenage girls, in which every ends in a question mark, she replied, “Because ‘enslaved African’ describes slavery as something that was done to them? Instead of what they were? Enslavement was not their whole identity?”
“Um,” I asked, “isn’t the whole point about being a slave that you don’t have a choice to be anything else?” Prettying up the word slave with that adjective-noun construction makes “enslaved African” sound nonchalant. As in “Those were the cabins of the jolly leprechauns.”

I adore her writing. When reading it, the voice in my head is cool, collected, smug. Shooting off lines as though they’re not funny when they are with ease; a kind of a Rory-Gilmore-ten-years-later voice.

And then Hannukah hit, and two things happened.

The first thing is that I asked for more of her books. I’ve read her most recent three, and so I wanted to round out my collection. The thing about going backwards, however (which, slightly related fact, I’ve done with MJ too; saved her first two books for last, I mean) is that writers really do improve over time. Practice may not make perfect, but it really does make better. Perhaps I shouldn’t have been, but I was surprised when I started reading Radio On—25-year-old-Vowell’s diary chronicling a year of… well, listening to the radio—and found that she didn’t “sound” like herself. In fact, she sounded an awful lot like Chuck Klosterman. While one could argue that any witty young writer who focuses on grunge music sounds like Klosterman, I really wasn’t expecting the brashness, the anger and bitterness in Vowell’s normally light, teasing prose. It was like I was watching a video of her awkward, rebellious teenage years.

But should a decade really make a difference? Well, obviously, yes. A decade ago, I was writing such gripping tales as Wangdoodles and The Wacky Invention. Do those carry my voice? God help me, I hope not. But they’re still mine; I could deny it, but those (god-awful) stories are a part of my personal literary history. Who am I to disown them?

So Sarah Vowell did a little growing up. Okay, so did I.

And then the second thing happened: I actually *heard* her voice. Curious to see if she’d written any columns or articles on Barack Obama, I googled them together. I found a video clip of her on The Daily Show. Cue the shock:

[Okay, I tried to embed the video here but it wouldn't work, so be a dear and click the link?] (THE LINK.)

I knew that she’d done the voice of Violet in The Incredibles, but I thought that was just, y’know… a voice. Not HER voice.

So which is it? How she speaks, or how I, reading her words, assume she speaks? Or do one’s vocal chords have no bearing on one’s textual voice at all?

Again, familiarity gets in the way. I think of the essay Hayley wrote to apply to colleges; how I hadn’t needed to listen to her read it out loud on fiveawesomegirls because I could hear her so clearly in my head. How I have trouble writing my own work after watching a few hours of John Green on blogtv, because I’m hearing him narrate, not me, and I start to phrase things as he would rather than how I would.

… I’m horrible at ending blogs. I always want to cap it off with a “what do you think?” One of the reasons that I’ve never done this before is that blogs, I find, are for people with opinions who know what they’re talking about. Not that I don’t fit both of those categories, but I feel very uncomfortable broadcasting them here as though I’m the only person who is right. I don’t think I am; why should you?

So I think what I’d rather do is introduce a topic and then open up some dialogue. My bit’s covered, so now it’s your turn:

What do you think?

Re: My Last Post

2008-12-16T11:06:00.000-05:00

Stayed up until about 4:30 AM finishing Prisoner of Azkaban; while the relative pros and cons as to the intelligence of this plan are sorely debatable, I wouldn't have been able to sleep anyway and found a little of the magic coming back as I read.

I'm not sure why that is, exactly. I mean, I have my theories:

It was very late at night; everything starts to get better when you're tired.
PoA was my favorite book of the series for a very long time.
The emergence of teenaged themes caught my interest (in other words, it's only the first two that I've simply outgrown; I think this very probable).
Remus Lupin.
Punctum!
Christmas spirit was definitely thin on the ground in the Gryffindor common room that morning. Hermione had shut Crookshanks in her dormitory, but was furious with Ron for trying to kick him; Ron was still fuming about Crookshanks's fresh attempt to eat Scabbers. Harry gave up trying to make them talk to each other and devoted himself to examining the Firebolt, which he had brought down to the common room with him. For some reason this seemed to annoy Hermione as well; she didn't say anything, but she kept looking darkly at the broom as though it too had been criticizing her cat.

So I don't know. I'm not prepared to redact anything I said the other day yet (especially not the HBP stuff) but... well, I'll keep you posted, shall I?

Why Do I Like Harry Potter?

2008-12-14T19:19:00.000-05:00

[warning: disjointed, half-baked thoughts to follow.]

So I’m doing this thing where I’ve decided to reread the entire Potter series from start to finish. I haven’t revisited them since Deathly Hallows came out, and after reading first Harry, a History and then Beedle the Bard, it just seemed like it was time to go back to Hogwarts.

And as I’m reading, I’m starting to wonder… why is it, again, that I like these books so much?

When I ask it, it’s not in a disgusted, “Why do I like these? Ugh!” kind of way. It’s just idle curiosity. To be frank, they really don’t suit my current tastes. I’m all about John Green and Maureen Johnson: relevant tales for teens with witty dialogue and a slightly funnier, but still very believable, reality. And sure, Ron gets off a really great line every now and then, but to be perfectly honest, I’m kind of rushing through the beginning. I’ve just started Prisoner of Azkaban, and a part of me was tapping my foot (… I suppose my foot was, huh?) all through SS and CoS, just wanting to get to Order of the Phoenix when we see real danger, real hormones and real emotion. Raised stakes.

I may return to this when I’ve gotten to it in my reread process, but this is just something I have to say: Half-Blood Prince was a very frustrating book for me. Such a big part of it was teenaged drama, just classic high school stuff, and I loved that—it would have been extremely bad form to pretend as though 16 year olds act any other way. But I felt as though Jo could have handled it much better. As a staunch believer in Harry/Ginny, I was obviously gratified to see that relationship come to fruition, but the way it happened made me want to punch things and pull teeth. There’s a logical build-up of interest on Harry’s side: the wonderful exchanges in OotP that made Ginny my favorite character, their shared experiences at the Burrow, him missing her when she’s gone—but then, when the time comes and the monster in his chest rears its ugly head, it’s all “Ginny’s so pretty.” Well, YES, Harry, we know. But she’s also fierce and funny and why the hell don’t you ever talk about that? Jo is known for her subtlety, but the telling-not-showing here really baffled me, left a bad taste in my mouth. And once the two of them have their several sunlit days? Their relationship is mentioned about three times in passing. I treasure that moment in the Common Room where they discuss tattoos; it’s the closest to typical YA the series ever gets. And obviously this was her first go, and the Pensieve and the Lightning-Struck Tower and the typical Rowling mind-blowing amazingness was present and accounted for.

But.

It’s hard for me to talk about this. I don’t want to sound as though I’m insulting Jo or Potter or… I’m not. I’m really not. The thing that makes Harry Potter such a satisfying experience is the richness of the world—knowing that it’s not real, yet being unable to shake the feeling that it could be real. The government is a government, the school is a school and the people are people.

And maybe that’s it. Maybe Harry, Ron and Hermione were too busy being people to be teenagers. They had their angst (GOD, did Ron and Hermione have angst) but it just didn’t seem to have the right vibe.

I don’t know. There are no pull-quote punctums (punctia?) in Potter. All the rightnesses are slow and amorphous and spring from depth of character. Potter is a plot-driven series. It has strong themes, yes—good versus evil and the power of love—but aside from a few wonderful Dumbledore quotations, there’s very little one can just grab and show off as a token of what they’ve learned and how they’ve grown. The narrative does not go on thematic, idea-driven tangents. And I miss that. I love Jo’s quirky, tongue-in-cheek style, and I just wish that there were… more of it.

I suppose one could argue that I like Potter because I’ve always liked Potter, but that doesn’t seem right, either. I don’t pop in my Star Wars DVDs whenever I get depressed, and I was a fan of George Lucas younger and (possibly) harder than I was for Jo. There is—or rather, was—a great comfort in slipping into the world of Potter that I just can’t seem to get back any more.

And most of all, I miss the wondering.

This is the first time I’m starting at the beginning from a perspective of a truly closed canon. I read through all of them one last time after DH came out (“Oh my god, they learned about dittany for their very first final exams!”) but at the time, everything was still nebulous and swirling in my brain. I hadn’t gone to Prophecy yet, hadn’t sat down and truly examined all there was to examine… but I have now. And the mystery is gone.

And the more I think about it, the more I realize just how much the mystery really meant.

Harry Potter was more than just something to read. It was more, even, than an experience. It was an event in my life. It was what I lived and breathed and dreamt. And it was, at the time, just as open-ended as my own day-to-day was. Reading the series again now isn’t like rereading any other book, because I’m not reading it—I can’t read it—like I would anything else. I can’t dissect her style or choices, like I can every time I go back and read Looking For Alaska over again. All I can do is try and feel like I did then; it’s like going through an old photo album. I can forgive everything I find lacking, smile at all my favorite bits when I get to them, just as I can look back and examine my own adolescence.

But nostalgia just isn’t as fun as being there, and I can’t find a way to go back.

An Introduction and A Spiel About Faith

2008-12-13T20:04:00.000-05:00

Okay, so a few words on this blog and why it’s called what it’s called, before I get on with the actual post (which might not be terribly exciting.)

As an English-major-to-be at Brandeis, there’s a pre-requisite course I had to take entitled “Introduction to Literary Method.” Being rather cocky when it comes to all things Literate, I was fairly certain that this course would be a complete waste of my time, and do nothing but reiterate the boring points and stupid poems I’d already talked to death in AP Brit Lit at PHS.

Well, I was wrong.

At first, I only gave credit to the course for introducing me to the people who have become my closest friends on campus. Even if Lit Method had turned out to be the garbage class I assumed I was in for, it would have been worth it to meet Talia, Ben and Chef.

And yet.

When writing my final paper for this class, which I handed in yesterday, it slowly dawned on me that… I actually learned a hell of a lot. And not just in an acquiring-knowledge kind of sense, but in an acquiring-knowledge-about-myself kind of a sense. I found that “The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock” is actually one of the best poems I’ve ever read, and not a disgusting pile of pretentious drivel, and more importantly? I finally found the words to phrase a concept that has shaped my understanding of literature for years.

We read a poem by Wallace Stevens entitled “Of Modern Poetry.” The poem itself still isn’t my favorite, but he discusses how a poem must bend over backwards, be everything to everyone- stage, actor, and audience. He writes that that actor must be
“A metaphysician in the dark, twanging
An instrument, twanging a wiry string that gives
Sounds passing through sudden rightnesses, wholly
Containing the mind, below which it cannot descend,
Beyond which it has no will to rise.”

I cannot get over the truth and power of those words. Everyone has a favorite line of a poem, favorite scene of a story, favorite bridge in a song. And it’s not just that it’s human nature to latch on to certain things; it’s… a deeply personal experience. Certain words, certain phrases, simply speak to us—resonate on a level that sometimes we ourselves can’t fully comprehend.

I grooved on that idea for ages, and was naturally thrilled when I got to see it come into play yet again in that same English class. We studied Camera Lucida, a book on photography theory by Roland Barthes. According to Barthes, every photo contains two elements—a studium and a punctum. The studium comprises the work as a whole; what the photographer (or author, or artist) is trying to convey, and how they choose to convey it. The studium is the kind of thing you write papers about in high school.

And the punctum is, largely, an accident. The punctum is a small detail that captures your interest—it enthralls you, “wounds you,” as Barthes would say, and greatly informs your entire reading of the piece. In other words, the punctum would be a “sudden rightness.”

So this blog is largely going to be about that—my experiences writing and reading, what influences me and what makes me cringe. A place for me to discuss what I love and why I love it.

And now on to the post I was going to write in the first place:

For about two years, I have been developing a novel that is very close to my heart—the kind of endeavor Hayley has referred to as “the infinite writing project of my soul,” which I could not agree with more. Entitled Keeping Faith, it revolves entirely around the relationship (and occasionally non-relationship) of two best friends: Faith Caldwell and David Goldstein.

These two characters have come a long way since I first met them in the winter of early 2007, just as I have come a long way as a writer. Initially very little more than a “Dharma and Greg” rip off (come on, you remember that show, right?), the two of them have grown into very distinct personalities.

I’m not going to lie. David is still very much like a male version of me: a worrier, a compulsive do-gooder, responsible and sarcastic. But in the years I’ve known him, he’s deteriorated; his moral core has gone off-center, just as Faith—whom I originally conceptualized as a complete wild child—daily becomes easier to anticipate and read, more open with herself and with me.

And slowly, I’m starting to discover why that is.

Of course, there’s the obvious reason: I’m, slowly but surely, becoming better at what I do. I’m taking baby steps towards a reasonable facsimile of reality in my prose every day. But the evolution of David and Faith, I have come to realize, has everything to do with me and my own relationship with my own faith.

You’ll forgive me if my thoughts get a little disjointed here: the epiphany I’m trying to convey to you now was first reached during a very deep, very religious and ultimately, quite personal conversation with Sarah Keeler at 4 in the morning.

My faith is my core. And not faith as in simply “blind belief;” faith is more than that. To me, faith is an unshakable conviction in the overall okayness of the universe. Knowing that things happen for a reason: not saying that we are rudderless puppets of Fate, but that we are put on this earth to learn and grow, and pain is just as big a part of that as joy. Knowing that everything we experience is an opportunity we are meant to grasp, and a lesson that we have to learn.

My faith is my core. There is pretty much nothing anyone could do or say that could make me lose my certainty. But what I’ve come to realize? David doesn’t have that. And that’s the big discrepancy between us—where the mirror reflecting me back on myself bends like a fun house, twisting him away from me and turning him into his own person.

David doesn’t have an internal faith. …but he does have Faith. And she acts as his ballast and compass just as surely as he does for her: not as a voice of reason, as he so often must be for others, but as a voice of profound empathy.

(Like I said: the bloggity bit was kind of boring.)

I’m not going to make any promises as to the frequency or substantiality of posts here; that’s only gotten me into trouble in the past. But for now… I’m excited, and I hope to see you soon.