Those Darn Commercials

Consider this your warning: This will be long.

I mostly try to avoid politics here; I really do.  From what I can tell, my regular readers share my view -- but who knows?  I might have nerdy conservative lurkers out there.  Who knows, right?

But I can't let this go.  The "Yes on 8" commercials are driving me freaking insane -- especially the one about teaching second graders about same-sex marriage.

Okay, first off?  Check out the English Language Arts and Social Studies content standards (PDFs), and search "marriage," "marry," "family," etc., and see how far it gets you.  Not very, that's how far.

Second.  There are already books dealing with same-sex couples.  People have complained for years about all sorts of books.  Don't believe me?  Google "banned books" and see what you get.

Third.  When I had Space Cadet J in my class, her family didn't want anything to do with Halloween (for religious reasons).  Knowing this, I made my Halloween vocabulary homework optional.  Her mom said that they'd discussed not having her do it, and took the opportunity to explain what Halloween was and why they didn't believe in it.  If your school does teach same-sex marriage (which is NOT in the content standards), if you feel so moved, take the opportunity to tell your child why you don't believe in it.

Fourth.  Pardon the yelling.

RELIGIOUS MARRIAGE DOES NOT EQUAL CIVIL MARRIAGE.

Want proof?

Go get married in a church, don't get a marriage license, and see what the government says when you try to claim a benefit of marriage.

Then, go get a marriage license but don't get married in a church, and see what the government says when you try to claim a benefit of marriage.

Making same-sex marriage legal -- or, rather, keeping it legal -- does not compel your church to marry same-sex couples.  I would venture to say that there may be churches out there that won't marry mixed-race couples.  Fifth Grade Teacher E's rabbi wouldn't marry her son because he married a Catholic girl.

ALL.  TOTALLY.  LEGAL.

Fifth.

Again, pardon the yelling.

FOR FRELL'S SAKE, HOW DOES IT IMPACT YOU IF TWO OTHER PEOPLE GET MARRIED?

I mean, really.  It's not like they'll run out of marriage licenses.

It's infuriating.

Marriage, as far as the government is concerned, is a civil contract between two people that entails both rights and responsibilities.  Denying a marriage license to two people of the same gender is discrimination because it's telling one of the two that they can't get a marriage license because of their gender.

It's not right.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It may seem odd that someone raised in a conservative family who went to a conservative Lutheran elementary school, a Catholic middle and high school, and a Lutheran college would hold such views.  Because of that, I probably should share a little.

I was raised in a very sheltered environment.  My elementary school was extremely small, and -- for the most part -- not very diverse.  How small?  I was one of four graduating sixth graders.

So you'll pardon me that I was close to thirteen-ish before I realized that my uncle's sister (who had been bringing her "friend" to family-only events for years) was gay.

In my freshman year of high school, I had a very forward thinking religion/sex ed teacher (yes, our semester of sex ed was considered our religion class for the semester) who showed an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation to explain homosexuality.  She explained that the character who had committed the heinous act, according to her society, of being born a female in a genderless society was roughly equivalent to someone who was born gay.

While she was bogged down in what is (to my understanding) still current Catholic dogma -- that is, being gay isn't a sin but acting on it and having intercourse is -- it was remarkably progressive, given the environment.

Because of that, I was already predisposed to believe that being gay was just a genetic variation -- and (and this is key) something over which one does not have control.

So, that was percolating in the back of my brain as I became interested in Babylon 5 -- but I still totally missed the Susan/Talia thing until Susan blurted out at the end of an episode that she had loved Talia.  (Actually, the line was "I think I loved Talia," which I always found very poignant.)

Meanwhile (this is important, I promise), Leonardo DiCaprio was becoming the Next Big Thing.  (I'll get there; I promise.)

Also meanwhile, I was developing a "relationship radar" -- that is, if I watch a show for more than an episode or two, I can generally sense which characters will eventually pair off.  Whether it's because writers are transparent or because several years of scouring every detail of Babylon 5 and Star Trek for hidden clues predisposed me to look harder and catch subtle clues, I don't know, but the effect was the same.

By my freshman year of college, the Internet happened.  Being the inquisitive sort, I checked out Star Trek fan sites within weeks of starting college.  Being the naive sort, I did not anticipate -- at all -- the...ahem...varied views one can find in fandom regarding relationships.

That is, I had no idea about Rule 34 :  If it exists, people will 'ship it.  (Well, technically the rule is "if it exists, there is p*rn for it," but I can count on one hand the number of things with a greater-than-R rating I've ever read...and the ones I have involved a lot of skimming and page-down-ing.)

Boy, oh, boy, was I in for a shock.

Most of the pairings made very little to no literary sense -- that is, I just could not see how anyone thought the original "text" of the show suggested a relationship of any kind.  But it did force me to examine whether I was reacting negatively to a lot of those things because I am a bit of a canon-snob (in other words, you have to convince me that your story could conceivably happen on the show) or because of the content.

Well, around that time, Titanic smashed into the box office, and every female on the planet was swooning over Leonardo DiCaprio.

I didn't get it.  (I still don't.)

Now, Jason Carter?  Sure.  Kevin Smith (the kiwi, not the Jay and Silent Bob guy).  Heck yeah.  The guy who played Gunn on Angel?  Oooh, boy yes.  Honestly...Leonard Nimoy?  Uh huh.

But Leo DiCaprio?

Meh.

And I realized that if I was not able to convince my hormones that he was OMG THE BEST THING EVER...how could I expect someone else to make their hormones react to another gender?

Meanwhile, I was home for winter break and forced to watch only channel 5 due to having a c-band satellite in one room and an iffy antenna on the other.  I flipped onto an episode of Xena ("The Quest ," as it happens), and within 20 minutes, my relationship radar was going off the charts, and I was...a bit confused.  Had I flipped into the episode five minutes earlier and seen the much-discussed kiss...I doubt I would have been confused.

I don't read much fan fiction online anymore (and I find it infinitely amusing that of the little I do, they are written by opposite ends of the political spectrum, even though the second show isn't overtly conservative), but I do read Missy Good.

I found her second story, At a Distance, on one of my first searches into online Xena stuff, when I was still trying to figure out what was going on with my relationship radar.  I had no idea what "alt" was, and by the time I got to that one scene ("The feeling was stronger now..."), I didn't care.  I was hooked, and have been ever since.

It's been fun watching her writing develop over the past -- Good Lord -- twelve years.  I'm not the only one; she eventually ended up writing two episodes of the sixth season and collaborated on a musical episode that, sadly, never aired (I'd have killed to hear Xena sing "Last Dance.").

And I'm going to borrow her words -- words I read, if I'm not mistaken, when I was a sophomore in college -- to end this, because it was reading them that I became absolutely, unequivocally, a proponent of same-sex rights.  They hit me that hard.

"There was so much hate in his voice…I don't understand, Dar...how can people hate you for something as beautiful as loving someone?"

Vote no on 8.

Please.

My Eyes!

I...

I just...

I...

There are no words.

Well, there are, but...I think I lost them.

Headdesk...

...which is Internet slang, of course, for, "D'oh!"

So, I'm reading this perfectly lovely piece of smushy fluff (yeah, yeah), by this mostly literate author (I can't read any other kind anymore; in my early days online, I read everything, but now...), and...I....

"Blah blah blah, then all visages of sleep left."

NO.  No, no, no, no-ity, no!

Visage = appearance (his ancient visage = his old face).

Vestige = stuff left over (vestigial organs = organs that are left over that used to be important and aren't anymore).

You meant "vestiges of sleep."

As on, all little itty bits and pieces of sleepiness went away.

Threw me right out of the moment, it did.

Maybe THEY Should Play Free Rice

Ahem.

Ladies and gentlemen of the writing community,

Palatable = nice.  Yummy.  Good for your palate.  You like it.

Palpable = you can feel it.  Touchable.

I highly doubt that the electricity between two people was "palatable."

Unless you...like...eating...elec--

Nah.

What Writer's Block Means to Me

I've started another video. It  all happened while driving -- my iPod was on random (as usual) and I heard "Don't You Need," and before I knew it, I had the insane idea to try to pull enough clips from "Blood Fever" to make a Voyager video.

Problem is, all the relevant clips from that episode are dark -- lit by the actors' handheld flashlights -- and they are filled with talky-face.  I may end up making slight exception, despite the generally accepted vidder's rule that talky-face is bad.

So now I'm left borrowing clips from other episodes -- mostly in the third season, when the producers randomly decided to go the Tom/B'Elanna route instead of the Harry/B'Elanna route -- while still trying to make the narrative make sense.

(The main narrative is, of course, the story of B'Elanna's increasing desperation as the pon farr makes her more and more...err...feverish.)

I don't have the series on DVD but of course it's -- cough -- available in other venues -- cough -- not that I would ever -- cough -- acquire the series that way.  I am, of course, simply -- cough -- story-boarding at this point.

Cough.

What was I saying?

Oh, yeah.  Writer's block.

So the other night, just for fun, I opened most of my active stories in Word and just cycled through them.  Lots of words.  Some in script format, some in narrative format, and some half-and-half.

Dialogue remains my weakness, as does my tendency be very straightforward and information-dump-like in my descriptions, so I have a few stories I'm working on specifically to force myself to describe things better -- in particular stories that force me to work within certain limitations (for instance, a Blood Ties story from Vicki's point of view in near-darkness (she has night blindness, or a Sue Thomas story where I can't rely on Sue picking up on tone of voice).

One thing I've learned over the past few years is that different things draw me to different stories, characters, and even shows.

For instance, the large majority of my Farscape stories are centered around a few isolated moments.

Like, say, Aeryn in "Till the Blood Runs Clear," because I find the interplay between her fierce desire to be independent despite her temporary blindness and her wide grin when Crichton compliments her ingenuity to be fascinating.  I saw a brief snippet of that episode when it first aired, and for years after -- even though I didn't yet watch the show -- my memory of Aeryn was her abrupt "Don't help me, Crichton!"  In fact, my first Farscape story was based off that moment.

Most of my other stories are centered around the following: Aeryn's breakdown in "The Way We Weren't," the aftermath of Moya!John's death (which is one of only two stories written from anyone other than Aeryn's point of view), the aftermath of Aeryn's torture, and the aftermath of John's collapse in The Peacekeeper Wars.

With other shows, of course, it's other moments -- but that's why I tend to write missing scenes and episode tags.  I'm drawn to the moments and want to explore them more.

So, anyhow, when a bout of writer's block comes along, the first thing that begins to happen is that I watch these moments themselves, or I'm reading something, or listening to a song, and start thinking: "Wow, if only I had that gift with language."

Which brings me back to the beginning of this.  I realize song writing is an entirely different thing than fiction writing or prose writing.  But when I read the lyrics to "Don't You Need," I'm invariably struck by the powerful imagery -- and it's something that always seems like it's beyond my reach.

In fact, imagery is one reason I've always been drawn to Melissa Etheridge's songs, ever since a friend gave me a copy of her self-titled album because it didn't fit on her CD case and I liked the song "Come to My Window."

(That song was immediately over-played and is probably one of my least favorite of her songs now, but whatever.)

So I've got these open files, especially the ones that are in script format, and I wonder: Can I come up with words to bring the images in my head into being on paper?  Lately, it seems like the answer is no.  The images themselves are as clear as ever -- I generally picture it like a movie in my head -- but when I try to describe them, it ends up sounding like an instruction manual.

Writer's block, for me, is not a lack of ideas.  It's not a lack of story lines, of plots, even of dialogue.  Writer's block is self-censoring.  It's me stopping myself from writing something because I know -- I know -- it's not up to snuff.

It's times like this that I have to remember what I did during the Summer of Drama, when I finished my first long story -- write a little, every day, on every story -- even if it's just a word, just a sentence.

Even if it sucks...because I can always go back and change it later.

Today's lesson in self pity was brought to you by the letters W and B and the number 47.

(W and B for writer's block, of course, and the number 47 just 'cause.)

Sometimes I Amuse Myself Too Much

Must be part of the writing thing.  Sometimes, the phrases that come out of my head just amuse me...especially when they appear on my computer screen without any advance warning.

Right now, I am tickled pink that my brain came up with this:

Tara shook her head in exasperation. “They’re the FBI’s real life Mulder and Scully.” She shrugged defensively at the looks she was getting. “X-Files? If they kissed, the world would stop turning?” She shook her head. “Forget it.”

The joke here, of course, is that the "real life" Mulder and Scully are just as fictional as...

...hey, it was funny to me!  :-)

Of Fingernail Clippers

The good news is that it was a Monday and Bulldozer only had two minor meltdowns -- one of which was semi-provoked. Yay. :-)

The better news is that against all expectations, Aide S's working for a certain psych care services place has only made her better at her job instead of turning her into a discrete trial drone. Yay. :-)

However.

(You knew there was a however, didn't you?)

However, our current drama is that Aide J is just incensed because Elastigirl's parents must clip her fingernails right this second!!!!!

She has asked me to write a note requesting that they do this, but I replied that I was not comfortable doing that because they know that Elastigirl's fingernails should be cut.

(And, also, 'cause you wouldn't get the bejeezus scratched out of you if you only actually did what I told you to for more than 10 minutes at a time, and 'cause the girl could find a way to scratch if all of her fingernails were ripped off in a tragic Velcro accident. Seriously.)

In any event, she has now decided that Elastigirl's scratching is OMG A HEALTH HAZARD because she touches places that shouldn't be touched without washing your hand.

And she is, apparently, telling everybody this...according to our principal.

So I chatted with our principal after school, who grinned knowingly when I said that Aide J had been asked repeatedly to just step away when Elastigirl is scratching ('cause, you know, if you move away, she won't get attention, and -- get this! -- she'll stop scratching) and said that she would tell her the same.

But she did ask me to write the note asking that Elastigirl's fingernails be clipped.

I'm chafing at that (I've worked hard to maintain a good relationship with them, because they had some run-ins with school staff before), but our principal has been very nice and very supportive, so, hey, don't rock the boat, you know?

But this is my blog, and I'll have my say here. (So there.)

1. Elastigirl's parents know her fingernails need to be cut. Her behavior is the same at home as it is at school.

2. Elastigirl's parents have been working very hard to provide for her and do right by her, in the face of enormous challenges and obstacles. She has even done homework sometimes.

3. Elastigirl cringes and flails away from washing her hands. Can you imagine the production that is required to actually clip her fingernails?

4. Seriously. They know her fingernails should be cut. They also know she should have a bath every day, but with a kid with intense needs who has a dad on daily dialysis...sometimes things have to give -- and feeding her dinner is more important than washing her hair.

4a. Don't get all snippy with me. I know kids should have baths. But I have also been the harried sixteen-year-old sister whose dad is in the hospital and who is trying to study for midterms, pick her kid brother up from school, cook dinner, take midterms, hold together a tutoring program while the official tutor's brother is in a hospice dying of cancer, and waiting to see if her dad will wake up from his coma. Guess what? Patrick didn't get a bath that week. So sue me.

4b. Seriously? They know. Get over it and implement her behavior support plan and stop worrying about trivial things like fingernails. If you're worried they're so dirty, wash her hands. Or, you know, your cuts. That you wouldn't have (or, at least, 90% of which you wouldn't have) if you actually absorbed what I tol dyou.

4c. Seriously? They know. They're trying.

4d. While Elastigirl's "mental functioning" is in question, she unquestionably has severe delays. My brother -- my 20-year-old, mostly high-functioning brother -- would, to this day, rather chew off his fingernails than allow fingernail clippers within 50 feet of him. He would rather his toenails rip off in his socks than allow toenail clippers within 100 feet of him. Don't assume it's a matter of, "Oh, c'mere, Elastigirl, let me cut your fingernails, honey."

4e. Seriously? They know.

4f. THEY KNOW AND PLEASE DON'T MAKE ME TICK THEM OFF OVER THIS; LET ME SAVE IT FOR WHEN SHE IS BRUISING HER OWN JAW BY HITTING IT BECAUSE ANOTHER TOOTH IS ROTTING OUT OF HER HEAD, OKAY?

Allow me to rephrase that: If I have only so much good will with this family, I'd rather use it on the thing that is causing such severe pain that hitting herself is the only thing that will make it feel better than on something they know should be done anyway.

Hmph.

Amusing bookmark to this story. I, I admit, whined at one point, "Oooh, she's such a thorn in my side sometimes."

The principal looked askance at me. "Aide J, not Elastigirl," I said.

She looked dubious.

"Seriously. I adore Elastigirl (I do). I'd take Elastigirl home with me in a second...though I might have to fight Aide T for the privelege."

She grinned and at that point wondered if perhaps Aide J is angling for a disability leave from us (with pay, of course) so she only has to work the one job but is paid for both.

Welcome to another week!

(However, my writer's block un-blocked. Or, rather, the dam burst. I have about 4 stories almost done and two videos totally vidded in my head. Squee!)

Small Addendum

Schmoop is good. I love schmoop. Schmoop is why I liked the show in the first place. Don't know why I haven't checked that site in something like 9 months.

I'm a mushy grinning mess here.

But I just have to say...in love or not...Jack's not a cryer.

But that's okay; I'll suspend my disbelief and go back to melting into a puddle and grinning like an idiot.

Now THAT's Better

Nothing like a little schmoop. If only it weren't on a message board. Oh well...I needed distraction today.

I realize that a responsible citizen would shop somewhere other than WalMart, but I simply can't afford to, especially at Back to School time. But I spent almost an hour in a 5 cart line in order to buy zip ties, magnet tape, and 8 3-ring binders. Eesh.

Then I go to Wendy's for lunch and get stuck behind a large -- and I mean large -- white truck that honked and honked and honked because the drive-thru people weren't responding. I pulled up and they did right away. Got my food, and then almost got run over when the white truck decided it couldn't get around the bend to get out of the drive-thru without backing up once.

Website Update

For what it's worth -- I know many of you who I know in real life aren't interested in my fannish endeavors -- I have updated my website. While I've changed how I present my videos, the main update here is a new story, "What You Don't Know."

The story is set sometime shortly after the Stargate SG-1 series finale, "Unending." As such, it contains spoilers for that episode. If you haven't seen it -- and care about such things -- you probably don't want to read yet.

Oddly enough, Teal'c's voice was more of a challenge than Jack's -- for Jack, I just had to challenge my inner snarkiness. For Teal'c, though, I found it hard to mimic his stilted, overly-formal way of speaking without making it ridiculous.

One of the pairings is canon; the other is not, but hinted at.

My favorite section:

"But...Mitchell!  He's -- he's a weenie."

Teal'c was fairly certain that Jack wasn't speaking of a hot dog -- which was his only reference for the word -- especially given the scornful tone to his voice, but he found nothing to say in response.