{ split subject }

i. calling all girlslashers: you know you have to watch Damages, right? I mean, you can trust afterellen if you don't want to take my word for it (click the "Damages" tag for more), but seriously? this is the most mind-meltingly gay series to come to summer cable in recent memory. picture The Devil Wears Prada as a serious serial drama, then substitute high-powered law firm for high-powered fashion mag, turn Meryl Streep into Glenn Close and make her character about five times as scary, and you will begin to comprehend the power of this OTP.

if that image isn't enough for you, here are ( a couple ubergay things that happened in the pilot ) it's getting good critical buzz, but honestly I wasn't overly impressed by the clunky, derivative anti-corporate thriller plot. Ted Danson is so endearing as Evil CEO that you almost want HIM to win! but OH PATTY. go ahead, DL it and see for yourself. and then join damages_fx.

ii. someone is clearly falling down on the job, because it was only by accident that I found tallulah71's new BSG vid Sunday Bloody Sunday. and yeah, I also went, "really? isn't that a bit heavy-handed?" but it turned out to be everything one could possibly want from a vid to that song. I said, in my comment, that she managed to make it simultaneously a biting political commentary and a heart-wrenching emotional juggernaut. and there are these beautiful sequences of parallel clips in it about humans and cylons, in hate and in love. (oh, and iamsab said, "it had really good 'people pointing guns at each other while trembling.' not just Lee. he's usually the trembler.") it gives me chills, man, every time.

seriously, this deserves to be part of the pantheon of Big Name BSG Vids. I'm pretty sure I've seen most of the ones that get recced right and left, but if there are any other new ones like THIS out there that I don't know about, please rectify the oversight. (no Adama/Roslin or Kara/Lee, kthnx.)

also, you should watch jarrow's Snape vid, along with everything Brad Neely ever does. TRUST ME. Professor Snake is totally my girlfriend!

iii. I got a haircut and lost half my sprout. TRAUMA. to be fair, Miguel did ask me three times if I was sure I wanted him to cut it. thing is, I DID want him to do something with it. really, I wanted for him to have some overarching artistic concept. or at least, to cut only the three inches he showed me with his fingers, and not the six inches he actually lobbed off. I won't even have enough for tiny pigtails for a week or two; luckily I have the flower clip and there's one and only one hairstyle I can do in the meantime, with the remaining spit of curls flipped up so it somewhat covers the unfortunate spikes. of the good: the back is perfectly fauxhawked, just how I want to keep it for the foreseeable future. I just don't know HOW I'll keep it this way while the top grows back out enough to work with, because I don't really feel like paying $30 a pop to maintain it (I can mohawk by myself, but not fauxhawk). this is why I started Operation Grownup Haircut 18 months in advance of interviews, I suppose. pictures not forthcoming.

iv. also, after exercising heretofore untapped reserves of willpower in the various eyewear boutiques where I shopped for sunglasses, I accidentally bought new glasses frames at Lenscrafters. I pick them up tomorrow, and I'm rather trepidatious, because can they really be the ubertrendy Frames of Ultimate Destiny that I was trying to hold out for?? but they were subtly cateyed metallic pink with (woefully logoed and undecorated) orangey plastic sides, and maybe it's enough for them to be the Frames of Opportunity, because did I really want to put new $500 lenses in year-old frames (however magenta)? pictures forthcoming (I hope).

v. (as seen on twitter) we saw Jorja Fox (again) at Brite Spot! she's such Silverlake hipster dyke and it makes me very very happy. we're not maintaining a very high volume of celebrity sightings, around here, but Jorja's always a good one.

vi. I have NOT read Book 7, nor am I planning to do so anytime soon, but I HAVE read all your Book 7 reaction posts. which means I am spoiled for *everything* that happens, hurrah! it traumatizes me (despite said fandom's current wankopalypse) that I'm apparently so utterly out of HP fandom. I mean, I still have a tag! I did see the movie! *clings*

vii. I accidentally did this:



it's accurate, I think, except I might technically be slightly stronger on the J, and I/E is pretty much a tossup.

viii. I retired a whole mess of icons, leaving me slightly shellshocked, but now I have so much space for shinies! (c.f. temporary Damages icon that I threw together; nyuszi has promised more and better). but I cannot, for the life of me, find the girlslashy Grey's icons. WTF, people?? my kingdom for a good Addison/Cally square. also, some combination of Ugly Betty's Alexis/Wilhemina/Christina (I found Betty/Amanda). and I wouldn't mind some Teen Girl Squad. SEND HELP.

ix. the Which LOLcat Are You? results page is genius. it's like a zillion times better than the quiz itself (which gave me icanhazcheezburger cat, when *clearly* I am but-I-eated-it cat).

x. lest you think I'm spending ALL my time writing long, pointless lj entries, look how I've started posting tiny bits of my dissertation @ cyborganize. go team me!

i. I'm DONE with school (as of last friday). no more pencils, no more books (most importantly, no more GR4D1NG) for the next year (probably two) of fellowship funding. bring it on.

ii. clyde_man landed hir dream job. it's in D.C., with a far hipper company than these financial drones she's been stuck with for 20 years. this is, seriously, beyond our wildest expectations of what could come of leaving the previous clusterfuck. like kismet. but much as I said I was ready, much as this scenario makes everything far less complicated, it never seemed like leaving NY(J)C was a realistic possibility. and now, all of a sudden, it's happening. we're driving to Jersey tomorrow to pack up my stuff there and say goodbye. tuesday we're continuing on to Providence. I know it's short notice, but if anyone wants to take a ride on the PATH train to hang out with us tomorrow night, you're welcome. dinner at Sushi Tango! tea and ice cream!

iii. as soon as this iron went into the fire, I realized that NYC had been a major oversight in my summer planning. I mean, I subliminally expected that I'd be returning to the city when I leave LA at an undetermined date in august. eep! so now I'm going to try to squeeze in a visit from june 10-14, approximately. I have a plane ticket from Providence to Michigan for june 15, which in retrospect is a terrible arrangement (I could have flown from Newark, and stayed longer!). but now I'm stuck with it. so this will be a whirlwind trip devoted entirely to catching up with friends -- pencil me in, stay tuned, give a shout, etc.

iv. the rest of the schedule: clyde will be in Providence helping me pack until friday. memorial day weekend I'm visiting my grandparents. then lucky (clyde's partner!) is coming to town to finish up the packing and help with the move itself on june 2, because clyde will have started the new job (and can't carry things with hir bad back anyway). this intra-familial delegation was her idea -- so adorable! we are completely Bill and Barb and Margie.

v. apparently lucky and clyde are going to Burning Man at the end of august: anybody interested in taking me? and the boston dyke march is on june 8 (6pm) -- be there or be square!

vi. I have no number vi. mostly just my perpetual battle with time, how unlimited projects lie in wait for me inside my computer and out there in the world. I don't seem to be able to prevent myself (especially while grading, writing) from joining ficathons and redesigning layouts and playing with new gadgets (that's a "lifestream": one-stop shopping for everything I post everywhere [excluding fanfic]). speaking of which, if you've joined twitter and I haven't added you yet, give me a holler.

vii. there was a moment, as I schlepped through the Denver airport, when the architecture of taking a break from lj was actually comprehensible. I know, intellectually, that my current involvement in fandom and internet life isn't sustainable long term, but most of the time the prospect of not participating at this level seems unimaginable. lj has been a source of so much stress and anxiety for me in recent months, though, and in that brief flash in transit I could SEE the relief (of a drastic unfriending and a break from fanfic) stretching before me. writing my diss about fandom creates a sort of hilarious catch 22, however, because I can't very well de-engage with my object of study! a year from now, when I'll have hopefully finished my case studies, I'm going to re-evaluate my status.

viii. speaking of fandom stress, I followed thassalia into the fray at Denis McGrath's blog. why did I do that?? he's a friend of FL, so I suppose I felt some responsibility to raise the level of debate. anyway, my comments (down at the bottom) are clearly informed by recent MiT5-y conversations with theorynut, cathexys, et al. go team acafangirl! I had this realization, by the way, that the reason I'm not blogging publicly and making myself visible like the fanboys is that I'd rather devote that energy to WRITING FIC.

ix. the girls of Shoemoney Haus are living three of my alternate lives, and it just fills me with flaily pride. I hate that I've been away since january.

x. that meme: I asked for icons and interests from the first five folks to cross my flist. shout if you want me to pick for you!

for, in order, ana_grrl, pocketwitch, annakovsky, tellitslant, and wearemany:

( words & squares )

I'm kicking this paper's ass, for the record (I'll be nearly 2/3 done with a drafty draft by the time I leave for california in 2 days). I should have just come to provincetown to write the week before xmas too. there's nothing else to do here! and being with the "family" makes me quite surprisingly happy, with their good cooking and strict scrabble and willingness to laugh at me (which is a gift, considering what a rough road it was for me and lucky, in the early years). but meanwhile it somehow became imperative for me to post 2+ years of icons. I always say I'm happy to share them, but never have I offered them up concertedly. varying quality (I'm improving, at least), and none as gorgeous as you can get elsewhere. icon that I'm posting with included!

credit required; comment appreciated. ( x30 random )

*

I'm on fully board with all of these except the last one:

last night we went to the Vixen, where the bartender made me a tequila sunrise with very light sunrise, and after approximately 5 sips (the amount I needed to drink to make room for more orange juice) I was about as drunk as I've ever been. I amused people and danced to music I was still sober enough to recognize as atrocious, and clyde_man walked me home immediately after midnight so I could crawl in bed and start the new year with water, advil, and NCIS.

happy 2007, everyone.

resources ~
in my time following 100x100_brushes, I took brushes by miggy, oh_pants, cyberelf, wherethewind__, inxsomniax, dragong, likegunfire, and saniagreenleaf, among others. so brushes that appear on any icons above may be by one of those lovely folks. I've also downloaded brushes from http://8nero.net. sorry I didn't do a better job keeping track...

i. one "star journal" left to grade, folks, ONE (the longest one, probably 40 pages and requiring comments at the end -- but still only one), and I've haplessly failed at finishing my semester by today (which is now yesterday). so I'll send it off in the morning (so help me!) and poke at LJ for a bit and then devote what will hopefully be a sizable chunk of the rest of the day (and night...) to my getyourtoaster:Starbuck story which, frankly, is all I've actually been interested in working on for the past week and counting. but it's daunting, and I can't multitask. if I don't finish it tomorrow I'm DEAD MEAT. meanwhile, in the course of procrastination, I spiffed up my lj layout a bit (working off css by faceon) and uploaded some new "loyalty" squarethings (including this shiny new default, which features cygnus). so things are looking up. wasn't I supposed to become less busy, though?

ii. your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to help spread the word about our final project: Opensaurus, a playful, educational, and activist celebration of copyleft and the public domain. At Opensaurus, you can:

- Learn about copyright issues and free culture through the humorous drama Tales of Opensaurus.
- Send ecards of Creative Commons-licensed images to your friends, and add more images to share as ecards.
- Sign email petitions urging copywrong corporations to cease and desist sending cease and desist letters! You can also create your own campaigns.
- Watch and share Hallmark-style video cards supporting Creative Commons, as well as other CC-licensed videos.

the other group did a workshop and BYOMP3 party for their final project, so as a reward for poking around our site you get audio! an entirely random selection that, in the opinion of a dance-phobic nerd who doesn't listen to popular music (namely, me), has good danceability. surprise songs!

( ysi links )

this message will self-destruct (probably in less than 24 hours -- I sent them last thursday night, I think).

iii. I was going to ask lj for advice, as follows: I need a sidebar-type indicator that displays my location (city). far tinier than WAYN, perhaps along the same lines as imood. preferably with social-networking capability and/or an SMS interface, but really the only crucial feature is that I be able to update it quickly and easily.

I need this because I'm going to be running all over the place this summer (and thereafter), providence nyc boston etc. without a lot of advance planning, and you want to be able to keep track of my whereabouts, don't you??

but then I went to Johnny Rocket's with _plasticity_ (we've been attached at the hip, lately -- studying together virtually every day), who was in the midst of research for his paper on ubiquitous computing, and he said "Have you heard of Plazes?"

which led to one of those mind-blowing moments when the most intimate, intricate efflorescences of my subjectivity converge with my intellectual passions in a technology of daily life.

in short: every time I go online, Plazes logs my location and puts it on a map. it does this automatically if I'm using my own laptop; otherwise I have to log in. if it's not a location (a "plaze") where I or another Plazes user has been before, I can define its name and attributes.

there's such poetry to the idea that I, an internet-based lifeform, can leave this trace ("traze") of my physical presence every time I touch cyberspace.

and there's also such profoundly totalitarian potential implicit in this fantasy of complete tracking. I was reading this book, The Innocents, about convicts who are exonerated of their crimes after years in prison, and one of them has become an advocate of GPS anklets that log your movements at all times, a perpetual alibi.

basically I could write a paper about this right now, but I'm bundling my more extensive thoughts in with the post about privacy that cyborganize is (theoretically) going to write. but in terms of the practical concerns, I did think a lot about safety when I was configuring my profile. not that it wouldn't be easy to stalk me if you put your mind to it, but there's something about this sort of powerful aggregation of the virtual-RL intersection that seems to invite it (or at least to generate those anxieties). you can make your info visible only to your Plazes "friends," but that does me no good since none of you have joined yet (hint hint). so I opted, counter to my usual practice, to include as little identifying information about myself as possible (no name, photo, URL), and of course to give no street address for my house and other private spaces (I did put addresses for the office, the cafe, etc.).

the site's in beta and has got some bugs still -- Xs aren't showing up in the right spot on the map, for one (complicated issue with generating lat/lon data and google maps licensing, apparently). but it's going to be one of those next big things.

iv. IT'S HERE!
by Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and their secret love child I WANT ONE. and so help me, I want a black (gratuitously more expensive) one! curse you, apple. not that I'm particularly fond of black laptops (pink, I say!), but I'm even less fond of white ones (no offense to parents of ibooks). I've been saying I'll wait for back-to-school specials at the computer store, but I don't know if I can hold out until august -- I actually made an invoice today at the online store and emailed it to myself. I CAN at least hold out until I've plowed through some of the computer-y stuff on The List. or, at least until they sell neoprene sleeves in the right size, natch.

v. another Real Sex sighting on tuesday, heh. "Excuse me, did I see you on TV?" when I was all in sweatpants and grading emergency mode, too, but at least it was a bright spot of amusement in an otherwise dismal day.

I was all technologically inspired by my discussions with new media folks yesterday. does anyone want to go in on a TXTmob with me? it's basically the same as a yahoogroup-like email list, but using txt messages to/from your phone rather than emails. we could use it just to chat or for some particular purpose (ideas? fandom??). we could dump the messages into an lj to archive them (or not). I suppose I don't have any particular goal in mind (yet), but I'm interested in experiencing the system. alternately, does anybody belong to any TXTmobs that I might like to join? (the reason that I don't txt more is that the interface on my cellie is awful -- sending pix is much less hassle.)

MT was also telling us about collaboratively authoring his forthcoming book. they used a wiki, and he says "in the end I couldn't point to a single paragraph and say whether she or I wrote it." I've never written collaboratively, but I've always been fascinated by the phenomenon (I like to imagine Deleuze and Guattari sitting at a desk together, cackling maniacally). those of you who collaborate: how does it work? I've heard reports of a certain division of labor: one person writes the plot, another the smut, for example. or there's round-robin style -- like this comment porn I read today, and on a grander scale in RPGs (as far as I understand them). do any of you have ways to intertwine even further? (I'm wildly curious about the mind-melding MO of punkensab)

more importantly, would anybody be interested in participating in an experimental collaborative-fanfic-authoring wiki?? has this or anything like it ever been done before? I don't know how realistic this is, considering how little time I have to write -- but part of me wonders if I'd write more if I were posting/contributing bits and pieces of things, without the pressure of producing finished works (even drabbles). I envision running MediaWIki (unless somebody has a better idea -- it looks pretty easy to install), with pages categorized by contributing author, fandom/pairing, finished/WIP/stub/bunny (etc.) for easy indexing. fics that were declared finished (there would have to be some protocol for this -- perhaps a parallel lj comm, since wikis aren't a good architecture for discussion) could be posted elsewhere too, with all non-anonymous authors credited (though a prerequisite for this process would of course be a less-than-robust investment in one's own author-function -- I suppose the first page would have to be ground rules). is this just another one of my pipe dreams? I don't want to set it up unless 5 or 10 people are interested in playing with it (but this doesn't mean you have to write with me -- you could invite whoever you like to write whatever you like).

*

and LJ/fandom/miscellany:

• G is writing a brilliant psychoanalytic paper about representations of female masochism in film, and we all want to help her out, right? she's including Secretary (yay!) and some weird French movie about a girl who cuts herself. is there anything else? I seem to recall that when Secretary came out, there was much discussion of an earlier (80's?) film about a kinky couple -- I even watched it, but I can't remember the name or anything else about it. it was not a very positive portrayal: the relationship was creepy and sort of abusive. what was it?? I believe I was thinking of 9+1/2 Weeks -- thanks aqua_blurr!

• wallowing in South of Nowhere has me happier than a pig in shit. I picked _southofnowhere out fairly randomly from among several fan comms. no new ep yet, but the promos (vid and stills seen there) are PORN *drools* -- also joined southof_fic and spencerashley (Spashley! *squishes*). icon from _sonicons, and media (redundantly) from southof_eps.

• SVU is really so tiresome. Casey and Liz were soooooo slashy and I could only go "euw! euw!" -- I may have finally found the pairing that is too wrong even for me (though I think I have asked quasiradiant to write it in the past -- somehow it's not as squicky without the visual) O.o

• in solidarity with the boyslashers among you, I capped the recent GAY on Nip/Tuck. this show is so gay that it has to actually poke fun at its own gayness! and speaking of gayness, who wants to write me Lynette/Nina, huh? -- it must be done.

• 100 icons! and I adore each and every one. whatever shall I do?? it's the multifannishness that kills me -- there are now 13 TV shows (Bad Girls, Battlestar Galactica, Desperate Housewives, The L Word, SVU, X-Files, CSI, Farscape, The O.C., South of Nowhere, Weeds, Voyager, West Wing) and 5 other fandoms (Harry Potter, D.E.B.S., Wicked, Avenue Q, Mary Poppins, Olsens) represented among my icons, oy -- and of course that's not even comprehensive.

• buy this!! New York based Graphic Designer Matthew Powell and Photographer Matthew Baker are pleased to announce the release of their new collaborative project, Bedside Companions, a sexy 2006 pin-up calendar benefiting God's Love We Deliver and GMHC. Inspired by the work of 1940's pin-up artists, the calendar's theme captures the coy sensuality of yesteryear, though instead of pin-up girls, they've updated the style using fourteen drag queens…and added in a message promoting the fact that safer sex is really sexy. (via girlynyc2000)

first of all: OMG 100 ICONZ EEEEEEE!!! (I'm up to 82 -- had them all in reserve, ready to go...)

I also made a few icons

I got this nasty cold/sinus infection at my grandparents' house. managed to stay in pretty good spirits nevertheless. while sick, and in the interest of paper procrastination, I organized not only all my pictures from the Rome/Greece/Istanbul trip, but the entire backlog of photos on my computer. I rather thought this was an impossible project, so I'm quite proud of myself (in the end, the rest of pictures combined took less time than the 300 from the trip). millions of pictures!

and I finished Half Blood Prince. I think I might have skimmed some parts of it in my haste -- I don't know if I'll go back. I correctly guessed who was going to die before I started -- that was widely speculated in fandom and really not that hard to figure out. I guessed who the half blood prince is on about page 40, and I'm inordinately proud of my powers of deduction. aeonian warned me that my beloved Tonks (our fanon lesbian) would be character-assassinated through an ill-begotten romance, so having prepared myself for the worst, I was pleasantly surprised. after absorbing 2nd Song, I take a sort of triangulated bond between ( spoiler ) to be only natural, so the pairing made perfect sense and was rather adorable. didn't really follow the kerfuffle between the Harry het ships, but I LOVE Ginny more and more. but where the heck was Hermione? I imagine the Harry/Draco faction is happy. ( spoilers and a theory ) anyway, I *heart* Snape! if anybody got character-assassinated I thought it was Madam Pince, who I've had a soft spot for ever since I read a great Hermione/Pince story. and our other fanon lesbian, Madam Hooch, didn't appear at all hmmmph. the Bellatrix/Narcissa bit better make it into the movie, because I adore those two. overall, I thought characterization was brutally sacrificed to a faster-moving plot, and it was an entertaining read but not nearly as affecting as OotP.

if you posted a HBP reaction, please link me here. I can read them now!

I really could not overstate how much I'm in love with battlestar galactica. every episode just keeps getting better and better. (I haven't DLed 2x06 yet; don't spoil me please.) I adore Starbuck's ( spoilers ) guh.

meanwhile, I don't have time to read my flist during this trip. and in the last-minute beginning-of-semester crunch I doubt I'll have time to catch up. what I'm saying is: this is my first official LJ hiatus. so please link me, too, to fic you write and anything else I should know. :*

may start logging onto IM more frequently, as I figured out how to make my antisocial self invisible, so tell me your AIM, Yahoo, or MSN screen name if you want me to add you to my buddy list.

I am working on my paper. I am. slowly.