Ookings of d00m

Positive update for once. Just got back from the doctor (GP). Blood pressure is under control with current meds. As far as breathing goes, last time I biked there it took a bit over 15 minutes, and I was wheezing when I got there. Today, it took 10 minutes and I was breathing fine.

His theory on why my ankles keep swelling is sodium intake. Which sounds hinky to me, but I can use the motivation to cut out salt anyway. I go back in a month to see how the ankles are doing.

All in all, I'm feeling somewhat positive for once.

Food

Chicken sandwich with spinach salad

Music

Album: Straftanz's Forward Ever - Backward Never

Genre: Aggrotech

Similar Bands: See all the freaking Aggrotech acts I've posted about already.

Review: Simple, angry, dancey. "Straftanz", according to google, translates to "criminal dance". German lyrics, or short, repetitive English, with the requisite movie samples. This is pure, basic Aggrotech. I like it.

Playlist Potential: Workout, Driving.

Food

Bread, cheese and cold cuts.

Music

Album: Rasputina's Sister Kinderhook

Genre: In iTunes I have the band tagged as "Gothic cello rock".

Similar Bands: Uh... Nothing, quite. Sort of Emilie Autumn, Zoe Keating, Abney Park and even sort of Vernian Process.

Review: I had an epiphany while listening to this album. I have been disappointed with everything Rasputina has done since How We Quit the Forest. Really, what I wanted was the same sort of goth cello rock that lead me to genre tag them. However, since HWQtF, what Rasputina has been doing is more sort of Steampunk, ahead of the masses like me picking it up. It's an American Steampunk, a sort of Cherie Priest's Boneshaker kind of Steampunk, but there it is. This album is the least cello-driven. There's a lot of banjo.

I think it's going to take some time to adjust to the Rasputina we have from the Rasputina I fell for in the late 90s, but I think I will learn to appreciate it.

Playlist Potential: Possibly my Nano-Victorian playlist for some of it.

Food

PC basmati rice with red pepper and edamame. From a line of bagged frozen vegetarian things. This one is pretty good, though "heat" and "tomato" are the only dominant tastes. Could use a little more rounding out flavourwise. Still, I should see if this is still available for the next time I am too lazy to make dinner - this batch had been in the freezer for something like 6 months, and it was still fine.

Music

Album: Emilie Autumn's Enchant

Genre: Darkwave? Folkwave? Or is "spooky women with orchestral string instruments" now its own genre?

Similar Bands: Vaguely speaking, Birthday Massacre, early Rasputina, Zoe Keating

Review: Emilie Autumn's earliest album in iTunes. You can see the Emilie Autumn responsible for Opheliac peeking out occasionally, but the differences are clear from the cover photo. Opheliac has her with red hair dressed all in black with heavy makeup. Enchant has her with lavendar hair wearing fairy wings. Enchant has a strong Renn Faire/Enya feel mixed in with the harder gothy/darkwave stuff that later comes out on Opheliac. She even borrows several bars from Greensleeves at one point. Given how much I liked her later album, I was a little disappointed with this one, but better that than the other way 'round.

Playlist Potential: I don't think it really matches any of my current playlists.

Food

The entire week of meals at camp at Kaleidoscope Gathering. Though mycrazyhair's quinoa and chickpea salad was my favourite.

Music

Album: Memmaker's How To Remix A Robot Uprising

Genre: Electro-Industrial

Similar Bands: Valium Era, Skylight Glare, etc.

Review: I bought this because it has the remix of Energon³ with the Optimus Prime sample in that I liked. It manages to stand on its own as a good album, though, which is rare in remix albums. If you liked How To Enlist in a Robot Uprising, it's definitely worth your time and money to pick up this one, too.

Bonus

I also picked up 4 Heather Dale CDs at Kscope; The Road To Santiago, The Green Knight, The Gabriel Hounds and The Trial of Lancelot. Itunes can't decide if Heather's World music or Folk, but that tells you most of what you need to know genre-wise. I've seen Heather and Ben play a few times at Kaleidoscope, and gotten enough of the songs half-lodged in my head that I figured I should give them some money. It's Celtic-y, pagan-y, Arthurianish folky type stuff. I'm particularly fond of Mordred's Lullaby and the Green Knight. Black Fox is a great track, but the album version isn't nearly as great as it was live, with Ben growl-whispering the Devil's lines under Heather's lyrics. Which is just to say, if you get a chance, go see them live.

I find myself thinking far too seriously about difficult it would be to build either a sedan chair or a rickshaw. Because, that way we could carry around mycrazyhair at Kaleidoscope and other fun events she hasn't the spoons to go to!

Surely all I'd need is an Ikea armchair, some bolt on rings and wooden dowels...

In a comment on a friend's post, something that's been bugging me finally came together in my head.

In various recent events (Peter Watts' Squidgate, the g20 mess, etc.), there has been a bunch of commenters (live and on the net, natch) who seem to cheer louder the more it looks like the police have abused thier power. These are the folks who say things like "if a cop tells you to do something, you do it *immediately* or you deserve what happens to you", "if you haven't worn a uniform, you don't get to complain", etc.

The general idea of Authoritarian Apologism is that anyone that gets beaten up by the police, or the border guards, or anyone with a bade or a uniform, deserves what they get. That those forces are always justified in whatever they do to thier citizens.

I've been trying to figure out what it is that drives me so nuts about this position, besides the obvious. It finally clicked today - it's the same logical fallacy that drives Rape Culture victim-blaming and shunning of people who are ill. It's the idea that Bad things don't happen to Good people. So when bad things happen to someone previously presumed to be Good, the Apologist makes the inference that the person must be Bad. Because the alternative is that Bad things *do* happen to Good people. And that's terrifying - the Apologist naturally sees zirself as a Good person. If something bad can happen to some random writer, to some random jogger or random tourist, then it means that something bad can happen to *me*!

And a lot of people can't face that. So they go to great lengths to come up with reasons why people deserve to be beaten by cops, to be raped by thier "friend", to get cancer or AIDS. I mean, of course that guy deserved to be arrested and held in a pen in the rain overnight with no drinking water - did you *see* what he was wearing? He was *asking* for it! Good thing I'd never do something like that, so I'm safe.

It's all about Othering victims so that the Apologist can feel safe knowing that bad things only happen to bad people. It's about fear, and letting that fear make your world ever smaller.

For those on my flist not in Toronto, a super brief summary.

There's been protesting, rioting, violence by thugs on both sides. I avoided it, though a northerly shift meant I saw the police getting ready on my way to buy fabric.

I and all my peoples are safe.

I am hoping tomorrow will be quieter.

A list of ongoing creative sewing projects, in no particular order;

• Great sarong tie review; I have grown gradually fatter since I started wearing sarongs, so the older the sarong, the shorter the ties. The older ones are now too shrot to wear. So, I need to sew on longer ties to the older ones. also, the black sarong I got last year has no ties at all on it.


• Make two new satin cravats. I have the material, just need to rearrange the living room so that I have the space to measure and cut.


• Fix both pairs of thai fisherman's pants. The bigger pair have a gaping crotch hole that needs to get patched. Thankfully, the pants came in a bag of the same material, so I have somethign to patch with. The other pair just need to get some sitching replaced.


• Sew buttons on to pinstripe pants. This is for attaching button braces to. I also need to get at least one more set of button braces.


• Steampunk Kscope outfit. I'm thinking sarong-weight double-breasted waistcoat over wrap pants or a sarong, big boots, bandana, goggles and leather cuffs. Maybe a cravat, and maybe a standalone collar to go with it above the waistcoat. And the bat-utility belt, of course. Sketching will hopefully happen at lunch time today.


• polar fleece arm-warmers. These have been sitting in the sewing bin for probably close to two years at this point.


• Utility belt. Needs more grommets, another pair of pouches and two more belt loops. Also considering making a removable larger pouch to hang down one side to put a paperback in.


• Raven hoodie. Black hoodie with a raven cut out from an old t-shirt, plus glow in the dark skull and crossbones patches on the arms. I want to lengthen the sleeves with some sort of black and white stripe pattern. Do I want to use alternating strips of black and white sweatshirt material to match the hoodie? Will that result in the white getting greyed out when the hoodie gets washed? What about using white spray paint or screen printing ink to add white stripes to black? I suspect that I will continue to add bits and pieces as I find more neat stuff to sew on to it over time.


• I should also make a pair or two of gaiters to wear over combat boots etc. They'd also be useful when biking, as long as I made them snug enough.


• black flannel hakama; because 7 layers of flannel should keep me warm pretty much anywhere... Again, I have the material and a pattern, but no space to lay out the pattern, etc. Also, i still suck at using patterns.

via stillsostrange

1. Reply to this post and I'll assign you a letter.
2. List 5 songs that start with that letter.
3. Post them to your journal with these instructions.

stillsostrange gave me "R".

1. Rainbow Disconnection by Sad Kermit. Because even muppets get sad sometimes.


2. Rats by Rasputina (Yes, corwin77, clicking that link is a bad idea. Contains rats. In fact, no one watch the video, just minimize it and listen tot he song.)


3. Re:Your Brains by Jonathan Coulton. I think I've been in meetings with the protag from this song.


4. Red Right Hand by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. This song always makes me think of the old 90s TV show American Gothic. Which I think was only watched by me. Every time I hear this song I picture Gary Cole in a dusty black coat with stacks of green paper in his red right hand. Also, lookit the pretty pre-moustache Nick Cave!


5. Romulan Ale by S.P.O.C.K. While looking through youtube, I found an utterly devastating fanvid for Rasptutina's "A Quitter", so I needed something silly to cheer me up. Couldn't find it online, sadly. S.P.O.C.K. are highly goofy.

Food

June 10, 2010;
One of neeuqdrazil's magic vegan soups from Stitch and Bitch. Veggie stock, macaroni, chickpeas, fake chicken, spinach and dried mushrooms. Yummy, and at least this time there's some veggies in my lunch. I added some hot sauce, and had a glass of milk with it.

Music

Album: Terrorfakt's Teethgrinder

Genre: Aggrotech

Similar Bands: ... just go look in previous posts at all the aggrotech bands there.

Review: I bought this album because I wanted something heavy, and I liked what I had heard of Terrorfakt's Skullfucker in podcasts. Much like Memmaker's Energon³, apparently the album version of SKullfucker is instrumental and does not in fact feature samples of Gunnery Sgt. R. Lee Emory from Full Metal Jacket. Unlike the Memmaker album, I wasn't that impressed with the rest of the album either. My main impression was boredom. It wasn't *bad* exactly, I think it is just that I had certain expectations.

I am started to get frustrated with tracks that are awesome remixed but kind of dull in the original. More frustrating is that I generally can't find any legal way to get the better versions online - itunes certainly doesn't have them, so except for situations where the remixing band gives the track away online for free, my only options are trying to hunt down obscure compilations and find a way to get the physical disc shipped to me, or trying to grab it illegally online. Given that a big part of the 52 weeks of music and lunch project is to get more music without acquiring space-filling junk, and to actually pay artists for their work, I'm not happy.

Playlist Potential: Meh. It's good filler for generic dance stuff.

mycrazyhair and I went to Opera Atelier's surplus costume sale.


mycrazyhair found something:

18.Issola by Steven Brust

Cosmic Vlad is cosmic. Also, *sniff*. Chronologically, this is as far as I got when I initially read the Vlad books.

19.More Eric Meyer On CSS by Eric Meyer

Eric Meyer's a pretty good writer, and I am interested in CSS. However, my last big drive to learn a pile of CSS a few years ago covered most of the new techniques Meyer presents, so I mostly got some incremental improvements to my skill set. Also, it reminded me why I stopped getting excited about CSS and web design - to make pretty designs you really need to be either a good artist, a good photographer, or have access to a really nice stock photo library. Next time I'm doing web design I'll probably be glad for all the IE bug workarounds from this, though.

20.Athyra by Steven Brust

Paternal Vlad is... not so paternal actually. Hi Dee Hi Dee Ho la. Step on out.

21.Orca by Steven Brust

Financial Vlad is financial. Surprise endings! (not that surprising if you were paying attention)

22.Dragon by Steven Brust

Military Vlad is military. Some day I think I might work up something about the never-ending fantasy series and the apparent need for one installment wherein the hero enlists. Vlad does it, Tavi of Calderon does it, and I'm sure comparisons can be pulled out for Miles Vorkosigan and Harry Dresden, too. Tangentially, there's also a common theme of premise threat and having it followed through late in the series, but that's a different post that requires spoiler warnings and footnotes. Some times I just need to remind myself that I always hated writing essays in school.

23.Ink-Stained Amazons and Cinematic Warriors by Jennifer K. Stuller

My Fandom Has a Publisher! This is a great book. Stuller writes from what seems to me to be a distinctly fannish meets academia POV. The book examines female heroes in comics, movies and TV. It covers how they're portrayed in contrast with male heroes, where they succeed and fail from a feminist perspective, and how the archetype of the female hero is forming. I especially like the parts about how the female hero's journey (in constrast to the Conradian hero's journey) is shaping up in popular culture. This is, in a lot of ways, the book I had been hoping for with Mike Madrid's book on femlae superheroes in the last booklog post. Stuller's language use is interesting - she uses feminist/academic terms fairly casually, but also uses what I think of as fan language - "The Scoobies", "Uber-whatever", etc. All in all, I am quite happy that I picked this up. It's given me a lot to think about, especially for gaming and writing female heroes.

So, my next Vlad books will be ones I actually haven't read before. Next up, Dzur, followed by Jhegaala. Then I have to wait for paperbacks. I should probably head to chapters and put in my next order...