Why Do Women Make Such Good Men?

In cosplay, at least, (which is where people dress up in costumes of various characters) girls who aren't particularly voluptuous (so that rules me out) make excellent male characters. I've already sent most of you pics of the girl who dresses up as Link, and now I've found this women who dresses up as Snape. I suppose costume design is just more popular with women, but I wish there actually was a man who looked as good in these costumes as these women do. For the woman who dresses as Snape, I admit you can tell she's a woman in some of her more dramatic poses and when you see her face full on. But at certain angles, you can completely believe she's a man, which is a strange compliment because I think she makes quite a handsome man.

Anyway, here's the link to the Snape pictures: http://logospilgrim.com/
(click photos, then scroll down and click "The First Gallery", then scroll down again and click on any or of the 28 galleries to see a bunch of pictures.) The picture below is just one of many but one where I thought she particularly resembled Snape.




And here are the Link pics for anyone who doesn't remember, didn't get them, or wants to see them again: http://images.cosplay.com/showphoto.php?photo=703577
(there are more pictures on the link)

Feeling Much Better

I just thought I should let everyone know that I did not die or suffer any brain damage (that I can tell) from my recent illness. My dad also bought me a nice, shiny, new digital camera today! This is excellent since the hamster living in my last camera seems to have retired indefinitely. This also means that I have no excuse not to have some pictures of the week so here are some pictures of my dad's Christmas tree. Dad's never had anything against Christmas so it's not too surprising that he got a tree. Knowing my dad it's also not surprising that he neglected to buy ornaments for it. But it seems that my little brothers have remedied this by hanging anything on it that has a loop or will stick in the needles, including but not limited to key chains, empty tape dispensers, halloween decorations (Jack from The Nightmare Before Christmas would be pleased), and some actual handmade Christmas themed ornaments.

Cold, Flu, or Hypochondria?

Whatever I have it wasn't even possible for me to concentrate properly on a simple game of Candyland with my brothers. I'm pretty sure I'm not imagining the whole thing as my hypochondria usually doesn't make me feel like I've been run over by a truck. But I'm not sure about the severity of it. I figure it's either a bad cold or mild flu. Either way I hope it goes away soon and it isn't some brain-eating virus or I wasn't bitten by a black widow or rattle snake in my sleep (yup, that's the hypochondria kicking in.)

Santa's Bag...

Well, I'm in San Diego now on winter vacation, and for those of you who were in touch with me during exams week, you know this break could not have come too soon. Anyway, I'm certainly enjoying the rest. I took my little brothers to the mall today. They looked at toys for ten minutes and then got bored. Go figure. So I got home in plenty of time to ride my bike (yay!) and then color some of a Christmas card before I too got bored (must be a genetic trait.)

Last night I asked my little brothers what they want for Christmas. My little brother Curtis wants a Voltswagon van. Not a toy one but a real one. The kind hippies used to paint flowers on. It's kinda a shame because my dad actually had one when I was a kid. It was brown and didn't have any flowers and he sold it some time ago. Somehow Curtis found out about it and has since become strangely obsessed. I tried explaining to him that a van wouldn't fit in Santa's bag and that Santa's elves can't make one anyway, but he's quite persistent. Meanwhile, my other little brother, Dennis would like a polar bear.

I think Santa's bag may have a white bear for Dennis (polar bear-esque if he can wrangle it) but for Curtis there may be some monetary amount with a note suggesting that he start saving...

Happy Holidays to All!

Graduate School Apps and Gambling

It has occured to me that paying application fees for Grad School is a lot like gambling. In both you're giving money for an uncertain return. The only difference is, if you don't get anything back in gambling, then you're just unlucky (and possibly stupid for gambling in the first place). However, if Grad Schools do not accept you, that's actually some kind of reflection on your worth as a person. I've never gambled, but I can safely say I'd infinitely prefer the cruelty of a slot machine at this point.

The Saddest Thing in the World and the Sins of George Lucas...

For this post these two things are not one in the same. But they easily could be...

Anyway, the sad fact I learned today is that bunnies can get syphilis. Considering the sexual habits of bunnies this has got to be one of the saddest things I've ever heard. It also brings to mind certain questions like "What happens when a bunny goes crazy?" and "If one bunny can get syphilis, how come all bunnies do not now have syphilis?" I am informed that this is not the type of syphilis transferable to humans. But I would still not recommend having intercourse with a rabbit.

As for the sins of George Lucas...oh, where to start... Well, he's released the "1977" version of his films on DVD. This "original" version contains ALL of the revisions he's made from the computer generation of 1997 to the blasphemous edition of Hayden Christensen to return of the Jedi. Basically, it's the Special Editions with the word "original" written on them. George, you've done some pretty low things, but I think this has got to be the lowest. I mean, the prequels may have been bad but at least they were new. Now you're just trying to trick fans into buying the Special Edition AGAIN by telling them it's the "original." And if you cannot believe on my word alone that such an atrocity is even possible (and it's so incredibly bad that I'd understand if you didn't want to believe it), here's the Amazon review confirming the sadness of it all.


George = the Emperor in flannel

Hi Brian! And To All Other Anonymous Posters...

I just wanted you to know that I guessed it might be you in the comments on the anaconda post. But I also thought it might be your sister. As one who shares her initials with her own sibling (my sister and I are both CML as well as my father), I recommend a more specific form of identification. Although, now that I know it's you, as long as Becky doesn't start signing the same way, I suppose it doesn't matter. Anyway, I'm always be happy when people read and comment on my blog so many thanks!

And a note to anyone wishing to post with their name in the title instead of having "anonymous says," click the "other" bubble in the box below the comment's field, and you'll be able to put in your name. Or letter initial, nickname, royal title, etc...

Pictures of the Week: The Wilds of Nashville

For anyone too queasy to appreciate the picture of the anaconda from the Nashville zoo, here's some less objectionable animals. Additionally, I'd like to add that these pictures, as well as the anaconda from the last post, are all courtesy of my fabulous sister Chrissy.



Animals make such cute couples. You can bet people don't look nearly as endearing when they lick each others heads.



If this meerkat could speak, I think it'd be saying, "Just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they're not out to get you."

Don't forget, you can click on the picture to enlarge it. I've even found out recently that you can click on it again to make it even bigger!

Slow Anacondas, Ghosts, and Water Guns

If you're easily grossed out, then I do not recommend looking at my picture of the week. But, if not, read on: Here is an anaconda feeding that my sister and I witnessed at the Nashville zoo. But after seeing this creature eat, I'm shocked it survives as a predator at all. The zoo keepers feed it pre-killed bunnies so I suppose that may have taken some of the hunt out of it. The woman feeding it practically had to coax it into eating the thing. It opened its mouth which was pretty impressive, then put part of the bunny in its mouth and dragged it back under the water with it. Then it sat there. And sat there some more. It clearly had no intention of finishing its food anytime soon. I mean, I suppose there probably aren't a lot of things that would bother an anaconda, mouth full or no. But I would think it'd be pretty vulnerable just sitting around with a mouthful of rabbit.
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Well, I've probably insured a pretty small audience for the rest of my news but oh well. I'm beginning to think there's a ghost in my lounge that likes Harry Potter. Here's why. A while back I went down into the lounge and saw The Chamber of Secrets playing on the TV but no one was sitting and watching it. The lounge was completely deserted and no one came back in while I was there. Then today I went down an The Sorcerer's Stone was playing and there was no one around. I feel this is conclusive evidence of a ghost and not someone who just doesn't turn off the TV.

Furthermore I wish to report the sad news that I actually tested the range of my water gun today and, as I suspected, found it dissappointingly deficient for the purpose of shooting drunks.

Note to Self:

For Thanksgiving break I meant to bring a Christmas card I made for Tim and Mag with me so that I could color it. Unfortunately, much to my general vexation, it was lost amid the rubble of my desk. I have finally tracked it down once more upon returning and would just like to note that it is behind the framed picture of my Dad on my desk with a folder of loan information I should show to my father over Christmas break.

The Perils of Hypochondria

Tim reminded me that there are still people who read my blog (even if it is just him). Well, to be fair, there's probably at least three, maybe even four if I haven't lost someone's interest. And as long as I have an audience, no matter how small, my vanity forbids me from giving up completely. So I apologize for my long hiatus. My life to date has unfortunately been filled with grad school applications, spending time with my family, and getting sick. You would think that Thanksgiving break would have been an opportune time to post in my blog, but I felt guilty about any time not devoted to spending with my family, grad school apps, or editing my novel. Besides, since my sister is a member of my audience, and thus also a large percentage all by herself, I felt that there wasn't a lot of reason for me to post over break. Plus, I also figured that all of the rest of my audience would be spending time with their families rather than reading my blog.

Anyway, I'm afraid I'm not very happy right now because I had to call in sick for work. Although, I suppose the "had to" part is the problem. I am sick. There's little question about that. I've been sick for days. But I have a little Confucius that lives inside me that says I'm never too sick to do work (where this Confucius goes when I'm writing papers, however, is a mystery). Still, I took one look outside which is a very wet-looking grey mess and decided that going out for the long walk down to the elementary school would not improve my health. It's a bummer because I actually love my job. I love working with the kids, and I feel bad when I can't go in. I worry the kids will think I've abandoned them. It's bad enough that I do have to abandon them at the end of the year. It seems I have precious little time with them as it is. But I also was so exhasted last night that I went to bed around 9pm but still slept very poorly. All night I was unusally hot and thought that I must have a fever. However, when I woke up this morning and asked my roommate if it was hot in the room she said that it was. She also reported that my forehead did not feel hot, so I must conclude my hypochondria got the better of me as far as the fever was concerned. But I still do have a bad cold and that's undeniable. It is doubtful, however, that I have Mad Cow disease, though I did consider the possibility.

I just wish this horrible weather had been last night instead of this morning because I was constantly woken up by drunks outside my window. Close enough to hear clearly but not close enough to shoot a water gun at. It appears to have stopped raining, though, which makes me feel even guiltier for not going to work, but what's done is done.

Pulchritudinous

I bet when you learned the word pulchritudinous (the world's ugliest word for beautiful) for the SAT, you never thought you'd see it again, save for maybe something stuffy and literary. To be honest I had't seen it in anything outside my high school vocab book, and I've read some pretty esoteric stuff. Until now. Today I have found the word pulchritude (the noun version of pulchitrudinous) in MSN's current dating article: Are You Hung Up On Looks? proving that the SATs are not in fact useless but teach us how to understand internet dating advice.

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On a completely different subject I'd like to note that I was a bit hard on Tim and that I misinterpreted his remark on my pictures of the Louvre. He was actually simply saying that the Louvre would be an excellent setting for a horror story. It already is the setting of The Da Vinci Code, though I suppose that's more suspense than horror. Besides, the scariest thing about Dan Brown is his writing style (or lack thereof).

Art Wars







My apologies to all like Tim who feel that Michelangelo is "creepy." You're right. How dare I post such filth? So to make it up to Tim and anyone else who was offended, here are some works of art I hope you find more to your liking.

Pictures of the Week: Palace of the Gods





Just thought I'd remind everyone what an art nerd I am. For anyone sadly unaware of the most beautiful place on Earth, this is the Louvre and these are some pictures I took on a nighttime visit.

Sciencey Thoughts

It has occured to me that the answer to my previous writer's question would depend on how hot it gets in a burning house. Tim seems to be estimating far higher than I would (read comments in Another Writer's Question for details). But my only basis for how hot a house gets when it's on fire is the book Fahrenheit 451 where the firemen had to make sure the house reached that temperature for the books to incinerate.

So, anyone know the average temperature of a burning house?

Another Writer's Question

If your house caught fire and you have a box made of something that doesn't burn with a bunch of coins inside, would the coins melt?

Morris Dancing

I'm reading the new Terry Pratchett book Wintersmith right now and it mentions morris dancing. Now this isn't the first time Pratchett's mentioned morris dancing and in a newspaper article that Pratchett once heatedly criticized, they also said that the fantasy genre was nothing but "lords and ladies morris dancing to greensleeves" or some such nonsense. Pratchett got a lot of flack for criticizing this article because it was trying to praise JK Rowling while putting down all other fantasy authors. Personally I think Pratchett was too polite. I would like to find that reporter's house and have a stampede of morris dancers level it.

At any rate, all this inspired a great curiosity to actually SEE some morris dancing so I looked it up on YouTube. Pratchett always seems to associate this dance with some sort of dark portent, but as far as I can tell it's England's form of square dancing with a bit more do-si-do and a little less swing-your-partner. But go ahead and take a look at these videos to decide what you think of it. They say it can be done with swords, which would be AWESOME, but sadly I could not find any examples of that...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rw8Cf1rPmio
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2YplTOOtEI&NR

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EDIT: Well, I still couldn't find morris dancing with swords but I did find this video. I think it's more Asian style sword dancing and it's Star Wars themed! Anyway, these kids are AMAZING and the little girl's like a billion times cooler than Amidala.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=2DpFFIJKDBI

Stupid Scam People Wasting My Time!!!

Here I will do a community service and say that if you received a postcard that looks like the one below and was postmarked from San Diego California, ignore it! :P You might already do so but if you're a conscientious person like me, you have to verify everything, so I'll save you the trouble. I wasn't stupid enough to call the number on the card, but I did call the REAL loan center just to be absolutely certain it was a scam. Which it is. So that's 20 minutes of my life wasted because some moron decided to rob people with student loans. It's not bad enough that we're in debt, you've decided to try to take the money we don't have! To whoever sent this to me, congratulations, you are officially scum.

Luckily they didn't get my money but my time is just as precious to me. So I would now really like these people to do my presentation that's due tomorrow which is ironically about finding a HELPFUL solution to the wealth divide... On second thought, nevermind; these people would only mess it up.

Writer's Question of the Week

Writers often must ask themselves strange questions when they write such as whether or not someone would die if an elephant sat on them or the average time it would take a unleaden swallow to fly north. Here's my writer's question of the week:

Would a small glass ink pot shatter if it was thrown in someone's face or would it just leave a heck of a bruise?

The beauty of writer's questions is you don't necessarily have to be right. You just need a general consensus because the whole idea is that someone doesn't read your book and then say to themselves "That wouldn't happen!"

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Shout Out To...

Kelly who got married yesterday! Congratulations! It was a beautiful ceremony full of love, light, and ...pumpkins.

And personally I think EVERYONE should have a Hello Kitty wedding cake!

Picture of the Week and News!



This is a rather blurry picture but it looks good that way. I took it in Taiwan at a place called Tiger Head Park. It reminds me of one of those fast action camera tricks they do on TV when all the cars turn into streaming lights.

In Cherie News:

I started serious editing on my novel today. I already separated the scrap from what needs to be kept but since I dropped dozens of characters and made several changes much of it needs to be rewritten. Starting with the entire beginning. I was going to start on Saturday but I was so daunted by the fear of doing something wrong and once again messing up the story that's been my life's work that I decided to write in my children's novel instead. But today I actually started the new beginning and I'm feeling really optimistic about it. I just hope it stays that way because I'm too lazy to learn to be good at anything else. Writing's all I've got.

On a somewhat related note I've decided that I quite like surrealist French poetry. This is a nice surprise since I thought I'd hate it more than the classic poetry considering I generally dislike modern artistic movements. It's best in French, though, so I recommend you all learn French to read it.