Now Who's the One Percent?

He who doesn't lose his wits over certain things has no wits to lose.
--Gotthold Lessing

So now we're looking at the defunding of the NEA, and killing off Big Bird. Again. I began my recurring donations to PBS about two minutes post-election-results, y'all.

Sales of George Orwell's 1984 shot up TEN THOUSAND PERCENT this week, thanks to Kellyanne Conway.


Ya know. Because facts are relative .... to your position of power.


I suspect that "getting people to read more" has not been any part of the GOP's radical agenda.



What the current Powers What Be's seem to have forgotten is that they have no mandate. When ONE PERCENT* of the entire population of the United States comes out on Day One to remind them of our power, it is the people who carry the mandate, and the power.

We do still have power, you know.

Let's exercise it thoughtfully and consistently - before we are forced to exercise it with cudgels.





*"(T)he low estimate for turnout on Jan. 21 was 3.2 million, according to researchers at the University of Connecticut and University of Denver--leaving aside the demonstrations on every other continent, including, thanks to an expedition tour, Antarctica." Current US population: 3.23 million.

Collection

This piece from CNN is kind of a wonderful look at what it's like for freshmen representatives. In this age of political horrors, it's important to remember that some people really do want to serve. This look at first-timers is encouraging, and the excitement is one source of hope.

Are you a photosensitive sneezer? It’s funny; I am, but not in the way this article seems to describe this phenomenon. I can only sneeze when looking at a light if I needed to sneeze already; it doesn’t just happen spontaneously because bright light appears. (Bonus points to Scientific American for the phrase “for the trait to be expressed” AND for getting a “shed light” in there. I get the light-sneeze from my mom, and my mom does love a good (bad) pun, so this is a suitable turn of phrase. Heh.) I do prefer my phrase “photosensitive sneezer” to “photic sneeze reflex” – but their other article on the subject includes ACHOO as an acronym, which has a “Happy April Fool’s Day from Scientific American!” feel to it, so I can at least appreciate the whimsy. The pointer toward light-induced seizures and migraine is especially curious.

We need to help people, and computers, to avoid being distracted by unimportant, attention-grabbing, information.

SA also has a great piece on the road to pseudoscientific thinking. Is it paved with good intentions? Could be … Could also devolve into magical thinking, which is just as unhelpful to us, intellectually. The best part, though, is; it is UN-learnable.

The results are IN on the Pen and Goss (or Rex and Simone) flash fiction contest at Janet Reid's blog. I note with some fascination that she points out that a lot of entries were "constrained by reality" ... a hint to the Reidership?

This is not-Rex indulging not-reality.

Speaking of Janet's blog, I haven't linked it in ages except to show off my wee and timorous beasties. The decision to seriously contemplate self-pub, I think, may have colored my collection-linking tendencies, which disappoints even me. I haven't even *read* BookEnds' blog in too long. So how about a great link today, on textbook bad agenting? However I end up publishing, in the end, it's always wise to learn, and Mizz Reid is a good teacher. She's also a great cheerleader, reminding authors that we are NOT beggars at the banquet of publishing.

You should never be made to feel that you are somehow a lesser part of the publishing process.
--Guess Who?

Okay, and *sigh* - I'll "go there", as the kids probably haven't said for years, and get to the question of Nazi-punching. My feeling is this: no matter which side of the political or ethical/activist spectrum you fall on, this is YET ANOTHER DISTRACTION. Distraction has become the modus operandi at the highets levels of government and across all media (journalism and well beyond), and this is in its way just as frightening as any ideology.

I'll close out THAT thought, and this Collection, with two quotes ...

"To delight in a kind of comeuppance when someone is hoisted by his own petard—when someone who advocates violence against others meets a kind of of nonlethal violence—to enjoy hearing about that, that's not a crime. That's not an ethical transgression. That's asking more of human beings than they can resist."

"(W)hy are you writing about this relatively trivial question rather than something important?"

Exactly.

Pride and Prejudice and Privilege

Of all the literary scandals I've read in my day, holy heck is this a fascinating ethical exploration.

This cropped up in Janet's blog today, and for once the result was a comments section I did *not* find comfortable to read, so I am not linking it. It is only where I learned of this anyway, so go to the link above if you are curious about the deeper details. Skip over a LENGTHY intro all about rules, and most of a long series of paragraphs beginning with "I" and get to the one that begins with "I chose a strange and funny and rueful poem" and read from there.

The crux of the issue is a white male poet who submitted under an Asian (or Asian-sounding; I am not the one to verify other cultures' nomenclature) name, and whose poem was chosen for the Best American Poetry 2015 ... admittedly and partially because of this.

The examination of the man who made this choice, and both his culpability and the reasons for it, is devastatingly and honorably honest in the rarest way.

(T)here was no doubt that I would pull that fucking poem because of that deceitful pseudonym. But I realized that I would primarily be jettisoning the poem because of my own sense of embarrassment. I would have pulled it because I didn't want to hear people say, "Oh, look at the big Indian writer conned by the white guy." I would have dumped the poem because of my vanity. ...  I had to keep that pseudonymous poem in the anthology because it would have been dishonest to do otherwise.

That last sentence had to be an incredibly difficult conclusion to reach, and the conclusion of the post itself, Sherman Alexie's examination of his own identity, is a great example of integrity, whatever else the controversy may have borne for him.


It hasn't occurred to me to blog about this, but somehow it seems relevant in a sidelong way now.

At a very different point on an identity spectrum that spans not a line, but an entire plane and perhaps three dimensions, lies one Caitlyn Jenner. I've found myself watching a good deal of "I Am Cait", the reality show she launched along with the revolution in her own identity. It's the sort of thing I wanted to resist; frankly, it was unformed but in my mind to ignore the whole show attendant upon her transition, thereby proving my lack of prejudice (and maintaining a mile-wide perimeter against anything even Kardashian-adjacent). But, thanks to its ubiquity across many channels and many weeks, I caught the Diane Sawyer interview, and ended up reluctantly intrigued.

The theme of the reality show that has struck me far more than the splashy headline of "ooh, trans person" has by far and away been its examination of privilege.

Note that I do not say HER examination of privilege; because she went into the show with expectations that she would be exploring the process of gender transition, dealing with her family and her identity and the pain and the liberty she now has in her own skin, which has finally come to resemble the sense of self she's always harbored and hidden and lived with all her life.

But the fact is, Caitlyn's role - which she seems eager to adopt and live up to - has become that of an avatar for an entire "community" of transgender people ... and yet, "community" is a foolish term, because inherently the deepest problems with transgender individuals is that of isolation and even self-denial ... and yet, Caitlyn's experience is like NOTHING any other has ever experienced, or probably ever will.

For one, Caitlyn is transitioning at a time in her life which is not, perhaps (I am no judge here) typical of the experience.

She is also essentially chairing a public discourse and her own personal experience from a position of wealth and power pretty much nobody else in her position has ever possessed.

And the show is illustrating, in pretty clear detail, just how powerful Caitlyn's privilege is. The new trans friends with whom she is surrounding herself are keeping her pretty honest at every turn ("Why do you keep saying THEY when you talk about trans people? You are a trans person!" ... "You keep saying how normal we are. This is because you are aware of the freak factor." ... "YES, many trans women turn to sex work; not a lot of us have the privilege you do, and being trans can make it harder to keep a job, or lose you one if you have it." and so on). They are begging her to look at the power she wields, having been Bruce Jenner for as long as she felt she must or could hide - and to use it.

In a year when I've spent so much time examining my own privilege, to watch someone with this much of it trying to do the same, and doing so earnestly, if sometimes imperfectly, has been an unexpected lens through which to examine someone's transition into a physical body that aligns with their sense of self better than the one issued at birth.

Caitlyn has made a hell of an avatar. Statuesque and showing pride as well as vulnerability, gorgeously attired and constantly attended, the chrysalis has opened and someone unexpected and in some ways both spectacular and delicate seems to be emerging.

I don't essentially admire Jenner as a woman, any more than I did before we knew she was, particularly; but I respect her stepping up, acknowledging her power in a position which for most is the opposite of powerful, and trying to do good. Even for her, it cannot be easy; just as admitting his bias has hardly been easy for Alexie, in a situation he could have avoided if he chose to.

Caitlyn Jenner could have avoided this ... and yet, could not. Not while living with the fullest integrity.

Sherman Alexie could have avoided the controversy, too ... and yet, could not. He clearly placed honesty higher than comfort, and that is never simple, never easy.

Thirteen Minutes or So

As journalistic statements go, it is culturally and certainly factually questionable to state that "It's estimated that Italy is home to two-thirds of the world's cultural treasures." (By whom is this Euro-centric estimation being made, by what criteria, and using what sources?)

Full disclosure: I have not watched 60 minutes to speak of at all since they aired a suicide in 1998; at an estimate, perhaps I've stopped on the program three or four times in these seventeen years. Whatever my moral feelings upon euthanasia, my moral feelings about the sickest imaginable ratings grab are clear: I am against it.

However, I did watch "Saving History" this Sunday, and thought I would share. Combining, as it does, some of the thematic obsessions of this blog - fashion, archaeology, preservation ... and, frankly, the fascinating ethical and political questions attendant upon the initiatives under discussion - I was curious.

It's worth a watch if only to gain some perspective, if you feel you don't have any, on just what we're up against across the world, culturally, in an economy still aching from strain in too many areas. It's also worth just seeing the beauty of those areas of the Colosseum in Rome which have been cleaned with incredible care and dedication by those who have been given the chance. And to see the real extent of the filth threatening it in the first place.

Collection

Mark Chappelle, one of my first friends on Twitter, has some thoughts on being a packrat ... and being an emotional packrat ...

History Extra looks at the crucial components of the phrase and the concept of being "better equipped than ever before" to study the royal dead in England, but the questions the whole idea raises reach well beyond the U. K.

Heard about that skull found still inside its ancient Geek helm at Marathon? Gary Corby takes a good look at the facts.

Finally, a quote for the day:

I pity the man who wants a coat so cheap that the man or woman who produces the cloth will starve in the process.
--Benjamin Harrison

"Hollywood is exploiting an ever-popular cultural phenomenon to sell you something."

The Gatsby movie is here - and, whether it is itself trading on the astounding popularity and vintage fashion porn of Downton Abbey or just upping the game for its own purposes, the much-touted fashion tie-ins have gone beyond providing style-keteers such as myself with clothing and shoe design options much improved over the recent box-pleats-over-the-hip-area and seven-inch-plats inexplicable trends, they've started (yet another) conversation.

Here is an in-depth, and extremely good, look at what flapper fashion was, what it wasn't, and some of the many points missed by modern entertainment literally dressed up to sell.  Fascinating indeed is the point that much of what we're having pitched at us is - once again - filtered through The Male Gaze ... a dangerous way to look at flapper era perspective indeed.

Don't be afraid of cherrypicking through some of this link-rich article's branches.  I enjoyed a few, including a critical look at how the latest mania for vintage has sparked a new abundance in cruelty-inclusive clothing.  Very interesting perspective.  It veers for some time into tips on how to wear vintage fur fashionably, but also includes a lot of information on the more ethical points of vintage fur, as well as other options to recycle.

Unstifled

Today I had a conversation which damn near shattered me, precisely because it has meant so much to me recently that I did not have this coversation sooner.

I don't feel freed.  I don't feel empowered.  I have, it may be said, an almost physically painful shortness of breath, and the most intense headache I've had in some months.



But I do feel *hope* - that what I chose to do to myself ... simply won't be a choice for for anyone again.


***


While I chose to leave at a mildly scoffing dismissiveness from the manager I spoke with "informally" at the time this happened, I know frankly and simply what happened was sexual harassment.  For me, this does not translate into lawsuits or punitive action against my company - I stayed on the alert for any escalation, and when my extreme and instant brusque, cold, keep-it-professional attitude apparently headed off any further "hopes" this person had in my direction, I nursed a quiet grudge, contenting myself with feeling I didn't have to do anything.

It was probably within the last eight or ten months I witnessed a woman having to speak with the same man, who was clearly discomfited having to deal with him.  I knew her well enough to ask her if he had disturbed her, when we were alone, and she did not specify what he had done, but it was clear that she was profoundly creeped-out by him.

And so, I know:  it's not just me.


So.

When I was cc'd on a note from a higher-up responding positively to this person's interest in a permanent position with my employer:  I felt I had to say something.

This was a difficult decision to make, but not a lengthy one, and, rather dizzyingly, the opportunity to have the conversation came up extremely quickly.  From email to decision to dread to conversation:  something under two and a half hours.

Today was simply bloody difficult.  I had to have a conversation I stipulated at its outset I never wanted to have.  I had to present the situation, the context of why I was bringing it up, AND the context of why I had never brought this up before, professionally and coolly, honestly and somewhat dispassionately.

And I did.  And it is done.  I gave permission to the higher-up to use my name; and have already spoken with someone in HR, setting a time on Wednesday to have a conversation about this.

The worst of it is over - the event itself, long ago.  The conversation, today.  I am no longer stifled.

And I pray:  no other woman will have to make this choice.


***


And so for me, tonight ...  If not peace and power - then Big Bang Theory, set to "play all" (or perhaps a new purchase on Amazon, of a new season I can stream in my digital library) - and, if not the satisfaction of feeling whole ... then at least the contentment that I've done the right thing.

I am so blinking exhausted.

Sigh

To know what is right and not to do it is the worst cowardice.
---Confucius

Right now, there is so much I can't even begin to post about. But this quote resonates with more than one layer of them right now.

It doesn't help, except that it is true.

*Sigh*

Give One, Get One

The big query just got its rejection notice.

It somehow actually seems fair.

I just completed service as part of a jury which meted out a terrible rejection of sorts today. It doesn't feel good, but unfortunately ... it was the "right" thing to do.

If only right and good could always neatly coexist.

Who DID This to You, Siddy?

I've told the tale (among longwinded other things) of Sid's having spent well over thirty hours alone, through Hurricane Gaston, and never eliminating in the house. I have seethed in ungrateful horror at what manner of "training" must have taken place, to yield such a pitiful, painful result.

And by G-d, I love my good, good dog.



This morning, she headed downstairs ahead of me. This isn't typical, but it's nothing I worry about much. When I came down, though, I saw her water bowl was emp-oh-tee. She must've been thirsty - and I realized, even just a tiny bit of ham fat is more, to a dog. And I realized - oh, man. SALT. Aiee.

I filled her bowl again, and added even more when she drank about 2/3 of what I'd poured without even glancing at breakfast. She drank a little more.

Full on water, she never did look twice at her kibble.

And I am no fool. I had an idea what this would mean.



To her credit, wee girl *did* wee a *lot* along our walk. But I fully expected what I did find, when I came home. Well, the artifact.

I didn't expect the terrified dog.

Siddy peed on the tiny, cheap rug in my front hall, which was frankly nothing more than I expected, and hardly less than what I had earned with the sequence of salt and water. I wasn't upset with her.

Oh my heart, but she was in trembling fear.


***


Eight YEARS I have had her now. Eight years over a month ago.

But whatever the discipline she was given, so severe it held her to the point of obvious distress, and I am certain, actual pain, through that hurricane, had her SHAKING in fear. At me.

I told her it was okay, I put her harness on, I took her outside. I took the rug out, too, and rinsed it. When she saw me carrying it, she clearly understood her "crime" was clear to me too. I took it over to the hose, rinsed it off a little. I brought it back, and slung it over the rail on the back stoop.

And I sat with my poor girl, caressing her velvet ears, as she shook and shook and clearly vascillated in fear. I told her it was okay. I told her it was okay over and over and over again, and I scritched her and patted her and put my hand on her back with the same gentleness I hope she knows eight-years-well-and-deep from me by now. I bonked her head with my own. I hung out, unconcerned, watched the sky, watched her. Told her again and again it was okay.







I'll say it again.

What assholes.



And what a great dog - BEST dog - my old Siddy-La is.

I am so lucky to have her.

I sure hope she is lucky in me.

Relative to my predecessors, clearly at least she's SAFER.

But I won't relax until she's really fortunate.

Po' lil t'ing.

Hmph.

Okay, I've described the questionable incident of my day to two people. X's response is that this isn't an ambiguous situation. The woman (one of my oldest friends) basically wants to know if there's a dead bunny in a drawer coming next.

Grumph.

The Line

So I'm thinking that a line got crossed at work today.

I'm a woman of prodigious noise, but (like most of my kind, frankly) at my core, that stems from timidity more than confidence. When it comes to really fundamental points, unfortunately, I'm the sort who'll go out of my way NOT to be heard, sometimes.

But ... when someone steps out of ambiguity, past perhaps-creepy, and into the outright baffling in their offerings of attention, you have to begin to think: when am I going to have to say something about this?

Because I have a feeling there's going to be a when - and I am not so frail I'm likely to sit mute very long.


I'm not so dainty I can't survive inappropriateness without my calm perfectly intact. The point is that: I don't *have* to survive it, and my tolerating it does no favors to those more dainty than I.

Just because I am made of stern stuff doesn't mean I can't be offended. It doesn't require raving lunacy for someone to be out of line.

Then again ... sometimes, even small moments are ravingly lunatic, at that.

*Sigh*

People.

People - Really?

Look. I know I'm a luddite and all that ha-ha-oh-isn't-she-such-a-silly-old-writer stuff, but ... I have also experienced unemployment. I can TELL every one of you reading, if you have a job, there is probably a minimum waiting list of 200 people who would be THRILLED to take it from you, if you are not interested in doing it.

Yet, apparently, it's incumbent upon employers to deal with what their workers prefer to do ON company equipment, ON company TIME. This absolutely floors me.

I am a born and true underachiever. I really am. If I had my druthers, I would nap every single day, and not have to work for a living. If I had my d*mned druthers, frankly I would be a waste of skin. In many ways, it's lucky I was born at such a time as to get vomited onto my first serious job market in a major recession - because I had to learn how to be a decent employee.

It's like this, you halfwits: People WANT TO WORK. If you are lucky enough to be DOING that, consider seriously the option of doing so ethically - of, you know. DOING SO.

It amazes me how incessantly, now, I am hearing stories about people who seem perfectly happy to abuse their *living*. And did I mention? I am lazy, people. I do not like that I have to work for a living. That is why they *pay* people to come in and do it. But, dang. The older I get, the more I feel like some sort of meritorious service award winner, because I just can't get over how happy people are to act like jobs aren't particularly worthwhile endeavors.

Promise you: those 200 people, working on their resumes outside the door? They think it's worthwhile. You insult THEM, perhaps more than you insult your very own employers, by wasting work hours.


***


The thing that really bugs out my eyes about the level of "entitlement" to play on social networks comes around page 6, where the CORPORATE side of the equation is discussed. The bit about how easy users make it for the marketing professionals happily gobbling up their data to get their personal information.

The other big advantage, says Rosetta Stone senior vice president Jay Topper, is how much data companies can glean from sites like Facebook -- for absolutely free.

"Companies spend so much money trying to get information from their customers, while places like Facebook are essentially a free 24/7 focus group where every day thousands of people are providing you with a constant flow of information," he says. "It's mind-boggling how much you could mine from this."

In what universe is this a desirable state, no MATTER the supposed return on the venture ... ? And what actually is the return? Seriously.

I have belonged to FB. Even apart from the incredibly creepy and horrifying reality of this aspect, I quit it because ... seriously, there is no discernible content. I don't GET it, and that's not because I'm a frowzy weirdo fuddy duddy. It's because the people I want to have relationships with, I want to have RELATIONSHIPS with. It's just not possible to do that on an electronic wall. All I ever got out of FB was advertising, exhortations to join groups I was not interested in, to sign things, to give to things, to do things, which - as an old weirdo - resemble friendship about as much as an advertisement resembles entertainment.

Never mind the fact that some of the people I've lost touch with in this life, it took me literally years to do that with. Why would I wish to invite them all back to be "friends" (who can then ping me with pointless links, animated livestock I don't understand the point of, or expect me to bask in their importance)? Why should I expect that of the people around ME, for that matter?


***


But I have gotten off my point.

That happens, when I am as thoroughly creeped out by human behavior as I am by both sides of the satanic bargain people seem to love to make with their personal lives. Yeep.

My point was that doing all this stuff at WORK - apart from the sheer, exuberant selfishness and stupidity of it - is dangerous indulgence. And not strictly becuase of the way it compromises one personally. Because it compromises your bread and butter. The security of computer equipment YOU DON'T OWN. The security of the entity which PAYS YOUR BILLS by employing you. The security of information - personal and professional. You name it, it's poor thinking to go assuming hitting a mirror site is harmless just this once. It's poor thinking, frankly, to put this sort of playing above your d*mned job.



When you accept a job, you accept a certain contract. Are we all so inured to maintaining an attention span, that we can't concentrate even on our own livelihoods for eight lousy hours in a day? Seriously? Is it THAT bad, is it THAT HARD - to discipline ourselves into such simple behavior? Is the next comment on your own last comment actually even that interesting ...

Good grief, if nothing else, leaving that stuff alone for a sec gives it time for all the other slackers to manage to accumulate something for you to actually read, if you aren't constantly checking for new updates.

I was only unemployed for three months, and I THANK MY LUCKY STARS I don't have all day, every day to waste on emptying my piffling brains online. I am so bleeding happy not to have time for that stuff. Even on my lunch hour, the reward for me is this funny hardbound thing made out of paper, called a *book*. I pull it out, I read it.

It doesn't put my company at risk.

Nor my job.

I signed up for this employment, assuming what it means is, I'm not going to be the transparent ween calling in sick every third Monday, or suddenly having family drama and car troubles conveniently timed to allow me to sleep in (or go out late the night before - *ahem*). I'm not going to take home all the paper I want to print my book (I don't have a printer in any case - that works - but one has a point to make, har-de-har). I'm not going to spend my time at the office texting, or talking on the phone, or shopping on eBay, or social networking. Good grief. I wouldn't have time, even if I wanted to do these things. Because MOST of us who still have the good fortune to be working are so stinkin' slammed, because there's still as much to do as when millions of our bretheren and sisteren were ALSO working, who aren't now.

I don't know - maybe that's the point. Maybe people who feel overworked, when so many are not employed at all, come to feel a sneaking entitlement - it's okay, just this once. They get so much out of me, they can give me my Facebook too. I've finished my spreadsheet, now I'm going to look at my wall. Or maybe the habit, the addiction, really IS as pathetically entrenched and automatic as I'm sitting here assuming, and people are just idiots.

Experience lends, a bit, to that last possibility. Yeah, it's probably a mix.

But people really are kind of idiots. Just look at the emails they're still forwarding, even after all these years.

Motivation, Intent, and Tone

Here we have a very interesting post indeed, considering my own recent thoughts about horror and violence. Something of a gamer's eye view of the same things I was on about, with a more big-picture perspective, which is good to see too.

It's not so much the violence. The violence is a symptom. It's the blatant fear of ideas in the face of financial risk.
--a perfectly-stated point from the post's comments section

My old barbarian - a warrior king, after all; and a historical one, yet - fits in the category of a mindless sociopath, but his perspective on the requirement of violence is unfamiliar to my mind, my context, my ability to personally justify. It was easy enough to see the reasons the *character* would and could do as he did; yet to spool it out, to produce the words describing it (in first-person, no less), to get all the scenes of murder and battle out, was a trial for me nonetheless. I put off writing certain of my battle scenes literally for YEARS, out of dread of having to do them.

I hate battle scenes, as we know; as I chide myself for committing to in the way I have and did. The ones I've created were more than a necessary evil; they were a story actually important to tell.

This really makes me wonder, then, how they read. I invested myself in the character - and in the first-person - with honesty. I have re-read these scenes perhaps more than others, because I'm aware I need the most editing and scrutiny in these things I have such a hard time writing in the first place. I put a lot of work into ... I don't know what the word is to use here. Verissimilitude seems best, though it dissatisfies me. Satisfaction, in its way, is better actually. The violence is "satisfactory" in the sense that it doesn't read as if a forty-two year old wimp of a hausfrau in modern Virginia was filtering through all the shock, yuck, and goo to produce them.

I produced them, let it be said, in a fairly workmanlike way - and, once I'd had useful feedback on a false start early on in the going, with pretty decent first-go results on the products themselves. I tucked my head down, took deep breaths, plunged in, and got the job(s) done.

Reading my own violence, as I've said, I have little visceral response, though emotionally I do follow pretty well, and I think the "read" works authentically in terms of what it is meant to evoke in a reader. But even with the control one has over reading, as opposed to other art forms - the way we can slow down (or perhaps rush) through certain passages, and manage our experience of them - they pack the punch they need to.

Video games can't be as easily modulated as books, slowing down or speeding up the pace of our reading; lingering or skimming, even physically holding the body - or the book - in some particular way. Sure, there are pause buttons, but play determines its speed, and immersive experience is the best way to do best, so "backing off" mentally is less of an option for the gamer ... or, at least, so I believe from my experience of gamers. My experience of actual play is nonexistent. But I know how much willing suspension of disbeief it takes just to watch a movie. And I know that it takes even more than WSD to participate in a game. A lot more.

So I segue from thinking of the effect my own violence has, on those whose responses to it I can guess, on those I can identify in one way or another, to the universal and popular question of "what media does to us" - and of course the answers always seem to make me queasy.

I justify my own contributions. I justify my own consumption. But I still find the whole a less enjoyable part of the culture than real storytelling, real human interaction, real *entertainment* (by, admittedly, my own definition of the term), real enjoyment of life. I question whether what I've done is art, or merely creativity designed to sell to a sick(-ish ... ?) society.

I tuck my head. And write the next scene of sudden gore.


As Vonnegut says. So it goes.

*Sigh*

Working "It"

I've allowed this blog enough of a connection to my real life identity that the original mindset, of writing it in such a way that it could be read by even my nieces without any issue, has evolved a little bit over time. Since I'm looking for a job, I conduct my online life in such a way that any web search for my name won't turn up anything inappropriate: I expect occasional employers to find this, and conduct myself (mostly) accordingly.

It's not a constraint, considering the potential audience here. The page was conceived in the first place as a first foray into public life, as an author using my own name rather than a pen name. (This is as opposed to "foray into fame", which I don't particularly expect to gain much of - but which I'll have more of, once my work is published, than I do now certainly.)

So the content here, if not self-consciously authorial or specifically directed, is at least considered in the sense of overall tone. I'm not afraid for people holding my resume to know I'm a huge nerd, or even to have former coworkers laughing at my passions about mascara. It isn't relevant stuff, nor illuminating in itself, but at least I don't have reason to apologize for any of it. The more philosophical stuff shouldn't prohibit my professional viability - and, if anyone thinks it does, just as well for me not to go work for them. Even the posts about faith and relationships: if I'm okay with the concept of my mom finding my words here, I'm not going to go all pearl-clutchy about anyone else reading it.

I figured going in this would be a backwater, and as far as I'm aware, I still have fewer than a dozen readers. That's fine and dandy, and even if I don't turn the place into a coffee klatch per se, at least I can keep it safe and still maintain a somewhat intimate voice online.

Beyond my small core audience, I know over time things will change. I mean to be welcoming, even maintaining my non-blockbuster expectations, whatever happens in terms of publishing/name value. It's early days yet. Hopefully no days will become regrettable or difficult here. As much as family-transparency, that is the raison d'etre, and I expect it to remain so.

So, yes. I'm aware that when I'm linked on a fellow geek's site I may get some particular sorts of readers. I'm aware that when I throw my name around online, scrabbling for a job, HR people might find me. It affects my posting; that's obvious to the world. But I don't think, so far, that's a detriment to the content. In some ways, it stimulates me to write here in the first place.

And in other ways - important ones - it keeps me honest and aware. Not bad, those two things. For a hopeful job candidate, AND for a writer.

"Food"

Running errands after lunch today, I saw a guy sitting in the shade of one of the trees outside the big retail box I was headed for to pick up some things. "Food" was all his sign said. I was still full from lunch, and had half my (big!) club sandwich, and some of my fries, left. Untouched.

I hope it wasn't a tacky regifting, to share it with him instead of taking it home. But he did disappear after I gave him the box. I'd seen someone give him some money, but once he had actual food he took it off, alone. I hope he liked it as much as I did; the fries were good ones.

I haven't been giving much since I lost my job - not even blood. I haven't given blood in a good while, actually, because my platelet count is high enough the Blood Service actually flagged me. I have a note from my doc saying it's normal for me. I should take that note to the center and re-up my eligibility. I should take my dog to the vet. I should take *myself* to the doc, at that, to have a few things looked into. There's no excuse not to. But I keep finding other ways to use my time. Job hunting, agent-shilling. Even actual reading and writing.

Blogging.

Erm.

Anyway, so I had a good lunch and shared it with someone who seemed to be glad to have it.

I got outside, and soaked up some photons.

I have some queries organized and in qeue to get sent today.

Surely, I can do these important things tomorrow ...
*Sigh*

Aaaack

I am bored out of my mind, and don't want to be bothering my friends with JOBS and distracting them. (Actually, I do *want* to - I just know I really shouldn't.)

*Pleh*

MM

Oh, Miss Manners ... what if it's not your coworkers, though ... ?

Last Post

I didn't attach the tag "outrage" to the previous post. It may be odd to some observers, but there are a lot of things which prevent this seeming "out" of the ordinary (sadly), nor engendering any particular rage on my part.

For one, I've been looking for other work for some months now. Not because I imagined at all that this might happen. I just wasn't happy, I certainly wasn't being used particularly well, I can't say the position was the slightest bit stimulating, and I'm completely aware that what I have to offer, the management had no use for. The firing, for my part (I refuse to speak for the many others who hit the surprise chopping-block today), was no-harm/no-foul, in a way.

It also allowed me to demonstrate to the very nice people with whom I recently enjoyed a very good interview I sincerely hope to soon call a "successful" interview how beautifully I manage change and stressful surprises. My first act upon being let go was to scan and email myself the "this is not her fault" form letter the employer provided me. My first act upon returning home was to email it to the guy in HR at the prospective employer. He called within six minutes, surprisingly enough, and thus I was able to demonstrate my extreme grace and humor under pressure.

I can hardly think that (a) the call was a bad sign, nor that (b) my opportunity to behave so magnificently was poorly timed, itself.



This also frees me to discuss, here, the fuller extent of my current context, without so many filters.

I'd been dissatisfied for some time at the current job, and it was three days before Christmas I (as TEO puts it) "gave myself permission" to find another one. I haven't poured on the coal at this project, but it's been a small, steady stream of considerations. A conversation with a recruiter. A few resumes. I've used my own resources (the receipt of a laptop for Christmas was immensely interesting timing, I must say) and time - having flex scheduling has meant I didn't need to steal even that.

For a period of time, I felt terrible guilt over it, actually. It felt emotionally rather like cheating, and it was a bit of a dirty sensation. I pushed past that, and actually improved my outlook on the job itself, even as I continued looking for another, and found this put me in the position of strength. I wasn't feeling desperate to leave, which meant I'd have to be impressed out of this position.

Monday, I was impressed.

Here's hoping ... they were too.

Aherem.

Ramble On

My dog and I share a birthday, and it's coming up soon. She's going to be twelve, and I'll be forty-two. For you Douglas Adams fans, do be aware I've already celebrated for some time - as *this* year, I'm in my forty-second year as it is.

Anyway, the dog. I found her a bit over seven years ago, after losing the best kitty ever, my special, the Puppycat, an inimitable little guy named Smikey. Smike was entitled by his daddy, my Beloved Ex, who chose both this little weed and a kit I named Byshe back in the mists of time before we ever even married. Smike was a funny and friendly little guy, had a huge bullseye splotch on each side (we considered naming him Hal - and people DID want to poke his bullseyes, poor old devil), and became ill during the year or so after Byshe (pronounced BY-she, he was named for Shelley by way of a kit I went to HS with, whose parents had given him the slightly doctored version/pronunciation; I always thought it was a great cat name) left us behind. Smike turned out to be diabetic, and in his final couple of years, he was angel enough not only to put up with a NEEDLE IN THE NECK twice daily (he seemed to understand its connection to his improving and blooming health), as well as the cruelty that is blood-drawing and testing for a kitty. Trying not to feel a total heel while intentionally cutting your best boy's little nails to the quick for a drop of blood is hard to do ...

Anyway. Poor old Smee died horribly, in the end. It was brutal, and painful, and worse than that dear little kid ever deserved, and I was guilty and desperately horrified for him, and bless him he was a total sport and a fighter and a little love, and to this day I miss that kid, and good lord I'm getting misty just thinking about him.


This post was totally going to be about my dog.

Ahem. A moment, then.


Anyway. So Sid is my housemate now. She was four when my elder niece helped me one beautiful Saturday in September, on the mission to find a dog. She was such an odd-looking, wonderful weirdo she had us before we'd even crossed the parking lot.

That I can still recall the first MOMENT I saw my DOG probably says entirely too much, but it was a month after I got her before I experienced that same cliche' with a man for the first time, and dang if that didn't turn out to be an even more ridiculously cinematic intro.

Anyway, Sid. Sidney. I suppose her previous owners spelled it Sydney, or something equally overwrought/pretentious. The name itself I've never had much problem with, but of course she rarely gets called that (at least not without embellishments galore). I'd already nicknamed her Siddy even before "deciding" she was the one (yes, Zuba, I remember well your being the one to say that if I'd NICKNAMED her she was obviously the one I wanted). I couldn't resist taking her even when they called to say she'd been hurt by another dog at her foster home, and was wearing a halo and still had stitches. "GIMME GIMME" I believe was my unsubtle response to "do you want her, or would you like to wait until she's had the stitches out?"

Without wasting more verbiage on the hows and whys (it's sad the degree of detail I *could* provide on these points), Lolly is generally referred to as La, Lol, Lolly, and sometimes Lolly-ya. And lord is this dog a good beastie.

What karma I could possibly have contributed to the world to gain the blessings I have had of it is beyond all possible interpretation, but this dog is every bit the Best Beastie the Smikester was, and then some. She's so good I won't even bother listing all the reasons, just know she's the Gooderest Dog, and I'm so grateful to have been found by her I can't even begin to stand it.

And someone LET THIS DOG GO.


Sid was four years old when I adopted her. She was LET GO.

I met someone, not so long after I got Sid, who recognized her while we were on a walk. She's so distinctive looking, it's no surprise she'd be easy to place, if you saw her somewhere. I learned from this woman that the previous owners, whose story to the Animal Adoption and Rescue Foundation (AARF) had been pretty weak, were basically snobs for whom this dog no longer, apparently, suited their exalted sense of self.

To break my "this blog will be readable by my nieces" writing rule: What colossal assholes.

And idiots, to boot, really.

Sid isn't a barker, except in the context of her boisterous, barrel-chested idea of a friendly hello (hee), or her even MORE boisterous, and very much encouraged by me, attempts to guard and protect our home. She isn't too much of a jumper, she is very very good being at home alone much of the day, and she isn't a horrible spaz. She's amazing, just amazingly good with CHILDREN - which of course was Criterion Number One, for me, when taking my then four-year-old compatriot out for a dog-shopping expedition. She's always been a wonderful old lying-quietly-at-your feet dog.

She's had some training, that much has always been obvious.

She's BEAUTIFUL. "Aristocratic", one lady said of her, one time at the Pet Smart (just as she responded by squatting for a pee in the middle of the aisle - heh - "apisstocratic" maybe). She is in formidable health, too, at twelve; her leg muscles still clearly delineated under her short fur; her eyes clear, her teeth fine, and her energy never flagging.

This dog is, in short, perfectly ideal in every possible way. (That these former owners of her apparently "disciplined" her to the extent that the poor girl once went THIRTY-FOUR hours without messing in the house, when I was stranded during a hurricane, tells me too much about what may have been done to her before she came to me.) Making her tail wag is about the best thing I can ask to happen, or to see, any day in the world. Her big sad almond-shaped eyes are as honest and beautiful as any *person's* I have ever known, of course.

She's a good kid. She is sustained, in her complete ignorance of her own old age, by the advent, a year or more ago, of our next-dog-neighbor, a boy of four with whom she plays without the slightest indication she's anything but what he is - a vital and exuberant young dog with tons of energy and friendliness to spare. She's purty-ful and hilarious. She's got a head made of tungsten, shaped like a Volvo. She's mad fun, and relaxing too.


And some MORONS gave. this. dog. UP.

Good for me, is what I say. Quite hopefully, good for HER.

But good lord. Who DOES that??

Who looks at a beautiful, weird American Bull/Huskie mix and says, "Nope, Not Good Enough." Who can possibly presume to be too GOOD for a DOG?? Any dog? Whose standards are set to such unbelievable stupidity?

I just will never understand. I'm grateful as hell, and aspire to be good enough Siddy has reason to be happy. She sure doesn't complain much (though she can sing operas about how cruel her life is when we go to the drugstore and I have to tether her outside for a few).