Today’s otter, Kit the sea otter pup, comes from MNN, the Mother Nature Network.
Please feel free to use this thread to natter about anything your heart desires. Is there anything great happening in your life? Anything you want to get off your chest? Reading a great book? Anything in the news that you’d like to discuss? What have you created lately? Commiserations, felicitations, temptations, contemplations, speculations?
Categories: Life
Soggy here, innit? 
In memoriam: Diana Rigg 
Getting out the ‘yes’ 
100 books by women in 2016 
Hoyden About Town 
Back into the uni thing and I’m already playing catch-up. But I’ve made it through two weeks of labour law since Wednesday evening so I think I can get through another two over the weekend.
I’m finding that the shape of my days is changing a lot lately with MiniFP at High School etc: more time at home, more cooking, more homework supervision, more study etc…and strangely enough I don’t mind at all…that here is where I want to be. Which is fortunate since finances are tight enough to mean I couldn’t be anywhere else if I wanted to be.
MiniFP was off sick yesterday (went to school camp and wasn’t given his meds for three days which has lead to him wavering between kinda-ok and really not well for the last week and a half) but sleeping it off. I’ve had to cancel the plan he had to have two friends sleep over so it’ll be a dvd night. Anyone have any good fantasy/sci-fi movie recommendations? We’ve done the Labyrinth, the Dark Chrystal, Neverending Story, we’ve done Matrix, and Terminator…bit stuck thinking of something we’ll both enjoy and that TBO will enjoy when he comes over.
For now off to gym and then for study. Which actually sounds like a pleasant day. (WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ME????)
Galaxy Quest is both funny and fun. Actually, most of my sci-fi recs are old school and you’ve probably seen ‘em all.
I’m trying a simpler method of raised gilding today. Just to see if it works. Wish me luck!! (Gilding is SO HARD).
Sci-fi movie recommendations: How about Contact, Hitch-hiker’s guide, Tron or Farscape? It’s not sci-fi, but I just downloaded Life on Mars and have been enjoying it immensely.
Happy at the pre-prepared vegan curries in the supermarket, mildly miffed that the hairdresser cut my hair too short and miffed at myself because hair grows back.
Uni starts next week. I have two 14 hour days and a 4-day weekend. Should be interesting.
Not a movie but a TV series – Babylon 5. But YMMV with that. Or the new Star Trek movie.
My girls have taken to watching Jane Austen movies and TV series.
I’m a bit quiet lately, aren’t I? I’m in a down segment of my mood disorder, and probably not at all coincidentally have also spent the last two weeks crook with two different bugs. So I’m just getting done what I have to get done, and am not finding a lot of energy left over for normal blogging. I’m doing all the right things that I know help push me back onto a better mood balance, so hopefully I should be a bit more back to normal in a week or two.
All the best tigtog, and hope you return to your favoured version of normality soon. Plus, I don’t know about anyone else, but what with work and school beginning again I don’t have as much time for blog reading, so a slower-paced HAT is fine right about now.
Also, there’s a second series of Life on Mars! I’m so happy!
FEeling like I.ve finally kicked the bugs now. Cat is currently using my rack as a shelf, so typing on the netbook isslightly more of a challenge than usual.
(hugs) to Tigtog.
My first day lecturing today. Was nervous last week, but now mostly just champing at the bit to get stuck into the work. However, is two years, I realise, since I was last in front of a class. Prayers to the Flying Spaghetti Monster that I haven’t lost the touch.
Ugh…last few weeks don’t sound to fun tigtog. Glad to hear that ‘bugs’ are clearing up for you. Hope things continue to improve. Hehe…’the cat sat on the rack’ image is most amusing. Prob less so for you with cat fur up the nose.
Thanks for all the SF suggestions ppl! Turns out TBO and I were rejected – miniFP ground me down and had a friend stay over on promises they’d sleep at 9:30. TBO and I watched Fight Club – I never know how I feel about that movie. On the one hand it feels like a total critique of both capitalism and masculinity/mens groups etc, and on the other…it seems like OMG SHIRTLESS PITT AND BLOODY FIGHTS>>>AWESOME.
I shall pray to the Flying Spaghetti Monster even as I giggle at the image orlando
The other thing that has cheered me up immensely is getting my desktop fixed. New motherboard with a whole new suite of drivers (that work properly this time!) has done the business!
I nearly punched my TV just now. Amanda “Fuck everyone else I’m the centre of the universe” Palmer was on Good News Week, and it took barely 20 minutes for the Evelyn/Evelyn issue to come up. Fuck every one in that fucking studio who found the mention of “disabled feminists on the internet” funny. And just prior to that one of the other guests made a crack about people with albinism being kings of white supremicist groups, because they would be the whitest people there. I thought I was going to explode from rage before I turned off the tv. Fuck you GNW, PWD are not your comedy props.
Grrrrrrrrrrr. Bloody Amanda Palmer. Urge to puke rising.
I’m just watching GNW now Book Girl. Along with the albinism “joke”? Cracks about traumatic brain injury, hand atypicality, incontinence, psychosis, conjoined twinning, several rape jokes (including one with bonus Hitler, and one about teen girls as victims), a “Wii-tard” crack… the show hasn’t even finished yet, and there are probably bits I’ve forgotten.
Didn’t they used to mock politicians and people in other positions of power?
Addit: The host just did a callback crack about “handicapped feminists” being easily offended. Fuck this noise. I feel ill.
Signed, an ex-fan.
Maybe PWD and trauma survivors are now in positions of power and someone forgot to tell us? /sarcasm.
I caught the rape “jokes” and the one about incontinence (which is very personal for me these days, as I have problems with incontinence – and not one bit embarrassed or ashamed of it BTW, fuck you AB world.), but I stopped watching after that.
I also remember a while back there was a guest on who was making the usual arsehole comments about people using mobility scooters only because we were fat. Turned it off then too. I think my Mondays will now be bigot and GNW free.
Thank you HaT and FWD for existing and being places where I feel human and real and heard.
“The host just did a callback crack about “handicapped feminists” being easily offended.”
Oh, FUCK YOU Paul McDermott. Fuck you and your so-called liberal outlook.
It’s pretty obvious from the way Palmer, McDermott, and the others spat out the words “disabled/handicapped feminists” that they meant “There’s only one thing worse than a feminist, and that’s a disabled feminist”.
Sometimes I fucking hate this world.
Postfeminist my giant disabled arse.
The LA Times is doing a photo essay on how James Cameron is an ally to feminism:
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-james-cameron-feminist-films-pictures,0,610957.photogallery
@Curt, wow, what a condescending piece of “post-feminist” analysis.
Nice way to define the second and third waves of feminism as being only about what women want from the men they are romantically involved with. I thought that the battle against institutionalised sexism was about just a wee bit more than how the men actually/potentially in our beds treat us.
Notice how in all those movies, an essential part of what apparently makes a woman kickarse is that she doesn’t do anything unimportant to the interests of the men such as interacting with other women? Let’s go to Bechdel-Wallace town and count up the conversations between named women characters: Aliens (several exchanges between Ripley and Root, a child), The Abyss (one exchange between Lindsey and One-Night, which is just them saying hello, and they’re not even on screen together, so does it count?), Sarah Connor only gets to talk to her flatmate Ginger about how Ginger has a boyfriend and Sarah doesn’t, Neytiri can’t talk about the crisis facing their world to her mother without Jake Sully being the focus of the conversation. The only heroine in his ouvre who has conversations that include other women and which aren’t only about relationships with men is Rose in Titanic, who is the most conventional romantic heroine of the lot, and if it wasn’t for Molly Brown’s irreverent iconoclasm almost none of those exchanges would occur.
In a world where society valued women’s worth, conversations between women would be treated as if they are important as conversations between men. Cameron has never, ever given us a representation of such a world that I can bring to mind.
I haven’t watched GNW as Paul McD has not been anywhere NEAR as funny as he thinks he is for a very long time.
That’s some seriously disgusting television right there and I’m wondering where the massive public uproar is.
If it’s still on then, the link for the complaints form is here:
http://ten.com.au/contact-us.htm
If you scroll down past all the addresses, there is a section on Viewer Feedback, and under number 1. is a link to a pdf form to fill out to complain which can then be faxed back to their offices.
I’m not sure what level of accessibility people have but I’m happy to help out if I can and if I find an easier way to complain I’ll make sure I publish it on here. I can’t believe how out of line that is and how easily it continued without being challenged.
Oh my. I’m glad I didn’t watch. It sounds like some of my uni classes.
Video is now up, with transcript.
I just made myself a new twitter account — I’m bepster_1, if anyone wants to add me. If your name there is different to your blog name, please let me know who you are! 😀
Still angry and close to tears every time I think of this GNW/Amanda Palmer bullshit and the level of hatred for women and PWD that is all over and through it. Just having one of those ‘No, actually, I really CAN’T believe this is the world’ days in response.
Wondering if I can ask ppl something: I have accidentally ‘under-declared’ my income to Centrelink for about four fortnights – I just wasn’t thinking and kept plugging in the figures from when I was working full time and not part time. I have to go to the offices next week with all the payslips and ask someone to review it – does anyone know if they repay you for this stuff or if they say ‘too bad, so sad’?
@FP
A work colleague has said that they do pay you the difference, and also that they often underpay slightly so that at tax time if your income is slightly higher than you thought there is a buffer so you aren’t too out of pocket. Hope this is helpful.
Thanks Mindy…
Glad you worked it out – what I did was ‘over-declare’ not ‘under-declare’. Sheesh, no wonder finances have been so tight!!
Had a not so fun evening yesterday with taking the tigling to emergency because her sore foot suddenly puffed up and developed a growing red patch on the skin proximal to the hallux. After some prodding and an Xray the diagnosis is cellulitis and she’s on antibiotics and bedrest for the next few days. So today has been very very quiet.
((((Tigling))))
The poor kid. The particular injury can’t be much fun at all, and being on bedrest could be very, very challenging for a teen. I hope you have lots and lots of DVDs for her to watch.
Happy news: Despite the sad decline of the unis as a place to enjoy your undergraduate experience, as opposed to grind grind grind and get your qualification for your cubicle farm as opposed to ever attending any actual entertaining or social events… the Girlchild was at a BBQ and beer today put on by the Arts faculty on the South lawn of Unimelb, a priviliged milieu she’s been able to enter due to her north-of-90 ENTER courtesy of her Western suburbs high school. I’m so happy she has got this far and is so engaged and passionate about the learning experience, and that it appears she’s going to have some fun along the way and make some friends.