Warhead On Legs

People are never who you think they are. It's not a good thing or a bad thing, it just is.

I have a sudden craving for Starburst.

The fact that Laurell K Hamilton is making scads of money off bad porn really irritates me. I'm not sure why in particular, except for the fact that I used to like Anita Blake and now if I saw her on the street I'd put one between her eyes. The woman had a good thing going and she turned her heroine into Slut-Queen of the Paranormal. Mary Sue Slut-Queen of the Paranormal, no less. There's nothing she can't do except keep her legs shut and her tongue in her mouth.

Yes, there's the whole, if she can get published I bloody well can, thing. But it's not that simple. Today, I wish it were. But it's not.

I'm here at work on a day I really don't want to be. I'm worried, tired, stressed. I want the banging to just fucking stop from the kitchen. I want things to get where they're supposed to go on time. I want to be able to mail out things on time, like the goddamn query letter and thank you card that was supposed to go out Wed and I still haven't written yet. Too scared? And too tired. Things that aren't time-sensitive have been pushed back to a lower priority than sleep not involving teeth falling out and black and bloody dreams. I swear. My mouth looked like a pirate's last night. I didnt' even lose teeth, I lost gum. I had pointy molars an inch and a half long sticking out from a bloody island of gum. And when I say bloody, I don't mean the epithet. And black stains.

Not the kind of nightmare I want to have when I'm already worried and upset. And I come into work exhausted the next day. No customer better get shirty with me, that's all I'm saying.

I need a break. I just do. I'm not going to get one for a good two months or so. But I need a break. Maui's coming up and right now all I want to do is get it over with.

Every so often I look at fandom in general, and in this case I think it's just Harry Potter fandom in specific, and thank my lucky stars and my sense of self-preservation that I don't get involved in that. It's scary. And vicious. And occasionally just plain crazy.

And then I look at some of the controversies, the political mudslinging, the press activities and everything else in the so-called real world and realize it's pretty much the same in a lot of respects. And then I just want to shoot myself.

Anyway. Today is a day of writing, possibly sewing (tomorrow is definitely a day of sewing) and trying to avoid getting embroiled in the mess of OMGDRAMA! that has penetrated my real life. This drama involves arson, jail, bail, someone in the house possibly being called in to testify, stalkerish behavior, and me being afraid that there will be a knock on the door and someone with a gun on the other side. No, I am not being dramatic, this idea actually haunts me. As for the rest of it, well, it's RL stuff, and I actually don't think I want to publish it here. I'm not sure of all the details. The specific ones.

I have two stories to write, one of them due, though fortunately that's the just-about-finished one that I just need to get off my ass and post. TODAY. Stupid Jag. Novels to write, which slowed down over the last days due to sick. Um. I have a costume to sew, which I will probably do either tonight or tomorrow. We're taking down the big table which I used to cut, so I need to set up a new sewing station somewhere. Still, sewing takes up a lot less room than cutting.

MOMENTOUS DAY: I have decided not to take all ten novels to Maui. Just all ten synopses. I have decided to concentrate on five/six/seven ... a number yet to be determined. The rest, I'll just work on and see how far I get. So there.

Mostly this decision is due to the fact that, dammit, I want to sew and paint again. I haven't been painting in ages, and I miss it.

And that phone has been ringing non-stop, almost, since the drama started. Well, by non-stop I mean mostly once an hour, but still. Bloody hell.

Right. Writing. Actually, right now, showering and eating. And then writing.

.. I totally forgot to do this. Here, six things about me. No, you do not get to point out if I've posted these before.

1. I'm actually allergic to cats. Ironical, isn't it? My allergies are limited to a histamine reaction from feline overload, and since I've generally lived with cats for most of my life (except for college and a couple years after) and live with two now, they don't usually come out unless I suddenly go into a house with nine cats or something.

2. I've never worn makeup. I have no idea how to put it on. No, that's not true, I've worn makeup? Just, it's mostly been for theatre. So if I put on makeup it looks good from about fifteen feet away and further. And, yeah. That's about it.

3. Up until I was about sixteen, fifteen, I wanted ot be a dancer. I just about wanted it as much as I want to be a writer now, only I didn't quite have as clear a picture of what it would take. After a while I watched some films, went to Broadway. I think it was realizing what it would take that turned me off dancing. I don't have a strong enough body image to keep doing that. I barely have a strong enough self-esteem to keep writing.

4. When I was younger, and my friend and I used to stay at my family's beach house, we used to pretend the X-Men were after us. Well, the X-Men bad guys. Whenever we walked up and down the beach at night collecting driftwood for the fireplace Sabretooth was always a few feet behind. There was much squealing and running and secretly lusting after the poor people. We were also convinced that one house labeled 'Monroe' along the phone pole, next to the mailbox, was Storm's house.

We also were convinced, after the first time we saw Buffy the Vampire Slayer, that the vampires were after us. The movie, that is.

5. I've seen Richard III on stage at least four times. That I can remember. Of all of those times my favorite Richard is still Tom McCamus. He just had this evil smirk that still gives me shivers. He was also one of the most sympathetic. My favorite setting, cliche as it is for Richard, is still the Nazi-Germany-esque one at the Free for All at Carter Barron. They had the coolest sets for that one.

6. Here's one that just came up at dinner today; when I was a kid I put mint jelly on every meat I had. I have no idea how that started, except that someone said some kind of meat (lamb, I think?) was supposed to have mint jelly with it. I liked it so much that I insisted on having it at every meal at which there was chicken or beef or something. Except fried chicken. Or stewmeat. But roast beef, chicken breast, just about everything had to have mint jelly with it. My grandmother made me cold beef and mint jelly sandwiches for school lunch. I didn't stop that until I got to college. Come to think of it, maybe I should pick some up tomorrow since we have roast beef leftovers....

( And a meme, taken from bria, starwatching, and nutty )

Yeah, you knew it was coming. The inevitable political rant. *cracks knuckles* Here we go.

So we captured Saddam Hussein. Big whoop de fucking do. And by the time it gets around to trial we'll have the same issues that we had in the trials with Pinochet. He'll be so old and so senile that his competency will be called into question, and then they'll debate that until the idiot keels over dead. And then where will we be? Nowhere, that's where.

We captured Saddam Hussein, but what is that going to change in Iraq that couldn't have been changed before? Not very much, except it's going to give the pro-Hussein factions a martyr, a visible person to rally themselves around. It's like with Pol Pot, who died under house arrest. Like with Pinochet, who is so senile that the courts have ruled he doesn't need to be tried, he wouldn't understand the charges brought against him anyway. How long has Milosevic been on trial by now? Who knows. Who cares, anymore? The American public has such a short attention span that a lot of people probably don't even remember who Milosevic is, let alone Pinochet. Let alone Pol Pot. And how sad is that?

Really sad. Because you know why people in America don't know who Pinochet is, who Pol Pot is? Because our schools suck. And our media sucks. And because no one teaches these things anymore. No one teaches about the hundreds upon thousands of people who died in the last country we stormed through and incited coups and jackbooted all over their land in. It's old hat. It's tired news. And the American schools are so bad that we don't even teach basic geography anymore. When I was in high school the history teacher gave us all geography tests until we got the states right. Half of the class failed the US geography test the first time around. How sad is that? I just talked to a friend of mine, good friend, about my age, who doesn't know who any of the other dictators I mentioned are. Because nobody cares about them after they've been captured. We might as well shoot them in the head and leave them face down in a ditch for all the attention we pay them after we have them in hand. So why all the hype?

Stupid American schools. And Bush wants to spend 87 billion to rebuild Iraq? Without loan repayment in full? Fuck you, Bush. That's what the World Bank, the IMF, and other such organizations are for.

Saddam Hussein's been captured, big fucking deal. We have control of Iraq. We don't deserve or need it, but we have control over it. Against the protests of the UN. And, for Goddess' sake, what the fuck is a UNITED NATIONS for if not to ... well, be united? What is an international body of council and government for if not to be a thrice damned council? If we undermine its authority, if we start ignoring its rulings and doing whatever the hell we want regardless of what the council says, then we're practically inviting the anarchy and intenational wars and feuding that governed the world for so long. I don't care what the fucking UN says... well, I do care, but you have to at least respect the bloody authority of the body or it has no bleedin' authority! And then you have anarchy. And it's damned hard to live in anarchy.

I can't stand this. I can't stand the fact that now Bush is going to be gloating and putting the best possible spin on this, the fact that he captured Saddam Hussein. Hell, a year and a half ago, wasn't it Bin Laden we were going after? Make up your so-called mind you ineffectual prat. And while you're at it, sit up and take a good goddamn look around at how your country's going to shit. You're the king of a shitpile, you're President of a country of lunatics and morons.

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. The United States has, since the Wild West days, been on a stampeding trend. We elect government after cowboy government, ready to strap on the spurs and wrangle the cattle... excuse me, other countries. In the first part of this century, going up to the last thirty years or so, it was the Central and South American countries. And then it was ... well, I'm still not sure if we were trying to annex countries in SouthEast Asia or just be obnoxious and all-knowing and ... yeah. And now it's the Middle East. It's like being installed in the White House somehow confers upon the men we chose to govern our country the urge to swing around the army like a giant penis and beat other governments with it.

And George Bush, Jr. Dub-a-yah. Don't even get me started. Clinton may have fucked around, but at least he didn't decide that heterosexual marriage with its 2.5 kids and its overcompensatory SUV needed defending. Defending from WHAT? Just what the fuck are homosexuals going to do if they get the right to marry? Tie up all the churches so that heterosexual people can't get married? Not to mention, what the HELL is up with making a constitutional amendment specifically designed to discriminate against a group of people?? Where is that mandated in the Constituion? Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as long as you're a straight white male landowner worth so much money a year went out with slavery and sexism, or at least that's the impression I got.

Bush says he's been improving the economy. I know a shitload of people who are still out of jobs, Dubyah, shall I send them all to your doorstep and have you deal with it? I know where you live, Mr. Bush. I've walked in front of those tall black bars that line your front lawn. You're a mean one, Mr. Bush. What about the hundreds of thousands of children who don't know about all the other bad men out there? Oh wait. They don't count because you didn't wage war against them, personally, and capture and parade them in front of cameras like a homeless man who needs a cup of soup.

I'm so sick and tired of the bullshit that is this war on Iraq. Why on earth did we have to go in there, anyway? And don't give me that war on terrorism bullshit. Terrorism has existed from the first time one country started burning down the fields of another and planting their flags on the soil. Just because Bush declares a war on a nebulous concept and sends hundreds of thousands of troops to roll over one country like a mad dog isn't going to make it any better.

If you really want to cut back on terrorism, try (Goddess forbid that you actually use a little common sense) freezing the assets of the terrorists, going after them yourself, STOP FUCKING BANKROLLING THEM (*cough*IRA*cough*), and maybe wise up and stop conducting your international affairs in such a way as to make people mad at you? Like, oh, say, going into other countries with GIANT FUCKING TANKS and steamrollering the whole place flat. Goddess. No wonder people are throwing molotov cocktails at US troops. We don't belong there! Try sending them to do sane things, like protecting ... I don't know. I'm sure there must be someone out there worth protecting. Not even that, I'm sure there must be something or someone out there to protect that won't involve a misguided attempt to take over the damn country. Sweet Goddess of us all. What the hell is wrong with you people?

Pinochet, for those of you who are uninformed enough to have missed the 17 years in which he ruled over Chile with an iron fist and a death squad.

This world is a sick sick place, and I'm so ashamed to be an American sometimes.