Recontact, again.

Talking with Savil, one of my first real witch friends. Catching up on old times. I described Darkside to her, and she said that he sounded scarily like some guy we used to know in high school. Then I told her his first name. Same as the guy from high school.

We babbled on the phone for quite a while. She got married to her sweetheart, but got divorced this past spring break. She wants to meet Votania and Darkside. I told her about the thing where Votania's family thinks we're a couple... she lost it. Lesbian humor.

I checked up on how Shawn and Josh the twit are doing. Shawn has evidently progressed back to just plain idiot after his daughter's birth; he's not the flaming asshole he was in the first bit of college anymore. Josh the twit is still a good kid, but hangs with a bad crowd.

Savil and I met way back in 1992, in the seventh grade. She was the person who helped me through the first psychological complexities of realizing that I was not straight (her having known that she was a lesbian since she was old enough to know the difference between a boy and a girl helped some...) and gave me my first Scott Cunningham book. She saw rosalynde's life when it was just starting off into the Epic Romance it's become.

It's still spooky how much Darkside and the guy I had a crush on my freshman year of high school are alike.

Family

Neighbor is glad that his little sister (me) finally has some hair. When we met, I was rather scruffy, recovering from a shaved head. Now I have hair down past my shoulders.

Neighbor likes the new look.

It was good to see him again outside of school. He dropped by to say hello and take advantage of our DSL/LAN/good computers and give me hugs, because I needed them.

This isn't a good week for me.

Figured out why Marx was setting off my alarms: he's had all the symptoms associated with an unexploded, live bomb, lately. Frustration, anger, nervous energy, all bottled up inside, with an unpracticed and twitchy control over this high-pressure environment. Damn straight I'll be jumpy around him. ....He's started defusing, once I figured out where it was. Very good, for all concerned.

Adam warns me to not get too attached. Eeep. I wonder what's coming up next?

Breakdown

...again.

Got a few things hashed out with myself. My body allows itself to feel physical attraction for Darkside again, which attraction I sublimate with gentle, friendly violence. (He knows this.)

Attempting to describe the conversation accurately is futile. I ranted and raved at myself in two different sets of handwriting. This doesn't come off so well on the PC; it switches on its own, these days, rather than me being aware of the changeover as I used to be. I used to swap fonts for that.

I bitched at myself and the world in my journal. Darkside read it; I was beyond coherent speech, but not beyond coherent thought. Often, when beyond coherent speech, my voice locks up.

It takes a lot for me to reach out for help. I finally reached towards him, putting my hand down flat on the table. He touched one finger against my hand. ...Always, with someone else, I have a sensation of someone alien to me, a sense of not-me-in-there when there is physical contact. I see why some mages avoid it. With Darkside, though, we have worked together so well and so long, there is the same sense of connection, but not of alien presence. Unusual and new, yes. Alien, never.

I'm too good a friend to lie to.

I want to drag him into a utility closet and kiss him. Instead, I settle for punching him in the stomach for a *really* bad pun, after he walks me to class.

Oooh! *Survey*! For *Dell*!

They sent me an e-mail asking for me to complete a survey about my satisfaction with my support experience last night. This one, I'm filling out, with great delight.

They have a comments section. I'll share.

Your sales representative *hung up on me* when I asked to speak to a supervisor. Rather, when I asked to speak to his supervisor, this young man put me on hold, then told me that his supervisor had said that there was nothing he could do. When I asked to actually speak to a supervisor, I was hung up on. This is not a good use of my time, nor your company's time. I have had extremely positive experiences with your support staff, but your sales staff is rude and clueless. This lowers my overall satisfaction with Dell to the negative range, and I have been advertising my dislike of your company broadly. I attend DeVry University of Technology. Perhaps you have heard of it?

All of your support technicians have been surprised that the driver for my communications card, controlling sound and modem functions, was not included on my system recovery disk, the one I got with my system when it was new. Please note that this laptop is still with all original parts in place. This does not inspire my confidence.

Furthermore, the label material you use to put the service tag on your laptops is shoddy; it scrapes off with average wear, making my phone support experiences slow and painful. On approximately my tenth contact with your people, one fellow was finally clueful and polite enough to tell me my "Express Service Code" that your phone system prompts for ad nauseum.

I have been unable to order, either over the phone or online, a replacement power adapter for my not-so-recent laptop, a Latitude CPt. My next laptop purchase, rest assured, will *not* be Dell.

I also learned, the day before this call, that since my idiot ex ordered this computer under "business", I am unable to get support through the home division of your phone support system until my information is changed in your database, which will evidently take up to a month. I do like the hold music a lot more with your business phone support wait, as it is notably unmarked by reiterations of your thanks for my patience, *every thirty seconds*. This audible spam, from the hold on your home support line, does not inspire my patience: it inspires verbal abuse of your phone system delivered to your long-suffering tech support staff.

I'm not precisely happy. I am articulate.

Heinlein Women (crosspost from the list)

When growing up, I noticed that the ideal Heinlein woman was smart, bisexual, horny, good with children, an expert markswoman, prepared for every eventuality, and capable of mastering anything she tried, very quickly.

I wanted to grow up and kick, ah, "anatomy" like Friday, be householdy and practical like Janet (was that her name? The other woman in _Friday_, the one with the two husbands), make love with the skill of all the Heinlein women known to be skilled in the art put together, be all-around resourceful and twisty-minded like Hazel, and continue kicking anatomy with serenity like Cordelia after I found the gang of heavily armed Amazons (or male equivalent) who would love me freely and forever. With the Martian training of Mike Smith, the information manipulation retrieval, and analytical skills of Mr. Spock, the diplomacy of Miles, and the grace, beauty, brains, and technical skill of Lt. Uhura.

Heinlein women were an excellent role model to me when growing up. It will be interesting to re-read from an adult perspective. I have noticed that some of my favorite books when growing up (M*rc*d*s L*ck*y) did not age particularly well. Someone onlist said of that particular author, some years ago, that some authors have an axe to grind; this author takes the axe and bludgeons you about the head with the dull side... I've found that increasingly true with some of her books, especially those specifically targeted for a younger audience. I'm hoping that at least Friday will stand up to the test of time. I found that Gillian became less interesting after learning Martian; Anne became more interesting.

As an interesting and amusing contrast to the stereotypical attitude from a completely male-dominated society, until the age of ten, I believed with all my little heart that boys could not grow up to be teachers, because they were not smart enough... Somehow my father was an exception, just as smart as a girl.

Romance Novels are like sleeping pills

Occasionally, a romance novel (a book that exists solely to tell the story of a romantic relationship, with very little underlying meaning besides that) is refreshing to the mind. Used often, they are a dangerous habit.

The typical romance novel is badly or implausibly plotted, with weak characterization, and just plain damn bad writing.

Castles and islands and accidental swappings of kids at the hospital at birth, oh my! This is escape literature, after all, but good gods! is it necessary to make it that smegging obvious?

It is unlikely in the extreme that most men are a handsome prince in disguise, a true gentleman lurking behind the mask of a supposed complete arse, or even likely to change from their wicked ways: these are all common devices to explain why this gem has not been snapped up before.

Other than the sensitive side of rugged men being unexpectedly revealed, or the romantic side of previously cold ladies being uncovered, there is little character development. All of the character development generally leads straight to romance, without many of the little sidesteps that life usually winds up with.

Your typical mass-market romance has the writing style of an exceptionally talented sixth-grader, with clumsy and/or incomplete phrasing, grammar skills a freshman level college teacher would cringe at, and vocabulary suited to the lowest-common-denominator of reader, who does not care to have (usually) her happy read interrupted by the need to dive for a dictionary she probably doesn't own.

When I read a book for a romance, I expect to have a storyline, a situation that the characters must work through, a situation that would be sufficiently a problem to solve without the romance tagging along, and the problem must not be completely soluble by the successful management of the romance. I expect the characters to be three-dimensional ones that I can care about without effort on my part, or at least throw a good healthy dislike at. I would like to occasionally thow my head back and giggle in delight at a particularly smooth bit of phrasing, but I expect that my attention will not be distracted by the poor quality of the writing.

If the quality of writing that someone gets accustomed to is the mass-market romance, I despair for their sanity and writing skills. Any given person's writing adjusts to accomodate the vocabulary and style in their primary influences and surroundings. I should not like to have my writings pruned back to the style and content of my sixth grade journals. Writing is meant to grow and develop.

I do occasionally read select "romance" novels. The writing of "Amanda Quick" (Jayne Ann Krentz) is good, though her female lead is the exact same spunky character each time around, with different features put on the generic prefab three-dimensional character. Those books get boring after a while. Lois McMaster Bujold's A Civil Campaign is excellent. The classic Sense and Sensibility is one of my all-time favorites.

I avoid the mass-market pink-covered romance novels, mainly notable for "a romance", softcore porn, or occasionally hardcore porn. If I want smut, I'll stick to fanfic, thanks, because I can find some with good characterization, a plot, and better sex -- absolutely free online!

Fwd: If Popular Brands Made Condoms:

Nike Condoms: Just Do It!

Toyota Condoms: Oh what a feeling!

Diet Pepsi Condoms: You got the right one, baby!

Pringles Condoms: Once you pop, you can't stop!

Ford Condoms: The best never rest!

Chevy Condoms: Like a rock!

New York Lotto Condoms: 'Cause hey you never know!

California Lotto Condoms: Who's next?

Avis Condoms: Trying harder than ever!

KFC Condoms: Fingerlicking good! !

Coca Cola Condoms: Always the real thing!

Lays Condoms: Betcha can't have just one!

Campbell's Soup Condoms:Mmm mmm good!

AT&T Condoms: Reach out and touch someone!

Bounty Condoms: The quicker picker upper!

Energizer Condoms: It keeps going and going....!

M&M Condoms: It melts in your mouth, not in your hands!

Taco Bell Condoms: Get some; make a run for the border!

MCI Condoms: For friends and family!

Doublemint Condoms: Double your pleasure, double your fun!

Mmm, maple mead. ;)

Take maple syrup, the real shit. Nothing else will do. Add vodka. Mix.

It tastes good and smooth going down, but evidently destroys cell membranes coming up.

At some point, I shall have to make some real maple mead, with the official mead-making techniques, but meanwhile, this is some nice strong stuff.

Mmmm.

Next up to try: Mixing maple mead with a whipped combination of whipped topping and vanilla ice cream. Maple ambrosia, mmmm!

Fwd: Joke involving nudity.

Two priests are off to the showers late one night. They got undressed and stepped into the showers before they realized there was no soap. Father John says he has soap in his room and goes to get it, not bothering to dress.

He grabs two bars of soap in his hands and heads back to the showers.

He is halfway down the hall when he sees three nuns heading his way.

Having no place to hide, he stands against the wall and freezes like he's a statue.


The nuns stop and comment on how life-like he looks. The first nun suddenly reaches out and pulls his manhood. Startled, he drops a bar of soap.

"Oh look," says the first nun..."It's a soap dispenser."

To test her theory the second nun also pulls his tool ... and sure enough he drops the other bar of soap.

The third nun decides to have a go. She pulls once, then twice, and three times, but nothing happens. So she tries once more and, to her delight, she yells....

( the punch line )