Fun with the next blog button

For some reason, blogspot is full of Québécois.

I think this is a fetish page for people who are into long nails? Or a lookbook? Or both?

I had to talk and think about wedding plans for at least eight hours today. This evening, every single conversation I had was about some aspect of a nuptials. After dinner, I was standing in the kitchen with my father. He gave me the affixing stare of someone about to impart something essential about dress ruffles, speaking to seamstresses, or making wreaths out of broom corn. I braced myself as he leaned in.

"I've been wondering about the provenience of the type specimen for Nothrotheriops shastensis. The name indicates that it's local, but I can't find evidence of it except in the Southwest."

I love my dad.

It was in San Francisco.

Y'all have probably heard my story about the tire blowing out while I was hitching a ride back to college. (Here 'hitching' is used in the sense that one calls a friend and asks if they are also returning to school on a day.) Moderately long story short; he was so phlegmatic about tire blowouts that I assumed they were no big thing. According to everyone else: High Speed Tire Blowouts= Big Thing.

So I'm going on a week long camping trip for work. On the last day, we'll drive out six hours, pass within blocks of my house, drive for another hour, drop off my coworker, and turn and drive back. I mentioned that I would probably tuck and roll.

Yeah, apparently leaping out of a moving vehicle is not inherently funny unless you've seen someone do it for a parking space.

Infraction

I've been working in and around several campgrounds this summer. What with my elan and presence, people naturally assume I'm an authority figure. (I wear the orange vest of authority and carry the shiny clipboard of authority. The orange vest of authority is also the orange vest of not getting shot and the orange vest of being buzzed by hummingbirds. The shiny clipboard is sometimes used as a seat in particularly poisonoaky areas. Thus do I abuse my regalia.) Mostly I get scolded for how poorly things are run.

A couple weeks ago some teenagers were preparing to jump off a high bridge. When they saw me coming, they pretended that they were looking at some fish in the lake below. To my lasting regret I did not pull out my day planner, stare straight at them, and tap my foot until they either jumped or skulked off.

Five minutes later someone yelled at me because a couple of campgrounds were closed. I smiled real big, told her all about the terrible storms that had destroyed lots of campsites, apologized, and sent her to the next campground down the road.

Note to self

Look self, I know you love your birth control. I know you want to tell people how awesome it is. I understand. And you're usually pretty restrained about it. Never the less, recent events have led me to compile a short list of people who should not get the lowdown on sweet pregnancy prevention.

1.) Family. Yes, bonding, I know, couple of beers, I know. Still. Weird.
2.) Co-workers. I have no idea why you thought this was a good idea. Even if she asked.
3.) Ex-boyfriends. This is why we have lists like this, self. This is why we have lists.

C said "If my body has an innate ability to regulate its weight and request certain nutrients, why are hamburgers always delicious? I mean, it's not like I have a cultural history or emotional attachment to In n'Out..."

In between talking about feeding mice mostly shortening and keeping them in giant refrigerators, HaES briefly notes that there's no better way for the moderately iron deficient to grab some iron than 1/4-1/2 pound of ground beef.

C (and his mother) is always a little low on iron. Doctors have remarked on this, though none of them encouraged burger consumption. If they did, maybe he'd be more willing to go in and discuss his insomnia. (Oh, eat some cheesecake- it'll clear that right up. Either that or some video games.)

bivalentcy

I'm reading Extra Lives, a book on "why video games matter, and why they do not matter more". C recommended it as a way to understand his love of moving pixels.

I am possibly the worst canidate for liking video games ever. I have no patience for skills where there are no rewards for mediocrity. (or actual rewards) I am not dextrous. I have other time-sink indoor hobbies which gain respect from the adult world. I have your typical nerd-girl isolation and abandonment issues, compounded by nine years of the "I am more important than video games" fight. But the book is pretty good.

It is carefully argued and bewitchingly written- the sort of book that rewards you for playing freerice.com with the vocabulary I'd forgotten I knew. The interviews with game designers are fucking trenchant- as is the self analysis. (One of the roots of his periods of video game immersion is bouts of non-clinical depression; times of deep sadness due to unmet emotional needs. "I played this game for over a hundred hours because I was alone in a strange place and had no friends." is probably the most succinct reason I'm likely to get for why C played Stupid China Game until there was no more game unplayed.) Lastly, his descriptions of the most memorable moments in his gaming history are instantly familiar to an old D&D player- moments when some quirk of designer intellect and luck give a scene unexpected emotional resonance. I get that. And since the author sold his soul at the crossroads for a golden pen, they aren't mind-killingly stultifying to read, unlike every cool story from a RPG short of the gazebo attack.

So it makes its core argument very well- games do have emotional impact, they serve to fulfill emotional needs like other art, and the design process is deeply deeply flawed. I do hear the last chapter is basically a memoir of a six week cocaine and GTA binge that undermines some of these points.

But I don't know if I'll manage to make it to the final chapter. In college there were dudes- charming, interesting, amusing dudes- who A pointed out were not worth the effort of befriending. They could be aquaintances until the cows came home, but there was no reason to care about them, worry about them, or ever be alone with them. They, by word or deed, clearly did not think of women as people. Spending time considering the inside their heads made you feel... subhuman. I get the same vibe from this man. They are little things- he uses "sororal" as an insult; his test for game adequacy is whether a real life naked woman can distract the player; he repeats a joke which was probably funny the first time. Not only is his default gamer definitely male, so is his default human being.

My poor dear one attempted to show me why he loves the things he loves, and managed to tap into my fear of cultural misogyny.