Moving!!!

On Wednesday, I depart for Andrews, TX, city of my new home. I can't actually move into my house until the 1st, so I'll be sleeping on the head band director's couch for five days or so. But I am okay with that, because on the list of places I have slept, a co-worker's couch ranks in the top five or so.

I have Internet, cable, a landline (lol), and electricity set up to go on the 1st. For some reason, I can't set up water until I'm there in person, so I may not have it until the 2nd. We'll see how that goes. Because I'm using the same electricity company that I used before, I didn't to pay a deposit, which is awesome. I did have to drop $200 on SuddenLink but that's fine, most of it is the first month of service.

Thursday we start leadership training with the band kids (drum majors/section leaders/officers I assume) and on Monday the full band rehearsals start. I have no idea how I'm going to juggle getting water/electricity/internet turned on with summer band but I'm sure it will work out somehow.

@madampetticoats keeps asking me if I'm nervous about being all by myself out in Nowhere, Nowhere. I am a little, but between the Internet and being relatively close to Midland/Odessa (half an hour) I am fairly confident I'll survive. Somehow.

Also, my dad called me today and let me know that I have two savings accounts that I had no idea existed. One was a baby with only about $500 (apparently I made a deposit of $100 eleven years ago) but the other was an awesome $2400 so I am so much less worried about moving costs. I was almost definitely going to be able to cover all the costs beforehand, but now I have no reason to be worried (unless somehow getting a key from my landlord triples in cost). I'm not trying to brag about lol i'm so rich you guys I am just honestly limp with relief. I've never really had to deal with money problems anyway since my parents are basically rich but still! It's nice to have my own money with which to solve my own problems, not checks from my daddy.

Ew, even typing that word made me a little sick to my stomach.

So yeah. This Is My Life.

"Is It Really That Hard To Wear Contacts" or, A Review of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two: We're Done Camping

And by "review" I mean a disjointed list of my thoughts during the movie.

First of all: for the end of the Harry Potter series, this movie was surprisingly low-key. I don't mean boring, but it was mostly talking. The actions scenes were shortened (oh hey look a dragon, let's jump on and fly to a lake!) or done (quite effectively, to be sure) in silence or with the score covering the noise. Mostly, this was done well, and the fights were quite satisfying, especially the Molly/Bellatrix exchange.

The biggest problem this movie has is kind of a bizarre one. First of all, the movie is only two hours long. You would think that if you're going to split it up into two halves, you'd take advantage of that. Still, I understand that you can't just squash a book into a movie verbatim. This is, of course, the biggest complaint many have with the first two movies: they follow the books too closely.

However, the things that were cut/changed in the movie just make no sense. First of all, as you can tell from the title, apparently eye color is a SACRED GOD-GIVEN TRAIT THAT NO MAN CAN TOUCH. We spent approximately half an hour of movie time zoomed in on Harry, Voldemort, or Aberforth's faces and NONE of their eyes are the correct color. And those are the three whose eyes are most prominently described in the books (green, red, and blue, respectively). For all I know, Sirius's eyes are completely wrong too, but I feel much less passionately about that because it's not like Snape was in love with Sirius (THAT WE KNOW OF) or Harry thought McGonagall was looking through the shard of the mirror.

And while we're on the subject of Snape, really? His tears? Did you run out of special effects money, Warner Bros.? You couldn't afford one measly cloud of silver memory light? We had to watch Snape manfully squeeze out a tear into a random flask Hermione couldn't be bothered to conjure up? However, the Snape/Lily Pensieve scene wasmasterfully done, bravo bravo. No complaints there.

Also, for about five minutes I was seriously afraid that Ron or Hermione was going to kill Nagini, and THAT IS NOT OKAY. But never fear, it was Neville. (spoilers! neville kills nagini)

I think if the directors had asked Alan Rickman to speed up his delivery a little (If. Anyone. Knows. The. Location. Of. Potter. Step. Forward) then we could have gotten to actually see Fred die, instead of walk in on him having a slumber party next to Lupin and Tonks. Wait, pause, actually, we DID get to see Tonks die! NEWS FLASH, WB: YOU DIDN'T EVEN CAST TONKS UNTIL MOVIE FIVE. NO ONE IS INVESTED IN HER. And why did we spend two scenes explaining how Harry owns the Deathstick? One was plenty!

Speaking of the Elder Wand, oops! Guess Harry will have to use Draco Malfoy's wand forever, since we forgot to repair his original one. Unless Hermione didn't accidentally break it in Part One: Camping Fever, which I never actually saw. Very possible.

Has Goyle always been black? Or did he just drink the wrong potion before this movie? Also, when did Cho move to Scotland?

And did anyone notice that Hermione literally did not do anything during this movie? Even when she stabbed the Hufflepuff Cup, Ron had to tell her to do it and coach her through the process, then save her from the big scary snake that Neville should have killed two scenes ago. Well, I guess it was Hermione's idea to ride the dragon. And she threw a rock at one point.

Special mention has to go out to Helena Bonham Carter, quite seriously, for a wonderful job of pretending to be Hermione being Bellatrix. That was an excellent performance.

This post is much, much dumber than the last one

Ally McBeal would be a pretty good show if it were not for one person:

JOHN CAGE.

His character is stupid. His stuttering is annoying. His idiosyncrasies are inane. He expects everyone in his firm to just cater to his bizarre needs without making any efforts to help.

Most disgustingly, I have never once (and I am more than halfway through the entire run of the show) heard him make an argument that did not wholly consist of trying to sway a jury through emotion rather than actual, legal, factual statements (basically, jury nullification). His objections are tedious and useless, he refuses to bend to courtroom etiquette*, and he antagonizes judges with impunity and he is never punished for it ever. He can tell a judge, to his face, "I'm disappointed in you" and not even get fined. It's disgusting.

*my knowledge of courtroom etiquette is entirely based upon my extensive viewing of law and order and law and order SVU. here is your grain of salt

Fun Facts. Well, Fact. More at eleven.

Been watching Ally McBeal. Not a fabulous show, but one that makes me think about some things.

Fact: Acknowledging that you have a prejudice is not the same as not having a prejudice.

It's not okay to hate someone for what they are, saying "I know that what I'm doing to you is wrong, I know that whatever experiences I have in my past that make me hate you don't excuse the hatred of you that I am expressing, but I am not going to stop hating you".

Caveat: if you had a bad experience with a transgendered person in your youth, and you are uncomfortable around them, THAT IS OKAY. Your life experiences are your own, and you have every right to them. The problem occurs when you attempt to use your life experiences to deny the legitimacy of someone else's.

RIGHT: I'm sorry, I can't date you because you have a penis. When I was young, I dated a man that I thought was a woman, and lost all of my friends and ended up moving to a different state to escape.

WRONG: You have a penis? Why didn't you tell me, whore! All you bitches do is go around looking for unobservant men to fool into getting fucked over - LITERALLY!

Is it fair to expect everyone to communicate solely in the upper levels of Bloom's Taxonomy, never using exclamation marks and pausing to compose rational replies to every provocation? Perhaps not. It is, however, right and good to use language that does not demean, deny, or denigrate.

What if we apply this to the perhaps-more-common (citation needed) mistaken-for-gay event? Gay man (let's say, Rory) asks a straight man (oh, why not Daniel) out on a date. Let's presume they're acquaintances, probably facebook friends, share a few classes, but not hang-out-in-each-other's-house friends. Daniel will say no, because that's how being straight works. Obviously, this is fine, and Rory should have been prepared for that (though Lord knows it hurts anyway). But do we expect the relationship to stay exactly as is?

I don't think it's wrong for Daniel to be uncomfortable around Rory. I don't think it's wrong for Daniel to let the friendship, such as it is, stagnate. What is wrong is calling Rory a faggot, telling everyone Daniel knows that "can you believe that faggot thought I was a fairy like him?". The difference here lies in the actions. Daniel pulling away from Rory might hurt Rory a little bit, it's true, but it doesn't demean him, and it doesn't tell him that what he is is wrong. It just says that Daniel isn't attracted, and probably doesn't want to be hit on again. Perfectly normal feelings.

This is where I, personally, run into a lot of problems when I discuss topics like this. I often encounter people who, based on my understanding of their remarks, think that straight/cissexual/"normal" people should be forced to endure every GLBTQ individual at full volume. I know that tolerance != acceptance != embracing, and I'm not trying to argue that. I am saying that if I met someone who had an incredibly annoying voice, I would not want to hang out with that person. It's not their fault they have an annoying voice. They probably have wonderful insights and valuable contributions to society. But I'm going to avoid that person. And I am not wrong for wanting to do that.

So am I saying it's okay to hate, as long as you hate quietly? It's okay to hate as long as no one gets hurt? Those are conclusions that can be drawn from this rant, yes. I don't like them, but they're there. Part of the reason I wrote this out is to articulate what I feel so that I can evaluate it, and I'm not 100% happy with the things I've written. If I had to boil down what I want this treatise to say, it would be: Loving everyone and liking everyone are not the same, and that is not wrong.

I'd love to hear feedback. I think my running total of comments on this blog is 0. CHANGE THAT!

In Which I Rant About Writing Devices

So, ebooks. They are the best, yes? I have recently been gifted with a slew of ebooks containing the majority of the works by Jim Butcher and Rachel Caine. Jim Butcher's books are great, no question. Not perfect, obviously (BREASTS) but very good.

Rachel Caine, on the other hand...

First of all, I frickin' love Joanne Baldwin as a character. She's believable, she's identifiable, she wears kickass heels and drives kickass cars. Even though she ends up the second strongest magic-user in the books, it's all set up and foreshadowed in such a way that it feels natural and not Mary Sue-y, especially since the only major character we see other than her to even use magic is the strongest magic user in the books, so it's not like she's stomping all over the rank and file constantly. She's constantly in over her head, and she doesn't let that stop her...

Except.

EVERY SINGLE BOOK could be 150 pages shorter if there wasn't a huge amount of "oh, Joanne, I know how to fix (problem of the book) but I love you too much to send you into danger". NEWS FLASH, DAVID: SHE'S DIED THRICE. Joanne is absolutely of the mindset that her life is not worth more than the other six billion people on the planet, and she is absolutely prepared to do whatever is necessary to save the world (nine times, including dying in some form or another at least three times). This, for those of you taking notes at home, is the diametric opposite of one Harry Dresden, who will cheerfully toss the entire world into the hell-handbasket in order to save (insert character in danger who probably has BREASTS). The end result of all this endless moaning "I could tell you how to wake up Mother Earth but instead I'll just give you one tiny hint" is every book being resolved through deus ex machina (thus the multiple dyings of Joanne Baldwin).

On my first readthrough of these books, several years ago, I thought they were enjoyable but kind of trashy. This time, I keep getting frustrated with how slowly the plot moves, because it could be so much faster if David would just stop saying how much he loves Joanne all the time! It's the concept of Fake Difficulty applied to a novel: instead of coming up with actual content to increase the duration of the video game/book, simply fill it up with something that is arbitrarily difficult/doesn't actually advance the plot but fills pages.

They're still fun novels, and I very much enjoy the elaborate magic system Rachel Caine has developed (best way to sucker me in is a good, consistent Magic A is Magic A cosmology), but I'm getting very, very weary of this repetitive trope, and I'm only on book 5 of the reread.