flash bastard

wow, so lj's still a thing.

bentley — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 10:36:38 GMT

if you want to find me around the net, try lannister.net

deleted & purged

bentley — Fri, 06 May 2011 15:31:30 GMT

I'm a loser and went through the D&Ps, with an eye to RP usernames and the like. there's a few I thought looked nice or would make good OC names? idk how much crossover there is with mastodon's lists.

you can rename your account to any of these that still have a strike through them. please don't hoard!

agnese
alky
alligatores
amianta
amids
amster
anastasiyae
anitas
aroli
arousals
ascribes
asuke
attracta
babycrib
babydork
badmilk
bakerlite
bakers
banksy
baritsu
baywall
bobbypin
byebye
caelann
carlton
caveats
caville
cedere
celerai
chateux
chessing
chinglish
choric
ciannagh
cibini
cinemagraph
clearest
clothiers
coolware
coulton
criticizer
crossway
crownify
crummie
cryme
cumstains
cuntlets
cuteknees
cybil
cyian
cynicized
cysters
dairing
dilson
dnfw
dolcissimo
dormed
druidess
dulcete
electioneerer
epicuriosity
equalize
extolment
fabuloid
faceread
finnster
fireplum
flowre
gaudioso
haechi
haelia
harrion
holtes
jacen
jugg
kao
koichi
labyrinthed
lacebell
lemonlimebitter
lestweforget
loathe
macquarie
matthiaus
mccormak
mediocracy
na0to
occasionally
ode
p0tions
pacifaust
paean
pageo
painties
palling
pamphlet
paneless
paperbin
parallax
paratroops
percussio
perfections
pettycrimes
picassoed
pissing
policier
polkydot
polyphony
poque
protocode
psd
puccetto
pugnosed
quadratic
quadruplets
quaysides
queensknight
quietbook
quigonjin
r0xas
ragebringer
rapeface
recasting
rentboys
riannonn
ritualist
rolphus
romanies
samanel
samburg
schizotyping
self_destruct
sewal
shinpad
shordy
signalfire
sisternicci
skinshift
skypers
soccerish
squallhart
steffini
succinct
switchknife
teacaddy
teamleaders
thepianoman
totes
treks
trlupin
trololls
trumpeter
trustfunds
ultrarealism
unappable
unbridledgenius
undauntingly
undeprecating
underactive
vacationspots
vacuuming
variancy
veiler
versemaker
verveins
wightlord
xings
yap
yucku
zacari
zishka
zombietrail
zooropium

cool story bro

bentley — Sun, 30 Jan 2011 08:48:23 GMT

every so often I feel the need to update my LJ because I'm worried if I don't it will just get deactivated, even though I know there are journals sitting unused on the site since 1999 with about 4 entries.

I fell out of fandom a little bit but I do like to read about your lives and interesting political views etc etc etc. meanwhile I am, what? working, 80% of the time. writing bits of scripts on my iPhone and watching too much TV in the rest.

there is like this list of tiny fandoms I still voraciously want to read good fic for: Community, The Big Bang Theory, Misfits, Wolf House, The Hunger Games, misc RPF. I fell out of Merlin fandom but I keep getting reviews in my inbox - nothing makes me feel guilty like pleas for some of the kinkmeme fic I wrote anonymously and abandoned.

I update Dreamwidth like a fraction more than I post here, haha. mostly Tumblr and Twitter are my social network of choice, because I can be fannish and interactive without a lot of time/effort.

insert meme here. yeah.

bentley — Fri, 01 May 2009 00:45:26 GMT

Dreamwidth.org opens for general use today! (has opened, I should say, I wrote this last night.) if you have an OpenID or are on the mailing list you'll be recieving an invite code, but feel free to ask me if you need one.

my entries over at amber are going to be pretty consistently public, and once the bandwagon feel wears off and i work out who'll be there permanently, i'll re-evaluate my posting and reading habits. but for now, farewell! from _greenie_ through stiletto through bentley, it has been a really fun ride and i've enjoyed reading the entries of and interacting with every single one of you. i hope we won't lose touch. ♥ my final entry is a poem.

national poetry month is over. i've seen a lot of my favourites posted around (ozymandias, crane's "because it is bitter" extract, e.e. cummings) but here is one that has stuck with me enough that i have typed it up directly from my Rattle Bag of poetry since i can't find it on the internet. it's a translated poem, and something about its darkness and simplicity makes it one of my absolute all-time favourites.

games

before play.

One shuts one eye
Peers into oneself into every corner
Looks at oneself to see there are no spikes no thieves
No cuckoos' eggs

One shuts the other eye too
Crouches then jumps
Jumps high high high
To the top of oneself

Thence one drops by one's own weight
For days one drops deep deep deep
To the bottom of one's abyss.

He who is not smashed to smithereens.
He who remains whole and gets up whole.
He plays.

the nail.

One be the nail another the pincers
The others are workmen

The pincers grip the nail by the head
Grip him with their teeth with their hands
And tug tug tug

To get him out of the floor
Usually they only pull his head off
It's hard to get a nail out of a floor

Then the workmen say
The pincers are no good
They smash their jaws and break their arms
And throw them out the window.

After that someone else be the pincers
Someone else the nail
The others are the workmen.

hide-and-seek.

Someone hides from someone
Hides under his tongue
He looks for him under the earth.

He hides in his forehead
He looks for him in the sky.

He hides in his forgetting
He looks for him in the grass.

Looks for him looks
Where doesn't he look for him
And looking for him loses himself.

the rose thieves.

Someone be a rose tree
Some be the wind's daughters
Some the rose thieves.

The rose thieves creep up on the rose tree
One of them steals a rose
Hides it in his heart

The wind's daughters appear
See the tree stripped of its beauty
And give chase to the rose thieves

Open up their breasts one by one
In some they find a heart
In some, so help me, none.

They go on opening up their breasts
Until they uncover one heart
And in that heart the stolen rose.

he.

Some bite off the others'
Arm or leg or whatever

Take it between their teeth
Run off as quick as they can
Bury it in the earth

The others run in all directions
Sniff search sniff search
Turn up all the earth

If any are lucky enough to find their arm
Or leg or whatever
It's their turn to bite.

The game goes on briskly

As long as there are arms
As long as there are legs
As long as there is anything whatever.

the seed.

Someone sows someone
Sows him in his head
Stamps the earth down well

Waits for the seed to sprout.

The seed hollows out his head
Turns it into a mouse hole
The mice eat the seed.

They drop dead.

The wind comes to live in the empty head
And gives birth to chequered breezes.

ashes.

Some are nights others stars.

Each night lights up its star
And dances a black dance round it
Until the star burns out.

Then the nights split up
Some become stars
Other remain nights.

Again each night lights up its star
And dances a black dance around it
Until the star burns out.

The last night becomes both star and night.
It lights itself.
Dances the black dance around itself.

Vasco Popa
from the Serbo-Croat (translated by Anne Pennington.)

open source, open operations, open expression.

bentley — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 11:32:54 GMT

I've had a LiveJournal for almost eight years now. I've given them hundreds of dollars, made thousands of posts and tens of thousands of comments, helped out in Support, brought in new users, created alternate journals and multiple communities, and generally made it my home on the internet, the base from which all my other online activities extend.

So why the hell am I moving to Dreamwidth?

In two words? It's better. Want more? How about five reasons.

01. Because the people behind Dreamwidth are dissatisfied with LiveJournal for the same moral reasons I am. The project kicked off after that Strikethrough debacle, and gained more interest when a handful of important employees were laid off. Dreamwidth believes in the things LiveJournal used to stand for. No advertisements, for one. Creating features users want. Freedom of expression. Community. Their policy is about valuing the users, wherever they may come from or however they may use the site, and it's been a long time since I've believed LiveJournal values its users for anything other than their revenue. gerg, a guy who has spent far more time and support on LiveJournal than I have, has made an excellent post about why Dreamwidth is a better choice than LiveJournal in this regard. I dare you to read the Guiding Principles and not feel moved.

I don't want to spend too much time talking about why LiveJournal sucks; that's not what this post is about. That's not what Dreamwidth is solely about, either. But it's one of the reasons I'm making this a complete move. I believe that while LiveJournal is functional, DreamWidth is better because it shows us that we don't have to settle. We don't have to put up with site-wide changes that make us feel screwed over by a big company, whether it's the introduction of Plus Accounts, the "FaceBook"-izing of the profile page, the introduction of Adult Content filters, or the creation of an Advisory Board which is completely ignored. There's are many other posts which get outraged at LJ on behalf of a particular userbase; suffice to say I feel my money, my trust, and my hobby are safer in the hands Dreamwidth.

02. Because it's not just another LiveJournal clone. The Dreamwidth people have taken the source code for the site and improved it — to the point where Kit (of Inksome) and Squeaky (of InsaneJournal) are both in talks to eventually switch the base code of their entire site over to the adaptations Dreamwidth has made. They have fixed so many minor bugs that LiveJournal never got around to, and are implementing features that are creative and useful. It's because its creators have been LiveJournal users forever too; they know what irritates them in their day-to-day use of it.

For example, one of the level bosses, Denise, mentions in this post that there are plans to fix that piece of code which means when you make an error in your comment or are on the wrong journal or whatever, you are taken to an error notice which you have to click "back" from (and hope your comment is still intact in the textbox.) Instead, there are plans for you to get an error message and be able to edit your comment while still on the page.

My personal favourite new feature is that DW have removed the comment word limit. Interests, too - no more & nbsp;-ing! You can make more than 5000 comments per post! I enjoy too that they no longer use the word "friend" - your flist becomes your "circle", your friends are "readers" and "watchers" — everything is a lot more neutral, to encompass the many different ways in which people use these social networks. In the spirit of neutrality, they've also made the code for lj-cuts just <cut text="text!"> (though the old <lj-cut text="text!"> will still work, for those of you who hate change.) <lj user="username"> becomes <user name="username">! Icon pages with hundreds of icons will load on separate pages (and of course they're going to offer more icons than LJ does, that's a selling point for thousands of users.) These are just a few really blatant examples of the hundreds of minor ways Dreamwidth is deviating from the original LiveJournal code in innovative and practical ways.

03. Because they involve everyone. I understand what's going on. I'm not an accountant, or a coder, or a designer, but Dreamwidth explains what they're doing in terms I can understand and, more importantly, encourages me to get involved. A lot of the bug-fixes (patches) are done by first-timers; they have a guide to getting involved with that on their wiki. A lot of the site schemes, moodthemes and layouts being implemented were created by talented amateurs who showed an interest. They have regular updates with changes they're making to the site, they make their business decisions transparent, and they encourage user feedback; there's an entire community just for people to suggest cool new features that someone with more experience (in coding, design, whatever) can work out how to implement.

More importantly, they don't want to isolate themselves from the rest of the online social network. You can update your LiveJournal, Inksome, and eventually (if I'm understanding correctly) your blog from their update page. You can follow your friends on other sites, and people who aren't DW users can use OpenId to comment on posts with their LiveJournal (or other site) identity. You can add your Twitter and Facebook to your Profile in addition to your screen-names. My absolute favourite part of this is that by using <user name="bentley" site="livejournal.com"> (for example) you can create a little bentley which will link to the username on LiveJournal instead of Dreamwidth. So basically, they've cut out the major issue everyone has with moving to a new site; the eternal worry that even if 99% of your friends and communities replicate themselves, there will always be that 1% left behind.

04. Because they're fandom-friendly! Not exclusively — they're kinda everyone-friendly, if you check out their Diversity Statement — but a lot of the Dreamwidth team are geeks and fandomers. They did a little all-fandoms comment kink meme as a reward for the hard work the coders put in. Denise made a D&D reference in one of her news posts. In a world where (as I was recently harshly reminded) fandom values and internet nerds are considered abnormal and "wrong", it's really refreshing to see people in charge of a social networking site who get along with fandoms and understand pop-culture. It helps me believe that my needs for the site are going to be met in the future, and it reinforces the idea that the site is put together by real people, not faceless mindless drones who only have the bottom line in mind.

Their terms of service are very clear about the fact that they are fine with fandom expression, that users are both responsible for and the ultimate possessors of their content, and that the Adult Content filters are there only for those who want to use them — though now that you can mark something as either "14+" or "18+" and include a reason why (such as "for porn" or "excessive swearing" I think I am far more likely to use them.) They don't discriminate based on race, colour, sex, sexuality, gender, age, beliefs, values, professions, interests or hobbies. Dreamwidth makes it very clear that it wants to be a playground everyone can play in together. (Except the spambots. No-one wants them in the sandbox.)

05. Because it's time for a change. This one is entirely personal. Eight years of history on LiveJournal is also eight years of baggage, of embarrassing entries I made when I was sixteen, people associating my username with something stupid I said when I was in the HP fandom, of endless tags and defunct filters, of "coming out" as an underage porn-writer and starting a shitstorm. This is a place to cut the dead weight from my flist, get new icons and a new identity. Inksome has shown me how freeing a fresh start can be, and I think Dreamwidth is going to give me a place where I can grow and change without being limited by my not-entirely-fresh start. I've grown increasingly fragmented around the internet, with separate journals for separate things and different social circles and ... different identities, almost. I plan to consolidate all of that in one journal, to use tags properly, to filter things so I can keep all my content in one place without ever feeling uncomfortable, and to generally organize my internet life, safe in the knowledge that Dreamwidth is happy to help provide the tools I need to do that with ease.

I should note that it doesn't have to be a fresh start; Dreamwidth provides the ability to port over your entire LiveJournal or InsaneJournal, including tags, comments, icons, private and flocked posts, etc. Like I said, this is the most subjective of all my reasons, but it's also the one which is most important to me.

When I actually get a journal there, I'll post a guide to how you can follow and comment on my posts without having to create your own Dreamwidth identity. The site is in Closed Beta at the moment, and when it moves to Open Beta accounts will only available with an invite code or through buying a Paid Account (minimum US$3.) I plan on doing the latter. I'll be prioritizing close friends and people I want to see on the site for invite codes when they're scarce, but later I'll be posting again here offering a code for anyone who wants one, regardless of whether or not I know you (as I did for Inksome.)

So that's why I'm moving to Dreamwidth! And why I'm so incredibly excited about it (this entry doesn't have nearly as many caps and exclamation points as it deserves). Despite the fact that me moving and you staying wouldn't make any difference to our interactions, I hope you choose to follow me in creating and using an account there, for whatever reason.

rage, rage against the dying of complicated poetry form.

bentley — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 11:56:33 GMT

i know that i am a woman of many talents, but i frequently lament the fact that poetry is not one of them. despite, or perhaps because of, the fact that all my poems are gauche bullshit, i have an intense fascination with poets who can produce quality work. good poetry moves me; it makes me hungry to write, and it makes me bitter with the knowledge that i can't.

my favourite form is the villanelle. seriously, this is the way to my heart. there aren't many good ones, but to celebrate national poetry month, have a selection of my favourites. (god knows i won't remember to post poems i like each day.)

villanelle / w. h. auden.

Time can say nothing but I told you so,
Time only knows the price we have to pay;
If I could tell you, I would let you know.

If we should weep when clowns put on their show,
If we should stumble when musicians play,
Time can say nothing but I told you so.

There are no fortunes to be told, although
Because I love you more than I can say,
If I could tell you, I would let you know.

The winds must come from somewhere when they blow,
There must be reasons why the leaves decay;
Time can say nothing but I told you so.

Perhaps the roses really want to grow,
The vision seriously intends to stay;
If I could tell you, I would let you know.

Suppose the lions all get up and go,
And all the brooks and soldiers run away?
Time can say nothing but I told you so.
If I could tell you, I would let you know.

mad girl's love song / sylvia plath.

I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

The stars go waltzing out in blue and red,
And arbitrary darkness gallops in:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I dreamed that you bewitched me into bed
And sung me moon-struck, kissed me quite insane.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

God topples from the sky, hell's fires fade:
Exit seraphim and Satan's men:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I fancied you'd return the way you said.
But I grow old and I forget your name.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

I should have loved a thunderbird instead;
At least when spring comes they roar back again.
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

villanelle / william empson.

It is the pain, it is the pain endures.
Your chemic beauty burned my muscles through.
Poise of my hands reminded me of yours.

What later purge from this deep toxin cures?
What kindness now could the old salve renew?
It is the pain, it is the pain endures.

The infection slept (custom or changes inures)
And when pain's secondary phase was due
Poise of my hands reminded me of yours.

How safe I felt, whom memory assures,
Rich that your grace safely by heart I knew.
It is the pain, it is the pain endures.

My stare drank deep beauty that still allures.
My heart pumps yet the poison draught of you.
Poise of my hands reminded me of yours.

You are still kind whom the same shape immures.
Kind and beyond adieu. We miss our cue.
It is the pain, it is the pain endures.
Poise of my hands reminded me of yours.

villanelle for D.G.B. / marilyn hacker.

Every day our bodies separate,
exploded torn and dazed.
Not understanding what we celebrate

we grope through languages and hesitate
and touch each other, speechless and amazed;
and every day our bodies separate

us farther from our planned, deliberate
ironic lives. I am afraid, disphased,
not understanding what we celebrate

when our fused limbs and lips communicate
the unlettered power we have raised.
Every day our bodies' separate

routines are harder to perpetuate.
In wordless darkness we learn wordless praise,
not understanding what we celebrate;

wake to ourselves, exhausted, in the late
morning as the wind tears off the haze,
not understanding how we celebrate
our bodies. Every day we separate.

the villanelle is what? / john m. ford.

I am the King now, and I want a sandwich.
This monarch business makes a fellow hungry.
I wonder where my brother Richard is.

What happened to the kippers left from breakfast?
Or maybe there's a bit of cold roast pheasant.
I am the King now, and I want a sandwich.

A civil war is such an awful bother.
We fought at Tewksbury and still ran out of mustard.
I wonder where my brother Richard is.

Speak not to me of pasta Marinara.
I know we laid in lots of boar last Tuesday.
I am the King now, and I want a sandwich.

The pantry seems entirely full of Woodvilles
And Clarence has drunk two-thirds of the cellar.
I wonder where my brother Richard is.

If I ran England like I run that kitchen
You'd half expect somebody to usurp it.
I am the King now, and I want a sandwich.
I wonder where my brother Richard is.

And my favourite:

open letter

bentley — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 04:50:40 GMT

Dear fandom, internet, and geek population at large.

Liking things is not a competition. It doesn't matter whether you saw it first or know more obscure references. It's nice of you to share, of course, but there are no nerd-ranks, no prizes for having played more video games or read more DC or for liking a character the most. Boasting won't help you win friends and influence people.

Unless you created it yourself, you're still just a fan amongst hundreds of fans. It's nice to know other people like things you like, and it's nice to try and introduce them to other stuff they'll like. But don't expect accolades for having had the good fortune to hear about a show/band/comic/movie/book/etc first.

Not everyone noticed that minor artistic detail on page #239 which has completely changed the way you interpreted Character Z. In fact, not everyone interprets things "correctly" (ie, the way you do.) That doesn't make you a superior person. You're still writing fanfiction, or pretending to be a character on the internet, or any number of things that baffle the "normal" population of the world.

Instead of acting like insecure children one-upping each other, let's all just share, and enjoy, and have fun in our hobby, okay? There are more important things.

♥, Greenie.

Fable

bentley — Sat, 29 Oct 2005 13:22:12 GMT

Once upon a time
There was a lonely wolf
Lonelier than the angels.

He happened to come to a village
He fell in love with the first house he saw.

Already he loved its walls
The caresses of its bricks.
But the windows stopped him.

In the room sat people,
Apart from God, nobody ever
Found them so beautiful
As this child-like beast.

So at night he went into the house,
He stopped in the middle of the room
And never moved from there anymore.

He stood all through the night, with wide eyes,
And on into the morning when he was beaten to death.

_{János Pilinszky
(Translated from the Hungarian by Ted Hughes and János Csokrois)}

Harry and Voldemort: a correction?

bentley — Fri, 01 Jul 2005 04:18:23 GMT

Last time I did this, it was to argue that Remus was evil, and that was Moony’s fault as well.

The following contains references to all five books, and under the cut is an extract from JKR’s website and an analysis of the American cover of HBP that may be construed, for the very paranoid, as spoilers. You have been warned.

This sacrifice turned out to be vitally important, for it was the ancient magic of this act that protected the child. When Voldemort's Avada Kedavra curse hit Harry, the protection of Lily's sacrifice made the curse rebound onto Voldemort, who was all but killed. The curse left a curse scar in the shape of a lightning bolt on Harry's forehead.
- from the Harry Potter Lexicon.

Recently, I asked my friends list why they thought Voldemort was "killed" that night in Godric's Hollow. (Or at least, injured enough to need to possess animals and disappear for about ten years.) The answer was basically the same as what the Lexicon has to say. However I believe that this is another example of fanon, fandom and the movies digging into the perception of canon.

Dumbledore says: “Your mother died to save you. If there is one thing Voldemort cannot understand, it is love. He didn’t realise that a love so powerful as your mother’s for you leaves its own mark. Not a scar, not a visible sign… to have been loved so deeply, even though the person who loved us is gone, will give us some protection forever. It is in your very skin. Quirrell, full of hatred, greed and ambition could not touch you for this reason. It was agony to touch a person marked by something so good.” [PS/SS.]

However I do not believe that this “marking” is why the curse injured Voldemort – nor indeed that is the true reason the curse rebounded and set the prophecy in motion in the first place.

So what was the real reason? Dumbledore says “We can only guess… we may never know.” [PS/SS.] JKR says “for some mysterious reason, the curse didn't work on Harry.” Dumbledore is unsure about it for so long in the books – surely the solution of Lily dying for Harry would have been obvious from the very first? Voldemort, too, is confused as to why the curse rebounded and killed him.

It is Harry who makes the assumption that fandom believes as fact. “No-one knows why you lost your powers when you attacked me,” said Harry abruptly. “I don’t know myself. But I know why you couldn’t kill me. Because my mother died to save me.” [CoS.]

Riddle muses on this, believing that it was just pure luck. However numerous interviews from JKR state that this is not the case at all; that Harry is an exceptionally powerful wizard who is growing into his powers, and that Voldemort's non-death is important to the future plot.

The first question that I have never been asked—it has probably been asked in a chatroom but no one has ever asked me—is, “Why didn’t Voldemort die?” Not, “Why did Harry live?” but, “Why didn’t Voldemort die?” The killing curse rebounded, so he should have died. Why didn’t he? At the end of Goblet of Fire he says that one or more of the steps that he took enabled him to survive. You should be wondering what he did to make sure that he did not die—I will put it that way. I don’t think that it is guessable. It may be—someone could guess it—but you should be asking yourself that question, particularly now that you know about the prophesy.

So I’m not going to guess. Suffice to say, whatever it is didn’t show up in the Priori Incantatum in GoF. However I believe we are going to find out in Book Six.

You see, the cover shows Dumbledore and Harry peering into a Pensieve that is lighting up the room with green. We found out quite a lot about Pensieves in OotP, not the least that when entering someone’s memories, the person in the Pensieve can hear and see things which may not have been seen or heard by the person whose memory it is. The best example of this is Harry listening to MWPP joking around in Snape’s Worst Memory, despite the fact that Snape does not seem to be aware that they’re there, or watching what they’re doing.

JKR states on her website that Harry never saw Voldemort kill his mother or father because he was in his cot. So my theory is that in HBP Harry will use Dumbledore’s Pensieve to examine his one-year-old memories for a clue to exactly what happened between he and Voldemort on that night.

I believe they will begin to find out why Voldmort was able to survive the rebounded Killing Curse – perhaps by putting some of himself into Harry through his scar or eyes? Whatever the case, the entire house was destroyed but the two wizards, one the (second?) strongest in the Wizarding World and the other a baby, survived – and not because of Lily’s counter-curse.