Trust the Yarn.

"I'll just be a story in your head...and that's okay. We're all stories in the end."

2013-12-27T01:33:08Z

I'm sure everyone who believes that Moffat is the WORST THING EVER to happen to Doctor Who will be picking things apart soon enough, but I'm going the route of ignoring them (aside from wondering why they're still watching the series if they've come to hate it so very much. Turning it off worked wonderfully for me with the X-Files, Stargate Universe, AND the entire SyFy Channel.) and reminding myself that different people view things in different ways.

Suffice to say, yeah, I CRIED ALL THE TEARS at Eleven's regeneration, despite the fact that I'm sure I'll enjoy every bit of Twelve's tenure, given that I have a certain amount of affection for every incarnation of the Doctor.

None so much as Four, though. Four is always going to be special.

But Matt Smith is a phenomenal actor, and I'll genuinely miss his high adorkablity, oddly gentle gallantry, and amazing chemistry with Jenna Coleman.

Also, wow, way to wrap up every single dangling story thread in one go, Moffat! The man really loves him some predestination paradox, doesn't he? And that was like the storyline of THE PREDESTINATION PARADOX RULES ALL!!! going on.

Admittedly, on reflection, I'm a tad annoyed at Eleven NOW taking into account that this is effectively his last incarnation, but that's mostly because I'd have been really okay with the Beeb just quietly dropping something I've always considered a pretty damn arbitrary plot point in the first place, and it's not like Eleven himself seemed to be taking that into account whilst having the Tessalecta put on a regeneration light show or healing River's wrist with regeneration energy.

But, meh, minor quibble, and there are some seriously die-hard fans that will argue regeneration limits to the last. I don't really wanna get into it with them, and it's sure not like Doctor Who has been THAT stringent about following it's own internal continuity over fifty years. (Genetic looms, anyone? Hey, what about the Doctor being half-human? Or Peri's god-awful attempt at an American accent?) Anyway, between the Master and the Valeyard, it seems to have been established that the Time Lords CAN grant unlimited regenerations, so there ya go. Hand-wavey, timey-wimey justification to keep the story going in all the best traditions of Doctor Who.

All hail the Almighty Plot Hole of Gallifrey! Fifty years and still going strong!

I love that it ultimately WASN'T the Doctor who spoke to the Time Lords, but Clara, and that she's the one who convinced them, despite thier massive xenophobia about humans that, yeah, they really needed to help him out this time. One, he's really thier only chance of getting back into this universe, and two, how many times does the man have to save thier collective asses before they finally acknowledge that, yeah, they might just happen to care about him a bit?

I also like Clara pointing out that the name that the Doctor was born with doesn't matter. It's the name that he chose that's become who he IS, and it sums up everything that you really need to know about him. It also fits in with an idea that goes all the way back to Eleven's first adventures, that it's really the stories that permeate the universe that keeps it going, and the Doctor has become a rather epic and hopeful example of one of those stories, something further enforced as Eleven tells us himself that it's fine to change as long as you never forget the people you were before and the lessons you learned from them and that he will never forget a single line of Eleven's story, no matter who he becomes from there.

Also, the Time Lords granting more life to Eleven immediately brought to mind River's line from The Wedding of River Song. "You've saved so many lives...touched so many people. When your own time came, did you really think you'd have to do more than just ask? You've decided the universe is better off without you, but the universe doesn't agree."

And in so many ways, especially since the outcome of the Time War, that's been a central theme in the Doctor's life. His complete self-loathing and his total inability to see himself as someone that people can admire and even love deeply and I see this as the response to that. Maybe the ENTIRE UNIVERSE can't get through his thick head that he's far too hard on himself, but finally getting the forgiveness from his people that he's been seeking for centuries? That might just do it.

So, Eleven gets his goodbyes to Clara, becomes a hero to the people of Christmas, gains his people's forgiveness, gets a goodbye from both little Amelia and Amy, and is allowed to keep going? Yeah, I'm a quietly weeping mess by this point.

At first, I felt a wee bit bad, because I'm over here in a sobbing huddle over Eleven, but Ten's regeneration had me going, "oh, for god's sake, just GO ALREADY!"

But, then again, Moffat wasn't going the route of beating me over the head with "OMG, this is SAD! Look at how SAD it all is! The Bestest Doctor EVAR is regenerating and it's SAD! And we're going to sing a WHOLE SONG about it because he's REGENERATING and it's SAD! And he doesn't want to go and it's SAD!"

And in the meantime, I'm over here wondering how the hell I'm going to clean all the wangst off my couch, cause damn.

Eleven, on the other hand, went out as the gentle, kind hero he's always been, at peace with what he's done and knowing that, whatever comes next, it's gonna be okay. He'll miss us, we'll miss him, and it's still going to be okay.

And then Twelve has apparently forgotten how to pilot the Tardis.

The Brigadeer: ....well, here we go again.

So, that's my fabulously rambling thoughts on The Time of the Doctor.

I should probably put together a general life update, but I'm thinking I might go find some food first because food is always a win. Also, I've apparently been on a tear of rereading all the Redwall books lately and, wow, but I'd forgotten how much I love them.

Hope everyone had an awesome set of holidays and here's hoping good things keep going and the bad things GO AWAY in 2014!

"Just go foward in all your beliefs...and prove to me that I am not mistaken in mine."

2013-11-23T04:36:20Z

The ending to An Adventure in Space and Time has me currently crying ALL THE TEARS. I'm not going to post any spoilers here, but it's beautiful and funny and sad and has a remarkably bittersweet ending with a delightful surprise at the end that had me laughing and crying at the same time.

I hope everyone involved with this movie is justifibly proud of themselves.

...and I'd really seriously be okay with the Doctor showing up right now to give me a big hug and tell me that everything's okay and that William Hartnell was happy at the end.

Y'know...if he can find the time to. He's a busy man.

Alphanumeric!

2013-10-04T04:06:27Z

So, I'm perusing the Books of Face as I am occasionally wont to do, and I discover this particular little news item:

Sweet 90's Nostalgia: ReBoot is Being Rebooted For TV!

I think my girl Rainbow Dash is the only one who can adequately express my reaction to this news:

(Also, has anyone else noticed that when you type a pony's name into the Youtube search bar, it comes up in said pony's signature colors?)

So, yes, a ReBoot reboot might lead to a mass fan outcry of They Changed It, Now It Sucks, but surely I can live in a bit of hope in the meanwhile, right?

And maybe this time we'll get a less bitchy fandom with more maturity and less backstabbing?

...snerk

...snort

...giggle

(bursts into loud, hysterical laughter)

Oh man, that's a good one! Hee! Maturity from ReBoot fandom? (wiping away laugh-tears)Oh, I crack me up. Well, hopefully the series'll be worth watching at any rate.

karma_aster @ 2013-10-02T02:12:00

2013-10-02T06:11:55Z

I'm bored, I'm drifting, and it's past time to move on. I'm just not sure to what, but I'm miserable where I am.

And I'm pretty much feeling like people only notice me these days to tell me everything I'm screwing up or just pretend to care in order to manipulate me into doing something that they want. Either way, that tells me it's time to go somewhere else.

Not like I'll really be missing anything if I do.

Kind of an odd dream, really...

2013-06-18T03:01:19Z

So, I had an oddly coherent and ordered dream wherein the Doctor was having a fairly friendly chat with a girl that he met and rescued from a random dangerous incident involving alien badness. He asked her if she was all right afterwards, and was somewhat startled to have her dissolve into a crying mess about something that seemed to have nothing to do with the life-threatening circumstances from whence he had extracted her so, being the very kind person that he is, he took her for coffee, asked her what was wrong and tehn proceeded to begin consoling after what she reveals is a fairly dramatic and horrific breakup.

Had I recently been having any sort of relationship drama whatsoever (which I am so not and likely never will again because dating? Who needs it? Bleh.) or bore any resemblence to this girl in the slightest, it'd make some sense, but...yeah. Totally random and baffling on this end.

But, yeah, the Doctor was amazingly kind and funny in the right proportions, and was clearly a great comfort to the girl, who really, really needed a friend at that moment, so it was really a very NICE dream.

Maybe my subconcious just really wants to have a bit of a nice friendly chat with the Doctor and feels that one can't do so if the circumstances aren't somewhat dire?

Too bad. I imagine he's quite good at the random, friendly chats. And he also probably gives fantastic hugs if you're feeling just a bit lonely.

Seriously, ya'll...I have GOT to stop reading the comments on Yahoo.

2013-05-14T01:22:21Z

I posted a comment on a political news story predicting the vitrol, mindless spewing of Fox News talking points, name-calling, "clever" insults to both liberals and the Obama administration, and slew of horrific spelling and grammar to come.

And then every attack on my comment? Was the exact type of attack I'd predicted in the original comment.

Is it wrong that I want to cackle gleefully and exclaim, "Dance, my puppets, DANCE!"?

And if that's wrong, do I really wanna be right?

We don't learn, do we?

2013-04-20T04:04:10Z

I was watching a thing on the Science Channel earlier about how we would deal with visitation by a hypothetical alien species whilst reading up on the situation in Boston, including all of the fabulously racist anti-Islam crap and all about how the terrorists are out to get us and all Muslims can't be trusted and need to be deported immediately.

We can't seem to even handle variations amongst our own species, how the fuck would we handle first contact with nonhuman sentients?

Shit. Forget finding intelligent life on other planets. I'm despairing of even finding it here.

Note to Self:

2013-03-03T05:12:35Z

Self...you do not have the resources OR the know-how to create music videos. You KNOW THIS perfectly well.

So, why on earth are you STILL plotting out an all-eras Doctor Who video to Back In Time in your head? It's not gonna happen, self! Stop!

Besides, there are probably already fifty million horrifically goopy ones for Rose and Ten already out there. I haven't had the strength to look, but most of the fangirls who worship the almighty Rose/Ten ship (bleh!) tend to forget that Doctors existed before the Ninth one.

Qalupalik

2013-02-25T06:26:20Z

Nunavut Animation Lab: Qalupalik by Ame Papatsie, National Film Board of Canada

I've noticed a growing facination with Inuit folklore for a while now, and things like this just make me want to learn more about it. I've read up a bit on some of the deities, mostly touched off by the discovery of Sedna a few years back, but recently it's come back with a vengence.

Anyone know of any good resources for Inuit folklore and mythology? Or decent books written on the subject or whatnot?

No. Shut up. You are stupid and wrong.

2013-01-17T00:05:53Z

The NRA apparently feel that they haven't been vile enough in recent days, so they chose to release ads informing us that the President is an "elitist hypocrite" for having a Secret Service detail to protect his children.

Y'know...I don't believe that President Obama's children are more important or precious than any other children on this Earth, but I do believe that they are the children of a very high-profile public official who has already fielded a rather large and disturbing number of death treats from unhinged loonies who I think would have absolutely no trouble attacking his family.

As such, those are children under a rather realistic level of danger, and, consequently, having them protected by armed Secret Service agents JUST MAKES SENSE. After all, why do you put an emergency chemical shower in a chemistry lab rather than a library? Because, while you might have some risk of getting hit by caustic chemicals while researching for your history paper, it's a hell of a lot more likely when you're in the place where the caustic chemicals actually live.

But, then again, I'm one of those gun control advocates who would never even allow a gun into my house because guns actually frighten me, so I suppose that makes me a monster who hates freedom, right?

Hey, Wayne LaPierre already established that anyone who's mentally ill is a monster, y'know!

Just...fuck these guys.

Adventures in Random Imagery:

2013-01-06T23:16:38Z

So, this is an exchange that happened between me and a coworker today:

Me: Happy Twelth Night!
Coworker: Oh, yeah, it is the Epiphany, isn't it?
Me: Yep! Jesus gets his presents today!
Coworker: Still...it took the Wise Men twelve days to get there?
Me: Well, twelve days isn't too shabby for traveling on camels, although they coulda totally used some dune buggies.
Coworker: ...
Me: You're totally seeing it, aren't you? You're totally imagining the Three Wise Men riding dune buggies.
Coworker: (cracking up)Well, I am NOW.

My coworkers are so awesomely weird sometimes.

Ye gods...

2012-12-07T05:37:00Z

I was singing the Love Boat theme at work earlier.

Line Guy: What's that?

Me: Uh, the Love Boat theme?

Line guy: (confused look)...the what?

Finding my first grey hair didn't do it, but at that moment, I felt officially old.

Welp...

2012-12-03T02:11:52Z

Nanowrimo was an abject failure. Probably shouldn't be surprised. It's not like THAT was gonna actually be the project that I actually succeeded at for once.

At least I'm nearly over this flu bug. Although the constant cough is getting kinda old.

Yep. I have totally lost my damn mind.

2012-10-19T06:05:40Z

I had a plotbunny. Said plotbunny kept gnawing at my mind. I signed up for Nanowrimo.

I am clearly insane.

Oh, and it's going to involve fairytale tropes and smartass fairies. Because smartass fae are awesome.

Eeee!

2012-09-09T02:07:49Z

Dinosaurs! Onna spaceship!

Seriously, orders of magnitude cooler than snakes onna plane.

Also, my seven-year-old dinosaur-obsessed self was totally bouncing up and down gleefully.

Dinosaurs are AWESOME, dude.

Having a tough day?

2012-09-07T22:34:45Z

Do a Google image search for "baby squirrel".

I swear, it makes EVERYTHING better.

So, this is easily the most awesome thing I've seen all week:

2012-08-26T02:40:23Z

Small child at work happily playing with a toy truck as his dad steps away to refill his iced tea. Me and other cashier are puttering around tidying and restocking and occasionally smiling at the kid being cute when we both suddenly hear:

"DUN-DUN-DUN...DUN-DA-DUN! DUN-DA-DUN!"

I glance over at the other cashier. "Um...that's the Imperial March."

"Yep," he replies, beginning to crack up.

Tertiary cashier pops out from the back a moment later. "Was that the kid?"

"Yep."

"Damn," she says, looking amused and impressed. "I guess playtime just got real."

Guys, really?

2012-08-06T23:14:49Z

Can we stop distinquishing Oscar Pistorius's opponents as "able-bodied" in comparison to him?

Someone capable of running at an Olympic level is plenty "able-bodied" no matter how many prosthetics he's wearing. Trust me on this. Physical differances aside, he's definately not "disabled."

It's just irritating to constantly be hearing the term "able-bodied" in this instance, like he's not proven that he's just as capable of competing at the same level as any other olympic runner.

Sorta like the flak about Gabby Douglas's hair. Sheesh! She's an amazing athlete and cute as a button to boot. Who gives a flip about her hair? There's not a thing wrong with her hair and it has not a damn thing to do with her abilities!

The Olympics are not supposed to make me angry! Stop making me angry, NBC!

Pretty much a pointless update:

2012-07-28T22:02:49Z

But I'm kinda used to shouting into the void these days anyway, so...eh.

Lizzie allowed me to clip her claws without making me bleed for the privlege, although it involved a liberal use of a blanket to burrito her in so I wouldn't get hit with Flailing Claws of Death. Then she was pissy at me, so she got a nice through brushing and I filled her food dish which led to much purring and head-butting. I guess that means she won't be killing me in my sleep?

Opening Ceremonies last night rocked my socks. I think it was a perfect choice to not try to outdo Bejing, but to create something playful, quirky, and uniquely British. But tell me that I wasn't imagining the TARDIS engine noise during one of the sequences?

Because that had me bolting up off the couch and going, "Doctor? Where?"

And then one of my neighbors kept having thier car alarm going off loudly at an ungodly hour, so that was less fun. I debated marching out there and manually shutting it off with a sledgehammer. Sadly, this plan was thwarted by my lack of a sledgehammer.

Yes, so back to watching Doctor Who, knitting, and getting things ready for work tomorrow.

Why, hello, Desk! It's Head! How are the wife and kids?

2012-07-22T02:35:02Z

So, Rush Limbaugh has decided that The Dark Knight Rises is part of a vast left-wing conspiracy against Mitt Romney.

For those who don't wish to click the link, Rush (that bastion of reasoned and impartial political thought), has decided that the villian Bane, is a clear attack against Mitt Romney's former post at Bain Capital.

Impressive, given that Bane was a villian created nearly 20 years back for 1993's Vengence of Bane story arc, later rising to extreme prominence as the main villian of 1994's Knightfall. Also, he was a villian used rather ineptly in the exceedingly exretable Batman and Robin in 1997. All of this WAAAAAAAAY before Mitt Romney was anywhere near being a household name.

The question is, does Rush honestly believe this, or is this just a WTF? moment used to grab the attention he so desperately seems to crave?

In other Batman-related stupidity, I'm sure all of us are aware of the shocking and heartbreaking shooting in Aurora, CO yesterday. In retrospect, I'm not surprised that it took such a short time for some idiot to try and spin this tragedy to make political hay and selfishly use the deaths and suffering of others to represent thier own narrow point of view, but it still saddened and infuriated me to discover that Rep. Louie Gohmert(R-Texas) claimed only a few hours later that the attacks were part of "an ongoing attack on Judeo-Christian beliefs" and questioning why no one in the theatre had a gun in order to take down the shooter.

...

...what the ever-lovin'-

(strangely calm)If everyone could just step outside for a moment please.

Okay, now I believe myself calm enough to rationally explain every reason that this idiot is completely and utterly wrong. Or at least with a minimum of frothing at the mouth and swearing.

Same thing, really.

1. We don't really know why the shooter did this. All we know is that he called himself the Joker and set up a death trap to kill and injure a whole whack of innocent people. He booby-trapped his house and didn't seem to give a shit who got injured or killed as a result of entering. I'm fairly certain that mental illness is going to be at the root of this, and it's highly doubtful that dragging him to church every Sunday would have changed this outcome.

Plus, given the number of really horrible attrocities commited by various people in the name of Christianity, what an amazingly specious and ridiculous atatement to make in the first place. No matter what someone uses to "justify" thier evil, it's still evil. End of story.

2. People who know me know that I don't like guns. They frighten me, I don't even like to touch them, and there is no way in hell I would ever even allow one in my house. Other people may feel differently about guns and I accept and respect that fact, but I find them far more dangerous than they're worth and I don't want them around me.

I do, however, like going out to movies a great deal. I like going with my friends to movies a great deal. When going to the movies, I try to remember things like bringing enough money for a ticket and maybe food afterwards, sometimes bringing a light jacket if the theatre is really air-conditioned, a simple knitting project so I have something to keep me from fidgeting through the previews, y'know, things like that. At the theatre, I try to do things like settle in as non-disruptively as I can before the movie starts and making sure my cell is turned off.

At no point is the concept of preparing for ALL-OUT URBAN COMBAT even BEGINNING to cross my mind. Why don't people go to the movies packing heat? Because that's generally not the point of going to the movies. Now, I know that leaves all of us pretty well fucked sideways in the event of a sudden zombie apocalypse or, oh, Red Dawn scenario, but...and you can call me hopelessly naive if you like...those aren't really scenarios that most people envision during a night out at the movies.

3. When your shooter is wearing body armor, has set off smoke bombs abd tear gas, and is firing into a darkened theatre full of terrified, panicking, FLEEING people, it's PRETTY DAMN HARD for anyone to pull off a disabling or killing shot, especially if they don't want to injure or kill an innocent person. Snipers are craaaaaazy well-trained to make precise kill shots, and I even think a trained sniper would have had a hard time with that scenario, especially if, again, THEY DIDN'T WANT TO RISK KILLING AN INNOCENT PERSON.

And, just as total "this would absolutely never happen, ever, ever, EVER hypothetical," say I'm the crazy gunman. I'm shooting into a crowd of innocent and completely unarmed people with the goal of causing as much chaos and misery as possible and I see someone aiming a weapon at me in order to fight back. Who, pray tell, might you imagine MY first target is going to be?

Someone with a gun and firing back in that situation, unless they are a shooter of utterly god-like ability, is probably going to be amongst the first people killed or injured in such a scenario.

Having a gun and firing back would have done FUCK ALL in this case, and it is beyond stupid and irresponsible to claim that it would.

Let's praise the local emergency services for thier PHENOMENAL response times and subsequent actions at the scene which probably saved a whole hell of a lotta lives, pray, send positive energy, whatever to the survivors, victims, and families of those involved in this tragedy, and leave the partisian bickering and blame-laying out of it, shall we? This is a terrible thing and we truly do not need people's stupidity compounding a cloudying this more.

And, fuck it, I'm going to go knit and watch cartoons to calm down before I go to bed. I'd really suggest it as a cure for whatever's upsetting you.

Look! Things to read!

2012-07-13T22:00:01Z

Yep, this thing's making the rounds again! I saw it on beckyh2112's journal and thought "Oh, why not?" I'm surprised by how many of these I've read, honestly.

The Big Read reckons that the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books they've printed.

1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
2) Italicize those you intend to read.
3) Underline those you LOVE.
4) Put two plus signs next to the ones that you've tried to read and then gave up on.
5) Put an asterisk next to the books you'd rather die than read (or read again).

01. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen(I go through a periodic Jane Austen phase and I happen to love the hell outta Emma.)
02. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
03. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
04. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
05. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
06. The Bible(A childhood of church camp every summer insures this, really.)
07. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte(Just because it does sound delightfully melodramatic. Also, Kate Beaton of Hark! a vagrant fame created a series of insanely funny cartoons based on it.)
08. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
09. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
12. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare(Hey, once you've read "Titus Andronicus", Shakespeare can't get anymore hokey.)
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier(I've read "The Birds" and I've heard that this one's even creepier.)
16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18. ++Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger(Holden Caufield is such a whiny little dick.)
19. Both nineteen and the cake are a lie.
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell(I really should. I am Southern girl, after all.)
22. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia - C.S. Lewis
34. Emma - Jane Austen
35. Persuasion - Jane Austen
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis(Redundant entry is redundant!)
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh - A.A. Milne
41. Animal Farm - George Orwell
42. *The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez(I loved Chronicle of a Death Foretold. I've always meant to read more of his work.)
44. A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables - L.M. Montgomery
47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood(Great book, stupid ending.)
49. *Lord of the Flies - William Golding(SO MUCH HATE for this book.)
50. Atonement - Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52. ++Dune - Frank Herbert(People tell me it's brilliant, but I just can't get into it.)
53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64. ++The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold(It just didn't work for me.)
65. The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70. *Moby Dick - Herman Melville("Dense, symbolist tome" doesn't even BEGIN to cover it.)
71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses - James Joyce
76. ++The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal - Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession - A.S. Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte's Web - E.B. White
88. *The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92. The Little Prince - Antoine de Saint-Exupery(I totally agreed with the narrator's frustration about people not getting that his picture was of a snake having eaten an elephant.)
93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94. Watership Down - Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare(I've not read the COMPLETE WORKS, mind, but I've gotten a good way into them.)
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Seriously, no love for James Thurber or Ursula LeGuin? What's up with that?

I've apparently been on a Back to the Future kick lately.

2012-07-08T02:01:38Z

And wilst looking up music from it on Youtube, I came across this little pony-related gem:

Awesome remake of an awesome song with awesome ponies? What more can you ask for, really?

Although I'm gonna have that song stuck in my head for the rest of the day now. Since the power of love is a curious thing.

So, another one for the cracked-out dreams file:

2012-06-26T01:18:44Z

Try My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic meets The Hunger Games.

No, I'm not actually kidding.

Post-apocalypic Equestria. Twilight Sparkle as an archery expert and stand-in for Katniss Everdeen. For some reason, Peeta was still Peeta, just in pony-form.

And a really, really crazed Pinkie Pie with lots of firearms and apparently a reject from the Road Warrior.

Seriously, NO ONE wanted to fuck with Crazy!Pinkie Pie in this dream.

I have to assume that Celestia and Luna were overthrown or something for the sake of my sanity, but definately one of the most cracked-out dreams I have had in a SERIOUSLY long time.

And apparently Twilight is a hell of an archer.

Karen Huff Klein

2012-06-22T05:40:43Z

This broke my heart and is incredibly hard to watch all the way through, but it's also something that desperately needs to be shared. Triggers apply to this video for intense bullying, verbal taunts, inappropriate sexual commentary, swearing, and references to suicide.

It is VERY painful viewing.

This is a video that's gone viral of Karen Huff Klein, a 68 year old bus monitor in the Greece Central School District of Rochester, NY being mercilessly bullied by a group of middle school students.

Amongst taunts about her weight, her age, and her financial situation are genuine threats of violence and massively inappropriate sexual comments. What's most upsetting is that the bullying drives Ms. Klein to tears and NO ONE STEPPED IN TO STOP IT.

I remember plenty of bus rides home as a teenager where bullying was a frequent occurance and plenty of days at school that had similar verbal taunting and this video both made me want to cry and filled me with intense rage against this pack of children and thier cruelty.

The school district has released a statement that they are attempting to identify all the perpetuators and that all will face strong disciplinary action for thier behavior. And, with any luck, thier parents are going to see this and go ballistic because I would be horrified and LIVID if my child treated anyone this way, let alone a 68 year old woman.

If interested, this is the school's contact page, and this is the school's main website.

Please share this story so that people can see that bullying isn't just kid stuff. Bullying is real, disgustingly widespread, and horrifying.

This is awesome:

2012-06-18T23:54:45Z

And this is post is entirely to share it:

Enjoy!