First and foremost . . . a footnote. That balloon thing: it's over. So if you didn't read the protected entry and you were waiting for an explanation, well, it's not coming now from me. Sorry.
Now, I have been laid up the past few days with the most stubborn sore throat I have ever had. Now, don't get the wrong idea: I can function with a sore throat. A little pain isn't going to incapacitate me. I'm just cautious. So when I got a horrible sore throat, and particularly given the season, I decided to play it safe and stay home in bed all day. Which I did. I ¡even missed kung-fu! for it. And it has not gone away. I've used up every throat lozenge easily at hand, mostly ceased speaking, and it has not gotten better. It hurts to swallow or yawn. What is this, a cosmic comment on how stubborn I am?, that even my hiccups and sore throats have to be utterly stubborn as well?
But I won't let it stop me. If it doesn't get better through rest tomorrow, I will go on with my life, throwing in a doctor's visit for the sake of caution. Damn! And I also have had to take the socially conscious precaution of not exposing other people, which will make me feel guilty if I go out on Monday with a still-sore throat. Oh well. I can touch my chin to my chest, I don't have a fever or a cough, I'm hopefully not contagious through the air. It would just be much more convenient if it simply went away, though.
Now, a question for those familiar with Chinese vegetables: What looks like asparagus, to an untrained eye and hand acts like asparagus, but isn't asparagus? I haven't tried it plain, so I can't tell you if it for certain tastes lie asparagus, but I've put it in several stir-fries as asparagus and it's worked just fine. My mother tells me that it's a Chinese vegetable of some kind--which makes sense, given that I got it at a Chinese market. I'm just wondering: what is this mysterious green shoot, and what makes it special? Just a name would be sufficient to pursue this further, so if anyone could provide one, I'd be quite happy.
It looks like asparagus, it wiggles like asparagus, but it isn't asparagus. Anyone know?
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So, I keep meaning to post. I've written a few new posts, but keep not finishing we11 enough to post them as pub1ic. Among these, topics inc1ude "I now know what it's 1ike to 1ick an ashtray," "I hate jea1ousy!!!!!" and "Back to the Seven Mountains." Oh, and "Tiger!" "Dragon!!" and "The Crane Whose One Leg Bears Its A11." Curious? We11 . . . sorry. No, seriou1y, I am sorry, I just can't keep up with the entries as I perhaps ought, and if I try to go into exp1aining what those tit1es mean, I'11 get into another 1ong entry that I can't finish. Maybe if you're rea11y interested someday I'11 write exp1anations to those tit1es.
Now, first of a11 . . . Why the 1337 5p34k? No, I don't enjoy random1y inserting numbers in p1ace of 1etters. It's just part of an attempted temporary so1ution to this 1itt1e prob1em ca11ed MY S AND L KEYS DON'T WORK UNLESS I'M HOLDING DOWN ANOTHER KEY! And no, it's not the keys themse1ves. In any keyboard configuration, such as Dvorak right-handed, the keys for S and L don't work. In said configuration, the U and 6 keys don't work. So, not hardware.
How have I sometimes written s or l, or S or L? Easy—wait, no, not easy. I've got two basic options: put on CAPS LOCK and press down SHIFT at the same time as typing (I've rea11y gotten pretty good at typing whi1e ho1ding SHIFT down), or copy-paste. For a whi1e I was using the SHIFT method, then copy-paste for both, but I a1so use copy-paste for em-dashes, and it was getting more than cumbersome to be pasting in three characters and then se1ecting the one I wanted. So S got the c/p, and L got the 1337 method--sometimes |, but that sti11 invo1ves pressing SHIFT, so . . . the 1 character is sometimes easier. But writing can get very annoying, especia11y when I'm writing one of my stories and I'11 want to be ab1e to Ctrl-H out any rep1acement characters, etc, etc, etc. . . .
Sooooo, no more bitching about that, because then this entry wi11 get too 1ong, and it's a1ready annoying writing something this 1ong in the fashion I've been using. Okay, 1ast item on the agenda . . .
I cut my hair again. Did I hear someone gasp? No, don't worry. This "cut" was 1ess than some "trims" have been. It's just to keep it from being super-exceeding1y annoying, 1ike wrenching my head back when I sit down or such. It's sti11 freakin' 1ong and a freakin' hass1e to take care of. And oh, in midd1e schoo1 Mrs. C______ was certain that by the time I graduated from HS I'd've cut it short. (Let's temporari1y ignore the fact that I didn't technica11y graduate from HS.) Haha; joke's on her. ::grin::
(For a11 the comp1aints, I do 1ike my hair 1ong.)
Last thing to mention I'd've 1iked to have b1ogged about: Going to NJ and not being ab1e to use my mother's FREAKIN' OLD Windows 98 computer that COULDN'T READ MY USB KEY BECAUSE IT DIDN'T HAVE THE DRIVER. (It a1so won't connect to the internet, so, no getting the driver via that route.) Next time I'11 have to put whatever I want to transfer on a FLOPPY DISK. Yeah. Exact1y.
Ciao, fo1ks!
P.S. - If you find a red ba11oon, te11 me. I *intend* to exp1ain more 1ater!
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| Date: | 2009-09-03 02:54 |
| Subject: | Very Backlogged Entry |
| Security: | Public |
| Mood: |  rushed | | Music: | various Prometheus filk, VNV Nation, & "Apres Moi" by Regina Spektor |
This is something I began to write on: and never got around to finishing. It's very angsty. Now, I want to post a new entry about my trip to UTAH, and a general one asking for people's birthdays so I can enter them into my shiny new phone, but I want to post what I wrote of this before I do all that. So, here ya go. Very Backlogged Entry. You can see my notes at the bottom of whatever else I meant to write. The acronym stands for All I Ask of You, the song. I meant to talk about how selfish a song it is. Warning: I haven't proofread it, so it's exactly as it was two months ago.
This entry has quite a lot to say. I just saw my house in NJ for probably the last time, after spending much longer in it than expected partly owing to a delayed closing date. That house meant quite a lot to me, owing in large part to having grown up in it since I was six, and in another large part to the graves of my dearly beloved children being in the far reaches of the backyard. It's been an eventful and painful more-than-a-week, and has brought up a few issues that seem utterly unrelated to a house or the loss of such.
Let's begin with the current topic on my mind, which is the comfort of sleeping in a bed. I've never been much one for ergonomics, and certainly not one to be picky over mattresses. When I was a kid I slept for a few months on a coffee table with perhaps just a thin blanket under me for padding, and I know that I've slept on the floor before with no problem. Hence my confusion at being thoroughly not only uncomfortable, but in great pain when the furniture had been moved out and I began sleeping on the floor of the living room.
I chose that spot specifically because of its padding. The carpet is soft to walk on; it has an about one-half inch (maybe less) foam pad underneath it, and the carpet itself isn't exactly thing or hard-woven. I pulled it to a corner, stacked up some decorative pillows that will probably be going to my apt and thus were still around, and lay out a comforter on the ground, using half of it as the underpart of my bed. Half to sleep on, half to sleep under. A good arrangement, no?
The first night wasn't too bad. It was after a few nights that the back pain really began to set in. With all fairness, I had been doing a lot of heavy lifting, as I am the primary party doing that since no one else is around to take care of that. I can lift a 30 lb. box with ease, provided I can get a good handle on it--a fact which I say merely as a basis of comparison--and most of our boxes had that as an easy minimum. So that could have contributed to the back pain. But I digress. The point is, after a bit, my back started hurting, and before very long, that pain was almost unbearable. I think only my exhaustion has caused me to sleep as well as I did. {Interestingly, I passed out from pure exhaustion--and a good bed under me--at the very end of that sentence.) By the last night I was semi-conscious for half the time, and once actually pushed a kitty off me to roll onto my side.
I was speaking with an adult friend--and by that I mean, someone who was an adult when I was a kid and hasn't since become a peer--and when I mentioned my confusion over not being able to sleep on the hard floor with no qualms she said, "You're not as young as you used to be." I was still a little groggy from recently having woken up, and the unfiltered response that burst out of me was, "That's horrible!" She said, "Welcome to my world."
It really is horrible, though. I'm "getting older", in the sense of GETTING OLDER. I'm not as young and spry as I used to be! Agh! Sleeping on a floor for a week has me complaining!
Now, you may have been given this long ranting if I'd been available for several, shorter rants, but I wasn't. This reason is much more horrifying. I have been WITHOUT INTERNET for the past more-than-a-week! Yup. Exactly. Word.
- no bed
- no INTERNET
- AIAoY
- graves
- magnolia tree
- support of friends
- letters I've found
- goddamn packing
- fucking delayed closing
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| Date: | 2009-08-08 03:53 |
| Subject: | BSG |
| Security: | Public |
| Mood: |  contemplative |
I have finished Battlestar Galactica.
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Yo . . . I need someone in the Philly area with whom I can test AT&T service in my apt. It looks like my family might be going for that, so I really need to know how the service is with that.
Opinions on the topic would be appreciated as well. The heavy matter here is the iPhone and web capabilities. My family seems to think this is the best of the choices offered.
And I am sleepy and whoozy so I can't be blamed for what I say here, just in case I say something stupid, even though I'm still trying to* not.
*Split infinitive noted and decided stylisticalliy acceptable--even nearly necessary.
***
***BSG SPOILER ALERT***
Oh, and is BSG just trying to shake things up by killing people off? (Despite the claim that they've known all along what from happening.) BTW, I understand and like Felix Gaeta. I just "wish" he hadn't shared a smile with Tom Zerek before getting executed. Felix tried to do the right thing all along. He didn't realize where things would go, or the reckoning within himself that he would face.
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On this day one year ago, Trixy C-W died at approximately 6:15 AM. The wound is still fresh; it feels not like so much time has passed. A whole year. He was with me more than half of my life.
I don't have a birthdate for him, and even his adoption date is fuzzy. All I have is the date of his death. So this morning I woke up in the early morning, lit candles, and did my best to reach out to him beyond the grave. And, call me whatever you like, I could feel him reaching back. Some events are just too improbable.
I paid extra attention to my kitties, all of them--including Lucri, even though she isn't technically my daughter or even my niece. All day I've given them special attention. On a regular basis I try to pay great attention to my cats, but today I went beyond. The Kitten mews at me, and I sit back down and give him more attention, even though I've been sitting and giving him attention for 20 minutes already and only mean to get up for about 90 seconds. For example.
My actions at first felt odd--like I was celebrating his death. But no: today I celebrated Trixy's life. With respect to the gravity of the anniversary, I dressed in full mourning, but all day I recalled fond memories of him and mentioned him to my friends, noting lovable quirks and stating that I have not for an instant regretted running up my first credit card bill in a vain attempt to save his life. He was a different species, but he was my son.
Coming home, I was oddly cheerful, and continued giving lavish attention to every cat under my protection. And it dawned on me. Today is a reminder to cherish our loved ones, and in remembrance and celebration of Trixy's life, it is a time to give extra appreciation to every kitty-cat we know and love (and have contact with--two of my daughters live out of state). So today is the day to give extra attention and affection to our furry beloved. Time is limited, and it behooves us to appreciate fully the time we have now.
Today, in honor and celebration of Trixy C-W's life, is KittyKat Appreciation Day.
I love my son and daughters. And I appreciate the time we have together and the love we share.
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should be having its praises sung by me for its coolness and the shininess of my new(est) card, but currently FL(o)P is a FLOP because I'm watching the pot and a watch-pot never boils. Also it [the Library] limits the number of items you can check out at one time, which makes perfect sense considering that this is a city, and that the city is Philly, but after my raising in an affluent county I'm spoiled and DON'T LIKE having my holds limited to five at a time. I like having about a gillion holds at a time, and I want them to come in INSTANTLY (and yes, I realize how horrendously childish this entry is sounding and I'm not entirely okay with that but I need to vent) to my nearest of the 54 branches. (See? 54 branches! I should be singing its praises. I just got a 1 Gig USB flash drive from them for 10 bucks, and am I not keeping up with the times, or was that a good price?)
In other news, Lucrezia has ear mites and a polyp. Just my luck. I babysit for one of the coolest cats EV-AH (outside of my gang) and she has to have a sickness start [on or before] the very day I get her. (I noticed the excessive ear-scratching, but didn't know it was serious until she drew blood.) I sure hope P. is okay with paying for the bills she's wracking up, but I am sure as hell going to get her good care. Heck, the other day I crouched in the rain and cold wind for about half an hour, wearing light summer clothes, freezing while holding the umbrella over her carrier. I even, IMO, slightly compromised my computer's security by installing the chat program that P. uses so I can try to get in contact with him ASAP, but since he's in a far-off country that his internet access is sketchy so I haven't been able to converse with him to discuss surgery. I've even considered getting CareCredit again. Damn; I hate having this bulky plastic collar on her, but she can't be scratching at her ear; it does nothing but press the polyp against the eardrum and won't make the itchiness go away.
I've been feeling a little social lately and missing my Tetazoo friends. KC is the one who taught me what an ISO image is and how to use one. (Imagine not knowing that!) Call me. I haven't been on Facebook lately (I don't like their recent and recently recent changes), but I think my phone number's on there (for friends). IIRC (and I believe I do), Gordon F.'s my friend. Teddy B. is, too.
For the record, I'm sleepy and woozy and distracted by having to give Lucri attention, so if this entry is a little . . . blirk . . . that's why. But the main points, at least, are true. I want my freakin' stuff from the library, Lucri's sick, and I want to talk to those from 3rd East. Oh, and, I'm in between computers, which sucks. A hell of a lot more's going on, but as I SUCK at keeping up with journals, and I don't think this one entry should be all that long, I'll leave that stuff out and hope I get back to adding the new stuff in, hopefully in regularized installments in this Livejournal.
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So, I just got a guitar. It's pink (bleh), but was $15 and all I want to do is learn. Now, usually I wouldn't go announcing this: I like to be able to show before I talk, and not have something happen like saying "I'm going to play the guitar" and then never getting to it like most of the people on Craigslist who are selling. But I wanted to blog about something related to it.
As far as fingernails are concerned, I prefer to have them shorter these days: it's more practical, particularly on the computer. But since I came to have cats living with me, I had to let my nails grow longer so that I can give them good, satisfying scratchies--and I have to have both hands' nails long, because I have more than one cat. This has made typing a bit more annoying, and slowed my speed, but it hasn't been so terribly bad and I've adapted.
In the old days, when all three kids in my family were taking violin, I remember music teachers being militant about short nails. That's what happens on a string instrument, at least the violin. You've gotta have short nails, at least on your left hand.
I was concerned that I might have to cut the nail on my right thumb for strumming, but asked at this store and found that I can use my nail to strum. This saves on stuff. No need to get callouses or picks.
Then I started trying to learn chords. My guitar is 6-string, and I have to do a lot of holding down with the fingertips on my left hand. And dammit, those nails are getting in the way! I'm certain that other things are less than optimal with my technique, but I know that having a long nail makes the rest of my finger press against the string below and dampen it.
Problem.
So here's the question: Do I maintain long nails so that my kitties can get all sufficient scratchies whenever they want them, even if I'm already giving scratchies to another cat, or do I snip most of the nails on one hand so that I can better play? Does some reasonable, acceptable compromise exist?
(The kitties MUST have their scratchies. This is not negotiable. Says Cat.)
Oh, and:
Whine! Complain! My fingers aren't calloused and they hurt!!! Oh, the self-pity!
P.S. - All I've got is the guitar here, and oh, how nice it would be to have a few basic accessories. If anyone's got a free case or strap . . .
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| Date: | 2009-04-27 21:55 |
| Subject: | Jenika is dead. |
| Security: | Public |
| Mood: |  blindsided |
Jenny died 20 April 2009 in the evening. Aged 12.
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Sammy's dead. I just found this out. Now, I don't expect a single person reading this to know who Sammy is. He's a Californian psycho-kitty, pure black with amazing eyes. Apparently his death was sudden and unexpected, and he was still young.
When I left CA, I knew it was a distinct possibility I'd never see Tigger again. Sammy, though. Sammy I expected to come back to.
God, he isn't even my cat and I still grieve. Now so deeply as others, not so deeply as for others, but I grieve. He was fantastic. Wouldn't it be easier to be a hermit, never have a pet, never know anyone else or their children (meaning pets), so that the pain of loss needn't be an issue?
No, I suppose not. Ultimately I think I still believe it's better to have loved and lost. I wouldn't give up my years with Trixy; God no! So there you have it.
The thought still crosses my mind, though. It would be easier not to love, because with love inevitably comes pain.
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| Date: | 2009-03-14 22:01 |
| Subject: | Happy π Day! |
| Security: | Public |
| Mood: |  drained |
3.14 15926535897932...
Oh, and my birth birthday was a few days ago, but my mother made way a much bigger fuss about it than I did. She also made another damn tasty cake (and dinner), though, and Friday we went to Namaste in New Brunswick where I met a really cool vegan guy named Drew--cool as in, he actually knows how to think, so far as I can tell from one conversation. He can also whip up some excellent and freakishly healthy vegan food, wraps and shakes and juice mixes, among other things. (I say "freakishly" in all the best humor. He can rattle off a lot of facts about what's bad for the human body.) My apartment finally has furniture, although I'm still neck-deep in boxes, and will be in the sleeping bag on the couch for one more night. I am so drained from the past week.
Happy pi day. :-)
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Happy birthday to me! . . .
Alright, the first thing you're going to say is, "Today isn't your birthday. You don't turn ## until next month."
Are ya one,
Are ya two,
Are ya three,
Are ya four,
Are ya five,
Are ya six,
Are ya seven,
Are ya eight--
STOP! Now you're going to say, "You've totally lost it. Even more than usual. You've got a double-digit age!"
Well, there's a book. I never actually read this far in it, but my sister told me about how people give their ages according to when they got their swords. In response to "How old are you?" a guy who got his sword six months ago would respond, "I am not yet one year."
People tend to forget or not even know what an important date the 28th of February is for me, because, one, legally the anniversary of the date on which I was physically born isn't, in fact, until next month; two, because since this date of birth happened only eight years ago, people haven't had time to learn it well; three, because some people are used to my birthday being not today; and four, I didn't even figure out what this date was for a while, and often forget to realize its importance while in conversation with people. I have to reel off my legal birthday every couple of weeks for identification purposes, and places like the pharmacy don't give a damn about February 28th.
I know you're on the edge of your seat, waiting with bated breath for me to stop jabbering and tell you what the hell is so important about today for me. Well, did you recently notice a lot of people walking around with dark smudges on their foreheads? What happens around this time of year, every year?
Lent starts. What do people do for Lent?
They give something up.
At this point you say, "Nione, you don't celebrate Lent. Remember how you came back from California and said you were officially non-religious? And you stopped following the rituals of religion many years ago?"
Yes, you're right. But I was brought up a good little Catholic girl. And Lent is a perfect excuse to give something up . . . when a parent says it's too much work and you can't do it for another three or so years. Give up something like, hmm, eggs, dairy, and honey.
Getting it?
Eight years ago, after having a cheese sandwich for lunch, I came home, went to get a snack, remembered it was lent, and decided that this was the perfect opportunity to
GO
*~V-E-G-A-N~*.
Yes ladies and gentlemen, eight years ago today I went vegan, in all manners of lifestyle. I moved to cruelty-free living, and don't have a single regret.
(OK, it took some time to phase out the leather and wool that I was already using, but I didn't want to waste what I'd already given the industry money for, or--morbid as this might seem--what the cows, etc. had unwittingly given to me as protection for my body. Now, though, you can look at my shoes, and they'll tell you "ALL MAN MADE MATERIAL.")
I don't really know when my vegetarian anniversary is, but I came to it in a similar fashion. My sister and I both gave up meat for lent, but afterward went back to eating it. I think it was around that August that I stared at a hamburger patty and saw the dead cow staring back, after which point I permanently gave up the eating of animal flesh.
If 28 February wasn't actually the start of lent eight years ago, don't bother telling me. The date itself doesn't have meaning until it is imbued with such, and when I took a calendar from that year and counted back forty days from Easter, the 28th is what I landed on. For several years now I've held this as my anniversary, my second birthday, and if it's off my a few days I don't see an overwhelming point in changing it.
The real point is, this is when I was in many senses reborn. I didn't become really active in the animal rights movement until after I'd become vegan, and now, it's so much a part of me that it's second-nature to eschew anything that comes from an animal, besides love. (And I do keep some feathers that Nasly, may he rest in peace, molted off naturally, and some cat hair from all my children including Trixy, may he rest in peacefulness.) This was a very important day in my life, and a very fortunate one. It was a new birth.
On 11 March I became an independent human body, but on 28 February I became a fully independent spirit.
Oh, and that parent who thought it would be too much work? She realized it wasn't, and became vegan shortly thereafter. In three years, at the point she'd told me she'd have enough time to help me go vegan, we both had a good hoot at how easy it actually was, and how neither of us could imagine living any other way.
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Yes, that last entry was rather vague, wasn't it? In retrospect, I was about a ninth asleep when I wrote it.
First: I figured out what I needed, at least with regards to the numbers. (And I am using epsilon and hey; thanks.) I took a nap, then did a simple, type-and-click search on the OEIS, and found a whole bunch of possibilities.
Now, to clarify: what I need(ed) is a sequence of not-too-large numbers that contains the numbers 14 and 5 next to each other, preferably in that order.
I had been thinking, "something like the numbers 8 and 13 in the Fibonacci sequence." But 14 and 5? Not even, not prime, not divisible, separated by an absolute value of nine--I couldn't find a single connection. After an embarrassingly long time (but before my nap!) it dawned on my sleepy brain that the digits of 14 add up to 5, but then, what would the next number in the sequence be? (Interestingly, while writing this I've come up with a sequence of my own that could work, but I've already selected A052297, which works quite well for my purposes.)
Why the hell: I didn't originally use neatly connected numbers because I didn't originally realize their importance. Look, I don't plan these things in advance, thus I don't realize when I really should be trying to plan in advance, and then I pass the point of no return and basically have to do something a little (I dread to say) fanwanky.
If this last paragraph made sense to you, I congratulate you, because I'm back to being partially asleep. (I just wrote "partually asleem.") Agh, RULES.
Happy Friday the 13th, by the way.
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First I should say, happy birthday to Stepka, Emily, Calanda, and Faith. I have about two dozen other birthdays that are on my calendar that I keep missing.
Now, on to NUMBERS. 5 and 14, anyone? Or, I should probably say, 14 and 5? (It would be so much easier if this were 7 and 5.)
I looked at the On-line Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences, and found three out of over a hundred that have both numbers: signature permutation of a Catalan automorphism, a(n) is the smallest number not of the form a(i) (1<=i<=n-1) or a(i)+a(n-l) (1<=i<=n-2), and a(0)=2, a(n)=5, a(n-2)^2 + a(n-1)(n-2). (The last one churns out some very large numbers very fast.) It would help if I knew better how to read the mostly-plain-text, CLI-ish database, because two potential others are decimal expansion of Planck time and decimal expansion of tangent of 34 degrees, or Nimsum n+6. (??)
Help, someone who knows numbers?
(Yes, I know I ask for some very strange things sometimes. Just the other day I was trying to find out the fifth letter in various alphabets, preferably alphabets that use the first letters as first numbers also. This isn't hard to find, what's harder to find are transliterations for said alphanumeric symbols. I could still use help with that, by the way.)
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Do you know how long it took me to get this?? I have been without internet since I got back from CA, meaning, the beginning of January. Do I sound like I've gone insane in the meantime? (Well, I was insane to start with. . . .) I didn't get online until 11:50 THIS MORNING!!! Or, yesterday morning, technically. That was about a MONTH with NO INTERNET ACCESS. Aaaagh!
Oh! It feels so good to be free again. :-D
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Wikipedia is having its heavy push for funding, and the first time I saw its "Wikipedia is here when you need it--now it needs you," I felt like the statement was too true to ignore, and donated five precious dollars to the cause. It would be really nice if I could donate more, but I'd love to donate to so many different organizations and people (I actually keep a list).
Unfortunately, the drive doesn't seem to be going very fast. I just think, though: How many people use Wikipedia daily? If all of them donated one dollar, or five dollars, that would help so much.
And, okay, I'm a little selfish: I need Wikipedia. I don't know what I'd do if it disappeared. That's probably not likely to happen, but the slowness of the drive has got me a little concerned. They've only reached just over half their goal ("only" three and almost-a-half million dollars, but considering what it must cost to keep it running . . .) and it's not like I've really been taking note, but I seem to have some vague memory of fund drives going faster in the past. (Okay, crappy economy and all . . .)
_____________________________________
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And a whole new season be coming soon with the Princess herself working for YOU in the wait!
(If ye got it in you to ask her yerself on the forum.)
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| Date: | 2008-11-11 02:31 |
| Subject: | Movie Credits Songs |
| Security: | Public |
| Mood: |  head exploding from bad songs | | Music: | "Street Fighting Man" |
This entry is thoroughly ignorable and unimportant.
The (hi)story:
So, I heard the credits to a certain movie, and actually thought that they might go well in a little story I'm writing (that happens to be in screenplay format, so I think about things like music). Problem was, the music faded out halfway through the song and changed to another song, so I couldn't just grab the music from the movie. The title wasn't obvious, so I googled some of the discernible lyrics and found the song.
Then a lot of blah blah blah happened with me listening to various songs and reading my script at the same time, but although a popular music song seemed most appropriate, I just don't KNOW them, so I was pretty much going hit-or-miss. It occurred to me that if the credits from this movie were good, some others might be as well. (I tend either to* distinctly either like or dislike credits music.)
So I went online and looked for a list of the music used in movie credits. I found a bunch of entries of people saying, "I really liked the song in the credits from XYZ Movie; what was the name of it?" but no general listing.
The point:
Since so many people appear to like the song in the credits of a movie and later search for it, it seems like a general listing would be a good idea. Someone either with too much time on his/her hands or with a violent need to procrastinate should try to come up with a general list. People make lists like this all the time. The demand is out there, but no one has provided an easily-googlable supply.
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*
I put an asterisk in places where I write something that is stylistically incorrect, like splitting an infinitive. It's a way of saying, "I know this is a stylistic error, and I'm consciously breaking the rule."
Of course, I use asterisks for other purposes as well.
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PiratePrincessProductions.com
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(The music chosen here is really excellently fitting,
not to mention fun.)
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PiratePrincessProductions.com
Hot chicks with swords. Chocolate. Treasure.
Check it out.
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So, I'm writing this little story that takes place in the future in Britain, and the research is killing me! I wanted to make a character make a comment about the Constitution . . . but wait, the U.K. doesn't have a "The Constitution"! I've got some of the U.S.'s Preamble, Constitution, and Bill of Rights memorized, and could just spit those bits out, but I'm having to go back and Wikipedia all sorts of stuff about the Magna Carta (most of which has apparently been repealed), and the UK's "uncodified" constitution, and then I'm encountering stuff about "The English Civil War," about which I learned nothing in middle or high school (although apparently they had more than one). Everything was so US-centric!
(And yet, it's not from these things that most of my memorization came from. I can sing the Preamble thanks to Schoolhouse Rock!, and it's from everyone repeatedly quoting the beginning of the Constitution that I know those parts. Pretty much all I learned a lot about in public school was in eighth grade, when I had a good civics teacher and learned a good deal about the Bill of Rights, in a way that made me remember.)
Okay, perhaps I should have studied worldly history after dropping out of high school. But at first I was going to take the AP in US History (then decided not to), and by the time I was through with that I had decided that I hated history.
--This is ironic, considering that now I'm rather enamored with the subject. Mostly ancient Eurasian history, though, like the Romans and the Huns.--
Yes, I am deeply interested in my own country. Yes, I am very proud of it and its constitutional history. Yes, I'm glad to know in general how things went. But I don't think that that should have come at the expense of learning anything about the rest of the world. I spent so much time memorizing dates and names of generals that I lost my taste for the subject before anything else had the opportunity to whet my appetite. I don't think I know all that much more about US history as a result of having studied it so hard--I quickly forgot the dates and other details--and by the time I decided not to take that AP, I hadn't hit some of the stuff that I now find intriguing, such as the 1920's-'40's, the 80's, and a general idea of what happened in between (with specific focus on certain topic like fights for rights--I think I heard somewhere that in the 1950's my parents wouldn't have been able to be legally married, since they were of different races).
It's always been a goal of mine to read about the American Revolution from a British textbook. I want to know the different perspectives. And I want to know the history of my country, but the US is only one part of a much larger global tapestry. My seventh grade textbook was called Western Hemisphere, and my tenth grade book was called U.S. History.
America (whom I do love) has a lot of things that need to be fixed. Relative to others, this is on the lower end of the scale. But as we fix things, can't we, please, learn more about Japan than that it once closed its doors until the US militarily forced them open and that it was part of the Axis in WWII so we nuked two cities, more about Britain than that the US used to be one of many colonies all over the globe and that it has a Prime Minister instead of President, more about Panama than that we cut a canal on the isthmus, more about Australia than that it had do-do birds who are now extinct, more about Africa than that that's where slaves came from, more about China than that it has over a billion people, more about Greenland than that it's cold, and something, anything, about the existence of Malaysia?
My God, I've learned so much more about global events from linguistics classes than I have from history ones!
(In Greenland, elementary school teachers talk about how students have "the dative disease," in which they keep dropping use of the dative case.
The Huns participated rather heavily in the wars of the (AD/CE) Roman Empire, and left no written records.
Acadians were expelled from the Nova Scotia area and sometimes spent even seven years at sea, searching for a new home.
Acadian is not the same as Akkadian, the latter of which is one of the earliest languages with a writing system, based in Mesopotamia.)
Oh, and if not for recent violent events, I wouldn't even be able to place Iran on a map. (I'm actually ashamed to confess this. It strikes me as quite pathetic on my part, even if I do, in large part, blame the public school system.)
( Here's a beautiful, if very sad song that I learned in Acadia about the expulsion. )
Now I get to comb through the text of the Magna Carta. Fortunately, the Grand Lodge of British Columbia and Yukon has the English and Latin text side-by-side, so I don't have to feel like a complete cop-out by reading the English instead of stumbling through the Latin. (Besides, the character in my story doesn't know Latin, so it wouldn't be realistic to have her quoting it...)
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California had a very important animal rights initiative on the ballot this year, and, just like in Florida when I was 15, it PASSED! This victory is so much huger, though. In Florida it was a ban for gestation crates for pigs. In CA this year it was gestation crates, veal crates, AND battery cages. And it PASSED! This is so incredibly immensely awesome. ( Here's the article from Farm Sanctuary, or you can just click on the link and read it on the FS website! )
In other news, I watched Obama's acceptance speech and decided I like the guy. (Yeah, I know that's not much to go by. So I haven't done extensive research. Give me a break here.) Considering that he's the President elect of my country, that's a good thing.
(I was going to vote but my registration got screwed up, and I wasn't listed in my home state or my university state. Grr. Good thing it actually didn't matter in this case.)
(Did I mention I met a guy on a train who's convinced that Obama is the Antichrist?)
I can hear people all over screaming and honking in celebration of Obama's election. It's finally starting to die down a little (compared to around 11 PM - 1 AM).
THANK YOU to all you Californians who voted YES on Proposition 2. You've done so much to alleviate incredible amounts of suffering.
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The Moon is 100% full! Happy Festival!
http://www.calculatorcat.com/moon_phases/phasenow.php
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