Pinky Stuff

[Pinky]

I have several projects going. This one *might* turn into a coffee table book one day. I have a bit of an obsession with watching the seasons change in the Ozarks.



While I was driving around getting more pix yesterday, I was listening to Craig Chaquico, my fave instrumentalist.

If you like that you can buy it at Amazon.com: Trade Winds: Craig Chaquico: MP3 Downloads

[Pinky]

The countdown is on, travel plans loom, and I wake up from ridiculous dreams about opening up the washing machine to find the agitator has gone missing and my clothes got sucked into a hole where it used to be and now there's a big wet clog of soapy clothes.

There were a couple of years in my life where I actually washed clothes in my bathtub and an ancient wringer washer with a crap wringer because we were so dirt poor. I know all about wringing clothes out by hand till your wrists cramp up and then hanging them up to dry all over any open chair back or fence. Can you believe I really do like doing laundry? I find sorting and folding kind of cathartic. A lot of people hate laundry and let it pile up, dirty on the floors, or heaped on beds or couches. Sometimes a person won't remember whether a basket full of stuff is dirty or clean. That has never happened in my house.

This was my little girl (she has her own baby now), hanging out her dolly clothes and pajamas. We had a washer then, but no dryer for years. I also used laundromats off and on for years.



So the last 20 years I've had a very stable washer and dryer set, once in awhile we do a repair, but overall my laundry life has been pretty smooth. The last time this happened was back in 2008.



So what in the world is up with these dreams now about my washing machine falling apart and my laundry getting clogged up? This is isn't the first one. Every other night I dream a washer overflows or won't fill up or I have to go up a stepladder to load it because it's so huge or the clothes I thought I washed turn out to be someone else's and I have to start all over again. It didn't help at all that in the middle of all my washer nightmares Wil and Anne Wheaton's luggage wound up on a different plane than they did going to the Ottawa comic con, and now I'm so nervous about flying and losing my luggage I can hardly stand it. I remember when I worked a hotel desk and that happened to a few people and it really sucked for them. I already have a plan to send some of my stuff ahead by UPS in an insured box. At least I know there won't be someone pilfering through my things that way. Johnny Depp used to tell a story about how he got home and found vitamin powder all over everything in his luggage because security thought he was smuggling drugs and ripped through his stuff. ~omg, I am so stressed~

I think part of my nervousness is taking my pretty new medical jewelry to a trophy shop to be engraved. I am allergic to so many things now that I carry benadryl, prednisone, and an inhaler in my purse everywhere I go (~omg I hope no one steals my purse~), because not being able to breathe gets a little scary. And I'm super claustrophobic to boot, so I'll have to be sedated to get on the plane. I really really really want to go to Ireland some day (next year???) and not become one of those people who becomes trapped in their house, so this year's trip is practice. Doing a whole lotta laundry in my nightmares...

I hope we all survive me surviving this.

[Pinky]

So Ellen Dubin got with me on facebook about getting her fans reorganized over to her fanpage.



I realized I needed to change the link I was using in my latest survey on my bluejacky blog. I about fell over when I saw over 3000 hits in less than a week. O_O



I was happy when all I got was 30 hits in a year on a post. Yes, I'm that easy to please. Is it because the survey is about food this time? Is it because I have a Charlie Sheen video in it? It can't be Bradley James again, surely... Someone once told me to stop wasting time doing those surveys and do something useful, presumably meaning useful to them. I never waste my time. Everything I do is useful.

Anyway, Ellen Dubin is all over the place, and I've been keeping track of her fan pages across the internet since way back on myspace and her official website and forum because she played Giggerota in Lexx, although I generally don't get involved. But I seem to be a little involved now, thanx to her twitter. She's a fun actress to follow, very generous with fans (in between super busy spells), and goes from leggy knockout to zombie with incredible ease, just a pleasure in everything I've seen her in, plus great voice work in video games. This is a really good interview- Exclusive: Ellen Dubin - From Zemons to Skyrim

But my fave Ellen part will always be Giggerota the Wicked, one of the arch traitors to His Divine Shadow and bound for execution for pillaging temples and eating priests of the Divine Order. We have very little backstory, but I like to think she was part of biovizier experimentation to create assassins and forced to breed, whereupon she murdered and cannibalized her 'husband' and went on a rampage.

[Pinky]

This is where my aspie brain gets me into trouble, because I have a notorious memory for certain kinds of trivia, and for some reason, weird other-dimensional mapping (you'd think of it as conversations) make me a difficult person to tolerate sometimes because it's difficult for me to get past conversational glitches and anomalies. Twitter is like this huge world project for obsessively cataloguing human thought in real time with date and time stamps, a veritable aspie paradise. I may not always remember who said what out of the tens of thousands of tweets I've read, but I'll probably be able to find it again even months later because I can generally remember when I saw it with my eyes and fed it into my brain. So when something like this happens, I'm the one who throws a wrench in the works and looks like a crazy person.

The other morning I cross posted this from a fan page on facebook.



I'm not making this up, it was immediately picked up by Right Now I/O Feed on twitter. That timeline is a continual regurgitation of real time world headlines from all over the twitterverse.




I saw that in my interactions notification and immediately replied directly to that tweet and then had a field day with it.



Later in the morning I quoted it back into my timeline directly from their timeline.



And I'm so glad I did that, because that world headline tweet is GONE now. It was originally sandwiched in between these.



If I'd known that would disappear, I would have screengrabbed my 'news' tweet in their streaming pictorial feed at Right Now I/O website. I'd love to see if it's still actually in there, but I can't get the feed to go back beyond today's event headlines.

The reason this is so funny to me is because Right Now is an automated process, and apparently does a really good job of filtering out the regular chatty yap and spam that twitter is deluged with. Somehow I managed to trick their bot into thinking my cross post was breaking news. From About Right Now I/O-



At any rate, Camelot has been in world news anyway because Merlin was picked up for broadcasting in 80+ countries. In case you haven't seen it yet, this is where it all started.

[Pinky]

Having a super busy week, but you guys can have a teaser from a longer post with more pix that will be going up hopefully later today on my Lexx blog and facebook. I commissioned this one-off t-shirt artwork, and you can see more of what this guy can do on his facebook at McEwen Airbrush.



I'm running on adrenaline, have to split pretty early today.

[Pinky]

I had a Dr Who dream last night, first one ever, probably triggered from playing on facebook at 1:00 in the morning when I popped awake for awhile. Very weird and convoluted, time was super jumbled, and we had to go back and redo something that got screwed up. But, I really screwed it up worse. All I had to do was hold a door open so it couldn't lock the Doctor out. On one side was society ticking along, on the other was a trap for nutters and fringe people who couldn't quite seem to fit in. It was a nice trap, with a pool and an arcade, but they could never get back through the door because the handle and lock were only on one side. Well, someone very important for something to happen wound up getting locked out of society, and the Doctor had me stand guard by that door so I could open it and let him and that guy out when they reached it, but a scuffle happened on the society side, and I wound up getting shoved in by enforcers along with a bunch of derelicts. Oopsie. But you know what? I figured out how I could trick the system and get that door to stay open long enough to block it when more people got shoved in, huzzah! Unfortunately, things went horribly awry in the trap side and I couldn't get the door open in time. So we had to run the other way, and things just got more and more muddled until we actually escaped, only to find out it was into a place much worse- a tourist trap! We had to roll big foot tall coins at a slot across a lot, and if they went in, a hangar door would lift up and we'd have to dash like mad to reach it and roll under before it slammed down shut again. Only it was impossible to reach that distance in time.

There was a lot more, and I hope I remember it later, because it was so intriguing, lots of details. But it would take half the day to write it out, and I have other plans.

I have lots of dreams about doors and windows, locking and unlocking, trying to keep something out or trying to get away, trying to get free. Many years of doors and windows. They make the coolest stories. If I put them all together...

I imagine doing a search on dreams about doors and windows would bring me articles and posts and forums about doors and windows representing opportunities or feelings of helplessness and fear or my mind trying to figure out a decision I need to make or being in denial about something I don't want to face or psychologically rigging up a self protect system. Whatever. I think it's pointless to overanalyze. Actually kind of reminds me of being in a game, and figuring out what to do in the game is kind of mimicking what I just went through in real life or something. It's my V'Ger way of 3D image mapping my interactive memory storage, perhaps.

Well anyway, today is Black Spot Day in the Whoverse, and here is a little Black Spot cinematic and literary history.

Time to get to work!

[Pinky]

This is how my Monday started. Because zombie Yoda is really a thing. Just image search it, you'll be blown away. Or in heaven if you love zombie Star Wars stuff.



Now that the weird May snow has passed, I'm once again pouring benadryl in my coffee and getting ready to crank it up and WORK. Here is today's wake up music.

[Pinky]

So what DOES a person wear on Star Wars Day, Respect for Chickens Day, World Naked Gardening Day, Derby Day, Free Comic Book Day, National Homebrew Day, National Day to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, National Scrapbooking Day, International Space Day, Bladder Cancer Awareness Day, World Give Day, AND Dr. Who Day?



I'm wearing my fuzzy Where's Waldo sox because it's still freakily snowing outside, and my Peanuts Halloween shirt, and snacking on chocolate pie with purple meringue.










And I'm about to park myself on the couch for all day live Derby coverage (Watch the Derby) with my laptop on my lap working. Let us celebrate Respect for Chickens Day with the coolest chicken video on the internet. Have an awesome weekend, guys.

[Pinky]

I've got my DVR set, tomorrow is Derby Day! It's the 139th run for the roses at Churchill Downs in Kentucky, the fastest two minutes in sports. The Kentucky Derby was always a showcase for the rich and famous, but last few years it's become a red carpet event of its own. Derby 138 Red Carpet My favorite things are the hats and the horses.




This is from Kentucky Derby hats ΤΗ? Zuza Fun




This year fillies were officially banned from running in the Kentucky Derby, which means they're also automatically out of the Triple Crown. This has more to do with a point accumulation revision than anything, so I think it's silly to make this kind of rule.
Kentucky Derby 2013: Fillies Banned From Running For The Roses, New Rule Says

As the general public becomes more exposed to the creme de la creme of the sport of kings (horses are flown in from all over the world), the dark side of the racing industry comes more to light. This is just a tiny sample of the sad undercurrent of the leftovers of upper crust society. I would have wanted this horse to win the Derby if it could have run in it. Magna Fortuna

[Pinky]

(Public Service Announcement- Please be advised that the following blurb contains math. If you are allergic to math, please take the proper precautions and shut your eyes.)

It's about 3:45 in the afternoon. The internal tracker on my 'fortuna' blog says I've had 120 visitors so far today. Sitemeter says I've had 7.... Likewise, the internal tracker says I've had 782 visits so far this week, site meter says I've had 70.




This counter stat on my blog is the site meter total, but it's wrong for that date, and it's only counting unique visits, not total page views.




Site meter started my count over from zero after I lost all the stats during a couple of years when I had the blog shut down to the public, and then it completely stopped counting for two weeks after I opened it back up while they moved their servers (which I'm going to blow off), and ever since the big server move it practically stopped tracking, despite numerous attempts to get some maintenance tickets going. Before I closed my blog to the public, site meter said I had over 33,000 total visits, so the resumed count since then should be at least 40,700, and then the real total, if you consider the internal tracker on the blog catches about ten to twenty times more, would be at least 400,700 (the internal tracker still filters out bots, in case you're thinking that).

And believe it or not, that's still wrong. I have a third tracker in the form of a stalker module that additionally catches proxies the other two trackers never log. But to err conservatively, let's just call it almost half a million hits so far. I thought about paying for a different tracker, but after some of the diatribes I've seen from other bloggers, I decided who cares, sheesh. It's not like I'm running a business and making cost projections, although it is pretty cool to be able to see my page rankings in a nice little chart.

Not really making a point with this. I guess it's my little aspie 'train' obsession to compare the tracking services, and I was happy doing that when the numbers were much smaller, so I guess I'm kinda surprised. Waving hi to all you little dots out there. =)



But I digress from my intentions. I must grab my lapels and fling myself back into finishing what I was doing before it's supper time, while I listen to some pretty music.

[Pinky]

Party at my house today! With my fave ginger in the whole world.




This video first went live in March 2007, did all the filming and editing herself. In April of 2013 she turned 21. They grow up too fast!

[Pinky]

I'm 'Pinky'. I'm not a pink freak (one of my blogs is bluejacky on xanga), but there is something about the color pink that makes things interesting sometimes, plus it's fun to ennunciate. I woke up this morning with a vision of a pink TARDIS in my mind and wondered if anyone else had ever thought of it in pink. Well, apparently it's a real thing, and even a sort of holy grail for collectors.





I was not at all interested in digging up older Dr. Who shows (before the Rose days) until I ran smack dab into this when I searched "who created the pink tardis". The Happiness Patrol I also found a really good review of that episode on youtube. (This guy plays with his shirt the same way I do. )

That show came out in the 90's, a sort of 'big pharma' era, and obviously makes a statement about the push to 'fix' people with pills, and I can honestly stand on both sides of that fence. The debate over whether depression is a medical or psychological condition (or even real vs made up by big pharma) is pretty stupid because it comes from people who have never experienced real depression. Depression for me is a lifestyle, I was born this way with a wonky brain, but interestingly, my psychologist has commented that having Asperger's may have cushioned me from some of the nastier consequences throughout my life. For instance, I have never been suicidal, despite constructing elaborate arguments proving that happiness does not really exist. (I originally sought out my psychologist for help with social interaction, who then assessed me at 51-60 on a Global Assessment of Functioning scale with my Asperger's. I've been called Sheldon by several of my closest family, which actually helped me see myself better than anything else ever did.)

I am currently at a 51 on Goldberg's depression test. Unfortunately, thanks to an aggressive kind of mono that hit my liver a few years ago, I seem to be allergic to a frighteningly growing list of foods and medications, so I do not treat medically for depression. Since I am winging this, I am learning how vital it is to talk to people about my real stuff (which has taken several years to acclimate to doing with my glaring social deficit). In 2008 I went public about having Asperger's and depression, and my bluejacky blog became so popular that it unnerved me and I closed it the public for a couple of years (typical aspie reaction). I have been contacted out of the blue by people all over the world who ache for someone to listen to their weirdness and assure them they're ok.

YOU ARE OK. We're all going to be ok! But you'll be even more ok if you find someone you can talk to. If a family member won't listen, or you feel like a friend blows you off, keep looking for someone to talk to about your stuff, preferably someone in real life whose face you can actually see, not typing through a monitor. If you don't have the money or insurance, free counseling is still available. If you can't get into counseling right away and you feel it is urgent to talk to someone because you are frightened that you might do something rash, call your doctor's office and tell them that, and then do what they tell you. This actually saves lives in many more ways than simply stopping suicide. Your quality of life is important.

Having depression doesn't mean there is something wrong or bad with you any more than having something like diabetes. You do not cause your depression. Many people self medicate with alcohol and drugs without realizing they have depression. As I have learned how to control my diabetes with a diet change, so I am learning how to live better with my depression through a social interaction change.

Final note on living with depression. Much of the world's greatest art and literature has come from people living with depression. There is so much beauty and deeper meaning inside of us. Hug yourself, believe in yourself, eat something delicious, and find something or someone to love without condition. I know it's hard (believe me, I know it's hard). But you can do this. Be someone who makes life better for someone else, even if it feels like it's sucking for you. Be wonderful while you are here. Small actions and tiny moments add up to a lifetime of pretty cool big stuff if you can learn to focus yourself on that.

"Luminous beings we are, not this crude matter." -Yoda

If you are in the U.S. and need help NOW, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255
USA NATIONAL Suicide & Crisis Hotlines - When You Feel You Can't Go On...

[Pinky]

Well, this was an exciting morning, wasn't it? Announcement ripped around the world that Bradley James and some of the Knights will be guest appearing at conventions in Oz this June, in Sydney starting the 21st and in Perth starting the 28th. Fans need to remember they are nearly a day ahead of some of us there on the calendar. Follow @SupanovaExpo on twitter for updates, and get more info on their facebook page and their dotcom. I'll be retweeting live tweets as much as I can, as will a few other dedicated Merlin fans around the globe, so mark the dates. Don't call us crazy, just organizing fan action into timelines for easier twitter consumpution. I tend to heavily filter and I've never yet gone to twitter jail, but I'll still give my followers reminder heads up notices to mute their mobile alerts on those days since I periodically flood my timeline with several other fandoms and I know some of you aren't interested in Merlin stuff.




Some of you have not seen all the shows yet, so be warned this lengthy blooper reel may contain spoilers covering seasons 2-5. If your browser won't let syfydesigns play the entire video (some browsers get a little balky interfacing youtube videos through third parties), by all means click it out to a new window and enjoy!

[Pinky]

Please Don't Bring Merlin Back

I'm growing very impatient with the Bring Merlin Back groupie thing. I joined to watch what's going on partly out of morbid curiosity, because I have a sociology degree heavily anchored with anthropology and psychology. I've never observed a live cult group before, although I've seen a few from a distance. And I have to say, this one comes as close as any to weird obsession. I have bets on that if someone instructs them to drink the koolaid, a few of them just might.

In the real world, one fan does not hold the power to make a staff of hundreds of people do his or her bidding. The group leader ~seems~ to understand that millions more dollars would have to be dredged up and a number of lives would have to screech to a halt and go in reverse to get back to an intersect point where they could pick up where they left off. But the group leader also seems to epic fail to see that playing fan politics like this looks like a mental affliction gone wildly awry. To expect the world to behave this way because a very few people (compared to the entire fandom or world audience) 'work hard' to make it happen isn't much different from a toddler throwing a tantrum or a teenager manipulating relationships or an adult refusing to deal with reality.

I'm not wanting to be mean. I love Merlin so much that I spent good money procuring all 5 seasons, plus a calendar and a t-shirt. There are other fans out there spending much more than I have, buying collectible toys and apparel and traveling to film sites and conventions. IF these kinds of things are what keeps a show from ending, then Merlin would never have ended. Its international success exceeded so many expectations, and most of us feel so lucky to have seen it or been a part of it. But c'mon. Investing one's emotional belief system into remolding a television show via a fan army of swooning believers isn't how the rest of us want it to go. I do NOT want Merlin back if it means a handful of fans become the boss of everyone who ever created Merlin, and I especially do NOT want those fans to be the boss of Bradley and Colin.

I love the way Merlin ended. I bawled my eyes out, yes. I've seen a lot of Arthurs and Merlins come and go, and this creation was such beautifully crafted story about such a deep friendship, and how that friendship survived through thick and thin and eventually led to the United Kingdoms. We watched a core belief system rebirth through the seasons and in the end came down to a serving girl on a throne because of the utter kindness of her king. THAT is what Albion is all about. Albion is a dream that we are ALL equal, that we ALL matter, and that we treat each other with respect and courtesy, not drawing lines at status. Because Arthur had such good friends, he was a good king.

I do not want obsessive fans to change that. Arthur dies in all the legends, and I think this version of his death is fantastically beautiful and symbolic. Everything in the last two episodes is very symbolic- Merlin stuck in the dark cave while the battle begins in the dark, brother and sister both dying by swords forged in the dragons' breath, an actual dragon being Arthur Pendragon's pall bearer, and much more. I wept not just for the death of Arthur, but for how absolutely beautifully done that entire last stand was executed in film, how wonderfully uplifting the entire series was, how much it has actually helped me in my personal life to believe in good things during rough times.

I thank Bradley and Colin very much for being Arthur and Merlin. But I never want to see them do those roles again any other way. I vehemently do NOT want obsessed fans to change what is in MY head by bullying the market with faked email accounts and spamming. I'm sorry those fans need that to hang onto, and I do understand that sometimes we really do need something concrete when our lives need meaning. I don't want to make anyone feel like I am making fun of them, because I'm not. I have observed and not said anything for a long time. But as an American who has watched this 'international' group execute 'actions' to bring Merlin back before some of us have seen season 5 aired in our country (or even season 3 in some countries), I think they do the rest of us fans the discourtesy of not caring what WE want.

I want Arthur to rest in peace for awhile now. I want to make up my own fantasies about him rising out of Avalon again to join Merlin. I want that sparkling effervescence of 'maybe'. I want to move on and become the sort of person who would also be noble and patient and true like the rest of the supporting characters in Merlin.

I have been part of a number of fandoms, and while I appreciate that fan support can sometimes bring a show back long enough to bring a little closure, I also understand that sometimes a show really is simply over, at least in the real world. In my mind I carry on to my own amusement, as is should be. Stories give us something to occupy our thoughts while we get through mundane or difficult stuff, and stories can even help us with problem solving our own relationships and decision making. To turn a story into a production on demand taints the joy of those creating the story to begin with (after all, it WAS someone else's idea), and neglects the feeling of pride in their accomplishment.

I would invite the fans who demand a different sort of closure to create and publish their own stories. Instead of just demanding that everyone else drop whatever they're doing to please them, grow up and put the work into it yourselves. Invest your own money, dedicate your own hours of labor, form your own teams and produce something wonderful for the rest of the world to read or watch. The whole Merlin and Arthur field is wide open, anyone can interpret it any way they want. But don't think you can dare to turn our Colin and Bradley into puppets that you pull the strings on. Not cool. They have so much potential to go on and do so much more, and I want to see them continue to excel in other work. Please accept that they are actors, not dolls, not the real characters, not enamored of themselves as the fans are. They are simply men who get paid to fill roles. And we love them, that's ok.

I rarely cross post my stuff, but this one is going on multiple blogs I have strewn across the ethernet. Those of you wonderful lurkers who stalk all my stuff, sorry for the redundancy, but this feels important. Thank you for your time.

[Pinky]

Little bit of spring going on in my yard.



It hasn't been the funnest year to be a chicken with all the weather, so yesterday was a real treat.

15 more seconds with them actually eating the corn, if you want to see it.

http://youtu.be/y7GGGw7ngcc